it if the Protestant Charity should seem to fall short in outward Pomp and Magnificence it would be found much more to exceed it in number and usefulness Which makes me so much the more wonder to hear and see the ill effects of the Reformation in this kind so much insisted on of late to disprove the Goodness of it If some Great men had sinister ends in it when was there any great Action of that nature wherein some Persons did not aim at their own advantage by it Who can excuse all the Courtiers in the time of Constantine or all the Actions of that Great Emperour himself Must Christianity therefore be thought the worse because it did prevail in his time and very much by his means And there were some partial Historians in those dayes that impute the demolishing of Heathen Temples and the suppressing of Idolatry to the Rapine and Sacriledge of the Times For even those Heathen Temples were richly endowed and it is not to be supposed that when such a Tree was shaking there would be no scrambling for the Fruit of it However we are not concerned to justifie the Actions or Designs of any particular Persons how Great soever but that which we plead for is that the Reformation it self was a just pious prudent and necessary thing and had both sufficient Authority to warrant it and sufficient Reason to justifie it We read in the Spanish History a remarkable Precedent which vindicates the proceeding of our Reformation in England The Gotthick Nation had been infected with Arianism two hundred and thirteen years when by the means of Leander Bishop of Sevil the King Reccaredus being duly informed in the Orthodox Faith called a Council at Toledo wherein Arianism was renounced by the declaration and subscription of the King himself being present in Council and afterwards by the Bishops who joyned with him and the Great men which being done the Council proceeded to make new Canons and Constitutions which the King confirmed by his Edict declaring that if any Bishop Priest or Deacon refused to observe them he was sentenced by the Council to excommunication if any of the higher rank of the Laity the penalty was paying half their estates to the Exchequer if others confiscation and banishment All which is extant in the Records of that Council The Arian Bishops as Mariana relates such as Athalocus and Sunna with others having the old Queen Goswinda and several of the Nobility to joyn with them made all the disturbance they could to hinder the Reformation But God not only carried it through but wonderfully preserved the Life of the King notwithstanding many conspiracies against him after whose death the Arian faction was very busie and made several Attempts by Treason and Rebellion to be restored again and they once thought themselves sure when they had gotten Wittericus of their party to the Throne but his short Reign put an end to all their Hopes I find some of the latter Spanish Historians much troubled to see all done in this Reformation by the King and the Bishops and Great men without the least mention of the Popes Authority Lucas Tudensis therefore saith that Leander was the Popes Legat but Mariana confesses that the very Acts of the Council contradict it He would have it believed that they sent Legats to the Pope afterwards to have the Council confirmed by him but he acknowledgeth that nothing appears in History to that purpose and if any such thing had been it would not have been omitted in the Epistles of Gregory who writ to Leander a Letter of congratulation for the conversion of Reccaredus But then National Churches were supposed to have Power enough to Reform themselves provided that they proceeded according to the Decrees of the Four General Councils And this is that we maintain in behalf of the Church of England that it receives all the Creeds which were then received and hath reformed those Abuses only which have crept into the Church since that Time This My Lord is the Cause which by Command of my Superiours I was first engaged to defend among whom Your Lordships Predecessour whose constant Friendship and Kindness I must never forget was one of the Chief Since that time I have had but little respite from these not so pleasing to me as sometimes necessary Polemical Exercises and notwithstanding all the Rage and Malice of the Adversaries of our Church against me I sit down with that contentment that I have defended a Righteous Cause and with an honest Mind and therefore I little regard their bitterest Censures and Reproaches In the midst of such a Croud of Adversaries it was no unpleasant entertainment to me to see the various methods with which they have attacked me some with piteous moans and outcries others grinning and only shewing their teeth others ranting and Hectoring others scolding and reviling but I must needs say the Adversary I now answer hath shewed more art and cunning than all the rest put together and hath said as much in Defence of their Cause as Wit and Subtilty could invent I wish I could speak as freely of his Fair dealing and Ingenuity Him therefore I reserved to be answered by himself after I had shaken off the lesser and more barking Creatures What I have now done I humbly present to Your Lordships hands and I am very glad of this opportunity to declare what satisfaction the Members of Your own Church and the Clergy of this great City have to see a Person of so Noble Birth so much Temper and Prudence so firm an Assertor of the Protestant Religion and Church of England appointed by his Majesty to have the Conduct and Government of them That God Almighty would assist and direct Your Lordship in those things which tend to the Peace and Welfare of this Church is the hearty Prayer of My Lord Your Lordships most dutiful and obedient Servant ED. STILLINGFLEET May 30. 1676. TO THE READER IT hath been long expected that I should have published an Answer to T. G. as the most considerable Adversary that appeared against me but it is very well known that before his Book came out I had undertaken the Answer of several others which when I had set forth a Person of Honour who had been pleased to defend me against one of my keenest Antagonists was assaulted by him whom I was in the first place obliged in gratitude to ease of any farther trouble Since that time I have applyed my self to the consideration of T. G.'s Book as much as health and other business would permit And finding such confusion in most Discourses about Idolatry and that till the Nature of it were fully and clearly Stated men would still dispute in the dark about these matters in my last Summers retirement I set my self to the strict examination of it by searching with my utmost diligence into the Idolatries practised in all parts of the world by the help of the best Authors I could
signifying Daughters implies the lesser Deities and Olla taal the Supreme God as the words signifie which he proves from Sharestanius that the old Arabs did acknowledge Abraham Ecchellensis speaking of the Religion of the old Arabians saith that those who were of the Sect of Chaled went upon this principle that there was one Creator and Governor of all things most Powerful and most Wise Besides these there were those who worshipped Intelligences or Celestial Spirits and these saith he although they confessed one Creator of the World most holy wise and powerful yet they said we had need of Mediators to him therefore they invoked those Spirits with all rites of Religious worship and these saith he were called the Daughters of God as they are in the Alcoran not much different from these were the worshippers of Images whom he describes as we have done before But he tells us there was a Sect of Dahritae among them whom he calls Philosophers who were meer Atheists and asserted the Eternity of the World and these being excepted he saith that the ancient Arabs did believe the creation of the world and he tells out of them their particular history of it But Ecchellensis was aware of the parallel between the worship practised in the Church of Rome and that among the Arabians supposing they acknowledged one true God and therefore puts the Qustion whether they did worship their Idols for Gods without relation to any Superiour or only took them for second causes and gave them the name of Gods only Analogically It was a question seasonably put but not so wisely answered For as if he had quite forgotten what he had said before he saith without all doubt the most of them looked upon the Gods they worshipped as of Supreme Authority and Majesty and Independent of any other What although they acknowledged but one Supreme God and called all the lesser Deities his Daughters Although all of them a very few excepted believed the creation of all things by one most Wise and Powerful Being But alas he did not think of this Question when he said the other things and he was not bound to remember them now but to say what served best for his present purpose to clear the Roman Church from Idolatry I will not deny then but there might be a Sect of Dahritae who did only in name own any thing of God and Religion that did assert the Eternity of the world and that there were no other Gods but the Sun Moon and Stars both among the Phoenicians and Chaldeans as well as Arabians but I say these were Atheists and not Idolaters those who where charged with Idolatry among them were such as believed a Supreme Deity but gave Divine Honours to Beings created by him The like is suggested by some concerning the Persians as though they attributed omnipotency and divine worship only to the Sun and those who take all things of this nature upon trust meerly from Herodotus or Iustin or other Greek and Latin writers may think they have reason to believe it but if we look into those who have been most conversant in the Persian writings we shall find a different account of them Iac. Golius in his Notes on Alferganus saith that the Persians gave the names of their Gods to their Months and Days according to the ancient Religion of the Persians and Magi whereby they did believe their Gods to preside over them for it was a principle among them as well as other Nations of the East that the things of this lower world are administred by Angels and accordingly they had their particular prayers and devotions according to the several Days and Months and not only so but their very meat drink clothing and perfumes were different and they had their Tables or Rubricks to instruct them And what worship they gave to the Planets was not saith he to themselves but to those Intelligencies which they supposed to rule them nay they supposed particular Spirits to rule over all the material parts of the world the Spirit over fire was called Adar and Aredbahist the Spirit over Herbs and Trees Chordad the Spirit over Bruits was Bahmen the Spirit over the Earth was Asfendurmed and so they had an Angel of Night and another of Death and the Spirit over the Sun was called Mihrgîan from Mihr the Sun whence the word Mithras but above all these they believed there was one Supreme God whom they called Hormuz and Dei and the Persian Writers say that Zoroaster appointed six great Festivals in the year in remembrance of the six days creation And to this is very agreeable what the Persees in Indosthan do to this day deliver of the principles of their Religion for they affirm God to be the maker of all things but that he committed the Government of the world to certain Spirits and they worship the fire as a part of God and call the Sun and Moon Gods great witnesses and the description of them in Varenius fully accords with this that they acknowledged one Supreme God every where present that governs the world but he makes use of seven chief Ministers for the management of it one over men another over bruits another over fire as is before described and under these they place 25 more who are all to give an account to the Supreme God of their administration With this account agrees the relation of Mandelslo concerning them who saith that the Parsis believe that there is but one God preserver of the Universe that he acts alone and immediately in all things and that the seven servants of God for whom they have also a great veneration have only an inferiour administration whereof they are obliged to give account and after the enumerating these with their particular charges he reckons up 26 under them with their several names but they call them all in common Geshoo i. e. Lords and believe he saith that they have an absolute power over the things whereof God hath intrusted them with the administration Whence it comes that they make no difficulty to worship them and to invocate them in their extremities out of a perswasion that God will not deny them any thing they desire on their intercession Schickard relates a particular story of the Persian King Firutz or Perozes which shews the acknowledgement of a Supreme Deity among the Persians in his time which was about the time of the Council of Chalcedon there happened a mighty drought in Persia so that it rained not for seven years and when the Kings granaries were utterly exhausted and there was no hope of further supplies he called his People out into the open Fields and there in a most humble manner he besought the great God Lord of Heaven and Earth to send them rain and gave not over praying till a plentiful shower fell upon them which saith he is another example after the Ninivites of Gods great mercy
that only reads T. G. and doth not understand the practice of the Roman Church would imagine all the dispute between him and me were whether the Saints in Heaven be capable of receiving any honour from men and whether that honour being given upon the account of Religion might be called Religious Honour or no This were indeed to wrangle about words which I perfectly hate I will therefore freely tell him how far I yield in this matter that he may better understand where the difficulty lyes 1. I yield that the Saints in Heaven do deserve real honour and esteem from us and I do agree with Mr. Thorndike whose words he cites therein that to dispute whether we are bound to honour the Saints were to dispute whether we are to be Christians or whether we believe them to be Saints in Heaven For on supposition that we believe that the greatest excellencies of mens minds come from the Grace of God communicated to men through Iesus Christ and we are assured that such persons now in Heaven were possessed of those excellencies it is impossible we should do otherwise than esteem and honour them For honour in this sense is nothing else but the due apprehension of anothers excellency and therefore it must be greater or lesser according to the nature and degree of those excellencies Since therefore we believe the Saints in Heaven are possessed of them in a higher degree than they were on earth our esteem of them must increase according to the measure of their perfections 2. That the honour we have for them may be called Religious honour because it is upon the account of those we may call Religious excellencies as they are distinguished from meer natural endowments and civil accomplishments On which account I will grant that is not properly civil honour because the motive or reason of the one is really different from the other And although the whole Church of Christ in Heaven and Earth make up one Body yet the nature of that Society is so different from a Civil Society that a different title and denomination ought to be given to the honour which belongs to either of them and the honour of those of the triumphant Church may the better be called Religious because it is an honour which particularly descends from the object of Religion viz. God himself as the fountain of it as civil honour doth from the Head of a Civil Society 3. That this honour may be expressed in such outward acts as are most agreeable to the nature of it And herein lyes a considerable difference between the honour of men for natural and acquired excellencies and divine graces that those having more of humane nature in them the honour doth more directly redound to the possessor of them but in Divine Graces which are more immediately conveyed into the souls of men through a supernatural assistance the Honour doth properly belong to the Giver of them Therefore the most agreeable expression of the honour of Saints is solemn Thanksgiving to God for them for thereby we acknowledge the true fountain of all the good they did or received However for the incouragement of men to follow their examples and to perpetuate their memories the primitive Christians thought it very fitting to meet at the places of their Martyrdom there to praise God for them and to perform other offices of Religious worship to God and to observe the Anniversary of their sufferings and to have Panegyricks made to set forth their vertues to excite others the more to their imitation Thus far I freely yield to T. G. to let him see what pittiful cavils those are that if men deserve honour for natural or supernatural endowments surely the Saints in Heaven much more do so Who denyes it We give the Saints in Heaven the utmost honour we dare give without robbing God of that which belongs only to him Which is that of Religious worship and consists in the acknowledgements we make of Gods supream excellency together with his Power and Dominion over us and so Religious worship consists in two things 1. Such external acts of Religion which God hath appropriated to himself 2. Such an inward submission of our souls as implyes his Superiority over them and that lyes as to worship 1. In prayer to him for what we want 2. In dependence upon him for help and assistance 3. In Thankfulness to him for what we receive Prayer is a signification of want and the expression of our desire of obtaining that which we need and whosoever beggs any thing of another doth in so doing not only acknowledge his own indigency but the others power to supply him therefore Suarez truly observes from Aquinas that as command is towards inferiours so is prayer towards Superiours now to this saith he two things are requisite 1. That a man apprehends it is in the power of the Superiour to give what we ask 2. That he is willing to give it if it be asked of him The expectation of the performance of our desire is that we call dependence upon him for help and assistance and our acknowledgement of his doing it is Thankfulness Now if we consider Prayer as a part of Religious worship we are to enquire on what account it comes to be so not as though thereby we did discover any thing to God which he did not know before nor as though we hoped to change his will upon our prayer but that thereby we profess our subjection to him and our dependence on him for the supply of our necessities For although prayer be looked on by us as the means to obtain our requests yet the consideration upon which that becomes a means is that thereby we express our most humble dependence upon God It being the difference observed by Gul. Parisiensis between humane and divine prayer that prayer among men is supposed a means to change the Person to whom we pray but prayer to God doth not change him but fits us for receiving the things prayed for This one consideration is of greater importance towards the resolution of our present question than hath been hitherto imagined for the Question of invocation doth not depend so much upon the manner of obtaining the thing we desire i. e. whether we pray to the Saints to obtain things by their merits and intercessions which is allowed and contended for by all in the Roman Church or whether it be that they do bestow the things themselves upon us which they deny but the true State of the Question is this whether by the manner of Invocation of Saints which is allowed and practised in the Roman Church they do not give that worship to Saints which is only peculiar to God Now we are farther to consider wherein that act of worship towards God doth lye which is not in an act of the mind whereby we apprehend God to be the first and independent cause of all good but in an act of dependence upon him for the
although this Image were believed to represent Christ after his Incarnation What shall be said to such an Author who not only omits so considerable a passage but puts in words of his own directly contrary to his meaning The Author of the Caroline Book saith that allowing this story to be true which by comparing the relation of Asterius in Photius with what Eusebius Sozomen and the rest say there seems to be some reason to suspect yet it signifies nothing to the worship of Images such a Statue being erected by a weak ignorant Woman to express her gratitude after the best fashion among the Gentiles and what doth this signifie to the Church of God and supposing the miraculous cures to be wrought by the Herb that grew at the foot of the Statue yet that doth not prove any worship of Images but that men ought to leave their former Idols and embrace the true Faith for saith he according to the Apostle signs are not for Believers but for Unbelievers But if we allow the story as it is reported by Sozomen That the Christians gathered up the broken fragments of the Statue and laid them up in the Church I grant it proves that those Christians did not abhor the use of Images although there be no proof of any worship they gave to them and this seems to be as much as Petavius thinks can be made of this story But Baronius is not content with the Syrophoenician Womans example in this matter of Images but he produces the Apostles Council at Antioch and a venerable decree made by them there which commands Christians to make Images of Christ instead of Heathen Idols but our comfort is that Petavius discards this as a meer forgery as most of the things of the latter Greeks he saith are and yet Baronius saith this Canon is made use of by the second Nicene Council which shews what excellent Authorities that Council relyed upon Nicolas de Clemangis is so far from thinking there was any Apostolical decree in this matter that he saith the Universal Church did decree for the sake of the Gentile Converts that there should be no Images at all in Churches which decree he saith was afterwards repealed I would he had told us by what Authority and why other Commandments and Decrees might not be repealed as well as that The first authentick Testimony of any thing like Images among Christians is that of the painted Chalices in Tertullian wherein Christ was represented under the Embleme of a Shepherd with a sheep on his back as it was very usual among the Romans to have Emblematical Figures on their Cups but was ever any man so weak among them not to distinguish between the ornaments of their Cups and Glasses and their Sacred Images How ridiculous would that man have been that should have proved at that time that Christians worshipped Images because they made use of painted Glasses If this signifies any thing why do they quarrel with us that have painted glass Windows in our Churches All that can be inferred from hence is that the Church at that time did not think Emblematical figures unlawful Ornaments of Cups or Chalices and do we think otherwise This I confess doth sufficiently prove that the Roman Church did think Ornamental Images lawful but it doth no more prove the worship of Images than the very same Emblem often used before Protestant Books doth prove that those Books are worshipped by us I cannot find any thing more that looks like any evidence for Images for the first three hundred years afterwards there began to be some appearances of some in some places but they met with different entertainment according to the several apprehensions of men For although the whole Christian Church agreed in refusing to worship Images yet they were of several opinions as to the Use of them Some followed the strict opinion of Tertullian Clemens Alexandrinus and Origen who thought the very making of Images unlawful others thought it not unlawful to make them but to use them in Churches as the Eliberitan Bishops and Epiphanius others thought it not unlawful to have Images there provided no worship were given to them It is ridiculous to bring S. Hierom's Saucomariae for any other purpose than to prove that the Apostles Images were then seen upon their common drinking cups of which he speaks as any one may easily see that reads the passage and the sport he makes with Canthelius about it which will prove as much towards the worship of Images as having the Apostles pictures on a pack of Cards would do Whatever the custome was in Tertullians time if at least he speaks of the Sacred Chalices we are sure in S. Augustines time there were no Images of mankind on the Sacred Vessels For although these saith he are consecrated to a sacred use and are the work of mens hands yet they have not a mouth and speak not nor eyes and see not as the Heathen Images had and afterwards saith that the humane figure doth more to deceive mankind as to their worship than the want of sense doth to correct their errour and the great cause of the madness of Idolatry is that the likeness to a living Being prevails more on the affections of miserable men to worship them than their knowledge that they are not living doth to the contempt of them Is it possible such a man as S. Austin was could use such expressions as these if in his time there had been any Images then used or worshipped in Christian Churches What need he have so much as mentioned the Sacred Utensils if there had been Sacred Images and how could he have urged those things against Heathen Images which would altogether have held as well against Christian For it was not the opinion of the Heathens he disputed against so much as the proneness of men to be seduced to worship such representations which they find to be like themselves To this Bellarmin answers that S. Augustin doth not say there were no Images in Churches but only that the humane shape of Images did tend much to increase their errour who worshipped them for Gods But would any man of common sense have used those arguments against Images which do not suppose them already worshipped for Gods but imply the danger of being seduced to that worship where ever they are in case there were such Images in Christian Churches The Worship S. Augustin speaks against is adoring or praying looking on an Image Quis autem ador at vel orat intuens simulachrum which whosoever doth saith he is so affected as to think he is heard by that he prays before and may receive help by it and yet these persons S. Augustin disputes against declare that they did not worship their Images for Gods but only as the signs or representations of that Being which they worshipped Which S. Augustin shews to be a most unlikely thing because the manner of address
he makes more of his own For he saith these were Samaritan Sectaries who were more precise than the rest of the Iews and were much troubled at the Cherubims in the Temple and more at the respect which the Christians tendered to the Images of Christ and his Saints I never saw a more pittiful pretender to History than this Author who if he offers to add to or vary from his Original he makes the matter worse than he found it For not one of his Authors in the Margin say they were Samaritans but only Hebrews as Zonaras and Cedrenus his other Authors Elmacinus and the Chronicon Orientale have not one word about it where they mention Iezid the Chaliph of Arabia And yet granting they were Samaritans there is not the least ground for his saying they were more precise in this matter of Images than the rest of the Iews for Epiphanius himself whom he quotes suspects them of secret Idolatry in Mount Gerizim and the Iews generally charge them with it for they say they worship the Image of a Dove on Mount Gerizim which Maimonides affirms of them with great confidence and Obadias Bartenora with several others It was therefore very unhappy for this Historian to pitch upon the Samaritan Sectaries of all others as the Beginners of the heresie of the Iconoclasts And was it not luckily done to begin a History with so palpable a falshood But this was a pretty artifice to possess his Reader at the entrance that none but Samaritan Sectaries could be enemies to the worship of Images which he knew to have been the method of the second Council of Nice only he pursued it with greater Ignorance than they 2. By fabulous stories and lying Miracles Of the former we have many instances in the Actions of that famous Council but I shall only mention that out of the Limonarion of the pretended Sophronius about the Spirit of Fornication haunting a Monk who had an Image of the Blessed Virgin to whom the Devil said If thou wilt not worship that Image I will trouble thee no more But the Devil would not tell him this great secret till he had solemnly promised him he would reveal it to no body The Monk next day told it to the Abbot Theodore who assured him he had better go into all the Stews in the City than leave off the worship of that Image with which the Monk went away much comforted But the Devil soon after charged him with perjury the Monk replyed he had forsworn to God and not to him Upon which Iohn Vicar of the Oriental Bishops said it was better to forswear ones self than to keep an oath for the destruction of Images And concerning miracles it is observable that Tarasius confesses that their Images did work none in their dayes because miracles were for unbelievers and yet Manzo a Bishop there present saith he was cured of a disease by laying an Image of Christ upon the part affected Bellarmin and Baronius say the miracle of the Image at Berytus was done in those times and yet after the reading the story which made the good Fathers weep Tharasius saith those words which make this story by comparing these circumstances together appear a meer Fabulous imposture For in the Council of Nice the story is reported as written by S. Athanasius near four hundred years before but not only those Authors but Sigebert saith it was done A. D. 765. and Lambecius undertakes to prove that this story was never written by S. Athanasius But most remarkable is the passage which Eutychius the Patriarch of Alexandria relates concerning the occasion of Theophilus the Emperours extirpating Images out of Churches One of the Courtiers had told him there was an Image of the Blessed Virgin from whose breasts there dropt Milk upon her day but search being made the Cheat was discovered the Church officers executed and all Images prohibited If all the Impostors of this kind were dealt with after the same manner there would be fewer pretences to miracles wrought by Images than there are 3. By crying up those for Martyrs who suffered for the worship of Images and opposing the Imperial Edicts for pulling them down Thus Pope Gregory 2. in his Epistle to Leo magnifies the zeal of the Women who killed the Emperours Officer who was sent to demolish the Image of Christ called Antiphoneta and afterwards suffered themselves for the tumult they raised in the City But this was not the only Act of Zeal in the Women in this good Cause for as Baronius relates it out of the Acts of Stephanus extant in Damascens Works when a new Patriarch was set up in the room of Germanus they shook off all Modesty and ran into the Church and threw stones at the Patriarch and called him Hireling Wolf and what not One need not wonder at the mighty zeal of the Women in this Cause for as Pope Gregory notably observes on behalf of Images the Women were wont to take the little Children in their arms and shew them this and the other Image which contributed mightily to the infallibility of Oral Tradition when the Women and Nurses could point with their Fingers to the Articles of Faith elegantly expressed in Pictures which the Children did delight to look upon The great number of Martyrs in this Cause of which Baronius glories consisted chiefly of Women and Monks who were the most zealous Champions in it And the late Historian can hardly abstain from making the Empress Irene a Martyr in this Cause for in his Epistle to the Queen a Lady of so incomparably greater Virtue and Goodness that it is an affront to her Majesty to commend such an one to her protection he had the boldness to tell her that the only imputation which assaults those Princesses repute viz. Irene and Theodora was their piety in restoring the Religious use and veneration of holy Images to the Eastern Empire What can be expected from such an Historian who durst in the face of the World tell her Majesty so impudent a falshood For Zonaras Cedrenus Glycas Theophanes Constantinus Manasses although Friends to the worship of Images yet all accuse Irene of Intolerable Ambition and Cruelty to her Son the Emperour Constantine and to all his Kindred Nay Baronius himself who minceth the matter as much as may be saith That if she used those cruelties to her Son out of a desire of Empire as the Greek Historians say she did she was worse than Agrippina but Const. Manasses as zealous as any for Images makes her worse than a Tigre or Lion or Bear or Dragon for her cruelty and he can think of no Parallel for her among women but Medea And was not this an excellent Confessour at least if not a Martyr in this Cause a Person fit to be commended to her Majesties protection as one that suffered only under the imputation of her zeal for Images But if any be given up to
us that they hardly worship Images in the Roman Church but praying to them they abhorr and detest What conscientious men were those then who made the poor Lollards swear to do that which they forbid them to do But surely the Bishops and Clergy then understood the doctrine and practice of the Roman Church as well as T. G. and his Brethren do at this day and having Authority in their hands were not so cautious and reserved in this matter as some think it for their interest to be at present And it is observable that those learned men in the Roman Church who have been most nice and scrupulous in this matter of the worship of Images have yet agreed with the rest in the practice of the outward acts of worship towards them So Vasquez observes concerning Durandus Holcot and Picus Mirandula who speak the most suspiciously among them about the Worship of Images that they agreed with the Catholick Church in performing all external acts of adoration to Images and that they differed only in the manner of speaking from the rest and that the main thing the Council of Nice determined was the real acts of worship to be performed to Images leaving the several ways of explaining the manner of giving them and the names of this worship at greater liberty The same Card. Lugo saith that these men differed from Hereticks because these utterly refuse giving external acts of adoration to Images which they allowed Suarez confesses that some of the Hereticks condemned by the Council of Nice did maintain the Use of Images for Memory which he saith appears by the Acts of the Council and that all Catholicks agree in this proposition Imagines esse adorandas that Imagines are to be worshipped although some he saith do so explain that worship as to differ little or nothing from hereticks So Durandus saith he openly teacheth that Images are not to be worshipped but only impropriè abusivè improperly and abusively because at their presence we call to mind those objects represented by them which are worshipped before the Images as if they were present and on this account the Images are said to be worshipped It will contribute much to the understanding the State of this Controversie to shew a little more particularly what the opinion of these men was and how it is condemned by the rest as savouring of Heresie and repugnant to the Council of Nice and the sense of the Catholick Church Durandus goes upon these grounds 1. That worship properly belongs to him in whom the cause of that worship is and by accident may be given to that which hath only a relation to that which is the cause 2. In him to whom proper worship is given we are to consider both the Person to whom it is given and the Cause for which worship is only properly given to the Person and not to any part of him the Cause is that from whence the excellency of the Person arises 3. That Supreme worship or Latria is due only to God for it self by reason of his Deity because the cause of this honour is only in God but by accident the honour of Latria may belong to other things Now saith he a thing may have relation to God two waies 1. When it goes to make up the same Person as the Humanity of Christ. 2. When it hath only an extrinsecal relation to Him as Christs Mother or His Image 4. That the humane nature of Christ hath only by accident the honour of Latria given to it as being part of that Person who is worshipped who is the Son of God but the Humanity it self is not properly that which is worshipped nor is the Cause or reason of that worship but only of an inferiour 5. Of those things which have only an extrinsecal relation to God this is to be held in general that either they deserve no worship at all of themselves as the Cross and Images or other inanimate things or if they do as the B. Virgin it is an inferiour worship of the first he determines that no manner of worship doth belong to them no not to the Cross it self upon the account of any excellency or contact of Christ for which he gives this reason That which is no subject capable of holiness or vertue cannot in it self be the term of adoration but the Cross on which Christ did hang was not a subject capable of holiness c. Nunquam ergo cruci Christi debetur aliquis honor nisi in quantum reducit in rememorationem Christi no kind of honour is due to the Cross but as it calls Christ to our remembrance 6. That although the conception of the mind be of the thing represented upon sight of an Image there is still a real difference in the thing and in the conception between the Image and the thing represented and therefore properly speaking the same worship is never due to the Image that is to the object represented by it But saith he because we must speak as the most do the Image may be said to be worshipped with the same worship with the thing represented because at the presence of the Image we worship the object represented by it as if he were actually present Holkot in his Lectures on the Book of Wisdom saith That in a large sense we may be said to worship the Image because by the Image we call Christ to mind and worship him before the Image and therefore saith he I think it fitter to say that I do not worship the Image of Christ because it is Wood nor because it is the Image of Christ but that I worship Christ before his Image but he by no means alloweth that Latria in any sense be given to an Image of Christ. 1. Because Latria is the worship due only to God but no Image is God and therefore it is a contradiction to say that Latria is due only to God and yet that it is due to the Image of Christ and to Christ. 2. Then the same worship would be due to Christ and to a Stone or to Christ and to a creature 3. He that gives to any thing the worship of Latria confesseth that to be God therefore a man may as lawfully say the Image is God as that it may be worshipped with Latria and consequently that something which is not God is God Ioh. Picus Mirandula gave this for one of his conclusions That neither the Cross nor any other Image is to be worshipped with Latria after the way of Thomas this conclusion was condemned and he forced to write an Apology for it where he saith That the way of Thomas is dangerous for the Image as an Image is distinct from the thing represented therefore if as such it terminates the worship of Latria it seems to follow that something which is not God is worshipped with Latria and he declares that he agrees with Durandus and Holcot but withal he saith that
Mouse-hole but he soon grows too big ever to get out again For Baluzius saith what I affirmed and Agobardus saith no such thing as he affirms of him and in that very Synopsis of his doctrine by Massonus to which he referrs we have just the contrary Picturae aspectandae causâ historiae memoriae non Religionis Images are to be looked on for history and memory sake but not for Religion and what is this but for instruction of the people Whosoever it was that helped T. G. to this citation I desire him as a Friend that he will never trust him more for I would think better of T. G. himself than that he would wilfully prevaricare But if this were Agobardus his opinion why have we it not in his own words rather than those of Pap. Massonus who talks so ignorantly and inconsistently in that very place where those words are but are not set down by him as the judgement of Agobardus If T. G. would have taken no great pains to have read over Agobardus his discourse of Images he would have saved me the labour of confuting him about his opinion for he delivers it plainly enough against all worship of Images though for the sake of the Exemplar but he expresly allows them for instruction I am sorry T. G. makes it so necessary for me to give him such home-thrusts for he lays himself so open and uses so little art to avoid them that I must either do nothing or expose his weakness and want of skill But all this while we are got no farther than towards the middle of the ninth Century the Church of France might change its opinion after this time and assert the Council of Nice to have been a General Council and submit to the Decrees of it I grant all this to be possible but we are looking for certainties and not bare possibilities Hincmarus of Rhemes a stout and understanding Bishop of the Gallican Church died saith Bellarmin A. D. 882. and he not only calls the Nicene Synod a false General Council but he makes that at Francford to be truly so And these latter words of his are cited with approbation by Card. Cusanus and he condemns both Factions among the Greeks of the Iconoclasts and of the Nicene Fathers In the same Age lived Anastasius Bibliothecarius who made it his business to recommend all the Greek Canons and Councils to the Latin Church he was alive saith Baronius A. D. 886. He first translated the eighth General Council at which himself was present and when this was abroad he tells the Pope what a soloecism it would be to have the eighth without a seventh ubi septima non habetur are his very words from whence it appears in how very little Regard that Council was in the Western Church It is true he saith it was translated before but it was almost by all so much contemned that it was so far from being transcribed that it was not thought worth reading This he would have to be laid upon the badness of the translation he hath mended the matter much when in his Lives of the Popes he saith it was done by the particular Command of Pope Hadrian and laid up in his Sacred Library But when he hath said his utmost for the Catholick doctrine of Image-worship as he would have it believed he cannot deny that the admirable usefulness of this doctrine was not yet revealed to some of the Gallican Church because they said it was not lawful to worship the Work of mens Hands After this time came on the Midnight of the Church wherein the very names of Councils were forgotten and men did only dream of what had past but all things were judged good that were got into any vogue in the practice of the Church yet even in that time we meet with some glitterings of light enough to let us see the Council of Nice had not prevailed over the Western Church Leo Tuscus who was a Secretary to the Greek Emperour and lived saith Gesner A. D. 1170. giving an account of the Schism between the Greek and Latin Churches hath these words saith Cassander that among the Causes of the Breach that Synod was to be assigned which was called by Constantine and Irene and which they would have called the seventh and a General Council and he adds moreover that it was not received even by the Church of Rome About the year 1189. was the Expedition into Palestine by Fredericus Aenobarbus and Nicetas Acominatus who was a great Officer under the Greek Emperour Isacius Angelus and present in the Army saith Baronius gives this account of the Germans opinion in those times about the worship of Images When saith he all the Greeks had deserted Philippopolis the Armenians staid behind for they looked on the Germans as their Friends and agreeing with them in Religion for the worship of Images is forbidden among both of them Which being a Testimony of so considerable a Person and not barely concerning the opinion of some Divines but the general practice of the people doth shew that in the twelfth Century the Necene Council had not prevailed all over the Western Church when T. G. affirms it did for many hundreds of years before the Reformation Especially if we consider what the judgement and practice of the Armenians was as it is delivered by Nicon who is supposed to have been a Saint and Martyr in Armenia who saith that they do not worship Images and their Catholick Bishop or Patriarch excommunicates those that do Which is confirmed by what is said to the same purpose by Isaac an Armenian Bishop who lived in the same Century viz. that they do not Worship the Images either of Christ the B. Virgin or the Saints And Pet. Pithaeus a learned and ingenuous Papist confesses that it was but very lately that those of the Gallican Church began to be fond of Images and he writ that Epistle wherein those words are extant A. D. 1568. Surely he did not think the doctrine of the Nicene Council had been received in the Gallican Church for many hundred years But suppose the Nicene Synod were not owned for a General Council yet it might be very wise and judicious Assembly to say that is to reflect on the Emperour Charles the Great and all the Western Bishops in his Dominions And I am sure their expressions would justifie me if I had spoken sharper without an Irony for in the Caroline Book we frequently meet with such expressions as these concerning those grave Fathers ut illi stultissimè irrationabilitèr putant indoctè inordinatè dicunt quam absurdè agant quod magnae sit temeritatis dicere quod non minus omnibus sed pene plus cunctis Tharasius delirasse dignoscitur Deliramento plena dictio Leonis Ut illi delirant ut illi garriunt Ridiculosè pueriliter dictum infaustè praecipitantèr sive insipienter dementia
obtaining that good we stand in need of For a man may apprehend God to be the first Author of all good and yet make no prayer to him nor use the acts of Religious worship because he may suppose that God may have committed the care of humane affairs to inferiour Deities and therefore all our addresses and acts of worship are to be performed to them on this account the worship proper to God must lye in dependence upon him as the Sole Author of all Good to us and this to be expressed by our Solemn Invocation of him For although the internal desire be sufficiently known to God yet the necessity of external Religious worship and owning this dependence upon God to the world doth require the expression of it by outward duties and offices of Religion in such a manner that our sole dependence upon God be understood thereby Now the Question between T. G. and me is this whether the doctrine and practice of the Roman Church in the Invocation of Saints and Angels be consistent with the acknowledgement of our sole dependence upon God for all our Blessings The doctrine of their Church is thus delivered by himself in the words of the Council of Trent It is good and profitable for Christians humbly to invocate the Saints and to have recourse to their prayers aid and assistance whereby to obtain benefits of God by his Son our Lord Iesus Christ who is our only Redeemer and Saviour Where we take notice of the phrase suppliciter invocare to invocate them after the manner of suppliants and that not only voce but mente with words but mental prayers as the Council adds which words seem to be put on purpose to distinguish it from that office of Kindness in one man to another when he desires him to pray for him for this is as much as they would use concerning the Saints in Heaven praying to God that they do suppliciter invocare this phrase then doth not limit the signification of this invocation to be no more than praying to the Saints to pray for us For a man doth I suppose answer the signification of that phrase by praying to them to give rather than by praying to them to pray for the one imports more the humility of a suppliant than the other doth And if there had been apprehended any danger of praying to them as the givers of blessings is is not to be imagined but so wary a Council would have expressed it as it was most easie to have done and most necessary to avoid that danger if they had any regard to the good of mens souls And that man must have an understanding indeed of a very common size that can apprehend that the Council of Trent disallowed the praying to Saints as the Givers of Blessings which was known to be practised in their Church when they commend the humble invocation of Saints without the least censure of that manner of praying to them Nay farther which puts the matter out of dispute with all who do not wilfully blind themselves the Council of Trent commends the making recourse not only to the prayers of the Saints but to their aid and assistance what doth this aid and assistance signifie as distinct from prayers and expressing somewhat beyond them or else those words were very weakly inserted in such a place where they are so lyable to misconstruction unless it be that which they pray for to them viz. that they would help comfort strengthen and protect them Of which sort of prayers I produced several instances in their most Authentick Offices And what saith T. G. to this why truly these Forms of prayer to Saints cannot be denyed to be in use among them but yet the sense of them is no more than praying to them to pray for them and this is only varying the Phrase to say to the Blessed Virgin Pray for me or Help me and comfort me and strengthen me O Blessed Virgin But I asked him whence must people take the sense of these prayers if not from the signification of the words He answers not meerly from Lilly 's Grammar Rules but from the doctrine of the Church delivered in her Councils and Catechisms and from the common use of such words and expressions among Christians I am content with this way of interpreting the sense of these prayers provided that a generally received practice never condemned by their Councils but rather justified by them and a doctrine agreeable to that practice allowed and countenanced in that Church be thought a sufficient means to interpret the sense of these prayers And to make the matter more plain besides the prayers already mentioned I shall give only a Tast of some few of those which are recommended to the Use of the devout Persons of their Church in the Manuals and Offices which are now allowed them in our own language in which we may be sure they would be careful to have nothing they thought scandalous or repugnant to the doctrine and practise of their Church In the Manual of Godly Prayers which hath been often printed and once very lately I find these words under the title of A Most Devout Commendation to our most Blessed Lady O most singular most excellent most beautiful most glorious and most worthy Mother of God most Noble Queen of Heaven and most entirely beloved and most sweet Lady and Virgin Mary so often from the bottom of my heart I do salute thee as there be in number Angels in Heaven drops of water in the Sea Stars in the Firmament leaves on the Trees and grass on the earth I do salute thee in the union of love and by the blessed and most sweet heart of thy most dear Son and of all that love thee I do commend and assign my self unto thee as to my dear Patroness to be thy proper and loving Child And farther I humbly beseech thee O blessed Lady that thou wilt vouchsafe to entertain and receive me and obtain of thy dear Son that I may be wholly thine and thou next unto God may be wholly mine that is my Lady my Ioy my Crown and my most sweet and faithful Mother Amen Lilly's Grammar I confess will not help us out here nor the Construing Book neither I do not think any Rules will do it It must be a special gift of interpreting that can make any one think that no more is meant by all this but to pray to the Blessed Virgin to pray for them In the same Manual I find another Recommendation to the Virgin Mary in these words O my Lady Holy Mary I recommend my self into thy blessed trust and singular custody and into the bosome of thy mercy this night and evermore and in the hour of my death as also my Soul and my Body and I yield unto thee all my hope and consolation all my distress and miseries my life and the end thereof that by thy most holy intercession and by thy merits all