Selected quad for the lemma: faith_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
faith_n	article_n	church_n	fundamental_a	4,539	5	10.3758	5	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A77347	Saul and Samuel at Endor, or The new waies of salvation and service, which usually temt [sic] men to Rome, and detain them there Truly represented, and refuted. By Dan. Brevint, D.D. As also a brief account of R.F. his Missale vindicatum, or Vindication of the Roman Mass. By the same author.	Brevint, Daniel, 1616-1695.	1674 (1674)	Wing B4423; ESTC R212267	257,888	438

of Antiquity or ever consecrated them in Churches where they are now u Alex. Alens 3. Part. q. 3. a. ult Tho. 3. part q 25. q. 3. Cajet ibid. Bell. l. 2. de Imag. proper means to serve Saints by and fit Objects to have for themselves a considerable part of this service That one Hanging with St. Epiphanius x Epist ad Johan Hierosol apud Hieron Tom. 1. Ep. 6. p. 449. Edit Paris 1643. tore to pieces because it represented a Saint at the entring into a Church might well serve for a winding sheet to wrap up all such Images and to bury them out of the precincts of Gods Church 7. All other Tools and impliments of Popery as Rosaries Beads holy Medals Agnus Dei's Blessed Grains Privileged Altars Christening of Bells all the three sorts of holy water and such Furnitures of the Roman Church may very well go the same way as rather the dirt then the Doctrine of any true Catholic Church r Ibid. 8. Auricular Confession that is the continual work of Priests and People is not much better and as it is sometimes practised is a great deal worse Of all their more sober and intelligent writers y Gratian. de Poenit. Dist 1. Sect. Quib. Authoritatib Nicol. de Othel. 4. Sect. Sent. Dict. 17. Gab. Biel. ibid. some doubt much whether it be a Catholic Practice and others adventure to say z Panormit C. Omnis utriusque Sexus Beat. Rhenanus in Tertul de Poenit. that it is not The Eastern Churches where the Gospel was first preached * Gloss de Poenit. Dict. 15. Theod. Gent. apud Gratian. de Paenit Dict. 1. Sect. Quidam deo never had it and it came among the Romans † Beat. Rhenan Sup. when public Confessions and other good customes grew out of date I forbear to bring more instances because these being the chief materials which compose this Roman Body may suffice to shew what it is As a dry skin filled with straw can never make a true Lion nor the hollow bark of an Oak stuffed up never so industriously with moss and dirt ever make a fruitful Tree so neither can now the Church of Rome to what bigness soever it swells or what face soever it may put on make with these pitiful Ingredients a Catholic much less the true Catholic Church Let Papists try by these undeniable Characters namely Christian Antiquity of Beginning Continuance of Duration and Universality of reception what is properly Catholic and then turn out of their doors what is not so you shall presently see Rome without Popes Churches without Image-worship and Mass service all new Doctrines and old Idols will fall immediately down to the ground and the manifest novelty of what they brag of and give out as old shall soon betray the Imposture I confess that Popery wants not as much Age and Antiquity as may deceive ignorant men their Doctrine of Purgatory is as old as Homer himself who lived many years afore Christ and their worshipping of Images as old among the Christians as is Simon the sorcerer who both had and adored them and therefore * S. Iren. adv Haeres l. 1. c. 24. is branded for it in the very Apostles times only some difference may be that Simon had his from Pilates Brush and Rome had theirs as they do think from St. Nicodemus or St. Lukes hand There was a worshipping of Angels as bad it may be as as the Popish is at this day of no lesser date then all the writings of S. Paul a B. Theodoret. Coloss 2. Coloss 2.18 and condemned † Concil Laodic Can. 35. by the Ancient Fathers Transubstantiation is not so new as many think for Marcus an old Enchanter endeavored somewhat like it by b Iren. cont Haeres l. 1. c. 19. turning the Wine into Blood which he called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 somthing like Transubstantiation That the same Body might be and was at the same time in several places was a Doctrine plainly taught by the Manichees c August cont Faust. l. 20. c. 6. many hundred years before all the Councils of Lateran or Trent Those Laws forced on mens Consciences since Christ and his Apostles had left them to their Liberty concerning Meats and Marrying are not less Ancient then d Theodor. Haeret. Fabul l. 5. c. 24. Cerdon Marcion Tatian and the Encratites who were very Ancient Heretics Extreme Unction bestowed by the Mass Priests on dying persons was prescribed by e S. August cont Haereses c. 16. Heracleon about an hundred and ten years after Christ Not to multiply instances the very source and fountain whence all errors were derived to Rome namely the magnifying f Hieron ad Dametam an unwritten Tradition and the vilifying the Holy Scripture g Iren. l. 1. c. 24. l. 3. c. 2. for an uncertain and obscure Rule hath no later Authors then the Scribes were long before Christ and the Gnostics soon after him Thus the Papists are not without Antiquity such as it is for I may say in general and prove too by many Instances that Jews Gentils and old Heretics scarce ever had any famous and general Abuse among them but Rome woud have somewhat of it But as for truly Christian and Apostolical Antiquity such as can be the only Root and essential Character of Catholic Doctrine I may safely defie the best of them to name me any one Article proper to their own Roman Faith that is ancient in this sense And as to those Articles of Christian Faith which they have in common with us and are truly Apostolical and Catholic it is most pitiful to think how shamefully they abuse and poison them by the mixture of their own peculiar Roman ones Therefore if you take this mixt and confused Body together that is the Roman Church at the best side as it holds yet the fundamental Ground of Christianity which we profess thus far I grant it is a true Church and if you take it at the worst as to its proper Roman Doctrines wherein it differs no more from us then from all true Catholic and Apostolical Antiquity thus far it is if a Church at all a most corrupt and desperately infected one But if you come to huddle up these two heterogeneous and incompatible Parts together in order to an absolute estimate and denomination of the whole as at the great day of the Lord one shall not appear without the other then it were most unreasonable that the lesser and weaker part should give the Title and that the Cities of Sodoma Gomorrha Admah and Zeboim should be called holy Cities because they have one Lot among them The Mountain that has many Grains of Gold lying under it is rock or sand nevertheless the Ocean is still salt water tho some Rivers and some Shipwracks mix with it other liquors Thus Papists are ridiculously vain who brag as they do of our acknowledging their Church to

demonstrated already that St Peters Roial Power was not believed by the Apostles nor in any Apostolical times and made it good out of Acts and Evidences altogether incompatible with destructive of this Belief namely His being rebuked by St. Paul both to the Face and publicly his being called to account by his Brethren his being sent to Cesarea c. Can you think that if at his return they had found him guilty of such a foul miscarriage as would send whole Nations to Hell they had thought it presumtion as the Canon Law saies it is to ask wherefore he did so Was it ever heard among the twelve that besides the general Commission of Preaching Christ St. Peter had another more special and proper Power of degrading all such Princes as would not be ruled by his Bulls And if he had it not Is it likely that the present Roman Popes have more Secular Power from Christ then he for compensation of their having less Holiness To come lower to the holy Fathers read their Epistles to the then Popes and judg whether St. Cyprian St. Basil c. did believe them to be their Monarchs when they call them as commonly they do their Brethren and Fellow-servants Did St. Augustin and his Brethren the worthiest Prelats of that Age submit themselves very modestly to the Roman Papal Power of controlling by their Legats and Officers the African Church Affairs when they called it again and again Secular y Conc. Afric sub Bonif. Ep. ad Bonif. Ep. ad Celest Pride and do the African z Codex Canon Afric Can. 28 sect Item placuit ut Presbyteri Canons the best Ecclesiastical Rules that the Church hath look upon Popes as their lawful supreme Visitors when they do forbid all Church-men under pain of Excommunication in any Church business to appeal to Rome During this long misunderstanding which lasted the lives of three Popes did Sozimus Boniface and Celestin Learned and Wise Roman Bishops believe that clear Texts of Scripture did sufficiently assert the Papacy when they were afraid of their Cause unless they could help it up better by forging false Nicene Canons And on the other side What meant the honest African Fathers in sending a Concil Afric ibid. to Constantinople to Alexandria and Nicea for true Copies with profession of a readiness of submitting to all the true Nicene Canons if they had thought That feed my flock and Thou art Peter and such other Texts of Scriptures better worth then all the Councils had so much as nodded the Roman way Or if the Papists say for I know not what they can say else that these places of Scripture which they now mainly stand upon are not so clear to their purpose without the help of Tradition Did St. Augustin and all the rest of Africa not yet know what Tradition was or what it said Was the ancient Tradition of the Universa Church then quite lost among the eighty Nicene Canons which some b Alph. Pisan l. 3. in Conc. Nic. Ep. ad Marcum fondly suppose to have bin burnt by the Arrians Books and Papers indeed may have bin burnt but Christian Faith and Tradition written no where so legibly as in Mens hearts could not be so unless the whole Church had bin burnt also Besides the general Practice whatsoever becomes of Tradition must remain still for you cannot imagin that the Church of Rome could actually exercise an universal Jurisdiction over all the Churches of the World without imagining in these an universal submission to that Power To this purpose tell me I pray Whether and where S. Chrysostom or St. Basil did swear Canonical Obedience to his Holiness when they were consecrated What sums of Money did they send to Rome when they had thence got their Pallium And when or where among a thousand Prelats in the old Times do you find one either subscribing himself or being called by others as now they do and are Arch-Bishops or Bishops of Milan of Constantinople or any other Diocess by the Grace of God and of the Holy Apostolical See fairly acknowledging themselves thereby little better then what they are now meer Suffragans Vicars or Curats of that Universal Bishop I am sure that Pope Gregory abhorred as long as he lived that very Title and much more the Usurpation as c Greg. Magn. Regist l. 4. Ind. 13. Ep. 33. Item l. 5. Indict 14. Epist. 39. a Mark of Antichrist and as a Destruction of the Faith Now it is cherished at Rome not only as a Catholic Doctrine but as the very Fundamental that makes the Catholic Church Thus Knaves grow great upon cheating and Rebels become Kings upon a Murther and Mens Crimes prove sometimes their Pride and Exaltation 2. From the Roman Supremacy go on and look upon the Roman Mass you know what great proportion that Sacrifice has among them Whole Popery depends or tends that way as on its Center and if the Roman Pope is that Churches Head this Roman Service is its Body I say then in the second place that this vast and comprehensive Bulk is nothing less then Catholic Catholic is By all Mens acknowledgment that which hath bin alwaies believ'd if a Doctrine or observed and practiced if a Service since Christian Antiquity in all Christian Churches and Ages Go therefore and seek when and where the twelve Apostles ever offered in Preaching their Savior to men to offer him up and to make him a Victime to God Enquire of all the Holy Fathers when and where they sung any Mass publicly without any Communicants except the Priests When and where they ever solemnly and publicly administred the holy Communion under one kind When and where they ever heard one single syllable of those Unchristian Doctrines that now a daies make the Main Fundamentals of the Romish Religion to wit that Christ offered up himself to God as an Expiatory Sacrifice any where else but on the Cross that the Natural Body of Christ is both in Heaven upon a Throne and on Earth on a thousand Altars that here his Body contracts shrinks it self into the compass of a small Crumb of Bread or any the least drop of Wine that these appearing Crumbs and Drops altho emtied to all Substance and attenuated to meer Accidents can both well subsist by themselves and whithersoever they be driven pull along with them the Flesh of Christ If these and other like Doctrines which now are essential to Roman Mass had in Ancient time bin Preach'd and heard as essential to Christian Faith Where was all the wit of Celsus or the malice of Julian and such Enemies of Christ Jesus when they fell foul upon the Blessed Trinity the Incarnation and Resurrection of Christ and all such other Articles as seemed to them ridiculous to spare both the Mass-Sacrifice and the Transubstantiation that both are and seem to be so Where was either the wisdom or the care of Origen Eusebius St. Augustin and

Essential Article of the Christian Faith yet all of their own accord especially upon certain daies will throng both to see and to worship St. Paul's Head or St. Peter's Tooth And without any great teaching Men learn presently any where what most Israelites learn'd in Egypt when they care little for God or for Moses whom they see not they will gape and run lustily after the Calf or any thing which they can see Thus evidently Let us make Gods to go before us is the most corrupt natural wish and the most universal Religion of all Mankind To this purpose the Holy Fathers have observed this Enchantment in Images that the very Men that should best know what stuff these Idols are made of yet will stand in some a S. August Epist. 49. Quaest. 3. awe of them when they see them bravely seated over the Heads of a multitude and that either such is the Charm of these dead figures b Idem in Psal 113. Conc. 2. to make Mens Souls stoop unto them or the natural weakness of Men to let themselves stoop to these shapes that the very Men who see the Sun and believe it to be their God will turn c Ibidem their back to their own God and turn their Face to his Image The truth is carnal Worshippers such as naturally all Men are are all for present carnal Objects and if these have also human shapes in St. Augustins Judgment this likeness becomes to them so great a Charm that as the same Father observes Men shall not be discouraged from following after Images by seeing them both Deaf Blind and Dumb but will take them for friendly Gods because they see them have Ears Eyes and Mouths Whatever this Reason be worth this Experience is most certain that the People of God excepted all the World besides hath bin drawn to their respective Religions by the help of these gross Images and if by chance any Temple or Nation happened to have none that is observed by most Historians as extraordinary and singular All the Provinces of China however full as they say of Teachers who think of God much above all what an Image can represent yet never draw up their Train'd Bands to any Religious solemn purpose but still march with such Standards and the true Israel of God and the Primitive Church of Christ are the only two Societies that both had not and detested Image Worship Not to speak of the Israelites according to the Flesh of which there is no question the Church of Christ as well at Rome as every where else hath for above six hundred Years after her first Institution best lived and best served her Savior without Images as to any Worshipping account If there were Images at all to be seen among Christians during the three first and most Virgin Centuries they were either kept useless in private hands or used by the Followers of Simon the d Iren. l. 1. c. 23. Magician Carpocrates e Ibid. c. 24. and such Infamous Heretics and if by any Christians it was by such weak Superstitious ones as in S. Augustins f Augustin de Consens Evangel l. 1. c. 9. Judgment deserved well to be deceived for their offering to learn Christian and Apostolical Faith from painted Walls When first Images crept into Churches which was about the sixth Century it was on a civil account either as Ornaments of Christian Temples or as Memorials of Holy Stories Pope Gregory the first and the first Patron of Images * Gregorins Magn. supr never pleaded farther then this against Serenus for his Clients which stood 200 Years in this posture till the second Nicene Council with much opposition and more scandal advanced them a step higher Then soon after came the ninth Century noted by all for the worst the saddest and the ignorantest Age of the Church which drowned the Gospel with Popery and which as their best Authors g Baronius an 900. n. 1. confess began in good earnest to set up the Abominable Desolation foretold by Dan. 9. in the Roman Church And so Images had a fair opportunity to come in when both the Holy Scriptures were kept unknown under the Bushel of Ignorance and when all other things were managed by new Revelations and new Miracles Here I do not undertake to shew how far Roman Images lead worshippers into the way of plain Pagan Idolatry since able men have done it before But what is proper to my purpose and is not so generally known I will insist 1. upon their Roman Original Secondly upon their use among Papists Thirdly and most principally upon what good or bad accounts Roman Images are grown so lovely and so taking 1. First as to the Original of Roman Images it imitates that of Roman Relics So the Papists have them two waies for some are made by the Roman Church others have an unknown Extraction as being supposed either made by some Saint or brought down from Heaven by Angels or however found out one way or other by some extraordinary Providence The Images made by the Roman Church are made this way the Carpenter cuts down a Tree or the Mason digs out a Stone then a Carver works this Stone or Tree into an Image and the Mass-Bishop consecrates both into a Saint or a Virgin or a Crucifix In the joint labor and concurrence of these three Craftsmen the first finds the Materials the second adds the shape and Figure and the third that is the Mass Bishop puts in the Essential form the very Soul and by his powerful Consecration introduces it into the Body of the Image in this manner When the Church wants a Crucifix the Bishop puts off his Miter and in a pretty long Office declares or explains to God what he would have that is what it is that he hath a mind to set up namely Singulare Signum a Pontifical Rom. sect De Benedict Nov. Crucis a special Standard which by a special Blessing may be a saving help to Mankind a supporter to Faith a Means of Proficiency in good works a Redeeming Instrument for Souls and both in the Town and in the Field a protecting Shelter against all Enemies whensoever a good Catholic shall come and humbly kneel before it If the Crucifix be made of some better matter then common Wood as of some fine Stone Brass or Silver it is intended and praied for that by the Merits of this Crucifix all devout Worshippers may be cleansed from all their sins as the world was by the Holiness of Christs Cross In order to these great Designs the Bishop makes use of Holy Water not such ordinary holy water as Mass Priests make every Sunday for every body to keep off Devils and Diseases nor such tho nobler as is used at every Christening of Children but that noblest sort of holy water which a Pope b Layman l. 5. tract●t 9. c. 13. n. 12. or a Bishop only can make to consecrate

true and of the other side I do not believe that all is false However if all were false they should do well to burn out of their Church their great Pontifical Ceremonial and Missal Books and to throw away their Images back again into the same Holes whence they were pleased to dig them out But if any part of what they say concerning them be true I make no question it will prove worse then if it were false and to make it good I require only the patient attention of an understanding and unprepossessed Reader Not to make Pagans or Papists in any degree worse then they are both disown in the consecrating of their Images all such a Cellus ap Origen l. 7. substantial Change as in the transubstantiating of Mass wafers both acknowlege the material part of their Images however called and adored by those as Gods by these as Saints to be still stone or wood or silver or viler stuff And in this case the Papists deal disingenuously with the Pagans when they b Bellar. de Imag. l. 2. c. 3. make these worse then they are that they may seem worse then themselves But that within neer or about the Roman or Pagan Images either by consecrating or worshipping them are imported such Additionals of either inherent or wonderful assisting vertues as may both help out worshippers and well deserve Adoration and Service is an Article of Heathenish Faith which the Pagans publicly declare and which the Papists do as really presuppose in all their practice and Histories nor can in truth without belying both their Devotions and Consciences plainly deny however they think it more convenient to mince and palliate it for mere shame This is the down-right Confession of the Heathenish Philosophers You must not wonder saies c Ap. Sozomen Eccles Hist l. 7. c. 15. Olympius to his persecuted Pagans if you see the pulling down and the breaking of your Images since they are made of vile matter and therefore easie to be bruised to dust But once were within them those Immortal and Invisible Powers which are now gone up to Heaven For as another adds more fully d Ap. Arnob. Contr. Gent. l. 6. We take not Brass Gold or Silver properly to be our Gods only we worship in them what holy Consecration hath called into and seated within those Images And this is the Religion of Roman Doctors and Saints 1. e Thom. 3. part q. 83. a. 3. That these dead and inanimate things Wood Stone c. by being Consecrated receive a kind of Spiritual Vertue which makes them fit for Gods Service and for the Peoples Adoration So 2. f Bellarm de Imag. l. 2. c. 23. sect Quod autem possit That both the Saint and his Image being joined together may be Praied to and Adored together also 3. And g Ibid. c. 21. sect Nunc juxta if they be taken asunder the very Images may lawfully be worshipped both by themselves and for themselves besides the Worship due to the Saint No Pagan Idolater for all I know ever said so much and the Roman Practice goes yet much farther First In their ordinary Language the Image is called and taken for the very Saint and in that ordinary Devotion the Image is adored kissed embraced and spoken to just as if they had the Saint in their arms 'T is you saies the Preacher speaking to a Crucifix h Bellarm. De Imag. l. 2. c. 23. that have redeemed us it is you that have reconciled us with God the Father c. Just as the cursed Idolater in the Prophets Isa 44.9 Habakkuk 2.15 praies to the Wood Rowse now thy self and rescue me There both the Devil and his Idol and there the Saint and his Image are hudled up in the same Adoration And as when the Host is carried along all that see the Mass-Priest at any distance fall on their knees and if they hear only the little Bell they cry There is the good God who passes by whosoever goes to or comes from a Church saies Either I will go and pray or now I come from visiting and praying to our good Lady because as he really believes that there the Mass-Wafer is by Transubstantiation become the Lord so he believes that the Image which he hath seen is either by Consubstantiation Inhabitation or some other assisting mode become to him the good Lady And I defie all the Roman Preachers to say any thing to justifie what they do upon this account which the Pagans may not say as well or better for themselves Secondly Lest you should think that Wood and Stone are thus adored spoken and praied to upon the mere account of Resemblance in which case any one of our Ladies Pictures might be adored and praied to as well at a Painters as in a Church is is generally done upon the Faith and Belief of an inclosed or at least assisting Vertue It is this strong perswasion that makes a Catholic Worshipper creep reverently and trembling to our Lady to get a touch for the little Image which he hath newly bought of a Shop and all Men know how much the better their Beads will sell when the Pedler can stoutly swear that they have touched such a Saint that is his Image By this it doth appear evidently that the Image is conceived by them to have some prime Vertue in it self since it imparts it to another and I would know who of them all dares say any of those Images which he dares not scarce look in the Face that it hath besides resemblance nothing more then another stone They that go to touch the Chin or the Toe or some other Bone of a Saint think it endued with some vertue above that of ordinary Bones because it was and is still the part of a Holy Body They who go a long Pilgrimage to rub their Clothes against the Shift of our Lady or their Stockings against the Breeches of Thomas Becket must think that the warmth of their holy Flesh have left in them some hidden Blessing which they do hope may be in some mesure communicated to other things Ask the Papists why that Image which they do call Veronica should have such extraordinary vertues they will tell you that Christ made it himself and that besides this he made it of the Sweat and Blood in his Face But what have other Images in their carved pieces of Wood which may temt sober Men to seek after to touch to kiss in hope of being Blessed by such Embraces unless it be the assisting or inhabitation or some other like commerce of Holy Powers which the Papists call Numina which are either therein or thereabout Thirdly If you will have more convincing Proofs go for example to the Image of our Lady in Mount Gardia i Bened. Gononus Chron. an 1433. which keeps Whores off and perfumes all that comes near it with a most Celestial Fragrancy or to another Image of hers once adored in