heard that Samaria had received the Word of God they sent unto them Peter and John. Doth this look like his being their Head or having supreme Authority over them Sure it would be esteemed a strange piece of presumption if the Bishops should undertake to do the like to the Pope St. Peter was required to render an account also of his Carriage Acts 11. 2 3. And when Peter was come up to Jerusalem they that were of the Circumcision contended with him saying Thou wentest in unto Men uncircumcised and didst eat with them But Peter rehearsed the Matter from the beginning and expounded it by order to them He was also publickly reproved by St. Paul Gal. 2. 11. When Peter was come to Antioch I withstood him to the face because he was to be blamed And vers 14. When I saw that they walked not uprightly according to the truth of the Gospel I said unto Peter before them all If thou being a Jew livest after the manner of the Gentiles and not as do the Jews why compellest thou the Gentiles to live as do the Jews Was this very decent in Paul if St. Peter was his Head and chief Governor over all So that here is not the least Testimony or Sign of any such Supremacy or Power ever owned or acknowledged by St. Peter Note also that all Headship over the Church is always appropriated to Christ and that in such a manner that it cannot be delegated to St. Peter or any other Thus Ephes 1. 22 23. God hath put all things under the feet of Jesus Christ and hath given him to be Head over all Things to his Church which is his Body the fulness of him that filleth all in all Had it not been proper to have said And under the feet of St. Peter too and his Successors as Christ's Vicar if it had been so But as in the Body of Man there is but one Head so there is but one Head in the Church of which we are all Members Ephes 5. 23. The Husband is the Head of the Wife even as Christ is the Head of the Church and he is the Saviour of the Body Where the Apostle joins his being Head of the Church and Saviour together So that he that is not the Saviour of the Church cannot be the Head. And note that our Lord Jesus Christ is the Head of the Church in the same manner as the Husband is the Head of the Wife So that as in the business of Marriage there is to be no Substitute so neither is Christ to have a Deputy or Vicar in his Church 1 Cor. 3. 11. For other Foundation can no Man lay than that is laid which is Jesus Christ But supposing that St. Peter was Head of the Church why must the Pope be so Or if it could be proved that there was such an Headship in St. Peter how doth it appear that this was any more than a personal Privilege in which therefore he was to have no Successor and an Honour conferred upon him out of particular respect and not from any universal necessity of such an Office in the Church A supreme Pastor they say is necessary to the Unity of the Church and therefore St. Peter was such a one and therefore he ought to have a Successor in that same Office. But is it sufficient to build so great a Pretension that can be rightly grounded upon nothing but a Divine Institution upon a mere humane reasoning of the expediency and necessity of the Thing Is it not more modest rather to argue the contrary that because there is no Divine Institution of such an Office that therefore it is not necessary however we may mistake the conveniency of it Shew the Institution and we will believe it or else though St. Peter should have been Prince of the Apostles and Head of the Church under Christ which yet is shown that it was not why may not we take this for a particular Honour and not for a necessary Office Cannot our Saviour who is God over all sufficiently dispence his Influences and provide for his Churches Welfare as far as he thinks meet in this military State by other Means and Church-Officers without such a Vicar Head Or how is it possible that a meer Creature should be capable of executing such an Office over all the Churches for their good at such remote and distant places or how could he be able to manage such a wide and mighty Empire But after all if it could be proved that St. Peter was vested in such an Office for the Time being yet how does it appear that he was to have a Successor in it or that it must be the Bishop of Rome rather than any other So that here we are altogether at uncertainty still and must build an Institution again upon meer humane Reasoning If because he himself was Bishop of Rome so was he said to be of Antioch too And why should not his Successor at Antioch claim this Privilege as much as he at Rome If because Rome was his last See when he died how doth it appear that his dying there transfers his Authority to the following Bishop unless it appears it was his last Will to have it so and that he had power to make such a Will But lastly doth it appear by the Scripture at all or certainly by ancient Record that ever St. Peter was at Rome much less Bishop there And if not how is the Pope his Successor at all See for this a late Discourse printed at London called A Modest Inquiry Whether St. Peter were ever at Rome c. So that here is nothing but uncertainty still to build all their glorious Pretences upon And considering all I cannot but conclude as our Church doth Sermon of Obedience 3d. part The usurped Power of the Bishop of Rome which he most wrongfully challengeth as the Successor of St. Peter is false feigned and forged Neither is it necessary then to the being of a true Church to be united to the Pope as supreme Pastor and Governour over it as is pretended Catech. Roman par 1. de 9. Artic. Symbol sl 11. If no such Center of Unity be appointed by Christ who is the Lord and Bridegroom of the Church then it cannot be necessary to the Unity of the Faith to be united in it nor is that an essential Note of the True Catholick Church And so all those great Pretensions of the absolute necessity of Peoples being in Communion with the Church of Rome under the Pope as supreme Pastor upon the pain of Damnation for the guilt of Heresy and Schism in breaking this Union are meerly false and vain So that our Church may be a Member of the true Catholick Church and in Catholick Unity still though we have separated from them if there be nothing else to render our separation culpable besides this vain pretence The Apostle gives us an account of all other Church-Officers both ordinary and extraordinary that are appointed by
we are sure they know because our Saviour hath told us so but we are sure of no more But neither Saints nor Angels know our Hearts or secret Thoughts and therefore it is certain they do not know what the inward Disposition is of him that prays whether there be that Piety Charity Faith good Intention c. as there ought to be to bring his Performance within the promise of Audience And for want of this Knowledg they do not know whether his Prayers ought to be regarded or no though they know his Necessities All this is the Prerogative of God alone to know the Hearts of Men 1 King. 8. 39. Hear thou and do and give to every Man according to his ways whose Heart thou knowest For thou even thou only knowest the Hearts of all the Children of Men. And upon this consideration he directs his Prayer to him and according to this there is none but he alone that knows what Prayer of any Man is from the Heart Rev. 2. 23. All the Churches shall know that I am he which searcheth the Reins and Hearts If either Saints or Angels then know our Hearts or all our Wants what other way is there but by Revelation from God But we have no assurance that there is such Revelation And therefore to pray to them in confidence of that which we do not know can be nothing less than a presumptuous vanity And it seems God must first tell them all we want before they can represent the Matter to him and also must inform them whether our Prayers be fit to be regarded or no before they can reasonably undertake our Cause For Example whensoever a Scholar prays to St. Catherine or a Sea-man to St. Nicholas or a Painter to St. Luke nothing can be done till God calls to these Saints and tells them Hear you Catherine Nicholas and you Luke such and such an one prays to you that you would pray to me and persuade me to grant them such and such things and to dispose you to be the more earnest with me I must tell you the poor Sea-man is in great danger and is at this very nick of time like to miscarry c. Thus God must reveal to his Saints what is to be done before they can pray to him the King must be as it were a Master of Requests to his Courtiers Which is a meer round-about and useless course but the proper and direct way is to go to God himself immediately who certainly knows all and who is of himself ready to hear us John 16. 26 27. In that Day ye shall ask in my Name and I say not unto you that I will pray the Father for you for the Father himself loveth you because ye have loved me To set up other Mediators which he hath not appointed we may fear will alienate both him and the Father from such Men. The Holy Angels and Saints departed this Life are in an invisible State and for what we know to the contrary are very far remote and distant from us and so are out of the Lines of Civil Conversation either by Word Letter or Message and there being no manner of certainty of their being acquainted with all our Wants or that they know our Hearts and hear our Prayers to pray to them with confidence of their hearing us and to trust in their Aid and Help is to perform an Act of Honour and Worship to them above what is due to their Degrée and which can be paid only to God with any rational Assurance And it is not the Presumption that they hear us if they hear us not and practising accordingly upon this Presumption will excuse this Act from Idolatry no more than the covetous Man's inordinate presumption of the value and helpfulness of his Riâ—hes above what is really in them will excuse his delight and confidence and trust in them from being Idolatry which yet the Scripture condemns for such And tho the Saints and Angels in this case are not believed or owned for Gods or to have the Supreme Perfections of the Deity yet if there be a degree of Honour and Worship given to them which is above them and doth not belong to them but to the supreme God though they are not believed to be the supreme God this degree of Honour and Worship that is given to them will be Idolatry For any degree of Honour and Worship given to a Creature which doth not belong to them but to God is Idolatry And unless they could certainly show how the Saints may know our Wants and Hearts and hear our Prayers otherwise to pray to them and trust in them is in the construction of the Fact to suppose them Omnipresent and Omniscient and these are owned to be the Perfections of the Supreme God alone and therefore in the construction of the Fact this is to suppose them to have the supreme Perfections of the Deity and an Act of Honour to them upon such a Supposition implied though not intended what is it but that they can very hardly be excus'd from Idolatry But suppose again they had such a knowledg as is pretended to reach to all our Wants and Hearts howsoever they come by it if this â—â—pposition were real as it is not yet this does not necessarily infer that we should pray to them for their Help and Aid nor ought we therefore to do it unless we are authorised to do it by the Divine Command or Law. And if we are forbid to do it by the Divine Law and this Act of Prayer be by the Divine Law appropriated to God as it is before proved to be then to perform this Act to them is to perform that to them which is due only to God and so is Idolatry still in the construction of the Law notwithstanding the knowledg supposed in them But observe moreover Our Adversaries do not barely ask the Prayers of the Saints and trust in their hearing and helping them but they pray with the same solemnity of Devotion as they do to God and Christ In the same Places and Times of Worship in the Churches and Divine Offices with the same prostration of Body and uncovering the Head and what is all this but to equal them with God Almighty in all the Circumstances of Worship and outward Adoration so that there is no difference in their outward carriage between what they perform to God and what they perform to them And is not this to give them that Worship which is only due to God or is there no outward Adoration appropriated to God at all or if there be with what Circumstances is it invested or how is it to be known or differenced from what they perform to the Saints departed or doth the difference lie only in the inward intention of the Mind and not in any outward Circumstance at all So it seems they think there being no outward Circumstances at all by which their outward Adoration of God and the Saints are
Earth are within the compass of civil Conversation and we can certainly acquaint them with all our Wants It is quite otherwise with the Saints in Heaven We are required to ask the Prayers of our Brethren upon Earth but we are required to pray to God only in Heaven Our Brethren upon Earth pray for us as Joint-Petitioners or Fellow-Supplicants through the Merits of our common Redeemer Christ Jesus Whereas they pray to the Saints in Heaven as Joint-Mediators of Intercession with our Blessed Saviour Here we ask or desire the Prayers of our Brethren but they pray to the Saints in Heaven with the Solemnities of Devotion as they do to God himself But should we kneel down in a solemn manner in the same place and manner as we do to God and Christ and pray to a Friend in Spain or America to hear or help us then we should do just as the Papists do to the Saints in Heaven But would not the Papists themselves censure that for Idolatry or down-right Madness And whatsoever words do they think then their own Practice deserves Let them give their own Practice what Name they please we will not wrangle with them about a Name CHAP. XIII That it is lawful to represent God and the Holy Trinity by Images And that these Images and the Images and Reliques of Christ and the Saints are to be duly honoured venerated or worshipp'd And that in this Veneration and Worship those are venerated which are represented by them Council of Trent Sess 25. de Invocat Catech. Rom. par 3. cap. 2. WHich is expresly contrary to all those Texts that forbid the making any Image or Resemblance of God at all or of any other thing whatsoever in order to the bowing down to them and worshipping them and that condemn all such Practices for the greatest Blockishness and Idolatry For Exod. 20. 4. Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven Image nor any likeness of any Thing that is in Heaven above or in the Earth beneath or in the Waters under the Earth thou shalt not bow down thy self to them nor serve them The words are universal forbidding all Images whatsoever in order to Worship and not only the Images of false Gods neither is there any one Circumstance in the words to limit or determine them to such What boldness is it then to except the Images of the Trinity and our Saviour and the Saints out of it contrary to a plain and general Law But notwithstanding this plain prohibition it is pretended that God himself appointed the Cherubims as the Symbols of his Presence and his Representations and that the Jews were to direct their Worship to them as the Objects of it Exod. 25. 17 22. Whereas the Cherubims were not in the place of Worship for that was the Temple it self representing the Church upon Earth But the Cherubims were in the Holy of Holies which was the Figure of Heaven out of the Peoples sight where they were never to come but the High Priest only once a Year as a Type of Christ entring into Heaven It was the Mercy-Seat and not the Cherubims that was the Symbolical Presence of God and the Cherubims were to represent the Angels that encompass his Throne And it was neither the Cherubims or Mercy-Seat that was to be worshipp'd or prayed to or any Adoration to be made to them but only to God who made there his peculiar Residence and so they worshipp'd God towards that place and no otherwise as we now lift up our Hands and Eyes to Heaven where he now dwells But it can never be shown that God any where appointed any Images as Representations of Himself or Objects of Worship which would be against his most express Prohibition Deut. 4. 15 16. Take ye therefore good heed unto your selves for ye saw no manner of Similitude when the Lord spake unto you in Horeb out of the midst of the Fire 〈◊〉 you corrupt your selves and make you a graven Image the similitude of any Figure the likeness of Male or Female Here God forbids the making any Image or Resemblance of himself by whatsoever Figure it may be express'd For the Circumstances of the place determine this plainly to the Images of the True God who spake from Mount Horeb and the Prohibition of them is made without any limitations or evasions For it is in the Nature of the thing tending to produce in Men gross Notions of God and tending to the abasement and dishonour of his spiritual and incomprehensibly glorious Nature Act. 17. 29. Forasmuch then as we are the Off-spring of God we ought not to think that the Godhead is like unto Gold or Silver or Stone graven by Art and Man's Device◠5But such gross Notions these Images are too apt to incline unto As Rom. 1. 22 23. Professing themselves to be wise they became fools and changed the Glory of the Incorruptible God into an Image made like to corruptible Man and to Birds and four-footed Beasts and creeping Things Where not only the worshipping but the very making of any Images of God by the Heathen is censured by the Apostle as being a debasing of his Nature For Isa 40. 18. To whom will ye liken God or what likeness will ye compare unto him It is not a thing possible to be done And how will the Images among the Romanists escape this Censure which have as little resemblance of God as any that the Apostle and Prophet do condemn Sometimes they paint one Body with three Heads sometimes one Head with three Faces sometimes one Body with two Heads and a Pigeon in the midst sometimes and old Man holding a Crucifix in his Hands and a Pigeon upon his Shoulder What is this but a mere mocking of God and the Holy Trinity and a down-right debasing of his glorious Nature These Images of God and the Holy Trinity as also some others of Christ as a Child in his Mother's Arms are so far from being any way beatificial to give the Vulgar any Instruction that they tend to pervert and overthrow all honourable Notions of God and our blessed Saviour They tend to render Men as Jer. 10. 8. Altogether brutish and foolish for the Stock is a Doctrine of Vanities For ver 14 15. Every Man is brutish in his Knowledg every Founder is confounded in his graven Image For his molten Image is falshood there is no breath in them they are Vanity and the work of Errors Doth not this agree to the Popish Images as well as to any other or what difference is there Psal 115. 4 5. Their Idols are Silver and Gold the work of Mens hands They have Mouths but they speak not Eyes they have but they see not they have Ears but they hear not Noses have they but they smell not they have Hands but they handle not Feet have they but they walk not neither speak they through their Throat This is just the description of the Images of the Church of Rome neither is