Peter and Paul to Thomas and Sergius c. And what the Papists alledge of their doing all the same things that we Protestants do but they do more also is but all one in this matter as if a Woman should say that she doth all things to her Husband that another honest Woman doth to hers but she doth this more that whereas the other honest Woman yields her Body to her Husband only and admits no other man into her Bed besides she out of respect to her Husband admits him and his Servants and familiar Friends also And as a wise Husband would scarce think that a good honour given or done to him by his Wife no more will God take such adulterous embraces of the Saints and their Images and the like as a good honouring of him its like also as if the false Apostles and their followers should have pleaded against the true Apostles and theirs that they did the same things with them but they exceeded them and did more for they not only Baptized into the Name of Christ but Circumcised too and were Circumcised after the manner of Moses nor did they only celebrate the Lords Supper but also observed the dayes and times appointed in the Law and surely there was more colour for their so pleading than for these mens for they had something formerly of Gods appointment to shew for themselves but these have nothing at all but many prohibitions there against to produce Nothing said I Yes I remember the Plea of a Jesuite for the Picture of Christ though nothing for worship to be given it nor for worshiping the Saints and their Images from the Apostles saying to the Galathians that they were Fools to turn to Moses law when Christ Jesus had been set forth and evidently crucifyed among them the word saith he is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that is was Pictured and therefore they had the Picture of Christ drawn before their Eyes even of Christ Crucifyed surely the Jesuits was hard put to it for a proof that he was fain to fetch one from that word by the same way he might prove that the Prophets of old were Painters and Image makers because it s said in Rom. 15.4 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and so it should be translated whatsoever things were Pictured aforetime were Pictured for our Instruction he might have found the Pictures of other men besides Christ though not of the Saints unless such saints as some of them of the Roman Church may be for Jude tells us of some that were 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 shall we read Pictured out unto this Condemnation Jude 4. ungodly Men. Surely the Jesuit was either a man of little judgment or which is rather to be judged of a profligate conscience that mattered not with what colours to paint over his matters or else he would have waved such a proof for so bad a purpose and have remembred that the Apostles and their fellow Labourers whither they did 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 ingrave or pourtray yet it was 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 not in Tables of Stone as the Romish Picturers work but in the fleshly Tables of the heart 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 not with Ink or such like Paint but with the Spirit of God as the Apostle writes in 2 Cor. 3.3 and with such a manner of drawing I suppose their Picture makers have little or no acquaintance nor indeed would it have deserved the title of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Foolish Galathians had the false Apostles only drawn them from a Christ Crucifyed as represented in an externally visible Picture or Image of him wherein nothing but his body and flesh or rather the external lineaments proportion and complexion of it could be represented and so the shape of a man Crucifyed nothing of his Deity and inward Virtue as they deserved for being drawn from him as Painted forth by the Spirit in the Gospel to the eyes of their understandings as the Son of God and so as God manifested in the flesh and baring our Sins in his Body on the Tree and there through geting the victory over Sin and death and the Divel which no Painters in matters of Stone or other Metals could draw to the Life the other might rather offend them and give the false Apostles advantage against believing on him than perswade to constancy therein there being nothing but a Crucifyed man represented to them therein But I have been tedious in making good this charge but therein I suppose I have abundantly discovered the truth thereof that Rome Papal is as arrant a Whore as Rome Pagan was nay in one respect far greater and worse for in those times she was not espoused to Christ as such therefore was not charged then as commiting adultery from him or breaking Wedlock as now that having been the Catholick Church and her Faith that that was preached in the whole World and she a famous Mother without it yet she hath played the Harlot from him like Jerusalem in Ezek. 16.15 as being corrupted from the simplicity in him to swarve so much from her loyalty to him and admit a multitude into the Bed of love besides him yea the Kings of the Earth also with whom she hath truckt for their honours and riches crowns and scepters accommodating her self to their wills that she might lift up her self by them and get her will on them as in the famous Story of her Bishop Boniface chaffering with Phocas who having Murthered his own Master Mauritius and his Children was owned as Emperour in his stead by the said Boniface that he might as he was be made and declared by him to be the Universal Bishop over all the Churches in Christendom upon a fond pretence never before thought on its likely that because Christ said to Peter that he would give him the keys of the Kingdom of Heaven therefore the Bishops of Rome however unlike to St. Peter and without any delegation of them by him in any of his Epistles or other ways of conveyance of them to them must rule over all the Church in all after ages A notable reward of Romes Whoredom with that Murtherer but that may lead me to another particular charge agreeable also with the character given her which also declares her to be the Babilon spoken of by the holy ghost in the book of the Revelations viz. That 8. The Church of Rome is not only a Whore and the great Whore but a Bloody Whore too else she should not be that Babilon for St. John was shewed that so she would be for he saw her drunk with the Blood of the Saints and with the Blood of the Martyrs of Jesus to his great admiration and amazement and that in her was found the blood of the Prophets and of Saints and of all that were Slain upon the Earth Rev. 17.6 and 18.24 and indeed it may be doubted whither she slew more in her Pagan state to raise and maintain
threatned to give up their wise and prudent men on whom the people leaned to an infatuation of their understandings Isa 29.9 10 11 12 13 14. and the fault charged by our Saviour on the Scribes and Pharisees and the Jewish Church as depending on them Math. 15.1 3 7 8 9. Mark 7.6 7. to vers 13. and it will be as great or a greater evil in us than in them if we make our selves guilty of it in as much as God having now spoken to us by his only begotten Son hath declared his Name more plainly and expresly than he had done in former ages and therefore greater heed and acquiescence in his words and sayings is expected from us for us then to forsake the fountain of Living waters which is Christ speaking in his Servants the Apostles and Prophets in the Scriptures to dig up Cisterns broken Cisterns as all men with their inventions and decrees and all their authority and power that are not his are would be a more astonishable madness than what of that nature was practised under Moses and the Prophets by the Church of Israel Jer. 2.12 13. Our Saviour in the Relation of the Rich man and Lazarus introduces Abraham directing the Rich mans five brethren to Moses and the Prophets and not to the Jewish Sanhedrim or High-Priest or any other persons claiming an infallible authority distinct from them though they might have had more colour by far for claiming such a thing either from that in Deut. 17.8.11.13 appointing men in case of doubt or controversy to stick to and observe the determinations of the High-Priest or chief Ruler of the People or from that promise in Isa 59.21 where God promiseth to put his Spirit upon Zion or some persons in it and his words into their mouth so as to continue it from generation to generation than any the Pope or the Church of Rome can shew for their claim yet I say Abraham directs them to no such person or persons but onely to Moses and the Prophets and if he so directed them then surely now that we have Christ and his Apostles also added as a compleatment of the revelation of Gods mind and will and as infallible Interpreters of Moses and the Prophets it behoves us to take heed to them as speaking in their words and writings and not to neglect or refuse them under pretence of insufficiency in them to direct us now aright without some other infallible Guide that he no where directs us to to determine us And that Rome or her Head the Pope is not Infallible in her doctrine of Transubstantiation the thing last insisted on is evident from hence that Gelasius one of their Popes or Bishops hath taught the Church that the bread in the Sacrament is not naturû or substantiâ mutatus changed in its nature or substance and others of them have taught and determined that it is substantially changed so as the flesh of Christ it is that is eaten and torn with the Teeth of the Communicants as in the Luteran Council was defined and in contradictories one part must needs be false which things duly considered may imbolden us to reject the Pleas and pretence of that Church as more groundless Usurpations Inchroachments by which they pervert men from the right ways of God which our Lord Jesus hath delivered to us Nay our Lord Jesus in the Book of the Revelations instead of directing us to Rome doth clearly call us off from it and hath revealed that to us concerning her which being taken heed to by us will admonish us to flee from her for by the concurrent consent of Interpreters as led to it by the Scripture it self compared with the state and condition of Rome it is Rome deciphered in that Book not by the Name of Jerusalem the beloved City of God in the light whereof the Nations of the saved should walk but by the name of Babylon the Enemy of Jerusalem and her Inhabitants and the subject of the deepest died sins and heaviest judgments mentioned in that Book Yea the Papist writers themselves are also forced to confess the truth hereof it is so palpable and evident yea rather than they will not prove St. Peter to have been at Rome Babylon shall signifie Rome too in his 1. Epistle 5.13 surely she was the City that then ruled over the Kings of the Earth and was built upon seven Hills or Mountains and that 's the City called Babylon Rev. 17.9 18. and its evident that she ruled over the Kings of the Earth not only in her Pagan but also as much or more in her Papal State wherein their Popes or Bishops have exacted Homage of them made them kiss their Toes hold their Stirrups wait at their Doors and do things far below their Majesty and Grandeur in subjection to them Now in all that Book no good is spoken of Babylon nor any direction is given to Gods people the followers of the Lamb to resort to her for any thing but much is spoken of its Wickedness Whoredom Idolatry Bloodiness while it remains and of its woe and misery irreparable in its fall as that that shall for ever Perish with express and vehement command to Gods people that are in her to come out of her lest pertaking with her in her sins they should also pertake with her in her Plagues Rev. 18.4 which one consideration also quite overthrows that corrupt interpretation that would confine what is said of her to her Heathen state only as the Papists to excuse themselves do or rather to blind themselves from seeing their own guilt for if it were so then she should have found her not as a City or Harlot destroyed for ever but by a glorious Metamorphosis or dispossession of the Spirit of Whoredom and Resurrection from her falls in Heathenism changed into the holy City or the Lambs Wife whereas there is not the least intimation of any such thing but a vehement assertion of her sinking like a mighty stone in the waters never to rise again Rev. 18.21 whence it is evident which I shall mention as a farther distinct charge and a farther instance not only of her fallibility but also that she is fallen foully already in that it is thereby evident That 7. She is guilty of Idolatry for that 's it that in Scripture is represented by Whoredom and she is called the great WHORE and the Mother of Harlots and abominations of the earth And she is certainly as great a WHORE from Christ as ever the old Babilon or the old Pagan Rome was and more truly so also being not so espoused to Christ in her Pagan state as since she turned Christian Indeed she is a Mystical WHORE corrupted from the purity of the Faith and Worship of God in Christ yet giving out herself to be a Queen and Lady the Queen or Darling of Heaven the only Catholique and Infallible Church In her Pagan state she was more openly and grosly a Harlot a gross Idolatress
rather argues them guilty of being a lying Church 4. There is a brief character of the true Church and her Children in the book of the Revelations by which we may better judg of the truth and rightness of any Church than by any or all those fair Pleas that Rome makes for her self namely that the true Church and its Children are that society and company of men that keep the commandments of God and the faith or Testemony of Jesus Rev. 12.17 and 14.12 But now if we bring the Church of Rome to this test I am sure she will be cast only let us mind that by keeping the Commandments of God is meant both the careful observation of them to walk after them and also the holding them forth sincerely and purely without corrupting them that others may know and walk after them also and by keeping the faith and testimony of Jesus is meant the keeping it without spot or mixture of corruption with it either by adding to or taking from it And surely if we take a little view of their carriage in either of them we shall find them not a little faulty in both 1. First as to the keeping of Gods commandments which of them do they keep in the sences above mentioned not the first for they have other Gods in the Scripture Language beside the only true God the maker of all things in Scripture Language they are called other Gods to whom men give that adoration that belongs to God and unto whom they perform religious worship or service asking of and expecting from them what is proper to God to give so the Calves made by Jeroboam to be sacrificed to though intended as mediums to worship the true God by yet they are called Gods that he made to himself 2. King 14.9 and so the golden Calf in the wilderness though it was to Jehovah they pretended to Sacrifice keep a feast by it yet they were charged with changing their glory that is their God therein into the similitude of an Ox that eateth grass and so intimately of making a new God to themselves Exod. 32,4.5 Psal 106.19.20 now how many there are in the Roman Church that according to those Notions they make Gods to themselves it is not easy to determin The host in the Sacrament they stick not to own as God God-man to give divine adoration unto insomuch as one of their own Doctors acknowledges that the errors of those that worship some Golden or Silver Statues or some Images of any other materialls for their God as the Heathen worshiped their Gods or a Red Cloth hung upon the Top of Spear as is reported of the Laplanders or some live Animal as of old the Egyptians did Fran. Coster Enchir. contro vers Cap 12. were more tollerable than of those who worshiped a piece of Bread as hitherto the Christians have done all over the World for so many hundred years if the Doctrine of Transubstantiation be not true And that that Doctrine is not true we have as good evidence as Christ gave to his Disciples that he was not a Spirit that is we may handle and see it yea and tast and smell it too as was said above yea we have the same that we have that the Cup is not transubstantiated into the New Testament and we have no more authority from the Scripture that the Bread is Transubstantiated than that the Cup is so Transubstantiated nay rather we have more ground to believe that the Cup is changed into a divine writing than that the Bread is changed into the Body the very real and substantial Body of Christ For it is expresly said this Cup is the New Testament but it is not said this Bread is my Body nor this that was Bread is become my Body and for ought that appears to the contrary in the Text his Body being visibly present he might point to or speak of it in saying this is my Body as he speak of the Temple of his body when walk-in the Temple he said to the Jews Destroy ye this Temple and in three days I will raise it up again as our sences tell us the Cup is not the New Testament but a Silver or Golden Cup or Challice so the very same sences tell us as plainly that the Bread still remains in the nature of Bread non substantiâ aut naturâ mutatus not changed in substance or nature into God or into the person of God-man the Lord Jesus besides it is their own Doctrine that the change of the Elements depend upon the Intention of the Priest so that if the Priest intend not in saying the words to make the body of Christ it is not the Body of Christ but Bread still and then they are Idolaters that worship it as God and who can be certain of the Priests Intentions not to mention again the many Saints both Hees and Shee s that they give such adorations to as belongs only to God and ask such things of as God only can give so that they are notorious transgressors of the first commandment of God and keep it not and as to the second they are so far from keeping it and act so grosly contrary to it that they expung it out of their Catechisms The third also they grosly violate in their Doctrine and practice about sacred oaths dispenceing with them and loosing men from the obligation of them enacting them by mental reservations and breaking solemn Oaths and promises as in their breaking their promises with John Hus and in the Popes dispensing with the Oath given by Ladislaus King of Poland to Amurath the Turkish Emperour or grand Sultan and causing him to break his Truce with him to the great scandal of Christian Religion and slaughter of the Christians The Turk himself appealing to Christ if he were indeed God to revenge the perfidious Perjury of the Christians towards him which he also did in the ensuing slaughter and destruction of them but such abuse of Gods name in dissolving and dispensing with religious and solemn Oaths yea and with mens rash swearing they give allowance of in their Doctrines and treatises as well as in their practices yea it was a thing that the above cited Fryer Aegan tells us gave him one of his first disgusts at their Religion that when at his first being made a Fryer he took one and twenty Oaths and among them that he would never come on Horseback that he would never ware shoes that he would obey his superiours in what ever he commanded never examining the lawfulness of his commands not to be ashamed to beg never to be out of his Fryers habit c. yet after all these oaths taken his superiour told him that he must take his former garments and return in the same Posture that he came in which was on Horseback with Sword and Pistols and gay Apparrel and go see his friends though quite contrary to his oaths from which he would absolve him If
vers 9 10. Even so the Church of Rome and it's Teachers reject the word of the Lord as is evident in the instances we have given and yet they say the Law the Scriptures and it's Exposition are with that is belong unto them They are they from whom men must receive it and upon whom they must depend for it Yea they do as the false Church in Isa 48.1 2. is said to have done who make mention of the name of the Lord but not in truth nor in righteousness though they called themselves of the holy City that is in effect the holy Catholick Church The like is timated of them in Jer. 18.18 where the persecutors of the Lord's Prophets that were such in truth yet said of themselves come let us devise devices against Jeremiah and add as if they had thence authority to do so for the Law shall not perish from the Priest nor counsel from the wise nor the word from the Prophet Now when we see or may see by the Scriptures of truth and the testimony of the Holy Spirit in them that there should be false Teachers among the Christians answerable to the false Prophets among the Jews that would bring in Doctrines swarving from the Scriptures and find that the Papists and their Teachers evidently do so their challenge of authority to be the sole Expounders of the Scriptures should nothing move us while we see that they therein walk in the steps of the false Prophets especially seeing also that they challenge an authority which the Holy Ghost hath not given them nor directed his followers any where unto For the Holy Ghost himself who led the Apostles into all truth Joh. 16.13 doth not in any Scripture testifie to us of Rome or the Roman Church that we should derive our Faith from her or resolve it into her or her Doctors more than into any other Church The Apostle Peter whose authority they pretend to have committed to them but without any evidence of the holy Scriptures and whose Successors they tell us their Popes or Bishops are could not leave more authority to them than he had exercised himself Now we find him expresly preferring the authority of the Scriptures before his own saying or testimony as to the resolution of other mens Faith Yea he as well as other Apostles proved his sayings by the holy Scriptures as is evident in his Epistles 1 Pet. 2.6 7. and 3.10 11 12. and obtruded nothing upon men on his own authority barely as the Popes presume to do He calls the word of Prophesy a more sure word than what he related of his own knowledge 2 Pet. 1.16 17 18 19. and instead of directing the Believers after his death to the Church of Rome and her Bishops which surely he would and ought to have done had he known of any power given of Christ to her or to them for resolving mens doubts and determining their Faith and exercising a dominion over mens consciences more than to other Churches or their Bishops yea or directing them to himself more than to the rest of the Apostles when he forewarned them of false Teachers Scoffers that would come in the last days He stirs up the Believers minds to remember the words of the Prophets and the Commandments of the Apostles of our Lord and Saviour He saith not his own Commands or his rather than of the other Apostles but indefinitely of the Apostles puting in himself with them as one of the same rank and of no superior rank or authority among or over them much less doth he say that we should after his death be take our selves to the Church or Bishop of Rome for our direction guidance and preservation from the Error of the wicked but directs us to the Scriptures of the Prophets and Apostles the things spoken and commanded in and by them He thought not of the Lord Peter or the Lord Pope nor signified that the rest of the Apostles stood in relation more than himself to any man as their Lord but only to him who is the Saviour Yea and the Lord Jesus himself when afterward he appeared to John in the Isle of Patmos and gave him visions and revelations of the things that should come to pass in the world and unto the Churches directed him not to bid us go to Rome for resolution of our hearts in the matters of God and in what concerns our preservation in his truth but he in his several Epistles to the Churches bids Let him that hath an ear hear what the Spirit saith to the Churches He bids not That he that hath an ear should hear the Churches simply no nor yet what the Spirit saith in the Churches much less saith he Let him that hath an ear hear what the Church of Rome saith or what her Bishop as an heavenly Oracle or the Spirit as either in it or him as Infallibly tied to his Chair should dictate to us And yet which is very considerable this Book of the Revelations according to the most authentick testimonies of Antiquity was written after the Deaths of all the other Apostles and its probable at least that he lived not long after it himself who was the Penman thereof and therefore if there were any judge or orderer of mens faith infallible to be looked to by all Churches besides the holy Scriptures of the Prophets and Apostles or any Infallible Interpreter of them above the rest to be taken heed to it had been the proper place and time surely for Christ the faithful and true witness of God the Amen the firm and sure friend and Pastour of his Church to have signified who it is and directed the Church and every one that hath an ear to hear and hearken to him but neither when he was asked or there was a strife among the Apostles who of them should be the greatest did he tell them Peter should be their Prince and chief among them nor did he direct them here to any Successor of his at Rome or elsewhere as an infallible Guide and Head to them no there is no other Director as to matters of Faith and Worship directed to of God by his Holy Spirit in any Scripture as our absolute and infallible Guide but only the Spirit himself as speaking in and by the Scriptures to the Churches what the Scripture saith being called the saying of the Holy Ghost or Spirit as is to be seen Heb. 3.7 and 10.15 Act. 28.25 And surely they are guilty of horrible Idolatry that prefer the Testimony Word or Determination of any person or persons Church or Bishop before or above yea or but as equal with the testimony of the Holy Ghost to cast by his sayings or commands to listen to and be ruled by men is indeed to have the fear of God taught us by mens precepts and in vain to honour God or worship him which was the fault of the Jewish Church reproved by the Holy Ghost in the Prophet Isaiah for which also he
how many Cities have Perished regardless or forgetful of their warnings how many Colonies have been led out by their directions and have been increased with great felicities while they have not neglected their commandments how many both Princes and private Persons have fared well or ill upon these accounts how many being troubled for want of Children by taking heed to them have obtained their desires how many have escaped the Anger of the Demons or devils how many that have been Lame in their Members have recovered their former soundness again how many doing violence to their holy things have forthwith been variously punished some have gone out of their Wits some have of their own accord confessed their evil facts others have made away themselves others have fallen into incurable diseases nor wants there examples of some who have been killed by a dreadful voice that hath proceeded forth from the cells or secret places of their Temples Such strange wonderful things could that Heathen boast of concerning his false Gods and their wicked Worship as I might also mention some instances that St. Augustine speakes of in his tenth Book de civitate Dei Cap 16. as of Aeneas his Images going of themselves from one place to another of â—arquinius cutting a Whetstone through with a Raisour of a Woman with her girdle only fastned thereto drawing a Ship that stuck so fast in the River Tybâ—r as it could not be moved as a Testimony of her Chastity and of another carrying Water in a sieve from the said River upon the like account not to mention the strange things done by Apollonius which Philostratus would make the world believe might be equallized with the Miracles wrought by Christ Surely these nor any nor all of these were no good evidences that they were Gods Church and that they or their doctrine or worship were approved of him though the Signs and Wonders seem not much Inferior to what either Theodoret in his 8. Book before mentioned relates of miraculous Cures done or helps obtained at the Monuments of the Martyrs or what some others have elsewhere related as St. Gregory or perhaps some of those things mentioned by St. Augustine lib. 21. de Civitate Dei cap. 8.9 c. But 2. Besides this there is another thing to be said to the Plea of the Roman Churches Miracles that a great many of them are fained forged matters and therein she is a lying false Harlot to go about to gull Souls with her lying and false delusions not but that those mentioned by St. Augustine or others of the Fathers might many of them be true and God might work many miracles at such places as were dedicated to the memory of the Martyrs and of his holy servants to draw people thereby to the beliefe and obedience of his truth which they had confessed and suffered Martyrdom for but doubtless Sathan and his instruments have also taken occasion thence either to work by Gods permission diverse strange things to punish those that therefore departed from the purity of the worship of God and Christ or also to counterfeit and pretend what was not indeed wrought to draw the minds of People into deceit I shall not search books for confirmation hereof seeing if any man will vouchsafe seriously to peruse what the Learned D. Stillingfleet hath largly discoursed on this subject of their pretended miracles he may be satisfyed sufficiently hereof only I shall set down hear what the forementioned Fryer Mr. Anthony Aegan in his recantation Sermon relates which is to this purpose That about seven years before his said Recantation Sermon made at London April 6. 1673. a Priest near the City of Limrick by name William Sarchwel had for fifty shillings hired a Woman to pretend her self a Cripple from her birth and that she had a revelation that if she dipt her self in such a Well while a Priest said Mass by the place she should be recovered of her Infirmity whereupon she came halting at a time appointed to the Well and returned out of it as one perfectly cured which became a miracle to the people and both got to the contriver a vast some of Mony and confirmed the People in their superstition which he tells us the said counterfeit Woman after some time upon some remorse of conscience confessed to him the said Anthony Aegan which he made her declare to the whole Congregation before he absolved her as also he tells of a Fryer of great note and zeal that told him that he was at a Franciscan Convent beyond the Seas where was the Image of the B. Virgin made with a scrue in the head thereof where they put in some water and having a string that came undeserned to a place where the Fryers stood when they thought the People had brought a good offering then by the help of that string they could unloose the scrue and then the Image of the B. Virgin would seem to weep and that was one of their Miracles which the relator said was a great scandal to him and that therefore he complained of it to the General of their Order who answered him that should he make a reformation in that particuler that Convent should starve to which he adds that the Monks of a certain Convent put a like cheat upon St. Barnard by an instrument carrying the Voice to the Image of the said Virgin Mary causing her to salute him with a salve Barnarde when he came into the Church but he apprehending the Cheat gave no other return to the complement but this that it is ashame for a Woman to speak in the Church but adds the said Fryer Aegan of all the fine stories commend me to this new Miracle they talk of for the confirmation of transubstantiation viz. that in a certain place in the King of Spains dominion as the Mass was celebrated all the perfect effigies proportion of a man rose out of the host but when the People came too near that they might see the Miracle plainly he Vanished away on which he only relates a remark made by a Facetious Person to the relatot of it you suppose said he that it was Christ himself that appeared and it seems upon the approach of the People he vanished away which is the only circumstance to make the Story credible for he might suppose the People were come to eat him and so he vanished I shall add to it this remark of my own that many of their Miracles are such as will not abide the search and tryal but upon a near approach to that end vanish into nothing but pretence and delusion Now if we put both these together both that false Prophets and Persons of false Religion may do signs and wonders especially lying signs and that many that are boasted of in the Church of Rome are the lying cheats and delusions of their Priests then will their Plea of Miracles be too far from evidencing them to be the true Church of Christ that it
here was not a taking Gods name in vain and a notorious leading men to debauch their consciences I know not what is as for the fourth commandment they keep not that while they keep Markets on the Sabbath day and less observe it than many of their own instituted holy days the fifth commandment how little they reguard their often absolving Children from ingagements to honour their Parents and obey them yea their stirring up Children somtimes against them as Gregory the ninth stirred up Henry the Son against his Father Frederick the second Emperour of Germany and how often they have discharged subjects from their due allegiance and obedience to their lawful Sovereigns stirred them up to rebel and rise in War against them both our own Cronicles and the Histories of other Nations do abundantly evidence And then as for the sixth commandment their Murthering of Princes and the many great Slaughters and Massacres yea destructions both of Souls and Bodies occasioned and caused by the Roman Church and her Bishops before hinted at sufficiently declare how little care they have thereof That they little reguard the seventh both their forbiding Marriage to their Priests without any order or command of God and Christ to that purpose nay contrary to the express permission and allowance thereof of God in the Scriptures for both our Lord Jesus Christ himself chose Married Persons to be Apostles at least Peter was such when he chose him for we read before that of his Wives Mother Mark 1.30 with 3.16 Which he would not have done surely had he judged a Wedded State incompatible or inconsistent with the Ministry which he instituted yea and that St. Peter and other Apostles led their Wives about with them when they were Apostles is evident in 1 Cor. 9.5 And the Apostle expresly both in his Orders about Bishops and in those about Deacons orders and much more allows that they be Husbands of one Wife and have their Children in subjection which they would not have done had they forbidden Marriage to the Bishops and Ministers of the Church or judged it unfit for them as these according to his predictions of false Teachers that would depart from the faith do 1 Tim. 3.2.4.11.12 with 4.12.3 By which means they often put them upon the practice of uncleanness whoredoms furnications and the like mischiefs and allow them to keep Concubines for Money besides the Practice of Sodomy even in the Popes themselves some of them and the notorious Wickedness of one of their Cardinals that wrote and Wrote published a Book in commendation thereof their allowing publick Stews for Mony even in Rome it self are sufficient Proofs And that they as little keep the eighth Commandment their insatiable covetousness and many frauds to get Mony some whereof have by the way been hinted at yea their grasping whole Kingdoms to themselves from their lawful Princes as they did a great part of Italy yea and Rome it self from the Emperours to which they belonged and our Kingdom of England in King Johns time and taking away by force the Kingdoms of some Princes from them and giving them to others whom they have incouraged to get them from them as appears in the History of the Albingenses and the attempts of their Popes and Sea of Rome against our late Queen Elizabeth are sufficient demonstrations besides the most horrible theft of all others they are guilty of in stealing or taking forcibly from men the word of God not suffering men to know or be instructed into that therein taking away the key of knowledg and shutting up the Kingdom of Heaven against them and robbing their Souls thereof a theft which God complained of in the false Prophets of Israel when he saith Behold I am against the Prophets which steal my word every one from his Neighbour Jer. 23.30 Against the ninth Commandment is all their reproaching and branding falsly as Hereticks those that will not subscribe to their corruptions stirring up Princes and People against them to make Havock of them And that the tenth commandment is little set by their Doctrine that denyes the first stirrings and motions of Sin to be Sins and their Doctrine of venial Sins and their insatiable covetousness may be evidence enough so that they are horribly guilty of not keeping the commandments of God the like may be observed too of their keeping the things given in commandment by our Lord Jesus Christ that they keep none of his commandments purely and incorruptly for whereas he commanded Baptism into the Name of the Father of the Son of the Holy Ghost they have corrupt that with many devises as of oyl and cream and spettle and the like Fopperies his commandment of his Supper to take and break and eat Bread set a part with blessing to that purpose and drinking the Cup in Remembrance of him and as a commemoration of his death they have horribly corrupted and changed into a sacrifice propitiatory and unbloody available for obtaining remission of Sins for the quick and for Dead and into private Masses and half Communions and the Pageantry of carrying the consecrated Host as a God in Procession the command of Preaching the word sincerely they have exchanged into teaching for Doctrines of men that is their own precepts and devises and his command about prayers and supplications unto God they have corrupted by injoyning Prayers in unknown Tongue and to others besides God even to Saints and Angels But what needed I to have been so larg in going over these several commandments when the complexion of much of their divinity is a clear patronage of all manner of Sin and Naughtiness while they promise to men the pardon thereof upon so easy termes as the only being at some small time before they dye grieved that they have sinned though without any real contrition of heart for it or love to God and so hearty sorrow that they have offended him as springing therefrom provided that they receive but the Sacrament as they will have it of their extream Unction and the absolution of one of their Priests and have devised a Purgatory in which after death they may be Purifyed though they continue till death in their Sins from the pains of which also they perswade men they may be soon delivered by the propitiatory sacrifices which they say they can and do dayly make in their Masses both for the quick and for the dead and by the indulgences which are in the Popes dispose and which for such sums of Mony given to their Church-men or for such uses as they prescribe as for the procuring Masses Dirgies and such like fopperies they propose to sale what are all these devises of this covetous Church and its Church-men but ways of making merchandise of mens Souls and an incouraging them in and unto an impenitent breach of all Gods commandments all their days for who that loves his lusts and lives in any pleasurable or profitable way of Sin will much
inquiry and search into the truth as it is in him that they might understand it and be led and guided by it And then 5. The just and righteous Judgment of God it is to harden both this Harlot and her Adherents for their unfaithfulness in seeking after or not admitting the truth of God but either slightly neglecting the inquiry after it or against evident shinings of it closing their eyes lest they should see with their eyes or hear with their ears or understand with their hearts what they see would tend to convert them from their gainful and delicious interests and enjoyments Even as Gods Judgments were upon Pharaoh and the Aegyptians to harden them for as Pharaoh and the Aegyptians hardning themselves and doing wickedly against Israel were left of God to their hardness or hardened by him that he might glorify himself on them in their destruction so it is with this falsly Infallible but truly inflexible impenitent Church he gives her and her Adherents up to their own hearts lusts and to walk in their Idolatrous and bloody ways to fill up the measure of their iniquities that he might glorify himself in executing upon them the Doom and Judgment that is written concerning them 6. Though also some occasion of hardning this Church and some advantage her subtle Factors take to harden people in their obstinate cleaving to her from the too great divisions found and by them also fomented among us Protestants with the too much iniquity also practised among us and some harsh Principles about Gods Decrees of Reprobation in some among us Whence they possess the minds of her Followers that they are in a better state more at unity and perhaps many of them less outwardly vitious though not their generality and more devout than they should be should they forsake their Communion to embrace ours Yea and they can aggravate our divisions represent them as if they were the just judgment of God upon us for deserting her Communion though that be as false as and no truer than that the Divisions Feuds and Wars among us Christians both Papists and Protestants are the just judgment of God upon us for casting off Heathenism or for not turning Jews or Mahumetans 7. To which add the fair paints and cunning carriage of this Harlot for as it is with other Whores they may and often have as handsom bodies as comely faces as smooth carriages as good parts and witty winning behaviour as honest Women and chast Matrons Yea sometimes they may in some of those things if not in all exceed them and being rich or richly maintained may and often have as costly apparel as rich ornaments and Jewels as other honester persons nay and where they find defect of beauty can supply it by art painting their faces with such fresh lively colours as shall make them seem young and youthful when in truth and underneath they are black and deformed Even so this Romish Church being a rich and subtle Harlot is not void of many taking and winning matters wherewith she sets forth her self to draw or keep in Lovers and trims her way to seek love as the Prophet said of the Adulterous Church that did precede her Jer. 2.33 Yea to her may well be applyed that of the Prophet Nahum to the bloody City That she is a well-favoured Harlot 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Mistriss of witchcrafts that selleth Nations through her whoredoms and Families through her Witchcrafts Nah. 3.4 For it is true that she hath in her Persons indued with great natural parts and endowments Men of learning and policy and that she hath many good gifts from God by Jesus Christ wherewith she might and ought to serve and please him Yea she hath Jewels of his gold and of his silver as it were which he in her better state was pleased mercifully and gratiously freely to impart unto her But as it is the fault of Harlots to abuse the gifts of God men to dishonest arts and ends so it fares with this Church also for she doth as Jerusalem did before her of whom the Lord saith That she took of her garments namely that he had given her for he found her naked and in her blood and decked her high places with divers colours and played the Harlot thereupon And she took her fair jewels of his gold and of his silver and made to her self Images of a male and committed Whoredom with them and she took her broidred garments and covered them and set his Oyl and his Incense before them and his meat which he gave her even fine flower and oyl and honey wherewith he fed her she set it even before them for a sweet savour c. Ezek. 16.16 17 18 19. Even so we may say of this Church that she serves her Idols with the gifts of God and makes use even of the truths that she hath received from Christ and his ordinances to make up an Image of them as mixed with her inventions a frame of Religion which she worships and causeth all to worship Yea and she decks her self with her natural parts and gifts Moral Virtues and acquired Sciences and with many things which she hath received from God But not that she might singly serve Christ therewith but to seek love from the Kings and Princes and people of the World to commit fornication with them and many are taken and led captive with these her ornaments that is with her Learning seeming Devotion Charity and Piety which are all made use of subserviently to the grand design of making her self a Goddess or an Object of worship by the poor simple Souls that she that way deludes and as artifices of drawing them to commit adultery with her With such things she paints and guilds over her self to inamour men of her and make them her Vassals that she might inrich her self though with the spoil of their Souls As in a vision was forerepresented by the Holy Ghost concerning her in Rev. 17.4 while the holy man saw her as a Woman arrayed in purple and scarlet colour and deckt or gilded with Gold and pretious Stones and Pearls having a golden Cup in her hand in which she gives forth her abominations Signifying hereby what a gawdy Church she would be in her appearance and worship and how she would be adorned with many fine glittering and rich colours the better to inamour the Kings and people of the Earth on her Yea and as crafty and witty Whores can conform themselves to the different tempers of their Paramours the better to work upon and captivate and keep their affections so it is with this wiley Church and her Panders For those that are melancholly or of a more grave sober temper or religiously inclined she can entertain them with Books of Devotion formes of Penance rules of Mortification and many learned Discourses that may suit their humors but yet so as they must take in therewith her Superstitions and she hath her