can I know what our Protestants can have if all other things were equal above vulgar Catholiks by their scriptur translated as it lies in its own phrase Do they know any more of the mysteries of salvation Sacraments or hopes of a life to com or sincerity of a pious life then the other I am sure they do less whatever they know and are so taught to do Or does any Protestant after he has read a chapter know any more of what is expedient for salvation then before he began it It renews you will say and moves devotion Devotion to what Are they not taught by the Reformation that the good works there commended to our practis are all mortal sins And therfor do our people so read and hear that in hearing and reading they wholly acquiesce and trouble themselvs no further And they do wisely in it For who would chastise his body or mortifie his appetites or give alms and sin so many wayes with so much expences and trouble when he may as well do nothing and sin less And do not the sacred gospel which Catholiks read in their own language with pious meditations annexed for that very purpos which also they are taught to read for no other end move devotion too And this I judg to be right piety Whereas to read only to say that I have read or to find out new ways or strengthen my self therin is but vanity and sin After a duty is once known Catholiks conceiv then no further thing remains but only their corresponding practis which is with all their forces to be put in ure according to the dictates of that their rule of faith now sufficiently understood unto their sanctification and merit Whilst others think nothing behind but only to read over again what they knew before that they may have words in their head to talk of Which of these is right Christianity he knew well enough who said Fidelis sermo de his volo te confirmare ut curent bonis operibus praeesse qui credunt Deo It is a faithful saying and of this I would have you to be strongly confirmed that such as once have beleeved in God attend unto good works These things are good and profitable to men but other questions controversies and contentions which are the only fruit of our vulgar reading of scriptur in its own short ambiguous phrase these do thou avoid for they are useles and vain This is St Pauls mind and I think he had the Spirit of God in him As for the sacred liturgy which Mr Whitby would also have in a vulgar tongue if he knew what the Messach or Catholick Liturgy is which here I do not intend to teach him he would know that it could no more be understood in English then in Hebrew Latine or Greek For in it the Priest does but offer and pray submissively for the peoples attonement unto him who equally understands all languages and people offer with him as they are taught and know well enough to do all their several necessities either with words or without them in the mediation of his blood who reconciled the world in his flesh to God which reconciliation is figured and repeated in their Messach for their religious exercise and comfort And the great capital work of a true religion ought to be common unto all not to those only who hear and speak and see but even to the deaf and blind and dumb how ever these may fail in other inferiour and less necessary duties Ch. 16. from p. 273. to 369. Maintains very stoutly first that the Saints and Angels of God do not pray for us in heaven either in general or in particular Secondly that they do not assist help or protect us by their presence on earth And thirdly that to trust to any such help is to rest in them as our final end and to make them our Gods Though the two first be as much dissonant to any true religion as the last to reason yet will Mr. Whitby hold them all three And he has an evasion for any grounds or reasonings you or any Catholik can make an evasion at hand as smart and senceles as any of those he gave before against Supremacy c. But this your catholik doctrin about Angels he buts and runns at it with most frightful and horned dilemma's So many millions of Angel-guardians quoth he if for example upon the festival of St. Peter they go up to heaven to St. Peter with their pupils prayers who guards their persons and if they do not go up who presents their prayers Again When saith he these Angel messengers com so may thousand of them at once to tell the Virgin Mary of her new suitors how can she have any quiet to say her prayers And if she say her own prayers quietly how can they tell her continually of so many new suitors Again Have all the houses in London and all the Papist houses in Rome so many Angels as will guard them and keep the Devil from setting them on fire or not If they have then are the Angels finely employed If they have not why doth not the enemy set a fire on them every night Again Had Jobs cammels oxen and asses ther Angel-guardian or no If not why then did Satan complain he could not com at them If they had then must we allow our Author Mr. Cressy one Is not this notable divinity Surely Hudibras was but an ass to Whitby This this is the man of whom the poet sings Canto 1. This is he In school divinity as able As he that height irrefragable A second Thomas or at once To name them all another Duns But all this countrey divinity Mr. Whitby gathered I know well enough à sensibilibus from the natur and property of his serving-boy who cannot go of an errand and stay too cannot sup and blow together cannot tell a tale and whistle both at once cannot speak of Jobs asses but he must remember Mr. Cressy In truth though Mr. Whitby be thus extravagant yet can I not perswade my self that other graver Protestants are so likewise For when Christ our Lord comforts his poor beleevers and terrifies their oppressing adversaries with this his divine ratiocination See that you do not abuse or contemn any of these my little ones For I say unto you that their Angels do alwayes behold the face of my Father who is in heaven he seems apparently to speak somthing that serves directly for the catholik beleef and is consequently against these three assertions of Whitby to the contrary For those angel-guardians whom our Lord calls their angels the angels of his beleevers and of his little ones either they must be so perspicatious as one way or other to see even in heaven where they behold the face of God in glory all the persecutions and necessities of them whose angels they are or at least whilst they are present on earth with them whose angels they be they must still
see and enjoy the God of glory who is in heaven Both these things are possible and whether it be this or that they must needs be both so potent and good as to be able and willing when they see time to assist and help them in their afflictions and need whose angels they are either by praying for them in general or in particular or by strengthening comforting protecting their persons And lastly poor man may comfort himself in this invisible assistance whatever it be and however it be wrought without making those angels his gods or relying upon them as his final end And all this must be intended by our Lord and Saviour in that his comfortable ratiocination I should think if it conclude any thing If they be not there insinuated it is very hard to say what it may conclude If the angels do neither pray for us nor any way assist and help us nor we can without danger of sin rely on any such assistance then surely to say Let none abuse my little ones for their angels c. would be a ratiocination as impertinent as to say Let none abuse c. for the North and South poles are half the heavens distant and far more dangerous For man could hardly be perswaded by such a speech to put any trust in that distance of the poles as here he cannot but be moved to take comfort in that acquaintance and nearnes we have with angels which any way to rely on Mr. Whitby tell us is to rest in them as our final end and make them our gods I could wish Mr. Whitby would first consult his own reason whether any way to rely on the comfort of second causes visible or invisible infer necessarily that we do rely upon them as our ultimate end and make them our gods as he affirms more then once in this his 16 chapter And again I desire him that he would be more wary and take heed how he speaks against the angels of God and deride those hosts of heaven in whom our Lord Christ advised us if I understand him right to take comfort lest they strike him as som others they have don with sudden death Poor Catholiks are yet in their pilgrimage and place of sufferance who must therfor patiently endure all scoffs contumelies and slanders for their futur merit But the Angels of God are in glory and blessed and therfor not to be blasphemed or mockt at by insolent dust or their protection and assistance to be slighted What is the essence of Angels what their presence or how great their power we cannot here under our thick corporeal veil conceiv They may for ought we can tell be as compleatly present all at once both here on earth and heaven too unto any effect of perceiving or operating as a man is present within the four walls of his chamber At least if our Lord whom we pretend all of us equally to beleev hath so clearly allowed us to support our selves in their assistance however it be wrought no man I should think who bears the name of Christian can with any modesty affirm as Whitby does here that they neither pray for us in heaven nor assist us on earth nor that we can any way support our selvs in any comfort from them without making them our gods Ch. 17. from page 369 to 410. Is very bitter against the celibacy and single life of priests and exclaims on the contrary with very broad language that you may see he is very sensible of what he sayes against the uncleannes of the clergy not excepting any nor allowing so much as a possibility to do otherwise And I doubt not saith he p. 378. whether such advocates of Celibacy as M. C. if strict inquiry were made might not be often found where the Card. of Crema was Where that man was found I do not know In all likelihood it was in som place where Jobs asses use to graze for he lately made you Sir one of them Good Sir do not hate the man as he deservs but pitty pardon and pray for him He has mocked away his own angel-guardian and cannot therfor be civil towards men Mr. Whitby understands not the several wayes and means prescribed by catholik religion as a preservative against the incursions of that or any other sensual temptation He is unacquainted either with their frequent fastings or disciplines or hair-cloth or continual and hourly exercise of psalms hymns and canticles which take up in a manner all the whole life of the Roman Clergy That man who uses heartily such like exercises commended by catholik religion will easily subdue any whatever temptation if ever it should assault him as they know well enough who practis that their religion seriously and prevent oftentimes its very assault But if any will be so forgetful of his own welfare as utterly to neglect those sacred means he may fall deservedly into a lower religion and becom a Whitby Ministers are either in bed with their wives or thinking haply after one when the catholik clergy if they correspond with their duty and calling are watching and saying their sacred mattins which consist of many divine lessons psalms anthems responsories hymns canticles which put divine and spiritual thoughts into their minds When ministers are feasting they fast When they are caressing their mistrisses these chastise their body with disciplines When they got out of their beds are at their mornings draught these are saying their Lauds and Prime and devoutly disposing themselves by prayer and meditation upon their knees unto their sacred liturgy When they are eating and drinking and mannaging worldly affairs about their wives and children these are at their Sext and None and Vespars and Compline that they may fulfill their daily task of prayers and devotions to their Redeemer I say no more but of this I am and will be consident that if Mr. Whitby had ever practised or seen the lives and conversations of Roman Priests those visible angels of God or been otherwise acquainted therewith he would not have so boldly affirmed as he does even against the very tenour of gospel which saith that som are made eunuchs by men and som again make themselvs so for the kingdom of heaven that it is impossible to be chast Nor would he so universally calumniat all professours of chastity for the wickednes of som few who have in som particular ages and places given offence by their evil lives unto Catholiks whose testimony Mr. Whitby uses against them But commonly men judg of others as they act themselvs And he that keeps himself chast will in charity think so of other men When you say Sir and all catholiks with you that it is indeed a doctrin of devils both pernicious and fals to forbid marriage absolutely as evil and unlawful in it self as did the Encratites Montanists Marcionites and Manichees but yet relatively and upon som particular account may som persons notwithstanding be withheld from marriage for diviner
much swerved from the ancient primitive practice of former Christians For Protestants have neither priests nor altars nor offerings nor sacrifice nor satisfactions nor expiations for the dead which those authorities speak of Ch. 11. from page 188. to 203. The real presence under the elements of the Eucharist Mr. Whitby here will not by any means endure And he hath one shield of a word which consists of almost as many syllables as Ajax his buckler of bulls hides to repell all autorities that may witness it Representatively that is the word Thou seest saith St. Chrisostom upon the altar the very body which the wise-men saw and worshipped Representatively saith Whitby Again The most precious thing in heaven I will shew thee upon earth saith the same father It is shewed representatively saith Whitby it is seen representatively I dare not adore the earth saith St. Augustin and yet I have learned how the earth is to be adored becaus flesh is of the earth and our Lord gave us his flesh to eat which no man eats except he first adore It is Christ saith Whitby who is adored representatively And if any words will not bear that distinction then are they all spurious Nay if any should say expresly that not only Christ in heaven but his very Sacrament is worshipped this man will tells us presently who hath as many shifts in readiness where one will not serv his turn as Achelous had to slip out of the hands of Hercules that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and adoro have other significations But he has poor man no very good memory For after he had in this one chapter spent many of his pages to show that the real presence was not the former faith of Christians and that they never adored the Eucharist he lets fall a word by chance in the very close which spoils all by giving us to understand that this was so universal a beleef and practis among Christians that it came even to the notice of Infidels and that it was withall of so great concernment amongst beleevers that it expressed their whole religion as the abridgment of their faith and great capital work of their devotion Quandoquidem Christiani adorant quod comedunt sit anima mea cum Philosophis It was the speech of Avicen saith Whitby although I think it was Averroes who well enough understood both of them the natur of Christian religion not only by what they saw themselves but what they had read from more ancient writers both Christian pagan and Mahometan up and down the world concerning the religion of Christians Since the Christians worship that which they eat saith that Infidel let my sould be with Philosophers Ch. 12. from page 203. to 218. Labours much for the general use of the Cup in all Communions But neither does Mr. Whitby nor can he distinguish as appears by his discours wherein he sayes that otherwise ther would not be a representation of Christs death which is the wisest word he speaks in all this whole chapter I say he knows not and cannot distinguish that ther is in that one Eucharistian liturgy a double action the one of sanctifying and offering to God the other of giving or communicating to the people In the sanctifying and offering of the sacred simbols does only the sacrifice which is a representation of Christs death consist But the communicating of these symbols to the people is only a consequent of the former and no formal representation of our Lords death at all But he does not know and you need not heed what he sayes The concomitance of our Lords body and blood where ever it be in any one or other of the species or symbols which may enough justifie communion in one kinde he tells you very roundly it is a figment But if he had heeded the very practis of his own Church which indeed he never does he would have forborn those words For when the Protestant minister gives the people first the bread and sayes Take and eat this in remembrance that Christ died for thee and feed upon him in thy heart by faith with thanksgiving Do not the ministers words there imply a concomitance before the cup come even as perfect a concomitance as you Sir can plead for I think they do For surely they intend not to feed only upon one half of him Chap. 13. from page 218 to 230. Declares that alms-deeds and preaching of the Gospel is a sacrifice But the Eucharist he will not allow to be any true sacrifice at all Although to put by your arguments and solid reasonings for it he grants it may be called a Symbolical sacrifice And so he has caught hold of another distinction which runs quite through this matter or rather put the same distinction into other characters And if any ancient writers as ther are enough do give testimony that our Lords body and blood in the Eucharist is offered immolated and sacrificed on Christian altars by the priest for our attonement It is to be understood saith Whitby to be offered symbolically immolated symbolically sacrificed symbolically figuratively significatively representatively And though you beat his head never so much with your autorities and reasons so long as symbolically remains there you do but beat the air But where are any altars in our English Churches or any sacrifices offered or immolated theron And how comes it to pass that all these hundred years of our separation from Roman unity our people have never been told that they have priests still amongst them and altars and sacrifice although they be but symbolical ones symbolical sacrifice symbolical altars and symbolical priests For sacrifice is the very form and essence of all religion And they that know so much would have been much satisfied to hear that they have yet a sacrifice at least a symbolical sacrifice amongst them I will be bold to say that not one man of a million has ever heard of any such thing in an English pulpit or ever read it in a catechism The minister of the word and word of the minister that is all we ever hear of But it is thought perhaps that symbolical Priest would make but a jarring sound like two voices in a defective octave which have a semblance and shadow of a perfect concord but coming short of it produce the harshest and worst of discords in our ear That our Lords death upon the Cross was a true and real sacrifice to God for mankinde all Catholiks know well enough and our Ministers need not put them in minde of that which already they beleev But as the sacrifices of the old law were instituted by almighty God to be often iterated before the passion of the great Messias for a continual exercise of religion in order to his future death So did the same Lord for the very same purpos of religious exercise institute another to be iterated after his death unto which once past it was to have reference as the former had a
children from parents And thus he concludes his third plea against Popery ending his book with a prayer That the Lord would give his reader understanding He prayes to his own ruin For if the reader of his book have understanding the writer of it will utterly lose his credit And is it possible that Dr. Taylor should have so low opinion of us all as to expose such talk as this to the view of three nations He wrote indeed first and principally for those Irish people that belong to his charge and he has it may be some such opinion of them as I remember I had when being a boy I first heard talk of the wild Irish But we are now men and should put away such childsh things Neither they nor we are so wild or simple as Dr. Taylor takes us to be How he has behaved himself in his first chapter wherin he would prove Popery that is to say Catholik Religion neither apostolik nor primitive I have told you Sir more at large Now I tell you briefly concerning these two chapters that ther is not so much as any the least parcel of popery proposed to be confuted therin But he either depraves and slanders their religion or imposes what no way belongs to it which is injustice on both hands But their discredit will promote his applaus and he cares not how it be effected He is secure if they be misunderstood and himself beleeved to be their enemy For then the better part of the land will hold him up and the other not go about to pull him down And therfor that all may joyn with him in the derision of this same Ecce homo he first like a Jew puts a reed into the Papists hand and then laughs at the featous scepter All this whole book of Dr. Taylors and three parts of all the other books that have ever been written since the Reformation against Popery might be sufficiently answered without descending to particulars and totally annulled by one general discours of the nature and poperties of school-divinity whence the adversaries of Catholik faith cull out all their little drolleries when they make their rhetorical discourses against Popery to blind the Land and abuse good people And I had it in my heart when I first set pen to paper to do it fully so much in my heart that I made but little account in comparison of all the other things I had to speak But I have already exceeded the length of a letter and shall take some other time for that discours Only take notice Sir that Dr. Taylor and such like Protestant writers do as fond and unjustly herein as that Catholik would do who undertaking to write against protestancy should never take notice either of the principles of reformation or of the articles canons or constitutions for example of our English Church but only pick out here and there some few words of this or that obscure ministers book found up and down in the Stationers shops in Oxford Cambridg or London and call a heap of such stuff swerving perhaps from the Protestancy he opposes by the name of Protestant-doctrin Thus do all Protestants deal with popery Not a word do we hear when any one of them writes against it of their substantial Religion which is in the hearts and hands of all Catholiks established by gospel tradition and councels and justified by the universal practice and judgments of all men in the world who profess that faith which only is popery and Catholik profession but only som deviations either in the words or manners of some one or other that have lived amongst them and this is that they call Popery This Disswasive of Dr. Taylors is wholly nothing els only with this difference that the subject and heads of his first chapter is somthing that pertains to Catholik faith and profession though in speaking of them he utterly swerves from the purpos but in his other two chapters both what he speaks and what he speaks of is utterly impertinent But thus is malice and misapprehension against Catholiks and their Religion most holy and innocent diffused up and down in mens hearts to the ruin of charity and a right understanding in this Land But my Protestant Countreymen those I beseech not to be too credulous And my Catholik Countreymen I most fervently beg of them still more and more to beleev and hope and trust in God who in his good time will justifie his own religion and all his poor servants that profess it We must still remember in what a world we live and be willing for our beloved Lord to suffer contumelies here in all resignation and peace He that can do this is a conquerour of himself and lord of the world a friend of Christ and heir of heaven This is all Sir I either mean or need to speak at this time concerning this Disswasive Try all things and hold what is right Truth like the sun will soon appear to an open unveiled and clear eye but prejudice leads us blind-fold unto ruin Nor must you stay Sir till our good ministers tell you that you and they are in an errour Though an Angel from heaven should convince them of it yet can he not by any argument perswade them to leave a wife and five hundred pound a year for a poor humble and naked truth It were in the mean time a thing I should think of much wisdom in them not to write any books against Papists For they do but lose by that publick slander which comes to Catholik eyes all that varnish of vain glory which they procure themselvs by private calumnies cast upon them in the pulpit which Catholiks never hear of Some one or other amongst those papists may haply think it expedient and no wayes against the rules of patience to refute their folly And then the minister is lost That most honourable authority which forbids Catholiks to write any books forbids others by a tacit consequence to slander them For the law of God and nature ever permits and somtimes commands the innocent to justifie themselves and clear their injured reputation Farewell Dated this 8. of the Calends of July 1665. J. V. C.