holy Assemblies the great paramount work of Christianity especially at Mass But these men although moved unto that their exception by a Zeal not evil yet were they fain to yield at last unto the prevaling reasons of other Prelates which over bore their lesser ones Some other of our Catholick Doctors and Prelates would have had us to have used no Pictures that Jews and Pagans might not catch at that pretence to cavil against our Christianity as they did But all these submitted at last unto the prevailing part by whom they were made to understand that the inconveniences they urged were but imaginary and small the conveniences great and real There have been not a few who have excepted against much vocal Prayer because it took up too much of the time which would be better employed in the more principal work of prayer in spirit But yet could they not carry it although their reasons were very plausible and good because that high and Angelical prayer in spirit agreed not equally to all men or to any one consisting of flesh and blood equally at all times and places as vocal prayer does Some have disliked even our material Temples built up so sumptuously as they are because God immense and incomprehensible dwells not in buildings made by mans hands Heaven is his Seat and Earth his Footstool Yet could they not obtain that our Churches should be therefore pulled down or not built up Prayer-books were nothing at all in use amongst Christians in primitive times when they prayed almost altogether in spirit and used no other vocal prayer but that our Lord taught us And yet this hinders us not either to make such books or use them in following times Instead of our beads in wood or mettal they used in ancient times a bag of little stones by the emptying whereof they knew that they had said over our Lords prayer a hundred or perhaps three hundred times according as any one in his devotion had prefixed to himself every day of his life to do for Gods glory and service And there might be inconveniences pretended against our present heads especially those of gold and pearl But they will not be thrown away for that Our Church-musick has been more than once opposed and that by Prelates most holy and renowned men who deemed it an unsufferable lettance to the spiritual recollection which Christians ought above all things to a tend unto that they may have our Lords good Spirit and his holy operations in them especially when they meet together at their holy Synaxis But Church-musick is kept up to this day notwithstanding their reason against it which is very good for other reasons no less good and great than it specified and urged by the far greater number of pious Prelates for it And yet if all or the greater part of Catholick Prelates meeting together should take away all these outward helps from us beads and books singing and Church-musick pictures and Churches and all finding the inconveniences to be now greater than they have been and weightier than any convenience we have by them though the thing would seem very strange to us yet ought we I think to obey them resignedly and attend wholly unto our spiritual meditations either alone or in our Eucharistian meetings and to the other good works commanded orcounselled us in Gospel in expectation of our future bliss and eternal happiness in God which can never be taken from us though all things of discipline or helps in government be alterable § 4. And now it is time to turn back and view the subject of this Chapter that we may see if any one period in it be true and pertinent He tells us first that Papists worship God by Images which logically is not true Then that a representation of the invisible Deity cannot be made which is impertinent Then that the worship given to God by an Image does not terminate upon God which is neither pertinent nor true And so he proceeds on to the very end of his Chapter with sounds either empty or false or both neither heeding or caring what he says so he do but mention learned Papists and wiser Heathens which may help to butterress up his reputation I cannot but remember here the shadow or Ghost in Virgil which Juno made of Aeneas to draw her beloved Turnus out of the field It seemed to fight and threaten and press on and give back But nothing at all was done really Tum dea nube cave tenuem sine viribus umbram In faciem Aeneae visu mirabile monstrum Dardaniis ornat telis clypeumque jubasque Divini assimilat capitis dat inania verba Dat sine mente sonum gressusque effingit euntiâ— Morte obita quales fama est volit are figuras Aut quae sopitos deludunt somnia sensus Ac primas laeta ante acres exultat imago Irritatque virum telis ac voce lacessit And such a shadow of controversie is all this present Chapter and his whole book also a foming face and feeble force big but empty words rumbling and yet insignificant sounds quâ—ck profers and no progress a daring shadow or armed Ghost without either body or bones And yet such a thing as defies the whole Catholick Church steps out from the rest of his Camp and defies them all alone defies them both in letters syllables words And this is all For he touches no body Because Catholâ—cks by the advice and allowance of their Prelates do keep amongst them the representation of the divine Founder of their Religion who appeared amongst us by his unspeakable Love in form of a Man and of some of his holy followers in the way he chalked out for us therefore he talks of Moloch and Milcom Osiris and Isis Chemosh and Astaroth Baal Peor and Rimmon golden Bulls and Remphan the Calves of Dan and Bethel And what is all this for Wy to over-run Papists and beat us down How can it do that These Idols were set up by Heathens in opposition to the true God and in the very place of God as darkness in the night time is in the place of light This is true What then and therefore I must not forsooth keep the figure of Jesus Christ or of S. Paul or other domestick of my own religion for my own incouragement therein What likness what consequence is there in all this Which is Remphan and where is Moloch Which is the Calf and where is the Bull Nay and here it is worth our observing too that Protestant Gentlement and Ladies of England Ministers and Bishops too have all pictures in their Chambers as well as Catholicks even those of our holy Apostâ—es and Martyrs as well as others And there they are good and lawful figures but in our Chambers they are Bulls of Basan and Calves of Bethel among us Catholick Pictures are against Moses his Law but theirs are not so Although they be representations both in Heaven above and Earth below and Waters
end we say our daily prayers with our hymns and canticles for this end we meditate for this end we fast and chastise our bodies for this we do penance make restitution give alms frequent sacraments and all that we endeavour according to our poor abilities Gods good counsels and holy grace assisting us He who shall please onely to peruse the writings of Dr. Eckius and his fellow Catholicks who opposed Martin Luther and his Protestant-reformation when it first rose up may there clearly see that this interiour sanctity and renovation and holiness of life is the one great Catholick point stoutly maintained against those wild and dissolute Reformers who began now to corrupt the world with that cursed opinion of theirs that faith alone is sufficient to salvation And what a strange man is this Dr. Stillingfleet If any one indeed of our men had objected to Protestants that in their reformation-way neither penance nor contrition nor satisfaction nor renovation of life is needful according to the first Masters of the Reformation who taught and maintained openly and in the eyes of this very Sun that nothing is necessary to salvation but onely to believe and by that naked faith to apply Christs merits to themselves all interiour sanctification being both impossible and needless he had said no more than truth and what he might easily have proved out of the first Reformers principles however I hope not maintained now by many of our wiser Protestants in England who notwithstanding remain still in that reformation which was chalked out for them by such wicked Leaders But now to lay upon Catholicks that wicked doctrine of Reformers opposed now a whole hundred years by our Catholick Divines is a desperate confidence befitting none but men wholly unconscionable Let them keep their own dirt to themselves and not throw it into our faces however they begin now to be weary and ashamed of it The precepts of holiness sobriety and justice are insignificant to them who have hitherto even from the very cradles of this unlucky reformation publickly defended them to be insignificant and not to us who have still maintained that they are the very all in all of Christianity I have troubled my self some while to think what should move Dr. Still to invent this slander Some word or other he must pervert but I cannot conclude what it should be Perhaps he may take occasion from hence that whereas there be several things concurring to our purification after sin as Gods grace and our dislike of our own ill deeds fear of Gods wrath and punishment grief for his love and favour forfeited an humble confession purpose of amendment and renovation of life some Schoolmen have amongst their other curiosities considered into which of these many things may our justification be principally attributed as the principal virtue and cause of it under God For God who created us without our selves will not redeem us without our selves And if any one in his philosophy have said that confession and sorrow have the chiefest influence on our fide that may be enough for Dr. Still to say as here he does that we make confession and contrition all in all and renovation of life nothing Or perhaps because Catholick Doctors have taught that confession together with contrition may sometimes be so great and cordial at the last hour that evil men may thereby find mercy with God as the good thief did although they have no further leasure to mend and renew their lives therefore does this man conclude that with us confession with contrition is sufficient without any more ado Whence soever he concludes or gathers it he knows best himself But this I know that it is an abominable slander And if all his readers were as skilful in our Catholick religion as we our selves who profess it he would not have dared to speak these things despairing then of finding any credit either with man woman or child § 2. They of the Church of Rome need little to heed a good life who can have their sins expiated in Purgatory by the prayers of the living which is a doctrine very pleasing to rich men but uncomfortable to the poor Pretty stuff And need not then any man heed either to have patience in afflictions or do his duty because another prays to God either that he may do so or find mercy if he have done otherwise Or must he needs be negligent of himself to day because he hopes good people will pray for him to morrow when he cannot help himself Souls departed are by our Christianity believed to be now out of the place and way of merit for there is neither art nor industry nor any good work to be done in the grave whether we all hasten And if friends on earth where Gods favour may by our dutiful compliance be obtained do commend their dead to Gods mercy and goodness this surely cannot make those friends careless of themselves while they remain here living All men know that it is not enough for our entrance into heaven to cry Lord Lord which is the voice of those who think that onely faith saves but the will of God who is in heaven is to be fulfilled by every one that shall enter there And yet it is good and pleasing and profitable notwithstanding to cry and supplicate unto our Lord God with all earnestness of heart both for our selves and friends But the poor are then in a sad condition and the rich man may easilier enter into the kingdom of heaven than a camel through a needles eye by procuring Masses for their Souls Who told this man that the Souls of the poor are not prayed for in the Catholick Church He onely thinks so And he thinks amiss therein as he loves to do Whence doth he gather that the rich go to heaven so easily in our esteem by Masses This he thinks too Perhaps he does For I am much deceived if he do not utter many a falshood which he knows to be such before he utters it At least none of ours ever told him the one nor the other and what we believe or do our selves he may easily mistake and we have had already sufficient experience of his ignorance therein or some worser misdemeanor Prayer or whatever good work of Christianity although it may do some good ye◠does it not therefore do all and what does not all good must not therefore be denied to do some Poor Lazarus's may by their cold hunger and nakedness here on earth patiently endured satisfie for their humane frailties so far with God here that after this life having no utmost farthing to account for they may chance not to need any farther help But the rich men of the world will not easily be brought unto those many voluntary penances and mortifications which their sensualities exact unto their expiation and peace with God It were a happy thing if they would be perswaded in their life-time to distribute part of their goods unto
beloved memory of our crucified Lord and all his blessed followers that they incite in their hearts a thankfulness for so many their good deeds still redounding to our good and that they kindle a desire of imitating them so often as they behold those virtuous faces once Pilgrims as we now are and Believers with us even as they imitated our Lord by a strange force and courage trampling Sin and Satan under their feet And thus by Images we do reverence and honour Christ our Lord and his holy Saints with a respect and veneration due unto them each one in his place and dignity Nay one yet further good use do we guided by our Faith and Religion still make of those pious representations For being assured that our Saints in heaven do offer up their incense of prayers in behalf of their Brethren on earth we seldom cast our eyes upon their figures but desire in heart at least to reap some benefit thereby partakers of their heavenly intercession Thus we do But does Dr. Stilling fleet speak of these things or unto these things or against any of these things no not one word Nor would any custom of ours or belief or doctrine of the Church have brought in any of the contents which make up his first Chapter wherein our Image-idolatry is declared and confuted by him Wherefore laying out his charge against us in a phrase of ambiguous words industriously conâ—râ—ved he brings in thereby all that talk of his which nothing at all concerns us aâ—â— yet sounds aâ— if it did This Sir is his inâ—â—nceâ—â—cy Papists saith he worship God by Images the Church of Rome worships God in Images and therefore are they Idolaters This is his charge very ambiguous as all men may see and of an uncertain interpretation It sounds in a direct sence as if Catholicks had some representations of the eternal Deity either made by themselves or some other way conâ—â—â—ghed unto them by which and in which they worship God Thus chief Magicians pâ—â—cking their finger let the blood drop in a pan of â—urning coals and when the sinoak â—rises down they fall and worship thâ—ir wâ—ckâ—d Familiar whose face then appears beâ—ore them in a Looking-glass set aforehand for that puâ—pose on their Altar And some such way â—â—ay the Reader conceive that we worship God in Images as they do their Familiar Demon. And again when it is said that we worship God by Images he may as well imagine that seâ—ting our Images a fire we offer them to God as a Burnt-offering or some other such like way worship God thereby For this is the direct and connatural meaning of the words And in this direct â—ence the Doctor proceeds and brings in thereby all the contents of that his first Chapter Papists saith he worship God by Images and in Images which is idolatry and a fond idolatry too For such a worship cannot terminate upon God because he hath forbid it For can any representation of the inviâ—â—ble Deâ—y be made as even the wiser Heathens have ackâ—â—wledged An Image of God must needs be below God and unbeseeming his glory For which cause Moses forbids it S. Paul disowns it learned Christian Doctors abhorre it This was the fault of Aaron the fault of Jeroboam the fault of all the Heathens who worshipped God in their Images or Idols Thus our Doctor speaks and this is all he speaks quite besides his business and our Catholick custom For our Images are the representations of our Lord Christ born and crucified for us and of his holy Apostles and Martyrs and other his renowned followers And although we believe Christ our Lord to be God yet the Image of Christ and the Image of God are two different things as all men know This then is the reason why he words his charge against us in that manner he does with much insincerity For if he had only charged us with that which we only do namely that we make Images of Christ and his blessed Saints or that we worship and honour them thereby this would not have brought in those many materials of his long discourse nor would he have had any thing thereof to have said against us And surely we can only honour them by Images whose Images we set up for our use as 〈◊〉 men know well enough And if he will infâ—â—â— upon another reflected act because 〈◊〉 think we do well thereby in order to God thâ—◠〈◊〉 therefore worship God by them 〈…〉 them this is meerly to trifle For thus wâ—â—ay be said and that more properly 〈◊〉 â—â—ly too that we worship God by the Kâ—â—◠〈◊〉 in the King or other Magistraâ—◠〈…〉 us by God Almighty for our go◠〈◊〉 which in that sence is most certainly true Nay we may as well be charged to worship God by and in our Bread and Butter Beef and Mutton which we eat giving God thanks thereby This I say is the Doctors inunâ—â—â—ity totally blameable in Treatises of Contâ—oversies that concern Religion which exact a proper direct and plain expression And it is in vain for him to reply that we use also the representations of Father Son and Holy Ghost For we have none of these as they are in themselves but as they have appeared unto us the Holy Ghost in the form of a Dove the Son in the form of man and Father as he founds to us under that notion in our ear which are still no representations of the invisible Deity of which the Doctor speaks And he may remember too that the present Church of England which he pretends to defend allows and uses all these Images also even that of God the Father which many of our Catholick Prelates have excepted against and endeavoured to suppress however some others amongst them have thought withall that such a figure might well enough be permitted because what may be represented to the ear may in the same manner be represented to the eye also Thus much Sir of the Doctors insincerity hitherto And what pretty Sophistical tricks he uses afterward you may see in due time and place You may note only for the present that after his imagined overthrow of our Christian Images he now in his second Chapter invades our antient Sacrifice typified by Melchisedek his bread and wine which he calls the Host just according to the first method of the furious Reformation which first battered our Church-windows and then slurred down the Altar-table Host-Idolatry and Saint-Idolatry The adoration of the Host is a grand piece of Idolatry in the Roman Church Nor will it suffice them here to plead that they believe Christ to be in the Eucharist on the same divine motives they believe Christ to be God and that they may therefore worship him there for if there were a revelation of his presence there yet is there not the same command of worshipping him there as is of his person Let all the Angels of God adore and again all must honour the Son as they do
is here put upon the Jesuitical party And yet it is nothing to our purpose if it were But as to the personal designs of them or any others we can no more dive into them then into the several wandering thoughts and purposes of men museing daily in London-streets about their affairs And one man or other thus museing amiss amongst the Jesuits can no more be called the Jesuitical party then such a one here in England be termed the English party Mariana I am sure has been soundly checkt amongst them and other Catholicks for his fault here spoken of And if the Court or Courtiers of Rome have any fancy that they are higher than Kings and by their excommunication can render them Kings no more as this Doctour here speaks this may argue indeed that they are a high minded people But Courtiers do not walk so exactly according to our Christian religion that this can prove that vanity of theirs to be any part of it Catholick Kings who have been here in England well nigh twenty since the Conquest more among the Saxons and others not a few amongst our antient Brittains and the present Catholick Kings of France Spain the Emperour German Princes and others have and do all know well enough that such a fancy is no part of our Catholick religion Nor did our King Henry the Eighth who first left it off express any such cause or reason for it The times would be very good and happy if all the words and actions of every particular man were answerable to his holy faith But this is not to be expected in this evil world And to call that religion which is done or spoken contrary unto it is a very great injury and injustice Our holy religion teaches us to observe and obey our Kings and Superiours as Gods Vicegerents upon earth though they be Infidels and Pagans and rather to lay down our lives for them then suffer them to be hurt And this is nothing but the very law of Nature antecedent to any religion whatsoever and holds good although there were neither heaven nor hell nor any reward or punishment to come And what power can any man upon earth have to take that away which he never gave nor ever had He that creates can only annihilate So long as kings are Catholicks the Pope prays for them And if they cease to be so he is nothing to them any more And yet are they the same they were in all their royalty and power uncontroulably If the King of France should receive the Garter from our King of England he is thought to be so long his friend as he is pleased to wear it But if he throw it off he is King of France still as much as ever he was I know not what the Court or Courtiers of Rome may think or say in this business For what the Doctour here tells us about the Irish remonstrance is a personal business and not so circumstanced that one can draw any general conclusion or position from it But if they be only so much as said either to have conceived or countenanced any such opinion looked upon by all Catholicks and good Christians upon earth as ungrounded fals and impious it behoves them I should think both for the publick good honour of Catholick religion and their own credit to see it censured with all speed that the progress of Christianity be not stopped by it For no Pagan King will venture at a promise of everlasting felicity with the hazard of his Crown at the pleasure of one man whom he never saw nor knows Sure I am if any such opinion had been heard of when Christianity was first planted in Kingdoms it had never found footing in this world And if it be now countenanced the progress of Christianity is at an end I doubt not but that a Cotholick writer may in his controversy about religion if so he pleas defend an opinion also of any one or other who has professed the Catholick religion which he maintains But this is more then any one needs to do For religion is quite another thing derived from another authour and original established in another manner no less differing from an opinion then a fixed star in the firmament from the mist or fog ariseing from the earth Faiâ—h is one known thing but opinions are innumerable and endless If the various opinions entertained in mens minds but one only day in any City of England were all faithfully recorded at night they would exhibite to a Reader a most prodigious spectacle Opinions are infinitly various infinitly changable infinitely contradictory and absurd in the world Nor may we doubt but that thousands of them are contrary both to religion and law Angry rageing men and wanton women unfaithful servants and di obedient children theevs and murderers cheats and liars can we think when they act according to their own disordered passions that they hold not then an opinion that in such circumstances it is expedient for them so to do Wicked sinners hold wicked opinions be the religion what it will Gainsay and blame them in their heat and it will soon appear that they are stiff and resolved in that their opinion by the very fury of their wrath And what will not sycophants and flatterers either say or write to pleas the mind of those on whom they depend even against their own Rules of law and religion are fixt and stable and ever the same But opinions are moveable as water and never right but when conformable to a right rule of some good law and how far they are conformable so far are they right and no more And therfore it is a madness in any one who undertakes to write against the standard of a religion to object instead of that opinions of men For first one man may have an opinion to day and write it also in a book and yet few years after nay perhaps very few days change his mind Secondly the opinion of one man may be gain-said by a thousand as wise as he who live under the same law and religion Thirdly an opinion in a book is indeed nothing at all in the world but a meer pâ—atonick idea till it be reduced to some reall existence by circumstances which actuate it and make the action really to be and some opinions are worse then nothing For which reason all the multitude of opinions which sill up the books of learned Casuists may be exercises of wit indeed but no guids can they be unto action The direction of a liveing Oracle and Counsellour who can penetrate all present circumstances and prescribe by his wisdom on which side is then most of good and least of evil which is the only rule that directs a wise counsellour what to determin this only is our guide in doubts Wherfore the great Princes of the earth recurre not to books in their difficulties but use the wisdom of their counsel wise and grave men who must hear all