that the Faithful ought to be in nothing more solicitous than to take care to expiate their Soul by Confession Is it because it 's called whispering For what then serve their Boxes and why is it call'd a Seal Is it because of the easiness of it That is the case at the last For saith he every one will see how insincere this Preacher was in saying that a man unlades himself c. To make his Followers believe the Papists to be so sottish as to think their sins forgiven by a whisper only He may e'ne turn his anger upon his own Church for teaching this Doctrine for from thence the Preacher learn'd it which saith The Sacrament of Confession was graciously instituted on purpose to supply the place of Contrition For further proof of this I remit the Reader to the Apology Assertion 21. 4. Of Transubstantiation where men must renounce all their Five Senses at once Here the Apologist charged our Author with a small Falsification which indeed he has now mended but not acknowledged But he will make up that defect by the force of his Argument for now he seriously undertakes to prove that in Transubstantiation they don't renounce all their Five Senses As for three of them he has nothing to say but then Sight and Hearing are so far from being against that they eminently serve for the proof of it As how If saith he we follow our Hearing which is the sense by which Faith comes we are oblig'd to believe it Christ's words expresly signifie and declare the Sacrament is his Body These words we hear deliver'd by those whom he has appointed to Teach and Instruct the Flock to wit the Pastors of the Church these words we see likewise and read in Holy Scripture So that if we follow our Ears and our Eyes directed by the Word of God we are bound to believe this Mystery and consequently do not Renounce all our Five Senses at once Well! but do we hear Christ thus declaring No but we hear the Church Has the Church then such an Organical voice to speak as we have Ears to hear No but the Church teaches by its Pastors But are the Pastors we hear all Infallible in their Teaching And are we to believe them although they teach contrary to sense and reason There indeed he has lost the Case But however he brings in Sight to his relief For these words saith he we see likewise and read in Holy Scripture And whilst we let both our Senses and Reason be immediately directed by God's Word which is Infallible we more reverence the Scriptures and believe upon better Grounds than the Protestants Thus we are at last led to a Private Spirit and the Protestant way of resolving Faith into the Scriptures without need of any Infallible Interpreter For 't is but letting our Senses and Reason be immediately directed by God's Word which is Infallible and we may soon be satisfied I heartily thank our Author for this free Concession for these are the Grounds Protestants do believe upon But yet he will needs have it that they believe upon better Grounds than the Protestants This I am apt to think he will no more be able to prove than that they Reverence the Scriptures more than Protestants However this he attempts and gives this reason for that Protestants let natural Objects ever about Mysteries of their Faith have the direction of their Senses in which they are so often deceived rather than the Word of God which cannot deceive them But where has the Word of God taught us that we are not to judg of Natural Objects by those Senses which he has given us to judg of Natural Objects by Will he undertake to provâ— this also When he himself acknowledges that to frame a judgment of the nature or substance of a thing we must depend upon the information of sense and that the common and natural way is to judg according to the relation the senses give from the external and natural accidents of the thing And now is not a Wafer a Sensible Object and are we not to judg of it according to the Relation the Senses give of it and from its external and natural accidents How will our Author salve this difficulty That he proceeds in after this manner But if we desire to frame a true judgment as if the other was a false one of what is the Nature and Substance of such an Object not according to a Natural Being but according to the Divine Power and what it may have of Supernatural the Senses ought not to be laid aside but we must consider here too the information these give not now from the Natural Accidents but from the Word of God. I should have thought the Conclusion to be infer'd from hence would rather be the Senses ought to be laid aside forasmuch as we are not in such case to judg of the Natural Accidents according to what they report For I must confess he is one of the first I have met with that has improved the Argument this way and that appeals to the Senses for the proof of Transubstantiation which their Church so cautiously warns them against in this matter But he will illustrate this by an instance in another matter A Friend saith he sends me a transparent Stone of which when I would make a judgment I cannot do it without the information of my Senses These may inform me two ways either by looking upon the thing it self or by reading the Letter sent along with it or the report of the Bearer If I take the information of my Senses from the view of the Stone I judg it to be a pebble if from the Letter wrote by an excellent Artist and the Bearer a skilful Jeweller I judg it to be a true Diamond upon their authority and greater skill Now in which judgment of these ought I to acquiesce Certainly in this last and yet in so doing I hope I should not renounce all my Five Senses at once So since my Senses assure me from Scripture and the Pastors of God's Church that the Sacrament is Christ's Body I am bound in reason to judg of it so rather than from the Natural Accidents to judg it to be Bread So that in thus believing this Mystery we do not renounce but follow our Senses But his Instance reaches not the Case 1. Because the judging whether a Transparent Stone be a Counterfeit or a Diamond is not a matter of mere sense but judgment skill and experience and belongs to an Artist But Sense will teach every one whether it be a Stone or a Pea hard or soft transparent or opacous But now the Case before us is whether what we see is a bit of Bread or the Body of a Man whether it 's broken or whole c. And therefore to put the case right and make it parallel he must suppose the Stone to be a known Diamond as known to him it 's sent to as to
him that sent it and that the Letter and Bearer both affirm this small Stone which he now holds betwixt his fingers and knows by his Senses to be a Stone and not a Man is yet the great Mogul in person and so is every Diamond besides that comes over and yet that Prince is still in his own Country Must that person now because of their Authority and greater skill think himself bound to acquiesce in their judgment against the testimony of sense or must he not renounce his senses to do it 2. He supposes further that the Doctrine of Transubstantiation is as plainly contained in Scripture as it is in the Letter that the Transparent Stone then sent is a Diamond But that he knows we deny and when he can find these or the like words This Bread is turn'd into my Natural Body or is upon Consecration my true Substantial Body it will be time enough to prepare a further Answer for him The Question being not whether what God teaches is not to be believed but whether he hath so taught So that it still remains true what the Preacher charged upon him that in believing Transubstantiation a man must renounce his five Senses at once even hearing it self which will not only teach us to distinguish betwixt the Host's and the Priest's falling into the water though we are blindfold but we must in their way renounce that Sense to believe it when we hear all Mankind concurring in it that the report of Sense is to be believed and that in our Author's words To frame a judgment of the nature or substance of a thing we must depend upon Sense 5. The Pope alone cannot err and all others without some of his Assistance cannot but err Here are two Propositions 1. The Pope cannot err This our Author now calls an Opinion of some School-Divines whereas the Apologist shewed it to be the prevailing Opinion of their Church whether in respect of number or authority It 's the most common opinion of almost all Catholicks as Bellarmin It 's the Catholick Truth and what all Catholick Doctors teach in these days saith Suarez But to this not a word 2. All others cannot but err Here our Author is guilty of a new Misrepresentation It is charged upon us saith he because we believe the members of our Church to be fallible that therefore they cannot but err Where he changes the Proposition into a Conclusion by foysting in the word Therefore and then running it down as a most Illogical and absurd consequence but let him answer for the faults of it whose conseqeunce it is The consequence then be to himself and let the Proposition be the Preacher's that all others without some of his assistance cannot but err This is absolutely false saith our Author and so say I too but it is true Popery Let their Catechism decide the Case to that I appeal which thus delivers the sense of their Church upon it But as this one Church which the Pope of Rome is at the Head of Sect. 15. cannot err in delivering the Doctrine of Faith and Manners seeing it 's governed by the Holy Ghost So all the rest which assume to themselves the name of a Church must of necessity be engaged in the most pernicious Errors of Doctrine and Manners as being led by the spirit of the Devil Now here is the whole Calummy at large If men submit to the Pope and are in his Church they have the benefit and assistance of his Infallibility and are under the Guidance of it as secure as in the Ark of Noah but if they leave it they are drown'd in error and perdition And surely while they are in actual Error they cannot but err according to the known Axiom Quicquid est quamdiu est necesse est esse Because the Apologist before was modest and having not seen the Sermon it self and so not fully understanding the sense of it would neither too hastily condemn or acquit but after he had said what he thought fit upon it concludes If the Preacher went beyond this what Author or Authors he had for it I know not they do not at present occur to me our Author begins to exult saying It 's such a Consequence as the Apologizer himself knows not how to justifie nor need not as a Consequence for that 's his own and yet he has not goodness enough to acquit us from so foul a Calumny The matter it seems is foul and is prov'd upon them let him now she his goodness in confessing the Charge or more of his strength to prove it a Calumny Eighth Character of a Pulpit-Papist He is professedly edified in ignorance by his Church Praying and Prophesying in an Vnknown Tongue They make no other use or account of Confession than what profest Drunkards do of Vomiting The first shall be considered in another place Char. 14. As to the second The Apologist shew'd what is the sense of the word Prophesie in the 1 Cor. 14. which the Preacher there refer'd to viz. that the Apostle there understands by it the expounding the Articles of the Christian Faith and of the Scriptures that contain it But here our Author grievously mistakes him when he adds and to be the same as Preaching For that he affirmed not as well knowing that the Apostle is to be otherwise understood than of Vulgar Preaching 1. Because the Apostle there distinguishes it from Doctrine v. 6. 2. Because of the way it was exercised in when one spoke after another agreeably to the custom of the Jewish Doctors in their Synagogues of whom Philo saith that one read the Bible and another of the more skilful 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 passing through places not understood expâ—undâ—d them 3. Because it was an extraordinary gift by Revelation v. 29 30 31 32. and reckoned as such amongst them c. 12.10 13.2.9 2. The Apologist shew'd farther it was not reasonable to fix this sence upon the Preacher because he must needs know it to be otherwise To this our Author briskly returns Marry if they never Preached contrary to what they knew this would be a good Rule And he has found it by woful experience to be a hard task to discover it though it has been plainly made out that some write contrary to what they know 3. He shew'd farther that the Preacher was speaking about Worship and so consequently it must be what is so accounted and therefore that this must be rather the Reading of Lessons out of Scripture and Hymns which are sometimes call'd Prophesie 1 Chron. 25.1 and which are in their Church-Service in an Vnknown Tongue This our Author passes by as also the Challenge following it But yet he will have it a Calumny whilst he asserts a thing of the Papists which in the common acceptation of the word is absolutely false But what if it was the common acceptation of the word if not the acceptation the Apostle takes it in in that place which the Preacher
c. some according to the Institution of St. Benedict others of St. Francis c. And what follows therefore they are not Fanaticks therefore they are not Superstitious and Enthusiasts that is they are not Fanaticks because they are not Surely no Fanatick could have fallen into this account without the assistance of such a Representer 2. He adds Religious men in Convents are Fanaticks forsooth because they are acted by some suppos'd Revelations Visions Raptures c. What Controversial Stuff is this Why at this rate he might make Fanaticks of all the Patriarchs and Prophets of St. Joseph St. Peter and St. Paul and the rest of the Apostles and most of all St. John whose whole Book of Revelation is nothing now it seems but so much Fanaticism Surely our Author is here driven to some Extremity when he has no other Refuge but by making the Case in dispute betwixt us parallel with the Case of the Prophets and Apostles and that when the Apologist calls those of the Romish Church Supposed Revelations Visions and Raptures it 's as Criminal as if he had said as much of the Divine Writers At this rate saith he he might make Fanaticks of all the Patriarchs Prophets and Apostles At what rate What because he saith those pretended to in the Church of Rome are supposed will it follow therefore that those of the Prophets and Apostles are supposed too No surely no more than it will follow because the Revelations of the Prophets and Apostles are Divine therefore those alledged in the Church of Rome are Divine also Our Author saith of the Apologists account of Fanaticism What Controversial stuff is this But I may with good reason return it What impious stuff is this that will make the Inspirations of Magdalen of Pazzi and the Revelations of St. Bridget and Catharine of Siena how fond and contradictory soever to stand upon the same foundation with the Revelations of St. John And those which some of their own Authors call Humane Dreams Fantastick Visions and others call Impostures to be as much from God as the Visions of Ezekiel and the Dream of Joseph c. 4. That the Church of Rome disposes her Fanaticks into Convents for advantage is another Charge produced against them by the Preacher and insisted upon by the Apologist but that our Author for reasons best known to himself left as he found it Sixth Character of a Pulpit-Papist In the Roman Church the Sacrament must now be no longer a Representative but a Real Propitiatory Sacrifice And Christ's Natural Body must be brought down upon a Thousand Altars at once and there Really broken and his Blood actually spilt a Thousand times every day Here the Apologist charges our Author with altering the sense of the Preacher when he makes the Preacher to declare that was a positive Assertion of the Papists which was an Argument and Consequence of the Preacher's from their Assertion and that for this purpose he had left out the words Now and must be that were the Indications of it All that our Author has to reply to this Charge is that it 's a Nice point the Vindicator is reduced to to bring off the Preacher But it 's not so Nice as 't is evident that our Author's account of it is a Foul Misrepresentation If the Preacher had charged it as a Doctrine own'd by the Papists then so far as they disown it it had been a Misrepresentation but as it 's an Argument against them as it 's plain it was then it 's no more a Misrepresentation than it 's false and that belongs not to Representation but Dispute And therefore so far as an Argument of the Preacher against the Papists differs from a Concession and Assertion of the Papists so far has our Author misrepresented the Preacher when he saith That the Protestants awkard Reasoning is set out for their Doctrine Well at length however it shall be own'd for Reasoning and Inference and though it 's not his Province he saith to examine the truth of such Reasoning yet he fancies that 't is easily reconcilable with Reason and Scripture and so intelligible that the Sacrifice of the Altar is Representative of that upon the Cross That is if he will speak to the purpose That though the Sacrament be a Real and Propitiatory Sacrifice yet it 's still Representative But how will he prove it His Argument is this Christ really present in the Sacrament may be offer'd to God upon the Altar by the Hands of the Priest in Remembrance of the same Christ offering himself a Victim upon the Cross for the Redemption of man and consequently the Sacrifice of the Altar is Representative of that upon the Cross. Where I would only ask him what is the difference betwixt Christ's being really present in the Sacrament when offer'd and the Sacrifice of the Altar What again is the difference 'twixt the being offer'd in Remembrance of Christ's offering himself upon the Cross and the Representative of that upon the Cross and consequently whether he has not proved what he intended after this manner that the Sacrifice of the Altar is Representative of that upon the Cross because it 's Representative Methinks he might have shewn some little respect when he is on the Arguing part to what the Apologist had offer'd against this But however though his Argument may signifie little yet he hopes Mr. Thorndike's may be of some Authority who he saith never scrupled the least at this expresly owning the Elements changed into the Body and Blood of Christ to be truly the Sacrifice of Christ upon the Cross and to be both Propitiatory and Impetratory and yet never deni'd it to be perform'd in Remembrance of Christ crucified But here our Author has grosly injur'd Mr. Thorndike For 1. Mr. Thorndike owns no such thing as I can find that the Elements are changed into the Body and Blood of Christ. But he speaks things plainly inconsistent with it as he saith N. 1. The Sacrament containing Mystically Spiritually and Sacramentally that is as in and by a Sacrament tendreth and exhibiteth not the Body of Christ much less turn'd into it Nay further he saith The Eucharist is Nothing else but the Representation here upon Earth of what is done in Heaven N. 4. 2. Neither doth he say the Elements are truly the Sacrifice of Christ upon the Cross but the Eucharist and the Eucharist as Representing For thus he saith N. 10. Not the Elements but the breaking pouring forth distributing dealing are all parts of the Sacrifice as the whole action is that Sacrifice by which the Covenant of Grace is confirmed N. 10. And further the Eucharist that is as thus administred is the same Sacrifice of Christ upon the Cross. How As that which representeth is truly said to be the thing which it representeth That is so far as the Representer of the thing may be said to be the thing Represented so far is the Eucharist the same Sacrifice 3. When he
Doctrine of the Church which teaches that Absolution with Attrition is equivalent to Confession Of this see Char. 14. n. 2. 8. The bare saying of Prayers without either minding what he says or understanding it is sufficient to the Divine acceptance 9. So he is to appear before God dumb and senseless like one of his Idols Our Author observes here that it seems by the Apologizer this saying of the Preacher is not charged upon us as a profess'd Doctrine of ours but only as a consequence of his own Head and from whence does he draw it From this suppos'd principle viz. the Romish Church enjoyns the saying Prayers in a Language unknown to the Generality of the people The Chain as here represented is wholly a Fiction For after the Apologist had charged him with a partial Relation of the Preacher's sense he thus concludes So that what the Adviser quotes is not a consequence infer'd from a principle as he saith but a particular of the foregoing General the Preacher telling his Auditors that meer Works done in Acts of Devotion in the Church of Rome is in the opinion of that Church sufficient to Divine Acceptance This he fortifies with an Instance as it is in bare saying of Prayers without either minding what they say or understanding it And he goes on And agreeably hereunto the Romish Church enjoyns the saying them in a Language not understood c. So far is it either from our Author's consequence or a principle from whence it 's infer'd But here our Author slips away from the Argument of the Apologist which brought him to the exigence of owning himself a Falsifier as to his charge against the Preacher or a Deserter and Condemner of his own Church But why doth he now call the enjoyning of a Prayer in a Language unknown to the People a supposed Principle Is it not enjoyned There he is silent But what if the Priests do not understand So it has been so Nic. Clemangis saith We see Priests almost universally have much ado to read without understanding the Sense or the Words so Billet c. And what if the Priests do understand it Is it therefore understood by the People But why doth he instance in Missals translated for Vulgar use That sure he should be cautious in for it 's an attempt stands reprobated by a great Authority as the Seed-plot of Disobedience Sedition Schism c. Now which is in the right Pope Alexander the 7 th who thus condemn'd and forbad it or our Author who saith The People have the same in English and what will become both of Priests that allow it and People that use it when the Anathema of the Council of Trent is also against it as Salmeron and others declare I shall leave as I find it From thence our Author runs to the Mass which he saith being a Sacrifice rather than a Prayer the Attention and Devotion of the People doth not so much consist in the Words said by the Priest as in what is done by him But is there in the Mass nothing but the Oblation nothing but Action Are there no Prayers That he dares not say he only softens it 's not so much it 's rather And what does this signify to these parts of the Service which are not of that kind Where then is the Devotion and Attention when there is no Understanding Where the Acceptance when there is neither Attention or Devotion Let him consider what the Apologist said p. 37 39. and then he will find his Appeal to their Practice to be of no Service to him When all is said he has lost the Argument about the Acceptance of Prayer not understood and which the Apologist offer'd him Authorities for But here he supposes he has him at Advantage and tho he lets go Tolet and Salmeron yet he charges him home with somewhat worse than Ignorance for making the Representer an Abetter of such unreasonable Doctrine that to say Prayers well and devoutly 't is not necessary to have Attention not on the Words or Sense when he has left out the following Words But rather purely on God. It 's an Omission I confess a fault frequent with himself I heartily wish our Author as clear of Abetting what he calls the unreasonable Doctrine as the Apologist is of Contrivance who may therefore justly return his own words in a charge somewhat worse I can assure him 't was not design but mistake only In justice to him let us put it in yet I don't see the case at all amended Attention purely on God being a distinct thing from Attention on the Prayers And if he says his Prayers without attending to the Words or Sense whether he thinks purely on God or thinks on any thing else yet he is no more at these his Prayers with his mind than if he were not at Prayers For what are Prayers in publick but the Words and Sense And what makes them our Prayers but Attention to the Words and Sense So that Prayers without Attention are much at one with Prayers without Understanding And those are Prayers without Attention where the Words and Sense of the Prayers are not attended to Well this saith our Author is unreasonable Doctrine That to say say Prayers well and devoutly 't is not necessary to have Attention on the Words and Sense And I hope 't is unreasonable Doctrine then that to say Prayers well and devoutly 't is not necessary to understand either Words and Sense And yet this is approv'd Doctrine in their Church for saith Salmeron Prayers are like the Words of a Charmer they prevail even when they are not understood I hope again 't is unreasonable Doctrine that in Prayer 't is not necessary to attend to the Sense nor so much as to consider he is present before God And yet no less than Cardinal Tolet so determines By this time I hope both Preacher and Vindicator are set right in our Author 's good Opinion as to this matter Proceed we Here I expected a round Charge against Assertion 20 th that they avowedly allow what God positively forbids It 's blunt and home and what the Apologist makes good but this is a dry Doctrine and so he substitutes a new one in the place Fourteenth Character of a Pulpit-Papist Under this are reduced seven Particulars 1. To cover his Idolatry he commits Sacrilege steals away one of the Ten Commandments and by their Index Expurgatorius blots the two Tables themselves This is a new Charge brought to the Account but I shall give it some Consideration This Charge he saith is not sincere 1. Because they have the Ten Commandments in their Bibles and Catechism 2. If they are set short in some little Abstracts of Christian Doctrine it 's in Compliance to the Weakness of some Memories and Capacities setting down only the Words of the Precept without the Addition of Threats Promises or Explications In the first of these he would