that would make him a Client to the Saints and a constant Votary to the Blessed Virgin and his Guardian Spirit He that is well grounded in the Doctrine of the Second Commandment will never be induced to believe that the Image is to be adored with the same Worship that is due to what is worshipped He will be wary of admitting any bodily representations of the Holy Trinity and look jealously upon all the Doctrine of Image worship which he sees to be vindicated with a few remote and suspicious Distinctions devised by the Fathers of that Doctrine on purpose to maintain its Credit He that is throughly instructed in the Doctrine of the Third Commandment and hath thence been taught to tremble at and reverence the Holy Name of the Almighty will never be induced to believe that frequent Cursing and Swearing if customary is Venial or a Sin which is pardonable in its own Nature and for which the Favour of God cannot be forfeited That equivocating in Oaths is â—awful That our most Solemn Oaths may be dispensed with That the dreadful Name of God may be used in the unwarrantable exorcization of the Creatures That Understanding and Devotion are not necessarily required to our Invocations upon God He that has been throughly informed of the mind of its eternal Author in the Fourth Commandment will never give up himself to a Religion that prefers a Mans Day before Gods or a Saints Day before the Lords Which would alter the Institution of God himself as was designed by Pope Silvester who decreed that Thursday should be kept for the Lords Day He that hath well learned the Fifth Commandment must do great Violence to his Understanding before he can chuse to be of a Religion that loves to drink the Blood of princes That absolves Subjects from their Allegiance to their Lawful Sovereign That gives Power to a Vicar to depose Princes at Pleasure That Arms Subjects with Power to murther their King The like may be said of all the Precepts of the Royal Law of God which is the most perfect Rule of our Obedience and which we are Taught to violate so soon as we have given up our selves to Popery and to the Service of the Roman Moloch And though these are Mysteries which the Romish Seducers carefully conceal and sometime zealously inveigh against while they are compassing easie Proselytes with whom they deal in the most specious Pretences yet they have no sooner deluded them to give up their Names to Popery and thereupon to shake Hands with all liberty of judging for themselves than by degrees they let them know what is to be done And if they startle at doing what is commanded them this is presently censured for a Relick of their Old Heresie and that there was something wanting in their Conversion which cannot be supplied but by acting throughly all the most horrible Injunctions of their New Faith And by the same means of being well Catechised in the Lords Prayer a Man will be able to apprehend and reject the many Errors Popery would impose upon him in that high concern For thereby he will clearly perceive that Prayer ought be made to God only and that none to can share with him in that or any other part of Divine and Religious Worship And that for this reason he ought not to embrace a Religion which enjoyns him to pray unto Saints and Angels and that too not only to have them intercede to God for him but also to help him in his Necessities and to deliver him both in Bodily and Ghostly Dangers And that this may not be thought the fault of Rosaries Hours and Books of private Devotions for which the Church of Rome is accountable as having confirmed them by her Authority it is also the Tenor of her publick Service as is plainly to be seen in the Collects Hymns and Litanies of that Breviary which was restored by the Council of Trent and authorised by several Popes and which is at this day in uncontroulable use through all the Papal Dominions And we might also observe the like concerning the Doctrine of the Sacraments in which whosoever is once fully instructed according to the Catechism of this Church will quickly discern the Abuses thereinto introduced by Popery To mention no more than what belongs to the Author of a Sacrament which our Catechism asserts and which is an undeniablle Truth to be only Christ And therefore all those things are to be excluded the number of Sacraments that are not of his immediate and clear appointment And that Orders Penance Confirmation Marriage Extream Unction all Romish Sacraments are not of Christ's Institution is easily discernable to Men but slenderly versed in the Holy Bible and therefore not to be received for the Sacraments of Christ but Inventions of those who teach for Doctrines the Commandments of Men. Now by these imperfect intimations we may safely infer That those who have had their Foundation in Religion surely laid according to the publickly allowed Catechism of this Church must have other Ends to serve than those of Religion and drive other projects than Gods Honour and their own Salvation who forsake her Communion for that of Rome But to return What ever hath unhappily contributed to our Revolting to the one hand or the other from the Established Religion of this Church there is none that will deny but that the lack of a plain and solid Catechising has had therein a very large share And therefore we may conlude That the careful practice of that will be a chief means to restore Union and Peace the Omission whereof hath occasioned the contrary And indeed Catechising seems the only proper way not only to strengthen those that do stand but to raise up those that are faln if we consider how ineffectual all other ways have proved which have been managed to this end Which now come to be surveyed CHAP. VIII The Methods used for our reclaiming surveyed proving ineffectual c. AND here we need not be told how Indulgence and Clemency Acts of Amnesty and Grace have been so far unable so much as to work us up to a good Humour that like fresh Pastures to unruly Beasts they have only served to strengthen us for a sturdier resistance Nor need we be told of making Converts with the Churches Patrimony for though by this means some may be invited to bear the Ark of God yet they do it but like the Philistins Kine who were still lowing after the Calves they had left behind them It needs not be demonstrated that our frowardness and opiniastrè are not to be cured by such Methods But that which I would chiefly take notice of is that Disputation and Preaching which out of an agreeableness that they are generally thought to bear to our distempers and the powerfulness of their management have obtained a Name to be the only proper remedies But the continuance of the Malady is a convincing Argument that these are not so proper for
themselves descended of those Old Gnosticks who were so pestilential to the Primitive Church being notoriously addicted to Blaspheme rail at and speak evil of the things they know not and in a peculiar manner are gifted with Maliciousness Avarice Schismaticalness Rebellion and Contumacy According to their description in St. Jude 10.11.12 c. And the want of having been duly acquainted with the true grounds of Religion is one main reason why they are in that Divine Science such Smatterers and half-witted whereof there is small hopes ever to have them cured but by a full Institution in those Elements which are undeniably requisite to sound Knowledge But Catechising is not only necessary upon the account of a regular entrance and encrease of Knowledge in Religion but also to give us a clear intuition of those particular Truths whereof we cannot be ignoranâ—â—ut with the peril of our eternal Happiness For notwithstanding that all things necessary to Salvation are clear and plain in Scripture yet the Scripture it self is so spacious a Field that even a wary Traveller may therein lose himself And besides this the things necessary to be known by us in order to our future Welfare are in Sacred Writ so often mingled with things that are otherwise that it exceeds the generality of Capacities to find them out and rightly to sever Those that are idle as the most are in this Study will not take pains and those that are ignorant have not the ability to distinguish collect and reduce such necessary Points to their respective Chapters And yet till such Points be plainly digested into several Heads many at least the the illiterate Multitude will unavoidably want a competent Knowledge of what is necessary both to their Temporal and Immortal Happiness Now that the gathering of these necessary Truths into Sums and Models is the proper Work of Catchism is visible in all those Systems which have ever born that Name And of this Truth our own Church-Catechism yields a sufficient Testimony In which all things that concern Faith Practice Prayer and Doctrine are collected into such short and plain Sums that the weakness of no Mans Wit can either hinder altogether the Knowledge or excuse the utter ignorance of things necessary to Salvation For whosoever with a mind free from Prejudice shall impartially peruse the Church Catechism he therein may observe all saving Truths reduced to such short but full Heads that the weak are not left to the hazardous nor the slothful to the laborious re-search thereof in Holy Scriptures CHAP. VII Catechising the most sutable means to heal the Distempers of this Church Seveveral Propositions to be supposed A short digression concerning our Disorders BUT we will yet suppose that all which hitherto has been delivered ought to receive no better estimation than meer ordinary Discourse and that we are to proceed upon a new Ground and examine the necessity of Catechising in respect of the present Temper and Disposition or indeed rather Distempers and Disorders of this Church and People And in order unto this it will not be altogether impertinent and useless a little to consider what our present Disorders are And in the First Place we cannot but observe that our Declension both from the Design and Rule of the Gospel â—s not conspicuous only in those grand Debauchees who grow weary of the Name of Christ or profess it only to disgrace it But also in those who seem strict and severe in performing all the Formal and Exteriour part of Discipleship Even those I mean who are zealous Hearers of Christs Word and constant Communicants at his Table not professing Devotion to any other For even these are content as occasion serves to abandon that Purity Continence Meekness Humility Candor Mercifulness and other instances of a sweet Nature so vehemently urged by our Divine Law-giver and which are the genuine result of true Christian Principles for that one Law of sordid Interest brutal Passion and churlish Self-preservation although they cannot but acknowledge that all these are totally opposite to the true Spirit of Christianity And besides professed Politicians there are others who seem to look upon Religion as a meer Engine of State and a thing that is as tractable for Battery as Defence And who notwithstanding their contrary Pretences live as if they regarded not what Christ chiefly aimed at by his Incarnation Death and Resurrection And how that he gave himself for us both in his Birth and Death to redeem us from all iniquity and to purifie unto himself a peculiar People zealous of Good Works And that he rose from the dead to bless us in turning every one of us from our Iniquities And that the main design of our inspired Christianity is the entire Reformation of our Lives and to make us as good as our Profession But besides this sort of Nominal Christians there is another which are so far transported with the opinion of that Union which they fancy already to enjoy with Christ that they dream to be in present Possession of that Vision which is peculiar to the future State And they are so dazled with the supposititious Glory of their Spiritual Perfection that they contemn the means ordained to make them truly perfect because they fancy they have arrived at it already And with these may be joyned all such who are so closely addicted to their own Opinions that they think it a matter of Conscience Piety and Religion to oppose and condemn whosoever are not of their Mind and Perswasion Since whose rise we have been under a sensible decay of Charity and as a natural consequent thereof an encrease of wickedness But if these ingross not all the occasions of our Disorders there is another sort of People who will fill up their measure Those I mean who pervert the plainest Scriptures to such a meaning as doth best help to carry on their Designs And what is yet worse who make it matter of Conscience to assert that Sense of the Text which they have perversely mistaâ—en And this deifying our own Interpretations and tyrannically enforcing â—hem upon others This restraining of the Word of God from that Latitude and Generality and the Understandings of Men from that liberty wherein Christ and his Apostles left them is and hath been the only Fountain of all the Schisms of the Church and that which makes them Immortal The common Incentaries of Christendom and that which â—ears into pieces not the Coat but the â—owels and Members of Christ Ridente â—urcâ nec dolente Judaeo Take away these Walls of Separation and all will quickly be one Take away the damning of Men for not subscribing to the Words of Men as the Words of God require of Christians only to believe Christ and to call no Man Master but him only Let those leave claiming Infalibility who have no Title to it and let them that in their Words disclaim it disclaim it likewise in their Actions In a word take away tyranny in
Hearers of Sermons have proved wavering and unconstant in their judgments for want of a timely and through Catechizing so likewise upon the same ground they have been very erroneous and Opiniative For this want of a plain Institution in the Principles of Truth hath left them destitute of a proper Test whereby they might be able to explore and try what is preacht and to separate the pretious from the vile Through the want whereof they as greedily imbibe a false as true Doctrine and are ready to change their Opinions according to the impression which the affectionate noise of the last Sermon has made upon their Senses Nor are they happier in their reading Holy Scriptures than in hearing of them thus preacht The Un-catechized run upon the same Rock in both For albeit the Divine Word is in it self the pure Fountain of all saving Truths yet persons not trained up in a competent apprehension of Catechistical Principles make it a sink of pernicious Errors sucking Contention from the Breasts of Peace turning the sincere Milk of Gods Word into the Poyson of Asps and perverting the Scripture to their own destruction while they make the Oracles of God not to speak their own but such a Sense and Language as may best adjust their Designs and Interests And as no malice proves more implacable than that which ariseth out of the Ashes of an Apostate love So no Errors are more dangerous than those which proceed from a wrong interpreting and application of the Word of Truth And as those whose fancy has been playing with sounds think every thing they hear is tunable to their fancy So those whose minds are once infected with evil Opinions think every Text speaks according to the Opinions wherewith they are infected And it is an Hypothesis will meet with few Adversaries That Men who are prejudiced and prepossessed with Errors in Religion cannot be reduced but by getting them therein rightly principled which was never yet attempted but by solid and perspicuous Catechizing it being by this that Men prove in Religion like the House in the Gospel founded upon a Rock which by no force of storms and winds could be subverted And therefore if this ground-work be not surely laid all superstructures in Religion lie upon the loose Sand and are easily washt away by the insinuating suggestions of false Teachers And what is yet further to be considered we see the rest of the Building sink with the Foundation if that be shaken all will go to ruine And Christians not well grounded in the Elements of Truth and Holiness will quickly be perswaded to give themselves up to any wild Opinion or loose Practice and turn Schismatick or Traytor to the great hazard and confusion both of Church and State But if it be objected that Catechizing is a Plaister too narrow for our Sore because it cannot reach those whose Age or some other Circumstance excludes them the number of those for whom this sort of Instruction is appointed notwithstanding they have no less need thereof than others To this it will be enough to return the succeeding considerations viz. 1. That the Church obviated this Scruple when in the last Edition of the Liturgy she appointed the Catechism to be learned of every person And in her Fifty ninth Canon enjoyn'd the Clergy to instruct all the ignorant Persons of their Parishes in the publick Catechism And that those who bear the heavy load of many years might not decline this way of Institution they may see it founded in the Apostolical practice which was to Catechize the adult as before was observed 2. To be duly instructed in the Principles of Christianity is a duty incumbent upon all who by the Knowledg and Practice thereof hope to be eternally saved And therefore if the Aged be therein ignorant they have more reason to blush at their ignorance than to be thus instructed and with diligence and humility to wait at this Gate of Knowledge rather than with scorn to disdain it 3. If the Elder sort have either not been taught at all or have forgot the chief Heads and Catechetical Fundamentals of Christianity they now meet with a fair occasion boâ—h to learn and call them to mind For by beiâ—g present and attentive in hearing the Younger Catechized the Ancient and all may be brought to know what they do not understand to remember what they have forgot and to be inform'd in what they have erred So that at the same time Catechising will instruct the Ignorant remember the Forgetful and inform the Erroneous and therefore administer a Physick proper and sutable to our several Maladies which cannot be pretended to by those other Methods that have hitherto been so eagerly pursued CHAP. XIII The Benefits of Catechizing 1. In respect of the Civil State 2. The Clergy 3. The People The Mischiefs of private Schools Objections against the constant practice of Catechizing removed BUt besides what has been discoursed there are other good Effects of Catechising which at least may be as so many motives to enforce its practice And in the first place Catechising is in an eminent manner conducive to the Peace and Welfare of the State because it takes care that the Younger sort who are the hopes of a Nation be duly educated in those Principles on whose practice the safety and happiness of a State depends For to sowe in the pure minds of Youth the Seeds of Vertue and Truth before the Tares of Vice and Error and the Weeds of the World have canker'd and spoiled the Soil is by the consent of all wise men a point of incomparable force and moment for the well ordering and Government of all kind of Societies and for making Common-wealths ever flourishing and happy For by the means of Catechising the Younger sort will be planted and grow up in a due Conformity and Obedience to the Laws in being which is undeniably a proper expedient to uphold States in the Terms wherein they are and to free them from the danger of being so easily obvious to alteration and change For the Opinions of what nature soever wherewith we are first season'd are of double force to any second Perswasion and Usages And this makes the Spanish Nation early and careful in Catechising their Children by which Method ever since its use they have not suffer'd the least disturbance and alteration in Church or State That serious people having largely experienced the Truth of their own saying No es menos importante el ser de la Doctrina que el de la Naturaleza And in confirmation of this remark it were easie to load the Margin with a numerous Quotation and the Line with a tedious recital of many excellent Passages out of Plato Aristotle Socrates Seneca Tacitus Agell and almost all the learned Heathen Plutarch's Education of Children doth abridge them all But we need not go sharpen our Tools with the Philistines seeing an Israelite can do it better For Solomon is plain That the way to