Lib. 15. c. 28. concerning it viz. that Peter Cnapheus the false Patriarch of Antioch an intruding Eutychian Heretick did of his own head mention the Mother of God in all his Prayers and invoke her Divine Name This was about the Year 470 or 480. Behold a great reputation for the religious Worship of the Virgin to be invented by an Heretick This unadvised Zeal for the Virgin began upon occasion of the Nestorian Heresie who affirmed a Humane Person in Christ Jesus as well as a Divine and for that reason did not think fit that the Virgin should be called the Mother of God because she had not been made use of for any thing else but to conceive in her Womb the Humane Nature and Person of our Saviour To oppose this men fell into other excesses they began to give to the Virgin great and magnificent Titles But Invocation and Worship of her came not so soon 'T is true 't was the first original of her adoration Nestorius was rash without doubt and God forbid that we should ever be of his Opinion if he did indeed put two persons in Christ Jesus as well as two Natures Neither do we deny that the Holy Virgin may in a good sence be called the Mother of God seeing she is the Mother of Jesus Christ who is God. But nevertheless it was an unhappy rashness in the Doctors of the Fifth Age to innovate in the terms The Virgin is not called the Mother of God any where in the New Testament but only the Mother of Jesus and we ought to have kept there This Name the Mother of God hath something which sounds ill and is opposite to the Idea of God who can have no Mother Moreover God did not pour out his blessing upon the false Wisdom of these Doctors On the contrary he hath permitted that the most criminal and excessive of all the Idolatries of Antichristianism should take its original from thence Theodorus Lector tells us of a Temple of the blessed Virgin * Lib. 2. In which the Patriarch Timothy appointed Prayers for the day of preparation But this was under the Empire of Anastasius at the end of the Fifth Age. If they quote to you Authors of the Fourth Age and those that did precede it for the Invocation of the blessed Virgin maintain boldly to them that they are suppositious Pieces and we are ready to prove it by the Testimonies of our Adversaries themselves Father Crasset hath lately taken a great deal of pains to find Testimonies in the Ancients for the Invocation of the Virgin before the Sixth Age. But altho' all his Book be a declared war against good sence and honesty nevertheless there is not any subject in which he hath bid greater defiance to the one and the other than on this He quotes to us two Epistles of St. Ignatius in the First Age the one to St. John the other to the Virgin two sottish Pieces which are acknowledged supposititious by the learned of the Church of Rome as well as by those of our own And yet what is there in those two Epistles No religious Invocation but only some excessive Praises and a Prayer to the Virgin who was yet living that she would fortifie the New Converts in the Faith. He produces Dionisius the Areopagite another false Work and which some Impostor did forge under the Name of this Saint more than 400 Years after his death And yet there is no Invocation of the Virgin found there but only excessive Elogies and Praises In the Second Age he quotes under the Name of Justin Martyr a Book of Questions and Answers to the Orthodox He must have as little Judgment as this Jesuit to quote under the Name of Justin Martyr a Work where the Author speaks of Clemens Alexandrinus and of Origen who writ almost of hundred Years after the death of Justin Moreover they quote nothing from this Book to which we cannot subscribe for 't is an explication of the just Honour which is due to the Virgin exactly according to our apprehensions and sentiments Father Crasset could quote nothing more to his own disadvantage This Jesuit who heaps together all the Impertinencies of those which went before him could not forbear to imitate the falshood of those who quoted those words of Ireneus That the Virgin Mary was the Advocate of the Virgin Eve. As if St. Ireneus intended to say that Mary prays and interceeds at this day in the Heavens for the sins of Eve the Mother of all men But these Gentlemen have been advertised a long time since that the word whereof Ireneus serves himself in the Greek which is lost is Paraclete which signifies rather a Comforter than an Advocate His meaning is that Mary becoming Mother to the Saviour of the World hath comforted Eve concerning the evil which she did by destroying Mankind And Father Crasset is so injudicious that in the same place he quotes from the same Ireneus another passage which ruins the advantage he would drawn from the first 'T is a passage where St. Ireneus says * Iren. l. 3. c. 3. Eve by her disobedience was the cause that she herself and all mankind have been subject to death But the Virgin Mary by her obedience was the cause of her own salvation and that of all mankind By her obedience i. e. by the faith which she gave to the words of the Angel by which faith the Lord was conceived in her Womb. Behold now this Ancient understands that Mary was the Comforter and the Advocate of Eve. In the Third Age he quotes a passage of Origen Homily the 1st in Matt. which says nothing which we don't say every day touching the purity of the Virgin. In the same Age he quotes under the Name of Gregory of Neocesarea called Thaumaturgus three Sermons on the Feast of the Annunciation But this man knows not that the Feast of the Annunciation was unknown in the Third Age in which Gregory of Neocesarea lived how could he make Sermons on that Feast And how could there be a Feast in that Age to the memory of the Annunciation when there was none as yet to the honour of our Lord and Saviour's Birth St. Chrysostom learns us that it was in his time i. e. about the end of the Fourth Age that men began to celebrate this latter Feast That which he reports from St. Cyprian and Dionisius of Alexandria is nothing to purpose He reports in this Third Age a passage attributed to Methodius Bishop of Tyre who suffered Martyrdom under Dioclesian but this Sermon belongs not to him nor to any other contemporary Author For there are Impertinencies therein which we cannot ascribe to a wise man as this which he says that God is debtor to the Virgin and that God who hath said Honour thy Father and thy Mother ought himself to observe the Commandment which he hath given to others In the Fourth Age he quotes St. Athanasius St. Ephraim St. Jerom
from Judaism but bred up in the Schools of the Greeks having suck'd the Spirit of Fables and Lies wherewith those two Nations are justly reproached forged the Oracles which he attributes to the Sybils he caused to enter there as Oracles of those ancient Prophetesses all that which he believed proper to support the Christian Religion and render it plausible to the Pagans The better to persuade the Greeks he there mingled their Fables and to please the Philosophers he entered their Dreams there making himself all things to all Men that he might gain some Among other Philosophick Dreams he inserts two in his Work The first was drawn from the Platonick Philosophy 'T was that there was a certain separate place into which he pretended the Souls of the Faithful were carried after death and where they were lodged till the Day of Judgment without enjoying the happy vision of God. The other was this that at the end of the World there would be a great Fire through which all Men must pass that should be saved An imagination which seems to have some likeness to the Stoick Philosophy which teaches that the World would be burnt after which it would return into the State wherein it was at the beginning and in a continual vicissitude pass through the same Revolutions and Changes Or rather 't is taken from what the Holy Scripture says that the World at last must be burnt by Fire We are not able to say how these two Opinions the one concerâ—â—ng the separate state of Souls and the other concerning the Torrent of Fire through which they ought to pass did readily diffuse themselves among those which had any Learning and read any thing besides the Sacred Volumes The Ancients good Men and credulous being ravished to find Books under the name of Pagan Prophesies which foretold the coming of Jesus Christ his Names his Passion the Circumstances of his Birth of his Life Death and Resurrection much more clearly than the true Prophets embraced with greediness what they found in these false Prophesies Justin Martyr who wrote well nigh in the same time that these false Oracles were forged falls into the persuasion that Souls after death are in a separate place where even in some sort they are subject to the Power and Persecution of the Devil From thence it comes to pass that he said it was the Devil that caused the true Samuel to ascend by the Charms of the Witch of Endor ‖ Dial. cum Tryph. For which reason says he when a person is near death you ought to pray that his Soul don't fall under such a power S. Ireneus Bishop of Lyons the most considerable Writer of this second Age was of the same opinion concerning this separate place where all Souls must be inclosed until the Day of Judgment without seeing the Face of God. * Advers Haeres lib. 5. He calls this place Paradise whither Enoch and Elias were transported but he also calls it Hades Hell and a place invisible Note that this Opinion is universally at this day rejected by the Papists and passes among them for an Error Pope John XXII having been accused to be of this Persuasion there was a terrible noise about it and he was forced to retract it Now this Opinion is the original of Purgatory For as we shall see afterward this place changes by little and little its-nature until at length they made of it a place of Torments and Punishments for the purging of Souls This separate state produced a little while after Prayer for the Dead which we shall see had its original about the beginning of the third Age. But whereof nevertheless we see nothing in the second unless it be towards its end On the contrary Justin Martyr tells us that we must pray for dying Souls to the end that in the place of their Separation they fall not under the Power of Devils He would not have failed to have added that we must pray for Souls after death to the end that we might draw them from under the power of Devils if Prayers for the dead had then been in use On the Subject of this praying for the Dead whereof they make such great boasts in Antiquity tell them these three things 1. That it was not in use in the first and second Age. 2. That the Reason why they began to pray for the Dead is very different from that which causes Prayers for them at this day At this day 't is to draw them from Purgatory then it was to the end that in the terrestrial Paradise or other place of Separation where they were God would increase their rest and joy for it was believed that they were there in the beginning of Happiness 3. To conclude tell them that these Prayers for the Dead are no important business in Religion and that they are not the Reason of our Separation After that press them to shew you in the second Age the least footsteps of this place of Torments whither penitent Souls must go after Death to pay the remainder of those punishments which they could not satisfie during their life Demand proofs from them that in this Age the Church prayed for Souls that they might quickly get out of torment and you will see them forced to confess that there are none I come to the Worship and Adoration of Creatures such as are Relicks Images the Blessed Virgin Saints and Angels They treat this as a small business we shall have occasion to prove to you one day that without running into any extravagance 't is a Pagan Idolatry But for the present we will content our selves to shew you that we do not find the least footsteps of these worships in the second Age wherein we now are If they did invoke Saints the Blessed Virgin and Angels if they had Images if they did kiss and adore Relicks let them shew it you let them cause you to read one Author that speaks of it Bellarmine hath the impudence to produce the words of Justin Martyr to prove the Worship of Angels We adore and venerate the Father and the Son which is come to us from him who hath taught us both us and others which follow him and the Army of good Angels by the Spirit of Prophecy c. Apol. 2. He refers the word we adored to that of Angels as if the design of Justin Martyr had been to say that they adored Angels Whereas he ought to refer Angels to the word teach his Sense being that Jesus Christ hath taught the Angels as well as us the Mystery of the Gospel according to what S. Paul says To the intent that now unto the principalities and powers in heavenly places might be known by the Church the manifold wisdom of God Eph. 3.10 It is so clear that this is the Sense of S. Justin that at this day none of your new Doctors dare quote these words to prove that they worshiped Angels in the second Age. This passage being
them Wine But the truth is they did all that could be done to destroy them that they might deliver themselves from the fear of seeing them in Arms and returning to their own Estates and Possessions They put Mortar in their Bread they gave them nothing to drink but stinking water and they let them die in their dung and ordure And they have been so successful in their design that there is a place where of 400 persons there are 250 dead nevertheless we have not heard that any one did renounce his Religion it were injustice to refuse both the Name and Glory of Martyrdom to those which have died in so constant and so difficult a Confession The Church hath put its Confessors one degree below Martyrs but in truth I do not find that they are much inferior to them I do openly avow that there are Confessors which I admire more than Martyrs It is in my opinion a more glorious Work to endure a terrible and furious Combat during the space of many months or years than to behold the face of death for a few moments And we may say with assurance that such persons have faln in a long Confession which would courageously have endured the sight of death Therefore my Brethren do honor to so many Believers which have suffered to afford you an example Remember how many righteous persons are in the Gallies laden in Chains but incircled with Glory We have there two which are very famous among many others who it may be are not inferior to them tho they be less known to us We have there M. de Marolles of whom we have spoken already and some of whose Letters we have communicated unto you We have there another Man of Learning and Merit called M. Le Feure of a considerable Family of Chastel Chinon in Nivernois of the Church of Corbigni This faithful Christian after he had avoided with a great deal of labor the occasions and seasons of Subscriptions by shifting hither and thither at length he puts himself on the way to go out of the Kingdom He was seised upon the Frontiers towards the beginning of the month of March he was conducted to Besancon where he was put into a Dungeon in which during the space of three months he experienced all the Severities which they put upon the greatest Criminals and he endured all the Temptations of Threatnings Promises and Disputes which the Persecutors are wont to make use of to vanquish the Constancy of the Saints By word of mouth and writing he caused all his Friends to know that they had no reason to fear on his behalf and all his Letters bore the Marks and Characters of true Christianity by the Humility Sweetness Piety and Patience which were manifested and displayed there After he had languished many months in Dungeons with a Body naturally weak and sickly he was condemned for ever to the Gallies They sent him in Chains to Dijon where he met with M. de Marolles which they brought from Paris So these two illustrious Confessors who already knew each other by the report of their Courage and Sufferings were joyned together to be a pair of eminent Witnesses to the Truth They had the same Fortune as they had the same Heart both were sick even unto death upon the way whilst they dragged their Chains after them both arrived at Marseilles and both are actually in the Gallies bearing their Chains both night and day by express order from the Court and both of them with the same courage pursue the glorious Race of their Martyrdom until it shall please God to grant them the Crown after which they breath Amongst the Confessions which are well worthy of Martyrs I cannot forbear to place that of a Gentlewoman of Poictou near St. Maixant about the Age of fifty or fifty five years whose name is slipt from us though there be many Witnesses of the same place who have informed and assured us with one consent of the truth of the following History She endured the first rage of the Dragoons that is to say the wasting of her Estate their Threatnings Blasphemies and other Evangelical means of our modern Converters Her Goods being wasted the Soldiers attacked her Person and there was not any kind of Torment Violence Blows or Reproaches which they did not offer to her They tied her to the post of a Bed where she remained a long time the object of the impudence and fury of the Soldiers who proceeded to commit all the outrages upon her that an honest Woman could suffer except Violation In conclusion one of these Wretches thought fit to tell her if you can suffer a living Coal upon your hand during the space of a Pater Noster we will let you go She consented very freely They then took the greatest and the most burning Coal that was in the Fire she had the Courage to stretch out her Hand and to hold it herself stretched out without complaint and to pronounce Our Father c. from the beginning to the end a Dragoon in the mean time blowing the Coal for fear it should go out which scorched her Flesh and Skin and made her Blood and Humours to bubble and boil when this as done one of the Soldiers raging and swearing said thou haft said the Pater Noster too quickly I will say it my self and if thou canst endure a light Coal of Fire on the other Hand whilst I repeat my Pater Noster we will give thee thy Liberty This poor Woman consented to this second proposition with the same chearfulness which she had manifested at the first this was done The Soldier takes the Coal she receives it and held up her Hand in the Air with the fire Coal which consumed it whilst the Soldier said his Pater Noster putting a great distance between word and word In conclusion another Soldier overcome by an example of Courage so extraordinary blamed him for repeating his Prayer so slowly and struck off the Coal from her hand and so they left her Behold say I in my Opinion a Confession well worthy of a true Martyr Praised be God that we have yet souls so inspired of God to overcome such punishments and so inflamed with his Love that they can surmount the burning Fire Jan. 1. 1687. The TENTH PASTORAL LETTER Two Articles the one of Antiquity the other of Controversie The Article of Antiquity The Faith of the Third Age about the Invocation of Saints Relicks Images Fasts Indulgences Human Satisfaction and Confession The Article of Controversie Concerning the Unity of the Church that 't is not included in the Church of Rome and that we are not excluded from it Dear Brethren in our Lord Grace and Peace be given to you from our God and Saviour Jesus Christ WE have already begun in the last Letters to give you a History of the Faith of the Church in the Third Age and the last thing upon which we staid was the Real Presence and Transubstantiation
not exactly understand Nevertheless what your Apologist hath advanced is very rash and very criminal for he supposeth with Monsieur Nicolas Monsieur de Meaux and your other Convertors That all those that live in the Romans Church and which were saved there did partake in all her Superstitions This is false and we are perswaded that an infinite number received Christianity there without taking part in Antichristianity or that they repented of it before their death Because they do not comprehend how this may be done was it not therefore done This is to put bounds to the Divine Power God hath his ways which are known to none but himself Fifthly But I have almost no need of all this that I have said in the present Affair for I declare to you that although all your Ancestours should be saved in the Roman Church whilst they pertook in her Worships although all the honest Papists at this day should be saved nevertheless you would not be in the way of Salvation in the way in which now you are and I will convince you thereof in two words the first is That your own Apologist condemns you Your Father saith he were born and bred up in a Religion and never heard any other Doctrines discoursed on How dare you compare your state to that Although he should have mercy for such persons would he have it for such who have been brought up in the Bosom of Truth who have not forsaken the Faith but only the Profession of it who have subscribed to Errours against their Conscience who adhere to Worships whereof the strong and the weak do know the Filthiness and Impurities I have already said unto you and I do say it over again To act contrary to Conscience hath something so aggravating in an evil action that it makes a moderate Superstition become a kind of Sin against the Holy Ghost You do well perceive this when you go to Mass with such terrible regret and reluctancy it is your Conscience that accuses and condemns you The other circumstance which puts you absolutely out of all condition to compare with your Ancestours is That by your weakness you have ruined the greatest Works of the Grace and Providence of God which hath appeared since the Establishment of Christianity that is to say the Work of Reformation 'T is a thing past doubt that since the death of the Apostles there hath nothing happened so great as this magnificent Work whereby God at one shock did overthrow almost half the Antichristian Empire and very much weakned the other half God is jealous of his Works and he cannot but look with a Soveraign Indignation upon the lapse of those who by their fall runied the late glorious Reformation and who proceeded so far as to blame it and say as you say to us We must not Separate we must tolerate Abuses we must expect the Separation that Jesus Christ will make at the Day of Judgment Oh criminal Imagination We must live in the Dirt and Slime we must not restore to the Church her primitive Beauty we must not disengage the Truth from a hideous Mass of Lyes that do oppress it we must not restore to God that Worship that hath been ravished from him we must not remove from before his eyes so many Idols of Jealousie Have you never no holy Compunction for entertaining such thoughts Do not you perceive that your weakness in suffering yourselves to be led to Mass will ruine the Reformation if God don't bring a speedy Remedy thereunto The Protestants of the three Kingdoms of England Scotland and Ireland will have the same Complaisance for their King that you have for yours Popery re-united will confederate against all Protestant States and then behold them speedily tumbling into Superstition by your Principles and by your Conduct So that by following you we shall soon see the fruit of much Blood so many Martyrs and so many glorious Confessions perish and come to nothing If you give attention to this you will no more compare yourselves to those poor miserable Ignorants which went whither they were led who being placed in a night of deep Superstition saw not a beam of better Light which way soever they turned their eyes on one hand they saw behind them a multitude of Ages corrupt as their own a Corruption which came by so long a descent to them that it appeared a natural state on the other hand they saw before them an Authority which swallowed them up a Clergy Magnificent Powerful Tyrannical Numerous rich and abounding in Spiritual and Temporal Thunders all this amazed them in such a manner that they could not distinguish the state in which they were We do not think them savable in this state but we think you far less so in the estate in which you are God by a blow from Heaven the most miraculous that ever was seen hath broken this dismal Charm he hath thundred he hath lightned from Heaven and dispersed this Darkness See whether you who have been Partakers of this Heavenly Light be in an estate to flatter yourselves with a Tolleration which God might have for your Ancestours so then if you gain any thing by your reasonings it will not be for you but for your Children for 't is of them concerning whom we may say it seems they were born in that Religion they were educated therein 't is probable God will save them although they do communicate in a Worship Impure and full of Superstitions But in truth you gain nothing either for your Children or yourselves The past time will return no more the times of Darkness and Ignorance may indeed return but the times of Tolleration and Sufferance will never return again That which is done can never be undone The Light of the Reformation hath cast abroad a very great Lustre and although at this day men endeavour to stifle it the memory thereof will never be extinguished and the Truth which we have set in so great a light can never be abolished For which reason both we and our Posterity in all following Ages are obliged to see follow and entertain this Light If we do otherwise there will be neither Excuse nor Illusion which will be able to save us out of the hands of the Judge of the World. IN the preceding Letter we sent you some News from Languedoc Behold a Letter that will tell you more we will give it you without any change or mutation You have heard of the Death of Monsieur de Cross Monsieur Brousson had bailed him seeing him sick in the Vessel which was to carry him with others into America He was an Example without Equal The Bishop of Marseilles told him Monsieur If your Religion be true I must confess that you are a Saint Let him die in his Religion and be buried in a Dormitory of the Turks He had not the grief to understand the death of his youngest Daughter who had been carried some little time since from the
number of their Nobility they Massacred more than three thousand of them they resolved to seize the Prince of Condy and the Admiral to cut off the Head of this and commit the other to perpetual Imprisonment To conclude they did not re-take their Arms but to repel those which were taken against them and to give way to the greatest necessity that ever was of defending themselves By these two Examples we may judge the Fidelity of Soulier in the rest The second thing which this Priest says upon occasion of that which we had said That in the Year 1659 we were not treated so ill as to incline us to a Conspiracy with the English 't was that even then the Court designed our Ruine that we knew it well and that it already appeared by many Declarations which had been published to our disadvantage which he quotes To this we answer That the design of the Clergy was to destroy us we do not doubt and that it may be the Court might have the same intents and purposes that 't is true some Declarations had been already published against us But we say That the fear of a future and uncertain Evil or some little present Evils did never engage us to make use of actual Conspiracies for our Preservation The Declarations and Decrees which the Clergy obtained against us were as yet nothing and then did us no Evil. The King himself granted us a National Synod at Laudun in the Year 1659 a Favour which had not been conceded to us since the Year 1641 an evident proof that the Court was not then under those wicked Inclinations in which it hath been since engaged or at least if it had already conceived the design of destroying us it was not possible for us to guess at it seeing their actions spake the contrary The third Argument of Falshood drawn from the State of England and France But to the sence of this second Argument drawn from the Condition of the Affairs of the Protestants in France we will add a third drawn from the State of Affairs in France and England at that time which will shew both the Ignorance and Bruitishness of Soulier himself and the other Authors of this Imposture They are pleased to affirm That in the Month of July in the Year 1659 we did treat with the English about their entring France We must enquire whether it be not a thing against all Sence at that time to attribute to the English a design of entring into France with Weapons in their hands through Guyenne First we must know that then the English were in the most strict Alliance with France which could be betwixt two States The English had caused their Troops to pass into Flanders to joyn those of the King Dunkirk was joyntly Besieged by both Nations it was taken from the Spaniards put into the hands of the English to the astonishment of all Europe and the scandal of all true French-men yea there were some that had the boldness to complain thereof by their Writings This may be seen in a Writing made by Monsieur Sillon to justifie the Conduct of Cardinal Mazarine his Master and in some of the printed Letters of Monsieur Coster Arch-Deacon of Mans. This Union of England and France was yet so great in 1660 that an English Garrison was received at Amiens to whom the publick Exercise of their Religion was allowed in the City This obliged the General Assembly of the Clergy to make complaint thereof to the King and to content them a Promise was made to give to the English a Farm-house in the Suburbs there to exercise their Religion out of the City Behold the English and French at Peace and perfect Correspondence and their Armies united against the Spaniard and France in so great a confidence of them that it delivers to them the important place Dunkirk and receives their Garrisons into their proper Cities When men make Fictions if they are not directly brutish they choose proper seasons for them he should have assigned to this Conspiracy of the Protestants of Guyenne some time in which France had been in War with England but in truth 't is to have a distempered mind to take a time of the most perfect correspondence that ever was between the two States But this is not all 't is needful to see in the second place the Condition of the Affairs of the English in themselves to know whether there be any probability that they then had a design of entring France It must therefore be remembred that Cromwell died in the Month of September 1658 and that from that time till the return of Charles the Second England was always in a dreadful Confusion as may be seen by the History of that time and by the News Books published one after another Richard was proclaimed Protector immediately after the death of his Father and he who hath collected the News of that time tells us See the Collection of News Ordinary and Extraordinary Relations and Reports of things happening in this Kingdom and elsewhere in the Year 1659. Printed at Paris 1660 with Priviledge That Richard did not think he could do better than preserve himself in the Friendship of those whose Alliance his Father had sought after and to continue War against those against whom his Father had declared it He continued therefore in a strict Alliance with France and at War with Spain Behold the man which they make to Treat with the Protestants of Guyenne to carry his Arms into France against the only Support that he could have to maintain himself in the place which he possessed who was otherwise uncapable thereof If Richard were not a mad man I don't understand how he could engage in this Affair This new Protector calls a Parliament in the beginning of the Year 1659 which is exactly the Year of the Conspiracy of Montpazier the Extraordinary of the sixth of March speaks of the opening of this Parliament and says That from the fifteenth of February to the twentieth it was employed in examining the Title and Rights of my Lord Protector In the following Sessions they endeavoured to Regulate the Power of this new Protector and to retrench the Excesses which he enjoyed to the prejudice of the Rights and Liberties of the Nation From that time behold Richard attacqued and yet he enterprizes new Work abroad which alone required a man and a whole Kingdom besides From the thirteenth of March there were great Contests in the Parliament touching the manner how it ought to be composed whether they should there permit two Houses the Upper and the Lower what persons ought to be received into the Upper House in case they suffered it to subsist These Differences continued all the Month of April with the utmost heat and with great violence and rage Behold these people in a good condition to carry Arms into France In the Extraordinary of the fifth of May is seen a large Remonstrance presented to the
before our general Banishment Is it credible he would have permitted a Minister convinced of Rebellion against his Majesty and of Conspiracy against the State to go out of his Kingdom He who had kept in Prison other Ministers of Guyenne for Preaching or Praying after the Prohibitions would he have given the Keys of the Gates to a Minister known guilty not only of the same faults but of a crime worthy of the severest Punishment Certainly there is nothing could have protected me and I must have expected to have been condemned to Prison or to the Gallies for ever Seeing therefore that after the sight of this Act he gave me my Pass-port and was content with my Banishment as well as with that of others 't is an indisputable proof that he gave no credit to it and knew the Falshood thereof only he thought fit to leave Soulier at liberty to fight us with the Weapons of his Tongue and Pen. To conclude though we have to do with a King who hath condemned his Faithful Subjects to Banishment even those who exposed their Goods their Lives and Liberties to his Service yet I do not repent the performance of my Duty 't is matter of Confidence to me and gives me the boldness to implore the Protection of GOD against the Cruelty of Men. Two things are considerable in this Testimony of Monsieur Asimont the first is That he is a man of great Age and of whom it may be said that he expects the moment in which he must go and appear before God. Can any one believe that a man so near to leave the World should be willing to keep measures with it for the preservation of I know not what trifle of Honour and Reputation and that being so near his appearance before God should dare to prophane his holy Name by so many Falshoods and Perjuries The other thing observable is The Circumstance which he observes in his Letter concerning the suspicion though unjust under which he fell in the minds of some of his Brethren by reason of a certain Letter of Favour and Thanks which the King caused to be written to him as an Acknowledgment of his Fidelity to his Service This is notorious and all the World knows it Is there any probability that they would trust such a man with a Conspiracy which they knew to have been so faithful and so perfectly in the Interests of the Court But is there any probability that a man who had been so faithful to the King and so fast and sure to his Service would have any part in such a Confederacy and Conspiracy I do acknowledge that I have no more to say after this and that if the Priest Soulier does continue to maintain his Act and Conspiracy of Montpazier he may very well boast that he hath the gift of Impudence to the highest degree and measure For never had Romance and Fiction so many marks of Falshood Let us see them a little altogether 1. Ricottier is here Minister of Clairac and in truth he was Minister of the Reformed Church of Burdeaux 2. Saint Blancard is here Commissary for the King but in truth 't was Monsieur Vivans of Vilefranche 3. Daret is he by whose Mediation they treated with the English this Daret is a Phantome who never was in the World. 4. Durel Minister of the Duke de la Force substituted in the place of Daret was not Assistant to the Synod 't was Dorde Minister of Montpazier itself 5. To Durel who treated with the English they give the name of Elijah or Estienne or Esay or some such name beginning with an E and yet his name was John. 6. Durel is present he receives the Act and nevertheless he was not so much as deputed to the Synod 7. Durel treated with Cromewell who even had been dead ten Months 8. Durel treated with the Parliamentarians to whom he was a mortal Enemy and by whom he was mortally hated 9. The English offer to enter France with their Arms in a time when they were in the greatest Confusion among themselves in an Anarchy and by consequence in a state of the utmost weakness 10. A Conspiracy is discovered to the Court part of the Authors are living and the Court says nothing thereof 11. Asimont one of the principal Conspirators begs leave for himself and his two Sons to depart the Kingdom 't is granted him without any difficulty 12. They suppress the Edict of Nantes they Persecute the Reformed even to death without objecting this Conspiracy as a fault unto them 13. Men enterprize and attempt to deliver places to an Enemy which they have not had in their hands these fifty Years 14. Men attempt to raise a Civil War in the time of the Peace of the Pyreneans at a season when the Kingdom remained without any trouble from abroad 15. They are four or five Ministers and it may be as many Elders which make this Conspiracy and pretend to execute this great Design without communicating it to any one 16. Or they did communicate a Secret on which the Lives of an infinite number of persons depended to an hundred and fifty Deputies yea to all the Consistories 17. To conclude the Reformed attempted to trouble a Kingdom and themselves in a time when they enjoyed a very great Peace I do maintain that here are a heap of Falshoods Contradictions and Follies so plain and sensible that a man must have a head and heart made like those of Soulier the Priest to be able to digest them To conclude let us see a little the Channels by which this Piece hath passed and Providence will therein shew us new Indications of Falshood As to its source 't is sufficiently difficult to discover it according to Soulier this Act made by the Synod of Montpazier is put into the hands of the Minister Vignier Vignier died in the Year 1666 and dying committed this Piece in trust into the hands of Mounier Minister of Nerac also and his Colleague the Minister Mounier turns Catholick in the Year 1675 and dies in the Year 1677 at Paris in an Inn near the House of Soissons Monsieur de Quesne Arch-Deacon and Vicar-General of Condom goes to see him in the time of his Sickness he gives him this Act of Montpazier Monsieur de Quesne gives it Monsieur Joly then Bishop of Agen Joly gives it to Monsieur the Cardinal of Bouillion the Cardinal of Bouillion gives it to the King and at last the King gives it to Monsieur Chasteau-neuf who puts it in his Office where it is sealed up and joyned to the Acts of the Synod of Montpazier Behold a great many hands which are either unknown to us or suspected by us As to the Minister Mounier we do continue to say he was a man wounded in his Reputation by Suspension from his Ministry he was besides an Apostate from the Truth and had the Character of all voluntary Apostates i. e. hatred for the Truth and for those which do
advantage upon the Abyssines because they were very ignorant But King Claudias interposing therein had almost as much advantage on the Missionaries of Portugal as they had on the Ecclesiasticks of Aethiopia because he was without comparison the most able man of his Kingdom as well in Divinity as in the Art of Government Oviedo seeing that he got nothing by these ways resolved to employ those which were more violent He left the Court to testifie his displeasure and published a Writing injurious to the Abyssine Church in which he accused it of many Heresies and forbad the Portugese to have any Communion with it The King was angry also on his part but a little while after he was slain in a Battel and left his Brother Adamus Saghed Successor to his Realm This Prince used more rigour against Oviedo and his Companions he revoked all those Acts of Grace which his Predecessors had granted to them He forbad them upon pain of death to trouble his Estates by their new Gospel The Bishop withdrew to Fremone upon the Frontiers of the Kingdom and there abode thirty years with the Portugese under the Title of the Patriarch of the Abyssines which he took after the death of John Barrett Adam Saghed died and his Son Malec Saghed succeeded him He treated the Portugese more kindly and they being reformed by the correction they had received acted more wisely and with greater moderation Nevertheless this Mission was extinct because they had no way of sending Successors the Turks having possessed the Ports of the Red-Sea which gave admission into Aethiopia And the Portugese which would have converted all the Nation were found without Priests to give them the Communion But in the beginning of this Age in the year 1604. a Jesuit named Peter Pais was more happy than all those who had preceded them He entered into Aethiopia and made himself admired by an Ability which although it were but very indifferent seemed extraordinary among people which knew nothing He came to the Court of Zadengel who was then King of Aethiopia and managed him so well that he obtained an express Promise from him that he would submit to the Pope and the Religion of the Romans This Prince began with an Ordinance which forbad the observation of Saturday or the Sabbath which the Abyssines venerate as the Lord's Day The Great Men of the Realm being provoked by this Enterprize conspired against him and slew him after a Battel in which he was not successful Behold already the death of one King which Papery caused in Aethiopia This death cost the Jesuit Converters nothing on the contrary they found in Susneus the Successor of Zadengel a Protector much more proper to make the Minister of their Violence Susneus permitted himself to be managed by these Missionaries of Portugal in such a manner that they prevailed with him to declare openly that he would change the Religion of the Country and submit the Abyssine Church to the Pope He wrote concerning it to Clement the Eighth and to Philip King of Spain who was then also King of Portugal Many Great Lords of the Court and Officers of the Army out of complaisance to their King embraced the Religion of the Romans and communicated with them Susneus having received many kind Letters from Paul the Fifth writ to him again another Letter dated the 31th of January 1613. by which he acknowledges him for Pastor of the Universal Church and desires his assistance to confirm his Religion This Prince guided by the Jesuits to the end that they might do things a little in form caused many Conferences to be held upon the Question of the two Natures in Christ Jesus For the Aethiopians following the Schism of Eutyches acknowledge in him but one But the truth is there is at this day nothing but a dispute of words thereon for the Eutychians acknowledge the Divinity and Humanity in Christ Jesus but it pleases them to say this Union makes but one Nature compounded of two as the Body and Soul in Man make but one Compound so that 't is certain that we may very well give our selves indulgence therein but 't is not of the Spirit of Popery to tollerate any thing The King at the sollicitations of the Jesuits made an Edict by which he ordained That henceforward they should believe two Natures in Christ Jesus The Abyssine Monks which fell in the Dispute sustained themselves in their ignorance with obstinacy in their Opinion but one of them having spoken a little too freely was brought before the King and was beaten with a stirrup-leather Behold the Spirit of Popery which began to discover it self without disguise This first Violence awakened their sleeping Spirits Simeon the Metropolitan of the Abyssines came to Court he complains That without consulting him they had done such things upon Religion The King answered That for his satisfaction there should yet be a Conference on that subject The consequence was that after the Conference the Jesuits obtained an Edict by which it was forbidden on pain of death to say there was but one Nature in Christ Jesus This frightful Decree was a clap of Thunder which seemed to reduce the whole Empire of the Abyssines into powder and Aethiopia knew then by experience what Evils the Spirit of Popery drew along with it all the Realm was alarmed and the most moderate lost their moderation and considered that in truth the Controversie about two Natures in Christ in the estate in which now it was was of no importance but that such a severity was unheard of in Aethiopia since the times of the Apostles and that it was wholly opposite to the nature of the Christian Religion for which Religion they concluded they must not suffer such Violence Jamanaxus Brother by the Mothers side of the Emperour puts himself at the head of a very powerful Confederation into which many great Lords entered with all the Church-men and a great part of the People The Metropolitan Simeon who strove less against the two Natures in Jesus Christ than for his Dignity which they would have taken from him in favour of him whom it should please the Pope to name excommunicated all those which followed the Religion of the Franks for so they call the Religion of the Romans This boldness caused some fear to the Emperour he grew a little moderate and made another Edict in which he gave Liberty of Conscience to all his Subjects and in all appearance he had continued so to do if he had followed his own Inclinations But at the instigation of the Jesuits he returned to more violent Counsels The Queen-Mother the Metropolitan the Church-men and the Monks threw themselves at his feet in favour of the ancient Religion but he rejected them all with violence so that there was no more hopes of Peace Jamanaxus the King's Brother Elias his Son-in-Law Governour of the Province of Tygris with a great Party resolved to oppose the Violence by force The Metropolitan
account which does honour enough to the Spirit and Wit of him that made it Would to God he would take as exact an account of his own Heart Our Sheet being full you shall have no Answer to these Juggles till the following Letters March 15. 1687. The FIFTEENTH PASTORAL LETTER AN Article of Antiquity The Birth of the religious Worship of Creatures in the Fourth and Fifth Ages The proofs of the Novelty of this Worship An Article An Answer to the Reasons of the new Converts on the Subject of Schism and Separation Dear Brethren in our Lord Grace and Peace be given to you from our God and Saviour Jesus Christ SInce we entred into the Fourth Age we found there three great Innovations Monnachism General Councils and the Hierarchy The fourth important Change which altered the form of the Church happening in the Fourth and Fifth Ages is the Worship of Creatures the Adoration of Relicks and the Invocations of Saints If there be any thing certain in the World it is that this Worship was wholly unknown in the preceding Ages and no man can give attention to those few Proofs that heretofore we have made thereof without being convinced of it 't is certain that we have seen the Occasions and if I may so say the Blossoms thereof in that excessive respect which they had for the Persons of their Confessors in the regards which they had for their Intercessions and in the care that they took to collect their Bones and to bury their Bodies honourably and this is it which gave occasion to the Pagans of accusing the Christians for worshiping their Martyrs as we have seen that the Jews of Smyrna did accuse the Christians thereof on the occasion of the Body of Polycarpus which they hindred from being given unto them This is that which caused the Pagans under the Persecution of Dioclesian to dig up the Bodies of those two Martyrs Dorotheus and Gorgonius and throw them into the Sea For fear saith Eusebius * Lib. 8. Hist Eccl. cap. 6. that if they continued in their Tombs they should be adored and taken for Gods according to the Opinion they had concerning us We have seen how the Christians of Smyrna and Eusebius who transcribes their Epistle did refute this calumny Moreover Eusebius saith in this last Passage According to the Opinion that they have concerning us This makes it appear that the Opinion was false They had therefore in the beginning of the Fourth Age a very great respect for the Tombs of Martyrs but 't was a thing unheard of to open them take out their Bones and put them in Chests and Boxes to the end that they might be scattered over all the World yea long before in the fourth Age St. Anthony being about to dye declared that it was his Will that his Body should be buried and not kept upon a Bed after the manner of the Egyptians Because says he 't is an affront and a Violation of the Laws not to bury the Bodies of the Dead how holy soever they might be These were the last Words of dying Truth for afterwards Men began to search all Places and to disinterr the Bodies of Saints The deceit of Priests the Innocence of the People and the malice of the Devil advanced this unhappy Superstition Persons ran about in the search of Relicks nor would they build any Temple or Church without them they feigned Visions and devious Dreams which revealed unto them where the Bodies of Saints were laid and they took the pretended Bodies of Apostles and Martyrs from their Tombs three hundred and four hundred Years after their Death As it was impossible that this foolish Superstition should not soon degenerate into Idolatry so it did not fail to come to pass for these Relicks drawn from their Tombs wrought Miracles these Miracles were ascribed to the Saints whose Relicks they were Men could not fail of invoking those Saints which they believed did work Miracles in favour of those who did venerate and honour their Relicks We see no sensible marks of the Invocation of Saints till after the year of our Lord 360 and the most ancient Authors that speak thereof are St. Ambrose and St. Basil not that we are not persuaded that the People the Authors of this Superstition did not practise it a long time before as in the time of St. Austin we observe the Worship of Images to have taken its birth by the Superstition of some ignorant People notwithstanding the generality of the People and Pastors did not suffer themselves to be carried away to this unhappy Idolatry till a long time after In like manner it may not be doubted but that from the beginning of the Fourth Age there were some ignorant Persons among the People who ran into excess in the respect which they gave to the Ashes of the Martyrs But the practice did not become universal till the Fifth Age and the Doctors and Teachers began not to be born down thereby till about the end of the Fourth And yet there was but little of it for in all the former part of the Fourth Age we see very few Monuments or Footsteps thereof in the Authors of those times but in the Fifth Age this Torrent ran with a prodigious swiftness in such a manner that in less than Fifty Years this Superstition became as it were the reigning Religion of the People Behold then a matter of Fact which we dispute not with the Papists 't is that about the end of the Fourth Age some Examples of the Invocation of Saints are seen and a great many more in the Fifth so that it is to no purpose that they quote to us Passages from S. Austin S. Basil Chrysostom and Theodoret to prove the Invocation of Saints in that Age for 't is a Point we do not dispute with them But we do maintain these Two things 1. That the Worship of Saints took its original from that of Relicks and that Men only invoked the Martyrs whose Relicks they had 2. That this Worship was new in that Age and that it was unknown in the Ages preceding The first Point will serve in what follows for a proof of the second which is the important Point we have to prove viz. The novelty of this Worship in the Fourth and Fifth Ages 1. We prove the novelty of this Worship by the silence of Christian Authors during the space of three Hundred or four Hundred Years 'T is a thing impossible that so many Writers having so much occasion to speak of the Martyrs and Saints and having said so much concerning them did never find it convenient to speak one word concerning the Worship and Honour that was to be given them after their death The lesser Doctors among the Papists such is that from whom Mr. Pelisson produces a Latin Fragment treat this negative Argument with Contempt but no Man of good Sense will treat it so and no wise Man will ever perswade himself that for the space of three
Hundred and sixty Years Justin Martyr Clemens Alexandrinus Ireneus Cyprian Eusebius Athanasius Hillary and so many others should not speak one word of this religious Worship of Creatures if it had been then in use Besides this negative Proof we make use of all those positive Proofs which we have proved from the Second and Third Age by which it appears that the Primitive Christians invoked none but God and that they did not invoke even Angels 'T is that which Origen hath plainly told us and 't is that which Ireneus had said before him * Iren. lib. 2. cap. 58. That the Church doth nothing by the Invocation of Angles nor by any other wicked Curiosity but by Addressing purely plainly and openly her Prayers to the Lord the maker of all things Among these positive Proofs we have seen some of them which formally tell us that the Church neither worships invokes nor adores Martyrs such is the Epistle of the Christians of Smyrna about the Martyrdom of Polycarpus Is it not therefore an amazing boldness in your Converters to mantain to you that there was no change in the Doctrine and Practice of the Church thereon in the Fourth Age 'T is clear that Men did not invoke Saints in the Third Age it is clear that they began to do it about the end of the Fourth it is therefore clear that a Change did happen But they will say where is the Author of this Change Where is the Innovator This Question is absurd 'T was not one single Person that introduced this alteration in Worship 't was the superstitious People the great respect which the People saw Men had for the Tombs of Martyrs carried some Dotards to advance that the Souls of Martyrs were about their Tombs And 't is apparently according to the conjecture of Albespinus that which the Thirty fourth Canon of the Council of Eliberis hath respect unto * Albasp Annot in Concil Eliberitan That we ought not to light up Torches in the day time in the Coemetaries lest we disturb the Spirits of the Saints They imagined that these Spirits fluttering about their Tombs might suffer inconvenience by the Smoak of Torches and Candles Is not this a pleasant Imagination S. Jerome writing against Vigilantius doth also say That the Souls of Martyrs love their Ashes hover about then and are always present with them We know that the Vulgar are naturally inclined to Superstition and 't is easie to conceive how the People instructed in such an Opinion should conceive an extraordinary respect for those places where were the Bodies and Souls of Martyrs And conceiving that these Souls which conversed about their Tombs had also the liberty of flying back to Heaven when they thought good it was very easie for ignorant People to fall into a perswasion that it was very good to recommend themselves to their care and intercession There was therefore no need of an Innovator or a new Preacher nothing more was needful but to let the People do as they pleased Mark this well all Heresies have been introduced by Doctors for there is need of Wit and Knowledg to innovate in Opinions but all Superstitions have been introduced by the People For nothing more is needful to become superstitious than Sottishness Simplicity and Ignorance therefore the Authors of Innovation in Doctrine may be observed for they are ordinarily single Persons but we cannot observe the first Innovators in matter of Superstition because they are the People But it will be said why did not the Doctors oppose themselves to the Superstition of the People First it is not true that the Doctors did not oppose themselves to Superstitions at their birth S. Austin and S. Jerome himself blamed the Superstitions which began to take place in their Age and which afterwards overcame all Contradiction But nevertheless 't is true that they did not oppose them as they ought to have done yea that they suffered themselves to be carried away with them as others did because that these Superstitions were established by little and little and that the beginnings which the Doctors did easily suffer because 't was but a small matter gave place to the toleration of that which was introduced afterwards which nevertheless was altogether intolerable To conclude 't is of little importance to us how and why the Doctors suffered themselves to be carried into Errors and popular Superstitions The matter of Fact is certain and ought to be indisputable by the proof that we have made thereof and by that which we shall make thereof in what follows Our Second Proof of the novelty of this Worship in the Fifth Age is that then Men did not invoke all the Saints as 't is done at this day yea they did not invoke those Saints which are most eminent such were the Apostles excepting S. Peter and S. Paul whose Relicks were believed to be at Rome others had no Churches Temples Memorials nor Persons devoted to them S. Basil the most ancient of all those which speak of the Invocation of Saints celebrates the Memory only of the Forty Martyrs that of Julitta and the Martyr Mamas In this Homily upon Julitta the Martyr there is nothing that teaches us they did invoke her In the Homily upon the Forty Martyrs he says indeed that Persons fled to them for refuge and that the pious Wife prayed there for her Children that she there desired the return of her absent Husband and his Health when he was sick First it appears that this was the Devotion of Women who are inclined to Superstition Secondly 't is not very clear that these Prayers were addressed to Martyrs for in the beginning these Prayers are addressed to the God of Martyrs with respect to the Merits and Sufferings of Martyrs to whom God would do Honour by Miracles 'T is true that in the Homily on the Martyr Mamas the Invocation of the Saint appears more express But observe that this Julitta this Mamas and these Forty Martyrs were obscure Saints and of little Reputation in comparison of the Apostles concerning the Invocation of whom S. Basil speaks not one word This is a strange thing and that whereof they know not how to give us a reason Make the same observation upon the Passages of S. Austin which they quote unto you for the Invocation of Saints He there speaks of the Invocation of S. Protais and of S. Garvais Good God! what Saints are these in comparison of S. Matthew and S. John. 'T is true that this Father speaks of the Invocation of S. Stephen the first Martyr But however eminent this great Saint was he was but a Deacon and we ought not to make him equal with the Apostles Nevertheless there appears no Invocation of the Apostles in the Writings of S. Austin I call not this a simple Proof 't is a Demonstration of the Novelty of this superstitious Worship If the Worship and Invocation of Saints were ancient if they were from the time of the Apostles why
the year 1606 was made the Treaty called the Pacification between Rodolphus Emperour and King of Hungary and Stephen Bothskey Kis-ma-ria The first Article whereof grants That the Reformed Hungarians should not in any thing be troubled in the exercise of their Religion and that all the Churches taken from them during the Troubles should be restored to them All the Kings of Hungary which have been since Matthias Ferdinand the Second and Ferdinand the Third have confirmed these Priviledges by their Declarations To conclude the present Emperour in the year 1655 when he was crowned King of Hungary confirmed by an express Declaration all that his Predecessours had done The eleventh Article of that Declaration concedes That for the Conservation of Peace amongst all the Orders and States of Hungary the business of Religion shall remain free without receiving any Disturbance according to the Constitution of Vienna and the Articles published before the Coronation in such sort that the exercise of Religion shall be entirely free for the Barons Lords Nobles free Citizens and generally for all Estates and Orders of Hungary as also for the Towns and Villages which will embrace it so that no person of what estate or condition soever may be hindered by his Majesty or other Temporal Lords in any manner or under any pretence whatsoever from the free use and exercise of the said Religion Things were in this estate in the year 1671 when a Jesuite named George Barze Titular Bishop of Warradine calling himself Counsellour to his Imperial Majesty published a Book with this Title Truth declared to all the World which makes it appear by three Arguments that his Imperial Majesty is not obliged to Tollerate the Lutheran and Calvinist Sect in Hungary It is easie to understand what a Work of this Title that has a Jesuite for its Author doth contain The design thereof was to justifie the Persecutions which had been already made against the Protestants of Hungary as well as those they were preparing to make For already a long time before the publication of this Writing some particular Lords had set up for cruel Persecutors Among others Francis Nadasti Paul Esthersiazy and many others at the instigation of the Priests and Jesuites had employed both fire and sword they had massacred the Reformed in their Churches hanged them up on the bars of their Church-doors and many others they had thrown head-long from Turrets The Arch-bishops Bishops and Popish Gentlemen had thus used them and also pulled down the Churches in the Countries which held and depended on them The free Cities and those who depended only on the Emperour were exempt from this storm but they shall have their turn on the occasion following Many great Hungarian Lords of the Popish Religion as the Nadasties the Serinies the Frangipanes joyn themselves to Francis Rakotsqui and took Arms against the Emperour for private Quarrels The Troops of Austria on this occasion entred into Hungary on the year 1670 and defeated these Rebels The Arch-bishops Bishops and Jesuites of Hungary thought they must not let slip the opportunities they now had to persecute the Protestants They served themselves of these insolent victorious Troops in all the free Cities to do the same Violences which had been done by particular Lords against the Reformed Without form of Process they took away their Churches they banished the Ministers they put them in Prison they massacred a great number they charged the People and even the Nobility with Taxes Souldiers and Garisons they offered a thousand and a thousand Violences to oblige people to change their Religion All the Ecclesiasticks every one by himself acted like unbridled Furies The Prisons were filled with these miserable Wretches the Churches were razed every-where in the most places there were horrible Massacres and even whole Villages burnt because they were wholly inhabited by Protestants they hung the Ministers at the Doors of their Churches There was one named John Baki a Minister of the Church of Comana who was burnt At Cassovia and Posonium they put to death a great number of persons of all Sexes of all Ages and all Qualities They banished all those whom they dare not kill In one word all Hungary became a place like Hell for the Reformed where death punishments and torments presented themselves every-where before their eyes To give some colour of Justice to these Violences they established a Chamber at Posonium made up of all such as were found most cruel Enemies to the Protestants They summon'd the people before they summon'd their Pastors hoping that they would fall the more easily by the Temptation and that fear would cause them to change their Religion those which appeared and supported themselves on their innocency were cast into Prisons oppressed with Fines persecuted after a hundred manners and constrained at last to change their Religion To those which had courage enough not to renounce the Truth they presented a Writing to be subscribed by which they made them promise they would forsake their Pastors that they would not protect them and that they would not oppose the Priests in taking possession of their Churches On which Condition they promised to let them live in peace in hope and expectation that the Spirit would enlighten and Convert them Some fell and made their subscriptions others perished through misery famine and torments in the prisons When they had thus subdued and abused the people they turn themselves to their Pastors they established three Chambers of Justice the one at Tinew and two at Posonium before whom they summoned at first a small number of Pastors of the Confession of Ausburgh They appeared to the number of thirty two or thirty three the 25th of September 1673 they presented them a Writing to be subscribed importing That it was their will and pleasure that they should say that to escape the sentence which might be pronounced against them for their Rebellion they did consent to one of these three things Either to Renounce all exercise of their Office for ever and to live as good Subjects privately in the Realm or to go voluntarily into Exile with promise never to return again into the Estates of the Emperour or to embrace the Catholick Religion in which case they might remain in the Kingdom and enjoy all sorts of Advantages there The providence of God permitted this unjust and altogether unrighteous procedure to the end that these poor accused persons might have an opportunity to justifie themselves from the Crime of Rebellion whereof they were accused Is it so that men used to proceed against those that are Traytors And has it been usual to punish them with a voluntary Exile or by a simple Renunciation of their Offices and Charges They did all that they could to oblige the Pastors to subscribe this Writing and the most part of them fearing death did subscribe confessing themselves culpable though they were innocent and went voluntarily into Banishment Section This attempt having succeed sufficiently well
to the Persecutors the year following in the Month of February 1674 they summon'd before their Tribunals generally all Ministers Regents Professors and Masters of Schools of the Reformed Religion in Hungary as well those of the Confession of Ausburgh as those of the Confession of Switzerland part of them refuse to appear others fled and others tarried at home under the protection of their Lords who were Protestants Nevertheless there were to the number of two hundred and fifty which had the courage to appear at the day appointed These were they which God had appointed to be the Objects of the most cruel Rage that ever was exercised Of these two hundred and fifty they chose out six to answer in the name of all to the Accusation which was thus formed against them That renouncing the fear of God and Men they had accused all the Members of the Catholick Kingdom of Hungary and by consequence the King himself of being Idolaters that they had spoken insolently in their Sermons against the Blessed Virgin the Saints departed and against their Images and those of Jesus Christ that they had violated the Oath of Fidelity made to their Prince given Succours to his Enemies opened the way to the Turks to the end they might possess themselves of the Kingdom of Hungary and by consequence that they were guilty of Treason against GOD and Man and worthy to lose both their Goods and Lives The first part of the Accusation was an Affair purely of Religion and 't was that alone for which these poor afflicted persons suffered Persecution For the fault of Rebellion there was not the least ground to suspect them guilty of it their Judges themselves justified them therein and Forgatz the President of the Chamber said to some that did sollicite him In the Name of God trouble me no more for before God I myself am in no security for if I speak but one word on their behalf they will accuse me of Rebellion and cast me into Prison But in truth they were ready to discharge them of the punishments which these horrible Crimes deserved and whereof they were accused provided they would sign the Writing which others had signed confess themselves guilty and go into voluntary Exile Yea they offered to give them Money to conduct them whithersoever they would go There is a great deal of probability that persons who had caused the Turk to enter into the Country should be permitted to quit it by a voluntary Banishment Moreover this Accusation seems so absurd that I can see no reason why they should choose it for a pretence 'T is a hellish Wickedness to determine Banishment to persons only for Religion and yet make them confess a Fault of which every one knows they were innocent to the end they might have opportunity to say that they were punished for a Crime against the State. 'T is the Spirit that hath always reigned among Persecutors The Pagans made the Christians suffer horrible punishments only for their Faith Nevertheless to deprive them of the glory of Martyrdom they would make them confess these enormous Crimes whereof they were accused On this pretended Crime or to speak better upon the refusal of these Hungarian Pastors to quit their Ministery their Churches and their Country on the fourth of April 1674 they were condemned to dye And happy had they been if the Sentence had been executed upon them since never were Martyrs and Confessors under the first ten Persecutions of the Pagans exposed to such cruel tryals and temptations Leopold of Colonitsch Bishop of Newstadt the Jesuite Nicholas Kellion Monsters of barbarity and cruelty were the chief Ministers of those horrible torments which they caused these glorious-Confessors of Jesus Christ to suffer whereof we shall give you a very short Abridgement They had no design to put them to death according to the sentence pronounced against them that had been to deliver them too soon and it 't was in their design to make them pass through a thousand deaths successively Some of them they put into Irons giving liberty to others thereby to oblige them to renounce the truth through fear of the Chastisement which they saw fall upon their Companions For the space of eight whole Weeks they employed all sorts of Artifice to get them to sign the Writing and to go voluntarily into Banishment confessing themselves guilty But seeing they encouraged each other to bear the tryal they separated them and put the Ministers of the Confession of Ausburgh by themselves Many fell subscribed confessed themselves guilty and went into Exile There was forty six which refused and were cast into prisons and a few hours after they fetched them thence and transported them some by Waggon and some by the Danube into divers Fortresses of the Kingdom They carried twenty to Comarine eight to Sawarine eight to Berenstchine and nineteen to Leopolstadt all of them laden with Chains and Irons They gave for Conductor to those nineteen carried to Leopolstadt a Hangman which carrying Halters in his hand throughout the whole Journey threatned to hang them on the first Gibbet if they did not yield to what he demanded of them The Reformed Pastors of the Confession of Switzerland had more courage than the most part of the Lutheran Pastors for except two they all resolv'd to suffer all things rather than sign that Writing by which it was intended they should sully their innocence by confessing a pretended Rebellion and that they should renounce their Ministry Upon their refusal they distributed them as the others to divers Cittadels of the Kingdom They carried seven of them to Sawarine as many to Kapuwarin six to Eberard-Castle and the twenty one that remain were sent to Leopolstadt they were all chained and put into deep and dark Dungeons In all these places they received unheard of Treatments those which were conducted to Berentschin were coupled two and two as they yoke Oxen. They put Irons on their feet all filled with Nails which passed through their shoes and stockings and pierced their very flesh The Prison where they were put was as dark as Hell 't was a low stinking Dungeon full of Excrements Mud Man's Dung Serpents and Toads into which they could not enter but on their hands and knees The Governour of the Cittadel having represented to Colonitsch the Bishop of Newstadt that these Prisoners had not strength enough to suffer such torment and that they would die under it 'T is no matter said the Bishop when they be dead earth enough will be found in the Fields to cover them They took them not thence but to make them carry Wood for the use of the Cittadel and to draw Water from a deep Well Of those which had been conducted to Comorin the most part having suffered the most horrible Prison during the space of many months were so weak as to suffer themselves to be overcome and abandon their Confession There were not in this place above three Confessors that persevered