HVGO GROTIVS Against PAGANISM JUDAISM MAHUMETISM Translated by C. B. LONDON Printed for the Author and are to be Sold by John Barksdale Book-binder next door to the Five Bells in New-street near Shoe lane 1676. STEPHANVS CVRCELLAEVS To the Most Illustrious HVGO GROTIVS A Vreus tuus de Christianae Religionis veritate Liber omnibus Pietatis studiosis in deliciis esse debet That Golden Book of yours of the verity of Christian Religion deserves to be in the bosome of all that are studious of Piety To his Honoured Patron DAVID WILLIAMS of Corndon Esq SIR THE former Discourses were long since Dedicated to your Worthy Brother now with God and they have born several Impressions It is high time these should follow to complete The Defence of Christian Religion and they gladly come forth under your Name hoping for the like favourable reception amongst ingenuous Readers because the Author is the same and the Translator and the Dedication now will add as much Grace to this little Piece as the former hath received And it serves my Design as well that is to remain as a little Monument of my Thankfulness to your self and your Noble Family whom I daily pray God to bless Your most humble Servant Cl. Barksdale HVGO GROTIVS AGAINST PAGANISM I. A special Refutation of Religions differing from the Christian IT is the happiness of a Christian in this life not only to rejoyce within himself and delight in Truth found out but also to give help to other men that wander about in the various by-paths of Errour and make them partakers of so great a Good This although we have in some measure endeavour'd in our former Discourses because the demonstration of Truth contains the refutation of Errour Nevertheless seeing every sort of Religion opposite to the Christians viz. Paganism Judaism and Mahumetism beside what they have common among them have certain proper Errors and some peculiar arguments which they are wont to urge against us 't will be to good purpose I think to enter into a special disputation with them severally entreating the Readers so free their Judgment from partiality and prepossession that they may give the more equal sentence upon the things to be delivered II. And first of Paganism That there is one God alone And first against the Pagans we say if they put more Gods eternal and equal that 's sufficiently refuted already in our first Discourse where we demonstrated the only one God the cause of all things But if by the name of Gods they call created Minds or Intelligences superiour to Man they are either good or evil If they say Good they ought to be sure of it lest they fall perhaps into a dangerous Errour receiving enemies for friends fugitives for messengers Besides reason requires that some evident difference of Worship be made between the Highest God and these Intelligences Moreover it should be known what order is among them what good may be expected from every one and what honour the Greatest King is willing should be done unto each of them All which being wanting in their Religion it is hence apparent enough how nothing of certainty is therein and how much more safe a way t were for them to betake themselves to the Worship and Service of the one Supreme God which also Plato hath affirmed to be the duty of a Wise man and so much the rather because good Spirits being the Ministers of the Supreme God they cannot chuse but be very serviceable to such as live in Gods favour III. That evil Spirits are worship'd by the Pagans But we have weighty Arguments to prove the Spirits which the Pagans worshipped were not Good but Evil Spirits First because they remitted not their servants to the Worship of the Highest God yea as much as they could they took away that Worship or at least by all means would therein make themselves equal to him Secondly because they procured very grievous Persecutions of the Worshippers of the Supreme God stirring up the Magistrates and people against them For whenas the Poets might freely sing of the Parricides and Adulteries of the gods and the Epicureans deny the Divine Providence and no other Religion was so dissonant in Rites but was admitted into Society as the Egyptian Phrygian Grecian Thuscan at Rome the Jews only were a Curti recutiti nubium adoratores dementes in porcos mocked every where as appears by the Satyrs and Epigrams and sometimes b Ioseph 18.5 Tacit. Annal 2. Sen. Epist 109. Act. 18.1 Suet. Tiber. cap. 36. banished but the Christians c Tac. An. 15. Iuvenal toeda lucebis in illa Qua stantes ardent qui fixo gutture sumant were also put to most cruel Torments whereof there can be rendred no other cause but that these two Sects had a Veneration for the one true God whose Honour the Vulgar gods opposed emulous not so much one of another as all of him Thirdly From the manner of Worship which cannot please or become an honest good Spirit by Hmmane d Vid. Disc 2. Bloud by runnings e Vt in Lupercalibus Liv. I. of naked men in the Temples by sports and dances full of f Vt in Floral Ovid. Fast 4. obscenity such as are now also seen among the People of America and Africa o'rewhelm'd with darkness Moreover there were of old and at this time are People which adore evil Spirits which they know and profess to be evil as the Persians a Plutarch de Iside Laert Praef. Arimanius the Grecians Cacodaemons the Latines b Cic. 3. de Nat. Deorum Vejoves and now some of the Ethiops and Indians Other than which nothing can be imagin'd more impious For Religious Worship what is it else but a testimony of most excellent goodness acknowledged to be in him whom you worship Which if it be bestowed upon an evil Spirit 't is false and lying and contains in it self the crime of Rebellion when the Honour due to the King is not onely withdrawn from him but transferred also upon his desertor and his Enemy Now 't is a foolish perswasion when they imagine the good God will not avenge it as if that were not consistent with his goodness For Clemency that it may be just hath its c Quomodo diliges nisi times non diligere Tertull. adv Marcion 1. limits and where wickedness exceeds a measure Justice produces out of it self as it were upon necessity punishment Nor is it less to be blamed that they say they serve Evil Spirits drawn thereto by fear For since he who is most infinite in goodness is also most communicative and the producer of all other Natures it follows that he hath supreme dominion over them as his works so that none of them can do ought which he will plainly hinder Whereupon this is easily gather'd Whosoever hath the favour of God who is highest both in power and goodness can be hurt no farther by the evil Spirits than
compound things very different to the producing of astonishing effects Now that the Spirits by whom this was effected were not good Spirits and therefore that the Religion was not a good Religion as it appears by what we have said in another place so is it hence also manifest because they confessed themselves to be constrain'd a Apollo a pud Porphyrium Invitum me audi quando me lege ligasti against their Will by certain charms whenas among the wiâ—â—st even of the Pagans it is agreed that in Words is no such power but the power of perswasion only and that according to the manner of their signification This is also an argument of their wickedness that they did undertake to inveigle b Vid. pharmaceutriâ—m Theocriti Virgilii some persons into the love of others from whom they were of themselves averse herein injurious either in promising or effecting it being a thing forbidden c Paulus sent l. 5. tit 23. even by Humane Laws under the name of Witchcraft Neither may we wonder that the most High God suffer'd some marvellous things to be performed by wicked Spirits among them who having first forsaken the true God and his service had deserved to be given up to such a 2 Thes 2.9 delusions Their Impotency is farther prov'd by this That their Works brought with them no considerable benefit For if any seemed to be restored to Life they continued not long alive nor exercis'd the functions of the living And suppose any thing some time appeared in the sight of Pagans proceeding from a Power Divine yet was it not fore-said it should come to pass for the confirmation of their Religion but we may conceive the Divine operation proposed to it self far different causes For example Be it so that by Vespasian a blind man was made to see 't was done to this end that he being thereby more Venerable b Tac. Hist 4. Multa miracula evenere queis coelestis favor quaedam in Vespasianum inelinatio numinum ostenderetur might be the more easily advanced to the Roman Empire as a man chosen of God the Minister of his Judgments upon the Jews And the like causes of other Prodigies may have been where Religion was not at all concern'd IX Answer to the Objection of Oracles The same answer almost may serve for that which they object concerning Oracles chiefly what was said That those men deserv'd to be illuded who had contemn'd the notices which reason and most antient tradition doth suggest But farther the Words of their Oracles were usually ambiguous and such as easily receiv'd an Interpretation a cicero de Divinat 2. Vtrum corum accidisset inquit verum oraculum fuisset from whatsoever came to pass But in case any thing more definitely was foretold by them it is not necessary it should proceed from an omniscient Spirit when the things were such which might from natural causes pre-existing be foreseen as Physicians have predicted diseases or probably conjectur'd from the consideration of common events as we read it hath been often done b Cic. de seipso 1. Epist 6. Quo in bello nibil adversi accidit non praedicente me by Politicians Now if at any time God hath among Pagans used the service of some Prophets o foreshew things that could have no certain causes besides the Divine Will this pertaineth not to the confirming of the Pagan Religion but rather to its overthrow namely that passage extant in Virgils a Vide August de C. D. 10.27 fourth Eclog taken out of the Sibyllin Verses where he unwittingly presents to us the coming of Christ and his benenefits So 't was in the same Sibyllin Verses that He must be received for King b cicero meminis 2. de Divin who truly should be our King and That he should come from the East c Sueton. Vesp c. 4. Tacit. Hist 4. who should have Dominion over all things In Porphyrius the Oracle of d Vide August de C. D. 20.23 Apollo is read wherein he saith Other Gods are aiery Spirits The God of the Hebrews is alone to be Worshipped Which saying if Apollo's Worshippers obey they will then cease to worship him if not obey they accuse their God of a lye Add this also that if those Spirits had by their Oracles consulted the welfare of mankind they would above all things have proposed a General Rule of Life and given assurance of a reward for those that lived well They have done neither But contrarily e Vid. Euseb praep Evang. lib. 5.23 35. in their Verses Kings although wicked are often commended Divine Honours are decreed for Gamesters men enticed into Loves illegitimate to unjust Gain to Murther as might be demonstrated by many Examples X. Pagan Religion déstitute of Humane aid decayed Moreover Beside the Proofs already made the Pagan Religion affords us a great Argument against it self in that wheresoever it was destitute of humane strength it fell to the ground the prop being taken away upon which alone it stood For if you cast your eyes upon all the Kingdomes either of Christians or Mahumetans you shall no where see any memory of Paganism but in Books Yea you shall find in Histories that even in those times when Emperours used either force and punishments as the former did or Learning and Wit as Julian for the supporting of Pagan Religion nevertheless it decreased daily not by any force opposed not by nobleness of birth for JESUS was by the Vulgar call'd the Carpenters Son not by Flower of Learning the speech of the Christian Doctors was not adorned with it not by gifts for they were poor not by any assentation or allurements for they on the contrary declared that all Worldly advantages were to be despised and all adversities to be suffered for the Gospels sake Behold the imbecillity of Paganism pulled down and overthrown by no other Engines but these Nor did only the credulity of Pagans vanish at the appearance of Christs Doctrine but the Spirits also themselves at the Name of Christ departed out of bodies a Act. 5.16.8.7.16.18 held their Tongues and being asked the cause of their silence were forced to confess They had no power b Tert. Apol. vide Chrysost cont gent. where Christ was called upon XI The pretended efficacy of Stars There were Philosophers who ascribed as the rise so the fall oâ— every Religion to the Stars But the science of the Stars which they profess to have Learned is delivered under so disagreeing rules that nothing can be found certain therein but this that there is no a Vide Dissert in philocal origen certainty I speak not of those effects that follow naturally from necessary causes but of those which proceed from the Will of man which is endued with such liberty b Vide Alex. Aphrodis hac de re librum in it self that no necessity can be imposed on it from without For if
not troublesome unto them not known by any injury so that they an pretend no cause of War but Religion alone which is most of War but Religion alone which is most irreligious For the worship of God is no worship unless it proceed from a willing mind And the will is drawn by instruction and perswasion not by threats and violence He that is compelled to believe does not believe but only makes a show that he may escape pain And he that by sense or fear of punishment would extort assent thereby shews his distrust of Arguments But again themselves destroy this very pretence of Religion when they allow those whom they have subdued to use what Religion they will yea and some times openly acknowledge that Christians may be saved in their own Religion VIII Their precepts compared Compare we now the precepts together On the one side patience is commanded and benignity even to enemies on the other side revenge on this side perpetual fidelity of Marriage mutual toleration of manners on that license of a Vide Euthymium departing Here the Husband performs himself what he exacteth of the Wife and by his own example teacheth her to fasten love but upon one there came women b Azoara 3.8 9. after women new provocations unto Lust Here Religion is called inward to the heart that being cherisht therein it may bring forth Fruits profitable to mankind there it spends almost all its virtue in c Vide Barth Geor. de ritibus Turcarum circumcision and other things in themselves d Azoara 9. indiffererent Here a temporate use of meats and Wine is permitted there to eat of the Swine e 2.26 or drink of the f Vide Euthymium Grapes is forbidden although Wine is a great gift of God for the comfort of the mind and body being taken with moderation That such weak Rudinients as 't were for Children preceded the most perfect Law such as is Chrifts we do not wonder but to succeed after it and for us now to return to types and shadows is preposterous nor can any cause be given why another Religion after the Christian which is far the best of all should be now produced IX Objection touching the Son of God answered The Mahumetists say they are offended that we give God a Son when he uses not a Wife as if the name of Son in respect of God cannot have a more Divine signification But Mahumet himself ascribes many things to God not less unworthy then if he should be said to have a Wife namely that he has a cold hand a Cantacuz orat in Mahum 2.18 and he felt it to be so that he is carried in a Chair b Ibid. and such like As for us when we call Jesus the Son of God we signifie the same thing which he does when he stiles him the word of God for the word is after a sort c Vide Plat. in Conviv begotten of the mind add also that he was born of a Virgin the operation of God alone supplying the Fathers part that he was taken up into Heaven by the power of God which things being confest also by Mahumet declare that Jesus may and ought to be called the Son of God d Luc. 1.35 Jo. 10.36 In lib. doctrina Mahumetis Jesus inducitur deum suum patrem appellans by a cerrain singular right X. Absurd things in their Books But on the contrary in the Mahumetan writings it would be tedious to enumerate how many things there are remote from all truth of a Azoara 28.37 History how many altogether ridiculous Such is that Fable of a fair Woman b Cantacuz orat 2.15 whom the Angels overcome with Wine taught a charm to get up to Heaven and come down again But having got up very high God catcht her and fixt her there and this is the Star Venus Another is of a Mouse c Inlib doctr Mahum in Noabs Ark made of the Elephants Dung and a Cat d Ibid. of the Lyons breath And that 's a notable one e in fine dicti libri of death to be turned into a Ram and to be lodged in the middle space between Heaven and Hell And of f Exod. 1. dainty meats in the other life to be voided by sweat and of Companies of women to be assigned every one for his pleasure All which are of such a nature that they must needs be sotted by their own folly who can give any credit to such gross faults especially now the light of the Gospel shiues round about them CONCLUSION I address my self now leaving Aliens to Christians of all sorts and names beseeching them to lift up pure hands a Jam. 4.8 unto that God who hath made all things visible and invisible b Col. 1.26 out of nothing with a sure confidence that he takes care c I Pet. 5.7 of us that without his permission not a Sparrow d Mat. 10.29 falls and that they fear not those which can only hurt the body e 10.28 in comparison to him who hath equal power both over body and Soul Let them not trust in God the Father only but in Jesus f Jo. 14.2 seeing there is no other name g Act. 4.12 in earth which can save us This ye shall rightly do if you perswade your selves not they that call the one Father and the other Lord shall live for ever but they that compose their lives according to the will h Mat. 7.21 of God Farther I exhort you carefully to keep i 1 Tim. 6. 20. Institution of Christ as a most pretious treasure and to that end also read often the k 1 Cor. 4.16 Holy Scriptures where with no man can be deceived but he that first deceives himself For the writers of them were more faithful and more full of a Divine Afflatus than to deprive us l Vide Tert de praeser of necessary truth or to hide it under a Cloud but we must bring a mind disposed m Jo. 7.17 to obedience If we do so none of those things shall escape us which ought to be believed hoped for or performed n 2 Tim. 3.15.16 by us And by this means is the Holy Spirit nourished o 1.6 and raised in us who is given as the earnest p Eph. 1.14 of our future happiness Moreover I disswade all Christians from the imitation of Pagans First in the worship of false gods q 1 Cor. 8.5 which are nothing but vain names that wicked Spirits r 1 Cor. 10.20 use to avert us from the Service f Eph. 2.2 of the true God Wherefore we cannot partake of their Sacrifices so as withal to have a part in Christs Sacrifices Secondly in their licentious manner of living t Eph. 2.3 having no other Law but what is dictated by their own Lust from which it behoveth Christians to keep u