opposite So that I cannot conceive any thing but an over-earnestness of Dispute should force St. Hierome to make such ostentation of the Sibyls and maintain against Jovinian That They had for their Livery Virginity and that Divination had been the reward of their Virginity for it is an horrid Reward to be made the Instrument of the Devil to publish his Lies and to contribute to his Deceits Nor can I see how the greatest of Ills can be ranked among Goods nor at hazard to say something to the advantage of the Sibyls that any Advantage can be made of this improbable shift that they made any other Predictions then these which induced the Pagans into Errour and that upon the account of them and their Virginity they have been thought worthy recommendation Not that I would deny but it had been as possible for God to declare by those women the Secrets to come as to make Balaam's Ass to speak or move Balaam himself to Prophecy the coming of the Messias one thousand four hundred ninety and two years before it happened especially seeing St. Augustine expounding these words of Saint Paul Whom he had before promised by his Prophets took from the Prejudice he had conceived thereof occasion to write That there have been Prophets who were not of him in whom also we finde some things which they have sang as having heard them of Christ as it is said of the Sibyl But I hope he and the other Fathers will pardon me if I presume to answer That they have grounded their Opinion on a broken Reed to wit the Authority of the eight Books of the pretended Daughter-in-law of Noah For First They have taken for very antient a Piece that was very new and adulterate Secondly Though it were as antient as they thought yet could it not be Divine for this very reason that it contains as hath been already observed abundance of Errours which no man unless lost to his Senses will ever impute to Celestial Revelation Thirdly Though it were granted that those Pieces are as free from Errours as they are full of them and that their Original is to be taken much higher then the Birth of our Saviour yet would Hilary the Deacon deny that it necessarily followed thence that they came from God The spirit of the world saith he is that which possesses persons subject to Enthusiasms who are without God for it is the chiefest among the worldly Spirits Whence it comes that he is wont by conjecture to fore-tell the things which are of this World and it is he who is called Python or the Prophecying Spirit it is he who is deceived and deceives by things that have a probability of Truth it is he who spoke by the Sibyl imitating ours and desirous to be numbred among the Celestial For my part I freely confess it were a very hard matter to maintain that the eight Books of the Sibyls which copy out the best part of the History of the Gospel had been written before our Saviour's coming into the Flesh and â—…at they were the Productions of some Python or Prophecying Spirit but it is evident that Hilary reflecting on the fond Imaginations wherewith they are pestered chose rather to think them the Work a Fanatick then a Divine Person and in that though contrary to the Opinion of many of the Fathers he is much in the right For though we should lay the Spunge on all the marks of their Supposititiousness before alleged yet could we not any way wipe out that Character which the said Rhapsody hath with its own hands imprinted so deep in its forehead that it is remarkable in the chiefest of those great men who would acknowledg its authority and oppose it to the Heathens CHAP. XXII The Sentiment of Aristotle concerning Enthusiasts taken into Consideration ARistotle had been of Opinion That the heat of Melancholy being near the place of Intelligence many were taken with Frantick and Enthusiastical Diseases That thence came all the Sibyls Bacchides and inspired Persons that is when they became such not through disease but the temperament of nature and thereupon alleges that Maracus of Syracuse was a better Poet when he was besides himself discovering thereby That according to his Sentiment to say of a woman that she was a Sibyl was to put her into the qualification of Hypochondriacks and such as are subject to black Choler But the common Opinion of the Heathens was that the Sibyls were seized by a supernatural power and not warmed by a simple Ebullition of black Choler and that their being so seised made while it lasted so strong an impression upon their minds that it deprived them of all Intelligence and Memory Thus Heraclitus in Plutarch affirms that the Sibyl had with her frantick mouth said things which are neither ridiculous nor gaudy nor adulterate Virgil introduces Helenus speaking to Aeneas of the Cumaean Sibyl Thou the enraged Prophetess shalt see And elswhere making a Description of her Transports he uses these express terms This said her colour straight did change her face And flowing Tresses lost their former grace A growing passion swels her troubled breast And fury her distracted soul possest And a little after When she not able to endure the load Of such a pow'r strives to shake off the God The more she chaf'd the more he curbs her in Tames her wilde breast and calms her swelling spleen And again Then Phoebus slakes His curbing reins and from her bosom takes His cruel Spurs granting a little rest Soon as her Fit and high Distraction ceas'd Lucan's Description is much to the same purpose and Claudian in imitation of them calls the Place of the Cumaean Sibyl The Porch of the enraged Sibyl But this Description which naturally expresses the violent possession of an evil Spirit tormenting the person it seises in stead of raising an horrour in the Writer of the eight Books attributed to the Sibyls enflames him with an emulation insomuch that that impertinent person hath not been ashamed to attribute to the God of glory extravagant sallies like those of the Devils and to say of himself what the prophane Poets had writ of their Prophetesses Corpore tota stupens trahor huc ignara quid ipsa Eloquar ipse sed haec mandat Deus omnia fari And elswhere Sed quid cor iterùm quatitur mihi ménsque flagello Icta forà s vocem prorumpere cogitur omnes Ut moneam And again Ut mihi divino requieta à carmine mens est Orabam magnum genitorem vis ut abesset Sed mihi suggessit vocem sub pectora rursum Pérque omnes terras praecepit vaticinari And that she came from Babylon 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 furious or fanatick All which affords us a manifest Argument that the unhappy Impostour who took upon him to play the Sibyl was besotted with such an extravagant conceit that he would upon any terms be taken
was restored to Christ c. And of Paulina the Wife of Pammachius departed this life in the year 393. Illa Blaesilla cum sorore Paulina dulci somno fruitur tu duarum medius leviùs ad Christum subvolabis c. Blaesilla with her Sister Paulina rests in a quiet sleep thou being between both shalt have a more easie flight to Christ c. Of Paula the Mother of Blaesilla and Paulina departed in Beth-lehem on the twenty eighth of January 404. Fides opera tua Christo te sociant praesens quod postulas facilius impetrabis c. Thy Faith and Works associate thee to Christ being present O Paula thou shalt more easily obtain what thou desirest c. Aspices angustum praecisâ rupe Sepulchrum Hospitium Paulae coelestia regna tenentis c. Seest thou a Rock t' a narrow Coffin hewn 'T is Paula's Mansion who to Heav'n is flown Of Lucinus departed about the year 410. Obsecro te c. I beseech thee Theodorus that thou wouldest bewail thy Lucinius as a Brother yet so as to rejoyce withall that he reigns with Christ c. Confident and Conquerour he looks from on high c. Of Fabiola departed in the year 401. Depositâ tandem sarcinâ levior volavit ad Caelum c. Having lay'd down her burthen she is fled with more ease towards heaven Saint Chrysostome of Berenice and Prosdoce who were drowned during the Persecution 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Moreover these were with the Souldiers of Christ the heavenly Angels Of Pelagia who had cast her self down Headlong 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. She ran not towards the top of a mountain but towards the highest heaven c. The threatning of the Judg c. pressed her to flie with greater haste towards heaven c. She went out of her Chamber out of the Woman's Closet into another Chamber that is to say heaven c. Which is as much as he could have said and what he had said in substance of the greatest Martyrs St. Ignatius of Antioch St. Romanus St. Julian St. Juventinus St. Maximus and others whose Elogies he writ The same St. Chrysostome says also of Philogonius Arch-Bishop of Antioch deceased the twentieth of December about the year 322. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. Ascending into heaven he hath no need of the Praises of men since he is gone to a greater and more happy portion c. He is transferred to the Society of Angels c. Of Eustathius who had held the same See and died about the year 359. upon the sixteenth of July 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Transferred to heaven he is gone towards Jesus whom he had desired and almost in the same Terms of Meletius his Ordinary 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 He is gone towards Jesus whom he had desired St. Augustine of Verecundus who had entertained him and all his Company at his Countrey-House Retribues illi Domine in resurrectione Justorum quia jam ipsam sortem retribuisti ei c. O Lord thou shalt reward him in the Resurrection of the Just because thou hast already cast that Lot upon him And of Nebridius who was come out of Africk into Italy to live with him Nunc ille vivit in sinu Abrahae c. Now he lives in Abraham ' s Bosom whatsoever it be that is understood by that Bosom There my Nobridius lives that dear Friend of mine and thy adopted Son O Lord who had once been a Bond-slave but was after freed There he liveth for what other place can be fit for such a Soul In that place he liveth whereof he was wont to ask me miserable and unexperienced man so many Questions Now he no longer laies his Ear to my Mouth but applies his spiritual mouth to thy Spring and drinks Wisdom after the rate of his greedy Thirst happy to all Eternity Paulinus of Rusina the Wife of Alethius Habes jam in Christo magnum tui pignus c. Thou hast already in Christ a great pledge of thy self an earnest Suffr age thy Wife who prepares as much favour for thee in the Heavenly Places as thou furnishest her with abundance from those upon Earth c. She abounds by the supplies of thy Wealth being clad in a Golden Vesture and cloathed all over with variety viz. precious light c. Paulinus the African of St. Ambrose Ubi corpus Domini accepit c. After be had received the Body of our Lord he gave up the Ghost taking along with him a good provision that his Soul being more refreshed by the strength of that Viand should be now rejoycing in the Society of Angels and Elias whose Life he lived here Sulpicius Severus of St. Martin who died on Sunday November the eleventh 400. Spiritum coelo reddidit c. He resigned his Spirit to Heaven c. There was an holy rejoycing at his Glory c. The Heavenly Company singing Hymns accompanies the Body of the Blessed man to the place of his Enterment c. Martin hath the Acclamations of divine Psalms Martin is honoured with Ecclesiastical Hymns c. Martin is entertained with joy in Abraham ' s Bosom Martin who had been here poor and beggarly enters Rich into Heaven c. And it is to be noted by the way that that Great Man a little before he gave up the Ghost had answered those who would have had him to lie on his side Sinite me Fratres coelum potius respicere quà m terram ut suo jam itinere iturus ad Dominum Spiritus dirigatur Suffer me Brethren rather to look up towards Heaven then down upon the ground that my Spirit which is now taking its journey to God may be directed in its way Palladius writes of St. Chrysostome who dyed November the seventh 407. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Passing hence to Christ c. Ennodius Bishop of Pavia of Epiphanius his Praedecessour deceased January the twenty first 496. Cùm beatissimus cerneret Pontifex c. The blessed Prelate seeing c. that he was ready to fly to the pure brightness of Heaven c. assured of his perfection he added My heart is confirmed in the Lord c. So as that heavenly Soul resounding with Hymns and Songs even at the point of Death returned to her Lord c. He whose departure we bewail upon Earth is in possession of the high places with God c. And of Anthony the Hermit of Valtelina afterwards a Monk in the Monastery of Lerina deceased December the twenty eighth 488. Mundi istius sarcinam deponens c. Laying down the burthen of this World and having overcome the Ambushes laid by the craft of the old Serpent he hath exchanged our day and the light of this present World for that which is perpetual If the Harmony of all these Testimonies which have been produced suffice not to satisfie and perswade the most-prepossessed Spirits that the most eminent and best-informed Antiquity reforming the
which St. Epiphanius confines himself nor coincident with the ninety eighth chosen by Beda nor with the ninety ninth which Usuard hath taken nor yet with the hundredth which Cedrenus for some reason unknown to us thought most worthy his Choice And Thirdly the Death of St. John was seventeen years before that of Trajan who dyed of a Flux at Selinuntium in Cilicia on the tenth of August in the year 117. CHAP. II. The Sentiment of St. Epiphanius concerning the Time of the Apocalyps refuted I Have hitherto given an account of their Opinions who dissenting from the common Tradition thought that St. John had writ his Apocalyps either before the twelfth year of Domitian about four years sooner then he did or under the Reign of Trajan much later then is consistent with the Truth I now come to prove the mistake of Saint Epiphanius who contrary to the Opinion of all precedent Antiquity going back to the Reign of Claudius would needs make that Prince Authour of St. John's Banishment to Patmos The Holy Spirit saith he necessitates John who out of a Religious and humble respect refused to Evangelize in his old Age after the ninetieth year of his Life after his return from Patmos happening under Claudius Caesar and after an aboad of many years in Asia And towards the End of the same Treatise The Holy Spirit Prophetically foretells by the mouth of St. John what happened after his decease he himself having in the Time of Claudius Caesar long before when he was in the Isle Patmos for they themselves that is to say the Alogians acknowledg that these things have been accomplished in Thyatira written through the Spirit of Prophecy to those who professed Christianity there at that time that a Woman should call her self a Prophetess This Venerable man pressed to Ward off the Objections of the Hereticks alledging the Supposititiousness of the Apocalyps in that it presupposed as extant Churches that were not in the Time of St. John as for instance that of Thyatira admits without any necessity the Objection of those troublesom Spirits as if it had been out of all Question then Answers That John spoke by Prophecy not of the Church which was then but of that which should be planted some time after at Thyatira where the People seduced by the Alogians and Montanists should after the ninety third year from our Saviour's Ascension or the one hundred twenty sixth from his Birth according to the account of St. Epiphanius corrupt that wretched City with their Errour and having cited the Text of the Apostle makes Application of it in these Terms Do you not see that he speaks of Women who having been seduced with an Imagination that they had the Gift of Prophecy have seduced many others Now I speak of Priscilla and Maximilla and Quintilla whose Seduction hath not been hidden from the Holy Spirit In fine after he had searched into the time when he thought John Banished to Patmos he shuts up his Discourse with this Conclusion that is to say That in Thyatira a Woman should call her self a Prophetess But the more I consider this Answer the less I finde it without prejudice to the respect due to its Authour capable of giving satisfaction to judicious Persons For First Is there any likelyhood that the Holy Spirit should direct Letters from the Son of God to Churches which had no being when it dictated them and that we must understand these words Unto the Angel of the Church which is in Thyatira write these things I know thy works c. The last are more then the first c. I have a few things against thee because thou sufferest the woman Jezabel who calleth her self a Prophetess to teach and seduce c. in this sence Write to the Angel of the Church which shall be in Thyatira I know the works thou shalt do the last shall be more then the first I shall have some few things against thee thou shalt suffer the woman Jezabel who shall call her self a Prophetess to teach c It was no hard matter for St. Epiphanius to write it but whom hath he hitherto convinced of it besides himself This manner of Interpretation being such as that not any one of either the Antients or Modern hath followed it the very Singularity thereof should be sufficient not onely to bring it into suspicion but also to represent it as so much the more unmaintainable in as much as all that professed Christianity from St. John to St. Epiphanius that is from the year 100. to the year 375. wherein the later wrote against the Alogians had held the contrary to what it supposes and took it for a thing indisputable that the seven Churches to whom our Saviour directed his Epistles had been planted by the Ministery of Saint John before his Banishment to Patmos Secondly Contradicting his own Hypothesis to wit that Thyatira had not had any Church in the Time of St. John he comes for want of reflection to maintain the opposite Affirmative saying Then the whole Church of Thyatira was wholly degenerated into the Sect of the Cataphrygians or Montanists accordingly the holy Spirit would needs reveal unto you how it should come to pass that the Church should be seduced after the time of the Apostles and St. John and those who came after it was about ninety three years after the Assumption of our Saviour that the Church of that place to wit Thyatira should be seduced and fall into the Heresie of the Cataphrygians For if the Church were planted at Thyatira it necessarily follows it was there the Allegation of the destruction of a thing containing the formal presupposition of its precedent existence Thirdly But not to meddle any further with that contradiction of St. Epiphanius nor the supposition which he granted the Hereticks as acknowledged by all he advances a new one against the express Text of St. John for he writes expresly that the whole Church of Thyatira was degenerated into the Sect of the Cataphrygians whereas the Holy Spirit on the contrary says it was not the whole Church of Thyatira that had committed Adultery with Jezabel and received her Doctrine but that in Thyatira there were some Members of that Church which were not fallen into those Errours as it expresly declares speaking To the rest in Thyatira who had not received that Doctrine nor known the depth of Satan I say c. Fourthly Saint Epiphanius himself does further destroy the Computation he had taken to denote the falling-away of the Church of Thyatira For whereas in his Dispute against the Alogians he affirms that in the ninety third year after the Ascension and consequently the one hundred twenty sixth after the Birth of our Saviour this Revolt happened in the fourty eighth Heresie where he particularly refutes the Montanists he comes thirty years later then that Date saying These to wit the Montanists were about the twenty fifth year of Antoninus Pius after Adrian
Christ shewing that on the one side these things to be abjent from the body or from the Lord and being in the body or with the Lord are irreconcileably opposite on the other side these to be absent from the body and to be with the Lord and on the contrary to be present in the body and to be absent from the Lord are inseparably conjoined so that the very act of the separation of the body necessarily translates the Faithfull into the presence of the Lord of which their presence in the body deprives them Yet this Supposition though refuted as aforesaid had such a strange influence upon the spirits of many great Church-men in the Second and Third Age that they outvied one another in the maintaining of it Thus Hermas at the same time that the Counterfeit Sibyl made her first attempt upon the sincerity of the Christians became the Patron and Propagatour of it writing of the Apostles and Faithfull departed before The Apostles and Doctours who have preached the Name of the Son of God and are dead by the power of God and by Faith preached to those who were dead before and gave them the Seal of preaching They are descended with them into the water and they ascended again out of it but those who were dead before descended dead and ascended living Which words are so much the more observable in that they have been subscribed by Clemens Alexandrinus Strom. 2 and 6. inferring from them that the Apostles conformably to what had been done by our Saviour preached the Gospel to those who were in Hell and that it was necessary that the best of the Disciples should be imitatours of their Master there as they had been here supposing after Justin Martyr and St. Irenaeus that our Saviour being descended into hell after his Passion had preached the Gospel to those who were detained there in which Opinion he hath been followed by St. Athanasius St. Hilary of Poictiers Hilary Deacon of the Romane Church St. Epiphanius St. Hierome St. Cyril of Alexandria Oecumenius c. And secondly for that they insinuate not onely that the Apostles descended into hell after their death for to preach there but that the Faithfull departed after the Passion of our Saviour had been there taught and converted and consequently that all without any exception were there detained Presently after the publication of Hermas's Writings Pope Pius the First Brother to that pretended Prophet complies with him in his first Epistle to Justus of Vienna saying The Priests who having been nourished by the Apostles have lived to our days with whom we have divided together the word of Faith being called hence by the Lord are detained shut up in eternal Repositories sufficiently discovering by these words which denote a perpetual detention if not absolutely at least in some respect that he had embraced the same Opinion Justin Martyr in his Dialogue with Trypho the Jew writ some years after the presentation of his Apologie where he makes mention of the Sibyl endeavours all he can to maintain it as well by his Hypothesis of the Souls of the Just being exposed to the rage of evil Spirits as by an Apocryphal Passage he attributes to Jeremy and which Irenaeus sometime after cites one while under the name of Esay another under that of Jeremy and certainly with as little reason one as the other in these Terms The God of Israel hath remembred his dead lying in the slimy earth and descended to them to preach his salvation among them Which St. Irenaeus does five several times apply to the descent of our Saviour into hell after his Passion saying If the Lord that he might become the first-fruits from the dead Col. i. 18. observed the Law of the dead and continued to the third day in the lower parts of the Earth Ephes iv 9. c. since he went to the valley of the shadow of death Psal xxiii 4 where the souls of the dead were c. it is manifest that the souls of his Disciples for whose sake the Lord did those things shall also go to the invisible place designed them by God and remain there expecting the Resurrection till the Resurrection Whence it must needs be that the Latine Interpreter having found in the Original Text the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which properly signifies Invisible and hath been taken by all the Heathens either for Hell or the God which they imagined presided there Literally translated 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Into an invisible place By which place the lovers of Truth are not as many at this day who to free St. Irenaeus form the Errour first proposed in the Sibylline Writing attribute to him Conceptions he neither ever had nor could have had to understand the State of the souls of the Saints departed which those Gentlemen conceive might be expressed by the Term of invisible place because Eye hath not seen the things which God hath prepared for those that love him wherever they may be laid up for them rather then the place properly so called where they effectually enjoy them For St. Irenaeus his manner of reasoning and the contexture of his Discourse expresly refutes their Glosses in as much as if the Disciples whom the Gospel assures us not to have been above their Master ought both in life and death to imitate him and if the Master according to the sentiment of St. Irenaeus and the Church of Rome at this day passed from the Cross to the lower parts of the earth and to the valley of the shadow of death that is to say to hell properly so called and remained there all the time from his Passion to his Resurrection it must of necessity follow that by the invisible place whither the Disciples go after their Death should according to the said Father be understood hell scituated in the lower parts of the earth and in the Valley of the shadow of Death and that they remain there till the time of their Resurrection It is apparent from the words before transcribed that Clemens Alexandrinus Contemporary with St. Irenaeus was of the same Opinion And Tertullian whom St. Cyprian acknowledges for his Master and whom Saint Hierome affirms to have died about the year 217. being arrived to a very great Age discovers in many places that all the Montanist Party had embraced it For instance in the seventh Chapter of his Book Of the Soul After the divorce saith he or separation of the body the soul is transferred to hell she is there detained she is there reserved â—ill the day of Judgment c. Christ at his Death descended to the souls of the Patriarchs And in the ninth Chapter The souls of Martyrs are understood to be under the Altar And in fifty fifth Chapter Hell is in an hollowness of the earth a vast space as to its depth and there is an undiscovered profundity in its entrails c. Christ descended into the lowest parts of
put him into the Catalogue of the Millenaries Not long after came Lactantius who in magnificent Terms entertains us with all the particulars of their Opinion saying Cum deleverit injustitiam c. When God shall have taken away Injustice and kept Sovereign Judgment and restrored to life the Just who were from the beginning he will converse among men for the space of a thousand years and shall rule over them with Justice Which is no more then what the prophecying and distracted Sibyl somewhere proclaims Mortals attend th' eternal King does reign And then those who shall be found alive in their Bodies shall not dy but during the said thousand years shall propogate an infinite multitude and their progeny shall be holy and dear to God Those also who shall be raised out of Hell shall as Judges command the living c. The holy City shall be established in the midst of the earth in which God the Founder thereof shall make his abode with the Just who govern After which he supposes all we have said of the fruitfulness of the earth of the peace which there shall be in it and of the change of the natures of cruel and savage Beasts alledging to that purpose though with some little diversity the words of the third Book of the pretended Sibyl in the thirty second and thirty fifth pages and those of the fifth Book in the fourty sixth page cited by us already Dionysius of Alexandria who had undertaken the Refutation not of Saint Irenaeus as Saint Hierome thought but of Nepos in two Books entituled Of the Promises was about one hundred years after engaged by Apollinarius of Laodicea as we learn from the same Saint Hierome saying Duobus voluminibus respondit Apollinarius c. That is to say Apollinarius answered in two Volumes whom follow not onely the men of his own Sect but also a great multitude of ours as to that particular onely So that I now see with a spirit foreseeing what will happen what considerable Persons will be exasperated against me Much about the same time lived Tychonius the learned African of the Donatist Party of whom Gennadius writes in his Catalogue Mille annorum quoque regni in terra Justorum post resurrectionem futuri suspicionem intulit c. He also gave some suspicion of imagining a Reign of the Just upon Earth for the space of a thousand years after the Resurrection To which may be added that in the confused Collection of Homilies which is attributed to Saint Augustine and was indeed extracted out of the Writings of Tychonius upon the Apocalyps we read these words Retulit Spiritus dum haec scriberet regnaturam Ecclesiam mille annos in hoc saeculo usque ad finem mundi That is to say The Spirit while he writ these things delivered that the Church should reign a thousand years upon Earth even to the end of the World The same Gennadius observes of one Commodianus De divinis repromissionibus adversùs illos Paganos agens vili satis crasso ut ità dixerim sensu disseruit illis stuporem nobis desperationem incutiens Tertullianum Lactantium Papiam sequutus c. Treating against the Heathens concerning the divine Promises he discoursed thereof in a sence sufficiently flat and unpolished casting them into Insensibility us into Despair wherein he followed Tertullian Lactantius and Papias for his Authours We have it also upon the account of St. Hierome that our Severus Sulpitius who writ the Life of St. Martin had committed the same Errour in his Dialogue entituled Gallus wherein yet there is not at this day any thing of that nature to be found Nay the same St. Hierome himself though not chargeable with the Errour which to his grief he saw generally followed by the Christians of the fifth Age betrays himself guilty of so great a respect towards those who first maintained it that he dares not condemn it saying about the year 415. Licet non sequamur tamen damnare non possumus quia multi Ecclesiasticorum virorum Martyres ista dixerunt unusquisque in suo sensu abundat Domini cuncta judicio reservantur c. In regard many Ecclesiastical Persons and Martyrs have said these things as also that every man aboundeth in his own sence and that all is reserved for the Judgment of the Lord though I do not follow them yet can I not condemn them CHAP. XIII Inducements of Praying for the Dead arising from the Hypotheses proposed in the pretended Sibylline Writing BY this means had the Opinion of the Millenaries with a success equal to that of the other Supposiâ—…s of the pretended Sibylline Writing not onely found Partisans among the Christians but also gained the applause of many of the most eminent among them and all had conceived this apprehension thereof that it was impossible to maintain all the Hypotheses contained in it without inducing by a necessary consequence Prayer for the Dead whom they imagined to stand so much the more in need of the Assistances of the living by how much they imagined them exposed as well to the disturbances which those might be subject to who are reduced to the expectation of their Happiness as to the Temptations and Assaults which the Faithfull are exercised with through the implacable malice of Evil Spirits and are obliged at last to stand to the rigorous Judgment of the God of glory We cannot make a better representation of the State whereto the Christians of that Time conceived their deceased Brethren to be reduced then by copying-out what Justin Martyr who had seen the Eruption of the first Sibylline Imposture hath written of the condition of our Saviour himself to whom he very justly applied those words of the two and twentieth Psalm according to the Hebrews Save me from the Lyon's Mouth That he prayed his Soul might be delivered from the Sword from the Lyon's Mouth and the Paw of the Dog was a request that none should prevail over his Soul to the end that when we come to depart this life we should desire the same things as he did of Almighty God that every wicked bold Spirit may be prevented from taking our Souls as being what the Souls expect I have shewn as much in that Saul required that the Soul of Samuel might be evocated by the Witch It appears also that the Souls of all those who have been Just and Prophets are subject to such Powers as by the effect it is manifest was that wherewith the Witch was Possessed Whence it is that he teacheth us by his Son that we for whose sake it is clear that that was done should Fight all manner of waies and desire at our Departure out of this life that our Souls may not fall under any such Powers for as much as when he gave up the Ghost upon the Cross he said Father into thy hands I commend my Spirit From which Discourse
his sins be not granted him by thee We therefore beseech thee O Lord that thy Judgments may not by strange Sentences be rigorous towards him whom the true supplication of Christian faith recommends to thee but that through the assistance of thy grace he may be thought worthy to escape the Judgment of eternal vengeance he who while living was honoured with the Seal of the Holy Trinity through Jesus Christ our Lord Amen Upon some such considerations was it that St. Cyril of Jerusalem in his fifth Mystagogical Catechesis speaking of the departed said 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. We offer prayers to God for the departed and if they are sinners we do not weave Crowns for them but offer up Christ sacrificed for our sins appeasing on their behalf and our own him who is the Lover of mankind Upon which passage it is to be noted by the way that the Text is disordered by the Transcriber who having found in his Copy 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. thrust in a whole line after 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 writing 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 From the same Hypothesis also St. Augustine in the forecited place of his Confessions took occasion to make these Prayers for his Mother Dimitte illi tu debitu sua non intres cum ea in judicium superexaltet misericordia tua judicium c. Do thou also forgive her her Trespasses enter not into judgment with her Let thy mercy be above thy judgment c. But though it were granted this Hypothesis might do somewhat against Aërius who might have been drawn into the common Opinion that the departed being after death in an imperfect State were detained in a place by themselves till their resurrection yet does it not amount to any thing against the Protestants who are of a different Opinion since that if it be always lawfull to conclude He was guilty of sin Therefore we must pray for him the Church would be obliged to pray eternally for all its Members even after their Resurrection and the last Judgment which none hitherto hath conceived she ought to practise CHAP. XIX Saint Epiphanius's seventh Motive Considered IN the last place St. Epiphanius affirms that in his Time Men prayed for the Saints and the Just whoever they were upon this accompt that there might be a distinction made between them and our Saviour who interceding for all does not stand in need of any one's intercession and to shew that there ought not to be parallelled with him any of those who were most recommendable for their Piety Upon which last Hypothesis it may be said that from most certain Principles to wit that we must be tender of the honour of Jesus Christ and distinguish him from the men redeemed by him and by no means suffer that any one compare them to their Saviour it draws a false Consequence to wit that we must pray for them For if it were admitted it were also necessary to pray for the Faithfull as well after their Resurrection and the last Judgment as before since the honour proper to the Son of God will be no less due after the Resurrection then before and that it will be at all times impiously done to take away the distinction there is between him and men for whom he died and interceded by making any one equal to him Thence it appears how weak St. Epiphanius's Reason is even from this that it proves more then he had proposed to himself nay more then the Church of Rome at this day desires the Church of Rome I say which hath not onely for the space of 1200. years past left off Praying for the Patriarchs Prophets Apostles Evangelists Martyrs c. but would look on that kinde of Devotion as injurious having grounded her proceeding on this Discourse of St. Augustine copied by Beda upon the twelfth Chapter to the Hebrews and others Habet Disciplina Ecclesiastica c. It is according to Ecclesiastical Discipline as the Faithfull know that when the Names of the Martyrs are recited before the Altar of God men pray not for them but for all others that are Commemorated Prayers are made For it is an injury to pray for the Martyr by whose Prayers we are to be recommended And yet what to use the Terms of this Father the Ecclesiastical Discipline of the Christians of Africk Rome and in a word of all the West thrust as injurious and ill-grounded out of the both Publick and Private Service after they had quitted the Hypotheses of those that had preceeded them is continued in the Offices of many other Churches Whence we read in the Liturgie of the Armenians Da aeternam pacem omnibus qui nos praecesserunt in fide Christi Sanctis Patribus Patriarchis Apostolis Prophetis Martyribus c. Give eternal peace to the holy Fathers Patriarchs Apostles Prophets Martyrs who have preceeded us in the Faith of Christ In that which goes under the Name of Saint Mark 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. O Lord our God give rest unto the Souls of our Fathers and Brethren who are departed before us in the Faith of Christ being mindfull of the first Fathers who lived in the beginning of the World the Fathers Patriarchs Prophets Apostles Martyrs Confessours Bishops Saints Just men the spirits of all those that have had their accomplishment in the Faith of Christ of whom we this day make Commemoration as also of our holy Father the Apostle and Evangelist St. Mark who hath shewn us the way of Salvation In that of St. Chrysostome though very much altered 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. We offer unto thee this reasonable service for those who rest in Faith our Ancestours Fathers Patriarchs Prophets Apostles Preachers Evangelists Martyrs Confessours continent persons and every spirit accomplished in Faith especially for the absolutely-holy undefiled blessed above all things our glorious Lady the Mother of God and ever Virgin Mary In the Sacramentary of St. Gregory Divina mysteria Sanctis tuis prosint ad gloriam c. Let the divine Mysteries be profitable to thy Saints for their glory We might finde as much in that which St. Epiphanius had seen in use among the Christians of Cyprus Palestine Syria and all the other Provinces not excepting even Africk it self if we had them at present since that in the year 250. St. Cyprian in his 34th Epistle speaking of Celerina Grandmother to Laurentinus Uncle by the Father's side and of Ignatius Uncle by the Mother-side to Celerinus Confessour and Reader in the Church of Carthage said Palmas à Domino coronas illustri passione meruerunt sacrificia pro eis semper ut meministis offerimus quoties Martyrum passiones dies anniversariâ commemoratione celebramus c. They have by their illustrious sufferings obtained of the Lord Palms and Crowns We dayly offer sacrifices for them as you remember as often as we celebrate the Anniversaries of the Passions and Days of the Martyrs But they have been
for his Funeral-Oration and to stop their Mouths tell them that he denied not he had been there but that it was onely to take a Glass of Wine as he passed by which Discourse was to them an absolute Put-off and caused them to be laughed at whereever they came CHAP. XLII Of the true Motives which the Antients had to Pray for the Blessed Saints in Heaven BUt not further to mention Baldric or the Bishop of Mascon it will be demanded what Motive enclined those who since the year 500. are found to have made Prayers for the Dead to do so And here I am willing to acknowleg that there was no more noise of the Opinion which had so much distracted the Spirits of Christians of the Second and Third Age deceived by the Pretended Sibylline Writing and presupposing that all Souls without exception descended to Hell were there confined till the Resurrection of their Bodies and exposed not onely to the temptations but also to the violences of Evil Spirits which to prove Justine Martyr alledged to Trypho the Jew the pretended raising of Samuel by the Witch of En-dor For though the most antient Prayers as for Instance those which St. Augustine made for his Mother seem to have been drawn up by that Precedent and that the Libera if it be applied to the Departed rather then to the Faithfull in Agonies and preparing themselves for death requires we should think they were yet had they even from the Time of Tertullian seventy years or thereabouts after the first coming abroad of the Sibylline Writing so called begun to exempt the Martyrs from the necessity of descending into Hell and so by little and little the minds of the Christians strugling with and overcoming the Imposture that first Hypothesis was cast out of doors yet so as that it was done without a rejection of the Forms which those who maintained it had introduced into the Publick Service of the Church And thence comes it that St. Ambrose prays for his Brother Satyrus saying Tibi nunc omnipotens Deus innoxiam commendo animam c. Now O Almighty God I recommend unto thee his innocent soul And for Valentinian the Second and Gratian in these words Hîc adhuc intercessionem c. Should I still make Intercession here for him to whom I dare promise a reward Put into my hands the sacred Mysteries let us with a devout affection demand rest for him give me the celestial Sacraments let us attend his religious soul with our Oblations Lift up your hands with me in the Sanctuary O ye People to the end at least that by this Present we may recompense his merits c. No night shall go over my head but that I will make you some present of my prayers in all my Visitations I shall remember you c. And for the Great Theodosius Praesumo de Domino c. I so far presume of the Lord that he will hear the voyce of my cry wherewith I attend thy pious soul c. Grant perfect rest unto thy servant Theodosius even that rest which thou hast prepared for thy Saints May his soul return thither whence it descended where he cannot feel the sting of death where he may be satisfied that this death is the end not of Nature but of sin c. From which Prayers it is to be observed by the way First That this Holy Prelate expressing that he considered not his prayers for Valentinian who died a Catechumen but a Person very Religious and truly inclined to Piety as an Office whereof he stood in need but as a simple Effect of his good Wishes manifestly discovers that not any one of the Faithfull departed in the Lord stands in any necessity of the suffrages of the surviving and accordingly that the Protestants who believe that in matter of Religion nothing should be attempted without the express order of God himself speaking in his Word cannot be accompted criminals for their declining an act which is not even in their Judgment who practised it of any necessity or any way beneficial to those for whom the voluntary devotion or Will-worship of men designs it Secondly That St. Ambrose who calls the Eucharist celebrated in memory of Valentinian and upon his occasion a Present which he makes his Friend and by which he requites him could not have believed it to be either the Body of the Son of God or the Offering-up of that Body or in general a Propitiatory Sacrifice properly so called For who could without an impious Absurdity imagine that the real Body of our Saviour should be so much at our disposal as that we might make Presents of it to our Friends c. that the Proper Oblation of the same Body being infinitely more precious then we or any thing that can proceed from us is or could be a supplement which we adjoyn to our Prayers for our Friends and that this kind of Present is as the meanest kindness we can do them so as that we might say with St. Ambrose that at least by that Present we requite them It seems then he pretended not to do what the Church of Rome thinks to do at this day in the Masses of Requiem For she professes to present the Oblation she makes therein whatever it may be not to the deceased for whom she prays but onely to God for or on the behalf of the deceased She conceives also that her Host which she believes to be properly and really the Body of the Son of God surpasses in value not onely our Prayers but what ever is most excellent either in Earth or in Heaven among the Angels and Spirits of the glorified Saints And though she who cannot endure the Protestants because they are unwilling to submit their Consciences to any other Rule then that of Faith contained in the Sacred Scriptures hath born in her Bosom and suffered unreproved those inconsiderate Children who have had the boldness to write that the solemn Sacrifice might be offered to Creatures As when the Authour of the great Chronicle of the Low-Countries thrust in this into his History that on the 27th of October 1467. Charles last Duke of Burgundy who conquered the People about Liege Ecclesiae Lovaniensis universo Clero commisit omnipotenti Deo suaeque sanctae Genitrici offerre suo nomine sacrificium c. gave express Order to all the Clergy of the Church of Lovain to offer unto Almighty God and to his most Holy Mother the solemn Sacrifice in his name never considering either that the Oblation of the solemn Sacrifice is by the confession of all the act of Latria and sovereign adoration due to God alone as being the most proper Object and most worthy of it nor that the most Holy Mother of our Lord though blessed according to the saying of the Angel among Women never ceased being a Creature and that she is such now in Heaven as much as she was before she was crowned with Glory or
every where that all Souls are produced by God at the very instant of their infusion into the Bodies they are to animate and that for as much as they were not at all before they were united to their Bodies they could not either be or sin in Heaven or consequently descend thence as St. Ambrose presupposed that which is not absolutely neither having before it is any Being nor pre-existing nor capable of either Action or Motion from one place to another or of any Passion any way conceivable by us But as to the main point it is manifest that St. Ambrose and all the Church of his Time had absolutely rejected the first Hypothesis derived from the pretended Sibylline Writing maintaining that all Souls without exception descend into Hell after their departure out of the Bodies wherewith they every one as to its own particular constituted humane Persons and that that other Branch of Errour which had prepossessed the Spirit of Justine Martyr and his Contemporaries whereby they imagined that the Souls of the greatest Saints during their pretended detention in Hell were in some sort subject to the power of Evil Spirits and upon that accompt stood in need of being relieved by the Prayers of the Living imploring on their behalf the Protection of God and his good Angels was no longer held it being the perswasion even of those who continued to make the same Prayers as they who had been of that Belief that the true Christians departing out of the Body were with the Lord in an eternal rest and absolute safety In so much that these who recommended the Dead to God grounded not their so doing on either of these two Motives St. Ambrose telling us plainly concerning Valentinian the Second Requiescamus inquit anima pia in Castellis ostendens illic esse quietem tutiorem quae septo Coelestis refugii munita atque vallata non exagitatur soecularium incursibus Bestiarum c. Let us rest says the Faithfull soul in Towers shewing that there where she is received there is a more assured Repose which being encompassed and fortified with the Enclosure of celestial refuge is not disturbed by the Incursions of the Beasts of this World that is to say Evil Spirits and Wicked Men. And concerning Theodosius Lapsum sentire non poterit in illa requie constitutits c. Being seated in that Rest he cannot be subject to fall from it And Paulinus not long before the Death of St. Ambrose to Pammachius concerning his Wife Paulina deceased in the year 396. Satis docuit Rex Propheta c. The Royal Prophet hath sufficiently taught us how far we should be troubled at the departure of our Friends and Kinred to wit so as rather to think of our Journey after them then of that which they are already come to the end of It is indeed an Expression of Piety to be cast down at the taking away hence of Just men but it is also an Holy thing to be raised up into Gladness upon the Hope and Faith of God's Promises and to say to him that it is in trouble Why art thou sad Be it so that Piety bewail for a time yet is it necessary that Faith should always be joyfull Upon this Ground was it that all those who for the space of six hundred years made it their Business to write the Lives of the Faithfull accompted them among the Blessed not admitting any adjournment of their Peace and Felicity after their death In so much as Gregory Arch-Bishop of Tours deceased the seventeenth of November 592. about which time Pope GREGORY first of that Name was designing the first-draught of Purgatory should not have spoken of those Virtuous Persons whose memory he celebrated in other Terms then those who had preceeded him saying of Gregory Bishop of Langres of Nicetius Bishop of Lyons of Porcianus Ursus and Caluppa Religious Men Migravit ad Dominum c. He is gone hence to the Lord of Gullus Bishop of Cler-mont of Nicetius Bishop of Trier and of Lupicinus Spiritum coelo intentum proemisit ad Dominum c. He sent before his Body to the Lord his Soul imployed in Thoughts of Heaven of Friard Christus animam suscepit in Coelo c. Christ hath received his soul into Heaven of Martius Ad Coronam commigravit c. He is gone hence to receive a Crown of Venantius Vitam percepturus aeternam emicuit saeculo c. He is hurried hence to receive eternal Life of Leobord Manifestum est eum ab Angelis susceptum c. It is manifest he hath been entertained by Angels In a word the great number of those who admire the Novelties that have crept into the Opinion of Purgatory hath been no hindrance but that the Authours of Lives who have written since the year 600. have spoken and believed of their Dead consonantly to what had been done by the most Antient. If therefore even in the Time of St. Ambrose the Opinion of the Millenaries was so lost to credit that St. Hierome who out of respect towards the Great Persons that had followed it forbore to express his Thoughts thereof and to number it among Heresies thought it a great Tenderness towards it to assign it a place among the dreaming Imaginations of mis-informed Spirits it is not to be conceived that after the year 500. descending still it should have regained any Partizans and that there should have been any man whose Prayers for his deceased Friends proceeded from that Motive so as that he thought himself obliged to wish them their part in the First Resurrection which no man then understood in the sense wherein Tertullian and those of his Time had conceived it But indeed many even till after the year 600. relying on that Hypothesis partly extracted out of the pretended Oracles of the Counterfeit Sibyl that All Souls should pass through the last Conflagration of the World demanded on the Behalf of their departed Friends two things One that they might pass through that great Conflagration as through a Purgative Fire not to be prejudiced thereby no more then the Gold melted in the Crucible Another that they might have their part with all the Saints in the Resurrection to Glory Upon this perswasion Kindasvind King of the West-Goths in Spain who reigned between the year 642. and 649. had caused these Verses to be written on the Tomb of his Wife Reciberga Ego te Conjux quia vincere fata nequivi Funere perfunctam Sanctis commendo tuendam Ut cùm Flamma vorax veniet comburere Terras Coetibus ipsorum meritò sociata resurgas Since death on my desires would not thee spare Of thee departed may the Saints take care That thou with them mayst rise again that day When of the Fire the Earth shall be the prey The First of these Demands hath lost much of that Consideration with those who have embraced the New Opinion of Purgatory which seemed to require the Example of the
whether it were so or not which also he but slightly advances as finding it not contributary to ought Impious yet without imposing any necessity to admit it and which in fine he lets pass under a Whether an It may be a Peradventure so that not presuming himself to approve it all the kindness he hath for it is expressed in his telling us that he does not disallow it Fourthly That the very thing which he proposes so doubtfully may be adjusted to the Opinion which the most Antient had had of the general Conflagration of the Universe at the end of the World whose Imagination it was that it should serve as a general Lustration through which the Spirits of the Saints even that of the Blessed Virgin were to pass and who reflected on nothing less then the Purgatory proposed to us at this day Fifthly That though he should assure us that that certain Fire of Grief whereof he speaks shall be a material Fire that it shall burn the Spirits of men and that the Torment which they shall endure thereby shall afflict them from their departure out of the Bodies they had cast off yet should not his assurance be of greater weight to the Protestants then to the Church of Rome which submits not to his Authority but onely in what she finds consistent with her own Opinions land confidently rejects what she quarrels at For if she think it just to dissent from him when he teaches that In the Deity there are three Substances that The Angels are corporeal that The sins of the Fathers make the Children liable to punishment that The souls of all the Departed are between the day of their departure out of this World and that of the Last Judgment shut up in secret Receptacles that the Prayers made for them are beneficial to them to the end that either the Remission may be full or that their Damnation be more tolerable and that those Prayers made on the behalf of the Damned are a kinde of consolation to the â—iving all which things the said Holy Prelate positively affirms why should she take it ill that after her Example we should refuse absolutely to depend on his Authority especially in a subject wherein he does not pretend any in as much as it is his own acknowledgment that he was not resolved what he should should hold What greater Necessity is there that we should determine for the Affirmative when he himself makes it a Question Whether there be after this life a Purgatory for the Spirits of the Deceased then when he doubts Whether the Sun Moon and Stars belong to the society of the blessed Spirits in Heaven Though we had read no other Lecture of Modesly then the reservedness which prevailed with him to forbear resolving ought upon these two Questions do we not deserve commendation for having in imitation of him kept the Scales in our Hands rather then Blame which we must never expect to avoid if without pregnant Proof we affirmed what he proposed onely Problematically and without any decision If it may with any colour be pretended that the Bent of his inclination was the Affirmative of a Purgatory of some kinde or other and that it should be a Pattern for us to do the like why should not his confidence in denying the Antipodes force us by a like Negative to dispute against our own Experience whose Testimony for these 150. years assures us he was mistaken Were it not much better that those who would make use of his Name in a Cause he never maintained should behave themselves according to his Moderation and protest with him I would if it might be or rather I will if it may be be overcome by the Truth which is not openly repugnant to the sacred Scriptures in as much as that which is repugnant to them cannot in any sort be either called or accompted Truth I therefore intreat them in the fear of God to take it into their serious Consideration First Whether it be possible their Belief such as they propose it to us can be the same with that of St. Augustine who never for ought we could ever learn determined in the Affirmative of any Purgatory much less of that which the Monastical Revelations have furnish'd us with in despight of the most Venerable Antiquity but hath expresly declared by his Sermons that he acquiesced in the common Sentiment of the Church of his Time which held that those whom God calls to himself are Translated at their Death either into the actual enjoyment of their Felicity or confined in the Place of their eternal Punishment To this Effect does he express himself to his Church upon the eleventh Chapter of St. John Receptus est Pauper receptus est Dives sed ille in sinu Abrahae ille c. The Poor man was received the Rich man was received but the former into Abraham ' s Bosom the later where he should be thirsty and not finde a drop of Water the souls of all men therefore that I may hence take occasion to instruct your Charity all souls have after their departure out of this World their several Retreats the Good are in Bliss the Wicked in Torments c. The rest which is given immediately after Death whoever is worthy of it receives it immediately when he Dies And upon the First of St. John Ille qui vixit mortuus est c. He who hath lived is also dead his Soul is transported into other places his Body is disposed into the Ground whether those words viz. those of his Last Will be put in execution or not it does not concern him he does he endures quite another thing he either rejoyces in Abraham ' s Bosom or in eternal Fire prays for a little Water I know Cardinal Bellarmine either thought or pretended to think that all could be deduced from those Words was that the Souls of the Faithfull are immediately after their Departure out of this World gathered into rest in as much as assured of their eternal Salvation and that thence they derive great Joy but that to some it is not given without the admixture of Temporal Pains But I maintain that his Commentary is a formal corruption of the Text to which he applies it in as much as S. Augustine gives us to observe therein as things immediately opposite the Good and the Wicked the Joy of the former in Abraham's Bosom and the Torments of the later in eternal Fire so that as the Torment of these is an absolute Privation of Joy and Rest so the Joy and Rest of the other is necessarily an absolute exemption from Torment Besides I do not see how long any can number among those who rejoyce and are in Bliss the Spirits of such as are supposed to suffer more then could be suffered in this Life and much less how the Believer dead in the Lord receives when he dies his Rest and Joy if he be then
of Israel asking Why is this mad fellow come to thee And Schemaiah the Nehelamite stirring up Zephaniah and the other Priests against Jeremiah writ to them The Lord hath made thee c. that ye should be Officers in the House of the Lord for every man that is mad and maketh himself a Prophet And Saint Ambrose doth in appearance acknowledg it by this Discourse There are certain Madnesses and alienations of spirit which are true and it may be of the Prophets who being transported as to their understanding Prophecied being so filled with the Spirit of God that to some they seemed mad when not minding their own safety many times naked and bare-foot as Esay the Prophet did they ran among the People crying not what they would themselves but what the Lord commanded them But for the beter understanding of all these Passages the Christian Reader is onely to remember that as the Prophets though they did not any action that was irregular or void of reason passed for Mad men in the apprehension of the profane such as might be the Captains at Ramoth-Gilead and Shemaiah the Presecutour of Jeremiah so the Devils egged on their Foretellers of things to come to play the Apes and imitate the Prophets and to brag even when they were at the height of their Extravagance of Inspirations equal with theirs So that if the true Prophets moved by Celestial Grace discovered the operations of it by some action suitable to their condition upon which account Saul being among them stripped himself of his Royal Robe and lay upon the ground humbling himself before God and celebrating the glory of his Infinite Power according as the Spirit gave him to speak on the contrary when he was overpressed with Melancholy and tormented by the evil Spirit which put him into Madness and Ecstasie he spoke also in that condition as if he had Prophecyed And Saint Ambrose minds us of the difference there is between the servile transportation of Possessed Persons which darkens the light of their minds binds up its Faculties makes their Reason unprofitable and forces them to violent motions and that holy Ravishment of the Prophets which filling them with admiration and joy refined their understanding and left them the free use of their ratiocination yet in such manner as to diver them from all humane Considerations and bend their thoughts to an extraordinary submission to God Upon which account he said They cryed not what they would themselves but what he commanded intending to express thereby the violence they did themselves by renouncing their own will that they might the more freely pursue the motions of his Grace and observed further that they minded not their own safety representing that they regarded not the preservation of their Lives nor their own convenience but were always ready to Sacrifice themselves and protest with St. Paul None of these things move me neither count I my life dear unto my self Nor did he absolutely pronounce that the action of the Prophetick Spirit upon the Person who was thereby inspired made him a Fool or so drew him out of himself as that he was without reason and had no other motion then what was forced but that inclining him to do not what his own ratiocination suggested to him but what it self advised him to it many times put him upon such extraordinary actions that those who vouchsafed not to consider the signification thereof were by their own corrupt judgment induced to attribute them to Madness and Extravagant Transportation which obliged him to say not that He was but that To some he seemed Mad. Tertullian went yet much further when drunk with the cup of Montanus he esteemed highly of those Ecstasies and Transportations which so ravish a man out of himself that he looses either wholly or in part the freedom of his Ratiocination But in regard Justin Martyr as well as he was of opinion That those Alienations which he pretended to have been in the Cumaean Sibyl might proceed from Divine Inspiration it is of some consequence as well to clear up his sentiment as to consider what judgment Antiquity hath made thereof and that the rather for that we have now some Divines who imagine That God does sometimes send such strong and violent Irradiations of his Love as strike through the Hearts of men like Thunder-bolts force those who receive them to cry out and do so cast them down that they are as it were dead Further That the Persons who are honoured with such an Illumination have motions of Piety so impetuous that they cannot pray unto God and when they attempt it suffer incredible pains their Bodies not being able to bear the vehement motions of so great a Devotion In his Book Of the Soul he hath this Discourse which Pamelius unjustly applies to Prisca or Maximilla dead fifty years before There is at this day among us a Sister on whom are fallen the Gifts of Revelations which she endures in spirit in the Church during the Divine Solemnities by Ecstasie And in another place having supposed that the Ecstasis that is to say the deep sleep that fell upon Adam was the force of the holy Spirit working Prophecy he adds God sent him an alienation of spirit which is a spiritual force wherein Prophecy consists and lower We say That Ecstasie is a sally out of sound sence somewhat like Madness Item This shall be the property of the said alienation of spirit that it comes not through any injury done to health but according to natural reason for it does not exterminate the understanding but force it out of the way It is one thing to shake another to move it one thing to overturn it another to exercise it What therefore proceeds from the Memory argues the sound constitution of the Mind if the soundness of the Soul be stupified the Memory remaining entire it is a kinde of Madness Wherefore we are not said to be Mad but to Dream and so it is then if ever that we are wise for our knowledge though in Umbrage yet is not extinct save that it may then seem to be wanting And elsewhere wresting to a wrong sence the words of the Gospel concerning Saint Peter's not knowing what he said he put this Question How not knowing was it through simple errour or want of reason Wresting also the sence of Saint Paul's Discourse he hath these Expressions Let him take out some Psalm some Vision some Prayer in a spiritual way onely that is in Ecstasie in alienation of spirit And against Praxeas Neither Peter nor John nor James were sensible of the Vision of God without a denial of Reason and alienation of spirit for which we maintain in the cause of new Prophecy that Ecstasie that is alienation of spirit is consistent with Grace For it is necessary that the man ravished in spirit especially when he sees the glory of
God or when God speaks by him disclaim his own sentiment being overshadowed by the power of God concerning which there is a Dispute between us and the Psychici And indeed Saint Hierome expresly numbers among the Books written by him against the Church six Volumes Of Ecstasie and a seventh Against Apollonius wherein he endeavours to maintain whatever the other quarrels at his Design being to vindicate Montanus who had written thus Behold man is like a Viol and I am the Bow man lies him down to rest and I watch Behold the Lord who takes mens Hearts out of them and who also bestows Hearts on them and Maximilla who held this strange Discourse The Lord hath sent me c. forced me I being both willing and unwilling to learn the knowledg of God The Church therefore formally condemning the Opinion of those who believed that God made Ecstatick and transported such as he inspired and that he exercised violence on their spirits expressed her self By Claudius Apollinaris Bishop of Hierapolis to this effect Montanus through an insatiable covetousness of Primacy giving access in his Soul to the Adversary being of a sudden transported in mind and out of himself was inspired and began to speak and to pronounce strange words and his Prophetesses were filled with an adulterate spirit so as that they spoke with a transportation of their understanding unseasonably and after a strange manner and Theodotus his Complice was besides himself and delivered up to the spirit of Errour By Miltiades Disputing against the same Montanus b That false Prophet being in a Transport of spirit which is attended by Confidence and want of Fear began by a voluntary Ignorance which turned into an involuntary Madness of the Soul in which manner they cannot shew that any Prophet either of the Old or New Testament hath been transported By St. Irenaeus who set forth in the same colours one of the Prophetesses of the Marcosians Being foolishly swollen and puffed up by the said words and having her Soul warmed by the expectation of what she should Prophecy and her Heart beating more then it should she presumed to utter things Fantastick and whatever occurred to her thoughts vainly and audaciously in regard she is set on by a vain spirit according to what a better then we hath said of such People to wit that a Soul enflamed by vain air is a presumptuous and shameless thing By Clemens Alexandrinus giving the Impostours of his Time this Touch They Prophecied in Ecstasie as the servants of an Apostate By Origen who esteemed that kind of Emotion unworthy the Holy men of God The Prophets were not as some imagine alienated in spirit and spoke not through any violence of the spirit If any thing saith the Apostle be revealed to another that sitteth by let the first hold his peace Whence he shews that he who speaks is at liberty to speak when he will and to hold his peace when he will By St. Basil who presses the same Doctrine in these Terms There are some who say that the Saints Prophecied being out of or besides themselves the humane understanding being shadowed by the Spirit but this is contrary to what the Divine presence doth promise that it should alienate in spirit him who is seised of God and that when he is full of Divine Instructions he should himself be deprived of Ratiocination and while he contributes to the advantage of others should reap no benefit from his own Discourses In a word How does it stand with Reason that through the Wisdom of the Spirit a man should become as one besides himself And that the spirit of Knowledg should deliver what is incohaerent For neither is light the Authour of Blindness but stirs up the Visual Faculty implanted by Nature nor does the spirit cause obscurity in mens minds but raises the Understanding to the contemplation of things intelligible cleansing it from the stains of sin Nor is it improbable that through the Design of the evil Spirit who lays his Ambushes to ensnare humane Nature the mind is confounded but to say that the same is effected by the presence of the Holy Spirit is impious By St. Epiphanius who strongly seconding him says When there hath been any necessity the Holy men of God have foretold all things with the true spirit of the Prophets and a strong Ratiocination and an understanding reaching the sence of what was said Again The Prophet spoke with a clear ratiocination and consequently saying all things with a certain vigour as Moses the servant of God who was faithfull in all his House The Prophet in the Old Testament is called the Seer The Vision of Isaiah the Son of Amos which he saw c. I saw the Lord c. And after he had heard what the Lord said unto him coming towards the people he saith The Lord saith these things Do you not see that this is the Discourse of one who comprehends and not of one who is besides himself and that he expressed not himself as one that was transported in his understanding In like manner Ezechiâ—l the Prophet hearing the Lord speak thus to him Take thou also unto thee Wheat and Barley and Beans c. and bake it with dung that cometh out of man answers Ah! Lord God behold my Soul hath not been polluted for from my youth up have I not eaten of that which dieth of it self or is torn in pieces neither came there abominable flesh into my mouth For knowing that the Oracle had come to him from the Lord to serve for a Threat he was so far from being distracted in his understanding that he delayed to do it but that he was of that Opinion is to be attributed to the settledness of his thoughts which may be argued from his expostulation Ah! Lord God c. This indeed being proper to the true Prophets to have their reason fortified by the Holy Spirit by Instruction and Discourse Daniel also had not he knowledg and skill in all Learning and Wisdom and comprehended his own imaginationsâ— He who resolved the Riddles of Nebuchadnezzar and explicated in such manner what the other had seen in his Dreams that he presently gave him the Interpretation thereof with a settled spirit and out of a superabundance of the gift of God having an intelligence of things above all men through the riches of the spirit truly instructing the Prophet and those who by the means of the Prophet were honoured with the Precepts of Truth But what these promise to Prophecy they declare being not well in their wits nor comprehending the meaning thereof for their words are elusive ambiguous and such as are uncapable of a right sence By St. Chrysostome who writes Hence we learn also another thing to wit That the Prophets were not as those who foretell things to come for there when the Devil breaks in upon
Opinion which the Sibylline Writing falsly so called had introduced among Christians hath unanimously embraced and constantly taught the Protestants the Sentiment which they with one accord follow concerning the State of the Faithfull departed in Jesus Christ it were no hard matter for them to make a more ample Production of Instances since that in a manner all we have left of the Lives of Persons who have made profession of Piety assures us that all without any distinction Martyrs Confessours Prelates Religious Persons Laicks c. even to the Catechumens whom an invincible necessity deprived of the Baptism they had earnestly desired were upon their dissolution translated to Heaven where they have been and still are in Rest Happiness and Glory expecting the Resurrection of the Bodies they have deposited in Earth And as we might justly rely on the grave Remonstrance which Saint Hierome made above one thousand two hundred and seventy years ago even in Rome it self to Paula excessively lamenting the death of her Daughter Blaesilla speaking of himself and of all Christians in general Nos quorum exitum Angelorum turba comitatur quibus obviam Christus occurrit gravamur magis si diutiùs in isto mortis Tabernaculo habitamus c. In Jesu mortem gaudia prosequuntur c. We whose Departure the Assemblies of Angels accompany whom Christ comes to meet are more grieved that we dwell any longer in this Tabernacle of Death c. Joys attend the death which is in Jesus c. So might we with good reason summon those who hold the contrary to let us know what they have of greater Consequence then the unanimous Consent of Eusebius's Athanasius's Gregory's Ambrose's Hierome's Chrysostome's c. and might induce them not to embrace it and force us to change our Opinion CHAP. XXXIX The same Sentiment further confirmed from Sepulchral Inscriptions BUt though we should be willing out of a Design to gratify our Adversaries not to bring into any accompt at all the Depositions of all these Great Persons and make a voluntary loss of their Writings and Judgments yet would the Epigrams and Inscriptions of antient Monuments which Rome and her Correspondents preserve for us be enough to keep us from falling into so great a weakness as the renouncing of our present Opinion concerning the State of the Faithfull departed Nay though all the Doctours of the Church were silent and their Testimonies cast out of all respect the Stones as long as they shall remain will not cease publishing and that very loudly the truth of the perswasion maintained by us Let us then consult those half consumed Epitaphs which the Providence of God hath made to triumph over so many ruins and make our advantage of the hardness of Marbles which have hitherto stood out against the injury of Times to confound the insensibility of those who seem desirous injuriously to smother a most evident Truth Let us propose it to their own Consciences whether it be not a very strong presumption against them that not any one of those Antient Inscriptions whereof they are the Preservers and Admirers can without violence be applied to their Sentiment and that all of them presuppose ours which yet they charge I know not upon what accompt with Novelty Which to make so much the more manifest I shall begin with the most simple which I shall reduce into Classes alledging of every one some Instance then conclude with those which being of greater length make a clearer discovery of the Design of their Authours The Book entituled Roma Subterranea in as much as it contains a Description of the Vaults and Cemiteries digged under ground in and about that City furnishes us with about ninety Examples of Epitaphs which say simply In Pace c. In Peace as that of Proclus Interred under the eighth Consulship of Honorius that is to say in the year 409. that of Hilara deceased under the Consulship of Opilio that is to say in the year 453. those of Crescentina Honoraius Pelagia Ulpius Festus Quartina c. Others had 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a Place of Rest As that of Ammonius and of Eutyches Locus GerontI Presbyteri c. The Place of Gerontius the Priest deceased the seventeenth of June under the Consulship of Avitus that is to say in the year 456. Hîc habet sedem Leo Presbyter c. The Priest Leo hath his Seat here Others which in some sort savour of the Style of the Heavens As Domus aeterna Ex. Tyres in Pace c. The eternal house of Ex. and Tyre in peace and that of Valeriana in like manner Others had onely this word Quiescit c. He rests As that of Victoria that of Pancratius the Bishop deceased in the year 493. and that of Alix the Daughter of Pipin Interred at St. Arnoul-de-Mets Or Requiescit which signifies the same thing As that of Gordianus Interred the ninth of September under the Consulship of Symmachus that is to say in the year 485. That of Aemiliana Interred the eleventh of October under the Consulship of Probinus viz in the year 489. That of Pelagius the First deceased the fourth of March 558. That of Augustine Arch-Bishop of Canterbury deceased the twenty fifth of May 604. That of Boniface the Fourth deceased the eighth of May 614. That of Theodore who died in the year 619. That of Theobald Bishop of Ostia That of Roderick last King of the West-Goths in Spain who died on Sunday the eleventh of November 714. That of Alcuin deceased the nineteenth of May 804. That of Bernard King of Italy deceased April the 17 th 871. and Interred at Milan that of the Abbot Vintila deceased at Leon the three and twentieth of December in the year 928. Others Quievit c. He is at rest As that of Susanna deceased the seven and twentieth of July under the Consulship of Caesarius and Atticus in the year 397. Or Requievit as that of Leo the Neopâ—yte deceased the four and twentieth of June under the Consulship of Philippus and Sallea in the year 348. and that of Leontius the Spanyard deceased the four and twentieth of June 510. Others Depositus c. He is left as a Pledge c. As those of Macedonia and Fortunula Others Quiescet in pace c. He shall rest in Peace As that of Marinus deceased the thirtieth of November under the Consulship of Arbaethio and Lollianus in the year 355. Others Requiescet in pace which signifies the same thing as that of Felix Others Requievit in pace c. He is at rest in peace as that of Litorius deceased at Talabriga or Talavera della Reina the four and twentieth of June in the year of the Aera 548 or 510 of Christ That of Primus deceased at Evora the thirteenth of March according to the Aera 582. or 544 of Christ That of Paulina deceased the eighteenth of November under the Consulship of Datianus and Cerealis in the year 318. That of