Church in relation to her Practice about Festival Days However our Compiler now he has laid aside his Disguise advances the same Accusation against me in his own Person but considering what Church he was of could do no less than give me Thanks for my Concessions Well then since this Man is not ashamed of serving us up again the very same Objections which I had already answered I must e'en be forced to trouble the Reader with Repetition since the importunity of an Adversary that cannot blush forces me upon it and must tell the Compiler a second time that when our Church doth set apart Days for the commemorating of the Saints which is all the Honour she either gives or intends Them she only appoints them for to bless God for the good and pious Examples of his Saints and Martyrs not to put up Prayers to the Saints themselves nor to offer Praises unto Them but to their God which was the genuine Practice of the Primitive Church as I shewed from the Example of the Church of Smyrna in relation to S. Polycarp their Martyred Bishop Our Church pays no Religious Worship to the Saints themselves but the Church of Rome does not only worship them but is very lavish and extravagant in it as it were easie to shew however as they of the Church of Rome are not imitated by us so neither have they the Example of the Primitive Church to defend their present Practices We do with the Primitive Church honour the Martyrs and Saints and have often enough declared it to be such an Honour as was given to them in the Primitive Times and what that Honour was S. Austin shall determine who in answer to a false Aspersion of the Manichees of the Church's worshipping the Saints upon their Festival Days and at their Monuments told Faustus the Manichee that the Church did indeed worship the Martyrs but that it was with no other Worship than that of Love and Fellowship which is paid to the (e) Colimus ergo Martyres eo cultu dilectionis societatis quo in hâc vitâ coluntur sancti homines Dei. D. Aug. cont Faust Manich. l. 20. c. 21. in Tomo 6. Oper. August Holy Men of God while they are alive on Earth That this was no other than a civil worship or respect I hope will not be denied by my Adversary since I suppose he will not pretend to shew that mortal and frail men while on Earth are used to have Religious Worship paid unto them and solemn Prayers offered up to them with all the external indications of devotion As to the Concessions which he pretends I have made and supposes it here again because I did not particularly consider the Testimonies under that Head I must tell him a second time that I neither did grant all that he had collected in the Nubes Testium upon that Subject nor seemed to grant it but did set them aside as needless and am notwithstanding our Compiler far from joining with them in this Point as he falsly would insinuate that I do but this is not the first of such wrongs done to me by this Compiler When he is next come to the Chapter about Invocation of Saints he tells the Reader that I appear with some disconfidence of my cause and therefore says the Compiler p. 19. tho' he pretended in the Title Page that Antiquity for the first five hundred years did not favour this or any Doctrine of the Church of Rome here he has considered better on 't and therefore cutting off Two of the Five he says we cannot shew this to have been the Practice of the first Three Centuries So that here he is willing to give us the Fourth and Fifth Ages as Practising the Invocation of Saints The Compiler quotes for all this the 43. page of my Answer to the Nubes Testium and a little after tells the Reader that I grant that Invocation of Saints was practised in the Fourth and Fifth Centuries If ever I was surpized at the reading any thing in my life it was at this account of my Book against that Chapter in the Nubes my memory of what I had written and this account of it were so diametrically opposite that I could not but immediately look into my Book to see whether was in the fault and quickly found that this Compiler had need to have a very large forehead that would venture at this when my Book was in so many hands For first as to his saying I have cut off two of the five Centuries and only insist on their being not able to shew that Invocation of Saints was practis'd in the First Three Centuries it is very false I neither cut off two of the five nor insisted upon the three first Centuries only but said in that very page and place quoted by the Compiler that I would pass on to Invocation of Saints and see whether the Compiler did shew this to have been the practice of the Three first Centuries and so on does and so on here signifie nothing I did intend it and I question not but the World understood it to mean the two next Centuries to wit the Fourth and Fifth in Controversie betwixt us and yet this Writer hath the assurance to tell the World I had cut them two off He next tells them that I am willing to give the Papists the Fourth and Fifth Ages as practising Invocation of Saints and a little lower that I have granted that Invocation of Saints was practis'd in the Fourth and Fifth Centuries This is just as true as the other for to expose this bold falshood I need turn over only to the next page in my Book and transcribe what I had said there which I intreat the Reader to compare with what the Compiler says of it here Speaking in defence of the Church of England's not practising Invocation of Saints I have these very expressions We have far more reason to reject Invocation and solemn Prayers to Saints as Superstitious since it is against Scripture and against the Practice of the Three first Centuries AGAINST A COUNCIL in the FOURTH CENTURY and WANTS A PATTERN EVEN IN THE FIFTH and SIXTH and hath NO EXAMPLE in ANY of the PLACES produced by our Compiler on this head With what face then could this man write that I had given up the fourth and fifth Centuries Who can believe that such men have in reality either Religion or Conscience that can with so much deliberation commit such a deliberate wrong Had he had any regard to Truth or Honesty his Conscience must have flown into his Face and told him that what he was then writing was a very great injustice and directly false Good God! that men who make such shew of Religion make such frequent appeals unto the God of purer Eyes than either to behold iniquity or to let it go unpunished that talk so often of a day of Judgment and severe reckoning can do such things as must force
account of their own Devotions that they were offered up with tears and bended knees unto the same Lord. Century II In the second Century we have the famous Epistle of the Church of Smyrna concerning the Martyrdom of S. Polycarp wherein we meet with an account of his Practice in his Devotions They inform us of his continuing instant in Prayer to God day and night for the peace and Tranquillity of all the Christian Churches and have preserved us the very Prayer he used when he was tyed to the stake to suffer Martyrdom which we find addressed wholly to God the Father * Apud Euseb Hist Eccles l. 4. c. 15. through the everlasting High-Priest Jesus Christ his only Son not one syllable nor the least hint of any Romish Invocation of Saint or Angel either to assist or defend or recommend him unto God. After this account of the Religious Practice of those two most glorious Martyrs the Christian Church ever had next to the Apostles I will set down in the same Century Justin Martyr's account of the Christian Liturgie where we may justly expect to meet with a full relation to whom all the Services of the Church were addressed at that time His account is that their Publick and Common Prayers their Praises and f Justin M. in Apol. 2. Edit Paris p. 97 98. Thanksgivings for the good things of this life were offered up by their Bishop to God the Father through his Son Jesus Christ and the Holy Ghost Here is no mention in this very exact account of the Christian Service of any Prayers or so much as Wishes made to Angels or Saints no footsteps of any Practice of invocating of Saints which is evidence strong enough that such things were not then in being any where Century III In the beginning of the Third Century Tertullian in his Apologetic Terull Apologet c. 39. Edit Franck. 1597. acquaints us at large with the Practice of the Catholick Church and the nature of her Liturgy and sets her out as offering up her Prayers with the united Forces and joint requests of the whole Congregation unto God as praying to him for all Estates and Conditions and in his account of their Love-Feasts in the same place he acquaints us that they did not sit down to those Feasts till they had made their Prayers unto God that as they begun them with Prayers unto God so they ended them with singing Hymns unto God. Not a syllable is to be met with in Tertullian's Narration of the Customs and Divine Service of the Church of God of the Third Century about any Prayers to or Invocation of Saints of any Praises to God and the Virgin Mary or to God and any other of the Angels or Saints Century IV In the Fourth Century we meet with a much larger and more particular account of the Divine Service in the Christian Assemblies from the Book called Constitutiones Apostolica which bears the name of Clemens Romanus but really belongs to some Author of the Fourth Age. In this there is not only an account of their Practice but a very great many of the Prayers then used are put down at large every one of which we find directed to God alone See Clementis Romani Constitutiones Apostolicae from the 25th Chapter of the 7th Book to the end of the Eighth Book in Labbe's Councils Tom. 1. p. 428 c. not the least mention or hint of any Invocation of Saints of any Prayers to the Virgin Mary or any other Saint and as all the Prayers of the Church then in that Century according to this Author as well on all other days as the Lord's day as well in all other Offices and services of the Church as in the Communion-Service it self were offered up only to God so there is no desire or Petition in them for any of the Saints aid assistance or Intercession All which Circumstances together shew how far Invocation of Saints was from being the Practice of the Catholick Church in the Fourth Century when in the Prayers addressed to God alone there was not so much as any mention of the Saints Intercession or Aid which are things so frequent now in the Church of Rome that they desire of God for the Merits of the Saints both spiritual and temporal Blessings Century V As we find the Practice of the Fourth Century so visibly without any Prayers to or Invocation of Saints so we are as certain that such Invocation or Prayers got no footstep in the Publick Offices of the Church either during the rest of this Century or in the Fifth Century of this we cannot desire a more certain and satisfactory account than we have from S. Austin himself about whom the Jesuit Sabran hath made so much stir and doth still insist upon it that S. Austin did invocate the Virgin Mary S. Austin in his Books de Civitate Dei giving an account of the Service of the Church in his Age and of what was the Practice of the Church in relation to the Martyrs tells us indeed that the Martyrs names were recited during the divine Service but tells also as expresly that they were not then invocated by the Priest who did officiate g August de Civ Dei. l. 22. c. 10. I have traced hitherto the Practice of the Primitive Church through the Five First Centuries I have insisted chiefly upon those Authors and Books which present us with the Liturgies which are doubtless the best and only Evidences of the Practice of the Primitive Church for those Ages I have not insisted upon the Practice of particular Persons excepting those two glorious and most conspicuous Martyrs S. Ignatius and S. Polycarp whose Prayers I question not were wholly conformed to the Publick Services in the Churches in their time Had I done the same concerning the other Martyrs of the first and later Ages that I did about them two or had I been careful to urge the Practice of particular Persons apparent in their own writings I must have transcribed a great part of the ancient Martyrologies where we find all the Prayers of those Martyrs addressed to God and must have filled too many Pages with the Instances of other particular Persons and Writers But I thought the other method of urging only the Liturgies of the several first Centuries as the fairest way of understanding the Practice of the Primitive Church in those Ages and I believe I have made it fully and undeniably evident that Invocation of Saints was not the Practice of the Primitive Fathers As we are able to shew from the ancient Accounts of the Churches Services that Invocation of Saints was not their Practice so we are as able to shew that the Doctrine of the Fathers of those first five Centuries was directly against and inconsistent with any such Invocation of Saints as is now practised in the Church of Rome and this I shall the more largely insist upon because this is an Argument which they
as he is to do it when we pray to him our selves I will but instance in One Father St. Austin about whom this whole Controversy touching Invocation was begun betwixt me and Sabran the Jesuit This Father in his Enchiridion to Laurentius shewing that the things which appertain to Hope are all included in the Lord's Prayer and that the Scriptures pronounce him accursed who putteth his Trust in MAN concludes from it that for that very Reason i Ideo non nisi à Domino Deo petere debemus quicquid speramus nos vel bene operaturos vel pro bonis operibus adepturos D. Aug. Enchirid. ad Laurent c. 114. Tom. 3. p. 73. we ought not to ask or pray to any other but our Lord God alone for whatever we hope either to do well or to be rewarded for after we have done so In another part of his Works in the very last that he wrote He asks this question of the Heathen Can we then believe that these Angels whose employment is to declare to Mankind the Will of the Father k Num igitur hos Angelos quorum ministerium est declarare voluntatem Patris credendum est velle nos subdi nisi ei cujus nobis annunciant voluntatem Unde optimè admonet etiam ipse Platonicus IMITANDOS Eos potius quam INVOCANDOS Idem de Civit. Dei l. 10. c. 26. would have us be subject and serve any other besides Him whose Will they declare to us the Platonician himself doth give us herein the best Admonition That the ANGELS are to be IMITATED rather than INVOCATED If this Father was so very earnest against any Invocation of Angels we have reason to believe that upon his own reasons urged above against placing any Trust in MAN he was as positive if not much more against Invocation of Saints since according to him the Angels who are so constantly employed in the affairs of men cannot but see and understand our wants whereas the Saints according to Him know nothing of us and therefore cannot be Invocated by us except we are resolved to throw away our Prayers and to pray to those who do not hear us It is his own Doctrine in his Tract about taking care of the Dead in which after several Arguments Pro and Con he concludes l Proinde fatendum est nescire quidem mortuos quid hic agatur Idem de Cura pro Mort. c. 15. That we must acknowledge that the Dead are ignorant of what is done here upon earth He had just before this Conclusion argued that if the dead had any knowledge of things on earth he should not have wanted the constant assistance of his dear Mother Monica in his troubles and that if as the Scriptures assure us the Patriarchs themselves were ignorant of their Posterity and knew nothing of the Condition good or bad of the People of Israel we have a great deal of reason to conclude that all the Dead were in the same Condition This certainly was that Father's Opinion and this Doctrine I am sure is perfectly inconsistent with Invocation of Saints since it takes away the very foundation it self on which Invocation is built to wit that the Dead do know our wants and do hear us and are able to relieve us I will conclude the Testimonies upon this Head against Invocation of Saints with that severe question which Hilary the Deacon put to those who were wont to worship the Elements because they believed that the Government or Patronage of mens lives was intrusted with them We demand of them whether this be commanded or ordered by God m A quibus ut supra requirimus si mandatum est aut jussum à Deo quem etiam ipsi magnum summum fatentur negligunt Si enim fieri debet ab illo mandari oportuit qui Author eorum dicitur Si autem ab illo non est mandatum praesumptio est ad poenam proficiet non ad praemium quia ad contumeliam pertinet Conditoris ut contempto Domino colantur servi spreto Imperatore adorentur Comites Hilar. Diacon Quaestion Vet. Nov. Testam apud August in Append. ad Tom. 4. p. 45. whom they themselves own to be Great and the Supreme and yet neglect him If this thing must be done it ought to have been commanded by Him who is the Creatour of those Elements But if it is not commanded by Him it is a presumption and will bring us punishment not a reward because it is an affronting of the Creatour of all to have the Lord contemned and his servants worshipped to have the Emperour despised and his Officers adored It is but altering a few words in this passage and we may put the same question to the Church of Rome about their Invocation and worship of Saints We require to know whether their Invocation of Saints be commanded and appointed by God for if Invocation of Saints ought to be practised it ought to be commanded by him who made them Saints but if it is no where commanded by him Invocation of Saints is a PRESUMPTION and will bring a Punishment on their Heads that practise it since it is a Contempt and affront to God to have his Servants made sharers with him in his WORSHIP Thus I have gone through the Doctrine of the Primitive Fathers down to St. Austin's time in the Fifth Age of the Church and have found their Doctrine to be like their Practice we had no reason to expect to meet with any Practice of Invocation of Saints or Angels in their days since we find their Doctrines so fully and so unanimously against any such thing I am not conscious to my self of having either curtail'd or misapply'd or perverted one of all the passages I have produced out of the Fathers of the Five Centuries I hope the Reader hath carried them in his memory that so he may help me to compare them with what Sabran the Jesuit had the Assurance in both his Letters to say concerning St. Austin and the Fathers of his and the precedent Century that Invocation of Saints was taught by S. Austin and ALL the Fathers of his Age and the Precedent Century And is all this certainly true Yes surely or else the Jesuit would have scorn'd to have asserted it so boldly in both his Letters but alas it will not prove so since what I have collected out of the Fathers of the Fourth and Fifth Centuries will prove this to be a scandalous falshood for to argue the matter a little with him did S. Athanasius teach Invocation of Saints who tells us that no good Christian ever prayed to Angels or any other Creatures of which number are the Saints together with God who proves the Divinity of our Saviour from his being Invocated did Hilary the Deacon teach Invocation of Saints who does so very well expose the very ground of Invocation of going to God by the Saints and ridicules the Comparison drawn from
his little touches at me I had like to have slipt I know not how over his saying I impose sillily upon the Reader when in answer to the Objection made about no one 's denying the Bishop of Rome 's power of Excommunicating the Asiaticks I had said Every Bishop might deny to communicate with any other Bishop or Church against whom they had sufficient reason As if says he denying to communicate were the same thing as to Excommunicate to the doing of which an Authority or Jurisdiction over them who are Excommunicated is required whilst refusing Communion may be done without any such power Well then this Man shall have his Will and I therefore tell him that by denying Communion I meant a doing it authoritatively that is a putting the other Bishop from them by Ecclesiastical Censure but I must also tell him that an Authority or Jurisdiction over the persons to be Excommunicated is not required but that an Equality of State with the other persons is sufficient and this of his is dangerous Doctrine since every Greek can prove their Bishops of Constantinople to have Jurisdiction over the Bishop of Rome by this Argument since Photius's time who did Excommunicate the then Bishop of Rome and the Bishops of that Church do continue to excommunicate yearly to this day the Bishop and Church of Rome and not only the Greeks but the French Bishops also may by this Argument also be proved to be above the Pope since they so long ago as Monsieur Talon told the Parliament of Paris the other day threaten'd the Pope that if he came to Excommunicate them He should be Excommunicated himself for medling in things he had nothing to do with So that I suppose I shall hear no more of my imposing sillily about this thing nor the Compiler have any thanks for his untoward Observation Such little things will not serve to build that Supremacy upon which is pretended to by the Bishops of Rome And as the Primitive Fathers neither knew of nor believed nor therefore could submit to any Supremacy of the Bishop of Rome for the first six Centuries so they were as far from the Romish Doctrines about Tradition grounding all Matters of Faith as we do upon the Holy Scriptures and were as far from Invocating Saints as we of the Church of England and from the Belief of Purgatory or Transubstantiation and did detest the Worship of Images and Reliques as much as we can so that since in all these Points their Doctrines were contrary to the Doctrines of the Church of Rome and their Practices contrary to the present Practices of that Church we are bound to vindicate them to the world and to inform our Readers that they were no more Papists as to those Points mentioned by the Compiler in his Nubes Testium than we of the Reformation are and therefore I have Reason to conclude my Defence as I did my last Book against the Nubes with asserting it upon further Reasons That the Primitive Fathers were no Papists THE END Books lately Printed for Richard Chiswell A Papist not Misrepresented by Protestants Being a Reply to the Reflections upon the Answer to A Papist Misrepresented and Represented 4 to An Exposition of the Doctrine of the Church of England in the several Articles proposed by the late BISHOP of CONDOM in his Exposition of the Doctrine of the Catholick Church 4to A Defence of the Exposition of the Doctrine of the Church of England against the Exceptions of Mons de Meaux late Bishop of Condom and his Vindicator 4to A CATECHISM explaining the Doctrines and Practices of the Church of Rome With an Answer thereunto By a Protestant of the Church of England 8vo A Papist Represented and not Misrepresented being an Answer to the First Second Fifth and Sixth Sheets of the Second Part of the Papist Misrepresented and Represented and a further Vindication of the CATECHISM truly representing the Doctrines and Practices of the Church of Rome 4to The Lay-Christian's Obligation to read the Holy Scriptures 4to The Plain Man's Reply to the Catholick Missionaries 24. An Answer to THREE PAPERS lately printed concerning the Authority of the Catholick Church in matters of Faith and the Reformation of the Church of England 4to A Vindication of the Answer to THREE PAPERS concerning the Unity and Authority of the Catholick Church and the Reformation of the Church of England 4to Mr. Chillingworth's Book called The Religion of Protestants a safe way to Salvation made more generally useful by omitting personal Contests but inserting whatsoever concerns the common Cause of Protestants or defends the Church of England with an exact Table of Contents and an Addition of some genuine Pieces of Mr. Chillingworth's never before Printed viz. against the Infallibility of the Roman Church Transubstantiation Tradition c. And an Account of what moved the Author to turn Papist with his Confutation of the said Motives An Historical Treatise written by an Author of the Communion of the Church of Rome touching Transubstantiation Wherein is made appear That according to the Principles of that Church this Doctrine cannot be an Article of Faith. 4to The Protestants Companion or an Impartial Survey and Comparison of the Protestant Religion as by Law established with the main Doctrines of Popery Wherein is shewn that Popery is contrary to Scripture Primitive Fathers and Councils and that proved from Holy Writ the Writings of the ancient Fathers for several hundred years and the Confession of the most learned Papists themselves 4to The Pillar and Ground of Truth A Treatise shewing that the Roman Church falsly claims to be that Church and the Pillar of that Truth mentioned by S. Paul in his first Epistle to Timothy chap. 3. ver 15. 4to A Sermon preached on St. Peter's Day published with Enlargements A short Summary of the principal Controversies between the Church of England and the Church of Rome being a Vindication of several Protestant Doctrines in answer to a late Pamphlet intituled Protestancy destitute of Scripture-Proofs 4to An Answer to a late Pamphlet intituled The Judgment and Doctrine of the Clergy of the Church of England concerning one special Branch of the King's Prerogative viz. In dispensing with the Penal Laws A Discourse of the Holy Eucharist in the two great Points of the Real Presence and the Adoration of the Host in Answer to the Two Discourses lately printed at Oxford on this Subject To which is prefixed a large Historical Preface relating to the same Argument Two Discourses Of Purgatory and Prayers for the Dead The People's Right to read the Holy Scriptures asserted The Fifteen Notes of the Church as laid down by Cardinal Bellarmine examined and confuted 4 to With a Table to the whole Preparation for Death being a Letter sent to a young Gentlewoman in France in a dangerous Distemper of which she died By William Wake M. A. 12mo The Difference between the Church of England and the Church of Rome in opposition to a late Book Intituled An Agreement between the Church of England and the Church of Rome 4to A Private Prayer to be used in difficult Times A True Account of a Conference held about Religion at London Sept. 29. 1687. between A. Pulton Jesuit and Tho. Tenison D. D. as also of that which led to it and followed after it 4to The Vindication of A. Cressener Schoolmaster in Long-Acre from the Aspersions of A. Pulton Jesuit Schoolmaster in the Savoy together with some Account of his Discourse with Mr. Meredith A Discourse shewing that Protestants are on the safer side notwithstanding the uncharitable Judgment of their Adversaries and that Their Religion is the surest way to Heaven 4to Six Conferences concerning the Eucharist wherein is shewed That the Doctrine of Transubstantiation overthrows the Proofs of Christian Religion A Discourse concerning the pretended Sacrament of Extreme Vnction with an Account of the Occasions and Beginnings of it in the Western Church In Three Parts With a Letter to the Vindicator of the Bishop of Condom The Pamphlet intituled Speculum Ecclesiasticum or an Ecclesiastical Prospective-Glass considered in its false Reasonings and Quotations There are added by way of Preface two further Answers the first to the Defender of the Speculum the second to the Half-sheet against the Six Conferences A Second Defence of the Exposition of the Doctrine of the Church of England against the new Exceptions of Monsieur de Meaux late Bishop of Condom and his Vindicator The FIRST PART in which the Account that has been given of the Bishop of Meaux's Exposition is fully vindicated the Distinction of Old and New Popery Historically asserted and the Doctrine of the Church of Rome in point of Image-Worship more particularly considered 4to The incurable Scepticism of the Church of Rome By the Author of the Six Conferences concerning the Eucharist 4to Mr. Pulton considered in his Sincerity Reasonings Authorities Or a Just Answer to what he hath hitherto published in his True Account his True and Full Account of a Conference c. His Remarks and in them his pretended Confutation of what he calls Dr. T 's Rule of Faith. By Th. Tenison D. D. A Full View of the Doctrines and Practices of the Ancient Church relating to the Eucharist wholly different from those of the Present Roman Church and inconsistent with the Belief of Transubstantiation being a sufficient Confutation of Consensus Veterum Nubes Testium and other late Collections of the Fathers pretending to the contrary 4to An Answer to the Representer's Reflections upon the State and View of the Controversy With a Reply to the Vindicators Full Answer shewing that the Vindicator has utterly ruin'd the New Design of Expounding and Representing Popery An Answer to the Address presented to the Ministers of the Church of England