continue in it And that upon these Grounds 1. Because they must by the terms of communion with that Church be guilty either of Hypocrisie or Idolatry either of which are sins inconsistent with Salvation Which I thus prove That Church which requires the giving the Creature the Worship due only to the Creator makes the Members of it guilty of Hypocrisie or Idolatry for if they do it they are guilty of the latter if they do it not of the former but the Church of Rome in the Worship of God by Images the Adoration of the Bread in the Eucharist and the formal Invocation of Saints doth require the giving to the Creature the Worship due only to the Creator therefore it makes the Members of it guilty of Hypocrisie or Idolatry That the Church of Rome in these particulars doth require the giving the Creature the honour due only to God I prove thus concerning each of them 1. Where the Worship of God is terminated upon a Creature there by their own confession the Worship due only to God is given to the Creature but in the Worship of God by Images the Worship due to God is terminated wholly on the Creature which is thus proved The Worship which God himself denies to receive must be terminated on the Creature but God himself in the second Commandment not only denies to receive it but threatens severely to punish them that give it Therefore it cannot be terminated on God but only on the Image 2. The same Argument which would make the grâ—ssest Heathen Idolatry lawful cannot excuse any act from Idolatry but the same argument whereby the Papists make the Worship of the Bread in the Eucharist not to be Idolatry would make the grossest Heathen Idolatry not to be so For if it be not therefore Idolatry because they suppose the bread to be God then the Worship of the Sun was not Idolatry by them who supposed the Sun to be God and upon this ground the grâ—sser the Idolatry was the less it was Idolatry for the grâ—ssâ—st Idolaters were those who supposed their Statues to be Gods And upon this ground their Worship was more lawful than of those who supposed them not to be so 3. If the supposition of a middle excellency between God and us be a sufficient ground for formal Invocation then the Heathen Worship of their inferiour Deities could be no Idolatry for the Heathens still pretended that they did not give to them the Worship proper to the Supream God which is as much as is pretended by the devoutest Papist in justification of the Invocation of Saints To these I expect a direct and punctual answer professing as much Charity towards them as is consistent with Scripture and Reason 2. Because the Church of Rome is guilty of so great corruption of the Christian Religion by such opinions and practises which are very apt to hinder a good life Such are the destroying the necessity of a good life by making the Sacrament of Penance joyned with contrition sufficient for salvation the taking off the care of it by supposing an expiation of sin by the prayers of the living after death and the sincerity of devotion is much obstructed in it by prayers in a language which many understand not by making the efficacy of Sacraments depend upon the bare administration whether our minds be prepared for them or not by discouraging the reading the Scripture which is our most certain rule of faith and life by the multitude of superstitious observations never used in the Primitive Church as we are ready to defend by the gross abuse of people in Pardons and Indulgences by denying the Cup to the Laity contrary to the practice of the Church in the solemn Celebration of the Eucharist for a thousand years after Christ by making it in the power of any person to dispense contrary to the Law of God in oaths and Marriages by making disobedience to the Church in disputable matters more hainous than disobedience to the Lawes of Christ in unquestionable things as Marriage in a Priest to be a greater crime than Fornication By all which practises and opinions we assert that there are so many hinderances to a good life that none who have a care of their salvation can venture their souls in the communion of such a Church which either enjoyns or publickly allows them 3. Because it exposeth the â—aith of Christians to so great uncertainty By making the authority of the Scriptures to depend on the infallibility of the Church when the Churches Infallibility must be proved by the Scripture by making those things necessary to be believed which if they be believed overthrow all foundations of faith viz. That we are not to believe our senses in the plainest objects of them as that bread which we see is not bread upon which it follows that tradition being a continued kind of sensation can be no more certain than sense it self and that the Apostles might have been deceived in the Body of Christ after the Resurrection and the Church of any Age in what they saw or heard By denying to Men the use of their judgment and reason as to the matters of saith proposed by a Church when they must use it in the choice of a Church by making the Churches power extend to make new Articles of faith viz. by making those things necessary to be believed which were not so before By pâ—etending to infallibility in determining Controversies and yet not determining Controversies which are on foot among themselves All which and several other things which my designed brevity will not permit me to mention tend very much to shake the faith of such who have nothing else to rely on but the authority of the Church of Rome 3. I answer That a Protestant leaving the Communion of our Church doth incur a greater guilt than one who was bred up in the communion of the Church of Rome and continues therein by invincible ignorance and therefore cannot equally be saved with such a one For a Protestant is supposed to have sufficient convictions of the Errors of the Roman Church or is guilty of wilful ignorance if he hath not but although we know not what allowances God will make for invincible ignorance we are sure that wilful ignorance or choosing a worse Church before a better is a damnable sin and unrepented of destroys salvation To the second Question I answer 1. I do not understand what is meant by a Christian in the Abstract or in the whole Latitude it being a thing I never heard or read of before and therefore may have some meaning in it which I cannot understand 2. But if the Question be as the last words imply it Whether a Christian by vertue of his being so be bound to joyn in some Church or Congregation of Christians I answer affirmatively and that he is bound to choose the communion of the purest Church and not to leave that for a corrupt one though called never so
as in the matter of Tradition or Christs Body after the Resurrection 3. He saith that We expose Faith to great uncertainty by denying to Men the use of their Judgment and Reason as to matters of Faith proposed by a Church that is we deny particular Mens Judgment as to matters of faith to be as good if not better than the Churches and to infer from hence that we make Faith uncertain is just as if on the contrary one should say that Protestants make faith certain by exposing matter of faith determined by the Church to be discussed and reversed by the Judgment and Reason or rather Fancy of every private Man We have good store of this kind of certainty in England But as for the use of our Judgment and Reason as to the matters themselves proposed by the Church it is the daily business of Divines and Preachers not only to shew them not to be repugnant to any natural truth but also to illustrate them with Arguments drawn from reason But the use he would have of reason is I suppose to believe nothing but what his reason can comprehend and this is not only irrational in its self but contrary to the Doctrin of St. Paul where he commands us to captivate our understandings to the Obedience of Faith 4. He adds We expose faith to uncertainty by making the Church power extend to making new Articles of Faith And this if it were true were something indeed to his purpose But the Church never yet owned any such power in her General Councils but only to manifest and establish the Doctrin received from her Fore-fathers as is to be seen in the prooems of all the Sessions of the Council of Trent where the Fathers before they declare what is to be believed ever premise that what they declare is the same they have received by Tradition from the Apostles And because it may happen that some particular Doctrine was not so plainly delivered to each part of the Church as it happened in St. Cyprian's case concerning the non-rebaptization of Hereticks we acknowledg it is in her power to make that necessary to be believed which was not so before not by inventing new Articles but by declaring more explicitly the Truths contained in Scripture and Tradition Lastly he saith We expose Faith to great uncertainty because the Church pretending to infallibility does not determine Controversies on foot among our selves As if faith could not be certain unless all Controversies among particular Men be determined what then becomes of the certainty of Protestants faith who could yet never find out a sufficient means to determin any one Controversie among them for if that means be plain Scripture what one Judgeth plain another Judgeth not so and they acknowledg no Judg between them to decide the Controversie As for the Catholick Church if any Controversies arise concerning the Doctrin delivered as in St. Cyprian's case she determines the controversy by declaring what is of faith And for other Controversies which belong not to faith she permits as St. Paul saith every one to abound in his own sence And thus much in Answer to his third Argument by which and what hath been said to his former objections it appears that he hath not at all proved what he asserted in his second Answer to the first Question viz. That all those who are in the Communion of the Church of Rome do run so great a hazard of their Salvation that none who have a care of their souls ought to embrace or continue in it But he hath a third Answer for us in case the former fail and it is § 10. That a Protestant leaving the Communion of the Protestant Church doth incur a greater guilt than one who was bred up in the Church of Rome and continues therein by invincible ignorance This is the directest Answer he gives to the Question and what it imports is this That invincible Ignorance and he doth not know what allowance God will make for that neither is the only Anchor which a Catholick hath to save himself by If by discoursing with Protestants and reading their Books he be not sufficiently convinced whereas he ought in the supposition of the Answerer to be so that the Letter of the Scripture as interpretable by every private Mans reason is a most certain Rule of Faith and Life but is still over-ruled by his own Motives the same which held St. Austin in the bosome of the Catholick Church he is guilty of wilful Ignorance and consequently a lost Man there is no hope of Salvation for him Much less for a Protestant who shall embrace the Catholick Communion because he is supposed doubtless from the same Rule to have sufficient conviction of the Errours of the Roman Church or is guilty of wilful Ignorance if he have it not which is a damnable sin and unrepented of destroys salvation So that now the upshot of the Answer to the Question Whether a Protestant embracing Catholick Religion upon the same motives which one bred and well grounded in it hath to remain in it may be equally saved with him comes to this that they shall both be damned though unequally because the converted Catholick more deeply than he that was bred so And now who can out lament the sad condition of that great Doctor and Father of the Church and hitherto reputed St. Austin who rejecting the Manichees pretended rule of Scripture upon the aforesaid grounds left their Communion to embrace the Communion of the Church of Rome And what is become now of their distinction of points fundamental from not fundamental which heretofore they thought sufficient to secure both Catholicks and Protestants Salvation and to charge us with unconscionable uncharitableness in not allowing them to be sharers with us The absurdness of these consequences may serve for a sufficient conviction of the nullity of his third and last answer to the first Question As for what he saith to the second I agree so far with him that every Christian is bound to choose the Communion of the purest Church but which that Church is must be seen by the grounds it brings to prove the Doctrines it teaches to have been delivered by Christ and his Apostles That Church is to be judged purest which hath the best grounds and consequently it is of necessity to salvation to embrace the communion of it What then you are bound to do in reason and conscience is to see which Religion of the two hath the strongest Motives for it and to embrace that as you will answer the contrary to God and your own soul To help you to do this and that the Answerer may have the less exception against them I will give you a Catalogue of Catholick Motives though not all neither in the words of the fore-cited Dr. Taylor advertising only for brevity sake I leave out some mention'd by him and that in these I set down you also give allowance for some expressions of his with which
As for Marriages we acknowledge the Church may dispense in some degrees of Consanguinity and Affinity but in nothing contrary to the Law of God His Tenth pretended Obstruction of Devotion is that we make disobedience to the Church in Disputable matters more hainous than disobedience to Christ in unquestionable things as Marriage he saith in a Priest to be a greater crime than Fornication I answer That whether a Priest may Marry or no supposing the Law of the Church forbidding it is not a disputable matter but 't is out of Question even by the Law of God that Obedience is to be given to the Commands or Prohibitions of the Church The Antithesis therefore between disobedience to the Church in disputable matters and disobedience to the Laws of Christ in unquestionable things is not only impertinent to the Marriage of Priests which is unquestionably forbidden but supposing the matter to remaind sputable after the Churches Prohibition destroys all obedience to the Church But if it suppose them only disputable before then why may not the Church interpose her Judgment and put them out of dispute But still it seems strange to them who either cannot or will not take the Word of Christ that is his Counsel of Chastity that Marriage in a Priest should be a greater sin than Fornication But he considers not that though Marriage in it self be honourable yet if it be prohibited to a certain order of persons by the Church to whom Christ himself commands us to give obedience they oblige themselves by a voluntary vow to live in perpetual chastity the Law of God commanding us to pay our Vows it loses its honour in such persons and if contracted after such vow made is in the language of the Fathers no better than Adultery In the Primitive Church it was the custom of some younger Widdows to Dedicate themselves to the Service of the Church and in order therunto to take upon them a peculiar habit and make a vow of continency for the future Now in case they married after this St. Paul himself 1 Tim. 1. 12. saith That they incurred Damnation because by so doing they made void their first faith that is as the Fathers Expound it the vow they had made And the fourth Council of Carthage in which were 214 Bishops and among them St. Austin gives the Reason in these words If Wives who commit Adultery are guilty to their Husbands how much more shall such Widdows as change their Religious State be noted with the crime of Adultery And if this were so in Widdows much more in Priests if by Marrying they shall make void their first Faith given to God when they were consâ—eâ—ated in a more peculiar manner to his Service Thus much may suffice for Answer to the Argument which with its intricate terms may seem to puzzle an unlearned Reader let us now speak a word to the true state of the Controversy which is whether Marriage or single life in a Priest be more apt to obstruct or further devotion And St. Paul himself hath determined the question 1 Cor. 7. 32. where he saith He that is unmarried careth for the things that belong to our Lord how he may please our Lord But he that is Married careth for the things that are of the World how he may please his Wife This is the difference he putteth between the Married and Single life that this is apt to make us care for the things which belong to God and that to divert our thoughts from him to the things of the World Judge therefore which of these states is most convenient for Priests whose proper Office it is to attend wholly to the things of God Having thus cleared Catholick Doctrines from being any ways obstructive to good life or devotion I shall proceed to his third Argument by which he will still prove that Catholicks run a great hazard of their souls in adhering to the Communion of the Church of Rome Because it exposeth the Faith of Christians to so great uncertainty This is a strange charge from the Pen of a Protestant who hath no other certainty for his faith but every Man's interpretation of the Letter of the Scriptures But First he saith it doth this By making the Authority of the Scriptures to depend upon the infallibility of the Church when the Churches infallibility must be proved by the Scriptures To this I Answer that the Authority of the Scripture not in it self for so it hath its Authority from God but in order to us and our belief of it depends upon the infallibility of the Church And therefore St. Austin saith of himself That he would not believe the Gospel unless the Authority of the Catholick Church did move him And if you ask him what moved him to submit to that Authority he tells you That besides the Wisdom he found in the Tenets of the Church there were many other things which most justly held him in it as the consent of People and Nations an Authority begun by Miracles nourished by Hope increased by Charity and established by Antiquity the succession of Priests from the very Seat of St. Peter to whom our Lord commended the feeding of his Sheep unto the present Bishoprick Lastly The very name of Catholick which this Church alone among so many Heresies hath not without cause obtained so particularly to her self that wheras all Hereticks would be called Catholicks yet if a stranger demand where the Catholicks go to Church none of these Hereticks dares to shew either his own House or Church These saith St. Austin so many and great most dear bonds of the name of Christian do justly hold a believing Man in the Catholick Church These were the grounds which moved that great Man to submit to her Authority And when Catholick Authors prove the infallibility of the Church from Scriptures 't is an Argument ad hominem to convince Protestants who will admit nothing but Scripture and yet when they are convinced quarrel at them as illogical Disputants because they prove it from Scripture Next he saith we overthrow all foundation of Faith because We will not believe our sences in the plainest Objects of them But what if God have interposed his Authority as he hath done in the case of the Eucharist where he tells us that it is his Body must we believe our sences rather than God or must we not believe them in other things because in the particular case of the Eucharist we must believe God rather than our sences Both these consequences you see are absurd Now for the case it self in which he instances Dr. Taylor above cited confesses that they viz. Catholicks have a divine Revelation viz. Christ's word This is my Body whose Litteral and Grammatical sence if that sence were intended would warrant them to do violence to all the Sciences in the Circle but I add it would be no precedent to them not to believe their sences in other the plainest Objects of them
he hath mis-represented them Thus then he Liberty of Proph. Sect. 20. Speaking of Catholicks The beauty and Splendour of their Church their pompous he should have said solemn Service the stateliness and solemnity of the Hierarchy their Name of Catholick which they suppose he should have said their very Adversaries give them as their own due and to concern no other Sect of Christians the Antiquity of many of their Doctrines he should have said all the continual succession of their Bishops their immediate derivation from the Apostles their Title to succeed St. Peter the flattering he should have said due expressions of Minor Bishops he means in acknowledging the Pope head of the Church which by being old records have obtained credibility the multitude and variety of People which are of their perswasion apparent consent with Antiquity in many Ceremonials which other Churches have rejected and a pretended and sometimes he should have said always apparent consent with some elder Ages in matters Doctrinal The great consent of one part with another in that which most of them affirm to be de fide of Faith The great differences which are commenced among their Adversaries abusing the liberty of Prophecying into a very great licentiousness Their happiness of being Instruments in converting divers he should rather have said of all Nations The piety and austerity of their Religious Orders of Men and Women The single life of their Priests and Bishops the severity of their Fasts and their exteriour observances the great reputation of their first Bishops for faith and sanctity the known holiness of some of those persons whose institutes the religious persons pretend to imitate the oblique Arts and indirect proceedings of some of those who dâ—parted from them and amongst many other things the names of Heretick and Schismatick which they with infinite pertinacity he should have said upon the same grounds the Fathers did fasten upon all that disagree from them These things saith he and divers others may very easily perswade persons of much reason and more piety to retain that which they know to have been the Religion of their Forefathers which had actually possession and seizure of Mens understandings before the opposite professions to wit of Protestant Presbyterian Anabaptist c. had a name Thus Dr. Taylor an eminent and leading Man amongst the Protestants and if he confess that these Motives were sufficient for a Catholick to retain his Religion they must be of like force to perswade a dis-interessed Protestant to embrace it unless the Protestants can produce Motives for their Religion of greater or at least equal force with these which so great a Man among them confesseth that Catholicks have for theirs Here therfore you must call upon the Author of the Paper you sent me to produce a Catalogue of grounds or at least some one ground for the Protestant Religion of greater or equal force with all these And as Dr. Taylor saith divers others which he omitted viz. The Scripture interpreted by the consent of Fathers the determination of General Councils the known Maxime of Catholicks that nothing is to be believed of Faith but what was received from their Fore-fathers as handed down from the Apostles The testimony of the present Church of no less Authority now than in St. Austin's time both for the Letter and the sence of the Scripture c. Do this and the Controversie will quickly be at an end Particular disputes are endless and above the understanding of such as are not learned but in grounds and principles 't is not so hard for Reason and common sence to Judge That you may the better do it in your case I shall desire you to take these two Cautions along with you First That the Subject of the present Controversie are not those Articles in which the Protestants agree with us and for which they may pretend to produce the same Motives we do But in those in which they dissent from us such as are no Transubstantiation no Purgatory no honour due to Images no Invocation to Saints and the like in which the very Essence of Protestant as distinct from Catholick consists What Motives they can or will produce for these I do not fore-see The pretence of Scriptures being sufficiently plain hath no place here because then the foresaid Negatives would be necessary to be believed as divine Truths And for their own Reason and Learning it will be found too light when put into the Scale against that of the Catholick Church for so many Ages The second Caution is That you be careful to distinguish between Protestants producing grounds for their own Religion and finding fault with ours An Atheist can cavil and find fault with the grounds which learned Men bring to prove a Deity such as are the Order of this visible World the general consent of Nations c. In this an Atheist thinks he doth somewhat But can he produce as good or better grounds for his own Opinion No you see then 't is one thing to produce grounds for what we hold and another to find fault with those which are produced by the contrary part The latter hath made Controversie so long and the former will make it as short let the Answerer therefore instead of finding fault with our Motives produce his own for the Articles in Controversie and I am confident you will quickly discern which carry the most weight and consequently which are to be preferred A Full Refutation OF Dr. STILLINGFLEET's Unjust Charge of IDOLATRY Against the Church of Rome The First Part. Of the Veneration of Holy Images CHAP. I. The First and Second Answer to the First Question shewn not pertinent Necessity of Communion with the Church of Rome proved and his Charge of Idolatry overthrown by his own Principles § 1. WHoever considers how Dr. Stillingfleet in his Answer to the Two Questions has engag'd himself and his Adversary in Seventeen or Eighteen of the most material Controversies between Catholicks and Protestants besides innumerable others of lesser concern which together with the former have swell'd his Rejoynder to a short Paper into a large Book will not very easily free him upon his own word from being fond of the practise of the Noble Science of Controversie or as his Friend Dr. T. calls it The Blessed Art of Eternal Wrangling especially if he reflect how easie and obvious the Answer was to the Questions themselves without running into farther Disputes To the First by shewing that the Motives which are sufficient to secure the Salvation of one bred up and well-grounded in Catholick Religion are not sufficient to secure the salvation of one bred up in the Protestant who convinced by them should embrace the Catholick To the Second by shewing the Motives for Communion with the Protestant Church to be greater and stronger than those for the Roman and therefore that to be necessarily embraced before this it being agreed between us that it is of necessity to salvation to be
a Member of some distinct Church This had been a ready way to put an end to the Dispute and give Satisfaction to the Reader and this had been sufficient our Assent to the Articles in controversie depending upon the strength of the Motives But to multiply Disputes without cause without end and without bringing them to Grounds and Principles as it is no good Argument to prove a man not to be fond of Controversie so all the Satisfaction the Reader is likely to gather from it is a despair of being ever satisfied When therefore the Doctor says he had no other end in this increase of Controversies but to let his Protestant Reader see there could be no reason to forsake the Communion of that Church it is much like as if a Mother to deter her Son from travelling into other Countries should tell him there was a great Sea between full of Rocks and Pirates and no Vessel strong enough to venture over Besides that the Countrey whither he was going swarmed with Bears and Lions This is one way to let him see there could be no reason to think of leaving his Native Countrey and this is the Method generally pursued by our Adversaries for want of sound Principles to retain their Adherents in their Communion to make the dangers and difficulties they are to incounter with in that of the Roman seem insuperable and therefore best for them to sit down contented where they are But what if all the dangers and difficulties he raises prove but Bugbears and Scare-Crows This I hope by GOD's Grace to make appear in the following Treatise § 2. His first Answer to the first Question was that an equal capacity of Salvation of those persons supposed not onely in order to a safer Church but in two several Churches supposed equally safe can be no argument to forsake the Communion of the one for the other To this I reply'd that the Answer was altogether impertinent to the Question the Controversie not being between two persons compared with a third in a safer Church nor yet between two several Churches supposed to have in them an equal capacity of Salvation but between a Catholick bred so and a Protestant converted to be so whether the later having the same Motives with the former may not equally be saved with him To what purpose then was it to talk of an equal capacity supposed in two persons compared with a third in a much safer condition or in two several Churches compared to one another unless it were to make his Reader believe that a supposed possibility of Salvation in the Catholick Church was used by me as a sufficient Argument to embrace its Communion Whereas his own telling the Person concerned that however Catholicks who were bred so might be saved yet a Person leaving the Protestant Communion for the Catholick could Not be Saved in it was that which occasion'd the Question A weak but common Artifice of the Doctor and his Party to deter Persons from embracing the Catholick Communion when yet the more genuine Sons of the Church of England are not so cruel as to damn all those who embrace it The Answer then was nothing to the purpose of the Question and this himself seems to acknowledge when he adds Whether it were to the Question or no he is sure it was very much to the purpose for which this Controversie was first started And then having gotten this loop-hole he beseeches the Person who had proposed the Question to propose another and if not for her own sake yet for his to insist upon that he may know one reason at least why the Believing all the Ancient Creeds and leading a Good Life may not be sufficient to salvation unless one be of the Communion of the Church of Rome And this he says he cannot yet procure though he have often requested it Here himself is afraid he may be thought to digress but so earnest a request must not be denied § 3. I remember I promised to speak to this Point when it should be proper viz. in handling the second Question Whether it be necessary to be a Member of some distinct Church where it came in order and I did so though my Adversary takes no notice of it here as far as was pertinent to the present purpose when upon his Grant that A Christian by vertue of his being so is bound to joyn in some Church and to chuse the Communion of the purest I subjoyned that that Church was to be judged the purest which had the strongest Motives for it and then laid down a Catalogue of such weighty Motives for the Roman Catholick allowed by Dr. Taylor To which I added That neither himself in his Defence nor Dr. Taylor when he had a mind to invalidate them produced any thing to weigh against them but a few Tinsel-words and one Scripture-Testimony interpreted by and according to their own Fancy Having done this they sing Io Triumphe that Thou shalt not worship any graven Image will out-weigh all the best and fairest Imaginations of the Roman Church And now let the Reader judge whether he had any reason to say that he could not procure an Answer to this Question though he had often requested it § 4. But because he seems so little satisfied with this Answer as to take no notice of it I shall now enforce it farther with this Argument ad hominem There was in the World before Luther a distinct Church whose Communion was necessary to Salvation But this was not the Protestant Therefore it was the Roman The Major is evident from his own Concession that a Christian by virtue of his being so is bound to joyn in some distinct Church which is not possible if there be not such a distinct Church to joyn with The Minor also that this was not the Protestant is manifest because before Luther there was no such Church in the World distinct from the Roman It follows therefore the Question between him and us being of the necessity of Communion either with the Roman or with the Protestant that of the two the Roman Church was and still is as remaining still the same that Church whose Communion is necessary to Salvation § 5. Again taking the term Roman-Church not onely for the particular Diocess of Rome but for the Churches also in Communion with it as the Head as we generally take it in this Controversie nothing can render her Communion not necessary to Salvation but either Heresie that is an adhesion to some private or singular Opinion or Errour in Faith or Schism that is a Separation from former Ecclesiastical Unity For the first my Adversary himself Rat. Account p. 54. acknowledges as I shall shew before I end this Chapter the Church of Rome to believe all the same Articles of Faith with the Protestant and that the Points in which the Protestant differs from the Roman are not Articles of Faith consequently the Opposite Tenets to them can be no
Errours in Faith with him And for the second if he will make the Church of Rome guilty of Schism he must assign some other distinct Church then at least in being from whose Unity she departed which I think was never pretended I am sure can never be performed As for the Charge of Causal Schism that is the Churches having given just cause for Separation the common plea of all Separatists by Imposing as is pretended New Articles of Faith and some of them Idolatrous as it implies an acknowledgment of the Fact of Schism that is of breaking Church-Unity to be on the Protestants side so till the Accusation be made good and judged so by some other more competent Judge than themselves they stand arraigned of the Crime of Schism also for breaking Communion with the Church of Rome § 6. Lastly not to spend too much time in a Digression and yet satisfie his desire and if not his the Readers why the Believing all the Antient Creeds and leading a Good Life may not be sufficient to Salvation unless one be of the Communion of the Church of Rome I argue thus A Christian by virtue of his being so is bound to be of the Communion of that Church which evidently was the true one and the purest until it be as evidently at least if not more evidently proved not to be so for otherwise he wrongs both his Reason and Conscience if he leave a greater evidence and adhere to a lesser But the Roman Church as comprehending all those in Communion with her by the Testimony not only of S. Paul Rom. c. 1. and c. 16. but of the whole Christian World of all Ages was evidently once the onely true Church of Christ and conseqently the Purest and neither hath nor can be as evidently much less more evidently proved not to be so still since the Testimony of those who do or will deny it is incomparably short of the former Therefore a Christian by virtue of his being so is bound to be of the Communion of the Roman Church § 7. Having thus not only given one but more Reasons to his Demand which I heartily pray may do him good because he requested so earnestly to know them I cannot but reflect how speciously soever it hath been hitherto pretended against the Church of Rome that the believing all the Ancient Creeds and leading a Good Life is all that is necessary to Salvation yet now there is more required by him viz. to joyn in some Church or Congregation of Christians by virtue of a mans being a Christian and that he is bound to chuse the Communion of the Purest Church by which I will suppose at present he means the Church of England I hope I may without offence take the same liberty with him which he did with me and desire if not for my own sake at least for the satisfaction of the Presbyterians Anabaptists and other Separated Congregations to know one Reason from him why the believing all the Ancient Creeds and leading a Good Life may not be sufficient to Salvation unless one be of the Communion of the Church of England I confess I may be mistaken to suppose him to mean by the purest Church the Church of England It is not improbable as will appear in the following Discourse that he means that of the Presbyterians but let him mean which he will it comes all to the same pass I leave him to satisfie all other Sectaries why they are bound by virtue of their Christianity to joyn in either of those two Congregations or if not in them in any other which he fancies to be the purest Which done I proceed to his Second Answer to the First Question very fitly called by him the main business because it serves him as a Foundation to raise so many Controversies upon as by his manner of treating them may frighten any one that shall but look toward the Roman Church into despair of ever getting out of so intricate a Labyrinth § 8. His second Answer to the Frst Question was That all those who are in the Communion of the Church of Rome do run so great a hazard of their Salvation that none who have a care of their Souls ought to embrace it or continue in it because they must be guilty either of Hypocrisie or Idolatry sins inconsistent with Salvation This I said was as little pertinent to the Question as the former for though it be supposed that none ought to embrace or continue in the Catholick Church by reason of the great hazard he saith they run of their Salvation yet if they do embrace it why may they not be equally saved that is with equal hazard To this he returns that he is amazed I should say this Answer of his was not pertinent to the Question if the Question were propounded for any ones satisfaction that doubted which Churches Communion it were best to embrace And who can chuse but be more amazed at this Reply which gives no satisfaction at all to the Question For the Question supposing the same Motives and consequently an equal capacity or hazard as he will have it of Salvation in two persons what answer is it to the Question whether they may not equally be saved though with hazard to say the hazard they run is very great And yet of 573 pages his Book contains no less than 544 of them are spent upon this subject Tant◠〈…〉 I added farther That this Answer of his implied a Contradiction in asserting that all those of the Catholick Communion do run indeed a great hazard of their Salvation and then affirming for proof of this Assertion that they must be guilty of Hypocrisie or Idolatry sins inconsistent with Salvation Which reduced into plain terms is no other but to say they may be saved though with danger and yet indeed they cannot be saved at all To salve this Contradiction he runs to a pretended supposition of wilful embracing or continuing in Hypocrisie or Idolatry sins if unrepented of inconsistent with Salvation But this Salve is not at all proper for the Sore since if the Motives convince the Understanding and the Persons be sincere as the Question supposes there cannot with any shew of Reason be any thing of wilfulness supposed in the Case The Answer then was nothing to the purpose of the Question but onely that it might serve him for an occasion to bring the whole Body of Controversie into the Field and give a treble Charge of Idolatry against the Church of Rome viz. in worshipping of Images Adoration of the Host and Invocation of Saints There want not Learned and Eminent men of the Church of England who think the Charge to be over great and there needs no more than his own Principles to make the Metal of his Proofs appear of too inferiour an Alloy to bear it Which thus I shew § 9. In his Rational Account of the Grounds of Protestant Religion pag. 54. he lays down the state of the difference
between the Church of Rome and the Church of England in these words The Church of Rome imposeth new Articles of Faith to be believed as necessary to Salvation But the Church of England makes no Articles of Faith but such as have the Testimony and Approbation of the whole Christian World of all Ages and are acknowledged to be such by Rome it self and in other things as that no Veneration is due to Images the Bread is not Transubstantiated into the Body of Christ Saints are not to be invocated c. she requires subscription to them not as Articles of Faith but as inferiour Truths or as Dr. Bramhall Lord Primate of Ireland alledged by him calls them Pious Opinions fitted for the preservation of Unity not says he that we oblige any man to believe them but onely not to oppose or contradict them This then is the Basis and Foundation he lays of his Rational Account of the Grounds of the Protestant Religion that no Doctrine of the Protestant Religion as it differs from that of the Roman is an Article of Faith that is that no Protestant believes or if he do he ought not to believe as a matter of Faith that the Images for example of Christ and his Saints are not to be honoured that the substance of the Bread is not changed into the Body of Christ that the Saints in Heaven are not to be invoked to pray for us Nay all that he is obliged to by the Church of England is not to oppose or contradict them This being so let us now see what follows from this Doctrine 1. It follows that the Church of Rome does not erre against any Article of Faith because the Church of England as he saith makes no Articles of Faith but such as are acknowledged to be such by Rome it self 2dly It follows that himself does not believe any of these Points to be Articles of Faith Viz. That Veneration is not to be given to Holy Images that Adoration is not to be given to the Eucharist or that the Saints are not to be invocated because to be Articles of Faith with him they must have the Testimony and Approbation of the whole Christian World of all Ages and be acknowledged to be such by Rome it self 3dly It follows that after all this bustle to make the Church of Rome guilty of Idolatry in these very Points of Veneration of Images c. For ought any Man knows himself gives no interiour assent to any of the forementioned Tenets not even as to Inferiour Truths or Pious Opinions because the Church of England as he cites out of Dr. Bramhall doth not oblige any Man to believe them but only not to oppose or contradict them and it is not likely he defers more to the Church of England than she obliges him too 4thly and lastly It follows that his charge of Idolatry against the Church of Rome is vain and groundless for Idolatry being an Errour against the most Fundamental Point of Faith and the Church of Rome according to him not erring against any Article of Faith 't is evident that to charge the Church of Rome with Idolatry must according to his own Principles be the most groundless unreasonable and contradictory proceeding in the World But it is time now to come to particulars onely I must not omit to desire every indifferent Reader to reflect and judge whether Dr. Stillingfleet to render the Doctrine of the 39. Articles digestible to the most squeamish stomack of the nicest Nonconformist have not done a notable piece of service to the Church of England in degrading so many of them as are not acknowledged by the Church of Rome although they be esteemed the distinctive badg of the purity of the Church of England from the dignity of being Articles of Faith into a lower Classe of Inferiour Truths as he calls them which neither himself nor any Body else know whether they have a grain of truth in them or no and consequently are not bound to believe them Nay does he not undermine the Church of England both in her Doctrine and Government In her Doctrine by freeing her Subjects from any obligation of interiour believing her Articles in which she differs from the Church of Rome to be so much as Inferiour Truths In her Government by exposing her Ordination to be invaded without scruple by such as in their hearts judg it Anti-Christian when he tells them her Sense is to oblige them no farther than not to oppose or contradict it Was it not worth the while to rend asunder the Peace of Christendom for a Company of Opinions which though Dr. Bramhall call them Pious yet the greater part of Christians both in the East and West for many Ages have and do condemn for Impious and Blasphemous Is not this a very Rational or rather as Mr. J. S. expounds the word a very Reasonable Account of the Grounds of Protestant Religion and a rare way of justifying her from the Guilt of Schism Sure he never thought of charging the Church of Rome with Idolatry when he laid such sandy Principles for his Foundation Principles of so brittle a temper that it was not possible they should bear so great a Charge without breaking and discharging upon himself CHAP. II. Dr. St.'s chief Argument to prove the Church of Rome guilty of Idolatry examined and his Preposterous ways of arguing laid open § 1. IT is a known saying of St. Irenaeus and St. Hierom Ep. ad Ctesiphont speaking of those who set up their own fancies in opposition to the Doctrine of the Church that to lay open what they hold is to refute it and certainly it was never more true than in the subject of the present Debate concerning the Veneration of Images the very light of nature teaching that the honour or dishonour done to a Picture or Image reflects upon the Person represented by it This Protestants themselves confess in civil matters as in the Picture or Image of the King in order to his Person and did they not corrupt themselves in those things which they know naturally they could not but acknowledg the same in the Image of Christ and his Saints in order to them For is it an honour to the King to kiss his Picture and is it not the like to Christ to put off our Hats or kneel before His Was it a dishonour to the King to shoot his Picture with Bullets a◠the Souldiers did in the late times as they march'd along the Streets And was it none to Christ to have his Image bor'd through with hot Irons as he was represented rising from the Grave upon Cheapside Cross A Man would think there needed no more but the light of Nature and Common sence to decide this Controversie and yet the Doctor will needs sustain that the honour given to the Images of Christ and his Saints does not redound at all to them but is so far from that that it is no other than down right Idolatry §
Nature or Essence which is properly signified by such a Name The Doctor therefore to give him his due in the beginning of his Charge argues like a good Logician when he would conclude the Church of Rome guilty of Idolatry because he says she requires the giving to the Creature the Honour due onely to God But he plays the downright Sophister in the close when he would prove that in worshipping God by an Image she gives to the Image the Honour due onely to Him because if God have given it the name of Idolatry it must receive the denomination of Idolatry Either he must make it out that a meer Extrinsecal Denomination has the miraculous power to reflect against Nature the Honour directed to God from Him to the Image or he must confess that Gods Prohibition of such Worship if there were any may make it indeed to be unlawful but hinders not the Act from tending whither it was intended and consequently if it be intended or directed by the Understanding and Will to God though after an unlawful manner it will not fail to be terminated on God Nor is this to make the Intentions of men to be the Rule of Divine Worship for if God have forbidden himself to be Worshipped after such a manner the giving him such Worship will be a dishonouring of Him though the Giver intend it never so much for his honour Disobedience it will be or some other sin and denominatively Idolatry if forbidden under that name but not a terminating the honour due to God upon the Image unless the Doctor think it a good Argument to prove the Fields and Trees to be Merry Companions because the Prophet says The Fields are joyful and the Trees of the Wood rejoyce These he will say are Metaphorical denominations and so must that of Idolatry be in his supposed Prohibition unless he can prove the Worship due to God to be terminated wholly on the Image and so the Act it self to have in it the true nature of Idolatry antecedently to such a denomination § 9. As for that Courtly Comparison of his that it would be Treason in any man to bow down to a Sign Post with the Princes Head upon it though with an intention to honour him by it a most self-denying Ordinance I confess and not unlike to that rare example of Self-denyal to which himself so Religiously exhorts the Prelates of the Church of England in the Preface to his Irenicum viz. to reduce the form of Church-Government to its Primitive State and Order by retrenching all Exorbitancies as he calls them of Power and restoring Presbyteries as the World is like to want such an unheard-of Example of Self-abnegation at least till Princes can be perswaded that the honour or dishonour done to their Pictures reflects not upon Them and that Act of the Civil Law be repealed L. unica cod de his qui ad Statuas which declares it Treason for any man to deface his Princes Picture So were it enacted it would not hinder the Act of Reverence and Respect from being terminated upon the Prince to whom it was intended § 10. To the Instances I gave in my Reply of the Prayers which Thieves and Murderers make to God for good success of the Jews offering to God the Blind and Lame which he had forbidden and of Cain's offering a Sacrifice to God which he refused to accept all which evidently shew that God's having forbidden such a kind of Worship hinders it not from being terminated on him All that he answers is That these Instances do not suppose any prohibited Object or Means of Worship as he supposeth the Worship of God by an Image doth And here again he falls into the same Contradiction as before viz. that it is the Worship of God by an Image and yet the Image is made the whole and sole object of Worship But to conclude this point 'T is evident that the Image is not made the Object of Worship by the Intention of him that gives it which says Dr. Taylor is that by which God principally if not solely takes estimate of humane actions for what he intends is to Worship God by it and the Intention not making it the Object of Worship an Extrinsecal Denomination from a Law forbidding if there were any such cannot make it to be so nor hinder the Act from being terminated on God its intended Object 'T is manifest then that the Major Proposition of the Argument brought by him to prove the Church of Rome guilty of Idolatry viz. That the Worship which God denies to receive must be terminated on the Creature is absolutely false and consequently all that he builds upon it falls to the ground But this was but a Prelude to usher in his Minor viz. That God not onely denies to receive Worship by an Image but threatens severaly to punish them that give it Upon this it is he lays the main stress of his Charge of Idolatry how inconsequently though supposed to be as he would have it a Prohibition I have shewed already and shall make yet more apparent by laying open the nullity of the Proofs he brings to maintain it CHAP. III. The mystery of making the same Proposition sometimes an Article of Faith and sometimes none No express Text against Worshipping God by an Image His first Proof from the Terms of the Law manifesâ—ly groundless The Argument from St. Austin's Judgment and the Septuagints translating the word Pesel Idol and not Image re-inforced 1. WHat we are to consider in the first place here is what it is that Dr. St. will undertake to prove and it is this That God in the second Commandment according to his reckoning expresly prohibited the giving any Worship to himself by an Image This is what upon his Second Thoughts for the term expresly was not in his FIRST Answer he undertakes to prove And I cannot but wonder to see it drop now from his Pen who on the one side asserts Scripture doubtless express Scripture to be his most certain Rule of Faith and on the other side denies as I shewed above Chap. 1. any thing to bâ— an Article of Faith which is not acknowledged to be such by Rome it self What may the meaning of this be If it be expresly revealed in Scripture that God is not to be worshipped by an Image it is an Article of Faith If it be not acknowledged to be such by Rome it self it is no Article of Faith but as he calls it an Inferiour Truth or Pious Opinion yet such as neither himself nor any man else is bound to believe there is a jot of Truth in it Is it then or is it not an Article of Faith that God is not to be worshipped by an Image If it be an Article of Faith 't is false what he asserts so stiffly in his Rational Account p. 54. that the Church of England makes no Articles of Faith but what are acknowledged to be such by Rome it self If it be
not an Article of Faith 't is false what he affirms so positively here that God hath expresly prohibited it in the second Commandment Which side soever he takes 't is manifest he contradicts himself 2. But perhaps his meaning is that what at one time is but an Inferiour Truth must at another be an Article of Faith according as it may serve to the different ends and purposes he has designed to himself And here if I mistake not lies the Knack or if you will give it so venerable a name the Mystery of the business When the Hedge of the Church of England viz. Subscription to her 39 Articles must be broken down for the good Brethren the Nonconformists to enter in and ravage without scruple her Rights and Revenues so many of the said Articles as are not owned by Rome it self must be a company of Inferious Truths or Pious Opinions not to be assented to but not to be opposed for Unity's sake But when the Church of Rome is to be charged with Idolatry the Pretence with which Ignorant Preachers says Mr. Thorndike Just Weights p. 128. drive their Factions then they are no more Infericur Truths but Articles of Faith expresly revealed in the Holy Scriptures Now would an Impartial Reader to use Dr. Taylor 's expression upon another occasion say upon his conscience that this was not kindly done to make use of the Authority of the Church of Rome to unhallow so many of the 39 Articles as are not owned by her and cast them down into the Class of Inferiour Truths to stitch up the Rent made by the Nonconformists from the Church of England And then to consecrate them again so easily by virtue of this one definitive word Expresly into Divine Revelations against the Church of Rome to make the Breach of the Church of England from her yet wider But what cannot an Irenical Compliance with one Party and a Polemical Animosity or as Mr. Thorndike calls it Faction with another do When the same Proposition as it respects the former shall be rank'd onely amongst Inferiour Truths which none are obliged to assent to and as it oppugns the latter shall be raised to an Article of Faith which all are bound to believe Here then lies the Mystery that the same Proposition viz. That God is not to be worshipped by an Image taken Irenically and in its Paciâ—iâ—k Temper is but an Inferiour Truth because not owned to be an Article of Faith by the Church of Rome but taken Polemically and in its â—aâ—like Humour it must be an Article of Faith because expresly as he says revealed in Scripture And if he will have it so let us see how he goes about to prove it 3. Our Contrâ—versie says he p. 58. being 〈◊〉 about the sence of a Law the best ways we have to find the meaning of it are either from the Terms in which it is expressâ—d or from the Reason annexed to it or from the Judgment of Thâ—se whom we believe best able to understand and interpret it And he will prove from every one of these three ways that it is expresly prohibited in the second Commandment to worship God by an Image It were well he would tell us here first what he understands by the term Expresly For if he calls that for example an express Text which of it self is absolutely clear and manifest and therefore as St. Austin says de unit Eâ—â—l c. 19. Non eget Interprete needs no Interpreter Mr. Thorndike and those other Learned Men of the Church of England who see no better than he have reason to lament the loss of their Eye-sight But if he mean no more but that it is clear and manifest to himself they may hope they see as well as their Neighbours though they see the quite contrary unless They will suffer themselves to be wrought upon by his stout asserting it to be clear and manifest as the Travellers were by Polus in Erasmus his Exorcismus when pretending that he saw a huge Dragon with â—iery Horns in the Sky by avouching it strongly and pointing expresly to the place he forced them out of shame not to see so perspicuous a thing to confess that they saw it also That it is not absolutely clear and manifest of it self the pains and the ways he takes to make it out sufficiently evince And whether it be clear and manifest even to himself we have cause to doubt because the Proposition in debate viz. That God hath prohibited the worshipping himself by an Image in the second Commandment not being acknowledged by the Church of Rome for an Article of Faith the Church of England says he obliges no man to assent to it but onely not to oppose it and yet on the other side every man is bound to assent to that which he sees to be clear and manifest Such frequent self-contradictions are the natural Consequences of a Discourse not grounded upon Truth And although the Reader may think I take a delight to discover them in my Adversary yet I can assure him 't is a much greater Grief to me to see so subtil a Wit so often entangled in them The fault is in the Couse which cannot be managed without falling into them But as St. Austin says Quis coegit ers malam causam habere Who forced him and his Partizans to engage in a bad Cause Nothing of Faith if it be true which he tells us in his Rational Account Nothing of Reason as I shall shew in the Examination of his Proofs 4. The first way he takes to prove that God in the second Commandment hath expresly prohibited the giving any Worship to himself by an Image is from the Terms in which the Law is expressed And what are they in the Protestants own Translation Exod. 20. 4 Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven Image or any likeness of any thing c. Thou shalt not bow down thy self to them nor serve them These are the Terms in which the Law is expressed and where I pray is it expressed here that we may not give any Worship to God himself by an Image The first part touches not the Worship of Images nor of God himself by them but onely the making them and gives matter to Divines to dispute whether it be forbidden by this Commandment to make any Image or any Likeness at all A thing in which Catholicks and Protestants are equally concerned The second forbids indeed in express terms to bow our selves down to the Images themselves but speaks not one word of the lawfulness or unlawfulness of worshipping God himself by them So that in case we have not here another of the Doctors Identical Propositions viz. that to treat a matter expresly is the same in other words as not to speak of it at all it is manifest that to worship God himself before or by an Image is not expresly prohibited in this Commandment Let the Protestant Reader consider this well and not suffer himself to be
the end of this be but the banishing Faith and Christianity out of the World § 3. After all these endeavours to wrest out of our hands the supposition he so freely granted p. 110. of the same Revelation for Christ's Presence in the Eucharist as for his Divinity he would bring the business at last to a Composition if we will beg of him to yield that the Body of Christ being present his Divinity is there present too And I am not so nice if it will come no cheaper way as not to begg it of him for Christianity's sake but then he adds that even upon this supposition that Christ's Divinity is present with his Body in the Sacrament p. 127. his mind must still unavoidably rest unsatisfied as to the Adoration of the Host For supposing the divine Nature present in any thing gives no ground upon that account to give the same worship to the thing wherein he is present as I do to Christ himself But here again he relapses into his former mistake of the Controversy which in spight of the practise of Catholicks which is to adore Christ under the Accidents in like manner as he was worshipped in his Apparel he will have to be that proper divine worship is to be given to the Accidents For this is what he means here by the Host Let him state the Question as it ought to be that is Whether Christ may not be worshipped under the Accidents as well as in his Garments Or if he will needs mix the Questions of the Schools with those of Faith Whether the Accidents may not be worshipped together with Christ in like manner as his Garments were worshipped together with Him And the Controversy will quickly be at an End But not to tire the Reader with following him in his Repetitions his scruple if I mistake not at present is why supposing the divine nature present in any thing gives no ground to worship every thing in which he is present yet his presence in the Eucharist should be a sufficient reason to worship the Accidents together with him And to this I give Bellarmin 's answer which I take also to be the sense of Greg. de Valentia in the place cited by the Doctor Longe aliter Christus est in Eucharistia c. That Christ is in the Eucharist in a far different manner than God is in other things For in the Eucharist there is but one only Suppositum and that divine All other things there present belong to that and in a certain manner make one with that though not in the same manner mark that Hence it is that the whole is rightly worshipped together as we said before of Christ apparell'd But although God be in all other things yet not so that he is one Suppositum with them nor is there such an Union between God and the Creature in which he is that they can be said to be in a manner One. By this it appears that as Greg. de Valentia deservedly calls this presence of Christ to the Accidents an admirable Conjuction so the Doctor unjustly imposes upon Bellarmin that he grants as great an hypostatical union between Christ and the Accidents as between the divine and humane Nature for although Bellarmin say that all things there present in a certain manner make One with the Suppositum yet he declares expresly that it is not in the same manner But here the Doctor complains of un-intelligible terms and notions used in this matter And might he not do the same with as much reason of the terms and Notions used by the School-men in explicating the mysteries of the Trinity and Incarnation How un-intelligible soever the School-terms appear to him yet it is very easy to understand that neither Greg. de Valentia nor Bellarmin mean to give divine honour to the Accidents for themselves and yet much easier to understand what Christian People mean when they profess the Object of their Adoration in the Eucharist to be the only begotten Son of God under the Accidents of Bread and Wine As for what he alledges out of Vasquez that supposing the presence of Christ to be the Ground of Adoration it follows in his Opinion that God may very lawfully be adored by us in any created Beeing wherein he is intimately present I have spoken to it in the 5th Chapt. of the 1. Part And as Vasquez himself acknowledges the danger of that Doctrine if it should be commonly and publickly put in practise by the People for possibly there may be another consideration for Philosophical and Contemplative Men in their private Devotions as St. Leo there cited seems to grant so if the Doctrine be Good what follows from thence is that Christ being supposed to be really present in the Sacrament and in a particular manner by Transubstantiation may most certainly be adored in it Vasquez was a Man of great learning and of a searching wit but it is noted of him as of Lactantius that he was more subtil in oppugning the Opinions of others than solid in establishing his own CHAP. IV. Dr. St.'s Fundamental Principle of judging of matters proposed to our Belief by Sense and Reason shown to be absurd in it self and destructive to Christianity § 1. WE come now to the Doctor 's Second Proposition that there are not the same Motives and Grounds to believe the Doctrine of Transubstantiation that there are to believe that Christ is God which he saith I affirm without any appearance of reason And he would gladly know what excellent Motives and Reasons those are which so advantageously recommend so absurd a doctrine as Transubstantiation is as to make any Man think he hath reason to believe it He is sure he saith it gives the greatest advantage to the Enemies of Christ's Divinity to see these two put together upon equal terms as though no Man could have reason to believe Christ to be the Eternal Son of God that did not at the same time swallow the greatest Contradictions to sense and reason imaginable This is a Topick in which the Doctor wonderfully delights himself as all others have done before him who have deserted the Faith of the Church We have it over and over at every turn as if the whole System of Christian Faith and every particular Article of it were to be measured by the Standard of Sense and Reason so that if any thing seem absurd and contradictory to them no grounds or motives can recommend it so advantageously as to make any Man think he hath reason to believe it This is what lies at the bottom of his Discourse and himself lays it down for the only Principle oâ— Criterium by which we are to judge of the Truth of Divine Revelation when in his second Câ—asse of Principles he affirms There can be no other means imagined whereby we are to judg of the Truth of divine Revelation but a Faculty in us of discerning truth and falshood in matters propos'd to our Belief
of Sense or Reason can digest it Fools as you are what Demonstration So evident as this My God profest it And if you once can prove that He can lie This Wonder and Him too I will deny 89 What thank is it that you can credit that Which your own sense Reason's eye reads plain Heaven 's much to them beholden who will not Believe it higher is than they can strain Who jealous are of God and will not be Induc'd to trust Him further than they see 90 And yet had you these modest eyes of mine You in this gloomy Cloud would see the Sun That Sun who wisely doth disdain to shine On those who with bold prying press upon His secret Majesty which plainly I Because I make no anxious search descry 91 This is the valorous Resolution Of Gallant Faith and this will serve to be The Blessed Rule by which all those must run Who are the Scholars of Humility Yet I must tell thee Psyche itching Pride VVill not hereafter thus be satisfied And then having inveigh'd in the following Stanza's against those who will needs be prying with the skill they take for granted hath fill'd their brains that is with the Doctor 's faculty of discerning Truth and falshood into the manner how this Miracle is brought to pass He concludes with these words in favour of Transubstantiation 99 It is in vain to tell these Wranglers how Jesus could graft cold Stones into the stock Of Abraham and make them fertil grow In Israelites or that the Bread he took In 's daily Diet was not wholly spent But part into his Body's substance went 100 In vain to tell them how into his Blood The Wine he drank was changed day by day For though such speculations understood With prudent Reverence might make easier way Unto the Mystery yet Wranglers will Because they will be so be Wranglers still This and much more to this Purpose which not to surfet the Reader with too many delicacies I omit saith the Author of that Illustrious Poem in which to the satisfaction of all that read it himself hath made appear to the World what his Modesty made him willing to expect rather from others that a Divine Theam is as capable and happy a subject of Poetical Ornament as any Pagan or Humane device whatsoever And would the Gallants of both Sexes employ as many of their precious Hours in reading this excellent Piece as they do in Romances and Play-Books I dare be bold to affirm though perhaps I shall not be credited They would find not only more substance but more delight in this than in the best of them But to return to my present business My design was to let the Reader see how far my Adversary's beloved Principles of Sense and Reason are from being fit Umpires to judge of matters proposed as of divine Revelation particularly in what relates to the presence of our Saviour in the Eucharist and I thought I could not do it better than in the words of this learned and Ingenious Author whose whole Discourse seems but a Descant upon those words of St. Chrysostom when speaking of this Mystery to the People of Antioch he saith Let us obey God in all things and not gain-say Him though what is said seem to contradict both our Imaginations and Eyes Let his word obtain more credit from us than our thoughts or sight And thus let us behave our selves in the Mysteries that is in the most Holy Sacrament not beholding only those things which lye before us viz. the Symbols of Bread and Wine but holding fast his words For his Word is Infallible but our sense is easy to be deceived That never fails but this most frequently mistakes Because therfore the Word saith This is my Body let us obey and believe and behold Him with the eyes of our Understanding If the Doctor will not do so but will have his Readers to measure matters of Faith by the Rule of Sense and Reason and not trust God farther than they can see with them I am sure he gives a far greater advantage to the Enemies of the most Holy Trinity and Christ's Divinity by so unChristian a Principle than we can possibly do by asserting a like divine Revelation for his being present in the Eucharist as for his being true God notwithstanding the seeming contradictions that occur in it But perhaps the Doctor wâ—ll say that I am mistaken all this while and that he meant no such thing by the use of Reason For I remember now that when upon his Asserting that Catholicks expose the Faith of Christiaâ—s to a great uncertainty by denying to Men the use of their Judgment and Reason as to the matters of Faith propâ—sed by a Church when they must use it in the choice of a Church which if it say any thing to the purpose it must be this that because Men must make use of their reason to find out the true Ground of believing which Catholicks affirm to be the Church therefore they must believe nothing which the Church proposes as a matter of Faith but what the Faculty in them called reason of discerning Truth and Falshood in matters proposed to our belief shall judge to be true in it self for otherwise how doth it follow that they expose the Faith of Christians to uncertainâ—y when I say upon this assertion of his I supposed and clearly enough I think that the use he would have of reason was to believe nothing but what his reason could understand He assures me p. 542. upon his word that he meant no such thing for I believe saith he an Infinite Being and all the Doctrines revealed by it in H. Scriptures although I cannot reconcile all particulars concerning them to those Conceptions we call Reason But here I observe first as no very great sign that he means not by the use of Reason what I supposed that he doth not tell us of any one particular Article he believes with that terrible condition unless he mean he cannot reconcile all particulars concerning the existence of a Deity but huddles them up in a blind Universal that he believes all the Doctrines revealed by God in the H. Scriptures as if it were enough for a Christian to believe in general all that God hath revealed in Scripture without troubling himself about the Sense of any thing in particular for fear of over-straining his Reason to swallow something that may seem a Contradiction And I confess the Letter of the Scripture may be a sufficient Rule of such a Faith 2dly This Assertion of his exposes the Faith of Christians to as great uncertainty as that he charges upon Catholicks by its denying to Men the use of their Judgment and Reason as to matters of Faith revealed by God in the Scriptures when they must necessarily use them to find out the Scriptures and the existence of a Deity For whether the Scripture or the Church be supposed to be the Ground of believing
2. How vain and groundless to say no more this Assertion of his is I have already shewed in the foregoing Chapter which may serve for a full and just Refutation of all he brings to justifie his Charge of Idolatry not onely in this matter of Veneration of Images but also of the Adoration of the B. Sacrament and Invocation of Saints In regard none of the contrary Tenets are with him Articles of Faith nay he professes himself not obliged to give any interiour Assent to them so much as to inferiour Truths or Pious Opinions But lest he should take this Compendious way of Refuting by bringing things to Grounds and Principles for none at all as his very-well-assured Friend Dr. Tillotson does with my demonstrating Friend as he calls him Mr. J. S. after two Books set forth by him in answer to his Rule of Faith viz. his Letter of Thanks and Faith vindicated to remove I say the very Temptation of any such-like vapouring pretence from my Adversary I shall take the pains to examine and answer with as much brevity as his prolixity will permit the particular Arguments with which he endeavours to underprop his tottering because groundless Charge of Idolatry § 3. In order hereunto I shall first set down what it is that the Catholick Church teaches concerning the Veneration of Images and thus it stands recorded in the last General Council at Trent Conc. Trident. Sess 25. viz. That the Images of Christ and of the Blessed Virgin Mother of God and of other Saints are to be kept and reserved especially in Churches and due Honour and Veneration to be given to them not for that any Divinity or Virtue is believed to be in them or that any thing is to be asked of them or any confidence to be placed in them as was anciently done by the Heathens who put their trust in Idols but because the honour which is exhibited to the Images is referr'd to the Prototype or thing represented by them So that by the Images which we kiss and before which we kneel or put off our Hats we adore Christ and reverence his Saints whom the said Images represent This is what the Council teaches and the import of it is that we may lawfully and therefore ought upon occasion to put off our Hats or knâ—el before the Images of Christ and his Saints with intent thereby to adore him and reverence them and this is what the Council calls most conformably to the Light of Nature and Relâ—gion the giving of due Honour and Veneration to Images but Dr. Still most repugnantly to both Idolatry § 4 To maintain this Charge he lays down a Pâ—oposition which I said imply'd a Contradiction viz. that in the worship of God by Images the worship due to God is terminated wholly on the Creature For what greater Contradiction than that it should be the worship of God and yet be terminated wholly on the Creature What he brings in his Excuse p. 57. is a pretence that God hath forbidden it under the Notion of Idolatry and that the Worship which God calls by the name of Idolatry and its being terminated wholly on the Creature are but the sâ—me thing in other words And what is this in effect but to tell us first that it is Idolatry because it is wholly terminated on the Creature and then again that it is wholly terminated on the Creature because it is Idolatry A very proper deâ—ence for such a Cause And from hence Dâ— Tillotson may note that the use of Identical Propositions is not so despicable and ridiculous as he would make it but rather the most expedite way for Dr. St. to reconcile the Terms of the greatest Contradiction But to the matter it self I shall speak more anon Let us now see how he proves this main Proposition viz. In the worship of God by Images the worship aue to God is terminated wholly on the Creature The worship sath he p. 4. which God himself denies to receive must be terminated on the Creature But God himself in the second Commandment not onely denies to receive it but threatens severely to punish them that give it Therefore it cannot be terminated on God but onely on the Image § 5. This is the terrible Argument by virtue of which he passes the Sentence of Eternal Damnation upon all those who are of the Communion of the Church of Rome if they repent not of their â—doring Christ by putting off their hats or kneeling before his Image And that the Reader may see with what Justice and Charity he does it before I proceed to examine particulars I shall convene his own Conscience to declare to the World what kind of Argument he judges this to be If onely Topical or Probable what answer will he give to the Great Judge at the dreadful day of Judgment for positively condemning his Spouse the Church for an Adulteress upon an account which himself acknowledges to be inevident and uncertain I believe himself would condemn that person for unjust and uncharitable who should positively charge the meanest mans Wife of Adultery upon the like account If he judge it a Demonstration which I cannot easily believe he seems to have taken such a Pique against the Demonstrating Way then the Premisses must be evidently and certainly true and the Conclusion in virtue of them Impossible to be false and consequently he must have greater certainty that the Church of Rome is Idolatrous than he hath if he be of the same mind with his Friend Dr. Tillotson of the Scripture's being the Word of God or of the Sence of any Text of it for example that Christ is God for the said Doctor lays this down for his Fundamental Position in his Rule of Faith p. 118. and affirms it expresly of the Books of Scripture in the Preface to his Sermons that we are not infallibly certain either that any Book is so ancient as it pretends to be or that it was written by him whose name it bears or that this is the sence of such and such passages in it It is possible all this may be otherwise From whence I infer yet farther that if we are not sure of the Sence of any Text of Scripture but possibly it may be false Himself is not sure that God hath forbidden the worshipping himself by Images in the second Commandment and therefore cannot judge his own Argument to be a Demonstration nor consequently evidence sufficient to make out his Charge of Idolatry But to come now to particulars § 5. The worship saith he which God himself denies to receive must be terminated on the Creature and that wholly and onely on the Creature as he expresses it in the Context of his Discourse This is the Major Proposition of his Syllogism and if this fail the Charge he builds upon it must needs fall I asserted it in my Reply to be absolutely false as built upon a mistake of the nature of humane Acts which though they ought to be
concerning the lawfulness of representing God in Picture we see how far the Church of England allows it in the Front of her Publick Liturgy and there want not other examples not unparallel to this in some of her Churches also So that Dr. Stillingfleet must either condemn her of Impiety i◠making and exposing such kind of Representations to the Eyes of the People or himself of a most gross Errour when he asserts in so universal a manner that God cannot be represented to men in any way but what must be an infinite disparagement to him Perhaps he will say they are not exposed by the Church of England for Worship But that belongs to the Consequence Our Question at present is about the Antecedent whether they may not be made without disparagement to God Besides that himself not onely condemns them for Worship but also in order to the putting us in mind of God which how strange soever it seem he avowedly maintains p. 68. when he affirms That they tend highly to the dishonour of God and suggest mean thoughts to us of the God we are to worship But of this more in the next Chapter Let him make his attonement with the Church of England as he can I come now to speak to the point it self § 3. Pictures or Images made with reference to God may be considered two ways either a◠made to represent the Divinity it Self out of an Erroneous Conceit which the Maker hath of it in his mind such as the Anthropomorphites had of God whom they conceived to have Eyes and Ears and Hands and other like bodily parts as we have or as representing immediately such things as bear a certain Analogy or Proportion to some divine Perfections and thereupon are apt to raise our Minds to the Knowledge and Contemplation of the Perfections themselves As when God the Father is pictured as he appeared to Daniel in the likeness of the Ancient of Days to manifest his Wisdom and Eternity and the H. Ghost in the likeness of a Dove to signifie his Purity and Simplicity in a manner suitable to our Conceptions The first sort of Representations are an infinite disparagement to the Divine Nature because being infinite and invisible it cannot be represented as it is in it self by any corporeal likeness or figures But the Second are no way dishonourable to him because they are not made to represent the Divine Nature by an immediate or proper similitude but by Analogy onely or Metaphorical signification as is above declared And if it were no disparagement to God to appear in such or such visible forms it can be none to represent them in Picture no more than it is to relate or describe them in Writing § 4. This premised I answer to the Preposition If his meaning be that Gods Nature being infinite and incomprehensible cannot be represented to men either Properly or Analogically but in a way that must be an infinite disparagement to it I deny it as false God the Father would never have represented himself in a humane form nor the H. Ghost in the likeness of a Dove had it been dishonourable Nor do I believe the Church of England would have permitted the Divinity to be pictured in the likeness of a Triangular Light had she thought it a disparagement But if his meaning be that the Divine Nature being infinite cannot be represented properly as it is by any corporeal similitude I grant it But then the Consequence in virtue of this Antecedent can onely be this that to worship God by such a visible Representation as conceiv'd proper to his Nature is extreamly dishonourable to him And in this we perfectly agree with him but utterly deny what he farther infers without any restriction or reason that all Worship given to God by any visible Representation of him whether conceiv'd as Proper or Analogical is extreamly dishonourable to him Having shown the Proposition it self 〈◊〉 taken in the unlimited Sense he gives it to be false it follows manifestly that it cannot be the Reason of the Law Yet for a more ample discovery of his Sophistical managing of Controversie I shall give it a farther Consideration as it is assigned by him for the Reason of the Law § 5. The Question at present between us is about the Reason of the Law viz. Why God forbad the making a graven Image or the likeness of any thing in Heaven or Earth or under the Earth to bow down and worship it And on the People's part to whom the Law was given it is evident that it was to keep them in their duty of giving Soveraign Worship to God alone by restraining them from Idolatry But this it seems was too plain and obvious a Reason for so Metaphysical a Discourser He seeks therefore another more subtil and elevated and consequently more apt to lead a vulgar Reader into a maze viz. What Perfection in God was the Cause or Reason why he made this Law What he asserts it to be we have already heard viz. That the Divinity cannot be represented to men but in a way that must be an infinite disparagement to it What I affirm it to be is The Supreme Excellency of God's Nature to which Soveraign Worship is onely due and not the incongruity of an Image to represent it as he often expresseth it The Question thus stated I prove my Assertion 1. From the Preface of the Law the usual place where the Reasons of all Laws are expressed because the Reason there assigned by the Law-maker himself is this I am the Lord thy God And what is this but I am the onely Supreme and Super-Excellent Being above all and over all to whom therefore Soveraign honour is onely to be given and to none beside me Neither is there any mention at all made of the irrepresentableness of the Divine Nature or the incongruity of an Image to represent it to men But the same reason of his Supreme Excellency is enforced anew from the Zeal or Jealousie which God hath of his honour when immediately after the Prohibition he adds For I the Lord thy God am a Jealous God as the Protestant Translation hath it by which he gives us to understand that the Reason why he will punish severely those who shall give his honour to any thing beside him is because he is the Lord their God to whom onely it is due 2. I prove it from the necessary Connexion there is as of an effect to its proper Cause between the Prohibition of the Law on the one side and the Supreme Excellency of the Divine Nature on the other To make this as clear as the matter will give me leave I must desire the Reader to reflect that although there be no distinction of Attributes or Perfections in God but that All are really one and the same indivisible Perfection with his Nature and consequently the same with one another viz. his Mercy with his Justice his Justice with his Truth and his Truth with
that none of the Idols of the Heathen were to be compared to Him in Wisdom Greatness Power c. as is manifest he does from v. 12. to the end of the Chapter it is no more to the purpose for which he alledges it viz. Therefore it is forbidden to worship God himself by bowing or kneeling before an Image than if one should say There is no comparison for Riches and Greatness between a King and a Peasant therefore it is not lawful to give honour to the King by putting off ones Hat before his Picture or the Chair of State § 7. To the other Text of Deut. 4. 15. where Moses saith Take good heed to your selves for ye saw no manner of Similitude in the day that the Lord spake to you I answer That de facto no manner of Similitude was seen at that time by the People that afterwards they might not take occasion as they were apt enough to conceive it to have been a proper Representation of the Divinity and so entertain an erroneous Conceit of God Notwithstanding if it had so pleas'd him when he gave the Law he might have appeared to the People in some visible likeness without disparagement to his Nature as it is likely he did in a glorious manner to Moses at the Second giving of the Law when he descended and stood with him on the Rock and he saw the back parts of God and bowed to the Earth and worshipped Exod. 33. 23. 34. 5 8. and as both before and after he appeared to the Patriarchs and Prophets and consequently his not appearing so de facto could not be the Reason of the Law For as Dr. St. himself confesses very ingenuously p. 63. Although God had appeared with a Similitude then yet there might have been great reason for making a Law against worshipping the Heathen Idols or fixing the intention of their Worship upon the bare Image I add Even against thinking of honouring God by an Image made by men if that were the meaning of the Law as it is not since such a Law if necessary might have been made and would have obliged although God had chosen some visible likeness to appear in at that time The words then For ye saw no manner of Similitude on the day that the Lord spake to you though cited by the Doctor without a Parenthesis to make them seem of more force were not set down by Moses as the Reason of the Law But the matter of fact was made use of by him as a Motive to induce the People to the Observance of it in a Sermon he makes Deut. 4. to press them to that duty And this Explication also the Doctor might have found in his own Bible if he had but vouchsafed to cast his Eye upon the Contents of the Chapter where the whole Discourse is entituled An Exhortation to Obedience or on the Breviate on the top of the Page where the Arguments us'd in it are call'd Perswasions to Obedience But there was the word likeness in the first Text and Similitude in the second denied of God and these were enough without considering the Context or the intent of the Writer or the Contents of the Chapters to ask Whether God by that Reason doth not declare that all Worship given to him by any visible Representation of him is extreamly dishonourable to him Now though Protestants may hold with Dr. St. that the Scripture is the most certain Rule of their Faith yet unless they wilfully shut their Eyes they cannot think the Method he takes to be the most certain way to find out its Sense But to draw to a Conclusion in this matter § 8. Let us suppose the Argument notwithstanding all that hath been said to shew its deficiency in all its parts to be good and sound and that in its largest extent viz. The Nature of God being infinite and incomprehensible cannot be represented to men but in a way that must be an infinite disparagement to it Let us grant I say this Antecedent and the Places of Scripture in the sense they are cited by him Let us grant the Consequence too he infers from them Therefore all Worship given to Him by any visible Representation of him whether Proper or Analogical is extreamly dishonourable to him Suppose I say all this to be so Will it follow from hence that Christ according to his Humanity cannot be represented but with great disparagement to Him Or that to put off our Hats when we behold the Figure of his Sacred Body as Nailed upon the Cross with intent to Worship Him must be extremly dishonourable to Him What if the Soul of Man be Invisible and cannot be represented by any Corporeal Figure or Colours Will it follow from thence that any Picture made to represent a Prince according to his External Features would be a disparagement to him and any Honour given him by means of such a Representation a Dishonour The Consequence he brings is no better in order to Christ and his Image If then his Argument do not at all concern the practise of Catholicks in making the Images of Christ and his Saints with respect to their Honour to what purpose was it to lay down for the Reason of the Law in which he will have it to be forbidden That God's Nature being Infinite and Incomprehensible could not be represented without infinite disparagement to it To what purpose was it to spend no less than three Pages as he does § 6. in citing Authours to prove that the Wiser Persons of the Heathens themselves condemned the Worship of God by Images as incongruous to a Divine Nature Was it to make his Reader believe that Catholicks allow of any Pictures as proper Representations of the Invisible Deity Let him lay his Hand upon his Heart I have told him the Churches Sense in that Point What those Wiser Persons of the Heathens meant is evident from their Words and from the Time in which they lived to be this That the Nature of God being Spiritual and Invisible it could not be represented by any thing like unto it and therefore the Worship which the People gave to their Images as Gods or like unto the Gods they worshipped was incongruous to the Divine Nature and a disparagement to the Deity And if the Germans as Tacitus reporteth de morib German c. 9. rejected Images made in the likeness of men which the Doctor conveniently leaves out because they thought them unsuitable to the Greatness of Celestial Deities for Other Figures and Symbols they had in their consecrated Groves as the same Tacitus there witnesseth and Dr. St. suppresseth it was but what the Light of Nature taught them concerning the notion of a Deity which had the mystery of God made Man been revealed to them would have taught them also that it was no disparagement to Him to be represented in the likeness of Man and to be worshipped by such an Image His other Citations I took upon his word without
to take an Ant o◠an Ape by reason of their greater Excellency for God than the Sun the reason suppos'd by himself why we chuse rather to worship God by an Image than by the Sun on that account to let him feel the force of his own Argument if it have any that which deserves most honour should have least given it and that which deserves least should have most For the danger is there still greater where the Excellency is greater and by that means we ought rather to worship he says to us a Beast than a Saint I say to him the Earth than the Sun for there is less danger of believing one to be God than the other But to return to his former words § 4. Is there nothing then in a Picture worthy admiration besides the Skill of the Painter or Artificer I dare avouch for the greater part of Ladies who sit for their Pictures that they do it not purely to beget in the Beholders an admiration of the Painter and those who procure an Author's Picture to be set before his Book intend no doubt that those who fix their eyes upon it should admire something besides the Skill of the Engraver I have my self a Picture of a Friend which gives me occasion frequently to admire the great Endowments of his Mind but not at all the Hand that did it it is so rudely done Something then there is in Pictures besides the Skill of the Painter which may make them worthy if not of admiration for the excellency of the work at least of use for their quick suggesting to our Mind not onely the outward Features but also the inward Graces of the Persons they represent This virtue they have from their more express representation and likeness even above other things which have a greater resemblance in natural perfections and this is one Reason why we make use of them so frequently since God was made Man because they bring Him more immediately to our Mind than either the Sun or an Ant or a Fly And this may be the Reason if I may have leave to suggest one why Dr. St. Himself prefers the Sun for a Help to his Devotion before an Ant or a Fly though inferiour to them by two degrees in perfection because amongst corporeal things Light is the putest and conceived by us to be likest to a Spirit But to prefer them all and with them the Ape the Ass and the Tyger before an Image because they have greater natural perfections than an Image hath may if it prevail in the World quite undo the Company of Picture-drawers in a little time For if it shall be made appear much more reasonable to make use of what approaches nearer in perfection than likeness the Ladies may come instead of the Pictures of their Friends to wear Ants and Flies in Crystal Cases upon their Brests and instead of their own Pictures to send them the Apes and Asses he brought in so lamely in his former Comparison I and his Tygers too when they can catch them as greater resemblances of their Perfections Perhaps he 'll say he speaks not of the Perfections of these Creatures as barely such but as great evidences to him of the Power and Wisdom and Goodness of God But how many are there in the World not so Philosophical and Contemplative as he is who think more how to free themselves from the importunity of the Ants and Flies and from the heat of the Sun than to consider their perfections as great evidences of the Wisdom c. of God and yet if they come into a place where a Crucifix is are presently put in mind of God and testifie the venerable apprehension they have of him by bowing their Knee or putting off their Hats If he find his Devotion more inflam'd by the light and heat of the Sun and the motions of those little Beasts than by an Image much good may it do him But this ought not to prescribe to the Generality of Christians who I believe experience more frequent and more venerable thoughts of God suggested to their Minds by the sight of a Crucifix than by seeing the Sun with all the Ants and Flies in the World 'T is not the nearer approach in perfection even in the effect that brings us always soonest and surest to the knowledge of the cause We see many Fathers are not known by their Sons who yet are presently known by their Pictures And Atheists deny the perfections of the Creatures to be any evidences at all of that Being we call God but cannot deny a Crucifix to represent to their own thoughts that Person whom we believe to be God Pictures then we see have an advantage in representing above the Creatures though in natural perfections they be inferiour to them But yet for all this § 5. He says He cannot for his Heart understand why he may not as well nay better burn Incense and say his Prayers to the Sun having an intention onely to honour the true God by it as to do both these to an Image And the reason is still the same because he is sure the Sun hath far more advantages than any Artificial Image can have and the beauty and influence of it may inflame and warm ones Devotion much more I am sure too the Sun hath far more advantages than any material word can have even the Name of JESUS either written or spoken and yet I do not find the beauty and influence of the Sun to inflame and warm ones Devotion so much as the hearing or reading of that Sacred Name But I perceive he hath a particular Devotion to the Sun though it have less advantages than an Ant or a Fly and therefore must warn him in Charity not to say his Prayers to it no more than we do to Images as he very well knows though he would make his Reader believe the contrary for that were to terminate his Intention upon the Sun to put his trust in it and make it his God but as for his bowing to it with intent to worship the true God or burning Incense using it as it is used by the Church for a Ceremony of like nature with bowing he may have a Resolution of the Case how far it may be allowed him from the Pen of that Great and Learned Doctor S. Leo and for his farther satisfaction I shall take the pains to transcribe his words From that Opinion saith S. Leo Serm. in Natal Dom. viz. That the life of Man is governed by the Stars that Impiety also takes its rise which is used by some who are less wise to adore the Sun at his Rising from some eminent place A thing which some Christians think they do so religiously in the observance of it that before they enter into the Church of S. Peter the Apostle which is dedicated to the One true and living God they go up to the top of the Church and turning themselves to the rising Sun with low obeysance bow
being engaged in it yet 't is certain they reclaimed against their proceedings and if the Fathers at Francford persisted in their mistake what wonder if the Historians of that time who favour'd them took no notice of it Or if the English Historians ran into the same Errour as it is manifest they did by what Hoveden reports that the English Bishops believed the Doctrine of the Council of Nice to be that Adoration was to be given to Images which the Church of Christ abhors That the Author of the Caroline Book and Agobardus after him did not content themselves with what the Council of Francford had condemned viz. That Worship was not to be given to Images as to the Holy Trinity but denied any veneration at all to be due to them as the Doctor will have it hinders not but that the Council of Francford condemned that of Nice upon a misunderstanding of its Doctrine as I have evidently shewed § 3. Secondly But now supposing there had been no mistake but that the Fathers at Francford as my Adversary would have it had really condemned the Doctrine of the Council of Nice yet I affirm it had been no advantage to his Cause because as himself p. 84. saith The Popes of Rome sided with the Worshippers of Images that is confirmed the Doctrine of the Council of Nice whereas they opposed and rejected the condemnation of it by the Fathers of Francford That the Popes Legates contradicted it in the Synod is confessed by the Magdeburgenses and that the Pope himself oppos'd it is manifest from the Confutation he wrote of the Caroline Book and that no Decrees of any Council could be valid without the Popes consent was so undoubted a thing among all Christians that the Author himself of that Book durst not deny it but on the contrary affirms it to have been the sense even of the Fathers of Francford as acknowledging and professing the last Judgment of Controversies to belong to the Bishop of Rome and upon this account they affirmed the Council of Nice was to be rejected viz. for that it had not been confirmed as they pretended though falsely by the Pope And if the Fathers of Francford look'd upon it then as an advantage to their Cause that the Pope as they pretended had not sided with the Worshippers of Images that is with the Nicen Fathers how comes the Doctor to look upon it now as so apparent an advantage to the same Cause that the Pope as he confesseth sided with them What I can discover here is nothing but a great improvement of confidence to alledge that for an Advantage which in Church-Affairs is the greatest prejudice upon Earth But if the Popes confirming the Council of Nice were no advantage to his Cause as little is it that the Council at Francford denied it to be Occumenical because the Greeks onely were there present and none of the other Provinces were called for what weight soever the Doctor may conceive that Exception to have carried at that time yet 't is certain now it hath no force at all since the Council it self hath for many hundreds of years been accepted as a true and lawful General Council and its Doctrine as Catholick by all the Provinces of Christendom and the contrary to it condemned for Heresie And this is no other 〈◊〉 what Mr. Thorndike answers to two Objections urged from St. Epiphanius and the Council of Elvira that granting they held all Images in Churches dangerous for Idolatry of which saith he there is appearance it is manifest they were afterwards admitted all over From whence it follows that what Dr. St. argues from the Synod of Paris under Ludovicus Pius which was indeed but a Conference of some Learned Men condemning Pope Adrian for a superstitious adoration of Images From the Doctrine also of the Author of the Caroline Book and that of Agobardus which Baluzius saith he confesseth to be no more than the whole Gallican Church believed in that Age is no advantage at all to his Cause because in supposition that they then did look upon the very true Doctrine of the Council of Nice as dangerous and impugn it as such by reason of a very evil superstition the same Baluzius saith had possessed the minds of some persons in that Age viz. that the same Worship was to be given to Images as to the Blessed Trinity yet afterwards the Doctrine of the said Nicene Council prevailed all over and was received as an Apostolical Tradition by the Gallican Church it self like as the Doctrine of Non-rebaptization of Hereticks wâ—s received in the African Church although it had been condemned there before in a Council by St. Cyprian But upon a diligent survey of Baluzius his Discourse in that place I do not perceive his meaning to be what the Doctor would have it viz. that what Agobardus wrote was the belief of the whole Gallican Church in that Age but that it was the Judgment and Design of the French Bishops at that time to extirpate by all means the above-mentioned Superstition which then reigned although in doing it they might seem to run into the other extream of denying any Worship at all to be due to Images all the whole business of the use of Images being as the Author of the Account very well observes p. 18. but a matter of Discipline and Government For had he meant that what Agobardus wrote was no more than the whole Gallican Church believed in that Age how could the same Baluzius tell us that the French Bishops at that time although they seemed to remove all Worship from Images yet allowed them to be kept that the Faithful by seeing them might be excited to imitate those Holy Persons they represented Whereas Agobardus went so far as to affirm that they were kept for Ornament to delight the eyes but not for the instruction of the people nay that they were not to be painted upon the Church-Walls Was this the Belief of the Gallican Church in that Age when Jonas Aurelianensis waâ— commanded by Ludovicus Pius â—o 〈◊〉 against Claudius â—aurinensis for casting them out of the Church Surely the little care there was taken to preserve the Canon of the Council of Eranâ—ford against Image-Worship or â—ather the unanimous concurrence to suppress it if there were ever any such Canon for it lay in obscurity for above seven hundred years together till it was published as my Adversary says about the middle of the last â—entury by Du Tillet as also the prevalency of the contrary Belief in the Gallican Church as it is at this day without any noise or opposition are no great Presumptions to men who have any insight into the Affairs of Religion that the said Church in that Age believed as Dr. St. would have us believe from the Confession of Baluzius that no Veneration was to be given to Holy Images It is upon the contrary supposition that Baluzius endeavours to excuse Agobardus
by it to the Bread and Wine or any corporal presence of Christ's Natural Flesh and Blood Will the Doctor be so unkind as to make her say that no Reverence at all is due to that Holy Sacrament that this of all things in the World ought not to have been objected against them What! will he make them fall below Calvin in their respect to that Sacrament who saith it is to be received with reverence as the Pledge of our Holy Union with Christ Is it not time now to remind him as I promised above p. 138. how his Beloved Constantinopolitan Fathers call it an Honourable Image of Christ's quickning Body And thereupon invite all those and among them the Doctor unless he will leave himself out as he did these words all those I say to rejoyce and exult with confidence who desire worship and offer it for the Salvation both of Soul and Body Though He stile me very ineptly a Revolted Protestant yet I have so much respect for those learned Persons who made that Rubrick as to think they meant by Adoration what the word now signifieth by use in English that is Divine Worship proper to God alone and not that no more Reverence should be used towards the Bread and Wine in the Church than there is to the Remainder of it at home by some seemingly Revolted Presbyterians I cannot believe them to be truly Sons of the Church of England Now what the sense of that Church was and still is unless the Doctor will have us suppose these Modern Divines to have prevaricated from their Fathers Bishop Jewel tells us in these words We only adore Christ saith he as very God but we Worship also and Reverence the Sacrament we Worship the Word of God we worship all other like things in such Religious wise to Christ belonging The same is witnessed by Bishop Morton Under the degree of Divine Worship we our selvs yield as much to the Eucharist as St. Austin did to Baptisme where he said Epist 164. We reverence Baptisme wheresoever it is Nor is this delivered by them as their private Opinion but as the sense of the Church of England as appears by their words And if you ask how they can excuse themselves from Idolatry you have the Answer of Bishop Jewel that the Sacraments be adored but the whole honour resteth not in them but is passed over from them to the things signified So that it seems I was not much miâ—â—â—ken when to paralel the Reverence given by Catholicks to Images I instanced in that which is given by Protestants to the Sacramental signs by kneeling at the Eucharist for they do not only allow a like Reverence but maintain it also with the same distinction Nor will the Doctor ever be able to perswade his Parishioners out of it till he can make them leave their usual Expression when they speak of this Sacrament that they do not receive it as Bread but as the Body of Christ § 6. The 6th and last Instance was of Reverence given to the Altar by bowing to it a practise of great Antiquity as Dr. Heylin shows in his defence of the Modern Practise of it in the Church of England against Burton p. 25. This Dr. Still saith is of the same nature with the putting off our Hats while we are in the Church And what is this to say Himself admits a Reverence to Holy Places p. 105. and surely the Church the House of God is one of them Here then we find him incline to admit a Reverence due to the Altar and if it be of the same nature with putting off our Hats while we are in the Church as he doth the one so he may lawfully do the other But then as if he had granted too much he presently draws back and tells us This is only determining a natural act of Reverence that way which the ancient Christians did use to direct their Worship which as far as I can understand the words is not of the same nature with putting off our Hats when we are in the Church but with going to Church when the Bell tolls which is to give no more Reverence to the Altar than to the Bell. But who can unfold the Riddle and tell me what he means by a natural Act of Reverence that way which the ancient Christians did use to direct their Worship If he mean by that way the local situation of the Altar in the East which was the way the ancient Christians used to direct their Worship and that Nature teacheth us to direct our Worship that way although the Altar for example in St. Andrew's may serve for such a determination because it is placed in the East yet he must give another reason why those in the Savoy bow towards the Altar where it is seated in the North because it doth not there determin a Natural Act of Reverence that way which the ancient Christians used to direct their Worship which was towards the East But if he mean by that way a like manner of Reverence to the Altar as was used to be given by the Ancient Christians he will find in the aforecited place out of Dr. Heylin that they acknowledged an honour and veneration due to the Holy Altar and testified that honour by bowing and kneeling to it In fine whatever the meaning of the words be to speak to the practise it self either he condemns those of the Churcâ— of England who profess and testify their reverence to the Altar by bowing to it for Idolatry or no. If he do they are at age to answer for themselves If he do not an Inferiour or Relative honour may be given to it for his sake whose Throne it is under the degree of Divine Worship due to God alone and as the allowing this will render him a true Son of the Church of England so the allowing the like to the sacred Images of Christ will make him in this point a perfect Proselyte of the Church of Rome whose Councils have decreed that we are not to give to the Images of Christ and his Saints Latria or the worship due to God but a honourary respect and veneration as to the Books of H. Scripture and other Holy things But what himself may justly fear should success crown his endeavours in putting scruples into poor simple Mens minds to with draw them from the Reverence they owe to the Sacraments of Christ his Saints his Name his Image his Altars and such like Holy things relating to his Worship is that the Event whatever the design be of his labours will be no other as those Pious and Learned Doctors of Rhemes long since observed and we see at this Day in a great measure fulfilled than to inure Men by degrees to lose all honour and respect to Christ himself to abolish all true Religion out of the World and to make them plain Atheists The Chair of State is not more an Ornament to the King's Palace than the
Respect given to it is a Fence against the Contempt of his Person He that passes by that with his Hat on thinks himself excus'd upon the same account from putting it off to the King himself The End of the First Part. THE SECOND PART OF THE ADORATION OF THE Most Blessed Sacrament CHAP. I. The Practise of the Primitive Church in this Point The Doctor 's Argument to prove it to be Idolatry built upon an Injurious Calumny that Catholicks believe the Bread to be God The sense of his first Proposition cleared and the Proofs he brings for it refuted § 1. HAving cleared the Doctrin and Practise of the Catholick Church from my Adversaries Unjust Charge of Idolatry in the Worship or Veneration she gives to the Images of Christ I come now to show the Injustice of a like accusation he brings in upon account of the Adoration she gives to Christ himself in the most H. Sacrament of the Altar A thâ—â—g so universally practiced and recommended by the Fathers of the Primitive Church both Greek and Latin that who so will condemn the practise of it at this day in the Church of Rome must have the confidence to involve the Church of that time in the same Condemnation with it Among other Apostolical Traditions which were delivered to the Church without Writing St. Basil reckons the words of Invocation when the Eucharistical Brâ—ad and Cup of Blessing were shewed And Theodoret affirms expresly that The Mystical Symbols are understood to be what they are made and are believed and adored as being the things they are believed S. Gregory Nâ—zianzen reporteth of his Sister Gorgonia as a great testimony of her devotion that in a certain sickness she had she went with Faith to the Altar and with a lowd voice besought him who is worshipped upon it for remedy giving him all his Titles or Attributes and remembring him of all the miraculous things which he had done And the same no doubt was done by St. Monica the Mother of St. Austin in her daily devotions at the Altar at which she used to assist without pretermission of any one day and from whence she knew saith he that Holy Victime to be dispensed by which the 〈◊〉 writing was blotted out which carried our condemnation in it To this Sacrament of our Redemptiâ—â— she had tied her Soul fast by the Bond of â—â—ith And in this she did no more 〈◊〉 what her Son teacheâ—â— upon the 98th Psalâ—â— where expounding 〈◊〉 words of the Psalmist Adore ye his Foot-stool to be meant of the Earth and by the Earth to be understood the Flesh of Christ he addeth that whereas Christ walked here in the Flesh and gave us that very flesh to be eaten for our Salvation and no man eateth that Flesh unless he have first adored we find saith he how such a Foot-stool of our Lord may be adored and that we do not only not sin in adoring but we sin in not adoring Viz. that Foot-stool of our Lord by which he said before was meant his most Holy Flesh And from whom did he learn this Doctrin but from the same Master from whom he learn't Christianity St. Ambrose who treating of the same place of the Psalmist saith By the Foot-stool is understood the Earth and by the Earth the Flesh of Christ which we adore also at this day in the Mysteries and which the Apostles adored in our Lord Jesus Upon this Account it is that St. Chrysostome exhorts Christians to this duty by the Example of the Wise-men These Men saith he though Barbarians after a long Journey adored this Body of our Lord in the Manger with great fear and trembling Let us imitate what they did Thou seest Him not in the Manger but on the Altar And then again by the Example of the Angels who saith he assist the Priest at the time of offring the Holy Sacrifice and the whole order of Heavenly Powers list up their Voices and the place round about the Altar is filled with the Quires of Angels in honour of Him who lyeth upon it And therfore it is called by St. Optatus the Seat or Throne of the Body of our Lord. Thus these Holy Men not as private Doctors delivering their own Opinions but as Fathers testifying and transmitting to Posterity the Doctrin and Practise of the Church of their time which was so notorious in this point of the Adoration of the Eucharist that the Heathens because they knew Christians made use of Bread and Wine in the Mysteries objected to them as St. Austin reports that they worshipped Ceres and Bacchus And hereupon Mr. Thorndike Epil 3. p. pag. 351. ingenuously saith I do believe that it was so practised and done in the ancient Church which I maintain from the beginning to have been the true Church of Christ For I do acknowledge the testimonies that are produced out of St. Ambrose St. Austin St. Chrysostome St. Gregory Nazianzen with the rest and more than I have produced And now it is in the Reader 's choice whether he will condemn so great and Holy Men and with them the Church of that time of Idolatry for adoring our Lord Christ in the Sacrament of the Altar or will absolve Uj for doing what they did It is with them we must stand or fall And the Doctor 's argument will make neither or both Idolaters But before I speak to that and that the Reader may see what force it is like to have behold how he ushers it in § 2. I proceeded saith he to the Adoration of the Host and here the argument I proposed was to take off the common answer viz. of Catholicks that it cannot be Idolatry because they believe the Bread to be God This is what the Doctor exposes in the front of his Rejoynder to publick view And if the Reader meet with such sophisticate Ware in the Mouth of the Sack What may he expect when he comes neerer to the bottom The argument I proposed saith he was to take off the Common Answer viz. of Catholicks that it cannot be Idolatry because they believe the Bread to be God And that too just as the Worshippers of the Sun believed the Sun to be God For upon the same ground he saith it is that they who believe the Sun to be God and worship him on that account would be excused from Idolatry too The unhandsomness of this Proceeding I fairly hinted to him in my Reply whereas I might justly have called it a most injurious calumny and it became an Ingenuous Writer either to have justified his charge or if he could not do that nor yet had humility enough to retract it to have wav'd at least the repeating it in his Answer But this he is so far from doing that without any proof at all what he did but insinuate before in the Body of his Argument he lays down now expresly in his Rejoinder as the Ground of his charge of
that it carries not the show of a Probability For if the Bread be converted into that Body of Christ which is hypostatically united with the divine nature and not meerly into that but into the Person of Christ does it follow that he hath as many Bodies hypostatically united to him as there are Elements consecrated No more than because the Bread the Flesh the Fish which he eat upon Earth were converted into the substance of his Body and hypostatically united to him it follows that he had as many bodies hypostatically united to him as there were several meats eaten by him Before Digestion or Conversion they were distinct by Conversion they were made the same body But if this will not serve the turn he wants not a false supposition to blind his Reader with Viz. that we make the Elements i.e. the Accidents of Bread for we we will have nothing else remain after Consecration in spight he says of all the reason and sense of the World the Object of divine worship But the falsity of this supposition I shall make appear in the next Chapter together with his mistake if it be no more of the meaning of the Council of Trent CHAP. II. The true State of the Controversy laid open together with the Doctor 's Endeavours to misrepresent it His manner of arguing against the Adoration of Christ in the Eucharist equally destructive to the adoration of Him as God § 1. IN pursuance of his former design my Adversary will now undertake p. ii4 to prove yet further that upon the Principles of the Roman Church no Man can be assured that he doth not commit Idolatry every time he gives adoration to the Host And this he hopes will abundantly add to the discoâ—ering of the disparity between the worship given to the Person of Christ and that which is given to the Eucharist upon supposition of Transubstantiation But before he can come to this he must needs mistake or rather mis-state the Controversy which he does in most ample manner when after a great many Preambles for three whole Pages together no more to the purpose than the Flourishes of a great Text-letter are to the force of a Bond he tells the Reader at length that the state of the Controversy between us is whether proper divine worship may be given to the Elements i. e. the Accidents on account of Christ's corporal presence under them But whatever Divines dispute concerning the Worship of the Accidents the Object of Catholicks Adoration as Dr. Taylor ingenuously confesses Viz. What is represented to them in their mind their thoughts and purposes in the B. Sacrament is the only true and Eternal God hypostatically joined with his Holy Humanity And consequently the Question between us is Whether supposing our Lord Christ to be really present under the Sacramental signs the same proper divine worship be not to be given to him there which is due to his Person wherever it is present by hypostatical union with his sacred Humanity Let the Doctor do thus and we have no quarrel with him which is an evident sign that the Question between us is not as he says whether the same Adoration ought to be given to the Accidents which we would give to the very Person of Christ But what may not be venture to say who had the confidâ—nce to advance so notorious a calumny as that it is our common answer in this matter to excuse our selves from Idolatry that we believe the Bread to be God I told the Reader what he was like to find neer the bottom of the Sack when he met with such sophistical Ware at the very top But the Doctor pretends he hath something to say here in his defence and it is this that the Council of Trent hath expresly determin'd that there is no manner of doubt left but that all Christians ought to give the same worship to this Holy Sacrament which they give to God himself For it is not therefore less to be worshipped because it was Instituted by Christ our Lord that it might be taken But who tells him that the Council here by the word Sacrament means only the Signs or Accidents of Bread Why may it not mean the Holy Victime which is dispensed from the Altar as St. Austin did when he said that his Mother St. Monica had tied her Soul fast to this Sacrament by the bond of Faith If the Council may be allowed to explicate its own meaning we shall find the sense of the word to be the Body of Christ and with it his Divinity under the Sacramental Veil for the reason it gives in the words immediately following which the Doctor conveniently leaves out of this adoration is because we believe the same God to be present in it of whom the Eternal Father said Let all the Angels of God adore him And this is yet more plain from the 6th Canon where the Anathema is denounced against those who shall say that in the most H. Sacrament of the Eucharist the only begotten of God is not to be adored with the worship of Latria But let the Council say what it will Dr. St. says that by the Sacrament it must understand the Elements or Accidents as the Immediate term of that divine worship or else the latter words that the Sacrament ought not less to be adored because it was instituted to be taken signify nothing at all And why so Do Catholicks understand nothing by the Sacrament but the Accidents Or was nothing instituted to be taken but the bare signs of Bread and Wine Dr. St. is or would be an Author of great Authority and from his own Confession we have it p. 111. that the Holy Sacrament according to Catholicks is the Body of Christ under the Accidents of Bread These are his own words and if he will not believe the Council let him believe himself whether he do so or no 〈◊〉 proceeding upon his supposition that proper divine worship is to be given to the Accidents he affirms p. 118. that this is not denied that he knows of by any who understand the Doctrine or Practise of the Roman Church I leave to the Reader to judg when he shall have heard what Bellarmin an Author not unacquainted with the Doctrin and Practise of the Church says in this matter There is not saith he any one Catholick who teaches that the External Symbols per se that is absolutely and properly are to be adored with the worship of Latria but only to be reverenced with a certain inferiour worship which is due to all Sacraments What we affirm is that Christ is properly and per se to be adored with the worship of Latria and that this adoration belongs also to the Symbols of Bread and Wine under which he is contained as they are apprehended united with him in such manner as those who adored him apparl'd upon Earth did not adore him alone but quodammodo in a certain kind his Garments also For neither
were they so scrupulous as to require him to put off his cloths before they adored him nor yet to separate him in thought from them at the time of adoration but worshipped him absolutely as then he was And then a little after whatever difference saith he there may be among Divines about the manner of speaking the Question is no other but whether Christ be to be adored with divine worship in the Eucharist This is what Bellarmin says And if the Doctor would not except against an Example from civil worship I should tell him that his stating the Controversy between us concerning the adoration of Christ in the Eucharist to be whether the Accidents be to be adored with proper Divine Worship which is due to God alone is just as if a Quaker should make the Question between him and a Protestant concerning the worship of the King in his Robes to be whether the Robes are to be worshipped with the same Regal worship which is due only to the King's Person The subtilty such as it is is Parallel in both Only the Doctor hath the fortune to be applauded for what the poor Quaker would be laughed at and hiss'd out of the Court. I cannot doubt but the Doctor who is so well vers'd in Bell. as his Objections show had read these passages in him when he subjoins that Catholicks to answer their adversaries arguments would seem to direct their worship only to Christ as under the Elements or Accidents a pretty self-conviction if well observ'd for who should we believe for the Doctrin and practise of Catholicks but themselves But what he adds that they yield that on the account of this corporal presence that which appears ought to have the same worship given to it with that which is supposed or believed is sufficiently convinced by what hath been cited out of Bellarmin in that absolute sense in which the Doctor charges it upon us to be a meer calumny as Bellarmin calls it for although he affirm that when Christ is worshipped under the Symbols that adoration belongs also to the Symbols yet he says it is in such manner as the adoration given to him upon Earth in his apparel belonged to his Garments which he qualifies with a quodammodo after a certain manner that is to say not as it is given to Christ himself but in an inferiour manner as hath been above declared Part 1. chap. 10. p. 190. § 2. After all this turning and winding to mis-represent the state of the Controversy to be whether on the account of Christ's corporal presence in the Sacrament that which appears viz. the accidents of bread ought to have the same worship given to it with that which is supposed or believed that is with Christ himself He comes at length to show that upon the Principles of the Roman Church no Man can be assured that he doth not commit Idolatry every time he gives adoration to the Host To prove this he makes use of a double Medium The first That no Man can be secure that the Object is such as doth deserve divine worship The second That no Man can be satisfied that he hath a sufficient reason for giving this worship to the Host And they are both of them impertinent to the present purpose and quite overthrow his supposition for proceeding upon the Principles of the Roman Church and supposing as he doth at presâ—nt a divine Revelation for the presence of Christ true God and Man in the Saccrament he must either deny Christ himself to be adorable or he must grant that the Object doth deserve Divine Worship and that there is sufficient reason to give it He that is too Prodigal in giving away what in time he may need himself casts himself upon a necessity either of begging what he gave or pretending an Error in the Deed of Gift And to these straits hath the Doctor brought himself by his over-liberality in supposing a like divine Revelation for Christ's presence in the Sacrament as for his being true God His honour will not permit him to begg what he so freely granted and therefore he takes the other course of pretending a double flaw in the donation and although his pretences be excluded by the very evidence of the deed as it stands upon Record in his own Book p. 111. yet I shall give them the hearing and show them to have nothing at all of proof in them 1. He saith p. 120. No Man can be secure that the Object is such as doth deserve divine worship If you ask him why He tells you the Mass-Bell now rings the Host is to be adored and if he should chance to believe his senses or harken to his reason he becomes an Idolater by not being a Fool or a Mad-man Again if he consider the miraculousness of the change it is so strange and sudden he can hardly say that God becoming Man was so great a wonder as a little piece of Bread becoming God If he be recall'd from carnal Reason to the Words of Christ this is my body he is told that Scripture is very obscure and dangerous for any one to be too confident of the sense of it If he be sent for the meaning of it to the unanimous consent of the Fathers he sees the World is as full of disputes concerning the sense of their words as of the Scriptures Lastly If he be counsel'd to lay aside his scruples and submit to the authority of the present Church he finds that Catholicks are not agreed about that neither Some think it enough that it is defined by the Pope Others require the concurrence of a General Council and that it be confirmed wholly by the Pope and doth proceed in the way of a Council So that he sees he may spend all his life in the study and search of these things and yet never be satisfied in them nor consequently in Transubstantiation it self which is now the Point he pretends he is not satisfied in wherefore if this be the only way of satisfaction he must forbear giving adoration or be guilty of Idolatry in doing it And doth he not manifestly prove himself here to be in the case of the Prodigal I lately mentioned when supposing a like divine Revelation of the presence of Christ in the Eucharist as of his being true God he now spends no less than four whole Pages to prove that he cannot be satisfied there is any such Revelation Let Schollars judge of this illiberal manner of proceeding whilst I speak to the Argument it self And not to tire the Reader with particular Reflexions upon the sâ—veral difficulties he starts concerning the evidence of his sense the miraculousness of the change the obscurity of Scripture the consent of the Fathers which have been answered over and over by Catholick Writers to free my self from all scruples in the case I take the Authority of the present Church to be sufficient for me For however some Divines think it enough that it be
the case is the same as to the Point of Reason Men must be allowed the use of their Judgment and Reason in the search of both And therefore he must either acknowledge his Charge to have been groundless when he taxed Catholicks for exposing Faith to uncertainty or he must grant to Men though it be with contradicting himself which is much easier to do than to swallow the least seeming Contradiction in a matter of Faith that they may and ought to make use of their discerning Faculty as to the truth or falshood of matters proposed to our belief which I confess I take to be the same as to believe no more than their Reason can comprehend and so if Reason chance to meet with some seeming Contradiction with which it is not able or willing to grapple the Article ought and must be exploded for such a monstrous Prodigy of hood wink'd and abused Faith as no Man can imagine God would e're obtrude upon the Faith of Reasonable Men. But here again perhaps he will say that although God may impose upon us an Obligation of believing against the Conceptions of our Reason yet he cannot do it against the suggestion of our sense because as he asserts p. 540. This would be to overthrow all certainty of Faith where the matters to be believed depend upon mattâ—r of Fact But here I would desire to know what Angel from Heaven reveal'd this Doctrin to him Suppose in the case of the two Disciples at Emmaus that our Saviour had vanished out of their sight before he brake bread might he not hâ—ve told them afterwards that it was He who had appeared to them in a disguise without overthrowing all the certainty of Faith where matters to be believed depend upon matter of Fact St. Chrysostome above cited I am sure was of another mind in the very point of Christ's real presence in the Sacrament when he bids us obey God in that mystery though what he say seem to contradict our thoughts and eyes And so was St. Cyril too when he exhorts Christians not to consider it as naked Bread and Wine for it 〈…〉 Blood of Christ according to the words of Christ himself And although sense do suggest this to theâ— viz. that it is Bread yet let Faith confirm thee Do not judge of the thing by thy tast but know and hold for most certain that this Bread which is seen of us is not Bread though the tast judge it to be Bread but the Body of Christ and that the Wine which is seen by us although it seem Wine to the sense of tasting notwithstanding is not Wine but the Blood of Christ This is what these Holy Fathers teach in this matter and with great reason for as God is not only God of the Hills but also of the Valleys So is he God not onâ—y of our Reason but of our Senses also And if the Antidote his Goodness hath prâ—scrib'd to Cure our Corrupt Nature be prepared in such a manner as requires the captivating of our Sense as well as of our Understanding who shall question either his Wisdome or Power He hath said This is my Body though it appear to us to be bread And this being but one Exception from the General Rule of Sensation why that should overthrow all certainty of Faith more than so many exceptions as the Trinity and other Mysteries lay upon the General Rules of our Reasoning I leave to all Men of sense and Reason to judge O but this is the strangest of Miracles and Miracles ought to be the objects of sense I grant it of such Miracles as are done for the Conversion of Unbelievers but this is not done upon such an account but for the Sanctification of those who believe already And for these it is enough that Christ hath said It is his Body They know very well the danger of not believing him more than their senses And that others may know it also I shall set it before them in the words of St. Epiphanius no less than 1300. Years ago We see saith he speaking of the Blessed Sacrament that It is neither equal nor like in proportion or Image to his Flesh to the Invisible Deity to the lineaments of a Body for this is of a round forme and insensible according to power And yet because he was pleased to say through Grace This is my Body every one believeth his saying For who believeth not that it is his very true Body falleth from Grace and Salvation Thus much to the Doctors Principles of Sense and Reason Let us now see what he says against the Grounds and Motives of Transubstantiation CHAP. V. A Check to the Doctor 's bigg words against the Grounds of Transubstantiation with a new Example of reporting faithfully as he calls it the Words and Sense of an Author § 1. TO show there are not the same Grounds and Motives for Christs presence in the Eucharist by Transubstantiation as for his Divinity my Adversary instances in Three 1. The Authority of the Roman Church 2. Catholick Tradition 3. Scripture And for the first of these Viz. The Authority of the Roman Church if it have any at all it stands against the Doctor for Transubstantiation and that so evidently that he is forced to take the confidence p. 130. utterly to deny that to be any ground of believing at all For my part I believe every sober Person of his own Party will judge he had much better have said nothing at all And I cannot but think how St. Austin who calls the Chair of Peter that Rock which the proud Gates of Hell do not overcome and professes that the Principality of the Apostolick Chair did always conserve its vigour in the Roman Church would have startled to hear one single Doctor so pertly deny it to be any Ground at all of believing How St. Hierome who writing to Pope Damasus saith I know that upon this Rock the Church is built and whosoever eateth the Lamb out of this House is Prophane c. would have whetted his stile more against him for denying her Authority to be any Ground of believing at all than ever he did against Vigilantius for deriding Invocation of Saints Veneration of Relicks or Lighting Candles at Noon-Day in the Church c. And how St. Irenaeus would have excluded him out of the Society of Christians for this peremptory behaviour when he affirms it necessary for all other Churches convenire to have recourse and agree with the Roman by reason of its more eminent Principality That this was the Dignity and Prerogative of the Roman Church in the time of these Holy Fathers the Doctor himself cannot deny and if he pretend she is fallen from the Purity she then enjoyed it is but what the Donatists his Predecessors in this point said above twelve hundred years ago when as St. Austin tells us they call'd the Apostolick Chair the Chair of Pestilence because it oppos'd their Novelities
suffred for our Sins an evident sign that all those who held the Flesh of Christ to be true Flesh and not Phantastical believed also the Eucharist to be that very true Flesh This is what Protestants themselves confess of the most eminent Fathers of God's Church in each Age from our Saviours time concerning the Doctrin of Transubstantiation as I find them cited in two Treatises the one called The Protestants Apology for the Roman Church the other The Progeny of Catholicks and Protestants whose Authors I never heard were taxed of insincerity in their quotations And if it be true what Dr. Field saith of Bellarmin that if he could prove that Protestants confess the Roman to be the true Church he needed not to use any other arguments I might supersede any farther proof of this matter and leave the Doctor to join issue with his Fellow-Brethren But the Reader perhaps may desire to see the Testimonies themselves of those Fathers which were so pregnant as to force such learned Men of the Protestant Party to confess that they taught the Doctrin of Transubstantiation And in order to his satisfaction in this Point I shall set down one Testimony of each Father in the same order as they stand cited above and but One to avoid Prolixity TESTIMONIES OF THE FATHERS FOR TRANSUBSTANTIATION IN the beginning of the Eighth Century St. Jo. Damascen li. 4. de fid c. 14. The Bread and Wine and Water are by the Invocation and Coming of the Holy Ghost changed supernaturally into the Body and Blood of Christ And with him agrees Theophylact The Bread is transformed by the Mystical Benediction and the coming of the Holy Ghost into the Flesh of our Lord. At the end of the Fifth and beginning of the Sixth Century St. Gregory Our Creator well knowing our Infirmity by that Power with which he made all things of nothing by the Sanctification of his Spirit converts the Bread and Wine mixed with Water their proper species or figure remaining into his Flesh and Blood In the Fifth Eusebius Emissenus and St. John Chrysostome The former saith Before Consecration there is the Substance of Bread and Wine but after the words of Christ it is the Body and Blood of Christ For what wonder that he who created them with his Word should convert or change them after they were created The latter The things we propose are not done by Humane Power We hold but the place of Ministers but he that sanctifieth and changeth them is Christ himself In the Fourth Century St. Ambrose and because this is the Age I suppose the Doctor pitches upon when he saith he will undertake to instance in an Age since the first three Centuries Wherein if the most learned Fathers and Bishops who lived in it are to be credited Transubstantiation was not believed I shall be somewhat larger in citing the words of St. Ambrose and also add other Testimonies of Fathers of the same time to his that the Reader may see what Issue his Undertaking is like to have in this matter First Then St. Ambrose as if he foresaw my Adversaries objection puts it down in these formal words You will say perhaps How do you prove to me that I receive the Body of Christ when I see another thing And the way he takes to Answer it is by comparing the change made here in the Nature of the Bread with the examples of those miraculous changes which were wrought by Holy Men of Old in the Natures of other things as of Moses's Rodd being turned into a Serpent the Waters of Aegypt into Blood c. From whence he infers that if the Benediction of those who were but pure Men was of such force as to change Nature What must we say of that divine Consecration where the very words of our Lord and Saviour do operate Thou hast read saith he of the works of the Creation how God spake the Word and they were made he commanded and they were created that is produc'd out of nothing The Word therefore of Christ which of nothing could make that to be which was not can it not change those things which are viz. Bread and Wine into that which before they were not viz. his own Body and Blood surely it is not a less matter to give new natures to things out of nothing than to change them after they are made Again You will say perhaps my Bread is usual Bread No saith he this Bread is Bread before the Sacramental words When the Consecration is performed of Bread is made the Flesh of Christ He spake the Word and it was made he commanded and it was created And that we may not doubt he meant it was made his true Flesh he saith As our Lord Jesus Christ is the true Son of God not as Men are by Grace but as the Son of the substance of his Father so it is his very true Flesh as himself hath said which we receive and his very true Blood which we drink This and much more doth St. Ambrose write of this subject so that no Man need to wonder if the Centurists say he wrote not well of Transubstantiation And I have either read or heard it reported of Calvin that he wish'd the Devil had struck the Pen out of St. Ambrose's hand when he wrote those Books of the Sacraments But let us now see what other Fathers of the same Age teach concerning this Point S. Cyril Our Saviour saith he sometime changed Water into Wine and shall we not think him worthy of our belief that he changed Wine into his Blood S. Gregory Nyssen We do rightly believe that the Bread sanctified by the Word of God is changed into the Body of God the Word By vertue of his Benediction he changeth the nature of the things which are seen Bread and Wine into that Viz. his own Body S. Gaudentius The Maker Lord of Natures who produceth Bread out of the Earth doth again of Bread because he can and hath promised to do it make his own Body and He who made Water of Wine maketh of Wine his own Blood These are Fathers who lived in the Age immediately following the three first Centuries to whom I might add St. Chrysostome above cited who flourished in this Century though he dyed in the beginning of the next and others but these may suffice to let the Reader see if this be the Age which the Doctor intends to instance in how unlikely it is he should make good what he asserts that Transubstantiation was not believed in it In the Third Century St. Cyprian saith The Bread which our Lord gave to his Disciples being changed not in shape or figure but in nature was by the Omnipotency of the Word made Flesh And Ursinus confesseth There are many sayings in him which seem to affirm Transubstantiation And Tertullian in the same Age saith that our Lord having taken Bread made it his
his Adversary will be so rude as to remember him of what he told us out of Celsus p. 150. that the Aegyptian Deities at least I mean Chnumen Chnaachumen Cnat Sicat Biu Eru c. Every one of them healed the diseases of the parts proper to themselves and therefore might justly be invocated nor yet of what he told us so lately out of St. Austin p. 155. that the Heathens supposed that the Gods could not know the Necessities and Prayers of Men but by the Intervention of those Spirits and that the giving them divine worship proceeded upon that supposition Viz. that it was their Office to inform the Superiour Gods of what they could not know otherwise For if these things be true it is manifestly false what the Doctor affirms at present Viz. that ALL that the Heathens attributed to their Inferiour Deities was only Intercession and consequently he not only contradicts the Truth but what perhaps to him is worse Himself also So dear doth it cost him to make the Church of Rome appear guilty of Idolatry for desiring the prayers of the Holy Angels and Saints not to inform God of what he knows not nor for them to give what they ask as the Heathens believed of their Deities but only to recommend us to his favour as we begg the prayers of one another But his Zeal is not all spent There follows a second Part of it to the same doleful Tune And we must dance step by step after it if we will not be counted Rats CHAP. III. What kind of Worship of Angels was Condemned by St. Paul Theodoret c. with a farther display of the disparity between the Heathens Worship of their Inferiour Deities and that given by Catholicks to Holy Angels and Saints § 1. THe Second Thing the Doctor proposed to show out of the Fathers p. 154. was that they did not only condemn giving this worship to the Spirits which the Heathen worshipped but to good Angels too And here again he deludes his Reader with that general term of this Worship as if the honour which Catholicks give to the good Angels by desiring their Prayers to the only true God were the same with that worship which the Heathen gave to those spirits whom they worshipped with sacrifice as Gods But we must give him leave to cry whoop all hid in Generals and find him out if we can The first place he seeks to hide himself in and he was so afraid to be discover'd that he would not set down the words is that Text of St. Paul Col. 2. 18. Let no Man beguile you of your reward in a voluntary humility and worshipping of Angels c. and not holding the Head Christ Here he saith that St. Paul doth in the general condemn the worship of Angels that is all kind of worship of any kind of Angels whether good or bad But if so why did St. Paul say in a voluntary humility and not holding the Head Christ These Clauses sufficiently intimate a particularity in the Worship which St. Paul condemn'd and this was saith St. Chrysostome that some among the Colossians said that we ought to be recociled and have access to the Father not by Christ but by the Angels And this saith he is that which is said i. e. condemned by the Apostle that they so admitted and worshipped the Angels for Mediators as to exclude Christ And the reason why they did so is given by Theophylact because they esteemed it a thing unworthy the Majesty of the only begotten Son on the one side to make the Reconciliation and far transcending Man's Poverty or lowness on the other This supposed the Doctor 's petty Objections of St. Paul's not distinguishing good Angels from evil ones and our setting up other Mediatours besides Christ vanish into Air because good Angels themselves are not to be worshipped but in subordination to Christ the Head nor their Prayers to be desired as efficacious for us but through his merits And when we have recourse to them upon this account it is no more to set up other Mediators besides Christ than when we desire the Prayers of Holy Men upon Earth § 2. But Theodoret upon this Place of the Apostle saith that those who defended the Law perswaded Men to worship Angels because the Law was delivered by Angels which practice he saith continued a long time in Phrygia and Pisidia and therefore the Synod of Laodicea doth forbid praying to Angels And to this day the Oratories of St. Michael are among them This they perswaded Men to as a piece of humility affirming that God the Creator of all things could not be seen nor comprehended nor approached by us and therefore we ought to obtain his favour by the Angels This is what Theodoret saith and the Import of it amounting only to this that St. Paul and the Council of Laodicea in his Judgment forbad the worshipping or praying to Angels upon account that the Law was deliver'd by them and therefore as Theophylact saith they brought us salvation or that God by reason that he is Invisible and Incomprehensible cannot be approached but by the Angels The Reader sees how unjustly this Place is urged against Catholicks who have recourse to the Holy Angels for their Prayers not upon account that they brought us salvation without Christ by delivering the Law or that God is so high we cannot have access to Him but by them but that they as true Friends of GOD would intercede for us through the Merits of Christ our only Saviour and Redeemer as the Council of Trent declareth But if Theodoret will not do the Doctor 's work Baronius shall No wonder saith he p. 155. Baronius is so much displeas'd with Theodoret for this Interpretation for he very fairly tells us what he condemns and St. Paul too was the practice of the Church of Rome and those Oratories were set up by Catholicks and not by Hereticks And I shall wonder more if he find any one who will believe him that so great a Champion of the Church of Rome as Baronius should be so stupid as to maintain in the face of the World the lawfulness of praying to Angels as it is practised in that Church and yet confess that as so practised it is condemned by Theodoret and St. Paul too Either Baronius was a very great Dolt or the Doctor does not deal very fairly by him And this is but too too evident 1. Because the words as put by him for the words of Baronius Viz. what Theodoret condemns and St. Paul too was the practise of the Roman Church are not Baronius his words but the Doctor 's for Baronius saith there expresly that Theodoret as to the Doctrine of the Veneration of Angels recta sensit that is held the same which the Roman Church holds at this day 2dly Because the Point in which Baronius differs from Theodoret is not that those were not condemn'd by him and St. Paul too who worshipped Angels
be Intercessours to Him for them Now that such as piously and faithfully pray to them obtain their desires The Donaries when they pay their Vows do witness as evident Testimonies of their recovered health For some hang up the resemblances of Eyes others of Hands others of Feet made of Gold or Silver which their Lord how small and vile soever the gifts be disdains not most gratefully to accept measuring the gift by the ability of the Giver These therefore being exposed to the eyes of all Men and brought by those who have obtained health are most certain signs of the Cure of the Diseases These I say shew the vertues of the Martyrs who lye buried there and the vertue of the Martyrs declares the God whom they worshipped to be the true God 3dly St. Austin is so copious in this subject that he writes a Treatise rather than a Chapter of the Miracles which were done in his time at the Shrines of several Martyrs particularly of St. Stephen which those who desire to be informed of the Truth may read at their leisure I have instanced already in that of the devout Mother who exacted of St. Stephen to restore her Son to life and had her Petition granted God saith St. Austin doing it per Martyrem by his Martyr I shall only add at present what he relates of a poor but pious Man called Florentius who having lost his Cloak and not having wherewith to buy another went to the twenty Martyrs whose memory saith he with us is very famous and pray'd with a loud voice to be cloathed Certain young Men whom St. Austin calls Irrisores i. e. scoffers hearing him pray derided him as no doubt Dr. St. would have done had he been there as if he had begg'd so much money of the Martyrs as would buy him a Cloak But he departing from thence towards the Sea-side found a great Fish upon the shore in whose Belly when open'd there was found a Gold Ring which the Cook a good Christian to whom he had sold the Fish and knew what had passed gave him with these words Behold how the Twenty Martyrs have cloathed Thee Thus St. Austin little thinking then or now if he know nothing of what passes here below what sport this story will make for the Doctor and his Partizans though he good Mâ—n judg'd it worthy to be recounted that God might be glorified in his Saints And upon the same account I shall not omit though it may add matter of new Merriment to the scoffing humour of the Age to set down what I find related by John Patriarch of JERUSALEM to have passed in this kind with Saint John Damascen about the Year 728. He is known to have been a stout Asserter of the Veneration of Holy Images and when the Emperour Leo Isauricus raised a Persecution for that cause he wrote divers learned Epistles to confirm the Faithful in the Tradition of the Church He was then at Damascus where the Prince of the Saracens kept his Court and highly in the favour of that Prince for his Wisdom and Learning And the Emperor Leo not knowing otherwise how to execute his Fury against him causes a Letter to be forged as from Damascen to Him and to be transcribed by One who could exactly imitate his hand the Contents whereof were to invite him to pass that way with his Army with promise to deliver the City into his hands This Letter the Emperor as out of friendship to an Ally and detestation of the Treachery sent to the Prince of the Saracens who no sooner saw and read it but in a brutish Passion commanded the right hand of Damascen which he supposed had writ it to be cut off Dictum Factum A word and a blow His hand was struck off and hung up in the Market-place till Evening when upon Petition that he might have leave to bury it it was commanded to be delivered to him He takes the hand and instead of laying it in the Ground joins it to his Arm and prostrating himself before an Image of our B. Lady which he kept in his Oratory humbly besought her Intercession for the restoring of his hand that he might employ it in setting forth her Son's praises and Hers This done sleep seiz'd on him and he beheld the Image of the B. Virgin looking upon him with a pleasant aspect and telling Him that his Hand was restored which when he awaked he found to be true and a small Circle or mark only remaining in the place where it had been cut off to testify the truth of the Miracle This is recorded by John Patriarch of Jerusalem in the Life of St. John Damascen and to this I might add many more of the like kind But these may suffice to satisfy an Impartial mind that whether the Saints themselves hear us or no yet those who implore their Intercession are most certainly heard and as St. Austin saith helped by them And it can never be unlawful much less Idolatrous to use that means for the obtaining our just desires which God himself hath attested by so many Miracles to be acceptable to him All that the Doctor brings to uphold his slippery consequence is that it would be a sensless thing to desire some excellent Person in the Indies when we are at our solemn devotion to pray for us And so no doubt he would have derided those three Tribunes who being unjustly condemn'd by the Emperor Constantine commended themselves to the Prayers of St. Nicholas at that time far from the Court for double Innocents But God who is every where present and to whom the Wisdom of the World is Foolishness both could and did reward the simplicity of their Devotion by causing the Holy Man to appear to the Emperour in his sleep and divert him from executing the Sentence In fine if the Doctor will needs have it to be a sensless thing to call upon the Saints in Heaven for the Assistance of their Prayers he must either condemn the Lights both of the Greek and Latin Church as Mr. Thorndike calls them to have been sensless Men and they may thank God they escape so or he must grant this practise of theirs to be a convincing Argument that they believed the Saints did hear them § 4. The last thing he quarrels at is the setting up the Images of Saints in some higher place of the Church and burning Incense before them And what he says to show this to be very Evil is that which proves it to be very Good viz. That the Persons for whose sake this is done are as we suppose them truly such as for their assured sanctity would deserve to have it done to themselves though perhaps Humility or other Moral Considerations might weigh both with them and the Church not to permit it to be done Yet we know that Elias sate upon the top of a Hill and call'd Fire from Heaven upon those two Captains who came to seize him but