the original of the word is another thing not super statutum what then can he tolerably mean by t is well applied by Divines can Divines do well to apply superstitio to super statutum when that is no way the nature of the word Or can any proof be brought from hence to conclude superstition an excess or addition to the rule because it is super statutum when there is no affinity between super statutum and superstition what is or can be unreasonable if this be not And so it appears how little truth there is in that which shuts up this first reason That which the Old Testament calls addition to the word the New calls doctrines traditions of men wil-worship superstition In which few words as there be many infirm parts 1. That additions to the word are in the N. T. called Doctrines I suppose he means teaching somewhat else for doctrines Mat. 15 9. assuming them to be such when they are not So again Mar. 7. 7. where yet the word Doctrines signifies the Scripture or Doctrine of God and so the teaching their own traditions for doctrines is adding them to the Scripture Doctrines there simply signifying not that addition but that to which the addition is made and 2. that they are called wil-worship the contrary of which is proved in the Treatise of wil-worship and here to suppose it is a begging of the question so sure this is a third that additions to the rule of worship are any where in the New T. called superstition I desire he will shew me one such place for my Concordance will not afford it me T is but a 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 only twice there used First Act. 17. 22. by St. Paul of the Athenians whom he perceived to be 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 more superstitious then others But these sure never medled with and so added not to the true rule of worship any otherwise then as all that abandon it adde to it live by some other false rule and minde not that and if they are for so doing to be styled adders to the rule of Worship adulterers are so in like manner and so by that measure or standard every sin in the world is superstition Secondly the word is used Act. 25. 29. where Festus speaks of Pauls 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 own superstition but sure meant not to accuse him of adding to his or the Jews rule of worship but understood his own Religion and nothing else by that phrase And so still 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 here are as many misadventures amasst together as could well be crowded into so few words His second proof now follows thus Because as the defect in Religion is called profaneness so the excess is called superstition as standing in opposition to it Alas it seems there is great need of proofs for this again as the former was the very medium to prove the first proposition and so either the first and this second proposition of his are all one and then why was it cut in two by Lucians beetle or else these proofs are very excellent instruments fitted for all turns indifferently However it is I shall not need provide new answers to it but remand it to the former Section where it was considered to the utmost it could pretend Only if he please I shall put it in form for him thus The worship of the many false Gods or Demons is an excess opposed to Religion or worship of the one true God of heaven and earth in Aquinas's opinion and so also is the worshipping the true God after an undue or unlawfull manner ergo the using any Ceremony in the worship of the true God which the Scripture hath not commanded is superstition and superstition is that As if he should say superstition is that because it is somewhat else as extremely distant from that as that which is not God is from God or as unlawfull for so is superstition is from lawfull for such is that which is not prohibited 13. A third proof he now adds of his affirmation and that after the manner observed in his former argument from the Doctors own concessions and no less then five nay the fourth number being twice repeated no less then six of them And if I have so liberally granted it I wonder how it came to be my charge and that as the cause of my miscarriages that I denyed it But 't is strange to see what 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 can do phansie first and next accuse me of denying a thing grosso modo and to prove me to have erred in thus denying produce six several senses wherein I have granted it whereas there is in the whole inditement but one pretended wherein I had denyed it In all reason those six concessions might have reconciled the Diatribist to me and perswaded him that I was of his minde rather then one single appearance of dissenting have thus provoked him The Doctors Concessions such as they are are evidently reconcileable with all that he hath proposed in that Tract of Superstition and the descending to a particular view of them as they are marshalled up by the Diatribist will take away all doubt in this matter First saith he he grants that superstitions may denote such an excess Sect. 31. Here I demand what Mr. C. means by such an excess that indeed is thus far answered already that he means an excess of Religion But what excess in Religion The super statutum every addition to the rule of worship i. e. every uncommanded circumstance or Ceremony in the worship of God Thus he must mean if he be constant to himself and if the Doctors Concessions yield him any appearance of proof for his affirmative But to see the luck of it this first citation from the Doctor is so far from yielding him any such testimony that it is indeed the quite contrary for that which the Doctor there observes Sect. 31. is this that the word superstitiosus may indeed denote such excess from the force of the termination osus but this no more then the word religiosus also denotes in the opinion of Agellius out of Nigidius Figulus and consequently that 1. Superstitio and Religio were all one in that same Author's opinion and 2. that it is the animadversion of Agellius upon that Author that all such excesses are not culpable or taken in ill but good senses And then was not this a dangerous concession fit to be called out in judgement against me then which nothing could be more direct to the asserting mine and refuting the Diatribists hypothesis If this account of the word superstitiosus were not sufficient to secure my pretensions which in that place were only this that superstition among all Authors signified not any criminous excess I might farther adde that even when the word superstitiosus is but a bare denominative from superstitio and yet is used in an ill sense as when we Christians say a superstitious person the account is clear
be many acts of worship many circumstances of worship yea and many heights of Christian heroical virtue which may bear proportion with worship that are not under obligation from any particular command of Gods and so remain to be acts of the will or choise of man which are perfectly lawfull acceptable yea some highly rewardable by God and so far from the guilt which Mr. C. affixes of high indignity or affront to the divine Majestie What he addes of the simple word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that they are but twice apiece used in the Book of Wisdome and alway in an ill notion which saith he is but little to the credit of the compound 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 might sure have been spared it being as certain and visible to him that the same word is used by St James c. 1. 27. in as good a sense as could be wisht with the epithets of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 pure and undefiled before God added to it and v. 26. for the profession of Christianity though for want of actions bridling the tongue and the like that becomes 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 vain And as plain that the word is in it self equally applicable to the true as to the false indifferently to any religion to St Pauls religion among the Jews Act. 26. 5. the strictest sect of our religion to the worship of Angels Col. 2. 18. and so to the worship of Idols in the Book of Wisdome which yet can no more tend to the disadvantage of the compound 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 when that is not terminated on any prohibited object then the use of the Latine cultus sometimes for the worship of false Gods can prejudge voluntarius cultus voluntary worship when either the object is not specified or the mention of the one true God is added to it It being confest and supposed by both parties in this contest that the simple 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or worship it self is not culpable save onely when the other part of the composition the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 i. e. the interposition of the will or as he will style it the devise or appointment of man hath an influence upon it Sect. 3. His entrance on the view of Col. 2. answered The difference betwixt Commands of Magistrates and imposition of dogmatizers What t is which is said to have 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 HIS 3d § is his entrance on the view of Col. 2. where onely the word Will-worship is to be found and in setting down his grounds of interpreting it 1. He citeth Beza and BP Davenant whose words are presently answered by adverting to the distinction formerly given between the essentials and circumstantials the parts and the ceremonies of worship 2dly He pretends to discover a mistake in me in that I observe from v. 22. that St Paul speaks not of commands but doctrines not of the prohibition of the Magistrate but of false teachers imposing them as the commands of God Whereas saith he the Apostle speaks expressely of these impositions that they were after the Commandments and doctrines of men v. 8. after the traditions of men to worship God by the observation of them Of which words of his if there be any shadow of force in them by way of exception against me the meaning must be that the Apostle there speaks of the commands or prohibitions of Magistrates in things of themselves perfectly indifferent and censures those commands under the style of Will-worship But then this hath no degree of truth in it for 1. The matter of the commands is no lawful matter but either the worship of Angels and that is criminous as the worshipping of a creature or the reducing of antiquated rites of Judaisme which ought not to be reduced being once cancelled and nailed to the cross of Christ 2. The commands were not commands of Magistrates but of men which had no authority to prescribe any thing especially so contrary to the doctrine which the Apostles had planted among them the Christian liberty from the Judaical yoke 3. The manner of imposing them was quite distant from that of the Magistrates giving laws Ecclesiastical or Civil those are by way of Canon as of things indifferent in order to decency and the like without ever pretending them to be in themselves necessary as commanded by God these are imposed as from God when they are not so and that is the known sin of dogmatizing to which I formerly applied the place And the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 commands signifies no more then so being joyned with and explicated by 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 doctrines i. e. such things as false teachers require all men to do in obedience to God or as if they were now commanded by him when some of them as abstinencies c. having once been required by God are now abolisht by Christ and the other the worship of Angels though it pretend not ever to have been commanded but onely to be acceptable to God is clearly forbidden by him So that here is a palpable mistake in the Diatribist who observes them to be commands meaning as he must if he censureth or opposeth me commands of Magistrates and not onely doctrines of false teachers when indeed commands and doctrines are all one both joyned together to signifie these dogmatizers pretending the things which they taught to be in force by Divine command by virtue of the Law given to Moses and not onely such as would be accepted by God as of the worship of Angels I suppose was pretended by those false teachers For this is to be remembred here once for all that the seducers spoken of in that Chapter were the Gnostick hereticks who made up their Theologie of Judaical and heathenish additions to the Christian truth from the Jews they had many abstinences such as were now abolisht by Christ and those they imposed as commands of God when they were not and from the heathens the doctrine of the Aeones or Angels as creators of this inferior world and so such as might with Gods good liking be worshipt by us Lastly Those commands of theirs are not censured by the Apostle as acts of Will-worship or blamed or put under any ill character for being such any more then for being acts of humility which is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 joyned with Will-worship in that place v. 22. but as intrenchments on that liberty purchased for them by the death of Christ v. 20. which had cancelled these Judaical ordinances to all that were dead with him i. e. to Christians and had turned all Daemon worship out of their hearts but had no way bound up the hands of his Apostles or their successors the Governors of the Church from instituting ceremonies or festivals among Christians When the Diatribist addes of Will-worship that it had a shew of wisdome but no more t is but a begging the question or if it pretend to be concluded from that text it is without
only of impiety in Idolatry And thus I hope I have at length vindicated this 2d argument for the good sense of the word from all the evasions and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and truly there have been good store of them and I believe this Section his masterpiece of dexterity and therefore I have so punctually and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 insisted on it from all the subtile refuges of this Diatribist Sect. 11. The Greek Fathers acception of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 An argument of goodness that 't is pretended by hypocrates Religion in a good sense will-Will-worship not worse then false worship not abominable All devised worship is not Idolatry doth not pretend to more wisdom then Gods The Latin Fathers cited by Mr. C. The vulgar Translator and the followers thereof 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 by the vulgar rendred decernitis The authority of Bellarmine and Daillé for the good sense The testimonies out of Ambrose Theodoret Salmeron Estius Augustine Thomas examined MY third reason being taken from the Greek fathers understanding of the place who though they interpret 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 only of appearance yet paraphrase Will-worship by words of good savour 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 pious religious c. The Diatribist begins with a triumph and ovation First saith he this is well that the Greek Fathers agree with us in exposition of the first words a shew not as he somewhat real of wisdom nay they expressely oppose against it power and truth and can that which hath neither power nor truth in the worship of God be taken in a good sense And do not the Fathers imply as much Chrysost 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 he seems to be religious but is not so Oecumenius 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 pretending religion in worship And is there any goodnesse in hypocrisie Here truly it is not to be reprehended but cherished in the Diatribist that he is so very much rejoyced to hear the newes that the Greek Fathers and he are of a minde in any the least particular I hope it will incourage and ingage him to a more familiar conversation with them and then I am perswaded no body will have reason to repent of it All that I am to complain of at the present is first that their interpreting 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a shew should be deemed an agreement with him more then with me who he knowes have produced them and never exprest any dislike to that interpretation All the difference between us being but this that the Greek 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 being capable of two rendrings rationem and speciem I that desired to proceed on sure grounds proposed them both and which soever should be adhered to shewed the necessity of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 being taken in a good sense T is true indeed if 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 should be there taken for ratio the argument for the good sense would proceed most irresistibly But supposing it with the Fathers to signifie species a bare shew or appearance yet the argument holds very firmly thus also the Gnostick doctrines cannot have so much as a shew of piety in Will-worship unlesse Will-worship real be piety real and the appearance of Will-worship a foundation of an appearance of piety And this being the sense of the Fathers which rendred 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a bare shew this sure was fit to be confronted to the Diatribist's pretensions as a third argument And is it not now a strange way of answer to this argument to ask as he here doth Can that which hath neither power nor truth in the worship of God be taken in a good sense I reply by demanding what it is of which the Fathers say that it hath neither power nor truth Sure the doctrines of abstinence and not the Will-worship And yet his answer proceeds as if they supposed it of the Will-worship and without that hath no appearance of force in it And is not this a strange perverting of plain words Chrysostome saith the false teacher seems to be pious but is not and Oecumenius that he simulates piety and from hence Mr. C. concludes that Will-worship is not taken in a good sense But I pray is not piety taken in a good sense even when the hypocrite simulates piety Nay would he pretend to it if it were not good Doth a hypocrite pretend to that which is acknowledgedly ill This were sure to appear what he is and that is contrary to his being an hypocrite The product is plain Will-worship is rendred by piety not by appearance of piety unless piety it self can be taken there in an ill sense Will-worship must be taken in a good sense Certainly I need adde no more 't is pity I should be required to say so much of this matter But on occasion of the interpreter of Clemens who renders 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in religione from whence I thought I might conclude it that mans sense that Will-worship signifies religion and so that it was not taken in an ill sense he is pleased to ask Why Is not religion it self of various senses The simple word signifies false religion as well as true but the composition makes it worse and alters the sense because it addes the work of mans will to worship which is abominable to God What depth there is in this question will soon appear For 1. What if both religio and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 be of various senses and signifie false religion as well as true heathen or Judaical as well as Christian Is there any appearance of reason to determine it to the former in this place or in that interpreters acception of it If there be then there is an account of the words being taken in an ill sense without any influence of the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 mans will upon it if there be not as he is obliged to affirm there is not saying p. 69 that the Apostle brands them as destructive because they are but will-Will-worship not because they are outdated or Judaical much lesse then because they are any more dangerous sort of false worship such as was used among the heathens then what matters it what in other places it signifie whensoever the adjuncts or context so determine it unlesse it do or can be pretended to do so here This being premised that which follows is yet more strange that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 signifying false religion as well as true the composition makes it worse worse then what then false religion This is fairly to resolve that the use of any thing uncommanded in the service of the true God is worse then false religion indefinitely i. e. then Idolatry or Superstition and the reason annext is of the same temper adding the work of mans will is abominable to God Here indeed is a foundation of charge of Idolatry or whatever is most abominable on this poor Church of ours for the bare using of any most innnocent ceremony
he cites not In all reason this defect must be supplied by Salmeron who cited in the margent August lib. de verâ rel lib. 2. de doctr Christ c. 25. and Thomas 2a. 2 ae qu. 93. art 1. What place in Augustines book de vera relig it is to which he referres we have no direction and so are left to guesse that it is cap. 55. Non sit nobis religio in phantasmatibus nostris Melius est enim qualecumque verum quà m omne quicquid pro arbitrio fingi potest Let not our religion be placed in our fantasmes for any thing which is true is better then whatsoever can be feigned at our own pleasure And as to the truth of this position I give full consent that all fictitious false worship is to be avoided not only as he contents himself to say unfit to compare with true so I no where undertake to be advocate for any false or fictitious or fantastick religion The commemorating the birth of Christ on the 25th of December I hope is not such nor any Ceremony admitted into use in our Church The other place out of the 2d de doctr Christ c. 55. stands thus Having at the 20th Chapter defined Superstitiosum superstitious to be whatsoever was instituted by men for the making or worshipping of Idols and that either belonging to the worshipping any Creature or part of a Creature as God or to consulting or making any pacts with Devils c. and having fallen on the several sorts of divinations c. 20 21 22 23 24. he begins his 25th ch quibus ampuâ—atis atque eradicatis ab animo Christiano deinceps videndae sunt institutiones hominum non superstitiosae i. e. non cum daemonibus sed cum ipsis hominibus institutae the former being lopt off and eradicated from a Christians minde let us farther view such institutions of men as are not superstitious i. e. are not made with Devils but with men themselves And having added somewhat of such vain institutions which sure no way concern the matter now in hand he comes to those which are useful to humane society and resolves that such are not to be avoided by a Christian imò etiam quantum satis est intuenda memoriaeque retinenda but in a competent manner to be observed and retained and this how little it belongs to the present purpose to the proving 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to be here used in an ill sense is already so apparent that I need adde no word more to the clearing of it As for the place of Aquinas 2a. 2 ae qu. 93. art 1. It is the very same which long ago we considered in the former part of this Tract ch 3. § 3. n. 5. and to the view of it there presented I refer the reader finding nothing more in that whole place art 1. which was not there punctually considered unlesse it be a citation out of the Glosse Col. 2. quòd superstitio est quando traditioni humanae religionis nomen applicatur that it is superstition when the name of religion is applied to the tradition of men which words have nothing in them which I am not ready to acknowledge being sufficiently assured that dogmatizing is a sin and consequently that so good a name as religion ought not to be pretended for or applied to it What he addes by way of answer to my fourth reason hath I think nothing of moment in it but what hath oft been spoken to already unlesse it be that he saith he hath not observed any such difficulty or obscurity in that text Col 2. 20. c. but dares say the Doctors exposition makes the greatest obscurity that ever he met with But of this there is no disputing I must not expect that he shall acknowledge my interpretation to be clear when he dislikes it or discern the involutions or difficulties of that other which he hath espoused when if he did he were obliged to forsake it Sect. 12. The fifth reason vindicated 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Hesychius corrected twise 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 adverbially 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Hesychius's Glossary concordant to th Scripture use 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Eph. 5. 4. TO my fifth reason taken from Hesychius's rendring it by 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 voluntary piety or worship and the notion which he had of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in composition to signifie that which a man did 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 voluntarily and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of his own accord agreeably to which the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 freewill-offerings are rendred by the Septuagint 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 voluntary performances his answer is brief that this is no advantage to my cause for the words may both signifie well-devised worship in an ill sense And though in humane authors the derivatives and compounds of this word expresse the Freewillingnesse of the person yet that will not help the Doctor who doth not understand 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in respect to the willingnesse of the person in a commanded worship of God but voluntary worship i. e. worship not commanded by God but offered to him by the free will of man To this I reply 1. that I willingly confesse 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as capable of an ill sense as 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 i. e. that when the worship is forbidden or false then being ill the voluntarinesse of it can infuse no goodnesse into it as when it is of it self good the uncommandednesse cannot make it ill And therefore 2dly this was not it on which I laid the weight only I thought 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 had not been so likely to hear ill with gainsayers as this other which I saw was fallen under great prejudice with some but rather that which followed of the other compounds of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which signifie no more but doing somewhat voluntarily or of their own accord without any necessity to doe it 3dly Then I say that acknowledging it my notion of the word to signifie worship not commanded by God the authority of Hesychius and the other Greek Glossaries which concur with or follow him is clear and home to confirm that to be the meaning of it If that which is said already be not sufficient to lay the parallel directly betwixt Will-worship and voluntary oblations or performances of things not commanded then adde 1. from Hesychius again that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 signifies 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 voluntary proceeding from his own will and that sure is distant enough from the will or command of another The words in Hesychius are certainly false printed as much of that book is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 It must questionlesse thus be mended either 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or else in stead of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 we must read 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 adverbially for so Suidas fetcheth that word out of approved authors and which way soever it is the sense
more immediately lead into vitious practice I shall never willingly contend with any man or make reply to the contentious But in Doctrines which have immediate influence upon practice t is obligation of charity to indevour the disabusing of all and not to permit or suffer any such fruitfull and noxious error upon my neighbour 8. Under which head because I cannot but place the rejecting of Children from Baptisme and find some objections offered by Mr. Tombes to what I have written on that subject I have therefore drawn a short defence of that Apostolical practice and vindicated my former discourse from his answers and exceptions which being offered to the Reader as soon as the Printer will permit I shall not doubt of his leave to shut up the Palaestra at this time having sufficiently cloyed him with these Spectacles 9. And it is my wish for him that he may continue to have the ease at least of a Spectator that it may be his lot though for some moneths it hath not been mine 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to live peaceably and quietly with all men a felicity of which we are all to be ambitious 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and a grace that we are all not in prayer onely but by real indevours to contend for and to hold it fast untill it be violently wrested from us 10. As it is I have with patience fortified my self for the present undertaking and to make it also as supportable as may be to others abstained from transcribing the entire severall Sections of his Diatribae and onely repeated as much as exacts answer from me not omitting as far as my wit would serve me any the least particular which can be thought to have energy against any of those things that are asserted by me in those Tracts save only when the same things once answered have again whether in words or sense been repeated by him THE Contents of the severall CHAPTERS and Sections contained herein CHAPTER I. OF Mr. C. his Title Pages page 1 Sect. 1. Philosophy Col. 2. 8. Fables and endless Genealogies 1 Tim. 1. 4. Tit. 3. 9. The propriety of that Text Col. 2. to Mr. C. his discourse 1 Sect. 2. Mat. 15. 8 9. Gal. 4. 9 10. Deum sic colere quomodo scipsum colendum praecepit Christmass no irrational custome 3 CHAP. II. Of Mr. C. his Preface p. 4 Sect. 1. His discourse of the causes of my mistakes Comparing of Superstition and Wil-worship to Heresie Accounting Superstition our virtue 4 Sect. 2. Of being too Religious of the intension or degree The Messalians Neglect of Charity of particular callings Eccl. 7. 16. Of multitude of Ceremonies Too many Ceremonies no argument of too much but of too little Religion 6 Sect. 3. Mr. C. his distinctions of being too religious multiplied unnecessarily Frequency of duty if secured from other neglects no excess nor criminous Prayer a branch of Natural worship 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Excess in trust c. as well as in Prayer The Species of worship and the circumstances thereof The wide difference between these Times of Prayer not limited by Scripture Set days of worship Gestures Prostration Mr. C. his 3. proofs examined Deut. 4. 2. considering Apoc. 22. 19. A view of Aquinas's doctrine in this matter 8 Sect. 4. Excess of Religion Super statutum Addition to the Rule Doctrines 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Act. 17. 22. Act. 25. 29. Six concessions Superstitiosus Worshipping of Angels Superstitum cultus Slavish fear Religion in Epicurus Fear of punishment in sons in wicked men The necessity thereof Dogmatizing Placing more virtue in things then belongs to them 20 Sect. 5. The innocence of will-Wil-worship Analogie with voluntary oblationsunder the law Seeming Contradiction The authority of Chrysostome and Theophylact. The 2d. Commandment Reducing all sins to the Decalogue Addition to the rule Worship of Angels Other sins beside that of Dogmatizing 32 Sect. 6. The Lawfulness of instituting the Christmass Festival Of Church Laws 38 CHAP. III. Of Superstition peculiarly And first of his Prolegomenon on that Subject p. 41 Sect. 1. Answer to § 1. The method used to find the meaning of the word 41 Sect. 2. Answer to § 2. Amesius's definition The matter of the 4 first Commandments The affirmative part of the 2d. Commandment The Diatribist's misadventure about Duty in the midst No prohibition of either holy days in the 4th Commandment Jeroboams act 1 Kin. 12. 32. The Rubenites altar Josh 22. Naaman's altar Christmass Festival parallel to it The excesses in each Commandment 42 Sect. 3. The species of Superstition Idolatrie belongs to the 2d. Commandment Superstition to the first It differs from Wil-worship The meaning of Illegitimate worship in Aquinas His opinion of Ecclesiastical rites Barbarous ceremonies of Baals worship belong not to the 2d. Commandment Holy days before Popery Two antient Testimonies for them The Jews scrupulosity in not resisting on the Sabbath day 49 Sect. 4. The Diatribist's method and caution in setting down the species of Superstition 53 CHAP. IV. Of the particular exceptions of the Diatribist to the Tract of Superstition p. 55 Sect. 1. Confidence of innocence no argument of guilt 55 Sect. 2. The nature of the word Excess of fear among the Epicureans Superstitio from Super and sto not statuo Aquinas misreported 56 Sect. 3. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 among the heathens for Religion so in Hesychius and Phavorinus 58 Sect. 4. False worship is not Wil-worship Imposition of hands 59 Sect. 5. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Act. 17. 22. The Athenians the most devout of all the Greeks 60 Sect. 6. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Act. 25. Festus's scorn fals on the Jews not on Paul 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 his own not theirs 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and accusation Jesus put under the notion of a 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 by Festus 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 taken for a daemon 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The Diatribists objections answered Superstition for Religion simply 62 Sect. 7. The method of search for the original notion of the word Mr. Cawdries collections from the heathens Among them Superstition all one with Religion Plutarch of the Sabbatick rest Sacrificing children to Moloch was not to the true God Jer. 32. 35. Lev. 20. 2. nor a bare uncommanded worship The glosses of the Etymologist and Phavorinus 66 Sect. 8. Superstition always ill but not always excess Probations from the use of words among heathens The Quaere of Divorce vindicated Superstitions not reprocht in the Romans by Polybius Ignorance not presently Superstition 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Act. 17. The Israelites worshipping the Calfe 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Superstitiosus noting excess 70 Sect. 9. The Diatribist's concession of the innocence of unprescribed ceremonies and so of all that is demanded His censure of himself and Chamier Authority in a Church to institute Ceremonies Abstaining from ceremonies because commanded by men or abused by Papists 77 Sect. 10. Strictures on some particulars in the remaining Sections
that superstition there signifies Heathen-worship or somewhat proportionable to it worshipping of others beside the one true God and by analogie with that notion of the substantive the adjective fitly denotes him that acts like one of those false worshippers or agrees with them in some eminent thing which is a branch of their false worship as he that makes observations of dreams and ominous days or occurrences is said commonly to be superstitious herein i. e. to imitate the Auguries of the Heathen and many the like The 2. concession that the worship of Angels is an excess or addition to the object of worship and by him styled that crime of superstition a man would wonder to see produced by the Diatribist against me T is certain I make the worship of Angels superstition worshipping those fellow creatures which a Christian ought not to worship But is this an excess of religion or not rather of impiety worshipping of the creature 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 besides or over and above the creator T is true this is an addition to the object of worship as death is an addition to life i. e. destruction to the oneness of that which ought alone to be worshipt and admits no rival ye cannot serve God and Mammon nor worship the one God if ye impart and lavish out that incommunicable priviledge to any other and so adultery is an addition to the object of marital love and fidelity But then what is this to the prejudice of uncommanded ceremonies the using of which super statutum the Diatribist is to demonstrate to be superstition for about that onely he knowes the controversie is betwixt us The 3. concession is just parallel to this and in part the same superstitum cultus saith he the worship of the Worthies by heathens or of Saints and Angels by Papists is called superstition Sect. 3. most properly why but that it addes to the rule of worship I must not repeate what was so lately said though the Diatribist will T is evident I affirm all these to be superstition but the using of an uncommanded rite is none of these what heathen worthy Saint or Angel is worshipped or idolized by my prostrating my self in the worship of the true God by my bowing at the name of Jesus c. As for the reason why the worship of heathen Worthies and Saints and Angels by analogy is called superstition it is strange again what care of interest can do The reason one would think was visible enough to the Diatribist in the very naming of superstitum cultus these Worthies and Saints are superstites supposed to live after death sure that is the notion of superstes and so the worshipping of such is superstition and as the Angels so the souls of the Worthies that thus survive the bodies and in the heathens theology are removed 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to the fortunate Islands in the Christians to heaven or paradise or Abrahams bosome are solemnly styled 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and so the worshipping of them is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and that is superstition Is not this reason enough for the justifying the propriety of the use of a word that it perfectly accords with the origination of it both in Greek and Latine and then what need of his capriccio why but that it addes to the rule of worship Certainly so doth sacriledge even when it robbes God adde to the rule of worship in this sense doing something which the rule commands not no nor permits and yet that is not superstition The 4. concession produced is yet more strange A slavish fear saith he of God is granted to be superstition because fear of God being worship commanded in the first commandment slavish fear is an excess of that and he hath adventured to cite the sections wherein t is granted by me § 24. 25. of the treatise of superstition Herein the Reader will easily satisfie himself by his own eyes In a word those sections say no syllable of slavish fear or any such matter and yet the Printer hath not mistaken his figures all that they say is this that superstitio sometimes signifies in authors any part of Divine worship which in obedience to his God or for fear of vengeance from him any worshipper doth perform a thing which every sect likes in themselves but dislikes in others of a distant worship and so either honours or defames with the title as of superstition so of Religion also Then that it also signifies a trembling fear of Gods punishments due for sinne such as the Epicureans that denyed all providence were willing to scoffe out of the world And of this notion of superstition and equally of religion among the Epicureans and Cicero that took it from them I had spoken there at large from § 14. to § 20. to which I must remit the Reader and onely adde what there I omitted that all that is there observed would probably receive much light if we could retrieve one book of Plutarch which is lost and instead of which I can now onely give him the title of it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of superstition to Epicurus differing it seems both by the addition of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and consequently in the subject of it from that which is now extant of Plutarchs 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which hath no considerable aspect on Epicurus or his followers and Philosophy either to defend or accuse it Of this see the learned Gassend in his life of Epicurus But to return what pretense can there be thus to change my words in an unprofitable citation when if it had been slavish fear in his notion of it of which I spake yet that had been farre enough from the using of uncommanded ceremonies or instituting of Festivals and instead of that divine worship which any performs in obedience to his God or for feare of punishment from him and which Epicurus desired to scoffe out of the world to substitute slavish fear of God or an excess of that fear of God which is prescribed as worship in the first commandment Can it enter into any Christians heart to think or say that Epicurus was in the right in that part of his Theology and consequently that it was an excess of fear which Epicurus desired to exterminate This is to say that all religion belief of hell infinite punishments apportioned to sinners in another world are excess of fear and under the title of slavish criminous and to be cast out This certainly was Epicurus's meaning and the verses in Lucretius demonstrate it where he thus argues Nam si nullum finem esse putarent Aerumnarum homines nullâ ratione valerent Religionibus atque minis obsistere vatum If men should believe endless punishments they could never resist the religions and threatnings of the Priests And who would have expected the Diatribist a favourer of this sect as he must be if this fear of God which Epicurus called Religion or Superstition
be accusations again 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 v. 7. c. Whence I suppose it will follow that the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of which he was charged which is the matter of the accusation or that wherein the offence consisted was his not their Superstition for how could their own Superstition be the matter of their charge against him To the 2d that what I said of Festus putting Jesus under the notion of a dead Heros though it be of that nature that I shall not because I need not make it a matter of controversie with any yet I had this consideration to incline me to it the immediate subjoyning of one Jesus whom Paul 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 contended to live to be superstes as of their Daemons Festus and those of his perswasions ordinarily affirmed To which purpose I remembred what the Athenians surmised when Paul preacht to them Jesus and the Resurrection Act. 17. 18. He seems say they 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to be a proclaimer of strange or new Daemons where St Chrysostome judges it so manifest that those Graecians thought Jesus to be a Daemon that he addes 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 they took also Anastasis Resurrection for some Goddess as being accustomed to worship females also And then why Festus an heathen likewise and which understood none but heathen Theologie should not thus mean in words of so neer an importance that will bear it so fitly I can yet see no reason to doubt Of this I am sure that in the one proof offered to the contrary the Diatribist hath strained more then I have in my Criticisme for 1. When he thus reads the text they had many questions that so he might make it necessary to distinguish the question concerning his Superstition from that of Jesus he hath inserted the word many there being neither in the Greek nor in our English any such word but onely 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 some or certain accusations 2dly When on the same design he again reads both concerning their Superstition and also there is no such word nor any thing either in the Greek or our English answerable either to both or to also but onely thus 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 concerning his own Superstition or daemon worship and one Jesus which was or had been dead so 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 signifies whom Paul affirmed to live and 3dly When he addes that he was accused of questions of their Law c. 23. and of sedition c. c. 24. this proves nothing which the Diatribist would have for though the Jews had thus accused him yet he had answered for himself in the latter part of c. 24. and cleared himself perfectly from those two charges from the first v. 12. and from the second v. 18. and so again c. 25. 8. and so still it remains that in Festus's judgement to which Paul appeals for the knowledge of it telling him that he knew he was guiltless from having done any wrong to the Jewes v. 10. Paul was not guilty nor stood charged of any thing but onely of his own Religion and one Jesus i. e. I suppose by way of explication as 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and is frequently exegetical of believing and proclaiming Jesus and the Resurrection c. 24. 15. which last also being common to him with the Jewes as there he contests could not by them duely be charged upon him and so the whole charge and that which is the characteristick distinctive note of his Religion is his contending that Jesus was alive who had dyed which how agreeable it is to Festus's notion of a Daemon I shall not need farther to declare As to the last it is evident that he that affirmes Jesus to be alive both soul and body doth to a heathen eare as much define him to be a Daemon as if he said nothing of his body However all that Festus here saith is that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 he affirmed him to live now after he had been dead and if to that we adde that Paul preached his ascension to heaven what could a heathen according to his perswasions conclude from thence but that he had attained his 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which was all that they required to his being a Daemon And so much for these objections Meanwhile if all were granted that is here desired by the Diatribist that the Superstition spoken of was not S. Pauls but the Jews this could no way incommodate me or hinder my pretensions in order to the main for then say I it shall signifie the Jews Religion simply without any character of ill or good laid on it as in Quintilian Primus Judaicae Superstitionis author the first author of the Jewish Superstition or Religion and in Vlpian that Severus and Antoninus permitted those to be capable of dignities qui Judaicam Superstitionem sequuntur who follow the Jewish Superstition or Religion and many the like Sect. 7. The method of search for the original notion of the word Mr. Cawdries collections from the heathens Among them Superstition all one with Religion Plutarch of the Sabbatick rest Sacrificing children to Moloch was not to the true God Jer. 32. 35. Lev. 20. 2. nor a bare uncommanded worship The glosses of the Etymologist and Phavorinus THe 21th § is a short dispatch of all that I had said of the use of the word among other Authors from § 14 to § 27. All which Sections though intirely designed to the discovering the true notion of the word by that norma loquendi the best rule to judge of words the use of it among writers of all sorts are shortly censured as a great deal of reading and learning to little purpose except to cloud the business to lead men away in a mist from the true and proper sense of the word among Christians It seems they which receive benefit by being in the dark are apt to mistake light for mists and the Apostle hath given the reason 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 they are reproved by the light T is certain the Christians took the word whether Greek or Latine from the heathens which were before them and accordingly to judge of the propriety of the use of it I thought my self obliged to search to the original i. e. to the use of it among the heathens and finding the Scripture use of it exactly agreeable to their acception of it from whom the Scripture had it and so likewise the Christian Glossaries that of Hesychius Suidas Phavorinus the Etymologist and others I thought this had been to some other purpose then onely to cloud the business And because I continue still in the same opinion I refer the judicious Reader for three eminent testimonies more to the same purpose out of Diod. Siculus of Imilco out of Heraclitns 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 out of an edict of Tiberius set down by Josephus to the Annotations on Act. 17. By which and those already produced in the Sections here thought fit to be despised by the
Diatribist it is most evident that Religion and Superstition were by them who were guilty of daemon worship or when used of them by others taken as exactly Synonyma words importing the same thing But against this the Diatribist conceives himself out of these very Sections to have gained somewhat to object It seems saith he the heathens did oft take the word in an ill sense and branded Religions which they did not like by that name Plutarch taxes the Jewes for their Superstition in two things remarkable 1. That when invaded they would not rise from their seats on the Sabbath day which was excess against the 4th Commandment and gross Superstition 2. Their killing and sacrificing their children to Moloch which being an horrid Superstition was as the former intended as a worship to the true God and yet was interpreted no better then sacrificing to devils Psal 106. 37. which though in other respects it was against the first Commandment gross Idolatry so in making it a worship of the true God when he commanded it not neither came it into his heart as somewhere he sayes it was a kind of Superstition against the 2d Commandment concluding in a word that the Etymologist speaks fully his sense the word among the heathen is taken for a good thing but among Christians for impiety How solid this way of objecting is will now soon be discerned 1. By remembring in the general that at the beginning of the § the testimonies brought by me in those Sections were judged to be to little purpose but to cloud the business and lead men away in a mist and yet now he can express kindness to some of the testimonies as thinking they may be usefull to his pretensions which assures me all the other might have been capable of the like favour and friendly reception from him if they could any way have been perswaded to do him service 2dly To the heathens taking the word in an ill sense the answer is most obvious so they did Religion too and indifferently either when either they that spake were Epicureans enemies to all Religion or when the Religions they spake of were disliked by them and so sure that proves nothing for the Diatribist 3dly This is the answer also to what is observed from Plutarch for he speaks of the religions which he disliked the Jewish was one of them and particularly their observation of Sabbatick rests to the ruining their City which he thought their Religion had bound them to and never dreamt that they had mistaken their Religion or that their 4th Commandment allowed them greater liberty 4thly That Plutarch mentions the killing and sacrificing of children he took that also for a part of some mens Religion and thought he had reason to be dissatisfied with it and to make it an instance of the Quantum Religio potuit how much evil Religion did in the world still making no distinction betwixt Religion and Superstition But here by the way the Diatribist hath a little mistaken in thinking that this bloody worship in sacrificing their children to Moloch was as the former i. e. as that of the strict Judaical rest in time of invasion intended as a worship to the true God Certainly Moloch was no true God but a false the abomination of the children of Ammon 1 Kin. 11. 7. and 2 Kin. 23. 13. thought by learned men to be a deified King of the Aegyptians and so a daemon placed among the starres the same that others make the planet Mars see Kircheri Prodromus Coptic 1. 5. and that sacrifice was the giving their seed to Moloch that false God Lev. 20. 2 3 4. or the making their sonnes and daughters pass through the fire to Moloch Jer. 32. 45. and so no way intended to the true God And whereas he saith this was interpreted no better then sacrificing to devils Psal 106. 37. t is strange he should not see or acknowledge that it was a downright sacrificing to Moloch a Daemon and not as to the true God but then he could have had no pretense to make it an act of uncommanded worship and so such a kind of Superstition as is chargeable on our Christmas Festival and then he had lost all the advantage which this instance was to bring in to him Toward this he thought to reap some benefit by that text of Scripture He commanded it not neither came it into his heart as he somewhere sayes But why did he not tell us where God saith this If his memory had failed his Concordance would soon have helpt him to set down the place But it was not for his turn it should be examined The place is Jer. 32. 35. and again Jer. 7. 31. and truely belongs to these sacrifices to Moloch but then God's not commanding c. signifies not onely uncommanded worship but by the figure 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 ordinary in the Scripture worship directly forbidden under threat of excision Lev. 20. 2. Whosoever he be that giveth any of his seed to Moloch he shall surely be put to death the people of the land shall stone him with stones and I will set my face against him and cut him off from among his people v. 3. And if the people of the land do any way hide their eyes from the man when he giveth of his seed to Moloch and kill him not then will I set my face against that man and family and will cut him off and all that go a whoring after him v. 4. and accordingly we see it in the Execution Jer. 7. 31 32. The valley of Tophet where they burnt their sonnes and daughters in the fire shall be called the vally of slaughter for they shall bury in Tophet till there be no place And sure this was not the manner of proceeding against those that observed any feast or sacrifice to the true God which was not commanded or prescribed by God they that kept the Encaenia were not thus judged and therefore this was very little to the Diatribist's advantage as now appears by examining the place it is pity Mr. C. would not consider it Lastly For the words in the Etymologist which he saith are fully his sense t is again a mistake they are directly the contrary 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. It must be known that the word Superstition is among the Graecians or Gentiles taken 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 for a good thing but among us Christians 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 for impiety i. e. evidently the heathens and the Christians use it for the same thing the worship of daemons but that the Gentiles commend and account good who use it but we Christians justly deem it the greatest impiety Agreeable hereto again is that of Phavorinus a Christian also 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Superstition is the worshipping all things even those which ' are not to be worshipt and that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 signifies 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 one that is dubious concerning faith as the Israelites betwixt God and
fill two spaces in his catalogue And for the onely Father now remaining St Ambrose if those Comments be his which go under his name they will bring no great prejudice to our pretensions for by paraphrasing 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 by simulatione religionis all that can be concluded is that those doctrines of abstinence had not any reality but onely a false guise of religion in them and so it follows there Hinc se sapientiae rationem habere putant quia traditioni humanae nomen religionis applicant religio appellatur cum sit sacrilegium Hence they think themselves to have some appearance of wisdome because they apply the name of religion to humane tradition and it is called religion when it is sacrilege And this I may casily grant and consequently that the will-Will-worship here and so likewise the humility were not either of them truely such and so offended in this that they were not what they pretended to be and would not have been criminous if they had been really such which still devolves all the fault on the doctrines and on the hypocrisie not on the Will-worship or Religion whose name would never have been pretended to by hypocrites if it had not been good See § 7. of this ch n. 10. Mean while I guess not how Theodoret which is acknowledged to be a Greek Father came to be ranked among the Latines and a Latine interpretation of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 cited out of him However I never pretended that all either Greek or Latine or particularly that he concurred with me in this sense therefore am not obliged to give any farther account of his interpretation Onely this I am sure of that t is not the uncommandedness of the worships that he finds fault with but 1. Their teaching those for Gods commands which are their own That is the meaning of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 their introducing their own ordinances 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 their unseasonable Judaical doctrine and 2dly Their bare shew of piety and humility without the truth of either 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 whereas by by his conclusion it is most evident that the abstinences without the doctrines would not have been deemed by him reproveable and so not the bare uncommandedness of the worship for thus we have it in the close 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 For abstinences ought to be by counsell not as from detestable but as from the most delectable things Which is the very thing which all this while we have endevoured to conclude from that place After these his Latine Fathers he hastens to later interpreters and those are two Salmeron and Estius and those two are one again the one taking from the other as the manner is without any considerable difference But to give his Testimonies their full weight we will view them distinctly Salmeron begins with observing that whereas the Vulgar Latine reads in Superstitione and humilitate non ad parcendum corpori the Greek hath onely three words 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which three saith he sunt tres colores ostendentes rationem specimen sapientiae are three colours shewing a specimen which by the way is more then speciem or bare shew some real evidence of that wisdome to which those doctrines of abstinences pretended And the first of these saith he signifies cultum spontaneum sive voluntariam religionem a spontaneous worship or voluntary religion pro arbitrio cujusvis abstinendi a cibis of absteining from meats as every man shall think fit and afterwards illâ voce alludit ad voluntarias oblationes legis quae nedaboth dicuntur Deut. 16. Amos 5. By this word he alludes to the voluntary oblations of the Law which are called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And then I shall desire the Diatribist to consider how fitly Salmeron was called out to give testimony against me he and one more in the name of all later interpreters when it is evident from these words that he saith the very same thing which all this while I contend for if I could have thought fit to have defended my self from singularity by his Testimony T is true indeed he conceives the words to allude to v. 18. volens in humilitate religione and so goes along with Estius and others in that mistake which I had taken notice of in them and that might have easily led him into farther mistake if the evidence of the truth or some other better guide had not rectified him But as it is I have no reason to complain of him as to the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which is now before us Somewhat more he addes of the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which signifying saith he the virtue of humility is here used for a feigned humility which is contrary to the Gospel because by it the Judaizers Evangelio legem admiscebant mixt the law with the Gospel And as this is also perfectly concordant to my notions so to this it is that he brings the testimonies of Augustine and Thomas and not for the notion of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as the Diatribist cites them out of Estius However to manifest my care of profiting by all his animadversions I shall view those testimonies also The one thing which Salmeron cites from both of them is this that omnis ritus colendi Deum qui à Deo non est nec à Spiritu sancto per Ecclesiam traditus sed voluntate hominum inventus superstitiosus est every rite of worshipping God that is not delivered from God nor from the holy Ghost by the Church but is invented by the will of man is superstitious Where it seems that which is delivered by the Church being by him supposed to be from the holy Ghost doth in no degree fall under this censure And then the Diatribist hath free leave to make his best advantage of this citation As for Estius his main endeavour in the interpretation of the verse is to evince that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 signifies speciem in genere sive veram sive falsam a species in general whether true or false which is very little for the Diatribists advantage for granting it to signifie species if that should prove a true one then that is perfectly destructive to his interests for such a species of wisdom nothing could have in Will-worship if Will-worship were supposed to be impious and foolish And if it should prove a false species and so a bare shew of wisdom yet is that very reconcileable with the good notion of Will-worship as hath oft been shew'd What followes in him is saith he secundum Augustinum Thomam according to Augustine and Thomas that these abstinences have rationem sapientiae non verae sed ejus quae sita est in superstitione humilitate quae falsa est sapientia not true wisdom but that which is placed in superstition and humility which is false wisdome But where Augustine or Thomas give him authority to pretend their accord with him
free it is t is so much the more commendable Now it is of lawfull and Christian worship that we here speak as he knows well enough or else it were not imaginable we could take it in a good sense and of this he must needs understand us also or else he could not make all the blame of it in mans will or devising as he doth And that a worship in itself and materially lawfull i. e. whilst it is abstracted from the consideration of Gods commanding it or not should by not being commanded by God become unlawfull this is to confound things most distant forbidding and not forbidding For the Law and Will of God being the rule in agreement with or opposition to which lawfull and unlawfull consists it is as impossible that any thing should be unlawfull in respect of Gods Law which is not forbidden by it as that any thing should be lawfull which is forbidden When therefore he proceeds affirming but offering no proof that the voluntariness of an action is the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or irregularity of it first this is a begging the question 2. 'T is set in such terms that it hath not the least appearance of truth in it for how can the voluntariness be the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or irregularity unless the Law forbid voluntariness which certainly it no way doth as was formerly evidenced from hence because there is no universall negative command in Scripture prohibiting all acts and degrees of acts beside what are in particular commanded That there is no such sufficiently appear by the one instance which here he thinks fit to mention that of the 2d Commandment which saith he forbids all things i. e. all worship and all degrees of that worship besides what are particularly commanded Which though it be as far from all appearance of truth as any thing affirmable by any for what word is there in that Commandment which can sound that way Certainly none unlesse every ceremony devised by man and every degree whether of charity or devotion which is not particularly under precept be presently metamorphosed into a graven image hath not yet any the least proof to back it and so still is the meanest begging of the main question imaginable And so having more largely spoken of this before this is sufficient also to be said here in the vindication of my last reason Sect. 14. The first occasion of mistaking 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 for ill The vulgar translator and Mr. Calvin The Diatribists three exceptions to this shewed to be of no force Will-worship distant from Superstition 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 only in a good sense among Christians Three mistakes of the Diatribist All uncommanded is not forbidden HIS next post or Stage is made up of an examination of those things to which I conceived the mistake and abuse of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 imputable The first of which I assigned to be the vulgar translations rendring it Superstitio that being most probably S. Hieroms and his words being found agreeable to it in some places and from thence Mr. Calvin hath affirmed it Superstitio Graecis dicitur 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 That this was fit to be insisted on as a first occasion of the mistake will be evident enough to any who considers how ordinary it is for the Romanists on one side without farther inquiry or consideration to follow the vulgar translation and for the reformed on the other to follow the steps of Mr. Calvin and not alwaies to examine his grounds of affirming which certainly were very farre from solid in this matter it being evident to all that know any thing of words that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is the Greek for Superstition and not 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 nay that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 being but once used in Scripture and not found in any author but such as may be resolved to have used it from thence Mr. Calvins words that Superstitio is called by the Greeks 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 cannot probably signifie any more then that the Greek word in that one place is by the vulgar translator rendred Superstitio And then this is an evidence of that which there I affirmed that the occasion of taking 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in in an ill sense which I must be allowed to deem a mistake is the vulgar translators rendring it Superstitio Now to this three things are here objected though not to the main of the observation for no word is replied to that yet to the mention of the Greek words 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. First that a man may say as much for 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 it self as the Doctor saith for 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and bring the Doctor for his voucher who saith that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 sometimes is taken in a good sense But I reply 1. that the Doctor never saith that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is taken in a good sense among Christians who sure never allowed the worship of Daemons but only among heathens who do allow it 2. That if it were sometimes taken in good sense yet that were not sufficient to conclude that it were all one with 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 all good things are not the same no nor all ill and therefore in whatsoever sense the words are taken whether both in good or both in ill the one in good the other in ill sense yet still the nature and importance of the words is distant so ought not to have been confounded either by the vulgar translator or by Mr. Calvin and being so unduly confounded the Diatribist cannot from thence raise any more solid argument for the ill sense of the one then I can which I pretend not to do for the good sense of the other 2dly He objects that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as the Doctor knowes is taken also sometimes in an ill sense as well as a good why then saith he may they not both equally signifie superstition especially when applied to false or men-devised worship I answer that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 when spoken of Christians is never taken in an ill sense unlesse by virtue of some Epithet joined with it which it self is ill as 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in S. James vain religion and then also t is the vanity which hath the ill sense not the religion And again that vain or ill religion is not superstition neither but an unagreeablenesse of the Professors practice to his religion Now he knows it is of Christians that now we speak and so there could be no place for this exception nor for any thing to be founded in it nor plea from hence that either the simple or the compound should be rendred superstition As for the men devised worship that that should be synonymous with false that is the old artifice of begging the question in stead of saying ought for the gaining of it His last exception is that Superstition or Will-worship is more general then 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉
What excess Divines mean by Superstition What S. Augustine Obligation to performance without being parts of worship Observers of order more Religious more acceptable then others The reason why Jewish ceremonies are interdicted The Church of England sparing in ceremonies Ceremonies not foreshewing Christ lawful to be retained by Christians The abstinence from bloud long continued in the Church The Saterday Sabbath Negative wholesomness not sufficient to recommmend ceremonies All folly in worship is not Superstition The opinion of the antient Church worth considering No duties appointed for the circumstances sake Time or place instituted by God is a circumstance as well as when by man Apostolical Divine 82 Sect. 11. A Vindication of the Tract of Superstition from uncharitableness 88 CHAP. V. Of Will-worship p. 92 Sect. 1. The state of the Question Wil-worship distinguisht from the circumstances of it The matter of mans will of three sorts The 6. several possible notions of Wil-worship The application of them to the matter in hand The vanity of the Diatribists distinction The scope of the 2d Commandment 92 Sect. 2. The method of explicating difficulties in the new Test 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in a good sense and when in a bad no prejudice to 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 99 Sect. 3. His entrance on the view of Col. 2. answered The difference betwixt Commands of Magistrates and imposition of dogmatizers What 't is which is said to have 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 101 Sect. 4. The Magistrates power acknowledged Inventing new ways of worship Davids appointing the Levites to waite from 20. years old an act of a King not of a Prophet Davids last words 104 Sect. 5. Col. 2. 22. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Placing worship Christian liberty Marriage The Glosses put on the commands of men 107 Sect. 6. The Diatribist's way to make the Doctors words witness against him 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. Placing worship an equivocal phrase 112 Sect. 7. Of Petitio Principii Of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 being capable of two rendrings The danger from mistake on the Diatribists side My interpretation not singular His no way probable 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a particle of extenuation no 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 No shew of wisdome in respect of the folly that is in it The Wil-worship parallel to the humility The prime argument for my interpretation 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 for piety vindicated from the contrary proofs 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Worship of Angels No agreement betwixt Col. 2. 18. 23. or betwixt 23 1 Cor. 2. 4. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 114 Sect. 8. The abstinences how taught by the Gnosticks Their pretenses for them no realities Abstinences may be free will offerings and self-denyals Such may Fasting duely qualified Such may virginal Chastity Pauls judgement of it Chrysostome of things 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Abstinences positive acts And yet if negative may be acceptable These abstinences not commanded 122 Sect. 9. Compliance with Papists The Diatribists inconstancy 125 Sect. 10. A reply to his answer of my two first reasons for the good sense Humility and Wil-worship associated either both real or both pretended Popish laniations why culpable 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 1 Tim. 4. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Fasting a 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 far from hurtful or abominable wherein the profit of it consists The true sense of 1 Tim. 4. 8. wherein the ilnesse of it consists 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Abstinence because of abuses For Religion Marcionites Durand A shew of Piety in will-Wil-worship All shew of good in respect of somewhat that is good The Diatribists fallacious instances and questions 127 Sect. 11. The Greek Fathers acception of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 An argument of goodness that 't is pretended by hypocrites Religion in a good sense will-Wil-worship not worse then false worship not abominable All devised worship is not Idolatry doth not pretend to more wisdome then Gods The Latin Fathers cited by Mr. C. The vulgar Translator and the followers thereof 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 by the vulgar rendred decernitis The authority of Bellarmine and Daillé for the goodsense The testimonies out of Ambrose Theodoret Salmeron Estius Augustine Thomas examined 139 Sect. 12. The fifth reason vindicated 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Hesychius corrected twise 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 adverbially 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Hesychius's Glossary concordant to the Scripture use 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Eph. 5. 4. 149 Sect. 13. Mr. C. His distinction of voluntary Spontaneous A work of love The Testimony of Socrates Worship true or false Nothing unlawfull which is not forbidden Voluntariness no way forbidden The second Commandment 153 Sect. 14. The first occasion of mistaking 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 for ill The vulgar translator and Mr. Calvin The Diatribists three exceptions to this shewed to be of no force Wil-worship distant from Superstition 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 onely in a good sense among Christians Three mistakes of the Diatribist All uncommanded is not forbidden 155 Sect. 15. The second occasion of taking 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in an ill sense vindicated The design of the Treatise of Wil-worship onely for ceremonies not for new kinds of worship Whether all ceremonies be forbidden which are not commanded The various reading of Philostorgius Sitting at the Gospel forbidden Chrysostomes Testimony 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 not 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 for Ecclesiastical Canon 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Will-worship 159 Sect. 16. The third occasion of the mistake cleared Worship of Angels forbidden not onely not commanded The reviving Judaical worship not called Wil-worship Col. 2. 23. Maimonides's words wrested to a distant sense by the Diatribist Original of Angel-worship Vain worships Clemens confounding of Col. 2. 18. with 23. Worship of Angels c. a forbidden Wil-worship The imposing of virginity and abstinences as from God the onely crime found fault with by S. Paul and the ancient Catholiks Alcibiabes his using and remission of austerity The like of Spiridion and Marcianus Cyrill of meats 1 Tim. 5. 23. explicated 163 Sect. 17. The last occasion of the ill sense 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in Epiphanius Of the Pharisees appellation 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Dogmatizing and discriminating Epiphanius's words cleared Wherein their hypocrisie consisted 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 1 Mac. 2. 42. Asidei 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 turned into 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the fault 169 CHAP. VI. Of Free-will offerings p. 173 Sect. 1. The use of them in this question The Diatribists discourse of them His 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The Leviticalness of spontaneous offerings asserted by him in order to denying them among Christians Arguments against this conceit Allowance of days as well as of worship among the Jews Allowance acknowledged by the Diatribist to be as good as commands 173 Sect. 2. A first instance of uncommanded Pieties Davids intention to build the Temple Vindicated from the three answers of the Diatribist 181 Sect. 3. A 2d instance and
of the word which first I speak of and vindicate our Church whether in the ceremonies or observances from all appearance of guilt of it is the worshipping of Demons or deified men and that sure is worse then heresie in every Christians account and so inconveniently compared so as to be equalled with it And 2 whatever our Church hath admitted is cleared to have nothing of Superstition in it in any other secundary notion or acception of the word or if it had yet as long as it is no more but uncommanded Rites or Festivals which by the Diatribist himself are thus styled those sure in any reason will not be capable of this comparison or accusation of being so bad as heresie and 3. will-worship in the one place where it is used in Scripture hath no manner of ill but good character set upon it being joyned 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 with humility which I hope is not yet condemned to be quite so criminal and abominable to God as pride and heresie is acknowledged to be however in this Preface before my interpretation of Col. 2. 23. hath been endevoured to be confuted this so eminent criminousness thereof was not with more reason then charity supposed by him 2. That he hath affirm'd in a parenthesis of some men that they account these and superstition is evidently one of these their virtues rather then crimes which again if applied to me or I think to any Protestant living is very unkind and unprovoked having no ground in any part of my Discourse 3. That Wil-worship hath been by him elswhere demonstrated to be as criminal as Heresie which in what notion soever he hath exprest himself to understand the word is with no truth assumed by him as far as refers to these Diatribae and if it be elswhere attempted 1. He should have referred us thither if but to vindicate his own veracity or else have recited the heads of such demonstrative arguments in this place or in the second Diatribe and yet neither of these are done by him Sect. 2. Of being too Religious of the intension or degree The Messalians Neglect of Charity of particular callings Eccl. 7. 16. Of multitude of Ceremonies Too many Ceremonies no argument of too much but of too little Religion HIS fourth mistake is that he hath recited it as one cause of my miscarriages in this business that I affirm that a man cannot be too religious and that I attest this both of the intension or degree and of the extension or number of Ceremonies taken into the worship of God Whereas that which I affirm is evidently this 1. That in respect of the degree there is no such thing as nimiety or excess in Religion no possibility of being Religious in too high a degree Sect. 33. and this is not denyed by Mr. C. nor can be by any pious man who knows that all his faults are omissions and defects but never excesses of piety or religion 2. The main objections imaginable against this from the practice of the Messalians or the neglect of the duties of charity and the particular calling incident to the intense practice of holy duties were foreseen and prevented there the Messalians fault was not their excessive practice but their laying that obligation on themselves and others the same that Tertullian and the Montanists were guilty of in respect of other austerities and so 't was their dogmatizing in their imposition of heavy burthens wherein their heresie not their superstition consisted And the others crime is his idleness and walking 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 disorderly a crime censured by the Apostle 2 Thes 3. 11. yet far enough from Superstition again and in like manner his want of charity and so not nimiety but unseasonableness of piety contrary to the express words of Christ I will have mercy and not sacrifice And if yet a third objection be offered from the words of the Preacher Eccl. 7. 16. which yet this Diatribist hath not thought fit to offer Be not righteous overmuch why shouldst thou destroy thy self I suppose the answer is obvious that those words are the intimation of the wordlings objection who taketh that for excess of duty which brings any damage or worldly destruction upon him and is answered in the next verse with this solid Aphorism of eternal verity Be not thou overmuch wicked why shouldest thou die before thy time The fears and from thence the prudential but oft times very impious practices of the worldling are far the more probable path to the most hasty ruines And so still this branch of my doctrine as far as asserted by me was neither untruth nor miscarriage nor cause of either in my discourse 5. As for the second that of the extension or number of rites and ceremonies taken into the worship that there cannot be too many of them is as far from being my assertion as that which is most contrary For upon that head my conclusion is that as some rites or circumstances of time and place and gesture are absolutely necessary to Religion and the significativeness of them is no manner of prejudice to the use or institution of them so if the Disputers will yield but this that even when they are significative the use of Ceremonies may be allowed among Christians I shall then in stead of pleading for the multitude of such give my vote to the confirming the old Rule that they be paucae salubres few and wholsom and particularly few for five reasons set down in the following words Sect. 39. and sure that is contrary enough to his reporting of my opinion that there cannot be too many of them and so that which was no part of my belief could be no cause of any miscarriage of mine in that business 6. To which if I shall now add that my granting there ought to be few and so that there may be too many Ceremonies in a Church is no way the yielding a possibility that a man may be too religious but on the contrary when the too many Ceremonies either cause or occasion or are accompanied with inward neglects there is not too much but too little Religion too much formality but too little devotion too much outward Pharisaical washing but too little inward Christian fervor as there may be 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 words too many but too little praying I may adde too many offers of proof but too little reason and remind the Diatribist that this was expresly said before in the end of Sect. 39. by the token of the insectile animals whose want of blood caused their multitude of legs I shall then sure have given him ground of conviction that there were more then one calumnie in his assignation of the causes particularly in this of the first cause of my miscarriages Sect. 3. Mr. C. his distinctions of being too religious multiplied unnecessarily Frequency of duty if secured from other neglects no excess nor criminous Prayer a
worship which saith he is too much and such a man may be too religious And this being the onely product of his distinction is as I intimated so far from clearing that it is the perplexing and intrieating the business which was formerly clear enough the leading the Reader not out but into Meanders an intanglement of the clue a Sphinx instead of an Oedipus For there was no such 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 before nothing so difficult so involved of so incertain and dubious signification as this which now he calls giving God more then he requires by the rule of worship and explains by uncommanded worship and the least addition to the rule of worship I shall evince the truth of what I now say and with the same hand clear again what he hath clouded by asking him but this one question Doth he mean in these words more and Addition any new species or sort of worship neither prescribed by the law of Nature nor instituted by any positive law of God or doth he designe onely some circumstance onely or ceremony which being not of the intrinsick nature or essence of worship but onely accidental to it is not particularly commanded or prescribed by the word of God the rule of worship such are the time the place the gestures and such outward but some of them inseparable attendants of worship I shall desire to secure my expressions from obscurity and mistakes and therefore to be as explicit as may be Prayer is a species of worship praying on the Lords day on Christmas day observing constant hours of prayer thrice seven ten times every day is each of them a circumstance adherent to Prayer some time is necessary and inseparable from Prayer but every of these times forementioned are not so he that prayes but thrice doth not pray seven or ten times a day So again the place of prayer may give it a different denomination either of publick or private the manner may render it more or less solemn the gestures more or less reverent or irreverent the increase letting down of ardor devout or formal and there are many sorts and degrees of each of these but these do not constitute new or several sorts of worship but all are accidents of one and the same special of worship viz. of Prayer Here then is a wide difference and if his meaning were of the species or sorts of worship then I never doubted to affirm with him that all uncommanded worship is an excess if he please an error I should rather say a setting up that for worship of God which is not worship nay perhaps quite contrary to worship and this sure was never justified by me explicitely or implicitely in conclusions or in grounds and principles of thus concluding and so still this hath not been usefull to me to discover any mistake of mine The second then is the onely branch remaining of which his words as referring to me can possibly be understood and then 't wil prove so far from being any misadventure of mine that it will devolve all absurdity upon the Diatribist For I shall demand Hath the rule of worship i. e. the Scripture any where prescribed the times the places the gestures and all the circumstances of the worship of God and that both positively and exclusively so that he that prayes oftener then the Scripture expresly commands or on any day not assigned to that purpose by Scripture sinnes in so doing addes to the rule gives more then God requires doth too much is too religious is criminous and abominable to God in so doing every of these must be the affirmations of this Diatribist if this 2d meaning be his and the like he is obliged to say again of him that prays in any place in any manner in any gesture which the word of Scripture the rule of worship hath not commanded And because this is by all reason to be resolved to be his meaning or else his whole Book is perfectly cast away a meer 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or beating the air without me or any man else to be his adversarie I shall at the present suppose it so and shew him as deictically as he can wish the absurdities of it And 1. for the times of prayer I demand What hath the rule of worship the Scripture prescribed hath it prescribed morning and evening Prayer and that both positively and exclusively to any more If so then by the standard of this Diatribist's doctrine Davids or Daniels praying three times a day adding the noon day season to the other two must be criminous and abominable or if he shall pitch upon any other number of times as prescribed by the Rule then I shall add an unite more to that number and demand whether that addition will adde abomination to his performances If he saith it will though I might press that affirmation with absurdities enough yet I shall spare it and onely demand the proof from the Scripture for this assertion and when he gives it me forfeit all my pretensions to the understanding that sacred book but if he cannot produce any such Scripture then is my Censor the guilty person the very dogmatizer that teacheth for Doctrines or Commandments of God his own Dictates which I must suppose to be the traditions of a man and the doing so I cannot resist to be a nimiety but not of religion that I yet discern In like manner for set days to be consecrated to the worship of God for fasting or for prayer I demand how many every week or every yeer hath the Rule of worship prescribed Or what rule of worship shall be appealed to the Law of Moses or the Gospel of Christ His answer to this question will involve him in intricacies enough If the Law of Moses be the rule then he knows all the New Moons and feasts of the Jews and Sabbatick years and Jubilees must return upon him If the Gospel of Christ which hath certainly abolisht all these and as he supposeth set up the Lords-day instead of them all then 1. I demand in what words of the New Testament the weekly observation of this is commanded and 2. in what words the observing all others but that particularly the Feast of Easter the annual commemorative of the Resurrection is interdicted and whether the weekly remembrance of so great a mercy being so acceptable to God it be reasonable to think the annual abominable before him And the same question soon extends it self to the day of Christs Incarnation Passion Ascension c. and if of each of these he shall define and pronounce them unlawfull without testimony and verdict from the Rule of worship the Scripture then he is the Dogmatizer that hath added to the Rule more interdicts then are there to be met with and so still he is the man guilty of the nimiety So again for gestures in the worship of God I demand What is the gesture of prayer prescribed by the Rule Is it standing sitting or
kneeling any or all of these or any fourth superadded to these If the Rule have prescribed none then according to his doctrine again any of these must be criminous additions to the Rule abominable c. If the rule have prescribed some one then all others beside that one must fall under the same severity that that one had done if it had not been prescribed and if all three are under several precepts and so the whole Rule obeyed by retaining these three then still I shall mention a fourth that of prostration whether will the old penitents in the porch or on the pavement every man in his closet and recesse and still the question returns whether this be criminous and by what part of the rule of worship it appears to be so Necdum finitus the enumeration of the Diatribists inextricable difficulties is not yet at an end but infinitely multipliable by every act of Religious Fast and of Almsgiving the two other sorts of Gods worship as Aquinas owned here by the Diatribist hath defined from the sixt of Matthew the proportions or degrees of each of which are yet no where defined in the Scripture But I suppose it cannot now be necessary that I farther confirm what is so evident already Else I might yet farther proceed from the duties of the first to the second Table and demand whether any thing that is done out of the service of God for which there is no command be a criminous excess Certainly the Analogy will hold God having given the Rule for justice and charity as well as worship and then whatsoever of any kind is not under precept must by this argument be under interdict and so there will be nothing left indifferent in the world A conclusion that some men which have held Mr. C. his hypothesis have rationally inlarged to finding it necessary and unavoidably deduced from thence But I discern not yet that Mr. C. hath thus improved his principle though sure whensoever it is for his turn it is thus improvable But Mr. C. hath added three proofs to his affirmation and how unreconcileable soever with common notions that is yet those must deserve to be heeded And his first proof is this If a man or Church may adde to the Rules of Religion then be or they may be too Religious But Ergo. Here it must be remembred that the thing which he had proposed to himself to prove was this that in uncommanded worship the least addition to the rule of worship is too much and such a man may be said to be too religious And this saith he I prove 1. If a man or Church may adde to the rule of religion c. Of this 1. I desire to be told whether it be not a meer idem per idem a proving a thing by it self and whether that be not contrary to all rules of syllogizing where the medium of probation is never to enter the conclusion as here most evidently it doth Having said this to the form t is not needfull that I say any thing to the matter of this proof it being the very thing that I have spoken to all this while and by that distinction of the sorts and circumstances of worship I have competently shewed that it hath no force against me that indeed he that introduces any new part of divine worship is a presumptuous assumer doth more then he should because that which he should not do and so that the Major is false instead of clear he that thus addes and imposeth on God and his word is not hereby too religious but too bold and was never pleaded for in the least by my treatise of Superstition The inconsequence of this Major will more appear by considering the proof of the Assumption which he annexes The assumption saith he is proved by Deut. 4. 2. where all additions to the word are prohibited But I pray doth he that prostrates himself in prayer adde to the word of God then sure he that walks in the garden doth so too much more he that makes any such deductions from Scripture as this Diatribist here doth for not onely the analogie enforceth this but it is also to be remembred that the laws which had here been given by Moses were all sorts of duties of common life towards our selves and our brethren as well as of worship toward God and so this Text must exclude all other uncommanded actions as well as worships The words in Deuteronomy are these Ye shall not adde to the word that I command you neither shall ye diminish from it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 ad custodiendum and in the same sense the Targum 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to observe or that ye may observe that ye may keep the commandments of the Lord your God which I command you The meaning is most evident that they were to perform uniform obedience to God not to make any change in Gods commands either to pretend more liberties or fewer obligations or again more obligations and fewer liberties to be delivered them by God then those which he had then delivered by Moses but to set themselves humbly to the performance of his precepts and accordingly the Septuagint renders 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to keep 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 ye shall keep the Latine custodite keep and the Syriack sed observate but keep the commandments by that opposition shewing that to be the meaning of not adding or diminishing viz. paying an obedience to Gods commands And the same sense in the like words we have again Apoc. 22. 18 19. to shut up the great prophecy in the New Testament And then I pray is he that offends against either of these two texts too Religious Is it not more true on the contrary that he is a false Prophet and a sacrilegious person that pretends the word of the Lord for that which God hath not spoken to him But this crime I hope every man is not guilty of that bowes or kneeles or prostrates himself in prayer by such outward gestures both signifying and inflaming the inward fervor of the heart but not inserting any precept of doing thus either into the book of Deuteronomy or the Apocalyps And this may suffice for his first proof His second proof is from the saying of the great School man that Religion is a moral virtue or very like it and stands between two extremes Ergo a man may be too much religious as well as too little First I answer to the antecedent that if it be remembred what the two extremes are between which religion in Aquinas stands the consequent will never be inferred from it The extremes are on one side Superstition on the other irreligion superstition is again saith he of two sorts either 1. the worshiping of a creature of false Gods or more Gods then one as in Tertullian adv Marc. l. 1. c. 5. speaking of the worshiping of two Gods Vererer saith he ne abundantia officii superstitio potiùs quà m
religio crederetur I should fear such abundance of officiousness would be rather believed superstition then religion and S. Augustine and out of him Aquinas tangis primam chordam qua colitur unus Deus cecidit bestia superstitionis the beast of superstition is destroyed by the first string of the Decachord the first commandment of the Decalogue prescribing the worship of one God or 2. cum Deo illegitimus cultus tribuitur giving undue worship to God and neither of these notions of superstition will be at all usefull to the Diatribist to prove his conclusion If from the former of these he should conclude that a man may be too religious t is plain that this must be his meaning that a man may be a Polytheist a worshipper of false Gods but I hope in this sense he that observes the ceremonies of the Church of England he that commemorates the birth of Christ on the 25 of Deber will not be said to be too religious As for the 2. that of cultus illegitimus or indebitus undue worship of the true God which alone can possibly be deemed for the Diatribist's purpose my answer shall be more particular by viewing weighing the words in Aquinas which are here referred to though the place be not set down by the Diatribist I suppose it must be 2 d1 2 d2 either quest 81. Art 1. or else qu. 92. Art 1. in conclus which indeed hath these words Religio est virtus moralis omnis autem virtus moralis in medio consist it Religion is a moral virtue and every moral virtue consists in the middle citing it with a sicut suprà dictum est from the former place qu. 81. Art 5. Now the summe of that Article is this that Religion is neither a Theological nor an Intellectual but a moral virtue as being a branch of justice in giving to God that which belongs to him and that the due medium wherein this as all moral virtue consists is to be taken not as the middle point between two passions the medium rei as ordinarily moral virtue is the moderating of passions reducing them to a mediocrity or temper or equilibration betwixt the excess and defect but according to some equality in respect of God medium rationis interpreting what he means by that viz. equality not absolutely because we cannot give God so much as belongs to him but secundum quandam considerationem humanae facultatis divinae acceptationis by considering what man is able to do and what God will accept As for superfluity in such things as these which belong to the worship of God there can be none saith he secundum circumstantiam quanti as to the circumstance of quantity I cannot do too much in the worship of God I cannot offend that way but as elsewhere he saith of this and the like tanto est melius quanto magis acceditur ad summum it is so much the better by how much it comes neerer the highest All the superfluity possible is as to the other circumstances and he names but three 1. cui non debet by exhibiting divine worship to him to whom it ought not to be exhibited 2. quando non debet by giving it at a time when it ought not when having formerly been acceptable to God t is now outdated 3. in respect of other circumstances prout non debet in a manner wherein it ought not By this it appears already how incompetent this testimony from Aquinas is to prove the conclusion proposed by the Diatribist that every thing in the worship of God which is not commanded by God is too much For sure every thing that is not commanded is not presently forbidden nor consequently offends against the prout debet as it ought the due manner time or other circumstances of it If there be any difficulty in that phrase prout debet as it ought and it be conceived to signifie so as is particularly commanded by God and è contra that what ever is done being not particularly commanded by God is prout non debet as it ought not this is certainly a mistake and very distant from Aquinas's sense who means by cultus debitus due worship any acts of worship qui ad Dei reverentiam fiunt which are done to the honour of God with considering whether they be under precept or not and consequently with him cultus indebitus undue worship is such as is done to the dishonor at least not to the honor of God as when of Idolatry he saith that it exhibits divine reverence indebitè unduly to the creature In full accord with this it is that in that other text qu. 92. art 1. Superstition is by him defined to be a vice opposed to religion in the excesse whereby a man gives worship to him to whom he ought not or not in a manner that he ought meaning as he explains himself not that of quantity but in respect of other circumstances when either it is fastned on a wrong object divine worship to that which is not God which sure is against not onely without the command of God or done in a wrong manner i. e. when any thing is done in the divine worship quod fieri non debet which ought not to be done and he instances si quis temporibus gratiae vellet colere Deum secundum veteris legis ritum If any man under Christianity would worship God after the rites of the old law which sure are not onely not commanded but forbidden under Christ and so are a proper instance of the quando non debet the undue circumstance of time mentioned particularly in the former place and convinces that which I assigned to be the meaning of it I need adde no more in this place concerning the testimony of Aquinas Other mentions of his opinion in this matter will hereafter occur and then I shall have occasion to speake more to them His 3. proof is from the Doctors own concession who saith he grants there may be a nimiety or excess of religion and addes words in such a style as are absolutely nonsense even when the not which I suppose the insertion of the Printer is blotted out thus there may be a nimiety in adding and so is an exceeder in the fear and service of God But to pass by that I answer 1. that the Dr. no where useth that phrase a nimiety or excess of religion the words of religion are inserted by the citer and honestly put in different letters to note them to be his own The matter is plain I there speak of an excess of fear but not of religion see the beginning of § 46. of the Tr. of superstit and though I after say that he that thinks himself bound or obliges others as from God when God neither commands nor forbids and so addes to the commands of God and fears where there is no reason to fear is an exceeder in the fear
and service of God yet neither is that excess of religion nor indeed excess of fear or of service of God but the meaning is apparently this that in fearing God and serving God he is guilty of some other excess not an excess of fear of God but fearing somewhat else which he phansies to come from God when it doth not this fear of that something else is an excessive fear more then religion suggests to him and yet the unhappiness of it is this interposeth it self in religion This will be more evident by an example suppose a man to phansie that by Gods law he ought to kill his Father and fears Gods wrath if he doth not this mans fear is excessive but his religion is not he is an exceeder in the service of God if he do that in Gods service which is no part of it but quite contrary to it but doth not mean-while serve God too much but too little doth not exceed but fall short and so is farre from being too religious There was certainly great need of Arguments when this was thought sit to be produced to me who sure knew my own meaning when I thus spake and was likely enough to be able to give this account of it As it is I have done with his first discovery of causes of my miscarriages and shall now hasten to the second Sect. 4. Excess of Religion Super statutum Addition to the Rule Doctrines 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Act. 17. 22. Act. 25. 29. Six concessions Superstitiosus Worshipping of Angels Superstitum cultus Slavish fear Religion in Epicurus Fear of punishment in sons in wicked men The necessity thereof Dogmatizing Placing more virtue in things then belongs to them THe second cause of the Doctors miscarriages saith he is his misprision That excess in Religion is not well called Superstition or that Superstition is not excess of Religion Sect. 27 c. To this I answer 1. That my memorie not suggesting unto me that I was at all guilty of this misprision thus unlimitedly charged on me I therefore read over that 27. and the two following Sections to discern what it was that had given him occasion to affirm this and there I find no such thing The subject of Section 27. being the improperness of their expressions who resolve Superstition simply and abstractly taken in all Authors to signifie evil of Sect. 28. a second inconsequence that the use of Ceremonies not prescribed by Christ should first be called Superstition then condemned for deserving that title of the 29. a third inconsequent that men should abstain from some indifferent Ceremonies as Superstitious and not expect to be counted superstitious for obliging themselves to do the contrary But sure none of these nor all together do at all yield any ground for that conclusion which he hath here misreported from them and that one would think were a competent answer to this second discovery of causes But then 2. till the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 be explained and agreed on what is meant by excess of religion t is not possible for me to affirm or deny to acknowledge or disclaim universally what I am said to affirm To deal plainly then and without all ambiguity If by excess of Religion he understand the doing of any thing in the worship of God which Gods word doth not command which is the onely thing which is of controversie betwixt us as hath already been manifested then I stick not to deny that this is Superstition or that superstition in any authentick notion or in the origination of the word whether Greek or Latine doth import or comporhend this and if he shall flie to any other sort of excess and contend that to be it of which he speaks this will be then the fallacie or lying hid in ambiguities which I took care to deprive him of in the last Section 4. But he expresses sufficiently what excess in religion he means by the proof which he first offers to confirm his affirmative For for this he brings three proofs and the first is this because it is an addition to the rule of worship and so an excess as super statutum 5. Here though it be very hard to reduce this to any formal or legal proof of the proposition for which it was designed and besides it must be observed in passing that the medium here used is no fitter for the proving of this then of the last proposition for it is the same to both and so indeed it is equally proper for both or for what else he please yet thus much is clear from it that by excess in Religion he means addition to the Rule and that we formerly discern'd to signifie with him the doing any thing uncommanded in the service of God and to that we have replyed abundantly in the last Section But he adds for the confirmation of his proof one thing not said before that all such addition to the Rule must be superstition forsooth because it is super statutum above what is commanded supposing it seems that that is the notation of the word superstition And then I desire the Diatribist's leave that it may for once be my turn to make discoveries of causes to propose to him at least for consideration whether this may not be his 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 fundamental procreative mistake the having inconsiderately in his youth swallowed this etymologie of the word superstition I am unwilling to phansie the Diatribist to be the inventer of it as if it were so called from supra statutum above what is commanded If this be not a right conjecture I shall profess to be at an end of my search of causes But if it be I desire him to allow me the favour once to disabuse him by exacting this justice from him to himself to consider whether any Laws of derivation composition or analogie can permit him seriously to believe that statutum is ingredient in compounding Superstition or that it can be by any Rules deduced from any word in the Latine tongue but superstes superstitis and the rather because 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which is resolved to be the parallel Greek to the Latine superstition and is visibly so if it be allowed to be deduced from superstitum cultus hath nothing to do with super statutum but is in plain words a worshipping of Demons Of this sure I have said enough in the Treatise of Superstition to satisfie any Scholar that knows in the least what belongs to the use or the nature of words and so much it seems that Mr. C. confesses that the original of the word was Heathenish to signifie superstitum cultus and only adds 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in civility or fidelity to his cause that though this be true yet 't is well applied by Divines to those additions made to the Rule of worship But I pray what is this but to grant the premises and deny the conclusion T is certain and by him acknowledged that
instituting any ceremonie or Festival which is not commanded by God And I hope this suppletory to those former discourses which hath considered those two texts hath sufficiently convinced that And so there is no more now needfull to be added to this matter Thus have I traced this Diatribist through every branch of his discovery of causes and shewed I hope competently on which side the mistakes ly and if there be no more miscarriages in those three tracts of Superstition Wil-worship and Festivals then this Preface assigned to that work hath discovered to me I shall have no need farther to importune the reader with a Superfluous vindication unless upon this score onely that t is possible that the Diatribist may not have summed up his bill aright that there may still remain some particular mistakes discoverable by the view of the particulars which are here omitted in the foot of the account and then I must not take advantage of false reckoning And upon this slender account I must now still attend his motions and shall do it in confidence that what hath been here in answer to his Preface said so largely will not be exacted of me again at every turn by way of Repetition On which ground it is evident that I am to make no return to the remainder which is the recapitulating of this Preface CHAP. III. Of Superstition peculiarly And first of his Prolegomenon on that Subject Sect. 1. Answer to §. 1. The method used to find the meaning of the word IN his first Diatribe that of Superstition § 1. I may lightly touch and pass over the dislike of my method in writing of Will-worship before Superstition together with the reason that being more general this a species under it for though it be certain that I am not of his mind that the former is a species of the latter and so that I cannot admit of his reason of change or that his is as he saith a more just methodical order of tractation yet I shall not ingage in a dispute of their precedence but onely reply to the latter part of his first § which directs the manner of inquiring what Superstition is not by searching into the monuments of heathen Authors Latine or Greek from the names or senses by them given as by the judgement of Divines c. In answer to this I shall need no farther reply then to remind him that as there is no better way to understand the full importance of words then to examine them in their origination and their usage among the best Authors Masters of words not only profane but sacred so sure this is the very method I have taken for 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and Superstition viewing it in the antient heathens in the parts first then in the composition and so also in the sacred Scripture which I hope is no heathen Author as oft as it is found there in Lactantius and St. Augustine which sure knew what true Religion meant whatsoever he is pleased to suggest of my way and Authors and are as competent judges of Superstition as his later Divines that have reduced the use of all ceremonies not commanded by God to the 2d Commandment and to Deut. 4. 2. under the title of Superstition Sect. 2. Answer to §. 2. Amesius's definition The matter of the 4. first Commandments The Affirmative part of the 2d Commandment The Diatribist's misadventure about Duty in the midst No prohibition of either holy days in the 4th Commandment Jeroboams act 1 Kin. 12. 32. The Rubenites altar Josh 22. Naaman's altar Christmass Festival parallel to it The excesses in each Commandment IN the 2d § where he shews out of Dr. Ames how Superstition may be fitly defined by Aquinas a vice contrary to Religion in the excess viz. in order to the acts or external means of worship superadded by the wisdome or will of man when a man tenders worship either to whom it is not due or not in that manner which he ought he knows this in the obvious sense of the words such as from Aquinas was lately cited is perfectly agreeable to my affirmations who make the worship of all but God and the worship of God in any forbidden or abolisht manner to be species of Superstition But if by the aequivocal phrase not in the manner which he ought he mean in whatsoever other manner or rite or circumstance which God hath not expressely prescribed any appendant of worship instituted or appointed by man and not onely any worship as he cites out of Amesius p. 4. there is no truth in his definition nor agreeableness to Aquinas's sense as hath appeared formerly T is sure Aquinas which is cited in the margent hath not owned any such interpretation of non prout debet to belong to all uncommanded rites If Amesius have which I have not commoditie to examine then he was one of the Casuists which I forementioned as the derivers of this prejudice into the Diatribist and if Vrsine Dr. Fulke Mr. Perkins are rightly cited in his margent and their words extended no farther then they designed them then perhaps we have the full catalogue of them and the Diatribist is now of age to consider whether they have proved or onely dictated in this matter As for the grounds which are here laid by the Diatribist toward the evincing of it they are no way qualified for such a structure For when to the 4. Commandments of the first Table he assigns these 4. things as the subject matter of them a right object of worship God alone of the first a right matter commanded worship of the second a right manner with all reverence of the third a right time his own appointed day of the fourth and thence concludes all excess in any of these Superstition there is scarce any one minute part of sound doctrine in all this For in the first which hath most of truth yet this failing there is that the right object of worship is not the principal matter of that Commandment but the worship it self all the parts of that having him for our God treating him addressing to him as such and of this there is no criminous excess which can be styled Superstition the Superstition forbidden in that commandment is not any extreme or excess of worshipping the true God but the taking in other rivals to that worship which belongs to the true God incommunicably and so is the matter of the negative part of that precept not the nimiety of the affirmative In the second there is not a word to determine the matter of it to commanded worship as hath been evidenced beyond all question The Subject of the 2d Commandment is the prohibition of Idol-worship And bending the knee to the true God and none else observing of Christmass c. are remote enough from that guilt As for the 3d I had thought our Saviour Mat. 6. had given us the summe of it Thou shalt not forswear thy self but perform unto the Lord thy
the following Sections how much more from the Greek and then to make use of all other proper means the use of the word in Scripture and Fathers to collect the full importance of it and consequently if what I vouched out of the Latine origination be true there is no more to be expected of my 2d § 2dly That I no where grant an excessive fear of the Deity to have been another kind of Superstition among the heathens but onely that some heathens especially the Epicureans which denyed all providence and judgement to come and scoft at all fear of punishment for sin affixt to this the name as of Superstition so of Religion also whereupon I thought it reasonable that we should not not that we should take our notion of Superstition from them which yet it seems the Diatribist is content to do and so with the famishing prodigal to herd himself among the Epicureans Having thus secured my self as far as pertains to this § I may now be allowed to consider the Diatribist and then I find in these few words a competent number of infirmities 1. That mentioning their Etymologie of Superstition who will have it super statutum he makes them derive it indifferently from super and sto or statuo as if those two were Synonyma whereas certainly to stand is competently distant from to make laws or statutes and if it be derived from the one it is not from the other 2dly That deriving it from sto he doth not discern that this is my way of derivation for sure superstes is from super and sto and so he confirmes my origination of the word whilest he thinks he confuteth it absolves very frankly whom he sat down on purpose to condemne 3dly That his forsaking the etymon from super statutum to which so oft he had exprest kindness was again on an undirect aime that he might get more advantage to his hypothesis by that means not moved with the absurdity of the derivation but meerly that he might have more liberty to range in by serving himself on a notion of Superstition qualified to extend it to all the Commandments of the first table which how those no mean ones whom for his own ends he hath now deserted will take at his hands I leave him to consider 4thly That having rejected the derivation from super and sto or statuo he hath substituted no other and so left a rivulet without a spring a compound derivative without an original a monster in art as well as nature 5 tly That making use of the Schooleman's definition he extends it much farther then he knows that Schooleman extended it This he formerly confest § 3. naming this Learned Schooleman as the first who came short in assigning the species of Superstition and here he more then confesseth it extending Superstition to all the four Commandments of the first table when he knows Aquinas made it a breach peculiar to the first of them Sect. 3. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 among the heathens for Religion so in Hesychyus and Phavorinus THe question of the 17th Sect. concerning 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 what kind of fear or dread of a Deity was among the heathens noted by it I have answered already even that which the Epicureans would have driven out of the world as making the Gods cruel tyrannical c. and accordingly in Cicero Superstitione liberare to free men from Superstition and in Lucretius Religionibus from all Religion and obligation of duty is explained by metum omnem Deorum pulsum esse to have all fear of the Gods banisht from us If there be any other minute difference observable it is this that it is such a feare of the Deity as wicked men are in reason to have and that sure though a great trembling was yet no excess no more then was very equitably the portion of such so saith Diodorus Siculus of Bomilcar 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 they that are about to undertake any notable wicked actions are generally afraid of the Gods or Daemons and so still that will yield our Diatribist no aid toward the support of any of his hypotheses sure the instituting of our Christmass Festival was no act of such a just dread of vengeance for sin nor effect whether immediately or remotely produced by it As for his affirmation that the former part of the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 doth not signifie worship but fear and not that fear which is oft put for the whole worship of God but slavish fear c. this is a clear mistake T is true indeed it doth signifie sometimes a trembling fear such as I said was the wicked mans portion and due lot and so not an excess or unproportionable to his state as when Plutarch saith of him he wisheth there were no Gods but it doth not always signifie thus but simply 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the fear of Gods and daemons and accordingly as Phavorinus in the Epicurean notion of it renders it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a cowardly fear toward God 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or an irrational fear of the Gods so Hesychius renders it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 fearing God or Religion in universum and the same Phavorinus explains 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 by 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Superstitious by devout or pious and addes 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as Saint Paul useth the word Act. 17. 22. Sect. 4. False worship is not Wil-worship Imposition of hands HIS 18th § being but an approbation of my conclusion that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 refers to the Poetical Gods Angels or dead men or indeed any thing but the onely true God must not be resisted by me I am glad I have once gratified him But when he addes that this clears what he had said that this is rather idolatry against the first Commandment which is Polytheisme then any kind of Superstition which is the giving of false i. e. uncommanded worship to the true God against the 2d Commandment this is but a heap of incongruities for 1. Idolatry as hath been evidenced is a sin against the 2d Commandment though Polytheisme be against the first 2dly Though Superstition be the giving of false worship to the true God as well as worship to false Gods Daemons and Superstites the soules of men departed or a dread which is not a worship to the true yet this false worship is unfitly explicated by uncommanded worship For certainly all such is not false as out of Aquinas was cleared especially if the word Worship be extended as this Diatribist extends it to rites and observances as well as to the substantial parts of worship such were imposition of hands in benediction among the Jewes continued also for many uses among Christians yet never prescribed or commanded by God and many the like elsewhere mentioned And this therefore 3dly cannot be truely affirmed to be against the 2d Commandment which also being spent upon the worship of Idols all for the interdicting of that cannot be
properly said to consider the worship of the true God unless it be the external part that of bowing down c. in the affirmative branch of it which had been the subject of the first Commandment and to that in all reason all false worship of the true God must be reduced and not to the second Sect. 5. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Act. 17. 22. The Athenians the most devout of all the Greeks WHat he saith by way of dilemma § 19. concerning the use of the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 more Superstitious of the Athenians Act. 17. 22. If saith he they were so called because they worshipt more Gods then they were Polytheists If because they were devout or pious rather impious in worshipping the true God ignorantly in a false manner then their sin was against the 2d Commandment though true in some sense is yet nothing gainfull to his design which can thrive by no other means but by getting 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or Superstition to denote all uncommanded rites in the worship of the true God This it no way signifies in that place of the Acts but onely their worshipping a multitude of Gods moe then any other nation did and the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or unknown God for one and so their being more pious in their course then other their heathen country men were or indeed then the Romans or any else That this is the truth and the whole truth hath sufficiently been evidenced in the Tr of Superstition § 11. and I now adde three testimonies more to that heap one out of Josephus l. 2. Contra Ap 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 All men affirme the Athenians to be the most pious of the Greeks A 2d out of Sophocles Oedip 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 If any know how to worship the Gods with honors sacrifices and offerings to their Temples Athens excels them all The third even now intimated out of Phavorinus but here more fully to be expressed who having explicated 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 superstitious by 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 pious subjoyns this testimonie of the Acts 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as S. Paul saith I see that you are more Superstitious the very place which we have now before us brought by that learned Grammarian as an instance that the word is there taken in a good not ill sense yet not of any uncommanded worship of the true God but a pious though Ethnick devotion toward the multitude of their false superadded to the one true God which though in a Christian scale or judgement it cannot be approved because it is Polytheisme yet in comparison with other heathens which was S. Pauls business in that place it was truly by him lookt on as a greater measure of devotion then the rest of the heathen world were guilty of and that is all that was meant by that phrase and so t is not at all usefull to the end to which the Diatribist would have inclined it Sect. 6. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Act. 25. Festus's scorn fals on the Jews not on Paul 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 his own not theirs 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 an accusation Jesus put under the notion of a 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 by Festus 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 taken for a daemon 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The Diatribists objections answered Superstition for Religion simply HIS 20th § is an arraignment of § 12. of Superst concerning the place Act. 25. 19. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. which I had rendred questions or accusations concerning his own Religion or Superstition or Worship and to explain what was meant by the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of one Jesus that was dead whom Paul said to be alive putting him under the notion of a dead Heros and so meaning the worship of him by 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Against this the Diatribist excepts in 3. particulars 1. It is like saith he Festus spake in scorn not of Pauls onely but of the whole Jewish Religion as saith he the words may import and are translated by ours 2. That what I said of putting Jesus under the notion of a dead Heros or 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is a strein of Criticisme compounding things which are in the Text distinct for Festus sayes saith he they had many questions both concerning their own Superstition and also concerning one Jesus c. adding to confirme this that he was accused of questions of their Law c. 23. 29. and of sedition seducement profanation of the Temple 24. 5 6. 3dly That Paul affirmed Jesus to be alive not in part as the Daemons were supposed but in the whole man as raised from the dead To these I briefely answer and first to the first For the scorn it no way appears to be meant by Festus against S. Paul or his Religion for Festus is at this time speaking in favour of Paul and slighteth the Jews accusations of him as matters of no considerable moment and so if there be any thing of sarcasme in the speech it fals on the Jews not on him and so cannot set any ill character on the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in case that be S. Paul's and not theirs As for the Diatribist's phansie that the scorn should fall not on Pauls onely but on the whole Jewish Religion that cannot hold for when he speaks of the Jewes charge against Paul he cannot speak of that wherein Paul and they agreed but wherein they differed and that must either be their way which Paul opposed or Paul's way which they now accused him of Now which of these two it was is not determinable by the words in Greek for the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 may either be rendred his own or their own Yet that it must be interpreted his I offer this reason to perswade whereas the Diatribist pretends to none for the contrary but onely that so the words may import and that our English hath so translated The Jews accusation or charge against S. Paul is plainly mentioned in this place That is the meaning of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 they had questions or laid charges against him the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 sometimes signifies a charge complaint inditement so c. 18. 15. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 but if the accusation or charge be of a word Thus Satan who is so called as 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 an adversary in foro 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 an accuser is said 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to seek 1 Pet. 5. 8. and Luk. 22. 31. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to require i. e. to accuse and charge men that so they may be delivered up to him as an executioner to winnow in one place and to devour in the other So to question a man among us vulgarly signifies to accuse him and that so it signifies here appears by v. 18. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the accusers brought no accusation of the things which I supposed 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 but some questions that must
Baal or as Tertullian saith if there were conceived more Gods then one cultura ejus in anceps deduceretur he should not know whom to worship whether one onely or both adv Marc l. 1. c. 5. or he also that fears or worships daemons as the Assyrians in Samaria that feared the Lord and served their own Gods And so still this is as contrary to the Diatribists pretensions as might be And so much for that Section Sect. 8. Superstition always ill but not always excess Probations from the use of words among heathens The Quaere of Divorce vindicated Superstitions not reprocht in the Romans by Polybius Ignorance not presently Superstition 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Act. 17. The Israelites worshipping the Calfe 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Superstitiosus noting excess THe 22d. § makes a leap from the 14th to the 27th over 12. not very brief Sections I suppose it is because he hath no least objection to make against them being not else very sparing in this kind and yet in them is contained my enumeration of all the notions wherein the word Superstition is or can be taken in the antient heathens Scriptures and Christian glossaries and the premises on which the subsequent conclusions are founded and cannot be denyed while the premisses are granted and the whole matter made clear that none of the notions of the word is applicable to the benefit of the Diatribist's pretensions Now in § 27. it seems some flawes are to be found as 1. When I say t is inconsequent that Superstition simply and absolutely taken should be resolved in all Authors to signifie somewhat that is ill particularly false worship this saith he is not the question but whether in Scripture and orthodox Divines it do not always signifie something evill particularly excessive and false worship To this the answer is easie that I am far from doubting that Superstition is an ill thing and therefore never meant to make that the question This appears of me because I every where acknowledge the word Greek and Latine to signifie the worship of daemons or false Gods onely I could not but observe in the first place that the heathens who are known to worship such daemons and not to think that a fault in themselves did mean no new ill by that word whether excess or other the like either more or worse then they ordinarily meant by Religion this being indeed their Religion to worship many Gods This they must have done if they had by that word understood an excess of Religion and by their taking it in a good sense as Synonymous with Religion it appears that this of excess was not esteemed the due notion of it This I thought usefull to be said that the very title of Superstition might not defame every thing as an excess in Religion and criminous to which it was affixt unless it might otherwise appear that there was really any such evill in it and this I said 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to shew the absurdness of their concluding who taking the word Superstition for a word of an universal ill savour as signifying excess of Religion first affixe it to innocent ceremonies and institutions to which it no way belongs and then infer them nocent as being Superstitions without proving any charge of malignity against them and as preparative to the discovery of the following mistakes rather then that I ever imagined Superstition truely so called to have no ill in it And therefore of this any otherwise then as I now say and then meant I shall make no question and on condition he will never apply the word Superstition any otherwise then the Scripture and antient Christian writers apply it i. e. to daemon worship or to undue worship of the true God in the notion of indebitus or illegitimus cultus in Aquinas not to each such Super statutum as he will call an excess the using of each uncommanded ceremonie and the like I shall acknowledge the word always to signifie that among all good writers heathen or Christian which we Christians justly deem evil and that was clearly the Etymologist's meaning as we shewed in the last Sect. and against that there is no colour of argument offered in all this long Sect. For what if the vulgar translation which he sets as the onely instance of Popish Commentators render 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 by Superstitio what if the Papists pretend it not to be taken in a good sense whom I suppose far enough from yielding themselves to be Superstitious doth that prove that Festus meant any excess by that word or indeed any more then Religion Next when he makes his observation that in all my large discourse I bring onely heathens to shew the meaning of the word and not one Divine Greek or Latine Father c. who take it in a good sense this is neither true in the affirmation for I bring the Scripture and the Christian glossaries to testifie all that I pretend to nor yet in the application for I do not pretend the word to signifie that which a Christian counts good but among the heathen the worship of many Gods which none but heathens can think to have no ill in it and consequently I pretend it onely of them and of those that set down the use of words among them and of S. Paul when he is not a finding that fault in them Act. 17. 22. and so still this is sufficient to prove that the word originally signifies not any excess of Religion or any other evil abstracted from that of the Daemon worship c. which was all that I had in design to conclude And in making this use of heathen Authors sure I have done nothing which I ever blamed in any man else as the Diatrihist's margent accuseth me citing the Quaere of Divorce § 58. where I thought it unreasonable that all the antient Christian writers should not be as competent to give us the signification of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as Demosthenes and Philo and yet made no scruple to acquiesce in the notion which either Demosthenes or Philo gave us § 57. For if he pleased to mark there is here no difference between the heathen writers and others Scripture and antient Christians concerning the meaning of the word Superstition all yeelding it 〈◊〉 to signifie the worship of many Gods whereas there that other person whom I opposed profest a contrariety and then preferred the one before the other To which yet it is necessarily consequent that in another inquiry whether Superstition were among Authors taken in a good sense some difference should be observed between Authors heathen and Christian because it is certain the heathen worship is by us Christians most justly lookt on as an ill thing being the worship of creatures but by the heathens thought well of as the Diatribist here confesseth practised and commended and so not lookt on any otherwise then Religion it self 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in the Etymologist used for a
good thing consequently the thing which I contest is not this that the worship of daemons is or ever was true or lawfull but that beside this supposed by Christians but denyed by heathens to be evill adding the like of illegitimate worship there is nothing else which hath been lookt on as simply bad in Superstition particularly not the excess as that signifies unprescribed uncommanded worship which is the onely matter of the present contest with such as the Diatribist And he doth but perplex and disturbe the matter when he saith the question is whether it doth not always in Scripture and Orthodox Divines signifie excessive and false worship for he must set the question as elsewhere he doth of excessive as that signifies no more then uncommanded worship without the addition of being false it being evident that I defend not false worship of any kind to be good but that ceremonies or institutions not commanded by God may yet be perfectly lawfull and blameless and that that is the onely question between us For the text of the Act. c. 25. 19. I have answered already and evidenced that Festus meant nothing ill by Superstition and the Drs. words cited from Sect. 24. of the ordinary practise of every Sect to dislike the distant worship of others and defame it under the title of Religion doth no way prejudge this because it is certain Festus was no way factious for the Jewes against Pauls Religion No more doth the marginal citation from § 22. where I have said that Superstition was made matter of reproach to the Romans where 1. It was not Superstition simply but the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 not coming short of excess of which that was said that it was 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 reproached by others and yet as much commended by the Author Polybius in that place and 2. That the old rule in Logick will always hold there is no syllogizing from particulars nor can this ever be formed into a regular syllogisme or valid probation some there were that reproacht the Romans Superstition therefore Festus reproacht Paul's Act. 25. 19. or spake of it by way of defamation What remains of this Sect. belongs to the place Act. 17. 23. of which I had said 1. That the Apostle speaking of those whom he cals 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 more Superstitious then other men tels them that they did 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 worship the true God though ignorantly 2. That he styles them more religious then other men meerly in relation to their worshipping the unknown which was the true God which others worshipt not and so meant no more by that phrase then that they were more religious then other men no way appearing to accuse them of that as of their fault but preparing thereby to declare to them that true God whom they worshipt ignorantly To this many things are here objected 1. That their worshipping the true God ignorantly with their own devised worship was a Superstition justly to be condemned It being gross Idolatry and sinful Superstition in the Israelites to worship the true God in the golden Calfe I answer their ignorance of the true God was justly to be condemned according to that of Minutius Felix Non minoris est sceleris Deum ignorare quà m laedere it is as great wickedness to be ignorant of God as to hurt him or that of Trismegistus as I remember 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Ignorance of God is a species of madness and in another of the antients style 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a kind of drunkenness of the soul But that being granted 1. This ignorance was not the thing that denominated them Superstitious but their worshipping many Gods 2. Their worshipping the true God though they knew him not was no new species of Superstition wherein they exceeded others 3. Their worshipping him with their own devised worship was not it which is meant by their worshipping him ignorantly the words in the original are 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 literally whom ye not knowing or being ignorant of him worship i. e. worship him whilest ye know him not which no way refers to the manner of their worship as devised by themselves but onely to their ignorance of the God whom they thus worshipt which therefore the Apostle applies himself to cure and accordingly it follows him declare I unto you Lastly their worshipping him as dwelling in Temples made with hands i. e. in little Chaplets or Shrines or Images c. v. 24. is not their Superstition but Idol-worship and is very much more then the uncommanded ceremonies will amount to and so cannot be a proper instance of their own devised worship in the Diatribists notion of the phrase for all uncommanded worship and sure the Israelites woshipping the true God in a golden Calf is as little pertinent to that business for if it be true that they worshipt none but the true God then was that only Idolatry against the 2d Commandment not Superstition or daemon worship against the first or if they worshipt the Gods of the Aegyptians or any one of them Apis in that figure then what was that to the worshipping of the true God in an ignorant or by themselves devised manner 2dly He saith my rendring the place more religious then other men in relation to their worshipping the unknown God which others worshipt not is my gloss begges the question is against the text it self I perceive that in all things yee are too Superstitious both in their worshipping many false Gods and in their ignorant worship of the true and in their vitious rites of worship adding that this sense the Dr. himself gave § 11. I consider and behold you in all things or in all that I see of you as men more Superstitious then others Here I perceive my words are mistaken and therefore shall first answer to that then to the former parts of the objection The Greek is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 literally in all things or in all respects I look upon you as more Superstitious i. e. I take it and I thought I had sufficiently exprest it before considering all the altars and inscriptions i. e. the names of your deities which I see or behold I conclude that you are more Superstitious or religious worship more Gods or daemons then other men That this is the sense I am inclined to believe by the reason of his speech rendred in the next 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. for passing through and contemplating your worâ—…ps i. e. the Gods which you worship I found also an altar on which was inscribed To the unknown God The summe of which is that in the survey of their altars which contained the names of their Gods he found one altar remarkably more then is usuall among other people that to the unknown God the true God of heaven which others in their 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or worship of many Gods did not worship which being the proof or reason exprest by the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉
and consequently proposes this whole matter not as 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 any command of Christs for he professeth to have no such but as his opinion or judgement v. 25. and 40. which what is it but the very notion of freewill-offering such as of which S. Chrysostome saith 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 it is an act of my own will in opposition to the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a precept or command precedent or 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Those things which are done above the precept have in this respect great reward but those which are in the rank of precept not so much As for the reasons produced by the Diatribist certainly they will be of no force against this evidence for why may not virginity or fasting deserve to be accounted positive things is it not as truly a positive action to conquer as to satisfie to subdue as to glut my appetite and if self-denials be negative things and yet acceptable to Christ what prejudice will it be to these abstinencies though they should be deemed negative also Are not all the obediences that are performed to negative precepts compliances with those negations and so negative also as not killing not committing adultery c. And shall not the same be said of all abstinences If Adam had not tasted the forbidden fruit this had been but negagive yet an act of obedience to God and that preferred by God before all burnt-offerings and sacrifices prescribed or voluntary And then what diminution could it be to an abstinence or prejudice to its being a freewill-offering that it is a negative act So wide is this kinde of arguing from proving any thing And as wide is his second proof that these abstinencies were commanded by special lawes when he knows that abstinence from marriage was never commanded by any law of Moses or Christ and that that other from meats was now left free by Christ those special laws under Moses given to the Jewes being now cassate and cancelled by Christ This sure is enough to his present velitations what he hath of reserve for a weightier impression shall then be warded when I see it approach and therefore so much for these two Sections Sect. 9. Compliance with Papists The Diatribists inconstancy HIS 10th § being an introduction to his survey of my six reasons for the taking Will-worship Col 2. in a good creditable sense begins with a general but that posing confounding note that taking the word in a good sense the Doctor complies too much with the Papists most of them taking it in an ill who use to take off the force of the Protestants objection from this place against their Will-worship by answering that it is taken here in a good sense for voluntary religion or worship To which I confesse my self unable to give any answer as not guessing wherein the objection lies whether in my complying or not complying with the Papists The words expressely tell me that taking it in a good sense I comply with the Papists and yet there are other words as expressely pronouncing that most of the Papists take it in an ill sense The only expedient to me imaginable to reconcile these contradictions which yet I have no pretence of imputing to the Printer or to any but the Author is this that though most of the Papists take it in an ill sense yet some though smaller number of them take it in a good and so defend their many traditions of worship as he calls them and answer the Protestants objections the Diatribists and his partners from that text Col 2. and then that I differ from those Protestants and comply with those Papists And if this be the meaning then as 1. I can truly say that I borrowed not this interpretation of that word or text from any Popish writer but from the weighing the text it self and the characters I found in it the same that Hugo Grotius hath discerned also as was said and accordingly set those down for the reasons of my interpretation so if I shall truly be found to have complied with any Papist herein yet 1. I shall never startle at the interpretation upon that account many Papists having given the true senses of many places of Scripture and 2. I shall with much more justice be able to retort this argument on the Diatribist if I may believe himself the sense which he hath given viz the ill sense being owned by most of the Papists as he here himself confesses And then sure he that is acknowledged to comply with most of the Papists and not he which is but accused to comply with some few of them must needs be most guilty of that crime whatsoever 't is fancied to be which consists in such compliance Nay 't is not long since he affirmed of my interpretation of this verse that he believes it is singular without any precedent either ancient or modern Protestant or Papist and then I have little reason to believe his bare general suggestion against his own belief that the Doctor herein complies with the Papists especially when out of Chamier he here addes that that learned and acute man Panstrat l. 3. c. 6. § 5. professes he never saw the good sense in any interpreter of the place So then this general note is not likely to tend much to our prejudice I proceed then to his more particular answer to my reasons Sect. 10. A reply to his answer of my two first reasons for the good sense Humility and Will-worship associated either both real or both pretended Popish laniations why culpable 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 1 Tim. 4. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Fasting a 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 far from hurtful or abominable wherein the profit of it consists The true sense of 1 Tim. 4. 8. wherein the ilnesse of it consists 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Abstinence because of abuses For Religion Marcionites Durand A shew of Piety in will-Will-worship All shew of good in respect of somewhat that is good The Diatribists fallacious instances and questions ANd my first reason being taken from the joining of Wil-worship with humility one undoubted Christian virtue and not sparing or as Calvin mortifying of the body To the former his answer is that by my favour humility here is not the true and laudable Christian virtue but a meer counterfeit a pretended humility fit for a pretended Will-worship And I reply that if it be so it fits my turn very well for still Will-worship and humility are associated the pretended Will-worship he saith with the pretended humility and consequently that as the fault is not in the humility but in the pretending of it when it is not true the falsenesse and counterfeitnesse of it and that an evidence that the humility if it were truly such were a Christian virtue because the fault is in the feignednesse of it so by the analogy of reason it must hold of Will-worship that when that is truly such it is
But this all the while incumbent on the Diatribist to prove and as it will not be granted for asking so it is not so neerly approaching toward truth as to want any farther answer then the reciting of it I cannot yet be so uncharitable to Mr. C. as to imagine it his serious opinion that kneeling in prayer or thanksgiving to God on purpose to expresse our lowly reverence to him or bowing at the name of Jesus in token that we believe him to be the eternal God in opposition to the ancient or modern Arians and Socinians is abominable to God and worse then false religion And though his following question confirms this to be his opinion Do not all Idolaters pretend wisdom in their inventions citing in the margent Psal 106. 39. went a whoring with their own inventions yet t is not to be believed that he can in earnest thence conclude Therefore all inventions of men are Idolatry and worse then Idolatry If he can 't is sufficient to reply that though all Idolatry be invented and devised worship yet all inventions of men are not Idolatry though every beast be a living creature yet every living creature is not a beast And so that though Idolatrous Will-worship be abominable to God yet all Will-worship is not Idolatrous Once more he presseth this argument Doth not saith he this pretence of wisdom make it more odious to God as taking upon them to be wiser then he and more devout then he requires But it may suffice once for all that he that useth an uncommanded ceremony in the service of God doth not take upon him to be wiser then God but walking regularly in obedience to the divine rule wheresoever there is any particularly given acts according to reason and the more universal rules of Decency c. where God hath not particularly prescribed any thing And so again in acts of uncommanded devotion doing that voluntarily out of love to God which God requires not sub periculo animae and so which is not extorted by fear either of offending or suffering this is again no elevating our own wisdome above Gods but our making use of those advantages and those liberties which God in his wisdome chose to afford us that there might be somewhat for us freely to exercise his graces upon and so for him as freely to reward in us And of this there is no fear that it shall ever be counted any irregular acting and having God's promise to be rewarded it is safe from being odious or abominable before him Thus I hope I have vindicated the good sense of the word as farre as in my 3d. Reason I pretended from the Greek Fathers concurrence with me As for the Latines and later interpreters to which the Diatribist now calls me and asks me why I did not tell him how they rendred the word To this I answer that as I have not commodity to examine all those interpreters in this matter so I did not think my self obliged to do it having never pretended that the notion which I give is universally received by all Expositors I acknowledge that all men have not rendred the word in a good sense particularly that the vulgar Latine reads it Superstitio though in what acception of that word I know not most probably in an ill sense but sure this with no more truth or analogie for so interpreting then is for their interpreting the Passive 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 by decernitis v. 20. which is no less then to change subjection into command undergoing a yoke into imposing of it one contrary into another However from thence t is nothing strange that the ill sense should be transfused into those Expositors which follow and never depart from that Latine translation neither examining the original word nor the context to reforme that translation by it This was the task which I then undertook and having found the context to incline it to a good sense and the Greek word to bear it very well and the Greek Fathers to concur with me in their notion of it I thought I might lawfully question the authority of the vulgar Latine and those who had been lead by it and so we know are the Papists and from them others also who do not take notice who t is that leads them and attempt that here which I saw ordinarily practised by all other sorts of men the Learned Papists themselves and I doubt not by this Diatribist when he conceives himself to have reason for it i. e. depart from their words and conduct as in other so in this particular In so doing I now see without any search that I have such a concurrence as will secure it from any censure of singularity Beside the Greek Fathers forementioned the Diatribist tells me I have Bellarmine's consent adding some other Papists also and I hope his authority alone were considerable enough if there were not also some others to weigh in the balance with Salmeron and Estius which are all the modern Expositors here cited by him And among the Protestants to Hugo Grotius already cited I now adde Monsieur Daillé in his late tract de Jejuniis written ex instituto against Bellarmine and yet in this place of St Paul contested between them he expressely acknowledges with Bellarmine the very thing that I concluded viz. that those false teachers had a threefold colour of wisdome 1. In Will-worship 2. In humility 3. In austerity to the body for which three things they admire these their doctrines of men defining 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 cultum sponte voluntariè assumtum nulla cogente Dei lege a worship undertaken voluntarily and of their own accord without any law of God constraining them and again that by the whole discourse of the Apostle it appeares that they commended and set off their doctrines of abstinence by this that voluntarily ex quadam zeli sanctificationis abundantiâ susciperentur they were voluntarily undertaken out of an abundance of zeal and holiness And so in his opinion if abundance of zeal and holiness were taken in a good sense Will-worship must be resolved to be so taken And so this Exposition of that learned man who will not be deemed partial to me against the Diatribist may now deserve to be considered by him as soon as the contrary of any modern Expositor produced or I believe producible by him For as to those antient Latine Fathers whom he hath already produced they are but three Ambrose Hierom and the vulgar Latine and those three may be reduced also and in fine will amount to little more then the one single vulgar Translator This is generally supposed to be St Hierome and if it be not t is certainly somebody whom St Hierome followed St Hieromes short notes on the Epistles being affixt to that translation and so St Hieromes name is no addition to that onely served the Diatribists turn as in a false muster to bear two names to appear twice and
shall have observed this method uprightly eschewed evill in a strict mortifying of lusts c. in abstaining from sin and doing all that is commanded as Virtus est vitium fugere Sapientia prima Stultitiâ caruisse And whensoever he hath failed secured his retrait by an early humiliation confession begging of pardon in Christ and sincere reformation and then laboured industriously to superstruct doing of good works of the more eminent I mean uncommanded degrees of virtue I shall not doubt to incourage him to think confidently and expect from our great 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 more and greater acceptance I shall adde reward also then the same person could in reason expect for doing onely what is commanded And though it be not best for him in this case to compare himself with other men the possible hazard of that exemplified by the Pharisee perswading the contrary yet of the truth of the success there is no reason to make question or suspect but that of two men which have been equall in obediences one exceeding the other in acts of uncommanded perfection the more perfect shall have the richest reward as is most evident whether by considering the degrees of glory in heaven or the rule by which God distributes them still under the Gospell by way of reward to every man secundum opera according to his works What he addes of Papists thinking they can merit with God by such works for themselves and others though ours saith he are not come so far yet is an essay of his charitable opinion of us and I shall take it by the best handle I can and conclude from it then by his own confession we are not Papists yet and then I do not after all that tract of Will-worship maintain works of Supererogation yet and then I need onely adde that t is no way usefull for him to lose his pains and his charity by confuting those of whom he onely divineth that they may hereafter fall into false doctrine which yet I hope I shall not do having no temptation from all this Diatribist's Exercitation and the arguments therein contained to fly to any other Sect of Religion to furnish my self with answers for him What now remains in the shutting up this 2d. Exercitation is wholly spent either in proving it to be my doctrine which I willingly and expressely grant it to be that the voluntary oblations are more acceptable and rewardable with God or in repeating his own sense the more voluntary the more abominable wherein it seems we are already at distance enough a man need not fly to the Papists doctrine of Supererogation to make the breach the wider or in charging on this doctrine that it makes Superstitious Will-worshippers and formalists to overlook others with abundance of contempt and insolence adding Characters by which we may discern who they are to whom he is pleased to affixe these titles To which my answer is 1. with St Paul Rom. 14. that as those which freely do those things which others account unlawfull ought not to despise those which do them not so on the other side those which do them not ought in no wise to judge or condemne those which do them and consequently that if our Bishops whom he seems to translate those who did overlook others had really been guilty of contempt and insolence toward them yet had not this been more criminous in them more contrary to St Paul's direction then this which is here visible in this Diatribist in calling them Superstitious Will-worshippers and Formalists which first presumes all use of uncommanded ceremonies to be Superstition first and then Formality and so is a double untruth and 2. charges those two great sins upon his own Lawful Superiors and so is a double uncharitablenesse attended with disobedience to and separation from them I delight not now to compare these sins and affirme which is more culpable If his own plain words or conscience do not accuse this Diatribist in any of these neither shall I accuse him but rather implore God's pardon for him And onely adde 2. That I have reason to hope and believe that the Governors of our Church and those who lately presided in it did not make their own voluntary performances the foundation or occasion of any degree of contempt or insolence towards others which used them not If any did I neither intended nor now design any defence for them And so much for the 2d Exercitation CHAP. VII Of Christmass and other Festivals Sect. 1. The observance which is due to the Custome of a Church The Testimonies of Ambrose and Augustine and Isidore IN our entrance on the discourse of Festivals I had thought that the customary practice of the universal Church of Christ and particularly the perpetual immemorial usage of the Church of England continued as farre as we can discern from the first plantation without any interruption to the time of writing that treatise might have had some weight with any that were not contentious if it were but upon the account of S. Pauls argument thus drawn from the customary practise of the Churches of God On occasion hereof the Diatribist falls presently into the examination of that place where S. Paul useth that argument 1 Cor. 11. 16. and inquires what inferences naturally arise from the words of the Apostle But I who designed to conclude no more from that reference but only this that the custome of the Church ought to be of some force and weight with any meek son of the Church have no need of following him into that inquiry if the loosest consideration and very first view of those words do not prove that neither shall I farther contend for it Paul argued from custome and I proposed the like argument and so made a reference to S. Paul whose example I thus farre transcribed and if in other respects the analogy held not it matters not so it held in this that custome was considerable in circumstances of religion such was covering or not covering the head in the service of God there and such is the observation of a Festival here And this is all that I need reply to his first § Yet I shall ex abundanti adde one or two testimonies for the confirming the weakest part of that consideration viz. the reasonableness of complying with so as not to oppose the custome of any particular Church though they be no more then so though they pretend not to be derived from the Apostles whether by institution or practise supposing withall that they are no way contrary thereto And 1. We have the words of St Ambrose sufficiently known Ad quamcunque Ecclesiam veneritis ejus morem servate si pati scandalum non vultis aut facere To whatsoever Church ye come observe the custome thereof if you will neither receive nor give scandal 2dly The as clear words of St Augustine Ego te illud breviter admonendum puto traditiones
be by him lookt on as an excess of that worship of the first commandment for that was Epicurus's very notion of it placing his own opinion in the midst and as on one side downright Atheisme denying any God at all so on the other beliefe of a providence of rewards and punishments which as the mother of fear or perturbation and interrupter of the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 quiet of life his great aim and very injurious to the Gods he rejected as another extreme under the title of Superstition But of this sure I have spoken abundantly and did not foresee that Mr. C. was to be admonisht of this worst principle in all Epicurus his philosophie Yet because he is fallen into it under color of the ordinary divinity concerning slavish fear and because mention of this slavish fear as of a criminous excess and a branch of superstition recurres very frequently in these Diatribae I shall not resist the invitation of saying somewhat in this place once for all of slavish fear By that I suppose he understands fear of punishment as by filial fear a reverential obedience proceeding wholly from love without any thing of fear in it Concerning this distinction I shall first demand whether it have any thing of propriety in it i. e. whether sonnes may not lawfully and reasonably fear punishment from their parents in case they shall deserve it even the greatest punishment exheredation and casting out of the family upon their continuing disobedient and refractary to their fathers commands and whether this very fear be not so usefull to restrain the excesses of youth and keep them within that obedience that no parent will ever think fit that the child shall know or think that his disobedience whatsoever the degree of it may be shall not be thus punisht and lastly whether it be not duty in the childe thus to fear and proportionably whether this be not applicable to every childe of God especially being exhorted to it Heb. 4. 1. Let us fear lest a promise being made of entring into his rest any of you should seem to come short of it adding thereto Heb. 12. 28 29. and this distinction being founded in the likeness between a childe of God and a childe of an humane parent If this be so then there can be no fitness or propriety in the distinction thus explicated nor can the fear of punishment be discriminatively called slavish nor with justice defined an excess of fear Secondly The slavish fear I shall suppose in the Diatribists notion to be such as is in a wicked man and then it must be either the fear of divine vengeance for sin committed formerly or for sin at the time of committing it or for sin before he commit it and I demand how any of these three fears can by a Christian duly be called an excess or with any propriety superstition For ought not the wicked man to fear punishment for his sins past when God affirms solemnly there is no peace no peace to such be not the judgements of God gone out against that man and if that Lyon roar shall not he fear if vengeance be denounced from God against him is it a season for him to cast off fear or if he doth is not this carnal security and is not the contrary apprehension i. e. fear necessary to reduce him in a word are not the terrors of the Gospel part of the Gospel and on purpose designed to bring such a man to repentance and can he be said to believe the Gospel which believes not that part of it or will they be motives of Reformation to him if he do not apply them to himself in respect of his present state and can he so apply them who doth not fear the execution of them So at the very point of committing any wilfull sin ought he not to look upon it as that against which the wrath of God is denounced and can he do so and believe God and not fear that wrath may fall on him and that as long as he remains under the power of such sin he remains under the wrath of God Are all the evil abodes of an accusing conscience in a vitious person excess nay is not the contrary the highest pitch both of presumption and danger the very root bearing gall and wormwood to bless himself in his heart saying I shall have peace though I walk in the imagination of my heart Deut. 29. 19. Lastly before the commission of sin when he enters into temptation is not the feare of hell an usefull restraint to him is it not both his duty and his bridle is there or can there be any excess in that should he fear or should he not fear If he should not then what can keep him from running into all excess of riot shall love of God or virtue but the wicked man as wicked is supposed to have none of that in his heart But if he should if it be his duty to fear and to fear hell in case he shall thus go on then still how can it be an excess The consideration of these few things may perhaps give the Diatribist reason to change his minde concerning slavish fear and no longer to think it an excess of Religion nor as such capable of the title of Superstition The truth is what is a miss in such fear is a defect not excess a want of love not any unproportionable measure of fear God is made up of goodness as well as justice and the Gospel compounded of promises as well as threats and the love of Christ ought to constrein us as well as the terrors of the Lord to perswade and he that hath a quick sense of one and none of the other he is not an exceeder in fear but deficient in love and so still the mention of slavish fear in this place and frequently in the first exercitation is very unapplicable to the purpose for which it is brought as an instance of an excesse of religion or superstition Some little thing more I shall perhaps be forced to say to it hereafter but this shall not be repeated and so must be remembred from hence The 4th Concession of the Drs is observed to be this that to affirme God to command when he doth not is granted to be superstition under the notion of nimiety or excesse because that man addes to the commands of Christ § 46. To this I answer that for them who are resolved to have superstition taken in the sense of nimiety and in that sense to be opposed to religion as an extreme to the mediocrity I did assign this of imposing commandments on God and so obligations on our selves and others which he never gave as an excesse of fear a being afraid of God when we need not and so proportionable to one notion of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 arising from the consideration of the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which may signifie perhaps a trembling and so cowardly fear 〈◊〉