continue in it And that upon these Grounds 1. Because they must by the terms of communion with that Church be guilty either of Hypocrisie or Idolatry either of which are sins inconsistent with Salvation Which I thus prove That Church which requires the giving the Creature the Worship due only to the Creator makes the Members of it guilty of Hypocrisie or Idolatry for if they do it they are guilty of the latter if they do it not of the former but the Church of Rome in the Worship of God by Images the Adoration of the Bread in the Eucharist and the formal Invocation of Saints doth require the giving to the Creature the Worship due only to the Creator therefore it makes the Members of it guilty of Hypocrisie or Idolatry That the Church of Rome in these particulars doth require the giving the Creature the honour due only to God I prove thus concerning each of them 1. Where the Worship of God is terminated upon a Creature there by their own confession the Worship due only to God is given to the Creature but in the Worship of God by Images the Worship due to God is terminated wholly on the Creature which is thus proved The Worship which God himself denies to receive must be terminated on the Creature but God himself in the second Commandment not only denies to receive it but threatens severely to punish them that give it Therefore it cannot be terminated on God but only on the Image 2. The same Argument which would make the grâ—ssest Heathen Idolatry lawful cannot excuse any act from Idolatry but the same argument whereby the Papists make the Worship of the Bread in the Eucharist not to be Idolatry would make the grossest Heathen Idolatry not to be so For if it be not therefore Idolatry because they suppose the bread to be God then the Worship of the Sun was not Idolatry by them who supposed the Sun to be God and upon this ground the grâ—sser the Idolatry was the less it was Idolatry for the grâ—ssâ—st Idolaters were those who supposed their Statues to be Gods And upon this ground their Worship was more lawful than of those who supposed them not to be so 3. If the supposition of a middle excellency between God and us be a sufficient ground for formal Invocation then the Heathen Worship of their inferiour Deities could be no Idolatry for the Heathens still pretended that they did not give to them the Worship proper to the Supream God which is as much as is pretended by the devoutest Papist in justification of the Invocation of Saints To these I expect a direct and punctual answer professing as much Charity towards them as is consistent with Scripture and Reason 2. Because the Church of Rome is guilty of so great corruption of the Christian Religion by such opinions and practises which are very apt to hinder a good life Such are the destroying the necessity of a good life by making the Sacrament of Penance joyned with contrition sufficient for salvation the taking off the care of it by supposing an expiation of sin by the prayers of the living after death and the sincerity of devotion is much obstructed in it by prayers in a language which many understand not by making the efficacy of Sacraments depend upon the bare administration whether our minds be prepared for them or not by discouraging the reading the Scripture which is our most certain rule of faith and life by the multitude of superstitious observations never used in the Primitive Church as we are ready to defend by the gross abuse of people in Pardons and Indulgences by denying the Cup to the Laity contrary to the practice of the Church in the solemn Celebration of the Eucharist for a thousand years after Christ by making it in the power of any person to dispense contrary to the Law of God in oaths and Marriages by making disobedience to the Church in disputable matters more hainous than disobedience to the Lawes of Christ in unquestionable things as Marriage in a Priest to be a greater crime than Fornication By all which practises and opinions we assert that there are so many hinderances to a good life that none who have a care of their salvation can venture their souls in the communion of such a Church which either enjoyns or publickly allows them 3. Because it exposeth the â—aith of Christians to so great uncertainty By making the authority of the Scriptures to depend on the infallibility of the Church when the Churches Infallibility must be proved by the Scripture by making those things necessary to be believed which if they be believed overthrow all foundations of faith viz. That we are not to believe our senses in the plainest objects of them as that bread which we see is not bread upon which it follows that tradition being a continued kind of sensation can be no more certain than sense it self and that the Apostles might have been deceived in the Body of Christ after the Resurrection and the Church of any Age in what they saw or heard By denying to Men the use of their judgment and reason as to the matters of saith proposed by a Church when they must use it in the choice of a Church by making the Churches power extend to make new Articles of faith viz. by making those things necessary to be believed which were not so before By pâ—etending to infallibility in determining Controversies and yet not determining Controversies which are on foot among themselves All which and several other things which my designed brevity will not permit me to mention tend very much to shake the faith of such who have nothing else to rely on but the authority of the Church of Rome 3. I answer That a Protestant leaving the Communion of our Church doth incur a greater guilt than one who was bred up in the communion of the Church of Rome and continues therein by invincible ignorance and therefore cannot equally be saved with such a one For a Protestant is supposed to have sufficient convictions of the Errors of the Roman Church or is guilty of wilful ignorance if he hath not but although we know not what allowances God will make for invincible ignorance we are sure that wilful ignorance or choosing a worse Church before a better is a damnable sin and unrepented of destroys salvation To the second Question I answer 1. I do not understand what is meant by a Christian in the Abstract or in the whole Latitude it being a thing I never heard or read of before and therefore may have some meaning in it which I cannot understand 2. But if the Question be as the last words imply it Whether a Christian by vertue of his being so be bound to joyn in some Church or Congregation of Christians I answer affirmatively and that he is bound to choose the communion of the purest Church and not to leave that for a corrupt one though called never so
not Image reinforced Pag. 33. Chap. 4. The Doctor 's Second Proof from the Reason of the Law sophistical All Representations of God not dishonourable to him nor rejected as such by the Church of England The Proper Reason of the Law on God's part is assigned and asserted to be the Supream Excellency of his Nature pag. 57. Chap. 5. Worship unlawful by the light of Nature equally unlawful to Jews and Christians A strange Paradox advanced by Dr. Stillingfleet viz. What can an Image do to the heightning devotion or raising Affections How far his Devotion to the Sun may be allowed in the Judgement of St. Leo. pag. 76. Chap. 6. Of the Notions and practice of the Wiser Heathens in the matter of their Images The Texts of St. Paul Acts 17. 24. and Rom. 1. 21. explained Some of the Doctor 's Testimonies examined in particular the Relation He gives of what the Jesuites did in China Pag. 95. Chap. 7. Of the 2d General Council of Nice call'd most irreverently by Dr. St. that wise Synod His Constantinopolitan Father's Objections answered by Epiphanius and his Answers shown to be goâ—d pag. 118. Chap. 8. The Dr.'s Objection from the Council of Franckford examin'd and shown to be no advantage to his Cause pag. 140. Chap. 9. Of the Doctor 's Third Proof from the Judgment as He pretends of the Law-giver His Speculation concerning the Golden Calves manifestly repugnant to the H. Scripture and Fathers Mr. Thorndike's Judgment of the Meaning and Extent of the second Commandment pag. 153. Chap. 10. What kind of honour the Church gives to Holy Images explained and the Doctor 's mixing School-disputes with matters of Faith shown to be sophistical pag. 176. Chap. 11. Of the Instances brought to explicate the nature of the honour given to Images from the like Reverence given to the Chair of State to the Ground to the Ark to the Name of Jesus c. The weakness of the Doctor 's Evasions laid open and His own Arguments return'd upon Him pag. 193. PART II. Of the Adoration of the most Blessed Sacrament Chap. 1. THe Practice of the Primitive Church in this Point The Doctor 's Argument to prove it to be Idolatry built upon an Injurious Calumny that Catholicks believe the Bread to be God The sense of his first Proposition cleared and the Proofs He brings for it refuted pag. 221. Chap. 2. The true State of the Controversie laid open together with the Doctor 's endeavours to mis-represent it His manner of arguing against the Adoration of Christ in the Eucharist equally destructive to the Adoration of Him as God pag. 243. Chap. 3. Of Dr. St.'s Scruple about the Host's not being consecrated for want of Intention in the Priest and his mistake of the true Reason of giving Adoration to Christ in the Sacrament pag. 256. Chap. 4. His Fundamental Principle of judging of matters proposed to our Belief by Sense and Reason shown to be absurd in it self and destructive to Christianity p. 272. Chap. 5. A Check to the Doctor 's bigg words against the Grounds of Transubstantiation With a New Example of reporting faithfully as he calls it the words and sense of an Author pag. 294. Chap. 6. Dr. Taylor 's Argument in behalf of Catholicks supposing them mistaken in the belief of Transubstantiation not answered by Dr. St. The Parallel of such a supposed mistake with that of Idolaters shown to be a real and very gross mistake in Himself pag. 317. PART III. Of the Invocation of Saints Chap. 1. THe Doctrine of the Church of Rome in this Point supposed by Dr. St. to be Idolatry but not proved The disparity between the Worship given by Catholicks to the Saints and that of the Heathens to their Inferiour Deities laid open pag. 333. Chap. 2. What kind of Honour Catholicks give to the Saints The Testimonies of Origen and St. Ambrose explained Of the practice of making Addresses to Particular Saints pag. 353. Chap. 3. What kind of Worship of Angels was condemned by St. Paul Theodoret c. with a farther display of the disparity between the Heathens Worship of their Inferiour Deities and that given by Catholicks to Holy Angels and Saints pag. 377. Chap. 4. Of the Term Formal Invocation and the different Forms used in the Invocation of Saints Some Instances out of the Fathers to show the like to have been used in their Times pag. 397. Chap. 5. The disparity assigned by Dr. St. between desiring the Saints in Heaven and Holy Men upon Earth to pray for us shown to be Insignificant pag. 414. Chap. 6. Of the practice of Christian People in St. Austin's time in the Invocation of Saints pag. 430. The Two Questions whence Dr. Still took Occasion to raise this Controversy 1. WHether a Protestant having the same Motives to become a Catholick which one bred and born and well grounded in the Catholick Religion hath to remain in it may not equally be saved in the profession of it 2. Whether it be sufficient to be a Christian in the abstract or in the whole latitude or there be a necessity of being a member of some distinct Church or Congregation of Christians His Answer to the aforesaid Questions The first Question being supposed to be put concerning a Protestant yet continuing so doth imply a contradiction viz. That a Protestant continuing so should have the same Motives to become a Catholick taking that term here only as signifying one of the communion of the Church of Rome which those have who have been horn or bred in that communion But supposing the meaning of the Question to be this Whether a Protestant leaving the communion of our Church upon the Motives used by those of the Roman Church may not be equally saved with those who are bred in it I answer 1. That an equal capacity of salvation of those persons being supposed can be no argument to leave the communion of a Church wherein salvation of a person may be much more safe than of either of them No more than it is for a Man to leap from the plain Ground into a Ship that is in danger of being wrackt because he may equally hope to be saved with those who are in it Nay supposing an equal capacity of Salvation in two several Churches there can be no reason to forsake the communion of the one for the other So that to perswade any one to leave our Church to embrace that of Rome it is by no means sufficient to ask whether such a one may not as well be savâ—d as they that are in it already but it is necessary that they prove that it is of necessity to salvation to leave our Church and become a Member of theirs And when they do this I intend to be one of their number 2. We assert that all those who are in the communion of the Church of Rome do run so great a hazard of their Salvation that none who have a care of their Souls ought to embrace it or
also the Liturgies and Rituals in a Tongue unknown but to the Learned among them that who will dispute against it must prepare himself to hear the censure of St. Austin Ep. 118. where he saith That it is a point of most insolent madness to dispute whether that be to be observed which is frequented by the whole Church through the World 4. He says The sincerity of Devotion is much obstructed by making the efficacy of Sacraments depend upon the bare administration whether our minds be prepared for them or not In what Council this Doctrine was defined I never read but as for the Sacrament of Penance which I suppose he chiefly aims at I read in the Council of Trent Sess 14. Falso quidam calumniantur That some do falsly calumniate Catholick Writers as if they taught the Sacrament of Penance did confer Grace without the good motion of the receiver which the Church of God never taught nor thought But I am rather inclined to look upon this as a mistake than a calumny in the Objector 5. He says The sincerity of Devotion is much obstructed by discouraging the reading of Scriptures which is our most certain Rule of Faith and Life Here he calls the Churches prudential dispensing the reading of Scripture to persons whom she judges fit and disposed for it and not to such whom she judges in a condition to receive or do harm by it a discouraging the reading of Scriptures which is no other than whereas St. Paul Coloss 3. 21. enjoyns Fathers not to provoke their Children lest they be discouraged one should reprove a Father for discouraging his Child because he will not put a Knife or Sword into his hands when he foresees he wil do mischief with it to himself or others the Scriptures in the hands of a meek and humble Soul who submits its judgment in the interpretation of it to that of the Church is a Sword to defend it but in the hands of an arrogant and presumptuous Spirit that hath no Guide to interpret it but it s own fancy or passion it is a dangerous Weapon with which he will wound both himself and others The first that permitted promiscuous reading of Scripture in our Nation was King Henry the Eighth and many years were not passed but he found the ill consequences of it for in a Book set forth by Him in the Year 1542. he complains in the Preface That he found entred into some of his Peoples hearts an inclination to sinister understanding of it presumption arrogancy carnal liberty and contention which he compares to the seven worse Spirits in the Gospel with which the Devil entred into the House that was purged and cleansed Whereupon he declares that for that part of the Church ordained to be taught that is the Lay People it ought not to be denyed certainly that the reading of the Old and New Testament is not so necessary for all those folks that of duty they ought and be bound to read it but as the Prince and Policy of the Realm shall think convenient so to be tolerated or taken from it Consonant whereunto saith he the Politick Law of our Realm hath now restrained it from a great many This was the judgment of him who first took upon him the Title of Head of the Church of England and if that ought not to have been followed in after times let the dire effects of so many new Sects and Fanaticisms as have risen in England from the reading of it bear witness For as St. Austin sayes Neque enim natae sunt Haereses Heresies have no other Origen but hence that the Scriptures which in themselves are good are not well understood and what is understood amiss in them is rashly and boldly asserted viz. to be the sense of them And now whether the Scriptures left to the private interpretation of every fanciful spirit as it is among Protestants be a most certain Rule of Faith and Life I leave to your self to judge 6. He says The sincerity of Devotion is much obstructed by the multitude of superstitious observations never used in the Primitive Church as he is ready to defend he should have said to prove for we deny any such to be used in the Church 7. By the gross abuse of People in Pardons and Indulgences Against this I can asseâ—t as an eye-witness the great devotion caused by the wholsome use of Indulgences in Catholick Countreys there being no Indulgence ordinarily granted but enjoyns him that will avail himself of it to confess his sins to receive the Sacraments to pray fast and give alms all which duties are with great devotion performed by Catholick people which without the incitement of an Indulgence had possibly been left undone 8. He says The sincerity of Devotion is much obstructed by denying the Cup to the Laity contrary to the practice of the Church in the solemn celebration of the Eucharist for a Thousand Years after Christ This thousand years after Christ makes a great noise as if it were not as much in the power of the Church a thousand years after Christ as well as in the first or second Century to alter and change things of their own nature indifferent such as the communicating under one or both kinds was ever held to be by Catholicks But although the Cup were not then denyed to the Laity yet that the custom of receiving but under one kind was permitted even in the Primitive Church in private Communions the Objector seems to grant because he speaks only of the Administration of it in the solemn Celebration and that it was also in use in publick Communions is evident from Examples of that time both in the Greek Church in the time of St. Chrysostome and of the Latin in the time of St. Leo the great As for the pretended obstruction of Devotion you must know Catholicks believe that under either species or kind whole Christ true God and Man is contained and received and if it be accounted an hindrance to devotion to receive the total refection of our soul though but under one kind what must it be to believe that I receive him under neither but instead of him have Elements of Bread and Wine Surely nothing can be more efficacious to stir up Reverence and Devotion in us than to believe that God himself will personally enter under our Roof The Ninth Hinderance of the sincerity of devotion is that we make it in the power of a person to dispense in Oaths and Marriages contrary to the Law of God To this I answer That some kind of Oaths the condition of the Person and other Circumstances considered may be judged to be hurtful and not fit to be kept and the dispensation in them is no more than to judg or determine them to be so and consequently to do this cannot be a hinderance but a furtherance to devotion nor is it contrary to the Law of God which commands nothing that 's hurtful to be done
As for Marriages we acknowledge the Church may dispense in some degrees of Consanguinity and Affinity but in nothing contrary to the Law of God His Tenth pretended Obstruction of Devotion is that we make disobedience to the Church in Disputable matters more hainous than disobedience to Christ in unquestionable things as Marriage he saith in a Priest to be a greater crime than Fornication I answer That whether a Priest may Marry or no supposing the Law of the Church forbidding it is not a disputable matter but 't is out of Question even by the Law of God that Obedience is to be given to the Commands or Prohibitions of the Church The Antithesis therefore between disobedience to the Church in disputable matters and disobedience to the Laws of Christ in unquestionable things is not only impertinent to the Marriage of Priests which is unquestionably forbidden but supposing the matter to remaind sputable after the Churches Prohibition destroys all obedience to the Church But if it suppose them only disputable before then why may not the Church interpose her Judgment and put them out of dispute But still it seems strange to them who either cannot or will not take the Word of Christ that is his Counsel of Chastity that Marriage in a Priest should be a greater sin than Fornication But he considers not that though Marriage in it self be honourable yet if it be prohibited to a certain order of persons by the Church to whom Christ himself commands us to give obedience they oblige themselves by a voluntary vow to live in perpetual chastity the Law of God commanding us to pay our Vows it loses its honour in such persons and if contracted after such vow made is in the language of the Fathers no better than Adultery In the Primitive Church it was the custom of some younger Widdows to Dedicate themselves to the Service of the Church and in order therunto to take upon them a peculiar habit and make a vow of continency for the future Now in case they married after this St. Paul himself 1 Tim. 1. 12. saith That they incurred Damnation because by so doing they made void their first faith that is as the Fathers Expound it the vow they had made And the fourth Council of Carthage in which were 214 Bishops and among them St. Austin gives the Reason in these words If Wives who commit Adultery are guilty to their Husbands how much more shall such Widdows as change their Religious State be noted with the crime of Adultery And if this were so in Widdows much more in Priests if by Marrying they shall make void their first Faith given to God when they were consâ—eâ—ated in a more peculiar manner to his Service Thus much may suffice for Answer to the Argument which with its intricate terms may seem to puzzle an unlearned Reader let us now speak a word to the true state of the Controversy which is whether Marriage or single life in a Priest be more apt to obstruct or further devotion And St. Paul himself hath determined the question 1 Cor. 7. 32. where he saith He that is unmarried careth for the things that belong to our Lord how he may please our Lord But he that is Married careth for the things that are of the World how he may please his Wife This is the difference he putteth between the Married and Single life that this is apt to make us care for the things which belong to God and that to divert our thoughts from him to the things of the World Judge therefore which of these states is most convenient for Priests whose proper Office it is to attend wholly to the things of God Having thus cleared Catholick Doctrines from being any ways obstructive to good life or devotion I shall proceed to his third Argument by which he will still prove that Catholicks run a great hazard of their souls in adhering to the Communion of the Church of Rome Because it exposeth the Faith of Christians to so great uncertainty This is a strange charge from the Pen of a Protestant who hath no other certainty for his faith but every Man's interpretation of the Letter of the Scriptures But First he saith it doth this By making the Authority of the Scriptures to depend upon the infallibility of the Church when the Churches infallibility must be proved by the Scriptures To this I Answer that the Authority of the Scripture not in it self for so it hath its Authority from God but in order to us and our belief of it depends upon the infallibility of the Church And therefore St. Austin saith of himself That he would not believe the Gospel unless the Authority of the Catholick Church did move him And if you ask him what moved him to submit to that Authority he tells you That besides the Wisdom he found in the Tenets of the Church there were many other things which most justly held him in it as the consent of People and Nations an Authority begun by Miracles nourished by Hope increased by Charity and established by Antiquity the succession of Priests from the very Seat of St. Peter to whom our Lord commended the feeding of his Sheep unto the present Bishoprick Lastly The very name of Catholick which this Church alone among so many Heresies hath not without cause obtained so particularly to her self that wheras all Hereticks would be called Catholicks yet if a stranger demand where the Catholicks go to Church none of these Hereticks dares to shew either his own House or Church These saith St. Austin so many and great most dear bonds of the name of Christian do justly hold a believing Man in the Catholick Church These were the grounds which moved that great Man to submit to her Authority And when Catholick Authors prove the infallibility of the Church from Scriptures 't is an Argument ad hominem to convince Protestants who will admit nothing but Scripture and yet when they are convinced quarrel at them as illogical Disputants because they prove it from Scripture Next he saith we overthrow all foundation of Faith because We will not believe our sences in the plainest Objects of them But what if God have interposed his Authority as he hath done in the case of the Eucharist where he tells us that it is his Body must we believe our sences rather than God or must we not believe them in other things because in the particular case of the Eucharist we must believe God rather than our sences Both these consequences you see are absurd Now for the case it self in which he instances Dr. Taylor above cited confesses that they viz. Catholicks have a divine Revelation viz. Christ's word This is my Body whose Litteral and Grammatical sence if that sence were intended would warrant them to do violence to all the Sciences in the Circle but I add it would be no precedent to them not to believe their sences in other the plainest Objects of them
as in the matter of Tradition or Christs Body after the Resurrection 3. He saith that We expose Faith to great uncertainty by denying to Men the use of their Judgment and Reason as to matters of Faith proposed by a Church that is we deny particular Mens Judgment as to matters of faith to be as good if not better than the Churches and to infer from hence that we make Faith uncertain is just as if on the contrary one should say that Protestants make faith certain by exposing matter of faith determined by the Church to be discussed and reversed by the Judgment and Reason or rather Fancy of every private Man We have good store of this kind of certainty in England But as for the use of our Judgment and Reason as to the matters themselves proposed by the Church it is the daily business of Divines and Preachers not only to shew them not to be repugnant to any natural truth but also to illustrate them with Arguments drawn from reason But the use he would have of reason is I suppose to believe nothing but what his reason can comprehend and this is not only irrational in its self but contrary to the Doctrin of St. Paul where he commands us to captivate our understandings to the Obedience of Faith 4. He adds We expose faith to uncertainty by making the Church power extend to making new Articles of Faith And this if it were true were something indeed to his purpose But the Church never yet owned any such power in her General Councils but only to manifest and establish the Doctrin received from her Fore-fathers as is to be seen in the prooems of all the Sessions of the Council of Trent where the Fathers before they declare what is to be believed ever premise that what they declare is the same they have received by Tradition from the Apostles And because it may happen that some particular Doctrine was not so plainly delivered to each part of the Church as it happened in St. Cyprian's case concerning the non-rebaptization of Hereticks we acknowledg it is in her power to make that necessary to be believed which was not so before not by inventing new Articles but by declaring more explicitly the Truths contained in Scripture and Tradition Lastly he saith We expose Faith to great uncertainty because the Church pretending to infallibility does not determine Controversies on foot among our selves As if faith could not be certain unless all Controversies among particular Men be determined what then becomes of the certainty of Protestants faith who could yet never find out a sufficient means to determin any one Controversie among them for if that means be plain Scripture what one Judgeth plain another Judgeth not so and they acknowledg no Judg between them to decide the Controversie As for the Catholick Church if any Controversies arise concerning the Doctrin delivered as in St. Cyprian's case she determines the controversy by declaring what is of faith And for other Controversies which belong not to faith she permits as St. Paul saith every one to abound in his own sence And thus much in Answer to his third Argument by which and what hath been said to his former objections it appears that he hath not at all proved what he asserted in his second Answer to the first Question viz. That all those who are in the Communion of the Church of Rome do run so great a hazard of their Salvation that none who have a care of their souls ought to embrace or continue in it But he hath a third Answer for us in case the former fail and it is § 10. That a Protestant leaving the Communion of the Protestant Church doth incur a greater guilt than one who was bred up in the Church of Rome and continues therein by invincible ignorance This is the directest Answer he gives to the Question and what it imports is this That invincible Ignorance and he doth not know what allowance God will make for that neither is the only Anchor which a Catholick hath to save himself by If by discoursing with Protestants and reading their Books he be not sufficiently convinced whereas he ought in the supposition of the Answerer to be so that the Letter of the Scripture as interpretable by every private Mans reason is a most certain Rule of Faith and Life but is still over-ruled by his own Motives the same which held St. Austin in the bosome of the Catholick Church he is guilty of wilful Ignorance and consequently a lost Man there is no hope of Salvation for him Much less for a Protestant who shall embrace the Catholick Communion because he is supposed doubtless from the same Rule to have sufficient conviction of the Errours of the Roman Church or is guilty of wilful Ignorance if he have it not which is a damnable sin and unrepented of destroys salvation So that now the upshot of the Answer to the Question Whether a Protestant embracing Catholick Religion upon the same motives which one bred and well grounded in it hath to remain in it may be equally saved with him comes to this that they shall both be damned though unequally because the converted Catholick more deeply than he that was bred so And now who can out lament the sad condition of that great Doctor and Father of the Church and hitherto reputed St. Austin who rejecting the Manichees pretended rule of Scripture upon the aforesaid grounds left their Communion to embrace the Communion of the Church of Rome And what is become now of their distinction of points fundamental from not fundamental which heretofore they thought sufficient to secure both Catholicks and Protestants Salvation and to charge us with unconscionable uncharitableness in not allowing them to be sharers with us The absurdness of these consequences may serve for a sufficient conviction of the nullity of his third and last answer to the first Question As for what he saith to the second I agree so far with him that every Christian is bound to choose the Communion of the purest Church but which that Church is must be seen by the grounds it brings to prove the Doctrines it teaches to have been delivered by Christ and his Apostles That Church is to be judged purest which hath the best grounds and consequently it is of necessity to salvation to embrace the communion of it What then you are bound to do in reason and conscience is to see which Religion of the two hath the strongest Motives for it and to embrace that as you will answer the contrary to God and your own soul To help you to do this and that the Answerer may have the less exception against them I will give you a Catalogue of Catholick Motives though not all neither in the words of the fore-cited Dr. Taylor advertising only for brevity sake I leave out some mention'd by him and that in these I set down you also give allowance for some expressions of his with which
2. How vain and groundless to say no more this Assertion of his is I have already shewed in the foregoing Chapter which may serve for a full and just Refutation of all he brings to justifie his Charge of Idolatry not onely in this matter of Veneration of Images but also of the Adoration of the B. Sacrament and Invocation of Saints In regard none of the contrary Tenets are with him Articles of Faith nay he professes himself not obliged to give any interiour Assent to them so much as to inferiour Truths or Pious Opinions But lest he should take this Compendious way of Refuting by bringing things to Grounds and Principles for none at all as his very-well-assured Friend Dr. Tillotson does with my demonstrating Friend as he calls him Mr. J. S. after two Books set forth by him in answer to his Rule of Faith viz. his Letter of Thanks and Faith vindicated to remove I say the very Temptation of any such-like vapouring pretence from my Adversary I shall take the pains to examine and answer with as much brevity as his prolixity will permit the particular Arguments with which he endeavours to underprop his tottering because groundless Charge of Idolatry § 3. In order hereunto I shall first set down what it is that the Catholick Church teaches concerning the Veneration of Images and thus it stands recorded in the last General Council at Trent Conc. Trident. Sess 25. viz. That the Images of Christ and of the Blessed Virgin Mother of God and of other Saints are to be kept and reserved especially in Churches and due Honour and Veneration to be given to them not for that any Divinity or Virtue is believed to be in them or that any thing is to be asked of them or any confidence to be placed in them as was anciently done by the Heathens who put their trust in Idols but because the honour which is exhibited to the Images is referr'd to the Prototype or thing represented by them So that by the Images which we kiss and before which we kneel or put off our Hats we adore Christ and reverence his Saints whom the said Images represent This is what the Council teaches and the import of it is that we may lawfully and therefore ought upon occasion to put off our Hats or knâ—el before the Images of Christ and his Saints with intent thereby to adore him and reverence them and this is what the Council calls most conformably to the Light of Nature and Relâ—gion the giving of due Honour and Veneration to Images but Dr. Still most repugnantly to both Idolatry § 4 To maintain this Charge he lays down a Pâ—oposition which I said imply'd a Contradiction viz. that in the worship of God by Images the worship due to God is terminated wholly on the Creature For what greater Contradiction than that it should be the worship of God and yet be terminated wholly on the Creature What he brings in his Excuse p. 57. is a pretence that God hath forbidden it under the Notion of Idolatry and that the Worship which God calls by the name of Idolatry and its being terminated wholly on the Creature are but the sâ—me thing in other words And what is this in effect but to tell us first that it is Idolatry because it is wholly terminated on the Creature and then again that it is wholly terminated on the Creature because it is Idolatry A very proper deâ—ence for such a Cause And from hence Dâ— Tillotson may note that the use of Identical Propositions is not so despicable and ridiculous as he would make it but rather the most expedite way for Dr. St. to reconcile the Terms of the greatest Contradiction But to the matter it self I shall speak more anon Let us now see how he proves this main Proposition viz. In the worship of God by Images the worship aue to God is terminated wholly on the Creature The worship sath he p. 4. which God himself denies to receive must be terminated on the Creature But God himself in the second Commandment not onely denies to receive it but threatens severely to punish them that give it Therefore it cannot be terminated on God but onely on the Image § 5. This is the terrible Argument by virtue of which he passes the Sentence of Eternal Damnation upon all those who are of the Communion of the Church of Rome if they repent not of their â—doring Christ by putting off their hats or kneeling before his Image And that the Reader may see with what Justice and Charity he does it before I proceed to examine particulars I shall convene his own Conscience to declare to the World what kind of Argument he judges this to be If onely Topical or Probable what answer will he give to the Great Judge at the dreadful day of Judgment for positively condemning his Spouse the Church for an Adulteress upon an account which himself acknowledges to be inevident and uncertain I believe himself would condemn that person for unjust and uncharitable who should positively charge the meanest mans Wife of Adultery upon the like account If he judge it a Demonstration which I cannot easily believe he seems to have taken such a Pique against the Demonstrating Way then the Premisses must be evidently and certainly true and the Conclusion in virtue of them Impossible to be false and consequently he must have greater certainty that the Church of Rome is Idolatrous than he hath if he be of the same mind with his Friend Dr. Tillotson of the Scripture's being the Word of God or of the Sence of any Text of it for example that Christ is God for the said Doctor lays this down for his Fundamental Position in his Rule of Faith p. 118. and affirms it expresly of the Books of Scripture in the Preface to his Sermons that we are not infallibly certain either that any Book is so ancient as it pretends to be or that it was written by him whose name it bears or that this is the sence of such and such passages in it It is possible all this may be otherwise From whence I infer yet farther that if we are not sure of the Sence of any Text of Scripture but possibly it may be false Himself is not sure that God hath forbidden the worshipping himself by Images in the second Commandment and therefore cannot judge his own Argument to be a Demonstration nor consequently evidence sufficient to make out his Charge of Idolatry But to come now to particulars § 5. The worship saith he which God himself denies to receive must be terminated on the Creature and that wholly and onely on the Creature as he expresses it in the Context of his Discourse This is the Major Proposition of his Syllogism and if this fail the Charge he builds upon it must needs fall I asserted it in my Reply to be absolutely false as built upon a mistake of the nature of humane Acts which though they ought to be
Catholicks NO IDOLATERS Or a Full Refutation Of Doctor STILLINGFLEETS Vnjust Charge of Idolatry Against the CHURCH OF ROME Let not Them who charge the Pope to be Antichrist and the Papists Idolaters lead the People by the Nose to believe that they can prove their Supposition when They cannot Mr. Thorndike Just Weights and Measures Chap. 2. Printed in the Year 1672. TO THE QUEEN MADAM THe Book before which I presume to fix Your Royal Name being the Product of some Hours defalkt from Your Majesties Service and the Subject of it Polemical set me for some time at dispute with my self whether I should let it venture to knock at Your Closet-Door Your Early Preventing the Sun to praise your Creator and Constant Retirements from the Tumults of the World which I could wish were as much imitated as they are admired to Vnite Your Soul by Prayer with Him and establish it in that perfect Peace which can only be enjoyed in becoming One Spirit with Him made me judg some Treatise of Divine Love which might minister matter to the Sacred Fire that burns continually upon the Altar of Your Heart would suit much better with that Better Part which you have chosen with Mary than a Book of Controversy Here then my thoughts were at a stand how to make my Address without Offence And I was ready to complain with Martha that I was left alone when that Admirable Mixture of Clemency and Zeal which disposes Your Heroick Mind not only to forgive Offences of this Nature but to esteem and cherish them as Pious convinc'd me I must be guilty of a greater Trespass should I doubt of obtaining either Your Pardon or Protection Nor was this All. The Glorious Saint whose Name You bear as she encourag'd me with her Example to engage in this Controversy so much more to recommend my endeavours to Your Majesties Patronage It was Her business to convince and reduce Idolaters to the Faith of Christ Mine is to defend the Faith which Christ planted in his Church from the Imputation of Idolatry An Aspersion so foul and Blasphemous that it betrays the Forger of it to be what the Anagram of his Name expresses a second Lucian Blasphemous I say For who-ever will undertake to maintain the Charge must at the same time profess that Christ who commanded us under pain of damnation to hear his Church hath permitted Her to require and enjoin her Children for many hundreds of years together to commit Idolatry as my Adversary contends parallel to that of the Heathens And consequently that Mahomet that grand Impostor whose Followers have been preserved by the Grounds he laid for above a Thousand Years from falling into Idolatry had more Wisdom and Power to contrive and carry on his design than the Son of God and that our Fore-Fathers in this Land had better have been converted to Judaism or Turcism than to Christianity as they were These Madam are the detestable Consequences of charging Idolatry upon the Catholick-Roman Church which as they must needs strike horrour into Your Religious Soul nay even of any who values the name of Christian So I thought it my Duty being singled out by a particular desiance from this new Abettor of it to appear in Vindication of that Faith on which Your MAJESTY grounds Your Hope of Heaven and whose Influence hath enrich'd Your Mind with all the Noblest Vertues from so unjust and scandalous a slander Which nevertheless I have endeavoured to manage with that Moderation and Temper as Circumstances duly weigh'd can neither create just Offence in the dissenting Party nor I hope render it mis-deserving to be presented to Your Majesties View by MADAM Your Majesties Most Humble and Most Obedient Subject and Servant T. G. THE PREFACE Christian Reader THough I never design'd to trouble Thee with any thing in Print especially in a Contentious way from which those who know me think me to be naturally averse yet now I am forc'd to appear publickly in defence of a little Paper which Another hath Printed for me Three Years were almost elapsed and the subject of that Paper quite worn out of my Memory when a Particular Messenger from Dr. Stillingfleet delivers me in Answer to it a large Book intitled A Discourse concerning the Idolatry practised in the Church of Rome c. As Civility oblig'd me to return thanks for such a Present to a Person to whom I thought I had been unknown so it had been great dulness not to look upon it with the same regard that Men look upon a Glove when sent by a Person with whom they have happened formerly to have some difference Hereupon my thoughts presently began to incline me to meditate a return both to his Civility and Challenge at least as to the Principal Heads contain'd in his Book but finding in his Preface the performances of those who had as occasion serv'd replied to some Passages of his Rational Account compared by Him to the way that Rats answer Books by gnawing some of the Leaves of them and that He proclaimed a general defiance to All to come into the Open Field from which he saith they had of late so wisely with-drawn themselves I easily conceiv'd he would not want many abler Adversaries who would take themselves to be concern'd to stand up for the Publick cause of GOD's Church and his Saints Nor was I deceived in my expectation as those Learned Treatises witness which have been written against Him upon this occasion Some of them in Vindication of the Devotion of the Roman Church and of the sanctity of those Persons whom he traduces Others against his Principles One to show how he contradicts himself and another compendiously refuting his whole Book All which I supposed would cost him a larger time to answer than he tells us he spent in writing and pointing the Book it self which he saith was but from about Christmas to Midsumer at what time it came forth This made me waver a while after I had applyed my thoughts to the Confutation of what first occurr'd in his Title and Book viz. The Charge of Idolatry which he most unjustly fixes upon the Church of Rome whether I should expose them to publick view or no. But then considering the Foulness of the Charge the particularness of the Challenge and the General Expectation to see him traced step by step which was the design I had undertaken I thought my self oblig'd to commit them to the Press And that the Reader may know what he is to expect from me it is that I have endeavoured to make my self such an Adversary as the Author of the Account 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 conceiv'd would be a great pleasure and content of heart to Dr. St. if he could meet with viz. One who viewing his Aiery subtilties should oppose him seriously as if he were serious himself and then distinguish as if he were dealing with some solid Divine and then ply him with Proofs and Testimonies
it or imagin any virtue or Divinity to be in it or to pray to the Saints as to those who are to give us what we pray for themselves All which are forbidden by the 2d Nicen Council and that of Trent and for other practices which the Dr. occasionally objects they shall be discuss'd in the following Discourse This being so as I have shewn and the Judgment of these Divines differing only as more and less in the same kind from what Mr. Thorndike and other learned Protestants pretend when they reprove some practices as Idolatrous or at least in danger to be such These last Six Authors cited by the Doctor ought to have been alledged for the contrary position of what He affirms viz. That the Church of Rome neither in her Doctrine nor Practice conformable to her Doctrin is guilty of Idolatry For whilst they impeach only some Practices which they judge different from the Doctrine 't is manifest they iâ—ply the Doctrine it self and Practice if conformable to it not to be Idolatrous Here then let the Reader judge whether Dr. St being as He saith by command publickly engag'd in the defence of so excellent a cause as that of the Church of England against the Church of Rome have not betray'd his trust and his Church too if it be his in advancing such a Medium to justifie Her separation as contradicts the sense of that Church if it be to be taken from the sentiments of those who are esteem'd Her true and Genuin Sons and in the Judgment of some of them makes it in plain terms to be Schismatical Which yet will appear more clearly if we consider how this Charge of Idolatry subverts the very foundation of Ecclesiastical Authority in the Church of England For it being a received Maxime and not denyable by any one of common sense that no Man can give to another that which he hath not himself it lies open to the Conscience of every man that if the Church of Rome be guilty of Heresy much more if Guilty of Idolatry it falls under the Apostles Excommunication Gal. 1. 8. and so remains depriv'd of the lawful Authority to use and exercise the Power of Orders and consequently the Authority of Governing Preaching and Administring Sacraments which those of the Church of England challenge to themselves as deriv'd from the Church of Rome can be no true and lawful Jurisdiction but usurped and Antichristian This is what follows against the Church of England from the charge of Idolatry upon the Church of Rome and so much the more as issuing from his Pen who in his Irenicum a Book very humbly tendred by him to Consideration after the Re-settlement of Episcopacy in the Church of England maintains that no particular Form of Church Government is De Jure Divino but mutable as the Secular Magistrate with the advice of learned and experienc'd Persons shall see convenient for State and Church and particularly that the main Ground for setling Episcopal Government in this Nation was not any pretence of Divine Right but conveniency to the State and condition of the Church at the time of its Reformation citing for it the Testimony of Arch bishop Cranmer and others Mr. Foulis I know speaking of that Book calls Him a Bold Fellow that Published it and affirms that he little understood the compass and merit of that Controversie I like not the rudeness of these and other expressions of like nature He there uses and I forbear to repeat yet I could willingly joyn with Him so far in Charity as to impute it rather to Inadvertence than design in my Adversary did not this new charge of Idolatry seem but too apparently to be but a clinching of the nail which He had driven before to the Head For if the Form of Church-Government be mutable as the Secular Power well-advised shall see reason what greater reason can there be for the actual changing of it than the nullity of its Jurisdiction This hath made me wonder not a little how the Governours of the Church of England could see their Authority so closely attacqued at least so manifestly betrayed by their pretended Champion and not vindicate themselves and their Jurisdiction from the â—oul stain of Antichristian which necessarily follows if the Church of Rome as He pretends be guilty of Idolatry and they derive together with their Consecration their Episcopal Jurisdiction from it But I shall leave these things to those whom it concerns and betake my self to my present business which is to show that the Church of Rome neither in her Doctrine nor Practice conformable to her Doctrine is guilty of Idolatry And this I bid done much sooner had not the Time spent iâ— Transcribing least the Copy should be surprized the Difficulty of the Press which also encreased the Errata and other Employments 〈◊〉 a few for we also are none of those happy Men who have only one thing to mind reâ—arded me in my design ERRATA IN the Preface page 2. line 27. for Pointing read Printing p. 6. l. 8. r. Dr. Taylor that neither p 25. l. 15. r. Question thus put p. 35. l. 30. for with r. against p. 38. l. 8. for couse r. causâ— l. 9. for ers r. eos p. 41 l. 10 r. writings p. 5â— l. 28. r. Beholders p. 64 l 12 r. Irrepresentablenes p. 80. l. 11. for the r. his p. 81. l. 18. f. seat r. State p. 87. l. 6. f. did r. drew p. 92. l. ult r. advantages p. 124. l. 11. add in the Marg. Of the Church li. 3. c. 36. p. 134. l. 3. f. cross r. Cross p. 138. l. 23. r. â—ue that by p. 140. l. ult f. rashly r. vainly p. 158. l. 27. r. Obcaecans l. 27. f. that r. that is p. 161. l. 25. or â—magine r. Imagine l. 28. for Oracres r. Oraces p 172. l. 5. for in r. me p. 178. l. 25. r. in this matter p. 212. l. 27. for honour r. comfort p. 2â—7 l 6. r. Wherefore p. 246. l. 2. r. Begotten Son p. 360. l. 30. f. first r. â—isth p. 363. l. 2. after foâ— Biu put St. Nicholas for Eru p. 411. l. 7. 8. f. Paul r. Paula l. 23. Praises r. prayes p. 448. l. 17. f. Flood r. Floods THE CONTENTS OF THE CHAPTERS PART I. Of the Veneration of Holy Images Chap. 1. DR Stillingfleet's 1st and 2d Answer to the First Question shown not pertinent Necessity of Communion with the Church of Rome proved and his Charge of Idolatry overthrown by his own Principles Pag. 1. Chap. 2. His chief Argument to prove the Church of Rome guilty of Idolatry examin'd and his Preposterous ways of arguing laid open Pag. 17. Chap. 3. The Mystery of making the same Proposition sometimes an Article of Faith and sometimes none No express Text against worshipping God by an Image His first Proof from the Terms of the Law manifestly groundless The Arguments from St. Austin's Judgment and the Septuagint's Translating the word Pesel Idol and
he hath mis-represented them Thus then he Liberty of Proph. Sect. 20. Speaking of Catholicks The beauty and Splendour of their Church their pompous he should have said solemn Service the stateliness and solemnity of the Hierarchy their Name of Catholick which they suppose he should have said their very Adversaries give them as their own due and to concern no other Sect of Christians the Antiquity of many of their Doctrines he should have said all the continual succession of their Bishops their immediate derivation from the Apostles their Title to succeed St. Peter the flattering he should have said due expressions of Minor Bishops he means in acknowledging the Pope head of the Church which by being old records have obtained credibility the multitude and variety of People which are of their perswasion apparent consent with Antiquity in many Ceremonials which other Churches have rejected and a pretended and sometimes he should have said always apparent consent with some elder Ages in matters Doctrinal The great consent of one part with another in that which most of them affirm to be de fide of Faith The great differences which are commenced among their Adversaries abusing the liberty of Prophecying into a very great licentiousness Their happiness of being Instruments in converting divers he should rather have said of all Nations The piety and austerity of their Religious Orders of Men and Women The single life of their Priests and Bishops the severity of their Fasts and their exteriour observances the great reputation of their first Bishops for faith and sanctity the known holiness of some of those persons whose institutes the religious persons pretend to imitate the oblique Arts and indirect proceedings of some of those who dâ—parted from them and amongst many other things the names of Heretick and Schismatick which they with infinite pertinacity he should have said upon the same grounds the Fathers did fasten upon all that disagree from them These things saith he and divers others may very easily perswade persons of much reason and more piety to retain that which they know to have been the Religion of their Forefathers which had actually possession and seizure of Mens understandings before the opposite professions to wit of Protestant Presbyterian Anabaptist c. had a name Thus Dr. Taylor an eminent and leading Man amongst the Protestants and if he confess that these Motives were sufficient for a Catholick to retain his Religion they must be of like force to perswade a dis-interessed Protestant to embrace it unless the Protestants can produce Motives for their Religion of greater or at least equal force with these which so great a Man among them confesseth that Catholicks have for theirs Here therfore you must call upon the Author of the Paper you sent me to produce a Catalogue of grounds or at least some one ground for the Protestant Religion of greater or equal force with all these And as Dr. Taylor saith divers others which he omitted viz. The Scripture interpreted by the consent of Fathers the determination of General Councils the known Maxime of Catholicks that nothing is to be believed of Faith but what was received from their Fore-fathers as handed down from the Apostles The testimony of the present Church of no less Authority now than in St. Austin's time both for the Letter and the sence of the Scripture c. Do this and the Controversie will quickly be at an end Particular disputes are endless and above the understanding of such as are not learned but in grounds and principles 't is not so hard for Reason and common sence to Judge That you may the better do it in your case I shall desire you to take these two Cautions along with you First That the Subject of the present Controversie are not those Articles in which the Protestants agree with us and for which they may pretend to produce the same Motives we do But in those in which they dissent from us such as are no Transubstantiation no Purgatory no honour due to Images no Invocation to Saints and the like in which the very Essence of Protestant as distinct from Catholick consists What Motives they can or will produce for these I do not fore-see The pretence of Scriptures being sufficiently plain hath no place here because then the foresaid Negatives would be necessary to be believed as divine Truths And for their own Reason and Learning it will be found too light when put into the Scale against that of the Catholick Church for so many Ages The second Caution is That you be careful to distinguish between Protestants producing grounds for their own Religion and finding fault with ours An Atheist can cavil and find fault with the grounds which learned Men bring to prove a Deity such as are the Order of this visible World the general consent of Nations c. In this an Atheist thinks he doth somewhat But can he produce as good or better grounds for his own Opinion No you see then 't is one thing to produce grounds for what we hold and another to find fault with those which are produced by the contrary part The latter hath made Controversie so long and the former will make it as short let the Answerer therefore instead of finding fault with our Motives produce his own for the Articles in Controversie and I am confident you will quickly discern which carry the most weight and consequently which are to be preferred A Full Refutation OF Dr. STILLINGFLEET's Unjust Charge of IDOLATRY Against the Church of Rome The First Part. Of the Veneration of Holy Images CHAP. I. The First and Second Answer to the First Question shewn not pertinent Necessity of Communion with the Church of Rome proved and his Charge of Idolatry overthrown by his own Principles § 1. WHoever considers how Dr. Stillingfleet in his Answer to the Two Questions has engag'd himself and his Adversary in Seventeen or Eighteen of the most material Controversies between Catholicks and Protestants besides innumerable others of lesser concern which together with the former have swell'd his Rejoynder to a short Paper into a large Book will not very easily free him upon his own word from being fond of the practise of the Noble Science of Controversie or as his Friend Dr. T. calls it The Blessed Art of Eternal Wrangling especially if he reflect how easie and obvious the Answer was to the Questions themselves without running into farther Disputes To the First by shewing that the Motives which are sufficient to secure the Salvation of one bred up and well-grounded in Catholick Religion are not sufficient to secure the salvation of one bred up in the Protestant who convinced by them should embrace the Catholick To the Second by shewing the Motives for Communion with the Protestant Church to be greater and stronger than those for the Roman and therefore that to be necessarily embraced before this it being agreed between us that it is of necessity to salvation to be
a Member of some distinct Church This had been a ready way to put an end to the Dispute and give Satisfaction to the Reader and this had been sufficient our Assent to the Articles in controversie depending upon the strength of the Motives But to multiply Disputes without cause without end and without bringing them to Grounds and Principles as it is no good Argument to prove a man not to be fond of Controversie so all the Satisfaction the Reader is likely to gather from it is a despair of being ever satisfied When therefore the Doctor says he had no other end in this increase of Controversies but to let his Protestant Reader see there could be no reason to forsake the Communion of that Church it is much like as if a Mother to deter her Son from travelling into other Countries should tell him there was a great Sea between full of Rocks and Pirates and no Vessel strong enough to venture over Besides that the Countrey whither he was going swarmed with Bears and Lions This is one way to let him see there could be no reason to think of leaving his Native Countrey and this is the Method generally pursued by our Adversaries for want of sound Principles to retain their Adherents in their Communion to make the dangers and difficulties they are to incounter with in that of the Roman seem insuperable and therefore best for them to sit down contented where they are But what if all the dangers and difficulties he raises prove but Bugbears and Scare-Crows This I hope by GOD's Grace to make appear in the following Treatise § 2. His first Answer to the first Question was that an equal capacity of Salvation of those persons supposed not onely in order to a safer Church but in two several Churches supposed equally safe can be no argument to forsake the Communion of the one for the other To this I reply'd that the Answer was altogether impertinent to the Question the Controversie not being between two persons compared with a third in a safer Church nor yet between two several Churches supposed to have in them an equal capacity of Salvation but between a Catholick bred so and a Protestant converted to be so whether the later having the same Motives with the former may not equally be saved with him To what purpose then was it to talk of an equal capacity supposed in two persons compared with a third in a much safer condition or in two several Churches compared to one another unless it were to make his Reader believe that a supposed possibility of Salvation in the Catholick Church was used by me as a sufficient Argument to embrace its Communion Whereas his own telling the Person concerned that however Catholicks who were bred so might be saved yet a Person leaving the Protestant Communion for the Catholick could Not be Saved in it was that which occasion'd the Question A weak but common Artifice of the Doctor and his Party to deter Persons from embracing the Catholick Communion when yet the more genuine Sons of the Church of England are not so cruel as to damn all those who embrace it The Answer then was nothing to the purpose of the Question and this himself seems to acknowledge when he adds Whether it were to the Question or no he is sure it was very much to the purpose for which this Controversie was first started And then having gotten this loop-hole he beseeches the Person who had proposed the Question to propose another and if not for her own sake yet for his to insist upon that he may know one reason at least why the Believing all the Ancient Creeds and leading a Good Life may not be sufficient to salvation unless one be of the Communion of the Church of Rome And this he says he cannot yet procure though he have often requested it Here himself is afraid he may be thought to digress but so earnest a request must not be denied § 3. I remember I promised to speak to this Point when it should be proper viz. in handling the second Question Whether it be necessary to be a Member of some distinct Church where it came in order and I did so though my Adversary takes no notice of it here as far as was pertinent to the present purpose when upon his Grant that A Christian by vertue of his being so is bound to joyn in some Church and to chuse the Communion of the purest I subjoyned that that Church was to be judged the purest which had the strongest Motives for it and then laid down a Catalogue of such weighty Motives for the Roman Catholick allowed by Dr. Taylor To which I added That neither himself in his Defence nor Dr. Taylor when he had a mind to invalidate them produced any thing to weigh against them but a few Tinsel-words and one Scripture-Testimony interpreted by and according to their own Fancy Having done this they sing Io Triumphe that Thou shalt not worship any graven Image will out-weigh all the best and fairest Imaginations of the Roman Church And now let the Reader judge whether he had any reason to say that he could not procure an Answer to this Question though he had often requested it § 4. But because he seems so little satisfied with this Answer as to take no notice of it I shall now enforce it farther with this Argument ad hominem There was in the World before Luther a distinct Church whose Communion was necessary to Salvation But this was not the Protestant Therefore it was the Roman The Major is evident from his own Concession that a Christian by virtue of his being so is bound to joyn in some distinct Church which is not possible if there be not such a distinct Church to joyn with The Minor also that this was not the Protestant is manifest because before Luther there was no such Church in the World distinct from the Roman It follows therefore the Question between him and us being of the necessity of Communion either with the Roman or with the Protestant that of the two the Roman Church was and still is as remaining still the same that Church whose Communion is necessary to Salvation § 5. Again taking the term Roman-Church not onely for the particular Diocess of Rome but for the Churches also in Communion with it as the Head as we generally take it in this Controversie nothing can render her Communion not necessary to Salvation but either Heresie that is an adhesion to some private or singular Opinion or Errour in Faith or Schism that is a Separation from former Ecclesiastical Unity For the first my Adversary himself Rat. Account p. 54. acknowledges as I shall shew before I end this Chapter the Church of Rome to believe all the same Articles of Faith with the Protestant and that the Points in which the Protestant differs from the Roman are not Articles of Faith consequently the Opposite Tenets to them can be no
Errours in Faith with him And for the second if he will make the Church of Rome guilty of Schism he must assign some other distinct Church then at least in being from whose Unity she departed which I think was never pretended I am sure can never be performed As for the Charge of Causal Schism that is the Churches having given just cause for Separation the common plea of all Separatists by Imposing as is pretended New Articles of Faith and some of them Idolatrous as it implies an acknowledgment of the Fact of Schism that is of breaking Church-Unity to be on the Protestants side so till the Accusation be made good and judged so by some other more competent Judge than themselves they stand arraigned of the Crime of Schism also for breaking Communion with the Church of Rome § 6. Lastly not to spend too much time in a Digression and yet satisfie his desire and if not his the Readers why the Believing all the Antient Creeds and leading a Good Life may not be sufficient to Salvation unless one be of the Communion of the Church of Rome I argue thus A Christian by virtue of his being so is bound to be of the Communion of that Church which evidently was the true one and the purest until it be as evidently at least if not more evidently proved not to be so for otherwise he wrongs both his Reason and Conscience if he leave a greater evidence and adhere to a lesser But the Roman Church as comprehending all those in Communion with her by the Testimony not only of S. Paul Rom. c. 1. and c. 16. but of the whole Christian World of all Ages was evidently once the onely true Church of Christ and conseqently the Purest and neither hath nor can be as evidently much less more evidently proved not to be so still since the Testimony of those who do or will deny it is incomparably short of the former Therefore a Christian by virtue of his being so is bound to be of the Communion of the Roman Church § 7. Having thus not only given one but more Reasons to his Demand which I heartily pray may do him good because he requested so earnestly to know them I cannot but reflect how speciously soever it hath been hitherto pretended against the Church of Rome that the believing all the Ancient Creeds and leading a Good Life is all that is necessary to Salvation yet now there is more required by him viz. to joyn in some Church or Congregation of Christians by virtue of a mans being a Christian and that he is bound to chuse the Communion of the Purest Church by which I will suppose at present he means the Church of England I hope I may without offence take the same liberty with him which he did with me and desire if not for my own sake at least for the satisfaction of the Presbyterians Anabaptists and other Separated Congregations to know one Reason from him why the believing all the Ancient Creeds and leading a Good Life may not be sufficient to Salvation unless one be of the Communion of the Church of England I confess I may be mistaken to suppose him to mean by the purest Church the Church of England It is not improbable as will appear in the following Discourse that he means that of the Presbyterians but let him mean which he will it comes all to the same pass I leave him to satisfie all other Sectaries why they are bound by virtue of their Christianity to joyn in either of those two Congregations or if not in them in any other which he fancies to be the purest Which done I proceed to his Second Answer to the First Question very fitly called by him the main business because it serves him as a Foundation to raise so many Controversies upon as by his manner of treating them may frighten any one that shall but look toward the Roman Church into despair of ever getting out of so intricate a Labyrinth § 8. His second Answer to the Frst Question was That all those who are in the Communion of the Church of Rome do run so great a hazard of their Salvation that none who have a care of their Souls ought to embrace it or continue in it because they must be guilty either of Hypocrisie or Idolatry sins inconsistent with Salvation This I said was as little pertinent to the Question as the former for though it be supposed that none ought to embrace or continue in the Catholick Church by reason of the great hazard he saith they run of their Salvation yet if they do embrace it why may they not be equally saved that is with equal hazard To this he returns that he is amazed I should say this Answer of his was not pertinent to the Question if the Question were propounded for any ones satisfaction that doubted which Churches Communion it were best to embrace And who can chuse but be more amazed at this Reply which gives no satisfaction at all to the Question For the Question supposing the same Motives and consequently an equal capacity or hazard as he will have it of Salvation in two persons what answer is it to the Question whether they may not equally be saved though with hazard to say the hazard they run is very great And yet of 573 pages his Book contains no less than 544 of them are spent upon this subject Tant◠〈…〉 I added farther That this Answer of his implied a Contradiction in asserting that all those of the Catholick Communion do run indeed a great hazard of their Salvation and then affirming for proof of this Assertion that they must be guilty of Hypocrisie or Idolatry sins inconsistent with Salvation Which reduced into plain terms is no other but to say they may be saved though with danger and yet indeed they cannot be saved at all To salve this Contradiction he runs to a pretended supposition of wilful embracing or continuing in Hypocrisie or Idolatry sins if unrepented of inconsistent with Salvation But this Salve is not at all proper for the Sore since if the Motives convince the Understanding and the Persons be sincere as the Question supposes there cannot with any shew of Reason be any thing of wilfulness supposed in the Case The Answer then was nothing to the purpose of the Question but onely that it might serve him for an occasion to bring the whole Body of Controversie into the Field and give a treble Charge of Idolatry against the Church of Rome viz. in worshipping of Images Adoration of the Host and Invocation of Saints There want not Learned and Eminent men of the Church of England who think the Charge to be over great and there needs no more than his own Principles to make the Metal of his Proofs appear of too inferiour an Alloy to bear it Which thus I shew § 9. In his Rational Account of the Grounds of Protestant Religion pag. 54. he lays down the state of the difference
between the Church of Rome and the Church of England in these words The Church of Rome imposeth new Articles of Faith to be believed as necessary to Salvation But the Church of England makes no Articles of Faith but such as have the Testimony and Approbation of the whole Christian World of all Ages and are acknowledged to be such by Rome it self and in other things as that no Veneration is due to Images the Bread is not Transubstantiated into the Body of Christ Saints are not to be invocated c. she requires subscription to them not as Articles of Faith but as inferiour Truths or as Dr. Bramhall Lord Primate of Ireland alledged by him calls them Pious Opinions fitted for the preservation of Unity not says he that we oblige any man to believe them but onely not to oppose or contradict them This then is the Basis and Foundation he lays of his Rational Account of the Grounds of the Protestant Religion that no Doctrine of the Protestant Religion as it differs from that of the Roman is an Article of Faith that is that no Protestant believes or if he do he ought not to believe as a matter of Faith that the Images for example of Christ and his Saints are not to be honoured that the substance of the Bread is not changed into the Body of Christ that the Saints in Heaven are not to be invoked to pray for us Nay all that he is obliged to by the Church of England is not to oppose or contradict them This being so let us now see what follows from this Doctrine 1. It follows that the Church of Rome does not erre against any Article of Faith because the Church of England as he saith makes no Articles of Faith but such as are acknowledged to be such by Rome it self 2dly It follows that himself does not believe any of these Points to be Articles of Faith Viz. That Veneration is not to be given to Holy Images that Adoration is not to be given to the Eucharist or that the Saints are not to be invocated because to be Articles of Faith with him they must have the Testimony and Approbation of the whole Christian World of all Ages and be acknowledged to be such by Rome it self 3dly It follows that after all this bustle to make the Church of Rome guilty of Idolatry in these very Points of Veneration of Images c. For ought any Man knows himself gives no interiour assent to any of the forementioned Tenets not even as to Inferiour Truths or Pious Opinions because the Church of England as he cites out of Dr. Bramhall doth not oblige any Man to believe them but only not to oppose or contradict them and it is not likely he defers more to the Church of England than she obliges him too 4thly and lastly It follows that his charge of Idolatry against the Church of Rome is vain and groundless for Idolatry being an Errour against the most Fundamental Point of Faith and the Church of Rome according to him not erring against any Article of Faith 't is evident that to charge the Church of Rome with Idolatry must according to his own Principles be the most groundless unreasonable and contradictory proceeding in the World But it is time now to come to particulars onely I must not omit to desire every indifferent Reader to reflect and judge whether Dr. Stillingfleet to render the Doctrine of the 39. Articles digestible to the most squeamish stomack of the nicest Nonconformist have not done a notable piece of service to the Church of England in degrading so many of them as are not acknowledged by the Church of Rome although they be esteemed the distinctive badg of the purity of the Church of England from the dignity of being Articles of Faith into a lower Classe of Inferiour Truths as he calls them which neither himself nor any Body else know whether they have a grain of truth in them or no and consequently are not bound to believe them Nay does he not undermine the Church of England both in her Doctrine and Government In her Doctrine by freeing her Subjects from any obligation of interiour believing her Articles in which she differs from the Church of Rome to be so much as Inferiour Truths In her Government by exposing her Ordination to be invaded without scruple by such as in their hearts judg it Anti-Christian when he tells them her Sense is to oblige them no farther than not to oppose or contradict it Was it not worth the while to rend asunder the Peace of Christendom for a Company of Opinions which though Dr. Bramhall call them Pious yet the greater part of Christians both in the East and West for many Ages have and do condemn for Impious and Blasphemous Is not this a very Rational or rather as Mr. J. S. expounds the word a very Reasonable Account of the Grounds of Protestant Religion and a rare way of justifying her from the Guilt of Schism Sure he never thought of charging the Church of Rome with Idolatry when he laid such sandy Principles for his Foundation Principles of so brittle a temper that it was not possible they should bear so great a Charge without breaking and discharging upon himself CHAP. II. Dr. St.'s chief Argument to prove the Church of Rome guilty of Idolatry examined and his Preposterous ways of arguing laid open § 1. IT is a known saying of St. Irenaeus and St. Hierom Ep. ad Ctesiphont speaking of those who set up their own fancies in opposition to the Doctrine of the Church that to lay open what they hold is to refute it and certainly it was never more true than in the subject of the present Debate concerning the Veneration of Images the very light of nature teaching that the honour or dishonour done to a Picture or Image reflects upon the Person represented by it This Protestants themselves confess in civil matters as in the Picture or Image of the King in order to his Person and did they not corrupt themselves in those things which they know naturally they could not but acknowledg the same in the Image of Christ and his Saints in order to them For is it an honour to the King to kiss his Picture and is it not the like to Christ to put off our Hats or kneel before His Was it a dishonour to the King to shoot his Picture with Bullets a◠the Souldiers did in the late times as they march'd along the Streets And was it none to Christ to have his Image bor'd through with hot Irons as he was represented rising from the Grave upon Cheapside Cross A Man would think there needed no more but the light of Nature and Common sence to decide this Controversie and yet the Doctor will needs sustain that the honour given to the Images of Christ and his Saints does not redound at all to them but is so far from that that it is no other than down right Idolatry §
Nature or Essence which is properly signified by such a Name The Doctor therefore to give him his due in the beginning of his Charge argues like a good Logician when he would conclude the Church of Rome guilty of Idolatry because he says she requires the giving to the Creature the Honour due onely to God But he plays the downright Sophister in the close when he would prove that in worshipping God by an Image she gives to the Image the Honour due onely to Him because if God have given it the name of Idolatry it must receive the denomination of Idolatry Either he must make it out that a meer Extrinsecal Denomination has the miraculous power to reflect against Nature the Honour directed to God from Him to the Image or he must confess that Gods Prohibition of such Worship if there were any may make it indeed to be unlawful but hinders not the Act from tending whither it was intended and consequently if it be intended or directed by the Understanding and Will to God though after an unlawful manner it will not fail to be terminated on God Nor is this to make the Intentions of men to be the Rule of Divine Worship for if God have forbidden himself to be Worshipped after such a manner the giving him such Worship will be a dishonouring of Him though the Giver intend it never so much for his honour Disobedience it will be or some other sin and denominatively Idolatry if forbidden under that name but not a terminating the honour due to God upon the Image unless the Doctor think it a good Argument to prove the Fields and Trees to be Merry Companions because the Prophet says The Fields are joyful and the Trees of the Wood rejoyce These he will say are Metaphorical denominations and so must that of Idolatry be in his supposed Prohibition unless he can prove the Worship due to God to be terminated wholly on the Image and so the Act it self to have in it the true nature of Idolatry antecedently to such a denomination § 9. As for that Courtly Comparison of his that it would be Treason in any man to bow down to a Sign Post with the Princes Head upon it though with an intention to honour him by it a most self-denying Ordinance I confess and not unlike to that rare example of Self-denyal to which himself so Religiously exhorts the Prelates of the Church of England in the Preface to his Irenicum viz. to reduce the form of Church-Government to its Primitive State and Order by retrenching all Exorbitancies as he calls them of Power and restoring Presbyteries as the World is like to want such an unheard-of Example of Self-abnegation at least till Princes can be perswaded that the honour or dishonour done to their Pictures reflects not upon Them and that Act of the Civil Law be repealed L. unica cod de his qui ad Statuas which declares it Treason for any man to deface his Princes Picture So were it enacted it would not hinder the Act of Reverence and Respect from being terminated upon the Prince to whom it was intended § 10. To the Instances I gave in my Reply of the Prayers which Thieves and Murderers make to God for good success of the Jews offering to God the Blind and Lame which he had forbidden and of Cain's offering a Sacrifice to God which he refused to accept all which evidently shew that God's having forbidden such a kind of Worship hinders it not from being terminated on him All that he answers is That these Instances do not suppose any prohibited Object or Means of Worship as he supposeth the Worship of God by an Image doth And here again he falls into the same Contradiction as before viz. that it is the Worship of God by an Image and yet the Image is made the whole and sole object of Worship But to conclude this point 'T is evident that the Image is not made the Object of Worship by the Intention of him that gives it which says Dr. Taylor is that by which God principally if not solely takes estimate of humane actions for what he intends is to Worship God by it and the Intention not making it the Object of Worship an Extrinsecal Denomination from a Law forbidding if there were any such cannot make it to be so nor hinder the Act from being terminated on God its intended Object 'T is manifest then that the Major Proposition of the Argument brought by him to prove the Church of Rome guilty of Idolatry viz. That the Worship which God denies to receive must be terminated on the Creature is absolutely false and consequently all that he builds upon it falls to the ground But this was but a Prelude to usher in his Minor viz. That God not onely denies to receive Worship by an Image but threatens severaly to punish them that give it Upon this it is he lays the main stress of his Charge of Idolatry how inconsequently though supposed to be as he would have it a Prohibition I have shewed already and shall make yet more apparent by laying open the nullity of the Proofs he brings to maintain it CHAP. III. The mystery of making the same Proposition sometimes an Article of Faith and sometimes none No express Text against Worshipping God by an Image His first Proof from the Terms of the Law manifesâ—ly groundless The Argument from St. Austin's Judgment and the Septuagints translating the word Pesel Idol and not Image re-inforced 1. WHat we are to consider in the first place here is what it is that Dr. St. will undertake to prove and it is this That God in the second Commandment according to his reckoning expresly prohibited the giving any Worship to himself by an Image This is what upon his Second Thoughts for the term expresly was not in his FIRST Answer he undertakes to prove And I cannot but wonder to see it drop now from his Pen who on the one side asserts Scripture doubtless express Scripture to be his most certain Rule of Faith and on the other side denies as I shewed above Chap. 1. any thing to bâ— an Article of Faith which is not acknowledged to be such by Rome it self What may the meaning of this be If it be expresly revealed in Scripture that God is not to be worshipped by an Image it is an Article of Faith If it be not acknowledged to be such by Rome it self it is no Article of Faith but as he calls it an Inferiour Truth or Pious Opinion yet such as neither himself nor any man else is bound to believe there is a jot of Truth in it Is it then or is it not an Article of Faith that God is not to be worshipped by an Image If it be an Article of Faith 't is false what he asserts so stiffly in his Rational Account p. 54. that the Church of England makes no Articles of Faith but what are acknowledged to be such by Rome it self If it be
not an Article of Faith 't is false what he affirms so positively here that God hath expresly prohibited it in the second Commandment Which side soever he takes 't is manifest he contradicts himself 2. But perhaps his meaning is that what at one time is but an Inferiour Truth must at another be an Article of Faith according as it may serve to the different ends and purposes he has designed to himself And here if I mistake not lies the Knack or if you will give it so venerable a name the Mystery of the business When the Hedge of the Church of England viz. Subscription to her 39 Articles must be broken down for the good Brethren the Nonconformists to enter in and ravage without scruple her Rights and Revenues so many of the said Articles as are not owned by Rome it self must be a company of Inferious Truths or Pious Opinions not to be assented to but not to be opposed for Unity's sake But when the Church of Rome is to be charged with Idolatry the Pretence with which Ignorant Preachers says Mr. Thorndike Just Weights p. 128. drive their Factions then they are no more Infericur Truths but Articles of Faith expresly revealed in the Holy Scriptures Now would an Impartial Reader to use Dr. Taylor 's expression upon another occasion say upon his conscience that this was not kindly done to make use of the Authority of the Church of Rome to unhallow so many of the 39 Articles as are not owned by her and cast them down into the Class of Inferiour Truths to stitch up the Rent made by the Nonconformists from the Church of England And then to consecrate them again so easily by virtue of this one definitive word Expresly into Divine Revelations against the Church of Rome to make the Breach of the Church of England from her yet wider But what cannot an Irenical Compliance with one Party and a Polemical Animosity or as Mr. Thorndike calls it Faction with another do When the same Proposition as it respects the former shall be rank'd onely amongst Inferiour Truths which none are obliged to assent to and as it oppugns the latter shall be raised to an Article of Faith which all are bound to believe Here then lies the Mystery that the same Proposition viz. That God is not to be worshipped by an Image taken Irenically and in its Paciâ—iâ—k Temper is but an Inferiour Truth because not owned to be an Article of Faith by the Church of Rome but taken Polemically and in its â—aâ—like Humour it must be an Article of Faith because expresly as he says revealed in Scripture And if he will have it so let us see how he goes about to prove it 3. Our Contrâ—versie says he p. 58. being 〈◊〉 about the sence of a Law the best ways we have to find the meaning of it are either from the Terms in which it is expressâ—d or from the Reason annexed to it or from the Judgment of Thâ—se whom we believe best able to understand and interpret it And he will prove from every one of these three ways that it is expresly prohibited in the second Commandment to worship God by an Image It were well he would tell us here first what he understands by the term Expresly For if he calls that for example an express Text which of it self is absolutely clear and manifest and therefore as St. Austin says de unit Eâ—â—l c. 19. Non eget Interprete needs no Interpreter Mr. Thorndike and those other Learned Men of the Church of England who see no better than he have reason to lament the loss of their Eye-sight But if he mean no more but that it is clear and manifest to himself they may hope they see as well as their Neighbours though they see the quite contrary unless They will suffer themselves to be wrought upon by his stout asserting it to be clear and manifest as the Travellers were by Polus in Erasmus his Exorcismus when pretending that he saw a huge Dragon with â—iery Horns in the Sky by avouching it strongly and pointing expresly to the place he forced them out of shame not to see so perspicuous a thing to confess that they saw it also That it is not absolutely clear and manifest of it self the pains and the ways he takes to make it out sufficiently evince And whether it be clear and manifest even to himself we have cause to doubt because the Proposition in debate viz. That God hath prohibited the worshipping himself by an Image in the second Commandment not being acknowledged by the Church of Rome for an Article of Faith the Church of England says he obliges no man to assent to it but onely not to oppose it and yet on the other side every man is bound to assent to that which he sees to be clear and manifest Such frequent self-contradictions are the natural Consequences of a Discourse not grounded upon Truth And although the Reader may think I take a delight to discover them in my Adversary yet I can assure him 't is a much greater Grief to me to see so subtil a Wit so often entangled in them The fault is in the Couse which cannot be managed without falling into them But as St. Austin says Quis coegit ers malam causam habere Who forced him and his Partizans to engage in a bad Cause Nothing of Faith if it be true which he tells us in his Rational Account Nothing of Reason as I shall shew in the Examination of his Proofs 4. The first way he takes to prove that God in the second Commandment hath expresly prohibited the giving any Worship to himself by an Image is from the Terms in which the Law is expressed And what are they in the Protestants own Translation Exod. 20. 4 Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven Image or any likeness of any thing c. Thou shalt not bow down thy self to them nor serve them These are the Terms in which the Law is expressed and where I pray is it expressed here that we may not give any Worship to God himself by an Image The first part touches not the Worship of Images nor of God himself by them but onely the making them and gives matter to Divines to dispute whether it be forbidden by this Commandment to make any Image or any Likeness at all A thing in which Catholicks and Protestants are equally concerned The second forbids indeed in express terms to bow our selves down to the Images themselves but speaks not one word of the lawfulness or unlawfulness of worshipping God himself by them So that in case we have not here another of the Doctors Identical Propositions viz. that to treat a matter expresly is the same in other words as not to speak of it at all it is manifest that to worship God himself before or by an Image is not expresly prohibited in this Commandment Let the Protestant Reader consider this well and not suffer himself to be
than the Athenians who were so possessed with a wrong apprehension of the Nature of God that as St. Chrysostom tells us upon that place when they heard St. Paul speak of Anastasis that is the Resurrection because it was a new thing they never heard of before and the word of the Feminine Gender they concluded he brought them Tidings of some new Goddess § 2. As for the second place of Rom. 1. 21 23. nothing can be more clear than that the Apostle speaks there of the Idols or Images of the Heathens for after he had laid down the matter of fact which he condemned viz. That although they knew God yet they did not glorifie him as God but changed the Glory of the Incorruptible God into an Image made like to corruptible Man he adds also And to Birds and four footed Beasts and Creeping Things which words were clapp'd under Deck by the Doctor with an c. because they plainly declare what kind of Images the Apostle meant and then vers 25. tells us that by so doing They changed the Truth of God into a Lie and worshipped and served the Creature rather than the Creator These are the words of the Apostle so plain that the Doctor could find no evasion but to tell us that St. Paul doth not discourse here against the most gross and sottish Idolaters of the Heathen but as St. Chrysostom saith he well observes against the Philosophers and the wisest among them who though they differed in their Opinions of Religion extreamly from the Vulgar yet they concurred with them in all the external practices of their Idolatry And before we go farther it is well worth the observing what he observes out of St. Chrysostom Dices quid haec ad Philosophos You will say saith St. Chrysostom if the Apostle reprehended the Heathens for giving the glory of God to irrational Creatures and what was yet more sottish to their very Images what is that to the Philosophers or more Intelligent among them Marry I answer saith he that what hath been said most of all concerns them For they have for their Masters the Aegyptians who were the Inventors of these things And Plato who yet seems graver than the rest glories in them Nay his Master Socrates was a great Admirer of them for this is He who commands a Cock to be offered to Aesculapius Hence you may see the Images of Beasts and Creeping Things to be worshipped and together with them Apollo and Bacchus This is what St. Chrysostom observ'd of the Philosophers And was it not luckily done of the Doctor to make him the Patron of his Explication viz. that the intent of the Apostle was not to charge them with false Notions of a Deity but to shew their vanity and folly in thinking they had found out subtiller ways of defending the Common Idolatry among them and instead of opposing them made use of their Wits to excuse them But suppose what he says were so that the Philosophers were as subtil as he would make them were they not worthily condemned by the Apostle though but for the external profession of praying and offering Sacrifice to the Statues of Jupiter Venus Mercury c. and also to those of Birds and four-footed Beasts and Creeping Things as the Vulgar did And if they found out subtiller ways of defending the Common Idolatries among them and instead of opposing them made use of their Wits to excuse them were they not to blame in so doing But what is all this to Christians To make his discourse from the Apostles words come home to them he should show that the Images by which they honour Christ and his Saints are worshipped by them as Gods or as the Images of false Gods as those were of which the Apostle speaks in that place otherwise the subtil ways of defending he covertly aims at wil be as allowable against the Deserters of the Churches Faith in the point of Images as in other Mysteries of Christianity But to come to the point it self § 3. The most Intelligent Heathens saith he did never look on their Images as any other than Symbols or Representations of that Being to which they gave Divine Worship What Being this was he doth not tell us whether the onely true God or those false ones represented by their Images If he mean these latter he knows in his Conscience he does wrong to Catholicks in comparing them even to his Wiser Heathens If the former he does those more right by his subtil way of defending them than appears from the Testimonies he brings They ever thought of doing themselves For all that is expressed there and you may believe he would suppress nothing that might make to his purpose out of Origen Eusebius Athanasius Arnobius Augustin Maximus Tyrius and Julian concerning the more Intelligent Heathens is that they did not look on their Images as Gods That they look'd upon them nevertheless as Images or Symbols of false Gods some of his own Testimonies affirm as that of Celsus in Origen lib. 7. That none but a stark fool believes the Images themselves to be Gods had he not left out the latter part of it viz. Non diis dicatas Statuas but that they were Statues erected to the Gods And that of Julian when he saith They are but Symbols of the presence of the Gods But not any thing is there in them to signifie that they worshipped the true God by them besides the two words of Divinity and Deity which he cogg'd into the Testimonies of Arnobius and St. Austin to make his Reader believe so I shall set down the passages both in his words and the Fathers that the Reader by comparing them may learn what credit he is to give hereafter to his citing of Authors and at the same time receive a farther Testimony of my kindness to him in taking the rest upon his word First then for Arnobius What Dr. St. p. 74. makes the Wiser Heathens deny there is that they ever thought their Images to be Gods or to have any Divinity in them but what onely comes from their Consecration to such an use And the Reader finding the word Divinity in a different Character and in the singular number as it were in opposition to the Gods he immediately mentions before and that they have no Divinity but what comes from their Consecration to such an use What can he think but that those wise Heathen intended to worship the true Divinity by those Images and look'd onely upon them as Signs consecrated to such an use by some extrinsecal deputation like that of the Images of Christ and his Saints among Catholicks or of the Communion-Cup or Table even among Protestants But is this what Arnobius makes the Heathens to say Pray hear what the wiser Heathens return upon him when he upbraided them for worshipping Gods of Gold and Silver the works of mens hands Erras laberis nam neque nos aera neque auri argentique
he saith were very well known to the Author of the Caroline Book and because the Copy of the Nicen Council was sent them by Pope Adrian whose Legates also presided in the Council of Francford and might easily rectifie any Mistake if they were guilty of it Besides none of the Historians of that time do take notice of any such Error and the second Canon of Francford published by Sirmondus expresly condemns the Council of Nice To this he adds That the same Council was rejected here in England and the Synod of Paris called by Ludovicus Pius condemned expresly Pope Adrian for asserting a superstitious Adoration of Images Lastly he confirms it from the Doctrine of the Caroline Books whose design as Binius confesseth was against all Worship of Images and of Agobardus published by Baluzius who ingenuously saith he confesseth that Agobardus saith no more than the whole Gallican Church believed in that Age. This is the sum and force of his Argument and to manifest the insufficiency of it in order to his design supposing the matter of fact to be true viz. that the Council of Francford did reject that of Nice which divers learned men not improbably deny I shall shew first that de facto there was a mis-understanding of the Doctrine of the Council of Nice Secondly That supposing there had been no mistake but that the Synod at Francford had really condemn'd the Doctrine of Nice yet had it been no advantage to his Cause § 2. First there was a misunderstanding of the Doctrine of the Council of Nice And to make this evident I shall need no more than to compare what was taught in the Council of Nice with what was condemn'd in the Council of Francford What the Council of Nice taught I have set down in the precedent Chapter viz. That the Images of Christ and his Saints were to be placed and retained in Churches c. and that an honourary adoration or respect was to be given to the said Images like as is given to Chalices and to the Books of the H Gospels but not LATRIA which as true Faith teacheth is due onely to God This was the plain and open Definition of the Council of Nice Let us now see what it was that the Synod of Francford condemned Allata est in medium Quaestio c. A Question was proposed in the Council saith the Author of the Caroline Book concerning the late Synod of the Greeks held at Constantinople a mistake of the place for Nicaea about the adoring of Images In qua scriptum habebatur In which there was written that those should be anathematized who did not give service and adoration to Images of the Saints as to the Divine Trinity Now saith the said Author our most Holy Fathers denying by all means Service and Adoration did both contemn and unanimously condemn the said Synod This is what the Fathers of the Synod at Francford condemned as it stands represented by the Author himself of the Carolin Book to whom my Adversary saith that the Acts of the Council were very well known and by Goldastus in Sir Henry Spelman who cites them as the very words of the Council and I suppose by Sirmondus also for had he published any thing else the Doctor would not have failed to let us know it And now I appeal to any indifferent Reader whether there were not a great misunderstanding of the Doctrine of the Council of Nice For had the Fathers of Francford rightly understood that the Council of Nice declar'd onely an honourary Worship to be given to Images like as to the H. Cross and to the Books of H. Scriptures c. and not Latria or the Worship due only to God they could never have condemn'd it for defining that the same Service and Worship was to be given to Images as to the Divine Trinity And therefore Mr. Thorndike ingenuously professeth that It is to be granted that whosoever it was that writ the Book against Images under the Name of Charles the Great did understand the Council to enjoyn the Worship of God to be given to the Image of our Lord. But it is not to be denied that it was a meer mistake and that the Council acknowledging that submission of the heart which the Excellence of God onely challenges proper to the H. Trinity maintains a signification of that esteem to be paid to the Image of our Lord. It is evident then there was a grand mistake And to omit what Bellarmin and others say of the ocsion of it Petrus de Marca the late learned Archbishop of Paris very probably judges it to have risen from the words of Constantinus Bishop of Constantia in Cyprus unskilfully rendred by the Latine Translator For as he well observeth the Council of Francford did not condemn the plain and open Definition of the Council of Nice but as the Canon it self of Francford speaks Quod scriptum habebatur for that there was found written in the Acts of that Council that the Worship due unto God was to be given to Images And the Author of the Caroline Book tells us that this was found written in the Sentence of the aforesaid Constantinus whom therefore he condemns of precipitancy and folly in these words Infauste praecipitanter sive insipienter Constantinus Constantiae Cypri Episcopus dixit suscipio amplector honorabiliter sanctas venerandas Imagines quae secundum servitium adorationis quae substantiali vivificatrici Trinitati emitto But instead of precipitancy and folly in Constantinus he should have laid the fault upon the ignorance of the Translator or his own if not his malice For the sense in Greek is plain and facil to be this Suscipio honorarie amplector sanctas venerabiles Imagines Et adorationem secundum Latriam soli supersubstantiali vivificae Trinitati impendo I receive and with honour embrace the holy and venerable Images of Christ and his Saints but for adoration of Latria I give it onely to the supersubstantial and Life-giving Trinity From whence it is is plain how ignorantly or maliciously rather it was said by Calvin that the same Constantinus professed he did reverently embrace the said holy Images cultumque honoris qui vivificae Trinitati debetur se illis exhibiturum and that he would give that Worship to them which is due to the Holy Trinity when what he professed was the quite contrary Such Arts as these were enough to make a man suspect a good Cause much more to desert a bad one But whether this were the occasion or no 't is evident as I shewed before that there was a great mistake and while the matter of fact is evident my Adversary labours in vain to argue from Conjectures that it was not possible especially since the Copy of the Acts of the Nicene Council was so unskilfully if not maliciously translated as to minister matter of mistake and though the Popes Legates could not perswade the Francford Fathers from
who had the power of limiting what is lawful and what is not by the Law should declare to be unlawful But to think that their declarations ought to bind Christians were to imagine that Christians ought to be Jews And then a little after he goes on For Christianity saith he having put Idolatry to flight which the Law never pretended to do it is not to be imagined that the having of Images can make a man take those for God which they represent so long as the belief of Christianity is alive at the heart For neither was it Idolatry though it were a breach of this Commandment for a Jew to have such Images as were forbidden by their Elders not taking that for God which they represented But what honour of Saints departed or what signs of that honour Christianity may require what Furniture or Ceremonies the Churches of Christians and the Publick Worship of God in them may require now all the world professes Christianity and must honour the Religion which they profess this the Church is at freedom to determine by the Word of God expounded according to the best agreement of Christians This is Mr. Thorndike's Discourse in which the Reader may observe 1. That to think the Declarations of the Jews ought to bind Christians were to imagine that Christians ought to be Jews 2. That all things forbidden to the Jews by this Commandment were Not Idolatry 3. That the Images which the Precept supposeth were the Representations of other that is false Gods which his People were wont to worship for God 4. That what Furniture viz. of Images the matter he there treats of or Ceremonies the Publick Worship of God may require is left to the Judgment of the Church to determine 5. and lastly That the Opposition in this Point between Dr. St. and Mr. Thorndike is not onely concerning the obligation of the Jews as between Catholick Divines but of Christians also in order to this Commandment So that some are of opinion however Dr. St. â—eem to direct his arrows against the Church of Rome yet he meant at least by rebound to shoot them at Mr. Thorndike And had he made it any part of his business to answer his Arguments I might easily have been induc'd to have embrac'd their Opinion But those remaining untouch'd I cannot but look upon this Discourse of that Learned Person as a kind of Prophetical Confutation in the year 1662. when he printed that Book of all which Dr. Stillingfleet brings in 1671. for the proof of his Charge of Idolatry against the Church of Rome in the matter of Images As for his new way of answering the Testimony I alledged of St. Austin's Judgment of the sense of this Commandment by asking me how I am sure that it was his constant Judgment I have at large refuted it in the Third Chapter to which I remit the Reader CHAP. X. What kind of Honour the Church gives to Holy Images explained and the Doctors mixing School Disputes with matters of Faith shewn to be sophistical § 1. TO clear the Doctrine and Practise of the Catholick Church from his most Unjust Charge of Idolatry I told the Reader That the Honour we give to the Sacred Images of Christ and his Saints was an inferiour or Relative Honour onely not Latria the Worship due to God but a certain Honourary Worship expressed by kissing them or putting off our Hats or kneeling before them much like the Worship which is given to the Chair of State or the Reverence which Moses and Joshua gave to the Ground by putting off their Shoes c. That this was the meaning of the Council of Nice is confessed by Dr. Field and Mr. Thorndike as I have shewed p. 124. And that the Council of Trent means no more is manifest from the words of the Council related above Chap. 2. as also for that Sess 25. it refers us expresly to the Council of Nice Yet because the Doctor is resolved to quarrel the distinction of Absolute and Relative Worship that the Reader may see what is meant by it I shall desire him to take notice first That Adoration or Worship being an Act of the Will as the Will can love one thing for it self because of the Perfection it is endow'd with and another thing not for it self but purely for that others sake to whom 〈◊〉 belongs So likewise it may adore or worship a thing either for it self that is for some intrinsecal Excellency in the thing for which it deserves Worship and then it is said to worship the thing absolutely because for it self Or it may worship it for another's sake that is for some Excellency in the Person to whom the said thing hath a Relation or Union and then it is said to worship such a thing with a Relative or Inferiour Worship because purely for that Persons sake And because Intellectual Beings are capable of having some Excellency in themselves for which they deserve to be worshipped as Virtue Sanctity Wisdom Power c. and Inanimate Beings are capable of bearing a Relation to a Person endowed with such Excellencies it follows that as Intellectual Beings may have Absolute Worship given to them so Inanimate Things relating to them may for their sakes have a Relative Respect or Honourary Adoration given to them and that so far from being injurious to the Person to whom they belong that it would be look'd upon as a disrespect and affront if in due circumstances it were not done Such a kind of Relative Worship it is we affirm to be due and to be given to the Images of Christ and his Saints when we kiss them or put off our Hats before them Secondly I must desire him to observe as Mr. Thorndike doth very well that the words Adoration Worship Respect Reverence or howsoever you translate the Latine word Cultus are or may be in despite of our hearts equivocal that is sometimes they may signifie one kind of honour and sometimes another Sometimes that which belongs to God and sometimes that which belongs to the Creature And the cause of this equivocation he saith is the want of words vulgar use not having provided words properly to signifie conceptions which came not from common sense And from this equivocation in the Words Adoration Worship c. the greatest part of the Difficulties which occur in this take their rise Now when the Doctor should set himself seriously to confute the aforesaid Explication he puts his Reader into a fit of laughing with a Drollish Parallel p. 100. that to give this Inferiour and Relative kind of Worship to the Image of Christ that is to honour and reverence it for his sake is just as if an unchaste Wife should plead in her excuse to her Husband that the person she was too kind with was extreamly like him and a near friend of his and that it was out of respect to him that she gave him the honour of his Bed But to lay open the
sobriety But it is no less than insolency and madness and that in the highest degree saith St. Austin to dispute whether that be to be done or no which is practised by the whole Church through the World as this Custom of giving an Honourary Respect to the Images of Christ and his Saints hath been confessedly for many hundreds of years § 3. But before the Doctor can or will become a perfect Proselyte of the Church of Rome he desires seriously it seems he was but as I guess'd in a fit of Drolling before to know of me whether any Worship doth at all belong to the Image or no Because saith he if there be any Worship due as the Council of Trent saith there is to the Image either it is the same that is given to the Prototype or distinct from it If it be the same then proper Divine Worship is given to the Image If distinct then the Image is worshipped with Divine Worship for it self and not relatively as I would have it And was it not subtilly done to tell us that if the Worship given to an Image be distinct from that which is given to the Prototype God then the Image is worshipped with Divine Worship for it self The words had been more express but the sense had been the same had he said If an Image be not worshipped with Divine Worship then it is worshipped with Divine Worship for the Worship due to God is Divine Worship and that which is distinct from it is not Divine Worship So hard a thing it is for one who intends mischief to meddle with such edge-tools as School-distinctions are and not cut his own fingers And this is 〈◊〉 first time my Adversary hath done so However he will not lay them down yet 〈◊〉 if it be the former i. e. the 〈◊〉 Worship that saith he is condemned of Idolatry by Bellarmine because the Creature is equally worshipped with God and if the latter i.e. distinct this is oppugned by Vasquez a man of great Reputation too and of as sâ—arching a Wit as Bellarmine as a certain kind of Superstition or Idolatry because Man expresseth submission to an Inanimate Thing From whence he concludes that it is in mens choice what sort of Idolatry they will commit who worship Images but in neither way can they avoid it And here it is he thinks he hath pinch'd us sore and yet will not give us leave to cry out upon himself and his Partizans for their insincere and sophistical mixing the Disputes and Niceties of the Schools with the Doctrine of the Church But how little the Faith and Practise of the Church is concerned in them I shall let the Reader see by a Parallel example in a passage relating to Civil Worship A Gentleman at Court passing through the Guard-Chamber saw a Countrey-man there engaged in a Dispute with three or four of the Yeomen The Clown it seems would have gone into the Presence cover'd They pull'd him back and told him when he went into that Room he must pull off his Haâ— He asked them very pertly To whom or to what for he saw nothing but a Chair and a Canopy They told him It was the Kings Chair of State and he must do it to the Chair out of respect to the King The Countrey-man here perhaps he had read Dr. St.'s Argument or heard him preach it for such kind of preaching hath been the ground of that part of Quakerism began with a serious countenance to demand of them whether any Worship at all were due to the Chair or no For his part he was a Loyal Subject of His Majesties and had really a scruple in the case For if any Worship were due to it it was either the same which is given to the King or distinct from it If the same then proper Regal Worship would be given to something beside the King which were Treason to do If distinct then the Chair would be worshipped with Regal Honour for it self and not relatively which were for a man to submit himself to a piece of Wood And he had so much esteem for his Manhood that he would not debase it so far for all their Halbards Here the Yeomen of the Guard bid him leave his quibbling and do his duty which he refusing to do unless they would satisfie his scruple they took him by the shoulders and thrust him out of doors The passage no doubt was pleasant but withal so parallel to the Doctors proceeding in this matter that I cannot but seriously desire to know of him whether he judge it a sufficient excuse for the Clown not to put off his Hat because he did not or would not understand what kind of Worship was due to the Chair Or to put the example in a thing relating to the Worship of God of which I shall speak more in the next Chapter whether Moses and Josue might have refused to have put off their Shoes in reverence to the Ground where they stood till they had first been satisfied whether it were the same Worship they gave to God or distinct from it That they did lawfully testifie their Reverence towards the Ground is affirmed by himself p. 105. and if they were not retarded from doing it by the Doctors Dilâ—mma no more ought Christians from testifying their Reverence to the Images of Christ and his Saints Let Plato and Aristotle with their followers wrangle as much as they will about the manner how we come to see the former contending that it cannot be done by the Object 's uniting it self with the Eye the latter asserting as strongly that it cannot be done by the Eye 's sending forth Rays to the Object Must we therefore stand still with our Eyes shut till it be agreed between them by which of the two ways we are to see At this rate we must neither see nor hear nor feel nor move till it be accorded between Philosophers how these Operations are performed which will be never Let the Schoolmen then dispute as much as they please about the manner how Honour is given to an Image yet honest Nature will teach us to do it for his sake who is represented by it with as much security and as little danger of erring as any of the aforesaid Operations What the Councils declare in this matter and to them it is the Doctor himself confesses p. 209. that we must appeal for the Churches sense is that we are not to give Latria the Worship due onely to God but a honourary Respect or Adoration to Holy Images as to the Books of Holy Scriptures and other things belonging to God § 4. This is what the Church requireth of her Children to believe and this is all that a Catholick Controvertist is bound to speak to Nor do the Arguments the Doctor brings in reality deserve to be answered otherwise than Zeno's Arguments against Motion were answered by Diogenes For Zeno proves every jot as subtilly that a man cannot move an inch
the end of this be but the banishing Faith and Christianity out of the World § 3. After all these endeavours to wrest out of our hands the supposition he so freely granted p. 110. of the same Revelation for Christ's Presence in the Eucharist as for his Divinity he would bring the business at last to a Composition if we will beg of him to yield that the Body of Christ being present his Divinity is there present too And I am not so nice if it will come no cheaper way as not to begg it of him for Christianity's sake but then he adds that even upon this supposition that Christ's Divinity is present with his Body in the Sacrament p. 127. his mind must still unavoidably rest unsatisfied as to the Adoration of the Host For supposing the divine Nature present in any thing gives no ground upon that account to give the same worship to the thing wherein he is present as I do to Christ himself But here again he relapses into his former mistake of the Controversy which in spight of the practise of Catholicks which is to adore Christ under the Accidents in like manner as he was worshipped in his Apparel he will have to be that proper divine worship is to be given to the Accidents For this is what he means here by the Host Let him state the Question as it ought to be that is Whether Christ may not be worshipped under the Accidents as well as in his Garments Or if he will needs mix the Questions of the Schools with those of Faith Whether the Accidents may not be worshipped together with Christ in like manner as his Garments were worshipped together with Him And the Controversy will quickly be at an End But not to tire the Reader with following him in his Repetitions his scruple if I mistake not at present is why supposing the divine nature present in any thing gives no ground to worship every thing in which he is present yet his presence in the Eucharist should be a sufficient reason to worship the Accidents together with him And to this I give Bellarmin 's answer which I take also to be the sense of Greg. de Valentia in the place cited by the Doctor Longe aliter Christus est in Eucharistia c. That Christ is in the Eucharist in a far different manner than God is in other things For in the Eucharist there is but one only Suppositum and that divine All other things there present belong to that and in a certain manner make one with that though not in the same manner mark that Hence it is that the whole is rightly worshipped together as we said before of Christ apparell'd But although God be in all other things yet not so that he is one Suppositum with them nor is there such an Union between God and the Creature in which he is that they can be said to be in a manner One. By this it appears that as Greg. de Valentia deservedly calls this presence of Christ to the Accidents an admirable Conjuction so the Doctor unjustly imposes upon Bellarmin that he grants as great an hypostatical union between Christ and the Accidents as between the divine and humane Nature for although Bellarmin say that all things there present in a certain manner make One with the Suppositum yet he declares expresly that it is not in the same manner But here the Doctor complains of un-intelligible terms and notions used in this matter And might he not do the same with as much reason of the terms and Notions used by the School-men in explicating the mysteries of the Trinity and Incarnation How un-intelligible soever the School-terms appear to him yet it is very easy to understand that neither Greg. de Valentia nor Bellarmin mean to give divine honour to the Accidents for themselves and yet much easier to understand what Christian People mean when they profess the Object of their Adoration in the Eucharist to be the only begotten Son of God under the Accidents of Bread and Wine As for what he alledges out of Vasquez that supposing the presence of Christ to be the Ground of Adoration it follows in his Opinion that God may very lawfully be adored by us in any created Beeing wherein he is intimately present I have spoken to it in the 5th Chapt. of the 1. Part And as Vasquez himself acknowledges the danger of that Doctrine if it should be commonly and publickly put in practise by the People for possibly there may be another consideration for Philosophical and Contemplative Men in their private Devotions as St. Leo there cited seems to grant so if the Doctrine be Good what follows from thence is that Christ being supposed to be really present in the Sacrament and in a particular manner by Transubstantiation may most certainly be adored in it Vasquez was a Man of great learning and of a searching wit but it is noted of him as of Lactantius that he was more subtil in oppugning the Opinions of others than solid in establishing his own CHAP. IV. Dr. St.'s Fundamental Principle of judging of matters proposed to our Belief by Sense and Reason shown to be absurd in it self and destructive to Christianity § 1. WE come now to the Doctor 's Second Proposition that there are not the same Motives and Grounds to believe the Doctrine of Transubstantiation that there are to believe that Christ is God which he saith I affirm without any appearance of reason And he would gladly know what excellent Motives and Reasons those are which so advantageously recommend so absurd a doctrine as Transubstantiation is as to make any Man think he hath reason to believe it He is sure he saith it gives the greatest advantage to the Enemies of Christ's Divinity to see these two put together upon equal terms as though no Man could have reason to believe Christ to be the Eternal Son of God that did not at the same time swallow the greatest Contradictions to sense and reason imaginable This is a Topick in which the Doctor wonderfully delights himself as all others have done before him who have deserted the Faith of the Church We have it over and over at every turn as if the whole System of Christian Faith and every particular Article of it were to be measured by the Standard of Sense and Reason so that if any thing seem absurd and contradictory to them no grounds or motives can recommend it so advantageously as to make any Man think he hath reason to believe it This is what lies at the bottom of his Discourse and himself lays it down for the only Principle oâ— Criterium by which we are to judge of the Truth of Divine Revelation when in his second Câ—asse of Principles he affirms There can be no other means imagined whereby we are to judg of the Truth of divine Revelation but a Faculty in us of discerning truth and falshood in matters propos'd to our Belief
which if we do not exercise in judging the truth of divine Revelation we must be imposed upon by every thing which pretends to be so The perfect discussion of this Principle I shall not engage my 〈◊〉 in at present The Men of Principles as the Doctor calls them not without just cause are likely enough to take it into Consideration a second and perhaps a third time too At present it may suffice to shew briefly now absurd in it self and how destructive to Christian Religion this Principle of the Doctor 's is Viz. That we are to judge of the truth of divine Revelation i.e. whether God have revealed such a thing or no by exercising our Faculty of discerning truth and falshood in matters proposed to our belief that is by making our Reason the Judge whether the matter proposed to our belief be true or false This is what I can understand by the Doctor 's words to be his meaning If He can give them a better I shall be glad to find my self mistaken But if this be as to me it seems to be the sense of his words I am sorry that any thing so irrational in its self and so fatal to Religion should proceed from the Pen of a Christian. For first as I said it is absurd in it self because it can by no means subsist unless we will equal Man's knowledge with that of God For if Man cannot comprehend the depth of the knowledge and power of God that is if God both know and can do more than Man can understand it is evident that the judgment of sense and reason about the Truth of the matter proposed can never be a â—it means to assure him whether God have revealed it or no and it is as evident on the contrary that if it be sufficiently proposed and asserted as revealed by God though it seem never so absurd and contradictory to humane sense and reason we must submit our judgment to the belief of it as True ' Tâ—s not all our reasonings and syllogisms against the matter proposed that can excuse us from the Obligation of câ—ptivating our Undeâ—standing to the Obedience of Christ 2 Cor. 10. 5. That which seems a Camel to us is not so much as a Gnat to the knowledge and power of God and therefore rather than give Him the lye we must strain our selves to swallow what seems to be the greatest Contradiction to Sense and Reason Imaginable Our first Mother Eve by taking part with her sense against Faith destroyed her Self and Posterity by believing the Devil rather than God and what more suitable Penance for this Fault or Cure for this Pride than for God to exact of us that we should believe Him rather than our sense and this particularly in the point of Transubstantiation of the Bread into the Body of our Redeemer that as by following sense and eating the fruit of the Tree of the knowledge of Good and Evil Death came upon all both of Soul and Body so all may receive Life by denying the suggestions of Sense and eating the true food of the Body of Christ under the forme of Bread 2dly It is destructive to Christianity since if we must believe nothing but what our Sense and Reason can comprehend we must lay aside our Creed and neither believe the Creation of the World nor the Trinity of Persons nor the Incarnation of the Son of God nor the Resurrection of the Dead all which seem to imply as many and great Absurdities and Contradictions as the Doctor for his heart can Object against Transubstantiation It would be too tedious to insist upon them all Those who are curious may meet with them every where in the Writings both of those who impugn and of those who defend the Catholick belief in those Points Yet to give the Reader a clearer Insight into the absurdness and malignity of this Principle of the Doctors and how agreeable this proceeding of his is in this Point to that of other Desertors of the Church's Faith I shall instance in some of the Contradictions objected against the Mysteries of the Trinity and Incarnation and that in the words of Dr. Beaumont now Master of Peter-House in Cambridge in his most excellent Poem call'd Psyche or Love's Mystery Verses I know in a Book of Controversy will seem as improper and come as unexpected as a Garden of Flowers in a rough and craggy Desâ—rt but a Traveller will not find fault with his Guide for leading him thorough it if he lead him not out of his way My Adversary without any occasion given him to please the Atheistical humour of the Wits of the Time could think fit to turn Spiritual Archy and make sport with the Saints in so prophane a manner as is no where to be parallel'd in the worst of Play-Books And I hope after so many hard and spiny Questions of the Schools wherewith he hath perplex'd the minds of his sober Readers I may have leave to divert them with citing a little Poetry which doth but express in Verse what the matter it self leads me to have said in Prose See then how the aforesaid Dr. Beaumont introduces a Cerinthian Heretick endeavouring to seduce Psyche that is the Soul from the belief of the Mysteries of the Incarnation and Trinity upon Dr. St.'s Principles of Sense and Reason 213 Blind Ignorance was grown so bold that she Sought to perswade the World it had no eyes Making the lazy Name of Mystery Instead of Demonstration suffice From this black Pit those monstrous Prodigies Of Hood-wink'd and abused Faith did rise 214 Who can imagin Heaven would e're ob'rude Upon the Faith of Reasonable Men That which against all Reason doth conclude And founded is on Contradiction Sure God so strange a Law did never give That Men must not be Men if they believe 219 For though the Marvel-Mongers †grant that He Was moulded up but of a Mortal Mettal And that his substance was the same which we Find in our selves to be so weak and brittle Yet an Eternal God they make Him too And angry are that we will not do so 220 Thus the quaint madness of a dreaming Brain Holds the same thing a Mountain and a Mite Fancies the Sun Light 's Royal Soveraign To look like swarthy and ignoble Night Imagins wretched Worms although it see They crawl in Dâ—rt Illustâ—ious Kings to be 221 But Heaven forbid that we should so blaspheme And think our God as poor a thing as we How can Eternity be born in Time How can Infinity a Baby be Or how can Heaven and Earth's Almighty Lord To Aegypt fly for fear of Herod's Sword 226 I know they strive to mince the matter by Distinguishing his Natures For their Art Being asham'd of no Absurdity Hâ—mself from his own self presumes to part Yet we durst not admit a Deity Which must on a distinction builded be 227 But how much more than Mad their doctrine is And how transcending Pagan Blasphemy Who
of Sense or Reason can digest it Fools as you are what Demonstration So evident as this My God profest it And if you once can prove that He can lie This Wonder and Him too I will deny 89 What thank is it that you can credit that Which your own sense Reason's eye reads plain Heaven 's much to them beholden who will not Believe it higher is than they can strain Who jealous are of God and will not be Induc'd to trust Him further than they see 90 And yet had you these modest eyes of mine You in this gloomy Cloud would see the Sun That Sun who wisely doth disdain to shine On those who with bold prying press upon His secret Majesty which plainly I Because I make no anxious search descry 91 This is the valorous Resolution Of Gallant Faith and this will serve to be The Blessed Rule by which all those must run Who are the Scholars of Humility Yet I must tell thee Psyche itching Pride VVill not hereafter thus be satisfied And then having inveigh'd in the following Stanza's against those who will needs be prying with the skill they take for granted hath fill'd their brains that is with the Doctor 's faculty of discerning Truth and falshood into the manner how this Miracle is brought to pass He concludes with these words in favour of Transubstantiation 99 It is in vain to tell these Wranglers how Jesus could graft cold Stones into the stock Of Abraham and make them fertil grow In Israelites or that the Bread he took In 's daily Diet was not wholly spent But part into his Body's substance went 100 In vain to tell them how into his Blood The Wine he drank was changed day by day For though such speculations understood With prudent Reverence might make easier way Unto the Mystery yet Wranglers will Because they will be so be Wranglers still This and much more to this Purpose which not to surfet the Reader with too many delicacies I omit saith the Author of that Illustrious Poem in which to the satisfaction of all that read it himself hath made appear to the World what his Modesty made him willing to expect rather from others that a Divine Theam is as capable and happy a subject of Poetical Ornament as any Pagan or Humane device whatsoever And would the Gallants of both Sexes employ as many of their precious Hours in reading this excellent Piece as they do in Romances and Play-Books I dare be bold to affirm though perhaps I shall not be credited They would find not only more substance but more delight in this than in the best of them But to return to my present business My design was to let the Reader see how far my Adversary's beloved Principles of Sense and Reason are from being fit Umpires to judge of matters proposed as of divine Revelation particularly in what relates to the presence of our Saviour in the Eucharist and I thought I could not do it better than in the words of this learned and Ingenious Author whose whole Discourse seems but a Descant upon those words of St. Chrysostom when speaking of this Mystery to the People of Antioch he saith Let us obey God in all things and not gain-say Him though what is said seem to contradict both our Imaginations and Eyes Let his word obtain more credit from us than our thoughts or sight And thus let us behave our selves in the Mysteries that is in the most Holy Sacrament not beholding only those things which lye before us viz. the Symbols of Bread and Wine but holding fast his words For his Word is Infallible but our sense is easy to be deceived That never fails but this most frequently mistakes Because therfore the Word saith This is my Body let us obey and believe and behold Him with the eyes of our Understanding If the Doctor will not do so but will have his Readers to measure matters of Faith by the Rule of Sense and Reason and not trust God farther than they can see with them I am sure he gives a far greater advantage to the Enemies of the most Holy Trinity and Christ's Divinity by so unChristian a Principle than we can possibly do by asserting a like divine Revelation for his being present in the Eucharist as for his being true God notwithstanding the seeming contradictions that occur in it But perhaps the Doctor wâ—ll say that I am mistaken all this while and that he meant no such thing by the use of Reason For I remember now that when upon his Asserting that Catholicks expose the Faith of Christiaâ—s to a great uncertainty by denying to Men the use of their Judgment and Reason as to the matters of Faith propâ—sed by a Church when they must use it in the choice of a Church which if it say any thing to the purpose it must be this that because Men must make use of their reason to find out the true Ground of believing which Catholicks affirm to be the Church therefore they must believe nothing which the Church proposes as a matter of Faith but what the Faculty in them called reason of discerning Truth and Falshood in matters proposed to our belief shall judge to be true in it self for otherwise how doth it follow that they expose the Faith of Christians to uncertainâ—y when I say upon this assertion of his I supposed and clearly enough I think that the use he would have of reason was to believe nothing but what his reason could understand He assures me p. 542. upon his word that he meant no such thing for I believe saith he an Infinite Being and all the Doctrines revealed by it in H. Scriptures although I cannot reconcile all particulars concerning them to those Conceptions we call Reason But here I observe first as no very great sign that he means not by the use of Reason what I supposed that he doth not tell us of any one particular Article he believes with that terrible condition unless he mean he cannot reconcile all particulars concerning the existence of a Deity but huddles them up in a blind Universal that he believes all the Doctrines revealed by God in the H. Scriptures as if it were enough for a Christian to believe in general all that God hath revealed in Scripture without troubling himself about the Sense of any thing in particular for fear of over-straining his Reason to swallow something that may seem a Contradiction And I confess the Letter of the Scripture may be a sufficient Rule of such a Faith 2dly This Assertion of his exposes the Faith of Christians to as great uncertainty as that he charges upon Catholicks by its denying to Men the use of their Judgment and Reason as to matters of Faith revealed by God in the Scriptures when they must necessarily use them to find out the Scriptures and the existence of a Deity For whether the Scripture or the Church be supposed to be the Ground of believing
as it does his at present And although the Challenge have been often made yet none of her Adversaries have ever been able to show the time when she fell from heâ— Primitive Purity either into Schism or Heresy Nor yet before what Tribunal her cause wâ—s examined or by what Judge she hath been condemned unless by themselves who are her Accusers whereas not only Piety but even Natural Reason teaches that no particular Man is to be condemned much less deprived of what he stands possessed till his cause be Juridically heard and sentenced Nor ought any Man to be Judge in his â—wn cause much less to execute the sentence given by himself All which the New-Reformers in England France Germany c. have done in denying the Authority of the Roman Church and setting up for themselves § 2. But now instead of making Good his Assertion Viz. That the Authority of the Roman Church is no ground of believing at all he desires he saith with all his heart to see this Authority proved which is just what all other Accusers do when their Proofs fail to call upon â—he Defendant to prove his Title which after a long Possession ought in all Law to stand Good and Valid till the Accuser can prove it to be otherwise Cromwell might with much more reason have summon'd the King to prove his Title to the Crown after a Prescription of 500. Years than the Doctor can exact it from the Church to prove her Authority of which she hath been in Possession a far longer time Olim possideo Prior possideo was the Church's Plea in Tertullian's time 'T is their part then to prove who are the Accusers yet Catholick Authors to satisfy if possible the importunity of the Church's Adversaries have receded from the Rigour of this Plea and written large Volumes in Justification of her Authority Particularly the two learned Cardinals Bellarmin and Perron And now very lately Mr. E. W. The Book is called Religion and Reason and being written particularly against the Doctor expects his Answer These he may consult at his leasure I shall only at present remind him of what I have proved already at his request in the first Chapter of the first Part to which I refer the Reader Viz. That a Christian by vertue of his being so is bound to be of the Communion of the Roman Church And then subsume But every Christian is bound to submit to the terms of Communion of that Church whose Communion by being a Christian he is bound to be of Therefore every Christian by vertue of his being so is bound to submit to the terms of Communion required by the Roman Church And this the Doctor knows for he often complains of it as a great violence put upon his Sense and Reason to be a submission to her Decrees in matters of Faith and particularly in the Point of Christ's presence in the Eucharist by Transubstantiation as well as of his being the same True and Consubstantial God with his Father § 2. The Second Ground or Motive he Instances in and I suppose he will deny this too to be any ground of believing at all is Catholick Tradition This done he bids me again to prove if I can as if it belong'd not at all to him who is the Accuser to prove his Action or as if it had been some new point which no Catholick Author had ever yet attempted to prove that Transubstantiation was a Doctrine received in the Universal Church from our Saviour's time and here he saith when I please he shall joyn issue with me And if I think fit to put the Negative upon him he will undertake to instance in an Age since the first Three Centuries wherein if the most learned Fathers and Bishops yea of Rome it self be to be credited Transubstantiation was not believed These are bigg words indeed and the Doctor might have done well to have remembred what the King of Israel answered to the proud message of the King of Syria Let not him that girdeth on his Harness boast himself as he that putteth it off But it is no new Artifice in our Adversaries then to speak biggest when there is least cause for it as I shall make appear my Adversary does in this matter from the very Confession of Protestants themselves Which kind of proof is look'd upon by all sober Men as very proper both to satisfie the Judgment of an Impartial Reader and also to abate the boasting of over confident Spirits For as Bishop Hall saith One blow of an Enemy dealt to his Brother is worth more than many from an adverse hand And upon this account it is that when Bellarmin makes use of the like proof that is undertakes to prove the Roman Church to be the true Church of God by the Confession of Protestants Dr. Field saith surely if he can prove that we confess it to be the true Church he needeth not to use any other arguments Let us see then what Protestants say in this Point And first that Transubstantiation was a Doctrine received in the Universal Church from the time of Berengarius that is 600. Years ago is scarcely denied by any that I know of Mr. Fox himself acknowledgeth that about that time the denying of it began to be accounted Heresy and in that number saith he was first one Berengarius who lived about Anno 1060. And Mr. Perkins allows it a longer Date when he says that during the space of 900 Years the Popish Heresy had spread it self over the whole World 2dly That it had remained in quiet possession from the Year 850. that is 200 Years before until the time of Berengarius is confessed by Joachim Camerarius as also that although it had been called into Question before by the prlvate Writings of some yet the first that publickly impugned it was Berengarius 3dly That Damascene in the beginning of the 8th Century and Theophylact who though he be not so ancient yet his Authority is much esteem'd by learned Men because he is look'd on as an Abridger of St. Chrysostome did plainly incline to Transubstantiation is confess'd by Ursinyus So is it of St. Gregory in the 6th Age by Dr. Humfrey when he saith that he and St. Austin the Apostle of England brought Transubstantiation into the English Church In the fift Age Eusebius Emissenus is taxed by the Centurists to have spoken not commodiously viz. for their purpose of Transubstantiation The like is affirmed by them of St. Chrysostome in the same Age and of St. Ambrose in the fourth of S. Cyprian in the third by Ursinus of Tertullian and Origen in the second by the forenamed Centurists and S. Ignatius in the first is acknowledged by sundry Protestants to have said of certain Hereticks of his time That they do not admit Eucharists and Oblations because they do not confess the Eucharist to be the Flesh of our Saviour Jesus Christ which Flesh
own Body by saying This is my Body and St. Ignatius in the first confesseth the Eucharist to be the Flesh of Christ which suffred for our sins And now let the Reader judge whether those learned Protestants above cited had reason to affirm of these Fathers though they taxed them of error for it that for what appears by their words they believed and taught the Doctrin of Transubstantiation I know the Doctor will not want many a pretty artifice to obscure if possible and elude the force of these Testimonies but the Confession of his Brethren will still be a Potent Prejudice against him Nor can he ever have the courage to deny but that the words taken as they sound seem evidently at least to teach the Doctrine of Transubstantiation and yet what is highly observable in this case this being a matter of so great consequence that Dr. Morton confesseth if it be defensible Protestants must stand chargeable of Heresie but if it may be confuted the Romanists must necessarily be condemned of Idolatry None of those Fathers who are cited by Protestants as Abettors of Transubstantiation were ever taxed of Errour for what they asserted by any of their Contemporaries whom we know to have been very jealous not only of new doctrines but of any new forms of words or by those who lived in the Ages after them nor yet did the Greeks move any dispute about this Point in the Council of Florence whereas Berengarius no sooner began to broach the contrary but immediately the whole Church as the Writers of that time witness was startled at the Novelty and condemned it as Heresie as Mr. Fox above cited witnesseth § 4. But what if the Doctor shall deny all this that is both the Testimonies of the Fathers and the Confession of his Brethren to be sufficient to prove Transubstantiation to have been a Doctrine received in the Universal Church from Christ's time To show the unreasonableness of such a denyal I would propose this case to his Consideration and the Readers Viz. In supposition that a Controversy arise in this present Age about the sense of a Law which was made 500. Years ago and that a considerable number of those who started the Controversy should confess that for the last two hundred years the contrary to what they maintain was generally received in the Kingdom as the sense of the Law and should further confess that the most eminent Lawyers of the former Ages from the first enacting of the Law held the same with the latter Nor had there ever been any disagreement or opposition among them in that Point whether it be not a sufficient proof that what they taught to be the sense of the Law was generally received to be the sense and meaning of it from the beginning The Testimonies themselves of those Ancient Lawyers would be conviction enough how much more when strengthned by the Confession of the Adverse Party it self Now if this be so in the delivery of the sense of a humane Law where it happens very often that great Lawyers may be and often are of different judgments how much more in the delivery of a divine Doctrine where the Pastors of the Church are bound to deliver what they received and the succeeding Age is stil bound to receive what they delivered Surely if we add to this the Confession of the very Adversaries themselves the Proof as St. Irenaeus saith must be true and without contradiction § 5. But if the Doctor will still persist in the denyal of so Evident a Proof because the Proposition is comparative between the Doctrine of Transubstantiation and that of Christ's Divinity as to its general reception in the Church I must desire him soberly to consider how much less St. Athanasius thought sufficient to prove this latter to be a Catholick Tradition For having cited the Testimonies of four Fathers only for the Consubstantiality of the Son with his Father viz. Theognostus Dionysius Alexandrinus Dionysius Romanus and Origen he concludes with an Ecce Behold we demonstrate saith he this Doctrine to have been delivered from Fathers to Fathers as it were by hand And St. Austin using the like Argument in the point of original sin first makes this Preface I will alledge saith he a few Testimonies of a few of the Fathers with which nevertheless our Adversaries will be constrained to blush and yield if either any fear of God or shame of Men can over-power in them so pervicacious an obstinacy And then having produced the Testimonies of five or six of the Latin Fathers he tells Julian against whom he wrote that that part of the World ought to suffice him that is to make him yield it to be the Catholick Faith in which our Lord was pleased to crown with a most glorious Martyrdome the First or Prince of the Apostles And then to show that the Faith of the Greek Church was the same with that of the Latin in this Point he cites the Testimonies only of three Greek Fathers and to the first of them viz. St. Greg. Nazianzen he immediately adds This is so great a Man that neither he would say this but from the Christian Faith most notorious to all neither would they have esteemed him so Venerable if they had not acknowledged that he spake these things out of the rule of the most known Truth And now let the Reader judg whether when we produce a far greater number of most manifest Testimonies of the Fathers of several Ages teaching without any Contradiction that the Bread is changed into the Body of Christ by Consecration and this confessed of some of the most Eminent of them in every Age by Protestants themselves we do not more than sufficiently prove that it was a Doctrine received in the Universal Church from our Saviour's time And if he think yet he can produce greater Evidence for the Doctrine of Christ's Divinity being universally received in the Church from Christ's time the early contest of the Arrians about that Point their Power and Continuance for so many Ages compared with the open and undisturbed delivery of the Doctrin of Transubstantiation may soon convince him of the vanity of such an undertaking § 6. The 3d. and last Ground he instances in is Scripture and this he saith he doth and shall acknowledge for his only Rule of Faith in spight of all pretences to infallibility either in Church or Tradition When he hath considered well what Mr. E. W. hath said to him upon this Subject in his two Learned Treatises Protestancy without Principles and Religion and Reason I hope this spight of his may be abated But in the mean time what doth he alledge out of this his only Rule of Faith as he will have it against Transubstantiation Not so much I can assure you as one single Text. But because Bellarmin produces One and but One for that Point viz. the words of Christ This is my Body whereas he cites many for
Property of the Christian Religion to give divine worship to none but God himself and his Son Christ Jesus To this purpose he cites Justin Martyr and Theophilus Bishop of Antioch to whom he says he might add if it were requisite in so Evident a matter the testimonies of Clemens Alexandrinus Tertullian Cyprian Origen Athenagoras Lactantius Arnobius and who not that ever pretended to the Name of Christian who all agree that Religious by which he means divine worship is proper to the true God and that no created Being is capable of it and in this strain he runs on for no less than Ten Leaves together and at length without ever proving that Catholicks do give divine worship to the Holy Angels and Saints he most triumphantly concluded them to be Idolaters This is the summe of his performance and by it I understand that it had been no great skill in the Pharisees to have made any of those Persons who honoured St. Peter or St. Paul when they were upon Earth or desired their Prayers to be Idolaters They needed not any other proof but only to suppose confidently that they gave to them the worship proper to God alone and the work was done especially if they had but cited that Text of Scripture Thou shalt worship the Lord thy God and Him only shalt thou serve I confess when I said that I thought it would be as easy to prove Snow to be black as the Doctrine of the Catholick Church in this matter to be Idolatry I did not reflect that Dr. St. might suppose Catholicks to give divine worship to the Saints and so conclude them to be Idolaters But this as I now remember is a Peculiar Topick of which all those who oppose the Faith of the Church are forced to make use Viz. to suppose her Doctrine not to be what she affirms but what they would have her to affirm and from thence to make her guilty of what Crimes and Enormities they pâ—ease themselves § 4. Now although the Testimonies of the Fathers he alledges are so impertinent to the present Question as I have shewed yet because some of them as they are imperfectly reported or advantageously translated by him may give occasion to an unwary Reader to suspect that they meant to deny that any worship at all was to be given to any besides God I shal take the pains to unfold their meaning and free him from any such Jealousy by showing that when they deny in general terms worship to be given to a Creature they mean divine worship which is due to God alone and not that worship which is given to Men upon account either of their Natural or Supernatural Endowments or for the Place or Office they hold in the Church or Common-Wealth For as there is a worship due to Men for the former so also doubtless for the latter And we have an Example of it in Dr. St. himself in his Irenicum p. 413. Printed at London An. 1662. Where speaking of Mr. Baxter he calls him Our Reverend and Learned Mr. Baxter Learned I suppose for his knowledge but Reverend for his Piety and Place in the Presbytery and so worthy of double if not of treble honour Thus much premised of the different degrees there are of worship as also that it is a thing notoriously known that many of the Heathen Emperors exacted to be worshipped as Gods that is with divine worship The Testimony out of Justin Martyr p. 141. answers it self because where he tells the Emperours that Christ did perswade Men to worship God alone c. He presently adds that the same Christ commanded Christians to give unto Caesar the things which are Caesars of which Honour is One in the Judgment of St. Peter And the like had been manifest of Theophilus Antiochenus if the Doctor had fairly set down his words for he expresly affirmeth that although the King was not ordained to be adored yet He was to be honour'd with that lawful worship which belongs to Him And this is insinuated in the very words cited by the Doctor himself viz. as the King suffers none under him to be called by his Name nor is it lawful to give it to any but himself so neither is it to worship any but God alone for although the King will suffer none under him to be called by his Name yet he requires that respect be given to those whom he constitutes Judges and Magistrates under Him according to their degree and quality And God himself although he forbid to give his own Name or Honour to any but Himself yet he commands us to give honour to whom honour is due Rom. 13. 7. And that this was the meaning both of Theophilus and Justin we need no better Expositor than Tertullian who was neer upon contemporary with them and tells us that the King is then to be honoured when he keeps â—imself within his own Sphere and abstains from divine honours Quum a divinis honoribus longe est So that I cannot but wonder what the Doctor meant by alledging these Testimonies of those two ancient Fathers unless he intend to deny any worship at all to be due to any besides God or that he think it not possible to worship a good Man for his vertue and sanctity but we must give him divine honour If he produc'd them for no other End but to show that we ought not to give divine worship to any created Being whatsoever it is evident they are not at all to the purpose it being far from the minds and hearts of Catholicks to give that honour to the Saints § 5. But then the old scruple returns again Why he may not as well honour God by giving worship to the Sun as to Ignatius Loyola or St. Francis or any other late Canoniz'd Saint He might have added if he had pleas'd or to one not yet Canonized his Reverend Mr. Baxter For he is sure the Sun and why not the most Reverend Sun is a certain Monument of God's Goodness Wisdome and Power and he cannot be mistaken therein but he can never be certain of the Holiness of those Persons he is to give divine Worship to Thus Dr. St. And certainly he must believe his Readers to be all stark blind who cannot distinguish the Reverence due to a Person for his Holiness from Divine Worship or that a Saint is not a greater Monument of GOD's Goodness Wisdome and Power than the Sun But by his particularizing the late Canonized Saints it seems he is satisfied that St. Peter and St. Paul were greater Monuments of the Divine Goodness Wisdome and Power than the Sun that more were raised to love God by seeing the light of their example than by gazing upon that bright Planet and consequently that we may much better honour God by giving worship to them at least than to the Sun and perhaps to St. Francis too because he is so kind as to honour him here with the title of Saint
true notion of external sacrifice is when he takes it as distinguish'd from Prayer And it would seem as he saith p 159. very strange indeed that sacrifice so taken should be that Latria which is proper to God But it seems as strange to me that He should take it so when himself confesseth that those who did appropriate sacrifice to God by which it seems himself is none of them did comprehend Prayer as the most spiritual and acceptable part of it and that 〈…〉 that sacrifices of old were Solemn 〈◊〉 of supplication unless he meant to make his Reader believe that Catholicks wâ—â—en they speak of sacrifice as proper to Goâ— mean only the external action as distinguish'd from Prayer which as 〈◊〉 is far from the◠〈…〉 minds to think so the Doctor in applauding the Doctrine of the Heathens and siding with them against St. Austin manifestly shows that he judg'd the Argument of the Heathens more rational than St. Austin's Answer 3. His third Reason of dissatisfaction is p. 159. because upon the same account that the Heathen did give divine honour to their Inferiour Deities those of the Roman Church he saith do so to Angels and Saints But this hath been sufficiently refuted already in the First Chapter § 6. And at present there needs no more but to put down the Negatives to the Doctor 's Affiâ—matives viz. that Catholicks do not use Solemn Ceremonies of making any capable of Divine Worship nor set up the Images of the Saints or Angels for that End nor consecrate Temples and erect Altars to them or keep Festivals and burn Incense before them as Gods or offer sacrifice to them as the Heathens did even to their Inferiour Deities These are all such known Truths both from the Doctrine and Practice of Catholicks that nothing but a Prodigious deal of Zeal to fix the black note of Idolatry upon that Church from which the English Nation receiv'd the Faith of Christ could occasion the frequent repetition of so notorious a slander Nor doth the Doctor so much as offer to prove the contrary of any of these Negatives against the Church of Rome but only the last of not offering sacrifice to the Saints and Angels And here he thinks he hath found something to catch at because Bellarmin saith That the sacrifices of the Eucharist and of Lauds and Prayers are publickly offered to God for their honour But is this what the Fathers say of the Heathens worship of their Inferiour Deities that they offered sacrifices to God for their honour No they say expresly that the Heathens offered sacrifices to them and maintained that they ought to do so whereas yet Catholicks profess it ought not to be done even to the Holy Angels and Saints but only to God though as Bellarmin saith it may be offered to God in honorem in or as the Doctor translates it for their honour And this is but what St. Austin professed when he said that what is offered at the Memories of the Martyrs is offered to God who made them both Men and Martyrs and joyned them in Heavenly Honour with his Holy Angels that by this solemnity we may give thanks saith he to the true God for their Victories and be excited to imitate what they did and suffered But the Doctor saith p. 116. that to sacrifice to one for the honour of another is a thing beyond his reach if that sacrifice does not belong to him for whose honour it is offered I have heard that some Beggars have the skill to shrink up their Armes into their Sleeves as if they could not reach above a span from their shoulders And now I perceive there is an Art of shrinking up Understandings as well as Armes For who can believe it beyond Dr. St.'s reach to understand how sacrifice may be offered to God in honour or for the honour of the B. Virgin but that it must be offered to the B. Virgin her self and that so as not to honour God by it as he most uncharitably and unchristianly would make his Reader believe we do A sudden twitch by the hand will serve to pluck out the Beggar 's arm to its full length and because I am perswaâ—ed a home-example may do as much for a shrunkâ— up Understanding I must desire the Doctor to reflect whether it would not be for his honour that his whole Party should keep a Solemn Day of Thanksgiving for the Great Wit and burning Zeal with which the Lord hath endow'd Him to the utter confusion of the Popish Cause If he think this would be much foâ— his honour although the Thanks were given to God and not to him I hope it is not beyond his reach now to Understand that sacrifice also may be offered to God in thanksgiving for the great Vertues and Prerogatives he bestow'd upon the B. Virgin although the sacrifice be offered to God and not to her In◠〈…〉 Honour is nothing but a Testimony oâ— Protestation of some excellency and whether Thanks be given to God by words or by sacrifice for the Gifts and Graces he hath bestowed on such a Person it is an evident Protestation of such excellency in that Person and consequently for his honour though both words and sacrifice be directed to God and not to him His 4th and last Reason that although Catholicks do not call the Saints and Angels Gods yet they give them the Worship of Invocation and the honour of sacrifices which are only due to God This I say is but a Repetition of the Burden of the old Song of Julian the Apostate and Faustus the Manichaean and hath been at large refuted in the precedent discourse I shall only add two Testimonies for a farther confutation of it as sung over anew by the Doctor The first is of S. Austin We do not saith he erect Temples or ordain Priests nor make Dedications nor offer sacrifices to the Martyrs because not They but their God is our God We honour indeed their Memories as of Holy Men of God who fought for the Truth even to the loss of their Lives But we do not worship them with divine honours as the Heathens did their Gods nor do we offer sacrifice to them The second is of Bishop Mountague in his Treatise of Invocation of Saints p. 60. Where he telleth all who are or will be concern'd for Truth that the Doctors of the Church of Rome do teach that the Saints are no Immediate Intercessors for Us with God but whatsoever they obtain for Us at GOD's hands that they do obtain by and through Christ And it is saith he for ought I know the voice of every Romanist Non ipsi sancti sed eorum Deus Dominus nobis est that is Not the Saints themselves but their GOD is our Lord. So it must not be imputed which is not deserved Were they worse than they are it is a sin they say to bely the Devil a shame to charge Men with what they are not guilty of