CHAP. II.

What is Idolatry according to the Determination of clear and free Reason.

1. WE will now try how obnoxious the Romanists are out of the plain Definitions and Determinations of free and clear Reason. In which Method let us set down for

The first Conclusion, That Idolatry is a kinde of Injustice against God. That this is true, may appear from that Definition of Religion in Tully, who defines it Justitiam adversùs Deum. Which is not the sense of Tully onely, but the very voice of Reason and Nature. And therefore Idolatry being one kinde of Irreligion or Impiety, it must needs include <14> in it a kind of Injustice against God.

2. The second Conclusion; That Idolatry is a very sore and grievous Disease of the Soul, vilely debasing her and sinking her into Sensuality and Materiality, keeping her at a distance from the true sense and right knowledge of God, and leaving her more liable to bodily Lusts: That the natural tendency of Idolatry is this, and yet the Souls of men, in this Lapsed state, are naturally prone to so mischievous a Disease, as both History and daily Experience do abundantly witnesse. See the Mischiefs of Idolatry in my Mystery of Iniquity, Part 1. Lib. 1. Ch. 16.

Nor can it infringe the truth of this Conclusion, that a man, retaining still the true Notion of God according to his Divine Attributes, may, according to a sense of his own, bow down toward a corporeall Object of worship. For he must retain it by force against such a Practice as would and does naturally debauch the users of it. And besides, if he had really the <15> Life of God in him as well as the Notion of him, he would feel such Actions grate against his heart, and perceive how they would invade and attempt the abating and extinguishing the more true and pure sense of God and of his Worship, and seduce the Soul to externall Vanity.

But suppose a man or two could keep their minds from sinking down from a right Notion of the Deity; yet they are as guilty of Idolatry, if they give religious Worship to corporeall Objects, as he is of Adultery and Fornication that yet uses them so cautiously as neither to impair his bodily Health, nor besott his natural Parts thereby. And therefore, though there may be some few such, yet the Laws against Fornication and Adultery ought notwithstanding to be very sacred to every one, even to those discreeter Transgressours of them, and ever to be obeyed by them, because the Observation of them is of such infinite importance to the Publick.

And what we have said of the Worship of God is analogically true of honouring of the Saints, who are best honoured by the remembrance and imitation of their Vertues, not by scraping Legs to or clinging about their Images, which are no more like them then an Apple is to an Oister.

3. The third Conclusion; That those high expressions of the Jealousie of God and his severe Displeasure against Idolatry are very becoming the nature of the thing, and his Paternal care of the Souls of men. This appears from the foregoing Conclusions. For both the Prerogatives and Rights of the Divine Majesty himself are concerned, and also the Perfection, Nobilitation and Salvation of the Souls of men. This we discover by Reason, and our Reason is again more strongly ratify'd by Divine Suffrage.

The fourth; That Idolatry, though it be so hainous a Sin, yet where it is committed most in good earnest does necessarily involve in it Ignorance or <17> Mistake, in the Act of Worship or in the Object; they either taking the Object to be God when it is not, or to have some Attribute of God when it has not, or to enjoy some Prerogative of God which yet it does not, or else the Worship not to be Divine when it is; or, lastly, they mistake in the Application of the Worship, thinking they do not apply Divine Worship to an Object when they do.

The fifth; That to be mistaken in the Object of Worship, or in the Kind of Worship, or in the Application, cannot excuse any-thing from being downright Idolatry; forasmuch as none are in good earnest Idolaters without some of these Mistakes.

The sixth; That the peculiar Honour or Worship which is given to God is given to him not so much as his Honour and Worship, as his Due and Right: insomuch that he that does not give it to God, or communicates it to another, does an injury to the Divine Majesty. This is plain, <18> and consonant to what was said on the first Conclusion, That Religion is a kinde of Justice towards God. And indeed if Divine Honour was not given to God as his Due and Right, it were no Honour at all, but rather a Benevolence.

4. The seventh; The Right of that peculiar Honour or Worship we doe to God is grounded either in the nature of his incommunicable Excellencies, or in his Excellencies so far as we know incommunicated to any Creature, or, lastly, in Divine Declaration or Prescription of the ways or Modes of thus or thus worshipping him, which himself has some-time set down.

The eighth; That any Actions, Gestures or Words directed to any Creature as to an Object, which naturally imply or signifie either the incommunicable or incommunicated Eminencies of God, is the giving that Worship that is the Right and Due of God alone to that Creature, and that Injury against the Divine <19> Majesty which is termed Idolatry. The evidence of this Conclusion may appear from hence, because there is no other way of Application of external Worship then by directing such significant Actions, Gestures, or Words, toward such a Being as to an Object.

The ninth; That the using any of those Actions or Gestures, or doing any of those things that the true and supreme God did chuse and challenge in the setting out the Mode of his own Worship, towards or in reference to any Creature as to an Object, this also is that Injury against God which we term Idolatry.

The Reason is this, Because such a mode of Worship does thus manifestly appear to be the peculiar Right of God, which none can transferr to another but God himself. Wherefore this Right having not been communicated by him to any other, when-ever such a kind of Worship is used, it must be used to him, and to none else.

Nor can his dereliction of any such Mode of being worshipped warrant the use of it to any Creature afterwards, because no Creature can be God in those circumstances as he thought fit to institute such a Worship for himself in: For no Creature can be God at all, and therefore never capable of any of those Modes of Divine Worship which God ever at any time instituted for himself. Besides, if this dereliction and disuse of any Mode of Worship might make it competible to a Creature, then might we sacrifice Beeves and Sheep (besides other Services of the Temple) to any Saint or Dæmon.

5. The tenth; An omnipercipient Omnipresence, which does hear and see what-ever is said or transacted in the World, whether considered in the whole, or as distributed into terrestriall, celestiall, and supercelestiall, not onely all these Omnipercipiencies but any one of them is a certain Excellency in God, and, for ought we know, incommunicated to any Creature.

The eleventh; That this Omnipresence or Omnipercipience terrestriall is one main ground of that religious Worship due to God which we call Invocation. This is plain, that upon this very ground that God hears and sees (though himself be invisible) what-ever is said or done upon earth, he has the honour of being invoked any-where or every-where, and of having Temples built to him; because he that is omnipresent cannot be absent from his Temple, but is alway there to be invoked.

The twelfth; That if Omnipresence or Omnipercipience, at least terrestriall, (if not celestiall,) be not communicated to Saints and Angels by God, the Invocation of either is palpable Idolatry. This is manifest from the eighth Conclusion. For Invocation implies an incommunicated Excellency in the Saints or Angels, and so communicates that Right to them that appertains onely to God, and is that Injury against God that is called Idolatry.

So that it is a vain Evasion that pretends that we honour God the more in making him so good to the Saints and Angels, as to bestow this Excellency on them; whenas yet his Wisedome has not thought fit so to doe. For we are so far from honoring him hereby, that we injure him in giving his Right to another; and we dishonour him in presuming he had done wiselier or better in doing what he has not done. Whenas indeed, if he were so lavish in imparting his proper Excellencies to Creatures as some would make us believe he is, to palliate their own Idolatries, it were the next way to make men forget all Applications to God, and to cast him out of their memory, and take up with the more particular Patronages of Saints and Angels.

6. The thirteenth; That our thinking such a Saint or Angel can hear us where-ever we invoke him, is no excuse for our Invocation of him, nor saves us from Idolatry, since all Idolatry committed in good <23> earnest implies some Mistake, as has been noted in the fourth Conclusion.

The fourteenth; That all the Modes or ways of the Communication of this Omnipercipiency to Saints or Angels are either very incredible, if not impossible, or extremely ridiculous as to any excuse for their Invocation. For the usual Residence of Saints and Angels being in sede Beatorum, as the Roman Church holds, and that place on the Cœlum Empyreum above all the Stars, That the Angels and Saints should upon the account of the Exaltednesse of their natures see and hear from thence what is done or said from one side of the Earth to the other, is extremely incredible, if not impossible; yea, sufficiently incredible, or rather impossible, though they had their abode on this side of the Moon.

And that they should see all things and transactions, hear all Prayers and Orations, in Speculo Divinitatis, is alike incredible; a thing which the <24> Humanity of Christ himself, though hypostatically united to the Divinity, did not pretend to. But that God should either in this Speculum or any otherwise advertise them that such a one prays to them that they would pray to him for that party, is it not at first sight above all measure ridiculous?

And alike ridiculous it is to pray to Saint or Angel, as if they were present and heard our Prayers, when indeed they are absent, and cannot tell that we did pray, unlesse by some Intelligencers. This Devotion is an improper and unnatural act, and shews that we doe that to an invisible Creature which is onely proper to be done to the invisible God; and that therefore it is Idolatry, as giving that right of Worship to others which is onely congruous to him.

7. The fifteenth; That though there were communicated by God to Saints and Angels at least a terrestriall Omnipercipiency, yet if he have not communicated the know <25> ledge thereof to us, as most certainly he has not, the Invocation of them is notwithstanding a very presumptuous invasion of the indubitable Rights of God, and the intrenching upon his Prerogatives, and therefore as to the internall Act no lesse then the Sin of Idolatry.

The Reasons of this Conclusion are, First, That God concealing from us the knowledge of the communication of this Excellency, does naturally thereby intimate that he would not have them invoked, but reserves the Honour of our Invocation of an invisible Power unto himself onely.

Secondly, That whatsoever is not of saith is sin: and therefore the ground of Invocation of Saints or Angels being at least dubitable, their Invocation is sin; and it being about the Rights of God in his Worship, what can it be better esteemed then Idolatry?

Thirdly, This Principle of feigning or groundlesly coneeiting, without any Revelation from God, that <26> any Creatures are capable of such Honours as are God's indubitable Right and Prerogative, is the Forge and Shop, the Palliation and Pretense, for infinite sorts and odly-excogitated varieties of Idolatrous Objects: and therefore so presumptuous and so abominable a Principle, which is the Mother and Nurse of such infinite ways of Idolatry and Injustice against God, even according to humane Reason ought to be declared against as Idolatrous; and, consequently, all the practices thereupon are also to be declared Idolatry, because they spring from a Principle taken up which is such a fundamental piece of Idolatry and Injustice against God, and exposes him to all manner of Idolatrous Injuries.

Fourthly, To dare to doe an act we know not whether it may be Idolatry or no, and this needlesly, our Conscience not at all compelling us thereto, this is to dare to commit Idolatry; and the daring to commit Idolatry, and so to doe defiance to the <27> Majesty of God, what is it less then to be an Idolater? For according to his inward man and the main Morality of the action he is so: As he is morally a Murtherer that, doubting or not knowing but that it is his own Friend, by luck killed his intended Enemy: For the sense is, that rather then not be revenged of his Enemy, he will not stick to kill his dearest Friend.

And finally, This Idolatry is the more discernible and aggravable in the Invocation of Saints or Angels, their Omnipercipiency being so extremely incredible, if not impossible or ridiculous, upon any ground, as appears by the foregoing Conclusion.

8. The sixteenth; That the erecting of a symbolicall Presence with Incurvations thitherward, the consecrating of Temples and Altars, the making of Oblations, the burning of Incense, and the like, were declared by the supreme God, the God of Israel, the manner of Worship due to <28> him, and therefore, without his Concession, this Mode of Worship is not to be given to any else; as appears by Conclusion the ninth.

The seventeenth; That the Pagans worshipping their Dæmons, though not as the supreme God, by symbolicall Presences, Temples, Altars, Sacrifices, and the like, become ipso facto Idolaters. This is manifest from the ninth, the fifteenth, and the foregoing Conclusion.

The eighteenth; Though it were admitted that there is communicated to Saints and Angels at least a terrestriall Omnipercipiency, and that we had the knowledge of this Communication, and so might speak to them in a civil way, though unseen; yet to invoke them in such Circumstances as at an Altar and in a Temple dedicated to them, or at their symbolicall presence, this were palpable Idolatry. The truth is manifest agian from the ninth and sixteenth Conclusions.

9. The nineteenth; Incurvati <29> on in way of Religion towards any open or bare symbolicall Presence, be it what-ever Figure or Image, as to an Object, is flat Idolatry: in the Worship of Saints, Angels and Dæmons, double Idolatry; in the Worship of the true God, single. The reason hereof is resolved partly into the ninth and sixteenth Conclusions, and partly into the nature of Application of Worship. For externall Worship is not any otherwise to be conceived to be apply'd to a symbolicall Presence, but by being directed towards it as towards an Object. Wherefore if religious Incurvation be directed towards any Figure or Image as to an Object, this Figure or Image necessarily receives this religious Incurvation, and partakes with God (if the Image be to him,) in it; which is manifest Idolatry. For the direction of our Intention here is but a Jesuiticall Juggle. And therefore I will set down for Conclusion

The twentieth, That religious Incurvation toward a bare symbolicall <30> Presence, wittingly and conscienciously directed thither, though with a mental reserve, that they intend to use it merely as a Circumstance of Worship, is notwithstanding real Idolatry.

The Reason is, because an externall Action toward such a thing as is look'd upon as receptive of such an Action, (and has frequently received it,) if it be thus or thus directed, will naturally conciliate the notions or respects of Action and Object betwixt these two, whether we intend it or no. And it is as ridiculous to pretend that their motions or actions toward or about such a symbolicall Presence are not directed to it or conversant about it as an Object, as it were for an Archer to contend that the Butt he shoots at is not the Scope or Object, but a Circumstance, of his Shooting; and he that embraces his Friend, that his Friend is not an Object, but a Circumstance, of his Embracing. Which are Conceits quite out of the rode of all Logick. See <31> the last Conclusion of the foregoing Chapter.

10. The twenty-first; That the Adoration of any Object which we, out of mistake, conceive to be the true God made visible by hypostatical union therewith, is manifest Idolatry. The Reason is, because Mistake does not excuse from Idolatry, by Conclusion the fourth and the fifth. And in this Supposition we misse of one part of the Object, and the onely part that single is capable of Divine Honour. For God to be disunited from this adored Object is in this case all one as to be absent: For God is not considered nor intended in this act of Adoration but as united with this visible Object. Which respect of Union if it fail, that consideration or Intention also fails, and the Worship falls upon a mere Creature.

In brief, If out of mistake I salute some lively Statue or dead body for such or such a living man, though this Man or his Soul were present, and saw and heard the Salutation, yet I <32> play the fool, and make my self ridiculous, and am conceived not to have saluted him I would: So if I doe Adoration to any Object, suppose the Sun or some Magicall Statue, for the true Deity visible, whenas neither of them are so, I play the Idolater, and make my self impious, and have missed of the due Object of my Adoration.

11. The twenty-second; That the Adoration of the Host upon the presumption that it is transubstantiated into the living Body of Christ is rank Idolatry. This appears from the precedent Conclusion. To which you may adde, that the Romanists, making Transubstantiation the true ground of their Adoration of the Host, do themselves imply, that without it were so their Adoration thereof would be Idolatry. But that it is not so, and that their Ground is false, any body may be as well assured of as he can of any thing in the world: and no lesse assured that they are Idolaters according to their own Sup <33> position and Implication, as Costerus indeed does most emphatically and expresly acknowledge it, if they be mistaken in their Doctrine of Transubstantiation; as we shall hear anon.

The twenty-third Conclusion; That Adoration given to the Host by Protestants or any else that hold not Transubstantiation is manifest Idolatry. The Reason is to be fetch'd from the nineteenth and twentieth Conclusions. For it is religious Veneration towards a bare corporeall Symbol of the Divine Presence, and, to make the Action more aggravable, towards a Symbol that has Imagery upon it, and that of the person that is pretended to be worshipped thereby. What can be Idolatry if this be not?

The twenty-fourth; That the Invocation of Saints and Angels, though attended with these considerations, that both that Excellency we suppose in them, and which makes them capable of that Honour, is deemed finite, and also (be it as great as it <34> will) wholly derived to them from God, yet it cannot for all this be excused from grosse Idolatry. This is clear from the seventh, eighth, tenth, and so on till the sixteenth Conclusion. For though this Excellency be supposed finite, yet if it be so great as that it is no-where to be found but in God, it is his Right onely to have such Honours as suppose it. And though it be deemed or conceived to be derived from God, yet if it be not, we give an uncommunicate Excellency to the Creature, and rob God of his Right and Honour. And, lastly, though this Excellency were communicated, but yet the Communication of it unreveal'd to us, it were a treasonable Presumption against the Majesty of God, thus of our own head to divulge such things as may violate the peculiar Rights of his Godhead, and (for ought we know) fill the world with infinite bold examples of the grossest Idolatry: and therefore all our practices upon this Principle must be Idolatrous, and <35> Treasonable against the Divine Majesty. Consider well the fifteenth Conclusion.

12. The last Conclusion; That this pretended Consideration, that where Christ is corporeally present, Divine Worship is not done to his Humanity, but to his Divinity, and that therefore, though the Bread should not prove transubstantiated, the Divine Worship will still be done to the same Object as before, viz. to the Divinity, which is every-where, and therefore in the Bread; this will not excuse the Adoration of the Host from palpable Idolatry.

For first, That part of the Pretense that supposes Divine Worship in no sense due or to be done to Christ's Humanity is false. For it is no greater presumption to say, that in some sense Divine Worship is communicable to the Humanity of Christ, then, that the Divinity is communicated thereto. In such sense then as the Divinity is communicated to the Humanity, which are one by hypo <36> staticall Union, may Divine Worship also be communicated to it; namely, as an acknowledgement that the Divinity with all its adorable Attributes is hypostatically, vitally and transplendently residing in this Humanity of Christ. Which is a kinde of Divine Worship of Christ's Humanity, and peculiar to him alone, and due to him, I mean, to his Humanity, though it be not God essentially, but onely hypostatically united with him that is; and does as naturally partake of Religious or Divine Worship in our Addresses to the Divinity, as the body of an eminently-vertuous, holy and wise man does of that great Reverence and civil Honour done to him for those Excellencies that are more immediately lodged in his Soul.

Which Honour indistinctly passes upon the whole man: And as the very bodily Presence of this vertuous person receives the civil Honour, so in an easie Analogy doth the Humanity of Christ receive the Divine; but both as partial Objects of what <37> they do receive, and with signification of the state of the whole case, viz. that they are united, the one with the Divinity, the other with so vertuous a Soul. Hence they both become due Objects of that entire externall Worship done towards them, to the one civil, to the other Divine.

And therefore, in the second place, it is plain, that there is not one and the same due Object capable of Religious Worship in either Supposition, as well in that which supposes the Bread transubstantiated, as in that which supposes it not transubstantiated. For in the former it is the true and living corporeall Presence of Christ, whose whole Suppositum is, as has been declared, capable of Divine Honour; but in the latter there is onely, at the most, but his symbolicall Presence, whose Adoration is Idolatry, by the nineteenth, twentieth and twenty-first Conclusions.

And lastly, The pretending that though the Bread be not transubstantiated, yet the Divinity of Christ is <38> there, and so we do not misse of the due Object of our Worship; this is so laxe an Excuse, that it will plead for the warrantableness of the Laplanders worshipping their Red cloth, or the Americans the Devil, let them but pretend they worship God in them. For God is also in that Red cloth and in the Devil in that Notion that he is said to be every-where. Nay, there is not any Object in which the ancient Pagans were mistaken, in taking the Divine Attributes to be lodged there, whether Sun, Heaven, or any other Creature, but by this Sophistry the worshipping thereof may be excused from Idolatry. For the Divine Attributes, as God himself, are every-where.

To direct our Adoration toward a supernatural and unimitable Transplendency of the Divine Presence, or to any visible corporeall nature that is hypostatically united with the Divinity, most assuredly is not that sunk and sottish, that dull and dotardly sin of Idolatry. For, as touching this <39> latter, to what-ever the Divinity is hypostatically united, or (to avoid all cavill about terms) so specially and mysteriously communicated as it is to Christ, the Right of Divine Worship is proportionably communicated therewith, as I have already intimated. And as for the former, That through which the Divine Transplendency appears is no more the Object of our Adoration, then the diaphanous Air is through which the visible Humanity of Christ appears when he is worshipped.

But the Eucharistick Bread being neither hypostatically united with the Divinity, nor being the Medium through which any such supernatural Transplendency of the Divine Presence appears to us, Adoration directed toward it cannot fail of being palpable Idolatry. For the Eucharistick Bread will receive this Adoration as the Object thereof, by Conclusion the nineteenth and twentieth. But the Adoration or any Divine Worship of an Object in which <40> the Divine Attributes do not personally reside, (in such a sense as is intimated in those words of S. John,^[11] And the Word was made flesh,) but onely locally, as I may so speak, this, according to sound reason and the sense of the Christian Church, must be downright Idolatry.

CHAP. III.

That the Romanists worship the Host with the highest kinde of Worship, even that of Latria, according to the Injunction of the Council of Trent; and that it is most grosse Idolatry so to doe.

1. AND having thus clearly and distinctly evinced and declared what is or ought to be held Idolatry amongst Christians; let us at length take more full notice of some Particulars wherein, according to these Determinations, the Church of Rome will be manifestly found guilty of <41> Idolatry, and that according to the very Definitions of their own Council of Trent. As first, in the Point of the Adoration of the Host, touching which the very words of the Council are,^[12] Latriæ cultum, qui vero Deo debetur, huic sanctissimo Sacramento in veneratione esse adhibendum: and again, Siquis dixerit, in sancto Eucharistiæ Sacramento Christum non esse cultu Latriae etiam externo adorandum, & solenniter circumgestandum populóque proponendum publicè ut adoretur, Anathema sit.

2. This confident Injunction of grosse Idolatry, as it is certainly such, is built upon their confidence of the truth of their Doctrine of Transubstantiation. For the Chapter of the Adoration of the Host succeeds that of Transubstantiation, as a natural, or rather necessary, Inference therefrom. Nullus itaque dubitandi locus relinquitur, &c. That is to say, The Doctrine of Transubstantiation being established, there is no Scruple left touching the Adoration of the <42> Host, or giving Divine Worship to the Sacrament (or Christ, as it is there called,) when it is carried about, and exposed publickly in Prócessions to the view of the people.

But the Doctrine of Transubstantiation being false, it must needs follow, that the giving of Divine Worship to the Host is as grosse a piece of Idolatry as ever was committed by any of the Heathens. For then their Divine Worship, even their Cultus Latriæ, which is onely due to the onely-true God, is exhibited to a mere Creature, and that a very sorry one too; and therefore must be gross Idolatry, by the twenty-first and twenty-second Conclusions of the second Chapter.

3. But now, that their Doctrine of Transubstantiation is false, after we have proposed it in the very words of the Council, we shall evince by undeniable Demonstration.^[13] Per consecrationem Panis & Vini conversionem fieri totius substantiæ Panis in substantiam Corporis Christi, & totius sub <43> stantiæ Vini in substantiam Sanguinis ejus; quæ conversio convenienter & propriè à Sancta Catholica Ecclesia Transubstantiatio est appellata. And a little before, cap. 3.^[14] Si quis negaverit in venerabili Sacramento Eucharistiæ sub unaquaque specie, & sub singulis cujusque speciei partibus, separatione factâ, totum Christum contineri, Anathema sit. In which passages it is plainly affirmed, that not onely the Bread is turned into the whole Body of Christ, and the Wine into his Bloud, but that each of them are turned into the whole Body of Christ, and every part of each, as often as division or separation is made, is also turned into his whole Body. Which is such a contradictious Figment, that there is nothing so repugnant to the Faculties of the humane Soul.

4. For thus the Body of Christ will be in God knows how many thousand places at once, and how many thousand miles distant one from another. Whenas Amphitruo rightly expostulates with his Servant Sosia, and <44> rates him for a Mad-man or Impostour, that he would go about to make him believe that he was at home, though but a little way off, while yet he was with him at that distance from home. Quo id (malúm!) pacto potest fieri nunc utî tu hîc sis, & domi? And a little before, in the same Colloquie with his Servant, Nemo unquam homo vidit, saith he, nec potest fieri, tempore uno homo idem duobus locis ut simul sit. Wherein Amphitruo speaks but according to the common sense and apprehension of all men, even of the meanest Idiots.

5. But now let us examine it according to the Principles of the learned, and of all their Arts and Sciences, Physicks, Metaphysicks, Mathematicks and Logick. It is a Principle in Physicks, That that internall space that a Body occupies at one time is equal to the Body that occupies it. Now let us suppose one and the same body occupy two such internall places or spaces at once; This Body is therefore equal to those two spaces, which are <45> double to one single space; wherefore the body is double to that body in one single space, and therefore one and the same body double to it self. Which is an enormous Contradiction.

Again, in Metaphysicks; The Body of Christ is acknowledged one, and that as much as any one body else in the world. Now the Metaphysicall Notion of one is, to be indivisum à se, (both quo ad partes and quo ad totum,) as well as divisum à quolibet alio. But the Body of Christ being both in Heaven, and, without any continuance of that body, here upon Earth also, the whole body is divided from the whole body, and therefore is entirely both unum and multa: which is a perfect Contradiction.

6. Thirdly, in Mathematicks; The Council saying that in the separation of the parts of the Species, (that which bears the outward show of Bread or Wine,) that from this Division there is a parting of the whole, divided into so many entire Bodies <46> of Christ, the Body of Christ being always at the same time equal to it self, it follows, that a part of the Division is equal to the whole, against that common Notion in Euclide, That the Whole is bigger then the Part.

And, lastly, in Logick it is a Maxime, That the Parts agree indeed with the Whole, but disagree one with another. But in the abovesaid Division of the Host or Sacrament the Parts do so well agree, that they are entirely the very same individuall thing. And whereas any Division, whether Logicall or Physicall, is the Division of some one into many; this is but the Division of one into one and itself, like him that for brevity sake divided his Text into one Part.

To all which you may adde, that, unlesse we will admit of two Sosia's and two Amphitruo's in that sense that the mirth is made with it in Plautus his Comedy, neither the Bread nor the Wine can be transubstantiated into the intire Body of Christ. For this <47> implies that the same thing is, and is not, at the same time. For that individual thing that can be, and is to be made of any thing, is not. Now the individual Body of Christ is to be made of the Wafer consecrated, for it is turned into his individual Body. But his individual Body was before this Consecration. Wherefore it was, and it was not, at the same time. Which is against that fundamental Principle in Logick and Metaphysicks, That both parts of a Contradiction cannot be true; or, That the same thing cannot both be, and not be, at once.

Thus fully and intirely contradictious and repugnant to all Sense and Reason, to all indubitable Principles of all Art and Science, is this Figment of Transubstantiation; and therefore most certainly false. Reade the ten first Conclusions of the brief Discourse of the true Grounds of Faith, added to the Divine Dialogues.

7. And from Scripture it has not the least support. All is, Hoc est cor <48> pus meum, when Christ held the Bread in his hand, and after put part into his^[15] own mouth, (as well as distributed it to his Disciples:) in doing whereof he swallow'd his whole Body down his throat at once, according to the Doctrine of this Council, or at least might have done so, if he would. And so all the Body of Christ, Flesh, Bones, Mouth, Teeth, Hair, Head, Heels, Thighs, Arms, Shoulders, Belly, Back, and all, went through his Mouth into his Stomach; and thus all were in his Stomach, though all his Body intirely, his Stomach excepted, was still without it. Which let any one judge whether it be more likely, then that this saying of Christ, This is my Body, is to be understood figuratively; the using the Verb substantive in this sense being not unusual in Scripture; as in, I am the Vine;^[16] The seven lean Kine are the seven years of Famine; and the like: and more particularly, since our Saviour, speaking elsewhere of eating his flesh and drinking his bloud, says <49> plainly, that^[17] the words he spake, they were spirit, and they were truth, that is to say, a spiritual or ænigmaticall truth, not carnally and literally to be understood.

And for the trusting of the judgement of the Roman Church herein that makes it self so sacrosanct & infallible, the Pride, Worldliness, Policy & multifarious Impostures of that Church, so often and so shamelesly repeated and practised, must needs make their Authority seem nothing in a Point that is so much for their own Interest, especially set against the undeniable Principles of common Sense and Reason, and of all the Arts and Sciences God has illuminated the Mind of man withall. Consider the twelfth Conclusion of the abovenamed Treatise, together with the other ten before cited. Wherefore any one that is not a mere Bigott may be as assured that Transubstantiation is a mere Figment or enormous Falsehood, as of any thing else in the whole world.

8. From whence it will unavoidably follow, and themselves cannot deny it, that they are most grosse and palpable Idolaters, and consequently most barbarous Murtherers, in killing the innocent Servants of God for not submitting to the same Idolatries with themselves. Costerus the Jesuite speaks expresly to this Point, (and consonantly, I think, to the Suppositions of the Council;) viz. That if their Church be mistaken in the Doctrine of Transubstantiation, they ipso facto stand guilty of such a piece of Idolatry as never was before seen or known of in the world.

^[18]For the errours of those, saith he, were more tolerable who worship some golden or silver Statue, or some Image of any other Materials, for their God, as the Heathen worshipped their Gods; or a red Cloth hung upon the top of a Spear, as is reported of the Laplanders; or some live Animal, as of old the Ægyptians did; then of these that worship a bit of Bread, as hitherto the Christians have done all over the world <51> for so many hundred years, if the Doctrine of Transubstantiation be not true.

What can be a more full and expresse acknowledgement of the gross Idolatry of the Church of Rome then this, if Transubstantiation prove an Errour? Then which notwithstanding there is nothing in the world more certain to all the Faculties of a man; as is manifest out of what has been here said. And therefore the Romanists must be grosse Idolaters, from the second, third, fourth, seventh and ninth Conclusions of the first Chapter, and from the fourth, fifth, eighth, ninth, twenty-first, twenty-second and twenty-fifth of the second Chapter. All these Conclusions will give evidence against them, that they are very notorious Idolaters.

9. And therefore this being so high and so palpable a strain of Idolatry in them touching the Eucharist, or the eating the Body and drinking the Bloud of Christ, wherein Christ is offered by the Priest as an Oblation, and the People feed upon him as in a <52> Feast upon a Sacrifice, which is not done without Divine Adoration done to the Host, according to the precept of their Church; This does hugely confirm our sense of the eating of things offered unto Idols in the Epistles to the Churches in Pergamus and in Thyatira, this worshipping of the Host being so expresly acknowledged by the Pope and his Clergy, and in that high sense of Cultus Latriæ, which is due to God alone. And therefore it is very choicely and judiciously perstringed by the Spirit of Prophecy above any other Modes of their Idolatry, it being such a grosse and confessed Specimen thereof, and such as there is no Evasion for or Excuse. Hoc teneas vultus mutantem Protea {illeg}odo.

CHAP. IV.

The grosse Idolatry of the Romanists in the Invocation of the Saints, even according to the allowance of the Council of Trent, and the authorized practice of that Church.

1. BUT we will fall also upon those Modes of Idolatry wherein the Church of Rome may seem less bold; though indeed this one, that is so grosse, is so often and so universally repeated every-where in the Roman Church, that by this alone, though we should take notice of nothing farther, Idolatry may seem quite to have overspred her like a noisome Leprosy. But, how-ever, we shall proceed; and first to their Invocation of Saints. Touching which the Council of Trent declares this Doctrine expresly:^[19] Sanctos utique unà cum Christo regnantes Orationes suas pro hominibus offerre, bonúmque atque utile esse suppliciter eos invocare; <54> & ob beneficia impetranda à Deo per Filium ejus Jesum Christum, ad eorum orationes, operam auxiliúmque confugere. Where Invocation of Saints is plainly allow'd and recommended: and besides their praying for us, or offering up our Prayers to God, it is plainly imply'd that there are other Aids and Succours they can afford, if they be supplicated, that is, invoked with most humble and prostrate Devotion. And the pretending that this is all but the way of procuring those good things we want from God, the first Fountain, and that through his Son Christ; that makes the Saints the more exactly like the Pagans Dii medioxumi, and the Dæmons that negotiated the affairs of men with the highest Deity.

2. I say then that, though they went no farther then thus, even this is down-right Idolatry which the Council of Trent thus openly owns, (and consequently the whole Church of Rome,) as appears from the third, fourth, fifth, sixth and eighth Con <55> clusions of the first Chapter; as also by the fifth, seventh, eighth, tenth, eleventh, twelfth, thirteenth, fourteenth, fifteenth and twenty-fourth of the second. But if we examine those Prayers that are put up to the Saints, their Invocation is still the more unexcusable.

3. Wherefore looking to the publick Practice of the Church of Rome, authorized by the Popes themselves, the Invocation of a Saint does not consist in a mere Ora pro nobis, as people are too forward to phansy that the state of the Question, (though the mere invoking of them to pray for us would be Idolatry, as is already proved:) but, which is insinuated in the Council it self, there are other more particular Aids and Succours that they implore of them, and some such as it is proper for none but God or Christ to give: Such as Protection from the Devil, Divine Graces, and the Joys of Paradise. But as the things they ask of the Saints are too big for them to be the Disposers of; <56> so the Compellations, of the Virgin Mary especially, are above the nature of any Creature. Whence this Invocation of Saints will appear a most grosse and palpable Mode of Idolatry in that Church. As I shall make manifest out of the following Examples, taken out of such pieces of Devotion as are not mutter'd in the corners of their Closets, but are publickly read or sung with Stentorian Voices in their very Churches. I will onely give the Reader a tast of this kinde of their Idolatry; for it were infinite to produce all we might.

4. And first, to begin with the smaller Saints, (as indeed they are all to be reckoned in comparison of the blessed Virgin, to whom therefore they give that Worship which they call Hyperdulia, as they give Dulia to the rest of the Saints, and Latria to God alone, and to Christ as being God:) That Prayer to S. Cosmas and S. Damian is plainly a Petition to them to keep us from all Diseases, as well of <57> Soul as of Body, that we may attain to the life of the Spirit, and live in Grace here, and be made partakers of Heaven hereafter. O Medici piissimi, Qui Meritis clarissimi In Cœlis refulgetis, A peste, clade corporum Præservetis, & operum, Moribus nè langueamus: Nec moriamur spiritu, Sed Animæ ab obitu Velociter surgamus; Et vivamus in Gratia, Sacra Cœli palatia Donec regrediamur.

5. Such a piece of Devotion as this is that to S. Francis: Sancte Francisce, properè veni; Pater, accelera ad populum, qui premitur & teritur sub o{illeg}ere, palea, luto, latere, & sepultos Ægyptio sub sabulo nos libera, carnis extincto vitio. Which is plainly a Prayer to this Saint that he would deliver us from the bondage and drudgery of Sin, which is onely in the power of our great Saviour <58> and Redeemer Christ for to doe.

That Invocation of S. Andrew is also for that spiritual Grace of duly Bearing the Crosse here, that we may obtain Heaven afterwards. Jam nas foveto languidos, Curámque nostrî suscipe, Quò per Crucis victoriam Cœli petamus gratiam. But that to S. Nicolas is against the Assaults of the Devil: Ergò piè nos exaudi Assistentes tuæ laudi, Nè subdamur Hostis fraudi, Nobis fer auxilia. Nos ab omni malo ducas, Vitâ rectâ nos conducas, Post hanc vitam nos inducas Ad æterna gaudia. The like Devotion is done to S. Martin, S. Andrew, S. James, S. Bartholomew, and others, though not in the same words.

6. When I have given an example or two of their Prayers put up to their She-Saints, I shall a little more copiously insist on those to the bles <59> sed Virgin. They beg of S. Agnes the greatest Grace that God is able to impart to the Soul of man, that is to say, to serve God in perfect Love. And this Gift this one poor single She-Saint is solicited to bestow on all men. Ave, Agnes gloriosa, Me in fide serves recta, Dulcis Virgo & dilecta, Te exoro precibus: Charitate da perfectâ Deum, per quem es electa, Colere piè omnibus. That Devotion put up to S. Brigitt is, that she would play the skilfull Pilot, and lead us through all the tempests and hazzards of this World so safely, that at last, by her good Conduct, we may attain to everlasting Life. The Rhyme runs thus: O Bregitta, mater bona, Dulcis Ductrix & Matrona, Nobis fer suffragia; Naufragantes in hoc Mari Tuo ductu salutari Duc ad vitæ bravia.

7. But that to S. Catharine is a piece of Devotion something of an higher strain, or rather more copious and expresse: But so great a Boon they beg of her as is in the power of none to give but God alone. Ave, Virgo Dei digna, Christo prece me consigna, Audi Preces, præsta Votum; Cor in bono fac immotum. Confer mibi Cor contritum; Rege Visum & Auditum; Rege Gustum & Olfactum, Virgo sancta, rege Tactum. Ut in cunctis te regente, Vivam Deo purâ mente. Christum pro me interpella, Salva Mortis de procella. Superare fac me Mundum, Nè demergar in profundum. Nè me sinas naufragari Per Peccata in hoc Mari. Visita tu me infirmum, Et in bonis fac me firmum. Agonista Dei fortis, Praestò sis in hora mortis. <61> Decumbentem fove, leva, Et de morte solve sæva; Ut resurgam novus homo Civis in cœlesti domo.

8. Now it is observable in this devotionall Rhyme to S. Catharine, that whereas the Council of Trent advises men, ad Sanctorum orationes, opem auxiliumque confugere, that in these many. Verses there are not passing two or three that are an entreating of the Saint to pray for us, but to aid and succour us in such a way as the Story of the Saint and the Allusion to her Name most naturally leads the phancy of the Devotionist to think sutable for her: As if she were the giver of Courage, of Patience, and of Purity of minde, and was to comfort and support us in the very Agonie of death by her presence, Which Petition is very frequent to other Saints also. So plain a thing is it, that this Invocation of the Saints is not a mere desiring of them to pray for us.

But here the Devotionist commits the whole Regimen of both his Soul <62> and Body unto this Saint, to rule all his Faculties and Senses, and begs so high Vertues and Graces, as that none but God can supply us with them; as I intimated at first. Whence the Invocation upon that very account also must appear most grosly Idolatrous, as Grotius, who yet is no such foe to the Papists, does expresly acknowledge and declare.

CHAP. V.

Forms of Invocation of the blessed Virgin used by the Church of Rome egregiously Idolatrous.

1. AND if they can contain themselves no better in their Devotions towards these lesser Saints, to whom their Church-men will allow onely the Worship they call Dulia, how wilde and extravagant will they shew themselves in their Addresses to the Virgin Marie, the Mo <63> ther of God, to whom they allow the Worship they call Hyperdulia? And that is the thing I will now take notice of, though not according to the copiousnesse of the Subject; for it would even fill a Volume. But some Instances I will produce, and those such as are publick and authentick, as I intimated at first. In the Rosarie of the blessed Virgin she is saluted thus: Reparatrix & Salvatrix desperantis Animæ, Irroratrix & largitrix spiritualis Gratiæ, Quod requiro, quod suspiro, mea sana Vulnera, Et da menti te poscenti Gratiarum munera; Ut sim castus, & modestus, dulcis, fortis, sobrius, Pius, rectus, circumspectus, simultatis nescius, Eruditus, & munitus Divinis eloquiis, Constans, gravis, & süavis, benignus, amabilis, <64> Corde prudens, ore studens veritatem dicere, Malum nolens, Deum volens pio semper opere. A very excellent Prayer, if it had been directed to a due Object. But such things are asked as are in the power of none but of Jesus Christ himself, as he is God, to give.

2. For the Virgin Mary is here made no lesse then a Saviour and giver of all spiritual Graces; as she is also a giver of eternall Life in what follows in Prose. Peccatorum causolatrix, infirmorum curatrix, errantium revocatrix, justorum confirmatrix, desolatorum spes & auxiliatrix, atque mea promptissima adjutrix, tibi, Domina gloriosa, commendo bodie & quotidie Animam meam; ut me in custodiam tuam commendatum ab omnibus malis & fraudibus Diaboli custodias, atque in hora mortis constanter mihi assistas, ac Animam ad æterna gaudia perducas. Here is the commending of the Soul of the Devotionist into the Protection of the Virgin, that he <65> may be kept from all Evil, and from the Frauds of the Devil, and that she would assist at the hour of death to convey his Soul to the eternall Joys of Heaven.

3. Like that at the end of the Rosarie; Cor meum illumina, fulgens Stella Maris, Et ab hostis machina semper tuearis. O gloriosa Virgo Maria, mater Regis æterni, Libera nos ab omni malo, & à poenis Inferni. Which is a Petition for Illumination of heart, for Security from the Devil and from eternall Death: which is onely the Privilege of the Son of God, the eternall Wisedome of the Father, to grant, who is said also to^[20] have the Keys of Hell and of Death.

4. But the thing which is very observable, and which I mainly drive at, is this, That the Roman Church toward the latter end, before the Reformation broke out, had run so mad after the Patronage of the Virgin, that they had almost forgot the Son of God, and spent all their Devotions on her, whom they do at least <66> equallize to Christ, and so really make her, as well as some love to call her, the Daughter of God, in as high a sense as Christ is his Son: as will farther appear in the process of our Quotations. As in that Prayer to the blessed Virgin that follows in Chemnitius: Te, mater illuminationis cordis mei, te, nutrix salutis meæ mentis, te obsecrant quantum possunt cuncta præcordia mea. Exaudi, Domina, adesto propitia, adjuva potentissima, ut mundentur sordes mentis meæ, ut illuminentur tenebræ meæ. O gloriosa Domina, Porta vitæ, Janua salutis, Via reconciliationis, Aditus recuperationis, obsecro te per salvatricem tuam fœcunditatem, fac ut peccatorum meorum venia & vivendi gratia concedatur, & usque in finem hic servus tuus sub tua protectione custodiatur. Which Petition and Compellations, saving what belongs to the Sex, are most proper and natural to be used towards Christ. But the Virgin is here made our Saviour and Mediatour in the feminine gender.

5. As she is again most expresly in <67> that Prayer to her in her Feast of Visitation:

Veni, præcelsa Domina Maria; tu nos visita: Ægras mentes illumina Per sacræ vitæ munera.

Veni, Salvatrix seculi; Sordes aufer piaculi; In visitando populum Pœnæ tollas periculum.

Veni, Regina gentium; Dele flammas reatuum; Dele quodcunque devium; Da vitam innocentium.

In which Invocation the Virgin Mary is plainly called the Saviour of the World, and pray'd unto for spiritual Illumination of the Soul, and for the purgation thereof from the filth both of Sin and Guilt: whereby she is plainly equallized to the Son of God, and made as it were a She-Christ, or Daughter of God.

To this sense also are those Prayers put up to her in her Feast of the Conception and of the Annunciation: But it were infinite to produce all. Reade that Prayer in Chemnitius sung to her by the Council of <68> Constance: It is a perfect Imitation of the ancient Prayer of the Church to the Holy Ghost.

CHAP. VI.

More Forms of Invocation of the blessed Virgin out of the Mary-Psalter, so called, extremely Idolatrous and Blasphemous.

1. WE will now onely note some passages in the Mary-Psalter, as it is called, wherein how much at that time the Church of Rome had thrust themselves under the Protection and Patronage of the Virgin, and made her the Daughter of God, in stead of approving themselves faithfull touching the Rights and Prerogatives of the Son and his Worship, will be most notoriously evident. I will begin with the thirtieth Psalm: In te, Domina, speravi; non confundar in æternum. In gratiam tuam suscipe me; inclina ad me <69> aurem tuam, & in mœrore meolætifica me. Tu es fortitudo mea & refugium meum, consolatio mea & protectio mea: ad te clamavi cùm tribularetur cor meum, & exaudîsti de vertice collium æternorum. In manus tuas, Domina, commendo spiritum meum, meam totam vitam, diem ultimum. This is that whole Psalm to the Virgin: just in such a form and with such a repose of spirit as David prays in to God himself.

2. But we will content our selves with transcribing onely some select pieces. As Psalm 71. Resperge, Domina, cor meum dulcedine tuâ. Fac me oblivisci miserias hujus vitæ: Concupiscentias æternas excita in anima mea, & de gaudio Paradiss inebria mentem meam. And again, Psalm 104. Salus sempiterna in manu tua est, Domina; qui te dignè honoraverint suscipient illam. Clementia tua non deficiet à seculis æternis, & misericordia tua à generatione in generationem. And Psalm 117. Dispositione tuâ mundus perseverat, quem tu, Domina, cum <70> Deo fundâsti ab initio. Tuus totus ego sum, Domina; salvum me fac, quoniam desiderabiles sunt laudes tuæ in tempore peregrinationis meæ. No man can say more to, or expect more from, the eternall God himself.

Whence they make the eternall Godhead as hypostatically united with the Virgin as with Christ himself, and carry themselves to her as if she were as properly the Daughter of God as he the Son. For else how could she be said to have everlasting Salvation in her power, and to have laid the Foundations of the world from the beginning with the eternall Deity?

3. There are also other passages in this Psalter whereby they make the Virgin Mary a She-Christ, the Daughter of God, as he is the Son of God; and that is by the applying of the very Phrases spoken of him in the Scripture, unto her. As in Psalm 2. Venite ad eam omnes qui laboratis & tribulati estis, & refrigerium & solatium dabit animabus vestris. And Psalm 81. <71> Terge fœditatem meam, Domina, quæ semper rutilas puritate. Fons vitæ, influe in os meum, ex quo viventes aquæ profluunt & emanant. Omnes sitientes venite ad illam, & de fonte suo gratanter vos potabit. This is the gift of the Spirit,^[21] belonging onely to Christ to give to them that believe on him.^[22] And he is also said to be the ease and rest of all them that are weary and heavy laden.

And again, Psalm 46. Omnes gentes, plaudite manibus, psallite in jubilo Virgini gloriosæ. Quoniam ipsa est porta vitæ, janua salutis, & via nostræ reconciliationis, spes pœnitentium, solamen lugentium, pax beata cordium atque salus. This is attributed to the Virgin, whenas it is Christ alone that is the way of Salvation and Reconciliation with God.

4. This is a foul and tedious Subject, and therefore to make an end at length, let us consider the Blasphemy of the 41. Psalm. Quemadmodum desiderat cervus ad fontes aquarum, ità ad amorem tuum anhelat anima mea, Virgo <72> sancta. Quia tu es genitrix vitæ meæ, & altrix reparationis carnis meæ: Quia tu lactatrix Salvationis animæ meæ, initium & finis totius salutis meæ. Here is that attributed to the Virgin which is said of Christ, that he is the Authour and Finisher of our Faith and Salvation. Nay, the Creation or Generation of our life and flesh, as well as our Salvation, is here ascribed to the Virgin. Which can have no sense or truth, unless she were θεόγηνος, God-woman, in that sense that Christ is θεάνθρωπος or θεάνως, God-man, and, as I said, were as properly the Daughter of God as he is the Son of God.

5. As she is expresly called in her Litanie, Filia Dei, the Daughter of God. Which, considering what high Titles they give her both in that Litanie and elsewhere, as, Illuminatrix cordium, Fons misericordiæ, Flumen sapientiæ, Mater Dei, Regina cœli, Domina mundi, Domina cœli & terræ, would be but a dwindling Title, (it belonging to all women that are be <73> lievers,) if there was not some such raised and sublime sense of it as I have intimated.

And therefore their Addresses to her being as if she were, as I said, a She-Christ, and the Daughter of God in as high a sense at least as Christ is the Son of God, and she being called the Daughter of God in the Litania Mariæ, in her Litanie or publick Supplication to her, it is plain, that in that Intervall of the Church wherein this most conspicuously and notoriously happened, the Church of Rome, by reason also of the abundance of their Devotions then to the Virgin, might be said to be rather the Worshippers of the Daughter of God then of the Son of God. And that therefore the Spirit of Prophecy foreseeing these times, whenas for such a space he called Rome Pergamus, this succeeding Scene coming on, he might very well change the title of Pergamus into that of Thyatira, with a derisorious Allusion to the occasion of the name of that City, from the <74> news of a Daughter being born to Nicanor. As if God Almighty had the like occasion of changing the name of Pergamus into Thyatira, from the Romanists turning the Virgin Mary into the Daughter of God.

6. For a stop to which Insolency Christ seems on purpose in the Epistle to the Church in Thyatira to resume to himself the Title of the^[23] Son of God, notwithstanding that he is called the Son of man in the Vision in^[24] the foregoing Chapter, out of which he ever draws a description of himself for an Entrance before each Epistle to the Churches. Which, in my judgement, is a thing specially well worth the marking; and that this making the Virgin Mary the Daughter of God in this Intervall, might alone be a sufficient occasion of changing the name of the Church of Rome from Pergamus to Thyatira. But other things that are apposite are also comprehended by a Propheticall Henopoeïa.

7. But this is an Overplus to our <75> present purpose, which was mainly to discover the grosse Idolatry of the Church of Rome in the Invocation of their Saints, and especially of the Virgin Mary; and how both the Definition of the Council of Trent is Idolatrous in this Point, and much more the Practice of the Church countenanced by publick Authority.

8. For this Mary-Psalter it self, that has the most enormous and blasphemous Forms of Idolatrous Invocation of any, is not the private Contrivance of some single, obscure, superstitious Monk, but bears the Title of that Seraphick Doctour S. Bonaventure, once Cardinal of Rome: Which is no small publick countenance thereto. And that nothing might be wanting to the grace and furtherance of so devotionall a piece of Idolatry, there was instituted a peculiar Society, entitled the Fraternity of the Many-Psalter, confirmed afterward by Sixtus the fourth, many Indulgences being added Anno 1470. And Innocent the eighth added to these Indul <76> gences plenarie Remission à pœna & culpa once in their life, and once in articulo mortis, to as many as entred into that Fraternity.

9. And in such case stands the Church of Rome at this very day, that is to say, she is still Thyatira, notorious for her Idolatrous Worship of the Virgin Mary. But the Intervall of the true Church in Thyatira ceased upon the Reformation, when we cast off the Pope, or suffered Jezebel to delude the Servants of God no longer, nor to debauch them with Idolatrous Modes of Worship. But this is onely by the bye.

In the mean time it is abundantly manifest, that the Invocation of Saints in the Roman Church is not onely the praying to them that they would pray to God for us, but the asking Aids of them, and such frequently as are in the power of none but of God, and of Christ as he is God, for to give; and therefore is still the grosser Idolatry.

CHAP. VII.

That the Doctrine of the Council of Trent touching the Worshipping of Images is Idolatrous, and the Reason of the Doctrine weak and unsound.

1. AND thus much for their Idolatry in the Invocation of Saints. Let us now consider what the sense of the Council of Trent is touching the worshipping of Images. Imagines porrò Christi,^[25] Deiparæ Virginis, & aliorum Sanctorum, in templis praesertim, habendas & retinendas esse, eisque debitum honorem & reverentiam impertiendam. Quoniam honos qui eis exhibetur refertur ad Prototypa, quæ illæ repræsentant; ità ut per Imagines quas osculamur, & coram quibus caput aperimus & procumbimus, Christum adoremus, & Sanctos, quorum illæ similitudinem gerunt, veneremur. Id quod Conciliorum, præsertim verò secundæ Nicænæ Synodi, Decre <78> tis contra Imaginum oppugnatores est sancitum.

The meaning of which in brief is this, That the Images of Christ, of the blessed Virgin and other Saints, are to be had and retain'd in Churches, and that due honour and reverence is to be done to them. For which are produced two Reasons. The first, In that the Honour that is done to the Images is referred to the Prototypes. The second, In that this Injunction is but what the second Nicene Council had of old decreed.

2. To which I answer, That thus much as the Council of Trent has declared touching Images is plain and open Idolatry by the seventh Conclusion of the first Chapter, and expresly against the Commandment of God, who forbids us to make any graven Image to bow down to or worship. But the Council of Trent says, Yes, ye may make graven Images of the Saints, and set them up in their Temples, and give them their due Honour and Worship; nay, ye <79> ought to doe so; and instances in the very act of Bowing or Kneeling and prostrating our selves before them. This Definition of the Council is so palpably against the Commandment of God, that they are fain to leave the second Commandment out of the Decalogue, that the people may not discern how grosly they goe against the express Precepts of God in their so frequent practices of Idolatry. See the first, ninth and tenth Conclusions of the first Chapter; as also the third, fourth, fifth, eighteenth, nineteenth and twentieth of the second.

3. Nor can all their Tricks and Tergiversations and subtil Elusions serve their turn. For undoubtedly the Decalogue was writ to the easie capacity of the people, and therefore their hearts and consciences are the best Interpreters. Not the foolish Evasions and Subterfuges of perfidious Sophisters, who, to the betraying of weak Souls to Idolatry and Damnation, and for the opening their Purses, would make them be <80> lieve that the Council of Trent's enjoyning of Images in Churches, and the honouring them or worshipping them and bowing down before them, can consist with God's forbidding to make any graven Image, and to bow down to it and worship it. So that I say, the Council it self does appoint flat Idolatry to the Christian world to be practised. And it being so monstrous a thing, I pray you now let us consider the Reasons why they do so.

4. The first is, Because the Honour done to the Image is referr'd to the Prototype. But I answer, that this Reference is either in virtue of that Similitude the Images have with those persons they represent, which the words of the Council seem to imply, at least touching the Saints, quorum illæ similitudinem gerunt; as when we praise a Picture of such or such a person, that it is a very comely and lovely Picture, this praise naturally has a reference to the Person whose Picture it is, in virtue of the similitude betwixt the Picture and the Party.

Or else this Reference, without any regard to personal Similitude, is from the Direction of the Intention of the Devotionist, that he intends upon the seeing and bowing, suppose, to the Image of Christ, the blessed Virgin, or any Saint, to take this occasion to worship Christ, the blessed Virgin or the Saint thereby, the Image being but at large a symbolicall Presence of them, it being not regarded whether the Symbol or Image have any personal Similitude with the party it represents or no.

5. But now as for the former it is evident, that it is infinitely uncertain whether any Image of Christ, the blessed Virgin, or of this or that Saint, be like the carnal figure of these persons while they were alive upon earth, or no. Nay, it is in a manner certain to the contrary, none of these holy Souls being given to such follies as to have their Pictures drawn while they were alive. See my^[26] Mysterie of Iniquity.

But being it is extremely impro <82> bable but an Image should be like some or other, that are either now alive, or have lived on the earth since the beginning of the world, according to this first supposition, this Honour or religious Worship intended to Christ, the blessed Virgin, or any other Saint, will not onely misse them, but certainly fall on some other who, in stead of being Saints, haply are or have been very vile and wicked persons.

6. But besides, no Saints are worshipped before they be in Heaven, nor indeed are properly Saints till then; and the Glories in their Pictures that are about their Heads shew plainly that they intend to represent the Saints in their present condition of Glory in Heaven. Whence it is plain that the Images are nothing like them they are made for. For how can these Images of brasse or stone or wood, or any other materials, bear the Image of a separate Soul, which all the Saints are for the present? And what likenesse can <83> there be betwixt the glorious body of Christ Heavenly and spiritual, and an Image of any terrestriall matter? No more then betwixt a piece of Dirt or Soot and the Sun or bright Morning-star.

And, which is most of all to be considered, what terrestriall Image can possibly represent him that is truly θεάνθρωπος, God-man, and is not the Object of our Adoration but as he is this Divine Complexum as well of the Divinity as the Humanity? But what Statuarie can carve out the Effigies of the Deity? So that the pretense of this Reference of the Honour to the Prototype in this first sense thereof is very weak and vain. Nor, though there were this natural Reference, would it follow that we are to honour them this way, it being so plainly forbid, and there being better ways then this, viz. the commemorating and imitating their Vertues.

7. And for that second sense, it is indeed disinvolved of those former <84> Difficulties; but greater here occurr. For as touching our Saviour Christ, forasmuch as his pretended Image is but his symbolicall Presence, the doing of Divine Worship towards it is again plain Idolatry, as appears by that Example of the Israelites, who worshipped the golden Calf in reference to Jehovah,^[27] as appears plainly in the Story. And for the blessed Virgin and the rest of the Saints, that Incurvation toward their symbolicall Presences is flat Idolatry, is manifest from the eighth, ninth and tenth Conclusions of the first Chapter, and the fifth, nineteenth and twentieth of the second of this Treatise.

And indeed thus to make the Images of the Saints so called onely their symbolicall Presences, and so to worship them before these Images, is an attributing Divine Honour to them. For this naturally does declare that they have at least a terrestriall Omnipresency, which no invisible Power which we know has <85> but onely God. But to make a low Obeisance to an absent person God knows how many millions of miles off, is still a more forced and ridiculous thing. And therefore the saluting of the Saints thus at their symbolicall Presences or Images, and in the mean time acknowledging them to be in sede Beatorum, (which they do, and must do, unlesse they exclude them Heaven,) is to acknowledge one Soul to fill Heaven and Earth with its presence, which is that vast Privilege of God Almighty onely; and therefore this Worship to them is gross Idolatry, as supposing such a Perfection in them as is no-where but in God.

Besides what was intimated before, that let this Reference be what it will, there being an Incurvation or Prostration before Images, whether they be mere Symbols or exact Representations, it must be ipso facto Idolatry by the seventh Conclusion of the first Chapter. From whence it follows, that the Saints are not ho <86> noured by this worshipping of their Images, but hideously reproched, it supposing them to be pleased and gratify'd with that which is an abomination to the Lord, and a grofs transgression of his express Commands. It implies, I say, that they are ambitious, vain-glorious and rebellious against God. And therefore they that the most vehemently oppose this way of honouring of them by Images and Invocation are the most true and faithfull Honourers of them, they so zealously vindicating them from the great Reproches these others cast upon them. So far are they from being guilty herein of any Rudenesse or Clownishnesse against the Saints of God.

CHAP. VIII.

The Doctrine of the second Council of Nice touching the Worship of Images, (to which the Council of Trent refers,) that it is grosly Idolatrous also.

1. BUT now as for the other Reason of these Tridentine Fathers, whereby they would support their Determination in this Point, viz. the Authority of the second Council of Nice held about the year 780, (to omit, that long before this time the Church had become asymmetral, which yet is a very substantial Consideration) I shall onely return this brief answer. The God of Israel, which is the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, has given this expresse command to his Church for ever, Thou shalt not make to thy self any graven Image, thou shalt not bow down to it, nor worship it. But the second Council of Nice says, Thou mayst and shalt bow <88> down to the Image of Christ, of the blessed Virgin, and of the rest of the Saints. Now whether it be fit to believe and obey God, or men, judge ye: I might adde farther, men so silly and frivolous in the defense of their Opinion, so false and fabulous in the Allegation of their Authorities and the recitall of miraculous Stories, as Chemnitius has proved at large in his Examen of the Council of Trent.

2. I will give an Instance or two.^[28] No man lighteth a candle, and putteth it under a bushell; therefore the Images of the Saints are to be placed on the Altars, and Wax-candles lighted up before them, in due honour to them. Again, Psalm 16. But to the Saints that are on the Earth: But the Saints are in Heaven, say they, therefore their Images ought to be on the Earth, &c. As for the Miracles done by Images, as their Speaking, the Healing of the sick, the Revenging of the wrong done to them, the Distilling of rorid drops of balsame to heal the wounded, sick or lame, their Recovering water into a <89> dry Well, and the like, it were too tedious to recite these Figments.

But that of the Image of the Virgin, to whom her Devotionist spake when he took leave of her, and was to take a long Journey, intreating her to look to her Candle, which he had lighted up for her, till his return, I cannot conceal. For the Story says, the same Candle was burning six months after, at the return of her Devoto. An example of the most miraculous Prolonger that ever I met withall before in all my days. Such an Image of the Virgin would save poor Students a great deal in the expense of Candles, if the thing were but lawfull and feasible.

3. From these small hints a man may easily discover of what Authority this second Council of Nice ought to be, though they had not concluded so point-blank against the Word of God. But because that Clause in this Paragraph of the Council I have recited, Id quod Conciliorum, praesertim verò secundae Nicaenae Synodi, &c. <90> may as well aim at the determination of what these Fathers mean by that debitus honor & reverentia which they declare to be due to the Images of Christ and the Saints, as confirm their own Conclusion by the Authority of that Nicene Council, we will take notice also what a kinde of Honour and Reverence to Images the Nicene Council did declare for, and in short it is this;

That they are to be worshipped and adored and to be honoured with Wax-candles, and by the smoaking of Incense or Perfumes, and the like. Which smells rankly enough in all conscience of Idolatry, as Grotius himself upon the Decalogue cannot but acknowledge. But this is not all. The Invocation of Saints, their Mediation and propitiating God for us for adoring their Images, healing of Diseases, and other Aids and Helps, besides Ora pro nobis, are manifestly involved in the Worship of these Images, according to that Nicene Council.

4. And truly, according to the Collections of Photius in Justellus, one would think that they meant the Cultus Latriæ to the Image of Christ, they using the word διαβαίνειν, as if that Worship which was done to the Image passed through to Christ himself, which would not be sutable to him, if it were not Divine Worship. And where that word is not used, yet the sense makes hugely for it. As in this Paragraph touching the second Council of Nice according to Photius; Τὴν δὲ εἰκόνα Χριστοῦ ἐπὶ τιμῇ καὶ σεβασμιότητι τοῦ ἐικονιζομένου προσκυνεῖσθαι καὶ τιμᾶσθαι ψήφοις ἁπάσαις ἐπεκύρωσέ τε καὶ ἐπεσφραγίσατο, τῆς προσκυνήσεως καὶ τιμῆς δηλονέτι προσαγομένης καθ' ὃν τρόπον καὶ τοῖς ἂλλοις ἱεροῖς συμβόλοις καὶ τύποις τῆς καθ' ἡμᾶς ἁγιωτάτης λατρείας προσερχόμεθα. Οὐ γὰρ ἠν αὐτοις ἰστῶμεν καὶ συμπερικλείομεν τὴν τιμὸν καὶ προσκύνησιν, ὀυδὲ εἰς ἑτερόφυλα καὶ διὰφορα τέλη σχιζόμεθα. ἀλλὰ διὰ τῆς φαινομένης διαφόρου καὶ μεριστῆς αὐτῶν θεραπείας καὶ προσκυνήσεως ἱεοπρεπῶς τε καὶ ἀδαιρέτως εἰς τὴν ἀμέριστον ἐκείνην ἑνοειδῆ τε καὶ ἑνοποιὸν θειότητα ἀναγόμεθα.

This seventh Synod, saith he, (that <92> is to say, the second of Nice) with joint suffrages hath established and ratify'd the worshipping of the Image of Christ, for the honour and reverence of him that is expressed by it; this Worship and Honour being done in such manner as when we approach the holy Symbols or Types of our most holy and Divine Worship: (for the word is λατρεία.) For we do not stop at them, nor restrain our Worship and Devotion to them, nor are we divided toward heterogeneous and different Scopes or Objects; but by that Service and Worship of them that appears divided are we carried up devoutly and undividedly unto the one and indivisible Deity. Whereby it is plainly declared, that that very Worship which passes to the Deity is done towards the Image of Christ first or jointly, as being one and the same undivided Worship in truth and reality; as also that this Worship is that Worship which is called Latria, and is due to the highest God onely.

5. But that religious Worship is done to the Images of all the Saints <93> seems imply'd in what comes afterwards, where it is said, that this second Council of Nice, (which Photius calls ἁγίαν καὶ θεόφερον πανήγυριν,) οὐ μόνον την εἰκονα Κριστοῦ, ἀλλὰ καὶ ἀειπαρθένου Μαγίας καὶ πάντων τῶν ἁγίων τὰς ἱερὰς εἰκόνας, κατ' ἀναλογίαν τῆς τῶν πρωτοτύπων ὑπεροχῆς καὶ σεβασμιότητος, ημᾶσθαι καὶ προσκυνεῖθαι ἐπεσφράγισέ τε καὶ ἐπεκύρωσεν. καὶ γὰρ καὶ δι' αὐτῆς ἀξιούμεθα θείας καὶ ὑπερφυοῦς συναφείας. That this Council has not onely established and appointed that the Image of Christ should be honoured and worshipped, but the holy Images of the Virgin Mary and of all the Saints, according to the excellency and venerability of their Prototypes. For even by these are we carried up into a certain unitive and conjunctive vision, and thereby are vouchsafed that divine and supernatural conjunction or contact with the highest of all desirables, that is, God himself.

6. Can any thing more inflame the Souls of men with that mysticall lust after Idols then the Doctrines of this <94> Nicene Synod? For as for the Image of Christ, the same Devotion and Worship is done to that which is done to God himself. And for the Images of the Virgin Mary and the rest of the Saints, though that Worship is allotted them onely that is proportionable to their Prototypes, yet they are worshipped such a way as that thereby, while we adhere to their Images or Statues, we are declared to be made fit for and to be vouchsafed a tactual Union with God himself. What Philtrum more effectual to raise up that Idolomania, that being mad and lovesick after Images and Idols, then this? What can inrage their Affections more towards Idolatry, then to phansie that while they worship Idols, and cling about dead Statues, that very individual act (and therefore it cannot be too intense) is that wherewith they are united to, and lie in the very Embraces of, the ever-living and true God?

7. The sense of the Synod is, according to the representation of Pho <95> tius, that we worship and unite our selves with God as well in the worshipping the Images of the Virgin and of other Saints, as in the worshipping of the Image of Christ. So that all is religious Worship, and consequently grosse Idolatry, it being done to Stocks and Stones and such like senslesse Objects. For the drift of all Idolatry is, when it is questioned, and craftily defended, that through the Worship of Dæmons and Images they reach at the Worship of, and the joyning their Devotion to, the first and highest Godhead. Wherefore the Council of Trent declaring with the second Council of Nice, that is to say, the blinde leading the blinde, they have both fallen into this dreadfull Pit of Idolatry.

CHAP. IX.

The meaning of the Doctrine of the Council of Trent touching the Worship of Images more determinately illustrated from the general Practice of the Roman Church and Suffrage of their Popes, whereby it is deprehended to be still more coursly and Paganically Idolatrous.

1. BUT it may be it may give more satisfaction to some, to know what is the Church of Rome's own sense of this Honor debitus she declares ought to be done to the Images of Christ and the Saints. Putting off a man's Hat, and lying prostrate before them, the Council does not stick to instance in by the bye. But because the Council calls this neither Dulia, nor Hyperdulia, nor Latria, some will, it may be, be ready to shuffle it off with the interpretation of but a civil Complement to these Images or their Prototypes.

But since the Council of Trent has declared nothing farther, what can be a more certain Interpreter of their meaning then the continued Custome of their Church, and the sense of such Doctours as have been even sainted for their Eminency, as Thomas Aquinas and Bonaventure, who both of them have declared that the Image of Christ is to be worshipped with the Worship of Latria, the same that Christ is worshipped with?

2. And Azorius the Jesuite affirms that it is the constant Opinion of the Theologers, (their own, he means, you may be sure,) that the Image is to be honoured and worshipped with the same Honour and Worship that he is whose Image it is. Which is not unlike that in the Council of Nice, κατ' ἀναλογίαν τῶν πρωτοτύπων ὑπεροχῆς, in the foregoing Citation. But that they are all capable of religious Worship, the Council of Trent it self (as well as Bellarmine and others, if not all the Theologers of that Church,) does plainly acknowledge, in that it deter <98> mines for their Invocation, which is competible to no invisible Power but the Godhead it self. Wherefore it is manifest that their Images are worshipped with religious Worship also.

3. But we shall make still the clearer judgement thereof, if we consider the Consecration of these Images which the Council of Trent declares are to be worshipped. For the Consecration and Worshipping of them makes them perfectly as the Idol-Gods of the Heathen, as Octavius jearingly speaks of the Heathen Gods, that is, their Idols, in Minucius Felix: Ecce funditur, fabricatur, scalpitur; nondum Deus est. Ecce plumbatur, construitur, erigitur; nec adhuc Deus est. Ecce ornatur, consecratur, oratur; tunc postremò Deus est. Behold it is clothed or adorned, it is consecrated and prayed unto; then at length it becomes a God. And if this will doe it, the Church of Rome's Images will prove as good Idol-Gods as any of them all.

4. Chemnitius recites some forms of Consecration: I will cull out one <99> ly those of the Images of the blessed Virgin and of S. John. That of the Virgin is this: Sanctify, O God, this Image of the blessed Virgin, that it may aid and keep safe thy faithfull people; that Thundrings and Lightnings, if they grow too terrible and dangerous, may be quickly expelled thereby; and that the Inundations of Rain, the Commotions of civil War, and Devastations by Pagans, may be suppressed by the presence thereof. Which is most effectual to make all men come and hurcle under the protection of the Virgin's Image in such dangers, as under the Wings of the great Jehovah. This is hugely like the consecrated Telesms of the Pagans.

But let us hear the form of the Consecration of the Image of S. John also: Grant, O God, that all those that behold this Image with Reverence, and pray before it, may be heard in whatsoever Streights they are. Let this Image be the holy Expulsion of Devils, the conciliating the presence and assistence of Angels, the protection of the faithfull; <100> and that the Intercession of this Saint may be very powerfull and effectuall in this place. What a mighty Charm is this to make the Souls of the feeble to hang about these Images as if their Presence were the Divine Protection it self?

5. These Chemnitius recites out of the Pontificall he perused. But the Rituale Romanum, published first by the command of Paulus Quintus, and again authorized by Pope Urban the eighth, will doe our businesse sufficiently, they being both since the Council of Trent; and therefore by the Exposition of these Popes we may know what that debitus Honor is which the Tridentine Fathers mention as that which ought to be done to the Images of Christ, the blessed Virgin, or any other Saint. For the Consecration of their Images runs thus:

Grant, O God, that whosoever before this Image shall diligently and humbly upon his knees worship and honour thy onely-begotten Son, or the blessed Virgin, (according as the Image is that is <101> a-consecrating, or this glorious Apostle, or Martyr, or Confessor, or Virgin, that he may obtain by his or her Merits and Intercession Grace in this present life, and eternall Glory hereafter.

So that the Virgin and other Saints are fellow-distributers of Grace and Glory with Christ himself to their Supplicants before their Images, and that upon their own Merits, and for this Service done to them in kneeling and pouring out their Prayers before their Statues or symbolicall Presences. What greater Blasphemy and Idolatry can be imagined? Ornatur, consecratur, oratur, tunc postremò fit Deus: that is to say, The Image is pray'd before, but the Dæmon pray'd unto. There is no more in Paganism it self. And yet by the Pope's own Exposition this is the debitus Honor that is owing to the Images of the Saints. Consider the latter end of the last Conclusion of the first Chapter, and the forms of Invocation in the fourth and fifth, as also the eighteenth Conclusion of the second Chapter.

6. This is all plain and expresse according to the Authority of their Church. And that, besides their Adoration and Praying before these Images, (which, considering the Postures of the Supplicant and the Image, is as much praying to them as the Heathens will acknowledge done to theirs,) there are also Wax-candles burning before them, and the Oblation of Incense or perfuming them, Feasts likewise, Temples and Altars to the same Saints, and the carrying them in Procession, (which was the guize of ancient Paganism,) is so well known, that I need not quote any Authours. And that this is the practice of the Roman Church jointly and coherently with their Worship of Images, is manifest to all the world; and that therefore it is as arrant Idolatry as Paganism it self, and consequently real Idolatry by the third Conclusion of the first Chapter. And lastly, it is to be noted that the Council of Trent, naming the debitus Honor of Images, and not excepting these in known <103> practice then amongst them, must of all reason be conceived to mean these very Circumstances, as Paganicall as they are, of the Worshipping of them.

7. And the rather, because they do pretend to rectify some Miscarriages in the business of Images, as any unlawfull or dishonest Gain by them, all lascivious Dresses of the Images, all Drunkenness and disorderly Riot at their Feasts, and the like. Which methinks is done with as grave caution against Idolatry, as if they had decreed that all the Whores in Rome should forbear to goe in so garish apparell, that they should be sure to wear clean linen, to be favourable to poor younger Brothers in the price of a night's Lodging, that they keep themselves wholsome and clean from the Pox, and the like; which were not the putting down, but the establishing, of Whores and Whoredome in the Papacy. And so are these Cautions touching Images. Exceptio firmat regulam in non exceptis. Wherefore these Circumstances of Idolatry be <104> ing not named by the Tridentine Fathers in their Exception, they are thereby ratify'd. Which yet are so like the old Pagan Idolatry, that Ludovicus Vives, one of their own Church, could not abstain from professing, non posse aliquid discrimen ostendi, nisi quòd nomina tantùm & titulos mutaverint; That onely the Names and Objects were changed, not the Modes, of the ancient Idolatry of the Heathen.

8. If the Council of Trent would have really and in good earnest rectify'd their Church in the point of Images, they should have followed the Example of that skilfull and famous Physician Dr. Butler, they should have imitated his Prescript touching the safe eating of a Pear, viz. That we should first pare it very carefully, and then be sure to cut out or scoup out all the Coar of it, and after that fill the hollow with Salt, and when this is done, cast it forthwith into the Kennell. This is the safest way of dealing with those things that have any in <105> trinsick Poison or Danger in them. See those most wholesome and judicious Homilies of our Church of England against the Perill of Idolatry.

9. And thus much shall serve for the setting out the Idolatry of the Church of Rome so far as it seems to be allow'd by the Church it self. But for those more grosse Extravagancies, which, though they have connived at, yet they would be loath to own upon publick Authority, I will neither weary my self nor my Reader by meddling with them. Such as the making the Images to sweat, their Eyes to move, the making them to smile, or lour and look sad, to feel heavy or light, or the like. Which does necessarily tend to the engaging of the people to believe and have affiance in the very Images themselves, as those Consecrations also imply which I cited out of Chemnitius, and which that Rhyme seems to acknowledge which they say to that Face of Christ which they call the Veronica. Which Rhyme runs thus: <106> Nos perduc ad patriam, felix ô Figura, Ad videndam Faciem quæ est Christi pura. Nos ab omni macula purga Vitiorum, Et tandem consortio junge Beatorum. And with such like blinde Devotion do they likewise speak to the Crosse: O Crux, spes unica, Hoc Passionis tempore Auge piis Justitiam, Reísque dona Veniam. This must sound very wildly and extravagantly to any sensible ear. And yet the invoking any Saint before his Image for Aid and Succour, (the Image bearing the name and representation of the Saint,) with Eyes and Hands lift up to it, is as arrant talking with a senslesse Stock or a Stone as this, and as gross a piece of^[29] Idolatry, though approved of by the Authority of the Roman Church. But I intended to break off before.

CHAP. X.

Severall important Consectaries from this clear Discovery of the gross Idolatry of the Church of Rome; with an hearty and vehement Exhortation to all men, that have any serious regard to their Salvation, to beware how they be drawn into the Communion of that Church.

1. THus have we abundantly demonstrated that the Church of Rome stands guilty of gross Idolatry according to the Concessions and Definitions of their own Council of Trent; that is to say, though we charge them with no more then with what the Council it self doth own, touching the Adoration of the Host, the Invocation of Saints, and the Worshipping of Images. But we must not forget, in the mean time, that the Crime grows still more course and palpable looking upon the particular forms of their Invocation of the Saints, <108> and the Circumstances of their worshipping their Images, and yet ratify'd by the Popes, and corroborated by the uncontrolled practice of their whole Church: Which therefore must in all reason be the Interpreter of the minde of the Council. So that there is no evasion left for them, but that they are guilty of as gross and palpable Idolatry as ever was committed by the sons of men, no lesse grosse then Roman Paganism it self.

2. From whence, in the next place, it necessarily follows, that they are the most barbarous Murtherers of the Servants of God that ever appeared on the face of the Earth. For indeed if they had had Truth on their side so far, as that the things they required at the hands of the Dissenters had been lawfull, (though not at all necessary;) yet considering the expresse voice of Scripture, which must be so exceeding effectual to raise consciencious Scruples, and indeed to fix a man in the contrary Opinions, besides the irrefragable Votes of com <109> mon Sense and Reason, and the Principles of all Arts and Sciences that can pretend any usefulnesse to Religion in any of its Theoreticall Disquisitions; I say, when it is so easie from hence, if not necessary, for some men to be born into a contrary consciencious Persuasion, it had undoubtedly even in this case been notorious Murther in the Pontifician Party, to have killed men for dissenting from the Doctrine and Practice of their Church.

But now the Murtherers themselves being in so palpable an Errour, and requiring of the Dissenters to profess Blasphemies and commit gross Idolatries with them, which is openly to rebell against God under pretense of obeying Holy Church, as they love to be called, they murthering so many hundred thousands of them for this Fidelity to their Maker, and their indispensable Obedience to the Lord Jesus Christ, this is Murther of a double dye, and not to be parallel'd by all the barbarous Persecutions un <110> der the red Dragon, the Pagan Emperours themselves.

3. From which two main Considerations it follows in the third place, that, considering the fit and easie congruity of the names of the Seven Churches and of the Events of the seven Intervalls (denoted by them) to the Prefigurations in the Visions, there can be no doubt but that by Balaam mentioned in the Epistle to the Church in Pergamus, wherein Antipas, that is, the Opposers of the Pope, are murthered, the Papal Hierarchy is understood; as it is also by the Prophetesse Jezebel in the Epistle to the Church in Thyatira, who was also a Murtheresse of the Prophets of God, and both of them expresly Patrons of Idolatry, as is manifest in the very Text.

Nor is it at all wonderfull that Balaam and Jezebel, the one a man, the other a woman, should signifie the same thing. For the false Prophet and the Whore of Babylon in the following Visions of the Apocalypse signifie <111> both one and the same thing, viz. The Hierarchy of Rome, from the Pope to the rest of their Ecclesiastick Body.

4. And what I have said of the Vision of those Seven Churches, the same I say of all those Expositions of the thirteenth and seventeenth Chapters of the Apocalypse, and that of the little Horn in Daniel; namely, The words of the Prophecies being so naturally applicable to the Affairs of that Church, besides the demonstration of Synchronism, that the weight of those two foregoing Conclusions being added thereto, there cannot be the least doubt or scruple left, but that those Interpretations are true; and that the Church of Rome is that Body of Antichrist, that Mother of Fornications and Abominations of the Earth, that is, of multifarious Modes of grosse Idolatries, or that scarlet Whore on the seven Hills, that is also drunk with the bloud of the Saints, and with the bloud of the Martyrs of Jesus.

5. And that therefore, in the fourth place, in the Church of Rome the Poi <112> son exceeding the Antidote, there can be no reason that Salvation should be hoped for there. It is a sad and lamentable Truth, but being a Truth, and of such huge moment, it is by no means to be concealed. What God may doe in his more hidden ways of Providence, he alone knows. And therefore we cannot say that every Idolatrous Heathen must perish eternally: But to speak no farther then we have commission, and according to the easy tenour of the Holy Scriptures, we must pronounce, though with great sadnesse of heart, that we have no warrant therefrom to think or declare any of the Popish Religion, so long as they continue so, to be in the state of Salvation; and especially, since that voice of the Angel which sounded in the Intervall of Thyatira, saying expresly, Come out of her, my people, that ye be not partakers of her sins, and receive not of her plagues; and the Apostle in his first Epistle to the Corinthians,^[30] Be not deceived, neither Fornicatours, nor Idolaters, nor Adul <113> terers, &c. shall inherit the Kingdome of God. And those of the Church of Rome are bound to continue Idolaters as long as they live, or else to renounce their Church; and therefore they are bound to be damned by adhering to the Roman Church, unless they could live in it for ever. For he that dies in such a capital sin as Idolatry without Repentance, nay, in a blinde, obstinate perseverance in it, how can he escape eternal Damnation?

6. But though we had kept our selves to the Apocalypse, the thing is clear in that Book alone, ch. 22. ver. 14, 15. where all Idolaters are expresly excluded from the Tree of Life: Blessed are they that doe his Commandments, (and one of them, though expunged by Rome, is, Thou shalt not worship any graven Image,) that they may have right to the tree of life, &c. For without are dogs, and Sorcerers, and Whoremongers, and Murtherers, and Idolaters, and whoso loveth and maketh a Lie. All these are excluded <114> the Heavenly Jerusalem, and from eating the Tree of Life. Of which who eateth not is most assuredly detain'd in eternall death. As it is written in the foregoing Chapter, that^[31] Murtherers, and Whoremongers, and Sorcerers, and Idolaters, and all Liars, shall have their part in the lake which burneth with fire and brimstone; which is the second Death. What sentence can be more expresse then this?

7. But besides this Divine sentence against them, they are also αὐτοκατάκριτοι, they are self-condemned, or at least give sentence against themselves, while they so freely pronounce that no Idolaters are to be saved; which they frequently doe, to save their own Church from the reproach of Idolatry. For, because some Protestants have declared for the Possibility of Salvation in the Romish Church, they farther improve the favour to the quitting themselves of the guilt, from others hopefull presages that by an hearty implicit Repentance of all their sins (even of those that are the <115> proper Crimes of that Church,) they may, through God's mercy in Christ, be delivered from the punishment.

This piece of Charity in some of our Party they turn to the fencing off all imputation of Idolatry from themselves, arguing thus; That no Idolaters can be saved: But those in the Romish Church may be saved, according to those Protestants opinion: Therefore those in the Romish Church are no Idolaters.

But most assuredly while they thus abuse the Charity of some, even by their own Proposition they must bring the sentence of Condemnation from all the rest upon their own heads, as they have herein given it against themselves, in saying that all Idolaters are damned, or that no Idolater can be saved. For it is demonstrated as clear as the Noon-light, in this present Discourse, that the Church of Rome are Idolaters.

8. And in that of those of our Church that say they may be saved upon a sincere and hearty implicit Re <116> pentance of all their sins, (wherein they include the Idolatries and all other Miscarriages which they know not themselves guilty of, by reason of the blinde Mis-instructions of their Church,) no more is given them by this then thus, viz. That they are saved by disowning of and dismembring themselves from the Roman Church, as much as it is in their power so to doe, and by bitterly repenting them that they were ever of that Church as such, and by being so minded, that if they did know what a corrupt Church it is, they would forthwith separate from it. So that in effect those of the Roman Church that some of ours conceit may be saved, are no otherwise saved, if at all, then by an implicit renouncing Communion with it, which in Foro Divino must goe for an actual and formal Separation from it.

In which Position if there were any Truth, it will reach the honest-minded Pagans as well; but it can shelter neither, unless in such Circumstances, that they had not the opportunity to <117> learn the Truth, which since the Reformation, and especially this last Age, by the mercy of God, is abundantly revealed to the world. So that all men, especially those that live in Protestant Nations or Kingdoms, are without all excuse; and therefore become obnoxious to God's eternall wrath and Damnation, if they relinquish not that false Prophetesse Jezebel, as she is called in the Epistle to the Church in Thyatira, who by her corrupt Doctrines deceives the people, and inveigles them into gross Idolatrous Practices.

9. Thus little is conceded by those of our Reformed Churches that speak most favourably of those in the Church of Rome. And yet this little must be retracted, unless we can make it out, that any of that Church are capable of sincere and unfeigned Repentance while they are of it. For to repent as a Thief, because he is afraid to be hanged, is not that saving Repentance. But to repent as a true Christian none can doe, unlesse he <118> has the Spirit of God, and be in the state of Regeneration.

For true Repentance arises out of the detestation of the uglinesse of Sin it self, and out of the love to the pulchritude and amiablenesse of the Divine Life and of true Vertue, which none can be touched with but those that are Regenerate or born of God. Now those holy and Divine Sentiments of the new Birth are so contrary to the Frauds and Impostures, to the grosse Idolatries and bloudy Murthers of the Church of Rome, which they from time to time have perpetrated upon the dear Servants of Christ, that it is impossible for any one that has this holy sense, but that he should incontinently fly from that Church with as much horrour and affrightment as any Countrey-man would from some evil Spectre, or at the approach of the Devil.

10.^[32] He that is born of God sinneth not, saith S. John: How then can they be so born whose very Religion is a Trade of sin, and that of the highest <119> nature, they ever and anon exercising grosse acts of Idolatry? besides that they are consenting (by giving up their belief and suffrage to the murtherous Conclusions of that Church) to all the barbarous and bloudy Persecutions of the Saints that either have happened or may happen in their own times, or ever shall happen, by that Church; they become, I say, guilty thereof by adjoyning themselves to this bloud-thirsty Body of men, with whom the Murther of those that will not commit Idolatry with them, and so rebell against God, is become an holy Papal Law and Statute.

And therefore, I say, how can any man conceive that those men are born of God who are thus deeply defiled with Murtherous and Idolatrous Impurities, but rather that they are in a mere blinde carnal condition, and uncapable, while they are thus, of any true and sincere Repentance, and consequently of repenting of their daily Idolatries which they commit, <120> and ordinarily (to make all sure) in ipso articulo mortis, and therefore are out of all capacity of Salvation while they are members of that Church? As plainly appears both by this present Reason fetch'd from the nature of Regeneration, as also from the judgement of the Romanists themselves touching the state of Idolaters after this life, and chiefly from the expresse sentence of the Spirit of God in Scripture, as I intimated before.

11. And therefore, in the fifth and last place, it is exceeding manifest how stupid and regardless those Souls are of their own Salvation, that continue in the Communion of the Church of Rome; and how desperately wilde and extravagant they are who, never having been of it, but having had the advantage of better Principles, yet can finde in their hearts to be reconciled to it. This must be a sign of some great defect in Judgement, or else in their Sincerity, that they ever can be allured to a Religion that is so far removed from God and Heaven.

12. But this Church, as the woman in the Proverbs, is, I must confess, both very fair of speech and subtil of heart, and knows how to tamper with the simple ones right skilfully. She knows how to overcome all their carnal senses by her luxurious Enticements. She has^[33] deck'd her bed with coverings of Tapestry, with carved works, with fine linens of Ægypt. She has perfumed her bed with Myrrh, Aloes and Cinnamon. She entertains her Paramours with the most delicious strains of Musick, and chants out the most sweet and pleasing Rhymes, to lull them secure in her lap: Such as those Idolatrous forms of the Invocation of the Virgin Marie, and of other Saints, which I have produced, of which she has a numerous store. Unto which I conceive the Prophet Isay to allude in that passage touching the City of Tyre, representing there mystically the relapsing Church of Rome:^[34] Take an harp, goe about the City, thou harlot that hast been forgotten, make sweet Melody, sing many Songs, that thou <122> mayst be remembred. See Synopsis Prophetica, Book 2. ch. 16.

13. She gilds her self over also with the goodly and specious Titles of Unity, Antiquity, Universality, the power of working Miracles, of Sanctity likewise, and of Infallibility; and boasts highly of her self, that she has the power of the Keys, and can give safe conduct to Heaven by Sacerdotal Absolution; and, if need be, out of the Treasury of the Merits of Holy men of their Church, which she has the keeping and disposing of, can adde Oyl to the Lamps of the unprovided Virgins, and so piece out their Deficiency in the works of Righteousnesse. Such fair speeches and fine glozing words she has to befool the judgements of the simple.

14. But as to the first, it is plain that that Unity that is by Force is no fruit of the Spirit, and therefore no Sign of the true Church: nor that which is from free Agreement, if it be not to good Ends. For Salomon describes an Agreement of Thieves <123> or Robbers, heartening one another to spoil and bloudshed, and to enter so strict a society as to^[35] have but one purse. And therefore for a company of men, under the pretense of Spirituality, to agree in the inventing or upholding such Doctrines or Fictions as are most serviceable for a worldly design, and for the more easily riding and abusing the credulous and carnal-minded, thereby to be masters of their Persons and Wealth, this is no holy Unity, but an horrid and unrighteous Conspiracy against the deluded sons of Adam.

15. And for Antiquity and Universality, they are both plainly on the Protestants side, who make no Fundamentals of Faith but such as are manifestly contained in the Scripture; which is much more ancient, and more universally received, then any of those things upon whose account we separate from the Church of Rome, which are but the fruits of that Apostasie which,^[36] after four Hundred years or thereabout, the Church <124> was to fall into according to Divine Prediction. So that we are as ancient and universal as the Apostolick Church it self, nor do we desire to appear to be the members of any Church that is not Apostolicall.

And for their boast of Miracles, which are produced to ratifie their crafty Figments, they are but Fictions themselves framed by their Priests, or Delusions of the Devil, according as is foretold concerning the coming of Antichrist, that Man of Sin, (which the Pope and his Clergy most assuredly is,) namely, that^[37] his coming is after the working of Satan, with all power, and signs, and lying wonders. So that they glory in their own shame, and boast themselves in the known Character of Antichrist, and would prove themselves to be Holy Church by pretending to the Privileges of that Man of Sin, and by appealing to the palpable signs of the Assistence of the Devil. For from thence are all Miracles that are produced in favour of Practices that <125> are plainly repugnant to the Doctrines of the Holy Scriptures.

16. But now, as for their Sanctity, what an holy Church they are, any one may judge upon the reading of the Lives of their Popes and History of their Cardinals, and other Religious Orders of that Church of Rome; how rankly all things smell of Fraud and Imposture, of Pride and Covetousnesse, of Ostentation and Hypocrisy; what monstrous examples of Sensuality their Holinesses themselves have ordinarily been, of Fornication and Adultery, of Incest and Sodomie; to say nothing of Simonie, and that infernall sin of Necromancy. But for Murther and Idolatry, those horrid Crimes are not onely made familiar to them, but have passed into a Law with them, and are interwoven into the very Essence of their Religion. Judge then how holy that Church must be, whose Religion is the establishment of Idolatry and Murther. Of the latter of which Crimes the holy Inquisition is an Instance with a witness. <126> And yet that Den of Murtherers, whose Office it is to kill men for not committing Idolatry, with the Church of Rome must needs bear the title of Holy.

17. And for their pretense of Infallibility, it is expresly predicted in the Apocalypse of S. John, as well as their laying claim to Miracles. For as the two-horned Beast is said to^[38] doe great Wonders, and to bring fire from Heaven, which two-horned Beast is the Pope and his Clergy; so Jezebel, which is the same Hierarchy, is called the Woman that gives to her self the title of^[39] a Prophetesse, whose Oracles you know must be infallible. For she does not mean that she is a false Prophetesse, though indeed and in truth she is so. And the Pope with his Clergy is judged to be so by the Spirit of God, in that he is called the^[40] false Prophet, as well as the two-horned Beast, in those Visions of S. John.

And while he pretends himself to be a Prophet, even without Divine Revelation, one may plainly demon <127> strate that he is a false one from this one notorious Instance of Transubstantiation; which is a Doctrine repugnant to common Sense and Reason, and all the Faculties of the Mind of man, and bears a contradiction to the most plain and indubitable Principles of all Arts and Sciences, as I have proved above. So that we may be more sure that this is false, then that we feel our own bodies, or can tell our toes and fingers on our hands and feet. Judge then therefore whether is more likely, that the Church of Rome should be infallible, or Transubstantiation a mere Figment, especially it being so serviceable for their worldly Advantages, and they being taken tardy in so many Impostures and Deceits. So that Infallibility is a mere Boast.

18. And now for their Sacerdotal Absolution, that they can so safely dismisse men to Heaven or secure them from Hell thereby, this power of their Priest is such another vain Boast as that of Transubstantiation. Except <128> a man be born again,^[41] he cannot enter into the kingdome of God. And the form of words upon one's Death-bed can no more regenerate any one, then their Quinqueverbiall Charm can transubstantiate the Bread and Wine into the Body and Bloud of Christ. Where the form of Absolution has any effect, it must be on such persons as are already really regenerate and unfeignedly and sincerely penitent: which I have shewn to be incompetible to any one so long and so far forth as he adheres to the Roman Church. So that in this case one Æthiopian does but wash another, which is labour spent in vain.

There must be a change of Nature, or no externall Ceremonie nor words can doe any thing. For the form of Absolution is not a Charm, as I said, to change the nature of things, but onely a Ticket to passe Guards and Scouts, and to procure safe Conduct to the Heavenly Regions. But if by Regeneration and due Repentance one has not contracted an alliance and <129> affinity with the Saints and Angels, but is really still involved in the impure and Hellish nature, the grim Officers of that dark Kingdome will most certainly challenge their own, and they will be sure to carry that Soul captive into a sutable place, let the flattering Priest have dismissed her hence with the fairest and most hopefull circumstances he could. This is the most hideous, the most dangerous and the most perfidious Cheat of that Church of Rome that ever she could light on for the damning of poor credulous Souls, that thus superstitiously depend on the vain breath of their Priest for the security of their Salvation.

19. And yet they are not content with this Device alone to lull men secure in wickednesse, but besides their pretense of singing them out of Purgatory by mercenary Masses, and pecuniarie Redemptions by Pardons and Indulgences, and I know not what Trumperies, they allure men to come into their Church as having <130> that great Store and Treasury of the Merits of Holy men and women, their works of Supererogation, which they pretend to have the keeping and disposing of. So that a poor Soul that is bankrupt of her self, and has no stock of Good works of her own, may sufficiently be furnished for love or money by the Merchants of this Storehouse. Which, besides that it is a blasphemous Derogation to the Merits of Christ, is the grossest Falshood that ever was uttered.

For these Holy men, as they are called, and Virgins, were, God wot, themselves most miserable Sinners, and died in most horrid Idolatries, as dying in the Practices of that Church; and he that comes to that Church does necessarily become a grosse Idolater himself; besides that he sets to his seal and makes himself accessory to all that innocent bloud, the bloud of those many hundred thousands of Martyrs for the Protestant Truth, which that Woman of bloud that sits on the Seven Hills has with the <131> most execrable Circumstances imaginable so frequently murthered. So that a Soul otherwise passable of her self would be necessarily drown'd in this one foul Deluge of Guilt: so far is she from having any relief or advantage by reconciling her self to the Church of Rome.

20. Wherefore who-ever thou art that hast any sense or solicitude for thy future state and Salvation, believe not this Woman of subtil lips and a deceitfull heart, and give no credit to her Fictions and high Pretensions; but the more she goes about to magnifie her self, do thou humble her the more, by shewing her her ugly hue in the glasse of the Holy Scriptures.

If she boast that she is that holy Jerusalem,^[42] a City at Unity within it self, whenas the rest of the World are so full of Sects and Factions; tell her that she is that carnal Jerusalem, wherein Christ in his true Members hath been so barbarously persecuted and murthered, and that the Stones <132> of her buildings are no living stones, but held together by a mere iron violence, and the Cement of her walls tempered with the large effusion of innocent bloud; forasmuch as she is that^[43] two-horned Beast that gave life to the Image of the Beast, and caused him to decree that as many as would not obey his Idolatrous Edicts should be slain. This is the power of your Unity, which is not from the Spirit of God, but from the spirit of the Devil, who was a Murtherer from the beginning. But the Division of us Protestants is both a sign of our sincere search after the Truth, and a more strong Testimony against you of Rome, in that we being so divided amongst our selves, yet we so unanimously give sentence against you: your Miscarriages and Crimes being so exceeding grosse, that no free eye but must needs discern them.

21. If she vaunts of her Antiquity; give her enough of it, and tell her she derives her pedigree from that great Dragon,^[44] the old Serpent, that <133> is called the Devil and Satan, that Murtherer of mankinde.^[45] Ye are of your father the Devil, saith our Saviour, and the works of your father will ye doe. We grant that the Visage and Lineage of your Church reaches even beyond the times of the Apostles, the two-horned Beast reviving the Image of the Pagan Beast, the great red Dragon, by bringing up again his old bloudy Persecutions and Idolatries. It suffices us, that our Church began with the Apostles.

If she glories in her Universality, and in her large Territories; tell her, she is^[46] that GREAT City which spiritually is called Sodom and Ægypt, where our Lord was crucified: And that she is Babylon the GREAT, the mother of Fornications and the Abominations of the Earth.

If she boast of the power of the Keys, and of Sacerdotal Absolution; tell her that^[47] he that is holy, he that is true, he that has the Key of David, he that openeth and no man shutteth, and shutteth and no man openeth, that is to <134> say, our Lord Jesus Christ, will never part with these Keys to his inveterate Enemy, that notorious Man of Sin, or Antichrist.

If she spread before thee her goodly wares of mercenary Masses, of Pardons and Indulgences, of the mutuatitious Good works of their pretended Holy men and women; or the Wealth and externall Glories of their Church, and varieties of rich Preferments and Dignities; say unto her; that she is that City of Trade of whom it is written, that^[48] no man buieth her merchandise any more; and again, Alas, alas! that great City that was cloathed in fine linnen and purple and scarlet, and decked with gold and precious stones and pearls: For in one hour so great riches are come to nought. For her Merchants were the great men of the Earth, and by her Sorceries were all Nations deceived. And in her was found the bloud of Prophets, and of Saints, and of all that were slain upon the Earth.

22. If she would amaze thee with <135> the stories of the wonderfull Miracles done by her; tell her that she is that two-horned Beast that^[49] doth great wonders, and that deceiveth them that dwell on the Earth by means of those Miracles which he had power to doe in the sight of the ten-horn'd Beast; or that false Prophet^[50] working Miracles, and deceiving them that receive the mark of the Beast, and worship his Image, who together with the Beast is to be taken, and cast alive into a lake of fire burning with brimstone; or lastly, that Man of Sin and Son of perdition,^[51] whose coming is after the working of Satan, with all power, and signs, and lying wonders.

If she would inveagle thee with her pretenses of Infallibility; tell her that she is that Woman^[52] Jezebel, that calleth her self a Prophetesse; or the Prophet^[53] Balaam, that insnared the Israelites in Idolatry; and that very^[54] false Prophet that together with the Beast is to be cast alive into the lake of burning brimstone.

23. And lastly, if she would gull <136> thee with that specious and much-affected Title of Holy Church; tell her that the Spirit of Truth in the Divine Oracles, let her commend her self as much as she pleases, gives no such Character of her, but quite contrary, declaring the See of Rome to be the^[55] Seat of Satan, and their Church^[56] his Synagogue; the Pope and his Clergy to be^[57] Balaam the son of Bozor, who loved the wages of unrighteousnesse, and who was the Murtherer of Christ's faithfull Martyr Antipas; to be that^[58] Woman Jezebel who calls her self a Prophetesse, but was indeed a Sorceresse, and a murtherer of the true Prophets of the Lord; to be also that^[59] false Prophet, that is to be taken alive, and cast into the lake of fire and brimstone; to be that^[60] great City that spiritually is called Sodom and Ægypt, where our Lord was crucified; to be^[61] the Beast that has the horns of a Lamb, but the voice of the Dragon, decreeing Idolatries and cruel Persecutions against God's people; <137> to be that^[62] Babylon the great, the Mother of Harlots and Abominations of the Earth; the Woman on the seven Hills, that is drunk with the bloud of the Saints and with the bloud of the Martyrs of Jesus; and, lastly, to be that^[63] Man of Sin, that notorious Antichrist, that opposeth and exalteth himself above all that is called God or is worshipped, whose coming is with all deceivableness of unrighteousnesse in them that perish, because they receive not the love of the truth that they may be saved. For which cause God sends them strong delusion, that they believe a lie. That they all might be damned that believe not the truth, but have pleasure in unrighteousnesse. As well πᾶς ὁ φιλῶν, as πᾶς ὁ ποιῶν ψεῦδος, as well all they that love the Romish Lies and Impostures, as all they that invent them, are here plainly declared in the state of Damnation.

With this Nosegay of Rue and Wormwood antidote thy self against the Idolatrous infection of that strange <138> Woman's breath,^[64] whose lips yet drop as an hony-comb, and her mouth is more smooth then oyl. And be assured that that cannot be the true Holy Church wherein Salvation is to be expected, which the Spirit of God has marked with such unholy and hellish Characters, let her boast of her own Holiness as much as she will.

24. And if she return this Answer to thee, That this is not to argue, but to rail in phrases of Scripture; do thou make this short Reply, That whiles she accuses thee of railing against sinfull and obnoxious men, she must take heed that she be not found guilty of blaspheming the holy Spirit of God. I confesse these Propheticall Passages apply'd to such persons as to whom they do not belong were an high and rude strain of Railing indeed, and quite out of the road of Christianity and common Humanity: But to call them Railings when they are apply'd to that very Party to whom they are really meant by that Spirit that dictated them, is indeed to <139> pretend to a sense of Civility towards men, but in the mean time to become a down-right Blasphemer against the Holy Ghost that dictated these Oracles.

And that they are not mis-apply'd, any impartial man of but an ordinary patience and comprehension of wit may have all assurance desirable from that demonstration of the truth compriz'd in the eight last Chapters of the first Book of Synopsis Prophetica; to say nothing of the present Exposition of the Seven Epistles to the Seven Churches in Asia.

25. Wherefore, O serious Soul, whoever thou art, be not complemented out of the Truth and an earnest pursuance of thine own Salvation from a vain sense of the Applauses or Reproaches of men, or from any consideration what they may think of thee for attesting or standing to such Verities as are so unwelcome to many ears, but of such huge importance to all to hear. For no lesse a Game is at stake in our choice of what Church we adhere to, that of Rome or the <140> Reformed, then the Possession of Heaven and eternall Life.

Wherefore stand stoutly upon thy guard, and whensoever thou art accosted by the fair words and sugar'd speeches of that cunning Woman, (who will make semblance of great solicitude for thy future Happinesse, most passionately inviting thee to return into the bosome of Holy Church,) be sure to remember what an Holy Church she is according to Divine description; and that if thou assentest to her smooth Persuasions and crafty Importunities, thou dost ipso facto (pardon the vehemence of expression) adventure thy self into the jaws of Hell, and^[65] cast thy self into the arms of the Devil.

God of his mercy give us all Grace to consider what has been spoken, that we may evermore escape these Snares of Death.