that it was out of respect to him she gave him the honour of his Bed And then make a grave application upon it as the Doctor does That if such an excuse will not be taken by a Jealous Husband how much less will such like pretences avail with that God who hath declared himself particularly jealous of his honour and that he will not give his Glory to another but hath reserved all Divine Worship as proper to himself and no such fond excuses of relative and inferiour Worship will serve when they encroach upon his Pregrogative Neither would this subtil Disputant be content to stop here but would farther adde that for his part he could see no reason why had he been in Moses and Josue's place but he might with as little scruple have offered sacrifice to the Ground as put off his shoes to it And he should think himself hardly dealt with if he did not come off with the same distinction For if he did it to God absolutely and for himself and to the Ground onely improperly and relatively wherein were he to blame in the Doctors Principles Let him deal as he pleases with this Personated Sosta For my own part to pursue his Method of arguing a little farther that the Reader may see whether it leads I desire seriously to know of him whether any Reverence was due to the Ground or no If none at all to what end did they put off their shoes which if the Ground as he saith of Images had any sense in it would think was done to it Why was there an express Command to require it And why doth the Doctor himself determine that they might lawfully testifie their Reverence towards the Ground because it was sanctified or Holy if none were due If there were any due whether it were the same which was given to God or distinct from it If it were the same then proper Divine Worship was given to the Ground if distinct then the Ground was worshipped with Divine Worship for it self and not relatively Again either it was Divine Worship or an Inferiour Worship distinct from it If it were Divine Worship then the Argument he urges out of Bellarmin p. 103. returns upon him that it is the nature of Divine Worship to be given for it self and therefore if it were given to the Ground the Creature was equally worshipped with God which certainly was Idolatry If it were not Divine but an Inferiour Worship distinct from that which is given to God then Vasquez a man of great Reputation too and of as searching a Wit as Bellarmin comes upon him that he that so gives it incurs the crime of Idolatry because he expresseth his submission to a meer inaninate thing that hath no kind of excellency to deserve if from him So that upon the whole what follows in Doctor St.'s Logick is that it was in Moses and Josue's choice what sort of Idolatry they would commit when they testified their Reverence to the Ground but in neither way could they avoid it I cannot expect he will set much by the Authority of Bellarmin and Vasquez but what I expect and in justice may exact from him is that he will answer their Reasons at least one of them if he embrace the other or else give a sufficient reason himself why this manner of arguing is absurd against the Reverence he confesses due to the Ground and not against the Reverence we assert to be due to Holy Images If he fly to the old shift of an express Command for the one and a pretended Prohibition for the other no relief is to be had from thence for besides his giving Gods special presence here as a second and distinct reason why they might lawfully testifie their Reverence towards the Ground whether there were any Command or no yet taking in the Command the Argument hath still the same force as before For either the Reverence they were commanded to testifie towards the Ground because it was Holy was the same which they gave to God or distinct from it If the same then proper Divine Worship was given to the Ground by Gods Command If distinct then the Ground was worshipped with Divine Worship for it self Both Idolatry in their own nature according to his Principles And consequently it is now in his choice whether he will blame Moses and Josue for committing or God for commanding them to commit Idolatry If it were Idolatry in the nature of the thing to put off their shoes in reverence to the Ground God's Command could not make it to be otherwise And if it were not Idolatry in it self neither is it to give a like honour to the Image of Christ From whence it follows to the utter ruine of all he hath argued from his pretended Prohibition that as no Command of God can make that to be not Idolatry which is so in the nature of the thing so no Prohibition if there were any could make that to be Idolatry which hath not in it the true and real nature of Idolatry Here the Ax is laid to the Root and if ever the Doctor will speak home to the purpose it must be upon this point He must speak to the nature of the thing and not stand pointing at the Sky as Polus did to perswade the World he sees a siery Dragon and that all are blind who see it not when there is nothing but pure Air. What he faintly suggests at present as some little difference between the case of giving reverence to the Ground and that of giving the like to Images viz. that God was present in the place by a special appearance but is not so in Images is to use his own Comparison that he may see how sit it was to the matter he applied it just as if an unchaste Wife should plead in her excuse to her Husband for giving a Friend of his the honour of his Bed that she did it not when he was absent but to testifie her greater respect to him at a time when he was particularly present and can any one think but that such an excuse as this would be taken by a Jealous Husband He adds for a farther difference that the Reverence then requir'd was not kissing the Ground or bowing to it much less praying to it but onely putting off their shoes And I wonder what Edition of the Council of Trent he makes use of to ground this calumny of praying to Images so often repeated by him for in all those printed in Catholick Countries we are told we are not to ask any thing of them and I wonder no less by what Rule he makes putting off the shoes to be a sign of less reverence than kissing the Ground or bowing to it The Rubrick of the Missal prescribes it to be done but once a year by the Priest upon Good Friday to testifie a greater Reverence to the Image of our Crucified Lord. But I shall not dispute it with him onely I perswade my self that
as would have serv'd Diogenes had he known it to conclude all the Platonists in the world to be blind For thus he might argue from the Doctors Topicks The Platonists and all Philosophers affirm that for a man to see there must necessarily be some union between the Object and the Eye that is something must pass from the Eye to the Object or from the Object to the Eye But Aristotle and his Followers have at large proved that this cannot be done by emission of Rays from the Eye to the Object as the Platonists would have it but by Immission of Species from the Object to the Eye Therefore all the Platonists in the world are blind What greater Sophistry can there be than when there are different Opinions how the same thing may be done and one of them really absurd at least seemingly so to others to make him who does the thing to be guilty of all the absurdities which follow from such an Opinion Yet such is the Doctors manner of arguing in this place All Catholicks agree that an Image may be worshipped for his sake whom it represents St. Thomas and his followers will have this to be done by the same act by which the Prototype is worshipped Others who take a different way of explicating the thing look upon this as absurd and think they can prove it to be Idolatrous and Dr. St. from hence concludes Epiphanius and the Nicen Fathers because they say onely what all Catholicks agree in viz. That they worshipped the Images of Christ onely for his sake who was represented by them to be Idolaters The Reader I suppose by this time sees the fallaciousness of this kind of arguing and that the Doctor may feel it if seeing be not enough I shall press him with his own Argument in a Point which himself affirms To shew what kind of Reverence we give to holy Images and that it is not Idolatrous I instanced in Moses and Joshua's putting off their Shoes in reverence to the Ground where they stood because it was Holy To this the Doctor answers p. 105. First That for this there was an express Command but in the case of Image Worship there is as plain a Prohibition But let this pass though I have manifestly proved the contrary What I fix upon at present is his Second Answer in which he avouches abstracting from any Prohibition or Command that the special presence and appearance of God doth sanctifie a place to so high a degree that we may lawfully testifie our Reverence towards it and this Reverence so testified towards the Ground by Moses and Joshua in putting off their Shoes I suppose himself will grant was not given to the Ground for it self but meerly for His sake who appeared there present in a special manner that is for God's This supposed I subsume according to his Logick But Aquinas and his followers have at large proved that where any thing is worshipped or reverenced meerly for the sake of another it must have the same kind of reverence given it which they give to the thing which sanctifieth it by its presence for they do not onely maintain that the same reverence is to be given to the Cross on which Christ suffered because it represents him to us as crucified but also because of his presence or conjunction to it upon which account they say the King and his Garment are worshipped with the same act of Civil Worship Therefore Moses and Joshua were Idolaters for giving reverence to the Ground meerly for his sake who sanctified it with his presence The Consequence though horrible to any Christian Ear is parallel to that of the Doctor against Epiphanius and the Nicen Fathers and if it have any force against these it must have the same against those Thus is the Doctor fallen into his own Trap. Neither can he save himself by having recourse to an express command in the case because Gods special presence is given by him there as a distinct reason why reverence might lawfully be given to the Ground for his sake who was present and if it were Idolatry in it self to do so because Aquinas and his followers have at large proved that where any thing is reverenced meerly for the sake of another it must have the same kind of reverence given it which they give to the thing which sanctifieth it by its presence it follows that God commanded Moses and Joshua upon his grounds to do an act which in it self is Idolatry and this sounds no less if not more horrible to a Christian Ear than the former Let him then take his choice whether he will allow what Aquinas and his followers have at large proved for good or no. If he grant it he must show the disparity why Moses and Joshua were not as much Idolaters according to his Principles as Epiphanius and the Nicen Fathers If he deny it let him tell us with what conscience he could condemn Epiphanius and the Nicen Fathers for Idolaters upon Grounds which himself denies to be good and solid Thus much to the form of the Doctors Argument As for the distinction it self of Absolute and Relative Latria with which St. Thomas and his followers explicate their Doctrine I shall have occasion to speak of it hereafter In the mean time the Reader may pâ—ously believe that to give Relative Latria to the Image of Christ is no more Idolatry than to give Relative Regal honour to the Kings Garment is Treason § 6. The third thing he urges from his Constantinopolitan Fathers is the great Absurdity as they call it and he applauds them for it p. 80. of making an Image of Christ for Worship because Christ is God and Man therefore the Image must be of God and Man which cannot be unless the Deity be circumscribed within the created flesh or there be a confusion of both Natures after their Union both which are blasphemies condemned by the Church To this Epiphanius answers two things 1. That the Name of Christ is significative of both Natures and that an Image represents onely the Humane Nature and agrees onely in name and not in substance with the Prototype 2. That the Divine is no more circumscribed within the Humane Nature in its being represented in an Image than it was in its being laid in the Manger or nailed to the â—ross And consequently that the Objection either of circumscription of the Divine Nature or confusion of both Natures was vain and frivolous I but says the Doctor What doth this Answer signifie unless there be an equal presence or union of the Divine Nature of Christ with the Image as there was with the Humane Nature And I would gladly know what this Answer of his is to the purpose unless he think that nothing may be worshipped with relation to God unless it have as great an Union with the Person of Christ as his Humane Nature had He will not deny I hope that the special presence and appearance of God
smote the Gourd and it withered But to return to the Israelites and their Golden Calf § 2. Did the Fathers understand the same by it which Calvin and the Doctor do Could They not imagine the People to be so sottish as to ascribe their deliverance and the Miracles wrought in it to this New God Nothing less There is no cause to wonder saith St. Athanasius at the Pharisees madness in imputing the works of Christ to the Devil because their Fathers were of the same mind before them for being but newly gone out of Egypt they attributed the benefits which God had bestowed on them to the Calf which themselves had made saying These are thy Gods O Israel which brought thee out of Egypt You will ask saith St. Hierom how they offered sacrifices in the Wilderness not to God but to their King whom they call Lucifer And the Answer he gives is that from the time they transformed their Gold into a Calf saying these are thy Gods O Israel which brought thee out of Egypt it is manifest that all what they did they did not to God but to Idols In like manner St. Chrysostom After the people had heard those words I am the Lord thy God Thou shalt have no other Gods beside me They made a Calf and rejected God They did not acknowledge him to be the Lord but disowned their Benefactor saying unto Aaron Make us Gods to go before us And then as if he had foreseen the difficulty Calvin and my Adversary have of imagining how the people could believe the Calf newly made to have been the God which before it was made brought them out of the Land of Egypt He objects to himself If they were Gods why did they say Make For how can those be Gods which are made And then answers Sic malitia obsaecans sibi ipsi repugnat semetipsam extinguit That It is the nature of malice to blind the mind it possesses to that degree that it makes it contradict and destroy it self § 3. This is what the Holy Scripture and the Fathers say expresly of the Israelites making and worshipping the Calf That they were Idolaters in so doing we confess but that their Idolatry consisted onely in worshipping the True God under that as a Symbol of his presence we utterly deny And till the Doctor can prove it by as great if not greater Authority of Scriptures and Fathers than I have done the contrary he will never prove from this fact of theirs that God hath expresly prohibited in the second Commandment the giving him any Worship by an Image What he does is to tell us that he cannot imagine the people to have been so sottish as to believe the Calf newly made to have been the God which before it was made brought them out of the Land of Egypt or to think the Gods of Egypt had wrought those Miracles for them in their deliverance But these are Conjectures of his own Fancy without any Authority of Scripture or Fathers nay expresly against them as I have shewed And although Aaron perhaps and some of the Wiser among them might not be so sottish yet it is certain as the Doctor confesses of his Wiser Heathens they were so weak as to concur with them in the external practises of their Idolatry But then he tells us again p. 94. that the people took it for granted that Moses by reason of his forty days absence was to be heard of no more and therefore they fell upon devising the fittest Symbol for the presence of God going before them and herein the greatest number saith he being possessed with the prejudices of their Education in Egypt where Golden Bulls were the Symbols of their chief God Osiris they pitched upon that and forced Aaron to a compliance with them in it And all the proof he brings for this is that immediately before Moses his going up to the Mount the last Promise God made to them was that he would send his Angel before them Exod. xxiii 20 23. as if those who had forgotten the God that made them could not also forget this Promise or at least think that He had forgotten it or was not able to perform it and so fall upon devising the making of a God like those they had seen in Egypt whose Presence and Conduct they might have continually with them This follows much more clearly from the prejudice of their Education in Egypt than what the Doctor has devised for them for they never devised any such thing to themselves as is manifest out of the Scriptures and Fathers before alledged And when I consider the Israelites a people without Learning oppressed for four hundred years together by the most Idolatrous Nation in the World and serving their Gods as it appears they did out of Ezek. xx 8. the prejudice which this custom had wrought in them and their readiness upon every slight occasion to turn back with their hearts into Egypt lastly the Character which God himself gives of them Deut. xxxii 28. that they were a Nation void of counsel neither was there any understanding in them When I say I consider all this on the one side and the quaint device the Doctor would transfer from his own head into theirs of making the Calf onely for the Symbol of the presence of the true God on the other I cannot but look upon it to be much of the same nature with those subtil fetches which Historians to shew their own skill in Politicks devise rather than discover in the Actions of those Persons though never so stupid who are the subject of their History How many Plots and Designs have Tacitus and others framed for them which they never dream't of themselves much less were the Israelites guilty of any such subtil speculation as Calvin and the Doctor have invented for them The highest pitch of their Fancy if it staid not in the Image it self was to magine some Deity like those of Egypt to insinuate it self into the Calf as the Egyptians believed of their Gods from thence to give Oracres and conduct them into the Land of Promise and not as the Doctor devises for them that they look'd upon it onely as a Symbol of the true God whom now they had thrust from them and forgotten To make out this device which had no other foundation but in his own fancie he is forc'd to invent a new kind of Idolatry distinct from the Heathen Idolatry Because there is no intimation saith he p. 95. made of their falling into the Heathen Idolatry But why then does he charge the Church of Rome with Idolatry upon this account p. 3. viz. that she requires the giving to the Creature the Worship due onely to the Creator Is not the giving Divine Worship to a Creature the same as to make it a false God And is it not Heathen Idolatry to worship a false God Either then he must retract the ground upon which he builds his Charge of
Council teaches is that It is good and profitable for Christians humbly to invocate the Saints and to have recourse to their Prayers aid and assistance wher by to obtain benefits of God by his Son our Lord Jesus Christ who is our only Redeemer and Saviour These are the very words of the Council and any Man but of common Reason would think it were as easy to prove Snow to be black as so Innocent a practice to be Idolatry even Heathen Idolatry What we teach and do in this matter is to desire the Saints in Heaven to pray for us as we desire the prayers of one another upon Earth and must we for this be compared to Heathens Do we not acknowledg that Jesus Christ the Son of God is our only Redeemer and Saviour Do we not confess that what Benefits we obtain of God either by our own or others Prayers must come by the merits of Him our only Redeemer Do we not believe that God needs neither our own Prayers nor the Prayers of others to confer his Benefits upon us but that all the need is on our part and all that we can do either by our own Prayers or humbly begging the Prayers of others is little enough to make us capable of his Favours Do we not profess to all the World that we look upon the Saints not as Gods but as the Friends and Servants of God that is as just Men whose Prayers therefore are available with him And that we worship them only with that worship of Love and Communion with which even in this life also Holy men of God are worshipped whose hearts we judge prepared to lose their Lives for the truth of the Gospel Where then lies the Heathenism Where lies the Idolatry Had the Doctor held himself to the Doctrine of the Church of England which terms the Invocation of Saints a fond thing vainly invented and grounded upon no warrant of Scripture there had been some colour for a dispute against the lawfulness of it But to condemn us of Idolatry down-right Idolatry for desiring the Servants of God in Heaven to pray for us was to put the common size of Intelligent Readers quite out of hopes of ever seeing it proved He says indeed in his Preface that He thinks it no great skill to make things appear either ridiculous or dark and here He gives us a very pregnant Example of what himself can do in that kind § 2. The Argument he made choice of to do this Feat that is to prove the Church of Rome guilty of Idolatry in the Invocation of Saints was this If the supposition of a middle excellency between God and us be sufficient ground for formal Invocation then the Heathens worship of their inferiour Deities could be no Idolatry for they still pretended they did not give to them the worship proper to the supreme God which is as much as is pretended by the devoutest Papists in Justification of the Invocation of Saints To this I answer'd two ways in my Reply 1. By shewing the disparity of Catholicks worship from that of the Heathens in two things 1. In the Objects where I said that by Persons of a middle excellency we understand Persons endowed with supernatural gifts of grace in this life and glory in Heaven whose Prayers by consequence are acceptable and available with God But the supreme Deity of the Heathens is known to be Jupiter and their inferiour Deuits Venus Mars Bacchus Vulcan and the like rabble of Devils as the Scripture calls thâ—m and therefore there can be no consequence that because the Heathens were Idolaters in the worship of these though they pretended not to give them the worship proper to Jupiter the supreme God therefore Catholicks must be guilty of Idolatry in desiring the servants of the true God to pray for them to him 2. In the manner of worship because I said if any of the Heathens did attain as the Platonists to the knowledge of the true God yet as St. Paul saith they did not glorify him as God but changed his glory into an Image made like to corruptible Man adorâ—â—g and offering sacrifice due to God alone to the Statues themselves or the inferiour Deities they supposed to dwell or assist in them which St. Austin upon the 96. Psalm proves to be Devils or evil Angels because they required sacrifice to be offered to them and would be worshipped as Gods What he meant by formal Invocation I said I did not well understand but Catholicks I told him understand no more by it in this matter but desiring or praying the Saints to pray for them And if this were Idolatry we must not desire the Prayers of a just Man even in this life because this formal Invocation will be to make him an Inferiour Deity 2. I answer'd that the same Calumny was cast upon the Catholicks in St. Austin's time and is answered by him and his Answer will serve as well now as then in his Twentieth Book against Faustus Chap. 21. who himself held such formal Invocation a part of the Worship due to Saints as is evident from the Prayer he made to St. Cyprian after his Martyrdome l. 7. de Bapt. c. Donat. c. 1. And Calvin himself confesseth it was the custome at that time to say Holy Mary or Holy Peter pray for Us. This indeed was my Answer and to disprove it he undertakes to show two things 1. That the disparity between Catholicks worship of Saints and the Heathens worship of their inferiour Deities is not so great as to excuse them from Idolatry 2. That the Answer given by St. Austin doth not vindicate them now as well as then § 3. 1. Concerning the disparity 1. As to the Object of Worship he abhors from his heart to parallel the Hâ—ly Angels and Saints with the impure Deities of the Heathens as to their Excellencies No. He hath more honour for them than not to think them more excellent than Devils or wicked Wretches I suppose in case they have the testimony of Scripture for their sanctity otherwise it may go hard with the best of them should he proceed in the same form with all the rest as he doth a little below with St. Ignatius But supposing them at present to be more excellent than the impure Deities of the Heathens yet if the Idolatry of the Heathens saith he lay not only in this that they worshipped Jupiter and Venus and Vulcan who are supposed to have been wicked Wretches but in this that they gave Divine Worship to any besides God then this disparity cannot excuse Catholicks from being Idolaters Behold here the ground upon which he intends to build his Charge of Idolatry Viz. That Catholicks give divine honour to the Holy Angels and Saints This is what the Reader must suppose otherwise his Arguments are at an End and having laid this false and scandalous supposition instead of proving it he undertakes to show out of the Primitive Fathers that it was the
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
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
have not seen anywhere proposed in these terms I answer that the first Proposition is built on a great mistake of the Nature of humane acts which though they ought to be govern'd by the Law of God yet when they swerve from it cease not to tend to their own proper objects Gods prohibition of such or such a kind of Worship may make it to be unlawful but hinders not the act from tending whither it is intended and consequently if it be intended or directed by the understanding to God though after an unlawful manner it will not fail to be terminated upon God Thus when a Thief or a Murderer prays to God to give him good success in the Theft or Murder he intends though God denies to hear any such Prayer yet is the Prayer truly directed to him and thus when the Jews offered to God in Sacrifice the blind and the lame though he had forbidden it yet was the oblation terminated on him and therefore he reproves them for having polluted him Mal 1. 8. and to convince them the more of their evil doings Offer it now says he to thy Governour will he be pleased with thee or accept thy person Though the Governor deny to accept what is presented to him yet it is truly offered to him by the Presenter and so although God deny to accept such or such Sacrifice yet it is truly offered to him though the offering of it after a forbidden manner make it to be sin Did not God refuse to accept the Sacrifice of Cain and yet the Scripture Gen. 4. 3. says expresly that he brought an offering to the Lord God had not respect to Cain nor his offering but this did not hinder but that Cain's offering had respect to God was terminated on him In like manner though God deny such or such a kind of Worship if it be offered though unlawfully by the Creature yet is it terminated on him The Proposition therefore which asserts that the Worship which God denies must be terminated on the Creature I deny as absolutely false and so will you too Madam when you shall see the sense of it to be no other but that a wicked Man cannot Pray to God or Worship him in an unlawful or forbidden manner who is therefore a wicked Man because he does so What follows from hence is that though God should have forbidden Men to Worship him by Images yet it does not follow but the Worship so given would be terminated on him But now to speak to his second Proposition in which the main force of this Argument consists We utterly deny that God in the second Commandment forbids himself to be Worshipped by a Crucifix for example or such like Sacred Image for such only are the subject of the present controversie What he forbids there is to give his Worship to Idols and this is clear from the circumstances of the Text First Because this Commandment if St. Austin's Judgment be to be followed is but a Part or Explication of the first Thou shalt have no other Gods before me Secondly because the Hebrew word Pescl in Latin Sculptile is used in Scripture to signifie an Idol Let them be confounded who adore Sculptilia that is Idols saith the Psalmist and so the Septuagint translate it in this very place 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 an Idol Thou shalt not make to thy self an Idol So that it was an artifice of the Protestants to make their assertion seem plausible to translate Image instead of Idol and not a certain kind of Image neither but any whatsoever Thou shalt not make to thy self any graven Image Now what is all this to Catholicks who neither make to themselves nor adore Idols nor yield Soveraign honour or acknowledgment of Deity to any but God We give indeed a veneration to Images but the Image of God is not another God besides him nor is the Worship of it the Worship of another God but of him who is represented by it for St. Basil saith The Worship of an Image stays not there but is referred or carried to the prototype or thing represented We give therefore an insetior or relative honour only to the Sacred Images of Christ and his blessed Mother and Saints not latriam the Worship due to God but Honorariam adorationem a certain honorary Worship expressed by kissing them or putting off our Hats or kneeling before them much like the Worship given to the Chair of State or the Kings Picture or his Garment by the like actions or to come nearer to the subject such as was commanded to be given by Moses and Joshua to the ground whereon they stood by putting off their Shoos because it was holy and by the Jews in adoring the foot-stool of God or falling down before it Psal 98. 5. and in Worshipping as St. Jerome testifies they did that part of the Temple called the Holy of Holies because there were the Cherubims sacred Images ordered by God himself to be placed there the propitiatory representing Gods Throne and the Ark his foot-stool In a word such as the Protestants themselves give to the Name of Jesus when they hear it spoken by putting off their Hats and bowing at it or to the Elements of Bread and Wine in the Supper by kneeling before them as figures representing the death of Christ if condescendence to the conscience of weaker Brethren will permit them to own they have any honour or veneration for them or for the Altar before which they bow To conclude this point the Objector brings a Text which forbids us to give the Soveraign honor due to God to an Idol but let us hear out of Scripture an express Text that it is not lawful to give to holy Images and other things relating to God an inferiour or relative Worship such as we have declared and that will be to the purpose § 6. He aims to conclude the Catholick Church guilty of Idolatry from the adoration of the Bread as he believes it in the Eucharist Now to do this he ought to prove that what we adore in the Eucharist is bread indeed But instead of that he brings a comparison between our adoration of Christ in the Eucharist and the Heathens adoration of the Sun viz. That the Papists by the same Argument make the Worship of the bread in the Eucharist not to be Idolatry which would excuse the Heathens Worship of the Sun and of their Statutes from Idolatry For if it be not therefore Idolatry says he because they suppose the bread to be God then the Worship of the Sun was not Idolatry in them who supposed the Sun to be God I shall not complain here of the unhandsomness of the expression that Catholicks suppose the Bread to be God just as the Heathens supposed the Sun to be God whereas he knows that Catholicks believe that the substance of the bread is changed into Christs body but shall answer to the Argument That the Worship of Christ in
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
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
if the Common-Prayer-Book should ordain the Minister when he goes up to the Communion-Table either to put off his shoes or to bow to it he would scruple much more to go barefoot than to nod to it with his Shoes on Two other pretences of difference he brings not unlike the former The first that in kising the Ground or bowing to it if these things had been done to the Ground the danger had not been so great as to Images The other that the Reverence of Holy Places and Things is of a quite different nature from the Worship of Images For the first of danger he may leave that as Mr. Thorndike hath told him to the Judgment of the Church And for the second Holy Places and Things may have several Relations to God according to the different uses for which they serve in order to his Worship and yet the Reverence given them may be proportionably alike that is an inferiour Respect and Veneration and not Latria which is due to God alone But how different soever he would make it from that of Images he must not think to escape For if any be due at all to Holy Places and Things I suppose it is given them for God's sake and then all his own Arguments return upon him afresh for either it is the same which is given to God or distinct from it and which way soever he take Bellarmin or Vasquez will be upon him Or none at all is due to them and then he mocks his Reader when he tells him that the Reverence of Holy Places and Things is of a quite different nature from the Worship of Images And this is indeed what lies at the bottom how speciously soever he pretend the contrary here in words as will manifestly appear from his Answers to the following Instances For first § 3. To that of the Reverence given by the Jews to the Ark and the Holy of Holies where the Cherubins and Propitiatory were he plainly enough denies that any was given them To prove there was I produced first that Text of the Psalm Adore ye the foot-stool of God for it it is holy Psal xcviii 5. as all the Ancient Fathers read it without scruple or as their own Translation hath it Fall down before his Foot-stool for He the Margin hath it It is holy And secondly the Testimony of St. Hierom who saith expresly Ep. 17. ad Marcel Venerabantur olim that the Jews in times past did worship or reverence the Holy of Holies because there were the Cherubins the Propitiatory the Ark c. To neither of these doth he vouchsafe any Answer at all but with an Ipse dixit tells us p. 106. that the Jews onely directed their Worship towards that place where God had promised to be signally present among them and signifies no more to the Worship of Images than our lifting up our Eyes to Heaven doth when we pray Thus He Oracularly without either Scripture or Father or Reason to abet him But if Moses and Josue might lawfully testifie their Reverence to the Ground because it was holy why might not the Jews do as much to the Foot-stool of God because that also was holy Why was it placed in the Holy of Holies and why were the People commanded to adore or bow down before it but to testifie their Reverence to it and that a much greater in the Doctors opinion than putting off their shoes for they were to adore it or fall down before it and all this I hope signifies something more to the Worship of Images than the lifting up our Eyes to Heaven doth when we pray which might have been as well if not better without all this Ceremony in an open field For the Cherubins he tells That they were always hid from the sight of the People as if nothing could have Reverence given it but what is seen It may reasonably be presumed that himself will charge us with Idolatry for adoring the Host not onely when we see it upon the Altar but when it is recluded in a Tabernacle or covered with a Veil Nor doth he mend the matter when he says That the High Priest himself went into the Holy of Holies but once a year for if at that time it were lawful for him to testifie Reverence to the Throne of God there placed it is as much as we desire and if unlawful it was more than he ought to have done though but once a year for as St. Hierom saith Quod semel fecisse bonum est non potest malum esse si frequenter fiat aut si aliqua culpa vitanda est non ex eo quod saepe sed ex eo quod â—it aliquando culpabile est What he adds of the Cherubins being placed meerly as Appendices to the Throne of God was a means rather to increase than diminish the people's reverence to them and for their form there needed no more be known than what Calvin in Exod. xxv 18. affirmeth of them That they represented Angels § 4. To bowing at the Name of JESUS This Ceremony was appointed and allowed by the Injunctions made in the time of Queen Elizabeth Art 52. and was defended by Dr. Whitgift in his Defence against Cartright by Dr. Fulk Dr. Andrews whose words are cited below and others and is at this day publickly practised in the Church of England and that in Dr. St.'s own sight by such as esteem themselves the onely true and genuine Sons of that Church This Instance I thought to be very pertinent because first it is allowed by Protestants and so more easily understood and secondly because of the Analogy there is between Words and Pictures a Picture being a Word to the Eye and a Word as Aristotle calls it a Picture to the Ear. Another reason I had also because the Doctor being inoculated into the Church of England or to speak his Dialect a Revolted Presbyterian I thought he would not dare to disavow all reverence to the Sacred Name of JESUS But I find I was deceived for he tells me plainly I might as well have instanced in going to Church at the Toll of a Bell as in bowing at the Name of Jesus for as the one only tells us the time when so the other only puts us in mind of the Person whom we are to worship This is plain enough I confess if it be as mannerly to tell us that no more Reverence is due to the most H. Name of JESUS when we hear it spoken than to a Bell when we hear it toll And the Compariâ—on is somewhat more elevated than if he had made it with Whittington's fancying the Bells to call him back to be Lord Maior of London But was this all that St. Paul meant when he told us That at the Name of Jesus or as Dr. St. himself reads it p. 111. To the Name of Jesus every knee shall bow Phil. ii 10. Was it for this that God so highly exalted Him that He gave Him
the Eucharist is not Idolatry because we only suppose him to be really present under the form of bread but because we know and believe this upon the same grounds and motives upon which we believe and those motives stronger than any Protestant hath if he have no other than the Catholick to believe that Christ is God and consequently to be adored And therefore that you may the better see the inefficaciousness of the Argument suppose it dropt from the Pen of an Arrian against the adoration of Christ as God and it will be of as much force to evince that to be Idolatry as it is from the Objector's to prove the adoration of him in the Eucharist to be so See there how an Arrian might argue in the same form The same Argument which would make the grossest Heathen Idolatry lawful cannot excuse any act from Idolatry but the same Argument whereby the Protestants make the Worship of Christ a pure Man says the Arrian not to be Idolatry would make the grossest Heathen Idolatry not to be so For if it be not therefore Idolatry because they suppose Christ to be God then the Worship of the Sun was not Idolatry by them who supposed the Sun to be God c. Now the same answer which solves the Arrians argument against the adoration of Christ as God serves no less to solve the Objectors Argument against the adoration of him in the Eucharist since we have a like Divine Revelation for his real presence under the Sacramental Signs as we have for his being true God and Man But what if Catholicks should be mistaken in their belief Would it then follow that they were Idolaters Dr. Taylor an eminent and leading Man amongst the Protestants denies the consequence His words are these in the Liberty of Prophecying Sect. 20. Numb 26. Idolatry says he is a forsaking the true God and giving Divine Worship to a Creature or to an Idol that is to an Imaginary God who hath no foundation in Essence or Existence And this is that kind of superstition which by Divines is called the superstition of an undue object Now it is evident that the object of their that is the Catholicks adoration that which is represented to them in their minds their thoughts and purposes and by which God principally if not solely takes estimate of humane actions in the blessed Sacrament is the only true and Eternal God hypostatically joyned with his Holy Humanity which Humanity they believe actually present under the Veil of the Sacramental Signs and if they thought him not present they are so far from worshipping the bread in this case that themselves profess it Idolatry to do so which is a demonstration mark that that their Soul hath nothing in it that is Idolatrical If their confidence and fanciful Opinion so he terms the faith of Catholicks hath engaged them upon so great a mistake as without doubt he says it hath yet the will hath nothing in it but what is a great enemy to Idolatry Et nihil ardet in inferno nisi propria voluntas that is Nothing burns in Hell but proper Will Thus Dr. Taylor and I think it will be a task worthy the Objectors pains to solve his Argument if he will not absolve us from being Idolaters § 7. He proceeds to prove that Catholicks are guilty of Idolatry by their Invocation of Saints And his Argument is this If the supposition of a middle excellency between God and us be a sufficient ground for formal Invocation then the Heathens Worship of their inferiour Deâ—ities 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 Papists in justification of the Invocation of Saints To answer this Argument I shall need little more than to explicate the hard words in it which thus I do By persons of a middle excellency we understand persons endowed with supernatural gifts of Grace in this life and Glory in Heaven whose prayers by consequence are acceptable and available with God what at he means by formal Invocation I understand not well but what we understand by it is desiring or praying those just persons to pray for us The supream Deity of the Heathens is known to be Jupiter and their inferiour Deities Venus Mars Bacchus Vulcan and the like rabble of Devils as the Scripture calls them The gods of the Heathens are Devils The terms thus explicated 't is easie to see the inconsequence of the Argument that because the Heathens were Idolaters in worshipping Mars and Venus their inâ—eriour Deities or rather Devils though they pretended not to give them the Worship proper to Jupiter their Supream God Therefore the Catholicks must be guilty of Idolatry in desiring the servants of the true God to pray for them to him Upon this account we must not desire the prayer of a just Man even in this life because this formal Invocation will be to make him an inferiour Deity But if some Sect of Heathens as the Platonists did attain to the knowledge of the true God yet St. Paul says they did not glorifie him as God but changed his glory into an Image made like to corruptible man adoring and offering Sacrifice due to God alone to the Statues themselves or the inferiour Deities they supposed to dwell or assist in them Which inferiour Deities St. Austin upon the Ninety sixth Psalm proves to be Devils or evil Angels because they required Sacrifice to be offered to them and would be worshipped as Gods Now what comparison there is between this worship of the Heathens inferiour Deities and Christians worship of Saints and Angels let the same St. Austin declare in his twentieth Book against Faustus the Manichaean chap. 21. Faâ—stus there calumniates the Catholicks the word is St. Austins because they honoured the Memories or Shrines of Martyrs charging them to have turned the Idols into Martyrs whom they worship said he with like Vows The Objection you see is not new that Catholicks make inferiour Deities of their Saints Faustus long ago made it and St. Austin ' s answer will serve as well now as then Christian People says he do with Religious Solemnity celebrate the Memory of Martyrs both to excite to the imitation of them and to become partakers of their Merits and be holpen by their Prayers but so that we erect Altars not to any of the Martyrs but to the God of Martyrs although in Memory of the said Martyrs For what Bishop efficiating at the Altar in the places where their holy Bodies are deposited does say at any time we offer to thee Peter or Paul or Cyprian but what is offered is offered to God who crown'd the Martyrs at the Memories of those whom he crowned that being put in mind by the very places a greater affection may be raised in us to quicken our love both to those whom we may imitate and towards him by whose