we are in all our Tongues translations and English Prayers And we are told That the people know what is done in the general to wit That God is worshipped and honoured That the Priest prays to him That good things are asked of him for the people and thanks given to him that the memory of Christ and his Passion are celebrated and the Sacrifice offered to God This no Clown is ignorant of and this is enough This is somewhat like the course taken by Socrates that said He only pray'd in general because what particular things were good for him the Gods knew better than himself But whether this be done among them with as much reason and whether with any respect to our Religion and the several Offices of it is now to be consider'd For our satisfaction herein we may observe I. They grant That the people can and do understand no more by their Service than the general intent and Points of it II. That the people cannot apply these Generals to the particular Points of it So the Rhemists The simple people are not bound to know to what Petition their part pertaineth c. It is enough that the people can tell this holy Oraison the Pater noster to be appointed to call upon God c. III. That no more is necessary and though they are to ask special things of God yet it-is not needful to understand what or how or when or if at all they are specially prayed for For then they would understand the specials But now this state of the Case will not solve the Point For I. This is contrary to the Apostle who doth maintain That as the publick Service of God is to be ordered so as to be for the edification of the Church so the Church cannot be edified without the Offices are administred in a Tongue that shall as distinctly and particularly signifie and point to the thing thereby to be expressed as a Trumpet or the like Instrument doth give notice by a distinction of Sounds when to advance or retreat when to fight and when to forbear And that every person the unlearned as well as the learned may know how to apply his Amen thereunto but which he can no more do without understanding the Tongue than He can know what motion or posture he is to observe that hath the Trumpet sounding to him without any distinction and whose Sounds and Notes being confounded give no direction to those that are to be guided by it So Aquinas How shall he say Amen when he knows not what is pray'd for because he cannot understand Quid boni dicas nisi quod benedicas What good thou sayest except that thou dost bless II. The nature of the thing is against it For as the Offices are various and distinguished by their Ends and Uses and we cannot attain those Ends nor make use of those Offices without the understanding of those Ends and Uses So there are particular things respected in those Offices which unless we also respect we lose the benefit of them but that we cannot do without a particular knowledge of them As for example the Romish Catechism faith That Prayer is the Interpreter of the Soul and is directed to God or the Saints That therein Men do confess their sins and pray for the pardon of them that they beg for others and themselves things Temporal Spiritual and Eternal that therein also they give Thanks for whatever good they have received and do enjoy Now as these things are of different kinds so according to their kind they require different dispositions and so what are suitable to the one will not be suitable to the other But if the knowledge be only general that cannot produce special dispositions and he that ventures to be particular therein may rejoyce and give Thanks when he is to mourn and confess may mind Earthly things when the Prayer is for Heavenly may imprecate when he should bless and instead of Ora pro nobis may say Miserere nobis that is make a Saint to be God and apply that to the Officer of the Court of Heaven which he should address only to the Judge He may be all the while in a posture of contradiction to the Church and have his dispositions so little suited to the solemnities of it that the Priests may say to such with some little variation in the Words of the Gospel We have piped unto you and ye have mourned we have mourned unto you and ye have danced So that unless they will say There are no need of particular dispositions according to the kinds and special uses of the Offices of Religion they must say That Service in an Unknown Tongue is not for the edification of the Church So Aquinas again He who doth hear and not understand is not edified as far as he understands not although he undestand it in general III. If this were true That a confused general knowledge is sufficient yet this will not help them or justifie them in the use of an Unknown Tongue For even the general knowledge they pretend to doth not proceed from the Tongue for that they understand not but is obtained some other way that is by some actions and Postures some particular Words and Phrases some Ceremonies and Signals given in the administration of their Service And which would signifie as much for the most part without the Tongue and Words as with the Tongue that is not understood IV. I shall add That whereas they pretend experience in the case and which for the present we shall not so far question as utterly to deny but that there may be and is some Devotion amongst the ignorant sort of them yet so far as this Devotion of theirs is real it must be because of somewhat understood but so far as it is without Instruction so far unquestionably it proceeds only from the imagination and if it rises from no better or higher a cause whatsoever semblance it may have of Devotion yet it hath no right to that Character I shall make this clear by an instance or two Not many years since in a certain City of Brabant there was for ornament a large Statue erected at a Conduit near the Market-place to which the Country people as they passed to and fro did often pay their Devotions not discerning any difference betwixt that and an image of a Saint so much to the publick scandal that to prevent any such mistake for the future it was by command transformed into a little Boy with a change also of the posture Now if we would enquire into this Devotion it is much what the same we are discoursing of There wanted not an inward disposition that inclined the people to it there wanted not outward expressions for they bowed before it kissed the Feet of it said their Pater nosters c. before it and all with as much Devotion as if it had been the Image of S. Roch or S.
Hebrew Greek and Latin made all to his praise c. And conformable to this is the Decree of the Council of Lateran under Innocent III. Anno 1215. that because in many parts within the same City and Diocess there are many people of different manners and Rites mixed together but of one Faith We therefore command that the Bishops of such Cities or Diocesses provide fit Men who shall celebrate Divine Offices according to the diversity of Tongues and Rites and administer the Sacraments This may be further confirmed by the very Offices of the Church of Rome but this is sufficient to shew that the Church of Rome hath departed from Scripture Antiquity and it self when it doth require that Divine Service be performed in a Tongue unknown to the people and that it was never the opinion of the Fathers nor any Church nor even of the Church of Rome that it is most expedient to have it so performed So little was it then thought that religious things the less they are understood the more they would be admired and that to preserve a reverence for them and the people from dangerous errors it is requisite to keep them from being understood So little was it pleaded that there are any Tongues sacred in themselves and that as the three upon the Cross of Christ are to be preferred before others and to exclude the rest so the Latin as next to the head of Christ is the most venerable of the three So little was it then thought that there is a certain kind of Divinity in Latin and something more of Majesty and fitter to stir up Devotion than in other Tongues So little were they afraid that Latin would be lost if the Service were not kept in it or however so little evident is it that they valued the preservation of that Tongue above the Edification of the Church Lastly So little did they think of the expedience of having the Service in one common Tongue as Latin That Christians wherever they travel may find the self same Service and Priests may officiate in it as at home As if for the sake of the few that travel the many that stay at home should be left destitute and for one Mans convenience 10000. be exposed to eternal perdition These are Arguments coined on purpose to defend the Cause and so are peculiar to the Church that needs them II. Let us consider Whether from the time of its having been a Rite it hath been the Rite of every Church To this I shall only produce their own Confessions for it is acknowledged that the Armenians Aegyptians Habassines Muscovites and Sclavonians have their Service in a Tongue known to the people And their giving them the hard Names of Hereticks Schismaticks and Barbarous will not save the Council from being fallible when it saith It is the rite of every Church But were there no such Churches in the World that herein practised contrary to the Church of Rome yet it would no more justifie her than it can make that good which is evil that expedient which is mischievous to the Church of God or reconcile one part of the Council to the other that when it hath declared The Mass contains great instruction for the people yet adds That it is expedient and an approved Rite that it be not celebrated in the Vulgar Tongue But say they this is granted If there were no interpretation but that is provided for by the Council for it is ordered That lest Christs sheep should hunger all that have the care of Souls shall frequently expound c. And that we are now to consider SECT IV. Whether the Provision made by the Council of Trent for having some part of the Mass expounded be sufficient to countervail the mischief of having the whole celebrated in a Tongue not understood of the people and to excuse the Church of Rome in the injunction of it This is the last refuge they betake themselves to confessing that without an Interpretation S. Paul is against them but with this they plead he is for them But what shall we then think of the case in their Church at a time when as the people could not understand so the Priests could not interpret and wanted both the gift and had not acquired so much as the art of it What shall we think of their case and their Church that hath neither provided nor doth use such an Interpretation as the Apostle speaks of but what differs as much from it in respect of the light it gives to the people as both that and the Tongue they use do in the way by which they are obtained If it were a translation what a ludicrous thing would it be for a Church in its constant Service to take suppose the Lord's Prayer in pieces and first pronounce it in Latin and then in English But as they do not permit their Offices not the Horae B. Virginis Breviary or Mass Book to be translated into a Vulgar Tongue So the verbal translation of it during the celebration of Mass was never thought of by the Council but was thereby condemned as the cause and seedplot of many errors as we are informed in a Letter wrote upon the occasion of Voisin's translation by the whole Clergy of France to Pope Alexander the Seventh And whatsoever the Exposition did refer to let it be what it will yet it was not to the devotional Part as Sanders declares who after he had pleaded that an Unknown Tongue with interpretation was the perfect fulfilling of S. Pauls advice perceiving a difficulty behind throws all off with this If the Interpretation of Prayers be laid aside for a season it is however not to be thought that it is to be omitted for ever c. So that at most no more was intended than a short exposition of some doctrinal Point or Ceremony which might as well be called an Exposition of the Breviary or any other Book containing much the same things as the Missal And it is probable that so much as this also was never intended which if ever is very rarely practised amongst them Insomuch as Ledesma saith That the sence of the Council was That the people should be instructed only by Sermons Indeed they would rather have this go for an Argument than dispute it They do as the Irish by their Bogs run over it lightly for fear if they tread too hard it will not support their cause but stifle it And therefore they wheel off again and then tell us That it being a known set Form in one set Language those that are ignorant of it at first need not continue so but by due attention and diligence may arrive to a sufficient knowledge As if the poor people are inexcusable if they do not arrive to a sufficient knowledge of the Tongue which must be learned before the things without other helps than their own attention and diligence when the Priests and
the other is understood by none Now in all this they say little or nothing to the purpose For if they plead for their Latin Service as Greek was in Galatia and Latin in Africa who is their Adversary For these Tongues were as I have shewed in those and the like places as well or little less spoken and understood than the Vulgar and Mother Tongues And the Protestants do not think it unlawful to have the common Service in a Tongue which is commonly understood though it be not the Vulgar Tongue of the Nation especially in Maritim and Provincial Countries where there is a concourse of diverse Nations and where either these several Languages are understood or there is a compound Language that serves for all as the Lingua Franca before spoken of But if they plead for Latin as it is now when a Dead and Learned Tongue that is where it is not known at all as in the West-Indies where yet it is as much used by those of the Roman communion in Mass as in Europe or where it is not known to the Vulgar people as it is with us and every where else then they speak to the purpose for that the Reformed do oppose but then the way of arguing hitherto taken notice of is of no use to them in the World and is no more to the purpose than if they would undertake to prove that there is at this day a famous University at Athens and that Latin is the Vulgar Tongue now at Rome because these were so formerly So that if we will know where the Controversie lies and what is contended for and against we must restore things to their proper places and I think all may be brought to an Issue by putting and resolving this plain Question viz. SECT II. Qu. Whether it be lawful and expedient to use such a Tongue in the publick Worship of God as is not vulgarly or commonly understood by the people according to the way at this day required and practised in the Church of Rome If we would enquire into the lawfulness of such things as appertain to Divine Worship we must apply our selves to the Holy Scripture being in matters of that nature to determine of Right and Wrong Lawful and Unlawful according to the Directions Commands and Prohibitions of it If we would be satisfied about their Expedience we must consider the Nature Ends and Use of what we enquire about This therefore is a proper method for the Resolution of the foregoing Question But because the Apostle in his Discourse upon this Subject 1. Cor. 14. doth argue from the ends and use of the several Offices belonging to Divine Worship and because the like Order may give some light and force to what follows I shall first of all I. Treat of the Ends for which Divine Worship and the several Offices of it were instituted II. Consider whether those Ends may be attained when the Worship is performed in a Tongue not understood III. Whether the Worship so performed as to leave those ends unattainable will be accepted by God IV. I shall consider the Apostle's Discourse upon this Argument and whether it can be reasonably concluded from thence That Divine Worship so administred as not to be understood of the people is unlawful I. In the first of these the Masters of Controversie in the Romish Church do proceed with great tenderness and no little obscurity For would we know what the Worship is they would have in an Unknown Tongue they answer it is the publick only they defend For as for private saith one It is lawful for every one to offer his lesser Prayers to God in what Tongue soever he pleaseth And saith another All Catholicks are taught to say their private Prayers in their Mother Tongue As if it were possible to assign such a vast difference betwixt them when the Dispositions Reasons and Ends required and intended are the same that what is lawful expedient and necessary in the one is unlawful inexpedient and unnecessary in the other Or as if the saying private Prayers in Latin was never heard of practised or encouraged in their Church Again Would we understand to what purposes the Divine Offices do serve and whether the Edification Instruction and Consolation of the people be not some of those Ends. Bellarmin answers 1. That the principal end of Divine Offices is not the instruction or consolation of the people but a Worship due to God from the Church As if there were no regard to be had to the special ends of those Offices such as the Instruction and Consolation of the people Or as if God could be honoured by that Worship where those ends are not regarded 2. The Rhemists add That Prayers are not made to teach make learned or increase knowledge though by occasion they sometimes instruct but their especial use is to offer our Hearts desires and Wants to God c. As if there were no Offices in God's Worship appointed for Instruction and increase of Knowledge and which are performed in an Unknown Tongue amongst them as well as Prayer Or as if their Adversaries did either deny it to be the special use of Prayer To offer our Hearts c. to God Or did affirm that the special use of it is To teach make learned and increase knowledge as they with others do falsly suggest and would fain have believed But to set this in a better light and that we may understand what are the Ends and Uses for which Divine Worship was appointed and after what manner they are to be respected It is to be observed 1. That Divine Worship in its first notion respects God as its Object and so the end of it in general is the giving Honour to him by suitable Thoughts Words and Actions 2. That he hath appointed several wayes and Offices by which he will be so honoured and in which as the Honour doth terminate in him so there redounds from thence benefit to the Church 3. That the Benefits redound to the Church according to the nature of those Offices and the special Ends they were designed unto As the Word of God is for our instruction and comfort c. The Lord's Supper for the encrease of Faith in God and love to him through Jesus Christ The Praising of God is to raise our Affections and to make us more sensible of his goodness and to quicken us in our duty The especial use of Prayer that I may use the Words forecited is to offer up our Hearts Wants and Desires to God and that by conversing with him we may be the more ardently excited to the love and adoration of him as the Trent Catechism doth express it 4. That those Offices are to be performed so as may effectually answer those Ends and as we may receive the benefits they were appointed for From whence it follows 5. That if the Offices of Divine Worship are to be performed by Words those Words and that
Tongue in which they are administred must be such as will not obstruct but promote and in their nature are qualified to attain those Ends. And if those Ends cannot be attained without the Tongue in which the Service is performed be understood It makes that means as necessary in its kind as the End and it is as necessary that the Tongue used for those Ends in Divine Worship be understood as that those Ends should be respected or that there should be a Tongue used at all For it is not God but Man that is immediately respected in the Words since there is no more need of Words to God than of Words that are vulgarly understood and so it is not for him but Man that this Tongue or that or indeed that any Tongue at all is used And if it be requisite that there be a Tongue and Words used in publick Worship and which all persons present are supposed to joyn in and receive benefit by then it is as necessary for the same reason to use Words significant and understood as to use any Words at all For saith S. Austin what doth the soundness of Speech profit if not followed with the Understanding of the Hearer Seeing there is no reason at all for our speaking if what we speak is not understood by them for whom that they might understand we spoke at all From what hath been said we may be able to vindicate such Arguments of the Protestants for Divine Service in a known and vulgar Tongue as were taken from the Ends of Worship against the replyes made to them by their Adversaries of the Romish Church As 1. The Protestants argue in general that the End of Divine Offices is for the Edification Instruction and Consolation of the people but these Ends cannot be attained in a Tongue not understood by them To this it is replyed That the Proposition is false because the chief end of Divine Offices is not the Instruction or Consolation of the people but a Worship or Honour due to God An Answer that became not so great a Man For 1. He argues as if those Ends were opposed which are not only consistent as Principal and Subordinate but also inseparable in the Case such are the Honour of God and the Edification of the Church 2. The Answer is not to the purpose unless it could be proved That either the Edification of the People is no End of the Divine Offices or that the Worship is compleat though that End be not respected or attained in them But if it be an End and the Service defective without that End be pursued then it is not that this is a subordinate End and the other a Principal that will destroy the force of the Argument and justify the use of an Unknown Tongue when persons are not edified by it 2. The Protestants argue in particular that there can no profit proceed to the Church from Prayers not understood To this it is answered That it is false because the Prayer of the Church is not made to the people but to God for the people And so there is no need that the people understand and it is sufficient if God understands But 1. if this Argument hold it will prove that which they do decline and be a Reason as well for Private as Publick Prayers in an Unknown Tongue For Private Prayer is also made to God and by this way of reasoning it will follow That it is sufficient that God understands it though it is not understood by him that useth it 2. Grant we to them what is not to be denied That Prayer is not made to the people but to God for the people Yet grant they must and do to us that It is the offering up our Hearts Wants and Desires to God and is to excite us to the Love and Adoration of him But if we cannot offer up our Hearts Wants and Desires to God nor be excited to the Love and Adoration of him by what we do not understand then it is as necessary for us to understand as it is to have those Qualifications when we pray For both are supposed for that we pray respects God but that we speak in publick Prayer respects the Church And though the principal End as they call it be regarded and it be an Honour and Worship given to God Yet if the less principal be neglected and the Service is not ordered to the encrease of Faith Love and Devotion in those that offer it as it cannot be where the Words and so the things prayed for in those Words are not understood it makes the Honour said to be given to God next to none And it is much at one whether there was no end at all propounded in Worship or such an End as through a defect in it shall render the service no better in it self and no more acceptable to God than if there were none But of this more anon II. I shall consider whether these Ends for which Divine Service is appointed can be attained when it is performed in a Tongue that is not understood The Apostle saith That the Offices of Divine Worship are intended and should be ordered for the Edification of the Church 1 Cor. 14. 4 5. That is say the Rhemists explaining that Phrase For increase of Faith true Knowledge and a good Life But when this comes to be applyed to the Case of Divine Service administred in an unknown Tongue they set aside the increase of Knowledge and Instruction as if it were not concerned in it So doth Bellarmin who saith Though the Minds of common people be not instructed by Service in an Unknown Tongue yet their affections are not without the benefit of it If this Argument signifies any thing it must be either because Divine Service is not a means appointed for our Instruction and then he must thwart not only the Apostle who saith it is for Edification and consequently for Instruction a Branch of it but also their own Church in the Council of Trent which saith That the Mass doth contain great Instruction for the faithful Or else he must say that the means of Instruction may be rendred ineffectual at the pleasure of the Church as it is granted it is by being in an unknown Tongue and yet neither the Church be blamed nor the Institution of such Means for such an End be disparaged nor the Souls of Men receive any damage by the want of that Instruction and the Means appointed for it So that as far as Instruction is an end and the Divine Service is a means for that End it is granted that the keeping it in an Unknown Tongue doth defeat that end For he saith That the Minds of common people are not instructed by Service in an Vnknown Tongue And now what an usurpation is this upon God to withhold that Means that he has appointed or to defeat the Means of that End that he hath appointed it for What an
thus distinguish have not ventured to tell us where the Apostle doth treat of the one and where of the other And it is evident that he applies his Argument of Edification to the whole and then proceeds from one Office to another from Prophesying to Praying and Singing if not also to the Lords Supper Now where the End is common to all without distinction the means conducing to that End are in all alike to be observed And if in those lesser Assemblies when they expounded prayed or sung they were to use a Tongue known to the Assembly because without so doing the Ends of their so assembling would have been defeated then certainly it was if not more yet at least as necessary that the same order be observed when the whole Church came together into one place Quest What was the Service used in those Assemblies and that was forbidden to be celebrated in an Unknown Tongue Some of the Church of Rome will understand it only of preaching and those that do grant it to respect Prayers yet will have it understood of such Prayers as were inspired But what though the Prayers were inspired when they were to be uttered in a Tongue known to the Church and were not to be used if they were not for the Edification of the Church as they were not if not understood And is not the Reason as full against Prayers not inspired when they are not understood The Question is not about Prayers inspired or not inspired but known and unknown according to which all the Offices of the Church are to be tryed as to their lawfulness and expedience But let the Prayers be as they will yet say they The Apostle treats of them occasionally only Supposing this so to be yet that is not to the purpose for the Question is not whether the Apostle treats so expresly of Prayer as of prophesying as whether the prohibition of an Unknown Tongue and the Argument taken from the End of Divine Offices lie not as expresly against praying as prophesying in that way And whether the Words If I pray in an Vnknown Tongue my Spirit prayeth but my understanding remaineth unfruitful c. v. 14 16. are not as plain as he that speaketh or prophesyeth in an Vnknown Tongue speaketh not unto Men c. If the Prohibition be the same and the reason of the prohibition be the same in both then it is not the being expresly or occasionally handled that can make so vast a difference as that the former shall be lawful and the latter unlawful Quest 4. How far is the Apostle's prohibition to be extended This will be determined partly from what hath been before said and partly from the current of the Apostle's Discourse who as he lays down that general Rule Let all things be done to Edifying so upon that principle he prohibits the use of an Unknown Tongue as inconsistent with it Verse 14. If I pray in an Vnknown Tongue my Spirit prayeth but my understanding remaineth unfruitful Where he doth not speak of a better and worse and prefer that which is understood before that which is not as they would have it but he speaks of a good and bad and so doth absolutely condemn an Unknown Tongue for the unprofitableness of it For saith he My Spirit prayeth not the Affection but the Spirit in the gift of an Unknown Tongue as many of the Antients and some of themselves expound it But my understanding remaineth unfruitful to my self that is if I do not understand it and to others if they do not understand me as the Apostle doth explain it Verse 16. So that from the whole we may with good Reason conclude That the administration of Divine Service in an Unknown Tongue is as unlawful as express Scripture can make it And that after all their attempts to decline pervert and overthrow it the fourteenth Chapter of the first Epistle to the Corinthians remains in full force against the Opinion and Practice of the Church of Rome and is a sufficient Reason on their part to keep the Scriptures in an Unknown Tongue as long as their Service is contrary to the Scripture celebrated constantly in it SECT III. I shall enquire Whether the celebrating Divine Service in a Tongue not understood of the people hath been the antient Rite of every Church I. I shall consider whether it hath been an antient Rite II. Whether from the time of its having been a Rite it hath been the Rite and Custom of every Church Both of these are affirmed by the Council of Trent Qu. I. Whether it hath been an antient Rite Antient is a Term of an uncertain date and seems to have been chosen by the Council upon mature deliberation lest peradventure if it had been determined it might have been so late as to be of no authority in it self or so early as for want of truth it might have given a foul shock to its own Authority But however because nothing can be antienter than what is first let us consider how Service was administred in Apostolical times and so downwards as much before the Council as any thing can be reasonably said to be antient by it I have already accounted for the Apostle's sence in this matter which Cassander calls after S. Chrysostome in loc an Apostolical Command for Service in a Tongue understood of the people And if we take a step lower and so proceed we shall find an uncontroulable Evidence for it both as to the Judgment and Practice of the Church In the first place setting aside the pretended Liturgies of S. James and S. Clement which are however plainly for it as is acknowledged is Justin Martyr that flourished about 150 years after Christ who relates That after the Bishop had concluded his Prayer and giving of Thanks all the people did assent to it with an Amen Which they could not have done as the Apostle and Fathers affirm unless they understood what was prayed for To this purpose doth Clemens Alexandrinus also write who lived toward the close of the second Century Origen who lived about the middle of the third Century saith The Greek Christians in their Prayers used the Graecian and the Romans used the Roman Words and each prays and praises God in his own Tongue And the Lord of all Tongues doth hear those that pray to him in all Tongues c. S. Cyprian at the same time doth say That the Mind in Prayer doth think of nothing else but what is prayed for And therefore the Priest before Prayer doth prepare the Minds of the Brethren by saying Lift up your Hearts that when the people doth answer We lift them up unto the Lord they may be admonished that they ought to think of nothing but the Lord. For not the sound of the Voice but the Mind must pray to the Lord. Dionysius Alexandrinus that lived in the same Age in a Letter to Xystus Bishop of Rome doth write of a