Imprimatur G. Iane R. P. D. Henr. Episc. Lond. Ã sac domesticis June 3. 1676. A DEFENCE OF THE DISCOURSE Concerning the IDOLATRY Practised in the CHURCH OF ROME In ANSWER to a BOOK Entituled Catholicks no Idolaters By ED. STILLINGFLEET D. D. Chaplain in Ordinary to His Majesty The two First Parts London Printed by Robert White for Henry Mortlock at the Sign of the Phoenix in St. Pauls Church-yard and at the White-Hart in Westminster-Hall 1676. TO THE RIGHT REVEREND FATHER in GOD HENRY Lord Bishop of LONDON One of the Lords of His Majesties Most Honourable Privy Council My Lord I Have heard that in some famous Prophetick Pictures pretending to represent the Fate of England the chief thing observable in several of them was a Mole a creature blind and busie smooth and deceitful continually working under Ground but now and then to be discerned by the disturbance it makes in the Surface of the earth which is so natural a description of a restless party among us that we need no Iudge of Controversies to interpret the meaning of it Our Forefathers had sufficient Testimony of their working under Ground but in our Age they act more visibly and with that indefatigable industry that they threaten without great care to prevent them the undermining of our Church and the Ruine of our established Religion Which since they cannot hope so easily to compass alone they endeavour to draw in to their Assistance all such discontented parties who are so weak if any can be so to be prevailed on to be instruments to serve them in pulling down a Church which can never fall but they must be stifled in its Ruins One would think it were hardly possible for any to run into a snare which lies so open to their view or to flatter themselves with the vain hopes of escaping better than the Church they design to destroy But such is the admirable Wisdom of Divine Providence to order things so above all humane Discretion that when the Sins of a Nation have provoked God to forsake it he suffers those to concurr in the most pernicious Counsels for enslaving Conscience who pretend to the greatest zeal for the Liberty of it So that our Church of England in its present condition seems to stand as the Church of Corinth did of old between two unquiet and boisterous Seas and there are some very busie in cutting through the Isthmus between them to let in both at once upon it supposing that no strength will be able to withstand the force of so terrible an inundation It is a consideration that might dishearten those who are engaged in the Defence of our Religion against the common Adversaries to see that they promise themselves as much from the folly of some of their most seeming Enemies as from the interest and Power of their Friends thus like S. Paul in Macedonia we are troubled on every side without are fightings and within are fears If men did but once understand the things which belong to our Peace we might yet hope to weather out the storms that threaten us and to live as the Church hath frequently done in a tossing condition with waves beating on every side But if through Weakness or Wilfulness those things should be hid from our eyes the prospect of our future condition is much more dreadful and amazing than the present can be If it were reasonable to hope that all men would lay aside prejudice and passion and have greater regard to the Common Good than to the interests of their several parties they could not but see where our main strength lies by what our enemies are most concerned to destroy And that no men of common understanding would make use of disunited Parties to destroy one Great Body unless they were sure to master them when they had done with them And therefore the best way for their own security were to unite themselves with the Church of England That were a Blessing too great for such a People to expect whose sins have made our Breaches so wide that we have too great reason to fear the common enemy may enter through them if there be not some way found out to repair those Breaches and to build up the places which are broken down For my own part I cannot see how those who could have joyned in Communion with the Christian Church in the time of Theodosius the Great can justly refuse to do it in ours For that is the Age of the Church which our Church of England since the Reformation comes the nearest to Idolatry being then suppressed by the Imperial Edicts the Churches settled by Law under the Government of Bishops Publick Liturgies appointed Antiquity Reverenced Schism discountenanced Learning encouraged and some few Ceremonies used but without any of those corrupt mixtures which afterwards prevailed in the Roman Church And whatever men of ill minds may suggest to the disparagement of those times it is really an Honour to our Church to suffer together with that Age when the Christian Church began to be firmly settled by the Countenance of the Civil Power and did enjoy its Primitive Purity without the Poverty and Hardships it endured before And the Bishops of that time were men of that exemplary Piety of those great Abilities of that excellent Conduct and Magnanimity as set them above the contempt or reproach of any but Infidels and Apostates For then lived the Gregories the Basils the Chrysostoms in the Eastern Church the Ambroses and Augustins in the Western and they who can suspect these to have been Enemies to the Power of Godliness did never understand what it meant It were no doubt the most desirable thing in our State and Condition to see the Piety the Zeal the Courage the Wisdom of those holy Bishops revived among us in such an Age which needs the conjunction of all these together For such is the insolency and number of the open contemners of our Church and Religion such is the activity of those who oppose it and the subtilty of those who undermine it as requires all the Devotion and Abilities of those great Persons to defend it And I hope that Divine Spirit which inflamed and acted them hath not forsaken that Sacred Order among us but that it will daily raise up more who shall be able to convince Dissenters that there may be true and hearty zeal for Religion among our Prelates and those of the Church of Rome that Good Works are most agreeable to the Principles of the Reformation Nay even in this Age as bad as it is there may be as great Instances produced of real Charity and of Works of Publick and pious uses as when men thought to get Souls out of Purgatory or themselves into Heaven by what they did And if it were possible exactly to compare all Acts of this nature which have been done ever since the Reformation with what there was done of the same kind for a much longer time immediately before
think the Name of Iesus equal to an Image of Christ. I am now come to his last Instance viz. bowing towards the Altar he would insinuate as though the Church of England were for giving some kind of worship to the Altar although under the degree of Divine Worship due to God alone and saith that as the allowing this would render me a true Son of the Church of England so the allowing the like to the sacred Images of Christ would make me in this point a perfect Proselyte of the Church of Rome Which is in effect to say that the Church of England in allowing bowing to the Altar doth give the very same worship to it which their Church requires to be given to Images and that they who do one and not the other do not attend to the Consequence of their own Actions I shall therefore shew 1. That the Church of England doth not allow any worship to be given to the Altar 2. That the adoration allowed and practised in the Church of England is of a very different Nature from the Worship of Images 1. That the Church of England doth not allow any Worship to be given to the Altar For this I appeal to that Canon wherein is contained the Explication of the sense of our Church in this particular Whereas the Church is the House of God dedicated to his holy Worship and therefore ought to mind us both of the Greatness and Goodness of his Divine Majesty certain it is that the acknowledgement thereof not only inwardly in our hearts but also outwardly with our bodies must needs be pious in it self profitable unto us and edifying unto others We therefore think it very meet and behooveful and heartily commend it to all good and well affected People members of this Church that they be ready to tender unto the Lord the said acknowledgement by doing Reverence and obeysance both at their coming in and going out of the said Churches Chancels or Chappels according to the most ancient Custome of the Primitive Church in the purest times and of this Church also for many years of the Reign of Q. Elizabeth The reviving therefore of this ancient and laudable custome we heartily commend to the serious consideration of all good People NOT WITH ANY INTENTION TO EXHIBITE ANY RELIGIOUS WORSHIP TO THE COMMUNION TABLE THE EAST OR THE CHURCH or any thing therein contained in so doing or to perform the said gesture in the Celebration of the Holy Eucharist upon any Opinion of the CORPORAL PRESENCE OF THE BODY OF JESUS CHRIST ON THE HOLY TABLE OR IN THE MYSTICAL ELEMENTS but ONLY for the advancement of Gods Majesty and to give him ALONE that honour and glory that is due unto him and NO OTHERWISE And in the practice or omission of this Rite we desire that the Rule of charity prescribed by the Apostle may be observed which is That they which use this Rite despise not them who use it not and they who use it not condemn not those that use it This is the full declaration of the sense of our Church about it made by those who met in Convocation and were most zealous for the practice of it Agreeably to this Archbishop Laud speaks when this was charged as an innovation To this I answer saith he First That God forbid that we should worship any thing but God himself 2. That if to worship God when we enter into his House or approach his Altar be an Innovation it was a very old one being practised by Jacob Moses Hezekiah c. And were this Kingdom such as would allow no holy Table standing in its proper place yet I would worship God when I came into his House And afterwards he calls it doing Reverence to Almighty God but towards his Altar and Idolatry it is not to worship God towards his holy Table Now with us the People did ever understand them fully and apply them to God and to none but God From whence it appears that God is looked on as the sole Object of this Act of Worship and that our Church declares that it allows no intention of exhibiting any Religious worship to the Communion Table or East or Church or any Corporal Presence of Christ. 2. That the adoration allowed and practised in the Church of England is of a very different nature from the worship of Images For as I have fully made it appear in the State of the Controversie the Church of Rome doth by the Decrees of Councils require Religious worship to be given to Images and that those who assert this inferiour worship do yet declare it to be truly Religious worship and that the Images themselves are the Object of it whereas our Church declares point-blank the contrary nay that those Persons are looked on by the Generality of Divines in the Roman Church as suspected at least if not condemned of Heresie who practise all the external acts of adoration to Images but yet do not in their minds look on them as Objects but only as Occasions of Worship which make the difference so plain in these two cases that T. G. himself could not but discern it But to remove all scruple from mens minds that suspect this practice to be too near the Idolatrous worship which we reject in the Roman Church I shall consider it not only as to its Object which is the main thing and which I have shewed to be the proper Object of worship viz. God himself and nothing else but as to the nature of the act and the local circumstance of doing it towards the Altar 1. As to the nature of the act so it is declared to be an act of external adoration of God which I shall prove from Scripture to be a lawful and proper act of Divine Worship I might prove it from the general consent of Mankind who have expressed their Reverence to the Deity by acts of external adoration from whence I called it a natural act of Reverence but I rather choose to do it from Scripture and that both before the Law had determined so punctually the matters of Divine Worship and under the Law by those who had the greatest regard to it and under the Gospel when the spiritual nature of its doctrine would seem to have superseded such external acts of worship 1. Before the Law I instance in Abraham's servant because Abraham is particularly commended for his care in instructing his Houshold to keep the way of the Lord in opposition to Heathen Idolatry and this was the Chief Servant of his House of whom it is said three times in one Chapter That he bowed his head worshipping the Lord the Hebrew words signifie and he inclined and bowed himself to the Lord for the word we translate worship doth properly signifie to bow and both the Iews and others say It relates to some external act of the body whereby we express our inward Reverence or Subjection to another
it if the Protestant Charity should seem to fall short in outward Pomp and Magnificence it would be found much more to exceed it in number and usefulness Which makes me so much the more wonder to hear and see the ill effects of the Reformation in this kind so much insisted on of late to disprove the Goodness of it If some Great men had sinister ends in it when was there any great Action of that nature wherein some Persons did not aim at their own advantage by it Who can excuse all the Courtiers in the time of Constantine or all the Actions of that Great Emperour himself Must Christianity therefore be thought the worse because it did prevail in his time and very much by his means And there were some partial Historians in those dayes that impute the demolishing of Heathen Temples and the suppressing of Idolatry to the Rapine and Sacriledge of the Times For even those Heathen Temples were richly endowed and it is not to be supposed that when such a Tree was shaking there would be no scrambling for the Fruit of it However we are not concerned to justifie the Actions or Designs of any particular Persons how Great soever but that which we plead for is that the Reformation it self was a just pious prudent and necessary thing and had both sufficient Authority to warrant it and sufficient Reason to justifie it We read in the Spanish History a remarkable Precedent which vindicates the proceeding of our Reformation in England The Gotthick Nation had been infected with Arianism two hundred and thirteen years when by the means of Leander Bishop of Sevil the King Reccaredus being duly informed in the Orthodox Faith called a Council at Toledo wherein Arianism was renounced by the declaration and subscription of the King himself being present in Council and afterwards by the Bishops who joyned with him and the Great men which being done the Council proceeded to make new Canons and Constitutions which the King confirmed by his Edict declaring that if any Bishop Priest or Deacon refused to observe them he was sentenced by the Council to excommunication if any of the higher rank of the Laity the penalty was paying half their estates to the Exchequer if others confiscation and banishment All which is extant in the Records of that Council The Arian Bishops as Mariana relates such as Athalocus and Sunna with others having the old Queen Goswinda and several of the Nobility to joyn with them made all the disturbance they could to hinder the Reformation But God not only carried it through but wonderfully preserved the Life of the King notwithstanding many conspiracies against him after whose death the Arian faction was very busie and made several Attempts by Treason and Rebellion to be restored again and they once thought themselves sure when they had gotten Wittericus of their party to the Throne but his short Reign put an end to all their Hopes I find some of the latter Spanish Historians much troubled to see all done in this Reformation by the King and the Bishops and Great men without the least mention of the Popes Authority Lucas Tudensis therefore saith that Leander was the Popes Legat but Mariana confesses that the very Acts of the Council contradict it He would have it believed that they sent Legats to the Pope afterwards to have the Council confirmed by him but he acknowledgeth that nothing appears in History to that purpose and if any such thing had been it would not have been omitted in the Epistles of Gregory who writ to Leander a Letter of congratulation for the conversion of Reccaredus But then National Churches were supposed to have Power enough to Reform themselves provided that they proceeded according to the Decrees of the Four General Councils And this is that we maintain in behalf of the Church of England that it receives all the Creeds which were then received and hath reformed those Abuses only which have crept into the Church since that Time This My Lord is the Cause which by Command of my Superiours I was first engaged to defend among whom Your Lordships Predecessour whose constant Friendship and Kindness I must never forget was one of the Chief Since that time I have had but little respite from these not so pleasing to me as sometimes necessary Polemical Exercises and notwithstanding all the Rage and Malice of the Adversaries of our Church against me I sit down with that contentment that I have defended a Righteous Cause and with an honest Mind and therefore I little regard their bitterest Censures and Reproaches In the midst of such a Croud of Adversaries it was no unpleasant entertainment to me to see the various methods with which they have attacked me some with piteous moans and outcries others grinning and only shewing their teeth others ranting and Hectoring others scolding and reviling but I must needs say the Adversary I now answer hath shewed more art and cunning than all the rest put together and hath said as much in Defence of their Cause as Wit and Subtilty could invent I wish I could speak as freely of his Fair dealing and Ingenuity Him therefore I reserved to be answered by himself after I had shaken off the lesser and more barking Creatures What I have now done I humbly present to Your Lordships hands and I am very glad of this opportunity to declare what satisfaction the Members of Your own Church and the Clergy of this great City have to see a Person of so Noble Birth so much Temper and Prudence so firm an Assertor of the Protestant Religion and Church of England appointed by his Majesty to have the Conduct and Government of them That God Almighty would assist and direct Your Lordship in those things which tend to the Peace and Welfare of this Church is the hearty Prayer of My Lord Your Lordships most dutiful and obedient Servant ED. STILLINGFLEET May 30. 1676. TO THE READER IT hath been long expected that I should have published an Answer to T. G. as the most considerable Adversary that appeared against me but it is very well known that before his Book came out I had undertaken the Answer of several others which when I had set forth a Person of Honour who had been pleased to defend me against one of my keenest Antagonists was assaulted by him whom I was in the first place obliged in gratitude to ease of any farther trouble Since that time I have applyed my self to the consideration of T. G.'s Book as much as health and other business would permit And finding such confusion in most Discourses about Idolatry and that till the Nature of it were fully and clearly Stated men would still dispute in the dark about these matters in my last Summers retirement I set my self to the strict examination of it by searching with my utmost diligence into the Idolatries practised in all parts of the world by the help of the best Authors I could
citations I there produced out of Origen wherein he saith the Christians durst have no Images of the Deity because of this Commandment and that they would rather dye than defile themselves with such an impiety And even Theodoret himself saith they were forbidden to make any Image of God because they saw no similitude of him and which is more to T. G. even the Nicene Council and the great Patrons of Images for a long time after did yield that the second Commandment did forbid the making or worshipping any representation of God as I have already at large proved If I might advise T. G. I would never have him venture at the Fathers again but be contented to bear his own burdens and out of meer pity to them not to load them with the imputation of his own infirmities if not wilful mistakes To make it appear that the intention of the Law was not meerly against the Idols of the Heathens I added these words If this had been the meaning of the Law why was it not more plainly expressed why were none of the words elsewhere used by way of contempt of the Heathen Idols here mentioned as being less liable to ambiguity why in so short a comprehension of Laws is this Law so much enlarged above what it might have been if nothing but what he saith were to be meant by it For then the meaning of the two first precepts might have been summed up in very few words Thou shalt have no other Gods but me and Thou shalt worship the Images of no other Gods but me To all this which is surely something more than saying that it is ridiculous to imagine the Law means any thing else T. G. answers not one word but instead of that he spends some pages about two similitudes one of mine and another quainter of his own which must stand or fall according to the Reason given for the sense of the Law and therefore I shall pass them over Only for his desiring me to make my similitude run on all four as the Beasts mentioned in it it is such a piece of Wit that I desire he may enjoy the comfort of it But he hath not yet done with the word Pesel which he saith the LXX would never have rendred it here contrary to their custome Idol without some particular Reason for it What particular Reason was there here more than in the repetition of the Commandment Deut. 5.8 where they translate it by 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in the Alex. M S. and in other Copies of the LXX Deut. 4.16 Was there not as much reason to have used the same word in those places as in this since the Commandment is the very same And for the other places he mentions as Isaiah 40.18 44.9 10 13. I dare leave it to the examination of any man whether they do not far better prove that an Idol in Scripture is an Image set up for worship than that by graven Image is meant an Heathen Idol This I am certain of that Pet. Picherellus an excellent Critick and learned Divine in the Roman Church was convinced by comparing of these places that the signification of an Idol in the second Commandment is the same with that of a graven Image and that the using any outward sign of worship before any Image is the thing forbidden in this Commandment and that the doing so is that Idolatry which God hath threatned so severely to punish which I beseeth T. G. and those of his Church to consider and repent The second way I proposed to find out the sense of the Commandment was from the Reason of it which I said the Scripture tells us was derived from Gods infinite and incomprehensible nature which could not be represented to men but in a way that must be an infinite disparagement to it For which I produced Isaiah 40.19 20 21 22. To whom will ye liken God or what likeness will ye compare to him The workman melteth a graven Image and the Goldsmith spreadeth it over with gold c. Have ye not known have ye not heard hath it not been told you from the beginning Have ye not understood from the foundation of the earth It is he that sitteth upon the circle of the earth c. Whence I desired to know whether this reason be given against Heathen Idols or those Images which were worshipped for Gods or no or whether by this reason God doth not declare that all worship given to him by any visible representation of him is extremely dishonourable to him And to this purpose when this precept is enforced on the people of Israel by a very particular caution Take ye therefore good heed to your selves lest ye corrupt your selves and make you a graven Image the similitude of any figure c. the ground of that Caution is expressed in these words For ye saw no manner of similitude on the day that the Lord spake unto you If the whole intention of the Law had been only to keep them from worshipping the Heathen Idols or Images for Gods to what purpose is it here mentioned that they saw no similitude of God when he spake to them For although God appeared with a similitude then yet there might have been great Reason against worshipping the Heathen Idols or fixing the intention of their worship on the bare Image But this was a very great Reason why they ought not to think of honouring God by an Image for if he had judged that a suitable way of Worship to his Nature and Excellency he would not have left the choice of the similitude to themselves but would have appeared himself in such a similitude as had best pleased him This Discourse T.G. saith is apt enough to delude a vulgar Auditory out of the Pulpit I with their Pulpits had never any worse before not vulgar Auditories but altogether empty and insignificant when brought to the Test of Reason That is to be tried whether my Reason or his Answer will be found so However he saith this doth not prove it Idolatry No! that is very strange for if the Image of God when worshipped be an Idol and forbidden as such in the Commandment then I suppose the worship of it is Idolatry But none so blind as they that will not see Now for the terrible Test of Reason He saith 1. That all representations of God are not dishonourable to him and for that he produces a Hieroglyphical Picture of a three corner'd light within a Cloud and the name Iehovah in the midst of it in the Frontispiece of a Book of Common Prayer by Rob. Barker 1642. from whence he inferrs that the Church of England doth not look on all visible representations as an infinite disparagement to God As though the Church of England were concerned in all the Fancies of Engravers in the Frontispieces of Books publickly allowed He might better have proved that we worship Iupiter Ammon in our Churches
because in some he may see Moses painted with Horns on his Forehead I do not think our Church ever determined that Moses should have horns any more than it appointed such an Hieroglyphical Representation of God Is our Church the only place in the World where the Painters have lost their old priviledge quidlibet audendi There needs no great atonement to be made between the Church of England and me in this matter for the Church of England declares in the Book of Homilies that the Images of God the Father Son and Holy Ghost are expresly forbidden and condemned by these very Scriptures I mentioned For how can God a most pure Spirit whom man never saw be expressed by a gross body or visible similitude or how can the infinite Majesty and Greatness of God incomprehensible to mans mind much more not able to be compassed with the sense be expressed in an Image With more to the same purpose by which our Church declares as plainly as possible that all Images of God are a disparagement to the Divine Nature therefore let T. G. make amends to our Church of England for this and other affronts he hath put upon her Here is nothing of the Test of Reason or Honesty in all this let us see whether it lies in what follows 2. He saith That Images of God may be considered two waies either as made to represent the Divinity it self or Analogically this distinction I have already fully examined and shewed it to be neither fit for Pulpit nor Schools and that all Images of God are condemned by the Nicene Fathers themselves as dishonourable to Him 3. He saith That the Reason of the Law was to keep them in their duty of giving Soveraign Worship to God alone by restraining them from Idolatry This is now the Severe Test that my Reason cannot stand before And was it indeed only Soveraign worship to God that was required by the Law to restrain them from Idolatry Doth this appear to return his own words in the Law it self or in the Preface or in the Commination against the transgressors of it if in none of these places nor any where else in Scripture methinks it is somewhat hard venturing upon this distinction of Soveraign and inferiour worship when the words are so general Thou shalt not bow down to them nor worship them And if God be so jealous a God in this matter of worship he will not be put off with idle distinctions of vain men that have no colour or pretence from the Law for whether the worship be supreme or inferiour it is worship and whether it be one or the other do they not bow down to Images and what can be forbidden in more express words than these are But T. G. proves his assertion 1. From the Preface of the Law because the Reason there assigned is I am the Lord thy God therefore Soveraign honour is only to be given to me and to none besides me Or as I think it is better expressed in the following words Thou shalt have no other Gods but me and who denies or doubts of this but what is this to the Second Commandment Yes saith T. G. The same reason is enforced from Gods jealousie of his honor very well of His Soveraign Honour but provided that supreme worship be reserved to Him He doth not regard an inferiour worship being given to Images Might not T. G. as well have explained the First Commandment after the same manner Thou shalt have no other Soveraign Gods besides me but inferiour and subordinate Deities you may have as many as you please notwithstanding the Reason of the Law which T. G. thus paraphrases I am the only supreme and super-excellent Being above all and over all to whom therefore Soveraign Honour is only to be given and to none besides me Very true say the Heathen Idolaters we yield you every word of this and why then do you charge us with Idolatry Thus by the admirable Test of T. G's reason the Heathen Idolaters are excused from the breach of the First Commandment as well as the Papists from the breach of the Second 2. He proves it from the necessary connexion between the prohibition of the Law on the one side and the supreme excellency of the Divine Nature on the other For from the supreme excellency of God it necessarily follows that Soveraign Worship is due only to it and not to be given to any other Image or thing but if we consider Him as invisible only and irrepresentable it doth not follow on that account precisely that Soveraign worship or indeed any worship at all is due unto it Which is just like this manner of Reasoning The Supreme Authority of a Husband is the Reason why the Wife is to obey him but if she consider her Husband as his name is Iohn or Thomas or as he hath such features in his face it doth not follow on that account precisely that she is bound to obey him and none else for her Husband And what of all this for the love of School Divinity May not the reason of obedience be taken from one particular thing in a Person and yet there be a general obligation of obedience to that Person and to none else besides him Although the features of his countenance be no Reason of obedience yet they may serve to discriminate him from any other Person whom she is not to love and obey And in case he forbids her familiarity with one of his servants because this would be a great disparagement to him doth it follow that because his Superiority is the general Reason of obedience he may not give a particular Reason for a special Command This is the case here Gods Supreme Excellency is granted to be the general Reason of obedience to all Gods Commands but in case he gives some particular precept as not to worship any Image may not he assign a Reason proper to it And what can be a more proper reason against making or worshipping any representation of God than to say He cannot be represented Meer invisibility I grant is no general reason of obedience but invisibility may be a very proper reason for not painting what is invisible There is no worship due to a sound because it cannot be painted but it is the most proper reason why a sound cannot be painted because it is not visible And if God himself gives this reason why they should make no graven Image because they saw no similitude on that day c. is it not madness and folly in men to say this is no Reason But T. G. still takes it for granted That all that is meant by this Commandment is that Soveraign worship is not to be given to Graven Images or similitudes and of the Soveraign worship he saith Gods excellency precisely is the formal and immediate Reason why it is to be given to none but him But we are not such Sots say the
inconsistent with the essence of a true Church And since no kind of Idolatry is lawful if the Roman Church hold it to be so she must needs hold an errour inconsistent with some Truth Most profoundly argued He only ought to have subsumed as I think such Logicians as I. W. call it but all Errour is Fundamental and inconsistent with the essence of a true Church or That Infallibility is necessary to the Being of a Church and when he proves that I promise to renounce the charge of Idolatry Now it is not possible saith I. W. that the Roman Church should bold any Idolatry lawful knowing it to be Idolatry unless she holds that some Honour which is due only to God may be given to a Creature I am afraid to be snapt by so cunning a Sophister and therefore I distinguish in time The Roman Church doth not hold any Idolatry lawful which it judges to be Idolatry or the Honour due only to God but the Roman Church may give the real parts of worship due only to God to a meer creature and yet at the same time tell men it is not a part of the Honour which is due to God To make this plain even to the understanding of I. W. The Church of Rome may entertain a false notion of Idolatry or of that worship which is due only to God which false notion being received men may really give the worship that only belongs to God to His Creatures and the utmost errour necessary in this case is no more than having a false notion of Idolatry as that there can be no Idolatry without giving Soveraign Worship to a Creature or that an Idol is the representation only of an Imaginary Being c. Now on these suppositions no more is necessary to the practice of Idolatry than being deceived in the notion of it If therefore T. G. or I.W. will prove that the Church of Rome can never be deceived in the notion of it or that it is repugnant to the essence of a Church to have a false notion of Idolatry they do something towards the proving me guilty of a contradiction in acknowledging the Church of Rome to be a true Church and yet charging it with Idolatry But I. W. saith That 't is impossible the Roman Church should teach or hold any kind of Idolatry whatsoever it be but she must hold expressly or implicitly that some Honour due only to God may be given to a meer Creature Such kind of stuff as this would make a man almost repent ever reading Logick which this man pretends so much to for surely Mother Wit is much better than Scholastick Fooling Such a Church which commits or by her doctrines and practises leads to Idolatry needs not to hold i. e. deliver as her judgment that some Honour due only to God may be given to a Creature it is sufficient if she commands or allows such things to be done which in their own nature or by the Law of God is really giving the worship of God to a Creature Yet upon this mistake as gross as it is the poor waspish Creature runs on for many leaves and thinks all that while he proves me guilty of a contradiction But the man hath something in his head which he means although he scarce knows how to express it viz. that in good Catholick Dictionaries a Fundamental errour and a damnable errour and an error inconsistent with the essence of a true Church are terms Synonymous Now I know what he would be at viz. that Infallibility is necessary to the Being of a Church therefore to suppose a Church to err is to suppose it not to be a Church But will he prove me guilty of contradiction by Catholick Dictionaries I beg his pardon for in them Transubstantiation implies none but whosoever writes against them must be guilty of many If he would prove me guilty of Contradiction let him prove it from my own sense and not from theirs Yet he would seem at last to prove that the practice of any kind of Idolatry especially being approved by the Church is destructive to the Being of a Church Which is the only thing he saith that deserves to be farther considered by enquiring into two things 1. Whether a Church allowing and countenancing the practice of Idolacry can be a true Church 2. Whether such a Church can have any power or Authority to consecrate Bishops or ordain Priests For this is a thing which T. G. likewise objects as consequent upon my assertion of their Idolatry that thereby I overthrow all Authority and Iurisdiction in the Church of England as being derived from an Idolatrous Church These are matters which deserve a farther handling and therefore I shall speak to them 1. Whether a Church may continue a true Church and yet allow and practise any kind of Idolatry And to resolve this I resort again to the ten Tribes Supposing what hath been said sufficient to prove them guilty of Idolatry my business is to enquire whether they were a true Church in that time This I. W. denies saying I ought to have proved and not barely supposed that the Idolatry introduced by Ieroboam was not destructive to the being of a True Church and several Protestants he saith produce the Church of Israel to shew that a true visible Church may cease Alas poor man he had heard something of this Nature but he could not tell what they had produced this as an instance against the perpetual Visibility of the Church and he brings it to prove that it ceased to be a true Church and the time they fix upon by his own Confession is when Elias complained that he was left alone in Israel which was not when the Idolatry of the Calves but when that of Baal prevailed among the people of Israel i. e. when they worshipped Beel-samen or the Sun instead of God Now that they were a true Church while they worshipped Ieroboams Calves I prove by these two things 1. That there was no time from Ieroboam to the Captivity of Israel wherein the worship of the Calves was not the established Religion of the ten Tribes this is evident from the expression before mentioned that the Children of Israel departed not from the sins of Jeroboam till God removed Israel out of his sight And it is observable of almost every one of the Kings of Israel that it is said particularly that he departed not from the sins of Jeroboam 2. That during that time God did own them for his People which is all one with making them a True Church Thus Iehu is said to be anointed King over the People of the Lord. And there is a remarkable expression in the time of Iehoahaz that the Lord was gracious unto them and had respect unto them because of his Covenant with Abraham Isaac and Jacob and would not destroy them neither cast he them from his presence as yet Would God have such
give to Images and which being given to an Image makes it Idolatry because those Acts are such which do imply a submission to the thing i. e. they are the highest expressions of adoration and those who assert that inferiour worship do hold it to be internal as well as external and to be terminated on the Images themselves which is the Reason why Vasquez saith it were Idolatry But Vasquez was not a man of so shallow an understanding to charge this upon those who declare they put off their shooes or hats out of no intention or design to worship the Ground or Place but meerly to express some outward Reverence to a Place on the account of its being Sacred to God Those who contended for that worship which Vasquez charges with Idolatry did agree with him in all external acts of adoration to Images and went farther than Vasquez thought fit as to the internal for they said both ought to concurr in the worship of Images and that this inferiour worship was terminated on the Images themselves as I have shewed at large in the stare of the Controversie Now saith Vasquez to assert and practise worship of Images after this manner is Idolatry for it is expressing our submission to a meer inanimate thing But do we say that all acts of worship are to be performed to the Ground that is holy or that any one act of worship is to be terminated upon it or that any submission of our minds is to be used towards it All these we utterly disavow as to the Reverence of Sacred Places and these things being declared we yet say there is a Reverence left to be shewed them on the account of their discrimination from other places and separation for sacred uses which Reverence is best expressed in the way most common for men to shew Respect by which was putting off Shooes in the Eastern parts and of Hats here of the difference of Reverence and worship I have spoken before I hope by this time T. G. sees a little better the force of the argument of Vasquez and how very far it is from recoiling on my head because I assert a Reverence to sacred places to have been shewed by Moses and Ioshua on the account of Gods special presence and so all that insipid Discourse of Idolatry which follows sneaks away as being ashamed to be brought in to so little purpose here but hath been fully handled in the First part 2. To his Instance of Bowing at the name of Iesus I answered that he might as well have instanced in our going to Church at the tolling of a Bell for as the one only tells us the time when we ought to go to worship God so the mentioning the name of Iesus doth only put us in mind of him to whom we owe all manner of Reverence without dishonouring him as the Object of our worship by any Image of him which can only represent that which is neither the object nor reason of our worship At this Answer T. G. is inflamed and when he hath nothing else to say he endeavours to set me at variance with the Church of England This runs quite through his Book and he takes all occasions to set me forth as a close and secret enemy to it although I appear never so much in its Vindication If my Adversaries were to be believed as I see no great reason they should be I must be a very prodigious Author in one respect for they represent me as a Friend to that which I write against viz. Socinianism and an enemy to that which I have defended viz. the Church of England But wherein is it that T. G. thinks me such a back-friend to our Church in disavowing all Reverence to the Sacred Name of Iesus which he saith our Church hath enjoyned and hath been defended by Fulk Whitgift and B. Andrews I am glad I know my charge and I do not doubt to clear my self to hold nothing in this or any other matter but what the Church of England hath declared to be her sense Witness as to this point the Declaration of the Archbishops and Bishops in Convocation When in time of Divine Service the Lord Jesus shall be mentioned due and lowly Reverence shall be done by all Persons present as hath been accustomed testifying by these outward ceremonies and gestures their inward humility Christian Resolution and due acknowledgement that the Lord Iesus Christ the true and Eternal Son of God is the only Saviour of the World Is this bowing to the very name of Iesus and worshipping that as they do Images when the Convocation declares that only a significant Ceremony is intended by it Arch-B Whitgift in the very place cited by him saith that the Christians used it to signifie their faith in Iesus and therefore they used bodily reverence at all times when they heard the name of Iesus but especially when the Gospel was read Dr. Fulk another of his Authors saith that the place alledged by T. G. to prove it pertains to the subjection of all Creatures to the Iudgement of Christ however he saith the ceremony of bowing may be used out of Reverence to his Majesty not to the bare name and that their Idolatrous worship is unfitly compared with the bowing at the name of Iesus Bishop Andrews saith we do not bow to the name but to the sense which answers and clears all the long allegation out of him Archbishop Laud calls it the Honour due to the Son of God at the mentioning of his Name which are almost the very words I used And Whittington and Meg of Westminster will altogether serve as well for his expression as that used by me But T. G. need not be so angry at my mentioning the tolling of a bell when he remembers the Christening of bells among them and what mighty Power they have after that and what Reverend God-fathers they have and what Saints names are given to them so that I should rather have thought he would have drawn an argument from the Bells than have been so disturbed at the naming of them For all this T. G. fancies a strange Analogy between Words and Pictures a picture being a word to the Eye and a word being a Picture to the Ear which sounds just like Whittington to my ears and I desire him to consider that Suarez tells us that some of their own Divines say no worship is due to any Name because they signifie only by imposition and do not supply the place of the thing represented as Images do of which opinion he saith Soto and Corduba are and Suarez himself grants that a name being a transient sound can hardly be apprehended as conjoyned with the Person or the Person in it so as to be worshipped together with it And one of their latest Ritualists saith that when the name of Iesus is mentioned they bow to the Crucifix which shews that even among them they do not
So it is said of the People of Israel when they heard that the Lord intended to deliver them out of Egypt They bowed their heads and worshipped when Moses declared the Institution of the Passeover to all the Elders of Israel it is said again The People bowed their heads and worshipped 2. Under the Law when they were so strictly forbidden in the same words to bow down or worship any Image or similitude yet the outward act of adoration towards God was allowed and practised So Moses commanded Aaron and the seventy Elders of Israel to bow themselves a far off the very same word which is used in the second Commandment And when God had so severely punished the Israelites for bowing to the Golden Calf yet when He appointed the Pillar of Fire for the Symbol of His own presence it is said That when all the People saw the Cloudy Pillar stand at the Tabernacle door they rose up and bowed themselves every man in his Tent-door When God appeared to Moses it is said That he made hast and bowed his head toward the earth and worshipped And when Moses and Aaron came to the door of the Tabernacle of the Congregation they are said to fall upon their faces In the time of David upon his solemn thanksgiving to God it is said All the Congregation blessed the Lord God of their Fathers and bowed down their heads and worshipped the Lord and the King And in the time of Hezekiah When they had made an end of offering the King and all that were present with him bowed their heads and worshipped 3. Under the Gospel we are to observe the difference between the same external act of worship when it was used towards Christ and toward His Apostles When the Syrophoenician woman came to our Saviour in one place it is said She worshipped Him and in another That she fell at His feet but in no place is there the least mention of any check given to her or any others who after that manner worshipped Christ But when Cornelius came to S. Peter and fell down at his feet and worshipped him he would by no means permit it but said Stand up I my self also am a man And when S. Iohn fell down at the feet of the Angel he would not suffer it but bade him worship God That which I observe from hence is that even under the Gospel the external acts of Religious adoration are proper and peculiar to God so that men are to blame when they give them to any Creature but no Persons are condemned for giving them to God And I desire those who scruple the lawfulness of giving to God such external adoration under the Gospel how they can condemn those for Idolatry who give it to any Creature if it be not a thing which doth still belong to God But if all the scruple be about the directing this Adoration one way more than another I say still it is done in conformity with the Primitive Church as our Canon declares and which every one knows did worship towards the East and this at the most is but a local circumstance of an Act of Worship which I have already shewed to be very different from an Object of it when I discoursed of the Nature of the Israelites worshipping toward the Ark and the Cherubims Thus through the Assistance of God I have gone through all the material points of T. G's Book which relate to the General Nature of Idolatry and have diligently weighed and considered every thing that looketh like a difficulty in this Controversie about the Worship of Images and do here sincerely protest that I have not given any Answer or delivered any Opinion which is not agreeable not only to the inward sense of my Mind but to the best of my understanding to the sense of Scripture and the Primitive Church and the Church of England And if the subtilties of T. G. could have satisfied me or any other Argument I have met with I would as freely have retracted this Charge of Idolatry as I ever made it For I do not love to represent others worse than they are but I daily pray to God to make both my self and others better and therein I know I have the hearty concurrence of all who are truly Good FINIS 2 Cor. 7.5 Concil Tolet. 3. 〈…〉 Marian. de rebus Hisp. l. 5. c. 14 15. Marian. l. 6. c. 1. Greg. Registr l. 1. ep 41. §. 1. T. G. p. 203. p. 64. p. 203. 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