or shall your Wonder-working Priest give you an entrance into Heaven when the express Declarations of Christ Jesus exclude you thence No wonder that Papists have their Priests in such high esteem and Veneration no marvel they declare they cannot live without them when they are endued with such an Omnipotency as to change the setled order of things to alter the Decrees of Heaven and cancel the fixed Laws of life and death by shutting them out of the presence of God whom Christ Jesus is ready to receive and intromitting others that he has declared shall be for ever banished thence But be not deceived God is not mocked for whatever a man sows that shall he also reap He that soweth to the flesh shall of the flesh reap corruption but he that soweth to the spirit shall of the spirit reap life everlasting 6. Hitherto in general I have shewed the opposition of the Popish Doctrines to the Grand End and Purpose of God in the Gospel I shall now descend to the particulars afore-mentioned the first of which was this that in order to the replantation of the Divine Nature in the souls of men Almighty God designed the utter extirpation of Idolatry Now though the Church of Rome endeavours by many fine shows and specious pretences to free her self from the imputation of so foul and horrid a Crime yet he that impartially weighs things shall find her no less guilty than was the Pagan World before the coming of Christ And if this do not evidently appear to every candid and ingenious Reader I am well assured that 't is not from the weakness or inconclusiveness of the Arguments but from some partial and preconceived Opinion or some other prejudice his mind labours under and is prepossessed and preingaged withal for this I do confidently affirm that there is no truth of greater usefulness and concernment to Reformed Christendom nor any that can more clearly and irrefragably justifie the necessity of our separation from that Church than this That I may therefore make a clear and demonstrative proof of this Charge which I have laid against the Romish Church I must a little recur to what I have said of the Pagan Idolatry which mainly consisted in these two things 1. In that they worshipped besides one Supreme God other Inferiour Beings not as independent and self-existent but as so many created Deities and these were worshipped by them upon these two accounts either as thinking that the honour done to them redounded to the Supreme or else that they might be their Mediators and Intercessors Orators and Negotiators with him 2. In that they worshipped both the supreme God and likewise their subordinate Deities in Images and Statues This Foundation being laid it will be no difficult task to draw the parallel between the ancient Paganish Idolatry and that now practised in the Church of Rome That the Saints and Angels are worshipped both publickly and privately in the Romish Church needs no other testimony than the daily practice of Papists who express a greater fervour and zeal in their Invocation of the Saints than of God himself so that as a learned Person observes Sir Edwin Sands Europ Spec. for one prayer to God they put up ten to the Virgin Mary Nay so mad are they after this extravagant humour that Cassander ingeniously confesses that some and those no bad men have made choice of some certain Saints as their Patrons and place their trust and confidence in their Merits and Intercessions more than in the Merits of Christ Cassand Consult do Invoc Sanct. and so laying aside the Mediation of Christ they have substituted the Saints and especially the Virgin Mary in his room And hence Cardinal Hosius is not ashamed to say We ought to believe in the Saints They build Temples and Altars to the Saints and prostrate themselves with the most humble devotion before their Images They swear by the Saints not only in their common speech but in their more solemn Oaths and to them they direct their Vows likewise Now upon the same accounts that the Pagans worshipped their inferiour Deities do the Papists adore and worship the Saints and Angels 1. Because the honour done to them redounds to God himself It is for the Majesty and Grandeur of the supreme God to have a multitude of inferiour Deities under him says Plotinus It is not only suitable with the bountiful and noble disposition of God not to grant many graces and favours but by the Intercession of the Saints but likewise for his glory that the world should know this Answer to certain Questions propounded by King James says Fisher the Jesuit which he further illustrates by this similitude because says he 't is impossible to honour and praise the Boughs without honouring and praising the Root therefore when the Saints and Angels are invocated and adored it is for the honour of the supreme God the Root and Spring of all things 2. They make them Mediators and Intercessors between God and them which was the office and imployment of the Mediae Potestates or middle Deities of the Heathen and the ground or reason of this is given by S. Austin because they excel us Mortals in Merits De Civ Dei lib. 8. c. 22. And that the Papists urge the Merits of their Saints is evident from divers of their publick forms of prayer The Saints are in high grace and favour with God and for this reason we poor Mortals implore their Intercession say the Romanists as we make use of a Courtier to deliver a Petition to an Earthly Prince After this manner Celsus argues when he would perswade the Christians to the worship of Daemons that they ought to seek their favour as the Ministers of the Great God To whom Origen replies Origen contr Celsum l. 8. that the Christians allow indeed an honour and reverence to the blessed Angels as Gods Ministers in a sound sense but they are taught to give Religious Worship only to God and to his Son his Word and Image by whom they offer up their Supplications to God the Lord of all beseeching him who is the Propitiation for our sins that he would be pleased as our High-Priest to offer up our Prayers and Sacrifices and Intercessions to the great God And again God alone is to be adored and our Prayers are only to be offered to the only begotten Word of God the First-born of every Creature who as our High-Priest offers our Supplications to his God and our God to his Father and the Father of all those that live according to his Word But if the favour of many be to be sought for we learn from the Scriptures that thousand thousands minister unto him and ten thousand times ten thousand stand before him who afford their friendly assistance to those that humbly invoke the Supreme God and earnestly contend after Salvation disdaining not to be officious to them that worship the same God with themselves For as the
of the Pagan Theology First that there is one Self-originated Deity who was the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or Maker of the whole VVorld Secondly That there are besides him other Gods also to be religiously worshipped that is Intellectual Beings superiour to Men which were notwithstanding all made or created by that one To the Supreme God they gave the highest worship but to those subordinate Deities they gave a lesser or inferiour kind of religious worship that is they adored and worshipped the Supreme God as the first Cause and Original of all things but their inferiour Deities as Mediators and Intercessors for them with the Supreme Numen And where I pray lies the difference now between the Papist and the Pagan save that the Dii Medioxumi of the Heathens are changed into Saints and Angels by the Papists And if it be said that the Pagans substituted these Subordinate Gods in the room of the Supreme God and worshipped them above or more than him I shall readily grant it and do likewise affirm the same of the Papists who by giving religious worship to Saints and Angels do really substitute them in the place of the true God and worship them above or more than him for so Sir Edwin Sands tells us that for one Prayer put up to God Europ spec there are ten offered to the Virgin Mary So that the Church of Rome are not so much the worshippers of the Man Christ Jesus as of the VVoman his Mother But that the Pagans did so worship their inferiour Deities as wholly to pass by and neglect the Supreme I utterly deny To the second I say That it is true the Saints and Martyrs are worthy of some regard and veneration but not of religious worship which to give them is down-right Idolatry but the honour and reverence which we pay to the Saints departed consists 1. In making an honourable mention of their Names as being great and glorious Lights in their times 2. in setting before our Eyes their Virtues and praying to God to give us Grace to follow their good Examples that with them we may be partakers of his Heavenly Kingdom And whereas 't is said that it was ridiculous in the Heathen to worship the Stars that have neither sense nor reason I find them utterly disclaiming this latter part forasmuch as they looked upon all the World and the several parts thereof to be animated at least with one great Soul and they that worshipped the Sun did not do it as supposing the Sun to be nothing but a dead and lifeless thing but as animated with some Intellectual Being For to deny the Worlds Animation and to be an Atheist or to deny a God was looked upon by them as one and the same thing because all the Pagans who asserted Providence held the World also to be animated and Epicurus denyed the Worlds Animation upon no other Reason but because he Atheistically endeavoured to exclude a Providence And though the Poets have introduced many absurd and impure Fables into their Religion concerning Jupiter yet certain it is that by Jupiter the Heathens understood the Supreme God the true Etymon of Jupiter being not Juvans Pater a helping Father as Cicero would have it but Jovis Pater Jove the Father of Gods and Men which Jovis is the very Hebrew Tetragrammaton only altered by a Latin Termination And Jupiter Pluto See Dr. Cudworth Intellect Syst l. 1. c. 4. p. 451. Neptune Juno Minerva c. in the Pagan Theology are nothing but the Polyonymy of one and the same Supreme Being in the various actings and manifestations of himself in the several things and parts of the world But if Jupiter were an impious King and the Heathens worshipped him after his death I do not doubt but to find many such Saints in the Roman Calendar Lastly for the Demons worshipped by the Pagans it is evident they looked upon them under another notion and did not conceive them to be haters of God and Virtue but Mediators and Intercessors and such who did negotiate Affairs between Mortals and the Supreme God So that this Argument like the former proceeding upon a false supposition leaves no other difference but what arises from the change of names between Papist and Pagan but the Popish Saints are exactly like the Demons of the Heathen To the third which extenuates the errour of Papists in their Invocation of Saints because they ascribe the Omniscience of the Saints whereby they hear their Suppliants throughout all the World to God as his gift I reply that the same may be said of the subordinate Gods of the Heathens who were altogether as Omniscient as the Romish Saints Nor did the Pagans ever look upon their Middle Gods as so many particular independent and self-originated Beings but were acknowledged to be the Creatures of the Supreme God and made by him what they were fancied to be by their Devotionists and all the honour conferred upon these subordinate Deities was judged by the Pagans to redound to the Supreme 7. Having now dispatched the first part wherein I affirmed the Pagan Polytheism and Idolatry to consist namely in worshipping many inferiour created Deities together with the Supreme God and drawn the Parallel fully and exactly between this Heathenish worship and that now practised in the Church of Rome I shall with the same clearness and evidence demonstrate the second Part viz. that Papists do egregiously Paganize in worshipping both the Supreme God and their other Inferiour Deities in Images and Statues And let not any man be mistaken and think that because Papists do not call Angels and the Souls of men departed Gods or Inferiour Deities but Saints that therefore the case is quite different between them and the Pagans for by giving Religious worship to them they do for that very reason make them Gods whether they call them so or not for neither did the Heathens believe their inferiour Deities to be so many self-existent and independent but created Beings made by the Supreme God but by performing Religious worship to them they made them Gods so far as any Creature can be made a God and upon this account they are called Gods in Scripture so that I cannot free the Romish Church from Polytheism and Idolatry any more than the Pagan VVorld who by all Christian VVriters has been justly branded with that heynous Impiety That the Pagans worshipped the Supreme God and likewise their subordinate Deities in Images and Statues I think is so evident as not to be denied however I shall offer something towards the proof of it And first that the Heathens worshipped the true God the Creator of Heaven and Earth in an Image appears from the story of the Inhabitants of Thebais who worshipped the Maker of VVorld under the name of Cneph in an Image or Statue of humane form and a blackish sky-coloured complexion holding in his hand a Girdle and a Scepter and wearing upon his head a Princely Plume and
Shadow follows the Body as it moves so when any person hath God propitious to him at the same time all the Angels and blessed Spirits are likewise his Friends In like manner Lactantius says that God hath his Ministers whom we call Angels verum hi neque Dii sunt neque Deos se vocari aut coli volunt quippe qui nihil praeter jussum ac voluntatem Dei fatiant i. e. but these are neither Gods nor would they be called Gods nor worshipped forasmuch as they only execute the Will and Command of God Add to this that the Papists make their Saints particular Presidents and Regents of Countries Cities Religious Orders of Beasts and of the Elements Fire Water c. and appoint to them distinctly and by name several Opitulations So Caecilius in Minutius Felix says of the Heathens that each particular Nation had its own Municipal Gods which they worshipped And Arnobius tells the Gentiles Lib. 2. adver Gentes that with them Dii certi certas habent tutelas licentias potestates neque eorum ab aliquo id quod ejus non sit potestatis ac licentiae postulant i. e. Certain Gods have certain Guardianships Licences and Powers neither do they ask from any of them that which is not in their power and gift Accordingly the Papists have distributed several Offices to several Saints whose assistance they implore for those particular things to which they are appointed as for example S. Apollonia for the Tooth-ach S. Otilia for Bleer-Eyes S. Rochus for the Pox S. Blasius for the Squinancy S. Petronella for Feavers S. Wendeline for Sheep and Oxen S. Anthony for Hogs S. Nicholas is the Patron of Mariners S. Clement of Bakers S. Luke of Painters and S. Afra and Magdalen of Whores For S. Austin says that Varro maintained C. D. l. 4. c. 22. it was profitable to know the power and working of every God in particular that men might be able to sue unto them according to their several Offices for every distinct or particular benefit lest otherwise they might ask water of Bacchus the God of Wine or Wine of the Nymphs the Goddesses of the Water And this is so plain and evident that it could not but extort this honest Confession from Ludovicus Vives one of their own In Com. C. D. l. 8. c. 27. Multi Christiani c. Many Christians err in a good matter in that they worship He and She-Saints after the same manner that they worship God nor can I see in many things what difference there is between their Opinion of the Saints and that which the Heathens thought of their Gods For what other account did the Pagans make or in what did they do honour to their inferiour Deities which Papists do not express to their Saints Did the Pagans consecrate Temples to their Demons so do the Papists to their Saints Do they appropriate several offices and imployments to their inferiour Gods the same do Papists to their Saints Have they Altars built to them so have the Saints Do the Heathens offer Sacrifice to their Deities so do Romanists to the Saints Had they Images erected to them so have the Saints Were the Demons invoked before their Images so are the Saints Did they make Vows to the Demons so do Papists to their Saints Do they make those Middle Powers Mediators and Intercessors between the Supreme God and them it is no more than what Papists ascribe to the Saints Now what these Mediae Potestates or Middle Powers were we learn from Apuleius that they are inter terricolas De Deo Socratis calicolasque Vectores hinc precum inde donorum qui ultro citroque portant hinc petitiones inde suppetias ceu quidam utrinque Interpretes Salutigeri i. e. a kind of Carriers between the Inhabitants of Heaven and Earth that travelling to and fro carry from hence Prayers and bring from thence Blessings from hence Requests and Petitions from thence supplies and aids or a certain kind of Interpreters or Messengers and Internuncii between both And 't is a great sign that the more understanding Papists were long ago sensible of this because in their Expurgatory Indices they take special care that such expressions as these should be blotted and razed out of those Authors that speak against their wicked Practices viz. that God alone is to be adored that the Saints are to be honoured but not Religiously worshipped that Angels are not to be honoured with Religious Worship And because when Protestants cite such notoriously blasphemous and idolatrous forms of prayer allowed in the Popish Church wherein they beg of their Saints and especially of the Virgin Mary no less Boons than remission of sins preservation from the assaults of the Devil a safe conduct through the hazards of the World to eternal life comfort and assistance at the hour of death and the possession of Eternal Glory in the life to come The Vulgar Papists amongst us are taught that these forms of prayer are no more than an Ora pro nobis and all one as to say Holy Apostle or Blessed Lady pray for us which yet is Idolatry it is certain that many of them are made in other expressions and likewise are direct Addresses to such and such Saints upon account of what is peculiar for them to help them in The prayer to S. Agnes is not Ora pro nobis but te exoro precibus I pray you to keep me in the right Faith or grant you that all may serve God in perfect charity And the prayer to S. Brigit is By your safe guidance bring us to the reward of everlasting life Can any man in his right senses say that this is no more then O Brigit pray for us The Belgick Expurgatory Index commands these words to be razed out of Fabricius which are not much unlike this subterfuge of our Jesuits O all ye Saints pray to God for me is all one as to say I wish all the Saints would pray to God for me adding this reason for in very deed we invoke the Saints not only wishing but requiring their prayers which cannot be excused from Idolatry The account which Chemnitius gives of the Introduction of this piece of Paganism into the Christian Church is to this purpose That in the Primitive Church until two hundred years after Christ Exam. Concil Trident. p. 3. this Doctrine and Practice was utterly unknown then about the year 370. it began to be spoken of in Publick Assemblies by Basil Nyssen and Nazianzen upon occasion of their Panegyrical Orations at the same time when by the same Persons Monkery was brought out of Egypt and Syria into Greece But notwithstanding this it was not generally and universally received in those times for about the year 400. S. Chrysostom interposed and laboured against it Afterwards he shews out of Nicephorus that Petrus Gnapheus condemned for Heresie in the fifth Universal Synod was the first Author among the Grecians of mixing
Intercessions to the Virgin Mary with Divine Prayers And moreover that in S. Austin's days Invocation of Saints was not used in the common Service of the Western Church but that it was brought in about the time of Pope Gregory the First Nor can this Paganish Idolatry be palliated and excused by that poor Subterfuge of distinguishing religious worship into Latria and Dulia the first of which is proper only to God the other to Creatures that is to Saints and Angels First because the true Object of religious worship is but one for God is one and therefore whatever Creature is worshipped with religious worship though inferiour to that which is given to the Supreme God is ipso facto by this made a God so far as it is possible for a Creature to be made a God 2. The words Latria and Dulia are promiscuously used in Scripture to denote the worship due to God alone as 1 Thes 1.9 Ye turned to God from Idols 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to serve the living and true God VVhich had been a Derogation if the Apostle had used a word that had signified any thing less than Divine worship I shall conclude this Particular with a Passage which I find cited out of Athanasius his fourth Oration against the Arrians 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. Why therefore do not these Arrians holding this reckon themselves amongst the Pagans or Gentiles since they do in like manner worship the Creature besides the Creator For though the Pagans worship one uncreated and many created Gods but these Arrians only one uncreated and one created to wit the Son or VVord of God yet will not this make any real difference betwixt them because the Arrians one created is one of those many Pagan Gods and those many Gods of the Pagans or Gentiles have the same nature with this one they being alike Creatures Wherefore these wretched Arrians are Apostates from the truth of Christianity they betraying Christ more than the Jews did and wallowing or tumbling in the filth of Pagan Idolatry worshipping Creatures and different kinds of Gods In which Passage of this Father these things are observable 1. That the Arrians are charged with Pagan Idolatry in the same words which St. Paul used against the Heathens That they did worship the Creature besides or in the room of the Creator for the Arrians constantly declared that they gave less worship to Christ the Son or Word of God he being by them accounted but a Creature than they did to the Father the Creator 2. That the Pagan Polytheism and Idolatry consisted in worshiping one only uncreated and independent and many created Gods 3. That the worship of the true God is not enough to excuse from Idolatry if any Creature be worshipped with religious worship together with him for then the Pagans cannot be charged with the guilt of Idolatry 4. That the Fathers of the Nicene Council if we may credit Athanasius affirmed that to give religious worship to any created Being whatsoever though inferiour to that worship which is given to the Supreme God is absolutely Idolatry and therefore the distinction of religious worship into Latria and Dulia as it was perfectly unknown to them so was it invented of late meerly to palliate and hide the odious Turpitude of Pagan Idolatry Because it is certain that the Arrians gave much an inferiour worship to Christ the Son or Word of God whom they contended to be a meer Creature made in time mutable and defectible than they did to that eternal God who was the Creator of him Now if the Arrians who zealously contended for the Unity of the God-head were nevertheless by those Fathers condemned as guilty of Pagan Idolatry for bestowing but an inferiour kind of religious worship upon Christ the Son or Word of God himself as he was supposed by them to be a Creature then certainly cannot Papists be excused from that guilt who bestow religious worship upon these other Creatures Angels and Souls of Men though inferiour to what they give to the Supreme Omnipotent God the Creator of all Because the Son or Word of God however conceived by these Arrians to be a Creature yet was looked upon by them as the first the most glorious and excellent of all Creatures and that by which as an Instrument all other Creatures as Angels and Souls were made And therefore if it were Idolatry in them to give an inferiour kind of religious worship to this Son and Word of God himself according to their Hypothesis then can it not possibly be accounted less to bestow the same upon those other Creatures made by him as Angels and Men deceased I confess there are many Pious and Learned Men both of our own and other Nations who cannot be induced to believe that the Romanists are Paganically Idolatrous in this Particular The Grounds and Reasons of this their Dissent seem to be these three especially which are laid down by Curcellaeus 1. In the Romish Church saith he the one Supreme God the Maker In Epist ad Adrian Tatium and Governour of Heaven and Earth is acknowledged and adored and the Saints are worshipped with an inferiour degree of honour as the Friends of God and such as are in great favour with him But the Pagans were ignorant of the true God and substituted the Sun and Moon the Souls of dead Men and Daemons in his place and worshipped them as Gods 2. There is no doubt but the Saints and Martyrs whom the Roman Catholicks worship are worthy of some veneration of the Mind for their excellent Virtues and constancy in Persecutions But to worship the Stars that have neither sense nor reason is ridiculous And no honour can be due to the Memory of Impious and Flagitious Kings such as Jupiter was And as for Daemons they ought to be detested by all good Men as haters of God and Virtue 3. The Romanists indeed attribute to their Saints a knowledge in some sense and measure Divine by which they hear our Prayers and take notice of our wants and necessities although the Scripture deny all such knowledge to the Dead as Eccles 9.5 6. Job 14.21 But this doth somewhat lessen their Errour that they profess that the Saints have not this knowledge of themselves but from the Gift of God But now the Heathens err inexcusably while they ascribe to their false Gods an independent Knowledge and Power which is only competible to the Supreme God Thus far Curcellaeus To which I reply To the first That it is a vulgar Errour to suppose the Pagans ignorant of the true God or that they did not worship the Supreme God the Maker of Heaven and Earth as not only appears from the Texts of Scripture cited already but is clearly and evidently demonstrated by a Person of singular Learning Dr. Cudworth's true Intellectual System of the Vniverse l. 1. c. 4. p. 462. who from Plutarch Heraiscus Asclepiades and others affirm these two to be Fundamental Points