As for the 215 Sermon De Tempore which comes next 't is none of S. Austin's but taken out of a Book written above 200 Years after his Death And yet that which the Cardinal aims at here does him not the least service For though S. James's Text is produced yet 't is to exhort the sick to anoint his own Body with Oil that the Church was to furnish them withal instead of going to Inchanters Wizards Soothsayers and using Devillish arts to recover his Health He must be a cunning Man indeed that can from hence make out either Extreme Vnction for the Soul or a Priest to Administer it But his next step is to the Treatise of the Visitation of the sick And now we are gotten the Lord knows where For Bellarmin himself confesseth That it seems to be falsly attributed to S. Austin only he adds It cannot be denied to be an ancient and good Book That 's hard indeed But yet Erasmus denied it who could judge of an Author as well as another Body and calls (q) Censura in Visit Infirm this Author a prating fellow neither Learned nor Eloquent And in truth 't is such a sensless Book that he had reason to be angry at the impudence or ignorance of those that obtrude such Writings upon us under the name of S. Austin And yet Bellarmin upon second thoughts could not find in his heart to let this Book go for one that seems to be none of S. Augustin's but afterward chose to say (r) De Scriptor Eccles p. 171. Lugd. that he had nothing certain about it For why there is good evidence in it for worshipping Crosses and Images and for Auricular Confession besides the small touch concerning the Spiritual signification of External Unction Such Books as these they give up as unwillingly as a Man parts with a dying Friend and seem to have no regret all the while for sacrificing the reputation of the Fathers to the service of their Cause Bede is mentioned next who in his Notes upon James V. speaking of the Unction there hath these words And we read in the Gospel that the Apostle also did this and now the custom of the Church is that the Sick should be anointed with consecrated Oyl by the Bishops and be healed thereby together with Prayer Nor is it only lawful for Presbyters but as Pope Innocentius writeth for all Christians also to anoint themselves or their friends with it in their need So that Bede makes the Unction of S. James to be the same with that of S. Mark and that of the Church the same with both the recovery of bodily health being the end of all three than which there could not be expected a better Testimony against Etreme Unction But by this time we are so well used to the Cardinals Authorities that we ought to wonder at nothing As for Theophylact in the eleventh Age the Cardinal sends us to his Notes upon S. Mark where indeed he takes occasion also to repeat the place of S. James and from thence to shew the several significations of anointing with Oyl but of Extreme Unction no nor so much as of anointing the Sick he saith not a word Lastly Oecumenius upon the Vth. of S. James tells us That whilest our Lord conversed with Men the Apostles did the same thing anointing the Sick with Oyl and healing them And therefore according to Oecumenius 't is impossible to prove Extreme Vnction from S. James which is not a Rite of healing the Sick but the Sacrament of the Dying Commend me to these Men for doing their work by Authorities of the Fathers and Traditions of the Antients The second sett of Bellarmin's Fathers are those that (s) Ubi supra §. Habemus deinde alios c. expresly number this Vnction amongst the Sacraments that is to say they call the Vnction of the Sick a Sacrament to which I have already said that if every Rite and Ceremony to which Antient Writers have given the name of a Sacrament must go for a Sacrament properly so called the Church of Rome must mend her Councils and Catechisms and multiply Sacraments exceedingly But who are those Fathers The most antient that he names is Alcuinus who lived in the later end of the 8th Age and the beginning of the 9th He was Scholar to Venerable Bede and if in this matter he learned of his Master we are secure enough that his Authority will do us no harm But whether it would or not we shall never learn from that †De divinis Officiis cap. 47.49 Book to which Bellarmin refers us because it was none of his but the work of a much later Writer as Quercetanus has shewn in the Preface to the Edition of Alcuinus But what is worst of all the testimony of this Author whoever he was though it proves Vnction of the Sick to be customary in his days yet proves as clearly that Extreme Unction was not For he distinguishes between the Sick and the Dying shewing that the Sick indeed were anointed but not those that were in extremedanger of Death for which there was very good reason since even in those days Unction was used in order to bodily health but not as a Sacrament to fortifie the Soul in her passage out of this Life For a more particular account of this Authority I refer the Reader to (t) Ubi supra p. 119. c. Mr. Daille's exquisite Discourse upon it Amalarius comes next whose judgment concerning the use and end of that Unction which S. James mentions we have already seen P. 1. § 5. and that in the very * De Offic. Eccl. lib. 1. cap. 12. place to which the Cardinal refers us This Writer does accordingly make the Unction of his time to be a Remedy of sickness and therefore they may as well make Life and Death to be one and the same thing as have the confidence to make the Unction of Amalarius Extreme Unction And now we are brought to the borders of the Twelfth Age for his next Father is Cardinal Damiani who is yet far enough from acknowledging this Sacrament of Extreme Unction For though he ascribes spiritual effects to that Unction mentioned by S. James yet he says health is restored by it and though he calls it a Sacrament yet he makes it to be a †Unde Sancti Patres hanc Unctionem Sacramentum esse sanxerunt Sacrament established by the Fathers i.e. a Rite which the Fathers thought deserved the name of a Sacrament no less than many others which yet were not of Divine Institution or universal and necessary obligation And that this was his meaning cannot I think reasonably be denied by our Adversaries since he makes Vnction of the Sick not to be one of Seven but of Twelve Sacraments which he reckons up in that place But to make sure of some body Bellarmin goes on to S. Bernard Father Hugo de Sancto Victore and Father Lombard who I
blind Jesus answered Neither hath this man sinned nor his parents i. e. It was for no sin either of him or his Parents that he was born blind but that the works of God should be made manifest in him In like manner the supposition of the sick Man's having committed sins is to be limited by reference to the Case now discoursed of that is of his Sickness For whether it came in the ordinary and natural course of things or whether God sent it for the trial of his patience and submission the Prayer of Faith should save the sick or if it were inflicted as a punishment and for his Correction God would release him of the punishment and raise him up and his sins should be forgiven It is not perhaps unfit to remember in this place that in the beginning of the Church it pleas'd God to inflict bodily Diseases upon many Christians that had grievously offended in any kind and this not only in pursuance of Church Censures but sometimes without them which was the Case of those in the Church of Corinth who for their unworthy behaviour at their Assemblies for Celebrating the Holy Communion were visited with Gods hand 1 Cor. 11.30 For saith St. Paul For this cause many are weak and sickly among you and many sleep i. e. Many are dead of those Sicknesses which God sent to chastise you for that great fault that reigned amongst you and many of you remain under those Sicknesses still being not yet humbled under the mighty hand of God V. 31. If we would judge our selves we should not be judged i.e. By care to do our duty we should prevent Gods Chastisements but if upon neglecting our selves we are chastned by the Lord V. 32. it is that we should not be condemned with the World For God did not strike them with sudden Death but with some sudden Sickness and gave them time to repent to confess their fault and to satisfy the Church Now altho it was the congruity of this place to the passage in St. James concerning the supposition of having committed sins that led me to interpret the one by the other yet upon farther inquiry I found the notion not to be altogether destitute of Antiquity For Venerable Bede in his Notes upon this Clause applies St. Paul's Text to it in this manner * Bed in loc Tom. 5. Many for sins done by the Soul are punished with the sickness or with the death also of the Body Whence it is that the Apostle saith to the Corinthians who were wont to receive the Lords Body unworthily For this cause many among you are sick and weak and many sleep If therefore the sick are under the guilt of sins and shall confess them to the Presbyters of the Church and shall make it their business to forsake and amend them with a perfect heart they shall be forgiven them And then he goes on shewing That sins of the greater sort had need to be confessed in order to this end ‖ De Eccles Offic. lib. 1. c. 12. Tom. 10. B. P. Amalarius also delivers the very same interpretation in the account he gives of the Unction of the sick in his days as I shall have farther occasion to observe in a more proper place So that besides the reason of the thing we have some Authority too to interpret this place as I have done viz. That those words And if he has committed sins are to be referred to such Cases as that which St. Paul discourses of where the Sickness was inflicted for the punishment of some notable and scandalous fault not excluding those instances of such punishment for sins secretly committed But for whatever sin the sickness was sent it should be forgiven and God would shew that he had received â—he sick person into favour again by taking off his sickness For in this case also the Prayer of Faith should save the sick Thus our Saviour demonstrated the Truth of that saying to the Man sick of the (a) Matt. ix 2 6 7. Palsie Son be of good cheer thy sins be forgiven thee by adding Arise take up thy bed and go unto thy house and by that miraculous Cure that followed Thus after he had healed the diseased Man at the Pool of Bethesda he said unto him (b) Joh. v. 14. Behold thou art made whole sin no more lest a worse thing come unto thee plainly intimating that his infirmity was the punishment of some sin that he had been guilty of which was now forgiven because he was made whole and should be dealt with hereafter not according to what he had been but as he should behave himself for the time to come In like manner and with like expression St. James does promise That upon the Prayer of Faith the Gift of Healing should take place even where the Disease was inflicted for the punishment of sins Which construction of the place is so natural and agreeable that I shall pursue the illustration of this passage no longer but leave the Reader to judge of it by what has been said already SECT VI. That our Interpretation of the use of Anointing in St. James and not our Adversaries is favoured by the following passages to the end of his Epistle THE third way of inquiry was to see what light is given to the meaning of St. James's Unction by those following passages that are in connexion with the place under debate 1. The very next words that follow are these Confess your faults one to another and pray one for another that you may be healed But whether by praying one for another in this Verse be meant the Prayer of Faith in the former Verse which referred to the Gift of Healing and was accompanied with a persuasion that God would raise up the sick or only praying that God would raise him up when they had no absolute persuasion that so it would be is what I dare not positively say having no clear reason to determine me one way or other But in which sense soever the words be taken as they must be in one of them they seem to have a very reasonable connexion with what went before and either way this Exhortation is to be referred to that special Case mentioned just before And if he has committed sins they shall be forgiven him If the Prayer of Faith is here meant as I think it is then St. James exhorts the sick person whom God had visited for his sins to humble himself and give glory to God by confessing to the Elders those sins which lay upon his Conscience and likewise intimates that the gift of healing would not otherwise take place in his Case and therefore he was first to confess and then the Elders to pray over him As for Anointing with Oil it was enough that the Apostle mentioned that before it being a Ceremony which or some other of like signification was customarily used in the Church upon Healing by a miraculous Gift The main matters
the End of his Epistle Pag. 36 § 7. Objections against our Interpretation answered Pag. 41 § 8. That St. James 's Text affords useful Admonitions though it is far from establishing a Sacrament of Extreme Vnction Pag. 45 PART II. That 't is a late Innovation and has no ground in Antiquity Sect. 1. What Anointings were used in the antient Church Pag. 49 § 2. That the Vnction of the Sick in the Antient Church confirms our Interpretation of St. Mark and St. James Pag. 54 § 3. That Extreme Vnction has not the Testimony of any Antient Pope Pag. 54 § 4. Nor of any Antient Council Pag. 73 § 5. Nor of any Antient Father Pag. 79 § 6. That the Silence of Antiquity and the Circumstances with which it is to be taken are a positive Proof that Extreme Vnction has not the Tradition of the Antients but is a notorious Innovation Pag. 87 § 7. Of the Occasions and Beginnings of Extreme Vnction How vast a Change it made from the Primitive Vnction and by what Degrees it was made Pag. 94 § 8. That this Innovation was not Vniversal the Vnction of the Greek Church at this day being not Extreme Vnction but that of the Antients Pag. 108 PART III. That the Appeal to Reason in behalf of this pretended Sacrament is altogether vain Sect. 1. THat the pretence to prove any thing to be a Sacrament by mere Reason is an absurd Presumption Pag. 110 § 2. That the Reason brought to prove that Extreme Vnction was fit to be instituted has not so much as any probability Pag. 116 § 3. That more congruous Reasoning may be offered against it than for it Pag. 123 § 4. An Apology for this Controversy about Extreme Vnction from the great moment of it Pag. 125 § 5. The Church of England and other Protestant Churches justified in not anointing the Sick at all Pag. 130 § 6. An Address to the Laity of the Roman Communion Pag. 134 ERRATA Pag. 96. line 10. for Sacred r. Second Pag. 103. for § ix r. § viii OF Extreme Unction PART I. That the places of Scripture produced for it are against it §. I. What the Doctrine of the Roman Church is concerning Extreme Unction HOW well soever they may agree in the practice of Extreme Vnction in the Roman Church yet as to the Doctrine of it their most celebrated Writers have (a) Vid. Dalleum de Extr. Unct. c. 2. fall'n so foully one against another that to know what it is from them would cost more pains than the Thing is worth And therefore we will be content and surely our Adversaries will be so too to take it as it is laid down by the Council of Trent Which Council has given too much advantage for us to desire any more from the Sentiments of private Authors which as they without cause complain we so often combat while we pretend all along to attaque the Established Doctrine of the Church But if the Reasons upon which the Council proceeded in its Decrees were not so convincing as to satisfy all of that Communion but very great Men amongst themselves have been of contrary Opinions concerning them this we have no Obligation upon us to dissemble how unwilling soever they may be to hear of it I know well enough that an undue Advantage may be made of the Testimonies of Authors and of the Concessions of Adversaries which are sometimes used to underprop a Cause that wants Truth at the bottom and has therefore no Foundation of its own But so long as the Arguments and the Answers which we produce in this Cause are good ones I hope they will not be thought worse of if some of them seemed good also to some Men of no mean Figure in the Church of Rome And now let us see in the First place what the Doctrine of the Church of Rome is concerning this pretended Sacrament The Council of Trent (b) Sess 14. has delivered it in this manner First of all concerning the Institution of this Sacrament the Holy Synod declares and teaches that our most gracious Redeemer who would have his Servants at all times provided with Saving Remedies and Defences against all the Weapons of all their Enemies as he has by other Sacraments supplied Christians with those mighty Aids by which they may in the Course of their Life keep themselves unhurt by all the greater Mischiefs that can happen to their Souls so by the Sacrament of Extreme Vnction he has set a most sure Guard about them to make good the end of their Life For tho our Adversary does all our Life long seek and catch at every occasion by any means to devour our Souls yet there is no time when he strains more vehemently to exert the utmost of his Craft to ruine us utterly and if he can possibly to bereave us of all Trust in the Mercy of God then when he perceives the end of our Life to be at hand But this Holy Vnction of the Sick was Instituted by our Lord Christ as a Sacrament of the New Testament truly and properly so called Insinuated indeed by St. Mark but recommended and published to the Faithful by St. James the Apostle and Brother of our Lord. Says he Is any one Sick c. In which Words as the Church has learned by Apostolical Tradition delivered from hand to hand he teaches the Matter the Form the proper Minister and Effect of this Saving Sacrament For the Church has understood the Matter thereof to be Oil Blessed by a Bishop For this Vnction does most fitly represent the Grace of the Holy Ghost by which the Soul of the sick Person is invisibly annointed And that the Form thereof is this By this Holy Vnction and by his most Holy Mercy God forgive thee whatsoever Sin thou hast committed by seeing by hearing by tasting by smelling and by touching Amen Which Form is repeated severally in anointing the seat of each Sense and according to the (c) Decret Eugenii IV. in Conc. Florent Catech. ad Paroc de Extr. U. §. 21. Florentine Fathers in anointing the Feet also for the Sins of walking and the Reins for the Sensuality that reigned there Moreover the thing signified and the effect of this Sacrament is explained in these Words And the Prayer of Faith shall save the Sick and the Lord shall raise him up and if he have committed Sins they shall be forgiven him For the thing here signified is the Grace of the Holy Ghost whose anointing cleanseth from Transgressions if any yet remain to be expiated and from the Reliques of Sin and easeth and strengthneth the Soul of the sick Person by exciting in him a great confidence in the Divine Mercy whereby he is in that manner supported that the Trouble and Pain which he sustains by his Sickness becomes more tolerable and he resists more easily the Temptations of the Devil now closely lying in wait for him and sometimes when it is expedient for the Welfare of
the Soul obtains the recovery of his Bodily Health But then as to the Persons who are designed whether to receive or to administer this Sacrament this also is delivered and that not obscurely in the foregoing Words For it is there shewn that the proper Ministers of this Sacrament are the Presbyters of the Church by which Word here we are not to understand the more Aged or Honourable amongst the People but either Bishops or Priests c. It is declared also that this Unction is to be ministred to the Sick but to those especially who are so dangerously ill that they seem to be past Recovery whence it is also called the †Sacramentum excuntium Sacrament of the Dying If the sick Persons recover after having received this Unction they may again be relieved by it when the like danger of Death happens Wherefore they are by no means to be hearkened to who against the manifest and clear Sense of the Apostle James teach either that this Unction is a device of Men or a Rite received from the Fathers that has neither a Divine Command nor a Promise of Grace and who assert that it is of no longer use as having been applied in the Primitive Church to the Gift of Healing only or who say that the Rite and Usage of the Holy Roman Church in the Administration of this Sacrament is repugnant to the Sense of St. James and therefore to be altered Lastly who affirm that this Extreme Unction may without Sin be contemn'd by the Faithful For all these things are most evidently contrary to the perspicuous Words of so great an Apostle c. So that in the Church of Rome Extreme Unction is a Sacrament administred to dying Persons the proper Effect whereof is the cleansing of them from the Remains of Sin by the Grace of the Holy Ghost and as appears by the Form of Words used in the Administration it is applied in order to the forgiveness of all Sins that have been committed by means of any of the Senses That Authority which they pretend for this Sacrament is indeed the highest for they say it was instituted by Christ The proof which they produce for this Institution is that it was insinuated by St. Mark and publish'd by St. James That the Evangelist did insinuate it and the other Apostle publish it we have the Word and Authority of the Council of Trent But I will be bold to say that if Men are not content to rely upon the Authority of the Council but will examine its proofs they may easily be convinced that neither did St. James publish nor St. Mark insinuate any such Doctrine or Practice as it has established And therefore the wisest Passage in the Declaration of the Council concerning this matter is that they are by no means to be hearkened unto who teach otherwise than it teaches For if we can but persuade Men to give us the hearing or the reading we are very confident to make it plain that not our Objections against this pretended Sacrament but their Pleas for it are most evidently contrary to the perspicuous Words both of the Evangelist who is said to insinuate it and of the Apostle who is said to publish it §. 2. That Extreme Unction can by no means be proved from St. James chap. v. 14 15. THE clearest proof they have for this pretended Sacrament are doubtless those Words of St. James ch v. 14 15. Is any sick among you let him call for the Elders of the Church and let them pray over him anointing him with Oil in the Name of the Lord And the Prayer of Faith shall save the Sick and the Lord shall raise him up and if he have committed Sins they shall be forgiven him Now supposing that the Institution of a Sacrament were implied in these Words and that the outward Sign thereof were anointing with Oil yet this could not by any means be the Sacrament of Extreme Vnction in the Church of Rome For according to St. James the Sick Person was to be anointed in order to the raising of him up or his Recovery from Sickness But the Sick are anointed in that Church for purging away the remains of their Sins when they seem to be past hopes of Recovery And tho perhaps one or other may recover afterward yet this is meerly accidental and besides the intention of administring their Sacrament which they therefore call the Sacrament of the Dying Nay the Sick Person in St. James was not to be anointed only in order to his Recovery but his Recovery was certainly to follow for 't is said the Prayer of Faith shall save the Sick and the Lord shall raise him up Which one Observation is sufficient to overthrow all the hope they have in this Text. For St. James does indeed advise anointing with Oil but 't is in such a Case when most assuredly the sick Person should not die The Church of Rome also does require the same but 't is when nothing can be well expected but the Death of the Patient Now which way they can gather a Sacrament of Extreme Vnction from an Authority that requires an Vnction which is not Extreme how they can prove a Sacrament which they pretend to be proper for dying Persons from those Words of Scripture that mention a Rite never used upon dying Persons a Man must have a great deal of Wit or rather a good share of the contrary to be able to imagine Which one thing seems to have been so well considered by †Bellar. de Extr. Unct. c. 3. Dico secundo illa verba duo c. Bellarmin and others after him that they found it necessary to interpret these Words The Prayer of Faith shall save the Sick and the Lord shall raise him up not so much of restoring Health to the Body as of cleansing forgiving and quieting the Soul And so they have made St. James to use Expressions in such a Sense as never Man of Understanding did either before or after him till the Cause of the Church of Rome made it necessary for these Men to interpret Words against all Rules of Speaking For according to the perpetual use of Words what is it to save the Sick but to save him from his Sickness What is it to raise up a sick Man but to restore him to Health And who would interpret these Expressions otherwise but they whose Cause is desperate if they be not otherwise interpreted But if it be asked what Grounds they pretend for this Liberty of Interpretation you must know that the Word saving indifferently refers to the healing of the Body or to the restoring of the Soul and the Word raising tho properly used of something that belongs to the Body yet by a Metaphor frequently used in Scripture signifies also to drive away sadness and dulness from the Mind Which is true indeed but nothing to the purpose 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 For tho these Words saving and raising may have
Supernatural and cost you nothing and you shall take nothing for the use of it But now (o) Mark vi 7. St. Mark mentions no other Power in the Commission which Jesus gave them but that over unclean Spirits And yet describing what they did in pursuance of their Commission he says (p) Mar. vi 13. They cast out many Devils and anointed with Oil many that were Sick and healed them which Words being compared with what the other Evangelists say are to be interpreted in this manner And as for the Sick which they healed that was done no less by a Divine and Supernatural Power than the casting out of Devils for they used nothing but the known Ceremony betokening an extraordinary work of God in the Cures they wrought that is Anointing with Oil. And thus those Words of St. Mark do plainly enough suppose that Power of healing the Sick to have been in their Commission tho he did not at first express it as the other two Evangelists did Finally it doth not appear that our Saviour enjoined the use of this Ceremony but it is rather probable that he did not since the Apostles healed many Persons without it And therefore if one should say that possibly they took it up of themselves as a Rite very pertinent for them to use upon this occasion and which would easily be understood by all I do not see how he could be confuted Perhaps it may not be unreasonably supposed that they received some general Direction from our Saviour that in exerting the Gift which he had bestowed upon them they might freely use this honourable Ceremony or some other of like signification that was fit to raise the expectation of a miraculous Healing Now this being the only place in the New Testament where anointing with Oil is mentioned besides that of St. James and it being also plain that the Vnction in St. Mark referred to the Gift of Healing surely the Vnction spoken of by St. James must have the same signification or else 't is a place of such obscurity that it will be very hard to find a Sacrament in it or to make any conclusion whatsoever from it For in all appearance the very same case is spoken of in both places The Action is the same viz. Anointing with Oil the Persons anointed are in the same Circumstances for in both they are the Sick And the Event the same for in St. Mark they were Healed and in St. James 't is expresly said The Lord shall raise him up What therefore should hinder but that if Anointing were the Ceremony of miraculous Healing in the one it should have the same signification in the other If there were any Difficulty in the Words of St. James and it were doubtful to what purpose the Vnction by him mentioned was applied one would think the obscurity should wholly disappear before the Light that St. Mark offers to clear that Text. But that in all appearance the same Case should be expressed in both and yet there should be so vast a difference as the Roman Doctrine supposes is for them to believe who make the Scriptures good for nothing till the Church comes to find out a meaning for them For this reason some of our Adversaries have thought fit to prove their pretended Sacrament out of St. Mark well perceiving that without drawing him in for a Witness to their Doctrine as well as they could they must be forced to quit St. James too Thus Maldonate without mincing the matter asks If the Sacrament of Extreme Unction be not here in St. Mark where is it A question put not without Reason I confess from whence I infer that here it is not and therefore 't is no where to be found in the Scripture As for his other Question which he presently adds Why is it not here if it be any where else I answer that if he could have made good proof that he had found it any where else he would never have stretched his Confidence so far as to pretend that he found it here ‖ Maldon Comm. in Evang. Marc. vi In this place says the Jesuit we are to deal not only with Hereticks who obstinately contend that the Sacrament of Extreme Vnction is not here spoken of but also with certain Catholicks who seem to say almost the same thing who are nevertheless excusable in great part since these new Heretics had not yet sprung up in their time And he was so well satisfied that their Sacrament was gone if St. Mark 's Text could not save it that he plainly said that to deny this place to be understood of the Sacrament of Extreme Unction was to make a step towards the taking of it away either maliciously if he were an Heretic that did so or imprudently if he were a Catholic He well knew that the Divines of his Church had generally denied the Unction which the Apostles used in St. Mark to be their Sacramental Unction and that they had laid the stress of their Cause upon St. James but he saw the Inconvenience of it too that the same Unction being indeed spoken of in both places by giving up one they in effect yeilded both and so left their Sacrament without any Testimony of Scripture at all Thus far therefore his Judgment is to be commended that he chose rather to challenge both places which might be done with the same Confidence and the same Pains that would serve to challenge one of them than to be at the Charge of wresting St. James and afterwards to be at a new expence of pains in making St. Mark and St. James to speak of two different Unctions i. e. to shew a Difference where in Truth there was none to be shown But how does this bold Undertaker bring St. Mark 's Text to his Purpose Why he proves that the Apostles did not use Oil as a Medicine as if any either Protestant or Papist was so weak as to say they did And then he concludes that they anointed the Sick not to cure their Bodies so much as their Minds by a Sacrament as if that Unction must needs be a Sacrament or a Medicine He pretends that it could not be used as a Sign of a miraculous Cure because it would have obscured the Miracle and led the Spectators into a belief that the Cure was wrought by the natural force of the Oil. And some other such things he says which are so intolerably trifling that I am very well pleased to be excused from giving them any answer by the Confession of the most and best Divines of the Roman Church that the Unction in St. Mark was not Sacramental or for the healing of the Mind but the Body For this was not taught by Cajetan only but by (q) Tom. iv Disp 8. qu. 1. Gregory de Valentia and by (r) De Extr. Unct. cap. ii Probo igitur c. Bellarmin who recites other great Authors of the same Opinion And that we may be
acknowledge began to speak of the Unction of the Sick as the Church of Rome does now But then I cannot allow these to be Antient Fathers for they were all Men of the Twelfth Age. And it is more than enough for us that the great Cardinal having undertaken to prove by the Tradition of the Antients that Extreme Unction is a Sacrament has not been able to produce so much as one pertinent Testimony for it of Pope Council or Father for above a thousand years after Christ SECT VI. That the silence of Antiquity and the Circumstances with which it is to be taken are a positive proof that Extreme Vnction has not the Tradition of the Antients but is a notorious Innovation THough so great a failing is of it self a reasonable inducement to believe that Extreme Unction was utterly unknown to Antiquity yet there are many more evidences of it which it may be worth the while to produce if it be but to reprove the confidence of our Adversaries and to shew that they who make the greatest noise of Antient Fathers and Councils have the least cause for it of all other Christians in the World And here I am entring upon a Subject which * De Extr. Unc. Lib. 11. cap. 1. Mr. Daillé has quite exhausted and have therefore no more to do than to bring into a narrow compass some of those Arguments from Antiquity which he has brought together and pursued at large with extraordinary judgment In the first place there is not the least mention of this pretended Sacrament in Justin Martyr Irenaeus Tertullian or Cyprian P. 61.62 nor in any of the Writers of the Three first Ages who yet discourse frequently and plainly of the Discipline and the Sacraments of the Christian Church and therefore it was not known to them 2. Neither was it known in the Fourth Age which afforded so many Christian Writers since not one of them mentions it no not in treating upon the Sacraments and Rites of the Church which had been as unpardonable negligence in them if they had believed any such Sacrament as this as it would be now in the Divines of the Church of Rome to omit Extreme Unction when they pretend to give an account of the Sacraments P. 62 63. Epiphanius largely treats of the Doctrins Rites and Disciplines of the Church in the close of his work against Heresies and has not a word of Extreme Unction The Countefeit Dionysius in his Eccl. Hist does with wonderful exactness and curiosity lay down all the mysteries of the Church from the Baptism to the Funerals of the Faithful but of Extreme Unction he is altogether silent And so is the Author of the Apostolical Institutions in his Eighth Book where he undertakes to declare all Ecclesiastical Forms whatsoever 3. That for the first fix Ages though the manner and circumstances of the Deaths of many holy Persons were described very particularly by the Writers of those times yet there is not the least intimation that so much as any one of them was anointed Eusebius mentions it not of Constantine or Helen Nor Athanasius of Anthony Nor Gregory Nazianzen of his Sister Gorgonia Cap. 2. p. 66.67 68. or of Gregory his Father or of Basil Nor Gregory Nyssen of Gregory of Neocaesara or of Ephrem Nor Ambrose of his Brother Satyrus or of Theodosius Nor Sulpitius of Martin Nor Simeon Metaphrastes of Chrysostom Nor Paulinus of Ambrose Nor Hierom of Lucinius or Hilarion c. no nor of Paula though he and her Daughter Eustochium were present at her end nor S. Augustin of his Mother Monica nor Possidius of S. Augustin On the other hand in these later Ages the Extreme Unction of those who dye in the Roman Communion and have their Lives and Deaths written afterward is seldom or never omitted as appears by a vast number of Instances out of Surius P. 70. particularly of Carolus Borromeus Franciscus Borgia Antonine of Florence Bernardinus de Senis Justinian of Venice Count Eleazar Thomas Aquinas William the Abbot Antony of Padua and the Famous Dominic and a great many more of whom 't is expresly recorded that they had Extreme Unction No other reasonable account can be given why this so very material a Circumstance should perpetually be omitted in describing the deaths of the Antient Christians and hardly ever omitted upon the like occasion by Roman Writers but that as the thing it self is now constantly practised in the Church of Rome so it was utterly unknown to the Antient Church 4. That from the fifth Age to the ninth they that wrote the deaths of Holy Persons do very frequently remember that they received the Eucharist never that they received Extreme Unction before their departure out of this Life which is proved by an abundance of Instances out of Bede and Surius c. Cap. 3. p. 73 74. c. But had Extreme Unction been used in those times no account can be given why the mention of that should be perpetually omitted there being no manner of reason why it should not have been as frequently remembred as the other 5. That to the ninth Age none of the Antients moved any Question concerning Penitents receiving or not receiving Extreme Unction before the Article of Death whereas nothing had been more proper if they had believed it to be the Sacrament of the Dying Cap. 4. p. 75. c. For there was a diversity of Discipline as to the communicating of Penitents in the Fourth and Fifth ages and so on from that which obtained in the three First and it consisted in this that the First were more rigid and denied the Eucharist to those in their departure out of this life to whom the latter Ages allowed it But if Extreme Unction had been then used this diversity had appeared in that and not in the Eucharist I shall produce no more of his Arguments to this purpose these being abundantly sufficient to satisfie any disinterested Man that either there was no such thing as Extreme Unction known in the Church for many Ages from the beginning or else the Antients and indeed all Christian Writers that had any occasion to treat of the forementioned things for above a thousand years after Christ were guilty of unaccountable folly and stupidity in one and the same thing i. e. in omitting not only what was necessary for their purpose but moreover plain and easie and one would think unavoidable by men of common diligence and understanding That one consideration which Chemnitius objected against Extreme Unction that there are no antient examples of Holy Men anointed in their Extremes is of it self sufficient to carry the cause from the Church of Rome in point of Antiquity after once it is made evident that there is no passage in any Antient Father that bears witness to that pretended Sacrament Unless Bellarmin's answer may pass that there are no such examples because (t) Cap. VI. §. Respondeo non exstare
upon these reasonings against the Divine Institution Nor do I now offer them as Arguments to prove that God hath not instituted any such thing for the true ground upon which we affirm there was no such Institution is That there is not the least evidence of the Fact but only to shew that the Cardinal was not less unfortunate in his Reasonings themselves why God ought to have instituted Extreme Vnction than presumptuous in offering to prove it by any such Reasonings whatsoever For tho presumptions of this kind are not to be brought either for or against an Institution under question yet the presumptions on our side are much more reasonable than those of his SECT IV. An Apology for this Controversie about Extreme Vnction from the great moment of it BUT now perhaps it may be asked by one or other To what good end all this serves Why must it be made to appear that Scripture Reason and Antiquity are all vainly pretended in behalf of Extreme Vnction The Opinion and Practise of it does not stand in defiance to any Institution of our Saviour or any express Rule of the Gospel and might therefore without great harm be indulged at least not opposed now it has spread as far and wide as the Roman Communion goes especially since we charge them with so many Doctrines and Practices which as we say do manifestly contradict the Scriptures To insist upon small faults is to heighten animosities and to make our breaches desperate And while we charge our Adversaries with Innovation in the use they make of an Antient Rite as Unction of the Sick is confessed to be they have this at least to return upon us that we are guilty of as great an Innovation in making no use of it at all Now as to letting the dispute fall there had been some reason for it if the Church of Rome had either kept to the Ancient Unction which directly referred to bodily Cures or if when they were perhaps grown ashamed of anointing the Sick for the recovery of their health after long experience had shewn that the Remedy was all in vain if then I say they had retained the Rite of Unction under the notion of a Rite meerly standing upon Ecclesiastical Authority and whatsoever plausible signification they had given it if they had ascribed no more spiritual effect to it than to the observation of any other mutable custom of the Church Had they ordered matters thus and not intermedled against the liberty and authority of other Churches I for my part am of opinion that neither breach of Communion ought to have followed such a provision nor any such controversies raised about it as would hazard the peace of the Catholick Church But the matter is far otherwise They thought it not worth the while to retain it as a mutable Rite but have given it the venerable name of a Sacrament and as much as they can the nature of a Sacrament too They have found out a Grace for it which they say it confers and they have put the invention upon our Lord Jesus and the recognition of it upon the Christian world They have Anathematized all that dare to call it into question nor are they content to train up their own people in the belief that it takes away sin but they would make us such hypocrites as to say that we believe it too for with these men we can have no Communion unless we (k) Bulla Pii supra Formâ Juramenti c. profess that there are seven Sacraments of the new Law truly and properly so called instituted by Jesus Christ our Lord and necessary to the Salvation of mankind of which number Extreme Vnction is one and that they do confer Grace Thus the case stands and as it stands let our enemies themselves be our Judges if the truth be on our side in this Question whether we have not all the reason in the world to avow it openly and defend it Besides that relation of Bishops and Presbyters to the particular Churches that are under their especial care they are also Ministers of the Catholick Church and by virtue of that relation wherein they stand to the whole are bound to declare against intolerable abuses and corruptions that do notoriously prevail in any part of it There are not many errors of more pernicious consequence to the souls of men than to be made to believe that forgiveness of Sins Grace and Salvation may be attained by things that are blest by man without any appointment of God Nor is it easie to give a worse instance of Treachery in managing the care of souls than to support so dangerous a superstition by pretending that God is the Author of those Institutions which he never established and of those promises which he has no where made What is this but under a pretence of carrying men to heaven to venture the diverting them out of the only way to it which God has shewn and to cherish a fatal superstition in the people to which of themselves they are strangely prone instead of reproving and correcting it as the Priests of the living God ought to do It is seldom seen that people are very much concerned for Ecclesiastical Rites and Customs for which no other reasons are pretended but those of Prudence Order and Expedience But when they are made Mysteries good to take away sin and to save the soul no degree of zeal is thought to be too great for them Men love to be saved by a multitude of Ceremonies and a Priest to administer them But surely it is not so much the business of a Christian Priest to make himself necessary by deceiving and pleasing others as to please God and to profit the flock of Christ He should be content with so much dependence of the people upon him as may be kept by speaking truth and doing his duty But as for them that do not think this to be enough but pretend to have ways of Gods appointing to take away sin which yet are meer inventions of their own do they not at once abuse the name of God and gratifie their own ambition at the price of mens souls Certainly if any occasion of declaring the truth can be just even when we know before hand that many will be offended with it this is such an occasion Express warning ought to be given against the deceitful insinuations of those men who talk of nothing more violently than the Salvation of souls and who would almost make one believe that no body can be saved who does not pass through their hands nor any body damned that does For if what they say of two of their Sacraments be true the Sacraments of Penance and of Extreme Vnction there is as little cause to fear damnation in their Church as they say there is to hope for Salvation in ours Of Confession in Penance they say thus (l) Catech ad Par. P. II. de Paenit Sect. 46 47. Granting that sins are
at all the word Sacrament at which elsewhere he is so ready to take advantage being not so much as here mentioned Moreover that Unction of which this Synod spake was for healing the distempers of the Body and therefore very different from the Roman Unction which is principally for those that are drawing on to the last gasp And as for the diseases of the Soul which it was said to heal too there is no reason that the Synod should be interpreted otherwise than according to the Text which they cited where 't is said If he hath committed sins they shall be forgiven him that is to say that the first and constant intention in Unction of the Sick was to relieve their Bodies and in some cases it would also be beneficial to their Souls But by this time I grant there was a certain custom of anointing the Sick slipt into the Church something different from the judgment and practice of more antient times but withal a great deal more different from the modern doctrine and practice of the Church of Rome This I shall shew more particularly in its proper place and that although thus much Antiquity comes too late to conclude us in points wherein it was singular yet it does effectually condemn the Roman Church in points wherein it was not so because it shews the lateness of their Innovations As for the Synod of Worms held in the year 868 which he next mentions he confesses that the Canon he refers to renews the Decree of Innocentius The truth is that Canon does word for word repeat all that passage in the Epistle of Innocentius Can. 72. which we have considered before and this without the least Preface to it or Note upon it This therefore instead of being a Testimony to Extreme Unction is a good Argument that those Fathers knew no more of it than the Bishops of Rome and Eugubium did above 400 years before He cites also a Canon of a Synod at Meaux out of Burchardus commanding that upon Good-Friday Eve the Rectors of Parishes should receive a Glass of holy Oyl from the Bishop for the anointing of the Sick according to Apostolical Tradition Now whether there ever was such a Canon made at Meaux or not 't is all one to us for that it was now the custom to anoint all Sick persons we readily grant but that it was either Extreme or Sacramental Unction we flatly deny nor is there a word to that purpose in the Canon now cited The next is the second Synod of Aken (e) Aquisgr 2. Cap. 2. §. 1. Can. 8. which requires that once a Year the Bishops in all Cities do not neglect the Benediction of Holy Oil †In quo salvatio infirmorum creditur wherein the relief of sick Persons is believed to be What says Bellarmin upon this The Canon says he requires that this Sacrament be not neglected in which the Salvation of the Sick is contained But does it speak of Extreme Vnction or of Sacramental Vnction Yes they will say for it speaks of that Vnction in which the Salvation of the Sick is contained But the Canon does not say as Bellarmin does but that the Health or Salvation of the Sick is believed to be in that Unction which is as much as to say that their Unction was believed to be very profitable towards the recovery of a sick Mans Health And that this was the meaning of the Fathers appears from their instructions to the Presbyters concerning the care they ought to have of the Sick which is expressed in these words (f) Ibid. §. 2â— Can. 5. But if he his Parishioner be grieved with Sickness let him not by his the Presbyters negligence want Confession and the Prayer of the Priest or the Anointing of holy Oil. Lastly If he perceives his end approaching let him commend the Christian Soul as a Priest should do to the Lord his God with the reception of the Holy Communion and his Body to be buried in a Christian manner By which you see there are two states of the sick Person considered one when he is deprest by sickness the other when he is drawing to his end And that the Anointing with Oil is prescribed as proper to the former viz. while good hope of life lasted not to the latter as 't is now in the Church of Rome when he seemed to be near his end For in that case they prescribed the Administration of the Communion Which shews that by believing the Salvation or Health of the Sick to be in Unction which they had observed not long before they meant the common belief of the profitableness of Unction to raise up the Sick and to restore him to Health For if they had taken Unction to be the Sacrament of the dying according to the new Divinity of the Trent-Synod they also would have prescribed Unction in that case wherein 't is plain they did not prescribe it viz. * Si finem urgentem perspexerit when it was perceived that Death was at hand To conclude whereas the Cardinal affirms That the Council of Mentz under Rabanus affirms like things I do acknowledge that in this he says the truth for they require (g) Mog I. Can. 26. that according to the decrees of the Fathers the Sick should be heartned with Prayers Consolations and holy Vnction and refreshed with the Communion where 't is again observable that the Unction is to go before and then the Communion to follow which later that they required in case of such a prospect of death as the Synod of Aken speaks of is plain from their calling the Communion the Viaticum or * Communione Viatici reficiantur the Food for their passage out of this into the other World But if they had dreamt of the Extreme Vnction of the Church of Rome that and not the Eucharist had been prescribed in the last place to fortifie the Soul in her last conflicts And now the summ of his Testimonies for Extreme Vnction out of Ancient Councils comes to this That he has not one genuine Canon of a Council to pretend till the Ninth Age and there is not one that he appeals to in that Age neither but all things considered it rather makâ—â—gainst him than for him And so much for Ancient Councils SECT V. That Extreme Unction has not the Testimony of any Ancient Father HE pretends that they (h) Ubi supra §. Jam vero ex patribus c. have two kinds of Testimonies from the Fathers One of those who indeed do not expresly say that this is one of the Sacraments but yet they expresly say That the words of S. James belong to us and that the Presbyters ought now and in all times to do that which S. James describes Now if he had such Testimonies as these to produce they would not in the least affect our Cause since we also say that this place of S. James belongs to us as I have already
shewn P. 1. § 8. and that it prescribes some things which there will be occasion for in all Ages of the Church and nothing but what is very fit to be done when there is the same occasion for it that there was at first But leâ— us however consider the Testimonies themselves The first he refers to is Origen's second Homily upon Leviticus where there are seven ways laid down of obtaining remission of sins the seventh being expressed in that passage which the Cardinal meant The words are these (i) Ultra med There is yet a seventh way though it be hard and painful when the sinner washes his Bed with tears and tears are his meat day and night and when he is not ashamed to show his sin to the Priest of the Lord and to seek for Healing according to him who saith I said I will confess against my self my transgressions unto the Lord and thou forgavest the ungodliness of my heart In which also is fulfilled that which the Apostle saith Is any man sick let him call for the Elders of the Church and let them lay their hands upon him anointing him with Oil in the Name of the Lord and the Prayer c. Now here indeed Origen says that in the Penitence which he described in order to the remission of sins that Text of S. James was fulfilled Which is so far from being an Argument that he understood the Text of Extreme Vnction that 't is a good Argument of the quite contrary for 't is manifest that he does not apply the Text to the case of a dying or so much as a sick Person but in general to the case of a sinner that anxiously seeks for Pardon and is willing to undergo that hard and painful Penitence which he described If therefore the Cardinal's meaning by this Testimony was to prove that Origen believed all was to be done in every Age which S. James directs and in particular the anointing with Oil then he must needs suppose that in Origen's opinion S. James directed the anointing of Penitents without any regard at all to a state of Health or Sickness But if Origen had thought so I dare say that he whatever the Cardinal might haâ—â— done would not have called this Unction either the Sacrament of the dying or Extreme Unction or so much as the Unction of the Sick Could any thing be more absurd than to pretend that this great Man produced S. James's Text in favour of Extreme Vnction which is always of the sick or the dying when the Persons to whom he applied it and who were to be anointed if he speaks of any that were to be so might every one of them be in good and perfect Health Only Bellarmin of all Men should not have dealt in this fashion because he says expresly afterward That (k) Ubi supra Cap. VII §. Tertio nota this Sacrament is as it were a kind of Penance of the Sick who cannot do works of Penance But 't is plain that those Persons to whom Origen applied the Text of S. James were those that did works of Penance and that a hard and laborious Penance too It is not for nothing that the Cardinal does so often refer his Reader to Authorities without producing the words themselves So that this Authority is grosly impertinent to the purpose for which 't is brought and though (l) Orig. Paris Genebrard had some colour to make this place speak of Sacramental Confession yet there is none in the World to produce it in favour of Extreme Vnction But then what was Origen's meaning to say that in the Penitence of a sinner and God's Mercy to him that was fulfilled which S. James said Is any man sick c I Answer First That although this Text was produced yet it may be reasonably supposed that Origen did not mean all was fulfilled that is there said but only some part of it viz. That which concerned calling for the Presbyter and desiring his Prayers and obtaining Remission of Sins to which we are to add Confessing of Faults though he did not cite the Text so far For that all should be fulfilled in the proper sense by doing what he prescribed is unconceivable for to weep and to confess c. is not to be anointed with Oil. I say therefore Origen might reser to some special passages in that Text viz. those which might be well accommodated to his presont purpose Or Secondly According to the ingenious conjecture of Mr. Daillé Origen allegorized this place after his manner making the sick Man the Type of the sinner (m) Ubi supra §. 93. As in S. James the sick calls for the Presbyters so here the sinner goes to the same There the sick is anointed with Oil. Here the sinner is besmear'd with his own Tears and as it were with the Vnction of Penitence There the sick Man is healed here also the sinner is restored And therefore Origen affirms that to be fulfilled in the one which S. James affirmed properly and literally of the other For every one knows that as often as that is done which was expressed by a Type so often the Type is said to be fulfilled Which supposition is the more probable because in this Homily that great Man's hand was in at Allegorizing for there the Reader may find that he discovered his seven ways of coming to Forgiveness in the Sacrifices of the Law But whatever his meaning was one thing is certain that he did not mean Extreme Vnction And that is all we need to be sure of at present To the same purpose is (n) De Sacerdotio L. III. c. 6. S. Chrysostom quoted in the next place but not a word produced that he says For indeed he brings in the Text of S. James as an instance of that Priestly Dignity and Power which he was speaking of how available it is to obtain forgiveness of sins for us not only in Baptism at first but afterward by Discipline Instruction and Prayers But of the case of a dying or sick Person he says not one word which shews plainly enough that he produced the whole Text for the sake only of the latter part of it which expresseth forgiveness of sins and that he thought this part of the Text might be understood of the power of the Keys which was the subject of his discourse both before and after the mentioning of this Text. As little to the purpose is it either that he found this Text quoted in S. Austin's (o) Tom. III. Speculum for no interpretation of it is given there or that as he observes Sâ—â—ustin lays down those passages only of the Scripture which are useful to us at all times as if this place of Scripture were of no use to us now unless the Doctrine and use of Extreme Vnction might be concluded from it the vanity of which conceit we have already touched more than once (p) Vid. Dallaeum de Extr. Unct. p. 108 113.