this Divine worship is but relative, yet consequently, the cross itself is worshipped terminatively by Divine adoration. For the image of the cross hath it relatively, and for the cross's sake; therefore the cross itself is the proper and full object of the Divine adoration. Now that they do and teach this, we charge upon them by undeniable records : for in the very Pontifical,' published by the authority of pope Clement the VIIIth, these words are found, "The legate's cross must be on the right hand, because latria, or Divine honour, is due to it b." And if Divine honour relative be due to the legate's cross, which is but the image of Christ's cross, then this Divine worship is terminated on Christ's cross, which is certainly but a mere creature. To this purpose are the words of Almain, "The images of the Trinity, and of the cross, are to be adored with the worship of latria;" that is, ' Divine.' Now if the image of the cross be the intermedial, then the cross itself, whose image that is, must be the last object of this Divine worship; and if this be not idolatry, it can never be told, what is the notion of the word. But this passes also into other real effects: and well may the cross itself be worshipped by Divine worship, when the church places her hopes of salvation on the cross; for so she does, says Aquinas, and makes one the argument of the other, and proves that the church places her hopes of salvation on the cross, that is, on the instrument of Christ's passion, by a hymn which she uses in her offices; but this thing we have remarked above, upon another occasion. Now although things are brought to a very ill state, when Christians are so probably and apparently charged with idolatry, and that the excuses are too fine to be understood by them that need them; yet no excuse can acquit these things, when the most that is, or can be said, is this, that although that which is God's due, is given to a creature; yet it is given with some difference of intention, and metaphysical abstraction, and separation; especially, since, if there can be idolatry in the worshipping of an image, it is certain, that a relative Divine worship is this idolatry; for no man that worships an image b Edit. Roman. p. 672. (in that consideration or formality) can make the image the last object: either, therefore, the heathens were not idolaters in the worshipping of an image, or else these men are. The heathens did indeed infinitely more violate the first commandment; but against the, second, precisely and separately from the first, the transgression is alike. The same also is the case in their worshipping the consecrated bread and wine: of which how far they will be excused before God, by their ignorant pretensions and suppositions, we know not; but they hope to save themselves harmless by saying, that they believe the bread to be their Saviour, and that if they did not believe so, they would not do so. We believe that they say true; but we are afraid that this will no more excuse them, than it will excuse those who worship the sun and moon, and the queen of heaven, whom they would not worship, if they did not believe them to have divinity in them: and it may be observed, that they are very fond of that persuasion, by which they are led into this worship. The error might be some excuse, if it were probable, or if there were much temptation to it: but when they choose this persuasion, and have nothing for it but a tropical expression of Scripture, which rather than not believe in the natural, useless, and impossible sense, they will defy all their own reason, and four of the five operations of their soul, seeing, smelling, tasting, and feeling,— and contradict the plain doctrine of the ancient church, before they can consent to believe this error, that bread is changed into God, and the priest can make his maker: we have too much cause to fear, that the error is too gross to admit an excuse; and it is hard to suppose it invincible and involuntary, because it is so hard, and so untempting, and so unnatural to admit the error. We do desire that God may find an excuse for it, and that they would not. But this we are, most sure of, that they might, if they pleased, find many excuses, or rather just causes, for not giving Divine honour to the consecrated elements; because there are so many contingencies in the whole conduct of this affair, and we are so uncertain of the priest's intention, and we can never be made certain, that there is not in the whole order of causes any invalidity in the consecration; and it is so impos sible that any man should be sure that here,' and 'now,' and this' bread is transubstantiated, and is really the natural body of Christ; that it were fit to omit the giving God's due to that which they do not know to be any thing but a piece of bread, and it cannot consist with holiness, and our duty to God, certainly to give Divine worship to that thing, which though their doctrine were true, they cannot know certainly to have a Divine Being. SECTION XII. AND now we shall plainly represent to our charges, how this whole matter stands. The case is this, the religion of a Christian consists in faith and hope, repentance and charity, Divine worship and celebration of the sacraments, and finally in keeping the commandments of God. Now in all these, both in doctrines and practices, the church of Rome does dangerously err, and teaches men so to do. They do injury to faith, by creating new articles, and enjoining them as of necessity to salvation. They spoil their hope, by placing it upon creatures, and devices of their own. They greatly sin against charity, by damning all that are not of their opinion, in things false or uncertain, right or wrong. They break in pieces the salutary doctrine of repentance, making it to be consistent with a wicked life, and little or no amendment. They worship they know not what, and pray to them that hear them not, and trust on that which helps them not. And as for the commandments, they leave one of them out of their catechisms and manuals; and while they contend earnestly against some opponents for the possibility of keeping them all, they do not insist upon the necessity of keeping any in the course of c Nemini potest per fidem constare se recepisse vel minimum sacramentum. Estque hoc ita certum ex fide, ac clarum est nos vivere. Nulla est via, qua, citra revelationem, nosse possumus intentionem ministrantis, vel evidenter, vel certò ex fide. Andreas Vega, lib. ix. de justific. c. 17.— Non potest quis esse certus, certitudine fidei, se percipere verum sacramentum : cum sacramentum sine intentione ministri non conficiatur, et intentionem alterius nemo videre potest. Bellar, lib. iii. c. 8. sect. Dicent, their lives, till the danger or article of their death. And concerning the sacraments, they have egregiously prevaricated in two points. For not to mention their reckoning of seven sacraments, which we only reckon to be an unnecessary, and unscholastical error; they take the one half of the principal away from the laity; and they institute little sacraments of their own; they invent rites, and annex spiritual graces to them, what they please themselves, of their own head, without a Divine warrant or institution: and, at last persuade their people to that which can never be excused, at least, from material idolatry. If these things can consist with the duty of Christians, not only to eat what they worship, but to adore those things with Divine worship, which are not God; to reconcile a wicked life with certain hopes and expectations of heaven at last, and to place these hopes upon other things than God, and to damn all the world that are not Christians at this rate: then we have lost the true measures of Christianity; and the doctrine and discipline of Christ is not a natural and rational religion: not a religion that makes men holy, but a confederacy under the conduct of a sect, and it must rest in forms and ceremonies, and devices of man's invention. And although we do not doubt, but that the goodness of God does so prevail over all the follies and malice of mankind, that there are, in the Roman communion, many very good Christians; yet they are not such, as they are papists, but by something that is higher, and before that, something that is of an abstract or more sublime consideration. And though the good people amongst them are what they are by the grace and goodness of God, yet by all or any of these opinions they are not so: but the very best suffer diminution, and allay by these things; and very many more are wholly subverted and destroyed. CHAPTER III. The Church of Rome teaches Doctrines, which in many Things are destructive of Christian Society in general, and of Monarchy in special: both which, the Religion of the Church of England and Ireland does, by her Doctrines, greatly and christianly support. SECTION I. THAT in the church of Rome, it is publicly taught by their greatest doctors, that it is lawful to lie, or deceive the question of the magistrate, to conceal their name, and to tell a false one, to elude all examinations, and make them insignificant and toothless, cannot be doubted by any man that knows how the English priests have behaved themselves in the times of queen Elizabeth, king James, and the blessed martyr king Charles I. Emonerius wrote in defence of it; and father Barnes, who wrote a book against lying and equivocating, was suspected for a heretic, and smarted severely under their hands. "To him that asks you again for what you have paid him already, you may safely say, You never had any thing of him, meaning so as to owe it him now:" it is the doctrine of Emanuel Sà and Sanchez;-which we understand to be a great lie, and a great sin, it being at the best a deceiving of the law, that you be not deceived by your creditor; that is, a doing evil to prevent one; a sin, to prevent the losing of your money. If a man asks his wife if she be an adulteress, though she be, yet she may say, she is not,' if in her mind secretly she say, "not with a purpose to tell you:" so cardinal Tolet teaches. And if a man swears he will take such a one to his wife, being compelled to swear; he may secretly mean, "if hereafter she do please me.' And if a man swears to a thief that he will give him twenty crowns, he may secretly If I please to do so;' and then he is not bound. And of this doctrine Vasquez brags, as of a rare, though new say, a Instruct. Sacerd. lib, iv. c. 21. c. 22.. |