such an answer for then all the folly and madness in making the grossest Images of God doth not lye in the Images themselves but in the imagination of the Persons that make them Is it not as great in those that worship them with such an imagination if it be then whatever the Design of the makers was if they be apt to beget such imaginations in those who see and worship them they are in that respect as unlawful as T. G. supposes any Images of God among the Heathens to have been 4. What doth T. G. mean when he makes those Images unlawful which represent the Divinity in it self and not those which represent God as he appeared Can the meer essence of any thing be represented by an Image Is it possible to represent any being otherwise than as it appears But it may be T. G. hath found out the way of painting Essences if he hath he deserves to have the Patent for it not only for himself but for his Heirs and Executors For he allows it to be the peculiar priviledge of an infinite Being that it cannot be represented as it is in it self then all other things may be represented as they are in themselves in opposition to the manner of their appearance or else the distinction signifies nothing Petrus Thyraeus a man highly commended by Possevin for for his explication of this matter saith the meaning is that an Image doth not represent the Nature but the Person that is visible for saith he when we see the Image of a man we do not say we see a Reasonable Creature but a Man Very well and so in the Image of the Deity we do not see the Divine Nature but the Divine Person or in such a way as he became visible The Invisible Nature of God cannot be represented in an Image and can the invisible Nature of Man Therefore saith he it is no injury to God to be painted by an Image no more upon these principles than to a man Bellarmin proves the lawfulness of making Images of God because man is said to be the Image of God and he may be painted therefore the Image of God may be too for that which is the Image of the Image is likewise the Image of the Exemplar those which agree in a third agreeing among themselves To this some answer'd that man was not the Image of God as to his body but as to his soul which could not be painted but Bellarmin takes off this answer by saying that then a man could not not be painted for he is not a man in regard of his outward lineaments but in regard of his substance and especially his Soul but notwithstanding the soul cannot be painted yet a man may truly and properly be said to be painted because the Figure and colours of an Image do represent the whole man otherwise saith he a thing painted could never seem to be the true Thing as Zeuxis his grapes did which deceived the birds Therefore according to Bellarmines reasoning that which represents a Being according to outward appearance although it have an invisible Nature yet is a true and real representation and represents it as it is in it self and as far as it is possible for an Image to represent any thing Wherein then lyes the difference between making the Picture of a man and the Image of God If it be said that the Image of God is very short imperfect and obscure is not the same thing to be said of the Picture of a man which can only represent his outward Features without any description of his inward substance or soul If it be farther said that there is a real resemblance between a Picture of a man and his outward lineaments but there is none between God and the Image of a man then I ask what Bellarmins argument doth signifie towards the proving the lawfulness of making an Image of God For if God may be painted because man may who is the Image of God for the Image of the Image is the Image of the Exemplar then it follows that Man is the Image of God as he may be painted and so God and man must agree in that common thing which is a capacity of being represented which cannot be supposed without as real a resemblance between God and his Image as between a Man and his Picture But T. G. tells us that they abhorr the very thoughts of making any such likeness of God and all that the Council of Trent allows is only making representations of some apparition or action of God in a way proportionable to our Humane Conception I answer 1. It is no great sign of their abhorring the thoughts of any such likeness of God to see such arguments made use of to prove the lawfulness of making Images of God which do imply it 2. Those Images of God which are the most used and allowed in the Roman Church have been thought by Wise men of their own Church to imply such a Likeness Molanus and Thyraeus mention four sorts of Images of the Trinity that have been used in the Roman Church 1. That of an old man for God the Father and of Christ in humane nature and of the Holy Ghost in the Form of a Dove 2. That of three Persons of equal Age and Stature 3. That of an Image of the Bl. Virgin in the belly of which was represented the Holy Trinity this Ioh. Gerson saith he saw in the Carmelites Church and saith there were others like it and Molanus saith he had seen such a one himself among the Carthusians 4. That of one Head with three faces or one body and three Heads which Molanus saith is much more common than the other and is wont to be set before the Office of the Holy Trinity these two latter those Authors do not allow because the former of them tends to a dangerous errour viz. that the whole Trinity was incarnate of the B. Virgin and the latter Molanus saith was an invention of the Devil it seems then there was one invention of the Devil at least to be seen in the Masse-Book for saith he the Devil once appeared with three Heads to a Monk telling him he was the Trinity But the two former they allow and defend Waldensis saith Molanus with a great deal of learning defends that of the three Persons from the appearance of the Three to Abraham and Thyraeus justifieth the first and the most common from the Authority of the Church the Consent of Fathers and the H. Scriptures And yet Pope Iohn 22. as Aventinus relates it condemned some to the Fire as Anthropomorphites and enemies to Religion for making the very same representation of the Trinity which he defends being only of God as an old man and of the Son as a young man and of the Holy Ghost under the picture of a Dove Ysambertus takes notice of this story but he saith they were such Images as were according to
believe lies some must be first given up to tell them And if this doughty Historian hath any honour or Conscience left he ought to beg her Majesties pardon for offering such an affront to her But what had Queen Mary deserved at his hands that in his Key to his History he should compare her to the Empress Irene 4. By pretending to Antiquity This might justly be wondred at in so clear evidence to the contrary as I have made to appear in this matter but however among the ignorant and superstitious multitude the very pretending to it goes a great way Thus the Patriarch Germanus boasted of Fathers and Councils for Image-worship to the Emperour Leo but what Fathers or Councils did the aged Patriarch mean why did he not name and produce them to stop the Emperours proceedings against Images Baronius confesseth there were no Councils which had approved the worship of Images by any Canon but because they never condemned it being constantly practised it was sufficient All the mischief is this constant practice is as far from being proved as the definition of Councils If the picture Christ sent to Abgarus King of Edessa or those drawn by S. Luke or the forged Canon of the Council of Antioch or the counterfeit Authority of S. Athanasius about the Image at Berytus if such evidences as these will do the business they have abundance of Autiquity on their side but if we be not satisfied with these they will call us Hereticks or it may be Samaritan Sectaries and that is all we are to expect in this matter 5. The Council of Nice had a trick beyond this viz. burning or suppressing all the Writings that were against them The Popes Deputies in the fifth Action made the motion which was received and consented to by the Council and they made a Canon to that purpose That all Writings against Images should be brought into the Patriarch of Constantinople under pain of Anathema if a Laick or Deposition if in Orders and this without any limitation as to Authors or Time and there to be disposed of among heretical Books So that it is to be wondred so much evidence should yet be left in the Monuments of Antiquity against the worship of Images As to what concerns the matter of Argument for the worship of Images produced in this Age I must leave that to its proper place and proceed to the last Period as to this Controversie which is necessary for discerning the History and the State of it viz. 4. When the Doctrine and Practice of Image-worship was settled upon the principles allowed and defended in the Roman Church Wherein I shall do these 2 things 1. I shall shew what additions have been to this doctrine and practice since the Nicene Council 2. Wherein the present practice of Image-worship in the Roman Church doth consist and upon what principles it is defended 1. For the additions that have been made in this matter since the Nicene Council And those lie especially in two things 1. In making Images of God the Father and the Holy Trinity 2. In the manner of worship given to Images 1. In making Images of God the Father and the Trinity It is easie to observe how much the most earnest pleaders for Images did then abhor the making of any Image of God So Gregory 2. in his Epistle to Leo saith expresly They made no Images of God because it is impossible to paint or describe him but if we had seen or known him as we have done his Son we might have painted and represented him too as well as his Son We make no Image or Likeness of the invisible Deity saith the Patriarch Germanus whom the highest Orders of Angels are not able to comprehend If we cannot paint the Soul saith Damascen how much less can we represent God by an Image who gave that Being to the soul which cannot be painted What Image can be made of him who is invisible incorporeal without quantity magnitude or form We should err indeed saith he if we should make an Image of God who cannot be seen and the same he repeats in other places Who is there in his senses saith Stephanus Junior that would go about to paint the Divine Nature which is immaterial and incomprehensible For if we cannot represent him in our minds how much less can we paint him in colours Now these four Gregory Germanus Damascen and Stephanus were the most renowed Champions for the Defence of Images and did certainly speak the sense of the Church at that time To the same purpose speak Ioh. Thessalonicensis Leontius and others in the Nicene Council The Greek Author of the Book of the use of Images according to the sense of the second Council of Nice published by Morellius and Fronto Ducaeus goes farther for he saith That no Images are to be made of God and if any man go about it he is to suffer death as a Pagan By which it appears that according to the sense of this Council the making any Images of God was looked on as a part of Heathen Idolatry But when a breach is once made the waters do not stop just at the mark which the first makers of the breach designed Other men thought they had as much reason to go a little farther as they had to go thus far Thence by degrees the Images of God the Father and the Holy Trinity came into the Roman Church and the making of these Images defended upon reasons which seemed to them as plausible as those for the Images of Christ upon his appearing in our Nature for so God the Father might be represented not in his nature but as he is said to have appeared in the Scriptures Baronius in his Marginal Notes on the Epistle of Gregory saith Afterwards it came into use to make Images of God the Father and of the Trinity not that they fall under our view but as they appeared in holy Writ for what can be described may be painted to the same purpose he speaks in another place It seems then by the confession of Baronius no Images of God the Father were in use then because they did not think them lawful when they first came into use Christianus Lupus professes that he knows not but he saith there were none such in the Roman Church in the time of Nicolaus 1. But Bellarmin Suarez and others produce an argument for the lawfulness of them from the general practice of their Church which they say would not have suffered such an universal custom if such Images had been unlawful Bernardus Pujol Professour of Divinity in Perpignan saith not only that the Images of the Trinity are universally received among Catholicks but that they are allowed by the Council of Trent and doth suppose the use of them as a thing certain and undoubted and saith that such Images are to be worshipped For saith he as the mind is
who acknowledge one Supreme God As to the Heathens who are confessed to be Idolaters I have such plenty and choice of evidence in this matter that it is not easie to know which to leave out for if either the Testimony of the Heathens themselves may be taken or the Testimony of the Writers of the Roman Church concerning them or the Testimonie of the Scriptures or of those Fathers who disputed against their Idolatry or of the Roman Church it self I do not doubt to make it evident that those Heathens who are charged with Idolatry did acknowledge one Supreme God In so great store I have reason to consider the temper of the person I have to deal with For if I produce the Testimony of the Heathen Writers themselves it may be he may suspect that the Devil dwelt in their Books as well as in their Images and being a very cunning Sophister that he might perswade their Philosophers to write for one God that he might have the worship belonging to him as O. C 's Instruments were for a single Person that the Government might be put into his hands But I have a better reason than this viz. that this Work is already undertaken by a very learned Person of our Church The Testimony of Scripture is plain enough in this matter to any unbyassed mind as appears by S. Pauls saying to the men of Athens when he saw the Altar to the unknown God Whom ye ignorantly worship him I declare unto you Did S. Paul mean the Devil by this Did he in good earnest go abroad to preach the Devil to the world yet he preached him whom they ignorantly worshipped i. e. the Devil saith T. G. Although S. Paul immediately saith it was the God that made the World and all things in it and afterwards quotes one of their Poets for saying 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 For we are his offspring and it is observable that the words immediately going before in Aratus are 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and he useth 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 twice more in the verses before 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which is the very word that T.G. saith doth signifie an Arch-Devil Doth S. Paul then say we are all the Devils off-spring and not an ordinary one neither but the very Arch-Devils Was this his way of perswading the Athenians to leave the worship of Devils to tell them that they were all the Devils off-spring No it was far enough from him for he infers from that saying of Aratus that they were the offspring of God 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 So that if Saint Paul may be credited rather than T. G. their Iupiter was so far from being the Arch-Devil that he was the true God blessed for evermore And it is observable that S. Paul quotes one of their Poets for this saying notwithstanding T. G 's sharp censure of them out of Horace with which the force of S. Pauls testimony is overthrown But he was not alone in making this to be the Poets sense for Aristobulus the Iewish Philosopher produces it to the same purpose and adds that although he used the name of Jove yet his design was to express the true God Minucius Felix saith wisely in this case They who make Jove the chief God are only deceived in the name but agree in the Power so far was he from thinking their Iupiter Father of Gods and men which he applauds the Poets for saying to have been the Arch-Devil But T. G. quotes Origen for saying that the Christians would undergo any Torments rather than confess Jupiter to be God for they did not believe Jupiter and Sabaoth to be the same neither indeed to be any God at all but a Devil who is delighted with the name of Jupiter an enemy to men and God I grant Origen doth say so but suppose St. Paul and Origen contradict one another I desire to know whom we are to follow Yet if T. G. had considered Origen as he ought to have done he would have seen how little had been gained by this saying of his For when Celsus had said it was no great matter whether they called the Supreme God Jupiter or Adonai or Sabaoth or Ammon as the Aegyptians did or Pappai as the Scythians Origen answers 1. That he had spoken already upon this subject which he desires may be remembered now in that place he saith that by reason of the abundance of filthy and obscene fables which went of their Jupiter the Christians would by no means endure to have the true God called by his name having learnt from Plato to be scrupulous about the very names of their Gods 2. Origen hath a particular conceit about the power of the Hebrew names and hath a very odd discourse unbecoming a Philosopher and a Christian about the power of words in enchantments and that the same words had great force in their Originals which they lost being translated into other Languages and if it be thus saith he in other names how much more ought we to think it so in the names of God And therefore he would by no means have those powerful names of Adonai and Sabaoth to be changed for any other By which for all that I can see Origen would as much have scrupled calling the Divine Being God as Iove If Vossius his conjecture be true that God is the same with the old German Gode or Godan and according to the common permutation of those letters Wodan who was the chief God among the Germans 3. He saith that it was no fault at all for any persons to call the Supreme God by the names used in their own language as the Aegyptians might call him Ammon and the Scythians Pappai and then why not the Greeks 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and I do not see he finds much fault with them for it but he would not have those names brought into the Christian Religion which had been defiled by such impure stories and representations among the Heathens which is the best thing that he saith to this purpose But we see that Origen himself doth not deny that either the Greeks or Aegyptians or Scythians did own a Supreme God or that they had proper names to express him by but he would not have the Christians bring those names into their Religion And that Origen grants that the Heathens did acknowledge the Supreme God will be proved afterwards But whatever his opinion was we are sure S. Paul by the God that was known among the Heathens did not mean the Devil For was the believing the Devil to be the Supreme God that holding the truth in unrighteousness which S. Paul charges the Heathens with Was this indeed that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 That which is known of God which he saith not only was manifest in them but that God himself had revealed it to them Was this that eternal Power and
them therefore he saith they deny Christ and joyn with the Gentiles giving the same worship to several Gods I do not think any proposition in Euclid can be made more clear than it is from these expressions of Athanasius that he believed Idolatry to be consistent with the belief and worship of one God The same thing he urges in other places but if this be not proof enough I know not what will be S. Gregory Nazianzen parallels those who worshipped the Son or Holy Ghost supposing them to be creatures with those who worshipped Astaroth or Chemosh or Remphan because they were creatures too For whatever difference of honour or glory there be all creatures are our fellow servants and therefore not to be worshipped by us Might not the Arians have chared Gregory Nazianzen to have imitated Iulian the Apostate upon as good reason as T. G. doth me For however in words they professed to abhor the worship of Ashtoreth or Chemosh or Remphan as much as he did yet he did not regard their professions but thought it reasonable to judge by the nature of their actions And what profaneness would T. G. have accounted this to parallel the worship of the Son and Holy Ghost with that of Chemosh and Ashtoreth Yet we see Gregory doth not forbear making use of the similitude of the worship although there were so great a disparity in the objects Gregory Nyssen saith that the Devil by the means of Arianism brought Idolatry again insensibly into the world perswading men to return to the worship of the creature by his sophistry and that Arius Eunomius Eudoxius and Aetius were his instruments in restoring Idolatry under a pretence of Christianity In another place he hath this considerable passage God commands by the Prophet that we should have no new God nor worship any strange God but that is a new God which was not for ever and that is a strange God which is different from our God Who is our God the true God who is a strange God he that hath a different nature from the true God He that makes the Son a creature makes him of a different nature And they who make him a creature do they worship him or no if not they joyn with the Iews if they do worship him 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 they commit Idolatry Therefore we must believe him to be the true Son of the true Father that we may worship him and doing so that we be not condemned as worshipping a strange God To the same purpose he argues against Eunomius that it is the property of Idolaters to worship the creature or any new or strange God and that they who divide the Father and the Son must either wholly take away the worship of the Son or they must worship an Idol the very word used by S. Gregory making a creature and not God the object of their worship 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 placing the name of Christ upon an Idol that this was the fault of the Heathen Idolaters that they did 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 worship those which were not Gods by nature and therefore could not worship the true God where it is observable that he uses the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 both for the worship given to Idols by the Heathens and for that which is proper to God from which it is evident that these Fathers knew of no such distinction of the nature of divine worship as is understood in the Roman Church under the terms of Latria and Dulia for if they had having to deal with subtile adversaries they would not have failed to have explained themselves in the matter which had been absolutely necessary to the force of their own arguments if any such distinction had been known or allowed in the Christian Church Again he saith that he that puts the name of Son to a creature 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 must be reckoned among Idolaters for they saith he called Dagon and Bel and the Dragon God but for all that they did not worship God and therefore he still urgeth against Eunomius that either with the Iews he must deny the worship of Christ or he must joyn with the Gentiles in the worship of the creature S. Basil charges the Arians and Eunomians with bringing in the Polytheism and Idolatry of the Greeks for they who say that the Son of God is a creature and yet worship him as God do worship a creature and not the Creator and so introduce Gentilism again And against Eunomius he urges the same places and reasons which I have already mentioned out of Nyssen viz. that if Christ be not the eternal God he must be a new and strange God and to worship that which by nature is not God is the fault S. Paul charges the Heathen Idolaters with Epiphanius proves that Christs being a creature and having divine worship given him are inconsistent according to the Scriptures and that those who worship a creature fall under S. Pauls reprehension of the Heathen Idolaters who did call the creatures God but true faith teaches us to worship the Creator and not the creature He thinks this Rule sufficient against all the arts and sophistry of men 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that no creature ought to be worshipped For saith he upon the same reason we worship one we may worship all together with their creator 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 where we see he doth not speak of such worship as doth exclude the Creator but of that which is supposed to be joyned together with his nor of a Soveraign Worship to be given to them but of such as doth suppose the distance between the Creator and his Creatures Upon this principle he saith the Arians made the Son of God like to the Idols of the Heathens for if he be not the true God he is not to be worshipped nay he adds that those who said Christ was to be worshipped although a creature did build up Babylon again and set up the image of Nebuchadnezzar and by their words as by Musical instruments draw men to the worship of an Image rather than of the true God Is it credible saith he that God should make a creature to be worshipped when he hath forbidden men to make any likeness of things in Heaven or Earth and to fall down and worship it when the Apostle makes this the Idolatry of the Heathen that they worshipped the creature as well as the Creator wherein they became Fools for it is a foolish thing to attribute divinity to a creature and to break the first Commandment of the Law Thou shalt worship the Lord thy God and him only shalt thou serve Therefore saith he the holy Church of God doth not worship any creature but the Father in the Son and the Son in the Father together with the Holy Ghost To the very same purpose he speaks in his Ancoratus If the Son of God be a creature
likewise for the adoration that is due to the Son and Holy Ghost S. Chrysostom saith that the Arians and Macedonians making one Great God and another less and created God did bring in Gentilism again For it is that which teacheth men to worship a Creature and to make one great God and others inferiour Such as these S. Paul condemns for giving worship to a creature and they are accursed according to the Law of Moses which saith Cursed is every one who worships a creature or any thing that is made S. Ambrose goes farther and saith S. Paul foresaw that Christians would be brought to the worship of Creatures and therefore not only condemns the Gentiles but warns the Christians by saying that God would damn those who worship the creature rather than the Creator Either therefore let the Arians cease to worship him whom they call a creature or cease to call him a creature whom they worship lest under the name of worshippers they be found to commit the greater sacriledge S. Augustin saith that the Arians by giving worship to Christ as God whom they believed to be a creature did make more Gods than one and break the Law of God which did forbid the worship of more than one God and set up Idols to themselves although they acknowledged one Great God and made the Son and Holy Ghost lesser and inferiour Gods From this unanimous consent of the Fathers in charging the Arrians with Idolatry it most evidently follows that according to them Idolatry is consistent with the belief and worship of one Supreme God which is not the only considerable advantage we gain by those Testimonies but from them it likewise appears 1. That it is Idolatry to give divine worship to any creature how great soever the excellencies of that creature be for none can be imagined greater than those which the Arians attributed to the Son of God 2. That the Fathers looked on the worship of Dulia as divine worship as appears by their applying that term to the worship which was given to Christ. 3. That the name of an Idol doth belong to the most real and excellènt being when divine worship is given to it for they give this name to Christ himself when he is worshipped as a Creature 4. That relative Latria is Idolatry when given to any Creature For this was all the Arians subterfuge that it could not be Idolatry to worship Christ as a Creature because they worshipped him only as the Image of God and relatively terminating their worship on God the Father through him notwithstanding which answer of theirs the Fathers with one consent declare such worship to be Idolatry and that it would make way for the worship of any creature and was the introducing of Heathen Idolatry under a pretence of Christianity These things which are here only observed in passage will be of great use in the following Discourses CHAP. II. Of the Nature of Divine Worship I Now come to the second Enquiry Wherein the Nature of that Divine Worship lies which being given to a creature makes that Worship Idolatry And that I may proceed with all possible clearness in this matter I shall enquire 1. What Worship is 2. What Divine Worship is and what are the proper acts of it 3. How the applying of these Acts to a Creature doth make the worship of it Idolatry What worship is Aquinas hath given this distinction between honour and worship that honour is quaedam recognitio excellentiae alicujus an acknowledgement of anothers excellency but cultus or worship in quodam obsequio consistit implies subjection to another The foundation of this distinction doth not lie so much in the force and signification of the words as in the different effects that excellency alone considered hath upon our minds from what it hath when it is joyned with Superiority and a Power over us Meer excellency doth produce only in our minds a due esteem according to the nature and degrees of it which is a debitum morale as the Schoolmen speak from us towards it i. e. something which according to nature and reason we ought to give it and therefore it is accounted a part of natural justice to esteem whatever excellencies we apprehend to be in others although we receive no benefit by them our selves and whatever implies a real excellencie whether it be intellectual or moral whether infinite or finite whether natural or acquired it deserves an estimation suitable to its kind and degree But the honour which is due to excellencie doth not only lie in an act of the mind but in a correspondent inclination of the will to testifie that esteem by such outward expressions as may manifest it to others and that either by words which is called Praise or by gestures as bowings of the body or by facts as gifts statues c. All these Aquinas tells us do belong to honour But Worship implies something beyond this which is subjection to anotheron the account of his Power over us for we may express honour and esteem towards equals or inferiours because the reason of it may be in those as well as others therefore there must be a different duty in us with respect to Superiority and this is worship So the Schoolmen define adoration adorare non dicimur nisi in dignitate constitutos quos nobis Superiores cognoscimus saith Vasquez Honor potest esse ad aequalem saith Suarez juxta illud ad Rom. 12. honore invicem praevenientes adoratio vero respicit alium ut excellentem superiorem Ex parte adorantis plane necessarium est saith Tannerus ut is rem adorandam concipiat tanquam aliquo modo se superiorem seu praestantiorem But more fully Bernardus Pujol Adoratio est submissio quaedam quasi humiliatio quam subditus facit propter excellentiam superioris in honorem illius and Gamachaeus Adoratio essentialiter includit subjectionem ac submissionem aliquam Adoratio est inferioris ad superiorem saith Ysambertus Cardinal Lugo goes farther saying of Cultus se apud probatos auctores videre semper eam vocem applicari ad significandam reverentiam erga superiores And although Arriaga thinks Cultus of a larger signification yet the definition he gives of adoration is that it is honor exhibitus superiori in signum submissionis humiliationis Bellarmine makes the first act of adoration to be in the mind and that only the apprehension of the excellencie of the object but the second in the will to be not only an inclination of it towards the object but a willing by some internal or external act to acknowledge the excellencie of the object and our subjection and to these he adds the external act either of bowing the head or bending the knee or some other token of subjection So that Bellarmine agrees with the rest in making the formal act of adoration to be
appears more probable both of him and Lot by Heb. 13.2 then it was only an expression of civil respect to them 4. Out of a sudden transport as St. Iohn did to the Angel twice which he would not have done a second time if he had considered his being checked for the first Rev. 19.10.22.8 9. Now if these things may by their circumstances and occasions be apparently differenced from each other and from that Religious adoration which God doth require to be given to himself then there can be no reason from thence to make the signification of external adoration to be equivocal There is the same nature in these acts that there is in words of different significations which being taken in general are of an equivocal sense but being considered with all their particular circumstances they have their sense so restrained and limited that it is easie to discern the one from the other That we call therefore Religious adoration which is performed with all the circumstances of Religious worship as to time place occasion and such like as if men used prostration to any thing within the Courts of the Temple wherein some of the Iews thought that posture only lawful if it were done in the time of Sacrifice or devotion if the occasion were such as required no respect of any other kind as when the Devil demanded of Christ to fall down and worship him in these and such like circumstances we say adoration hath the determin'd signification of Religious worship and is an appropriate sign of it by Gods own institution Thence the Psalmist saith O come let us worship and bow down let us kneel before the Lord our Maker and God forbids bowing down to and worshipping any graven Image or similitude where the bowing down is one act of worship and was so esteemed by the common consent of mankind as might be easily made appear by the several customs of external adoration that have been used in all parts of the world and it might for the universality of the practice of it vye with Sacrifice So that on this account as well as the proper signification of it adoration ought to be esteemed as significant and peculiar a sign of absolute worship as Sacrifice There are only two things that seem yet to make this adoration not appripriate to God for the instances of Balaam and Saul are not worth mentioning and those are Ioshua's Religious adoration of the Angel that appeared to him and the adoration that the Iews performed towards the Ark the latter is easily answered the Ark being only a Symbol of the divine presence of Gods own appointing towards which they were to direct their adoration but of this at large when I come to the worship of Images the other cannot be denied to be Religious worship but we are to consider what Aquinas saith to this place that it may be understood of the absolute worship of God who did appear and speak in the person of an Angel And St. Athanasius expresly saith that God did speak in an Angel to Moses at the burning Bush when Moses was bid to put off his Shooes as Ioshua was now and by the description on of him as Captain of the Host of the Lord it is apparent Ioshua looked not on him as an ordinary Angel but as the Angel of whom God said that he should go before them and whom they were bound to obey and by comparing the places in Exodus together where God afterwards threatens to send an Angel and Moses would not be satisfied till God said His Presence should go with them it is evident this Angel of His Presence was more than a meer Angel and therefore the Fathers generally suppose it was the Eternal Son of God who appeared in the Person of an Angel as Petavius hath at lage proved and is sufficiently manifest from hence that they make use of Adoration as a certain argument to prove that Christ was not a creature which argument were of no force at all if they did not believe that adoration was an appropriate sign of that absolute worship which belongs only to God and therefore they observe that when meer Angels appeared they refused adoration as the Angels that appeared to Manoe and St. Iohn but when adoration is allowed or commanded it was the divine nature appearing in the person of an Angel 3. The erection of Temples and Altars is another appropriate sign of divine worship which I need not go about to prove from Scripture since it is confessed by our Adversaries Ad Latriam pertinent templa altaria sacerdotia sacrificia festivitates ceremoniae hujusmodi quae soli Deo sunt exhibenda saith Durandus Mimatensis from Innocentius 3. and the applying these things to any but God he makes to be Idolatry Bellarmin joyns Temples and Altars together with Sacrifice as peculiar to God Templum saith Cardinal Bona est domus Numini Sacra a house Sacred to God and yet Bellarmin had the confidence to lay down this proposition Sacrae domus non solum Deo sed etiam sanctis recte aedificantur dedicantur and he is not satisfied with the answer of some Moderns that say That Temples cannot properly be erected to any but God any more than Sacrifice can be offered to any but him but because there are many Temples dedicated to God that they may be distinguished from each other they have their denomination from particular Saints which is an answer we find no fault with if they do not proceed to the worship and invocation of those Saints to whose memory the Churches are dedicated as the particular Patrons of it but Bellarmin hath found out a subtlety beyond this for he saw well enough this would not reach home to their case and therefore he saith That sacred places are truely and properly built to Saints but how not as they are Temples but as they are Basilicae For saith he Temples have a particular relation to sacrifice but Basilicae have not and he confesses it would be Idolatry to erect them as Temples to Saints but not as they are Basilicae This is a distinction without any difference for Isidore who certainly well understood the signification of these words as used among Christians saith Nunc autem ideo divina Templa Basilicae nominantur quia ibi Regi omnium Deo cultus sacrificia offeruntur and that which we insist upon is not the names that Churches are called by nor the preservation of the memories of Saints in them but the erecting them to Saints as places for the worship and invocation of them And the vanity of this distinction of Temples from Basilicae because Temples relate only to sacrifice will easily appear if we consider that the proper signification of Templum was Domicilium as Turnebus observes which is that which Varro calls Templum naturâ and in this sense he saith Naevius called the Heaven Templum magnum Iovis
altitonantis and from thence it was applyed to any place consecrated by the Augurs and so by degrees was taken for any sacred place that was set apart for divine worship for that was it which made them sacred sacra sunt loca saith Isidore divinis cultibus instituta Either therefore they must say there is no proper worship of God but Sacrifice or the notion of a Temple cannot be said only to refer to Sacrifice And among the Iews our B. Saviour hath told us that the Temple had relation to prayer as well as Sacrifice My House shall be called a House of Prayer Would it not have been a pleasant distinction among the Iews if any of them had dedicated a Temple to Abraham with a design to invocate him there and make him the Patron of it for them to have said they built it as a Temple to God but as a Basilica to Abraham for they sacrificed there only to God or to God for the honour of Abraham but they invocated Abraham as the particular Patron of it This is that therefore we charge them with upon their own principles that when they dedicate Churches to particular Saints as the Patrons of them and in order to the solemn invocation of them there they do apply that which themselves confess to be an appropriate sign of divine worship to Creatures and consequently by their own confession are guilty of Idolatry Neither can it be pleaded by them that their Churches and Altars are only dedicated to the honour of God for the memory of a particular Saint for they confess that it is for the solemn invocation of that Saint And with all in the Form of dedication in the Pontifical there is more implied as appears by these two prayers at the Consecration of the Altar The first when the Bishop stands before the Altar in these words Deus Omnipotens in cujus honorem ac Beatissimae Virginis Mariae omnium Sanctorum ac nomen memoriam Sancti tui N. nos indigni altare hoc consecramus c. The other after the Bishop hath with his right thumb dipped in the Chrism made the sign of a Cross upon the Front of the Altar Majestatem tuam Domine humiliter imploramus ut altare hoc sacrae unctionis libamine ad suscipienda populi tui munera inunctam potenter bene dicere sanctificare digneris ut quod nunc à nobis sub tui nominis invocatione in honorem Beatissimae Virginis Mariae omnium Sanctorum atque in memoriam sancti tui N. c. Where we see besides the memory of the particular Saint to whom the Altar is dedicated the honour of the B. Virgin and the Saints are joyned together with the Honour of God in the general dedication of it By the Pontifical no Altar is to be consecrated without Reliques which the night before the Bishop is to put into a clean vessel for that purpose with three grains of Frankincense and then to seal it up which being conveniently placed before the Church door the Vigils are to be celebrated that night before them and the Nocturn and the Mattins for the honour of the Saints whose the Reliques are and when the Reliques are brought into the Church this is one of the Antiphona's Surgite Sancti Dei de mansionibus vestris loca sanctificate plebem benedicite nos homines peccatores in pace custodite The form of consecration of the Altar it self is this Sanctificetur hoc Altare in honorem Dei omnipotentis gloriosae Virginis Mariae atque omnium sanctorum ad nomen ac memoriam Sancti N. In China Trigautius saith in the Chappel they had there they had two Altars one to our Saviour the other dedicated to the B. Virgin without any distinction at all In the speech the Bishop makes to the people he utterly overthrows Bellarmins distinction of Templum and Basilica for he saith nullibi enim quam in sacris Basilicis Domino offerri sacrificium debet It seems then Basilica is taken with a respect to sacrifice as well as Templum and then he declares that he hath dedicated this Basilica in honorem omnipotentis Dei Beatae Mariae semper virginis omnium Sanctorum ac memoriam Sancti N. So that Basilica is here taken with a respect to God and not meerly to the Saints although they joyn them together with God in the honour of dedication Let us now compare the practice of the Roman Church in this matter with the argument which the Fathers made use of to prove the Divinity of the Holy Ghost because we are said to be his Temple If we are said saith S. Basil to be his Temple because he is worshipped by us and dwells in us then it follows that he is God for we are commanded to worship and serve God alone Where it is plain S. Basil takes a Temple with a respect to worship and not meerly to sacrifice A Temple belongs only to God and not to a creature saith S. Ambrose therefore the Holy Ghost is God because we are his Temple This is peculiar to the Divine nature saith S. Cyril to have a Temple to dwell in If we were to build a Temple saith S. Augustin to the Holy Ghost in so doing we should give him the worship proper to God and he must be God to whom we give divine worship for we must worship the Lord our God and him only must we serve the same argument he urges in several other places a Temple saith he was never erected but either to the true God as Solomon did or to false Gods as the Heathens and this argument from our being said to be the Temple of the Holy Ghost he thinks is stronger than if adoration had been said to be given to it for this is so proper an act of divine worship to erect a Temple that if we should do it to the most excellent Angel we should be anathematized from the Church of God Hoc nunc sit quibuslibet Divis saith Erasmus there in the Margin This is every where now done to Saints at which Petavius is very angry and saith they do it not to the Saints per se praecipué But what becomes then of the argument of the Fathers which supposes the erecting a Temple to be such a peculiar act of adoration that it cannot be applied to any creature no not secondarily For then the opposers of the Divinity of the Holy Ghost might have easily answered S. Augustins argument after the same fashion viz. that we were said to be the Temple of the Holy Ghost not per se praecipuè but only secondarily as it was the divine instrument of purifying the Souls of men From hence we see how unanimously the Fathers looked on the dedication of Temples and Altars as an appropriate sign of that absolute worship we owe to God and that not meerly as an Appendix to sacrifice but as it contains in it
Aquinas quote these passages with approbation Did they know the intention of Seneca or the Philosophers Why doth Cajetan say that a man that commits only the external act of Idolatry is as guilty as he that commits the external act of theft To both which he sayes no more is necessary than a voluntary inclination to do that act not any apprehension in the mind that what he worships is God nor any intention to direct that act only to the Image Nay why doth Gregory de Valentia himself say that outward acts of worship may be so proper to God either from their own nature or the consent of mankind that whosoever doth them whatever his inward intention be ought to be understood to give the honour proper to God to that for whose sake he doth them And this he calls an implicit Tannerus an indirect intention but neither of them suppose it to be either an actual or virtual intention of the mind but only that which may be gathered from the outward acts Nay T. G. himself saith that on supposition the Philosophers did believe one God and yet joyned with the people in the practice of their Idolatry they were worthily condemned by the Apostle though but for the external profession of praying and offering sacrifice to their Images Say you so and yet do outward acts certainly go whither they are intended Suppose then these Philosophers intended to worship the true God by those Images where this Idolatry or no if not why were they so much to blame for giving worship to the true God by an Image which T. G. commends as a very good thing Was it the figure of their Images displeased him that could not be for the Statue of Iupiter Capitolinus might as fitly represent God to them as that of an old man in their Churches and young Iupiter in the lap of Fortune an Image Cicero mentions might put him in mind of one of the most common Images in their Church and by the help of a good intention might be carryed to a right object And why might not intention do that which their Church afterwards did when it changed the Temple of Hercules to S. Alexius because he was called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and that of the two Brothers Romulus and Remus or as Bellarmin saith Castor and Pollux to Cosmas and Damianus and the Pantheon to Omnium Sanctorum If there be no harm in the thing there could be none in the intention Or was it the scandal of their practice but to whom was the scandal given it would have been rather scandal among them not to have done it So that if a secret Intention doth carry that act whither it is intended and it be lawful to worship God by Images I do not see wherein the Philosophers were to blame in complying with those outward acts whose good or evil according to T. G. depends upon the intention of the doers of them But if they were really to blame it was for doing those external acts of worship to creatures which belong only to the worship of God and so the Apostle by condemning them doth prove that which I intended viz. that there are such peculiar external acts of divine worship that the doing of them for the worship of a Creature is Idolatry But my Adversary thinks to clear the Church of Rome from the charge of Idolatry by two general answers which serve him and his Brethren on all occasions viz. 1. That there are two sorts of worship one called Latria or Soveraign worship which is proper to God and another called Dulia or inferiour worship that may be given to creatures on the account of excellencies communicated to them from God 2. That the worship they give to any inanimate creatures that have no proper excellencies of their own is not absolute but a relative Latria they intending thereby only to worship God In the examining of these two I shall clear the last part of this Discourse viz. 3. How the applying the acts of Religious worship to a creature doth make that worship Idolatry 1. I shall consider the different sorts of worship which T. G. insists upon to clear the Church of Rome from the practice of Idolatry The Question at present saith T. G. between Dr. St. and the Church of Rome is not whether Divine worship be to be given to Saints for this is abhorred of all faithful Christians but whether an inferiour worship of like kind with that which is given to Holy men upon earth for their Holiness and near relation to God may not be lawfully given to them now they are in Heaven Again he saith if by Religious worship I mean that honour which is due to God alone it is true what the Fathers say that it is not to be given to the most excellent created Beings but nothing at all to the point in debate between us if I mean that honour of which a creature is capable for Religions sake and that relation which it setleth he will he saith shew it to be false that the Fathers deny any such honour to be given to the Holy Angels or Saints and if I prove that this worship ought not to be called Religious he tells me from S. Austin that it is but a meer wrangling about words because Religion may be used in other senses besides that of the worship due to God And by the help of this distinction between the Religious worship due to God and that of which a creature is capable for Religions sake he saith he can clearly dispell the mist I have raised from the Testimony of the Fathers and let the Reader see that I have perverted their meaning and yet said nothing to the purpose Thus he answers the testimonies of Iustin Martyr Theophilus Origen S. Ambrose or the Writer under his name Theodoret S. Austin and if they had been a hundred more it had been all one they had been all sent packing with the same answer let them say what they would they must be all understood of Divine worship proper to God and not of the inferiour worship which creatures are capable of which from S. Austin he calls Dulia as the former Latria The whole strength of T. G's defence as to the Worship of Saints and Angels lyes in this single distinction which I shall therefore the more carefully consider because it tends to clear the nature of Divine worship which is my present subject To proceed with all possible clearness in this debate which T. G. hath endeavoured to perplex I shall 1. Give a true account of the State of the Controversie 2. Enquire into the sense of the Fathers about this distinction about Soveraign and inferiour worship whether those acts of worship which are practised in the Roman Church he only such as the Fathers allowed 1. For the true state of the controversie which was never more necessary to be given than in this place For any one
worship contrary to the Law of God we have the same reason to believe that evil Spirits are the Causes of them as the Primitive Christians had that evil Spirits were worshipped by the Heathens under the notion of Good 5. The Arrians believed Christ to be a Creature and yet were charged with Idolatry by the Fathers If it be said that they did give a higher degree of worship to Christ than any do to Saints I answer that they did only give a degree of worship proportionable to the degrees of excellency supposed to be in him far above any other Creatures whatsoever But still that worship was inferiour to that which they gave to God the Father according to the opinion of those Persons I dispute against For if it be impossible for a man that believes the incomparable distance between God and the most excellent of his Creatures to attribute the honour due to God alone to any Creature then say I it is impossible for those who believed one God the Father to give to the Son whom they supposed to be a Creature the honour which was peculiar to God It must be therefore on their own supposition an inferiour and subordinate honour and at the highest such as the Platonists gave to their Coelestial Deities And although the Arrians did invocate Christ and put their trust in him yet they still supposed him to be a Creature and therefore believed that all the Power and Authority he had was given to him so that the worship they gave to Christ must be inferiour to that honour they gave to the Supreme God whom they believed to be Supreme Absolute and Independent But notwithstanding all this the Fathers by multitudes of Testimonies already produced do condemn the Arrians as guilty of Idolatry and therefore they could not believe that the owning of Saints to be Gods Creatures did alter the State of the Controversie and make such Christians uncapable of Idolatry 2. I come to the second Period wherein Images were brought into the Christian Church but no worship allowed to be given to them And I am so far from thinking that the forbearance of the Use of Images was from the fear of complyance with the Pagan Idolatry that I much rather believe the introducing of Images was out of Complyance with the Gentile worship For Eusebius in that memorable Testimony concerning the Statue at Paneas or Caesarea Philippi which he saith was said to be the Image of Christ and the Syrophoenician woman doth attribute the preserving the Images of Christ and Peter and Paul to a Heathen custome which he saith was done 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 i. e. saith Valesius inconsideratè imprudenter contra veterem disciplinam incautè very unadvisedly and against the ancient Rules of the Church And yet to my great amazement this place of Eusebius is on all occasions produced to justifie the antiquity and worship of Images if it had been only brought to prove that Heathenish Customes did by degrees creep into the Christian Church after it obtained ease and prosperity it were a sufficient proof of it Not that I think this Image was ever intended for Christ or the Syrophoenician Woman but because Eusebius saith the people had gotten such a Tradition among them and were then willing to turn their Images to the Stories of the Gospel Where they finding a Syrophoenician Woman making her address to our Saviour and a Tradition being among them that she was of this place and there finding two Images of Brass the one in a Form of a supplicant upon her Knees with her hands stretched out and the other over against her with a hand extended to receive her the common people seeing these figures to agree so luckily with the Story of the Gospel presently concluded these must be the very Images of Christ and the Woman and that the Woman out of meer gratitude upon her return home was at this great expence of two brass statues although the Gospel saith she had spent all that she had on Physitians before her miraculous cure and it would have been another miracle for such an Image of Christ to have stood untouched in a Gentile City during so many persecutions of Christians especially when Asterius in Photius saith this very Statue was demolished by Maximinus I confess it seems most probable to me to have been the Image of the City Paneas supplicating to the Emperour for I find the very same representations in the ancient Coines particularly those of Achaia Bithynia Macedonia and Hispania wherein the Provinces are represented in the Form of a Woman supplicating and the Emperour Hadrian in the same habit and posture as the Image at Paneas is described by Eusebius And that which adds more probability to this conjecture is that Bithynia is so represented because of the kindness done by Hadrian to Nicomedia in the restoring of it after its fall by an earthquake and Caesarea is said by Eusebius to have suffered by an earthquake at the same time and after such a Favour to the City it was no wonder to have two such brass statues erected for the Emperours honour But supposing this tradition were true it signifies no more than that this Gentile custome was observed by a Syrophoenician Woman in a Gentile City and what is this to the worship of Images in Christian Churches For Eusebius doth plainly speak of Gentiles when he saith it is not to be wondered that those Gentiles who received benefits by our Saviour should do these things when saith he we see the Images of his Apostles Paul and Peter and Christ himself preserved in Pictures being done in Colours it being their custome to honour their Benefactors after this manner I appeal to any man of common sense whether Eusebius doth not herein speak of a meer Gentile custome but Baronius in spight of the Greek will have it thus quod majores nostri ad Gentilis consuetudinis similitudinem quà m proximè accedentes at which place Is. Casaubon sets this Marginal Note Graeca lege miraberis but suppose this were the sense of Eusebius what is to be gained by it save only that the bringing of Images among Christians was a meer imitation of Gentilism and introducing the Heathen customes into the Christian Church Yet Baronius hath something more to say for this Image viz. that being placed in the Diaconicon or Vestry of the Church of Paneas it was there worshipped by Christians for which he quotes Nicephorus whom at other times he rejects as a fabulous Writer And it is observable that Philostorgius out of whom Nicephorus takes the other circumstances of his relation is so far from saying any thing of the worship of this Image that he saith expresly the contrary 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 giving no manner of worship to it to which he adds the reason for it because it is not lawful for Christians to worship either Brass or any other matter no not
the mind of the Anthropomorphites whereas Aventinus saith expresly they were no other than such as are used and allowed in the Roman Church by which Ysambertus saith there is no more danger of mens being led into a false opinion of God than there is by the expressions of Scripture And upon this ground the danger doth not lye in making any representations of God but in entertaining a false opinion of those representations and the Scripture instead of forbidding men to make any similitude of God should only have forbidden men to entertain any erroneous conceit of any Image of him But if the Church take care to prevent such an opinion as he saith she doth the other Image with three faces and one Head or one body and three Heads might be justified on the same reason that the other is Whereas the Roman Catechism saith that Moses did therefore wisely say that they saw no similitude of God lest they should be led aside by errour and make an Image of the Divinity and give the honour due to God to a Creature From whence it follows that all Images that tend to such an errour are forbidden and all worship given to such Images is Idolatry And it is farther observable that the Image allowed in the Roman Church for God the Father is just such a one as S. Augustin saith it is wickedness for Christians to make for God and to place in a Temple and I would desire of T. G. to tell me what other Image of God the greatest Anthropomorphites would make than that which is most common among them And if there be such danger in mens conceptions of a Deity from any Images of God they give as much occasion for it as ever any people did So much that all men of any ingenuity have cryed shame upon them but to very little purpose Abulensis Durandus and Peresius are cited by Bellarmin himself as condemning any Images of God and which is observable they do not condemn such Images as represent God in himself as T. G. speaks but such as were in use in the Roman Church Durandus saith it is a foolish thing either to make or to worship such Images viz. of the Father Son and Holy Ghost after the former manner and which is yet more he quotes Damascen against this sort of Images saying that it was impiety and madness to make them and so doth Peresius too Thuanus mentions this passage relating to this matter that A. D. 1562. the Queen Mother of France by the advice of two Bishops and these three Divines Butillerius Espencaeus and Picherellus declared that all Images of the Trinity should be taken out of Churches and other places as forbidden by Scripture Councils and Fathers and yet these were such Images which T.G. pleads for but this soon came to nothing as all good purposes of Reformation among them have ever done If it be said as it is by Ysambertus that these are not properly Images of God but of his appearance in a visible form I answer 1. This doth not mend the matter for we are speaking of an Image of the Father as a Person in the Trinity and whatever represents him as such must represent him as he is in himself and not barely in regard of a temporary appearance and as to such an Image of God the Father T. G's distinction will by no means reach 2. It is the common opinion of the Divines in the Roman Church that all the appearances of God in the old Testament were not of God himself but of Angels in his stead And Clichtovaeus gives that as a Reason why all representations of God were unlawful in the old Testament because all appearances were by Angels and those Angels were no more united to the Forms they assumed than a mans body is to his Garments from whence it must follow that all representations of God by such appearances is still unlawful 3. Suppose this be a representation only of some appearance of God and so not of what God is but of what he did I ask then on what account such an effect of divine power is made the object of Divine adoration For we have seen already by the confession of their most eminent Divines that the Images of the Trinity are proposed among them as objects of adoration now say I how comes a meer creature such as that apparition was to become the object of Divine worship Durandus well saw the consequence of this assertion for when he had said that those corporeal Forms which are painted are no representations of the Divine Person which never assumed them but only of those very Forms themselves in which he appeared therefore saith he no more reverence is due to them than is due to the Forms themselves When God appeared in the burning bush that Fire was then an effect of Divine Power and deserved no worship of it self how then can the Image of the burning bush be an object of Divine worship If God did appear to Daniel as the Ancient of dayes it must be either by the impression of such an Idea upon his Imagination or by assuming the Form of an old man but either way this was but a meer Creature and had no such personal Union to the Godhead to deserve adoration how much less then doth the Image of this Appearance deserve it So that I cannot see how upon their own principles they can be excused from Idolatry who give proper Divine worship to such Images as these He commits Idolatry saith Sanders that proposes any Image to be worshipped as the true Image of the Divine Nature if this be Idolatry what is it then to give the highest sort of worship to the meer representation of a Creature for those Images which only set forth such appearances are but the Creatures of Creatures and so still farther off from being the object of adoration So that notwithstanding all T. G's evasions and distinctions we find that as to this matter of the Images of God and the Trinity the Church of Rome is not only gone off from Scripture Reason and Antiquity but from the doctrine and practice of the second Council of Nice too 2. I now come to the additions that have been made to the Council of Nice by the Church of Rome as to the manner of worship given to Images For which I must consider 1. What that worship was which the Council of Nice did give to Images 2. What additions have been made to it since that time 1. What that worship was which the Council of Nice did give to Images which will appear by these two things 1. That it defined true and real worship to be given to Images 2. That it was an inferiour worship and not Latria 1. That it defined true and real worship to be given to Images i. e. that Images were not only to be Signs and helps to memory to call to mind or represent to us
a Book no one suspects that his praise is therefore directed to his Book Thus it is in the acts of worship the Object is that Being to which the worship is directed but because external Acts must have some local circumstances by the position of our countenances and the tendency of our posture either towards Heaven or towards some place as the more immediate Symbol of a divine presence the difference is apparent between such a direction of the act towards a place and the direction of it towards an Object in case it can be made appear that may be a place of worship which is not an object of it For which we must consider 1. That the object of worship is that to which the worship is given either for its own sake or for the sake of that which it represents but a local circumstance doth only circumscribe the material act of worship within certain bounds And the proper object of worship is a Person either really present or represented as present The Idolaters who worshipped their Images as Gods if at least any considerable number of them ever did so it was upon this account that they supposed some Spirit to be incorporated in the Image and so to make together with it a Person fit to receive worship Those who worshipped the Elements or heavenly bodies did it not on the account of the matter whereof they were made but of those spirits which they believed to rule over those things they worshipped as I have already shewed in the general discourse But it is not necessary in order to an object of worship that the Person be really present for if men by imagination do suppose him present as represented by an Image that makes those who worship that Image perform the very same acts as if he were actually present and in the Church of Rome they do make this representation by an Image a sufficient ground for making that an object of worship which we say is the very thing forbidden in the Second Commandment viz. that any Image should be worshipped on the account of what it represents and therefore it forbids all kind of representations to be worshipped by men because an Image seems to have such a relation to the thing it represents that they may pretend they give worship to it on another account than meerly its matter and form viz. the thing represented by it Thus when the Reason of the worship of Images is drawn from the exemplar as it is both in the Councils of Nice and Trent they thereby shew that they do make the Image a true object of worship although the reason of it be drawn from the Person represented But suppose men worship God towards the West as the Iews did or towards the East as the Christians did what is there in this that doth represent God to us what is there that we fix our worship upon but only himself God hath no where forbidden men to worship Him towards the place of His presence for even our Saviour hath bid us pray Our Father which art in Heaven and supposing God had promised a more peculiar presence in His Holy Temple it was as lawful to worship God towards that as towards Heaven but that which God hath strictly forbidden is the worshipping of any thing on the account of the representation either of himself or of His creatures for this doth suppose that Image to be made the object of worship although it be on the account of what it represents 2. Supposing the same external acts to be performed towards an Image and towards a place of Gods particular presence yet the case is not alike in both these if those who do them declare they do them not with a design to worship that place For to the making any thing an object of worship there must be some ground to believe that they intend to worship it either from the nature of their actions or the doctrine and practice of the Church they live in but in case it be expressly declared that what they do is only intended as a local circumstance there is no ground to charge them with making it an object of worship Thus those in the Church of Rome who declare that they do not worship the Image but only worship God before an Image although they perform the same external acts of worship yet are condemed of Heresie because hereby they declare they do not give worship to Images which is contrary to the decrees of their Councils Much more certainly will those be condemned by them who declare it unlawful to worship any thing on the account of representation and that they do only determine the acts of outward worship towards a particular place without any intention to worship that place but only to worship God that way And this was the case of the Iews as to the worshipping of Images and of God towards the Holy of Holies they declared it utterly unlawful to do one because God had strictly forbidden it and they though it as lawful to do the other because he allowed the practice of it and it was sufficiently known among the people of the Iews that they had no intention to worship either the Ark or the Cherubims 3. Where there is only a local circumstance of worship the same thing would be worshipped supposing that circumstance changed but where any thing is an object of worship that being changed the same thing is not worshipped This makes the difference between these two easie and intelligible by all If a Iew should worship towards the East or Christians towards the West the same object of their worship continues still for they worship the same God both waies but if the Image of Christ or the B. Virgin be taken away from the Altar a Papist cannot be said to worship the same thing there that he did before Which plainly shews that there is a real difference between these two which is of great moment to clear the Iewish worship of God towards his holy place and to shew how different it was from the worship of Images 2. But T. G. pretends to bring clear Scripture for the Iews worshipping the Ark Adore ye the foot-stool of God for it is holy Psal. 98.5 so all the ancient Fathers he saith read it without scruple and S. Hierome he saith confirms it And why was it placed in the Holy of Holies and why were the people commanded to adore or bow down before it but to testifie their reverence to it To this I answer 1. One might venture odds against T. G. that when he quotes all the Fathers for him he hath very few of his side Nothing less will content him here than all the Fathers reading it without scruple for It is holy when Lorinus saith That all the Greek Fathers not one dissenting that he had seen read it For He is holy and among the Latins he confesses That S. Hierome and S. Augustine both read it so for
he is not to be worshipped for it is folly and wickedness to worship a creature But these are not the only persons whom Epiphanius charges with such Idolatry as is consistent with the belief of one True God for he charges those with Idolatry who gave Divine Worship to the B. Virgin and saith that this was that very Idolatry which God condemned in the people of Israel 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 there shall be worshippers of the dead which worship of the B. Virgin was offering up a Cake to her which surely is not so much as mens offering up themselves to be her slaves and offering up their devotions and services to her yet this Epiphanius cryes out upon as rank Idolatry and destructive to their Souls who did it and the device of the Devil who always brought in Idolatry saith he under fair pretences Which of all the Prophets ever suffered a man to be worshipped not to speak of a woman And although she have never so great excellencies yet her nature remains the same with others But neither is Elias to be worshipped although still alive nor S. John although he received extraordinary favour from Christ nor Thecla nor any other of the Saints For saith he the old deceit shall not prevail over us to leave the living God and to worship the things that are made by him for they saith S. Paul served and worshipped the creature more than the Creator and therein became Fools But if it be not lawful to worship Angels how much less to worship the Daughter of Anna Of whom our Saviour said on purpose 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 what have I to do with thee Lest any should think more than was fitting of her he calls her Woman as foreseeing the Schisms and Heresies that would come into the world on her account We are not to imagine that these people were so silly to take the B. Virgin for the Great God nor that they did forsake the worship of God and Christ for that of the B. Virgin but all that Epiphanius saith of them is that they brought her in 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 instead of a Deity i. e. that they gave divine honour to her and whosoever did give this to a creature they looked on them as guilty of forsaking the true God however they might in words still profess and acknowledge him So he charges those with Idolatry who worshipped Iephthas daughter and Thermutis the daughter of Pharaoh but it were madness to think that either of these were esteemed by their worshippers the Supreme Deity But Epiphanius fully explains himself when he saith that Idolatry comes into the world through an adulterous inclination of the mind which cannot be contented with one God alone like an adulterous woman that is not satisfied with the chast embraces of one Husband and wanders in her lust after many Lovers Therefore as adultery is consistent with the owning of one lawful Husband so is Idolatry with the profession of one true God Therefore Epiphanius bids men have a care of too great an admiration of the Saints lest it should lead them into this dangerous error that the safest way is to honour their Lord that those are equally to blame who too much extol the B. Virgin as those who depress and vilifie her too great praises being apt to become an occasion of others falling and therefore he repeats it twice as the saying he would have all Christians remember 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Honour the Virgin but worship God and lest any should think worship were a part of that honour which was due to her he saith expresly 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Let no man worship the B. Virgin for that belongs neither to the Woman nor to her Husband nor to Angels but to God alone How punctually hath the Church of Rome followed the Counsel of Epiphanius But of this at large hereafter S. Cyril of Alexandria likewise makes those guilty of Heathen Idolatry of worshipping the creature rather than the creator who give adoration to Christ supposing him to be a creature and he undertakes to demonstrate out of Scripture that no creature ought to be worshipped as God and that nothing which doth give adoration to God ought to receive it from others which he proves from the examples of Peter to Cornelius the Angels to S. Iohn and Manoe and that whatever excellency we suppose in creatures it doth not make them capable of divine worship but although they have different excellencies yet one sort is not to worship another but all of them are to worship God alone and his Son Christ Iesus Again if Christ be not God and we give him worship we shall be found 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 worshipping the creature rather than the Creator where we are to observe that S. Cyril applies 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to proper divine worship Again it is written Thou shalt worship the Lord thy God and him only shalt thou serve how then if he be a creature can he be worshipped by us And elsewhere the question being proposed whether we may worship Christ as man he answers God forbid for saith he this would be vanity errour and deceit and we should differ nothing from those who worshipped the creature rather than the Creator and be liable to the same charge S. Paul draws up against the Heathen Idolaters viz. that they changed the Truth of God into a lie c. and at large there shews that this would be relapsing into the old Idolatry In his Commentaries on S. Iohn he shews that although Christ had never so divine excellencies communicated to him yet he was not a fit object for our worship if he were not the true God because we are bound to serve and worship God alone and that if he be not so not only mankind but the Angels will be guilty of Idolatry in giving him adoration In his Dialogues about the Trinity he saith it is one of the great blessings we have by Christ to be delivered from the worship of the Creature but in case we return to that the institution of Moses will be found better than that of Christianity for that did strictly forbid all worship of creatures and called men from them to the worship of God alone that this was the reproach of the Gentiles that they worshipped Creatures and that the Christians returned to Gentilism if they worshipped a Creature together with God 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and afterwards he calls this a falling from Christ all which doth fully discover S. Cyrils judgement that Idolatry is consistent with the acknowledgement and worship of one Supreme God Theodoret saith he that came to take away the worship of the creature would never set it up again for this would be a most absurd thing to bring them back again 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to the worship of creatures where he uses dulia