Gods but me the last Thou shalt not covet Primum est Non habebis Deos alienos coram me Ultimum Non concupisces whereas if his Church had then followed Saint Augustines division or account he must have said not ultimum but duo ultima Non concupises not the last but the two last are Thou shalt not covet For Saint Augustine takes Thou shalt not covet thy neighbours house for one and Thou shalt not covet thy neighbours wife for another Commandement But in the first words of the following Chapter he speaks yet more plainly whereby he that runs may read he that reads must understand That in the age wherein he lived neither was the second Commandement confounded with the first nor the second Table augmented in the number of its Commandements His words at large are these speaking of the Commandements in the very beginning of his 32. Chapter Quorum primum Non habebis Deos alienos coram me Non facies tibi sculptile sequens sed ultimum est Non concupisces Quatuor ex his dilectioni Dei sex dilectioni subserviunt proximi Non habebis Deos alienos coram me Non facies tibi sculptile neque omnem similitudinem Non assumes nomen Domini Dei tui in vanum Memento ut diem sabbatorum sanctifices Quatuor ista Dei dilectioni repugnantia prohibendo locum eidem dilectioni Dei sermo Dei parare intendit The first of the Commandements is this Thou shalt have no other Gods but me The next to that is Thou shalt not make to thy self any graven Image and the last of all is Thou shalt not covet Four of these set forth our love towards our God and six our love towards our neighbour Thou shalt have no other Gods Thou shalt not make an image Thou shalt not take the name of God in vain and Remember thou keep holy the Sabbath day by forbidding those four things which are repugnant to the love of God do intend to prepare amongst us a place for his love See here he allows four Commandements to treat of the love of God and the second to be one of those four So he admits not of Saint Augustines conjunction of the first and second into one and he allows six Commandements to treat of the love of our neighbour so he admits not of Saint Augustines division of the Tenth Commandement into two And he was of so great a repute for a true Catholick Divine that Tritenhemius saith of him in his life Vir in divinis Scripturis spiritu sancto per visionem illustrante doctissimus He was a man instructed in the knowledge of the holy Scriptures by immediate Visions and Revelations from the Holy Ghost Thus I have surveyed the chiefest Catholick Divines till full seven hundred years together after Saint Augustine not only of the Greek and Latine Church but also of Great Britane France Germany Africa and Hierusaâ—…em and not one of them follows Saint Augustines division of the Decalogue and though the master of the Sentences about the year 1145. brought the same in request and the Schoolmen after him yet Aquinas himself who is most zealous for it durst not say it was the division of the Decalogue generally received in the Church from Saint Augustines daies for it is his positive determination Quod praecepta Decalogi diversimodè à diversis distinguuntur 12 4 qu. 100. art 4. in c. The Commandements of the Decalogue have been severally distinguished by several men and he instanceth in Hesychius whom I named before Now Sir if you consider That the whole Catholick Church did speak by the mouthes of these fore-named Divines for so many Centuries after Saint Augustine I hope you will say This was an Assertion much sooner to be vented then to be verified for indeed never to be verified That All Catholick Divines after Saint Augustine did reckon the first and second but as one Commandement Having done my poor endeavour to prove de facto That all Catholick Divines after Saint Augustine have not reckoned the first and second Commandements but as one I now come to prove it de jure That they may not because indeed it is very Uncatholick so to do as being against essential Catholicism that is to say The substance of a Divine Truth taught by God himself and against Accidental Catholicism that is to say the Profession of A Divine Truth alwaies taught in the Church of God And if I prove both these I hope you will hereafter allow the Commandement an Interrogatory in your Confessions if not a distinct place in your Catechisms First I say it is against essential Catholicism that is against the substance of a divine truth taught by God himself For the Commandements are called by Gods holy Spirit Ten words Exod. 34. 28. Scripsit decem verba 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 say the 70. He writ the ten words whence hath been derived the name 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which hath ever been the usual appellation in all Christian Churches to say The Decalogue or Ten words for the Ten Commandements And Deut. 4. 13. tis expresly said that God writ these Ten Commandements upon two Tables of stone As many words as he writ with his finger we must read with our eyes hear with our ears and obey with our hearts and as many words as he writ in each Table so many must we read hear and obey in it neither more nor less if we will have our Divinity come from God or in vain shall we talk of being Catholicks with his Church whiles we are Schismaticks from himself for the reason why we may not separate from his Church is because his Church doth not separate from him Considering then That God writ these Ten distinct words in Two distinct Tables it must needs be uncatholick either to make no distinct word of Gods second word in the first Table or to make two distinct words of Gods last word in the second Table For most Catholick is that saying of our blessed Saviour Mat. 19. 6. What God hath joyned together let not man put asunder From whence by the Rule of Conversion emergeth this other What God hath put asunder let not man joyn together The first Proposition will not allow us to divide the Tenth Commandement into two because God hath made it but one so we must have but six Commandements in the second Table The second Proposition will not allow us to make the first and second Commandements into one because God hath made them two and so we must have full four Commandements in the first Table For neither fewer words then four were written by Gods own hand in the first nor more then six in the second Table And the Church of God may not be said to have power may not be thought to have will to correct Gods own Hand-writing For the same God who hath given us Ten words in both Tables hath also given us four in the one and six in the other And doubtless
add this limitation not from a Brother not from one of the family of Love and you will make it lawful to steal so it be from a stranger or from an enemy The reason is because an Universal is not capable of Addition for who can add to All and where nothing can be added nothing can be distinguished for who can distinguish upon nothing Therefore to distinguish upon an universal is to suppose it a particular to which something may be added and that is in truth to deny it to be an universal For every distinction is a kind of limitation and every limitation is a kind of negation Thus Drink ye All of this is an universal and therefore as we cannot add to All so we may not distinguish upon All and say Omnes conficientes All that consecrate for that is to suppose the Universal a particular nay to make it so by adding to it and consequently to include its contradictory in the same Precept making that to say not All instead of All and so Drink ye All of this and Drink not All of this will be the sense of one and the same Precept which being impossible we must look upon that Trent Declaration as more peremptory then true Ecclesia declarat nullo divino praecepto Laicos vel clericos non conficientes ad bibendum obligari Concil Trid. sess 21. The Church declareth that no divine Precept obligeth the Laity and not consecrating Clergy to drink of the cup For Drink ye all of this is a divine Precept and cannot but oblige all that receive the holy Sacrament because it is a Precept concerning the receiving it So in the particular case of Image-worship The Text saith Thou shalt not make to thy self any graven image or likeness to worship it if you will limit this universal negative by confining the graven image to this or that kind of image then the contradictory will be true Divinity as Thou shalt not make nor worship the graven image of Venus or Bacchus or Jupiter that is any image of the Heathen Gods which are meer fictions But thou maist make and worship the Image of Christ and of the Saints and Angels which have a real being So then Thou shalt not worship an Image and Thon shalt worship an Image being contradictories will be both true divinity and both commanded in the same Precept and God must be said to Command and men must be made to Obey contradictions And yet this is the slight by which your two great Champions Baronius and Bellarmine have endeavoured to elude this very Commandement Surely I think your Catechist Laurence Vaux much more ingenuous who goes to prove by this very Commandement that it is not only lawful but also necessary to worship the Images of the Saints For so in his Catechism Printed at Antwerp 1574. in the sixt Chapter of his first seven Queries upon the first Commandement he asketh this question Who breaketh the first Commandement of God by irreverence of God you may be sure he means the first with the second joyned to it because he speaketh of outward irreverence to which himself thus answers They that do not give due reverence to God and his Saints or to their reliques and images An excellent Catechist who makes the second Commandemement say Thou shalt make thou shalt worship graven Images yet this man said no more then your two great Cardinals have in effect though more covertly said after him only he tells us He writes for the use of children and ignorant men but your Cardinals write for the use of the greater and most learned Scholars But as unsuccessfully as they of Nice before them The Scripture doth not forbid us to worship Images but to worship them as God say the one The Scripture doth not forbid us to worship true but false Images say the other Both distinguish upon Gods universal Precept the one upon the act of worship the other upon the object or the image worshipped so both deny the precept to be universal and make it particular though God made it universal and by so doing give us the contradiction of the Precept for the exposition of it For Thou shalt not worship an Image is Thou shalt worship an Image according to both their expositions But which is very remarkable As they both contradict God so they also contradict one another That t is not easie for a sensible man to discern how far this Image-worship hath been dogmatized For Thou shalt not worship Images as God say they of Nice Thou shalt worship Images as God if they be his images say your men now whereby they have in truth forsaken the Council though they still cleave to the Images and we have done no more who have forsaken the Images And indeed we have been constrained thereto out of our bounden duty to God and his truth not only for the many falsities which shew it to have been a factious Council but also for the many falsifications therein which in effect shew it to have been no Council For they bring not Scripture but Revelation and Miracle the two principles of Enthusiasts not of Divines for the establishment of their new doctrine They talk of an Image of our blessed Saviour at Berytus which being pierced by the Jews there immediately gushed out of it Blood and Water which when the Synod heard They shewed their fond belief by their sad lamentations 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 They were much troubled and wept yet upon this and such like fabulous stories which supposed a stranger kind of Transubstantiation then you have since invented not changing the substance of bread into Christs Body but changing the substance of Christs body into Wood or Stone they were pleased to vote 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The Relative worshipping of Images and so call those Jews and Atheists and enemies to the Truth 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 who were opposers of that worship But these and the like particular falsifications do chiefly cast a dis-repute upon their doctrine I now come to a general falsification which will cast a disrepute upon the Council it self For that frequently speaks of letters from the three Patriarcks of Antiech Alexandria and Hierusalem to Tharasius And of Thomas and John two Presbyters as the Legates of those Patriarcks to subscribe in their names when your own Baronius confesseth That they could not then have any entercourse either by message or letter with those three Patriarcks because they were wholly under the power of the Sarazens and that one of them namely the Patriarck of Hierusalem was at that time dead in exile So that if you cannot take off this forgerie and falsification from these grand voters of Images you may not allow them the repute of a Council and you cannot take it off from them but you must cast it upon your own Baronius For these are his words An. 785. nu 40. Non fuit facultas tribus Patriarchis Orientis ad Tharasium rescribendi neque etiam
he never so glorious yet he is as far from God as my self for betwixt finite and infinite the distance is infinite whether the finite be glorious or inglorious for be he never so glorious yet he and his glory both are nothing in comparison of him to whom Cherubins and Seraphins continually do cry Heaven and earth are full of the majesty of thy Glory 7. Having vindicated mine own allegation against praying to Saints I come to oppose your Cardinals allegations for it which though they savour much more of learning authority yet not one jot less of impertinency And yet you and all yours swallow them as glib as once you swallowed the holy league and Covenant or as still you are desirous to swallow up all other Churches into your own pretended mother Church that is as that Behemoth swalloweth waters of whom it is said Behold he drinketh up a river and hasteth not he trusteth that he can draw up Jordan into his mouth Job 4. 23. A large swallow you have to let down your own Camels whiles you strain at our gnats not considering the advice of the first Bishop of Hierusalem to his Clergy My Brethren have not the faith of our Lord Jesus Christ the Lord of glory with respect of persons Jam. 2. 1. If you had not the faith of our Lord Jesus Christ with respect of persons more then of causes you would rather be exceptious against your own writers for most shamefully misapplying the holy Scriptures to set up your false worship then with ours for rightly applying them to pull it down since it is so much to the dishonour of Christ our Redeemer and to the danger of those Christian souls which he hath redeemed And yet your late writers seeing the unwritten word so unequal a match to grapple with the written word for the Protestants have opened their eyes though God alone can open their hearts and we pray him to open them do labour to prove all your false adorations and false invocations out of the holy Scriptures notwithstanding they are so plainly and so directly against the express letter of the Law of Moses and therefore cannot be according to the letter of the Prophets which are no other then 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 â—…aw But I will confine my self to your moâ—…â—…ed Dogmatist and desire you with me to consider the strange impertinency and if wilful the stranger imprety of his allegations out of the Text to maintain your invocation of Saints And amongst them all two only shall serve my turn 8. The first is that of Gen. 48. 16. The Angel which redeemed me from all evil bless the lads Hic apertè sanctus Jacob Aâ—…gelum invocavit saith Bellarm. Here holy Jacob did manifestly invocate an Angel If he did 't is manifest he took that Angel for the God of his Fathers Abraham and Isaac for the God which fed him all his life long and redeemed him from all evil for he invocateth none other to bless the lads but only that God so saith the Text God before whom my Fathers Abraham and Isaac did walk the God which â—…ed me all my life long to this day The Angel which redeemed me from all evil bless the â—…ads 'T is palpable all these particulars do concern but one and him Jacob desireth to bless the children If that one were an Angel he did not pray for Gods blessing upon them so the lads were little beholding to him If that one were God he did not pray to an Angel to blesâ—… them so 〈◊〉 â—…olding to your Carâ—… Nay indeed all that are concerned in this Text for the Angel though named yet is not concerned in it are litâ—…le beholding to him for all are losers by this interpretation 1º God loseth his honour of accepting feeding redeeming and blessing his servants 2º Abraham and Isaac lose their God For it was the Almighty God not an Angel that said to Abraham Walk before me and be thou perfect Gen. 17. 1. and God before whom my Fathers Abraham and Isaac did walk saith this Text. 3º The poor infants lose their blessing for t is clear an Angel could not bless them but only ministerially from God 4º Jacob loseth his Religion for he calleth upon a false God if upon an Angel instead of God All these cannot lose by this interpretation the Interpreter himself be no loser therefore though I will not say he lost his honesty by seeking to wrest a text yet I must say he hath lost his authority by seeking to oppose it For it is not an exposition but an opposition of the Text when words are taken Grammatically in their own sense that should be taken Theologically in Gods sense The Grammatical sense of a word is according to its own signification But the Theological sense of a word is according to Gods use of it or Gods application As Genesis 18. 2. The Lord appeared unto Abraham but v 2. Lo three men stood by him And again v. 16. The men rose up from thence yet v. 17. And the Lord said and 't is evident by all Abrahams prayer that it was the Lord appeared unto him for he calleth him the Judge of all the earth v. 25. and v. 33. 't is said The Lord went his way as soon as he had left communing with Abraham If you take this word men Grammatically as 't is in its own signification you must say Abraham prayed to a man But if you take it Theologically as 't is in Gods use or application 't is no less then the Lord appearing in the likeness of a Man and you must say That Abraham prayed only to the Lord So in this Text mis-interpreted by your great Doctor if you take the word Angel Grammatically as it signifies in it self 't is plain Iacob invocated an Angel but if you take it Theologically as God useth it 't is no less then the Lord in the likeness of an Angel and so 't is plain Iacob invocated none but God And truly the one Text might as well have been urged to prove that Abraham invocated a man as the other to prove that Iacob invocated an Angel Both good proofs Grammatically but neither a good proof Theologically For Grammarians look upon words as they signifie in themselves but Divines look upon words as they signifie in their use the reason is because the work of the one is to understand the Thing but the work of the other is to understand the Truth therefore as doubtful Propositions in the New Testament are to be expounded according to the Analogie of Faith in the Apostles Creed that we may have Truth in our Belief So doubtful Propositions in the Old Testament are to be expounded according to the analogie of righteousness in Moses his Decalogue that we may have Truth in our Obedience And as that Proposition This is my body must be taken Theologically that is in the sense of the speaker because taken Grammatically that is in the bare sense of the words it