the Church hath a Soveraign power to damn and save Eckius to make Articles of Faith to fetch Souls out of Purgatory c. The Church must be rich and wealthy and possess almost a third of the revenues of Christendom Bozius because S. Paul saith We that are strong ought to bear the infirmities of the weak Touch not mine anointed do my Prophets no harm i. e. All the Bishops and Priests tho they possess all the revenues Eckius yet ought not to bear any publick Charge Saints must be invoked because David saith Bellarm. Let the saints be joyful in glory They govern the world Eckius for David saith They shall have two-edged Swords in their hands They intercede for us in heaven for the Scripture saith For this shall every one that is godly Costerus pray unto thee in a time when thou mayest be found They know our Necessities for God saith to Moses I will make all my goodness pass before thee We must worship the Reliques of Saints for Christ saith to his disciples Not a Hair of your Heads shall perish Bozius The Hairs of your Head are numbred 'T is the B. Virgin which gives us Grace to grow in Faith for 't was said to Adam and Eve Be fruitfull and multiply The Church hath done very well in taking away the Cup from the Laity for God foretold to Eli that his Posterity should entreat the chief Priest to put them into one of the Priests Offices Eckius to eat a piece of bread Confession is of Divine Right and absolute necessity for S. Peter saith that Apostats are like a Dogg that returns to his Vomit Turrian pro Epistol Pontif l. 4. c. 17. The Authors gloss deserves the pains of transcribing it whole What is it to vomit up sins as a sick stomach doth We must follow the strain of the Metaphor Tell us where do we vomit but at the mouth why do we vomit but to ease and purge our selves Grant therefore that the Soul is purged by a certain secret vomiting of sins i. e. by secret Confession or else you give the Apostle the Lye. The Unmarried Life of Priests is of divine Right and of absolute necessity for S. Paul enjoyns a Bishop to be sober and chast Bellarm. Turrian and he reasoned before Felix of Righteousness Temperance and Judgment to come They who have a mind to see a greater number of these Abuses may find it in our Exceptions where we have cited both the Author and Book But here is enough to understand the Spirit of these Gentlemen In earnest we may say that they do very ill when they dispute with so much heat against the Scripture to maintain a certain other Rule of faith which they call Tradition They have good store of Scripture for with their Method there is nothing which they do not quickly and easily find there But if this Method of theirs be good for ought they must permit us to make some use of it and to conclude that by this they discover that they bear no respect to Scripture And that 't is not their fault if it be not accounted the most ridiculous Book in the world CHAPTER VI. The Conclusion of the fourth Character of Antichristianism which is found in the Papacy viz. the Affronts that it offers to the H. Scriptures both in words and actions THat which we have already discourst Exception 14. part 2. chap. 7 8. is enough to verisy that Oracle in which 't was foretold that the Papacy or Antichristianism should blaspheme God his tabernacle and his Saints For the greatest part of those Abuses of Scripture which we have mention'd are real Blasphemies But to finish this Character of Antichristianism we must add a third kind of Injuries which the Papacy offers to the Scripture these are the Affronts that it puts on them to take away all their Credit in the minds of men Here we clearly perceive that the Papacy carries it exactly like an Enemy to the Scripture Men employ against enemies Offensive and Defensive Weapons they strike at them and ward off the Blowes given by them 'T is exactly on this manner that the Papists act towards the Word of God on the one hand they perpetually ward off and repulse they distinguish and wrest it and on the other they accuse they vilify they destroy the Scriptures as much as lyes in their power First the Papists speak with the greatest Disrespect and Contempt of the H. Scriptures with respect to the Need we have of them They assert In the opinion of Papists the Scripture may very well be wanted that the Church may very well want them and with less inconvenience than in those Ages when 't is certain there was no H. Scripture After that these H. Books were written one part of them hath not only been layd out of the way but utterly lost thro the injurie of Wars and the Babylonish Captivities And yet the Church hath always been preserved in her Vigour Catechisme of W. Bayly by the aid of Tradition c. Thus even at this day The Church may be well enough preserved without the Scriptures Another famous Author tells us Costerus that 't is not the intention of God that his Church should depend on these Paper or Parchment Writings Another saith Lindanus That as long as the foundation of Apostolick Tradition remains intire the Church would have no loss if the Scriptures should be lost burnt or destroyed John Faber Vicar of the Bishop of Constance in the time when Zwinglius lived boldly asserted that the Old and New Testaments might well be mist And Cardinal Hâ—sius saith that it would go better with the Church if therâ— were no written Gospel I know not what name to give if these are not to be call'd Blasphemies The Papists charge Scripture with Obscurity The Second Affront which the Papacy puts on the Scriptures is an endeavour seeing it cannot abolish them to persuade men that 't is an Obscure Book good for nothing but to occasion heresies Every one saith Bayly the Jesuite makes the Scriptures go in the track of his own fancy All Hereticks make use of them as a Nose of Lead or of Wax The Scriptures saith Coster are very obscure and suffer themselves to be drawn any way like a Nose of Wax and to be applyed to any impious Opinion that you please as a leaden Rule 'T is a dead letter saith Pighius that endures every thing written with Ink and Paper which you may mangle and corrupt with false Expositions T is a Sheath that receives all kinds of Swords not only those of Steel but of Lead of Copper of Wood for you can with its own leave draw it to be on your party by interpreting it as you please We must saith one of these Gentlemen remember this not to refute the Hereticks by Scripture Men disputed against Luther with Scripture 't was this
that kindled the flame which burns to this day 'T is a prodigious blindness in which there is somthing supernatural that men should come so far as to utter such Blasphemies and that at this day men should not be afraid to repeat them Scripture insufficient The Third Affront tho Papists offer to the Scriptures is their asserting them to be insufficient and imperfect and that they cannot serve as a Rule of Faith. They employ their greatest Engins to establish this Principle Councill of Trent Ses 4. that Traditions ought to be regarded with the same reverence and veneration that is given to the Scripture Yea that Traditions excell the Scriptures because the H. Scriptures cannot subsist unless confirmed by Tradition Baron Tom. â— Annal. whereas Traditions keep their strength intire without the H. Writings We stand more in need of Tradition than of Scripture for the Scriptures only furnish us with a dead and dumb letter But Tradition as the Church holds it forth helps us to the true sense which is not indeed distinctly layd down in the Scripture yet is the real word of God. W. Bayly Nothing is more injurious to the Scripture than this Nothing is more contrary to the intention and wisdom of God than to suppose that he hath given a Rule of Faith which cannot regulate Faith which is too short by more than three quarters which is crooked dubious flexible and altogether useless without the aid of another Rule that is unknown to all Christians excepting a small number of Learned men who alone are capable of consulting it Scripture hath no Authority The fourth Affront that Popery offers to the Scriptures relates to their Authority They have no Authority without the testimony of the Church Without the Authority of the Church Bayly we should have no more Obligation to believe the Scriptures than the History of Titus Livius The Scripture Hosius if deprived of the Churches testimony have no more Authority than Esops Fables How know we say they that the Writings which go under the name of Moses are his seeing we never had a sight of the Originals And if we should who could assure us that they were writ by Moses's own hand Again if we could be assured of this what certainty have we that what Moses writ is true Who shall assure us that the Evangelists were Witnesses to all that they report But tho we should believe that they saw and heard all the Actions and Discourses of J. Christ which they report yet they might forgett and lye as every man may deceive and be deceived How can we again know with certainty Pighius that what goes under their names are their true Writings and not corrupted or forged I know not what kind of Temper a man must be of who can read and hear such things without trembling He that should speak at this rate of the Alcoran at Constantinople would be impaled alive An Infidel cannot say more to destroy all the Authority of the Holy Scriptures The several ways used by Papists to take away the Credit of the scripture 'T is not enough to these Gentlemen to affront the Scriptures by these four Accusations 1. That they are not necessary to the Church 2. That they are obscure 3. That they are defective 4. That they have no Authority as to us without the Church there is no Method imaginable which they employ not to dishonour them They tell us that they were writ only Occasionally and not at all with any design to make them a Rule of Faith. An Evangelist or an Apostle wrote a Gospel or an Epistle at random by chance and on particular private designs Afterward the Church collected those loose writings into one Book But seeing these were not writ by one or several persons writing in concert we cannot find in them a System of Faith. Can any thing be said more affronting to the H. Spirit who ordered the pens of these Writers and the occasions that obliged them to write The Papists talk just as if the Apostles had writ meerly on their own designs without any Inspiration But did not the H. Spirit who moved them to write design their writings collected together should be the true Rule of Faith To lessen the Credit of the Canonical books that are truly divine Popery hath joyn'd with them fabulous books a tale of Tobit a Romance of Judith of Bel and the Dragon of Susanna This tends to dispose the minds of men to believe whatever they have a mind to propose seeing the veriest Fables when authoriz'd by the Church ought to be received as Truth and the greatest Truth destitute of the Churches Testimony may be rejected as a Fable This is not yet enough the more effectually to abolish the holy Books and their Authority they affirm that at this time we have not the H. Scriptures compleat Many Books say they are lost we have not the Book of the Wars of the Lord mention'd in the Book of Numbers We have not the Books of Gad and of Iddo Solomon wrote concerning plants from the Cedar even to the Hyssop and I know not how many thousand Parables and Songs which we have not S. Paul wrote a third Epistle to the Corinthians which is lost one to the Church of Laodicea and perhaps many others which are not to be found and who knows whether in all these writings that we have not there were not innumerable things which would have made the Rule of Faith more compleat Perhaps what is come down to us are only some Planks escap'd from a Shipwrack which hath swallowed up the Vessel All the sacred Books of the Old Testament were burnt at the sacking of Jerusalem under Zedekiah Afterward Ezra gather'd what he could of the scatterd pieces There are Popish Authors who discourse at this rate Yea they go further Those Books of Holy Scripture that are preserved are yet corrupted and alterd The Jews out of hatred to the Christian Religion have corrupted the Originals at the best these Originals are lost and the Copies have felt the injuries of Time and the fate that is inevitable to all antient Books having for above three thousand years past thro the hands of so many ignorant persons many things may have been changed in them Besides they are dead Languages in which these Books are written such as we understand not we are not skill'd in their Grammar we know not the signification of their words This is what they discourse at this day Lastly to compleat the Affront they pull away these books out of the peoples hands they affright them with these as if they tended to ruin their souls They tell men that it never was the intention of God to abandon his Scriptures to the indiscretion of the Laity And on this pretence the Scripture is become a secret Book hid under a barbarous Language to which none is allowed to approach unless he is aforehand initiated in their
styl'd then a Spirit of Devotion that they might go and be destroy'd in the Eastern parts and there seek the punishment of their Crimes We may see how both antient and modern Writers set forth the state of the Roman Church at that time and the corruption of these Holy-war Souldiers who yet were the very Flower of the Saints of Europe for they had the Devotion to consecrate their Estates to sacrifice their Ease and Lives to the gaining of the H. Sepulchre They were Monsters Maimbourg History of the Crossades l. 1. who wherever they came left behind them the Traces of their Covetousness in seizing all of their Cruelty in Burning and Killing all Friends and Enemies without distinction of their abominable Luxury in the Villanies they committed The Lives of the very Clergy saith Maimbourg was so horribly debaucht that one cannot without trembling relate the hideous description which the Writers of that Age have made of them We may see how S. Bernard a Miracle-working Saint and consequently of good credit and Honorius of Autun the two gravest Authors of that Twelfth Age do paint is forth The Picture is made up of all kinds of Fornications Adulteries Incests Detestable Villanies and Acts of the utmost Filthiness This is S. Bernard's account he confesseth that if one had digg'd through the Wall of the Sanctuary as Ezechiel did he might have seen far greater Abominations than those the Prophet saw There was no order of men that was sound And Honorius of Autun ranks in order Princes Monks Priests Nunns and Nunneries and all orders of men giving a particular account of their horrid Abominations Corruption of the 13 Century The Corruption of the Thirteenth Century was every whit as bad yea worse even as a torrent in its progress swells and grows greater We may judge of this by one Instance related by Matthew Paris In this Thirteenth Century An. 1245. that the Council of Lyons which is reckon'd among the General ones was held In Henrico 3. At the Conclusion of this Council Cardinal Hugo preacheth a sermon in which he had this passage addressing himself to the Citrens of Lyons My Friends saith he to them since we came into this City we have been good Benefactors to you and brought you in very great Gain For at our coming hither we found but three or four Whore-houses but at our going away we leave but one 'T is true it reacheth thro the whole City from the East-gate to the West-gate The Corruption of Manners must be worse than it was in Sodom when Impudence gets up into the Pulpit of Jesus Christ or rather that must be the Pulpit of Antichrist where men take the liberty to speak such Abominable jests Corruption of the 14 Century We have credible Witnesses of the Corruption of the Fourteenth Century For instance one Alvares Pelagius a good Friend of Pope John XXII whom he defended against Oceam the Father of the Nominals who undertook the cause of the Emperor Lewis of Bavaria He sets forth the Cloysters of his Age a◠places of Prostitution where Debauchery Gluttony Idleness Drunkeness Luxury filthy Converses impure Discourses Lascivious Touches did reign And where all the Gates and Windows as 〈◊〉 speaketh were open towards Death He especially sets forth the horrid Sin of Sodom a sin which reign'd even in the Quire of the most august and venerable Churches We may likewise consult a grave Author call'd Marsilius of Padua Desensot paci◠who hath set forth Rome as it was in his days exactly like that Babylon of which we have seen the description in the Apocalypse But none hath so painted to the life the corruption of the 14th Century as Petrarch the greatest Wit and Schollar of his Age. There are two and twenty Letters of his which have no inscription in them he reckons up all the Villanies of the Nero's of Heliogabolus's of Sardanapulus's of Caligula's He addeth the Wickednesses feign'd by Poets the Crimes of Pasiphaë of Medea of Hercules when madd of Oedipus and Thyestes and finds all these too little to afford a true Idea of the Corruption of the Roman-Church in that Age. So that he requests from God the return of Nero's and the resurrection of the greatest Monsters of Impurity and Cruelty as a less Misery than that the Church was oppress'd by Corruption of the 15th Century We may judge concerning the state of the Roman Church in the 15th Century by the Chastity of that venerable Assembly the Council of Constance which passeth in the Gallican Church at this day for the most Sacred and valuable of all the Councils 'T was the flower of all the Clergy of Europe in it a Zeal against Heresie burnt John Huss and Jerome of Prague 'T was this Council that purged the Sanctuary and ended the grand Schism of the West Notwithstanding in the Catalogue of those who attended on this Council we find six hundred Barbers 450 Women of Pleasure and 320 Juglers and Stageplayers not reckoning the other Ministers of all sorts of criminal pleasures who no doubt were there Fornication in that Age was a mere trifle Aeneas Sylvius who was afterward Pope Epist 15. by the name of Pius II. confesseth it without the least shame as if it had been a Bagatell he saith that he was not holyer than David and Solomon 'T is saith he an old Fault and I know not so much as one who is free from it A good Evidence to prove the Chastity of the Age and Clergy in general Nay he is so impudent as to assert that 't is a natural Inclination and that it cannot be criminal seeing it comes from nature We need not wonder that this Pope should say that there was good reason to deny the Liberty of Marrying to Priests but that upon better it ought to be granted again to them If we would hear another Witness concerning the manners of the Roman Church in the 15th Century we may bring Nicholas de Clemangis Archdeacon of Bayeux He wrote a Treatise on purpose which he calls de corrupto Ecclesiae statu and besides this he mingleth his Complaints and Descriptions of it in all his Writings There are no Crimes Debauches Disorders Brutalities Ignorance Drunkenness Luxury Impuritie and Abominations which do not find place in the description which he makes Corruption of the 16th Century The sixteenth Century was the Age when the Reformation began If we would be assured concerning the Corruption of the Roman Church at that time we need only hear the Confessions which our Adversaries make at this day Read Maimbourg's History of Lutheranism Mr. Arnaud's Apologie for Catholicks and to say all in a word all those who have either writ the History of the Church of the last Age or have made Remarques on that History They all say that 't is true there was reason to complain and be offended at the Clergy and Monks that the Corruption was deplorable and Manners extremely corrupted and
us by the Titles of the Beast the City and the Empire by which 't is represented to us V. 5. And there was given to him a mouth Rev. 13. â— speaking great things and Blasphemies and power was given to him forty and two moneths i. e. twelve hundred and sixty years to reign and have Authority in V. 7. She hath glorifyed herself Chap. 18. and lived deliciously She saith in her heart I sit a Queen and shall see no sorrow The Church must be meaâ— and afflicted On the contrary every Body knoweth the Holy Scripture represents the true Church as a Society that must be persecuted afflicted under the Yoke and under oppression until the end of the sixth Period The faithful Witnesses must prophecy clothed in Sackcloth during the 1260 years of Antichrists Reign The Woman which had brought forth the Man-child must be hid in the Wilderness for the space of three Prophetick years and a half Let us now see to whom this Character of a long and constant prosperity belongs It doth not to the Christian Church of the three first Centuries for she was always in flames and blood It doth not belong to the Church of the fourth and fifth which kept as yet some purity for in those Ages the Church was cruelly persecuted by the Arrians and other Hereticks But as soon as the Church of Rome began to be corrupt and became Antichristian she began to have rest If she was opposed by some she did in conclusion rid herself of 'em she hath kill'd burn't and dispatch't those who had a mind to oppose her Doctrines and her Tyranny And she had the most desirable success until the last Age when the fatal ruin of the Papacy began Yea even after the Wound that she got a hundred and fifty years ago she is so recovered and hath got such strength that she was scarce ever more glorious She hath subdued new Kingdoms instead of those that were taken from her She hath persecuted at her old rate and always overcome she hath made others bear the Cross but hath boâ—n none herself Is this the Character of Christianity or of Antichristianism I ' le make the Bishop of Meaux Judge in the case Let us hear him speak The Bishop of Meaux confesseth that the Cross is inseparable from the Church The most peculiar Law of the Gospel saith he is the command of bearing the Cross The Cross is the true evidence of Faith the true foundation of Hope the perfect resining of Charity in one word the way to Heaven Jesus Christ dyed on the Cross he bore his Cross all his life On these terms he biddeth us follow him He makes this the price of Eternal Life The first to whom he particularly promised the Rest of the next World is a Companion of his Cross This day saith he to him thou shalt be with me in Paradise As soon as he was hung on the Cross the Vail that conceal'd the Sanctuary was rent in two from the top to the bottom and Heaven was opened to holy Souls 'T was presently after the enduring of the Cross that he appeared to his Apostles glorious and a Conqueror of Death to let 'em know that himself must enter into glory by the Cross and that he had told his Children of no other way thither Thus in the person of J. Christ was set before the world the Idea of acomplete Virtue that hath nothing and expects nothing upon earth which men require only with continual persecutions which â—easâ—th not to do 'em good and draweth on itself the last and worst punishments by its own benefits Jesus Christ dyeth not finding gratitude in these whom he had obliged nor fidelity in his Friends nor equity in his Judges His innocence tho it was confessed did not save him yea his Father in whom alone he had put all his trust withdraweth all the tokens of his Protection The just one is given up to his enemies and dyeth forsaken of God and men c. The wisest of the Philosophers searching after the Idea of Virtue concluded that of all wicked men he is the worst who can so conceal his wickedness as to pass for an honest man and by this means enjoys all the credit that virtue can bestow And on the other hand he is without doubt the most vertuous whose virtue by its perfection draweth on him the jealousy of all men so that he hath none to befriend him besides his own Conscience and seeth himself exposed to all sorts of injuries and even to the death of the Cross whilest his virtue cannot do him the small kindness of exemting him from such a punishment Is it not probable that God inspired the mind of this Philosopher with this marvellous Idea of Virtue intending to give an instance of it in the person of his Son and to let us know that the Righteous man hath another Glory another Rest and another Happiness than that which can be had on earth Behold how his heart speaks when he is not on his guard against the Calvinists when he frameth his Idea's from Reason Gospel and Experience It must be granted that these Reflexions would a little better fit the mouth of a persecuted Protestant than that of a person who liveth at the greatest ease in a persecuting Court. However I stand to the Decision of the Bishop of Meaux That the most peculiar Law of the Gospel is that of bearing the Cross But let 'em shew me what Cross the Church of Rome hath born from the time that she hath made material Crosses of Wood Stone and Metal the objects of Worship Where are her Martyrs where are her Persecutions Is it not a prodigy that for these seven or eight hundred years past she lives at the greatest ease always victorious Or if she hath endured any shakings her own restlesness Ambition Covetousness and Cruelty have caused ' em If she will have the honour of bearing the Cross and of reckoning the Persecutions that she hath suffer'd she must bring into her account the troubles she hath endured from the Emperors of Germany the oppositions they have made to her grandeur the bounds they endeavour'd to set to her pride the Arms they were forced to take up for repressing her insolencies I know of no other sufferings that the Papacy hath endured Indeed you shall hear Cardinal Baronius and his fellows tell us very seriously that the Emperors the Henries the Fredericks the Lewis's of Bavaria were cruel Persecutors of the Church and that under them the Church was miserably afflicted because sometimes they undertook to chastise the Ambition of the Popes 'T is true if they make Martyrs of all those who dyed in the Wars against those Emperors and of all the Guelfes who were slain by the faction of the Gibellines they will not want Confessors and Confession But I doubt whether they of Monfr de Meaux's principles do like these Martyrs and believe that the destiny of the Church
which ought in their judgment to be always under the Cross is fully obtain'd by these kind of sufferers I know not what Notions F. Maimbourg once a Jesuit had 'T is reported that he had begun to write the History of the Flourishing of Rome Christian probably he would have observed the Method which he used in his History of the Fall of the Empire If so 't is probable that he did not reckon among the Crosses of the Church all the troubles which the Popes endured from the Emperors who opposed their usurpations If the Papacy therefore will have Martyrs it must register in its Martyrology all that have dyed in the Wars raised against Kings by the Popes all that dyed in the Croisado's or in the massacring of the Waldenses and Albigenses all that dyed in the Field in the Wars raised in France on account of Religion at the Battels of Dreux of S. Denys Moncontour Coutras and many other engagements during the Design of the H. League in France to extinguish by Fire and Sword the Sect of the Calvinists and the antient Race of the French Kings I confess that such a reckoning would make a huge Martyrology and the Papists might glorie in being persecuted But the Hereticks in these dayes are somewhat scrupulous in the point of Martyrs and will find out something to hinder the Canonizing of such a vast multitude They will call those good Catholicks who dyed in the Wars against the Emperors of Germany Rebells who received from Heaven the just punishment of their Revolt They will say that the blessed Cross-bearers who dyed in the H. Lâ—nd or in going thither were a company of sidy distracted men who smarted for their rashness They 'le say that those who lost their lives in murthering the Waldenses and Hugenots were like Executioners who sometimes pay the scores of those who eâ—cape Laâ—â—ly they 'le say that the Church of Rome for eight hundred years past never suffered evil but when she had a mind to do mischief that She hath not born Jesus Christ's Cross but the Devils Cross that she hath been a Persecutor and not persecuted that she always came off victorious and that both her victories and combats have not been design'd for the advancing of the Throne of J. Christ but of that of the Pope Bellarmin is very ingenious Temporal prosperity cannot be a mark of the true Church Deâ—otis Eccl. â—ob 4. cap. 28. when he proves that temporal prosperity is a mark of the Church and among the Arguments to prove the real presence worship of Images Invocation of Saints c. he sets down the defeating of a hundred thousand Waldenses by eight thousand Catholicks the victories of the Popish Cantons in their Wars against the Protestant Swâ—â—zers and that of Charles V. over the Duke of Saxony in the year 1547. How well doth this agree with the Confession of the Bishop that the most peculiar Law of the Gospel is that of bearing the Cross These constant victories of the Papacy this continued prosperity of the Popes and of the Heroes who have defended their cause the dismal adversity of all that have opposed 'em these things I say in my opinion do afford a very strong Exception or prejudice against this Church For no such thing was ever promised to the Christian Church This prosperity was wholly reserved for the Antichristian Church at least until a certain Period in which the Church in her turn shall have Dominion over the earth and the world CHAPTER XXV The Conclusion In all Ages it hath been fore-seen or known that Rome and her Bishop are the Seat and Empire of Antichrist FOr a conclusion of this Work and of all that we design to say concerning the Antichristianism of the Church of Rome we will add some evidences to prove that we are not the only or the first men who have discern'd the Characters of Antichrist and of Antichristianism in Rome and her Bishop in the Pope and the Papacy 'T is above fifteen hundred years since some begun to discern that which we at this day behold more clearly The Fathers tho they fell into some mistakes concerning Antichrist yet did perceive something of this Mystery And in the Ages that were the darkest and the most enslaved under the Tyranny of the Papacy some were found who clearly saw Antichrist in Rome tho it was their great Interest not to see it because they always lookt on the Church of Rome as the true Church and both lived and dyed in her communion S. Irenaeus saw Antichrist in the number of the Beast S. Irenaeus without doubt was very unhappy in his Interpretations of the Mysteries of the Apocalypse as to what concerns Antichrist About whom he hath occasioned the mistakes of all those who followed his steps Notwithstanding we are beholding to him for the understanding of the Mystery coucht in the Name of Antichrist which was to make 666. He hath observed that the name Lateinos i. e. Roman or Latin does exactly make this number and this is of great use 't is a considerable discovery that lets us know where we ought to seek for Antichrist Not at Constantinople nor at Isphahan nor at Pequin but at Rome and in the Master of Rome S Jerom saw Antichrist in Rome Christian St. Jerom lived in the fourth Century in which the Church had a most glorious Age as to temporals The Church of Rome began at that time to raise herself above all other Churches to act the Queen and appear as a Star of the greatest magnitude The Bishop of Rome began to be a great Prince he had a brave House a stately Equipage a sumtuous Table was courted by many In a word his condition was such that a Roman Consul would willingly have changed preferments For a Heathen named Praetextatus prickt for Consul said Make me Bishop of Rome and I 'le turn Christian From hence the Flatterers of the Popes draw this profitable conclusion for the Church of Rome that she is naturally and necessarily the Queen of all the Churches St. Jerom who relates this saying of Pretextatus doth not draw the same conclusion on the contrary he begins to discern the characters of mystical Babylon in this pomp of the Roman Church his words are Whilst I dwelt in Babylon Praefat. in lib. Dydyâ—â— de Spir. Sâ—â— and was a subject of the Woman cloathed in purple I had a mind to discourse concerning the Holy Spirit and to dedicate that smal work which I had begun to the Bishop of that City but behold the Pot which Jeremy saw in the Northern climate behind a Staff began to boyle The Senat of Pharisees and all the false Scribes not one excepted making up one faction of Ignorance set themselves to conspire against me as tho I had a mind to contest with 'em in point of learning 'T is not Rome Pagan that he speaks of for 't was almost fifty years since she had submitted to Christianity
A CONTINUATION OF THE ACCOMPLISHMENT OF THE Scripture-Prophesies OR A Large Deduction of Historical Evidences Proving that the PAPACY Is the Real Antichristian Kingdom To which is added A CONFIRMATION of the Exposition of the sixteenth Chapter of the Revelation concerning the pouring out of the VIALS Written in French by PETER JURIEU Professor of Divinity one of the present Ministers of the French Church at Rotterdam Faithfully Englished LONDON Printed in the Year 1688. THE TRANSLATOR'S ADVERTISEMENT THE learned Author hath given the world an account of the Occasion and Original of his Legal Exceptions or Lawful Prejudices against Popery in the Preface to that Book of which this is an abridgment 'T is evident that in both he principally designed the advantage of his Country-men among whom the greatest wits have been employd to cover the deformity and paint over the foulness of Popery and consequently some Citations and passages will seem obscute to an ordinary English Reader But the present circumstances of our Nation abundantly justify the Translating and publishing a work of this design For tho the learned writers of the Church of England have sufficiently discovered the falsehood and danger of the Popish Doctrines yet the threatning Infection of our Age calleth for a stronger Antidote 'T is found by experience that the clearest Notions about these things are too weak to preserve from Apostacy in a time of Tryal Nothing can do this but deep Impressions on the Conscience which can produce an invincible Antipathy against Popery And I know nothing so effectual to work this as a due Consideration of the Characters of Antichrist that are to be found in the Roman Church If once a man is satisfied of this and withal hath a due concern for his own salvation tho he wants learning to plead against Popery yet he will be able chearfully to lay down his life in the Combat against it It hath been on this Principle that such numbers of antient and modern Witnesses have with admirable constancy suffered in the defence of the Gospel against the Tyranny of Rome 'T is therefore much to be lamented that our Author is somewhat mistaken in his charitable sentiments concerning the modern English divines whom in the conclusion of the Book he supposeth all to tread in the steps of their Predessors Whereas 't is manifest that the Example and Influence of a late Prelate A. B. Laâ—â— hath made many to for-bear the terms of Babylon and Antichrist in their Controversies with the Church of Rome So that of late these have past for rayling Expressions not fit to be used by Genteel Writers I heartily wish that such a Complaisance had not been attended with very pernitious effects Sure 't is no time now to manage and compliment such a declared Enemy of Christ and the Souls of men The Church doth therefore owe much to the Courage and Zeal of our Author who hath entred the lists against her with the Spirit and Weapons of a true Combatant and hath so effectually discovered the nakedness and deformity of the Apocalyptick Harlot that it must be madness for any either to fall in love with her or have any kind thoughts for her The Reader will find many passages of this Book to have an air of pleasantness and diversion as indeed 't is a hard matter to forbear laughter when the Objects are extravagantly ridiculous but I earnestly request this from him that he would take heed of jesting in so serious a matter 't is by no means enough to laugh and tell stories against Popery 't is alwayes to be remembred with what design these ridiculous passages are related which is not to make the Reader merry but to convince the Conscience that the Roman Church is the Babylon the Apostate Society which hath establicht herself by the most abominable Lyes and Fables as well as by the most barbarous Cruelty The Reader is entreared to make this Application of the whole otherwise the Labour of writing and Translating the Book will be lost The Lord grant it may not THE AUTHOR'S PREFACE A short Description of the Papacy TO divert and entertain Monsr Arnaud I shall once more act the part of a Mountebank as he is pleas'd to term it he shall have the Satisfaction to see a second Preservative of my writing and this may afford him a new Subject of raillery to imploy his wit as he formerly did in his Reflections upon the first Preservative which I publisht against the Catholick Exposition of the Bishop of Meaux But withal it will displease and vex him to review sometimes the passages quotedout of Father Crasset and the sorry scribbles of such Jesuites as he who are not at all to his liking and he would be glad never to see or hear any thing of ' em In this piece we give the true picture and representation of the Papacy as genuine and faithful as that is false and flattering which is of late made to the new Converts by the Gentlemen imployed in the famous Conversions in France It is composed of these thirteen lineaments which compleat the picture or so many Characters which describe Popery considering it in it self as distinct from the Common Christianity that doth yet remain in the Roman Church Let us then see what it is I. First 't is a Kingdom altogether Earthly and after the Spirit of the World. This Beast is as other Beasts which in the stile of Prophetick Scripture signifies Kingdoms and Empires It hath its Capital City its Monarch Provinces Governours Arms Cittadels Tributes c. and in one thing doth go beyond all other Tyrants that whereas their power reaches only to the Bodies of men the Papacy usurps an Authority over the Conscience and the Souls of men II. 'T is the effect of the most subile and yet the most detestable Poâ—icy by which any Worldly Empire was ever erected or preserved Their Temporal Tyranny is vailed under the appearance of Spirituality and at the same time 't is assisted and supported by it As Magicians to make up their Charms bring in the names of God and sometimes of Baptism and the Eucharist so doth the Roman Church make use of the words Religion Sacraments Church Censures Confession of sins the several degrees of the Ministry c. as the Means to establish a Kingdom and Government that is meerly Humane and Worldly and to exercise a power over the Bodies the estates the lives and Consciences of men III. 'T is a Proud Tyrant who is seated on a magnifick Throne and from thence cries aloud to the whole Earth that he is the Prophet of the Living God the mouth which Speaks Oracles Saying I am Queen and shall see no sorrow I am seated in the Eternal City Rome I am Infallible and of my Dominion there shall be no end It belongs to me to bestow the crowns of Paradise and I am the Soveraign Minister of the Living God upon Earth as to Temporals I am the only
been so fortunate as the Nuntio of Julius II. who tho taken Prisoner by Francis after the Battel of Ravenna received Hommages from the Souldiers Prostrate at his Feet and begging his pardon for having fought against the Church Such an influence hath the force of Religion on the minds of the people 'T was in vain that Boniface VIII put on his Pontifical Robes at Anagina notwithstanding this his Jawes were bruised with a blow of a Gantlet and he thrust into Prison 'T was therefore necessary to joyn a second policy to the former and support this falsly named Spiritual Dominion with a Worldly Pomp and Grandeur Men are compounded of Flesh and Blood the Passions are ever the prevailing Party and the senses are the Faculties which bear the chief sway in the conduct of men 'T was therefore necessary to maintain this Dominion that men should see something that affects the senses and engageth the Passions Therefore it hath been the Policy of that Spirit which framed this Engine to heap together vast Treasures to have stately Palaces to change Priests into secular Princes to furnish them with greath Revenues with pompous Retinues with sumptuous Tables and indeed with every thing that belongs to Worldly Glory This Policy is owned by the considerable persons of the Roman Church you need only read what hath been written by Pallavicino in his History of the Council of Trent and the Collection out of him drawn up by another Author of the same Religion in an ingenious Book called The new Gospel of Cardinal Pallavicino There it is shewn that the Cardinal makes it a matter of necessity that the Pope and the Church should be Rich and Wealthy should have Palaces Benefices Princes who are equall to secular Princes We cannot doubt that this Policy hath been of admirable use to the Antichristian Monarchy for 't is certain that if the Bishops of Rome had continued poor as they were for the three first Ages of the Church they had never made themselves Masters of the World. Thunderbolts issuing forth from a Cottage or a Tent would not long have astonisht men But coming from the Vatican from a Palace that in poynt of splendour may dispute with the most magnificent in the world people believed that there was indeed something real in those painted Thunderbolts The Authors of the Logick of Port-Royal Part 3. cap. 19. have made a judicious remarque No man doth expresly argue at this rate such a one hath ten thousand pounds per annum therefore he is in the right He is of a Noble Familie therefore we must believe every thing he saith Nevertheless something like this rate of arguing is found in the minds of most men which unawares corrupts their judgments c. They approve every thing done or spoken by a Great man through a secret condescension of mind which bowes down under the weight of Grandeur and wants Courage to look it in the face This is the very Method that the Papacy hath used to gain the minds of men which being once gain'd by this Pomp of Riches and Worldly Grandeur have argued at this rate The Pope is a great Prince therefore be is in the right therefore he hath Authority to do as he doth Yea this very thing hath helped to delude the Popes themselves A Great Person who taketh no pains to rectify the impressions which his secular Grandeur makes on his mind is easily brought to believe that he excels other men as much in moral and intellectual Qualitties as he doth in Riches and Dignitie Thus the Popes seeing themselves to be served as Kings and adored as Gods have easily believed that they have a rightful Authority over the whole World. Third Policy a gainâ—nâ— all the Great ones of the World to its party Again 't is an admirable Policy of the Papacy to have the Art of engaging on its side all the Great Families of Europe and of binding them to itself by the strongest of all the Passions viz. Ambition and Covetousness If the Court of Rome had engross'd her Grandeur and Riches to her self alone it had been the Object of the Envy of all other Courts and its Regency which depends onely upon the Consent of men could not have lasted long But as it hath Riches in all places so it bestowes Preferments in all places Rome is the Common City of the nations the whole World hath the Priviledge of Citizens There is not a great Family which doth not possess great benefices and supports their Luxury and vanity by the Churches Patrimony This Patrimony is the spoyls which have been taken from the World. When ever this Church is ruin'd all these Spoyls must be restored to the owners to whom they belong Therefore all the Great ones are concern'd to maintain this Monarchy which furnisheth them with Provisions for their Luxury and other lusts This consideration makes me assert that there never was any Monarchy in the world which had such firm Foundations as this It hath no Enemies among those who are led by Sense and lust nor can have On the contrary the whole world adores it to get a share in its Favours 'T is a wonder that the Empire of old Rome lasted so long What Interest had the Roman Provinces to contribute to the Grandeur of one City whiles they themselves were Slaves Here the case is not the same all consent to the Greatness of new Rome because all reign with her Priests may come to be Abbots Abbots to be Bishops Bishops to be Cardinals and all the Cardinals of whatever nation to be Popes Fourth Poliâ—yâ—s the Hierarchy That which is call'd the Roman Hierarchy is again a piece of admirable Policy This subordination of the Members of this great Body is a Bond which makes it firm The Curates are subject to the Rural Deans these Deans to their Bishop the Bishop to the Metropolitan the Metropolitan to the Primate the Primate to the Pope And this Pope is call'd the Center of Unity This Fiction is one of the last things which will be ruinâ—d Our French men who are cured of the fondness for the Popes power cannot as yet free themselves from this They adore this great Image whose Head is of Gold the Shoulders of Silver the Belly of Brass the Thighs of Iron the Feet of Earth The disproportion between the Pope and the petty Clergy is greater than that between Gold and Dust There must be a Stone cut without hands out of a Mountain an unconceivable Blow of Divine Power to break this Image in pieces 5. Policy The founding the various Orders of Monks Behold another very cunning Policy of the Papal Monarchy the founding of the different Orders of Monks which are as so many Citadels of this Kingdom These men have an Art to make themselves Masters of Families and Consciences They inspire all their Disciples with Maximes of Submission and Slavery to the Holy See as 't is named They stir up Subjects against
that it is not so plain but that 't is necessary it should be Prov'd Now from whence shall we fetch the Proofs of the Churches Infallability I must take them from her own mouth and believe her to be infallible because she tells me so and for that only reason because she saith it This is manifestly absurd for no man's bare word is to be taken in a business wherein he hath a particular Interest to be partial Hath a Turk right to oblige me to believe the Divinity of his Alchoran only because Mahomet hath said that the Angel Gabriel brought him the Alchoran from Heaven Must I then consult Tradition that is the Councils and the Writings of the Fathers this is another plain Absurdity because it is evident that this way cannot be made use of by three Quarters of the number of Christians and more who are ignorant of Greck and Latin and so cannot read the numberless volumns wherein this Tradition is to be found Or must every one believe his Curate or Pastor when he tells him that the Church is infallible This is another Absurdity for this Pastor must be infallible or I cannot build my Faith upon his Testimony He tells me there is an infallibility in the Church but how doth he Prove it which way soever I turn my self I fall into the former inconveniencies for if he saith I must believe it without proof he deals with me like a Brute and not as a Rational Creature If he gives me Tradition for Argument in this case I tell him I know nothing of it if he turns me over to the Church I ask where is this Church If he sends me to the Pope I tell him I cannot go thither and if I could I 'm told he is not Infallible If he send me to a Councill I say there is none now sitting If he send me to the Canons of former Councills I shall answer that I cannot understand 'em and if I could have no assurance that these Canons were really made by such a Councill If he proves that these Canons were not forged but really made by a Councill there remains another difficulty which I cannot get over viz. that several Good Catholicks maintain the fallibility of a Council There is then but one way left to satisfie my self concerning the infallibility of the Church and that is the Testimony of the H. Scriptures But how can any man make use of that according to the Principles of the Roman Church for I shall say that the Scriptures have no Authority without the Church I cannot believe the testimony of the Scripture till I know it to be divine and I cannot know it to be divine but by the testimony of the Church as we are often told The Scripture then hath no Authority as to me without the Testimony of the Church and yet you would have me believe the Infallibility of the Church upon the Testimony of the Scripture you must therefore in the first place convince me that the Church is infallible without dependance on the Scriptures and then I shall believe the divinity of the Scriptures on the Testimony of the Church and after that I may be able to believe the infallibility of the Church on the Testimonies of the Scripture The absurdities of blind obedience If the Church be infallible a blind Obedience is my Duty to obtain this submission to the Church is the reason of asserting her infallibility I must blindly believe all that the Church affirms But till then I am not obliged to credit any thing which the Scripture saith or seems to say for I am not capable to understand the meaning and sense of the Scriptures without the Church so that until the Church hath declar'd that Jesus Christ is the Eternal Son of God and equal with the Father I have leave to doubt of it There was a time when the Church had not deliver'd her opinion in this point there was then a time when I was permitted to be an Arrian Photinian or Socinian But on the other hand whenever it shall please the Church to determine that the Ark was of a square figure equal in length and breadth or that Aaron's Sandals were with or without latchets it will be necessary that I must believe this or be damn'd Can any man be unapprehensive of the absurdities of such a Doctrine according to which at one time we may Blaspheme God without the least danger and at another time lie liable to Damnation for the least mistake about that which the Church hath decided to be the Truth These Gentlemen tell us that we must believe without examination all that the Church declares And by the same reason the Heathens were obliged to believe all that their Priests told'um and the Jews to receive all that was taught in their Synagogues No you will say they were false Teachers and so not to be credited very well But the Pagans and Jews say the same concerning my Pastors that they are false Guides And if the Jews and Heathens are bound to examin the truth of what is told them by their Guides why are not Christians obliged to know and examin what is told them by the Church at least they ought to examin the Church it self and her Authority and then we fall into the same Difficulties which were mention'd before After all this if a short and easy way could be found out to convince me that the Church is infallible this were not enough to quiet my mind because I know not where to find this infallible Church I see a multitude of differing Sects in the East and West in Europe and Asia who all say that they are the Church and that all other parties of Christians are guilty of Schism The Latins say this of the Greeks and the Greeks are even with 'em and say the same of the Latins the Protestants charge it on the Papists and the Papists on the Protestants I must know which of all these is in the right and to find out this I am plung'd into an abysse of difficulties and how shall I find my way out or extricate my self for there is no way left but by the Scriptures and that way is forbidden me till I am assured of the Infallibility and Authority of the Church without which I cannot be certain that the Scripture is divine It may possibly be said that I may believe the Divinity of the Scriptures before I know in what Sect of Christians is the Church because the Scripture is receiv'd by all the several Sects It matters not may it be said which of them is the infallible Church since they all bear restimony to the Scripture and there is one among them that is infallible viz. the true Church for her where-ever she be the Scripture hath an infallible testimony But this remedy will serve to little or no purpose because 't is necessary that I should know which of these Sects is the true Church before I can understand the
Mysteries At present I appeal to the Consciences of all the men in the World whether the Behavior of Papists towards the H. Scriptures be not exactly like that of an indicted and convicted Criminal who goeth about to reproach the Witnesses and reject the Judges How long will this fatal inchantment last and when will men begin to perceive this Character of Antichristianism which is so manifest If Popery be Christianity why doth it so blame and reproach the Law of J. Christ If the Scriptures are favorable to it why goes it about to take away their credit and why doth it hinder the reading of them The vain Excuses of the modern Papists as to the preceding Points In our dayes those Impostors who are call'd Converters are still telling their Disciples that the most of these proceedings are false that which is true as to them was only the mistakes of some violent spirits who are condemn'd by the rest and lastly that all this is past and gone that at the present the Scriptures are in due esteem Translations of them made and put into the hands of the Laity with Exhortations to read them And those poor blind Creatures who are willing to be deceived believe all this But they ought to remember that even in this present age Cardinal du Perron hath heaped together every thing that might make the Scripture suspected and contemptible pleading that some things in it sound like Fables others are apt to raise in the mind indecent and dishonest Imaginations as some Expressions in Solomons Song the History of Balaams Asse which spoke and the Jawbone of an Ass with which Sampson slew a thousand Philistins c. 'T is in our age and very lately I confess that the Gentlemen of the Port Royal have wrote that we ought to read the H. Scripture Mr. Arnauld that it ought to be in the hands of the Common People that it is full of holy Unction and of great Efficacy and Vertue for Sanctification and Edification But it is likewise very lately said by these Gentlemen Mr. Nicole's apology c. Prejudices c and Calvinists convicted of Schism That it would be a Folly more plain than the day to go about to prove by Scripture that the Gospells according to S. Matthew and S. Mark are of divine authority that we never stop the mouths of the profane with our new Rule of Scripture without Tradition that the H. Scriptures have said nothing concerning the Divinity of J. Christ which may not be evaded that no Interpretations of Scripture are more than probable that the Sâ—cinian Hereticks find as much there for their cause as we for ours that there are some texts of Scripture which do naturally lead men to Error Behold what all their commendations of the Scripture do amount to This is just the same thing that the Ancient Papists were wont to say that the Scripture is a Nose of Wax a Leaden Rule a Sheath for any Sword. The terms are different but any man may perceive that the sense and meaning is altogether the same Lastly It must be observed that for eighâ— hundred years the common People in the Church of Rome have not known what the Scripture was and that the reading of it was forbidden them by their Popes Bishops Councils by the Indexes of forbidden Books and by Parliaments Mallet hath prov'd this against Mr. Arnauld in an irrefutable manner to which he never thought fit to make any Reply He only insists on the Question of Right viz. whether the reading of the Scriptures ought to be forbidden to the People he hath successfully prov'd that it ought not But he durst not meddle with the Question of Fact whether it hath not been always the practice of the Roman Church to forbid the Common People to read the word of God. He did well not to touch upon that for he could not have done it but to his own Dishonour Therfore let our New Converts to Popery no longer deceive themselves by regarding the Church of Rome only in that small part of it which is in France and hearken to that inconsiderable number of Popish Doctors who seduce them for they ought to know that even at this day in Spain and other places to have the Bible in the vulgar Language is a Crime to be punisht with Fire and Fagot and the Inquisition Popish dispensations contrary to the Law of God. 'T were easy to inlarge this chapter concerning the injuries and outrage that Popery is guilty of against the Scripture without digressing or going far we need but consider the bold attempts of the Pope and his Clergy to dispense with the law of God and act contrary to it no greater violence or affront can be offer'd to any Law than to command what it forbids and forbid what is commanded by it This is the case with the Church of Rome Popery requires the making of Images and injoyns the worship of 'em the Law of Christianity forbids it Popery forbids the eating of all sorts of meat at all times and forbids the marriage of the Clergy both are allowed by the Great Law of Christians It grants dispensations contrary to the Old and New Testament it dispenseth with the observation of the most solemn vows made to God and with Oaths of fidelity made to Kings wherein the name of God is invok't It dispenseth with that sacred and inviolable commandment of childrens obedience to their Parents and permits girles of twelve or fifteen years old to cast off the Paternal yoke that they may enter into a Nunnery It authorizeth the revolt and rebellion of Children against their own Fathers even so far as to permit them to usurp their Crowns and overturn their Thrones as is evident in History It establisheth new Sanctuaries and places of refuge in their Churches to save the lives of Murderers contrary to the express command of God. It makes void the plainest precept of God that every Soul must be subject to the Higher Powers by the many immunities granted to their Ecclesiasticks exempting them from the secular power It allows Fornication and Sodomy for such a sum of money and permits Incest contrary to the Law of God. It gives a Woman leave to marry two Brothers or a man to marry two Sisters or an unckle to marry his Neice It dispenseth contrary to the Apostles Rule that a Bishop should not be a Child or a Novice for it bestows benefices and Bishopsricks upon such as are altogether unfit and incapable which agrees exactly with what was foretold concerning Antichrist that he should endeavor to change the Times and the Law. These Seducers will doubtless tell their new Converts that these things are the Enterprizes and abuses of the Court of Rome and that according to the Gallican Church the Pope is not superior to the Laws and cannot dispense with the Canons This is the doctrine of the Sorbonne and of the Parliaments I refer them to what is written by
with the Devil to make himself Pope Clement VIII was accused to be a Poysoner a Murtherer guilty of Simony a Sodomite a Perjured Villain an Adulterer guilty of Superstitious divinations and sacriledge Thus ended the last Age. As for the Popes of our Age they are well enough known We know that Rome is always Rome We need only read the Writings of the Papists themselves such as the life of Donna Olympia the Miss of Innocent X. the Syndicat of Alexander VII and a hundred other pieces of this nature which are call'd Libels and Satyrs but do inform us of many Truths All this is the least part of what might be sayd on this head 'T is an Ocean of Iniquities which cannot be drawn dry In a word we must know there hath not been a Throne in the World defiled with such Abominations We find above 25 Popes convicted or accused of Magick Cardinal Benno reckons up several in less than fifty years He was a Cardinal of the Roman Church in the time of Gregory VII T is true he was a bitter enemy of that Pope and consequently it may perhaps be said that he is immoderate in speaking of him But I would fain know what Interest he could have in painting out in such a manner the seven Popes that were Predecessors of Gregory VII What rage could induce him to dishonour a Church in which he was Cardinal and Arch-presbyter if there had not been the force of truth and the wise Providence of God who would furnish us with this Witness We find in the Holy See examples of the most horrid Brutalities that ever Paganism was guilty of Incests Adulteries Sodomies Whoring and all along a monstrous Covetousness and Pride I confess I never reflect on this without trembling at the dismal judgments of God and the blindness which men may contract When men shall come to themselves they will wonder as I do how such multitudes can possibly look on this spectacle without Horror how they persuade themselves that such a Seat can be the Seat of J. Christ the mansion of the H. Spirit the source of those Oracles that guide the Church Surely say I some Thunder-clap hath struck the Hearts of Men and plainly brutifyed them None must object that some High Priests under the Law were wicked and favourd Idolatry for 1. First they come behind these Examples a thousand and a thousand leagues 2. Those High-priests had not the Priviledge of Infallibility which the Popes pretend to 3. Lastly 'T is not to be wondred at that about the End of Judaism God who intended to abolish that Religion should permit some of the last High-priests to fall into great Wickedness CHAPTER IX A continuation of the fifth Character of Antichristianism that is found in the Papacy The extreme Corruption of its Members HEarken how the great Babylon is described Predictions of the extreme corruption of Antichristianism in the 18 Chap. of the Revelation V. 7. How much she hath glorifyed herself and lived deliciously so much torment and sorrow give her c. 9. And the Kings of the Earth who have committed fornication and lived deliciously with her shall bewail her and lament for her when they see the smoke of her burning 11. And the merchants of the earth shall weep and mourn over her for no man buyeth their Merchandise any more 12. The Merchandise of Gold and Silver and Pretious Stones and of Pearls and fine Linnen and Purple and Sick and all thyne Wood and all manner Vessels of Ivory and all manner Vessells of most pretious Wood and of Brass and Iron and Marble 13 And Sinnamon and Odours and Oyntments and Frankincense and Wine and Oyl and fine Flour and Wheat and Beasts and Sheep and Horses and Charrets and Slaves and the Souls of Men. 14. And the Fruits that thy Soul lusted after are departed from thee and all things that were dainty and goodly are departed c. 16. Alas Alas that great City that was clothed in Fine Linnen and Purple and Scarlet and deckt with Gold and pretious Stones and Pearls 22. And the Voyce of Harpers and Musicians and of Pipers and Trumpetters shall be heard no more at all in thee 'T is evident that all this gives us an Idea of the Corruption of this false Church by the representation of what is seen in great Cities where all manner of Pleasures abound and all kinds of debauches are committed and where men tast all the sinful delights of the flesh Add to this that she is described as a prostitute Woman adorned with Gold and Pearls that invites all the Kings of the Earth to make themselves drunk with her criminal Amours Let us now see if this Copy does resemble the Original and if the Romish Church bears this Character of an extreme Corruption in Manners We have already viewed this Corruption in her Head by a Relation of the lives and Practices of the Popes We must now consider it in her Members The Corruption of the Tenth Century We shall not go further back than we have done in our account of the Popes i.e. we will only consider this Corruption down from the Tenth Century And as to this Century we will produce no other Evidences of the extreme Corruption which then prevailed besides the notoriety of the thing and the consent of all Historians Ad an 900. Since Cardinal Baronius confesseth it I believe none will question it He saith Is was an Iron age on the account of its Hardness and Barrenness a Leaden Age on the account of the Vgliness of the Vices which broke on t as a deluge and an Age of Darkness on the account of Ignorance We have seen that the City of Rome and the Church of Rome were arrived to a height of Wickedness and Corruption which passeth all imagination This Torrent over-flowed all the places which were joyn'd to this Church The Author of Fasciculus Temporum informs us that in most places not so much as the Sacraments were administred that Magick and the Art of making Charms and Bewuching people were almost the only Learning of the Priests The Corruption of the Eleventh Century The Eleventh Century was not better We may consult the Historians of that Age and Baronius who on their report tells us That besides Simony the Field of Christ was overgrown with Thoorns and Nettles which spring from the shameful putrefaction of the flesh and dunghil of Corruption that all flesh had corrupted its way so that it seem'd that a deluge was not sufficient to wash away the Filth and that these horrid sins call'd for the Fire of Gomorra That is that all kinds of Adulteries Fornication Sodomy Brutality horrid and monstrous Excesses Debauches Luxury Pomps Vanities and Pleasures of the Flesh reign'd in that Age. Corruption of the 12 Century The Twelfth Century comes next when Croisades were in fashion God weary with enduring such dismal Wickedness gave up these Wretches to a spirit of Madness
that this occasion'd the revolt of Zuinglius and Luther and disposed the spirits of the people to separate from a Clergy that was guilty of such dismal Disorders Besides we have the Confessions of the Papists of the same Age of Pope Adrian VI. of Cornelius Musse Bishop of Bitonto who in the midst of the Council of Trent said That there was no Filthyness how monstrous soever no Villany no Impurity with which the People and Clergy were not defiled We have the Testimony of the famous Mantuan and of the learned Espensaus who make such dismal and affrighting descriptions of the manners of the Roman City and Church in general that one cannot forbear trembling as he reads them After this we need not the testimony of the Lutherans and of the Hundred Grievances which were drawn up at the Diet of Norimberg 1522. wherein the Abominations of the Clergy of that time are set down with exact Fidelity The Priests and Monks have always been guilty of the greatest Corruption Observe I pray you that this dismal Corruption of Manners in all the Ages which we have been mentioning hath always been charged more particularly on the Clergy than on the People And this is a sensible Character of Antichristianism that is found in the Papacy We know that the Clergy and Monks are the principal Members of the Papacy its Spirit and Soul resides in them so that if Popery were Christianity the spirit of this later would be found in these two Orders of men we should perceive some marks of the Christian Religion to shine forth in them But by a righteous Judgment God hath permitted them to contract the very greatest corruption to convince those whom God will save that the Papal Empire cannot be the Kingdom of J. Christ The Corruption of the Priests Monks and Nuns hath always been worse than that of the Laity that so it might appear that the farther a man goes in Popery the more he partakes of the spirit of Antichrist We may view over again Alvares Pelagius Petrach Nicholas de Clemangis Fasciculus Temporum and add to them Walter Mapes an English Doctor Arnold de Villâ novâ Leonard Aretine and an infinite number of others and we shall see that their most bitter Invectives the lively Descriptions and affrighting Representations of the Corruption they speak of do principally relate to the Court of Rome the Priests the Clergy the Monks and Nuns This is not a matter that needs to be proved 'T is notorious even in our dayes for all who have had a mind to collect filthy and obscene stories even among the Papists themselves scarce relate any thing besides the enormous Crimes of the Priests and Monks this hath made the Name of a Fryar odious and the Proverbs which are in use among the vulgar make these the Instances of impurity such a one they say is Lazy fat and leacherous as a Friar Hence those who write Satyrs fall especially on the Monks as may be seen in the writings of Rablais and the Apologie for Herodotus Nor are they only obscure writers who have attacht them with violence The Bishop of Bellay in the present age hath omitted nothing that might make them odious And yet not one passage in him can be cited where he hath spoken without truth Consequences that ought to be drawn from â—â—nâ—e Here I conjure those who have any care of their own salvation to bestow their attention on this subject For in my judgment 't is the most proper to awaken those who have not quite lost even Common sense How can it possibly enter into the mind of any man that the only true Church should be found in a Society which for eight hundred years together hath been guilty of so abominable a corruption of manners that that of the Heathens has not equall'd it I grant indeed that we may find in Heathen History some passages as dismal as those which are seen in the History of the Papacy But I am bold to say that we cannot find such a long series of Villanies and abominable Practices so long continued For about a thousand years a Church is made up of Drunkards Whoremongers Incestuous Wizzards Magicians Sodomites Luxurious Unclean Wretches without Shame without Virtue without Modesty without Bounds without Masque These are the main body and community there are scarce honest men enough to complain of the Disorders of the rest A man I say must be resolved to damn himself in cool Blood if he digests this Absurdity and is persuaded that 't is possible for Jesus Christ to abandon his true Church at this rate and suffer her to sink into such a Corruption What can be replyd to this The Vanity of the Papists excuses 'T will perhaps be reply'd that in all Ages of the Church the H. Fathers have complain'd of Corruption of Manners and that we must not condemn the whole for the Faults of some particular men But 't is an intolerable Affront to the Primitive Church to make the Comparison between some Disorders that the Fathers complain'd of and the horrid Enormities of the Papacy At least the Clergy of those times complain'd therefore they were not guilty of the Disorders that they reproacht in others Some will say That there were great Corruptions sometimes in the people of Israel which was the only people of God. 'T is true but then they did not last so long God never sufferd this people to persevere constantly for seven or eight Ages in the Vices of the Heathen and in the Abominations which they borrowed from the Gentiles 'T is sayd that however these Disorders are past and that we cannot any longer justly charge the Church of Rome with them But First if this were true it doth not contradict the Truth of what I have alledg'd 'T is a certain Truth that the Church of Rome for seven or eight Ages was sunk into this extreme Corruption And I say it over again There is none who retains any Liberty of Mind who can possibly believe that the true Church could lye under this dismal Infamy for so long a time thro the permission of God. But besides where is this Reformation of Manners which they so much glory in In all the Countreys where there are no Protestants to inspect the Deportment and Manners of the Papists things are almost at the same pass We have Historians Travellors and Writers of Travells who tell us that in Italy and Spain Convents are places of Prostitution the Monks are employ'd to execute the worst of Villanies and the Priests are the most notorious Pimps We may consult A Relation of the Commonwealth of Venice writ by M. de S. Didier a Papist and a thousand other Books that are in every ones hands 'T is true in some Countries the outside is somewhat alter'd especially in France where for these twenty years past the Court being set upon the design of Reunion hath judg'd it necessary in order to gain the Protestants
we call Avarice and Simony is an honest and lawful means to support the honour and the Majesty of the Church CHAPTER XII The Eighth Character of Antichristianism which agrees to the Papacy The Spirit of Impurity and Reprobation IN the 16th Chapter of the Revelations we have an admirable Character of Antichristianism and a very plain and evident one where He speaks of three unclean Spirits coming out of the mouth of the Dragon of the Beast and the False Prophet V. 13. And I saw three unclean spirits like Frogs come out of the Mouth of the Dragon and out of the Mouth of the beast and out of the Mouth of the false Prophet V. 14. For they are the Spirits of Devils working Miracles which go forth unto the Kings of the Earth and of the whole World to gather them to the battel of that great day of God Almighty V. 15. And he gatherd them together into a place called in the Hebrew tongue Armageddon The Spirits coming out of the Mouth of the Dragon are his words I cannot think that any man who will consider without prejudice the interpretation we have given of this Oracle in our Accomplishment of Prophecies can doubt of the truth of it 'T is manifest that those Spirits coming out of the mouth must be understood of words for so words are exprest in a figurative stile in the H. Scripture The Spirits therfore which come out of the mouth of the Dragon the Beast and the False Prophet are doubtless the Words Laws and Doctrine of Antichrist And termed Vnclean Spirits because of the Impiety Folly Extravagance and Character of Reprobation which is to be apparent in those Laws and in that Doctrine of Antichrist Let us see whether this agree to the Papacy whether their words be not impious and impure extravagant and foolish and bear the marks of a Reprobate Spirit We must look for this in the words of Antichristianism that is what hath been said and taught by those who have liv'd in the Antichristian Kingdom in one word by the Doctors of the Church of Rome They are of several ranks and degrees Schoolmen Canonists Legendaries Preachers Casuists and the Authors of Mystical Theology Devotion and Controversy If we examin the words of all those different Authors we shall find in 'em the Characters of these impure and diabolical Spirits which come out of the mouth of the Dragon the Beast and the False Prophet The Impurity of the Schoolmen In the first rank are the Schoolmen a sort of Doctors who started up in the twelvth Century when the Devil had just compleated the Antichristian Monarchy and made up the confused mass of Errors and Superstitions which belong to Antichrist the Beast spake and innumerable lying Doctors appear'd under his Authority to abuse the People and continue them in the darkness of Ignorance The Patriarchs of this kind of Doctors who gave rise to this Monstrous Theology were Lombard whom they call the Master of the Sentences Albertus Magnus Abelardus and Thomas Aquinas The H. Scripture was buried in oblivion Aristotle succeeded in the place of S. Paul and a barbarous Philosophy brought forth a Divinity that was much more barbarous What is this Divinity of the Papists 'T is a black and gloomy science rising from the Bottomless Pit cover'd with Clouds and Darkness 'T is a Dedalus an inextricable Labyrinth which the wisest of mankind can never unriddle 'T is a dark and confused Chaos where a very little of that which is good is buried under a great deal of that which is otherwise 'T is a new and barbarous Language invented to astonish and confound the simple where they talk of nothing else but Quiddities and Entities Formalities and Modalities Hecceities and Identities Categoricks and Syncategoricks and a thousand such like things good for nothing but to darken the minds of men and hinder the light of Truth by an infinity of trifling unintelligble distinctions 'T is an Heap of frivolous Questions knotty impenetrable obscure and oftentimes blasphemous In this Scholastick Divinity they gravely inquire whether God can seperate a Relation from its subject whether the Body of J. Christ could be in the Eucharist before his Incarnation whether God could become a Woman whether this Proposition God is a snail or a pumkin be as possible as this God is man whether God could command all sorts of Crimes even the Haâ—red of himself and the Hypocrisie and Dissimulation of all good Actions even in his own Service whether numeral words do add any thing real to the Divinity whether the number of divine Persons ought to belong to first or to second Intentions whether this Proposition God the Father hates his Son be possible or no whether the second person of the Trinity might not have been united to a Devill to a Stone to a Plant to an Asse and if that be supposed how the Stone or Plant could have been crucified have preacht and wrought Miracles c. In all this one may plainly perceive an Impure and Reprobate Spirit and the unclean spirits which come out of the mouth of the false Prophet There is none of the Christian Mysteries but they have polluted and blemisht by their bold Questions that of the Trinity of the Incarnation of the Divine Nature and Providence And tho of late they are a little come off from that way there yet remains so much of it as is sufficient to discover this character of Antichristianism The Errors and Superstitions and Idolatries of Popery are concealed and cloak't under the niceties and darkness of this Divinity 'T is this that hath coin'd those numberless distinctions which are so many Subterfuges where error and Idolatry secure themselves when we attempt to discover ' em 'T is to this Theology that we owe those famous terms of worship absolute and relative Dulia Latria and Hyperdulia of Transubstantiation Concomitance and an hundred others like these Impurities of the Canonists The Canonists are another kind of the Mouths wherby the Dragon the Beast and the False Prophet do speak their words likewise have the Character of unclean and diabolical Spirits Burchard Bishop of Wormes Albertus Abbot of Gemblour Anselme Bishop of Lucca Ives Bishop of Chartres Gratian a Benedictine Monk of Bologna Raimond of Penna Fortè were the principal Composers of the Papal Laws and of those Decrees of the Papacy the body whereof makes up the Canon Law and they are in truth the unclean and diabolical spirits which come out to deceive the Kings of the Earth and to gather them together in battell against God in the place of Armageddon and that under the bond and tye of Excommunication It may be said truly that there is no Folly Filthiness Extravagance or Blasphemy which is not to be found in these Authors of the Canon Law. In one place we read that a Community of Wives is a very good thing and that Plato who would have introduc't it was the wisest of all
so negligent of their duty toward God tho Villains Robbers Debaucheés c. they cannot be damn'd because they have been Clients of the Virgin. This they prove by innumerable examples of those whom the Virgin hath by strange Miracles brought back as it were from the Gates of Hell because they had been her Votaries And as an evidence how highly pleasing this Adoration is to the Virgin she hath wrought more Miracles within these last seven or eight hundred years than God hath wrought snice the Creation by Moses and the Prophets by Jesus Christ and his Apostles and by all the Saints together Her Images have Spoken they have Sung they have resisted the Fire and the Hammer they have sored in the Air like Birds they have swet Blood and Oyle and Milk have run from them some of them have been turn'd into Flesh they have Wept Lamented Groaned they have made the Lame to Walk the Blind to See the Deaf to Hear They have cured all kinds of Diseases and Wrought all sorts of Prodigies For these reasons people will go to the end of the World to visit these consecrated Images they kiss and fall down before them and render to them an external Worship accompanyed with a most fervent internal devotion They rubb their Chaplets or Beads their Handkercheifs upon these Images and wear about them these Chaplets and cloths which have touched the Images of the Virgin and believe that they are reliques which have a virtue to preserve from all Evills That which we have discourst concerning the Virgin may be applyed to Saints proportionably There is no Folly or Extravagance that we have now related but every Order of Monks say such like of their Founder and Author the Cordeliers and Capucins of their S. Francis the Jacopins of their S. Dominick and in general of all the pretended Saints of their Orders they are more Holy than Seraphims they raise the Dead they heal all Disceases the whole Creation is subject to them We shall see their Instances when we come to handle the Fables of the Legends CHAPTER XV. An Examination of the Excuses by which some late Authors endeavour to palliate the Idolatry which hath been set forth in the preceding Chapter THere is none unless he is plung'd into the darkest Superstition but must confess that what we have been relating is Idolatry in the highest degree Accordingly since of late some Papists of the Gallican Church have taken up something of a Spirit of Moderation people begin to be ashamed of these Excesses Indeed how can it be that men should not see the Blasphemy that lyeth in giving to a Creature that which belongs only to the Creator To ascribe just every thing to the Virgin which can be spoken of God and consequently to give her divine Honours Those Gentlemen who make it an Article of their faith to follow the sentiments of a certain Ecclesiastick who wrote The wholsom Advices of the Virgin to her indiscreet Votaries tell us that the things charged are the Excesses of some Fryars which were never approved by the Church that no Council ever enjoyn'd them that at present all those Follies are antiquated that men are perfectly come off from 'em and that the Invocation of Saints must not be judged of by that measure And therefore if we have no other Arguments to make good the charge of Idolatry that we bring against the Church of Rome we must be non-suted This is their note for these last twelve or fifteen years and what they perpetually repeat to the New Converts yea they write and print it that all those who revive these Monkish Superstitions are some pitiful Jesuites such fellows as F. Crasset They tell us that when we pray to Saints we do nothing more really than place them among them who pray And that we pray to them on the same ground and design that we desire a Friend to pray for us The Roman Church is Idolatrous in the Invocation of Sts. First we reply in a word that the Invocation of Saints the most refin'd and the most amended by the Ecclesiasticks of France is a real Idolatry and therefore tho we could not reproach the Church of Rome with these excesses we have notwithstanding very good proof to convict her of Idolatry We say in the 2d place that 't is enough to us that these Gentlemen do acknowledge that these Excesses are Idolatrous as Mr. Arnaud expresly owns it and the Author of the Advices c. does strongly prove it This acknowledgment I say is enough to us to found an Accusation of Idolatry against the Church of Rome and to evince that she bears this Character of Antichristianism as well as the rest 'T is a meer Cavil to say that the Roman Church can only be charged with that she hath expresly determined in her Councils The universal consent the constant practice of her people the uniform Theology of all her Doctors the Orders and Examples of her Popes and lastly the toleration or rather the long reign of these Abominations without the least contradiction are sufficient to give us ground for judging this to be the Religion of the Papacy For we now take it for granted that for these last seven or eight hundred years this is the Religion of the Latin Church and that all her Teachers have approved have taught and practis'd it that the Popes have Authoriz'd it by their Decrees by their Examples by the blasphemous Hymns which themselves have composed in Honour of some Creature We defy Mr. Arnaud and all the refin'd Papists at this day to cite the Authors who have dared to condemn these Excesses We easily believe that there have been some who have neither approved nor practis'd them But the number hath been so small and the torrent so violent against them that they had been burnt if they had taken the courage to declare themselves 'T is so publickly notorious that nothing can be more that before the Reformation God and his Worship were scarce known by the common people Nothing was talked of but Pilgrimages to Saints or to some Image of the Virgin the Miracles wrought by Images and especially by those of the Virgin Vows and Prayers made to He-Saints and She-Saints The Jesu Maria had so shut out the name of God that it did fill your ears on all occasions In dangers in fear in surprises in short prayers produced by any strong passion All the world knoweth that in these horrid dark Ages the Monks were the Masters of the Conscience and Directors of the peoples Devotion These Monks I say who are the principal Authors of these dismal Excesses which men are forc't to be asham'd of at this day Such was the torrent of this impiety that those who were not born down with it were forced to conceal themselves so that 't is no wonder that we of this age cannot name and shew them These Gentlemen when we tell them that God reserved his Elect hidden in
mystical and spiritual reason assign'd for 't But First these are meer Chimaera's and fancies which the first Inventers of these Ceremonies never dreamt of we are told of a learned man in the Church of Rome a Canon of Clugny who hath prepared a book for the press that will confute and shame the Durand's the Biels the Innocent's and the Disciples of such as have wrote of the Mysteries of the Mass for he will prove that all these Ceremonies are without any mystery and that they were only instituted upon motives of commodity and convenience or by meer hazard and occasion but suppose there were a mysterious Intention hidden under these Ceremonies were the service any whit the less carnal for this who allmost is there that understands these Mysteries A man must have been for a long time in a dream to have imagin'd those impertinent reasons which are brought by the mystical Authors of the Roman Church for all the parts of their external worship The Priests themselves do not know them and the People never heard one word concerning them so that they never see any thing but bodily exercise and a worship meerly corporeal and external The most important piece of worship in the Church of Rome is the Mass let us examin it a little whether it hath those two Characters of being Spiritual and Reasonable which are certainly two properties of every Service in the Christian Religion In the Mass the Priest being cloath'd with his Sacerdotal Habit begins with that which they call the Judica the Introitus and the Confiteor There some words taken out of the Psalms are thrust in and mixt with some words of prayer The Priest makes confession of his sins to God to the Virgin and to the Saints he demands absolution and he bestows it on the People he ascendes to the Altar he stoops down below it and mutters some prayers to himself of which no body understands either the sense or the sound He says to the People Cantate Domino i. e. sing to the Lord and yet no man dares sing He repeats several times Kirie Eleison Christe Eleison Greek words whose meaning he knows not for 't is very common that he scarce understands the Latine of the Mass The Gradual is the second part of the Mass in which he sings some kind of songs that are different according to the time and Days on which Mass is read the Deacon prepares himself to read the Gospell he prays to God in Latin that he would purify his Lips the Priest gives him his blessing and makes many signs of the Cross over him The Deacon kisseth the hand of the Priest and makes the sign of the Cross with the thumb of his right hand over the Book over himself upon his forehead his mouth and stomach he perfumes the Book with Incense and being thus well armed against the charms of the Devill by his Grimace and wry-faces he reads the Gospell of the day but the poor People in the mean while understand nothing The reading being over the Priest returns the Book saying these words Per Evangelica dicta deleantur nostra Delicta i. e. by the sayings of the Gospell may our sins be blotted out The Deacon burns Incense the Priest reads the Creed and turning towards the People he says Dominus vobiscum After the Gradual comes the Offertory in which the Priest taking the dish wherin are the unconsecrated wafers he offers them unto God with these words Holy Father God Almighty and Eternal receive this immaculate sacrifice which I thine unworthy servant offer unto Thee my living and true God for my innumerable sins offences and negligences and for all those who are here present round about and for all faith full Christians Living and Dead that it might be profitable to their salvation in Eternal Life Observe that 't is all this while but meer bread But what kind of Bread think ye little loose leaves of paper made with a little flower and bak't between two Irons This is the propitiatory oblation that is offer'd for the Living and the Dead After this the Priest takes the Chalice and offers it likewise unto God he makes many Prayers that God would bless this sacrifice that he would accept it and that it may be gratefull and well-pleasing to him You must know that this was the sacrifice of the Mass before Transubstantiation was found out plain Bread and wine was then offer'd Judge then whether any man could believe that this was a true propitiatory Sacrifice In this part of the Mass every thing that can be imagin'd is done to make this bread and wine to be a propitiatory Sacrifice They offer it to God they offer it to the honour of the Saints and of the Virgin and say unto the People Pray to God that this Sacrifice which is yours and mine may be acceptable to him 'T is in this part that the Secrets are said they are short Prayers spoken with a low voice but are concluded with a per omnia saecula saeculorum which breaks forth in a voice of Thunder after a deep silence Lastly comes the Canon of the Mass which is an additional peice in favor of Transubstantiation There begins the Consecration and the Body of Jesus Christ then comes upon the Altar There the Priest changes postures and makes an hundred grimaces he speaks and then holds his tongue he stoops down then raiseth himself up and kisses the sides of the Altar He makes many signs of the cross he prays for the Popes for Kings and for him in particular on whose account that Mass is said He offers to the honour of God of the Virgin of the Apostles and of the Martyrs when the consecration is over he rises up and worships After this he proceeds to the true propitiatory Sacrifice He offers the Body of J. Christ praying God that it may be as agreable to him as the Sacrifice of Abel i. e. they compare the Body of our Lord to that of a dead Beast The Priest strikes upon his breast several times he uncovers the chalice and makes many signs of the Cross over the Blood of J. Christ to drive the Devil from it He sings he prays and then sets down the chalice and the consecrated wafers upon the corporal that is to say upon the linnen of the Altar He again takes up the Dish wherin the wafers are he makes over himself a great sign of the Cross and breaks the wafer into three pieces He throws one back into the chalice with the other he makes the signs of the cross over the chalice touching the foot of it the middle and the brim and then he stroaks his eyes with it He covers the chalice again he prays and returns to the side of the People and makes them kiss the Pax so they call a Trenchar or a little board on which is painted a Crucifix or the image of the Virgin. Then he puts himself in a posture to eat the wafer and
Father Crasset treats those who are incredulous as to these things As to other Miracles such as Curing diseases opening the Eyes of the Blind and the Ears of the Deaf restoring broken Limbs or paralitick wither'd Members or when half hath been lost c. These are little inconsiderable things which the Legend hardly thinks it worth while to take notice of I know not whether the Reader will not be weary of such stuff for my own part my patience is almost tired and I shall here conclude the Chapter of the Fables and Romances made in favor of the Invocation of Saints and pass to the Fabulous History of their Reliques CHAPTER XXI The fabulous History of Reliques of Images of the real Presence of the Adoration of the Host of the Sacrifice of the Mass of Purgatory of Founding the Orders of the Monks MOnks Adoration of Reliques and the Spirit of Lying came into the Church in the same Age. The Monks are those Cheats and Impostors who according to St. Paul's prediction were to set on foot the Worship and Doctrine of Demons or secondary Mediators And Reliques were the first step that led men to the diâ—iâ—al Superstitions which we have spoken of in the preceding Chapters If we should undertake to write the Annals of Reliques of their discovery of their Translations and Miracles down from the sourth Century they alone would make a vast Library but withal a very monstrous one for this is one of the most filthy and shameful Raggs which Popery hath sewed to Christianity Yea the very drawing up an Inventory of their Reliques would suffice to shew the filth of this piece of Popery One might sind at Rome an inexhaustible spring of Reliques and Cheats which is called the Catacombs These are Caves and Sepulchres Catacombs at Rome whence Reliques are now taken where the Romans of old buryed their Slaves and arterward all their dead When they gave over the Custom of Burning them which was after the time of the Antonins These Catacombs that were once the Sepulchres of Heathen Slaves are become the Quarries where the Gods of Christians are digg'd From thence some Bones are taken and baptiz'd with the name of some Saint who often never was in the world and are distributed into all Countreys Even those Papists who retain any Common Reason do abhor and deride them Marolles Abbot of Villeloin who dyed but a few years ago said That if a Church or a Community wanted Reliques they needed only to address to the Pope and most humbly desire his Holiness to give them some Who takes out of the Catacombs as many as he pleaseth and after an exact Tryal made he baptizeth them as they call it and giveth them their proper name whether by inspiration or because he hath a mind to do so is no matter Witness the chests fill'd with Reliques that were taken out of these Catacombs and which Pope Alexander VII and his Successor Clement the IX sent into France as a rich present Head of â—â—â—tunatus that was made of â—â—â—â—â—oard Among which was that miraculous Head of St. Fortunatus which the Physicians found to be made of Pastboard and the body of St. Ovidius which at this day worketh so many Miracles in the Convent of the Capuchius What a Pity it is that this Saint who was never known in the Martyrologies or History hath lost his time so sadly for twelve or fifteen Ages together what Miracles are lost which had been wrought if they had digg'd him up sooner Reliques of the Virgin. If we designed to make an Inventory of Reliques we ought to begin with those of the Virgin before we come to those of her Son. But since her Body as well as Soul is in Heaven these Gentlemen her Devoto's are deprived of the grand help to their Devotion because they can shew none of her Bones But to make amends for this they have made a curious Collection of her Linnens and little Cloaths They have her Girdles her Ropes her Sandals her Quoifs her Shifts her Wast-coats They have her Hair the Parings of her Nailes and her Milk in great quantity All this was never heard of till the sixth and seventh Centuries yea the most of these Reliques of the Virgin were not known a long time after But God who intended to honour these blessed Reliques with Altars and Adoration did carefully preserve them in little Corners that none knew of and after eight or ten Ages brought them to light to warm again the cold devotion of the Church They have good Warrant and Sureties for the truth of these Reliques for the Virgin hath taken care to assure some honest Monk or some boly Nunn by Dreams and Revelations If this will not serve they have a sure way to confirm their Faith as to these things viz. the Miracles that have been done by these Reliques And lastly If all fail they have Holy Tradition that cannot lye and this assureth us of the truth of these holy Reliques Reliques of J. Câ—rist His Foreskin Jesus Christ being also alive in Heaven with his Body we have not his Bones But this is no great loss for excepting these the Church hath almost every thing which she could desire She hath the glorious Foreskin of the Lord Jesus Christ The Physicians say that there can be no more than one but in favour of the Devout God hath made several Foreskins of Christ for there is one at Rome in the Lateran Church formerly there was one at Antwerp one in the Abby of Charrone another at Langres but as to this last the Abbot of Ville-loin dare not be very positive This multiplying of the Foreskin of Jesus Christ is not the thing that most troubleth the learn'd men of the Roman Church but 't is a question among them whether our Lord can have left his Foreskin on Earth for if he hath the Body of Jesus Christ in Heaven is not compleat and intire About this these Gentlemen have many pretty imaginations which may be seen in Suarez But the Devoto's who trouble not their heads with these deep and knotty questions do most piously adore all these Foreskins They mean well and this is enough They cannot want the Blood of our Lord Jesus Christ for he shed it on several occasions at his Circumcision as his bloody Sweat in the Garden of Gethsemene in Caiphas's Hall when he was Scourged on the way to Calvary at his crowning with Thorns and lastly on Mount Calvary where we must not doubt the Holy Women had brought Vessels on purpose to preserve his Blood. I say Holy Women for the Men have always been less devout Perhaps there did not run much Blood out of his Wounds for three or four nails which stop up the Wounds made by them do not leave much space for the Blood to run out which also presently congeles at the Orifices 'T was this which made the death of the Cross tedious and lingring For if the Blood had
run out in great quantity the patient would have been quickly dead But in favour of the Devout God did so multiply the Blood of Christ that at this day one may find as much as if made liquid would fill the veins of a hundred men and above They have also even the Tears of Christ Witness the Holy Tear at Vendome a very choice Relique For 't was necessary that a Devoto should be present at the nick of time and very dextrous to save a small drop of water which falls from the eye upon the cheek and is commonly lost After this we must not wonder that they have taken care to collect solid things as the Nails of the Cross there were but three but by the blessing of God the Latin Church hath fifteen of them besides the filings and little pieces of these Nails And perhaps who ever would make an exact search in the East would find as many there or more The Holy Thorns of the Crown that was put on our Saviours Head were planted in so fertile a Soyle that they are encreased a hundred for one The Gentlemen of Port-Royal who are no great Favorites of Holy Mother the Church have not withstandingly by some means gotten one of them which they order to be devoutly adored and which did abundance of Miracles in confirmation of Jansenism Monsieur the Bishop of Tournay a great Jansenist but an honest man dareth not assert that this very Thorn is one of our Saviours Crown But he hath found an expedient for this and concludeth that God worketh Miracles by false Reliques as well as by true ones Perhaps he speaks more truly than he is aware of for 't is certain that the Bone of some Rogue yea or of a Horse worketh more Miracles then the Reliques of Saint Paul. How can the Church complain that she wants Reliques of our Lord Jesus Christ since she hath his Cross which is the Glory of Christendom The Devoto's of the three first Centuries were very negligent in not seeking out this Cross and in suffering it to ly buryed under a heap of Earth and rubbish But St. Helena was very happy that the discovery of this pretious Treasure was reserved to her God hath so blessed her Endeavours that this Cross would at this day fill the whole Palace of this Princess were she still alive You have every where the wood of the true Cross all the world hath some and in certain places there are large pieces to be seen Besides this pretious Cross which had the honour to touch the bleeding Body of our Saviour they shew you at Rome the Manger where he was layd when he was born they have his Cradle his Swadling-bands his Shirt his Shoes the Altar of presentation on which he was layd when he was first brought to the Temple pieces of his Hankercheif some Fragment of his Sepulchre they have the Stone upon which he trod when he ascended into Heaven the print of his Foot is on it a certain proof that the story is true they have some of the Bread used at his last Supper and of that which he multiplyed for the five thousand they have some of the Wine which our Lord made at Cana in Galilee they have the Iron Head of the Lance of St. Longin who pierc'd his side his Seamless Coat is at Argenteuil at Triers and at St. Salvador in Spain They have his Hair the Parings of his Nails But they have but one of the Teeth which he cast in his Childhood it is at Laon. 'T was an unpardonable negligence of those honest Devoto's who went about to gather up the cuttings of his Hair why not rather take care to seek up 25. or 30. Teeth which he cast between the seventh and fourteenth year of his Age These might have been at this day the Treasures of so many Churches that should have had the honour of possessing them Shameful Idolatry as to Reliques In truth 't is impossible to speak of these things without passion a man must laugh or weep But alas there is far more cause to weep than to laugh at that which exposeth the Christian Religion to the just raillery of the Profane and Infidels and which is the object of the most horrible Superstition in the world I speak not now only to Papists I speak to Protestants The greatest part of them do not look on this with due abhorrence they do not sufficiently perceive that this is one of the great Abominations wherewith Popery hath defiled Christianity They think it enough to look on this Worship as a sottish Superstition But at the bottom 't is far worse 't is a shameful Idolatry They fall down they kiss they worship dead things Ashes Bones Linnen Toyes Excrements they carry these in Procession they expect rain and fair wheather from them they work Miracles by them This Church will never wash off these stains but by Fire these Nehustans must be broken in pieces and burnt in the Fire and she must be ashamed of her Idols Fabulous History of Images Images do naturally follow Reliques the Worship of the former is a great part of the Popish Devotion And this Worship is founded on fabulous Histories not less ridiculous than the preceding yea is much more so than the fabulous stories of the Pagan Images The Pagans have reported only of two or three of their Images that have spoken with an intelligible Voyce But among the Papists formerly nothing was more common than these speaking Images instances of this kind are very many One Crucisix spoke to S. Thomas Speaking Images and said to him Thomas thou hast written well concerning me what reward wilt thou have Another spoke to St. Brigit a third Crucifix made Responses at the Mass said by a Priest who had not a Clerk. An Image of our Lady spoke to St. Jacynthe a Polonian that he should save it from being burnt by some barbarous Souldiers who burnt every thing they found A certain Scotch Image used to speak and give answers as an Oracle At Affligen three Miles from Brussels there is a V. Mary which spoke Latin to St. Bernard At Bernarde vale But fareavel Bernard A Crucifix decided the Controversy that was in England between the Monks and Secular Priests the Priests desired to have Liberty again to marry a Crucifix that stood there cryed out Non Fiet non Fâ—et judicastis bene mutaretis male It shall not be c. Another Crucifix spoke to St. Francis and said to him Go and build up my House There was one day a long dispute between a Stone Statue of the Virgin and a little one of Jesus Christ which she held in her Armes The Virgin had a mind to shew mency to a Penitent who lay there before them The little Image of Christ was against it in conclusion the Virgin got the better because she was the Mother and her Statue was bigger than that of her Son. The Pagans to procure veneration to some
are far more sensible of a Tyranny that oppresseth 'em than of a Corruption that doth little or not at all concern and touch ' em This was the occasion why in the eleventh Century the Clergy of Liege being unjustly excommunicated by Pope Paschal the II. made him know that he was Antichrist and that his See was Babylon Tom. 10 of the Councils Paris Edition There was never a greater confusion in Babylon than is at this day in the Church c. Peter saith in his Epistle The Church that is at Babylon salutes you 'T was thought till now that he meant by Babylon Rome Pagan because then it was fill'd with Idolatry and filthiness But at this day sorrow forceth us to believe that Peter speaking of the Church at Babylon did by a spirit of Prophecy foresee the confusion and discord that at this day reigns in the Church This is to speak somewhat afar of But Aventin tells us that they most spoke more home The Preachers saith he did publickly curse the Pope and sayd that he was Antichrist and that under an outside of Piety he exercised his cruelty that under the pretence of Jesus Christ he advanc't the interest of Antichrist that he did sit in Babylon in the Temple of God and did lift up himself above all that is worship't and gloryed as tho he had been God that he could not err The Emperors of Germany cruelly vex'd by the ambition of the Popes plainly perceived that the real Antichristianism was there We have many Letters of the Emperor Frederick II. the conclusion of 'em is that Rome is Babylon and the Pope Antichrist But if we would know the sentiments of the Church of Germany concerning this it will be sufficient to hear the Admirable Discourse that Eberard Bishop of Saltsburgh made at Ratisbon before all the States of the Empire 'T is long and we will only take out what our Subject requir's An admirable Dicourse of a German Bishop that proves the Pope to be Antichrist Anno 1240. Aventin l. 7. 'T is about a hundred and twenty years since Hildebrand under pretext of Religion began to lay the Foundations of Antichrist's Monarchy He was the first Author of that War that is continued to this day by his Successors First they took from the Emperor the Right of Electing the Popes and gave it to the Priests and the People c. Paul who had a Treasure of Divine Philosophy saith Be subject one to another in the fear of the Lord our Soveraign and eternal Master our Heavenly Teacher instructs us in the difference between the Princes of the world and those of the Church which is this that the former rule over their Subjects and the later serve theirs He that was clothed with Soveraign Majesty took the form of a Servant ministred to his Disciples and wash'd their Feet But the Priests of Babylon will reign alone they can suffer no Equals and will give themselves no rest until they have put all things under their ' Feet and are exalted above all Authority Their Hunger after Riches and their Thirst after Honours is unsatiable c. He who calls himself a Servant of Servants will be Lord of Lords as if he were God c. He speaks as majestick as if he were God he frames new Projects in his heart he designs to found an Empire for himself where he is to be sole Master he changeth Lawes he publisheth his own he ravageth he pillageth he plundereth he cheats he kills Thus acteth this man of sin who is called Antichrist on whose Forehead is writ a name of blasphemy I AM GOD I CANNOT ERR He sits in the Temple of God and ruleth far and wide But as it is written in the Mysteries of the H. Scriptures he that readeth let him tenderstand the wise shall understand but the wicked shall do wickedly and shall not understand The Sybills spake plainly of this a long while ago and Hydaspes a very antient King he interpreted by a Child who prophecyed left to posterity the Name Roman a long time before the Trojan people were in the world And the Oracles of our Prophets have fore-told this under other names and in riddles that so every body might not understand it The Majesty of the People of Rome who once governed the Empire is vanisht out of the Earth and the Empire is return'd into Asia The East will recover the Empire and the West become a Slave The Kingdom hath been divided and the Soveraign Authority parted among many and at the same time weakned and lessned not to say that it hath been torn in pieces c. The name of Emperor is now nothing but an emty Title and a meer shadow There are ten Kings who have divided the Roman Empire among 'em not to govern but to destroy it These are the ten Horns which seem'd incredible to St. Augustin 1. The Turks 2. The Greeks 3. The Egyptians 4. The Africans 5. The Spaniards 6. The French. 7. The English. 8. The Germans 9. The Sicilians 10. The Italians possess the Roman Provinces and have expell'd the Romans out of ' em But among the ten a little Horn is grown up that hath Eyes and a mouth that speaks proudly and this little horn hath especially vanquisht three Kingdoms viz. that of Sicily that of Germany that of Italy and hath forced 'em to serve it Further it vexeth the people of Jesus Christ and his Saints by an intolerable tyranny it confounds divine with human affairs and commits horrid and execrable villanies Is there any thing more plain than this Prophecy I never read this passage without very great admiration There seems to be an enthusiasm in it And I cannot conceive how in such an Age as that any other Spirit than that of God could bestow so much knowledge Never any Calvinist or Lutheran spoke any thing more clear more excellent and exact to interpret Daniel or St. John. Let those who accuse at this day the applications of the Prophecies to the Pope as vain fancies and sports of wit learn that 't is now four hundred and fifty years ago there were those who had the same sentiments and proved 'em in a most convincing manner But some will object Why did not the Church of Germany break with the Pope at that time when it so clearly saw and so invincibly prov'd that he was Antichrist I answer Why the Germans in the 13th Age did not break with the Pope 't was because the Church of Germany was then divided Antichrist had there an infinite number of slaves who kept the rest in bondage Thence it was that even those who so clearly discern'd the Pope to be Antichrist remain'd nevertheless in the worst errors and in Idolatry They deserved not that God should give 'em the Grace to seperate from him whom they knew to be Antichrist Lastly the principal reason is because the Time appointed by the divine Providence was not come Only God was pleased
that such a bright Light should shine forth in so dark a night to shame those of after-ages who should Idolize this Antichristian Power 'T is a great reproach to the Princes of our days that they see not that which was so plainly seen by their predecessors in an age of ignorance and of superstition After this Passage I shall mention no other because I can produce none so good That light was not extinguisht but continued and increast till it broke forth with a more than ordinary lustre in the beginning of the last Century This famous passage of Eberard is as the Text to which every thing ought to be referred that hath since or then been said by others for instance the remarkable passage of Honorius of Autun who in the same age passing thro all the orders and degrees of people in the Church Princes Judges Ecclesiasticks Priests Men Women c. discovers the marks of Babylon every where even in his time In the same Age William de St. Amour a Parisian Doctor disputing against the Mendicant Friars the creatures of the Pope and the Court of Rome makes no scruple to say and prove that they are the Ministers of Antichrist and serve the Beast which hath seven heads and ten horns In the fourteenth Century Marsilius of Padua who vindicated the Emperor Lowis of Bavaria against the Court of Rome and the famous Petrarque whose reputation is to this day so considerable in the Roman Church have plainly proved by the very same predictions which we make use of in our time and Eberard the Bishop of Saltsbourg did in his that the Court of Rome is the Kingdom of Antichrist An Historian of that age tells us that a certain Carmelite had the courage to paint the Court of Rome and its Cardinals with all the colours of the Beast and of the Whore in the Apocalypse it was written to the Pope himself and affixt on the most publick places of Rome and Avignon You may see these Testimonies cited in our Legall Exceptions with those of S. Brigit of Nicholas of Clemangis Gregory of Heymbourg and many others So that we may say this light hath from age to age been diffused in all places men have allways either foreseen or seen it that Rome is the seat of Antichrist and that the Bishop of Rome who calls himself the Prince of Priests is the Man of Sin and the Apocalyptical Beast I here conclude what I intended to say to prove the Papacy to be Antichristianism and I repeat what I have said in other places that they who endeavour to darken this Truth are criminal against Christianity it self and they who see it not are prodigiously blind and stupid No wonder if Grotius and such as he be of that number these Gentlemen seem to design to overturn the Holy Scriptures and the Christian Religion Ought we to think it strange that those men who can find the Prophet Jeremy instead of Jesus Christ in the 53 Chapter of Isaiah cannot find the Pope in the book of the Revelations or in the Prophesies of Daniel I have said it elsewhere and I say it again that they who cannot discern the Pope in the Prophesies of the New Testament will never be able to find our Messiah in the predictions of the Old. Experience confirms this for the same men who exclude the Papacy from being intended in the Apocalypse do exclude Jesus Christ from almost all the Prophesies and Types of the Old Testament I would fain know how any man can make it out to a Jew that Jesus is the Messiah if he yeilds to him that all that which is spoken of the Passion of Christ in the 53. Isaiah may be applied to the Persecutions and sufferings which the Prophet Jeremy endur'd Where are there any Prophecies that may not as easily be turned to another sense as those If it be granted that he saith nothing for our opinion in this point shall any wonder that we are offended at so learned a man Who can with any justice complain of it since we have so much reason to complain of him who hath as much as he could by his Commentaries taken from us the strongest Arguments we had to confute both the Jews and Socinians He is the Patriarch and the Master of those Literal Interpreters of our days who undervalue all the Mysteries of the Bible and destroy the very Spirit and Spirituality of the Holy Scriptures Because they have taken some pains to discover some parts of Jewish or Pagan learning that their labors may not be lost all the Sacred Texts of the Old or New Testament must be understood with a relation to some Pagan rites or some Customs of the Synagogue and have nothing in 'em of spirit Mystery or depth Every one of these Gentlemen hath his own Idol one of 'em finds that the Gnosticks began to discover themselves in the time of the Apostles and for that reason we must meet with the Gnosticks in all the Apostolical Writings Another hath studied the Egyptian Antiquities and to prove that his time was well imploy'd we must find some of the Egyptian Rites in all the Mosaick Institutions Another believes he hath good Skill in the Traditions of the Jews and therefore the most spiritual part of the New Testament must be interpreted with respect to some of the Dreams and Fancies of the modern Jews We know very well that this sort of Learning Jewish and Pagan is not unuseful for the understanding of some part of Scripture but 't is in such places where some Heathenish Customs are treated of or in Historical matters But by going too far this way much mischief is done to Religion we shall soon abolish all the Types and destroy the Spirituality of the Law and make nothing to be contained in it but a bare Superficies We nevertheless respect and honour the learning and merit of the men we speak of but it were to be wish't that they had better imployed their parts and learning and we hope that they themselves will at length be sensible of it and perceive that their writings are not at all to edification However far be it from us to impute the particular Errors and Fancies of some few to any of the Protestant Churches to which they join themselves we know of no Christian Church in the West except the Church of Rome that doth not discern the Papacy to be the Antichristianism that is Prophetically described in the New Testament Therefore let it not be said that such or such a Church is not of this opinion for the sentiments of a few particular men here and there are not the Sentiments of the Church in which they live We must seek for those in their Confessions of Faith and the Annotations of the Bible authoriz'd by the Laws Now among all the Reformed Churches there is none we are so much obliged to for the discovery of the Mystery of Iniquity as to that 〈◊〉 England The most
none shall come after them And to those whom these answers are not satisfactory I have nothing farther to say upon this subject Nor is it difficult after what I have said to reply to two objections which contain nothing in them save what depends upon this principal difficulty The first Objection is that the Holy Spirit saith that by the seven plagues the wrath of God is fulfilled whereas say these Gentlemen the Wrath of God is not yet consummated upon Babylon forasmuch as it still subsisteth When I say that I am to give seven blows to this house in order to overthrow it is it thereby meant that the first of these strokes shall overturn the house Assuredly not But all thereby intended is that the seventh blow shall finish the subversion of that house They ought to remember that I have said the seventh Vial is not yet run out It runneth from the time of Luthers preaching until this day and will continue to run out till the entire destruction of the Antichristian Empire And so long as the Vial that is so long as the Period of Time is a running so long doth the plague continue nor will the destruction of that Empire be consummated until the last moment of the hourglass or Vial and until the last moment of the last plague If this had been thought upon these Gentlemen would have found no room for that objection which they advance from the words which the seventh Angel saith upon the pouring out of the seventh Vial namely that 't is finished whereas say they Babylon being still standing it is not true that 't is finished nor by consequence that the seventh Vial is fallen I say if they had remembred what I had answered for the preventing this objection they would not have a second time made it We are then to know that the word it is done has relation to the whole continuance of the Vial and of the plague The Vial hath run and the plague hath endured since the preaching of Luther and the Vials will continue to run and the Plague to endure until the entire destruction of the Antichristian Empire Had I said that the seven Vials are entirely poured forth finished and run out and that the seventh plague is wholly accomplished they would in that case have had reason to make this Objection But I expresly said that the seventh plague is divided into two other whereof the one is called the Harvest and the other the Vintage in the 14th Chap. The Harvest is the first part of the last plague and is the Reformation of the fore-going Age and the Vintage is the second part of the said last plague and will be the Reformation of the next Age. Now this second part of the last plague which is still to come will assuredly be the most considerable and will come up unto and answer the whole signification of the word it is done For altho the word hath a relation to the first Reformation of the Church by which almost a half of the Papal Empire was overthrown yet it most especially respects the second Reformation which is to finish the ruin of the Antichristian Empire In a word that which is signified by it is done is that the last Vial which is finally to destroy the Antichristian Empire is pouring forth and is running and that when it shall be wholly run out Babylon shall be wholly destroyed But I will propose one difficulty upon this which these Gentlemen have not made For it may be askt whence is it that I do suppose that the Reformation made the last Age and that which is to be made the next Age come to make but one general plague that hath two parts seeing these two Reformations are so considerable and so far distant the one from the other as to make two Vials and two distinct plagues This difficulty is much greater than any of those they have made to me for it is both specious and wholly breaks the order which I have assigned of the seven Vials and of the seven plagues But to this I have divers things to Reply which I Judg to be very solid Whereof the first is that the Holy Spirit hath comprehended both these Reformations under one and the same plague because the Space and Period is the same We have observed that the several plagues are things different from one another The corruption of the tenth Age which rendred the Antichristian See odious the Croisados the Excess of Papal Tyranny which vexed the Princes of Europe the great Schism in the West the Invasion of the Latine Provinces by the Turks and the Reformation are one and the same kind of punishment therefore the Holy Spirit did not think it convenient to make two plagues of them But one may object that according to my Exposition of the Visions God hath made two plagues of the two Reformations There are two reasons of that difference The first is because the Croisados are naturally branched into two parts by the loss of Jerusalem which was the scope and design of the Conquests 'T was about the year 1093. that men begun to be impetuously carried towards that Holy or Croisado War by means of one called Peter the Hermite and in the year 1187. eighty years after the first design of Conquering the Holy Land was Jerusalem retaken by Saladin And as this made a Period of considerable length so this was such an eminent event in the History of the Croisado's that it is no wonder if the Holy Spirit made the retaking of Jerusalem by Saladin one Epoch and that he there terminated These Wars continued a hundred years after the loss of Jerusalem but so feebly that the Holy Spirit represents this second Period of the Croisado's only as a River of Blood whereas he had represented the first as a Sea of Blood. Now we have no such signal Event in the midst of the duration of the seventh Plague as to make it divisible into two which is the reason that the Holy Spirit hath made it but one Plague Moreover there is no ground for dividing the two Reformations into two Plagues because they are but one Plague continued and carried on without interruption Whereas the Croisado's had two remarkable interruptions not only by Truces but by a peace made with the Sarazins especially after the taking of Jerusalem by Saladin I say there hath been no interruption in the work of Reformation in that the Reformation consists in the clearing up of the Truth For tho since the time of Luther and Zwinglius the Papacy instead of continuing to decay in its power hath in some degree recovered what it had lost yet nevertheless the Truth hath alway's acquired fresh strength and hath from day to day for above these 150. years been so illustrated and cleared up that it seems at this time to be arrived at the utmost evidence that it is capable of and which will not fail erâ— long to bring a total ruin upon