those indirect means which other solicitations of men tending to the like purchase are capable of All this being so how can you defend at least from blindness and imprudence your practice of more frequent recourse to your supposed Saints then to the supreme undoubted Saint of Saints Jesus Christ Not to treat at present how much this doctrine of the Invocation of Saints is in it self injurious to God by giving that worship to Creatures which belongs only to himself as may appear by all those places of Scripture which appropriate our Invocation to God only in regard of his incommunicable Attributes of Omniscience infinite goodness and power nor how dishonorable it is to Christ both in regard of his infinite merit and office of Mediator And finally the silence of such a practice in the first and better Ages of the Church so as Cardinal Perron confesses that in the Authors who lived nearer the Apostles times in the three first Centuries no foot-steps can be found of the Invocation of Saints this silence I say is a sufficient Argument of the unlawfulness of this practice how unsuitable it is to the spirit of the Apostles Origen is not only silent of such a practice but directly protests against it in several places assirming that Praiers and Supplications are to be directed only to God by Jesus Christ For being inquired by Celsus what opinion Christians had of Angels he answers That tho the Scripture somtime calls them Gods it is not with intention that we ought to worship them For all â—raiers and Supplications saies he and Intercession and Thanksgiving are to be sent up to the Lord of all by the high Priest who is above all Angels being the living word of God And reflecting often upon the unreasonableness of making addresses to Angels by reason of the little knowledg we have of their condition he adds That even such a knowledg if we were furnished with it * Origen contra Celsum lib. 5. p. 233. Edit Cantab. would not permit us to presume to pray unto any other but God the Lord of of all who is abundantly sufficient for all by our Saviour the Son of God And after he declares how Angels and Saints may assist us and pray for us to God if we be in the favor of God and do endeavor to please him We must endeavor to please God only saies he who is over all and pray that he may be propitious to us procuring his good will with piety and all kind of virtue And reflecting upon Celsus his proposal of worshipping Demons or Angels he addeth these remarkable words †Lib. 8. pag. 120. But if he will yet have us to procure the good will of any other after him that is God over all let him consider that as when the body is moved the motion of the shadow doth follow it so in like manner having God favorable to us who is over all it followeth that we shall have all his friends both Angels and Souls and Spirits favorable to us for they have a sympathy with them that are thought worthy to find favor with God ....... so as we may be bold to say that when men who with a resolution propose to themselves the best things do pray unto God many thousands of the sacred powers pray together with them uncalled upon Here and in other such Testimonies of Origen and others of his time we find mention of Angels and Saints to pray for men and to help them by Gods appointment but we find no mention at all of such a thing as an Invocation of them He saies they pray together with us when we pray to God himself and that not because we prai'd first to them to pray with us but uncalled upon Here we have the Spirit of that Church truly Catholic and Apostolic declared to us that we are to make our Addresses of Praiers and Invocations to God alone and thereby win the assistance and praiers of heavenly Spirits in our favor For as all the world shall fight with him against the unwise sinners so all the Court of Heaven will assist their King in favoring his Saints and Servants CHAP. XXV A great stock of Faults and Absurdities discovered in Mr. I. S. his defence of Purgatory SIR as you shew your special study to be to soure your Pen with all manner of sawciness even without occasion given to you and starting often from the point and purpose for to pleasure your self in the Sea of bitterness so it is my no small care and certainly a harder task then to answer your Arguments to refrain my Pen from pouring upon you continual showers of heavy Censures whether reflecting upon your boldness in asserting manifest untruths or upon your rudeness or malice in mis-understanding or mis-representing the state and terms of the Question in every point of my Discourse you pretend to answer or shunning shamefully or childishly the point and purpose and proposing another of your own instead of answering as Schole-boies do with riddles or hard questions as they call them when they want an answer to one of them they return for answer another of that kind of Questions Of all these faults I could easily convince you guilty in every point you handled from the beginning of your Book to the end I have abstained from doing it in formal reflexions tho in my replies faced with your Proposals the discreet Reader may easily see your foresaid faults really contained out of my aversion to offensive expressions and because I fear to offend my friends and Patrons on this side as you hope to please yours by bitter Language But when you tell palpable untruths shall I desert the defence of truth not to make you a liar when you clearly abandon the question proposed and misrepresent the case or misunderstand it shall I desist in my serious and close enquiry of the truth not to discover your ignorance and weakness So much complacency you are not to expect from me and by shewing you are guilty of all these faults in your reply to my discourse upon the point of Purgatory you will perceive I have bin indulgent to you in not enlarging upon a formal discovery of them in all the points hitherto treated upon among us Now to the proof of so much I begun my Discourse upon the point of Purgatory with the method and order that exact Disputants are wont to observe in handling seriously any subject First examining what we are to understand under the notion of Purgatory Seeondly whether such a thing be really extant As to the first I told how I did not find the more learned Men of the Roman Church so confident as the Vulgar in taking for Purgatory a determinate place in the bowels of the Earth with those frightful qualities their Legends do specify being contented to conclude from some places of Scripture by conjecture that after this life there must be some place to expiate sins without determining whether
TRUE CATHOLIC AND APOSTOLIC FAITH maintain'd in the CHURCH of ENGLAND By ANDREW SALL Doctor in Divinity Being A Reply to several Books published under the names of J.E. N.N. and J.S. against his Declaration for the Church of England and against the motives for his Separation from the Roman Church declared in a Printed Sermon which he Preached in Dublin Psal 27. v. 1. One thing have I desired of the Lord that will I seek after that I may dwell in the house of the Lord all the daies of my life to behold the beauty of the Lord and to enquire in his Temple Printed at the Theater in OXFORD 1676. IMPRIMATUR RAD. BATHVRST Vice-Can Oxon. June 23. 1676. To his EXCELLENCY The most Honorable Arthur Earle of Essex Viscount Malden Baron Capel of Hadham Lord Lieutenant General and General Governor of his Majesties Kingdom of Ireland Lord Lieutenant of the County of Hertford and one of the Lords of his Majesties most Honorable Privy Council My LORD HERE I present to your Excellency a defence of the true primitive and Catholic Apostolic Faith maintained and professed in the Church of England against the assaults of Adversaries so bold â—s to present the venem they spit against it one of them to a most Illustrious person of the Court of England another to the generality of the people and a third to your Excellency representative of our Gracious Soveraign in Ireland This last in a mockery like that of Judas betraying our Saviour with a kiss while he endeavours to bereave your Excellency of the life of your soul telling you that * I. S. pag. 140. and 304. the Church of England your Mother is not the Church of Christ nor any part of it that no Saint which is to say no just man or true servant of God was ever of it that you cannot without Blasphemy alledg Scripture for your Tenets with other like most insolent opprobries He stiles himself your Excellencies most humble and faithful servant He would have your Excellency burn the defenders of your Church for offering to deny that we are all confessedly Schismatics When our Adversaries are so bold and active it is much our concern to watch and stand on our guard I should prove undeserving the Gracious protection and favour I have from your Excellency enabling me to appear for truth if in this Exigency I did desert the defence of it I will therefore bâ— Gods Holy assistance betake me to the arms oâ— his Holy word to resist the insulting and detect the fraud of subtil and violent adversaries of the true Catholic Faith appearing under the veil of defenders of it and endeavor to shew with unfaigned plain and solid proofs that the Faith we profess in the reformed Church of England in which many other Illustrious nations join with us is the true primitive Catholic Apostolic faith which our Savior Jesus and his sacred Apostles taught and established on earth that our adversaries branding us with Heresy and Schism are themselves the prime cause of all the schisms and confusions which too long have vexed Christianity and are guilty of as many Heresies as Articles coined by them in after ages which I hope we shall prove to be opposit both to Canonical Scripture and to the Doctrin and practice of the Primitive Catholic and Apostolic Church In which opposition certainly the true nature of Heresy doth consist however they to their own advantage would make men believe that the Popes pleasure and decrees must be the rule of all and nothing Heresy but what is opposit to them His pretended Infallibility Supremacy Vice-Godship and such like big sounding Titles but emty as here will appear have frighted a great part of men to becom slaves unto him The invention of Purgatory indulgences remissions and other engines of lucre have increased his means to maintain his usurped power My work will be to shew with plainess of reasons suitable to the sincerity of my intention and apposit to overthrow their sophistry that the forementioned tenets of the Romish faction fewel of all the Combustions of Christendom are not from above conveied by the Holy Ghost but conceived in the mints of earthly passions for the wisdom that is from above is first pure then peaceable gentle and easy to be intreated full of mercy and good fruits without partiality and without Hypocrisy Jam. 3.17 Such is not the wisdom taught by the Roman Court or Church if they will have it so called It is not pure but corrupted with many pernicious errors as will appear in this Treatise It is not peaceable but contentious not easy to be intreated but obstinat against all reasonable overtures of peace against the continual and ardent desire of all good Christians for a Council truly Occumenical and free wherein the Roman Bishop and faction as others may sit with like freedom and indifferency to judg and to be judged by the â—ord of God and rules of Christian sincerity as practised in those purer ages of primitive Christianity Nothing will satisfy them but a blind obedience and entire submission to their will Far are they from being full of Mercy their thoughts are not of peace but of death and destruction to all their fellow Christians that will not be of their party All this I shall endeavor to demonstrate by a close and serious Examen of the particulars conducing to the discovery thereof with no other design then the Glory of God with no prejudice or Passion against the Roman Church but with a hearty desire of the happiness of it that setting aside all profane policy it may return to that primitive purity and lustre it had when the Faith of it was praised throughout the whole World Rom. 1.8 and so join heart and hands with other Christians to the Edification and thereby to to the Conversion of Infidels and to the encrease and splendor of Christianity This being my real intention as well as the hearty wishes of all good men in the reformed Churches sure I am that my study and endeavors to this end will be protected and countenanced by your Exellency Whose happiness Eternal and Temporal is the hearty and continual Prayer of Your Excellencies most Devoted Servant and Chaplain ANDREW SALL THE PREFACE SAINT John tells us that all the world lieth in wickedness 1 Jo. c. 5. v. 19. that hatred envy malice avarice and ambition are the most common â—actice of men If so who can expect a general apâ—ause of his actions exposed to public view What â—eed tho in it self just and commendâ—ble did ever â—â—ease a bitter enemy What elegancy of speech what â—â—rength of reasons could ever sound well in the ears of â—im whose cause they opposed And if envy reignâ—â—th could that black passion ever omit to lessen â—he credit of such as were applauded But if others â—retend to be wits now called so it is not for them â—o let any action pass without a Censure or without â—inding in it a
now in use the Pope chargeth every living in his gift with a pension more or less ordinarily it amounts to half of the whole value of the benefice if but a third part 't is held easy and favourable but sometimes it extends to two parts of the whole divided into three which don he provides by an other ordination that by present payment of five years profit the pension shall be exringuished Now when by this concourse and comparison of competitors they have found which of them is best able to buy it on him presently it 's conferr'd so not the worthiest but the wealthiest carries it and thus are all the Popes livings bestow'd at Rome Now he that comes thus to a benefice by paying down five years pension before hand buyes it full dear for he paies for it at the rate of 30. in the 100. over and besides his personal service For the clearing of this point Suppose a benefice worth 300 Crowns a year this is sure to be charged being so great a Living with a pension of the largest size namely some 200 that so one 100 may be left to the Incumbent he then that comes to it in this manner pays down a 1000 Crowns for the pension and an 100 more for writing and seal of his Bulls and for expedition and so all laid together he buys his living of 300 at the rate of 30. for the hundred besides his personal service and cure of Souls Moreover whereas in the Council of Trent certain Simoniacal tricks and devices called regressus expectatives are flatly forbidden the Pope to delude the Councils decree grants coadjutorships with assurance of future succession after his Death to whom he is made coadjutor but makes them pay one years profit for the expediting and dispatch of their Bulls Now these coadjutorships are the very same and tend to the very same end even to bring in by hook and crook sums of mony for by these pensions and buying out of pensions this Pope has scraped up twenty hundred thousand Scutes all which he has bestowed in buying lands for his Nephew He bought of Sarelly a goodly large territory called Rignanum near unto Rome at the price of 353000 Scutes The City of Sulmona in the Kingdom of Naples he bought of the King of Spain and gave for the same the summ of 150000 Scutes He purchased those goodly demains called the four Casalia within the territories of the City of Rome which cost no less then 700000 Scutes In the mountanous Countries belonging to the City which are commonly at six in the hundred he made a purchase that stood him in 400000 Scutes He has built a palace and called it after his own name the palace of Burghesius upon the Fabric whereof he has bestowed 300000. He has so enriched the Cardinal Burghesius his Nephew in private Stock and wealth that his very moveables are esteemed worth 600000 Scutes Good God what a mighty wealth is here and I appeal to any that knows the Court of Rome if this could be got together by any means into the Popes own Coffers and private purse but only out of that office of the benefices called the Datary Therefore this one demonstration is presumtion sufficient enough to prove his foul and detestable Simony seeing it is certain that the whole name and bloud of the Burghesies were but of a mean estate nay many of them are known to have run out of their livings and to be little better then bankrupt when this man got the Popedom Hitherto the words of the foresaid Author who promised to justify all that he had said to be true out of the Authentical Books Records and writings extant in Rome and that out of the Register of the Popes Bulls it shall appear to whom each benefice has been given and with what pension they were charged Of all which the Spanish Nation can give a large testimony for many of them dealing in businesses of benefices at Rome have transacted them in this manner The conclusion of all before said is that if Simoniacal contracts do annul the election of a Pope and the same crime committed after his election depriveth him of all right to that place and calling if all Cardinals made by such unlawful and criminal Popes were no Cardinals and Popes made by unlawful Cardinals are no Popes as is established by the Laws and Canons forementioned if all those nullities of Simonies frauds and cheats have intervened in the election of Sixtus and following Popes as hitherto recorded and no care has bin taken of repairing those nullities as is manifest but rather the like practices continued to this day as is well known to those that are acquainted with that Court all this being so it followeth as a forceable consequence that there is not in the See of Rome any true Pope nor has bin since Gregory the thirteen How strange will all the precedent narrative appear to many poor Irish and English Roman Catholics who are not permitted to know more then their beads and some small prayer Book with the litanies of the conception of Saint Joseph Sancta Theresa c. and a list of great indulgences for very small devotions But such as know by sight or faithfull relation the intrigues of Rome whereof my good friend N. N. who gave me the occasion of this discourse is one will easily perceive that all which is said is very suitable to the language and practice of that Court. Now therefore let the poor Souls consider by these particulars what mettal that Roman holiness is which they so blindly adore And let their bold and presumtuous instructors forbear to censure the Ordinations of the Church of England in which no such dirty practices did ever intervene when their prime See is defaced and disgraced with such public and peremtory exceptions against the usurpers of it and let them cease boasting as they do of a wicked practice reordaining such as were ordained in the Church of England if they chance to pass to their communion whereas it is not less sacrilegious and unlawful to reordain persons already lawfully ordained then to rebaptize such as were lawfully baptized according to Gregory the great his declaration * Lib. 2. Epist 32. end 10. Cap. 58. Sicut baptizatus semel iterum baptizari non debet ita qui consecratus est semel in eodem iterum ordine consecrari non debet As those who were baptized before ought not to be rebaptized again so he that was once consecrated ought not to be consecrated again in the same order The same was decreed in the Council of Carthage ch 38. and before in the Council of Capua as related by the said Council of Carthage and by Baronius in the year 139. To transgress the decrees of these grave and anâ—ient Councils is the boast of Romanists when they brag of not admitting Priests ordained in the Church of England to the function of Priesthood with them if they be
wherewith Christ himself is to be worshipped And so respectively of the Images of other Saints that they are to be worshipped with the same kind of worship that is due to the Prototype Neither indeed do they say herein more then the Council of Trent doth teach them to say For in the Decree above mentioned touching the worship of Images it gives such a reason of it as declares the said worship to be measured by the quality of the Prototype Quoniam honos qui iis exhibetur refertur ad prototypa quae illae repraesentant ità ut per Imagines quas osculamur coram quibus caput aperimus procumbimus Christum adoremus sanctos quorum illae similitudinem gerunt veneremur The honor which we give to Images says the Council is related to the Prototypes which they do represent so as that by the Images which we kiss and before which we uncover our head and bow down we adore Christ and worship the Saints whose likeness they bear Whence follows what the forementioned Divines said That the worship of Images being to be measured by the Quality of their Prototypes the worship of Latria is due to the Image of Christ that being the worship which is due to himself And by your denial of this to be the doctrine of your Church Mr. I. S. you will more easily perswade us that you begin to grow asham'd of your doctrine as well you may then that you understand the Tenets of the Roman Church better then Azorius did or those other Divines of greatest eminency among you by him quoted This being so consider the miserable condition of your doctrine how well you can desend it from the infamous note of Idolatry If you believe the best Interpreters touching the proper signification of the word Idolum you shall find them say it signifies no more then Imago So that an Image adored or worshipped is in propriety of speech an Idol worshipped and consequently a worship of Latria given to an Image or Idâ—l for they are the same is in all propriety of speech Idololatria Therefore according to the doctrine of the Council of Trent and your Divines forementioned by the worship of Latria given by you to the Image of Christ you commit formal Idolatry I wish with all my heart you did not and that no Argument of mine nor of any other could prove you guilty of this horrid crime By this you see how the Council of Trent and the most eminent of your Schole-men do countenance the stupid error of the vulgar among â—ou even exceed it It is plain they deliver in formal terms what I am certain would be a horror to the meaner Capacities if these did apprehend the sinful absurdity of it And your pretensiâ—n to more prudence in not terming your worship Latria doth not heal the wound nor so much as cover it from any clear sighted-eies The real guilt consists in worshipping Images against the Ordinance of God give that worship what name you please If I do say your people do pray to Images of wood or stone and therein do practice that great folly of which the Wise man accuses the Idolater that he is not ashamed to speak to that which hath no life For health he calls upon that which is weak for life prays to that which is dead Wisdom 13.17 if I do say moreover that your Church teacheth them to do so certainly you will say it is a great calumny But then tell me I pray whose words are these you speak to the Cross in the procession of good Friday O Crux ave spes unica Hoc Passionis tempore Auge piis justitiam Reisque dona veniam Hail ô Cross our only hope in this time of Passion give increase of grace to the godly and pardon to sinners If you tell me these are the words of the Church which you will not deny but spoken to Christ not to the Cross Azorius gainsays you for he declares that by those words the Church speaks to the Cross Ecclesia cum Crucem veneratur colit eam salutat alloquitur cum ait O Crux ave c. The Church says he adoring the Cross salutes it and speaks to it saying Hail ô Cross c. And is not this to speak to that which hath no life c. Thus your people do and which is worse thus your Church teaches them to do And thus we see your Church and People do what all Idolaters do to their Idols CHAP. XXIV Our Adversaries reply to my exceptions against their Invocation of Saints declared to be impertinent Mr. I.S. is so exact a Disputant that he takes it for a sufficient answer to my Arguments if he do's but mention the subject of them and say somthing of what his notes or stock of knowledg do's afford him without taking the trouble of examining whether what he saies be to the purpose of my Arguments or no. This is usual with him but very conspicuous in the present case of their Invocation of Saints I begun accusing their excesses in calling the Virgin Mary their life and hope their Redeemeress and Saviouress This I said to be contrary to St. Peters declaration That there is no salvation in any other besides Jesus Christ and that there is no other name under heaven given among men whereby we must be saved Act. IV. 12. To this Mr. I. S. saies it proves we must not ask the Saints on earth to pray for us which is to prove too much I hope Mr. I. S. himself will not be so desperate as to call his Colleague whose praiers he desires his Life and Hope his Saviour and Redeemer But how comes it to prove we must not desire at all the praiers of Saints upon earth Two excesses of Papists in their Invocation of Saints I took in hand to reprehend To speak of all the brevity which my business then did confine me to would not permit The one is to call the Virgin Mary Saviouress c. the other to dedicate more Churches and address more praiers to Saints then to Christ Both which excesses I convinc'd of error by those passages of Scripture which declare Christ our Lord to be our only Saviour and that he is more willing and able to help us then any other Saint and that he invites us to come to himself for remedy of all our needs Your way to answer this were either to purge your Church of those excesses or to prove that the Scriptures which I alledged did not evince those practices of yours to be excesses You do neither but in lieu thereof you speak only of desiring the praiers of Saints who live yet upon earth whereby you alter the state and terms of the question I spoke of praying to Saints who are no more on earth and fitted my Texts to the Confutation of that practice You speak of desiring those who are not yet departed this life to pray for us which are far different
things And so we find the latter practiced in the Gospel but not the former But you must say somthing and tho not to the purpose it must be called an Answer I related some desperate expressions of your Preachers over-valuing Saints And you confessing they were mad in so much fall into exclamations against me for leaving the Roman Church because I saw some mad men in it And thence you fall to your wonted immodest railleries without regarding how far you go from truth and the purpose Where did you find me say that for the madness of those Friers only I forsook the Roman Church Did not I alledg many other very grave causes of my resolution therein Did I say this was a cause at all for me to leave that Church I only reflected upon it as on very bad Fruit that declares the corruption of the Tree And in case it should be in some measure a cause how come you to imagine or think to perswade others it should be the only cause A thief that was hanged for stealing a purse wherein were twenty pounds and six pence because you heard in the process of his cause mention made of six pence were it ingenuous or just to exclaim at the Judges as if they did condemn a man to be hanged for stealing six pence I confess your disingenuity herein is hateful to me but if you think it should not be so pray then answer me to these two Questions If a Villain did come by night and cut down a score or two of those fair Trees that grace the Walks of the Roial Park of St. James in Westminster would you think it too much severity that such a Villain should be whipt about the streets for so great an Insolence But if after this check he should run about the City and Country with a little branch of one of those Trees in his hand exclaiming against the cruelty of the Judges as if they had order'd him to be whipt about the streets of London for cutting that little branch only would not you think him worthy to be whipt again for his notorious calumny Behold your case I express'd many grievous faults of the Roman Church which occasioned my withdrawing from her Idolatry Superstition cruelty in the conduct of Souls impiety in preferring her own laws to those of God rashness and even madness in her worship and Invocation of Saints and among others related the frantic expressions of a Friar in extolling his Saint as one of the Branches proceeding from that vitiated Tree Of this Branch you lay hold and cry that I have left the Communion of the Roman Church only because I saw in it a mad Friar Give me leave to tell you that this kind of arguing deserves no better than whipping in the Scholes And having answered my Arguments upon this Subject say you and having given no Answer to them say I as now I have shewn you provoke me to a trial of your Scholastic skill touching the knowledg that Saints in heaven have of our affairs here and how far they are concerned for them a thing whereof even your ablest Schole-men could never yet give a clear account Whoever shall please to read their Writings on this Subject will see a Theater of confusion The most that ever could be cleared of what they alledg and you can pick out of them is that God can and somtimes did reveal unto Saints in heaven some earthly concerns but that all the Saints in heaven should know all our thoughts and all our particular concerns could never be said upon any probable ground much less with certainâ— And yet a certain knowledg of it were requisite to save your practice from the note of blindness and solly in having such frequent recourse to them by mental and vocal praiers for all your particular concerns I say moreover that tho you were certain they did see all our peculiar concerns and were willing to be concerned for us yet you fall very short of giving a formal answer to my exception taken against your more frequent recourse to them then to Christ for Intercession and dedicating more Temples to their names then to the name of God and Christ How can this consist with our Christian acknowledgment of Christ to be our only Mediator and Advocate And if you deny so much to him I hope you will not doubt he is at least our chief Mediator and Advocate being so how come you to have less recourse unto him then to inferior Saints which was that I charg'd upon your practice To which you gave no answer because you saw no rational or Christian answer could be given and so finding it an easier work to fall upon your accustomed scurrilous Sarcasms you returned them for answer Only to that of building more Churches and offering praiers and devotions to your supposed Saints then unto Christ because you would seem to say somthing tho nothing indeed to the purpose You say at last that the honor you give to the Saints you give it to God in them or to them for God But who can understand this to be a good way to please God If an earthly King would have the Prince his Son and Heir to be Solicitor General to him in favor of his Subjects and that all Roial graces and favors should pass unto them by the hands of his Son Can any man rationally imagine it would be pleasing to such a King that his Subjects neglecting their Applications to the Prince should make all or the most frequent to inferior Servants of the Court Apply this example and if you do not see by it the unreasonableness of that practice of yours I think we may conclude that passion and prejudice has blinded you so far as not to see the light of noon-day Add to all this that many of your supposed Saints possibly may not be Saints indeed but wretched Souls damned in Hell Whereof your own Histories do afford no few instances and the possibility of the Case is evident for most of your Saints were Canonized or called Saints by Vulgar opinion not by that more exact scrutiny which in latter Ages was ordained to prevent the Invocation of Impostors and Cheats for Saints through Vulgar error It is manifest that such wicked men are solicitous and not seldom successful in getting the credit of Saints with the Vulgar That 's the business of hypocrites when true Saints make it theirs to hide their virtues and please only the eies of God And even now after so many solemnities and scrutinies ordained to proceed to a Canonization the matter still remains uncertain Many of your learned Schole-men deny the Pope to be infallible therein He may be mis-informed and why not May not Cheats intervene and Bribes work in such Informations as in others A Town or Society that will be engaged to get one of their Members Canonized for Saint and thereby obtain considerable Emoluments of credit and interest to their body may possibly use