to enquire since their authority depends not on the Writer but the Churches approbation of them but Dr. Jackson not only calls him the worthy and learned Author of the Homilies concerning the peril of Idolatry but saith he takes him to be a Reverend Bishop of our Church and no wonder since the most eminent Bishops in that time of Queen Elizabeth wherein these Homilies were added to the former did all assert and maintain the same thing As Bishop Jewell in his excellent Defence of the Apology of the Church of England and Answer to Harding wherein he proves that to give the honour of God to a creature is manifest Idolatry as the Papists do saith he in adoration of the Host and the Worship of Images And his works ought to be looked on with a higher esteem than any other private person being commanded to be placed in Churches to be read by the people Of all persons of that Age none could be less suspected to be Puritanically inclined than Archbishop Whitgift yet in his Learned Defence of the Church of England against T. C. he makes good the same charge in these words I do as much mislike the distinction of the Papists and the intent of it as any man doth neither do I go about to excuse them from wicked and without repentance and Gods singular mercy damnable Idolatry There are saith he three kinds of Idolatry one is when the true God is worshipped by other means and wayes than he hath prescribed or would be worshipped i. e. against his express command which is certainly his meaning the other is when the true God is worshipped with false Gods the third is when we worship false Gods either in heart mind or in external creatures living or dead and altogether forget the worship of the true God All these three kinds are detestable but the first is the least and the last is the worst The Papists worship God otherwise than his will is and otherwise than he hath prescribed almost in all points of their worship they also give to the creature that which is due to the Creator and sin against the first Table yet are they not for all that I can see or learn in the third kind of Idolatry and therefore if they repent unfeignedly they are not to be cast either out of the Church or out of the Ministry The Papists have little cause to thank me or fee me for any thing I have spoken in their behalf as yet you see that I place them among wicked and damnable Idolaters Thus far that Wise and Learned Bishop After him we may justly reckon Bishop Bilson than whom none did more learnedly in that time defend the perpetual Government of Christs Church by Bishops nor it may be since who in a set discourse at large proves the Church of Rome guilty of Idolatry 1. In the Worship of Images the having of which he saith was never Catholick and the worshipping of them was ever wicked by the judgement of Christs Church and that the Worship even of the Image of Christs is Heathenism Idolatry to Worship it makes it an Idol and burning Incense to it is Idolatry which he there proves at large and that the Image of God made with hands is a false God and no likeness of his but a leud imagination of theirs set up to feed their eyes with the contempt of his Sacred Will dishonour of his Holy Name and open injury to his Divine Nature 2. In the adoration of the Host of which he treats at large After these it will be less needful to produce the testimonies of Dr. Fulk Dr. Reynolds Dr. Whitaker who all asserted and proved the Church of Rome guilty of Idolatry and I cannot find one person who owned himself to be of the Church of England in all Queen Elizabeths reign who did make any doubt of it Let us now come to the reign of King James and here in the first place we ought to set down the judgement of that Learned Prince himself who so throughly understood the matters in controversie between us and the Church of Rome as appears by his Premonition to all Christian Princes wherein after speaking of other points he comes to that of Reliques of Saints But for the worshipping either of them or Images I must saith he account it damnable Idolatry and after adds that the Scriptures are so directly vehemently and punctually against it as I wonder what brain of man or suggestion of Satan durst offer it to Christians and all must be salved with nice and philosophical distinctions Let them therefore that maintain this doctrine answer it to Christ at the latter day when he shall accuse them of Idolatry and then I doubt if he will be paid with such nice Sophistical distinctions And when Isaac Casaubon was employed by him to deliver his opinion to Cardinal Perron mentioning the practices of the Church of Rome in invocation of Saints he saith that the Church of England did affirm that those practices were joyned with great impiety Bishop Andrews whom no man suspects of want of learning or not understanding the doctrine of our Church was also employed to answer Cardinal Bellarmin who had writ against the King and doth he decline charging the Church of Rome with Idolatry No so far from it that he not only in plain terms charges them with it but saith that Bellarmin runs into Heresie nay into madness to defend it and in his answer to Perron he saith it is most evident by their Breviaries Hours and Rosaries that they pray directly absolutely and finally to Saints and not meerly to the Saints to pray to God for them but to give what they pray for themselves In the same time of King James Bishop Abbot writ his Answer to Bishop in which he saith that the Church of Rome by the Worship of Images hath matched all the Idolatries of the Heathens and brought all their jugling devices into the Church abusing the ignorance and simplicity of the people as grosly and damnably as ever they did Towards the latter end of his Reign came forth Bishop Whites Reply to Fisher he calls the worshipping of Images a Superstitious dotage a palliate Idolatry a remainder of Paganism condemned by Sacred Scripture censured by Primitive Fathers and a Seminary of direful contention and mischief in the Church of Christ. Dr. Field chargeth the Invocation of Saints with such Superstition and Idolatry as cannot be excused We charge the adherents of the Church of Rome with gross Idolatry saith Bishop Usher in his Sermon preached before the Commons A. D. 1620. because that contrary to Gods express Commandment they are sound to be worshippers of Images Neither will it avail them here to say that the Idolatry forbidden in the Scripture is that only which was used by the Jews and Pagans For as well might one plead that Jewish
or Heathenish fornication was here only reprehended as Jewish or Heathenish Idolatry But as the one is a foul sin whether it be committed by Jew Pagan or Christian so if such as profess the Name of Christ shall practise that which the Word of God condemneth in Jews or Pagans for Idolatry their profession is so far from diminishing that it augmenteth rather the hainousness of the crime About the same time came forth Bishop Downams Book of Antichrist wherein he doth at large prove That to give divine honour to a creature is Idolatry and that the Papists do give it in the Worship of Saints the Host and Images which is likewise done nearer our own times by Bishop Davenant and Dr. Jackson I shall conclude all although I might produce more with the testimony of Archbishop Laud who in his Conference saith the ancient Church knew not the adoration of Images and the modern Church of Rome is too like to Paganism in the practice of it and driven to scarce intelligible subtleties in her Servants writings that defend it this without any care had of millions of souls unable to understand her subtleties or shun her practice and in his Marginal Notes upon Bellarmin written with his own hand now in my possession where Bellarmin answers the testimony of the Council of Laodicea against the Worship of Angels by saying That it doth not condemn all Worship of Images but only that which is proper to God he replyes That Theodoret who produced that testimony of the Council expresly mentions the praying to Angels therefore saith he the praying to them was that Idolatry which the Council condemns By this we see that the most Eminent and Learned Defenders of our Church of greatest authority in it and zeal for the Cause of it against enemies of all sorts have agreed in the charge of Idolatry against the Church of Rome And I cannot see why the authority of some very few persons though of great Learning should bear sway against the constant opinion of our Church ever since the Reformation Since our Church is not now to be formed according to the singular Fancies of some few though Learned men much less to be modelled by the Caprichio's of Superstitious Fanaticks who prefer some odd Opinions and wayes of their own before the received doctrine and practice of the Church they live in Such as these we rather pity their weakness than regard their censures and are only sorry when our Adversaries make such properties of them as by their means to beget in some a disaffection to our Church Which I am so far from whatever malice and peevishness may suggest to the contrary that upon the greatest enquiry I can make I esteem it the best Church of the Christian world and think my time very well imployed what ever thanks I meet with for it in defending its Cause and preserving persons in the communion of it THE Contents CHAP. I. Of the Idolatry practised in the Church of Rome in the Worship of Images THE introduction concerning the occasion of the debate The Church of Rome makes its members guilty of Hypocrisie or Idolatry First Of the Worship of God by Images Some propositions for clearing the notion of Divine Worship It is in Gods power to determine the way of his Worship which being determined Gods Law and not our intention is to be the rule of Worship The main question is Whether God hath forbidden the worshipping of himself by an Image under the notion of Idolatry Of the meaning of the second Commandment from the terms therein used the large sense and importance of them which cannot be understood only of Heathen Idols Of the reason of that Law from Gods infinite and invisible nature How far that hath been acknowledged by Heathens The Law against Image Worship no ceremonial Law respecting meerly the Iews the reason against it made more clear by the Gospel The wiser Heathen did not worship their Images as Gods yet their worship condemned as Idolatry The Christian Church believed the reason of this Law to be immutable Of the Doctrine of the second Council of Nice the opposition to it in Greece Germany France and England Of the Scripture Instances of Idolatry contrary to the second Commandment in the Golden Calf and the Calves of Dan and Bethel Of the distinctions used to excuse image-worship from being Idolatry The vanity and folly of them The instances supposed to be parallell answered P. 49 CHAP. II. Of their Idolatry in Adoration of the Host and Invocation of Saints The Argument proposed concerning the Adoration of the Host the insufficiency of the Answer to it manifested supposing equal revelation for Transubstantiation as for Christs Divinity yet not the same reason for Worshipping the Host as the person of Christ the great disparity between these two at large discovered the Controversie truly stated concerning Adoration of the Host and it is proved that no man on the principles of the Roman Church can be secure he doth not commit Idolatry in it The confession of our Adversaries that the same Principles will justifie the Worship of any Creature No such motives to believe Transubstantiation as the Divinity of Christ. Bishop Taylor 's Testimony answered by himself To Worship Christ in the Sun as lawful as to Worship him in the Host. The grossest Idolatry excusable on the same grounds The argument proposed and vindicated concerning the Invocation of Saints practised in the Church of Rome The Fathers Arguments against the Heathens hold against Invocation of Saints the state of the Controversie about Idolatry as managed by them They make it wholly unlawful to give divine Worship to any Creature how excellent soever The Worship not only of Heathen Gods but of Angels condemned The common evasions answered Prayer more proper to God than Sacrifice No such disparity as is pretended between the manner of Invocating Saints and the Heathens Invocating their Deities In the Church of Rome they do more than pray to Saints to pray for them proved from the present most Authentick Breviaries Supposing that were all it would not excuse them St. Austin no friend to Invocation of Saints Practices condemned by the Church pleaded for it Of Negative points being Articles of faith p. 108. CHAP. III. Of the hindrance of a good Life and Devotion in the Roman Church The doctrines of the Roman Church prejudicial to Piety The Sacrament of Pennance as taught among them destroyes the necessity of a good life The doctrine of Purgatory takes away the care of it as appears by the true stating it and comparing that doctrine with Protestants How easie it is according to them for a rich man to enter into the Kingdom of Heaven Purgatory dreadful to none but poor and friendless Sincerity of devotion hindred by prayers in an unknown Tongue The great absurdity of it manifested The effects of our Ancestors devotion had been as great if they had said their prayers in English
different nature from the Worship of Images 3. To the Iewes adoraâ—ion towards the Ark and the Holy of Holies where the Cherubims and Propitiatory were 1. That they only directed their Worship towards the place where God had promised to be signally present among them and signifies no more to the Worship of Images than our lifting our eyes to Heaven doth when we pray because God is more especially present there 2. That though the Cherubims were there yet they were alwayes hid from the sight of the people the High-Priest himself going into the Holy of Holies but once a year that the Cherubims were no representations of God and his Throne was between them upon the mercy seat and were Hieroglyphical figures of Gods own appointing which the Iews know no more than we do which are plain arguments they were never intended for objects of Worship for then they must not have been meerly appendices to another thing they must have been publickly exposed as the Images are in the Roman Churches and their form as well known as any of the B. Virgin 4. To bowing at the name of Iesus that he might as well have instanced in going to Church at the toll of a bell for as the one only tells us the time when we ought to go to Worship God so the mentioning the name of Iesus doth only put us in mind of him we owe all manner of reverence to without dishonouring him as the object of our Worship by any image of him which can only represent that which is neither the object nor reason of our Worship 5. To kneeling at the Eucharist that of all things should not be objected to us who have declared in our Rubrick after Communion That thereby no adoration is intended or ought to be done either unto the Sacramental Bread and Wine there bodily received or any corporal presence of Christs natural Flesh and Blood for the Sacramental Bread and Wine remain still in their very natural substances and therefore may not be adored for that were Idolatry to be abhorred of all faithful Christians To bowing towards the Altar or at entring in and going out of the Church that it is of the same nature with the putting off our Hats while we are there and is only determining a natural act of Reverence that way which the ancient Christians did use to direct their Worship CHAP. II. Of their Idolatry in Adoration of the Host and Invocation of Saints The Argument proposed concerning the Adoration of the Host the insufficiency of the Answer to it manifested supposing equal revelation for Transubstantiation as for Christs Divinity yet not the same reason for Worshipping the Host as the person of Christ the great disparity between these two at large discovered the Controversie truly stated concerning Adoration of the Host and it is proved that no man on the principles of the Roman Church can be secure he doth not commit Idolatry in it The confession of our Adversaries that the same Principles will justifie the Worship of any Creature No such motives to believe Transubstantiation as the Divinity of Christ. Bishop Taylor 's Testimony answered by himself To Worship Christ in the Sun as lawful as to Worship him in the Host. The grossest Idolatry excusable on the same grounds The argument proposed and vindicated concerning the Invocation of Saints practised in the Church of Rome The Fathers Arguments against the Heathens hold against Invocation of Saints the state of the Controversie about Idolatry as managed by them They make it wholly unlawful to give divine Worship to any Creature how excellent soever The Worship not only of Heathen Gods but of Angels condemned The common evasions answered Prayer more proper to God than Sacrifice No such disparity as is pretended between the manner of Invocating Saints and the Heathens Invocating their Deities In the Church of Rome they do more than pray to Saints to pray for them proved from the present most Authentick Breviaries Supposing that were all it would not excuse them St. Austin no friend to Invocation of Saints Practices condemned by the Church pleaded for it Of Negative points being Articles of faith § 1. I Proceeded to the Adoration of the Host and here the Argument I proposed was to take off the common answer That this could not be Idolatry because they believed the Bread to be God upon the same ground I said they who believe the Sun to be God and Worship him on that account would be excused from Idolatry too nay the grosser their Idolatry was the more excusable it would be as that of those who supposed their Images to be Gods and upon this ground their Worship was more Lawful than of those who supposed them not to be so To this he answers two wayes 1. That they do not barely suppose that the substance of bread is changed into Christs body and that he is really present under the form of Bread but that they know and believe this upon the same grounds and motives upon which they believe that Christ is God and consequently to be adored and further addes that the same argument will hold against the adoration of Christ as God as against the adoration of him in the Eucharist since they have a like Divine Revelation for his real presence under the Sacramental signes as for his being true God and man 2. Supposing they were mistaken yet it would not follow they were Idolaters which he proves from Dr. Taylors words But notwithstanding these appearances of answering that my argument still stands good will be evident by proving these things 1. That supposing there were the same revelation of Christs Divinity and of his presence in the Eucharist by Transubstantiation yet there could not be the same reason for the Adoration of the Host as for worshipping Christ himself 2. That there are not the same motives and grounds to believe that Doctrine of Transubstantiatim that there are to believe that Christ is God 3. That supposing they are mistaken in the doctrine of Transubstantiation this doth not excuse them from Idolatry 4. That the same reason which would excuse them would excuse the most gross Idolaters in the World § â— That supposing there were the same divine revelation of Transubstantiation and of Christs Divinity yet there could not be the same reason for adoration of the Host as of Christ himself 1. Because there is a plain command in Scripture for one and there is nothing like it for the other All the Angels are commanded to Worship the Son of God Heb. 1. 6. and much more all men who have greater obligation to do it All men are to honour the Son as they honour the Father Joh. 5. 23. and to his name every knee is to bow Phil. 2. 10. But where is there the least intimation given that we are to Worship Christ in the Elements supposing him present there If it be said the general command doth extend to him where-ever he is present It is
application of Worship due to a real object of adoration i. e. whether a man giving adoration to what he believes to be God which is not so in it self be not as excusable as believing a true object of adoration in general but giving divine worship to that which is not it as whether the Worshipping false Gods supposing them to be true be not as venial a fault as Worshipping that for the true God which is not so as for instance suppose the Aegyptians Worshipping the Sun for God and the Israelites the golden Calf believing it was the true God which brought them out of the Land of Aegypt or let us take one of the Inca's of Peru who believed by a Tradition supposed infallible among them that the Sun was their Father and the visible God by which the Invisible did govern the World and therefore they ought to give all external adoration to the Sun and internal only to the Invisible Deity upon what account shall these be charged with Idolatry if an involuntary mistake and firm belief that they worship the true God doth excuse from it Nay the most stupid and senseless of all Idolaters who worshipped the very Images for Gods which the wisest among them alwayes disclaimed and pretended only such a relative worship as he pleads for were in truth the most excusable upon this ground for supposing that it be true which they believed they did a very good thing and which every person else ought to do upon the same belief Which is the utmost can be said for the Papists adoration of the Host supposing the doctrine of transubstantiation were as true as it is false and absurd § 8. 3. As to invocation of Saints I found the chief answer given was this That they did not attribute the same kind of excellency to Saints which they give to God but suppose only a middle sort of excellency between God and us which they make the foundation of the worship which is given to them And as to this my argument was thus framed 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 supream God which is as much as is pretended by the devoutest Papists in justification of the Invocation of Saints To this he answers two wayes 1. By shewing the disparity of the Heathens worship from theirs in two things 1. In the object 2. In the manner of their worship 1. The persons whom they worship he saith are such as are 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 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 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 supream God therefore the Catholicks must be guilty of Idolatry in desiring the servants of the true God to pray for them to him 2. As to the manner of worship he saith If any of them did attain as the Platonists to the knowledge of the true God yet as St. Paul sayes 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 St. Austin upon the 90. Psalm proves to be Devils or evil Angels because they required sacrifice to be offered to them and would be worshipped as Gods But all he means by formal Invocation he saith is 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. He answers that the same calumny was cast upon the Catholicks in St. Austins 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 formal Invocation a part of the worship due to Saints as is evident from the prayer he made to St. Cyprian after his Martyrdom l. 7. de bapt c. Donat. c. 1. and Calvin confesseth he saith it was the custom at that time to say Holy Mary or Holy Peter pray for us This is his full answer in which are two things to be examined 1. Whether the disparity between the Heathen worship and theirs be so great as to excuse them from Idolatry 2. Whether the answer given by St. Austin doth vindicate them and whether Invocation of Saints as it is now practised in the Church of Rome were allowed or in use then § 9. 1. Concerning the disparity 1. As to the object of worship Far be it from me to parallel the Holy Angels and Saints with the impure Deities of the Heathens as to their excellencies but the true state of the Question is whether the Heathens were only too blame in making an ill choice of those they worshipped as in worshipping Iupiter and Venus and Vulcan who are supposed to have been wicked wretches or else in giving divine worship to any besides the true God And if their Idolatry lay not only in the former but the latter then this disparity cannot excuse them There were two Questions in debate between the Primitive Fathers of the Christian Church and the Heathen Idolaters The first was more general and in thesi whether it were lawful to give divine worship to any besides the true and Supream God The second was more particular and in hypothesi whether on supposition that were lawful those whom the Heathens worshipped were fit objects for such adoration In this latter they triumph over them with a great deal of eloquence laying open the impiety of those whom they commonly worshipped but withal knowing that the wiser among them had another notion of these Deities under the common names than the Vulgar had they therefore charge them with Idolatry in giving the worship proper to God to any creature let it be never so excellent and serviceable to mankind and that it was the property of the Christian Religion to give divine worship to none but God himself and his Son Christ Iesus without ever making any distinctions of absolute and relative worship which they must have been driven to in case they had given Religious worship to any besides Thus Iustin Martyr tells the Heathen Emperours to whom he makes his Apology for the Christians that Christ did perswade men to worship God alone by saying this is the great Commandment thou shalt worship the Lord thy God
no material difference that the Heathen called those they worshipped Gods but they do not so in the Roman Church For St. Austin saith there was scarce any difference between the Heathen and them about the name whether Angels might be called Gods or no for he thinks that they are called so in Scripture as well as Origen but the Question was about the thing whether they were to be Worshipped as Gods or no i. e. by giving any part of religious worship to them which they utterly deny And were I in the communion of the Roman Church I should much less scruple calling Canonized Saints or Angels by the names of Gods than giving them the worship of Invocation or the honour of Sacrifices but in so doing they are not only condemned by plain Scripture and reason but by those of the primitive Church who writ against the Heathen Idolatry which was the thing to be shewed § 13. 2. Another disparity is insisted on by him which is as to the manner of Worship And as to this he saith all that they understand by formal invocation is desiring or praying those Iust persons who are in glory in heaven to pray for us and if the Catholicks be guilty of Idolatry in this 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 Deitie To shew the palpable weakness of this answer I shall prove these two things 1. That those in the Church of Rome do allow and practise another kind of formal Invocation from what he asserts 2. That supposing this were all it would not excuse them and that it is of a very different nature from desiring the prayers of just men for us in this life 1. That they do allow and practise another kind of formal Invocation from what he asserts He might very well say he did understand well what I meant by formal Invocation when he makes this to be the meaning of it for never any person before him imagined that sense of it And that term of formal Invocation was purposely chosen by me to distinguish it from the rhetorical Apostrophe's of some of the Greek Fathers the Poetical Flourishes of Damasus Prudentius and Paulinus from general wishes that the Saints would pray for us Of which are some instances in good Authors from assemblies at the monuments of Martyrs which were usual in ancient times and that which I thought any man would understand by it was that which is constantly practised in the Roman Church viz. in places and times purposely appointed for divine and religious worship with all the same external signes of devotion which we use to God himself to offer up our Prayers to Saints or Angels to help us in our necessities as well as to pray to God for us The former part none can be ignorant of that have but so much as heard of the devotion of the Church of Rome all the difficulty lies in that whether they pray to them to help their necessities as well as pray for them And so many forms of Prayer allowed and practised in their Church have been so often objected to them wherein these things are manifest that I cannot but wonder this should be denyed Do they believe we never look into their Breviaries Rosaries Houres and other Books of Devotion wherein to this day such Prayers are to be found Do they think we never heard of the Offices of the B. Virgin or our Ladies Psalter a Blasphemous Book never yet censured wherein the Psalmes in their highest strains of Prayer to God are applyed to the V. Mary I have known my self intelligent persons of their Church who commit their souls to the V. Maries protection every day as we do to Almighty Gods and such who thought they understood the doctrine and practice of their Church as well as others But Madam these are mysteries not to be known till they have their Proselytes safe and fast enough then by degrees they let them know what is to be done when they have given away all liberty of judging for themselves Then it is no matter what they are commanded or expected to do they must do as others do or else their sincerity is questioned and they are thought Hereticks in their hearts whatever they profess I shall not insist upon any ancient Breviaries or obsolete Forms or private Devotions which yet they are accountable for till they do condemn them I need no more than the present Roman Breviary restored according to the Council of Trent and authorized by three several Popes In the Feast of Assumption of the Blessed Virgin as though it were not enough in the Antiphonae to say Hail Blessed Virgin thou alone hast destroyed all Heresies in the world but lest this should be interpreted of doing it by her Son a formal Invocation of her follows Vouchsafe to let me praise thee O Holy Virgin and give me strength against thy enemies And in the Hymn frequently used in her Office and particularly that day she is not only called the Gate of Heaven but she is intreated to loose the bonds of the guilty to give light to the blind and to drive away our evils and to shew her self to be a Mother or as it is in the Mass-book at Paris 1634. Iure Matris impera redemptori as thou art a Mother command the Redeemer In a word They pray to her therein for purity of life and a safe conduct to Heaven But lest the Hymns should be thought only Poetical in the Feast of S. Maria ad Nives Aug. 5. a formal prayer is made to her to help the miserable to strengthen the weak to comfort those that mourn and that all who celebrate her holy Festivity may feel her assistance By which we may understand the meaning of that solemn Hymn used in her Office wherein she is called the Mother of Mercy and Clemency and is prayed to protect us from our enemies and to receive us in the hour of death Is all this only praying to her to pray for us What could be more said to Almighty God or his Son Iesus Christ Nor is this devotion only to the Blessed Virgin but we shall see it alike in that to Angels and Saints in the Antiphona upon the apparition of Michael the Archangel May 8. he is prayed to come to the help of the people of God And in the Feast of the Guardian Angels recommended to all Catholicks by Paul the fifth in the last words of the Breviary they are prayed to defend them in War that they may not perish in Gods terrible judgement In the Hymn to the Holy Apostles they are prayed to command the guilty to be loosed from their guilt to heal unsound minds and to increase their vertues that when Christ shall come they may be partakers of eternal glory These may suffice for a present taste of the sincerity of such persons who say that in
the Church of Rome they do nothing but pray to the Saints to pray for them And it is a very pitiful shift that Bellarmin is put to whereby to excuse such prayers as these That indeed as to the words themselves they do imply more than praying to them to pray for us but the sense of the words he saith is no more But whence I pray must the people take the sense of such prayers as these are if not from the signification of the words If this were all why in all this time that these prayers have been complained of hath not their sense been better expressed Have not their Breviaries been often reviewed if this had not been their meaning why have they not been expunged all this while Suppose then that any persons in the Roman Church as no doubt most do take their sense from the words and do not force it upon them and they pray according to the form prescribed do they well or ill in it If they do ill in it their Church is guilty of intolerable negligence in not preventing it if they do well then their Church allows of more than praying to Angels and Saints to pray for them Bellarmins instances of the Apostles in Scripture being said to save men do shew what shifts a bad cause will put a man to For will any man in his wits say the case is the same in ordinary speech and in prayer Is it all one for a man to say that his Staff helped him in his going and to fall down upon his knees to pray to his Staff to help him God did use the Apostles as instruments on earth to promote the salvation of mankind but may we therefore pray to them now in Heaven to save us May we not truly say that the Sun enlightens the world but may we therefore pray to the Sun to enlighten us No the Sun is but Gods instrument and our addresses must be in prayer to the Supream Lord over all But to take his own explication of praying to them for these things i. e. praying to them that they would pray to God for them as we desire one another to pray would not that man be condemned of gross Idolatry or prodigious folly who instead of desiring his Friends to pray to God for the pardon of his sins and the assistance of Divine Grace should say to them I pray you pardon my sins and assist me with the Grace of God What would St. Paul have said to such men that should have asked such things of him who yet saith that he was an instrument of saving some § 14. 2. Supposing this were all that were done and allowed in the Roman Church yet this would not excuse them for their practice is very different in their Invocation of Saints from desiring our Brethren on Earth to pray for us And I cannot but wonder how any men of common sense can suffer themselves to be imposed upon so easily in this matter For is there really no difference in St. Pauls desiring his Brethren to pray for him as he often did and a mans falling down upon his knees with all the solemnity of devotion he uses to God himself to St. Paul to desire him to pray for him when he was present upon earth and did certainly know what he desired of him Suppose in the midst of the solemn devotions of the Church where St. Peter or St. Paul had been present the Letanies of the Church had been then as they are now and after they had prayed to the persons of the Holy Trinity the people should with the same postures and expression of devotion have immediately turned themselves to the Apostles and cryed only Peter and Paul pray for us do you think this would have been acceptable to them No doubt St. Peter would have been less pleased with this than with Cornelius only falling down before him and yet then he bid him stand up I my self also am a man They who impute this only to his modesty will not allow him to carry it to Heaven with him For they suppose him to be very well pleased with that honour in Heaven which he refused on earth And St. Paul would have rent his garments and cryed out as he did to the men of Lystra Why do ye these things we also are men of like passions with you They would not receive any honour that might in the least seem to incroach upon the divine honour and yet they might upon better grounds have done it to them on earth than now in Heaven because they were then sure they heard them which now they can never be And would it not be a senseless thing to desire some excellent person in the Indies when we are at our solemn devotion to pray for us because it is possible God may at the same time reveal our minds to him I would willingly be informed if we had assurance of the Sanctity of a person in this life as great as they have in the Church of Rome of those they invocate whether there would be any evil at all in publick places of worship and at the time used for the service of God to set such a person up in some higher place of the Church to burn incense before him to prostrate themselves with hands and eyes lifted up to him if at last they pretended that all that time they only prayed to him to pray for them And certainly a good man is much more the Image of God and deserves more reverence than all the artificial Images of Saints or of God himself If they will condemn this they may conceive that supposing they only prayed to Saints in their devotions to pray for them this would not excuse them For they do it in those places at such times and in such a manner as highly incroaches upon the worship and service due to God alone § 15. 2. I now come to consider whether the answer given by St. Austin will vindicate them and whether invocation of Saints as it is now practised in the Church of Rome were allowed or in use then Here he tells us That Faustus the Manichean calumniates the Catholicks the word is St. Austins he saith and we do not quarrel with the word but that they are not such Catholicks as St. Austin speaks of because they honoured the Memories or Shrines of Martyrs charged them to have turned the Idols into Martyrs whom they worshipped said he with like vows To shew how very far what St. Austin saith is from justifying the present practices of the Roman Church we need no more than barely to represent what St. Austin affirms and what he denyes He affirms that it was the custom of the Christians in his time to have their religious Assemblies at the Sepulchres or Memories of the Martyrs where the place it self would raise their affections and quicken their love towards the Martyrs and towards God but he utterly denyes that any religious worship
was performed to the Martyrs for neither was any Sacrifice offered up to any of them nor any other part of religious worship for thereupon he shews which is very conveniently left out in the citation that not only Sacrifice was refused by Saints and Angels but any other religious honour which is due to God himself as the Angel forbad St. Iohn to fall down and worship him All the worship therefore he saith that they give to Saints is That of love and society and of the same kind which we give to holy men in this life who are ready to suffer for the truth of the Gospel But that the worship of Invocation is expresly excluded by St. Austin appears by what himself saith on a like occasion where he shews the difference between the Gentiles worship and theirs They saith he build Temples erect Altars appoint Priests and offer Sacrifices but we erect no Temples to Martyrs as to Gods but Memories as to dead men whose Spirits live with God we raise no Altars on which to sacrifice to Martyrs but to one God the God of Martyrs as well as ours at which as men of God who have overcome the world by confessing him they are named in their place and order but are not invocated by the Priest who sacrifices And elsewhere saith Whatever the Christians do at the memories of the Martyrs is for ornaments to those memories not as any sacred Rites or Sacrifices belonging to the dead as Gods we therefore do not worship our Martyrs with divine honours nor with the faults of men as the Gentiles did their Gods Which gave occasion to Lud. Vives in his Notes on that Chapter to say that many Christians in his time what sort of Catholicks those were it is easie to guess but to be sure none of St. Austins did no otherwise worship Saints than they did God himself neither could he see in many things any difference between the opinion they had of Saints and what the Gentiles had of their Gods I cannot understand then how St. Austins answer should justifie that which he condemns He denyes that there was an Invocation of Saints but only a commemoration of them the Church of Rome pleads for any Invocation of them and condemns all those who deny it So that his answer is very far from clearing the Roman Church in the practice of Invocation and the objection we make against it that it doth parallel the Heathen Idolatry for it grants it would do so if they gave to the Saints the worship due to God of which he makes Invocation to be a part But after all this can we imagine that he should practise himself contrary to his own doctrine Yes saith he he made a prayer to St. Cyprian let Blessed Cyprian therefore help us in our prayers But is there no difference to be made between such an Apostrophe to a person in ones writing and solemn supplication to him with all the soâ—emnity of devotion in the duties of Religious worship If I should now say Let St. Austin now help me in his prayers while I am defending his constant opinion that Invocation is proper to God alone would they take this for renouncing the Protestant doctrine and embracing that of the Church of Rome I doubt they would not think that I escaped the Anathema of the Council of Trent for all this The Question between us is not how far such wishes rather than prayers were thought allowable being uttered occasionally as St. Austin doth this to St. Cyprian but whether solemn Invocation of Saints in the duties of Religious worship as it is now practised in the Roman Church were ever practised in St. Austins time and this we utterly deny We do not say that they did not then believe that the Saints in Heaven did pray for them and that some of them did express their wishes that they would pray particularly for them we do not say that some superstitions did not creep in after the Anniversary meetings at the Sepulchres of the Martyrs grew in request for St. Austin himself saith that what they taught was one thing and what they did bear with was another speaking of the customes used at those solemnities But here we stand and fix our foot against all opposition whatsoever that there was no such doctrine or practice allowed in the Church at that time as is owned and approved at this day in the Church of Rome But from St. Austin we are sent to Calvin whose authority though never owned as infallible by us we need not fear in this point and I cannot but wonder if he saw the words in Calvin or Bellarmin that he would produce them For Calvin doth there say That the Council of Carthage did forbid praying to Saints lest the publick prayers should be corrupted by such kind of addresses Holy Peter pray for us If St. Austin were present in this Council as my Adversary saith he was I wonder what advantage it will be to him from Calvins saying that the Council did condemn and forbid those prayers which were in use by some of the people But it seems he takes the peoples part against the Council and St. Austin too and thinks it enough for them to follow the practices condemned by Councils and Fathers which we are sure they do and are glad to find so ingenuous a confession of it He may as well the next time bring St. Austins testimony for worshipping Martyrs and Images because he saith he knew many who adored Sepulchres and Pictures and for the worship of Angels because he saith he had heard of many who had tryed to go to God by praying to Angels and were thought worthy to fall into delusions § 16. But the strangest effort of all the rest is what he hath reserved to the last place viz. That the charge of Idolatry against them must be vain and groundless because if I be pressed close I shall deny any one of these Negative points to be divine truths viz. that honour is not to be given to the Images of Christ and his Saints that what appears to be bread in the Eucharist is not the body of Christ that it is not lawful to Invocate the Saints to pray for us But the answer to this is so easie that it will not require much time to dispatch it For I do assert it to be an Article of my faith That God alone is to be worshipped with divine and religious worship and he that cannot hence infer that no created Being is to be so worshipped hath the name of reasonable creature given him to no purpose What need we make Negative Articles of faith where the Affirmative do necessarily imply them If I believe that the Scripture is my only rule of faith as I most firmly do will any man that considers what he saith require me to make Negative Articles of faith that the Pope is not Tradition is not Councils are not a
friend or the Letters you receive or the Laws of the Land all which are lyable to be abused by evil persons but not by good people and modest understandings It is now become a part of your Religion to be Ignorant to walk in blindness to believe the man that hears your Confessions to hear none but him not to hear God speaking but by him and so you are lyable to be abused by him as he please without remedy You are gone from us where you are only taught to worship God through Jesus Christ and now you are taught to Worship Saints and Angels with a Worship at least dangerous and in some things proper to God for your Church Worships the V. Mary with burning Incense and Candles to her and you give her presents which by the consent of all Nations used to be esteemed a Worship peculiar to God and it is the same thing which was condemned in the Collyridians who offered a Cake to the V. Mary A Candle and a Cake make no difference in the Worship and your joyning God and the Saints is like the device of them that fought for King and Parliament the latter destroys the former To which he subjoynes that the points of difference between us and the Church of Rome are such as do evidently serve the ends of Covetousness and Ambition in them and that very many of her Doctrines are very ill Friends to a good life and that our Religion is incomparably beyond theirs in point of safety as in point of Praying to God alone and without Images relying on God as infallible which are surely lawful but it is at least hugely disputable and not at all certain that any man or society of men can be infallible that we may put our trust in Saints or Worship Images c. From whence he concludes So that unless you mean to preferr a danger before safety temptation to unholiness before a severe and holy Religion unless you mean to lose the benefit of yours prayers by praying what you perceive not and the benefit of the Sacrament in great degrees by falling from Christs Institution and taking half instead of all unless you desire to provoke God to jealousie by Images and man to jealousie in professing a Religion in which you may in many cases have leave to forfeit your faith and lawful trust unless you will choose a Catechism without the second Commandment and a faith that grows bigger or lesser as men please and a hope that in many degrees relyes on men and vain confidences and a Charity that damns all the world but your selves unless you will do all this that is suffer an abuse in your Prayers in the Sacrament in the commandments in faith in hope in Charity in the Communion of Saints and your duty to your Supream you must return to the bosome of your Mother the Church of England and I doubt not but you will find the comfort of it in all your life and in the day of your death and in the day of Judgement Thus far that excellent person and I leave you now to judge between the Motives on both sides as they are laid down by him whom my Adversary appeals to and I must thank him for the kindness of mentioning him against me without which I had wanted so good a representation of the Motives of either side and so full an Answer to the pretences brought for the Church of Rome The other Motives which he adds of Fathers Councils and Tradition he knows are utterly denyed by us and I wonder he should insist upon them since in the matters of our debate Antiquity is so evidently of our side as against Worship of Images and Saints against Purgatory Transubstantiation Prayers in an unknown tongue and he thinks it no great matter to allow us a thousand years against communion in one kind and yet all this while Scripture Fathers Councils and Tradition are all on their side For the testimony of the present Church we deny that S. Austin speaks of it as of it self sufficient and though he did that concerns not the Roman Church any more than other parts of the Catholick Church and he may assoon prove Tyber to be the Ocean or S. Peters at Rome to have been before the Temple at Hierusalem as prove the Roman Church to be the Catholick Church or the Mother of all others § 17. But I must conclude with the method he prescribes to you for satisfaction from me which is not to meddle with particular disputes which we know very well the reason of but to call upon me for a Catalogue of our grounds and to bring things to Grounds and Principles as they have learnt to Cant of late and then he saith Controversie will soon be at an end I should be glad to see it so notwithstanding his Friend I. S. accounts it so noble a Science unless he hath changed his mind since for so many years now he hath failed in the Defence of his Demonstrations But to satisfie the men of Principles and to let them see we can do more than find fault with their Religion I shall give an account of the faith of Protestants in the way of Principles and of the reason of our rejecting their impositions which is all we can understand by Negative Points and if we can give an account of the Christian faith independently on their Churches Authority and Infallibility it evidently follows that cannot be the foundation of faith and so we may be very good Christians without having any thing to do with the Church of Rome And I know no other Answer necessary not only to this present demand but to a Book called Protestants without Principles the falsity of which will appear by what follows Principles Agreed on both sides 1. THat there is a God from whom man and all other Creatures had their Being 2. That the notion of God doth imply that he is a Being absolutely perfect and therefore Justice Goodness Wisdom and Truth must be in him to the highest degree of perfection 3. That man receiving his Being from God is thereby bound to obey his will and consequently is lyable to punishment in case of disobedience 4. That in order to mans obeying the will of God it is necessary that he know what it is for which some manifestation of the will of God is necessary both that man may know what he hath to do and that God may justly punish him if he do it not 5. Whatever God reveals to man is infallibly true and being intended for the rule of mans obedience may be certainly known to be his Will 6. God cannot act contrary to those essential Attributes of Justice Wisdom Goodness and Truth in any way which he makes choice of to make known his will unto man by These thing being agreed on both sides we are now to inquire into the particular wayes which God hath made choice of for revealing his will to mankind 1. AN entire
grand imposture 5. To disown what is so taught by such a Church is not to question the veracity of God but so firmly to adhere to that in what he hath revealed in Scriptures that men dare not out of love to their souls reject what is so taught 6. Though nothing were to be believed as the will of God but what is by the Catholick Church declared to be so yet this doth not at all concern the Church of Rome which neither is the Catholick Church nor any sound part or member of it This may suffice to shew the validity of the principles on which the faith of Protestants stands and the weakness of those of the Church of Rome From all which it followes that it can be nothing but willful Ignorance weakness of Judgement strength of prejudice or some sinful passion which makes any one forsake the Communion of the Church of England to embrace that of the Church of Rome The End §. 1. The necessity of writing in these Controversies §. 2. The present arts used by our Adversaries to gain Proselyter §. 3. The occasion of this present writing §. 4. Of the manner and design of the writing §. 5. Of the charge of Idolatry against the Church of Rome Articl 35. Homil. partâ— 2. p. 75. Dr. Iackson Original of Unbelief Sect. 4. Ch. 34. Defence of the Apology ch 7. div 2. p. 552. Answer to Harding 8. articl p. 283. Art 14. p. 368. p. 382. Defence of the Answer to the Admonition tr 8. p. 152. Bish. Bilson Disâ— of Christian subjection part 4. p. 319. p. 321. p. 324. p. 530 c. Dr. Fulks confutation of an Idolatrous Treatise of Nicol. Sanders Dr. Reynolds de Idolat Eccles. Rom. Dr. Whitaker c. Duraeum l. 5. p. 138. K. Iames his Works p. 303. Is Casaub. Ep. ad Cardin Perron ad quartam Instant Ad Tortâ— librum respons p. 312. Answer to Perron 20. chapt p. 58. Bish. Abbor against Bishop Tom. 2. p. 1106. Whites Reply to Fisher. p. 209. Dr. Field of the Church l. 3. ch 20. p. 109. Bish. ushers Sermon before the Commons p. 30. Downam de Antichristo l. 5. c. 1 2 c. Davenant deter quaest 18. D. Iacksons Original of Unbelief sect 4. Archbish. Lauds Conference p. 277. Bell. de sanct beat l. 1. c. 20. Ep. 17. ad Marcellam Li. de Bapt. cont Donat. c. 1. Tract 18. in To. Sozomen li. Hist. c. 5. Niceph. li. 13. c. 11. S. Leo Ser. 4. de Quad. Li. contr Epist. fund The Introduction Of the Idolatry of the Roman Church Of the Worship of Images Of the meaning of the second Commandment Of the reason of the second Commandment Isa. 40. 19. 20. 21. 22. Of the wiser Heathens Notion of Images Theodoret. c. Graec. Serm. 3. p. 519. Clem. Alexand Strom. 5. p. 584. Isa. 44. 16 17. Clem. Alexand Protrept p. 46. Strom. 1. p. 304. Plutarch in Numâ Varro apud Augustin de Civit. Dei l. 4. c 31. Philo de legat ad Caium p. 1035. Eusâ—bius de prepar Evang. l. 6. c. 10. Herodot l 1. Strabo l 15. Diog. Laert. prooem Tacit. de morib German c. 9. Lucian de Dea Syria init The reason of this Law more clear by the Gospel John 4. 23 24. Morinus in Pentatench Samarit Exerc. 1. S. 9. c. 5. Act. 17. 〈◊〉 25. 29. Rom. 1. 19. 21. 23. V. 18. 21. Celsus apud Origen l. 7. p. 373. Euseb. de preparat Evang. l. 3. c 7. Athanas. c. Gent. p. 24. 31. Arnob. c. Gent. l. 6. p. 203. August Tom. 8. in Psal. 113. Maxim Tyrius dissert 38. Iulian. op frag ep ed. Peravii p. 537. Eusâ—b prepar Evang. l. 4. c. 1. Trirant de Christian. Expedit apud Sinas l. 5. c. 16. p. 588. The Christian Church believed this Law immutable Clem. Alex. Strom. 5. p. 559. Origen c. Cels l. 7. p. 375. L. 6 p. 284. Synod Nic. 2. Act. 4. Ep. ad Iohan. Synad Ad Thom. Claudiop Ep. ibid. Damascen Orthod sid l. 4 c. 17. Bellarm. de Imag. l. 2. cap. 8. Of the Doctrine of the second Council of Nice Synod Nicaen 2. Act. 6. Aquinas Summ. p. 3. q. 25. art 3. Vasquez in l. 2. q. 25. disp 107. c. 5. Sirmond Concil Gall. To. 2. p. 194. Spelman Conâ— Tom. 1. p. 306. Hovedeni Annal. p. prior ad A. D 792 Simeon Dunel Histor. p. 111. Matth. Westmon ad A. D. 793. Caroli Capitut de non adoraâ—dis imagiâ—ibus Paris A. D. 1549. in Goldasti Coâ—stit Imperial To. 1. Synod Paris in Supplement Concil Gall. ad A. D. 824. Agobardi opera Ed. Massoni Balazii Caroli liber de Imag. l. 2. c. 24. Cap. 25. C. 31. L. 3. c. 15. Concil Tom. 5. p. 553. Tom. 6. p. 143. C. 36. Delaland Supplem Concil Gall. p. 109. Bellarm. Append. ad lib. de cultu Imag. c. 3. C. 4. Agobardi opera p. 221. Ed. 1666. Of the Scripture Instances of Idolatry contrary to the second Commandment Pâ—tav dogmat Theol. To 5. l 15. â— 13. s. 3. c. 14 s. 8. Vasâ— eâ— in 3. Thom. disp 94. q. 25. c. 3. Of the distinctions used to excuse this from being Idolaâ—ry Aug. c. duas Epist Peâ—ag l. 3 c. 4. B. Andrews Answer to Perron p. 57 Beâ—â—arm de imag l. 2. â—â—4 Vasquez 3. Th. disp 108. q. 25. art 3. c. 9. The instances supposed to be parallel Answered Of the Adoration of the Host. Concil Trident Sess. 13. c. 5. The State of the Controversie Joh. 20. 29. Rubrick after Communion Concil Tâ—â— dent 〈◊〉 c. 5. No security in the Roman Church agaâ—nst Idolatry in Adoration of the Host. Greg. de Val. de Idolol l. 2. c. 5. Bell. de Sacr. Euchar l. 4. c. 30. De Incarnat l. 3. c. 8. Vasquez Tom. 1. disp 108. c. 12 n. 111. Disput. 110. c. 2 3. No such motives to believe Transubstantiation as the Divinity of Christ. Bellar. de Sacr. Euch. l. 3. c. 19. De Christo l. 1. c. 4. A mistake doth not excuse from Idolatry Coster Enchir Contr. c. 8. de Euch. Sacram p. 308. Fisher c. Oecolompad l. 1. c. 2. p. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 760. B. Taylors second part of disswasive Introduct in Answ. to I S. 5. way 2. Part of dissâ—as b. 2. s. 6. p. 139. Ductor dubitant b. 2. c. 2. p. 344. p. 339. The grossest Idolatry excusable on the same grounds Aug. prefat in Psal. 93. To. 8. p. 2. p. 184. Aug. c. Faust Manich. l. 20. c. 1. 68. Garcilasso de la vega le Conmentaire Royal. liv 2. c. 1. Of Invocation of Saints The Fathers arguments against Heathen Idolatry condemn Invocation of Saints Iustin. Martyr Apol. 2. p. 65 66. Theophil ad Autolyc l. 1. p. 77. L. a. p. 110. Breviar Rom. 31. Iul. Antw. 1663. S. Basil. ad Amphiloch p. 332. V. Aug. c. Faust. l 20. c. 9. Baron Martycol Apr. 23 Iulii 25. All divine worship given to a creâ—ture condemned by the Fathers Origen c. câ—ls
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 it 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 denyes to receive must be terminated on the creature but God himself in the second Commandment not only denyes 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 grossest 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 grosser the Idolatry was the less it was Idolatry for the grossest 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 practices 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 Oathes and Marriages by making disobedience to the Church in disputable matters more hainous than disobedience to the Laws of Christ in unquestionable things as Marriage in a Priest to be a greater crime than Fornication By all which practices 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 faith 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 judgement and reason as to the matters of faith 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 pretending 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 incurr 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 destroyes 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 Catholick The Proposer of the Questions Reply to the Answer Madam I
Did not expect that two bare Questions could have produced such a super-foetation of Controversies as the Paper you sent me is fraught with But since the Answerer hath been pleased to take this Method for what end himself best knows I shall not refuse to give a fair and plain return to the several points he insists upon and that with as much brevity as the matter and circumstances will bear The Questions proposed were 1. Whether a Protestant having the same Motives to become a Catholick which one bred and born and well grounded in Catholick Religion hath to remain in it may not equally be saved in the profession of it The 2. Whether it be sufficient to be a Christian in the abstract or in the whole latitude or there be a necessity of being a member of some distinct Church or Congregation of Christians The first he saith being supposed to be put concerning a Protestant continuing so implyes a contradiction but where it lyes I cannot see for a Protestant may have the same Motives and yet out of wilfulness or passion not acquiesce to them He saw no doubt this supposition to be impertinent to the Question and therefore in the second part of the 1. § states it thus Whether a Protestant leaving the communion of the Protestant Church upon the motives used by those of the Roman Church may not be equally saved with those who were bred in it The Question thus stated in its true supposition he answers first § 2. That an equal capacity of salvation of those persons being supposed can be no argument to leave the Communion of a Church wherein the salvation of a person may be much more safe than either of them But before I reply I must do both him and my self right in matter of fact and it is Madam that when you first addressed to me you professed your self much troubled that he had told you a person leaving the Protestant communion and embracing the Catholick could not be saved That we should deny salvation to any out of the Catholick Church you lookt upon as uncharitable and this assertion of his had startled you in the opinion you had before of the Protestant Charity Whereupon you desired to know my opinion in the case and I told you I saw no reason why the same Motives which secured one born and bred and well grounded in Catholick Religion to continue in it were not sufficient also to secure a Protestant who convinced by them should embrace it This Madam your self can witness was the true occasion of your proposing the Question and not as the Answerer supposes that I used the meer Question it self as a sufficient Argument to perswade you to embrace the Catholick Communion This premised I reply that the Answer he gives is altogether forrain to the matter in hand the Controversie not being between a Bred and a Converted Catholick on the one side and a person supposed to be in a safer Church than either of them on the other nor yet between two several Churches supposed to have in them an equal Capacity of salvation but between a person bred in the Catholick Religion on the one side and another converted to it from Protestantism on the other whether the latter may not be equally saved with the former Nor is it to the purpose of the present Question to prove that it is of necessity to Salvation to leave the Protestant Church and become a member of the Catholick because the Question is only of the possibility not of the necessity of Salvation I say it is not necessary to the present Question to prove this but rather belongs to the second where I shall speak to it Whether there be a necessity of being a member of some distinct Church Which being resolved affirmatively by both parts it follows then in order to enquire which this true Church is As for the Example of a man leaping from the plain ground into a Ship that is in danger of being Wrackt meaning by that Ship as I suppose he does the Catholick Church Some will be apt to think he had come nearer the Mark if he had compared the Protestant to a Ship which by often knocking against the Rock on which the Catholick Church is built had split it self into innumerable Sects and was now in danger of sinking his comparison was grounded only on his own supposition but this is grounded on the truth it self of too sad an experience But to leave words and come to the matter His second Answer is § 3. that all those who are in the communion of the Church of Rome do run so great a hazard of their Salvation that none who have a care of their souls ought to embrace or continue in it The first answer as I have shewed was nothing pertinent to the present Question nor comes this second any nearer the matter for though it be supposed that none ought to embrace or continue in the Catholick Church by reason of the great hazard he saith they run of their salvation yet if they do embrace or continue in it why may they not be equally saved that is with equal capacity but this assertion however beside the Question he makes it his main business to prove First § 4. Because those who embrace or continue in the Catholick Church are guilty either of Hypocrisie or Idolatry either of which are sins inconsistent with salvation And here he must give me leave to return upon him a more palpable contradiction than that he supposed to have found in the Question viz. to assert only that those of the Catholick Communion run a great hazard of their salvation and yet affirm at the same time that they are guilty either of Hypocrisie or Idolatry sins inconsistent with Salvation which reduced into plain terms is no other but that they may be saved though hardly and yet cannot be saved But to the Argument The Church of Rome by the Worship of God by Images by the adoration of 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 The charge is great but what are the proofs Concerning the first he saith § 5. that in the Worship of God by Images the Worship due to God is terminated wholly on the Creature And surely this implies another contradiction that it should be the Worship of God by Images and yet be terminated wholly on the Creature Nevertheless he proves it thus The Worship which God himself denyes to receive must be terminated upon the Creature but God himself in the second Commandment not only denyes to receive it but threatens severely to punish them that give it that is that Worship him by an Image Therefore it cannot be terminated on God but only on the Image To this Argument which to be just to the Author I confess I have not seen any where
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 Objection 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 sayes 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 denyes the consequence His words are these in the Liberty of Prophecying Sect. 20. Numb 26. Idolatry sayes 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 sayes 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 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 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 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 inferiour 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. Faustus 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. Austins answer will serve as well now as then Christian people sayes 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 to 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 officiating 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 to God who crown'd the Martyrs at the memories or Shrines 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 assistance we can do it We worship therefore the
increase of Controversies in my answer which the Proposer of the Questions calls a superfoetation was but the natural issue of his own Questions To which I could not give a just answer without mentioning the hazards a person runs of his salvation in the communion of the Roman Church and if he thinks these too many as in truth they are he ought to condemn that Church for it which hath been the cause of them And I know no other end I had herein but to let you see there can be no reason to forsake the communion of our Church wherein the way of salvation is the same with that of the Apostolical and Primitive Church for another which hath degenerated so much from it as I hope will appear in the following Discourse To wave therefore any farther debate concerning the terms or sense of the Questions As to the occasion of them I could not but suppose it to relate to your own condition and I dare appeal to himself Whether the Question of the possibility of the salvation of a Protestant turn'd to the Church of Rome were moved for any other end than thereby the easier to draw persons of our Church into their communion which being so common and yet so weak an Artifice I had reason to premise an answer to that purpose and I do still affirm that such a possibility being granted it is no sufficient Motive to any one to leave the communion of one Church for another And whether this be to his Question or no I am sure it is very much to the purpose for which this Controversie was first started I beseech you therefore Madam do not so much disparage your own Judgement and the Church you have been bred up in to forsake it till some better reason be offered than the Proposer pretends that his Questions imply Which if not for your own sake yet for mine I desire you to insist upon that I may know one reason at least from them which I cannot yet procure although I have often requested it why the believing all the ancient Creeds and leading a good life may not be sufficient to salvation unless one be of the communion of the Church of Rome But lest I should be thought to digress I return to his Papers and am willing to pass over his unhandsome reflection on our Church as in a sinking condition which God hath hitherto preserved and I hope will do to the confusion of its enemies But why he should call my comparison a supposition and his own a truth before he proved their Church to be the Catholick Church I am yet to seek And so I come to the main business § 2. My second answer was That all those who are in the communion of the Church of Rome do run so great a hazard of their salvation that none who have a care of their souls ought to embrace it or continue in it which I am amazed he should say was not pertinent to the Question if the Question were propounded for any ones satisfaction that doubted which Churches communion it were best to embrace This I proved 1. Because They must by the terms of that communion be guilty either of Hypocrisie or Idolatry either of which are sins inconsistent with salvation Here he charges me with a contradiction because I overprove what I intended but he may easily excuse me from it if he will allow the possibility of salvation to any one who commits any wilful sins for in the case of any such sins it is true that they are inconsistent with salvation and yet he that doth commit them doth but run the hazzard of salvation because he may repent of them But if it be a contradiction to say that some sins are inconsistent with salvation yet those who commit them may be saved though hardly he must make all who commit any wilful sin to be unavoidably damned and then it is to no purpose what Church we are of The meaning therefore was this That Hypocrisie and Idolatry are sins inconsistent with a state of salvation and there is no way to escape being damned but by the repentance of those who are guilty of them But of this more at large in the vindication of my third Answer and those who are in the communion of the Church of Rome must be guilty either of the one or the other of these I proved by this Argument That Church which requires giving to the creature the Worship due only to the Creator makes the members of it guilty of Hypocrisie or Idolatry but the Church of Rome in the Worship of God by Images the adoration of Bread in the Eucharist and the formal invocation of Saints doth require giving to the creature the worship due only to the Creator therefore it makes the members of it guilty of Hypocrisie or Idolatry Which I did prove by parts 1. § 3. Concerning the Worship of God by Images I proved that it could not be terminated on God because in the second Commandment he not only denys to receive it but threatens to punish those who give it To this he answers 1. That it is a contradiction to say that it is the worship of God by an Image and yet be terminated wholly on the creature 2. That this is built on a mistake of the nature of humane acts which though they ought to be governed by the Law of God yet when they swerve from it cease not to tend to their own proper objects and that 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 which he proves by the prayers of Thieves and Murderers to God for good success the Iews offering to God in Sacrifice the blind and the lame which he hath forbidden Cains offering a Sacrifice to God which he refused to accept of from whence he concludes That though God should have forbidden men to worship him by Images yet it doth not follow but the worship so given would be terminated on him 3. That the second Commandment only forbids the worship of Idols or the giving the Soveraign honour due to God to an Idol but this doth not forbid the worship of Images because they give to them only an inferiour and relative honour and not that worship which is due to God This is the substance of his answer but to let you see the insufficiency of it I shall prove these two things 1. That where God hath prohibited any particular way or means of giving worship to himself that worship so given cannot be said to be terminated on him 2. That God in the second Commandment hath expresly prohibited the giving any worship to himself by an Image and not barely the worship of Idols 1. That where God hath prohibited any particular way or means of giving worship to himself that worship so given cannot be said to be terminated on him And however new this way of
his honour in this Command above others and that he will not give his glory to another but hath reserved all divine worship as peculiar to himself and no such fond excuses of relative inferiour and improper Worship will serve when they encroach upon his prerogative It was well observed by a very learned Bishop of our Church that such kind of distinctions so applyed are like the dispute among some of the Church of Rome in Scotland whether the Lords Prayer might be used to Saints or no and it was well resolved and very subtilly that ultimately principally primarily and strictly they might not but secondarily less principally and largely or relatively they might The same would certainly hold for Images too And I wonder very much they stick at any kind of Worship to be done to Images for my own part were I of their mind I should as little scruple offering up the Host to an Image as saying my Prayers to it and I should think my self hardly dealt with if I did not come off with the same distinctions For if I do it to God absolutely and for himself and to the Image only improperly and relatively wherein I am to blame I cannot understand if the Image have the honorary adoration as he calls it given to it only with a respect to what is represented by it but I may give the same kind of Worship to the Image which I do to the Prototype and that upon the rule he quotes from St. Basil although he uses it quite upon another occasion as if he looks upon the place he may see that the Worship of the Image is carryed to the Prototype or thing represented I desire therefore seriously to know of him whether any Worship doth at all belong to the image or no if none at all to what end are they kneeled before and kissed which if the Images had any sense in them would think was done to them and why doth the Council of Trent determine that due worship is to be given them if there be any due whether it be the same then 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 and subordinately as he speaks I know Madam when any thing pincheth them they cry presently these are disputes of the Schools and Niceties too deep for you to be able to judge of but I assure you some of the best learned among them have determined which side soever you take you fall into Idolatry and I hope that is no Scholastick nicety with you I shall endeavour to give you their sense as plainly as I can Bellarmin saith That no Image is to be Worshipped properly with that Worship which the thing represented is worshipped by for Latria as he calls it is a Worship proper to God but no Image upon account of relation or any other way is God therefore that Worship doth not belong to it It may be saith he some will say that Latria is a Worship proper to God when it is given for it self and not for another or relatively I Answer that it is of the Nature of Latria or Divine Worship to be given for it self for that is the Worship which is due to the true God as the first principle of all things and it implyes a contradiction for the highest Worship to be given to the first principle and relatively or for another and therefore this worship is given to the Image for it self which is plain Idolatry or else it is not given for it self and then it is not Latria or properly Divine Worship Again either the Divine Worship or Latria which is given to the Image relatively for another is the same with that which is given to God or an inferiour Worship if it be the same the Creature is equally Worshipped with God which certainly is Idolatry For Idolatry saith he is not only when God is forsaken and an Idol Worshipped but when an Idol is Worshipped together with God If it be an inferiour worship then it is not Latria for that is the highest Worship Thus far Bellarmin On the other side Vasquez a Iesuite a man of great reputation too and of as searching a wit as Bellarmin he saith That it an inferiour Worship be given to the Image distinct from that which is given to the thing represented he that so gives it incurres the crime of Idolatry for he expresseth his submission to a meer inanimate thing that hath no kind of excellency to deserve it from him By which we see that it is in mens choice what sort of Idolatry they will commit who worship Images but in neither way they can avoid it § 12. But yet he thinks to escape by some parallel instances as he fancies them such as the honour given to the Chair of State or the Kings picture or garment Moses and Joshua's putting off their Shooes because it was holy ground the Iews falling down before Gods footstool and Worshipping the Holy of Holies where were the Cherubims Propitiatory and Ark Protestants bowing at the name of Iesus or kneeling at the Eucharist and bowing before the Altar from these he thinks he hath sufficiently cleared that inferiour and relative Worship which they give to Images To which I answer 1. To that of the Chair of State that our dispute is not concerning Civil Worship but Divine and as to civil worship I suppose he would not say that were any honour to the King in case he had absolutely forbidden it as we have proved God hath done in the case of Images 2. To the putting off the Shooes upon holy ground 1. That we think there is some little difference to be made between what God hath commanded and what he hath forbidden for in the case of Moses and Ioshua there was an express command Exod. 3. 5. Josh. 5. 15. but in the case of Image Worship there is as plain a prohibition 2. 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 but this will not hold for Images unless God be proved present in them in the same manner as he appeared to Moses and Ioshua and yet even then the reverence he required was not kissing it or bowing to it much less praying to it but only putting off their Shooes 3. If these things had been done towards the ground the danger had not been so great as to Images because the ground had nothing of representation in it but was only Sacred by Divine consecration and therefore it could not pretend to be any similitude of God But in Images there is nothing Sacred but being an Image and so the representation is that which gives all the excellency and value to it and therefore the Reverence of holy places and things is of quite a
is not God and therefore that honour ought not to be given it and I am further told by them that the Church hath never determined this controversie Let me now apply this to our present case It is certain if the body of Christ be present in the Eucharist as distinct from the divine nature I am not not to adore it It is very uncertain if it be present whether I am to give divine worship to the body of Christ but it is most certain that if I worship Christ in the Sacrament it is upon the account of his corporal presence For although when I worship the person of Christ as out of the Sacrament my worship is terminated upon him as God and man and the reason of my worship is wholly drawn from his divine nature yet when I worship Christ as in the Sacrament I must worship him there upon the account of his bodily presence for I have no other reason to Worship him in the Sacrament but because his body is present in it And this is not barely determining the place of Worship but assigning the cause of it for the primary reason of all adoration in the Sacrament is because Christ hath said this is my body which words if they should be allowed to imply Transubstantiation cannot be understood of any other change than of the bread into the body of Christ. And if such a sense were to be put upon it why may not I imagine much more agreeably to the nature of the institution that the meer humane nature of Christ is there than that his Divinity should be there in a particular manner present to no end and where it makes not the least manifestation of it self But if I should yield all that can be begged in this kind viz. that the body of Christ being present his divinity is there present too yet my mind must unavoidably rest unsatisfied still as to the adoration of the Host. For supposing the divine nature present in any thing gives no ground upon that account to give the same Worship to the thing wherein he is present as I do to Christ himself This the more considerative men of the Roman Church are aware of but the different wayes they have taken to answer it rather increase mens doubts than satisfie them Greg. de Valentiâ denies not that divine honour is given by them to the Eucharist and that the accidents remaining after Consecration are the term of adoration not for themselves but by reason of the admirable conjunction which they have with Christ. Which is the very same which they say of the humane nature of Christ and yet this same person denies that they are hypostatically united to him which if any one can understand I shall not envy him Bellarmin in answer to this argument is forced to grant as great an hypostatical union between Christ and the Sacrament as between the divine and humane nature for when he speaks of that he saith it lyes in this that the humane nature loseth its own proper subsistence and it assumed into the subsistence of the divine nature and in the case of the Sacrament he yields such a losing the proper subsistence of the bread and that what ever remains makes no distinct suppositum from the body of Christ but all belong to him and make one with him and therefore may be Worshipped as he is Is not this an admirable way of easing the minds of dissatisfied persons about giving adoration to the Host to fill them with such unintelligible terms and notions which it is impossible for them to understand themselves or explain to others Vasquez therefore finding well that the force of the argument lay in the presence of Christ and that from thence they must at last derive only the ground of adoration very ingenuously yields the Consequence and grants that God may very lawfully be adored by us in any created being wherein he is intimately present and this he not only grants but contends for in a set disputation wherein he proves very well from the principles of Worship allowed in the Roman Church that God may be adored in inanimate and irrational beings as well as in Images and answers all the arguments the very same way that they defend the other and that we way Worship the Sun as lawfully and with the same kind of Worship that they do an Image and that men may be worshipped with the same worship with which we Worship God himself if our mind do not rest in the Creature but be terminated upon God as in the adoration of the Host. See here the admirable effects of the doctrine of divine worship allowed and required in the Roman Church For upon the very same principles that a Papist Worships Images Saints and the Host he may as lawfully worship the Earth the Stars or Men and be no more guilty of Idolatry in one than in the other of them So that if we have no more reason to Worship the person of Christ than they have to adore the host upon their principles we have no more ground to worship Christ than we have to worship any creature in the World § 5. 2. There are not the same motives and grounds to believe the doctrine of Transubstantiation that there are to believe that Christ is God which he affirms but without any appearance of reason And I would gladly know what excellent motives and reasons those are which so advantageously recommend so absurd a doctrine as Transubstantiation is as to make any man think he hath reason to believe it I am sure it gives the greatest advantage to the enemies of Christs Divinity to see these two put together upon equal terms as though no man could have reason to believe Christ to be the Eternal Son of God that did not at the same time swallow the greatest contradictions to sense and reason imaginable But what doth he mean by these motives and grounds to believe The authority of the Roman Church I utterly deny that to be any ground of believing at all and desire with all my heart to see it proved but this is a proper means to believe Transubstantiation by for the ground of believing is as absurd as the doctrine to be believed by it If he means Catholick Tradition let him prove if he can that Transubstantiation was a Doctrine received in the universal Church from our Saviours time and when he pleases I shall joyne issue with him upon that Subject And if he thinks fit to put the negative upon me I will undertake to instance in an Age since the three first Centuries wherein if the most learned Fathers and Bishops yea of Rome it self be to be credited Transubstantiation was not believed But if at last he means Scripture which we acknowledge for our only rule of faith and shall do in spight of all pretences to infallibility either in Church or Tradition I shall appeal even to Bellarmin himself in this
and him only shalt thou serve and that we are to render to Caesar the things that are Caesars and to God the things that are Gods on which account saith he we worship God alone and give cheerful service in all other things to you Theophilus Bishop of Antioch who lived in the second Century after Christ as well as Iustin giving an account why the Christians refused giving adoration to the Emperours which was then used not that adoration which was proper to the Supream God for none can be so senseless to imagine they required that but such kind of religious worship as they gave to the Images of their Gods saith That as the King or Emperour suffers none under him to be called by his name and that it is not lawful to give it to any but himself so neither is it to worship any but God alone and elsewhere saith that the Divine Law doth not only forbid the worship of Idols but of the Elements the Sun and Moon and Stars or any thing else in Heaven in Earth in Sea or Fountains or Rivers but we ought only to worship the true God and Maker of all things in the holiness of our hearts and integrity of our minds To the same purpose speak Clemens Alexandrinus Tertullian Cyprian Origen Athenagoras Lactantius Arnobius who all agree that religious worship is proper to the true God and that no created thing is capable of it on that very account because it is created it were easie to produce their testimonies if it were requisite in so evident a matter as this is If it be said That all these testimonies are only against that Idolatry which was then practised by the Heathens I answer 1. Their reasons equally extend to the giving divine worship to any created being whatsoever so that either they argued weakly and unskilfully or else it is as unlawful to give divine worship now to Saints as it was then to any creature 2. I would willingly understand why it should be more unlawful to worship God for his admirable Wisdom and Power and Goodness in the works of Creation than in supposed Saints i. e. why I may not as well honour God by giving worship to the Sun as to Ignatius Loyola or St. Francis or any other late Canonized Saint I am sure the Sun is a certain monument of Gods Goodness Wisdom and Power and I cannot be mistaken therein but I can never be certain of the Holiness of those persons I am to give divine worship to For all that I can know Ignatius Loyola was a great hypocrite but I am sure that the Sun is none but that he shines and communicates perpetual influences to the huge advantage of the world However I know the best of men have their corruptions and to what degree it is impossible for others to understand but I am certain the spots in the Sun are no Moral impurities nor displeasing to God And Philip Nerius could not be mistaken in the shining of the Sun although he might be in the shining of Ignatius his face which yet is thought so considerable a thing that it is read in the Lessons appointed for Ignatius in the Roman Breviary 3. On what account should the Christians refuse giving all external signs of Religious worship to the Heathen Emperours if they thought it lawful to be given to any sort of men Why might not they worship the Statues of Kings and Princes as well as others do those of Rebels and Traytors I mean why might not the Image of King Henry the second have the same reverence shewn to it that the Shrine of Thomas Becket had unless it be more meritorious to disobey a Prince than to give him reverence Might not the Primitive Christians have much easier defended themselves in giving those outward signs of worship to the Images of Emperours than others can do in the worship they give to Saints For they might have pleaded that external signs are to be interpreted by the intention of the person who uses them that they intended no more by it but the highest degree of Civil honour on the account of the authority they possessed or if this would not serve might not they have said that Kings and Princes were Gods Vicegerents and represented him to the world and that in giving divine worship to them they gave it to God and that their absolute ultimate and terminative worship was upon God and only a relative inferior and transient worship was given to them and all this might be better justified by St. Basils rule That the honour of the Image passes to the Prototype for he there pleads for the worship of Christ because he is one with the Father being his Image as the Image of a King is called the King and hath the same honour given to it for the honour of the Image passeth to the thing represented And as Christ hath the advantage above all by being Gods natural Image so Princes above Saints in that they represent God to the world which the other do not But notwithstanding all these Pleas the Primitive Christians were so punctual in observing that Command of worshipping God alone that they rather chose to lose their lives and suffer Martyrdom than be in the least guilty of giving any divine worship to a creature 4. They absolutely deny any religious worship to be given to the most excellent created Beings and therefore did not only condemn the Idolatry then in use but that which hath obtained in the Roman Church supposing all the persons worshipped therein to have been real Saints For that we are to consider that all the Heathens were not such great Fools as some men make them to excuse themselves if the wiser men were contented to let the people worship the Poetical Gods having their minds possessed with those Idea's of them which they had taken up by their education yet they understood them only as Allegories as some make the Image of St. Christopher and St. George in the Church of Rome to be no other and they had Temples erected to the greatest Vertues to Piety Faith Concord Iustice Chastity Clemency c. and others to the greatest Benefactors to mankind which was the only ground they pleaded for giving worship to them but still they acknowledged one Supream God not Iupiter of Creet but the Father of Gods and men only they said this Supream God being of so high a nature and there being other intermediate beings between him and men whose Office they conceived it was to carry the prayers of men to God and to bring down help from him to them they thought it very fitting to address their solemn supplications to them Here now was the very same case in debate altering only the names of things which is between us and the Church of Rome and if ever they speak home to our case they must do upon this point And so they do but very little to their comfort § 10.
Angels it seems very strange he should use the name generally given to good and alwayes indifferent to both Origen expresly denies any offering up of Prayers to them to be practised by Christians or reasonable to be done and produces this very place of the Apostle against it The Council of Laodicea we see by Theodoret is very severe against all who Worship Angels and charges them with Idolatry in so doing if they had only meant the Heathen Idolaters as Baronius contends yet by that it appears that the Heathens were condemned for Worshipping those whom they believed to be good spirits but these are only shifts to escape by and such which would not have come into the mind of any man if he did not first fear the force of that Canon against the practice of the Roman Church For why the Heathen Idolatry should at that time be called secret or hidden as it is in that Canon is not easie to be thought upon but very easily intelligible according to Theodorets interpretation because of the clandestine meetings of those who worshipped Angels and therein separated themselves from the Christian Churches St. Austin discourses purposely on this subject as is intimated before whether God or the Blessed Spirits are willing we should perform any sacred offices or Sacrifices to them or consecrate our selves or any thing of ours to them by any religious rites which he denies For this saith he is the worship proper to the Deity called by him in one word Latria which he thinks more proper to express divine worship as distinct from the honour and service we give to men which is plainly his meaning there than any one word Greek or Latine besides And this word he saith is proper to the Deity as such because he elsewhere tells us the difference between 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is this that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is the Service of God properly as God 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is the service of God as Lord. § 12. I know very well by what arts all these testimonies are endeavoured to be evaded viz. by saying That these are intended against the Gentiles Idolatry who Worshipped those Spirits as Gods and offered Sacrifices to them but this cannot hold as to the Doctrine or practice of the Roman Church who deny them to be Gods and assert that the Worship by Sacrifice is proper only to God but such devices as these are can never satisfie an impartial mind For 1. They do expresly deny that invocation or prayer is to be made to them for so Origen and Theodoret speak expresly that men are not to pray to Angels and any one that reads St. Austin will find that he makes solemn invocation to be as proper to God as Sacrifice is 2. On what account should it be unlawful to Sacrifice to Saints or Angels if it be lawful to invocate them may not one be relative and transient as well as the other nay the Heathen in St. Austin argued very well that Sacrifices being meer external things might more properly belong to the Inferiour Deities but the more invisible the Deity was the more invisible the Sacrifices were to be and the greater and better the Deity the Sacrifice was to be still proportionable and can any man in his senses think that a meer outward Sacrifice is more acceptable to God than the devotion of our heart is and wherein can we better express that to God than in offering up our prayers to him so that in all reason the duty of prayer ought to be reserved as more proper to God than any external sacrifice and those who did appropriate Sacrifice to God did comprehend prayer as the most spiritual and acceptable part of it So St. Austin speaking of the Sacrifice due to God makes our heart the Altar and Christ our Priest and our Prayers and Praises to be offered up to God by a fervent charity and any work which is therefore done that thereby we may be united to God in a holy Communion with him in order to our happiness to be a true Sacrifice and let any man judge whether this description do not so naturally agree to prayer as if it had been only intended for it Besides it is observable that sacrifices of old were solemn rites of supplication and calling upon the name of the Lord where Altars were erected is the main thing spoken of thence the Temple though the place of sacrifice is called the house of Prayer and where God slights sacrifices he requires prayer as much more acceptable to him It seems then very strange that sacrifice alone as distinguished from prayer should be that Latria that is proper to God 3. Upon the same account that the Heathen did give divine honour to their inferiour Deities those in the Roman Church do so to Angels and Saints For the Heathens made a difference in their sacrifices to the supreme God and their inferiour Deities and their Heroes so that if the putting any difference in the way of religious Worship doth excuse the one it must do the other also Did the Heathen use solemn Ceremonies of making any capable of divine worship so does the Roman Church Did they set up their Images in publick places of worship and there kneel before them and invocate those represented by them so does the Roman Church Did they consecrate Temples and erect Altars to them and keep Festivals and burn Incense before them so does the Roman Church Lastly did they offer up Sacrifices in those Temples to the Honour of their lesser Deities and Heroes so does the Roman Church For Bellarmin reckoning up the honours belonging to Canonized Saints besides those before mentioned reckons up this as one that the Sacrifices of the Eucharist and of lauds and prayers are publickly offered to God for their honour I would fain understand what the sacrificing to one for the honour of another means To offer Sacrifice to one for another is an intelligible thing but to Sacrifice to one for the honour of another is a thing beyond my reach if that sacrifice does not belong to him for whose honour it is offered and if the sacrifice do belong to him I wonder at the scrupulosity of those who dare not say they Sacrifice to him as well For what is sacrificing to God but sacrificing to his honour or doing such an act of Religion with a design to honour God by it but when men offer a Sacrifice but not to honour God by it but the B. Virgin or any Saints or Angels how can that Sacrifice belong to any other but those whose honour is designed by it It being then the opinion and practice of the Roman Church that Sacrifices are to be offered for the honour of Saints or Angels it is evident they have reserved no part of divine worship peculiar to God himself any more than the Heathen did 4. There can be
with her Picture and a Book of her life and eminent sanctity by a person of great authority which were preserved as precious things by the Vice-roy's Lady But this is nothing to Gregory the thirteenth then Pope who writ a Letter of encouragement to her to go on in the same way of sanctity she had begun She had been examined by the Inquisition and her wounds were allowed by them after diligent search But at last they found what she aimed at which was the Revolt of Portugall from Spain which being once suspected she is brought before the Inquisition and her Sanctity is condemned her wounds declared to be a meer Imposture being artificially made by red Lead and her self sentenced by the Inquisitors to a very severe pennance all her dayes Decemb. 8. A. D. 1588. I suppose my Adversary having been upon the place hath often heard the truth of this but if he doubts it he may find it as I have related it in Ludovicus a Paramo By which it is very easie to ghess what it is which gives and preserves the reputation of these things in the Roman Church for if this Saint had dyed before her design brake forth we might have heard of her wounds in the Roman Breviary as well as those of St. Francis and a Festival might have been kept in commemoration of her sanctity and her self as religiously invocated as the rest of the Popes making But supposing Pope Alexander the fourths authority prevailed so much upon the people to believe that S. Francis had the same wounds which Christ had c. No wonder then it should be written in the Book called The Flowers of S Francis that those only were saved by the blood of Christ who lived before S. Francis but all that followed were redeemed by the blood of S. Francis No wonder this Petrus Iohannis made the Rule of S. Francis to be the very same with the Gospel and that which Christ and his Apostles lived by of which S. Francis was the greatest observer next to Christ and his Mother and that as Christ when he was to reform the world chose twelve Apostles so S. Francis had twelve Brethren by whom the Evangelical Order was founded that those who opposed this Order were the carnal persecuting Clergy in whom the Seat of the Beast is much more than in the people that in the time of this Mystical Antichrist the Carnal Church shall oppose the doctrine life and zeal of the Saints and burn as it were with fire against them but it shall be dryed up from all spiritual Wisdom and Grace and the riches of Christ and be exposed to errors and delusion as it was with the Iews and Greeks Those who will not take the pains to see how faithfully I have translated these words out of Eymericus would imagine I have borrowed some of the canting language of the modern Quakers But he goes on saying That as Vasthi the Queen being cast off from the Kingdom and Marriage of Ahassuerus the humble Esther was chosen to succeed in her place and the King made a great Feast to his Princes and Servants so in this last state of the Church the adulterous Babylon the carnal Church being rejected the spiritual Church must be exalted and a great and spiritual Feast be kept to celebrate these Nuptials with that under the Mystical Antichrist there shall be overturnings and commotions by which the Carnal Church shall be terribly stirred up and moved against the Evangelical Spirit of Christ but that the Whore of Babylon the Carnal Church shall fall in which time the Saints shall preach saying from this time it is no longer the Church of Christ but the Synagogue of Satan and the Habitation of Devils which before said in the pride of her heart I sit as a Queen in great honour and glory I rule over my Kingdom I sit at ease I am no Widow i. e. I have Bishops and Kings on my side that the Roman Church is that great Whore spoken of in the Revelations which hath committed fornication with this world having departed from the worship and sincere love and the delights of Christ her Spouse and embraced the world the riches and pleasures of it and the Devil and Kings and Princes and Prelates and all the lovers of this world That the Teachers of this spiritual State are more properly the Gates to lead men into the wisdom of Christ than the Apostles themselves These things are expresly delivered concerning the doctrine of this Franciscan Fryer by the Inquisitor Eymericus I know Wadding in his Franciscan Annals to preserve the reputation of his Order would clear him from all suspicion of Heresie but I suppose the credit of an Inquisitor having such opportunities to know the truth so near his own time and having the examination of many of his followers is to be relyed on rather than the testimony of one at such a distance and partial for the honour of his order Especially that being considered which Possevin saith of Eymericus that most of his accounts of the times a little before his own were the very same with what was contained in a Manuscript in the Vatican Library both as to order and words which is though to have been brought from Avignon to Rome where he was made Inquisitour General by Gregory 11. A. D. 1358. But it is not denyed by Wadding or others that the Beguini and Fratricelli the Beguardi and others were his followers and we shall find so great an agreement in their opinions that it would be strange they should be accounted the Disciples of any other Eymericus gives this account of them that in the time of Clement 5. there arose in the Province of Narbonne one Petrus Iohannis a Franciscan Fryer who published by Writing and Preaching a great many Errours and Heresies in the same Province and drew many after him who had spread themselves over France Italy Germany and other places and continued in his time being daily searched for condemned by the Inquisitours They all agreed that their doctrine was from God by immediate inspiration and that all the writings of Petrus Johannis were revealed to him from the Lord and that he had declared this to some of his Friends that he was so great a Doctor that from the time of the Apostles and Evangelists there have been none greater than he in Learning and Holiness and that his writings theirs only excepted wherein they fell short of the former Sect were the most useful to the Church § 10. Their doctrines may be reduced to these four heads 1. Evangelical poverty 2. Unlawfulness of Swearing 3. The Doctrine of perfection 4. Opposition to the carnal Church Which being joyned with that greater degree of light which they supposed themselves to have above all the rest of the world makes up a Sect of Quakers after the Order of St. Francis 1. Their Doctrine of Evangelical poverty about which they said That our
the same Author layes it down as a fundamental rule that God only by his holy Inspirations is the guide and directour in an Internal contemplative life and that all the light they have therein is from immediate divine illumination as well as our strength from the divine operation and that this light doth extend further and to more and other more particular objects than the divine light or Grace by which good Christians living common lives in the world are lead extends to yea than it does even in those that seek perfection by the exercises of an active life But which is very extraordinary in this supernatural light he saith that generally when there is proposed the not doing or doing of an external work and both of them are lawfull the divine inspiration moves to the not doing but this is not all but among the impediments to divine Inspirations he reckons not only all external duties of Religion but the doing things meerly for Edification A most excellent and Apostolical doctrine but it is happy for the Christian world the Apostles had other kind of Inspirations from these or else they had never done much good in the World or been such eminent examples of holy life and actions What becomes of all the precepts they have left us of doing good of mutual edification of constant business besides the commands for the outward duties of Worship if these be the hinderances in the way to perfection And although he would not have his spiritual internal liver to pretend to extraordinary apparitions voices conversations with spirits message from Heaven c. Yet in his Discourse of Passive Vnions he saith that God reveals himself to the soul by a supernatural species impressed in her which revelations are either sensible as apparitions words c. or intellectual either immediately or by Angels the effects of which supernatural inactions of God are Rapts or Extasies internal visions c. in which he saith that the less experienced and imperfect are to advise with their directour about them but those who were more eminently perfect have followed their own light in judging of those things and practising accordingly without consulting others and withall addes that such souls which receive these things must carefully observe her internal direction and that they are not so absolutely obliged to resign their judgements and wills to others as to neglect their own proper call received from God And doth this doctrine now differ from that of the Fanatick Sectaries which have swarmed in England Yes Mr. Cressy in his Preface undertakes at large to shew the difference by answering the objection taken from thence against the publishing this doctrine because it would justifie them in all their frenzies and disorders and in order to this 1. He very foolishly goes about to prove the necessity of divine Inspirations from the necessity of divine Grace for the doing good actions which is not denyed by the greatest enemies to Enthusiasme 2. He saith we ought to correspond to those Divine Inspirations which stirr us up to good actions if he means by them nothing but the assistance of Divine Grace no one questions it 3. That there may be false suggestions of the Devil which may appear like the motions of Gods Spirit 4. That it being necessary these should be distinguished from each other the only means imaginable that can be proper natural and efficacious to obtain such a supernatural light to discern Gods will in all things as pure spiritual prayer exercised by a soul living an abstracted internal recollected life spent in a continual attendance on God c. i. e. in short the directions of F. Augustin Baker And is not this think we a very cunning way of vindicating his doctrine from Fanaticism to make Enthusiasm necessary to distinguish the motions of the good and bad Spirit in our minds I have already shewed that he teaches the highest Enthusiasm and it seems those who made the objection were sensible of it But how doth Mr. Cressy answer it by shewing what they condemn to be necessary and in effect that no man can know the difference between the motions of the Holy Ghost and the Devil but by Enthusiasme nay that is the plain meaning of his words for this contemplative prayer he saith is the only means to gain such a supernatural light whereby we can distinguish one from the other An admirable way to tell men they must first be mad before they can know whether they be in their wits or no. But since this contemplative state hath besides the common though immediate illuminations many passive unions or extraordinary revelations attending it suppose the Question were put how one should know whether these came from God or the Devil what answer will Mr. Cressy then give will he return back again to try illuminations by inspirations as he calls them and so inspirations by illuminations which is just like the Scripture by the Church and the Church by Scripture But here saith Mr. Cressy is no pretending to new or strange revelations no walking in mirabilibus super se yes I think he doth so when he utters these things for what are passive unions but new revelations and as great as ever any Fanatick Sectary pretended to Did not they deliver this for their Doctrine that men ought to hearken to the immediate impulses of the Spirit of God within them and that now God doth acquaint his own people with his mind and will in a way peculiar to themselves And what have they done of the mystical way but only changed a few terms and asserted the thing it self higher than our Enthusiasts did who did not boast of so many raptures visions and revelations as those of the Church of Rome have done Lud. Blosius in his works hath one Book called Monile Spirituale which consists of nothing but the new and strange revelations which were made to four Women Saints St. Gertrude St. Mathildis St. Bridgitt and St. Catharine and in his Preface saith it is a sign of a carnal mind to despise such revelations as these are for the Church of God is wonderfully enlightned by them What saith he did not the Prophets and Apostles receive truth from Heaven by Revelations As though the case were the very same in these melancholy Women and in the holy Prophets and Apostles and we had just as much reason to believe the effects of hysterical vapours and the divine Spirit And lest we should imagine these were only the Fancies of some Women which their Church would not be concerned for the credit of he concludes with saying that these Revelations were known to the world and approved For those of St. Bridgitt we have before shewed how much they were approved For St. Gertrudes he saith the same and that one very learned and illuminate man did say after the accurate reading of them that man could not have
do hold that it is only in the power of the whole Church successively from the Apostles to declare what books are Canonical and what not For the 11. article about justification he saith the Controversie is only about words because we are agreed that God alone is the efficient cause of Justification and that Christ and his passion are the meritorious cause of it and the only question is about the formal cause which our Church doth not attribute to the act of faith as he proves by the book of Homilies but only makes it a condition of our being justified and they believe that by faith we obtain our righteousness by Christ so that he can find no difference between them and us in that point He saith the Controversie about merit may be soon ended according to the doctrine of our Church for they deny as well as we article 1. 3. that any works done before the Grace of Christ and Inspiration of his Spirit can merit any thing and when we say article 12. that good works which follow justification are pleasing and acceptable to God in Christ if by that we mean that they are accepted by Christ in order to a reward by vertue of the promise of God through Christ that is all the sense of merit which he or the school of Scotus contends for For works of supererogation article 14. he saith our Church condemns them upon that ground that men are said to do more by them than of duty they are bounden to do which being generally understood they condemn he saith as well as we because we can doe no good works which upon the account of our natural obligation we are not bound to perform though by particular precept we are not bound to them In the 19 article where our Church saith that the Church of Rome hath erred not only in their living and manner of ceremonies but also in matters of faith he distinguisheth the particular Church of Rome from the Catholick Church which is frequently understood by that name and he saith it is only a matter of faith to believe that the Catholick Church hath not erred and not that the particular Church of Rome hath not In the 20. article our Church declares that the Church ought neither to decree any thing against holy writ so besides the same it ought not to enforce any thing to be believed of necessity to salvation this he interprets of what is neither actually nor potentially in the Scriptures neither in terms nor by consequence and so he thinks it orthodox and not against traditions Article 21. wherein our Church determins expresly against the infalibility of general Councils he understands it only of things that are not necessary to faith or manners which he saith is the common opinion among them The hardest article one would think to bring us off in was the 22. viz. that the Romish doctrine concerning Purgatory Pardons worshipping and adoration as well of Images as of Reliques and also Invocation of Saints is a fond thing vainly invented and grounded upon no warranty of Scripture But we need not despaire as long as one bred up in the Schools of Scotus designes our rescue he confesses it to be a difficult adventure but what will not subtilty and kindness doe together He observes very cunningly that these doctrines are not condemned absolutely and in themselves but only the Romish doctrine about them and therein we are not to consider what the Church of Rome doth teach but what we apprehend they teach or what we judge of their doctrine i. e. that they invocate Saints as they doe God himself that Purgatory destroys the cross of Christ and warms the Popes Kitchin that Pardons are the Popes bills of Exchange whereby he discharges the debts of what sinners he pleases that they give proper divine worship to images and reliques all which he saith are impious doctrines and we doe well to condemn them So that it is not want of faith but want of wit this good man condemns us for which if we attain to any competent measure of whereby to understand their doctrine there is nothing but absolute peace and harmony between us This grand difficulty being thus happily removed all the rest is done with a wet finger for what though our Church Art 24. saith that it is a thing plainly repugnant to the word of God and the custome of the primitive Church to have publick prayer in the Church or to Minister the Sacraments in a tongue not understood of the people Yet what can hinder a Scotist from understanding by the Scripture not the doctrine or command of it but the delivery of it viz. that the Scripture was written in a known tongue nay he proves that our Church is for praying in Latin by this Article because that either is a known tongue or ought to be so it being publickly lickly taught every where and if it be not understood he saith it is not per se but per accidens that it is so I suppose he means the Latin Tongue is not to blame that the people do not understand it but they that they learned their lessons no better at School But what is to be said for Women who do not think themselves bound to go to School to learn Latin He answers very plainly that S. Paul never meant them for he speaks of those who were to say Amen at the Prayers but both S. Paul and the Canon Law he tells us forbid women to speak in the Church The case is then clear S. Paul never regarded what language the Women used and it was no great matter whether they understood their Prayers or not But what is to be said to the Council of Trent which pronounces an Anathema to those who say that Prayers are to be said only in a known Tongue This doth not touch our Church at all he thinks because in some Colledges the Prayers are said in Latin but although that be a known tongue there it is no matter as long as the Council of Trent hath put in the word only that clears our Church sufficiently Besides the Council of Trent speaks expresly of the Masse which our Article doth not mention but only publick Prayers and the Council of Trent speaks of those who condemns it as contrary to the institution of Christ but our Church only condemns it as contrary to the institution of the Apostle but all the commands of the Apostles are not the commands of Christ therefore our Church declares nothing against faith in this Article Are not we infinitely obliged to a man that uses so much subtlety to defend our Church from errrour in faith But that which is most considerable is what he cites from Canus that it is no Heresie to condemn a custome or Law of the Church if it be not of something necessary to salvation especially if it be a custome introduced since the Apostles times as most certainly this was For the five Sacraments rejected
by our Church Art 25. he saith they are not absolutely rejected as Sacraments but as Sacraments of the same Nature with Baptism and the Lords Supper which they yield to For Transubstantiation which is utterly denyed by our Church Art 28. he very subtilly interprets it of a carnal presence of Christs Body which he grants to be repugnant to Scripture and to destroy the nature of a Sacrament but they do believe Christs Body to be present after the manner of a Spirit and so our Church doth not condemn theirs As to communion in both kinds asserted by our Church Art 30. he saith it is not condemned by the Council of Trent therein which only Anathematizes those who make it necessary to Salvation which our Church mentions not and however we condemn communion in one kind Canus proves him not to be guilty of Heresie who should say that the Church hath erred therein The 31 Article condemns the Sacrifice of the Masse i.e. saith he independently on the Sacrifice of the Crosse which is propitiatory of it self and the other only by vertue of it The 32. of the lawfulness of Priests Marriage he understands of the Law of God in respect of which it is the most common opinion among them he saith that it is lawful The 34. about Traditions he interprets of those which are not Doctrinal The Book of Homilies approved Art 35. he understands as they do Books approved by their Church not of every sentence contained therein but the substance of the Doctrine and he grants there are many good things contained therein For the 36. of consecration of Bishops and Ministers he proves from Vasquez Conink Arcudius and Innocent 4. that our Church hath all the essentials of Ordination required in Scripture and if the difference of form of words did null our Ordinations it would do those of the Greek Church too The last Article he examins is Art 37. Of the Civil Magistrates power in opposition to the Popes Authority and he grants that the King may be allowed a Supermacy i.e. such as may not be taken away by any one as his Superiour and that by custome a sufficient right accrues to him over all Ecclesiastical causes and that by divine and natural right he hath jurisdiction over all Ecclesiastical persons so far as the publick good is concerned And withall he grants that we yield no spiritual jurisdiction to the King and no more than is contended for by the French and the Parliament of Paris That part which denyes the Popes jurisdiction in England he saith may be understood of the Popes challenging England to be a Fee of the Roman See but if it be otherwise understood he makes use of many Scholastick distinctions of actus signatus exercitus c. the sense of which is that it is in some cases lawful for a temporal Prince to withdraw his obedience from the Pope but leaves it to be discussed whether he had sufficient reason for doing it But there can be no Heresie in matter of fact it remains then according to the sense put upon our Articles by him with the help of his Scholastick subtleties we differ no more from them in points of faith than they do from one another For such kind of distinctions and senses are they forced to use and put upon each others opinions to excuse them from disagreeing in articles of faith and there is no reason that we should not enjoy the benefit of them as well as they so that either they must be guilty of differing in matters of faith or we are not § 16. 3. They plead that their differences are only confined to their Schools and do not disturb the peace of the Church But there is as little truth in this as there is Vnity in their Church as plainly appears by what hath been said already Was the Controversie about the Popes temporal power confined to the Schools did not that make for several Ages as great disturbances in the Church as were ever known in it upon any quarrel of Religion Were the Controversies between the Bishops and the Monks confined to their Schools about the extent of the Episcopal jurisdiction in former times or in the renewing of this Hierarchical Warr as one of the Iansenists calls it in France But these things are at large discovered already I shall only adde one thing more which seems more like a dispute of the Schools between the several Orders among them about the immaculate conception and it will easily appear that whereever that dispute began it did not rest in the Schools if we consider the tumults and disturbances which have been made only on the account of it This Controversie began in the Schools about the beginning of the 14 Century when Scotus set up for a new Sect in opposition to Thomas Aquinas and among other points of Controversie he made choice of this to distinguish his followers by but proposed it himself very timerously as appears by his resolution of it in his Book on the Sentences however his followers boast that in this blessed quarrel he was sent for from Oxford to Paris from Paris to Cologne to overthrow all Adversaries and that he did great wonders every where But however this were there were some not long after him who boldly asserted what he doubtfully proposed of whom Franciscus Mayronis is accounted the first after him Petrus Aureolus Occam and the whole order of Franciscans But the great strength of this opinion lay not in the wit and subtilty of the defenders of it nor in any arguments from Scripture or Antiquity but in that which they called the Piety of it i. e. that it tended to advance the honour of the B. Virgin For after the worship of her came to be so publick and solemn in their Church I do not in the least wonder that they were willing to believe her to be without sin I much rather admire they do not believe all their Canonized Saints to have been so too and I am sure the same reasons will hold for them all But this Opinion by degrees obtaining among the people it grew scandalous for any man to oppose it So Walsingham saith towards the latter end of this Century the Dominicans Preaching the contrary opinion against the command first of the Bishops in France and then of the King and Nobles they were out-lawed by the King and absolutely forbid to go out of their own Convents for fear of seducing the people and not only so but to receive any one more into their Order that so the whole Order might in a little time be extinguished The occasion of this persecution arose from a disturbance which happened in Paris upon this Controversie one Ioh. de Montesono publickly read against the immaculate conception at which so great offence was taken that he was convented before the Faculty of Sorbonne but he declared that he had done nothing but by advice of the chief of his Order
points of Popery which he held to the last But we think it an advantage to our cause in the matter of Supremacy that they who were Papists in other points as well as this against reading the Scriptures yet contended so earnestly against the Popes Authority as Henry 8. and Stephen Gardiner Bonner and the rest did Doth he imagine that Henry 8. is owned by us to be Head of our Church as the Pope is with them so as to think him infallible He would be Head of the Popish Church in England in spight of the Pope but he never pretended to be Head of the Reformation any farther than the Supremacy went and if they will not believe him when he was influenced as they think by Cranmer neither are we to be tyed to his opinion when he was guided by Stephen Gardiner or any other who were not greater enemies to Cranmer than to the Reformation § 2. The next thing wherein I said the sincerity of devotion is much obstructed in their Church was by the multitude of superstitious observations never used in the primitive Church as I said I was ready to defend to this his answer is very short 1. That I should have said to prove but so weak was I as to think the Affirmative was to be proved and the Negative defended 2. He denyes any such to be used in their Church I desire then to know his opinion of baptizing bells with God-fathers and God-mothers holding the rope in their hands being buried in a Monks habit Pilgrimages to images of Saints sprinkling holy water spittle and salt in baptisme their rites of exorcism Agnus Dei's the Pageantry of the Passion-week the carrying about of the Host the numbering of Ave Marias and Pater Nosters to make Rosaries and Psalters of the B. Virgin the burning tapers at noon day particularly on Candlemas day with great devotion the incensing of images with many others which might be mention'd and if he can vindicate these from superstition it will be no hard task to vindicate the Heathens in the ceremonies of their devotion and to prove that there can be no such thing as Superstition in the world § 3. I now come to the gross abuse of people in Pardons and Indulgences by which I said the sincerity of devotion was much obstructed among them he tells me as an eye-witness that there is great devotion caused by them in Catholick Countries there being no Indulgence ordinarily granted but enjoyns him that will avail himself of it to confess his sins to receive the Sacraments to pray fast and give alms all which duties are with great devotion he saith performed by Catholick people which without the incitement of an Indulgence had possibly been left undone I will not be so troublesome to enquire what sincerity of devotion that was he was an eye-witness of which was caused by Indulgences nor what sort of persons they were who were thus devout at receiving them I think it will be sufficient for my purpose to prove that no persons in the world who understand what Indulgences mean in the Church of Rome can be excited to any devotion by them but that on the contrary they tend exceedingly to the obstructing of it which I shall doe by shewing that either they are great and notorious cheats if that be not meant by them which is expressed in them or if it be that nothing could be invented that tends more to obstructing their own way of devotion than these doe 1. That they are great and notorious cheats if that be not meant by them which is expressed in them For which we are to understand first what hath been expressed in their Indulgences 2. What opinion those of their own Church have had concerning them § 4. 1. What hath been expressed in their Indulgences the eldest Indulgences we meet with are those which were made by the Popes to such who undertook their quarrels against their enemies and the first of this kind I can meet with is that of Anselm Bishop of Luca Legat of Gregory 7. which he gave to those of his party who would fight against the Emperour Henry 4. which Baronius relates from his Poenitentiary in which was promised remission of all their sins to such who would venture their lives in that Holy War And Gregorius 7. himself in an epistle to the Monks of Marscilles who stuck close to him promised an Indulgence of all their sins The like Indulgence with remission of all their sins was granted to those who would fight against the Saracens in Africa by Victor who succeeded Gregorius 7. after him followed Vrban 2. who granted an Indulgence to all who would goe in the War to the Holy Land of all their sins and as Gul. Tyrius saith expressely mention'd those which the Scripture saith doe exclude from the Kingdom of God as murder theft c. and not only absolved them from all the penances they deserved by their sins but bid them not doubt of an eternal reward after death as Malmsbury saith the like is attested by Ordericus Vitalis in whose younger days this Expedition began upon which he saith all the thieves Pyrats and other Rogues came in great numbers and listed themselves having made confession of their sins and if we believe S. Bernard there were very few but such among them which he rejoyceth very much in and saith there was a double cause of joy in it both that they left the Countries where they were before and now went upon such an enterprise which would carry them to Heaven This way of Indulgences being thus introduced was made use of afterwards upon the like occasions by Callictus 2. A. D. 1122. by Eugenius 3. A. D. 1145. by Clem. 3. A. D. 1195. and others after them who all promised the same Indulgences that Vrban 2. had given And it is well observed by Morinus that these Indulgences cannot be understood of a meer relaxation of Canonical penances because such a remission of all sins is granted upon which eternal life followes and therefore must respect God and not barely the Church and because absolution was to be given upon them which saith he according to the discipline then in the Church ought not to be given but till the Canonical Penance had been gone through or at least the greatest part of it But therein he is very much mistaken when he saith that the Popes never granted these plenary Indulgences but only to encourage an Expedition to the Holy Land For Gelasius 2. A. D. 1118. granted the same to the Christian souldiers at the siege of Saragoza as appears by the Bull it self in Baronius Honorius 2. in the quarrel he had with Roger of Sicily gave the same to all who having confessed their sins should dye in the War against him but if they chanced to escape with their lives but half their sins were pardoned Alexander 3. gave to his Friends at Ancona
why is it not so expressed if they meant honestly but they know if their Pardons ran so no one would give a farthing for them What need any talk of the Churches Treasure for this which Clement 6. made the ground of Indulgences in his Bull and hath been asserted by the most zealous defenders of them This way of explaining Indulgences then though it be easie and intelligible yet it is not reconcileable with the practice of the Church of Rome nor with the suppositions on which that practice is built We are therefore to enquire what they can make of it who go about to defend it as it is practised and generally understood among them To this end they tell us that although the fault be remitted upon the Sacrament of Penance yet the temporal punishment of sin remains which God must be satisfied for that this temporal punishment is either to be undergone here or in Purgatory that every man must have undergone it himself if there had not been a treasure of the Church made up of the satisfactions of Christ and the Saints to make amends to God for every one to whom that Treasure is applyed That the dispensing of this Treasure is in the hands of the Pope who gives it out by Indulgences which being applyed to any person upon the condition required he is thereby discharged from the debt of temporal punishment which he owed to God This is the received doctrine of Indulgences in the Roman Church which holds together till you touch it and then it presently flies in pieces like a Glass drop or vanishes into smoke and aire It is of so tender a composition that it can endure no rough handling if you like it as it is much good may it do you but you must ask no Questions But however I shall to shew the monstrous absurdities of this Doctrine 1. Why if the Indulgence only respects the punishment and not the fault the terms of the Indulgence do not express this that the people may not be deceived Why in all Indulgences since this doctrine is so explained as in the Iubilees of Clement 8. and of Vrban 8. the former of whom is applauded by Bellarmin for a reformer of Indulgences the most general expressions are still used of most plenary Indulgence remission and pardon of all their sins why is it not said only of the temporal punishment due to sin the fault being supposed to be remitted 2. How punishment doth become due when the fault is remitted if the punishment be just it must have respect to the fault for to punish without respect to the fault is all one as to punish without fault if it have respect to the fault how that fault can be said to be remitted which is punished So far as a man is punished it is nonsense to say he is pardoned and so far as he is not pardoned his fault is charged upon him 3. Suppose temporal punishment remain to be satisfied for whether all or only some one kind whether diseases pains and death be not part of the temporal punishment of sin and whether men may be freed from these by Indulgences whether from the effects of the justice of God in extraordinary judgements if not how can a man be said to be freed from the temporal punishment of sin that is as lyable to it as any one else 4. If only one sort of the temporal punishment of sin why is not that one sort declared what it is that all men may be satisfied from the Pope himself whom some believe infallible in his Indulgence Others we find are not agreed about it some say it is only the punishment due to sin above the Canonical penance some that it is only the Canonical penance and not that which is due from the justice of God some that it is for both some only for negligence in performing penance some that it is only for injoyned penance and others that it is for all that may be enjoyned In this diversity of opinions what security can any man have what punishment he is to be freed from 5. If it be from Canonical Penance whether a man is wholly freed from the obligation to that or no if he be what power hath the Priest to enjoyne penance after if he be not free what is it he is freed from and in what tolerable sense can this be called a most full remission of sins which neither remits the fault nor the natural or divine punishment nor so much as the Canonical Penance enjoyned by a Priest 6. Although there needs no treasure where nothing is discharged yet since so great a one is spoken of for this purpose wherein the satisfaction of Christ bears the greatest share it were worth the enquiring why the satisfaction of Christ might not as well remit the temporal punishment when the fault is remitted on the account of it as afterwards by Indulgences 7. How the parts of Christs satisfaction come to be divided into that which was necessary and that which was redundant so as the necessary satisfies for the fault and the redundant for the temporal punishment whether Christ did any more than God required whether any thing which God required can be said to be redundant if there be how one part comes to be applyed and the other cast into a treasure what parts can be made of an infinite and entire satisfaction and if so little were necessary and so much redundant how the least part comes to satisfie for the fault and eternal punishment and the greatest only for the temporal punishment 8. Whether all the satisfaction of Christ taken together were not great enough to remit the eternal punishment of the whole world if it were whether all the redundant parts of that be cast into a treasure too and who hath the keeping of it and what use is made of so much more useful a treasure than that which serves only to remit the temporal punishment What account can the Pope give of suffering so vast a part of the Churches Treasure to lye idle and make no use of it for the benefit of those that need it 9. May not the Pope if he thinks of it gather another mighty Treasure of the absolute Power of God which is never used as for making new worlds c may he not by the help of this deliver souls out of hell as well as by the other out of Purgatory and if this be so much the greater kindness he ought to think of it and imploy this treasure for these purposes Why may he not think of another treasure of the light of the Sun that is more than enough for the use of the world and to lay it up in store for the benefit of the purblind and Aged 10. If the satisfaction of Christ be so redundant how comes it not to be sufficient for so poor an end as Indulgences serve for but the satisfactions of the Saints must make up a share in this
for the possibility of salvation allowed to any in their Church is built upon the supposition that they have all that is fundamentally necessary in order to it though there are many dangerous errours and corruptions in that Church whose communion they live in § 16. The Answers to the first Question being thus vindicated there remains little to be added concerning the second For he tells me that he agrees so far with me that every Christian is bound to choose the communion of the purest Church But which that Church is must be seen by the grounds it brings to prove the doctrines it teaches to have been delivered by Christ and his Apostles And to be even with him I thus far agree with him in the way of proof of a Churches purity viz. by agreement with the doctrine of Christ and his Apostles and that that Church is to be judged purest which shews the greatest evidence of that consent and that every one is bound to enquire which Church hath the strongest Motives for it and to embrace the communion of it Being thus far agreed I must now enquire into what motives he offers on behalf of their Church and what method he prescribes for delivering ours For the former he produces a large Catalogue of Catholick Motives as he calls them in the words of Dr. Taylour Liberty of Prophecy Sect. 20. And I do not know a better way of answering them than in the words of the same eminent and learned Person which he uses upon a like occasion to his demonstrating Friend I. S. But now in my Conscience saith the Bishop this was unkindly done that when I had spoken for them what I could and more than I knew they had ever said for themselves and yet to save them harmless from the iron hands of a tyrant and unreasonable power to keep them from being persecuted for their errours and opinions that they should take the arms I had lent them for their defence and throw them at my head But the best of it is though I. S. be unthankful yet the Weapons themselves are but wooden Daggers intended only to represent how the poor men are couzened by themselves and that under fair and fraudulent pretences even pious well meaning men men wise enough in other things may be abused And though what I said was but tinsel and pretence imagery and whipt Cream yet I could not be blamed to use no better than the best their cause could bear yet if that be the best they have to say for themselves their probabilities will be soon out-ballanced by one Scripture-testimony urged by Protestants and thou shalt not Worship any graven Images will out-weigh all the best and fairest imaginations of their Church But then I. S. might if he had pleased have considered that I did not intend to make that harangue to represent that the Roman Religion had probabilities of being true but probabilities that the Religion might be tolerated or might be endured and if I was deceived it was but a well meant errour hereafter they shall speak for themselves only for their comfort this they might have also observed in that Book that there is not half so much excuse for the Papists as there is for the Anabaptists and yet it was but an excuse at the best But since from me saith he they borrow their light Armour which is not Pistol-proof from me if they please they may borrow a remedy to undeceive them and that in the same kind and way of arguing for which he referrs to a letter written by him to a Gentlewoman seduced to the Church of Rome out of which I shall transcribe so much as may over-ballance the probabilities produced elsewhere by him After directions given rather to enquire what her Religion is than what her Church is for that which is a true Religion to day will be so to morrow and for ever but that which is a holy Church to day may be Heretical at the next change or may betray her trust or obtrude new Articles in contradiction to the old c. and shewing the unreasonablness of believing the Roman to be the Catholick Church he descends thus to particulars You are now gone to a Church that protects it self by arts of subtlety and arms by violence and persecuting all that are not of their minds to a Church in which you are to be a subject of the King so long as it pleases the Pope In which you may be absolved from your Vows made to God your Oaths to the King your Promises to Men your Duty to your Parents in some cases a Church in which men Pray to God and to Saints in the same Form of words in which they Pray to God as you may see in the Offices of Saints and particularly of our Lady a Church in which men are taught by most of the principal Leaders to Worship Images with the same Worship with which they Worship God or Christ or him or her whose Image it is and in which they usually picture God the Father and the Holy Trinity to the great dishonour of that Sacred mystery against the doctrine and practice of the primitive Church against the express doctrine of Scripture against the honour of a divine Attribute I mean the immensity and spirituality of the divine nature You are gone to a Church that pretends to be infallible and yet is infinitely deceived in many particulars and yet endures no contradiction and is impatient her Children should enquire into any thing her Priests obtrude You are gone from receiving the whole Sacrament to receive it but half from Christs Institution to a human Invention from Scripture to uncertain Traditions and from ancient Tradition to new pretences from Prayers which ye understood to Prayers which ye understand not from confidence in God to rely upon Creatures from intire dependance upon inward-acts to a dangerous temptation of resting too much in outward ministeries in the external work of Sacraments and Sacramentals You are gone from a Church whose Worshipping is simple Christian and Apostolical to a Church where mens Consciences are loaden with a burden of Ceremonies greater than that in the dayes of the Jewish Religion for the Ceremonial of the Church of Rome is a great Book in Folio You are gone from a Church where you were exhorted to read the Word of God the Holy Scriptures from whence you sound instruction institution comfort reproof a treasure of all excellencies to a Church that seals up that Fountain from you and gives you drink by drops out of such Cisterns as they first make and then stain and then reach out and if it be told you that some men abuse Scripture it is true for if your Priests had not abused Scripture they could not thus have abused you but there is no necessity they should and you need not unless you list any more than you need to abuse the Sacrament or Decrees of the Church or the messages of your
l. 8. p. 381. P. 384. L. 5. p. 233. P. 238. I. 8 p 395. P. 402. P. 416. Serrar Litan 2 q. 32. p. 420. Ambros. in 1. Rom. To. 5. p. 174. Aug. de Civit. Dei l. 8. c. 14. 18. C. 21. L. 9. c. 15. L. 9. c. 23. The Worship of Angels condemned Col. 2. 18. Theod. in Coloss 2. 18. Baron An. 60. s. 20 21. Iren. l. 2. c. 57. Orig. c. Cels. l. 5. p. 233. P. 236. Conâ—il Laodic Can. 35. Aug. de civit Dei l. 10. c. 1. Aug. q. in Exod. q. 94. The common evasions answered Aug. de Civit Dei l. 10. c. 19. L. 10. c. 4. C. 6. Gen. 21. 33. 26. 25. Isa. 56. 7. Psal. 50. 8. 15. Bell. de Sanct. beat l. 1. c. 7. Aug. de Civit. Dei l. 9. c. 23. Of the practice of Invocation in the Church of Roms Brev. Rom. Antw. 1663. p 984. P. 911. Offic. parv B. Mariae p. 127. Brev. p. 224. Commun Apostol p. 2. 9. Bell. de Sanct. Beatit l. 1. c. 17. The difference between praying to Saints in Heaven and desiring men on Earth to pray for us Aâ—â—s 10. 25 26. Acts 14. 14 15. St. Austin no Friend to Invocation of Saints Aug. de Civit. Dei l. 20. c. 10. L. 8. 6. 27. Aug. de bapt c. Don. l. 7. c. 1. C. Faust. l. 20. c. 2. Calv. Instit. l. 3. c. 20. n. 22. Bell. de Beatit sanct l. 1. c. 16. De Morib Eccl. Cath. c. 34. Confess l. 10. cap. 42. Of Negative points of faith Of the Sacrament of Penâ—ance destroying the necessity of a good life 2 Cor. 7. 10. Dissâ—asive p. 1. ch â— p. 81. The doctrine of Purgatory takes away the care of a good life Sincerity of devotion hindered by prayers in an unknown Tongue Preface to the Polyglott Bible 1655. The languagâ— of prayer no mâ—tter of discipline 2 Cor 10. 8 1 Cor. 14. 20 23. V. 28. V. 26. V. 2 3 4 5 c. V. 14. No universal consent for prayers in â—n unknown tongue Orig. c. Col. l. 8. p 402. Cassandr consult art 24. Lyra 〈◊〉 1 Cor. 〈◊〉 Baron Tom. 10. A. 880. n. 16. Walafrid Strabo de reb Eccles. c. 7. Of their doctrine of the efficacy of Sacraments Gabr. Biel sup Canon Missâ—e lect 26. lit 6. Bell. de effecta Sacram l. 2. c. 1. Concil Trident Sess. 7. Can. 8. Can. 6. This proved to be 〈◊〉 doctrine of the Roman Church Cassand Consult art 24. Arnald de freq Commun prefat Sect. 2. Part. 3. c. 7. p. 554. The History of the Council of Trent l. 2. p. 237. Rituale Roman de Sacram ext Unct. Lutet Paris 1665. Of their discouraging the reading the Scriptures Index libror prohibit Alexand 7. Romae A. D 1665. The arguments against reading the Scriptures would have held against the publishing them in a language known to the People Psal. 119. 9. Psal. 19. 7. Orlandin hist. Societ Iesu l. 1. n. 17. Maffeius vit Ignat. l. 1. c. 3. The practice of the Roman Church herein directly contrary to that of the Primitive Church 2 Pet. 1. 19. Rom. 15. 4. 2 Tim 3. 15 16. Clement Epistol ad Corinth p. 58. P. 61. P. 68. Constit. Clement l. 1. c. 4. Ignat. ep ad Philadelph Polycarp Ep. ad Philipp p. 16. ed. Usser Clem. Alexandr Strom. 7. p. 728. Tertul. de anim c. 9. Origen Comment in Matthaeum p. 320. Comment in Ios. p. 27. Homil. in Levit. 9. Basil. in Psal. 1. Hieron prefat com in ep ad Ephes. S. Chrys. prefat in Epist. ad Rom. Consil. de stabiliendâ Rom. sede p. 6. Alphons à Castro advers haerâ— l 1. c. 13. Sixti Senens Biblioth l. 6. Annot. 152. Espencaeus in Tit. c. 2. p. 517. The unreasonableness of objecting Sects and Fanaticism to us as the effect of reading the Scriptures Fanaticism countenanced in the Roman Church Private Revelations pleaded for matters of doctrine Iucas Waddiâ—g us Legation de concept Virg. Mariae preâ—at Sect. 3. Tract 11. Sect. 1. n. 3. Baron not in Martyrolog Rom. 8. Decemb. Wadding l. c. Sect. 24. p. 35â— Revelationes S. Briâ—ittae Aâ—tw 1611. Breviâ—r Rom. â— Octobr. p. 1017. Brev. Rom. Apr. 30. p. 808. Raynald Annales Ecclesiast A. D. 1380. n. 25. Raynald ibâ— Bzov. Annales A. D. 1370. n. 20. Revelations contrary to each other approved by the Roman Church Del Rio disquis Mag. l. 4. c. 1. q. 3. Sect. 4. Ioh. Francis Picus Mirand de rerum praenot l. 9. c. 2. C. 4. Del Rio ib. Brigittae Revel l. 4. c. 13. Salmero in 1. ad Cor. 15. disp 27. Baron Annal A. D. 604. n. 59. Bell. de Purgat l. 2. c. 8. Bellarm. de Purg. l. 1. c. 7. Cressy's Church-History l. 20. c. 10. Biel in Canoâ— Missâ—e lect 51. Bellar. de Saâ—ram Euchar. l. 3. c. 8. Bell. de poenit l 3. cap. 12. Festivals appointed on tho credit of Revelations Legatio de Concept V. Mariae Sect. 3. n. 42. p. 371. Bullar Rom. Tom. 1. p. 147. Cherubini Apud Bzov. Annal. To. 13. A. D. 1230. n. 16. Breviar Roman 8. Maij p. 825. Revelations still owned by them 16 Revelations of divine love ch 49. p. 112. Ch. 5. p. 12. Ch. 46 p. 105. Ch. 9. p. 24. Ch. 56. p. 144. P. 145. Ch. 58 p. 151. The Monastick orders founded on Enthusiasm Bellar. de Pontif. Rom. l. 3. c. 18. Gregor Dial l. 2. Bollandi Acta Sanctorum Martii 21. not in vit Bened. c. 1. Cap. 4. C. 9. C. 12 13. C. 14 15. C. 16. C. 18 19. C. 34. C. 35. Possevin A par v. S. Benedict Aquin. Sum. 2. 2. qu. 180. art 5â— ad 3. Vasquez in 1 a. d'sp 56. n. 5. Joh. 1. 18. ChronicoN Monast. Cassiaens p. 65. Lut. Paris 1668. Ioh. Bona de divinâ Psalmodia cap. 18. s. 3. Petr. Damiani vit S. Romoaldi cap. 4. Cap. 7. Cap. 16. Cap. 17. C. 2. C. 14. C. 31. Andreas Mugnotius de Eremo Camaldulensi lib. 1. Pet. Damiani vit S. Romualdi c. 50. Launoy de verâ causâ seccssus Brunonis in Eremâ—m c. â— p. 165. Launoy ib. p. 32 69 71 c. Launoy dâ— viso Simoâ—is Stockii cap. 1. The Franciscan and Dominican Orders founded in Fanatisism Rainald Annal. Eccles. A. D. 1215. n. 17. Bonavent vit Francisci c. 3. Sect. 8. Sedulius in Elogiis S. Franc. Bernard a Bustis Rosar p. 2. serm 27. Sedul 16. Iac. de Vitriaco Hist. Occident c. 32. Rainald A. 1219. n. 14. Bonav vit Francis c. 2. Cap. 1. sect 6. Cap. 2. sect 1. Sect. 2. Sect. 4. Brev. Roman 4. Octob Lect. 4. Cap. 3. sect 1. Sect. 2. Sect. 3. Sect. 5. Sect. 7. Possevin Appar v. Franciscus Brigittae Revel l. 7. c. 20 p. 559 Col. 1. Raâ—nald A. D. 1216. n. 48. Wolfii Lection Memorab cent 13. p. 509. The blasphemous Enthusiasm of the Meadicant Fryers Naucâ—ur Chronogr Vol. 2. Gen. 40. p. 900. Spondani Angales Eccles. A. D. 1204. n