a God But then again supposing the honour which Cornelius there intended to have been only an Inferiour respect as to a Holy Man and that St. Peter as St. Chrysostome thinketh refused it out of Humility or as the Doctor terms it Modesty Does that hinder but that upon another occasion he might have admitted it without danger to his Modesty and much more securely now that He is in Heaven For my part I believe that the Prophet Elizeus lost nothing of his Modesty or Humility when the Sunamitess fell down and held Him by the Feet and He forbad his Servant to thrust Her away To accept or refuse due honour is a matter belonging to Prudence and as sometimes it may be refused with vain glory so at an other it may be admitted with Humility What a Caprichio then was it to say that if we impute it only to St. Peter 's Modesty we will not allow him to carry it to Heaven with him as if St. Peter could not without forfeit forsooth of his Modesty have seen Christians do to him what they every Day do to one another in the Church § 3. The Second thing he hints at is that we can never be sure that the Saints do hear us therefore it must be unlawful or as he would make it Idolatrous to desire them to pray for us To this I answer first that this can be no excuse for him not to desire the Angels to pray for him for it is certain by many Texts of Holy Scripture that they know our necessities and prayers as Dan. 12. 1. At that time shall Michael stand up that great Prince which standeth for the Children of thy People Zach. 1. 12. The Angel of the Lord said O Lord of Hosts how long wilt thou not have mercy on Jerusalem and on the Cities of Juda against which thou hast had Indigration these threescore and ten Years Psal 137. 2. I will sing unto thee in the sight or presence of the Angels Luc. 15. 7. There shall be Joy in Heaven and V. 10. There shall be Joy before the Angels of God upon one Sinner that doth Penance Apoc. 8. 4. The smoke of the Incenses of the Prayers of the Saints ascended from the hand of the Angel before God All these places and divers others do manifestly show that our Prayers and Actions are not unknown to the Angels And whereas our Saviour himself saith that the Just in the Resurrection shall be as the Angels in Heaven Matth. 22. 30. the equality as to knowledge not depending upon the Body it follows by the Analogy of Faith that our prayers and concerns are known also to the Saints now enjoying the same Blissful Vision with the Angels and they no doubt rejoice as much at the Conversion of a Sinner as the Angels do and of them it is recorded also Apoc. 5. 8. as well as of the Angels that they had golden Vials full of Odours which are the prayers of Saints that is of the Faithful upon Earth who are here called Saints as they are often in other places of Holy Scripture also To this I might add the Incomparable perfection of the knowledge which the Blessed enjoy in Heaven with many other arguments both from Authority and Reason brought by Catholick Divines to prove this Tenet But because the Doctor brings nothing to prove the contrary viz. that the Saints do not hear us besides his own Ipse dixit I shall not inlarge further upon this Point but give him all the fair play he can desire which is to suppose with him at present that the Saints do not hear our prayers But will it follow from thence that it is unlawful or Idolatrical to desire their Intercession I answer 2dly with Bellarmine and deny the Consequence 1. Because although Protestant Writers do cite some of the Fathers as expressing themselves doubtfully whether the Saints hear our prayers or no yet supposing this to be as those Protestants would have it this was no Argument to those very Fathers not to call upon the Saints in particular to pray for them as is manifest from their own doctrin and practise by what hath been said above and from the Confession of Protestants themselves 2. Because it is certain by many and great Miracles wrought by God upon Addresses made to the Saints that those who call upon them are heard and obtain what they desire And for the Protestant Reader 's satisfaction in this Point I shall set down some of them as they stand recorded in the Works of St. Basil Theodoret and St. Austin witnesses of too great Authority and Integrity to be question'd much less rejected as Writers of Fables or Romances 1. St. Basil in his Hâ—mily upon the 40. Martyrs after he had told his Auditors that there was Help prepared for Christians Viz. The Church of the Martyrs and that those who had taken pains to find one to pray for them had here no less than Forty and that it was the practise of Christians at that time for those who were in Tribulation or Joy to fly and have recourse to the Forty Martyrs those for deliverance from their Troubles and these for the Conservation of their Prosperity he adds Here a Pious Mother praying for her Children is accepted or heard as also asking a safâ— return for her Husband when in a Journey or health for him in sickness Let us therefore pour forth our Prayers with these Holy Martyrs The Doctor will be apt to catch at these last words as if St. Basil meant that Christians were only to join their prayers with the Prayers of the Martyrs and not to desire them to pray for them But this exception is excluded by what he said before that those who are in Affliction fly and have recourse to the Martyrs themselves which practise of the People saith Dr. Forbes the first Bishop of Edinburgh had not St. Basil approved he would never have proposed as an Example to be imitated and with him agrees Vossius there cited by him 2dly Theodoret is yet more express in this matter Li. 8. de Graec. Affect The Temples of the Martyrs saith he are conspicuous and Illustrious both for their Greatness and Beauty Nor do we frequent them only once or twice or five times in a year but we celebrate frequent Assemblies in them and often sing praises every Day to the Lord of those Martyrs Those who are in good health begg of the Martyrs the conservation of it and such as are afflicted with any disease beg health Those who are barren pray that they may have Children and those who have Children that they may be preserved to them In like manner those who travel desire the Martyrs to be the companions or rather Guides of their Journey and those who return safe return also to give thanks for the benefit they have received Not that they imagin they go to Gods but they beseech and pray the Martyrs of God as Heavenly Men to
Council teaches is that It is good and profitable for Christians humbly to invocate the Saints and to have recourse to their Prayers aid and assistance wher by to obtain benefits of God by his Son our Lord Jesus Christ who is our only Redeemer and Saviour These are the very words of the Council and any Man but of common Reason would think it were as easy to prove Snow to be black as so Innocent a practice to be Idolatry even Heathen Idolatry What we teach and do in this matter is to desire the Saints in Heaven to pray for us as we desire the prayers of one another upon Earth and must we for this be compared to Heathens Do we not acknowledg that Jesus Christ the Son of God is our only Redeemer and Saviour Do we not confess that what Benefits we obtain of God either by our own or others Prayers must come by the merits of Him our only Redeemer Do we not believe that God needs neither our own Prayers nor the Prayers of others to confer his Benefits upon us but that all the need is on our part and all that we can do either by our own Prayers or humbly begging the Prayers of others is little enough to make us capable of his Favours Do we not profess to all the World that we look upon the Saints not as Gods but as the Friends and Servants of God that is as just Men whose Prayers therefore are available with him And that we worship them only with that worship of Love and Communion with which even in this life also Holy men of God are worshipped whose hearts we judge prepared to lose their Lives for the truth of the Gospel Where then lies the Heathenism Where lies the Idolatry Had the Doctor held himself to the Doctrine of the Church of England which terms the Invocation of Saints a fond thing vainly invented and grounded upon no warrant of Scripture there had been some colour for a dispute against the lawfulness of it But to condemn us of Idolatry down-right Idolatry for desiring the Servants of God in Heaven to pray for us was to put the common size of Intelligent Readers quite out of hopes of ever seeing it proved He says indeed in his Preface that He thinks it no great skill to make things appear either ridiculous or dark and here He gives us a very pregnant Example of what himself can do in that kind § 2. The Argument he made choice of to do this Feat that is to prove the Church of Rome guilty of Idolatry in the Invocation of Saints was this If the supposition of a middle excellency between God and us be sufficient ground for formal Invocation then the Heathens worship of their inferiour Deities could be no Idolatry for they still pretended they did not give to them the worship proper to the supreme God which is as much as is pretended by the devoutest Papists in Justification of the Invocation of Saints To this I answer'd two ways in my Reply 1. By shewing the disparity of Catholicks worship from that of the Heathens in two things 1. In the Objects where I said that by Persons of a middle excellency we understand Persons endowed with supernatural gifts of grace in this life and glory in Heaven whose Prayers by consequence are acceptable and available with God But the supreme Deity of the Heathens is known to be Jupiter and their inferiour Deuits Venus Mars Bacchus Vulcan and the like rabble of Devils as the Scripture calls thâ—m and therefore there can be no consequence that because the Heathens were Idolaters in the worship of these though they pretended not to give them the worship proper to Jupiter the supreme God therefore Catholicks must be guilty of Idolatry in desiring the servants of the true God to pray for them to him 2. In the manner of worship because I said if any of the Heathens did attain as the Platonists to the knowledge of the true God yet as St. Paul saith they did not glorify him as God but changed his glory into an Image made like to corruptible Man adorâ—â—g and offering sacrifice due to God alone to the Statues themselves or the inferiour Deities they supposed to dwell or assist in them which St. Austin upon the 96. Psalm proves to be Devils or evil Angels because they required sacrifice to be offered to them and would be worshipped as Gods What he meant by formal Invocation I said I did not well understand but Catholicks I told him understand no more by it in this matter but desiring or praying the Saints to pray for them And if this were Idolatry we must not desire the Prayers of a just Man even in this life because this formal Invocation will be to make him an Inferiour Deity 2. I answer'd that the same Calumny was cast upon the Catholicks in St. Austin's time and is answered by him and his Answer will serve as well now as then in his Twentieth Book against Faustus Chap. 21. who himself held such formal Invocation a part of the Worship due to Saints as is evident from the Prayer he made to St. Cyprian after his Martyrdome l. 7. de Bapt. c. Donat. c. 1. And Calvin himself confesseth it was the custome at that time to say Holy Mary or Holy Peter pray for Us. This indeed was my Answer and to disprove it he undertakes to show two things 1. That the disparity between Catholicks worship of Saints and the Heathens worship of their inferiour Deities is not so great as to excuse them from Idolatry 2. That the Answer given by St. Austin doth not vindicate them now as well as then § 3. 1. Concerning the disparity 1. As to the Object of Worship he abhors from his heart to parallel the Hâ—ly Angels and Saints with the impure Deities of the Heathens as to their Excellencies No. He hath more honour for them than not to think them more excellent than Devils or wicked Wretches I suppose in case they have the testimony of Scripture for their sanctity otherwise it may go hard with the best of them should he proceed in the same form with all the rest as he doth a little below with St. Ignatius But supposing them at present to be more excellent than the impure Deities of the Heathens yet if the Idolatry of the Heathens saith he lay not only in this that they worshipped Jupiter and Venus and Vulcan who are supposed to have been wicked Wretches but in this that they gave Divine Worship to any besides God then this disparity cannot excuse Catholicks from being Idolaters Behold here the ground upon which he intends to build his Charge of Idolatry Viz. That Catholicks give divine honour to the Holy Angels and Saints This is what the Reader must suppose otherwise his Arguments are at an End and having laid this false and scandalous supposition instead of proving it he undertakes to show out of the Primitive Fathers that it was the
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 2dly For the Intermediate Beings it is asserted by the same Origen that they were Devils also and according to the differently formed statues in which they assisted one was esteemed to be Bacchus another Hercules c. The like is affirmed also by Theophilus Antiochenus above cited and St. Austin upon the 96. Psalm But then because the supreme God was conceived to be of so high a Nature that he knew not what passed in this sublunary World Therefore 3dly The Office of these Inferiour Deities or Devils was to carry up the Prayers of Men to God as the Doctor himself cites out of St. Austin but very insincerely for St. Austin saith not to God but ad Deos to the Gods that is to Devils out of a supposition that they cannot know the necessities and prayers of Men but by Intervention of these Spirits and so to bring down to Men the blessings they prayed for And 4thly To oblige them to perform this Office of Nuncii or Messengers as St. Austin calls them they exacted of Men to give them Divine Worship by the Oblation of Victims and Sacrifices as the Fathers every where testify This then is the Scheme of the Heathens Divinity and Devotion The Doctor 's Father of Gods and Men was according to the Fathers an Arch-Devil The Inferiour Deities were Inferiour Devils Their Office was to inform the Superiour Gods of what passed here below and the reward they required for this service was no less than the Offering of Sacrifice to their Devil-ships And now was this the very same case altering only the Names of Things which he saith is in debate between Him and the Church of Rome concerning the Invocation of Saints Surely a more Injurious Calumny scarce ever dropt from the Pen of the greatest Enemy of Christianity except that of Julian the Apostate who charged the Christians of his time for their worshipping the Martyrs that for the one true God they worshipped many Men who were not Gods A most Injurious Calumny I say For r. The God whom we adore is not that wise Father of Gods and Men who was so high as not to know what was done here below but the true and Immortal God Maker of Heaven and Earth who sees the secrets of our hearts and knows our necessities before we utter them 2dly The Persons to whom we address our selves for their Prayers are not Devils or wicked Wretches but the Friends and Servants of God whom the Doctor himself as little respect as he hath for them acknowledges to exceed those other in excellency 3dly Their Office is not to inform the Supream God of what he knows not but to be Joynt Petitioners with us and for us to his divine Majesty as other Holymen are upon Earth 4thly and Lastly We do not procure or buy this favour of them by offering Sacrifice to them for as St. Austin saith What Bishop officiating at the Altar doth say at any time We offer to Thee Peter or Paul or Cyprian But as the same Holy Doctor there saith We celebrate their Memory with Religious Solemnity both to excite us to their imitation and to become partakers of their Merits and Prayers but so that we erect Altars not to any of the Martyrs but to the God of Martyrs although in Memory of them And now having spoken thus home to the Case I leave it to the Reader 's Judgment whether the Practice of Catholicks in honouring and Invocating the Saints be the same with that of the Heathens in the worship of their Inferiour Deities To make the Case run Parallel on all four the Doctor must prove either that the God we worship is not the very true God but an Arch-Devil or that the Holy Angels and Saints are not his friends and servants but inferiour Devils Or that we believe him to be so ignorant that he stands in need of them to inform him or that we offer sacrifice and erect Altars to them And when he can do all or any of these he will speak something to the Point But I believe these are none of those things which he threatens largely to prove if further occasion be given And I have good reason to believe so by his present undertaking which is not to prove any of these things in which the Parallel must consist if there be any but to cast a mist before his Readers eyes and make him lose both his labour and the Question as I shall show in the following Chapter CHAP. II. What kind of Honour Catholicks give to the Saints The Testimonies of Origen and St. Ambrose explained Of the Practice of making Addresses to particular Saints § 1. THe Question at present between Dr. St. and the Church of Rome is not whether divine worship be to be given to the Saints for this is abhor'd 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 neer Relation to God may not be lawfully given to them now they are in Heaven This is the true state of the Question between us which the Doctor afraid to grapple with turns aside and will he saith insist upon these two things 1. That the Fathers did condemn all such kind of worshâ—p supposing their Principle true that is as far as I can understand it supposing what they said was true 2. That they did not only condemn it in those spirits which the Heathens worshipped but in good Angels themselves And before I engage with Him upon the Testimonies of the Fathers I must disperse the Mist he raises by his Egregious equivocating in the words All such kind of worship What kind of worship is it the Fathers deny may be given to the most excellent created Beings He tells us p. 145. any Religious Worship And what doth he mean by Religious Worship To dispute saith Mr. Thorndike whether we are bound to honour the Saints or not were to dispute whether we are to be Christians and to believe this or not Whether this be Religious or Civil nothing but equivocation of words makes disputable and the cause of that equivocation the want of words vulgar use not having provided words properly to signify conceptions which came not from Common sense Plainly their excellence and the Relation we have to them being Intelligible only by Christianity must borrow a Name from that which vulgar language attributes to God or to Men our Superiours And then a little after he saith That the Relation which God hath settled between the Church Militant and Triumphant may be reasonably called Religious provided that the distance be not confounded between the Religious honour of God and that Honour of the Creature which the Religious honour of God enjoins being neither Civil nor
Saint above others as Patience Humility Chastity c. for which reason the Church saith of every one of them Non est inventus similis illi that there was no other found like to him or upon the particular manner of his suffering Martyrdom or some particular Miracle or such like remarkable passage in his Life and actions which may serve to excite the Hope of the suppliant to obtain redress by means of his Intercession in a case which he conceives to bear a suitableness or conformity to something acted or suffered by him Now the efficacy of Prayer being grounded on Hope and it being natural to us to hope for redress where others have found it or where it may more reasonably be expected by reason of some particular qualification we apprehend in the Person to whom we address it is manifest that as the abovesaid Reflexion serves to erect our Hope so also it conduces to the end of Prayer that is the obtaining of what we pray for Hence it is that although all the divine Attributes are really one and the same indivisible Perfection in God yet for pardon we fly to his Mercy for knowledge to his Wisdome for Protection to his Power c. And St. Paul assigns the remission of our sins to the Passion of Christ but our Justification by which we rise to newness of life to his Resurrection He was delivered to death for our sins and rose again for our Justification The reason whereof he gives in the Epistle to the Hebrews c. 2. v. 18. Where he saith that it behoved Christ to be made like unto his Brethren in all things that he might be a merciful and faithful High-Priest in things pertaining to God to make reconciliation for the sins of the People For saith he in that he suffred himself being tempted he is able to succour them that are tempted that is by what he suffred himself he is made prompt and ready to succour those who are in affliction and Temptation For it was true even of his most sacred Humanity what the Poet out of the very nature of Humanity made another say Haâ—d ignara â—â—li miseris succurrere disco that by his own sufferings he had learnt how to compassionate the sufferings of others And this was laid down by St. Paul as a powerful Argument to perswade the Hebrews to put their Hope in Him for their reconciliation with God because he was so particularly qualified and fitted for that Work by what he had suffered Why then may not a like Consideration of the fitness or qualification of one Saint above others as so conceived by us either for his eminent Perfection in such a particular virtue or some other Remarkable passage in his Life be taken as a Motive to invite us to address for the obtaining what we stand in need of to his Intercession before others The Scripture we know to perswade us to Patience in Adversity bids us reflect upon the sufferance of Job And why may not his eminence in that virtue as it serves for an example of our Imitation be also taken as a particular motive of our having recourse to his Intercession And when Jacob blessed the two Sons of Joseph Ephraim and Manasses among so many Angels whose assistance he might have implored he beggs for that Angel in particular to be their Guardian who had delivered him out of all his troubles The Angel saith he who delivered me from all evils bless these Children And why but because he thought that he who had been so careful to deliver him would be as careful to deliver them And upon this account were I in danger of being ship wrackt I should sooner fly to the Intercession of St. Paul who had saved by his Prayers all his Fellow-passengers in the Ship from being drowned than to another who had never been in the like danger Behold here then the Crime of Catholicks in calling particularly upon the Angel Raphael when they travel because he protected young Tobias in his Journey upon St. Roch against the Plague because his Charity was signal in assisting those who were insected with it upon St. Nicholas against Tempests because he saved some by his Prayers who in a storm at Sea invoked him while yet alive upon St. Apollonia for the Tooth-ach because all her Teeth were strucken out for her free Confession of Christ and upon St. Michael and St. George against Enemies because the latter was by Profession a Souldier and a most valiant Martyr And the former is recorded in Scripture to be the Protector of the People of God This is the Crime for which the Doctor charges Catholicks with Idolatry But if it be a Crime in them it is much like that of a Beggar who hopes to find relief at that door where he hears others have been relieved before The Doctor perhaps to carry on his sport will instance in some addresses that are made to particular Saints upon such accounts which seem to him ridiculous or it may be contrary to what happened to the Saint But while I defend the reasonableness of the practice in it self I am not bound to defend that all who use it take the hints of their application to one Saint before another from solid and reasonable Motives This I know that what seems ridiculous to One who scoffs at devotion may serve to raise affections in another who is truly devout And the Chananaean Woman when our Saviour said to her It is not good to take the Children's bread and cast it to Dogs drew an Argument of Hope from whence another who had not her Faith would have taken a Motive of despair In fine to conclude this Point let us suppose that Martha and Mary Magdalen who are now glorious Saints in Heaven were again living upon Earth I would gladly know whether a Person guilty of Incontinency might not without being guilty also of Aegyptian Idolatry conceive a greater Hope of obtaining God's favour by the Prayers of so Exemplar a Convert than by those of her Sister though more Innocent Surely the Parallel Example of her Conversion and the particular Zeal she must have for the Conversion of others would soon determin the devotion of the Penitent to have recourse to her Intercession The Case is the same now she is in Heaven for she hath not lost her Charity by being there And the case is the same in addresses made to other Saints upon like accounts as I shewed above When therefore the Doctor hath a mind hereafter to change the names of the Aegyptian Gods who according to their doctrin presided over the several parts of Man let him if he please transcribe out of the Almanack the Anatomy of Mans Body as the parts thereof are govern'd by the Twelve Signs Aries Taurus Gemini Cancer Leo c. The Characters at least may stand indifferently as Hieroglyphical Notes either of the Signs of the Zodiack or Aegyptian Deities But nothing can be more ridiculous
here by the Doctor he affirms that that service which is given by servants to their Masters is wont to be called by another Name in Greek that is dulia But this the Reader was not to know for fear he might infer that if some degree of the service called in Greek dulia might be given by Servants to their Masters then surely a higher degree of it may be given to the Holy Angels § 4. But now after all these endeavours used by the Doctor to hide himself in the General terms of such worship Religious worship Prayer Invocation c. and some obscure passages of the Fathers He tells us that he knows very well and I pray God his own knowledge may not rise against him in the Day of Judgment by what Arts all these Testimonies are endeavoured to be evaded or rather by what Light he will be discovered to have said nothing to the purpose Viz. That these sayings of the Fathers were intended against the Heathens Idolatry who worshipped those Spirits as Gods and offered Sacrifices to them But the Church of Rome denieâ— the Angels and Saints to be Gods and asserts that the worship by Sacrifice is proper only to God This Answer is indeed given by St. Austin very often and others of the Fathers And there needed no other to the Testimonies he produces if all who read his Book knew as much as himself But such devices as these for so he calls them though prov'd to be the sense of the Fathers out of the very places cited by him he saith can never satisfy an impartial mind And to return him his own words in a like occasion I must tell him that if ever he speak home to our case he must do it upon this Point And so he does but very little to his comfort as I shall make appear by showing the nullity of the Reasons with which he endeavours to make the aforesaid Answer seem insufficient 1. The First is because The Fathers he saith p. 158. do expresly deny that Invocation or Prayer is to be made to the Angels and Saints But this is but to say the same thing over again or to equivocate as Mr. Thorndike saith in the terms of Prayer and Invocation which are not so proper to God but that in despite of our hearts they may be used in signifying requests made also to Men. 2. His second Reason is because It would be no more unlawful to sacrifice to Saints or Angels than to Invocate them And this Reason clearly destroys it self because it supposes we hold it unlawful to sacrifice to the Saints as the Heathens did to their Inferiour Deities But to let that pass with the rest If he take the word Invocation here to signifie the Prayer we make to God as the Author and Giver of all Good I grant it no less unlawful to sacrifice to Saints and Angels than to Invocate them For what Catholick ever taught or thought that it was lawful to Invocate any Angel or Saint upon that account But if the word Invocation on the one side as in despite of all opposition it may be and by the Custome of the Church it is used be taken to signify the requests we make to Angels and Saints to pray for us and on the other side the offering of sacrifice be not only by the custome of the Church but of all Mankind as St. Austin teacheth appropriated to signify the absolute worship due only to God Who sees not the unlawfulness of offering it to any Saint or Angel may consist with the lawfulness of desiring them to pray for us The case is plain in just Men upon Earth For St. Paul and Barnabas accepted willingly the Prayers which others made to them for their assistance but utterly refused to admit the sacrifice which the Lycaonians Acts 14. would have offered to them and it is as plain of the Saints in Heaven because we pray no otherwise to them than we do to Holy Men upon Earth though more devoutly upon the account of their unchangeable state of Bliss How then could the Doctor parallel these two together and not only parallel them but make it less unlawful to pray to the Saints than to offer sacrifice to them I 'le tell you Catholicks when they write against Inâ—idels or Hereticks make use of the Answers which the Fathers have formerly given to their Objections But Dr. St. being to oppose the Doctrine of the Catholick Church in the Point of Invocation of Saints is forâ—'t to maintain an Argument of the Heathens against St. Austin Nay saith he p. 158. The Heathens in St. Austin argued very well that sacrifices being meer external things might more properly belong to the Inferiour Deities but the more Invisible the Deity was the more Invisible the sacrifices were to be and the greater and better the Deity the sacrifice was to be still proportionable Thus the Doctor to show that in all reason the duty of Prayer ought to be reserved as more proper to God than any External sacrifice or as he vaâ—ies the Phrâ—â—se than a meer outward sacrifice and consequently that Prayer was less communicable to a Saint than Sacrifice But do you not think the Doctor us'd the utmost of his confidence here to own and maintain for good nay very good an Argument of the Heathens confuted by St. Austin in that very place The Heathen saith Dr. St. argued very well I deny it saith St. Austin because in so arguing they manifest that they do not know nesciunt that visible sacrifices are the signs of the Invisible Sacrifices of the mind like as the words we speak are the signs of things For as when we pray or praise we direct the words to him to whom we offer in our hearts the things themselves which we signify by them so when we sacrifice we know that the visible Sacrifice is to be offered to no other but to Him whose Invisible Sacrifice we our selves ought to be in our hearts And upon this account he adds a little below it is and no other that the Devils require sacrifice to be offered to them because they know it to be due to God alone endeavouring by that means to hinder access to the true God that Man may not be his sacrifice whilst sacrifice is offered to any but to him Thus St. Austin in Answer to the Heathens Objection and the Doctor 's By which it appears 1st That in the Judgment of St. Austin external sacrifice being the highest expression of the highest part of Prayer which is the devoting and sacrificing our selves in our hearts to God it ought of all others to be reserv'd as most proper and acceptable to him And that Religion which admits no external visible sacrifice must needs be deficient in the most signal part of the Publick Worship of God 2dly That in the Judgment of the same St. Austin the Doctor if he speak as he thinks knows no more than the Heathens did what the
the Eucharist is not Idolatry because we only suppose him to be really present under the form of bread but because we know and believe this upon the same grounds and motives upon which we believe and those motives stronger than any Protestant hath if he have no other than the Catholick to believe that Christ is God and consequently to be adored And therefore that you may the better see the inefficaciousness of the Argument suppose it dropt from the Pen of an Arrian against the adoration of Christ as God and it will be of as much force to evince that to be Idolatry as it is from the Objector's to prove the adoration of him in the Eucharist to be so See there how an Arrian might argue in the same form The same Argument which would make the grossest Heathen Idolatry lawful cannot excuse any act from Idolatry but the same Argument whereby the Protestants make the Worship of Christ a pure Man says the Arrian not to be Idolatry would make the grossest Heathen Idolatry not to be so For if it be not therefore Idolatry because they suppose Christ to be God then the Worship of the Sun was not Idolatry by them who supposed the Sun to be God c. Now the same answer which solves the Arrians argument against the adoration of Christ as God serves no less to solve the Objectors Argument against the adoration of him in the Eucharist since we have a like Divine Revelation for his real presence under the Sacramental Signs as we have for his being true God and Man But what if Catholicks should be mistaken in their belief Would it then follow that they were Idolaters Dr. Taylor an eminent and leading Man amongst the Protestants denies the consequence His words are these in the Liberty of Prophecying Sect. 20. Numb 26. Idolatry says he is a forsaking the true God and giving Divine Worship to a Creature or to an Idol that is to an Imaginary God who hath no foundation in Essence or Existence And this is that kind of superstition which by Divines is called the superstition of an undue object Now it is evident that the object of their that is the Catholicks adoration that which is represented to them in their minds their thoughts and purposes and by which God principally if not solely takes estimate of humane actions in the blessed Sacrament is the only true and Eternal God hypostatically joyned with his Holy Humanity which Humanity they believe actually present under the Veil of the Sacramental Signs and if they thought him not present they are so far from worshipping the bread in this case that themselves profess it Idolatry to do so which is a demonstration mark that that their Soul hath nothing in it that is Idolatrical If their confidence and fanciful Opinion so he terms the faith of Catholicks hath engaged them upon so great a mistake as without doubt he says it hath yet the will hath nothing in it but what is a great enemy to Idolatry Et nihil ardet in inferno nisi propria voluntas that is Nothing burns in Hell but proper Will Thus Dr. Taylor and I think it will be a task worthy the Objectors pains to solve his Argument if he will not absolve us from being Idolaters § 7. He proceeds to prove that Catholicks are guilty of Idolatry by their Invocation of Saints And his Argument is this If the supposition of a middle excellency between God and us be a sufficient ground for formal Invocation then the Heathens Worship of their inferiour Deâ—ities could be no Idolatry for the Heathens still pretended that they did not give to them the Worship proper to the Supream God which is as much as is pretended by the devoutest Papists in justification of the Invocation of Saints To answer this Argument I shall need little more than to explicate the hard words in it which thus I do By persons of a middle excellency we understand persons endowed with supernatural gifts of Grace in this life and Glory in Heaven whose prayers by consequence are acceptable and available with God what at he means by formal Invocation I understand not well but what we understand by it is desiring or praying those just persons to pray for us The supream Deity of the Heathens is known to be Jupiter and their inferiour Deities Venus Mars Bacchus Vulcan and the like rabble of Devils as the Scripture calls them The gods of the Heathens are Devils The terms thus explicated 't is easie to see the inconsequence of the Argument that because the Heathens were Idolaters in worshipping Mars and Venus their inâ—eriour Deities or rather Devils though they pretended not to give them the Worship proper to Jupiter their Supream God Therefore the Catholicks must be guilty of Idolatry in desiring the servants of the true God to pray for them to him Upon this account we must not desire the prayer of a just Man even in this life because this formal Invocation will be to make him an inferiour Deity But if some Sect of Heathens as the Platonists did attain to the knowledge of the true God yet St. Paul says they did not glorifie him as God but changed his glory into an Image made like to corruptible man adoring and offering Sacrifice due to God alone to the Statues themselves or the inferiour Deities they supposed to dwell or assist in them Which inferiour Deities St. Austin upon the Ninety sixth Psalm proves to be Devils or evil Angels because they required Sacrifice to be offered to them and would be worshipped as Gods Now what comparison there is between this worship of the Heathens inferiour Deities and Christians worship of Saints and Angels let the same St. Austin declare in his twentieth Book against Faustus the Manichaean chap. 21. Faâ—stus there calumniates the Catholicks the word is St. Austins because they honoured the Memories or Shrines of Martyrs charging them to have turned the Idols into Martyrs whom they worship said he with like Vows The Objection you see is not new that Catholicks make inferiour Deities of their Saints Faustus long ago made it and St. Austin ' s answer will serve as well now as then Christian People says he do with Religious Solemnity celebrate the Memory of Martyrs both to excite to the imitation of them and to become partakers of their Merits and be holpen by their Prayers but so that we erect Altars not to any of the Martyrs but to the God of Martyrs although in Memory of the said Martyrs For what Bishop efficiating at the Altar in the places where their holy Bodies are deposited does say at any time we offer to thee Peter or Paul or Cyprian but what is offered is offered to God who crown'd the Martyrs at the Memories of those whom he crowned that being put in mind by the very places a greater affection may be raised in us to quicken our love both to those whom we may imitate and towards him by whose
the case is the same as to the Point of Reason Men must be allowed the use of their Judgment and Reason in the search of both And therefore he must either acknowledge his Charge to have been groundless when he taxed Catholicks for exposing Faith to uncertainty or he must grant to Men though it be with contradicting himself which is much easier to do than to swallow the least seeming Contradiction in a matter of Faith that they may and ought to make use of their discerning Faculty as to the truth or falshood of matters proposed to our belief which I confess I take to be the same as to believe no more than their Reason can comprehend and so if Reason chance to meet with some seeming Contradiction with which it is not able or willing to grapple the Article ought and must be exploded for such a monstrous Prodigy of hood wink'd and abused Faith as no Man can imagine God would e're obtrude upon the Faith of Reasonable Men. But here again perhaps he will say that although God may impose upon us an Obligation of believing against the Conceptions of our Reason yet he cannot do it against the suggestion of our sense because as he asserts p. 540. This would be to overthrow all certainty of Faith where the matters to be believed depend upon mattâ—r of Fact But here I would desire to know what Angel from Heaven reveal'd this Doctrin to him Suppose in the case of the two Disciples at Emmaus that our Saviour had vanished out of their sight before he brake bread might he not hâ—ve told them afterwards that it was He who had appeared to them in a disguise without overthrowing all the certainty of Faith where matters to be believed depend upon matter of Fact St. Chrysostome above cited I am sure was of another mind in the very point of Christ's real presence in the Sacrament when he bids us obey God in that mystery though what he say seem to contradict our thoughts and eyes And so was St. Cyril too when he exhorts Christians not to consider it as naked Bread and Wine for it 〈…〉 Blood of Christ according to the words of Christ himself And although sense do suggest this to theâ— viz. that it is Bread yet let Faith confirm thee Do not judge of the thing by thy tast but know and hold for most certain that this Bread which is seen of us is not Bread though the tast judge it to be Bread but the Body of Christ and that the Wine which is seen by us although it seem Wine to the sense of tasting notwithstanding is not Wine but the Blood of Christ This is what these Holy Fathers teach in this matter and with great reason for as God is not only God of the Hills but also of the Valleys So is he God not onâ—y of our Reason but of our Senses also And if the Antidote his Goodness hath prâ—scrib'd to Cure our Corrupt Nature be prepared in such a manner as requires the captivating of our Sense as well as of our Understanding who shall question either his Wisdome or Power He hath said This is my Body though it appear to us to be bread And this being but one Exception from the General Rule of Sensation why that should overthrow all certainty of Faith more than so many exceptions as the Trinity and other Mysteries lay upon the General Rules of our Reasoning I leave to all Men of sense and Reason to judge O but this is the strangest of Miracles and Miracles ought to be the objects of sense I grant it of such Miracles as are done for the Conversion of Unbelievers but this is not done upon such an account but for the Sanctification of those who believe already And for these it is enough that Christ hath said It is his Body They know very well the danger of not believing him more than their senses And that others may know it also I shall set it before them in the words of St. Epiphanius no less than 1300. Years ago We see saith he speaking of the Blessed Sacrament that It is neither equal nor like in proportion or Image to his Flesh to the Invisible Deity to the lineaments of a Body for this is of a round forme and insensible according to power And yet because he was pleased to say through Grace This is my Body every one believeth his saying For who believeth not that it is his very true Body falleth from Grace and Salvation Thus much to the Doctors Principles of Sense and Reason Let us now see what he says against the Grounds and Motives of Transubstantiation CHAP. V. A Check to the Doctor 's bigg words against the Grounds of Transubstantiation with a new Example of reporting faithfully as he calls it the Words and Sense of an Author § 1. TO show there are not the same Grounds and Motives for Christs presence in the Eucharist by Transubstantiation as for his Divinity my Adversary instances in Three 1. The Authority of the Roman Church 2. Catholick Tradition 3. Scripture And for the first of these Viz. The Authority of the Roman Church if it have any at all it stands against the Doctor for Transubstantiation and that so evidently that he is forced to take the confidence p. 130. utterly to deny that to be any ground of believing at all For my part I believe every sober Person of his own Party will judge he had much better have said nothing at all And I cannot but think how St. Austin who calls the Chair of Peter that Rock which the proud Gates of Hell do not overcome and professes that the Principality of the Apostolick Chair did always conserve its vigour in the Roman Church would have startled to hear one single Doctor so pertly deny it to be any Ground at all of believing How St. Hierome who writing to Pope Damasus saith I know that upon this Rock the Church is built and whosoever eateth the Lamb out of this House is Prophane c. would have whetted his stile more against him for denying her Authority to be any Ground of believing at all than ever he did against Vigilantius for deriding Invocation of Saints Veneration of Relicks or Lighting Candles at Noon-Day in the Church c. And how St. Irenaeus would have excluded him out of the Society of Christians for this peremptory behaviour when he affirms it necessary for all other Churches convenire to have recourse and agree with the Roman by reason of its more eminent Principality That this was the Dignity and Prerogative of the Roman Church in the time of these Holy Fathers the Doctor himself cannot deny and if he pretend she is fallen from the Purity she then enjoyed it is but what the Donatists his Predecessors in this point said above twelve hundred years ago when as St. Austin tells us they call'd the Apostolick Chair the Chair of Pestilence because it oppos'd their Novelities
signification of the words I Answer not meerly from Lilly's Grammar Rules but from the Doctrine of the Church delivered in her Councils and Catechisms and from the common use of such words and expressions among Christians If a Child being taught by his Parents that God alone can give what we ask when he saith to his Father Bless me understands the meaning of the words to be that his Father should pray to God to bless him then surely much more must Catholick People when they pray to the B. Virgin to drive away all evils understand the sense to be that she would pray to God to deliver them from all evil there being besides the common Doctrine of Christianity by which they are taught that God alone is the Giver of all good things so many Sermons Catechisms and Explications both by word and writing daily made in the Catholick Church by Priests to the People and Parents to their Children in this particular Point Well but if this were all saith the Doctor why in all this time that those Prayers have been complained of viz. by those who have revolted from the Church hath not their sense been better expressed Why have they not been expunged all this while after that their Breviaries have been so often reviewed This I fear if done would not be enough to keep them from telling us Once upon a time there was a blasphemous Book or in the Mass-Book Printed at Paris in such a Year there was But why to comply with the humour of a few Opiniators whom no Reason can satisfy must Mankind be debarred the natural manner of expressing their affections And why have not those scrupulous Person◠all this while devised a Dictionary or Phrase-Book to furnish us with words and forms of speaking which may equal our Conceptions and express every little variation of our thoughts and all the different tempers and emotions of the Spirit Do we not do the same action sometimes more quick and smartly than at others Why then must we be tyed to use always the same form of words Why may we not sometimes utter the same affection in a more fervent manner of expression than at others He that sees himself in an imminent danger makes no long Preambles but cries out Help me And St. Gregory Nazianzen records it as an act of great devotion in St. Justina that to free her self from the snares of Satan she call'd upon the Virgin Mary to help and succour her But the Doctor hath now found a Staff to beat Bellarmin with for offering to instance in Scripture that the Apostles are said to save Men Viz. by their Prayers c. Therefore in the like sense we may desire them to save us And he lays on so hard that he hath beat all the brains out of the Cardinal's head at a blow For will any Man saith he in his Wits say the Case is the same in Ordinary Speech and in Prayer Is it all one saith he for a Man to say that his Staff helped him in his going and to fall down upon his Knees and pray to his Staff to help him And now I pray who so proper a Man to confute Bellarmin as Dr. St. Bellarmin speaks of such Instruments as have both Understanding and Will to help us to Heaven by their Prayers and he presently lets drive at Him with his Staff for speaking Non-sense Let the Reader judge whether the Instrument be more Irrational or the Use he makes of it I have long since observ'd that whenever he makes other Men out of their Wits The Reader hath reason to suspect all is not right at home But St. Paul doubtless was a Rational Instrument and What would He have said saith the Doctor to one who should say to him I pray you pardon my sins and assist me with the grace of God I believe he would neither have condemned him of gross Idolatry nor prodigious Folly as the Doctor doth but considering the bitterness of his Soul by the eagerness of his Expression would have given him the assistance of his Prayers to obtain what he aimed to procure by his means of God § 7. Having thus cleared the fense of those Forms of Prayer we sometimes use to the B. Virgin and other Saints to be no other than praying to them to pray to God for us as I asserted in my Reply and answered the little exceptions the Doctor made against it I shall conclude this Point with some Instances of like expressions either used or approved by the Fathers of the Primitive times And first for the usual form of Holy Mary or Holy Peter pray for us the Instances are so numerous that to transcribe them would make a Volume Many of the Fathers are taxed for this practice by the Magdeburgenses and other Protestant Writers and for this sort of Invocation Mr. Thorndike saith it is confessed that the Lights both of the Greek and Latin Church Basil Nazianzen Nyssen Ambrose Hierome Austin Chrysostom Cyrils both Theodoret Fulgentius St. Gregory the Great Leo more or rather all after that time have spoken to the Saints and desired their Assistance Nay the Doctor himself though diminute in his Confession acknowledges there are some Instances of them in good Authors although he will needs have them to be but Rhetorical Apostrophes and Poetical Flourishes or Wishes that the Saints would pray for us as we Englishmen when we are at play saith Mr. Perkins and I wonder so pat an Example could escape the Doctor call upon the Bowls to rubb or to run as we would have them At this sport he fancies St. Hierome to have been when he cry'd to Paul after her death Help me O Paul in my old Age with thy Prayers And so no doubt was the Emperor Theodosius too when as Ruffinus reporteth Hist Eccl. l. 2. c. 33. He went to visit the Sepulchers of the Martyrs accompanyed with all the Clergy and People it was it seems a General Day of Bowling and prostrate before their Ashes You may imagin to take surer aim implored aid by their Intercession or as St. Chrysost hath it in the same or a like occasion Ho. 26. in 2 Cor. besought the Saints to be his Patrons and Advocates with GOD. And the Doctor Himself brings in Saint Austin as playing at the same Game when he says p. 173. that he wishes rather than praise that St. Cyprian would help him with his prayers Confessing also as I said before that there are some Instances of this pleasant kind of Invocation to be found in good Authors The difficulty then lies in those prayers which we make to Saints to help our Necessities But of these also there want not Instances in the Writings of good Authors of the Primitive times parallel to those which the Doctor objects out of the present Roman Breviary and Office of our Lady Do we say there Hail B. Virgin Thou alone hast destroyed all Heresies in the World Vouchsafe Holy Virgin to
let me praise Thee St. Cyril saith By Thee Holy Mother and Virgin every Creature that worshipped Idols hath been converted to the knowledge of the Truth Praise and Glory be to Thee O Sacred Trinity Praise also be to Thee O Holy Mother of God Who can sufficiently set forth thy Praises Do we entreat the B. Virgin to help the miserable to strengthen the weak c. St. Gregory Nazianzen above-cited commends St. Justina for beseeching the B. Virgin to help and succour her Do we desire her to protect us from our Enemies and shew her self to be a Mother St. Gregory Nissen calls upon St. Theodorus to fight for his Country as a Souldier and to use that liberty of speech for his Fellow-servants which besits a Martyr Do we supplicate the Angels to come to our help and defend Us St. Ambrose saith that they are to be supplicated for us who are given us for our Protectors Lastly Do we desire the Apostles Jubere the word signifies to wish or desire as well as to command but the Doctor will have it here to command the guilty to be loosed And He might as well have translated Jubeo te valere I command you to farewell It is not so much as what that devout Woman in St. Austin said to St. Stephen when upon the death of her Child before Baptism she brought the dead Body to the shrine of the B. Martyr and there exacted ofhim saith St. Austin to restore her Son to Life with these words Redde filium meum c. Give me my Son that I may behold him in the presence of him who crowned thee A thing both commended by St. Austin as a Testimony of her great Faith and confirmed for such by God in restoring her Son to Life at the Intercession of the Saint Thus much may suffice to show that whil'st the Doctor casts so much Dirt upon the Doctrine and Practice of the present Roman Church He makes it fly in the Faces of those great Fathers and Lights of the Primitive Times And much less might have sufficed for an Objection which taken in all its parts is as like the seeking for a knot in a Bul-rush as ever yet I met with any but that as the Apostle saith We are Debtors both to the Wise and to the Unwise Let us see whether the next be any better CHAP. V. The disparity assigned by Dr. St. between desiring the Saints in Heaven and Holy Men upon Earth to pray for Us shown to be Insignificant § 1. TO manifest farther the weakness of the Doctor 's Argument I added in my Reply that if Catholicks must be guilty of Idolatry for desiring just Persons in Heaven to pray for them upon the same account we must not desire the Prayers of a just Man even in this Life because this formal Invocation will be to make him an Inferiour Deity And the Doctor rejoins p. 168. that supposing this were all yet this would not excuse them But from what He was loath to name it the consequence is so absurd yet he would have his Reader believe that it would not excuse them from Idolatry And the Reason he gives is For their practice is very different in their Invocation of Saints from desiring our Brethren on Earth to pray for us And he cannot but wonder how any Men of common sense can suffer themselves to be imposed upon so easily in this matter But if he suppose that what we doâ— Invocating the Saints is no more than to desire them to pray for us as we do other Holy Men upon Earth How comes the one to be Idolatry and not the other The difference as far as I can gather from his words consists in this that amidst the Solemn Devotions of the Church after we have prayed to the Persons of the Holy Trinity to have mercy on us remaining upon our Knees we address to the Saints and require the assistance of their prayers saying Holy Peter and Paul pray for us and this without being sure that they hear us This together with a hint of our setting up their Images in some higher place in the Church and burning Incense before them is the whole summe of his Argument These circumstances he says make the desiring the Saints in Heaven to pray for us to be of a very different nature from desiring the same from our Brethren on Earth And I wonder how any Men of common sense can suffer themselves to be so far imposed upon as to believe that any thing of this or all of it together can amount to Idolatry Why we do not the same in all respects to Holy Men upon Earth St. Austin gives the Reason when he says that we worship the Saints in Heaven so much more devouâ—ly than when they were upon Earth because more securely after they have overcome all the dangers and uncertainties of this World as also we praise them more confidently now reigning Conquerours inâ—a more happy Life than whilst they were fighting in this So that what we do more to them in Heaven than whilst they were upon Earth in praying to and praising of them is an expression of a greater devotion to them now than then upon the account of their secure injoyment of a state of Bliss which they can never lose But for that Worship which is call'd Latria for as much as it is a certain service proper to the Divinity we neither worship them saith St. Austin and all Catholicks with him nor teach them to be worshipped but God alone But to return to the Doctor § 2. The first thing he cavils at is our turning to the Apostles with the same postures and expression of devotion to desire them to pray for us after we have invoked the Persons of the Holy Trinity And where lies the Idolatry here if we desire them only as he supposes to pray for us Is the desiring a just Man to pray for us to give him the honour due to God Why then were Job's Friends sent to him for his Intercession Or is it the doing it upon our Knees Why then do Parents permit their Children to ask them blessing in that posture Or is it the using that posture in the Church Are all the People then Idolaters for desiring upon their Knees the Priest nay one another to pray unto God for them These are such pitiful trifles that they were not worth the reciting much less refuting if as St. Hierom saith of the like to recite them were not to refute them Well but St. Peter he saith who would not permit Cornelius to fall down before him and St. Paul who rent his Garments and cryed out to the Men of Lystra Why do you these things would no doubt have been less pleased with this And why so if Cornelius as St. Hierome thinks intended through Error to worship him with divine honour and the Men of Lystra as St. Luke relates to offer sacrifice to St. Paul as to
be Intercessours to Him for them Now that such as piously and faithfully pray to them obtain their desires The Donaries when they pay their Vows do witness as evident Testimonies of their recovered health For some hang up the resemblances of Eyes others of Hands others of Feet made of Gold or Silver which their Lord how small and vile soever the gifts be disdains not most gratefully to accept measuring the gift by the ability of the Giver These therefore being exposed to the eyes of all Men and brought by those who have obtained health are most certain signs of the Cure of the Diseases These I say shew the vertues of the Martyrs who lye buried there and the vertue of the Martyrs declares the God whom they worshipped to be the true God 3dly St. Austin is so copious in this subject that he writes a Treatise rather than a Chapter of the Miracles which were done in his time at the Shrines of several Martyrs particularly of St. Stephen which those who desire to be informed of the Truth may read at their leisure I have instanced already in that of the devout Mother who exacted of St. Stephen to restore her Son to life and had her Petition granted God saith St. Austin doing it per Martyrem by his Martyr I shall only add at present what he relates of a poor but pious Man called Florentius who having lost his Cloak and not having wherewith to buy another went to the twenty Martyrs whose memory saith he with us is very famous and pray'd with a loud voice to be cloathed Certain young Men whom St. Austin calls Irrisores i. e. scoffers hearing him pray derided him as no doubt Dr. St. would have done had he been there as if he had begg'd so much money of the Martyrs as would buy him a Cloak But he departing from thence towards the Sea-side found a great Fish upon the shore in whose Belly when open'd there was found a Gold Ring which the Cook a good Christian to whom he had sold the Fish and knew what had passed gave him with these words Behold how the Twenty Martyrs have cloathed Thee Thus St. Austin little thinking then or now if he know nothing of what passes here below what sport this story will make for the Doctor and his Partizans though he good Mâ—n judg'd it worthy to be recounted that God might be glorified in his Saints And upon the same account I shall not omit though it may add matter of new Merriment to the scoffing humour of the Age to set down what I find related by John Patriarch of JERUSALEM to have passed in this kind with Saint John Damascen about the Year 728. He is known to have been a stout Asserter of the Veneration of Holy Images and when the Emperour Leo Isauricus raised a Persecution for that cause he wrote divers learned Epistles to confirm the Faithful in the Tradition of the Church He was then at Damascus where the Prince of the Saracens kept his Court and highly in the favour of that Prince for his Wisdom and Learning And the Emperor Leo not knowing otherwise how to execute his Fury against him causes a Letter to be forged as from Damascen to Him and to be transcribed by One who could exactly imitate his hand the Contents whereof were to invite him to pass that way with his Army with promise to deliver the City into his hands This Letter the Emperor as out of friendship to an Ally and detestation of the Treachery sent to the Prince of the Saracens who no sooner saw and read it but in a brutish Passion commanded the right hand of Damascen which he supposed had writ it to be cut off Dictum Factum A word and a blow His hand was struck off and hung up in the Market-place till Evening when upon Petition that he might have leave to bury it it was commanded to be delivered to him He takes the hand and instead of laying it in the Ground joins it to his Arm and prostrating himself before an Image of our B. Lady which he kept in his Oratory humbly besought her Intercession for the restoring of his hand that he might employ it in setting forth her Son's praises and Hers This done sleep seiz'd on him and he beheld the Image of the B. Virgin looking upon him with a pleasant aspect and telling Him that his Hand was restored which when he awaked he found to be true and a small Circle or mark only remaining in the place where it had been cut off to testify the truth of the Miracle This is recorded by John Patriarch of Jerusalem in the Life of St. John Damascen and to this I might add many more of the like kind But these may suffice to satisfy an Impartial mind that whether the Saints themselves hear us or no yet those who implore their Intercession are most certainly heard and as St. Austin saith helped by them And it can never be unlawful much less Idolatrous to use that means for the obtaining our just desires which God himself hath attested by so many Miracles to be acceptable to him All that the Doctor brings to uphold his slippery consequence is that it would be a sensless thing to desire some excellent Person in the Indies when we are at our solemn devotion to pray for us And so no doubt he would have derided those three Tribunes who being unjustly condemn'd by the Emperor Constantine commended themselves to the Prayers of St. Nicholas at that time far from the Court for double Innocents But God who is every where present and to whom the Wisdom of the World is Foolishness both could and did reward the simplicity of their Devotion by causing the Holy Man to appear to the Emperour in his sleep and divert him from executing the Sentence In fine if the Doctor will needs have it to be a sensless thing to call upon the Saints in Heaven for the Assistance of their Prayers he must either condemn the Lights both of the Greek and Latin Church as Mr. Thorndike calls them to have been sensless Men and they may thank God they escape so or he must grant this practise of theirs to be a convincing Argument that they believed the Saints did hear them § 4. The last thing he quarrels at is the setting up the Images of Saints in some higher place of the Church and burning Incense before them And what he says to show this to be very Evil is that which proves it to be very Good viz. That the Persons for whose sake this is done are as we suppose them truly such as for their assured sanctity would deserve to have it done to themselves though perhaps Humility or other Moral Considerations might weigh both with them and the Church not to permit it to be done Yet we know that Elias sate upon the top of a Hill and call'd Fire from Heaven upon those two Captains who came to seize him but
us For This saith the afore-cited Bish Forbes is a Testimony in which all Dissenters wonderfully exult and even Triumph But those of the Church of Rome saith he do answer and indeed truly that St. Austin speaks here of Invocation in the Liturgy and at the Altar where forasmuch as Sacrifice is truly offered to God though he think many of the Church of Rome mistaken in their Explication of it Invocation is to be directed to God alone And that this was St. Austin 's meaning in that place would have appeared from the Reason he gives in the words immediately following the Doctor 's citation had he not most conveniently left them out Viz. Because the Priest saith St. Austin sacrifices to God and not to the Martyrs although he sacrifice in Memory of the Martyrs for he is the Priest of God and not of the Martyrs Who sees not that St. Austin here speaks of Invocation made by the Priest at the Offering of the Sacrifice § 4. But that He did allow at other times the direct Invocation of Saints I have already shown in the 4th and 5th Chapters from the Examples of the devout Mother exacting of St. Stephen the restoring her Son to Life and of the poor Man who prayed to the Twenty Martyrs to be cloathed Both which St. Austin highly commends and relates them no doubt as patterns for our Imitation In his 17th Sermon de verbis Apostoli he expresly affirms that it is an Injury to pray for a Martyr to whose Prayers we ought to be commended And in his Book of the Care for the Dead c. 4. 5. he saith that the Christians of his time did not only recommend the Souls of their deceased Friends to God but to the Martyrs also as their Patrons to be helped by them And this he gives for the Reason why they desired to have their Bodies buried neer the Shrines or Sepulchers of the Martyrs Viz. That the Memory of the Place where they were buried might excite their Friends to recommend them by their Prayers to those very Saints These Testimonies are so clear that they cannot possibly be evaded by any shift or pretence whatsoever of Rhetorical Apostrophes or Poetical Flourishes or General Wishes that the Saints would pray for us And although Bishop Mountague with his piercing Wit being press'd with these Authorities sought every chink to escape out at yet Bish Forbes c. 4. p. 320. confesses it was in vain and that he is very sorry that the said Bish Mountague gave so just a cause to Joannes Barclaius to expostulate with Him for imposing upon the credulity of his Soveraign and others in this matter And had he been now alive he might with grief enough have pronounced the same as I doubt not but many other learned Protestanas do of Dr. Stillingfleet As for what he quotes to have been observed by Lud. Vives if his Observation were true that many Christians in his time did offend in re bona in a thing good in it self which the Doctor leaves out because they did saith he no otherwise worship Saints than they did God himself the contrary whereof is asserted by St. Austin of the Christians of his time it imports at most but an Errour or Abuse in some particular Persons such as St. Austin saith in the place above-cited against Faustus that whoever falls into it is to be reproved by sound Doctrine that he may be either corrected or avoided § 4. From St. Austin's Testimony of the custome of Christian People in his time I passed to his Practice and for a Proof of it I instanced in the Prayer he made to St. Cyprian after his Martyrdome in these words Let blessed Cyprian therefore help Us with his Prayers c. This the Doctor calls an Apostrophe that is a Counterfeit Invocation such as Mr. Perkins said we English men make to a Bowl when we pray it globum rogamus to rubb or run And the comparison being so Parallel between Mr. Perkins's Globum rogamus and St. Chrysostom's Sanctos rogamus I cannot but wonder that English-men who are generally esteemed the best Invocators of Bowls in the World should nevertheless be no better Invocators of Saints For if the devotion be the same it can be no more Idolatry to call upon the Saints than upon the Bowls But to speak to the words of St. Austin Let B. Cyprian therefore help us with his Prayers whoever considers the Motive alledged by Him why he addressed himself to St. Cyprian which was for that in Heaven He saw more clearly the truth of that Question of which himself had formerly doubted and St. Austin was then treating of and the necessity he had of his Prayers as being yet in this Mortal Flesh and labouring as in a dark Cloud will easily see that it was not a counterfeit but a true and serious address to Him for the assistance of his Prayers And Chemnitius no doubt understood it so when speaking of this very passage of St. Austin's invocating St. Cyprian This saith he Austin did suffering himself to be carried away with the Times and Custome Well but for all this the Doctor will have it to be a wish rather than a Prayer and he doubts his saying the like to St. Austin Let Blessed Austin now help me with his Prayers would not be taken by us for a renouncing the Protestant Doctrine and embracing that of the Church of Rome To this I Answer although the word Adjuvet taken Grammatically be of the wishing or Optative Mood yet taken with all the circumstances above-mention'd and the custome of Christian People of that time approved by St. Austin it imports as much a formal request as if a Child should say to his Father Benedicat Let my Father bless me For it is not so much the Mood as the Mode that is use and custome which determins the sense of words And if the Doctor will hazard a tryal of it Let him but profess as St. Austin did that we ought to celebrate with Religious Solemnity the Memories of the Martyrs to be assisted by their Prayers and that it is good and lawful to commend our selves to their Prayers and upon this account say as St. Austin said Let B. Cyprian help me with his Prayers I dare undertake his own Party shall take it for renouncing the Protestant Doctrine and embracing that of the Church of Rome But he is so far either from making this Profession with St. Austin or saying to him Let B. Austin now help me with his Prayers that he would have the Reader to take it for one of the superstitions which he would give us to understand crept in after the Anniversary Meetings at the Sepulchers of the Martyrs grew in request For S. Austin himself saith he affirmeth that what they taught was one thing and what they did bear with was another speaking of the customes used at those Solemnities And is it possible he could think so great a