As for Marriages we acknowledge the Church may dispense in some degrees of Consanguinity and Affinity but in nothing contrary to the Law of God His Tenth pretended Obstruction of Devotion is that we make disobedience to the Church in Disputable matters more hainous than disobedience to Christ in unquestionable things as Marriage he saith in a Priest to be a greater crime than Fornication I answer That whether a Priest may Marry or no supposing the Law of the Church forbidding it is not a disputable matter but 't is out of Question even by the Law of God that Obedience is to be given to the Commands or Prohibitions of the Church The Antithesis therefore between disobedience to the Church in disputable matters and disobedience to the Laws of Christ in unquestionable things is not only impertinent to the Marriage of Priests which is unquestionably forbidden but supposing the matter to remaind sputable after the Churches Prohibition destroys all obedience to the Church But if it suppose them only disputable before then why may not the Church interpose her Judgment and put them out of dispute But still it seems strange to them who either cannot or will not take the Word of Christ that is his Counsel of Chastity that Marriage in a Priest should be a greater sin than Fornication But he considers not that though Marriage in it self be honourable yet if it be prohibited to a certain order of persons by the Church to whom Christ himself commands us to give obedience they oblige themselves by a voluntary vow to live in perpetual chastity the Law of God commanding us to pay our Vows it loses its honour in such persons and if contracted after such vow made is in the language of the Fathers no better than Adultery In the Primitive Church it was the custom of some younger Widdows to Dedicate themselves to the Service of the Church and in order therunto to take upon them a peculiar habit and make a vow of continency for the future Now in case they married after this St. Paul himself 1 Tim. 1. 12. saith That they incurred Damnation because by so doing they made void their first faith that is as the Fathers Expound it the vow they had made And the fourth Council of Carthage in which were 214 Bishops and among them St. Austin gives the Reason in these words If Wives who commit Adultery are guilty to their Husbands how much more shall such Widdows as change their Religious State be noted with the crime of Adultery And if this were so in Widdows much more in Priests if by Marrying they shall make void their first Faith given to God when they were consâ—eâ—ated in a more peculiar manner to his Service Thus much may suffice for Answer to the Argument which with its intricate terms may seem to puzzle an unlearned Reader let us now speak a word to the true state of the Controversy which is whether Marriage or single life in a Priest be more apt to obstruct or further devotion And St. Paul himself hath determined the question 1 Cor. 7. 32. where he saith He that is unmarried careth for the things that belong to our Lord how he may please our Lord But he that is Married careth for the things that are of the World how he may please his Wife This is the difference he putteth between the Married and Single life that this is apt to make us care for the things which belong to God and that to divert our thoughts from him to the things of the World Judge therefore which of these states is most convenient for Priests whose proper Office it is to attend wholly to the things of God Having thus cleared Catholick Doctrines from being any ways obstructive to good life or devotion I shall proceed to his third Argument by which he will still prove that Catholicks run a great hazard of their souls in adhering to the Communion of the Church of Rome Because it exposeth the Faith of Christians to so great uncertainty This is a strange charge from the Pen of a Protestant who hath no other certainty for his faith but every Man's interpretation of the Letter of the Scriptures But First he saith it doth this By making the Authority of the Scriptures to depend upon the infallibility of the Church when the Churches infallibility must be proved by the Scriptures To this I Answer that the Authority of the Scripture not in it self for so it hath its Authority from God but in order to us and our belief of it depends upon the infallibility of the Church And therefore St. Austin saith of himself That he would not believe the Gospel unless the Authority of the Catholick Church did move him And if you ask him what moved him to submit to that Authority he tells you That besides the Wisdom he found in the Tenets of the Church there were many other things which most justly held him in it as the consent of People and Nations an Authority begun by Miracles nourished by Hope increased by Charity and established by Antiquity the succession of Priests from the very Seat of St. Peter to whom our Lord commended the feeding of his Sheep unto the present Bishoprick Lastly The very name of Catholick which this Church alone among so many Heresies hath not without cause obtained so particularly to her self that wheras all Hereticks would be called Catholicks yet if a stranger demand where the Catholicks go to Church none of these Hereticks dares to shew either his own House or Church These saith St. Austin so many and great most dear bonds of the name of Christian do justly hold a believing Man in the Catholick Church These were the grounds which moved that great Man to submit to her Authority And when Catholick Authors prove the infallibility of the Church from Scriptures 't is an Argument ad hominem to convince Protestants who will admit nothing but Scripture and yet when they are convinced quarrel at them as illogical Disputants because they prove it from Scripture Next he saith we overthrow all foundation of Faith because We will not believe our sences in the plainest Objects of them But what if God have interposed his Authority as he hath done in the case of the Eucharist where he tells us that it is his Body must we believe our sences rather than God or must we not believe them in other things because in the particular case of the Eucharist we must believe God rather than our sences Both these consequences you see are absurd Now for the case it self in which he instances Dr. Taylor above cited confesses that they viz. Catholicks have a divine Revelation viz. Christ's word This is my Body whose Litteral and Grammatical sence if that sence were intended would warrant them to do violence to all the Sciences in the Circle but I add it would be no precedent to them not to believe their sences in other the plainest Objects of them
continue in it And that upon these Grounds 1. Because they must 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 if 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 denies to receive must be terminated on the Creature but God himself in the second Commandment not only denies 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 grâ—ssest 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 grâ—sser the Idolatry was the less it was Idolatry for the grâ—ssâ—st 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 practises 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 oaths and Marriages by making disobedience to the Church in disputable matters more hainous than disobedience to the Lawes of Christ in unquestionable things as Marriage in a Priest to be a greater crime than Fornication By all which practises 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 â—aith 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 judgment and reason as to the matters of saith 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 pâ—etending 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 incur 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 destroys 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
also the Liturgies and Rituals in a Tongue unknown but to the Learned among them that who will dispute against it must prepare himself to hear the censure of St. Austin Ep. 118. where he saith That it is a point of most insolent madness to dispute whether that be to be observed which is frequented by the whole Church through the World 4. He says The sincerity of Devotion is much obstructed by making the efficacy of Sacraments depend upon the bare administration whether our minds be prepared for them or not In what Council this Doctrine was defined I never read but as for the Sacrament of Penance which I suppose he chiefly aims at I read in the Council of Trent Sess 14. Falso quidam calumniantur That some do falsly calumniate Catholick Writers as if they taught the Sacrament of Penance did confer Grace without the good motion of the receiver which the Church of God never taught nor thought But I am rather inclined to look upon this as a mistake than a calumny in the Objector 5. He says The sincerity of Devotion is much obstructed by discouraging the reading of Scriptures which is our most certain Rule of Faith and Life Here he calls the Churches prudential dispensing the reading of Scripture to persons whom she judges fit and disposed for it and not to such whom she judges in a condition to receive or do harm by it a discouraging the reading of Scriptures which is no other than whereas St. Paul Coloss 3. 21. enjoyns Fathers not to provoke their Children lest they be discouraged one should reprove a Father for discouraging his Child because he will not put a Knife or Sword into his hands when he foresees he wil do mischief with it to himself or others the Scriptures in the hands of a meek and humble Soul who submits its judgment in the interpretation of it to that of the Church is a Sword to defend it but in the hands of an arrogant and presumptuous Spirit that hath no Guide to interpret it but it s own fancy or passion it is a dangerous Weapon with which he will wound both himself and others The first that permitted promiscuous reading of Scripture in our Nation was King Henry the Eighth and many years were not passed but he found the ill consequences of it for in a Book set forth by Him in the Year 1542. he complains in the Preface That he found entred into some of his Peoples hearts an inclination to sinister understanding of it presumption arrogancy carnal liberty and contention which he compares to the seven worse Spirits in the Gospel with which the Devil entred into the House that was purged and cleansed Whereupon he declares that for that part of the Church ordained to be taught that is the Lay People it ought not to be denyed certainly that the reading of the Old and New Testament is not so necessary for all those folks that of duty they ought and be bound to read it but as the Prince and Policy of the Realm shall think convenient so to be tolerated or taken from it Consonant whereunto saith he the Politick Law of our Realm hath now restrained it from a great many This was the judgment of him who first took upon him the Title of Head of the Church of England and if that ought not to have been followed in after times let the dire effects of so many new Sects and Fanaticisms as have risen in England from the reading of it bear witness For as St. Austin sayes Neque enim natae sunt Haereses Heresies have no other Origen but hence that the Scriptures which in themselves are good are not well understood and what is understood amiss in them is rashly and boldly asserted viz. to be the sense of them And now whether the Scriptures left to the private interpretation of every fanciful spirit as it is among Protestants be a most certain Rule of Faith and Life I leave to your self to judge 6. He says The sincerity of Devotion is much obstructed by the multitude of superstitious observations never used in the Primitive Church as he is ready to defend he should have said to prove for we deny any such to be used in the Church 7. By the gross abuse of People in Pardons and Indulgences Against this I can asseâ—t as an eye-witness the great devotion caused by the wholsome use of Indulgences in Catholick Countreys 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 performed by Catholick people which without the incitement of an Indulgence had possibly been left undone 8. He says The sincerity of Devotion is much obstructed 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 This thousand years after Christ makes a great noise as if it were not as much in the power of the Church a thousand years after Christ as well as in the first or second Century to alter and change things of their own nature indifferent such as the communicating under one or both kinds was ever held to be by Catholicks But although the Cup were not then denyed to the Laity yet that the custom of receiving but under one kind was permitted even in the Primitive Church in private Communions the Objector seems to grant because he speaks only of the Administration of it in the solemn Celebration and that it was also in use in publick Communions is evident from Examples of that time both in the Greek Church in the time of St. Chrysostome and of the Latin in the time of St. Leo the great As for the pretended obstruction of Devotion you must know Catholicks believe that under either species or kind whole Christ true God and Man is contained and received and if it be accounted an hindrance to devotion to receive the total refection of our soul though but under one kind what must it be to believe that I receive him under neither but instead of him have Elements of Bread and Wine Surely nothing can be more efficacious to stir up Reverence and Devotion in us than to believe that God himself will personally enter under our Roof The Ninth Hinderance of the sincerity of devotion is that we make it in the power of a person to dispense in Oaths and Marriages contrary to the Law of God To this I answer That some kind of Oaths the condition of the Person and other Circumstances considered may be judged to be hurtful and not fit to be kept and the dispensation in them is no more than to judg or determine them to be so and consequently to do this cannot be a hinderance but a furtherance to devotion nor is it contrary to the Law of God which commands nothing that 's hurtful to be done
he hath mis-represented them Thus then he Liberty of Proph. Sect. 20. Speaking of Catholicks The beauty and Splendour of their Church their pompous he should have said solemn Service the stateliness and solemnity of the Hierarchy their Name of Catholick which they suppose he should have said their very Adversaries give them as their own due and to concern no other Sect of Christians the Antiquity of many of their Doctrines he should have said all the continual succession of their Bishops their immediate derivation from the Apostles their Title to succeed St. Peter the flattering he should have said due expressions of Minor Bishops he means in acknowledging the Pope head of the Church which by being old records have obtained credibility the multitude and variety of People which are of their perswasion apparent consent with Antiquity in many Ceremonials which other Churches have rejected and a pretended and sometimes he should have said always apparent consent with some elder Ages in matters Doctrinal The great consent of one part with another in that which most of them affirm to be de fide of Faith The great differences which are commenced among their Adversaries abusing the liberty of Prophecying into a very great licentiousness Their happiness of being Instruments in converting divers he should rather have said of all Nations The piety and austerity of their Religious Orders of Men and Women The single life of their Priests and Bishops the severity of their Fasts and their exteriour observances the great reputation of their first Bishops for faith and sanctity the known holiness of some of those persons whose institutes the religious persons pretend to imitate the oblique Arts and indirect proceedings of some of those who dâ—parted from them and amongst many other things the names of Heretick and Schismatick which they with infinite pertinacity he should have said upon the same grounds the Fathers did fasten upon all that disagree from them These things saith he and divers others may very easily perswade persons of much reason and more piety to retain that which they know to have been the Religion of their Forefathers which had actually possession and seizure of Mens understandings before the opposite professions to wit of Protestant Presbyterian Anabaptist c. had a name Thus Dr. Taylor an eminent and leading Man amongst the Protestants and if he confess that these Motives were sufficient for a Catholick to retain his Religion they must be of like force to perswade a dis-interessed Protestant to embrace it unless the Protestants can produce Motives for their Religion of greater or at least equal force with these which so great a Man among them confesseth that Catholicks have for theirs Here therfore you must call upon the Author of the Paper you sent me to produce a Catalogue of grounds or at least some one ground for the Protestant Religion of greater or equal force with all these And as Dr. Taylor saith divers others which he omitted viz. The Scripture interpreted by the consent of Fathers the determination of General Councils the known Maxime of Catholicks that nothing is to be believed of Faith but what was received from their Fore-fathers as handed down from the Apostles The testimony of the present Church of no less Authority now than in St. Austin's time both for the Letter and the sence of the Scripture c. Do this and the Controversie will quickly be at an end Particular disputes are endless and above the understanding of such as are not learned but in grounds and principles 't is not so hard for Reason and common sence to Judge That you may the better do it in your case I shall desire you to take these two Cautions along with you First That the Subject of the present Controversie are not those Articles in which the Protestants agree with us and for which they may pretend to produce the same Motives we do But in those in which they dissent from us such as are no Transubstantiation no Purgatory no honour due to Images no Invocation to Saints and the like in which the very Essence of Protestant as distinct from Catholick consists What Motives they can or will produce for these I do not fore-see The pretence of Scriptures being sufficiently plain hath no place here because then the foresaid Negatives would be necessary to be believed as divine Truths And for their own Reason and Learning it will be found too light when put into the Scale against that of the Catholick Church for so many Ages The second Caution is That you be careful to distinguish between Protestants producing grounds for their own Religion and finding fault with ours An Atheist can cavil and find fault with the grounds which learned Men bring to prove a Deity such as are the Order of this visible World the general consent of Nations c. In this an Atheist thinks he doth somewhat But can he produce as good or better grounds for his own Opinion No you see then 't is one thing to produce grounds for what we hold and another to find fault with those which are produced by the contrary part The latter hath made Controversie so long and the former will make it as short let the Answerer therefore instead of finding fault with our Motives produce his own for the Articles in Controversie and I am confident you will quickly discern which carry the most weight and consequently which are to be preferred A Full Refutation OF Dr. STILLINGFLEET's Unjust Charge of IDOLATRY Against the Church of Rome The First Part. Of the Veneration of Holy Images CHAP. I. The First and Second Answer to the First Question shewn not pertinent Necessity of Communion with the Church of Rome proved and his Charge of Idolatry overthrown by his own Principles § 1. WHoever considers how Dr. Stillingfleet in his Answer to the Two Questions has engag'd himself and his Adversary in Seventeen or Eighteen of the most material Controversies between Catholicks and Protestants besides innumerable others of lesser concern which together with the former have swell'd his Rejoynder to a short Paper into a large Book will not very easily free him upon his own word from being fond of the practise of the Noble Science of Controversie or as his Friend Dr. T. calls it The Blessed Art of Eternal Wrangling especially if he reflect how easie and obvious the Answer was to the Questions themselves without running into farther Disputes To the First by shewing that the Motives which are sufficient to secure the Salvation of one bred up and well-grounded in Catholick Religion are not sufficient to secure the salvation of one bred up in the Protestant who convinced by them should embrace the Catholick To the Second by shewing the Motives for Communion with the Protestant Church to be greater and stronger than those for the Roman and therefore that to be necessarily embraced before this it being agreed between us that it is of necessity to salvation to be
the case is the same as to the Point of Reason Men must be allowed the use of their Judgment and Reason in the search of both And therefore he must either acknowledge his Charge to have been groundless when he taxed Catholicks for exposing Faith to uncertainty or he must grant to Men though it be with contradicting himself which is much easier to do than to swallow the least seeming Contradiction in a matter of Faith that they may and ought to make use of their discerning Faculty as to the truth or falshood of matters proposed to our belief which I confess I take to be the same as to believe no more than their Reason can comprehend and so if Reason chance to meet with some seeming Contradiction with which it is not able or willing to grapple the Article ought and must be exploded for such a monstrous Prodigy of hood wink'd and abused Faith as no Man can imagine God would e're obtrude upon the Faith of Reasonable Men. But here again perhaps he will say that although God may impose upon us an Obligation of believing against the Conceptions of our Reason yet he cannot do it against the suggestion of our sense because as he asserts p. 540. This would be to overthrow all certainty of Faith where the matters to be believed depend upon mattâ—r of Fact But here I would desire to know what Angel from Heaven reveal'd this Doctrin to him Suppose in the case of the two Disciples at Emmaus that our Saviour had vanished out of their sight before he brake bread might he not hâ—ve told them afterwards that it was He who had appeared to them in a disguise without overthrowing all the certainty of Faith where matters to be believed depend upon matter of Fact St. Chrysostome above cited I am sure was of another mind in the very point of Christ's real presence in the Sacrament when he bids us obey God in that mystery though what he say seem to contradict our thoughts and eyes And so was St. Cyril too when he exhorts Christians not to consider it as naked Bread and Wine for it 〈…〉 Blood of Christ according to the words of Christ himself And although sense do suggest this to theâ— viz. that it is Bread yet let Faith confirm thee Do not judge of the thing by thy tast but know and hold for most certain that this Bread which is seen of us is not Bread though the tast judge it to be Bread but the Body of Christ and that the Wine which is seen by us although it seem Wine to the sense of tasting notwithstanding is not Wine but the Blood of Christ This is what these Holy Fathers teach in this matter and with great reason for as God is not only God of the Hills but also of the Valleys So is he God not onâ—y of our Reason but of our Senses also And if the Antidote his Goodness hath prâ—scrib'd to Cure our Corrupt Nature be prepared in such a manner as requires the captivating of our Sense as well as of our Understanding who shall question either his Wisdome or Power He hath said This is my Body though it appear to us to be bread And this being but one Exception from the General Rule of Sensation why that should overthrow all certainty of Faith more than so many exceptions as the Trinity and other Mysteries lay upon the General Rules of our Reasoning I leave to all Men of sense and Reason to judge O but this is the strangest of Miracles and Miracles ought to be the objects of sense I grant it of such Miracles as are done for the Conversion of Unbelievers but this is not done upon such an account but for the Sanctification of those who believe already And for these it is enough that Christ hath said It is his Body They know very well the danger of not believing him more than their senses And that others may know it also I shall set it before them in the words of St. Epiphanius no less than 1300. Years ago We see saith he speaking of the Blessed Sacrament that It is neither equal nor like in proportion or Image to his Flesh to the Invisible Deity to the lineaments of a Body for this is of a round forme and insensible according to power And yet because he was pleased to say through Grace This is my Body every one believeth his saying For who believeth not that it is his very true Body falleth from Grace and Salvation Thus much to the Doctors Principles of Sense and Reason Let us now see what he says against the Grounds and Motives of Transubstantiation CHAP. V. A Check to the Doctor 's bigg words against the Grounds of Transubstantiation with a new Example of reporting faithfully as he calls it the Words and Sense of an Author § 1. TO show there are not the same Grounds and Motives for Christs presence in the Eucharist by Transubstantiation as for his Divinity my Adversary instances in Three 1. The Authority of the Roman Church 2. Catholick Tradition 3. Scripture And for the first of these Viz. The Authority of the Roman Church if it have any at all it stands against the Doctor for Transubstantiation and that so evidently that he is forced to take the confidence p. 130. utterly to deny that to be any ground of believing at all For my part I believe every sober Person of his own Party will judge he had much better have said nothing at all And I cannot but think how St. Austin who calls the Chair of Peter that Rock which the proud Gates of Hell do not overcome and professes that the Principality of the Apostolick Chair did always conserve its vigour in the Roman Church would have startled to hear one single Doctor so pertly deny it to be any Ground at all of believing How St. Hierome who writing to Pope Damasus saith I know that upon this Rock the Church is built and whosoever eateth the Lamb out of this House is Prophane c. would have whetted his stile more against him for denying her Authority to be any Ground of believing at all than ever he did against Vigilantius for deriding Invocation of Saints Veneration of Relicks or Lighting Candles at Noon-Day in the Church c. And how St. Irenaeus would have excluded him out of the Society of Christians for this peremptory behaviour when he affirms it necessary for all other Churches convenire to have recourse and agree with the Roman by reason of its more eminent Principality That this was the Dignity and Prerogative of the Roman Church in the time of these Holy Fathers the Doctor himself cannot deny and if he pretend she is fallen from the Purity she then enjoyed it is but what the Donatists his Predecessors in this point said above twelve hundred years ago when as St. Austin tells us they call'd the Apostolick Chair the Chair of Pestilence because it oppos'd their Novelities
and some other French Bishops of that Age as transported with zeal against a Superstition which he says had then prevailed among some Persons in giving the same Worship to Images as to the Holy Trinity And for himself he professes that he is much pleased with the Decree of the Council of Cambray Anno 1565. That the People be taught that no Worship ought to be given to an Image for the matter or elegancy of the work c. but for the Thing represented by it to which the Worship and Honour is chiefly referr'd and that the Mind or Intention of him that prayeth or worshippeth be carried to the thing signified and not terminated on the sign which can neither hear nor see nor understand Thus much â—o the Doctors Objection from the Council of Francford a Passage take it which way you will so difficult and obscure by reason of the various Opinions of Authors and seeming if not real Contradictions in Historians that for one whose design is to blunder not satisfie his Reader a fitter Topick cannot be found unless it be that which follows of the Calves as he hath perplex'd it with his groundless Conjectures CHAP. IX Of the Doctors Third Proof from the Judgment as he pretends of the Law-giver His speculation concerning the Golden Calves manifesâ—ly repugnant to the H. Scriptures and Fathers Mr. Thorndike's Judgment of the Meaning and Extent of the Second Commandment § 1. THe Third Reason Dr. Stilling fleet brings to prove that God in the second Commandment hath expresly prohibited the giving any Worship to himself by an Image is taken saith he p. 92. from those who were best able to understand the meaning of it and among these none so competent a Judge as the Law-giver himself Here we have a solid Principle indeed to work upon and if the Doctor would give me leave to infer from it I would argue thus But the Law-giver himself commanded the Ark and the Cherubims to be placed in the Temple with respect to his Worship Therefore he did not expresly prohibit in the second Commandment the giving any Worship to himself by an Image For it cannot be â—onceived that himself would introduce 〈◊〉 allow such a practise as should be contrary to its meaning But I must not forestall but attend my Adversary and the substance of what he discourses upon that Principle is this That the Israelites were condemned by God of Idolatry for worshipping the Golden Calf and yet they did not fall into the Heathen Idolatry by so doing but onely worshipped the true God under that Symbol of his presence If you ask him how he knows for certain that the Israelites did not fall back into the Heathen Idolatry when it is certain that in Aegypt they worshipped the Idols of the Aegyptians Ezek. 20. 7 8 He tells you upon his word that they had not the least pretence of infidelity as to the true God and yet the very Text he cites to prove it tells us they pretended their despair of Moses returning as a sufficient reason to move Aaron to make them Gods who should go before them If you ask him how he knows for certain that the Calf was intended to be onely a Symbol of Gods presence He tells you We that is himself and his Master Calvin cannot imagine the people so sottish Nec tam incogitantes erant Judaei saith Calvin to desire Aaron to make them a God in the proper sence as though they could believe the Calf newly made to have been the God which before it was made brought them out of the land 〈◊〉 Egypt And yet they can both of them very easily imagine Catholick Christians to be so sottish as to terminate their Worship upon a Block or a hewn Stone though 〈◊〉 the same time they deny any Divinity to be in them or have not the least preâ—ence of Infidelity as to the True God But be their Imagination as much at the devotion of their Passion as they please could not the People taking it for granted as he says they did that Moses was not to be heard of more fall into a dislike or a distrust of the God whom Moses had taught them to worship and so run with their thoughts into Aegypt and require of Aaron to make them a God to go before them like unto the Gods which they had seen and worshipped there That this was their Intention and not to make a Symbol onely of the presence of the true God the very making of the Calf which was done in imitation of the Golden Bulls of Aegypt the Symbols as the Doctor calls them of their chief God Osiris sufficiently evinces And for this it is they are so frequently reprehended in Holy Scripture Deut. xxxii 15. He that is Israel forsook God which made him and went back from the God of his Salvation and vers 18. Thou hast forsaken the God which made thee and hast forgotten the God thy Creator Psal cv 19. They made a Calf in Horeb and worshipped the Molten Image Thus they changed their Glory into the similitude of an Ox that eateth Grass They forgat God who had saved them who had done so great things in Aegypt wonderous works in the Land of Cham and fearful things in the red Sea And again Acts vii 39 40. Our Fathers saith St. Stephen would not obey but thrust him that is the true God from them and in their hearts turned back again into Aegypt saying unto Aaron Make us Gods to go before us c. And they made a Calf in those days and offered sacrifice to the Idol and rejoyced in the work of their own hands This is what the Scripture testifieth that the Israelites did viz. that they forgat the God which made them that they thrust him from them and in their hearts turned back into Aegypt that the Molten Calf which they had made after the pattern they had seen there was an Idol and that they offered sacrifices to this Idol And must we now deny all this to be true because Calvin and Dr. St. cannot imagine the People to have been so sottish Is this to make Scripture the Rule of Faith or Imagination to be the Rule of Scripture Let the Reader observe here for his Instruction that according to Dr. St.'s behaviour here and elsewhere if he meet with any passage in Scripture that thwarts his Imagination he must understand it in a sense agreeable to what he can imagine that is as best pleases his own fancy And This how â—unningly soever He and his Partizans disguise it is indeed the onely Ground from which they take their measures in the Interpretation of Scripture as Mr. E. W. hath clearly proved in his Book called Protestancy without Principles And although His performance among others be likened by the Doctor to the way that Rats answer Books by gnawing some of the leaves of them yet an Impartiall Reader will compare it rather to the execution done by the Worm in Jonas which
smote the Gourd and it withered But to return to the Israelites and their Golden Calf § 2. Did the Fathers understand the same by it which Calvin and the Doctor do Could They not imagine the People to be so sottish as to ascribe their deliverance and the Miracles wrought in it to this New God Nothing less There is no cause to wonder saith St. Athanasius at the Pharisees madness in imputing the works of Christ to the Devil because their Fathers were of the same mind before them for being but newly gone out of Egypt they attributed the benefits which God had bestowed on them to the Calf which themselves had made saying These are thy Gods O Israel which brought thee out of Egypt You will ask saith St. Hierom how they offered sacrifices in the Wilderness not to God but to their King whom they call Lucifer And the Answer he gives is that from the time they transformed their Gold into a Calf saying these are thy Gods O Israel which brought thee out of Egypt it is manifest that all what they did they did not to God but to Idols In like manner St. Chrysostom After the people had heard those words I am the Lord thy God Thou shalt have no other Gods beside me They made a Calf and rejected God They did not acknowledge him to be the Lord but disowned their Benefactor saying unto Aaron Make us Gods to go before us And then as if he had foreseen the difficulty Calvin and my Adversary have of imagining how the people could believe the Calf newly made to have been the God which before it was made brought them out of the Land of Egypt He objects to himself If they were Gods why did they say Make For how can those be Gods which are made And then answers Sic malitia obsaecans sibi ipsi repugnat semetipsam extinguit That It is the nature of malice to blind the mind it possesses to that degree that it makes it contradict and destroy it self § 3. This is what the Holy Scripture and the Fathers say expresly of the Israelites making and worshipping the Calf That they were Idolaters in so doing we confess but that their Idolatry consisted onely in worshipping the True God under that as a Symbol of his presence we utterly deny And till the Doctor can prove it by as great if not greater Authority of Scriptures and Fathers than I have done the contrary he will never prove from this fact of theirs that God hath expresly prohibited in the second Commandment the giving him any Worship by an Image What he does is to tell us that he cannot imagine the people to have been so sottish as to believe the Calf newly made to have been the God which before it was made brought them out of the Land of Egypt or to think the Gods of Egypt had wrought those Miracles for them in their deliverance But these are Conjectures of his own Fancy without any Authority of Scripture or Fathers nay expresly against them as I have shewed And although Aaron perhaps and some of the Wiser among them might not be so sottish yet it is certain as the Doctor confesses of his Wiser Heathens they were so weak as to concur with them in the external practises of their Idolatry But then he tells us again p. 94. that the people took it for granted that Moses by reason of his forty days absence was to be heard of no more and therefore they fell upon devising the fittest Symbol for the presence of God going before them and herein the greatest number saith he being possessed with the prejudices of their Education in Egypt where Golden Bulls were the Symbols of their chief God Osiris they pitched upon that and forced Aaron to a compliance with them in it And all the proof he brings for this is that immediately before Moses his going up to the Mount the last Promise God made to them was that he would send his Angel before them Exod. xxiii 20 23. as if those who had forgotten the God that made them could not also forget this Promise or at least think that He had forgotten it or was not able to perform it and so fall upon devising the making of a God like those they had seen in Egypt whose Presence and Conduct they might have continually with them This follows much more clearly from the prejudice of their Education in Egypt than what the Doctor has devised for them for they never devised any such thing to themselves as is manifest out of the Scriptures and Fathers before alledged And when I consider the Israelites a people without Learning oppressed for four hundred years together by the most Idolatrous Nation in the World and serving their Gods as it appears they did out of Ezek. xx 8. the prejudice which this custom had wrought in them and their readiness upon every slight occasion to turn back with their hearts into Egypt lastly the Character which God himself gives of them Deut. xxxii 28. that they were a Nation void of counsel neither was there any understanding in them When I say I consider all this on the one side and the quaint device the Doctor would transfer from his own head into theirs of making the Calf onely for the Symbol of the presence of the true God on the other I cannot but look upon it to be much of the same nature with those subtil fetches which Historians to shew their own skill in Politicks devise rather than discover in the Actions of those Persons though never so stupid who are the subject of their History How many Plots and Designs have Tacitus and others framed for them which they never dream't of themselves much less were the Israelites guilty of any such subtil speculation as Calvin and the Doctor have invented for them The highest pitch of their Fancy if it staid not in the Image it self was to magine some Deity like those of Egypt to insinuate it self into the Calf as the Egyptians believed of their Gods from thence to give Oracres and conduct them into the Land of Promise and not as the Doctor devises for them that they look'd upon it onely as a Symbol of the true God whom now they had thrust from them and forgotten To make out this device which had no other foundation but in his own fancie he is forc'd to invent a new kind of Idolatry distinct from the Heathen Idolatry Because there is no intimation saith he p. 95. made of their falling into the Heathen Idolatry But why then does he charge the Church of Rome with Idolatry upon this account p. 3. viz. that she requires the giving to the Creature the Worship due onely to the Creator Is not the giving Divine Worship to a Creature the same as to make it a false God And is it not Heathen Idolatry to worship a false God Either then he must retract the ground upon which he builds his Charge of