could be worshipped by the work of mens hands and for changing thereby the glory due to God in regard of his infinite and incorruptible being into mean and unworthy Images thinking thereby to give honour to him § 8. And upon these grounds the Primitive Fathers disputed against the Heathen Idolatry for the making use of corporeal representations makes the Deity contemptible saith Clemens of Alexandria Origen saith That Christians have nothing to do with Images because of the second Commandment and on that account will rather dye than defile themselves with them and that it is impossible any one that knows God should pray to them That it is no sufficient excuse to say they do not take them for Gods but only for symbols or representations of them for they must be ignorant mean and unlearned persons who can imagine the work of an Artificer can be any representation of a Deity It would be too tedious at this time to transcribe all the invectives in the Writings of the Fathers upon this subject where they dispute against the Heathens from this argument and do still suppose the force of the reason of this Law to oblige Christians as much as ever it did the Iews but I purposely forbear only taking notice that after the worship of Images came in with the decay of the Primitive Piâ—ty and Learning in the Eastern Churches yet the great defenders of them still declared their abhorrence of any representation of the Divine Nature So Germanus Patriarch of Constantinople in his Epistles yet extant in the actions of that wise Synod at Nice We make saith he no kind of Image or similitude or figure or representation of the invisible Deity and that the meaning of the Commandment of the Law against Images was that the Divine Nature was invisible and incomprehensible and like to nothing we see and that we ought not to entertain any corporeal conceptions of God And Damascen saith expresly That it is the highest madness and impiety to go about to make an Image of God i. e. saith Clichtovaeus so as to think any Image to be like unto God or able perfectly to represent him to us which is likewise Bellarmins answer as though ever any men were such fools to believe an Image could perfectly represent an infinite Being or that God need to make a Law to forbid that which is utterly impossible in the very nature of the thing he might more reasonably forbid men to paint a sound to grasp all the Air in the hollow of their hands to drink up the Ocean to wear the Sun for a Pendant at their ears or to make new worlds than to command them not to make any Image which should perfectly represent his Nature And yet of this kind of Image alone of the true God Bellarmine understands the prohibition of the Law and the sayings before mentioned but all other he saith were allowed by both whether by way of History or analogical resemblance or the fashion of a man wherein he hath appeared i. e. all possible representations of God are allowed and only that which is impossible forbidden But this answer is not more weak and trifling than contrary to the meaning of Germanus Tharasius or the rest of the Nicene Fathers who do acknowledge there was no ground to make any Images with respect to the Divine Nature till the incarnation of Christ but since God appeared in humane nature there is no incongruity in representing that by an Image and by that to give honour to the invisible Godhead as long as they preserve the true belief concerning the Deity and consequently may honour God by giving worship to the Images of those Saints whom they believe to be in Heaven with God § 9. This is the substance of the Doctrine of the second Council of Nice which they justifie by fabulous stories and impertinent citations and insufficient answers For when the Fathers of the Synod at Constantinople had said that Christ came to deliver us from all Idolatry and to teach the worship of God in Spirit and in truth they bravely answer That then it is impossible for Christians to fall into Idolatry because Christs Kingdom was alwayes to continue and the gifts and graces of God are without repentance Which would as well hold against the prevalency of the Turk as Idolatry among them Those Fathers urge That the Devil now not being able to reduce the world to the former Idolatry endeavours under hand to introduce it under a pretence of Christianity bringing them again to the worship of the creature and making a God of a thing that is made when they have called it by the name of Christ. These answer That it is true the Fathers used that Argument against the Arrians who supposed Christ to be a Creature and they grant that they were guilty of Idolatry in giving Divine worship to Christ when they believed him to be a creature but the difference lyes herein that the Arrians trusted in Christ and gave properly divine honour to him which they say they did not to the Images but only worshipped them for the sake of the object represented by them But Aquinas and his followers have at large proved that where any thing is worshipped meerly for the sake of another it must have the same kind of worship given it which they give to the thing represented by it for as Aquinas observes the motion of the soul towards an Image is twofold either as it is a thing or as it is an Image the first he saith is distinct from that motion which respects the object but the second is the same so that to the Image of Christ as made of Wood or Stone no worship at all is given and therefore it being given meerly on the account of its being an Image it necessarily follows that the same worship must be given to the Image which is given to Christ himself And so they are in the same case with the Arrians whom they acknowledge to be Idolaters notwithstanding their Christianity or that the gifts and graces of God are without repentance Besides the Constantinopolitan Fathers urge The great absurdity of making an Image of Christ for worship because Christ is God and Man therefore the Image must be of God and Man which cannot be unless the Deity be circumscribed within the created flesh or there be a confusion of both natures after their union both which are blasphemies condemned by the Church The Nicene Fathers in answer to this yield That the Name Christ is significative of both natures and that an Image can only represent the visible humane nature and that it agrees only in name and not in substance with the thing represented and after many reviling expressions against their adversaries no argument of the goodness of their cause they say that if the Divine nature were circumscribed within the humane nature in the Cradle and on the Cross then it is in an image if not in one neither is it in the other But what doth this answer signifie unless there be an equal presence and union of the Divine nature of Christ with the Image as there was with the humane nature Which union was the reason of the adoration given to the person of
Christ and what ground can there be then of giving divine worship to the Image of Christ unless the same union be supposed If the humane nature without the union of the divine could yield us no sufficient reason of divine worship being given to it how much less can an Image deserve it which can only at the best represent but the external lineaments of that humane nature And if the divine nature be supposed united with the Image then the same divine honour is due to the Image of Christ which is to God himself which yet these Nicene Fathers deny and the Image then joyned with the divine nature is as proper an object of divine worship without respect to any Prototype as the person of Christ is consisting of the divine and humane nature Again they urge If the humane nature of Christ be represented in the Image of Christ to be worshipped as separate from the divine this would be plain Nestorianism To this the good Nicene Fathers not knowing what to answer plainly deny the conclusion and cry They Nestorians No they lye in their teeth they were no more Nestorians than themselves nor so much neither And now good men they say It is true they do represent Christ only by his humane nature in an Image and when they look on Images they understand nothing but what is signified by them as when the birth of the Virgin is represented they conceive in their minds that he who was born was truly God as well as man Alas for them that they should ever be charged with the worship of Images They plead for nothing now but a help to their profound Meditations by them But the Controversie was about worship what ever they think and their Adversaries argument did not lye in the Images being considered as an object of perception but of worship i. e. if the Image can only represent the humane nature of Christ as separate from the divine and in that respect be an object of worship to us then the charge of Nestorianism follows but this they very wisely pass by and their distinction of the Image from the principal cannot serve their turn since the Image receiving the worship due to the principal must have not only the name as they say but the reason of worship common with the principal which it represents After this the Fathers of Constantinople proceed to another Argument which is That all the representation of Christ allowed us by the Gospel is that which Christ himself instituted in the Elements of the Lords Supper whose use was to put us in remembrance of Christ. No other Figure or Type being chosen by Christ as able to represent his being in the flesh but this This was an honourable Image of his quickning body made by himself say they which he would not have of the shape of a man to prevent Idolatry but of a common nature as he took upon him the common nature of man and not any individuated person and as the body of Christ was really sanctified by the divine nature so by institution this holy Image is made divine through sanctification by Grace Here the Nicene Council quarrels with them for calling the Eucharist an Image contrary as they say to the Scriptures and Fathers but they are as much to be believed therein as in their admirable proofs that the worship of Images was the constant doctrine of the Church and having strenuously denyed this they suppose that to be enough to answer the argument Besides these particular arguments against the Images of Christ the Council of Constantinople useth many more against the Images of any other Because these being the chief there can be less reason for any other besides that there is no tradition of Christ or his Apostles or the primitive Fathers for them no way of consecration of them prescribed or practised no suitableness in the use of them to the design of Christian Religion which being in the middle between Iudaism and Paganism it casts off the Sacrifices of the one and not only the Sacrifices but all the Idolatries of the other and it is blasphemy to the Saints in Heaven to call in the Heathen superstitions into Christianity to honour them by that it is unbecoming their glory in Heaven to be set up on earth in dull and sensless Images that Christ himself would not receive testimony from Devils though they spake truth neither can such a Heathenish custome be acceptable to the Saints in Heaven though pretended to be for their honour That nothing can be plainer in the Gospel than that God is a Spirit and will be worshipped in Spirit and in truth to which nothing can be more contrary than the going about to honour God by worshipping any Image of himself or his Saints These and many other arguments from the Scriptures and Fathers that Council insists upon to shew the incongruity of the worship of Images to the nature of God and the design of the Christian Religion to which the Council of Nice returns very weak and trivial answers as shall more largely appear if any one thinks good to defend them And we have this apparent advantage on our side that although the Popes of Rome sided with these worshippers of Images yet the Council at Francford condemned it called together by Charles the Great Not out of misunderstanding their Doctrine as some vainly imagine because as Vasquez well proves the Copy of the Nicene Council was sent to them by Pope Adrian because the Acts of that Council were very well known to the Author of the Book written upon this subject under the name of Charles the Great and published by du Tillet at Paris about the middle of the last Century which is acknowledged by their learnedst men to have been written at the same time because the Popes Legats Theophylactus and Stephanus were present and might easily rectifie any mistake if they were guilty of it and none of the Historians of that time do take notice of any such error among them But Vasquez runs into another strange mistake himself that the Council of Francford did not condemn that of Nice which is evident they did expresly by the second Canon of of that Council published by Sirmondus And all the Objections of Vasquez are taken off by what Sirmondus speaks of the great authority and antiquity of that MS. from which he published them and from the consent of the Historians of that time that the Council of Francford did reject that of Nice and Sirmondus saith they had good reason to deny it to be an Oecumenical Council where only the Greeks met together and none of other Provinces were called
easily answered that this argument doth prove no more his Worship in the Elements than in a turfe or any other piece of bread for Christ being God is every where present and if his presence only may be ground of giving adoration to that wherein he is present we may as lawfully Worship the Sun or the Earth or any other thing as they do the Sacrament For he is present in all of them But our Worship is not to be guided by our own Fancies but the will of God and we have a command for Worshipping of the person of Christ and till we see one as to his presence in the Sacrament we ought not to think the one parallel with the other And by this the weakness of his retorting the argument in the Arrians behalf so he calls those who believe Christ to be a pure man against those who Worship the Son of God will appear for our Worship doth not meerly depend upon our belief but upon the divine command and therefore those who have denyed the one have yet contended for the other 2. The one gives us a sufficient reason for our Worship but the other doth not There can be no greater reason for giving his person adoration than that he is the eternal Son of God but what equivalent reason to this is there supposing the bread to be really converted into the body of Christ All that I can believe then present is the body of Christ and what then is that the object of our adoration do we terminate our Worship upon his humane nature and was it ever more properly so than in dying is it not the death of Christ that is set forth in the Eucharist And is his body present any other way than as it is agreeable to the end of the institution But it may be they will say the body of Christ being hypostatically united with the divine nature one cannot be present without the other That indeed is a good argument to prove the body of Christ cannot be there by transubstantiation for if the bread be converted into that body of Christ which is hypostatically united with the divine nature then the conversion is not meerly into the body but into the Person of Christ and then Christ hath as many bodies hypostatically united to him as there are Elements Consecrated and so all the accidents of the bread belong to that body of Christ which is hypostatically united with the divine nature Nay to make the Elements the object of divine worship as they do they must suppose an hypostatical union between them and the divine nature of Christ for if the only reason of joyning the humane nature with the divine in the person of Christ as the object of our Worship be the hypostatical union of those Natures then we can upon no other account make those Elements the object of Worship but by supposing such an union between Christ and them But I suppose they will not venture to say that Christ is hypostatically united with the shape figure and colour of the bread for they will have nothing else to remain after Consecration in spight of all the reason and sense of the world but meerly those accidents and the Council of Trent determines That the same Divine Worship which we give to God himself is in express terms to be given to the most holy Sacrament and pronounces an Anathema against all who deny it And what is the holy Sacrament but the body of Christ according to them under the accidents of the bread and although the body of Christ being believed to be there is the reason of their Worship yet the Worship is given to the Elements upon that account § 3. But this being a matter of so great importance to make it as clear as the nature of the thing will allow I shall yet further prove that upon the principles of the Roman Church no man can be assured that he doth not commit Idolatry every time he gives adoration to the Host and I hope this will abundantly add to the discovering the disparity between the Worship given to the person of Christ and that which is given to the Eucharist upon supposition of Transubstantiation But before I come to this I shall endeavour to give a true account of the State of the Controversie between us which I shall do in these particulars 1. The Question between us is not whether the person of Christ is to be Worshipped with divine worship for that we freely acknowledge And although the humane nature of Christ of it self can yield us no sufficient reason for adoration yet being considered as united to the divine nature that cannot hinder the same divine Worship being given to his person which belongs to his divine nature any more than the Robes of a Prince can take off from the honour due unto him 2. It is not whether the person of Christ visibly appearing to us in any place ought to have divine honour given to him For supposing sufficient evidence of such an appearance we make no more question of this than we do of the former Neither do we say that we need a particular command in such a case to make it lawful any more than the Patriarchs did at every appearance of God among them or those who conversed with our Lord on earth every time they fell down and Worshipped him Where our sense and reason is satisfied as well as St. Thomas his was in a visible appearance of Christ we can give divine Worship as he did when he said My Lord and my God for in this Worship given to the Person of Christ I am sure I give it to nothing but what is either God or hypostatically united to the divine nature But is there not the same reason of believing Christ to be present as seeing him I answer in matters of pure revelation there is where the matter proposed to our faith can be no object of sense as Christs infinite presence in all places as God I firmly believe upon the credit of divine revelation and I give divine Worship to him as God suitable to that infinite presence but our question is concerning the visible presence of Christ where honour is given on the account of the divine nature but he can be known to be present only by his humanity in this case I say the evidence of sense is necessary in order to the true Worshipping the person of Christ. If any should be so impertinent to urge that saying to this purpose blessed are they that have not seen and yet have believed I shall only say that doth not at all relate to this matter but to the truth of Christs resurrection 3. It is not concerning the spiritual Worship of Christ in the Celebration of the Eucharist For we declare that in all solemn acts of Religious Worship and particularly in the Eucharist we give divine honour to the Son of God as well as to the Father We affirm that we
dangerous for me to be too confident of the sense of it I have heard some wise men of our church have said that these words may bear a figurative sense like that rock was Christ and that if there were no other evidence for transubstantiation but what the Scripture gives there were no reason to make it an Article of faith I have heard the great names of Scotus Aliaco Biel Fisher Cajctan Canus and others quoted to this purpose and their testimonies produced What a case am I in then if those words do not prove it Now I think better of it I must trust the Church for the sense of Scripture and if I be not strangely mistaken I am sworn to interpret Scripture according to the unanimous consent of the Fathers but alas what relief is this to my anxious mind This is a thing I am to do or not to do almost every day and to be resolved of it I am put to a task which will hold me all my life time and may be as unsatisfied at last as I am now For I see the world is full of Disputes concerning the sense of their words as well as the Scriptures One saith that a Father by a figure means a substance and that another by a substance means a figure one man sayes his adversaries authorities are counterfeit and another sayes the same of his one quotes the saying of an Heretick for the Orthodox and another makes it appear that if he spake his own mind he must contradict himself and others of the Fathers One produces a Pope confirming the Doctrine of transubstantiation and another as plain a testimony of a Pope of greater antiquity and more learning overthrowing it One appeals to the first Ages of the Church another to the latest one saith the Fathers spake Rhetorically and another Dogmatically One that they loved to talk mystically and another that they spake differently about this matter In this great confusion what ground of certainty have I to stand upon whereby to secure my mind from commission of a great sin I am sure if I live in wilful sin all my dayes I shall be damned but God hath never told me if I do not study the Fathers all my life I shall be damned It is satisfaction I desire and that I am not like to have this way when I see men of greater Wit and Subtlety and Judgement than ever I am like to come to are still disputing about the sense of the Fathers in this point Witness the late heats in France about it While I am in this Labyrinth a kind Priest offers to give me ease and tells me these are doubts and scruples I ought not to trouble my self about the authority of the present Church is sufficient for me I thank him for his kindness only desiring to know what he means by the authority of the present Church For I find we Catholicks are not agreed about that neither May I be sure if the Pope who is Head of the Church say it No not unless he defines it but may I be sure then No not unless a General Council concur but may I be sure if a General Council determines it Yes if it be confirmed wholly by the Pope and doth proceed in the way of a Council but how is it possible for me to judge of that when the intrigues of actions are so secret I see then if this be the only way of satisfaction I must forbear giving adoration or be guilty of Idolatry in doing it But suppose I am satisfied in the point of transubstantiation it is not enough for me to know in general that there is such a change but I must believe particularly that very bread to be changed so which I am now to worship and by what means can I be sure of that For my Church tells me that it is necessary that he be a Priest that consecrates and that he had an intention of consecrating that very bread which I am to adore But what if it should come to pass after many consecrations that such a person prove no Priest because not rightly baptized which is no unheard of thing what became of all their actions who worshipped every Host he pretended to consecrate They must be guilty of Idolatry every Mass he celebrated But how is it possible for me to be sure of his Priesthood unless I could be sure of the intention of the Bishop that ordained him and the Priest that baptized him which it is impossible for me to be Yet suppose I were sure he was a Priest what assurance have I that he had an intention to consecrate that very Wafer which I am to adore If there were thirteen and he had an intention to consecrate only twelve if I worship the thirteenth I give divine honour to a meer creature for without the intention of the Priest in consecration it can be nothing else and then I am guilty of downright Idolatry So that upon the principles of the Roman Church no man can be satisfied that he doth not worship a meer creature with divine honour when he gives adoration to the Host. 2. No man can be satisfied that he hath sufficient reason for giving this worship to the Host. For which we must consider what suppositions the adoration of the Host depends upon if any of which prove uncertain I am in as bad a case as I was before I first suppose that the bread being really and substantially changed into that very body of Christ which was crucified at Hierusalem I ought to give the same honour to that body of Christ in the Sacrament which I am to give to the person of Christ as God and man and that the body of Christ being present in the Sacrament I may on the account of that presence give the same honour to the Sacrament in which he is present But if it prove uncertain whether the humane nature of Christ as conjoyned to the divine nature be capable of receiving proper divine worship then it must be much more so whether the body of Christ as present in the Sacrament be so But granting that it may be yet uncertain whether I ought to give the same honour to the visible part of the Sacrament which I do to the humanity of Christ for though Christ may be present there his presence doth not make the things wherein he is present capable of the same divine honour with himself Now that these things are uncertain upon their own principles I now make appear I find it generally agreed by the Doctors of the Roman Church that the humane nature of Christ considered alone ought not to have divine honour given to it and I find it hotly disputed among them whether Christs humane nature though united to the divine ought abstractly considered to have any true divine honour given it and those who deny it make use of this substantial argument proper divine honour is due only to God but the humane nature of Christ
is not God and therefore that honour ought not to be given it and I am further told by them that the Church hath never determined this controversie Let me now apply this to our present case It is certain if the body of Christ be present in the Eucharist as distinct from the divine nature I am not not to adore it It is very uncertain if it be present whether I am to give divine worship to the body of Christ but it is most certain that if I worship Christ in the Sacrament it is upon the account of his corporal presence For although when I worship the person of Christ as out of the Sacrament my worship is terminated upon him as God and man and the reason of my worship is wholly drawn from his divine nature yet when I worship Christ as in the Sacrament I must worship him there upon the account of his bodily presence for I have no other reason to Worship him in the Sacrament but because his body is present in it And this is not barely determining the place of Worship but assigning the cause of it for the primary reason of all adoration in the Sacrament is because Christ hath said this is my body which words if they should be allowed to imply Transubstantiation cannot be understood of any other change than of the bread into the body of Christ. And if such a sense were to be put upon it why may not I imagine much more agreeably to the nature of the institution that the meer humane nature of Christ is there than that his Divinity should be there in a particular manner present to no end and where it makes not the least manifestation of it self But if I should yield all that can be begged in this kind viz. that the body of Christ being present his divinity is there present too yet my mind must unavoidably rest unsatisfied still as to the adoration of the Host. For supposing the divine nature present in any thing gives no ground upon that account to give the same Worship to the thing wherein he is present as I do to Christ himself This the more considerative men of the Roman Church are aware of but the different wayes they have taken to answer it rather increase mens doubts than satisfie them Greg. de Valentiâ denies not that divine honour is given by them to the Eucharist and that the accidents remaining after Consecration are the term of adoration not for themselves but by reason of the admirable conjunction which they have with Christ. Which is the very same which they say of the humane nature of Christ and yet this same person denies that they are hypostatically united to him which if any one can understand I shall not envy him Bellarmin in answer to this argument is forced to grant as great an hypostatical union between Christ and the Sacrament as between the divine and humane nature for when he speaks of that he saith it lyes in this that the humane nature loseth its own proper subsistence and it assumed into the subsistence of the divine nature and in the case of the Sacrament he yields such a losing the proper subsistence of the bread and that what ever remains makes no distinct suppositum from the body of Christ but all belong to him and make one with him and therefore may be Worshipped as he is Is not this an admirable way of easing the minds of dissatisfied persons about giving adoration to the Host to fill them with such unintelligible terms and notions which it is impossible for them to understand themselves or explain to others Vasquez therefore finding well that the force of the argument lay in the presence of Christ and that from thence they must at last derive only the ground of adoration very ingenuously yields the Consequence and grants that God may very lawfully be adored by us in any created being wherein he is intimately present and this he not only grants but contends for in a set disputation wherein he proves very well from the principles of Worship allowed in the Roman Church that God may be adored in inanimate and irrational beings as well as in Images and answers all the arguments the very same way that they defend the other and that we way Worship the Sun as lawfully and with the same kind of Worship that they do an Image and that men may be worshipped with the same worship with which we Worship God himself if our mind do not rest in the Creature but be terminated upon God as in the adoration of the Host. See here the admirable effects of the doctrine of divine worship allowed and required in the Roman Church For upon the very same principles that a Papist Worships Images Saints and the Host he may as lawfully worship the Earth the Stars or Men and be no more guilty of Idolatry in one than in the other of them So that if we have no more reason to Worship the person of Christ than they have to adore the host upon their principles we have no more ground to worship Christ than we have to worship any creature in the World § 5. 2. There are not the same motives and grounds to believe the doctrine of Transubstantiation that there are to believe that Christ is God which he affirms but without any appearance of reason And I would gladly know what excellent motives and reasons those are which so advantageously recommend so absurd a doctrine as Transubstantiation is as to make any man think he hath reason to believe it I am sure it gives the greatest advantage to the enemies of Christs Divinity to see these two put together upon equal terms as though no man could have reason to believe Christ to be the Eternal Son of God that did not at the same time swallow the greatest contradictions to sense and reason imaginable But what doth he mean by these motives and grounds to believe The authority of the Roman Church I utterly deny that to be any ground of believing at all and desire with all my heart to see it proved but this is a proper means to believe Transubstantiation by for the ground of believing is as absurd as the doctrine to be believed by it If he means Catholick Tradition let him prove if he can that Transubstantiation was a Doctrine received in the universal Church from our Saviours time and when he pleases I shall joyne issue with him upon that Subject And if he thinks fit to put the negative upon me I will undertake to instance in an Age since the three first Centuries wherein if the most learned Fathers and Bishops yea of Rome it self be to be credited Transubstantiation was not believed But if at last he means Scripture which we acknowledge for our only rule of faith and shall do in spight of all pretences to infallibility either in Church or Tradition I shall appeal even to Bellarmin himself in this
similitude to be made with respect to his worship for it is ridiculous to imagine the Law means any thing else but he saith This Law must not be understood to exclude a Crucifix nor I suppose any Image of God himself at least as he appeared of old nor of his Saints or Angels with an intention to worship God by them but only they should not worship Apis or Dagon an Ichneumon or a Crocodile or any of the most ridiculous follies of the Heathen If this had been the meaning of the Law why was it not more plainly expressed Why were none of the words elsewhere used by way of contempt of the Heathen Idols here mentioned as being less lyable to ambiguity Why in so short a comprehension of Laws is this Law so much inlarged above what it might have been if all that he saith were only meant by it For then the meaning of the two first Precepts might have been summed up in very few words You shall have no other Gods but me and you shall worship the Images of no other Gods but me This is his meaning but far enough from being that of the second Commandment 2. The only word he insists upon which is Pesel is very properly rendred an Image and it doth not signifie barely an Idol the word properly signifies any thing that is carved or cut out of wood or stone and it is no less than forty several times rendred by the LXX by 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 sculptile and but thrice by 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and which is very observable although Exod. 20. 4. they render it by 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 yet in the repetition of the Law Deut. 5. 8. the Alexandrian MS. hath it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and Deut. 4. 16. in other Copies of the LXX the same word is translated 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 from whence it is plain that when they translate it by an Idol they mean no more thereby than a graven image and Isa. 40. 18. they translate it by 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which is properly an image so that no assistance can be given him by that translation and the Vulgar Latin it self useth Idolum Sculptile and Imago all to express the same thing Isa. 44. 9 10 13. By which it appears that any Image being made so far the object of Divine Worship that men do bow down before it doth thereby become an Idol and on that account is forbidden in this Commandment § 5. 3. We consider the reason given of this Law which will more fully explain the meaning of it which the Scripture tells us was derived from Gods infinite and incomprehensible nature which could not be represented to men but in a way that must be an infinite disparagement to it To whom will ye liken God or what likeness will ye compare unto him The workman melteth a graven Image and the Goldsmith spreadeth it over with Gold c. Have ye not known Have ye not heard Hath it not been told you from the beginning Have ye not understood from the foundation of the earth It is he that sitteth upon the circle of the earth c. I desire to know whether this reason be given against Heathen Idols or those Images which were worshipped for Gods or no or whether by this reason God doth not declare that all worship given to him by any visible representation of him is extreamly dishonourable to him And to this purpose when this Precept is enforced on the people of Israel by a very particular caution Deut. 4. 15 16 c. Take ye therefore good heed to your selves lest ye corrupt your selves and make you a graven Image the similitude of any figure c. the ground of that caution is expressed in these words For ye saw no manner of similitude on the day that the Lord spake unto you If the whole intention of the Law were only to keep them from worshipping the Heathen Idols or Images for Gods to what purpose is it here mentioned that they saw no similitude of God when he spake to them For although God appeared with a similitude then yet there might have been great reason against Worshipping the Heathen Idols or fixing the intention of their Worship upon the bare Image But this was a very great reason why they ought not to think of honouring God by an Image for if he had judged that a suitable way of Worship to his nature and excellency he would not have left the choice of the similitude to themselves but would have appeared himself in such a similitude as had best pleased him § 6. From hence the wiser persons of the Heathens themselves condemned the Worship of God by Images as incongruous to a Divine Nature and a disparagement to the Deity So Theodoret tells us that Zeno in his Books of Government did absolutely forbid the making any Images for Worship because they were not things worthy of God And that Xenophanes Colophonius derided the folly of those who made their Images which they Worshipped to be like themselves and by the same reason saith he if Horses and Elephants could paint as men can no doubt the Gods would be made in their shape as the Aethiopians and Thracians and others made their Gods in their own Colour and Fashion but he addes That the true God ought not to be represented by the resemblance of men to whom he was unlike in body and mind And that the only reason which hindred Plato from prohibiting all manner of Images was only the fear of Socrates his Fate for saith he he did forbid all private Images all Images of Gold and Silver of Ivory of Iron and Brass and left only Wood and Stone which being so contemptible matter might more easily keep the people from Worshipping Images made of them As God himself saith he derideth the Idolater in the Prophet he burneth part thereof in the fire and the residue thereof maketh he a God even his graven Image Antisthenes in Clemens Alexandrinus condemns the use of Images for Instruction because there is so great a dissimilitude between God and any visible representation of him that no man can learn any thing of God from an Image and Xenophon to the same purpose that God is great and powerful but we know not how to represent him And Clemens gives that reason why Numa prohibited among the Romans all Images to represent the Deity because we could not attain to any due conception of the Deity but only by our minds which is the same reason that Plutarch gives And therefore Varro in the known Testimony to this purpose speaking of the old Romans who had no Images for 170 years in their Divine Worship saith that if the same Custome had continued their Worship would have been more pure and chaste and that those who first placed Images in places of Divine Worship increased their Errour and took away their Reverence Wisely
judging saith St. Augustine that the folly of Images would easily bring the Deity into contempt And Augustus as Agrippa in Philo reports after he understood that the Iewes in their Temple had no Images or visible representations of the Deity expressed his wonder with great Reverence having no mean skill in Philosophy So that we see the wisest persons who had no such Law from God to direct them yet by the bare use of reason did agree in the thing it self that it was unsuitable to the Divine Nature to Worship God by any Images or visible representations of him From hence we have reason to suppose among the more ancient Nations who kept nearer to the dictates of natural reason the Worship of Images was almost generally rejected So Bardesanes in Eusebius saith of the most Eastern Countries then known of the Seres and the Brachmanns So Herodotus Strabo Diogenes Laertius say of the Persians So Tacitus of the Germans that they rejected Images because they thought them unsuitable to the greatness of their Deities So Lucian likewise saith of the most ancient Aegyptians and Historians agree of the Romans as we have already seen If all this had been a meer positive Law intended only for the Iewes because of their dulness and stupidity as some imagine whence comes it to pass that those who never heard of this Law yet judged such a way of Worship to be wholly unbecoming a Divine Nature It was not meerly the fear lest they should Worship the Images themselves for Gods which was the reason of the Commandment but the incongruity of such a way of Worship to a being supposed to be of an infinite and a spiritual nature § 7. And it seems of all things the most strange to me that any persons should think this precept only respected the Iewish Oeconomy and that now under the Gospel where we have clearer discoveries of Gods spiritual nature and Worship that we should be left at liberty to do that which was before unlawful to be done Was it inconsistent with Gods nature then and is it less so now when we understand his nature much better and that is given as a particular reason why we ought to Worship him after a spiritual manner and not by any corporeal representation as the Iews say the Samaritans Worshipped God in the form of a Dove in their Temple on Mount Garizim in which notwithstanding what Morinus saith there seems to be no improbability not only from our Saviours words and the occasion of speaking them to a Samaritan woman which we do not find he insisted on so much to the Iewes as being then free from this kind of Idolatry and the constant tradition of the Iewes but from the nature of the Samaritan Religion which they received from the ten Tribes which Worshipped God under Images as will appear afterwards and the agreeableness of the Symbol of a Dove to the name of Semiramis and their Assyrian off-spring among whom the Dove was accounted Sacred But however this be since the reason of this command drawn from the invisible and spiritual nature of God is now enforced upon us by the Gospel as the ground of giving spiritual worship to God how can any men in their senses imagine that Worship should be lawful among Christians which was unlawful to the Iewes Is it that there is now no danger of falling into Heathen Idolatry as there was among the Iewes on which account God tied them up so strictly in this point of Images But this is to begg the Question and to take it for granted that there was no other reason of this command Whereas God himself hath told us another and that is the incongruity of it to his infinite nature which the very Heathens themselves apprehended in this case I grant God might by this means design to keep them at the greatest distance from the Heathen Idolatry but that doth not hinder but there was an evil in the thing it self as it doth imply so great a disparagement of the divine nature to be Worshipped by a corporeal representation As we may say that the prohibition of common Swearing was intended by God to keep men from perjury but besides that it implyes so great an irreverence of God that it is evil without that further respect And can any one imagine there should be greater irreverence of God shewn in calling him to witness upon every slight occasion than there is in bowing down before a block or a hewn stone representing God to my mind by it What can such an Image do to the heightening of devotion or raising affections if it be by calling to my mind that Being I am to Worship then there must be supposed some likeness or Analogy or Vnion between the object represented and the image every one of which tends highly to the dishonour of the Deity and suggests mean thoughts to us of the God we are to Worship And is there no danger among Christians that they should entertain too low and unworthy thoughts of God and can any thing tend to it more effectually than the bringing down the representations of him to the figure and lineaments of a man drawn upon a Table or carved in an Image On which account it seems much more reasonable for me to Worship God by prostrating my self to the Sun or any of the Heavenly bodies nay to an Ant or a Fly than to a picture or an Image For in the other I see great evidences of the power and wisdom and goodness of God which may suggest venerable apprehensions of God to my mind whereas these can have nothing worthy admiration unless it be the skill of the Painter or Artificer And I cannot for my heart understand why I may not as well nay better burn Incense and say my Prayers to the Sun having an intention only to honour the true Gâ—d by it as to do both those to an Image I am sure the Sun hath far more advantages than any artificial Image can have the beauty and influence of it may inflame and warm ones devotions much more If the danger be that I am more like to take the Sun for God than an Image on that account that which deserves most honour should have least given it and that which deserves least should have most For the danger is there still greater where the excellency is greater and by that means we ought rather to Worship a beast than a Saint for there is less danger of believing one to be God than the other and so the Aegyptians were more excusable than the Papists I must ingenuously confess if I had been an Heathen Idolater only upon such principles as these that there is one supreme infinite Being who makes use of some more illustrious beings of the world to communicate benefits to the rest on which account I thought my self bound to testifie the honour I owe to the supream Deity by paying my
ought not only perform the offices of Religion out of obedience to his divine commands but with a due Veneration of his Majesty and power with thankfulness for his infinite goodness and with trust in his promises and subjection of our souls to his supream Authority About these things which are the main parts of divine and spiritual Worship we have no quarrel nor do we find fault with any for giving too much to Christ in this manner but rather for placing too much in the bare external acts of adoration which may be performed with all external pomp and shew where there is no inward reverence nor sincere devotion And yet 4. It is not concerning external Reverence to be shewn in the time of receiving the Eucharist For that our Church not only allowes but enjoynes and that not barely for the avoiding such profanation and disorder in the holy Communion as might otherwise ensue but for a signification of our humble and grateful acknowledgement of the benefit of Christ therein given to all worthy receivers But it is withall declared that thereby no Adoration is intended or ought to be done either unto the Sacramental Bread and Wine there bodily received or unto any corporal presence of Christs natural flesh and blood as I have already recited it But the Controversie concerning the adoration of the Host lyes in these two things 1. Whether proper divine Worship in the time of receiving the Eucharist may be given to the Elements on the account of a corporal presence of Christ under them 2. Whether out of the time of receiving the same adoration ought to be given to it when it is elevated or carried in procession which we would give to the very person of Christ And that this is the true state of the Controversie I appeal to the doctrine and practice of the Roman Church in this point For it is expresly determined by the Council of Trent That there is no manner of doubt left but that all Christians ought to give the same Worship to this holy Sacrament which they give to God himself For it is not therefore less to be Worshipped because it was instituted by Christ our Lord that it might be taken By which words the true state of the Controversie is made evident which is not about the reverence due only to Christ supposed to be corporally present there but the adoration due to the Sacrament upon that account And by the Sacrament the Council must understand the elements or accidents or whatever name they call them by as the immediate term of that divine Worship or else the latter words signifie nothing at all For what was that which was instituted by our Lord as a Sacrament was it not the external and visible signes or elements why do they urge that the Sacrament ought not the less to be adored because it was to be taken but to take off the common objection that we ought not to give divine Worship to that which we eat And what can this have respect to but the Elements But this is not denyed that I know of by any who understand either the doctrine or practice of that Church although to answer our Arguments they would seem to direct their Worship only to Christ as present under the elements yet yielding that on the account of this corporal presence that which appears ought to have the same Worship given to it with that which is supposed or believed And so they make the accidents of the Sacrament to have the very same honour which the humane nature of Christ hath which they say hath no divine honour for it self but on the account of the conjunction of the divinity with it § 4. The Controversie being thus stated I come to shew that upon the Principles of the Roman Church no man can be assured that he doth not commit Idolatry every time he gives Adoration to the Host. For it is a principle indisputable among them that to give proper divine honour called by them Adoration to a creature is Idolatry but no man upon the principles of their Church can be assured every time he Worships the Host that he doth not give proper divine honour to a creature For there are two things absolutely necessary to secure a mans mind in the performance of an act of divine Worship 1. That either the object be such in it self which deserves and requires such Worship from us as in the divine nature of Christ Or 2. That if of it self it doth not deserve it there be a reason sufficient to give it as is the humane nature of Christ upon its union with the Divine but in this matter of the adoration of the Host no man can be secure of either of these upon their own Principles 1. He cannot be secure that the object is such as doth deserve divine worship If a man should chance to believe his senses or hearken to his reason or at least think the matter disputable whether that which he sees to be bread be not really bread what case is this man in He becomes an Idolater by not being a fool or a mad man But because we are not now to proceed upon the principles of sense or reason but those of the Church of Rome I will suppose the case of one that goes firmly upon the received principles of it and try whether such a one can be satisfied in his mind that when he gives divine worship to the Host he doth not give it to a creature And because we are now supposing unreasonable things I will suppose my self to be that person The Mass-bell now rings and I must give the same divine honour to the Host which I do to Christ himself but hold if it should be but a meer creature all the world cannot excuse me from Idolatry and my own Church condemns me all agreeing that this is gross Idolatry how come I then to be assured that what but a little before was a meer creature is upon the pronouncing a few words turned into my Creator A strange and sudden change And I can hardly say that God becoming man was so great a wonder as a little piece of bread becoming God When God became man he shewed himself to be God by Wonders and Miracles which he wrought for the conviction of the world I will see if I can find any such evidence of so wonderful a transformation from a Wafer to a Deity I see it to be the very same it was I handle it as I did if I taste it it hath the very same agreeableness to the Palat it had Where then lyes this mighty change But O carnal reason what have I to do with thee in these mysteries of faith I remember what Church I am of and how much I am bid to beware of thee but how then shall I be satisfied Must I relye on the bare words of Christ This is my body But I have been told the Scripture is very obscure and
Reply but hearing for a great while no further of the person for whose sake this Discourse began and having affairs more than enough to take up my time I laid aside the Papers supposing that business at an end But about Christmass last they were called for by a near Friend of the party concerned and a personal Conference being declined an intimation was given me that the Papers were thought unanswerable I began to fear so too for at first I could not find them but assoon as I did I found the great improvement they had made by lying so long for what at first I looked on as inconsiderable was in that time thought to be too strong to be meddled with and I could not tell what they might come to in time if I let them alone any longer And I was informed by a worthy person that I. S. the man of confidence and principles had expressed great wonder I had not answered them as though we had no cause to wonder that the noble Science of Controversie should be so abandoned by him and that a man of such mettal should all this while leave his poor demonstrations alone to defend themselves Vpon these suggestions I resolved as fast as other imployments would give leave for we are not those happy men to have only one thing to mind to give a full and punctual answer to them Which I have now made publick and printed the Papers themselves at large that my Adversary may not complain of any injury done him by mis-representing his words or meaning And besides other reasons I the rather chose to appear in publick to draw them from their present way of pickeering and lying under hedges to take advantage of some stragling members of our Church not so able to defend themselves and whom they rather steal from us than conquer being blinded with their smoke more than overcome by any strength of argument If they have any thing to say either against our Church or in Defence of their own let them come into the open Field from which they have of late so wisely withdrawn themselves finding so little success in it And since these Disputes must be I am very well pleased that the Adversary I have now to deal with hath the Character of a Learned and Ingenuous man and I do not desire he should lose it in the Debate between us hoping that nothing shall proceed from me but what becomes a fair and ingenuous Adversary If I were not fully satisfied that we have truth and reason on our side I should never have been engaged in these combats I am so great a friend to the peace of the Christian world that I could take more pleasure in ending one Controversie than in being able to handle as many as the most Voluminous Schoolmen have ever done For however Noble some may think the Science of Controversie to be I am not fond of the practice of it especially being managed with so much heat and passion such scorn and contempt of Adversaries so many reproaches and personal reflections as they commonly are as if men forgot to be Christians when they began to be Disputants I do not think it such a mighty matter to throw dirt in a mans face and then to laugh at him or rather to take a Metaphor now from dry weather to raise such a dust as may endanger the eye-sight of weaker persons I think it no great skill to make things appear either ridiculous or dark but to give them their due Colours and set them in the clearest light shewes far more art and ingenuity And even that smartness of expression without which Controversie will hardly go down with many seems but like the throwing Vinegar upon hot Coals which gives a quick scent for the present but vanishes immediately into smoke and air In matters of Truth and Religion reason and evidence ought to sway men and not passion and noise and though men cannot command their judgements they may and ought to do their expressions And although this looks as like an Apologie for a dull Book as may be yet I had much rather it should suffer for want of wit and smartness than of good nature and Christianity My design is to represent the matters in difference between us truly to report faithfully and to argue closely and by these to shew that no person can have any pretence of reason to leave our Church to embrace the communion of the Church of Rome because the danger is so much greater there in the nature of their Worship and tendency of their doctrine and what they object most against us in point of Fanaticism and divisions will equally hold against them so that they have no advantages above us but have many apparent dangers which we have not Among the chiefest dangers in the communion of that Church I have insisted on that of Idolatry not to make the breach wider than some others have done but to let persons first understand the greatness of the danger before they run into it I wish I could acquit them from so heavy a charge but I cannot force my judgement and while I think them guilty it would be unfaithfulness in me not to warn those of it whom it most concerns to understand it And where other things are subtle and nice tedious and obscure this lyes plain to the conscience of every man if the Church of Rome be guilty of Idolatry our separation can be no Schism either before God or man because our communion would be a sin And although it may be only an excess of charity in some few learned persons to excuse that Church from Idolatry although not all who live in the communion of it yet upon the greatest search I can make I think there is more of charity than judgement in so doing For the proof of it I must refer the Reader to the following Discourse but that I may not be thought in so severe a censure to contradict the sense of our Church which I have so great a regard to I shall here shew that this charge of Idolatry hath been managed against the Church of Rome by the greatest and most learned defenders of it ever since the Reformation What greater discovery can be made of the sense of our Church than by the Book of Homilies not barely allowed but subscribed to as containing godly and wholsom doctrine and necessary for these times and nothing can be more plainly delivered therein than that the Church of Rome is condemned for Idolatry So the third part of the Sermon against the peril of Idolatry concludes Ye have heard it evidently proved in these Homilies against Idolatry by Gods Word the Doctors of the Church Ecclesiastical Histories reason and experience that Images have been and be worshipped and so Idolatry committed to them to the great offence of Gods Majesty and danger of infinite souls c. Who the Author of these Homilies was is not material
to enquire since their authority depends not on the Writer but the Churches approbation of them but Dr. Jackson not only calls him the worthy and learned Author of the Homilies concerning the peril of Idolatry but saith he takes him to be a Reverend Bishop of our Church and no wonder since the most eminent Bishops in that time of Queen Elizabeth wherein these Homilies were added to the former did all assert and maintain the same thing As Bishop Jewell in his excellent Defence of the Apology of the Church of England and Answer to Harding wherein he proves that to give the honour of God to a creature is manifest Idolatry as the Papists do saith he in adoration of the Host and the Worship of Images And his works ought to be looked on with a higher esteem than any other private person being commanded to be placed in Churches to be read by the people Of all persons of that Age none could be less suspected to be Puritanically inclined than Archbishop Whitgift yet in his Learned Defence of the Church of England against T. C. he makes good the same charge in these words I do as much mislike the distinction of the Papists and the intent of it as any man doth neither do I go about to excuse them from wicked and without repentance and Gods singular mercy damnable Idolatry There are saith he three kinds of Idolatry one is when the true God is worshipped by other means and wayes than he hath prescribed or would be worshipped i. e. against his express command which is certainly his meaning the other is when the true God is worshipped with false Gods the third is when we worship false Gods either in heart mind or in external creatures living or dead and altogether forget the worship of the true God All these three kinds are detestable but the first is the least and the last is the worst The Papists worship God otherwise than his will is and otherwise than he hath prescribed almost in all points of their worship they also give to the creature that which is due to the Creator and sin against the first Table yet are they not for all that I can see or learn in the third kind of Idolatry and therefore if they repent unfeignedly they are not to be cast either out of the Church or out of the Ministry The Papists have little cause to thank me or fee me for any thing I have spoken in their behalf as yet you see that I place them among wicked and damnable Idolaters Thus far that Wise and Learned Bishop After him we may justly reckon Bishop Bilson than whom none did more learnedly in that time defend the perpetual Government of Christs Church by Bishops nor it may be since who in a set discourse at large proves the Church of Rome guilty of Idolatry 1. In the Worship of Images the having of which he saith was never Catholick and the worshipping of them was ever wicked by the judgement of Christs Church and that the Worship even of the Image of Christs is Heathenism Idolatry to Worship it makes it an Idol and burning Incense to it is Idolatry which he there proves at large and that the Image of God made with hands is a false God and no likeness of his but a leud imagination of theirs set up to feed their eyes with the contempt of his Sacred Will dishonour of his Holy Name and open injury to his Divine Nature 2. In the adoration of the Host of which he treats at large After these it will be less needful to produce the testimonies of Dr. Fulk Dr. Reynolds Dr. Whitaker who all asserted and proved the Church of Rome guilty of Idolatry and I cannot find one person who owned himself to be of the Church of England in all Queen Elizabeths reign who did make any doubt of it Let us now come to the reign of King James and here in the first place we ought to set down the judgement of that Learned Prince himself who so throughly understood the matters in controversie between us and the Church of Rome as appears by his Premonition to all Christian Princes wherein after speaking of other points he comes to that of Reliques of Saints But for the worshipping either of them or Images I must saith he account it damnable Idolatry and after adds that the Scriptures are so directly vehemently and punctually against it as I wonder what brain of man or suggestion of Satan durst offer it to Christians and all must be salved with nice and philosophical distinctions Let them therefore that maintain this doctrine answer it to Christ at the latter day when he shall accuse them of Idolatry and then I doubt if he will be paid with such nice Sophistical distinctions And when Isaac Casaubon was employed by him to deliver his opinion to Cardinal Perron mentioning the practices of the Church of Rome in invocation of Saints he saith that the Church of England did affirm that those practices were joyned with great impiety Bishop Andrews whom no man suspects of want of learning or not understanding the doctrine of our Church was also employed to answer Cardinal Bellarmin who had writ against the King and doth he decline charging the Church of Rome with Idolatry No so far from it that he not only in plain terms charges them with it but saith that Bellarmin runs into Heresie nay into madness to defend it and in his answer to Perron he saith it is most evident by their Breviaries Hours and Rosaries that they pray directly absolutely and finally to Saints and not meerly to the Saints to pray to God for them but to give what they pray for themselves In the same time of King James Bishop Abbot writ his Answer to Bishop in which he saith that the Church of Rome by the Worship of Images hath matched all the Idolatries of the Heathens and brought all their jugling devices into the Church abusing the ignorance and simplicity of the people as grosly and damnably as ever they did Towards the latter end of his Reign came forth Bishop Whites Reply to Fisher he calls the worshipping of Images a Superstitious dotage a palliate Idolatry a remainder of Paganism condemned by Sacred Scripture censured by Primitive Fathers and a Seminary of direful contention and mischief in the Church of Christ. Dr. Field chargeth the Invocation of Saints with such Superstition and Idolatry as cannot be excused We charge the adherents of the Church of Rome with gross Idolatry saith Bishop Usher in his Sermon preached before the Commons A. D. 1620. because that contrary to Gods express Commandment they are sound to be worshippers of Images Neither will it avail them here to say that the Idolatry forbidden in the Scripture is that only which was used by the Jews and Pagans For as well might one plead that Jewish
or asked their opinion and Pope Adrian himself he saith in his defence of it against the Caroline Books never gives it the name or authority of an Oecumenical Council The same Council was rejected here in England as our Historians tell us because it asserted the adoration of Images which the Church of God abhors which are the words of Hoveden and others And we find afterwards in France by the Synod of Paris called by Ludovicus Pius upon the Letters of Michael Balbus Emperour of Constantinople in order to the Vnion of Christendome in this point that these Western Churches persisted still in the condemnation of the Nicene Council which they would not have done after so long a time to inform themselves if a meer mistake of their Doctrine at first had been the cause of their opposition But whosoever will read the Caroline Books or the Synod of Paris or Agobardus and others about that time will find that they condemn all religious worship of Images as adoration and contrary to that honour which is due to God alone and to the commands which he hath given in Scripture And I extreamly wonder how any men of common sense and much more any of learning and judgement that had read the Book of Charles the Great against the Nicene Synod could imagine it altogether proceeded upon a mistake of the meaning of it when it so distinctly relates and punctually answers the several places of Scriptures and Fathers produced by it for the worship of Images In the first Book an answer is given to many impertinent places of the Old Testament alledged in that Council which the second proceeds with and examines several testimonies of the Fathers and in the two remaining Books pursues all their pretences with that diligence that no one can imagine all this while that the Author did not know their meaning And that by adoration he means no more than giving Religious Worship to Images appears from hence because he calls the Civil worship which men give to one another by the name of adoration when he shewes that it is another thing to give adoration to a man upon a civil respect and to give adoration to Images upon a religious account when God challenges all religious worship or adoration to himself and whatever reason will hold for such a worship of Images will much more hold for the worship of men who have greater excellency in them and more honour put upon them by God than any Images can ever pretend to That God allows no other kind of adoration to be given to any but himself but that which we give to one another Can any be so senseless to think that by this civil adoration he meant we honoured every man we met as our Soveraign Prince And as little reason is there to say that by adoration given to Images he meant only the incommunicable worship due only to God in the sense of those Fathers Can we imagine saith he that S. Peter would allow the worship of Images who forbad Cornelius to worship him Or St. John whom the Angel checked for offering to worship him and bid him give that honour to God Or Paul and Barnabas who with such horror ran among the men of Lycaonia when they were about to worship them and yet surely Angels and such persons as these deserved more to be worshipped than any Images can do But we see by these examples that even these are not to be adored with any other kind of adoration than what the offices of civility require from us Besides in his language those who followed the Council of Constantinople are said not to adore Images by which nothing else can be meant than their giving no Religious worship to them and when he shews the great inconsequence of the argument from the adoration of the Statues of the Emperours to the adoration of Images because in matters of Religious Worship we are not to follow the customes of men against the will of God he thereby shews what kind of adoration he intended not the worship of Latria but supposed to be of an inferiour sort In so much that Binius confesseth that the design of these books was against all worship of Images It is true Pope Hadrian in the answer he sent to these Books which is still extant in the Tomes of the Councils doth deny that the Synod intended to give proper divine worship to Images but that is no more than the Synod it self had in words said before but that was not the Question what they said but what the nature of the thing did imply Whether that religious worship they gave to Images was not part of that adoration which was only due to God And he that expects an answer to this from him will find himself deceived who is so pitifully put to it for an answer to the demand of any example of words of the Apostles to justifie Image-worship that he is forced to make use of some Mystical passages of Dionysius the supposed Areopagite wherein the word Image hapning to be is very sufficient to his purpose And this answer of Hadrians gave so little satisfaction to the Western Bishops that A.D. 824. the Synod at Paris being called by Ludovicus Pius to advise about this point did condemn expressely Pope Hadrian for asserting a superstitious adoration of Images which they look on as a great impiety and say that he produces very impertinent places of the Fathers and remote from his purpose and that setting aside his Pontifical authority in his answer to the Caroline Books there were some things apparently false and they have nothing to excuse him by but his Ignorance And therefore they at large shew that the Religious worship of Images came first from Hereticks and that it was alwayes condemned by the Fathers of the Christian Church and answer the arguments produced on the other side out of the Writings of the Fathers And supposing that superstitious custome of worshipping Images had for some time obtained yet they shew by several testimonies that it ought to be abrogated No wonder then that Bellarmine is so much displeased with this Synod for offering so boldly to censure the Popes Writings and a Synod approved by him wherein the saith they exceed the fault of the Author of the Caroline Books because as he confesseth they offered to teach the Pope and resisted him to the face And yet no doubt they had read and considered Hadrians words wherein he disowns the giveing true divine honour to Images Not long after this Synod came forth the Book of Agobardus Archbishop of Lyons against Images occasioned saith Papirius Massonus by the stupendous superstition in that Age in the worship of them And this saith he is the substance of his Doctrine out of St. Augustine and other Fathers that there is no other Image of God but what is himself and therefore cannot be
condemn them And they triumph in nothing more than when they can handsomely revenge themselves on that bitter enemy of theirs called Reason which they never do with greater pleasure than when they pretend it to be upon the account of Religion In the Church of Rome the case hath been thus among them as in all Religions and places in the World there are some persons of a temper naturally disposed more to Religion than others are being melancholy thoughtful tender and easily moved by hopes and fears These do more easily receive the impressions of Religion which they being possessed with if they be not carefully governed are more lyable to fall into the dotages of superstition or to be transported by the heats of Enthusiasme Against both of them there can be no better cure imaginable than the true understanding the nature and reasonableness of the Christian Religion which fills our minds with a true sense of God and goodness and so arms us against superstition and withall acquaints us that the conduct of the Spirit of God is in the use of the greatest reason and prudence and so prevents the follies of Enthusiasme But it being so much the design of that Church to keep the members of it from knowing any thing against her interest so much as the true practice of Christianity is and therefore keeping the Bible out of the hands of the people they must substitute some other wayes in the room of that to gratifie the earthy dulness of a superstitious temper and the airiness and warmth of the Enthusiastical For the former they are abundantly provided by a tedious and ceremonious way of external devotion as dull and as cold as the earth it self to the other they commend abstractedness of life mental prayer passive unions a Deiform fund of the soul a state of introversion divine inspirations which must either end in Enthusiasme or madness And the perfection of this state lying in an intime Vnion with God as they speak whereby the soul is Deified is to be attained only in the way of unknowing for nothing so dangerous as the use of reason and self-annihilation and many other things as impossible to be understood as practised Which makes it difficult to give any account of such unintelligible stuffe for we must only grope in obscurity and profound darkness and draw a Night piece without lights This way came first into request in the Monastick orders by the examples of their founders as will easily appear by our former discourse but the men who most solemnly preached and divulged it were Rusbrochius Suso Harphius c. and he who in these latter ages hath gathered together most that had been said before him and is commended by Balthasar Corderius and others as a most sublime interpreter of mystical Divinity Ludovicus Blosius from these it were not difficult to put together some of their words and phrases as an account of their Divinity but I rather choose to do it chiefly from a late Author published by Mr. Cressy not many years since who after his many turnings and changes of opinions sits down at last as appears by his publishing Mother Iuliana's revelations and the Preface to Sancta Sophia with the deserved Character of a Popish Fanatick Which Book of Sancta Sophia being compiled by Mr. Cressy out of many writings of Father Augustin Baker and set forth A. D. 1657. with large approbations at the beginning and end of it I hope no doctrine contained therein will be thought a scandal to their Church The design of it is as the title tells us To give directions for the Prayer of Contemplation c. I would they had given directions for understanding it in the first place for if we have no other help than what Mr. Cressy gives in his Preface we may as well hope to understand the Quakers Canting as Mr. Cressy's Let the Reader judge by these few passages in his Preface The only proper disposition towards the receiving supernatural irradiations from Gods holy Spirit is an abstraction of life a sequestration from all business that concern others though it be their salvation and an attendance to God alone in the depth of the Spirit and a little after the lights here desired and prayed for are such as do expel all images of creatures and do calm all manner of passions to the end that the soul being in a vacuity may be more capable of receiving and entertaining God in the pure fund of the Spirit What this pure fund of the Spirit means I had been somewhat to seek for had not Lud. Blosius in the Preface to his spiritual Institution told us that the Deiform fund of the soul is the simple essence of the soul stamped with a divine impress or if this be not plain enough that from whence ariseth a super-essential life but if yet it cannot be understood we may be the less troubled at it since the same Author saith afterward that very few do know that hidden fund of their souls or believe that they have such a thing within them It being it seems like some very cunning drawer in a Cabinet where the main treasure lyes which the owner himself cannot find out till it be broken to pieces for self-annihilation is necessarily required in order to it And this super-essential life as he admirably describes it is a way of knowing without thoughts of seeing in darkness of understanding without reason of unknowing God by perceiving him of being melted and brought to nothing first and then being lost and swallowed up in God by which means all created being is put off and that which is only divine put on being changed into God as iron heated into the nature of fire This being the state of perfection aimed at here in this world we must now consider the directions given in order to it To this end in the first place a contemplative state is commended above an active as more perfect and more easie more simple and more secure from all errours and illusions which may be occasioned by an indiscreet use of Prayer Where by an active and contemplative state we must not understand what we commonly do by those terms but the active-state is the use of reasoning and internal discourse to fix our affections upon God and expressing it self in sensible devotion and outward acts of obedience to Gods will the contemplative in the Authors language is seeking God in the obscurity of faith with a more profound introversion of Spirit and with less activity and motion in sensitive nature and without the use of grosser images and such souls are not of themselves he saith much inclined to external works but they seek rather to purifie themselves and inflame their hearts to the love of God by internal quiet and pure actuations in spirit by a total abstraction from creatures by solitude both external and especially internal so disposing themselves to receive the influxes and inspirations of God
for the possibility of salvation allowed to any in their Church is built upon the supposition that they have all that is fundamentally necessary in order to it though there are many dangerous errours and corruptions in that Church whose communion they live in § 16. The Answers to the first Question being thus vindicated there remains little to be added concerning the second For he tells me that he agrees so far with me that every Christian is bound to choose the communion of the purest Church But which that Church is must be seen by the grounds it brings to prove the doctrines it teaches to have been delivered by Christ and his Apostles And to be even with him I thus far agree with him in the way of proof of a Churches purity viz. by agreement with the doctrine of Christ and his Apostles and that that Church is to be judged purest which shews the greatest evidence of that consent and that every one is bound to enquire which Church hath the strongest Motives for it and to embrace the communion of it Being thus far agreed I must now enquire into what motives he offers on behalf of their Church and what method he prescribes for delivering ours For the former he produces a large Catalogue of Catholick Motives as he calls them in the words of Dr. Taylour Liberty of Prophecy Sect. 20. And I do not know a better way of answering them than in the words of the same eminent and learned Person which he uses upon a like occasion to his demonstrating Friend I. S. But now in my Conscience saith the Bishop this was unkindly done that when I had spoken for them what I could and more than I knew they had ever said for themselves and yet to save them harmless from the iron hands of a tyrant and unreasonable power to keep them from being persecuted for their errours and opinions that they should take the arms I had lent them for their defence and throw them at my head But the best of it is though I. S. be unthankful yet the Weapons themselves are but wooden Daggers intended only to represent how the poor men are couzened by themselves and that under fair and fraudulent pretences even pious well meaning men men wise enough in other things may be abused And though what I said was but tinsel and pretence imagery and whipt Cream yet I could not be blamed to use no better than the best their cause could bear yet if that be the best they have to say for themselves their probabilities will be soon out-ballanced by one Scripture-testimony urged by Protestants and thou shalt not Worship any graven Images will out-weigh all the best and fairest imaginations of their Church But then I. S. might if he had pleased have considered that I did not intend to make that harangue to represent that the Roman Religion had probabilities of being true but probabilities that the Religion might be tolerated or might be endured and if I was deceived it was but a well meant errour hereafter they shall speak for themselves only for their comfort this they might have also observed in that Book that there is not half so much excuse for the Papists as there is for the Anabaptists and yet it was but an excuse at the best But since from me saith he they borrow their light Armour which is not Pistol-proof from me if they please they may borrow a remedy to undeceive them and that in the same kind and way of arguing for which he referrs to a letter written by him to a Gentlewoman seduced to the Church of Rome out of which I shall transcribe so much as may over-ballance the probabilities produced elsewhere by him After directions given rather to enquire what her Religion is than what her Church is for that which is a true Religion to day will be so to morrow and for ever but that which is a holy Church to day may be Heretical at the next change or may betray her trust or obtrude new Articles in contradiction to the old c. and shewing the unreasonablness of believing the Roman to be the Catholick Church he descends thus to particulars You are now gone to a Church that protects it self by arts of subtlety and arms by violence and persecuting all that are not of their minds to a Church in which you are to be a subject of the King so long as it pleases the Pope In which you may be absolved from your Vows made to God your Oaths to the King your Promises to Men your Duty to your Parents in some cases a Church in which men Pray to God and to Saints in the same Form of words in which they Pray to God as you may see in the Offices of Saints and particularly of our Lady a Church in which men are taught by most of the principal Leaders to Worship Images with the same Worship with which they Worship God or Christ or him or her whose Image it is and in which they usually picture God the Father and the Holy Trinity to the great dishonour of that Sacred mystery against the doctrine and practice of the primitive Church against the express doctrine of Scripture against the honour of a divine Attribute I mean the immensity and spirituality of the divine nature You are gone to a Church that pretends to be infallible and yet is infinitely deceived in many particulars and yet endures no contradiction and is impatient her Children should enquire into any thing her Priests obtrude You are gone from receiving the whole Sacrament to receive it but half from Christs Institution to a human Invention from Scripture to uncertain Traditions and from ancient Tradition to new pretences from Prayers which ye understood to Prayers which ye understand not from confidence in God to rely upon Creatures from intire dependance upon inward-acts to a dangerous temptation of resting too much in outward ministeries in the external work of Sacraments and Sacramentals You are gone from a Church whose Worshipping is simple Christian and Apostolical to a Church where mens Consciences are loaden with a burden of Ceremonies greater than that in the dayes of the Jewish Religion for the Ceremonial of the Church of Rome is a great Book in Folio You are gone from a Church where you were exhorted to read the Word of God the Holy Scriptures from whence you sound instruction institution comfort reproof a treasure of all excellencies to a Church that seals up that Fountain from you and gives you drink by drops out of such Cisterns as they first make and then stain and then reach out and if it be told you that some men abuse Scripture it is true for if your Priests had not abused Scripture they could not thus have abused you but there is no necessity they should and you need not unless you list any more than you need to abuse the Sacrament or Decrees of the Church or the messages of your
obedience to the will of God being agreed to be the condition of mans happiness no other way of Revelation is in it self necessary to that end than such whereby man may know what the will of God is 2. Man being framed a rational Creature capable of reflecting upon himself may antecedently to any external Revelation certainly know the Being of God and his dependence upon him and those things which are naturally pleasing unto him else there could be no such thing as a Law of Nature or any principles of Natural Religion 3. All supernatural and external Revelation must suppose the truth of natural Religion for unless we be antecedently certain that there is a God and that we are capable of knowing him it is impossible to be certain that God hath revealed his will to us by any supernatural means 4. Nothing ought to be admitted for Divine Revelation which overthrows the certainty of those Principles which must be antecedently supposed to all Divine Revelation For that were to overthrow the means whereby we are to Judge concerning the truth of any Divine Revelation 5. There can be no other means imagined whereby we are to judge of the truth of Divine Revelation but a Faculty in us of discerning truth and falshood in matters proposed to our belief which if we do not exercise in Judging the truth of Divine Revelation we must be imposed upon by every thing which pretends to be so 6. The pretence of Infallibility in any person or Society of men must be Judged in the same way that the truth of a Divine Revelation is for that Infallibility being challenged by vertue of a supernatural assistance and for that end to assure men what the will of God is the same means must be used for the trial of that as for any other supernatural way of Gods making known his Will to men 7. It being in the power of God to make choice of several wayes of revealing his will to us we ought not to dispute from the Attributes of God the necessity of one particular way to the Exclusion of all others but we ought to enquire what way God himself hath chosen and whatever he hath done we are sure cannot be repugnant to Infinite Justice Wisdome Goodness and Truth 8. Whatever way is capable of certainly conveying the will of God to us may be made choice of by him for the means of making known his will in order to the happiness of mankind so that no Argument can be sufficient a priori to prove that God cannot choose any particular way to reveal his mind by but such which evidently proves the insufficiency of that means for conveying the Will of God to us 9. There are several wayes conceivable by us how God may make known his Will to us either by immediate voice from Heaven or inward inspiration to every particular person or inspiring some to speak personally to others or assisting them with an infallible spirit in Writing such Books which shall contain the Will of God for the Benefit of distant Persons and future Ages 10. If the Will of God cannot be sufficiently declared to men by Writing it must either be because no Writing can be intelligible enough for that end or that it can never be known to be Written by men infallibly assisted the former is repugnant to common sense for words are equally capable of being understood spoken or written the latter overthrows the possibility of the Scriptures being known to be the Word of God 11. It is agreed among all Christians that although God in the first Ages of the World did reveal his mind to men immediately by a voice or secret inspirations yet afterwards he did communicate his mind to some immediately inspired to Write his Will in Books to be preserved for the benefit of future Ages and particularly that these Books of the New Testament which we now Receive were so Written by the Apostles and Disciples of Jesus Christ. 12. Such Writings having been received by the Christian Church of the first Ages as Divine and Infallible and being delivered down as such to us by an universal consent of all Ages since they ought to be owned by us as the certain rule of faith whereby we are to Judge what the Will of God is in order to our Salvation unless it appear with an evidence equal to that whereby we believe those Books to be the Word of God that they were never intended for that end because of their obscurity or imperfection 13. Although we cannot argue against any particular way of Revelation from the necessary Attributes of God yet such a way as writing being made choice of by him we may justly say that it is repugnant to the nature of the design and the Wisdom and Goodness of God to give infallible assurance to persons in Writing his Will for the benefit of Mankind if those Writings may not be understood by all persons who sincerely endeavour to know the meaning of them in all such things as are necessary for their salvation 14. To suppose the Books so Written to be imperfect i. e. that any things necessary to be believed or practised are not contained in them is either to charge the first Author of them with fraud and not delivering his whole mind or the Writers with insincerity in not setting it down and the whole Christian Church of the first Ages with folly in believing the Fulness and Prefection of the Scriptures in order to Salvation 15. These Writings being owned as containing in them the whole Will of God so plainly revealed that no sober enquirer can miss of what is necessary for salvation there can be no necessity supposed of any infallible society of men either to attest or explain these Writings among Christians any more than there was for some Ages before Christ of such a Body of men among the Iews to attest or explain to them the Writings of Moses or the Prophets 16. There can be no more intolerable usurpation upon the faith of Christians than for any Person or Society of men to pretend to an assistance as infallible in what they propose as was in Christ or his Apostles without giving an equal degree of evidence that they are so assisted as Christ and his Apostles did viz. by miracles as great publick and convincing as theirs were by which I mean such as are wrought by those very persons who challeng this infallibility and with a design for the conviction of those who doe not believe it 17. Nothing can be more absurd than to pretend the necessity of such an infallible commission and assistance to assure us of the truth of these writings and to interpret them and at the same time to prove that commission from those writings from which we are told nothing can be certainly deduced such an assistance not being supposed or to pretend that infallibility in a body of men is not as lyable to doubts and disputes as in those books from
whence only they derive their infallibility 18. There can be no hazard to any person in mistaking the meaning of any particular place in those books supposing he use the best means for understanding them comparable to that which every one runs who believes any person or society of men to be infallible who are not for in this latter he runs unavoidably into one great errour and by that may be led into a thousand but in the former God hath promised either he shall not erre or he shall not be damned for it 19. The assistance which God hath promised to those who sincerely desire to know his will may give them greater assurance of the truth of what is contained in the bookes of Scripture than it is possible for the greatest infallibility in any other persons to doe supposing they have not such assurance of their infallibility 20. No mans faith can therefore be infallible meerly because the Proponent is said to be infallible because the nature of Assent doth not depend upon the objective infallibility of any thing without us but is agreeable to the evidence we have of it in our minds for assent is not built on the nature of things but their evidence to us 21. It is therefore necessary in order to an infallible assent that every particular person be infallibly assisted in Judging of the matters proposed to him to be believed so that the ground on which a necessity of some external infallible Proponent is asserted must rather make every particular person infallible if no divine faith can be without an infallible assent and so renders any other infallibility useless 22. If no particular person be infallible in the assent he gives to matters proposed by others to him then no man can be infallibly sure that the Church is infallible and so the Churches infallibility can signifie nothing to our infallible assurance without an equal infallibility in our selves in the belief of it 23. The infallibility of every particular person being not asserted by those who plead for the infallibility of a Church and the one rendring the other useless for if every person be infallible what need any representative Church to be so and the infallibility of a Church being of no effect if every person be not infallible in the belief of it we are farther to inquire what certainty men may have in matters of faith supposing no external proponent to be infallible 24. There are different degrees of certainty to be attained according to the different degrees of evidence and measure of divine assistance but every Christian by the use of his reason and common helps of Grace may attain to so great a degree of certainty from the convincing arguments of the Christian Religion and authority of the Scriptures that on the same grounds on which men doubt of the truth of them they may as well doubt of the truth of those things which they Judge to be most evident to sense or reason 25. No man who firmly assents to any thing as true can at the same time entertaine any suspition of the falshood of it for that were to make him certain and uncertain of the same thing it is therefore absurd to say that those who are certain of what they believe may at the same time not know but it may be false which is an apparent contradiction and overthrowes any faculty in us of judging of truth or falshood 26. Whatever necessarily proves a thing to be true doth at the same time prove it impossible to be false because it is impossible the same thing should be true and false at the same time Therefore they who assent firmly to the doctrine of the Gospel as true doe thereby declare their belief of the Impossibility of the falshood of it 27. The nature of certainty doth receive several names either according to the nature of the proof or the degrees of the assent Thus moral certainty may be so called either as it is opposed to Mathematical evidence but implying a firme assent upon the highest evidence that Moral things can receive or as it is opposed to a higher degree of certainty in the same kind so Moral certainty implies only greater probabilities of one side than the other in the former sense we assert the certainty of Christian faith to be moral but not only in the latter 28. A Christian being thus certain to the highest degree of a firme assent that the Scriptures are the word of God his faith is thereby resolved into the Scriptures as into the rule and measure of what he is to believe as it is into the veracity of God as the ground of his believing what is therein contained 29. No Christian can be obliged under any pretence of infallibility to believe any thing as a matter of faith but what was revealed by God himself in that book wherein he believes his will to be contained and consequently is bound to reject whatsoever is offered to be imposed upon his faith which hath no foundation in Scripture or is contrary thereto which rejection is no making Negative Articles of faith but only applying the general grounds of faith to particular instances as because I believe nothing necessary to salvation but what is contained in Scripture therefore no such particular things which neither are there nor can be deduced thence 30. There can be no better way to prevent mens mistakes in the sense of Scripture which men being fallible are subject to than the considering the consequence of mistaking in a matter wherein their salvation is concerned And there can be no sufficient reason given why that may not serve in matters of faith which God himself hath made use of as the means to keep men from sin in their lives unless any imagine that errours in opinion are far more dangerous to mens souls than a vitious life is and therefore God is bound to take more care to prevent the one than the other It followeth that 1. There is no necessity at all or use of an infallible Society of men to assure men of the truth of those things which they may be certain without and cannot have any greater assurance supposing such infallibility to be in them 2. The infallibility of that Society of men who call themselves the Catholick Church must be examined by the same faculties in man the same rules of tryal the same motives by which the infallibility of any divine revelation is 3. The less convincing the miracles the more doubtful the marks the more obscure the sense of either what is called the Catholick Church or declared by it the less reason hath any Christian to believe upon the account of any who call themselves by the name of the Catholick Church 4. The more absurd any opinions are and repugnant to the first principles of sense and reason which any Church obtrudes upon the faith of men the greater reason men still have to reject the pretence of infallibility in that Church as a