their souls act with the greatest ease and pleasure and constancy and delight he designed by the promulgation of the Gospel 2. In the first place the utter Extirpation and rooting Idolatry out of the World For this is a sin so heynous and so derogatory to the Perfections of the Divine Nature that however it may be subtilized and refined by the crafty Patrons of it yet it doth most certainly thwart and cross that glorious purpose of God in making men like to himself And the reason of it is because it sinks mens minds too much into Body and Matter and so instead of purging their Souls from the gross affections and allurements of the Flesh it depresses and debases their thoughts to the lowest degree of Sensuality Now that when the Evangelical Dispensation should take place upon Earth all Idolatry was to be extirpated and destroyed the Prophets of old have clearly testified Isai 2.17 18 20. The Lord alone shall be exalted in that day and the Idols he shall utterly abolish In that day a man shall cast his Idols of Silver and his Idols of Gold which they made each one for himself to worship to the Moles and to the Bats That this Prophecy respects the times of the Messiah is acknowledged by the Jews themselves and may receive a further confirmation from the second and third Verses And it shall come to pass in the last days that the Mountain of the Lords House shall be established in the top of the Mountains and shall be exalted above the Hills and all Nations shall flow unto it For out of Zion shall go forth the Law and the Word of the Lord from Jerusalem i. e. That in the days of the Gospel which is frequently denoted in Scripture by the last times the worship of the true God shall take place and be established among all Nations and that this Evangelical Dispensation which should be carried and propagated over all the world should begin from Jerusalem where the Apostles of our Lord Jesus received their full and compleat Inauguration into this Office of preaching the Gospel by the descent of the Holy Ghost upon them and then in that day all the false Gods and Images of the Heathens shall be utterly thrown asitle and men shall honour and worship the true God only and that in Spirit and in Truth And again Zephan 2.11 The Lord will be terrible unto them for he will famish all the Gods of the Earth and men shall worship him every one from his place even all the Isles of the Heathen i.e. God will abolish and destroy all the Idols and false Deities of the Heathen and all Nations shall be reduced to the worship of the true God the Creator of Heaven and Earth every one in his own Land so that men shall not need to go up to Jerusalem or be obliged to worship God here or there but as Christ speaks the true worshippers shall worship the Father in Spirit and in Truth And more plainly yet in Zech. 13.2 And it shall come to pass in that day saith the Lord of Hists that I will cut off the names of the Idols out of the Land and they shall no more be remembred and also I will cause the Prophets and the unclean Spirit to pass out of the Land And that this unclean Spirit which sollicited mankind to spiritual whoredome and fornication was chased out of all those parts of the world where the Gospel was preached by the Apostles and their immediate Successors is evident not only from Ecclesiastical story but from the complaints of the Heathen that since the Religion of Jesus prevailed their Oracles were silent and their Sacrifices were offer'd in vain to their phantastick Deities And that this was a main design of the Gospel of our Lord Jesus he himself assures us in his discourse with the Woman of Samaria Joh. 4.21 22 23 24. where when the Woman told our Saviour that the Samaritans worshipped in Mount Ephraim at Shiloh but that the Jews taught that God was to be worshipped only at Jerusalem v. 20. He replies Woman believe me the hour comes when ye shall neither in this Mountain nor yet at Jerusalem worship the Father Ye worship ye know not what we know what we worship for Salvation is of the Jews But the hour comes and now is when the true worshippers shall worship the Father in Spirit and in Truth for the Father seeks such to worship him God is a Spirit and they that worship him must worship him in Spirit and in Truth The most genuine Interpretation of which-seems to be given by that pious and learned Person Mr. Mede viz. that the Samaritans who worshipped in the Temple of Mount Gerizim though they worshipped the true God yet it was under the visible representation of a Dove and circumcised their Children in the name thereof therefore says Christ ye worship ye know not what i.e. ye worship the God of Israel indeed but 't is under a Corporeal Representation which is an argument you do not know him but God must be worshipped in Spirit and in Truth that is conceiving him as a Spirit and not under any visible shape Therefore Idolatry is a belying God and Idols are termed lyes Amos 2.4 Their lyes caused them to err And Jer. 16.19 Surely our Fathers have inherited lyes the Chaldee have worshipped a lye Our blessed Lord and Saviour coming into the world to correct what was amiss and to reform the manners of mankind and to introduce a more spiritual Religion than the Jewish was it is not to be thought but he would in the first place design the Eradication of Idolatry which so much debases the soul of man and dishonours the Supreme Deity by representing him in a gross and material way and likewise by giving his Incommunicable Excellencies and Perfections to a Creature Sure it is the Primitive Christians retained so clear and vigorous a sense of the heynousness of this sin and the perfect inconsistency of it with the spirituality of their Religion that they chose rather to endure all manner of torments and die a thousand deaths than in the least manner pollute their souls with so gross an immorality Pertinent hereunto is that observation which is made that in the first part of the Jewish Talmud which was made about 200 years after Christ there is no accusation or complaint brought against the Christians for this Idolatry of Image-worship but in the second part which was finished about the year 500. when the Church of Christ began to Paganize there and in all the Commentaries of the Rabbins published in the Tenth or Eleventh Age the Jews call the Christian Churches the Houses of Idolatry It being plain then that Christ Jesus came to eradicate Idolatry which both spoiled the nature of the soul by sinking it into matter and fearfully dishonoured the true and ever-living God I come now to shew wherein the Pagan Idolatry chiefly consisted which was in these two things
or shall your Wonder-working Priest give you an entrance into Heaven when the express Declarations of Christ Jesus exclude you thence No wonder that Papists have their Priests in such high esteem and Veneration no marvel they declare they cannot live without them when they are endued with such an Omnipotency as to change the setled order of things to alter the Decrees of Heaven and cancel the fixed Laws of life and death by shutting them out of the presence of God whom Christ Jesus is ready to receive and intromitting others that he has declared shall be for ever banished thence But be not deceived God is not mocked for whatever a man sows that shall he also reap He that soweth to the flesh shall of the flesh reap corruption but he that soweth to the spirit shall of the spirit reap life everlasting 6. Hitherto in general I have shewed the opposition of the Popish Doctrines to the Grand End and Purpose of God in the Gospel I shall now descend to the particulars afore-mentioned the first of which was this that in order to the replantation of the Divine Nature in the souls of men Almighty God designed the utter extirpation of Idolatry Now though the Church of Rome endeavours by many fine shows and specious pretences to free her self from the imputation of so foul and horrid a Crime yet he that impartially weighs things shall find her no less guilty than was the Pagan World before the coming of Christ And if this do not evidently appear to every candid and ingenious Reader I am well assured that 't is not from the weakness or inconclusiveness of the Arguments but from some partial and preconceived Opinion or some other prejudice his mind labours under and is prepossessed and preingaged withal for this I do confidently affirm that there is no truth of greater usefulness and concernment to Reformed Christendom nor any that can more clearly and irrefragably justifie the necessity of our separation from that Church than this That I may therefore make a clear and demonstrative proof of this Charge which I have laid against the Romish Church I must a little recur to what I have said of the Pagan Idolatry which mainly consisted in these two things 1. In that they worshipped besides one Supreme God other Inferiour Beings not as independent and self-existent but as so many created Deities and these were worshipped by them upon these two accounts either as thinking that the honour done to them redounded to the Supreme or else that they might be their Mediators and Intercessors Orators and Negotiators with him 2. In that they worshipped both the supreme God and likewise their subordinate Deities in Images and Statues This Foundation being laid it will be no difficult task to draw the parallel between the ancient Paganish Idolatry and that now practised in the Church of Rome That the Saints and Angels are worshipped both publickly and privately in the Romish Church needs no other testimony than the daily practice of Papists who express a greater fervour and zeal in their Invocation of the Saints than of God himself so that as a learned Person observes Sir Edwin Sands Europ Spec. for one prayer to God they put up ten to the Virgin Mary Nay so mad are they after this extravagant humour that Cassander ingeniously confesses that some and those no bad men have made choice of some certain Saints as their Patrons and place their trust and confidence in their Merits and Intercessions more than in the Merits of Christ Cassand Consult do Invoc Sanct. and so laying aside the Mediation of Christ they have substituted the Saints and especially the Virgin Mary in his room And hence Cardinal Hosius is not ashamed to say We ought to believe in the Saints They build Temples and Altars to the Saints and prostrate themselves with the most humble devotion before their Images They swear by the Saints not only in their common speech but in their more solemn Oaths and to them they direct their Vows likewise Now upon the same accounts that the Pagans worshipped their inferiour Deities do the Papists adore and worship the Saints and Angels 1. Because the honour done to them redounds to God himself It is for the Majesty and Grandeur of the supreme God to have a multitude of inferiour Deities under him says Plotinus It is not only suitable with the bountiful and noble disposition of God not to grant many graces and favours but by the Intercession of the Saints but likewise for his glory that the world should know this Answer to certain Questions propounded by King James says Fisher the Jesuit which he further illustrates by this similitude because says he 't is impossible to honour and praise the Boughs without honouring and praising the Root therefore when the Saints and Angels are invocated and adored it is for the honour of the supreme God the Root and Spring of all things 2. They make them Mediators and Intercessors between God and them which was the office and imployment of the Mediae Potestates or middle Deities of the Heathen and the ground or reason of this is given by S. Austin because they excel us Mortals in Merits De Civ Dei lib. 8. c. 22. And that the Papists urge the Merits of their Saints is evident from divers of their publick forms of prayer The Saints are in high grace and favour with God and for this reason we poor Mortals implore their Intercession say the Romanists as we make use of a Courtier to deliver a Petition to an Earthly Prince After this manner Celsus argues when he would perswade the Christians to the worship of Daemons that they ought to seek their favour as the Ministers of the Great God To whom Origen replies Origen contr Celsum l. 8. that the Christians allow indeed an honour and reverence to the blessed Angels as Gods Ministers in a sound sense but they are taught to give Religious Worship only to God and to his Son his Word and Image by whom they offer up their Supplications to God the Lord of all beseeching him who is the Propitiation for our sins that he would be pleased as our High-Priest to offer up our Prayers and Sacrifices and Intercessions to the great God And again God alone is to be adored and our Prayers are only to be offered to the only begotten Word of God the First-born of every Creature who as our High-Priest offers our Supplications to his God and our God to his Father and the Father of all those that live according to his Word But if the favour of many be to be sought for we learn from the Scriptures that thousand thousands minister unto him and ten thousand times ten thousand stand before him who afford their friendly assistance to those that humbly invoke the Supreme God and earnestly contend after Salvation disdaining not to be officious to them that worship the same God with themselves For as the
Egypt especially when the execution done upon all the Tutelar Deities of Egypt was yet fresh in their minds who were notable to save themselves or protect their charge when God destroyed all the First-born in the Land 3. The people of Israel acknowledge that the Cherub or Calf that Aaron made was the symbolical presence of that God that brought them out of Egypt now they never thought that it was either Serapis or Osiris or any other Egyptian Deity that brought them out of Egypt but the true God the Creator of Heaven and Earth whose presence they lately saw in such terrible Majesty upon Mount Sinai 4. When Aaron had finished the matter of their sin he makes a Proclamation throughout the Camp To morrow is a Feast of the Lord v. 5. not to the Idol or false God but to Jehovah the true God whereas if this Golden Calf had been the symbol of some Egyptian God and the people had fallen into Paganish Idolatry it had been very improper for Aaron to have proclaimed this his Sacrifice a Feast to the Lord. 5. Neither here nor afterwards when Aaron relates the whole proceeding to Moses when he came down from the Mount is there any mention of any thing that may give the least suspition or intimation that this graven Image was the symbol or representation of a false God but much to evince the contrary forasmuch as here is no name of any particular false God which yet is usual in Scripture when in other places it relates their lapse into Polytheism and Idolatry but a Solemn Feast proclaimed to the Lord Jehovah And although this Calf was only intended by them to be a Symbol of the presence of the true God yet being directly contrary to his Command and having Divine Worship given to it it became a perfect piece of gross and soul Idolatry Another instance of the like nature we have in the Idolatry practised by Jeroboam for that the Calves which he placed in Dan and Bethel and built Altars and sacrificed to them were Hieroglyphicks or symbolical representations of the true God and not the Images of false Gods is plain and evident 1. In that there is no mention of Jeroboam's worshipping the Gods of Egypt or any other adjoyning Paganish Nation whereas when Solomon in his old Age was drawn away by his Wives to commit Idolatry there is a particular account and enumeration of the false Gods he adored as Ashtoreth the Goddess of the Zidonians Chemosh the God of the Moabites and Milcom the God of the Children of Ammon but of Jeroboam it is only said that he made two Calves of Gold and said to the people It is too much for you to go up to Jerusalem 1 Kin. 12.28 29. Behold thy Gods O Israel which brought thee up out of the Land of Egypt And he set the one in Bethel and the other in Dan. 2. The sin of Ahab which was the Introduction of Polytheism and the height of Pagan Idolatry and therefore is signally called in Scripture the way of Ahab is accounted greater in Gods sight than the sin of Jeroboam which is a plain sign that the way of Jeroboam was not the worshipping false Gods for that is called the way of the House of Ahab but the worshipping the true God in an Image Thus it is written of Jehoram the Son of Ahab 2 Kings 3.2 3. And he wrought evil in the sight of the Lord but not like his Father and like his Mother for he put away the Image of Baal that his Father had made Nevertheless he cleaved unto the sins of Jeroboam the Son of Nebat which made Israel to sin he departed not therefrom 3. In that the object of his Idolatry was a Golden Calf it seems to be the very same prevarication that Aaron was led into by the Israelites soon after the delivery of the Law or ten Commandments upon Mount Sinai and that these Calves as well as that made by Aaron were designed for symbols of the presence of the true God and that being a violation of the express Command of God and so interpreted by him in the severe punishment of the sin so likewise were these and both alike Idolatry 4. The same form of words is used by Jeroboam at the Dedication of these Calves that was afore-time made use of by the Israelites when Aaron made the Molten Calf These be thy Gods O Israel which brought thee up out of the Land of Egypt Now they knew and never thought otherwise that it was neither Chemosh nor Milcom nor Ashtoreth nor Dagon nor any other Pagan Deity but the true God who delivered them from the Egyptian Bondage 5. Jeroboam continues the same Feasts and way of worship which were at Jerusalem and therefore 't is most likely he designed still the worship of the true God in these Calves which were set up as symbols of his presence 6. It was not agreeable to the Political end or reason which Jeroboam propounded to himself to establish that part of Pagan Idolatry which consisted in Polytheism for his only aim was to hinder the people by this Project from going up to do Sacrifice in Jerusalem lest by that they should be tempted to return to the obedience of their natural Prince for thus he expresses his own fears And Jeroboam said in his heart now shall the Kingdom return to the House of David 1 Kin. 12.26 27. If this people go up to do Sacrifice in the House of the Lord at Jerusalem then shall the heart of this people turn again unto their Lord even unto Rehoboam King of Judah and they shall kill me and go again to Rehoboam King of Judah Now if this worship which he established had been the worship of strange and forreign Gods it would no ways have comported with his end which was to assure the ten Tribes to himself 7. Jeroboam only argues against the place and not any thing against the way or manner of worship performed at Jerusalem for he only tells them it was too much for them to go up to Jerusalem but if they would hearken to him they might worship God as well in another place as there for he placed an Image at Bethel and another at Dan which being symbols or visible representations of the presence of the true God that brought them out of Egypt they might sacrifice and perform their other Divine Rites and Ceremonies to them and not trouble themselves any further 8. To which may be added in the last place that it is the most unlikely and improbable thing in the World that Jeroboam at his very first entrance upon the Kingdom should establish the very same Idolatry for which the Kingdom was rent from the house of Solomon for when the Prophet Ahijah tells Jereboam that the Lord would rend the Kingdom out of the hand of Solomon and give ten Tribes to him and make him King over Israel the reason is given 1 Kings 11.33 Because they had forsaken