days within twenty should have been utterly destroyed I remember to have read how that the Primitive Christians to excite in their souls a more lively sense and apprehension of our B. Saviours humble Birth and painful Death were wont often to go to Bethlehem and Mount Calvary there to make their Prayers and Meditations reflecting and no doubt with a singular profit to their Souls that there their dear Redeemer was humbly born and here the same Redeemer pitiously died for them But the Devil envying these good Christians their so profitable Devotions by a cunning device thus thought to deterr them from them He suggested to the Pagans to set up the Statue of Adonis in the Stall of Bethlehem and the Statue of Venus on the Mount of Calvary so that the Devout Christians could not now go either to the one place or the other to help their Religious Piety without seeming superstitiously to worship Venus and Adonis A lively representation me-thinks this of the notorious abuse the same Devil has put upon us Christians in our yearly Observations of Christmas in memory of our Saviours Birth and weekly Observation of Friday in memory of his Death The Primitive Christians weekly observed the day of our Lords bitter Death and Passion afflicting their Souls for their sins with penitential sorrow and their bodies with rigorous Fasting both the quantity and quality of their Diet rather expelling Death than cherrishing Life The same first Christians yearly observed the time of their Lords Nativity but so Religiously as it was manifest their study was to fatten their souls with devout Meditations not to pamper their bodies with delicious fair The Devil envying the Church of Christ so great profit from the pious observation of these Holy Times he suggests to sensual Libertines so to prophane the Holy Time of Christmas with excessive Rioting that none could profess to keep it without playing the Debauche and so to abuse the Religious Fast of Friday and other times of Christian Abstinence by an intolerable excess in all sorts of Fish and Wine and dainty Comfitures that none could pretend to observe them without playing the Hypocrites professing to afflict their bodies with Austere Fasting when they pampered them by delicate Feasting But what Remedy Abandon the profane Abuse and recall the first Pious use Demolish the Statues of Venus and Adonis but help your Devotions still by Visiting the Sanctified places of our Lords Birth and Passion Though you must give me leave to tell you that I fear were the matter well examin'd it would be found that not others uncouth exotick manner of Fasting but our own Inordinate desire of eating when we will what we will and as much as we will that is of not Fasting at all is the true cause of our Cavilling at the Holy Fast of Lent and other times of Abstinence Let it be Some who pretend to Fast do nothing less abstaining indeed from Flesh but giving scope to their Sensuality in other things But they say Carpere vel noli vel meliora face Either do not carp at our Fasting or else Fast more strictly your selves And those who are so forward in Reproaching to their Neighbours their Mock-fasts I fear if they were obliged to Fast would find but difficulty enough even to fast so largely as they do whose Fastings they carpe at And though indeed you may find too too many Libertines who study by all means possible to avoyd the difficulty of Church-Fasts by excessive Drinking and intemperance in Meats not prohibited yet those of a better Conscience though they come far short of the rigor of the Primitive Christians in their Abstinence yet do so Fast as their fasting days are days of real Mortification unto them As for Libertins it s rather to be wondered they will deny themselves even to abstain from Flesh than that they take the liberty they do upon fasting-Fasting-days Do not so wholly fix your Eyes upon the Cockle as you take no notice at all of the good Corn. But to the Point undertaken to be proved How may one who with his soul desires nothing more than to observe most Religiously all Apostolical Ordinations be satisfied that the Holy Apostles of our Lord Jesus ordained the Quadragesimal Fast of Lent as a time of Abstinence and Humiliation for all Christians Let him throughly satisfie himself that Fasting is a Christian duty and has a singular force to cast out the Devil to obtain the Holy Ghost to appease the Allmighties just Anger and which shall have a singular reward in Heaven And moreover let him reflect if any Credit be to be given to the Old and New Scripture and to Eccesiastical History the more eminent any one has been for Piety and Sanctity the more exemplar have they been for Fasting and Abstinence Moyses Elias Daniel Iudith Anne great Fasters under the old Law St. Iohn Baptist our Blessed Saviour St. Mary Magdalen and all the Apostles under the Gospel St. Paul testifies of himself that he Fasted often Our B. Saviour assures us concerning all his Disciples that when he was taken from them they should Fast. To say nothing of our Basils Hieroms and Augustines c. whose Fasts were very frequent and very rigorous and yet we cannot without injury to the Apostolical Colledge surmise that those later Fathers of Christs Church should surpass either in Piety or Abstinence the first Planters of Christianity By which it is evident to every Christian Man that Fasting in general is very well becoming every good Christian and that he hardly deserves the name of a Christian who wanting neither health nor strength yet Fasts not at all And indeed if we examin the matter well we shall find that one great end of our Lord Jesus His coming into the World was to save us from our sins by Teaching by his Doctrin and by enabling us by his Example and other gracious Assistances fervourously to practise the propitiatory Humiliation of Fasting Our All-wise Mediator understanding very well that could he but bring us heartily to Repent us of our sins and to express the sincerity of our interior Contrition by exterior Humiliation or Fasting such was the genius of his Eternal Father that he could not but pardon us how great or how many soever our sins might be But on the contrary we refusing to Repent and that even in Sack-cloath and Ashes that is with such a Repentance as shows it self by some exterior acts or other no Prayers no Tears no Blood no Death of his could possibly obtain our pardon except we would Repent Perish we must and that Eternally But what conduces this to perswade Lent-Fast was appointed by the Apostles Very much For we having hence that Fasting is a necessary Christian duty and strangely conducing to save the World from sin it evidently follows it was well worthy the Apostles the better to secure so useful a practice to determin certain days every yeâ—r in which all Christians should be obliged to
humble themselves by Abstinence as to the quantity and quality of their Food they knowing very well by the Unction of the Holy Ghost what we know by too sad experience that the generality of the people being left to Fast when they pleased would please to Fast seldom or never at all Nay moreover it follows hence that the Institution of set-days of Abstinence was not only well worthy of the Apostles but also that it cannot well be understood how they could be faithful to their charge of the Souls of the whole World and neglect by the proviso of such an Ordination to propagate to all Generations an Universal practice of Fasting amongst Christians For though it were granted that the Primitive Christians were so fervorous both in Piety to God and in Mortification to themselves as they neither stood in need of set Holy-days to invite them to their Prayers nor of set Fasts to invite them to Penitential works Every day was a Lords day to them so long and frequent were their devout Prayers and other spiritual Exercises the whole year was one continued Lent unto them so rigid was their daily Abstinence Although I say all this were granted to the Honour of the Primitive Christian fervor yet it lying upon the Apostles to secure all Christian practices not only for their own days but to all Generations as much as in them lay and they foreseeing by the light of the Holy Ghost how apt tepid Posterity would be to excuse themselves from all obligation of the hard and troublesome duty of Fasting upon any set-times had they been left free to Fast when and how they pleased this I say the H. Apostles foreseeing their very Office seems to have obliged them from the beginning to ordain not only certain Festival days but certain Fasting days also lest after-Generations should say Our Ancestors went to Heaven without Fasting-Lent or other set Fasts and why may not we And indeed had not the Holy and long Fast of Lent been instituted by the first planters of Christianity over all the World Provincial or General Councils would have found it too hard a task to have obliged all Christian Countrys to an observation so repugnant to the natural inclination of Man-kind And this consideration alone does not a little encline me to believe that the Apostles of our Lord Jesus did actually and indeed ordain the Christian Lent Fast. For is it a likely Story that the Apostles and Primitive Christians Fasted as seldom and in such a manner as our Non Conformists do only deferring their good Flesh-meal till three a Clock in the Afternoon for five or six times a year But when Christians in after-Ages grew cold in all Christian exercises they fell to Abstinence from flesh contenting themselves with less nourishing and less savory Viands towards the Evening three days every Quarter and forty days every Year besides the Eves of several Festivities and two days of Abstinence every week Is this I say a likely story Or is it not rather much more likely that the Holy Apostles all over the World taught their first Converts both by their Example and Doctrin to Fast very often and very strictly but after-Ages growing more languid as in all Christian exercises so especially in Fasting as hardest and most contradictory to flesh and blood at length they came to Fast so remisly even upon days of the very Apostles Ordination that they added to one full Meal about Noon a Collation at Night and that such a one too as would hardly have been allowed a Primitive Christian Faster for his whole dayes Refection I desire the impartial Reader would be pleased to consider which of these two is the more likely story and to encline accordingly towards the belief of Lents being an Apostolical Ordination Or did the Primitive Christians Fast indeed very often and very strictly urged hereunto by their extraordiuary fervor but without any extrinsical Law obliging them hereunto upon any set-days or times but in after-Generations the Primitive inward fervor being lost did Christians generally Fast seldom and very remisly which their Pastors observing and watching for their souls good Did they hereupon Ordain Lent and other Fasting days as an extrinsical help to recover in their languishing Flock the Primitive Christian practice of Fasting According to that of the Apostle The Law is not made for the Iust Man but for the Vnjust 1 Tim. 1. 8. This might not without some probability be surmized were it not contrary to all Ecclesiastical History which makes mention of Lent in the most Primitive times as I shall say hereafter But Efficaciously to prove the holy Fast of Lent was taught the Christian world by the Apostles of our B. Saviour I confess I was not present when St. Peter or S. Paul or any other of the Apostles Preached to their first Converts the observation of Lent Neither were you present I believe when S. Paul writ his Epistle to the Romans and yet I perswade my self you think you are able to satisfie any reasonable man that he did write it Then why may not I be able also to prove satisfactorily that the holy Apostles did teach the Observation of Lent though I was not present at any of their Sermons or Exhortations to that purpose Or perhaps will you say You matter not who writ the Epistle to the Romans Having diligently Read and perused it you fear not with all confidence to aver whosoever writ this Letter I am sure the Holy Ghost Indited it I know it by its very stile and its other intrinsecal Vertues there 's a Divine Character stamp'd upon it by which I clearly distinguish it from all human Writings and this suffices me to make me receive it as a rule of my Faith and Manners But this would be small satisfaction to a Pagan who doubts of the Divine Authority of that holy Epistle unless you could make him also discern that Sacred Impress which you say you so clearly distinguish take heed you do not mistake 'T is Education I fear has made both you and me bear that Reverence we do to that and whatsoever else Portion of holy Writ we receive Had we been Educated in Judaism in all likelihood we should have as little regarded the New Testament as we do now Mahomets Alcaron I could tell you also that I know by the nature of Lent it self it must be Instituted and first taught by Missionants sent from Heaven and enumerating the singular benefits that accrue to a devout soul Religiously observing of it I could moreover make even you or any other Non-observer of it as well as my self see it must needs at first come from a good Spirit that wished Man-kind well for that it so strangely conduces to the perfecting of human Nature and to the adorning of it with many excellent Vertues For example If I Fast to afflict and humble my self before God Almighty for my sins my Fasting is an act of Repentance If I eat
interposing also your selves the half-fasts of the Stations and your selves other whiles also as each pleases living on meer Bread and Water The same Tertullian before he was a Montanist testifies in his Book of Prayer c. ult Sic die Paschae c. So also on the day of Christs suffering whereon is observed the common and as it were publick Religion of Fasting In the same Age S. Telesphorus Bishop of Rome did not first institute Lent-Fast as Zanchy observes l 1. m 4m Praeceptum Cited by B. Gunning in his Appendix but only added certain days to be observed over and above by the Clergy His words are Certe Telesphorus c. Assuredly Telesphorus who was the seventh Bishop of the Roman Church and a Martyr about the year of Christ 139. makes mention of this the Quadragesimal time above mentioned as observed before him in the Church For he added certain days which he would have observed by Clerks and Priests over and above what were observed by the Laity We ordain says he that all Clergy-men i. e. such as are called into the Lot of our Lord fast from flesh seven whole weeks before Easter because as the life of Clergy-men ought to be distinguish'd from the Conversation of the Laity so ought there to be a difference in their Fasting also Now the Church of Rome professing in her self a power to Institute Holy-days or Fasting-days had any of her Bishops first ordained Lent-Fast she would have made no more difficulty of Registring who it was then She does of telling us when and by whom was first Constituted the Feast of Corpus-Christi and divers other Ritual Observances Moreover in the same Age there was a difference betwixt S. Polycarp Disciple of S. Iohn and by him ordained Bishop of Smyrna together with Thraseas Bishop of Eumenia and S. Anicetus Bishop of Rome with other Western Bishops on the other side about which difference Polycarp came to Rome Anicetus professing to follow the Rule received from S. Peter and S. Paul by the Instruction of his Predecessors Xystus Telesphorus Hyginus Pius and Polycarp professing to follow what S. Iohn and other of the Apostles had practised The words of Irenaeus concerning Polycarp whom he had seen and heard are these That Anicetus could not perswade Polycarp to vary from what he had observed ever with John the Disciple of our Lord and the rest of the Apostles with whom he had Conversed or spent his time Iren. ap Euseb. l 5 c. 24. The same difference revived again about the 97th year after S. Iohn betwixt Polycrates Bishop of Ephesus with other Asian Bishops and Victor Bishop of Rome with others of the West Polycrates pleading the Authority of S. Iohn and S. Philip and Victor pleading the Authority of the Tradition of S. Peter and S. Paul Sozom. 1. 7. c. 19. Polycrates and they of Asia contending That from antient Tradition they deemed that they ought to observe the Feast of the Salutary Pasch on the 14th day of the month as being of duty altogether on that day upon what soever day of the week it fell to put an end to or dissolve their fastings On the other side which was Victors it was alledged No such Custom to observe on that mauner in the rest of the Churches throughout the whole World they observing from Apostolical Tradition which come down to that time that only on that day which should be also the weekly day of the Resurreci on of our Lord they ought to dissolve or end their Fastings You see both parties had a Tradition that the Feast of Easter was to conclude certain Fasting days and all this is witnessed in Eusebius l. 5. c. 23 24. About Easter-day it self they had indeed different Traditions S. Iohn and S. Philip finding it useful in those parts of Asia where many Iews Inhabited by condescention to observe the Christ an Easter on the same day with the Jewish Easter But S. Peter and S. Paul where no such cause was prescribed as meet not to disjoyn their Anniversary from their weekly memorial day of Christs Resurrection as B. Gunning reflects We have then S. Iohn taught S. Polycarp to Fast before Easter as testifies Irenaeus who saw and heard S. Polycarp Moreover in this Age the same Irenaeus tells Victor in an Epistle to him that there was Controversie not only concerning the day it self of Easter but also touching ' the manner it self of the Fast but none disputed whether there was to be a Fast or no before Easter His words are Neither is the Controversie only about the day of Easier but also concerning the ' form it self of the Fast for some think they ought to fast one day some two others also more and some by forty hours of Day-time and of Night commensurate their day And such variety of those that keep this Fast hath not been made or begun now in our Age but very long before with our Ancestors who as it is meet to believe not accurately retaining the manner of the Fast above-mentioned have changed the Custom which was simple and plain into that which was afterwards Now what uniform Custom could there precede in the Christian Church and not be from the Apostles Irenaeus writing thus about the 97th year after S. Iohn's death Though he seems not to speak of the whole Lent-Fast but only of the Fasts of the Paschal week In the very Age of the Apostles we have the Testimony of S. Ignatius their Contemporary in an Epistle to the Philippians His words are Do not Contemn Lent for it contains an imitation of the Conversation of God Neither do you despise Passion-week Fast upon Wednesday and Friday giving what you leave to the Poor Philo the Jew in his Book of the Religious says Eusebius l. 2. c. 16 17. describes the Religious Life of certain Apostolical persons of the Hebrew Nation at Alexandria having not only seen them but accurately taken knowledge of them describing there such their Conversation as is to be found in the Christian Religion only and he adds according to the Gospel and such Religious fastings says he which have descended down accurately the same even unto our times which more eminently were exercised in Fastings and whole Nights Watchings and attentions unto the Word of God at the Solemnity of the Passion of our Saviour It is manifest to every one that Philo comprised in that Writing Customs delivered in the beginning from the Apostles Hitherto Eusebius Now let us hear Philo's own words These Assemble themselves especially by the space of seven weeks Wine in those days is not brought in unto their Tables And their Table hath not any thing of that which had Blood but Bread for their Food and Salt for that which they eat with their Bread Some for the space of three days receive no Food and scarce by the space of six days did they refresh themselves with their natural Food A week they observed by a pure and holy Virgiral
Magistrates is a great shame Reflect also with him upon the Prayer for the first Sunday or Lent O Lord who for our sake didst Fast 40. days and 40. nights give us Grace to use such Abstinence that our Flesh being subdued to the Spirit we may ever obey thy Godly motions in Righteousness and true Holiness c. How unworthy it would be to make that Holy Prayer to bear such a sense as this O Lord who for our sakes didst Fast forcy days and forty nights give us Grace to use such Abstinence that our Sea-faring Men and Marriners and young Cattle and the like may be maintaâ—ned In fine Abstinence from certain Meats upon certain days is against no Law that I know of but the Law of sin in our own sinful bodys our corrupt greedy desire of eating what we will when we will and as much as we will But still you say you are afraid of Will-worship and Superstition by observing a time which you fear God has never commanded you But you have more reason to be afraid of Profaneness in taking no notice of a time which you have all reason to think God has commanded you Religiously to observe if you reflect well upon what has been said But you cannot perswade your self its any ways acceptable to God to Fast in Lent For that you must know that the power of Education is upon you and our proud corrupt Nature has a great deal of dâ—fficulty to condemn it self of so gross ignorance and mistake that notwithstanding we have made Religion our business for perhaps twenty or thirty years or more yet we have looked upon a Practice as an useless vain Superstition which was indeed true Christian Piety But it s better to come into Gods Vineyard at the Eleventh hour than not at all Better late than not at all come to the knowledge of any part of true Christian Piety Learn to be Wise from your own dammage and reflect seriously with your self how seldom you have Fasted in the whole course of your life and yet you cannot but acknowledge the singular benefit of Religious Fasting and if you believe Jesus Christ when it is rightly performed it shall have a singular reward in the other Life And consider moreover whether you shall in all likelihood Fast more days in this next year if you Fast only when the Spirit of God shall move you to Fast or if you should engage your self to Fast all Fridays ember-Ember-days Lent c. God knows our private good purposes are easily broken by us and the best of us stand in need of the extrinsecal help of a common Law to call upon us to do our duty especially in such things as are troublesome to Flesh and Blood as Fasting and Abstinence are You are resolved for example to Fast to morrow a Friend comes in and either invites himself to Dine with you or you to Dine with him and now it s ten to one but either out of modesty or human respect you break your purpose of Fasting But when a day is set apart for Fasting or Abstinence by a common Law every one presumes his Neighbour observes it and does not expect that for his sake he should Violate it Fasting and Prayer are strangely useful to save our souls and it concerns Superiors to secure some times for them in their Subjects let them super-add what they please by their own private Devotions And we find it but too true by too sad experience in too many what the German Lutheran confessed to his Son His Son refusing to eat upon a Fasting-day he told him he was not to Fast upon Fridays or Saturdays or any other Set-days that was Superstition but when the Spirit moved him His Son demanding I pray Father when did the Spirit move you to Fast these thirty years you have been a Lutheran He ingenuously confest By Goat niet een mael By God not once And indeed it is a sad thing to consider in our poor Country how many Zelots there are amongst us for Religion and yet how seldom or never at all they Fast. Nay many of them because they are loth to condemn their own practices because the holy Scripture sometimes Allegorically calls Abstinence from sin Fasting look upon Abstinence from Meat and Drink as no true Fast As if they should say there were no such thing prohibited by God as Carnal Adultery and Fornication because in a Spiritual and Allegorical sense Idolatry or a Worshipping of false Gods is often called in Holy Writ Fornication and Adultery But this is the just punishment of Pride and Self-conceit God ever resisting the Proud but giving Grace to the Humble deservedly do they fall into a thousand Spiritual Phrensies and Madnesses who prefer their own private seeming sense of H. Scriptures not only before the judgment of their present Guides and Teachers but also before the unanimous interpretation of the prime Christian Saints and Doctors of all Ages whom God has appointed to preserve us whilst we adhere to their solid Sentiments from being carryed away with every wind of Doctrin of our own private Opinions Whom all that has been said cannot perswade to a Religious Observation of the Penitential time of Lent I have one reasonable request to them that they would but for one year Fast as many days out of private Devotion as they do who Fast at Set-times and days commanded by an extrinsecal Authority and I perswade my self they would find so great spiritual benefit thereby that they would clearly see Fasting being good in it self its being commanded by our Superiors can never make it Superstition I deny not but the change of the Primitive Christian way of Fasting into a meer mock-abstinence from certain kind of Meats by Set-Fasters gave but too great occasion to many simple well-meaning people to look upon all Fasting as a meer Superstition It being hard to conceive that ever the Apostles could appoint such a manner of Fasting as is too too commonly practised by Pretenders to follow Apostolical Institutions in their Set-Fasts For what say Non-Conformists if we must upon the Authority of Primitive Fathers Fast Lent why then ought we not to follow the manner of Fasting prescribed by the same Fathers Now they recommend to us as well Abstinence from Wine as flesh and only one temperate Refection towards the Evening As for Answer to this Objection we all acknowledge our fault and are resolved seriously to endeavor amendment and according to our Corporal and Spiritual strength piously to emulate the Primitive Christians Fasting And would you joyn with us in so holy an exercise we hope what our own simple knowledge is not able to prevail with our sensual Nature to do your good example would shame us into the effectual performance of at least in some good measure And now I hope your Objection is Answered And a happy solution this indeed God grant it But its time to add a word concerning the Practical manner of Religious