Conferences of Romish Priest Fanatic Chaplin and English Divine, Dialogue 3

Conferences of Romish Priest Fanatic Chaplin and English Divine · Dialogue 3

p. 195THE Third Conference, About the Nature of Idolatry.

P. D.

WE are now entring upon a weighty business, and therefore without any preface to it, I begin. Dr. St. in his late Defence hath undertaken to clear the Nature of Idolatry, by considering two things. 1. Whether it were consistent with the acknowledgement of one supreme God? 2. Wherein the Nature of that Divine Worship lyes, which being given to a Creature makes it Idolatry?

1. To clear the former, he considered, who those are, which by common consent p. 196are charged with Idolatry, and from thence he supposed the best resolution of the question might be gathered; and those were, (1.) the Ancient Heathens, (2.) Modern Heathens, (3.) the Arrians. And concerning these he proved, that they did all acknowledge one supreme God, and consequently the Notion of Idolatry could not consist in the Worship of many independent Deities.

(1.) As to the Ancient Heathens. (1.) From the Testimony of Scripture. (2.) From their own Writers in the Roman Church, of whom he names twelve considerable ones. (3.) From the Fathers; and there he shews from a multitude of plain Testimonies, that the state of the Controversie about Idolatry between the Fathers and Heathens, was not about a supreme God which was acknowledged on both sides, but whether Divine Worship were to be given to any Creatures on the account of any supposed excellency in themselves, or relation to God? And so he draws the History of this controversie through the several Ages of Justin Martyr, Athenagoras, Clemens of Alexandria, Origen, Cyril, S. Augustin, &c. In short, through all those who did with greatest reputation to Christianity p. 197manage this Cause against the Heathen Idolaters.

(2.) As to modern Heathens; two wayes. (1.) From the Testimony of your own Writers concerning the Brachmans, Chineses, Tartars, Americans, Africans, Goths and Laplanders. (2.) From the Testimony of the Congregation of Cardinals in a remarkable case about Idolatry in China, wherein their resolution was desired.

(3.) As to the Arrians, he proves from Athanasius, Gr. Nazianzen, Nyssen, Basil, Epiphanius, Cyril, Theodoret, S. Chrysostom, S. Ambrose, S. Augustin; that the Arrians were unanimously charged with Idolatry; although they did acknowledge but one God, and supposed the greatest created excellencies to be in Christ, and believed the Worship of Christ tended to the honour of the Father.

2. As to the Nature of Divine Worship. He proceeds in this method.

1. To shew what Worship is; which he distinguishes from honour, the one relating to bare excellency, the other to Superiority and Power; which distinction he proves from the most eminent School Divines.

p. 1982. What Divine Worship is; viz. such a subjection of our selves to God as shews his peculiar Soveraignty over us: from whence he proceeds to manifest, That there are some peculiar external Acts of Divine Worship, which he proves, (1.) From the Nature and design of Religious Worship; and here he enquires into the distinction of Civil and Religious Worship; which, he saith, as other moral actions, is to be taken from the circumstances of them: and from hence came the institution of solemn rites for Religious Worship. And the best Divines of the Roman Church do allow, that there ought to be some peculiar external Acts of Divine Worship; which he likewise proves from the infinite distance between God and his Creatures; and from the remarkable Testimonies of the Heathens to that purpose.

(2.) From Gods appropriating some external Acts of Worship to himself; wherein he speaks to two things:

1. What those Acts are which God hath appropriated to himself; of which he reckons up six.

1. Sacrifice. 2. Religious adoration. 3. Erection of Temples and Altars. p. 1994. Burning of Incense. 5. Solemn Invocation. 6. Vows.

2. How far Gods appropriating these Acts doth concern us? Which he thus resolves. 1. It is granted there must be some peculiar Acts. 2. God is the best Judge of them. 3. What he hath once appropriated cannot be made common till his Will be declared. 4. Christ hath made no alteration herein by his Law. 5. The Apostles suppose the same notion of Idolatry to continue still. 6. The Jews did esteem it Idolatry to use those acts of Worship towards any Creature. Where he shews that Idolatry may be committed as many wayes as Worship may become due to God.

(3.) From the sense of the Christian Church; which hath condemned those for Idolatry who have applyed these appropriate Acts of Worship to any thing besides God.

3. How the applying the Acts of Religious Worship to a Creature makes that Worship Idolatry? Where he explains,

1. What real honour we do allow to the Saints on the account of their excellencies.

2. What Worship we deny to them. (1.) Inward submission of our souls in p. 200prayer, dependence, and thanksgiving. (2.) External and solemn Acts of Religious Worship, which are given to Saints in the Church of Rome: and he proves from unquestionable Testimonies of Antiquity, that the Fathers did deny to be given to them. And so he concludes that Discourse with a full and clear explication of a Testimony of S. Augustin against Invocation of Saints.

This is a brief Abstract of the design of Dr. St.'s discourse concerning the Nature of Idolatry; whose parts are too well considered and put together to be blown down with a puff or two of Wit. Let me now hear how T. G. hath acquitted himself in this matter, which we shall the better judge of, by having this Scheme before us.

R. P.

I perceive you expect T. G. should have followed Dr. St.'s method, and have answered him part by part; but he was wiser than so; for he charges him with three things. (1.) That he makes vain, and endless, and unnecessary discourses. (2.) That he ought to have laid down the true notion of Idolatry from the nature of the thing, which he hath not done. (3.) That he hath unfaithfully reported the words and sense of Authors. After which, p. 201he disproves the parallel between the Heathen and Romish Idolatry.

P. D.

This last, if you please, we will reserve to another Conference; for I believe the other three, will hold us long enough. I pray begin where T. G. doth.

R. P.

First, He complains much of the Bulk of the Book; and brings in a kind of a Taylors bill of the number of pages:Dial. p. 167, 171, 172. Imp. of T. G.'s notion of Idolatry, p. 183. It. Of the Nature of Divine Worship, p. 164. It. Of the Controversie about Images between Christians and Heathens, p. 140. It. Of Images in the Christian Church, p. 180. odd. It. Of the sense of the second Commandment, p. 113. It. Of Instances, and facings and linings, p. 96. Sum. tot. p. 877. Was not this enough to put any man out of humour?

P. D.

No doubt; when he considered he was to pay it all. And I do believe what he saith, that he was very uneasie when he read it; and like the Laconian in Boccalini, who was condemned to read over Guicciardines War of Pisa: and desired rather to be condemned to the Gallies. For there is nothing more troublesome to a man than to see that he owes more than he is ever able to pay.

p. 202R. P.

But T. G. shews how much of the Bill might have been cut off.

P. D.

The shortest way had been to have thrown all into the Fire, as no doubt he would have done, if it had been in his Power, and that had been the most effectual Discharge to Dr. St.'s charge of Idolatry. But do you think, it is a good answer to an Indictment, to say it consisted of too many lines?

R. P.

T. G. saith he ought to have proceeded more Mathematically.

P. D.

How so?

R. P.

By laying down only these four Postulata.Dial. p. 173. 1. That Idolatry may consist with the acknowledgement of one Supreme Being. 2. That God ought to be worshipped according to his own appointment. 3. That the Wiser Heathens pretended they did not look on their Images as Gods, but as Symbols of that Being to which they gave divine Worship. 4. That for the four first Centuries, there was little or no use of Images in the Temples and Oratories of Christians. Which as far as I understand T. G. he was willing to have granted him.

P. D.

Are you sure of that? If these things be fairly granted, they will go a great way toward the resolution of the present Question. But I pray let me p. 203understand how far and in what sense?

R. P.

For the first, that Idolatry may consist with the acknowledgement of one supreme Being: I perceive T. G. puts this limitation to it,Dial. p. 174. at least as Idolatry is taken by Dr. St. for the giving external Acts of Worship, due only to God, to a Creature.

P. D.

Let us then lay up this at present, that real Idolatrous Worship is consistent with the acknowledgement of one supreme God; which may be of use to us in this debate.

R. P.

For the second, T. G. saith, that it is no where denyed, but is supposed by him, Dial. p. 175.when he saith, that if God have forbidden himself to be worshipped after such a manner, the giving him such worship will be dishonouring of him, though the Giver intend it never so much for his honour, much more then, the giving acts of worship appropriated to him to another.

P. D.

This is very kind. For then if it appear, that God hath forbidden the Worship of himself by an Image, it follows that no intention of the person can excuse such worship from Idolatry.

R. P.

For the third, concerning the practice of the wiser Heathens, T. G. allows the Dr. to make his best of it.

p. 204P. D.

Then there may be Idolatrous worship of Images, where the Images themselves are not made the objects of Worship; and consequently if such worship be forbidden in the second Commandment, that cannot be understood only of bowing down to the Images themselves.

R. P.

For the fourth, he saith, since the Church hath a power in decreeing Rites and Ceremonies, Dial. p. 176, &c.it had been no prejudice to his Cause, if it had been longer, before the Use of Images was brought into Churches.

P. D.

If the Church had looked on the worship of Images as an indifferent Rite, there had been some reason for what T. G. saith; But the force of what Dr. St. said, lay not meerly in their having no Images in Churches in the Primitive times; but in the Reasons given by the Primitive Christians against the Worship of them. From whence he hath at large proved that the Primitive Christians did look on the Worship of Images as utterly unlawful by the Law of God, although the Object represented did deserve Worship. And this I take to be one of the most material Discourses in Dr. St.'s Book, to the present Controversie, and which he lays the greatest weight upon. For he insists upon these p. 205several particulars. (1.) **P. 419. to p. 428.That they judged such a representation of God by Images to be unsuitable to his Nature; for which he produceth the Testimonies of Clemens Alexandr., Justin Martyr, Athenagoras, Origen, S. Hierom, S. Augustin and others. (2.) ††Defence, p. 428, &c. p. 490, &c.That they looked on the Worship of Images as repugnant to the Will of God; as being contrary to the second Commandment, which did oblige Christians. (3.) **P. 494, &c.That to suppose that they looked on the worship of Images as a thing indifferent, is to charge the Primitive Christians with great hypocrisie. (4.) ††P. 497. to p. 505.That the Christian Church continued to have the same opinion about the worship of Images after the Pagan Idolatry was suppressed. (5.) **P. 506. to p. 521.That it was no just excuse in the sense of the Primitive Church, that they worshipped a true object, or gave only an inferiour worship to the Images, for the sake of those represented by them. (6.) ††P. 503, &c.That Ignorance and Superstition first brought in the worship of Images, which was still condemned by the best Divines of the Church. (7.) **P. 538. to p. 555.That the Worship of Images came to be established in the Church by very indirect means; such as Treason, calumnies, lyes, and burning and suppressing p. 206all Books against it. (8.) ††P. 812. to p. 840.That when it was established by the second Council of Nice, it was vehemently opposed by the Western Church at the Council of Francford: and that this Council of Nice was never owned in the Western Church for a General Council till the Reformation began.

And now I pray was it possible for T. G. to overlook all these things? or was it fair to pretend to answer Dr. St.'s Book, wherein all these things are, and yet to pass them over, as if they had never been written? If this be the way of making Just Discharges, I am afraid T.G.'s credit cannot hold out long; for this is not after the rate of five shillings in the pound: and for all that I see, Dr. St. may take out the Statute against him. However, I shall consider what he pretends to Discharge, and if his payment be not good in that neither, his Word will hardly be taken for any Just Discharge more. I pray go on.

R. P.

For the fifth Chapter, Of the sense of the second Commandment, T. G. saith,Dial. p. 177. if God hath there expresly prohibited the giving any Worship to himself by an Image, as Dr. St. affirms, there needed no more than to expose the Law as in a Table p. 207in Legislative Gothick (as it is done by him, p. 671.) with the addition only of a Finger in the Margent to point to the Words for every one that runs to read them.

P. D.

And must this pass for an Answer to Dr. St.'s Discourse about the sense of the second Commandment? I am really ashamed of such trifling in a matter of so great importance. I know not whether it were the Legislative Gothick or no, or a Finger on the Wall, but something or other about that Commandment hath so affrighted you in the Church of Rome, that you dare not let it be seen in your Ordinary Books of Devotion. As for the cavil about expresly, I have answered it already.

R. P.

For his last Chapter, T. G. saith, there needed no more than to say, Dial. p. 179.that the Church of England doth not allow any Worship to be given to the Altar.

P. D.

Is it possible for T. G. to think to fob us off with such answers as these? barely to tell his Adversary, he might have spared this and the other Discourse.

R. P.

But T. G. saith, this is the most material thing in that Chapter.

P. D.

Say you so? Was the wise Council of Nice, so immaterial a thing? that p. 208it must now be quite abandoned, and no kind of Discharge be so much as offered to be made for it? Was there nothing material in what concerns the charge of Contradictions, Paradoxes, School-disputes, &c.? And all the other Instances waved to come to this of Bowing to the Altar? there must be some Mysterie in this; and I think I have found it, the Patronus bonae Fidei inveighs bitterly against this, as worse than Egyptian Idolatry, and reproaches Dr. St. upon account of his defending it: and T. G. finds it much easier to reproach than to answer.

R. P.

The truth is, this Patronus bonae Fidei doth T. G. Knights service; For when he hath no mind to appear himself, he serves him for a Knight of the Post, who runs blindfold upon any thing that may discredit the Church of England; two or three such rare men would ease us of a great deal of trouble.Dial. p. 182. to 187. For T. G. takes between five and six pages together out of him in this place, besides what he hath taken up at interest upon other occasions.

P. D.

Is this the Just Discharge, to borrow so much out of the Fanatick stock? Setting then aside what is brought over of the old Account, which had been p. 209reckoned for before; and how very many material things are never entred, which he was accountable for; and how much he hath borrowed upon the Bona Fides of the Fanatick Historian, all the rest will amount to a very pitiful Discharge. But since no better payment can be had, let us at least examine this: For this Bona Fides is a kind of Republican Publick Faith, which no body will trust twice, not so much as for Bodkins and Thimbles.

F. C.

Hold Sir. You love alwayes to be rubbing upon old Sores; have you forgot the Act of Oblivion? You know we dare not speak what we think of those times now; and is that fair to accuse when we dare not answer? Mind your own business, defend the Church of England if you can, in that Idolatrous practice of bowing to the Altar. I alwayes thought what it would come to, when Dr. St. went about the charge of Idolatry upon the principles of the Church of England; I knew he could never defend himself but upon good Orthodox Fanatick principles, as you call them. Now Sir, you have him at an advantage, joyn your force and T. G.'s with that of the Patronus bonae Fidei, and if the Geese p. 210follow the Fox close, you will keep him from ever stirring more.

P. D.

I thank you for your good Will to the Cause, and that is all I fear from you; you only add to the number, and help to preserve the Roman Capitol by your noise.

R. P.

You shall not escape thus; what say you to bowing to the Altar, is not that as great Idolatry, as worship of Images?

P. D.

Do you not remember the answer Dr. St. hath already given to this objection?

R. P.

I tell you I read none of his Books, and know not what he hath written, but as I find it in T. G.

P. D.

What is that?

R. P.

Have I not told you already, that the Church of England doth not allow any worship to be given to the Altar?

P. D.

And is not that to the purpose? For dare any of you say so of the Church of Rome in respect of Images?

R. P.

But T. G. saith, this is not the meaning of the Canon which Dr. St. produces: Dial. p. 180.for, he saith, the Canon only implyes that they give no Religious worship to it, but they do not deny any kind of worship to be given to it; and Dr. St. himself grants p. 211that there is a Reverence due to Sacred Places.

P. D.

Now your bolt is shot I hope I may have leave to say something both in behalf of the Canon and Dr. St. (1.) For the Canon, I say as Dr. St. did, that it denyes any worship to be given to the Altar, for it makes the adoration to be immediately made to the Divine Majesty, without respect to the Altar, either as the Object or Means of Worship, which I prove, (1.) From the Introduction. For can any words be more express than those, in the Introduction? For as much as the Church is the House of God, dedicated to his holy Worship (not to that of the Altar) and therefore ought to mind us both of the Greatness and Goodness of his Divine Majesty (not of the sacredness of the Altar) certain it is that the acknowledgement thereof, not only inwardly in our hearts, but also outwardly with our Bodies, must needs be pious in it self, profitable unto us and edifying unto others. If the intention of the Canon had been to have given any worship to the Altar, the Introduction must have related to that, and not to the Divine Majesty.

p. 212(2.) From the Recommendation; we therefore think it meet and behooveful, and heartily commend it to all good and well-affected People, members of this Church, that they be ready to tender unto the Lord, (not to the Altar) the said due acknowledgement by doing Reverence and Obeysance both at their coming in and going out of the said Churches, &c. according to the most ancient Custom of the Primitive Church in Purest times, and of this Church also for many years of the Reign of Queen Elizabeth.

(3.) From the express disowning the giving any Religious worship to the Communion Table. Which is not meant of an individuum vagum, but of this Act of Adoration, which is the Religious worship here spoken of; and thereby no kind of worship is intended to the Altar, but only to God. And which is more plain yet by what follows, that it is not done out of an opinion of the Corporal Presence of Christs Body on the Table, or in the Mystical Elements; but only (mark that) for the advancement of Gods Majesty, and to give him Alone, (not the Altar together with him) that honour and glory which is due unto him and no otherwise. Can any words be plainer than these? They want p. 213only Legislative Gothick, and a Finger in the Margent, for T. G. to understand them.

(4.) Archbishop Laud who certainly understood the meaning of this Canon, pleads only for the worship to be given immediately to God himself. God forbid, saith he,Speech in Star-Chamber, p. 43, 46. that we should worship any thing but God himself: and he adds, if there were no Table standing, he would worship God when he came into his House. And he calls it still, Doing Reverence to Almighty God, but only towards his Altar: and he saith, the People did understand this fully, and apply the worship to God, and to none but God.

(5.) When the introducing this, was made one of the Articles of his Charge by the Commons; his Answer was,Canterbury's Tryal, p. 473. That his bowing was only to worship God, not the Altar, and I hope it is no offence or treason to worship God in the Kings own Chapel, or to induce others to do the like.

(6.) I do not find any of our Divines who pleaded most for it, do contend for any more than worshipping God towards the Altar, and not giving any worship to the Altar; the arguments they used were for determining the local circumstance of worship, and not for making the Altar the p. 214object of it.Defence, p. 705, &c. And the difference between these two Dr. St. hath at large cleared.

R. P.

But cannot we say, that we only worship God before an Image, and do not give any Religious worship to the Image, and then the case is parallel?

P. D.

You may say so, and you sometimes do, to deceive ignorant people; but you cannot say it truly. For (1.) Your Councils have determined that Religious worship is to be given to Images; our Canon saith, it is not to be given to the Altar, therefore the case is far from being parallel. And Dr. St. hath fully proved, that the Nicene Council did require Religious worship to be given to Images; Defence, p. 577, &c.and Anathematizes all who do it not. And utterly rejects those that say they are to be had only for memory, and out of some kind of Honour or Reverence; for nothing but Religious worship would satisfie them. And the Acts of that worship are expressed to be not only bowing but prostration, kissing, oblation of Incense and Lights; and Dr. St. hath elsewhere shewed, that all the Acts of worship which the Heathens did perform to their Images in old Rome, are given to Images in modern Rome. From p. 648. to p. 699.(2.) Those in the Church of Rome who have only contended for the worship of p. 215God before the Image, have been condemned by others as savouring of Heresie, who say it is a matter of Faith in the Roman Church, that Images are to be worshipped truly and properly; and that the contrary opinion is dangerous, rash, and sovouring of Heresie, From p. 583. to p. 599.which is likewise proved at large by Dr. St.

R. P.

But doth not Dr. St. himself allow a Reverence due to Sacred places?

P. D.

He doth so. But do you observe the difference he puts between that and Worship? I will endeavour to make his distinct notion of these things plain to you.

First, He distinguishes between Honour and Worship:

(1.) Honour he makes to be the Esteem of Excellency;

Either Inward, only in the mind.

Either Outward, in acts suitable to that estimation.

p. 216And this Excellency may be twofold, 1. Personal. 2. Relative.

1. Personal; and that threefold;

1. Civil; in regard of humane Society, as that of Abraham to the Children of Heth.

2. Moral; on account of moral Excellencies; either

Natural,

or Acquired.

3. Spiritual; in regard of supernatural Graces:

And that may be given two wayes,

(1.) To the Persons as present; which is Religious Respect: as that of Nebuchadnezzar to Daniel, Dan. 2.46. Of Abraham to the Angels, Gen. 18.2.

(2.) To them as absent; and this is Religious Honour: and it lyes chiefly in Thanksgiving to God for them, and celebrating their memories; because the Honour of Divine Graces ought to redound chiefly to the giver of them.

p. 2172. Relative: from the relation which things have to what we esteem on the account of its own excellency.

1. Civil Relation to our Friends, or strangers whom we esteem; and so we set a value on their Pictures, on their Letters or Hand-writing, or any thing belonging to them.

2. Spiritual Relation to God and his Worship; and the regard to these he calls Reverence.

And that lies in these things:

(1.) Discrimination from common use.

(2.) Consecration to a sacred use.

(3.) Suitable Vsage of them in regard of that relation.

p. 218But if you ask wherein the difference of this lies from Worship, He saith, from the greatest Divines of your Church, that

(2.) Worship hath a respect to Power and Superiority; and that is

1. Civil; in regard of the Power and Authority of Magistrates.

2. Religious; in regard of Gods peculiar Soveraignty over us,

And that is twofold,

1. Internal in

Submission,

Dependence.

2. External; which must be,

1. Such as express our submission and dependence; as

1. Sacrifice. 2. Solemn invocation. 3. Adoration. 4. Vows. 5. Swearing by him, &c.

2. They must be peculiar to himself.

1. From the dictate of Nature, as to the peculiarity of Gods Soverainty.

p. 2192. From the Will of God, which appropriates such Acts to himself.

3. From the consent of Nations and the Christian Church.

Therefore the giving that Worship which is due to God, and doth express our subjection to him, to any thing besides him, is violation of the Rights of Gods Soveraignty; and if it be given to any creature, it receives its denomination from the Nature of that Creature to which it is given.

(1.) To Animate Creatures.

Angels.

Good.

Bad.

Dead men.

Saints.

Wicked.

Brutes of all sorts.

(2.) To Inanimate.

Natural.

Elements.

Minerals.

Plants.

Artificial; made to represent the objects of Worship, and therefore called Images.

p. 220Which is properly Idolatry, being the worship of a representation; but because that word Idol is extended to any creature to which the Worship proper to God is given, therefore every such kind of Worship is in Scripture, and by the Christian Church called Idolatry. And by this Scheme of Dr. St.'s notion of these things, you may easily understand the difference he puts between Reverence and Worship.

R. P.

But T. G. saith, The Church of Rome requires by the terms of Communion with her, Dial. p. 181.no more than Reverence, or Honorary respect to Images.

P. D.

Why doth T. G. go about thus to impose on his Readers without answering what Dr. St. had produced to the contrary? From three things.

1. From the Decrees of the second Council of Nice.

2. From the constant opinion of their most eminent Divines, both before, and after the Council of Trent.

3. From the publick and allowed Practises of their Church.

1. In Consecration of Images for Worship; with Forms prescribed in the Roman Pontifical.

2. In Supplication before them, with prostrations and all other Acts p. 221of Worship which the Heathens used towards them.

3. In Solemn Processions with Images, with the same kind of Pomp and Ceremony which was used in Heathen Rome.

And after all this can T. G. have the confidence to say, this is only Honorary Respect without answering to any one of these particulars, which were purposely alledged to prove the contrary?

R. P.

But now Sir look to your self, for the Patronus bonae Fidei knocks all down before him, and proves bowing to the Altar practised in the Church of England to be worse than Popish or Egyptian Idolatry.

P. D.

I hope not worse than the Power of Excommunication, which the same excellent Advocate for Fanaticks hath bestowed as ill names upon and with as little Reason: but such as it is I am prepared to receive it.

R. P.

The Patronus bonae Fidei saith, that, However Dr. St. wheadled and blinded with preferments (for that is the meaning of T. G.'s &c.) endeavours to palliate this kind of Adoration, Prodr…m. p. 76.and to vindicate it from the crime of Idolatry, yet I doubt not to affirm, that this bowing outvies p. 222the Idolatry both of Egyptians and Romanists, not only in horrible iniquity and enormitie, but in madness and folly.

F. C.

Who is this Patronus bonae Fidei, you speak so much of? He is a good man I warrant him. He speaks home to the business.

P. D.

Yes if ignorance and confidence doth it: for never did man betray more than your Advocate in this saying.

F. C.

He will prove it I warrant you.

P. D.

Just as you did Kneeling at the Communion to be Idolatry; if so well. But first for the Roman Idolatry.

R. P.

It is not, saith he, so much madness in them to adore the Lord Jesus under the species of bread, as it is an error in them to believe transubstantiation. Dial. p. 183.But it is an Hypochondriacal madness, and giddybrained stupidity for men to perform adoration towards that place, where Christ is no more present than any where else, and where neither the Table, nor Altar, nor any thing that is set upon the Table (unless perchance a clean Towel, two Books richly bound, or a pair of Candlesticks with two Candles in them, not to be lighted, till their minds be quite drunk with Popery) represent either Christ or his Image. A Fanatical Adoration he calls it, without any Object.

p. 223P. D.

Call you this proving? It is rather raving and foaming at the mouth. This is such biting as may endanger an Hydrophobia. There is no arguing with such a man, but in a dark Room and under good Keepers. But that you may take no advantage by his sayings; how can it be Idolatry without an Object? i.e. Idolatry without an Idol. But can there be no Object of worship but what is visible? What doth he worship himself? Or rather whom do his Clients the Fanaticks worship? Nothing? Because not a visible object. Is not adoration a part of Worship? If not, it is no Idolatry to give it to an Image. If it be, then bowing to an Invisible Object in a place dedicated to Divine Worship is giving to God that Worship, which being given to an Image makes it Idolatry. I pray Sir do you answer for him.

F. C.

I understand you not.

P. D.

I thought so. But I will endeavour to make you understand me. Is the bowing down to an Image Idolatry?

F. C.

Yes, without all doubt.

P. D.

Is not Idolatry giving to a Creature the Worship that is due to God?

F. C.

Yes.

p. 224P. D.

How can that be giving to a Creature the Worship due to God; if it be not lawful to give this Worship to God which you give to the Creature?

F. C.

I know not what you mean.

P. D.

Not yet? Is not adoration of an Image, Idolatry?

F. C.

Yes, I told you so once already.

P. D.

Then adoration is to be given to God. How else can the giving it to a Creature make it Idolatry?

F. C.

I do not well understand you; but as far as I can guess, you speak of bodily worship; but alas! we know that God must be worshipped in Spirit and in Truth.

P. D.

Who denies that? But observe what follows, then no man is guilty of Idolatry, that doth not worship an Image in Spirit and in Truth: but the Law forbids bowing down to them and worshipping of them; do you think that bowing down is meant of the Mind or of the Body?

F. C.

What is it you would have by all these Questions?

P. D.

No more but this, that it is lawful to give external adoration to the Divine Majesty.

F. C.

And what then?

p. 225P. D.

Is it lawful to give God that worship, (which it is lawful to give absolutely) in a place set apart for his Worship?

F. C.

That is a strange question indeed.

P. D.

See now, what you have brought your self to; to acknowledge that to be lawful which you so rashly called Idolatry.

F. C.

What is that?

P. D.

Bowing in the Church, in testimony of our adoration of the Divine Majesty.

F. C.

That is not it; but it is bowing to the Altar.

P. D.

Who knows best? Those that made the Canon or you? They declare they meant nothing else than what I have said; and deny any Religious Worship to be given to the Altar. And would not you think it hard for us to accuse you for worshipping your Hats in prayer, because you put them before your faces when you pray; as you do us for worshipping the Altar, because we bow towards it?

F. C.

But you look towards the Altar when you bow.

p. 226P. D.

And are not your eyes upon your Hats when you pray? And is not prayer a part of Gods immediate Worship?

F. C.

But we call it bowing to the Altar.

P. D.

We may as well call yours, praying to the Hat.

F. C.

Some do assign the reason of their worship from the Communion Table, and we never do from our Hats.

P. D.

They do not assign the reason of their worship; but the reason of that circumstance of it, why that way rather than another; which they parallel with the Jews worshipping of God towards the Ark and the Cherubims, which yet were no objects of Divine Worship, either by Gods appointment, or the Jewish practice, or in the opinion of some of the most learned Divines, even of the Roman Church; who make the most advantage they can of it;Defence from p. 702, to p. 717. as Dr. St. hath at large proved in his Answer to T. G.; and I do not hear of any Reply T. G. hath made to it.

R. P.

But the Patronus bonae Fidei saith, the Papists have more reason to worship Christ on the supposition of Transubstantiation, than you have to worship—

p. 227P. D.

What? Speak out. The Altar? we deny it to be any Object of Worship to us: If he means, than to worship God with external adoration towards the Altar, let him do that, which he never yet did, prove what he saith; viz. that there is more reason to worship Christ under the bread on supposition of transubstantiation, than for our giving external adoration to the Divine Majesty. For to give this adoration to God needs no other supposition but of his infinite Majesty and Omnipresence; but to worship Christ on the Altar under the species of Bread, doth not only suppose the truth of one of the most absurd suppositions in the world, that the substance of the Bread is changed into the Body of Christ, and the Body of Christ is there invisibly present under the species of Bread: but it supposes likewise these things. 1. That the Body of Christ as united with the species of Bread is a proper object of Divine Adoration: i. e. that these two do make up one entire object of Divine Worship; and then it follows that the sacramental species are a partial object of Divine Adoration, for whatever goes to make up an object entire must have share with it; which is quite another thing from an p. 228accidental connexion, as of a Princes Robes together with his Person; for no man ever said the Princes Garments made up with his Person an Object fit to be kneeled to in token of Subjection. But here is an union supposed between Christs Body and the Accidents, and such an union by vertue whereof Divine Worship is directed to the species of Bread, and consequentially to the Body of Christ as united thereto. 2. It supposeth, that the Body of Christ being thus united with the species of bread may receive all that worship which is due to God alone. Which is not very easie to prove. Because it doth not follow, that whereever a Body is, there those things must be which do not result by necessary concomitancy from the being of a Body. For since it doth not follow by vertue of the Hypostatical union that whereever the Divinity is, the humane nature of Christ must be there also; how doth it necessarily follow, that whereever the Body of Christ is, the Divinity is so present as to make that Body become an Object of Divine Adoration? We say the Foot is united to the Soul as well as the Head, but do we therefore say that whatever is in the Soul is equally p. 229present in the Foot as in the Head? as that the Foot reasons, considers, directs as the Head doth. It is not therefore bare union but the manner of Presence, which doth make an Object fit for adoration. That Presence ought to be (if not glorious and becoming the Divine Majesty in that respect) yet so well attested, as the Divinity of Christ was in his humane nature, by the voice of Angels, by Testimony of God himself from Heaven, by miracles, by Prophecies, &c. But here is nothing like this; no evidence being given of the Divine Presence under the Elements, neither from sense, nor reason, nor Scripture. For the Scripture is only pretended to speak of the Body of Christ, and not of his Divinity.

R. P.

But by vertue of the hypostatical union where-ever the Body of Christ is, his Divine Nature must be present too.

P. D.

That I know very well is commonly said by you; but I pray consider these two things. (1.) If the Body of Christ may be present by reproduction of the same Body; as some of your greatest and latest Divines have asserted; then there is no such necessity of concomitancy of the Divinity of Christ; because they say, God may reproduce the same body without p. 230all the accidents of it, and consequently without the Hypostatical Vnion. (2.) By the same way of Concomitancy they may hold the Persons of the Father and Holy Ghost to be under the species, and to be there worshipped. For where the Body of Christ is, there the soul is; where Soul and Body is, there the Divinity is; where the Divinity is, there the Person of the Son is; and where the Person of the Son is, there the Persons of the Father and Holy Ghost are too.

R. P.

You may account this an absurdity, but we account it none at all: yea some of our Divines have said, If the Holy Trinity were not every where, yet it would be in the Eucharist, by vertue of this Concomitancy.

P. D.

I do not now meddle with your opinions; I only consider the Patronus bonae Fidei and his Brethren, who do look on these as absurdities, and yet are so foolish to say, that our worshipping God towards the Altar is more absurd than your worshipping Christ on the Altar, on supposition of Transubstantiation. But why worse than Egyptian Idolatry, I beseech you?

R. P.

The Egyptians, saith he, pretended some colour for their Idolatry, as p. 231than an Ape, or a Cat, or a Wolf, Dial. p. 184.&c. had some participation of the Divinity; but those that bow down to a Wooden Table are themselves stocks: with much more to that purpose.

P. D.

Is such a man to be endured in a Christian Common-wealth (not to say a Church, for excommunication he regards not) who parallels the adoration given only to the Divine Majesty (as our Church professeth) with the Worship of an Ape, or a Cat, or a Wolf, &c? Nay he makes the Egyptian Idolatry more reasonable than our Worship of God. The only thing that can excuse him is Rage and Madness; and therefore I leave him to his Keeper. But I pray tell me, was it meer kindness to the Church of England which made T. G. to produce all these passages at full length out of the Patronus bonae Fidei? Or out of pure spite to Dr. St. by so often repeating the passage of his being delinitus & occaecatus? And why in such a place, where he pretends only to give an account of Dr. St.'s vain and endless Discourses, doth he bring in this at large? Is it only for his comfort to let him see, there is one body at least in the world, more foolish and impertinent than he? We have seen enough p. 232of what T. G. ought not to have done, let us now see what he saith Dr. St. ought to have done.

R. P.

The first thing to be done in a Dispute, Dial. p. 193.is to settle the state of the Controversie upon its true Grounds, by laying down the true notion of the matter in debate; therefore Dr. St. ought in the first place to have given us the true Notion of Idolatry in the nature of the Thing; and then to have shewn that notion to have agreed to the honour and veneration which the Church of Rome in her Councils declares may be given to the Images of Christ and the Saints: but he chose rather to dazle the eyes of the Reader with the false lights of meer external Acts, the obscure practice even of wiser Heathens, and the clashing of School-Divines.

P. D.

Now I hope we are come to something worthy of consideration. I like the method of proceeding very well. And I like Dr. St.'s Book the better, because I think he pursued the right method, beginning first with the Nature of Idolatry and Divine Worship; and then coming to the first Particular of Image-worship, which he hath handled with great care and exactness in respect of your Councils as well as your Practices and School-Divines.

p. 233R. P.

It is true, he proposed well at first, Dial. p. 195, &c.but like a Preacher that hath patched up a Sermon out of his note-book, he names his Text, and then takes his leave of it. For, what he was to speak to, was Idolatry in the nature of the thing, independently of any positive Law, whereas he speaks only of an Idolatry forbidden by a positive Law; but if there be no Idolatry antecedent to a positive prohibition, the Heathens could not be justly charged with Idolatry.

P. D.

In my mind, he did not recede from his Text at all, but pursued it closely; but you are uneasie at his Application, and therefore find fault with his handling his Text. What could a man speak to more pertinently as to Idolatry in the Nature of the thing, than to consider, what that is, which is acknowledged to be Idolatry both in the Heathens and Arrians; What that was which the Primitive Church accounted Idolatry in them; What opinons those have of God, whom the Roman Church do charge with Idolatry; Wherein the Nature of Divine Worship consists, not only with respect to positive commands, but the general consent of mankind; Did **Defence, p. 191. p. 210.he not expresly argue from the Reason and design of solemn Religious worship abstractly from positive p. 234Laws? Did he not shew ††From p. 210. to p. 215.from many Testimonies, that the Heathens did look on some peculiar Rites of Divine worship as Sacred and Inviolable, that they chose rather to dye, than to give them any but a Divine Object? It is true, after this, he enquires into the Law of God, and what acts of worship he had appropriated to himself; and was there not great Reason to do so? Are we unconcerned in the Laws God made for his worship? In my apprehension, this was the great thing T. G. had to do, to prove that Gods Law about worship was barely ceremonial, and only respected the Jews; but that we are left to the Liberties of the Law of Nature, about Religious worship: but he neither doth this, nor if he had done it, had he overthrown Dr St.'s Book. For he proves in several places, that the Heathens had the same distinctions of soveraign and inferiour worship; absolute and relative, which are used in the Roman Church; and if these do excuse now, they would have excused them, who by Scripture and the consent of the Christian Church are condemned for Idolatry. And judge you now, whether Dr. St. took leave of his Text, whether he did not speak to Idolatry in the Nature of the thing?

p. 235R. P.

But he saith,P. 199, &c. the Heathens could not understand the nature and sinfulness of Idolatry if not from some Law of God; which is in effect to clear the Heathens from Idolatry, till that Law was delivered to them; whereas S. Paul saith, they had a Law written in their hearts, whereby they might understand it; and Dr. St. ought to have shewn wherein the deordination and sinfulness of Idolatry did consist antecedently to any positive prohibition; and till this be done, he can make no parallel between the Heathen Idolatry and that of the Roman Church.

P. D.

I am glad to find any thing that looks like a difficulty, which may give an occasion of farther thoughts about this weighty matter, and of clearing the Doctors mind concerning it. Herein I shall endeavour to explain these two things. 1. How far Dr. St. doth make the nature and sinfulness of Idolatry to depend on the Law of God. 2. Wherein the sinfulness of Idolatry doth consist abstractly from a positive Law.

1. How far he makes the sinfulness of it to depend on a positive Law.

1. He supposes Natural Religion to dictate these things.Defence, p. 194, 195, 196, 197. 1. That God ought to be solemnly worshipped. 2. That p. 236this worship ought to be peculiar to the Divine Nature in regard of his Soveraignty over us, and the infinite distance between him and his Creatures. 3. That the giving this solemn worship which is due to God to any Creature, is the invading the Rights of his Soveraignty. Thence he shews from Aquinas, that worship is not given to God because he needs it, but that the belief of one God may hereby be confirmed in us by external and sensible Acts, which cannot be done unless there be some peculiar Acts of his Worship. And external worship is a profession of internal; acts being expressive of our minds as well as words. Thence he determines, that Idolatry is a sin of the highest nature, because it invades Gods peculiar Rights; and implyes blasphemy in it, because it takes away from God the peculiarity of his dominion. Are not these arguments drawn from the nature of the thing, and not meerly from a positive Law?

2. Notwithstanding these dictates of natural Reason concerning the worship of God, yet he supposes mankind to have been so corrupted as to have lost the sense of the sinfulness of giving divine worship to creatures. Which, he saith, they did p. 237chiefly on a threefold supposition. (1.) That God committed the Government of the world under him to some inferiour Deities. Or,P. 113. (2.) That God was the soul of the world, and therefore the worship given to the parts of it did redound to him. Or (3.) That external adoration was below him, and that the service due to God was that of our minds, and the other might be given to Creatures.

3. That God saw it necessary to revive the peculiarity of his worship by his Law given in the Decalogue; which although given to the Jews, was of an eternal and immutable nature, being not built on any reason peculiar to them, but common to all mankind; and on this account the Christian Church did look on the same Law as obliging all Christians; as the Doctour hath proved in several places before cited.

4. That when the Apostles went abroad to reclaim the world from Idolatry, they made use of no other notion of it, than what was received among the Jews; and by the Reasons on which the Law of God was founded, they convinced the world of that sin of Idolatry, which by the corruption of mankind, and the custom of the world they had lost the p. 238sense of. And this was plainly the meaning of Dr. St.'s words to any unprejudiced mind, as appears by laying these things together; which are all contained in the same discourse. If we say the Gentiles had lost the sense of other sins, as it is evident they had, and the Apostles made use of the Law of God to convince them; doth it hence follow that the sinfulness of those things did barely depend upon a positive Law? And therefore the notion of Idolatry may be said to be new, not as though it were not against the principles of Natural Religion, but because they had lost the sense of them: so the Law of Moses was a new Law though it revived the Law of Nature in its moral precepts; the doctrine of Christ was a new doctrine to the world although most agreeable to the principles of natural reason.

(2.) The sinfulness of Idolatry according to natural Religion consists in these things. (1.) In taking away the due sense of the Distance between God and his Creatures: which is a violation of the Rights of his Soveraignty, and consequently it is crimen laesae Majestatis Divinae, or Treason against the Divine Majesty. (2.) In neglecting to give God the p. 239worship which was proper to him. And this was the consequent of Idolatry; and not as though the Nature of Idolatry did lye barely in not giving to God the worship due to him, as T. G. seems to suggest:Dial. p. 205. but when men did accustome themselves to the worship of Idols, they grew so fond of their own inventions, that they had five Ave Maries for one Pater Noster, and so the worship of God came to be almost lost in the croud of Deities which they joyned with him. (3.) In worshipping bad Spirits, instead of good ones; which craftily insinuated themselves among the Idolaters under the pretence of Inferiour Deities. For so the people still believed them to be good Spirits, and their learned men defied all those who said they worshipped any other, as Dr. St. hath shewed;Defence, p. 518. yet the Christians proved they were evil, because they received that worship from them, which the good ones would not do. (4.) In disparaging the Divine Nature by making Images to represent him, (which suggested mean thoughts of God to their minds, lessening the apprehensions of the Greatness of his Majesty) and hoping to please God by worshipping such representations of him. Which p. 240he thought so dishonourable to himself, that he forbids it by a severe Law, and punished the transgressours of it; and from hence the Christian Church hath accounted the same thing unlawful to them, because so dishonourable to God. (5.) In taking away that dependence upon God, which he expects from his Creatures. For when they suppose that God hath committed the care of these things to any inferiour beings, they are apt to make their addresses to them more frequently because of a vicinity of Nature to them; and to depend upon them for help in time of need; which takes off that entire trust in God which is most agreeable to his Wisdom, Goodness and Providence. (6.) In giving divine worship to vile and wicked men instead of God. This was an aggravation of Idolatry, and increased the sinfulness of it; although the nature of Idolatry doth not lye in giving divine worship to bad men, but to any Creatures. And in this particular lay the abominable sinfulness of the Poetical Idolatry among the Greeks and Romans, which was in this respect worse than of the most barbarous Nations we ever read of. (7.) The more vile the practices, the more mean the submissions, the more p. 241gross the errours of Idolaters were, the greater was the sinfulness of Idolatry. Hence the filthy and obscene Actions of the Eastern, Greek and Roman Idolatries; the mean submissions and the gross errours of the Egyptian Idolatries heightned the sinfulness of them. These are the main things wherein the sinfulness of Idolatry did consist, abstractly from any positive Law. You see how freely I give them to you upon such an invitation, and much good may they do you. If Dr. St. had thought T. G. had desired any such thing from him, I do believe he would have added not only a seventh, Dial. p. 201.but an eighth Chapter for his sake on such a subject as this, which it is so easie to inlarge upon. But I stop for fear T. G. should think I am only patching up a Sermon out of Note-books, yet I think I have not taken leave of my Text.

R. P.

Did you ever hear of the speaking Trumpet?

P. D.

What hath the speaking Trumpet to do with Idolatry? I am afraid I waked you out of some pleasant dream, you talk so far off from the business. Now I think of it, I have found it by the train of thoughts, in Mr. Hobs his way. Text led you to preaching, and preaching p. 242to the speaking Trumpet, because of the rare invention of the Virtuoso to have one Parson to preach to a whole County.

R. P.

No, that is not it. T. G. brings it in on the occasion of this dispute.

P. D.

Doth he truly? But how comes it in? As the man brought in Hercules into his Sermon by Head and Shoulders?

R. P.

T. G. is a man of a great reach; and therefore he may be allowed to bring in a thing, which another man would never have thought of.

P. D.

But I pray how?

R. P.

You know the Virtuoso argued thus, If the speaking Trumpet might be made to carry the voice a League, then eight mile about, if eight mile, then round a whole County, and then why not from one Nation to another, there being no stop in Art?

P. D.

This is very ridiculous; but how doth T. G. apply it?

R. P.

To Dr. St.'s argument against relative Worship; Dial. p. 202.who saith that by vertue of that, men may worship the Sun, the Stars, the Earth, or any other Creature.

P. D.

And doth not the argument hold?

R. P.

No; T. G. saith, it is like the Virtuoso's arguing about the speaking Trumpet.

p. 243P. D.

I pray tell how. In my mind T. G. rather imitates the Virtuoso's swiming on the Table; for he puffs and blows, and moves all the joynts of his Body, but he is on the Table still. The difficulty remains just where it was; and the speaking Trumpet takes away none of the force of it. For the parity of Reason holds in one case, which it is ridiculous to imagine in the other.

R. P.

T. G. saith, there is a conformity between it, and the extension of worship to any Creature. For, he saith, there is a stop in nature.

P. D.

How and where? For why may not I worship God in any creature as well as by an Image? Where are the measures and bounds fixed, that thus far we may go and no farther? Why may we not worship Trees, and Fountains, Earth, and Water, and the whole Host of Heaven as well as an Image? if we have due apprehensions of God in our minds as the Creator of them, and do not suffer our worship to rest absolutely on the Creatures, but intend to carry it at last to God, and to fall only after an inferiour manner upon them. I cannot for my heart find out this stop in nature. For the reason of relative worship as to an Image is p. 244bare imagination, supposing that person to be present who deserves worship: but in the Worship of the Creatures, there is a real presence of the Divinity, and a certain relation which the Creatures have to God; why therefore may I not worship God in any of his Creatures, as well as by an Image? and so the ancient Idolatry of the World, which the Christian Religion rooted out, may by the help of this trick of Relative Worship be revived again.

R. P.

You run too fast. For T. G. saith, the Creatures ever since sense prevailed against reason, Dial. p. 204.are become like stumbling-blocks to the souls of men, and a snare to the feet of the unwise, to allure and draw them to the worship of them.

P. D.

And do you think Images (but that they are set so high) have not more of the Nature of Stumbling-blocks in them? Are they such immaterial and insensible things, when S. Augustine saith, their very fashion and shape is apt to move men more, and the likeness to a living being prevails more on the affections of miserable men to worship them, Defence, p. 529.than their knowledge that they are not living doth to the contempt of them; as Dr. St. observed.

R. P.

But T. G. adds, that those very Divines of the Church of Rome who do admit p. 245the consequence in speculation, and do not condemn the practice of it in Philosophical and contemplative men, who consider the creatures purely as the works of God, and as it were behold him present in them; do notwithstanding utterly condemn the common and promiscuous use of it in the vulgar, as exposing them to manifest danger of being seduced by the tempting beauty and astonishing power of the Creatures, to forget the Creator and worship them.

P. D.

What is become of the speaking Trumpet now? and of the stop in nature? All the danger, it seems, is in the dulness and stupidity of the People. And yet, if I mistake not, T. G. hath provided against this, when he saith, the difference is so great between vulgar Heathens and Christians, Dial. p. 419.as to the Believing in one God the Father Almighty, Maker of Heaven and Earth, and of all things visible and invisible. If the common people have so firm and settled a Notion of this in their minds, they may as easily pass from the Scale of Creatures to the Creatour, as from an Image to what is represented by it. Is there so much danger they should stop in the Creatures; and none at all they should stop in Images; when himself confesseth, it is Idolatry to worship the p. 246Images themselves? And since Dr. St▪ hath shewn from their own Divines, Defence, p. 698.how many wayes Idolatry may be committed in the worship of Images. (1.) If proper Latria or Divine Worship be given to an Image, it becomes an Idol. Nay Bellarmine saith, that those who worshipped an Image of Christ with Divine Honours, although it were for the sake of Christ, and not of the Image, did commit Idolatry. Therefore, he saith, those were condemned for hereticks, who gave Divine Worship to the Image of Christ. If then the people happen to give Divine Worship to an Image, although they no not believe it to be so, yet this doth not excuse them from Idolatry; for, saith he, although a man pretend in words, the Worship to be Relative, or for the sake of God, or Christ; yet it being divine worship, he doth really do it absolutely and for themselves. (2.) When Images are worshipped as true representations of the Divine Nature. (3.) When Images are worshipped for the sake of any sanctity, vertue or Divinity abiding in them. But tell me now, whether common people are not in danger of any of these things, as much at least as of resting in the Creatures? Is it not as easie for them to forget the distinction of absolute p. 247and relative worship, or to fancy God to be like the Images of him; or to imagine some sanctity, vertue or Divinity to be inherent in the Images; as to stop at the Creatures and to go no higher? Yea, more than this, have not the common people been charged with doing these things by your own Divines? When they tell us of their madness in the Worship of Images; Defence, p. 309.and that there was little or no difference between their worship and that of the Heathens? in some places cited by Dr. St. Is it possible for any man that observes what the common people do, to imagine that they place no Sanctity, Vertue or Divinity in their Images? When they walk so many miles barefoot to a certain Image of our Lady; when they creep upon their bare knees towards it; when they make formal supplications to the Images, with as much Ceremony as if the persons they represent were present; when they look with so much submission and devotion towards them; when they come with such mighty expectations of relief and help from them; when they tell stories of so many miracles which have been wrought by them; nay, when their learned men, who should have more wit or honesty, write p. 248Books on purpose to heighten these follies and madnesses of the People. Can you, with any face say, there is not so much danger in the worship of Images, as in the worship of the Creatures? I did not expect, after what Dr. St. had represented in this matter, T. G. should have given so wretched an answer as this. For if this were all to keep men from the Relative worship of Creatures, I dare affirm that most of the Fathers arguments against this sort of Idolatry were very weak and feeble, and that they did not reach the Philosophical and contemplative men; but only the dull and stupid vulgar; that there was nothing of real Idolatry in their worship of the Creatures, but only danger to the common people, and scandal to the weak. Name me that Christian, who through all the Primitive Church ever let fall an expression to this purpose. It was Idolatry, downright Idolatry they charged them with in the worship of the Creatures, and not any meer scandalous complyance with the ignorant vulgar. If this had been all they meant, for all that I can see the Work of the Apostles and Primitive Christians had been to have informed them only of the True God whom they were to worship in the Creatures, p. 249and if all the People were once throughly informed of this, all the ancient Rites of worship might have continued. They might have still baked Cakes to the Queen of Heaven, and worshipped the whole Host of Heaven; they might have continued their Devotion to the Earth, and Fire, and Trees and Fountains, if they did but direct their worship through them to God. What mean all those sayings of Fathers, all those Canons of Councils, wherein this very manner of Worship was condemned for Idolatry? Defence, p. 400, &c.as Dr. St. hath in part shewed. Speak out Gentlemen, and let us know what you think of the Primitive Church, which so freely condemned this Relative Worship; but never imagine that we will be guided by your modern Schools, or the Doctrine of your Church in these things, against the consent of the whole Primitive Christian Church; whose Fathers you must condemn as Children, and whose Martyrs you must look on as Fools, if your doctrine of Relative worship be allowed. For most of those who suffered Martyrdom might have escaped if they had allowed these principles of Relative worship; no more being required of them, but to do as the rest did, to burn a little incense p. 250in obedience to the Laws, to make some customary libations before the Emperours Images, to make the common supplications at the Temples of Vesta or Ceres, or any other of the Gods, which the Philosophers understood of the several parts of the world: and might they not have done all these things, and referred the worship ultimately to the True God? I do not think this so trifling a matter as T. G. makes it, but I think the honour of Christianity and of the Primitive Martyrs deeply concerned in it; and I wish you not to maintain your Fooleries upon such principles as reflect dishonour upon Christianity it self.

R. P.

Methinks the speaking Trumpet hath roused you, and put you into a fit of furious zeal.

P. D.

No Sir, I do assure you. It is the honour I have for Christianity which hath made me speak thus warmly; for I am very unwilling to have the primitive Christians to suffer as Fools and as weak Brethren.

R. P.

But T. G. saith from Vossius, That the Gentiles concluded Nature it self to be God, Dial. p. 204.and the parts of it also to be Deities, and that they forsook God and staid in the worship of Nature.

p. 251P. D.

Some persons not inferiour to Vossius for learning or judgement in these matters, do suppose it to be a great mistake in him to make the Gentiles worship inanimate nature for a true God, which say they, is in plain terms to make them Atheists: For then they must own nothing but meer matter in the world. And to what purpose men should worship an inanimate senseless being, it is very hard to understand; it is therefore much more probable that they did own some inferiour Deities over the several parts of the world, and one Supream which passed through all; whom they did worship in and by his Creatures. But I am not now to give an account of the Pagan Idolatry, of which we shall have occasion to discourse afterwards. That which I insist upon is, that those who had a right notion of God might upon the principles of relative worship have justified themselves in doing the same things which the Heathens did, provided their intentions were directed aright; and consequently that there was no necessity of taking away the Heathen Rites as Idolatrous in reference to the parts of the world, but only of acquainting them p. 252more fully with the Notion of God, and the nature of Relative Worship.

R. P.

But T. G. still stands to it, that there is more danger in worshipping the Creatures, Dial. p. 206.than in the worship of Images; because the Creatures are not so apparently representative of God, as an Image is of the Person represented by it, which carries the thoughts presently and effectually to him. But the other needs a great deal of discourse to discover the analogy they bear to the Creator, and the dependence they have of him for their very being: yet so, that from the greatness and beauty of the Creatures the Maker of them may proportionably be seen.

P. D.

To this Dr. St. gave a full answer,Defence p. 806. when he said, that in an object of worship, we are not so much to consider the quickness of representation, as the perfections represented. Although therefore an Image may carry ones mind sooner to the thing represented, than the Creatures; yet the one is so infinite a disparagement to the Divine Nature in comparison of the other, that there is far greater danger upon T. G.'s principles in one than in the other. I will make this plain to you by this instance. Suppose the Image of a venerable old man p. 253with Pontifical Habits set up to represent God Almighty, as hath been usual in the Church of Rome; and one man worships God by this; another he looks upon the Sun as a wonderful Work of God, and he worships God as manifesting himself in the Sun; the Question now is, whether there be more danger in worshipping God by an Image, or by the Sun? I say by an Image. For (1.) T. G. confesses that Images are unlawful objects of Worship, which are conceived to be proper likenesses of the Divinity; now I appeal to your self, whether men are not more apt to take the Image of a man for a likeness of the Divinity, than any of Gods Creatures? Besides (2.) Images do not represent any thing that deserves our worship; but only lineaments and figures, the work of Painters and Carvers; but the Creatures represent to our minds infinite power, wisdom and goodness, which are the greatest Motives of Divine Worship. For as Dr. St. hath said, the least work of Nature infinitely exceeds the greatest of Art in curiosity,Defence p. 805. beauty, strength, proportion▪ and every thing that can discover Wisdom and Power. (3.) The presence of God in an Image is only by a fiction of the mind, p. 254a man fancying the true Object of Worship to be really present; but in the Creatures there is a real Divine Presence. And where there is greater reason for worship, there is surely the less danger. (4.) If the greater excellency of the Creature make the danger greater, then as Dr. St. argued, where there is less excellency there is less danger; and consequently there must be less danger in worshipping the Inanimate Creatures than Animate, and Bruits than Men, and mere Moral Men than Saints; because the danger must increase as the excellency doth: and consequently the Egyptians were more excuseable in their worship than you. And by this reason there was less danger in worshipping the Tail of the Asse our Saviour rode upon, than St. Peter, or his pretended Successor. (5.) There is less danger of Worship where the representation is more divine and spiritual, than where it is more gross and corporeal; but the representation of God is much more divine and spiritual by his Creatures than by Images. And therefore Cardinal Lugo said, if a Wooden Image may be worshipped for the sake of the exemplar, much more such a lively Image of God as man is. And p. 255thus upon this principle of Relative Worship all the several sorts of Idolatry which were used among the Heathens may be revived, and set up with as fair pretences at least as Image-worship.

R. P.

T. G. saith, If Dr. St. can discern God so easily in his Creatures, Dial. p. 207.as a mans mind is carried from the Image to the Prototype, he believes he is one of the most admirable Persons in the Meletetiques in the whole World.

P. D.

What is this but trifling in weighty matters? I would allow T. G. as much scope for his wit, as he would desire; provided it become the gravity of the subject. What is there in these Meletetiques, but what is the duty of every good man, to see God in his works? which all persons do who are not Atheists; And is this a thing to be exposed to scorn and derision?

R. P.

But T. G. takes it for that part of Mystical Theology which inessences the soul with God.

P. D.

Alas for his ignorance! that he cannot distinguish between natural and mystical Theology. I always took the seeing the great evidences of Gods Power, Wisdom and Goodness in his Creatures to be Natural Theology: and is it p. 256not possible to discover God in his works without inessencing the Soul with God? This is too mean and low for T. G.; surely you father this upon him. For I can hardly believe this and many other passages you mention, to be written by him; or else T. G. hath helped me to another piece of Meletetiques; for I discover him much better in his Works than I did before; but with no great advantage either as to his Wisdom or Goodness.

R. P.

You may satisfie your self if you please that I▪ do not wrong him; for here's the Book; and in the next page he compares Dr. St. with one who said Christ might be better represented by a Cow than a Crucifix, Dial. p. 208.and another who said he detested the Image of Christ Crucified.

P. D.

For what good end was Dr. St. joyned with these? (supposing the stories true, which I hardly believe) hath he ever said any such thing? or that tended that way? It is the worship he writes against, and not the bare representation of Christ Crucified. T. G. was not to seek for Dr. St.'s mind in this matter, for these are his words. I do not say there is as great incongruity in representing the humane nature of Christ,Defence p. 746. as there was in representing the infinite p. 257nature of God, but I say there is as great incongruity still in supposing an Image of whatsoever it be, can be the proper object of Divine Worship. For the humanity of Christ is only capable of receiving adoration from us, as it is hypostatically united to the Divine Nature; and if the humane nature of Christ be not, what then is the Image of it? What union is there between the Divine Nature and a Crucifix? All that can be said is, that imagination supplyes the Union, and Christ is supposed to be present by representation. But (1.) this overthrows all measures and bounds of Worship, and makes it lawful to worship any creature with respect to God. (2.) It contradicts the argument of S. Paul, for then God may be worshipped with the work of mens hands. (3.) 'Tis contrary to the sense and practice of the Primitive Church which interpreted the second Commandment to hold against all Images set up for wo…ship, as well those proper to Christians, as others among Jews or Gentiles. Why did not T. G. rather answer these arguments, than make odious comparisons of him, with Viret and Beza? But there is a reason for all things if a man can hit on it.

p. 258R. P.

But T. G. wonders Dr. St. should discover God so easily in his Creatures, while he saith elsewhere, the Creatures can give no greater than Moral Certainty of the Being of God himself.

P. D.

It was well thought upon, and deserves an answer; because T. G. is not the only person who hath cavilled at this. If Dr. St. by Moral Certainty doth mean only a bare probability, there were some colour for the objection, but in the very place to which T. G. referrs, he asserts the highest degree of actual certainty: Rat. Acc. p. 178, 179.and that which he calls Moral Certainty, he saith is, a firm, rational, and undoubted certainty. Why then may not Dr. St. discover God in his Creatures, since he asserts so great an assurance of Gods being their Creatour?

R. P.

But why then doth he call it Moral Certainty?

P. D.

It is meer cavilling, when a mans mind is understood, to be quarrelling at his terms; especially if they be such, as others have used before him, and seem most agreeable to the nature of the Evidence. For we may conceive these several sorts of Certainty.

1. A Certainty of Principles: which is that, I suppose, they call Metaphysical Certainty. p. 259For that was the proper Office of Metaphysicks, to establish certain general principles which might be of Vse to all other Sciences: such as those, that both parts of a contradiction cannot be true of the same thing: and that, of every thing, Arist. Anal. Post. l. 1. c. 11. n. 5, 6, 7. Metaph. l. 1. c. 12. l. 13. c. 1. Philop. in Analyt. l. 1. p. 27.either the one, or the other part of a contradiction is true. These are such principles, **Metaph. l. 4. c. 6. Themist. in Analyt. Post. l. 1.of which Aristotle saith, it is folly in any man to go about to demonstrate them, any otherwise than by shewing the absurdity of him that denyeth them: They are such, Themistius saith, which every man hath by nature, and without which he cannot be supposed to learn any thing; and these are called self-evident and indemonstrable principles; and Axioms; which need no more than the bare representation of them to the mind, as that the whole is greater than a part. If you take away equal things from equal, the remainder is equal. For whatever depends upon Induction, or needs any medium to prove it, more than the bare perception of terms, was never by any Philosopher accounted an indemonstrable and self-evident principle. Much less were Identical propositions taken for first principles, by any man that ever understood what principles were; as it were very easie to prove, if there p. 260were occasion for it. I have but two things to add concerning this kind of Certainty.

1. That the Certainty of our own Beings, is equal to this Certainty of Principles. It being a thing of natural and immediate evidence. For the very doubting as well as thinking proves the certainty of the being of that which doubts. And where there is such evident perception as of first principles, and our own beings, the assent is as necessary as for the ballance to incline where the greatest weight lyes.

2. That self-evident principles have very little influence upon our knowledge of other things; and therefore a late Philosopher observes that even that fundamental principle, …. l. 2. c. 7. n. 4.that it is impossible the same thing should be, and not be at the same time, is of little or no Vse for finding out of Truth. And supposing the first principle of the certainty of our own Beings to be granted the Cartesians (which no man who thinks can deny them) yet I do not see how the truth of other things conveyed by our senses can be drawn from thence; the one being an absolute certainty, the other only depending on a supposition which carryes not equal p. 261evidence along with it: which is the next kind.

2. A certainty by sense; or upon supposition, that we are not so framed as not to be deceived in the most plain and clear perceptions of sense. This is that I suppose they mean by Physical Certainty. It implyes no contradiction we should be so deceived, and consequently it is short of the first kind of Certainty. But withall the supposition is so just and reasonable, that such a mans understanding may be justly questioned, who questions the plain evidence of sense as to light, and day, and bodies, &c. And all mankind in spight of their most subtle arguments do trust their senses: and Epictetus well said,Arrian. l. 2. c. 20. that if he and two or three more were servants to a Sceptick, they would make him hang or starve himself if he did not change his opinion. And Galen saith,Galen. de Hippocr. & Plat. decret. l. 2. the evidence of sense needs no demonstration; for all those things which are evident to sense are to be believed for themselves.

3. A Certainty by Reason, or of deducing something not known from that which is known. Which is so evident in Mathematical demonstrations that no man who understands the terms, and attends to the proof can forbear his assent. p. 262Aristotle did attempt to bring the way of reasoning in other things to Mathematical certainty; which was the great design of his Logick. To this end he begins with the explication of simple terms, and so he proceeds to propositions, and then to the joyning of two of these so together that from thence a third thing may follow by vertue of some middle term wherein they agree. But because the conclusion may not necessarily follow, where the manner of reasoning was true, therefore in order to demonstration, he supposes two sorts of principles. 1. Axioms, or common principles received by all that understand them. 2. Positions; which are twofold: 1. Suppositions, or Postulata. 2. Definitions. But after all, he grants that only such things are capable of Demonstration which have a certain and immutable cause. And he puts a difference between a necessary conclusion, and a demonstration. The one depending on the Form of Syllogism, the other upon the necessity of the Cause. But in demonstrative Syllogisms Aristotle doth not require some degree of necessity but the highest, when the connexion between the Subject and Predicate is so great, that one cannot be defined without the other; so p. 263that Logical Demonstration must be of an inseparable property, and by the most immediate and necessary cause. But very few things in the world are capable of such demonstrations, by reason of our ignorance of the essential properties and immediate causes of things; and those Instances which are brought either by Aristotle or his Commentators are about such things where demonstration was least needful, and tend very little to the improvement of our knowledge.

4. A Certainty which supposes some Moral principles, and proceeds upon them. Such as these, That every Intelligent being acts for some end: That it is not the interest of mankind to deceive one another: That there are some things fit to be chosen, and others to be avoided: That circumstances vary the nature of Actions: That where comparisons are made, the greatest good and the least evil are to be chosen. Such as these, I call Moral Principles: which have self-evidence in them to any man that understands the terms. And whatever doth necessarily follow from these principles may be justly called a Moral Demonstration.

p. 2645. A Certainty which supposes an immediate Divine Assistance to preserve the mind from errour, and this is Infallible Certainty. For the mind of man being of it self lyable to mistake in its apprehension and judgement of things, nothing can preserve it from a possibility of errour, but immediate assistance from God, who cannot be deceived and will not deceive.

These things being premised, we are now to enquire what kind of Certainty that is, which we have concerning the principles of Religion.

1. For the principles of Natural Religion. You are to consider what kind of Adversary Dr. St. had to deal with, viz. one who pleaded for an infallible Certainty, Rat. Acc. p. 178, 206.as that infallibility doth imply Divine Assistance, as necessary in order to an obligation to Assent. Against this Dr. St. objects, that the main foundations of all Religion, which are the Being of God and immortality of the soul, were not capable of this kind of Proof. Because this very notion of Infallibility doth suppose that which he would prove, viz. that there is a God who must give this assistance. But at the same time he yields, that we have as great evidence p. 265and certainty, as humane nature is capable of, of such a Being as God is, from the consideration of his Works: which being neither from Mathematical Demonstrations, nor supernatural infallibility he called Moral Certainty. Which he might do from these grounds.

1. Because the force of the Argument from the Creatures depends upon some Moral Principles. Viz. From the suitableness and fitness of things to the Wisdom of an Intelligent and Infinite Agent, who might from thence be inferred to be the Maker of them. It being unconceivable that meer matter should ever produce things in so much beauty, order and usefulness as we see in every Creature; in an Ant or a Fly as much as in the vast bodies of the Heavens.

2. Because they do suppose some Moral Dispositions in the persons who do most readily and firmly assent to these Truths. For although men make use of the highest titles for their arguments, and call them Infallible Proofs, Mathematical Demonstrations, or what they please; yet we still see men of bad minds will find something to cavil at, whereby to suspend their assent; which they do not in p. 266meer Metaphysical notions, or in Mathematical Demonstrations. But vertuous and unprejudiced minds do more impartially judge, and therefore more readily give their assent: having no byas to incline them another way. Although therefore the principles be of another nature, and the arguments be drawn from Idea's, or series of Causes, or whatever medium it be, yet since the perverseness of mens will may hinder the force of the argument, as to themselves, the Certainty might be called Moral Certainty.

2. As to the Christian Faith. So he grants,

1. That there are some principles relating to it which have Metaphysical Certainty in them; as, that Whatever God reveals is impossible to be false, or as it is commonly expressed, though improperly, is infallibly True.

2. That there is a rational Certainty, that a Doctrine confirmed by such Miracles as were wrought by Christ and his Apostle must come from God: that being the most certain Criterion of Divine Revelation.

p. 2673. That there was a Physical Certainty of the truth of Christs Miracles and Resurrection from the dead, in the Apostles who were eye-witnesses of them.

4. That there was an Infallible Certainty in the Apostles delivering this doctrine to the world, and writing it for the benefit of the Church in all Ages.

5. That we have a moral Certainty of the matters of Fact, which do concern the Doctrine, the Miracles, and the Books of Scripture: which is of the same kind with the certainty those had of Christs Doctrine and Miracles, who lived in Mesopotamia, at that time; which must depend upon the credibility of the Witnesses who convey these things, which is a Moral Consideration, and therefore the Certainty which is taken from it may be properly called Moral Certainty. Of which there being many degrees, the highest is here understood, which any matter of fact is capable of.

And now I pray tell me, what reason hath there been for all this noise about Moral Certainty?

R. P.

T. G. owns that the Dr. in other places doth acknowledge a true certainty of the principles of Religion; but, he saith, he can say and unsay, without retracting, Dial. …. 209.with p. 268as much art and ease as any man he ever read.

P. D.

I had thought unsaying had been retracting. But Dr. St. saith as much in those very places T. G. objects against, as in those he allows. Only T. G. delights in cavilling above most Authors I have ever read.

R. P.

But doth not Dr. St. allow a possibility of falshood notwithstanding all this pretence of Certainty?P. 210.

P. D.

Whatever is true, is impossible to be false; and the same degree of evidence any one hath of the truth of a thing, he hath of the impossibility of the falshood of it: therefore he that hath an undoubted certainty of the truth of Christianity, hath the same certainty that it is impossible it should be false. And because possibility and impossibility are capable of the same distinctions that Certainty is, therefore according to the nature and degrees of Certainty is the possibility or impossibility of falshood. That which is Metaphysically certain is so impossible to be false, that it implyes a contradiction to be otherwise: but it is not so in Physical Certainty, nor in all rational Certainty, nor in Moral: and yet, whereever any man is certain of the truth p. 269of a thing, he is proportionably certain that it is impossible to be false.

R. P.

This only relates to the person, and not to the Evidence; Is there any such evidence of the Existence of a Deity, as can infallibly convince it to be absolutely true, and so impossible to be false?

P. D.

I do not doubt, but that there are such evidences of the Being of God, as do prove it to any unprejudiced mind impossible to be otherwise. And T. G. had no reason to doubt of this, from any thing Dr. St. had said, who had endeavoured so early to prove the Being of God, and the Principles of Christian Faith; Origines Sacrae l. 2. & 3.before he set himself to consider the Controversies which have happened in the Christian Church. T. G. therefore might well have spared these reflections, in a debate of so different a nature; but that he was glad of an opportunity to go off from the business, as men are, that know they are not like to bring it to a good issue.

R. P.

T. G. confesseth this is a digression; but he promises to return to the matter; and so he does I assure you, for he comes to the second thing, which, he saith, the Dr. ought to have done, Dial. p. 213.viz. to have shewed how the Notion of Idolatry doth p. 270agree to the Doctrine of the Church of Rome in her Councils.

P. D.

It is a wonder to me, you should think him defective in this, when he shews that there are two things from whence the sense of the Roman Church is to be taken; 1. From the Definitions of Councils. 2. From the practice of the Church.

1. From the Definitions of Councils. And here **Defence from p. 5…5. to 605.he entred upon the consideration of what that worship was, which was required to be given to Images: and shewed from the words of the Council, and from the Testimony of the most eminent Divines of the Roman Church, that it was not enough to worship before Images, and to have an intention to perform those external Acts; but there must be an inward intention to worship the Images themselves; and that the contrary doctrine was esteemed little better than downright Heresie.

2. From the Practice of the Church. For he shews many of your best Divines went upon this principle, that God would not suffer his Church to err; and therefore they thought the allowed practice of the Church sufficient for them to defend those things to be lawful which they saw generally p. 271practised. And from hence he makes it appear that the Church of Rome hath gone beyond the Council of Nice in two things.

1. In making and worshipping Images of God and the B. Trinity, which was **Defence, from p. 556. to p. 575.esteemed madness and Pagan Idolatry in the time of the second Council of Nice; and is justified by the modern Divines of the Church of Rome from the general practice of their Church.

2. In giving the Worship of Latria to Images; ††Defence, from p. 606. to p. 639.which was condemned by the Council of Nice; and notwithstanding is defended by multitudes of Divines in the Roman Church, from the allowed practice in the Worship of the Cross; both before and after the Council of Trent.

After which he enquires at large into the publick Offices, and commended Devotions of that Church in respect to Images, and from thence he **Defence, from p. 639. to p. 699.proves that 1. As to Consecration of Images for worship, 2. As to the Rites of Supplication to them; 3. As to pompous procession with them, the modern Church of Rome doth not fall short of the practice of Pagan Rome.

And do you think all this is not applying the notion of Idolatry home to p. 272the Roman Church? When, 1. He shews by the principles of the second Council of Nice, the modern practices of the Church of Rome are chargeable with Idolatry. 2. That the practices agreeable with that Council were charged with Idolatry by the Western Church in the Council of Francford, not from any mistake of their meaning, but because they looked on the Worship then decreed to be proper adoration.

R. P.

Dial. p. 214.But T. G. saith, If the Worship defined by the Council of Nice were inferiour Worship, and not Latria, as Dr. St. confesseth, then nothing can be clearer than that it was not the Worship due to God, and consequently the Church of Rome cannot be chargeable with Idolatry from any thing contained in that decree.

P. D.

Will T. G. never understand the difference between the intention of the person and the Nature of the Act? They might declare it to be only inferiour Worship, but the Council of Francford took it to be proper adoration which was due only to God. And if that Councils Judgement must stand; all those in the Church of Rome who give Latria to the Cross, must be guilty of Idolatry.

p. 273R. P.

Doth not the Church of England allow bowing to the Altar, which if the Altar had any sense would think were done to it; as T. G. saith,Dial. p. 215, &c. he was certainly informed of a Countrey fellow who being got near the Altar in his Majesties Chapel, thought all the Congies had been made to him, and so returned Congy for Congy. And if bowing may be used out of Religious respect to the Altar, why not kneeling, or prostration, or fixing our eyes in time of Prayer, or burning Incense or Lights before the Images of Christ and his Saints: but how can Dr. St. purge the Church of England from Idolatry in that practice, when he saith, that any Image being made so far the object of Divine Worship, that men do bow down before it, (and he supposes the same will hold for any other creature) it doth thereby become an Idol, and on that account is forbidden in the second Commandment?

P. D.

What would T. G. have done, had it not been for this practice of bowing towards the Altar? when yet he cannot but know that the practice of it is not enjoyned by our Church, for the Canon leaves it at liberty; If the Church of Rome did the same about the Worship of Images, the parallel would hold somewhat better. p. 274But the Church of Rome declares Religious Worship is to be given to Images, and our Church declares that none is to be given to the Altar, and doth not this make an apparent difference? If the Countrey fellow standing without the rails fancied the Congies made to himself; what would he have done, if he had stood within an Image of our Lady, and seen all the Courtship that had been used towards her by some of her devoted servants and slaves; when he beheld the bare knees bleeding, the tears trickling, the breast knocking, the eyes scarce lifted up to shew the greater reverence and humility towards the Image, what could he have thought, but that he was shut up within the bowels of the Goddess they worshipped? Whereas if the Countrey fellow had gone up into the Court, and seen the ancient servants make their Reverences after dinner in the Presence chamber, he would soon have been better informed; if some of the old Courtiers had told him, it was the ancient Custome of the Court to make their Reverences in all Chambers of Presence, and from thence when they went into his Majesties Chapel they used the same custome out of Reverence to God Almighty whose Presence-chamber p. 275they accounted the Chapel to be. What is all this to giving Religious Worship to the Altar? wherein the force of all T. G. saith must lye.

R. P.

But you do bow before the Altar, as we do before Images.

P. D.

I utterly deny that. For your Church declares bowing before Images without an intention to worship the Images is next to Heresie, (if we are to take the sense of your Councils from their own words and the explication of Divines;) You explode their Doctrine who say, that we are only to worship God before them. And is there no difference between the Acts of these two men as to Images themselves? The one declares that he looks on no Religious worship as due to an Image, but it serves him only to put him in mind of him who is the proper object of Worship, and he never intends by any Act of his to worship the Image it self: another saith, the Church requires Images to be worshipped, and for my part I think my self bound to do what the Church requires, and therefore it is my intention to give Worship not barely to the object represented, but to the very Image it self, although it be on the account of its representation. And the p. 276latter Dr. St. hath shewed to be the only allowed sense in the Church of Rome, and the other rejected either as heretical or next to it. Which T. G. never so much as once takes notice of. But however this doth not reach our case; for we believe the second Commandment to be still in force, which is express and positive against all worship of Images, and bowing down to them, but that which was lawful among the Jews, notwithstanding that precept, viz. to Worship God towards the Mercy Seat, is still lawful among Christians, viz. to Worship God alone, but towards the Altar. And thus I hope T. G. will at last be brought a little better to understand the sense of our Church in this practice, and how far it is from being a parallel with your Worship of Images.

R. P.

T. G. finds great fault with Dr. St.'s citation out of Card. Lugo, about submission to Images, Dial. from p. 218. to p. 227.because he left out aliquis, and potest dici, and I tell you, he makes a huge outcry about it, and fills up several pages with it.

P. D.

Doth he truly? It was a great sign he wanted matter to fill up his book. But I pray on what occasion was this passage brought in? It may p. 277be that will give us some light into this matter.

R. P.

T. G. referrs to the page, but he never mentions the occasion. It is such a page.Defence, p. 599.

P. D.

Let us see, what Dr. St. was proving in that place. It was, that by the Council of Nice as it is explained by the Divines of the Roman Church, true and real Worship is to be given to Images;P. 575. and for this he produces the several Testimonies of Suarez, Medina, Victoria, Catharinus, Naclantus, Bellarmine, Soto, Velosillus, Pujol, Tannerus, Ysambertus, Bassaeus, Sylvius, Arriaga, and at last Card. Lugo. If the thing be not proved, which he designed, why is Card. Lugo alone produced? If it be proved, why is Card. Lugo produced at all?

R.P.

Because he left out aliquis and dici potest.

P. D.

But suppose the other be sufficient to express his concurrence with the rest, what unfairness is there in that, to shorten his words when he layes no weight upon the manner, but upon the thing? Had Dr. St. charged Lugo with holding greater submission than the rest, and then left out the qualifying expressions, he had done him injury. But he knew p. 278Lugo meant no more than the rest, and produced him for no other purpose. If there be but any inward affection carried to the Image, which may be called a certain kind of submission to the Image, it is all one to Dr. St.'s purpose; which was only to prove, as he saith, in the same page, from the Acts of the Council, and the Judgement of their learned and eminent Divines, that by the Decree of the Nicene Council such true and real Worship is to be given to Images as is terminated upon the Images themselves. Did these Testimonies prove this, or did they not? If they did not; why did not T. G. discover them all? if they did; why doth he so vainly cavil, about some thing impertinent to the main business, in the very last of all? So that, after all this cry, there is very little Wool, unless it be that which is made of Goats hair.

R. P.

But this tends to breed an impression in the Reader, that the inward affection Card. Lugo required was of giving submission to an Image as superiour; because in another place he quotes the same Author for making cultus to signifie Reverence towards Superiours.

P. D.

But doth not the Cardinal say so?

p. 279R. P.

T. G. saith nothing to the contrary, which I am sure he would have done, if he had not.

P. D.

Well then; Lugo makes worship to be a Reverence towards Superiours; but he saith, that true worship is due to Images. And is not this making the Image Superiour?

R. P.

I thought where I should have you; but T. G. hath explained Lugo's meaning from himself.

P. D.

Let me hear it as T. G. that candid and ingenuous dealer hath it.

R. P.

1. He saith, When we worship an Image, the inward affection is not carried to the Image, after the same manner it is to the Prototype; for we worship the Prototype absolutely, i. e. for its own proper excellency; but the Image only with a relative worship, i. e. for the excellency not of the Image it self, but of the Prototype, which kind of Worship he affirms to be far inferiour to the other, which is absolute.

2. We have not the same inward submission towards the Image, which we have towards the Prototype; for we submit our selves to the Prototype, acknowledging it to be more excellent than our selves, and superiour to us, which kind of submission we cannot prudently conceive to belong to an Image; p. 280nor indeed any at all, by which we submit our selves to it, preferring it before us.

3. The sole external act of kissing or bowing is not so carryed to the Image but that some inward affection also goes along with it, which he saith, may be called also some kind of affection of submission; by which he means an affection of submitting our selves to the Image; for as much as the Act of the Will from which it proceeds is an affection of performing those acts about their Images, which we are wont to exercise towards our Superiours.

P. D.

Now I hope, we have the Cardinals true meaning. From whence I desire you to observe.

1. That the difference he puts between the Worship of the Image and the Prototype lyes in the inward estimation of the Excellency of the one above the other; which is as much as to say, that he doth really think there is more excellency in Christ himself than in a Crucifix. Which deserves a special remark; especially being made by a Cardinal. When one might venture to say, that there is scarce an Idolater so sottish in the world, but will acknowledge his Deity to be much better than the Image of him; and that he worships one for his own excellency, and the other only out of respect to him.

p. 2812. He acknowledges, that all those Acts whereby we express reverence towards Superiours may be used towards Images, as bowing, kneeling, prostration, &c.

3. That there is some kind of inward affection which may be called a certain kind of affection of submission going along with these external Acts. And doth not all this amount to true and real worship? which was the thing Dr. St. designed to prove. For here, without exception, all those Acts whereby our reverence towards Superiours is expressed, may be used to Images; i. e. all tokens of submission to them, and an inward affection of some kind, which may be called affection of submission. By which we find it yielded to us that all external Acts of Adoration may be given to Images, provided, that the inward affection be carryed after a different manner to the Prototype and to the Image; which no Idolater in the world, if Maimonides may be believed, would ever deny: if they believed any other Gods besides their Idols, as he saith, there were none but did. So that Card. Lugo upon fair ground gives up all peculiarity of any external Acts of Divine Worship; and for all that I can see, may p. 282sacrifice to an Image, or offer up the Host to it, on the same reasons that they make their prostrations before it. And he understood the consequence of his own Doctrine so well, that he doth not seem to boggle at it on the account of adoration. But as long as T. G. yields that Cardinal Lugo doth allow all external Acts of submission to Images, and such an inward affection as to make that submission sincere and real, Dr. St. hath all which his heart could desire from this testimony of Lugo.

R. P.

But all this amounts to no more, T. G. saith from him, but that the Prototype deserves to be treated honourably, not only in it self, but in all things which have connexion with it, as an Image or the like.

P. D.

That is, God may be worshipped in any Creature; and any act of adoration may be performed towards it, if it have a respect to him: whether by a real or imaginary presence. Which takes away the distinction of divine worship as it is applied to outward acts, and all necessary discrimination between the Worship we give to God and to his Creatures; And if this be for the honour of his Soveraignty and Dominion over us, let the world judge.

p. 283R. P.

After all this, T. G. saith,Dial. p. 228. that Dr. St. agrees with Cardinal Lugo in the thing, although he quarrels with him about the words.

P. D.

That is news indeed. How doth T. G. make that out?

R. P.

Because he saith from Aquinas, that although no irrational or inanimate being be capable of that real excellency to deserve any honour from us for its own sake; Defence, p. 600, 601.yet on the account of a relation to divine things they may deserve a different regard and usage from other things.

P. D.

This is true; but he immediately distinguishes from St. Augustin between the peculiarity of use belonging to the sacred utensils, and the worship given to Images.

R. P.

That is no matter how he distinguishes, as long as the consequence holds from one to the other. For if a Religious respect be due to sacred places and things on the account of their Relation to God, Dial. p. 229, 230, 231.and an inward intention of the mind to express it towards them by an outward token of submission, as bowing to the Altar, it comes to the same thing which Cardinal Lugo pleads for to an Image, so that if one be Idolatry, the other must be so too. So that T. G. concludes very triumphantly p. 284that by these edge-tools, viz. School-distinctions Dr. St. hath cut the throat of his own Cause. And then he brings in the Patronus bonae Fidei again.

P. D.

Methinks another writing of the same worthy Author had been much more proper, called Jugulum Causae. But is it possible for T. G. not to apprehend the difference of these things? I will once more endeavour to make it plain to you. The reverence to sacred places and things differs from the relative worship of Images in these things.

1. In the Acts belonging to them. For this I need only to repeat Dr. St.'s words. Is there no difference between a Religious respect (if I may so call it) to sacred places and things,Defence, p. 603. and all the most solemn Acts of Adoration which were ever given to Images by the most sottish Idolaters? Such as kneelings before them, prostrations, praying with their eyes fixed upon them, as though they were speaking to them, burning incense and lights before them, which are as great testimonies of worship as ever were used by the greatest and most sottish Idolaters. And here Cardinal Lugo allows all external acts of submission to Images; whereas p. 285in the other case, discrimination is all that is contended for, out of Reverence to them. As for bowing towards the Altar, it hath been so often answered before, that I shall not repeat.

2. In the Reason of Worship. For if the Reason assigned for the Worship of Images be peculiar to them, then it cannot hold for all sacred things and places. Now the Reason of the Worship of Images is representation of the Prototype as present to the fancy of him that worships; but this cannot hold for the sacred Vtensils and places which have their honour for the sake of the use they are dedicated to. Thus if Images in Churches were appointed only for use without any worship to be given to them, it would come much nearer to a parallel, than they can do now, when they are consecrated and set up on purpose for adoration; as they are continually in the Roman Church.

3. In the distinction the Law of God makes between them. For when it most severely prohibits the worship of Images, it not only allows but commands the reverencing Gods Sanctuary; and the consecrating Sacred Vessels for the use of the Temple. So that where the Law p. 286distinguisheth we have reason to do it too: and so the Christian Church did, when it looked on the worship of Images as unlawful, yet they did shew respect and honour to sacred things and places: and honour is all they are capable of as St. Augustine saith, but no worship doth belong to them. So that these Edge-Tools do no execution at all but upon T. G.'s Images; which could never have been framed without them, and yet are destroyed by them.

R. P.

You think to escape about the Doctor's unfaithful reporting the sense of Authors with this one Testimony of Cardinal Lugo; but you are deceived, I have another ready for you of Gregory Nyssen.

P. D.

Another! I expected hundreds upon T. G.'s outcries. Dial. p. p. 226.When he saith, the Citations are many and long, and out of Authors of all Nations, and all Ages, and all Religions. What! but another?

R. P.

You would have T. G. write an Answer as big as Foxes Acts and Monuments, but you are deceived, he is wiser than so. For he hath a particular aversion to a great Book upon one subject. If he can discover four or five citations faulty, that will take away the reputation of all the rest.

p. 287P. D.

A very short way I confess. Methinks one or two may serve; and save Candle and Firing, and Waste-paper. Nay one single Testimony may do it, with an end of an old Latine verse tacked to it, Crimine ab uno — especially such a one as this of Cardinal Lugo. But, however let us hear that of Gregory Nyssen.

R. P.

It is about the Arians being charged with Idolatry: Dial. p. 234.which is brought in with a great deal of Pomp among other Testimonies, to shew that the Arians were charged with Idolatry for the worship they gave to Christ, whom they acknowledged to be a Creature, from thence to parallel their worship with that of the Church of Rome to the Saints.

P. D.

I am glad to hear but one of those Testimonies challenged; for if that be given up, there are enough remaining to prove his design: which you mightily mistake, if you think it was only to parallel your worship of Saints with the Arians Idolatry. For this is never so much as mentioned by Dr. St.; but he names several considerable advantages which are gained by it in this subject of Idolatry.

p. 2881. That there may be Idolatry where the true God is owned, and worshipped, as he was no doubt among the Arians; from whence it follows, that the Nature of Idolatry doth not consist in giving Soveraign Worship to a Creature, without respect to the Creator. Which will be of use to us in the debate about the Pagan Idolatry.

2. That Relative Latria being given to a Creature is Idolatry, for notwithstanding they looked on Christ as the express Image of God; yet because they gave divine worship to him, supposing him to be a Creature, they were charged with Idolatry.

3. That making God the Fountain and Original of those excellencies for which any Creature is worshipped doth not excuse from Idolatry. For the Arians were guilty who supposed all the excellencies of Christ to be derived from God.

4. That no distinction of Doulia and Latria doth excuse from Idolatry; For the Fathers make the giving Doulia to Christ to be Idolatry.

5. That the notion of an Idol is so far from being a meer imaginary figment or Chimera, that it was attributed by the Fathers p. 289to the most excellent Being, even to Christ himself, when Divine Worship was given to him as a Creature.

These are matters of great moment, if they hold good; doth he pass all these by, only to fall upon one single Testimony? If he doth, it is a shrewd sign, though he cried out of Gregory Nyssen, yet he was pinched somewhere else. Well; but what is this horrible crime about Gregory Nyssen? Hath he brought him under an Index Expurgatorius? Hath he falsified his words and corrupted the Text? Or hath he wilfully altered his sense and meaning? Hath he done it in all the quotations out of him, or only in one? Whatever it is, let us have it.

R. P.

It is in the citation out of his Oration de laudibus Basilii.

P. D.

But the Dr. hath three or four more out of the same Author. It seems they stand well enough. Hath not the Dr. truly cited his words?

R. P.

Yes, T. G. saith, as to the general truly enough.

P. D.

What is the fault then?

R. P.

That he doth not add the words that follow, wherein he shews what kind of worship that was which the Arians gave to p. 290Christ;Dial. p. 234, &c. viz. not only to worship and serve him, but also to six hopes of salvation in a Creature and to expect judgement from it. And was it not neatly done of the Doctor to wrap up all this in those short words, The Devil perswaded men to return to the worship of the Creature? Which is a Laconism not observed by him on other occasions: but it was here done on purpose to conceal from the Reader the apparent difference between the worship of Saints in the Church of Rome, and the Arians worship of Christ.

P. D.

I am glad, it is out at last, after so much straining. See how much choler there is in it! Indeed, it might have done him much harm, if he had kept it in any longer. But I wonder the Laconick Gentleman doth complain of shortness. Do you think the Laconian in Boccalini would have made such a noise for missing a page or two in Guicciardins War of Pisa? Do you in earnest think Dr. St. should take such pains to conceal that which every one knows, that the Arians fixed their hopes of Salvation on Christ, and expected him to come to Judgement? What wonderful discovery is this, which T. G. hath made? Nay Dr. St. himself takes notice of this Objection,Defence, p. 519. that they did give a higher degree p. 291of worship to Christ than any do to Saints; and returns this Answer to it; that they did only give a degree of worship proportionable to the degrees of excellency supposed to be in him far above any other creatures whatsoever. But still that worship was inferiour to that which they gave to God the Father: and at the highest such as the Platonists gave to their celestial Deities. And although the Arians did invocate Christ and put their trust in him, yet they still supposed him to be a creature, and therefore believed that all the Power and Authority he had was given to him: so that the worship they gave to Christ must be inferiour to that honour they gave to the Supreme God whom they believed to be Supreme, Absolute and Independent.

R. P.

T. G. takes notice of this Answer, and objects two things against it. First, Dial. p. 247.That it stands too far off from the words of Nyssen at the distance of 350 pages; and so proves a very late salve for so old a wound.

P. D.

Especially, considering how poor Nyssen lay a bleeding all that while. Is it not enough for us to unswer Objections; unless we put them just in the page you would have them, after the p. 292way of Objections and Solutions? I pity the hard fate of the Laconian that hath 350 leaves to turn over, longer than the War of Pisa. O for the Gallies! But I hope he will consider better of it.

R. P.

You may jest as you please at this Answer; but the second is a very solid one: for T. G. shews the parallel to be inconsistent, both with the practice of the Arians, and Doctrine of the Fathers.

P. D.

What parallel doth he mean? Dr. St. proves from hence inferiour relative worship given to a creature to be Idolatry, in the sense of the Fathers. Is this true, or is it not?

R. P.

You have not patience to hear T. G.'s answer out. For,

1. He saith, The Fathers do acknowledge a worship due to the Saints, Dial. p. 248, &c.and particularly Gregory Nyssen in an Oration produced by him: and therefore if they had condemned the Arians of Idolatry for giving only a like worship to Christ though in a higher degree, they had condemned themselves for the like crime.

2. The Arians made no such Apology for themselves, as the Doctor makes for them, viz. that they gave Soveraign and absolute worship to God, and only inferiour and relative worship to Christ.

p. 2933. Why might not the generality at least believe Christ to be of a superiour Order, so as to have true Divinity in him, as the Heathens did of their lesser Gods, and that being assumed as a Consort in the Empire, absolute Divine Honour was due to him?

4. They were chargeable with Idolatry, because they did avowedly give those Acts of Worship to Christ believing him to be a Creature, which by the common consent and publick practice of Christians, from whence exteriour signs in the duties of Religion receive their determination, were understood to be due only to God incarnate. Which makes their case very much different from that of the Church of Rome, which gave to Saints and Images only such Acts of Worship as by the common use and practice of the Christian World before Luther, were determined and understood, when applied to Saints and Images, to express an inferiour degree of Reverence or Worship, than what is due to God himself. This is the substance of T. G.'s answer.

P. D.

I confess T. G. now offers something worthy a serious debate. Which may be reduced to these two things.

1. What those Acts of Worship were, which the Arians were charged with Idolatry p. 294for giving to Christ supposing him a Creature.

2. How far the Church of Rome is liable to the same charge, for the worship she gives to Saints and Images.

1. For the Acts of Worship which the Arians were charged with Idolatry in giving to Christ as a Creature. The strength of T. G.'s answer lies in two things.

1. That they were given absolutely to Christ, as a lesser God.

2. That they were such Acts which by the consent of the Church did signifie proper Divine worship.

1. Let us consider whether the worship given to Christ could be absolute upon their supposition that Christ was a Creature. T. G. speaks somewhat faintly in this matter, at first saying only, Why might it not be absolute? at least as to the generality? But afterwards, he takes heart, and sayes roundly that the Fathers evermore charge the Arians for giving absolute Divine Worship to Christ, Dial. p. 250.although they believed him to be of a different nature from the Supreme God: which he hopes is far enough from the Doctors relative or inferior Worship. But p. 295I am very far from being satisfied with this Answer. For I pray tell me wherein lies the difference between Soveraign Worship, and Inferiour: In Acts of the Mind, or in External Acts?

R. P.

In Internal doubtless; on T. G.'s principles, who makes External Acts to signifie according to the determination of the Church.

P. D.

What are those Internal Acts wherein the Worship of the Supreme God consists?

R. P.

A due esteem of his excellency, and suitable affection to it.

P. D.

Must not this due esteem distinguish him from all Creatures?

R. P.

Yes surely; for otherwise it can be no due esteem: the distance being infinite between God and his Creatures.

P. D.

Can a man then have an equal esteem of God and a Creature? which he acknowledges to be made by him?

R. P.

Certainly not.

P. D.

Then it must be unequal, according to the difference of uncreated and created excellencies.

R. P.

Yes.

P. D.

Then the Worship must be unequal; and that which is given to a Creature must be inferiour worship.

p. 296R. P.

But T. G. saith, they might believe true Divinity to be in him, as the Heathens did of their lesser Gods.

P. D.

True Divinity! What is that, when they believed him to be a Creature? did they take him for an uncreated creature? For that can be no true Divinity which is not uncreated; and yet you confess they owned Christ to be a Creature. What nonsense and contradiction would T. G. cry out upon, if Dr. St. had ever said any such thing?

R. P.

Might not they believe Christ to be assumed as Consort in the Empire, and so absolute Divine Honour to be due to him?

P. D.

What do you mean by this absolute Divine Honour? For I have already proved it must be inferiour Worship.

R. P.

I do suppose absolute Divine Honour is that which is given to a Being on the account of its own excellency, and relative from the respect it hath to another.

P. D.

But whether absolute or relative, it is proper Divine Honour you mean. And doth not that imply an esteem of proper divine excellency, and is not that proper to God alone and uncreated? How then can this absolute Divine Honour be given to a Created Being?

p. 297R. P.

How did the Gentiles to their false Gods?

P. D.

Just as the Arians, for they made distinctions in their worship; as will appear when we come to that subject.

R. P.

What do you make then this worship of the Arians to be?

P. D.

An Inferior and Relative Worship; for they supposed they worshipped God, when they gave those Acts of Worship to Christ which were agreeable to the excellencies that were in him.

R. P.

But (2.) Those Acts were such as by the consent of the Church were understood to be due only to God incarnate.

P. D.

Here we are to know, both what these Acts were; and what power the Church hath to impose a signification upon them.

R. P.

T. G. names these. 1. Worshipping and serving him with Latria. Dial. p. 249, 251.2. Putting their trust in him as Mediator of Redemption. 3. Invoking him as the Judge of the quick and the dead, &c.

P. D.

What means this &c. I am afraid here is something beyond the trick about Gregory Nyssen, which lies under this Dragons Tayl. Are these all which Dr. St. mentioned?

p. 298R. P.

I know not that; if you know more I am sure to hear of it.

P. D.

You are not mistaken; for Dr. St. had shewed at large, (1.) That external adoration was one of those things which the Fathers charged the Arians with Idolatry for giving to Christ supposing him to be a Creature: from Peters forbidding Cornelius, Defence, p. 165, 175, 178.and the Angel St. John; because this is only proper to God: from the plain testimonies of Athanasius, Epiphanius and St. Cyril. (2.) That invocation of Christ as a Mediator of Intercession, was condemned as Idolatry in the Arians. Athanasius supposes it inconsistent with Christianity to joyn Christ, P. 166.if he were a creature, in our prayers, together with God. (3.) That they made no such distinction of worshipping and serving with Latria, as T. G. insinuates. For he shews from the Testimonies of Athanasius, P. 163. P. 171. P. 178. P. 180.and even Gregory Nyssen, St. Cyril and Theodoret, that the very worship which they condemn for Idolatry is called Doulia by them. And therefore these are meer shifts and evasions which do not remove the difficulty at all. I deny not, but they did put their trust in Christ for Salvation, and expect his coming to judge the quick p. 299and the dead; but I say these were but expressions suitable to the apprehensions they had of his excellencies above any other Creatures, but still inferiour to Gods: and the Fathers did not charge them with Idolatry meerly for these Acts, but for the other likewise mentioned before.

R. P.

But T. G. hath a reserve still behind, viz. that it is in the Churches Power to determine the signification of external Acts of Worship, what belongs to Soveraign or proper Divine Worship, and what to inferiour worship; that at that time the Church might take those for Acts of Divine Worship which afterwards by consent of the Church came only to signifie inferiour Acts of Worship when applied to Creatures; and therefore the argument cannot hold from that time to after Ages.

P.D.

I think you have hit upon T.G.'s meaning: and in truth it is the only thing to be said in the case. For if Idolatry be a thing in the Churches Power to determine, it is the only way in the world for the Church of Rome to free her self (supposing that power to be lodged in her); but if it should happen that the Law of God, the consent of Nations, the Reason of Divine Worship and the Practice of p. 300the Primitive Church have determined Idolatry antecedently to the power of the present Church: what a case are you then in? The guilt of Idolatry must lie heavily upon you, and if it be so great a sin as your own Schoolmen determine, you have a great deal to answer for; notwithstanding all the tricks and evasions of T. G. But why doth not T. G. make the external Acts of Theft, Adultery, Murder and Perjury, as much under the Churches power as those of Idolatry? But I forbear now, supposing that we shall meet with this useful notion again before we end this debate.

R. P.

You are mistaken, if you think T. G. had no other answer to give: For he saith, they could not be understood of that worship which our Church gives to Saints, because they acknowledge an inferiour worship due to the Saints; for which he quotes St. Austin, Gregory Nazianzen, St. Hierom and Gregory Nyssen.

P. D.

Had T. G. the confidence to quote St. Augustin again for this, when Dr. St. purposely answered this very Testimony in his Book which T. G. pretends here to answer, and proves evidently from him that no worship was then given to the Saints? Defence, p. 336.and to all this T. G. p. 301returns nothing, but however he brings the same Testimony again; as whole and as sound, and as much to the purpose as ever. Gregory Nazianzen is quoted at peradventure, for I remember nothing in the Orat. de Nat. Christ. to that purpose, although I lately read it over. St. Hierom speaks only of reverencing the Sepulchres of the Martyrs: but all the weight lies upon Gregory Nyssen, and what, I pray, saith this single Witness to the business?

R.P.

More than you will be willing to hear, or able to answer. For in his Oration upon St. Theodore that great and holy Martyr, (which even Rivetus himself that capricious Fanatick in Criticism doth not question to be his genuine work) he commends the peoples devotion to the Martyrs, Dial. p. 238.he describes the magnificent structure of the Temple, the pieces of Sculpture in it, and especially the picture of the Martyr; then coming to the Shrine he shews the esteem they had for his Relicks; and if they were admitted to touch his body, they embrace it as if they beheld it yet alive; and weeping over it as if he were whole before them, they solicit his supplication and intercession, beseeching him as a Champion of God, and invocating him as one that could obtain p. 302blessings, when he would, for them. And then he dilates himself upon the Acts of the Martyr and the great benefits they received by him: and at the end of his Oration addresses himself to him in these words, We stand in need of many benefits, do thou intercede and deprecate with our common King and Lord for thy Country. Do thou as a Souldier fight in our defence. And in case there be need of greater intercession call an Assembly of thy Brother Martyrs; let the prayers of many just persons expiate the sins of multitudes of Offenders. Admonish Peter, excite Paul, and John also the beloved Disciple to be solicitors for the Churches they have founded; that Idolatry may not lift up its head, that Heresies may not overgrow the Vineyard, &c. But by the Power of thine and thy fellows intercession, O admirable man, and eminent among Martyrs, the Christian Church may be a plentiful Field of Harvest, &c. If Dr. St. had been present at this Oration, saith T. G. how may we think would his zeal have urged him to have cried out Idolatry, Dial. p. 242.flat Idolatry, very real Idolatry, meer Heathenish Idolatry.

P. D.

I am not of your mind in this; for I suppose he would have considered the allowances to be made for an eloquent p. 303person in a Panegyrical Oration; when things are amplified, heightned, improved, with all the most moving figures and strains of Rhetorick to excite the Auditors admiration and affection to the party commended. And he must be a great stranger to the Schools of Eloquence that will form doctrines and devotions from Apostrophe's and Prosopopeia's. I do not think Dr. St. would have charged Cicero a jot the more for Idolatry for his praying to the Hills and Woods of Alba, Vos Albani tumuli atque luci, oro atque obtestor: What! flat Idolatry! Heathenish Idolatry! praying to Hills and Woods. No such matter. For so Rhetoricians will tell T. G. what great scope Orators may take in the representation of persons and the things done by them; and how mightily those figures both adorn the Oration and move the Auditors; But withal, that these are figures it is very easie to exceed in, and it requires great judgement to manage them with a due decorum. If it were needful for T. G. I could produce the Testimonies of both Greek and Latine Rhetoricians to this purpose. All the question is, whether Gregory Nyssen spake like an Orator in these expressions, for which we must p. 304consider the character of the Person, and the Occasion of speaking. As to Gregory Nyssen, Gregory Nazianzen severely rebukes him in a whole Epistle for affecting more the Glory of an Orator than of a Christian; Greg. Naz. Ep. 43.and this after he was a Priest, and devoted to the service of Christ; in so much that many Christians were very much offended at him. And what wonder is it to find such a person, on such an occasion as making a Panegyrical Oration on a Martyr, laying on all his colours, opening his perfuming pots, and using more the figures of an Orator, than the exactness of a Divine? Nay, it was become so general a Custom among their Eloquent men to exceed in their Panegyrical Orations, that I find Theodoret quoted for saying, No rule of Doctrine is to be taken from them. Theod. Dial. 3.And it is agreed by your Divines as well as our own, that the Fathers in their popular Orations do make use of such bold figures, as are not to be made a foundation for doctrines to be taken from them. Therefore this Apostrophe to Theodorus by Gregory Nyssen is no argument to prove invocation of Saints; there being a great difference between flowers of Rhetorick and Forms of Devotion.

p. 305R. P.

But he commends the devotion of the people to the Martyrs, and calls it a pure worship.

P. D.

That he might well do, as the solemnities of the Martyrs were observed out of honour to God and the Christian Religion. For then the Christians met at the Tombs of the Martyrs to perform the publick worship of God there; and afterwards erected Churches upon their memories, so that the place, the time, the occasion of meeting was for the honour of the Martyrs, but the worship was given to God alone.

R. P.

Doth not Gregory Nyssen take notice of the peoples soliciting his supplication and intercession with God for them, as their Champion, &c.

P. D.

I grant he doth so; but observe his words; he saith the people when they touch any part of his body, (which was very rarely granted) they embraced it, as if it had been living; and wept over it; and then he adds foreign. As if he had been whole and appeared before them, (which last word foreign T. G. very conveniently left out, which I p. 306leave to the reader to judge of, as a Testimony of T. G.'s sincerity, at the very same time he charges Dr. St. for the same fault) they solicit his intercession, beseeching him as the Champion of God, and calling upon him as one that received gifts when he pleased. I do not think this Superstition of the People was to be excused, which began most early to appear in the parts of Cappadocia and Pontus, and the reason of it is not hard to give, from the turning the Heathen Festivals into Christian Solemnities to the Martyrs, of which Gregory Nyssen speaks in the Life of Gregory Thaumaturgus;Greg. Nyss. in vit. Greg. p. 574. but however, this was not any solemn invocation of him, as a part of Religious Worship, but an occasional and rare thing, and done upon supposition, as if he had been alive and then present among them. And that the practice of these men who seemed most to make addresses to Saints in the fourth Century did differ from the invocation of Saints in your Church, I shall make appear by these particulars.

1. Invocation of Saints is made a solemn part of Religious Worship in the Church of Rome. For which, we do not run to some extravagant expressions of your Preachers; nor barely to the Ave p. 307Maries they use in their Pulpits, of which no single instance can be produced out of Antiquity; but to the publick, solemn Authorized Offices of your Church. And although you may say, the Church is not answerable for the indiscretion of Preachers, or the Figures of Poets, yet certainly she is for all standing and allowed Offices of Divine Worship. And this is that we charge you with, that by this you make Religious Worship of the Creatures, a part of your constant and solemn worship. Even in the Masse it self, you begin with confession to God and to his Creatures (which Athanasius accounted so great an impiety, to joyn God and his Creature together in an Act of Worship) and afterwards pray to them. And although in the plain Canon of the Masse you pretend there is scarce any, or but twice or thrice, a direct invocation of the Saints; yet upon occasional and anniversary Masses, such Invocation is very frequent, as in the Masses of the Festivals of the Blessed Virgin, which are many in the year; the Masse for Women with Child; the Masses of the Apostles, the Angel Michael and many Saints: which it were tedious to repeat. It would be endless to give an account how much p. 306duplicate page p. 307duplicate page p. 308of your Breviaries, Houres, Litanies, and private Offices of Devotion is stuffed out with formal addresses to Saints. If you but cast your eye on any of the Offices of the B. Virgin, you cannot question the truth of this. Now I pray tell me, where you meet with any like this in Antiquity; you may pick up some flourishes of Orators or Poets in the fourth Century; but what are these to the standing Offices of the Church; which are the standard of Divine Worship? Name me any one Liturgy of the Church, which is Authentick, that had the name of a…y Saint or Creature in it by way of Invocation before the time of Petrus Fallo, who is no Author to be gloried in. And of him indeed Nicephorus saith, that he first brought the Invocation of the Blessed Virgin into the Prayers of the Church. Niceph. Callist. l. 15. c. 28.Before his time, the Fathers utterly deny there was any Invocation of Saints in the Prayers of the faithful, Defence p. 340, to 347.as Dr. St. hath evidently proved from St. Augustin: and methinks T. G. should have said something or other to it, and not think this poor single Testimony of Gregory Nyssen would overthrow all.

p. 3092. The Invocation of Saints in your Church is direct and formal, not meerly by way of desire to pray for them, but to bestow blessings upon them. Of which Dr. St. hath produced several late Instances in Books of Devotion now in use here in England; Defence, p. 293. to 305.to which many more might be added, if it were needful. And it is a wonder to me, that any man who hath looked into the Offices of the B. Virgin can make the least doubt of this. And considering the Titles given her in the Roman Church, it were a disparagement to her, not to pray directly to her for blessings. For if she be the Fountain of Grace and Mercy, the Mother of Consolation, the Safety of all that trust in her, the Dispenser of Graces to whom she pleases, the Queen of Heaven to whom all Power is committed, the Mediatrix between her Son and us; as she is stiled in the Roman Church; why may not men pray as directly to her as to Christ himself? As long as these and many other Titles are owned in their Prayers, in their Sacred Hymns, in their Commentators on Scripture, and not meerly in their Poets and Orators. Why doth T. G. go about to deceive the world in making it believe that all their Invocation is only praying to pray for them? Which is p. 310all that is pretended to be used in the Ancient Church: And Cassander thinks they were rather wishes and desires than prayers; Cassand. Ep. 19. Op. p. 1109.for which he gives a very good reason, viz. that there was a condition expressed by them; such as that of Greg. Nazianzen in his Oration on his Sister Gorgonia. If thou hast any regard to our affairs, and if this be part of the reward of holy Souls to be sensible of things done below, receive this Office of Kindness from me. Which shews they had no confidence or assurance that the Saints in Heaven did understand our affairs, and therefore all expressions of this kind in them were rather Wishes than Prayers. And even Greg. Nyssen in this Oration upon Theodore supposes,Greg. Nyssen Orat. in Theod. p. 585. that unless he came down from above where-ever he was, whether in the Aethereal Region, or Celestial, or Angelical, and were actually present among them, he could not understand the honours that were done him, nor the addresses they made to him. And when they did express such an uncertainty as this at the same time they made these Addresses towards the Conclusion of their Orations, after the manner of Oratours, it is plain they are to be understood rather for Rhetorical Wishes, than formal Invocations. Now let any man compare this doubtfulness p. 311of the Ancients, with the confidence expressed in the Church of Rome, when they declare it to be de Fide that the Saints do hear them, (although the manner be not) and then judge whether their practises can be of the same kind.

3. The Invocation of Saints in your Church doth imply inward submission to a Creature; and therefore goes very much beyond the addresses of the Ancients. There are three things which prove this Inward submission to a Creature in the Invocation of Saints. 1. Inward Devotion to them: 2. An acknowledged superiority over them: 3. An intention to give them Divine Worship.

1. Inward Devotion. For even mental Prayers to Saints are allowed by the Council of Trent, as Dr. St. told T. G., Defence, p. 293.of which he takes no notice; and yet quarrels with him for two other passages in the same place. Must we impute this to a casual Vndulation of the visual rayes, Dial. p. 256.as T. G. very finely expresseth it? I am afraid, there was some other cause for it. For since that Council allows internal prayers to Saints, it must not only certainly suppose their knowledge of the heart, but a due submission of our souls to them; which inward Prayer doth import. p. 312And therefore suppliciter invocare tam voce quàm mente, which are the words of the Council of Trent; doth not only imply formal Invocation, but internal submission; both which do belong to suppliants.

2. An acknowledged Superiority over them: which appears by that Authority and Government which they attribute to them, with respect to particular places and things. Whereby they make the Saints not bare Intercessours, but Tutelar Deities, and they invocate them as such. T. G. saith,Dial. p. 238. they do not make them Authours of those Blessings; not Originally, and Independently; but subordinately and Ministerially they do. And if this be not Idolatry, no worship of the inferiour Deities among the Heathens was so. Lipsius was no Fool when he made the B. Virgin a Tutelar Deity; and the Popes surely understand their own Religion, when they Canonize particular Saints to be Patrons of such places: which may be seen in some of the latest Canonizations. As of S. Rosa, that admirable Saint of Peru, and others.

3. An intention to give Divine Worship to them. For what else can be meant by that eminent kind of adoration p. 313which Bellarmine saith, doth belong to them; that Divine worship, D. Forbes Consid. modest. & pacif. p. 293.which Azorius saith, you give to the Saints; and Serrarius saith, many of the wisest persons among you say, that Latria and Doulia proceed both from the same vertue of Religion; that is, they are of the same kind. So that this is not meerly the Superstition of the Vulgar, but the Judgement of the wisest among you, if Serrarius his Judgement may be taken. I will not dissemble what B. Forbs observes,P. 297. that some of the School-men do make the Invocation of Saints not to slow from the vertue of Religion, but another of their own making, called singularis observantia. But this is only a trick found out to avoid the imputation of Idolatry, which they thought would fall justly upon them, if they made the Worship to be of the same kind, although of a different degree: since nothing can be plainer in Antiquity, than that all truly Religious Worship belongs only to God and cannot be given to a Creature, without the guilt of Idolatry. For even in the same Age wherein Greg. Nyssen lived, the Council of Laodicea declared the Invocation of Angels to be Idolatry;Concil. Laodic. c. 35. Theod. in Col. 2.18.Col 2:18 so Theodoret expresseth the sense of that Council, who certainly p. 314understood the meaning of it, foreign, are his words, which he makes to be all one with foreign. So that praying to them is that part of divine worship which was condemned for Idolatry, being given to Angels.

R. P.

T. G. Cathol. no Idol. p. 384.T. G. saith, This was a practice of nominating Angels, which he saith, cannot with any shew of probability be understood of that worship, which the Holy Catholick Church gives to Holy Angels.

P. D.

Good Sir, his Reason; for to my apprehension it comes as home to the practice of the Church of Rome as may be.

R. P.

(1.) Because the Council speaks of such as excluded our Lord Jesus Christ, making private Assemblies: which words Dr. St. conveniently omitted.

P. D.

Did he so? let us hear them at length. That Christians ought not to forsake the Church of God, and go aside, to invocate Angels; or make unlawful Conventicles; If any one be found practising this secret Idolatry, let him be accursed; because he hath forsaken our Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of God, and betaken himself to Idolatry. The Council speaks this of a sort of Christians, who yet were guilty of Idolatry in praying to Angels; therefore praying to Angels is Idolatry.

p. 315R. P.

Yes, such praying to Angels as Theodoret speaks of, upon account that the Law was delivered by them, or that God being invisible and incomprehensible cannot be approached but by the Angels.

P. D.

Will T. G. stand to it, that this is Idolatry? then it must be Idolatry in the nature of the thing, or by some positive Law; if the latter, we see the Council of Laodicea accounts it equal Idolatry among Christians as before: if the former, then praying to a Creature is Idolatry in the Nature of the Thing: which is a very fair concession, and I suppose the Church of Rome will con him no thanks for.

R. P.

But it is Idolatry on those accounts I mentioned.

P. D.

On what I pray? Because the Law was delivered by them? How is that possible on T. G.'s principles, when they were only Gods Ministers therein? and so praying to Gods Ministers in Heaven is Idolatry; how then will praying to Saints escape?

R. P.

But Theodoret adds, they brought us salvation thereby.

P. D.

Only Ministerially; and this alters not the case.

R. P.

But suppose they thought access to God was only by them?

p. 316P. D.

What then? that might prove them no Christians, but doth it prove them Idolaters? Suppose they were Jews; must they therefore needs be Idolaters?

R. P.

But T. G. saith, good Angels are not to be worshipped but in subordination to Christ the Head, nor their prayers to be desired as efficacious for us but through his merits.

P. D.

And what follows? therefore leaving out Christ is Idolatry? Doth T. G. talk at this rate; and hope to excuse the Church of Rome from Idolatry? For I still ask, what it was, which made their Worship of Angels Idolatry? Leaving out of Christ might make it Judaism or Heathenism, but how comes it to be Idolatry?

R. P.

I think you will never be satisfied.

P. D.

Not with such answers, I assure you.

R. P.

Baronius saith, Theodoret was mistaken; and that this Canon is to be understood of Heathen Idolatry; and that the Oratories of Michael which Theodoret saith, were built by those Idolaters, were in truth built by very good Catholicks.

P. D.

This is plain dealing: and Baronius p. 317saw well enough, there was no way to justifie the Church of Rome, but by condemning Theodoret: but I leave it to any mans consideration, whether Theodoret, whose distance was not great, either in Age or Place, did not better understand the meaning of this Council; and the practises of those times and places, than Baronius; and whether his judgement be not rather to be taken, than that of a man, who turns every stone to avoid a difficulty, which he saw could no otherwise be answered.

R. P.

(2.) How can this be the meaning of the Council of Laodicea, when it declares for the honouring, and celebrating the Feast-days of the Martyrs?

P. D.

Doth T. G. call this a second Reason? Where lyes the consequence? The Council of Laodicea, was for honouring the Feast-dayes of the Martyrs, therefore the praying to Angels is not condemned by it for Idolatry. As though there were no way of celebrating their Festivals, but by praying to Saints and Angels. When T. G. proves that meeting at their Memories on their Anniversary dayes, and praising God for them, and rehearsing their Acts, was no keeping their Festivals without praying to them; he will do something towards p. 318making this look like a Reason. In the mean time, let the Reader consider whether praying to Saints was practised by Greg. Nyssen, when praying to Angels about the same time by the Council of Laodicea is condemned for Idolatry. But this is not all which I have to say; for if Gregory Nyssen's practice doth excuse the modern Invocation of Saints from Idolatry, I desire to know whether it was singular in him, or the sense of the Church of that Age?

R. P.

No doubt T. G. brings it for an instance of the sense of the Church: for it were to no great purpose to produce a singular opinion or practice of one man condemned by the rest of the Church.

P. D.

Then I ask, whether offering up ones self, or offering up a cake to a Saint, be the greater Idolatry?

R. P.

A mans self certainly.

P. D.

Do not they who devote themselves to a particular Saint, choosing her for their perpetual Patroness, vowing themselves to be her slaves, offer up themselves to her?

R. P.

What would you have?

P. D.

I will tell you, Epiphanius who lived in the same Age with Greg. Nyssen, p. 319condemns those for rank Idolatry, who offered up Cakes to the B. Virgin; and do you think he would have excused those who offered up themselves and their devotions to her? And at the same time he condemns the worship both of Saints and Angels; Defence, p. 175. to p. 180.in the places produced by Dr. St. What answer hath T. G. made to this?

R. P.

I do not remember he takes notice of it.

P. D.

T. G. would make an excellent Commentator; for he knows how to pass over a hard place, as well as any I have met with. But still I have one question more. Whether Greg. Nyssen did argue well against the Arians or not?

R. P.

Why should you question that?

P. D.

Do you think he spake consistently to himself? Or, if not, is his opinion to be taken from a Panegyrical Oration, or a strict Dispute?

R. P.

A strict dispute; for then men consider every word, and the consequence of it.

P. D.

Greg. Nyssen goes upon this principle, To give Divine Worship to a Creature is Idolatry: but the Arians in p. 320worshipping Christ as a Creature do give Divine Worship to a Creature: therefore, &c. To make good the particulars of this charge, we must consider what Greg. Nyssen makes to be the parts of Divine Worship; and if I can prove, that Greg. Nyssen doth make prayer to be such a part of Divine Worship, then by necessary consequence he makes praying to a Creature to be Idolatry. Now it is very well known that Greg. Nyssen in several places makes prayer with supplication to be peculiar to God; Bell. de bonis oper. in particul. l. 1. c. 1. Greg. Nyssen orat. 1. de orat. orat. 2. de orat. Dom. Tract. 2. de inscript. Psalm c. 3. Ambros. de obit. Theod.Ps 3therefore he calls it a conversing with God; a request of good things with supplication unto God. In which he agrees with the rest of the Fathers, who made Religious Invocation peculiar to God. Sed tamen tu solus Domine invocandus es, saith S. Ambrose. I do not pray to any besides thy self; saith Ephreem Syrus in the Officium Diurnum of the Maronites. We call not on the name of this man or that man, saith S. Chrysostome, Chrysost. in 1 Cor. Hom. 1. in Coloss. 3. Hom. 9.Col 3but on the name of the Lord. This is an honour, he saith, God hath reserved to himself, to call upon him, and will not give it to Angels or Arch-angels; as he elsewhere speaks. VntoUnto God alone do we pray, saith the Greek Catena on the fifth Psalm. To whom shall I call but unto thee, p. 321saith S. Augustine. Aug. Confess…. l. 1. c. …. Clem. …rom. l. 7. Tirtul. Apol. c. 30.This is the best sacrifice we can offer unto God, say Clemens of Alexandria and Tertullian. It were easie to produce many more Testimonies to this purpose, if these be not sufficient to prove, that in Greg. Nyssens ▪ Age, as well as before, Prayer was looked on as a peculiar part of Divine Worship.

R. P.

To what purpose? since no body denyes, that prayer as it is a means to obtain blessings from God as the Author of them is peculiar to God.

P. D.

This Answer doth not take off the force of the argument. For prayer may be considered two wayes. 1. As a Means to obtain blessings. 2. As a solemn part of Divine Worship. Now if they reserved prayer to God, on the latter account, then it follows, that whatever Invocation doth take off from the peculiarity of this part of external worship, is against the design of the Fathers. So Origen argues that Invocation and Adoration do imply each other. Orig. l. 8. in Epist. ad Rom. c. 10.Rom 10Invocare nomen Domini & adorare Deum unum atque idem est. To invocate God and to adore him is all one; from whence he proves that those who invocate Christ do adore him. And where the Church of Smyrna declares in her Epistle about the Martyrdom of Polycarp, p. 322that they did not worship any other but Christ, the old Latin Translation renders it, neque alteri cuiquam precem orationis impendere. And Theodoret makes praying to Angels, and the worshipping of them the same thing. So that prayer was looked on as a part of adoration; therefore whosoever gives the external worship of prayer to another besides God, doth give to a Creature that which belongs to God.

R. P.

I know not what you mean, I pray explain your self more.

P. D.

Is not God worshipped solemnly by us, when we joyn together in prayer to him?

R. P.

Yes.

P. D.

Is not this external worship, that which the Fathers mean, by the adoration that is implyed in prayer?

R. P.

Suppose it be.

P. D.

Wherein lyes this external worship? Is it not that we meet together and joyn in acts of Devotion to testifie our acknowledgement of Gods Soveraignty and dependence upon him?

R. P.

What then?

P. D.

Then whosoever do use the same external Acts of Worship to a Creature, do apply that to a Creature which p. 323the Fathers did suppose to belong only to God; as if men kneel and pray to Saints in the same place, at the same time, with the same Ceremonies of Devotion they use to God himself, they take off the peculiarity of this worship to God, and make it common to his Creatures.

R. R.

This only reaches to the external Acts, but the intention and design of the worshippers with us make the difference.

P. D.

I do not now meddle with your intention and design; but I am pursuing the force of the argument used by the Fathers. To make this yet more plain to you. The Fathers use the argument of external adoration against the Arians; for say they,Defence, p. 165. Peter forbad Cornelius to worship him, and the Angel S. John; from whence they infer that God only ought to be worshipped, and therefore giving external adoration to Christ, supposing him to be a Creature, is Idolatry. Is this argument good, or not?

R. P.

Let me consider a little: It was good then, but it is not now; for T. G. saith, it is in the Churches power to determine the signification of exteriour signs.

P. D.

An admirable answer! which makes the arguments of the Fathers in p. 324truth to have no force at all. For the Arians might say, the external acts of adoration did not signifie the same with them, which they did with Catholicks, for they only signified an inferiour and relative worship, when applyed to the Son; and Soveraign and absolute worship, when given to the Father. So that if there be any force in what the Fathers did argue against the Arians, it will make the inferiour and relative worship of a Creature to be Idolatry; notwithstanding Greg. Nyssens Oration upon Theodore.

R. P.

I am like T. G. who hates a great Book upon one subject; so do I a long discourse upon one argument: methinks Greg. Nyssen hath taken up a great deal of our time, and I have something more yet to say to you, before we part.

P. D.

I pray let me hear it, and I suppose it will admit of a quicker dispatch.

R. P.

It is upon the same head of the Doctors fidelity in quoting Authors, and it concerns the passage in Arnobius, in which T. G. charged him with cogging in the word Divinity in the singular number instead of adorable Deities in the Plural; Dial. p. 252.and Dr. St. answers with a protestation, p. 325that he translated these words nihil numinis inesse simulachris, which he saith are but two lines above the words T. G. charges him with.

P. D.

And how I pray doth T. G. clear himself? for in my mind he is most concerned to vindicate himself.

R. P.

He doth it very well; for he denyes not those words to be there which Dr. St. translated, but he saith, he ought not to have translated the words of Arnobius to the Heathens, but the words of the Heathens to Arnobius, since his design was to prove the Heathens did not worship the Images themselves for Gods.

P. D.

A pitiful shift! T. G. charged Dr. St. with cogging in the word Divinity in the singular number; Dr. St. shews, it was so used but two lines before those words which T. G. cites, and those were the words he translated. Now saith T. G. those were the words of Arnobius to the Heathen; what then? doth he not confute them in something which they held; if he proves, nihil numinis inesse simulachris, must not they hold aliquid numinis, &c. so that it comes all to one. But to put this out of all doubt, if T. G. had looked a little farther, he might have found these very words of the Heathens, p. 326Illud etiam dicere simulachrorum assertores solent; … l. 6. p. 208.surely these are the Heathens; non ignorasse antiquos nihil habere numinis signa. What doth T. G. think now? Had he not better look more about him, before he makes such rude and impertinent clamours about Dr. St.'s insincerity in quoting Authors? Of which you may judge by this one Instance, where himself is so notoriously faulty, and yet from hence he concludes what a sad account of Citations we are like to have from him.Dial. p. 257.

R. P.

What say you to Dr. St.'s obs…rvations of the Council of Trent about the Worship of Images?

P. D.

Have you ever been a hunting of Squirrels?

R. P.

Why do you ask me such an impertinent question?

P. D.

Not so impertinent as you think: for the Squirrels leaping from bough to bough, forwards and backwards, is just like T. G.'s answer to Dr. St.'s Book. For he makes nothing of leaping a hundred or two hundred pages forwards and backwards as the humour takes him. However, let us hear what he hath to say to those observations. For I remember very well, what the design p. 327of them was;Defence, p. 614. viz. that though the worship of Latria was owned before it by many Divines to be given to Images, and that were against the decree of the Council of Nice; yet the Council of Trent allows all external acts of adoration of Images, gives no intimation against this kind of Worship; and since it, many of the most eminent Divines of your Church have justified the giving Latria to Images, and that from the words of this Council.

R. P.

But T. G. saith,Dial. p. 214. those very Divines do not mean by Latria proper Divine Worship, which is due to God and terminated upon him; but that the Act being in their opinion one in substance to the Prototype and the Images, it is terminated absolutely upon the Person of Christ for himself, and falls upon the Image after an inferiour manner, as a thing only relating to him, and purely for his sake: for which reason, some call it relative Latria; others, secundary; others, improper; others, Analogical; others, per accidens; and the dispute in effect is rather de modo loquendi, than of the thing it self.

P. D.

To clear this matter, we must consider, (1.) That the Council of Nice doth deny Latria to be given to an Image. (2.) That the Divines of the Roman p. 328Church do say that the practice of the Church cannot be defended in the Worship of the Cross, without giving Latria to it. (3.) That the Council of Trent, when just occasion was given, declares nothing against this; for although it referrs to the Council of Nice, yet when it gives the reason of worship, it doth it in such terms, that many of your Divines say, must infer the worship of Latria to be given to them.

R. P.

What if it doth, saith T. G. since, it is only a dispute about words, and all agree that the worship proper to God, signified primarily by the word Latria, is not to be given to Images?

P. D.

That must be a little better considered. For do you think it is possible to give the worship proper to God to an Image, or not? If it be not, why did the Council of Nice declare against it; if it be, tell me in what Acts that Worship of Latria doth consist?

R. P.

It is when men give proper divine honour to an Image.

P. D.

What is this proper divine honour? for you are not one step forwarder by this answer. I see I must come to particulars. Were the Gnosticks and ancient Hereticks to blame in their Worship of Images, or not?

p. 329R. P.

No doubt they were; for they stand condemned by the Church for that worship they gave to Images.

P. D.

Wherein did their fault lye?

R. P.

In giving Divine Honour and Worship to the Image.

P. D.

Did not they worship the Image of Christ?

R. P.

And what then?

P. D.

Then their fault lay in giving divine Worship to the Image of Christ?

R. P.

Yes, proper divine Worship.

P. D.

What was that proper divine worship? was it absolute, or relative?

R. P.

Absolute.

P. D.

Then it was giving divine worship to an Image of Christ, without respect to Christ; which is either non-sense, or a contradiction. Is it possible to give divine worship to an Image of a person, without respect to the person? Men may worship a piece of Wood, or a Stone, without respect to a person; but to worship that which represents, and on that account, because it represents, without any respect to what it represents, is a contradiction; therefore the worship of an Image as such is a relative worship; and proper Latria as given to an Image is relative Latria.

R. P.

But men may give absolute divine p. 330worship to an Image; for may not a man joyn in his mind the Image and person represented as one object of Worship, and so give proper divine worship to both considered as one?

P. D.

I thank you for that: For so I find some of your Divines have determined that in this sense absolute and proper divine worship may be given to the Cross. Defence, p. 616. to p. 620. p. 637.And Dr. St. produced several of them, who contended for an absolute Latria to be due to Images: such as Ludovicus à Paramo, Paulus Maria Quarti, Gamachaeus a late Professour of Divinity in the Sorbon; and others.

R. P.

But T. G. saith, they only differ in modo loquendi.

P. D.

I think rather in modo colendi. For are not absolute and relative worship two distinct kinds? how else comes the giving absolute worship to be Idolatry, and not the giving relative? And if giving absolute worship be Idolatry, all in your Church are guilty of it, who worship the Image and thing represented as one object. If it be not, then there can be none to an Image as such.

R. P.

Yes; if they offer sacrifice to Images, as the Gnosticks did.

p. 331P. D.

S. Augustin and Theodoret say; they adored Images, and offered Incense to them. And is not the very same practised in your Church? If this were Idolatry in them, why not in you? Unless your Church hath power to change the Nature of Idolatry: which is all one with changing the nature of Vertues and Vices.

R. P.

But they sacrificed to Images as the Heathens did.

P. D.

True; for the burning Incense before Images was thought to be sacrificing to them, being joyned with adoration. And the Christians chose rather to dye, than to joyn in that act of worship towards the Images of the Emperours: whence Dr. St. observed,Defence, p. 323. that burning of Incense towards Images was the same tryal of Christians, that eating of Swines flesh was of the Jews. I pray tell me, was there any harm in this or not? supposing the Christians looked on the Emperours as Gods Vicegerents, and the Images only as representing them?

R. P.

I see what you aim at; you would have me condemn the primitive Christians or our selves: according to the sense of the Church at that time, it was unlawful, but according to the sense of our Church now, it is lawful to do the p. 332same things out of honour to the Images of Christ, or his Saints.

P. D.

That is, your Church is innocent, if your Church may be judge. But I now dispute upon your own principles of relative worship, whether those Acts might not have been done to the Emperours Images, which had saved the lives of so many Martyrs?

R. P.

No; for the Emperours then exacted to be worshipped as Gods, i. e. with divine worship.

P. D.

Was that Divine Worship supreme or not? i. e. did they take the Emperours for supreme Deities?

R. P.

No; but they gave them the Worship of the supreme Deity.

P. D.

Then the giving this Worship was thought Idolatry, though mens conceptions were right as to their being Creatures.

R. P.

But what is this to the worship of Images?

P. D.

Was it not lawful to give the same worship to the Images of the Emperours as to the Emperours themselves? Might not they look on the Emperours as Gods Vicegerents, and so give them relative Latria on that account; and then look on their Images as representing them, p. 333and so give a secundary, improper, Analogical relative Latria to their Images? and by this means the Heathens and the Christians had only differed in modo loquendi; but the Christians had saved their lives by the bargain.

R. P.

But our dispute is of the Images of Christ, and not of Heathen Emperours.

P. D.

I only shew the absurd consequences of this doctrine, and how inconsistent it is with the principles of primitive Christianity. But I return to the distinctions of your Divines about Latria being given to Images. You all agree T. G. saith, that the worship proper to God is not to be given to Images. Is not Latria the Worship proper to God?

R. P.

Yes: proper Latria is; but not improper and relative.

P. D.

Is there any worship so proper to God, that it cannot be improperly and relatively given to an Image?

R. P.

What do you mean? for I do not understand you.

P. D.

Rather, you will not. I ask you, whether there be any such act of worship so proper to God, that you may not in respect to God, do that to his p. 334Image; or in respect to Christ, do that to the Cross?

R. P.

Although there may be none such, yet the Church doth not use all acts of worship to the Image, which it doth to God.

P. D.

I not ask what you do; but what upon your principles you may do. And suppose a man doth that Act which your Church allows not, is he guilty of Idolatry or bare disobedience in doing it to an Image?

R. P.

Of Idolatry.

P. D.

Then there are such external acts of worship so proper to God himself, that the doing them to an Image for his sake is Idolatry. As to sacrifice to an Image for the sake of Christ is Idolatry. Is it not?

R. P.

Yes.

P. D.

Is the improper and relative sacrificing to an Image Idolatry?

R. P.

You ask an untoward question. For I see what you drive at.

P. D.

Answer me directly. Is it, or is it not?

R. P.

I think it is.

P. D.

Then it follows, that this distinction of proper and improper, absolute p. 335and relative Latria signifies nothing. For if the Acts of Worship are proper to God, no relative or improper use of them can excuse from Idolatry; if they are not proper, then it is no Latria.

R. P.

I must think again of this matter. For as you represent it, this can never excuse us.

P. D.

I wonder so many subtle men should ever think it would. But I will not thus give it over. When the Council of Nice did forbid Latria being given to an Image, did they mean to an Image, as a piece of Wood, or Stone; or to an Image, as an Image?

R. P.

As an Image. For they did forbid giving Latria to that which they worshipped, but they worshipped it as an Image, for the sake of the Prototype.

P. D.

Your reason is unanswerable. Therefore I say, they did forbid all relative Latria of an Image, call it by what name soever you please. For the Worship of an Image as such must be relative worship. Therefore all those who contend for relative Latria are condemned by the Council of Nice. Besides, I would fain know of these Gentlemen, whether their improper and relative Latria, be Latria or Inferiour worship? p. 336one or other it must be; and it is a contradiction to say Latria is inferiour worship; for that is to say, It is Latria, and it is not. If it be then true Latria, I ask whether the Image as an Image be God or a Creature; if it be a Creature, as no doubt it is, then true Latria is given to a Creature; which according to T. G. must be Idolatry. Again; Either it is the same Act of Latria which is terminated on the Person of Christ absolutely, and on the Cross relatively; or it is a different Act. If the same act; then there is a double worship, and but one Act; for there is an absolute worship of the person of Christ, and a relative worship of the Image; and let it be relative, or what it will, it is a real Act of worship; and so there must be two Acts, and yet it is but one Act. For is the Image or Cross worshipped, or not? If it be worshipped, there must be an act of worship terminated on it; and how can there be an act of worship terminated upon it, if the same act passeth from the Image to the Prototype? These are unintelligible subtleties, and only invented to confound mens understandings, as to the true and distinct notion of Divine Worship; and to blind their minds in the practice of Idolatry. p. 337Farther, if this be a difference only de modo loquendi, as T. G. saith, then the very same act may be proper and improper, absolute and relative, per se and per accidens. For so T. G. saith, that it is one Act in substance; but it is absolute as terminated on the person of Christ, relative as on the Cross; proper in one sense, improper in the other; per se in the former sense, per accidens in the later. Which Catharinus thought to be no less than ridiculous. Lastly, there is nothing in the world, but may be worshipped with Latria by the help of these distinctions. For a Divine presence in the creatures is really a far better ground of worship, than a bare fiction of the mind, that the Image and the thing represented are all one. But of this we have discoursed already.

R. P.

To tell you plainly my mind, I never liked this giving Latria to Images my self; but it being a common doctrine in our Church, we ought to say as much for it as we can; but I am only for an inferiour worship to be given to them, and so is T. G. if I do not much mistake his meaning.

P. D.

Let us then consider this inferiour worship, as distinct from Latria; and concerning this I shall prove, that p. 338it neither answers the reasons given by Councils; nor the practice of the Roman Church.

(1.) Not the reasons given by the Councils of Nice and Trent. For which I desire but these two postulata. 1. That Images are to have true and proper worship given to them; which is expressely determined by those Councils. 2. That the Reason of this Worship is nothing inherent in the Image, but something represented by it. Which is affirmed by those Councils. From hence I argue thus.

To worship Christ only before an Image is not to give proper worship to the Image, which the Councils require to be given. Therefore either the Image is to be worshipped for it self, which were Idolatry by your own confession; or Christ is to be worshipped in and by the Image.

R. P.

Christ is to be worshipped in and by the Image.

P. D.

Then you give Christ the worship due to him, or not?

R. P.

The worship due to him.

P. D.

But the Worship due to Christ is proper Latria; therefore you must give proper Latria to Christ as worshipped in and by the Image.

p. 339R. P.

True; but we give it to the Image of Christ otherwise than to his Person; for we worship him absolutely, and the Image respectively and for his sake.

P. D.

That is it which I would have; that there is no worshipping an Image on the account of representation, but you must fall into the doctrine of relative Latria.

R. P.

But may not I shew respect to the Cross for Christs sake, without giving the same worship to the Cross, that I do to Christ?

P. D.

That is not the question; but whether you may worship Christ in and by the Cross representing his Person, without giving that worship which belongs to the person of Christ? For either you worship the Cross for it self, which you confess to be Idolatry; or you worship Christ as represented by it: if you worship Christ, you must give him the worship which belongs to him, and that can be no other than Latria. Which not only appears by the doctrine but by the practice of your Church in the worship of the Cross. Which I prove by the second particular, viz.

(2.) Inferiour worship doth not come p. 340up to the practice of your Church, because your Church in praying to the Cross speaks to it, as if it were Christ himself. O Crux ave, spes unica, &c. as Aquinas observes and many other of your Divines, who never own any Prosopopoeia; but do say, that the Cross is truly worshipped with that worship which belongs to the person of Christ, on the account of representation. And can you imagine so many of your most eminent Divines would have put themselves to so much difficulty in defending a Relative Latria, if they could have defended the practice of your Church without it? But they saw plainly the Church did own such a worship to the Cross; and when occasion was offered, did declare it, as in the place cited out of the Pontifical by Dr. St., which it would never have done,Def. p. 640. if it had not been agreeable to its sense.

R. P.

But this is but one single passage, and will you condemn a whole Church for that?

P. D.

Not, if the sense of the Church were otherwise fully expressed against it; but here we have shewed that passage to be very agreeable to the reason of worship given by your Councils; and p. 341to the solemn practice of your Church in adoration of the Cross; and therefore that passage ought to be looked on as a more explicite declaration of the sense of the Church. For, let me ask you, if the Church of Rome had been against Latria being given to the Cross; whether in a book of such publick and constant use as the Pontifical is, it should be left standing, when the Book-menders are so busie in your Church, that scarce an Index of a Father can escape them; nor such sentences as seem to thwart their present doctrine. Of which take this Instance. You remember what stir T. G. made about Gregory Nyssen's oration upon Theodore; now the same person disputing against the Arians, saith, that no created thing is to be worshipped by men; this sentence Antonius in his Melissa had put down thus, that we are only to worship that being which is uncreated. This Book happened to come under the Spanish Index of Cardinal Quiroga; do you think he would suffer it to stand as it did? No, I assure you, Deleatur dictio solummodo, saith he; satis pro imperio. Away with this Only. Why so? was it not in the Author? No matter for that. It is against the practice p. 342of the Church; out with it. More such instances might be produced: but I appeal to your self, whether after such care hath been taken to review the Pontifical by Clement 8. and the publishing of it with so much Authority, such a passage would have been suffered to remain, if it had been any wayes repugnant to the sense of the Church?

R. P.

But T. G. saith, the Terms of Communion with the Church are not the Opinions of her School-Divines, Dial. p. 263.but the Decrees of her Councils.

P. D.

And what then? Did Dr. St. meddle with the School-Divines any otherwise than as they explained the sense of Councils, or the practice of the Church? And what helps more proper to understand these, than the Doctrine of your most learned Divines? T. G. will have one Mr. Thorndike to speak the sense of the Church of England, against the current Doctrine of the rest, as Dr. St. hath proved; yet he will not allow so many Divines of greatest Note and Authority to explain the sense of the Church of Rome? Is this equal dealing?

R. P.

T. G. saith,Dial. p. 264. That for his life he cannot understand any more the Idolatry p. 343of worshipping an Image, than the Treason of bowing to a Chair of State, or the Adultery of a Wives kissing her Husbands Picture; and that the same subtilties may be used against these, as against the other; and therefore notwithstanding the disputes of School-Divines, honest nature informed with Christian Principles will be security enough against the practice of Idolatry in honouring the Image of Christ for his sake.

P. D.

What is the matter with T. G. that for his life he can understand these things no better, after all the pains which hath been taken about him? Hath not the difference of these cases been laid open before him? Do not your own Writers confess, that in some cases an Image may become an Idol, by having Divine Worship given to it? Is this then the same case with a Wives kissing her Husbands Picture? Doth not this excuse the Gnosticks worship of the Image of Christ, as well as yours? If there may be Idolatry in the worship of an Image, we are then to consider, whether your worship be not Idolatry? Especially, since both parties charge each other with Idolatry; those who will have it to be Latria, and those who will not. And I p. 344do not see what honest nature can do in this case, however assisted, unless it can make the worship of Images to be neither one nor the other. I see T. G. would fain make it to be no more than bare honour of an Image for the sake of Christ; but this doth not come up to the Decrees of Councils, the general sense of Divines, and the constant practice of your Church; If ever worship was given to Images you give it, by using all Acts of Adoration towards them.

R. P.

But suppose the King had made an Order, that due honour and respect should be given to the Chair of State, ought not that to be observed, notwithstanding the disputes which might arise about the nature of the Act?

P. D.

To answer this, we must suppose a Command from God that we must worship an Image of Christ, as we do his Person; but here it is just contrary. The Reason of the second Command being owned by the Christian Church to hold against the worship of Images now as well as under the Law. But those in the Church of Rome who do charge each other with Idolatry, without supposing any such command, do proceed upon the nature of the Worship; which p. 345must either be Divine Worship, which one party saith is Idolatry, being the same which is given to God; or an inferiour Religious Worship, which the other party saith must be Idolatry, being an expression of our submission to an inanimate thing. And for my life I cannot see what answer T. G. makes to this.

R. P.

T. G. saith,Dial. p. 265. the Rules of the Church are to be observed in this case as the Rules of the Court about the Chair of State.

P. D.

What! are the Rules of the Church to be observed absolutely, whether against the Law of God or not? Which is as much as to say at Court, that the Orders of the Green-cloth are to be observed, against his Majesties pleasure. But not to insist on that; I say in this case the Rules of the Church help nothing; for they who do follow the Rules of the Church must do one, or the other of these; and whichsoever they do, they are charged with Idolatry. And therefore Dr. St. had great reason to say; Where there is no necessity of doing the thing, the best way to avoid Idolatry is to give no worship to Images at all.

p. 346R. P.

Dial. p. 266.What will become of the Rules of the Church, saith T. G. if men may be permitted to break them for such Capriches as these are?

P. D.

Are you in earnest? Doth T. G. call these Capriches? Idolatry is accounted both by Fathers and Schoolmen a crime of the highest nature; and when I am told I must commit it one way or other, by your Divines, if I give worship to Images, is this only a Capriche?

R. P.

Dial. p. 267.Will not the same reason hold against bowing to the Altar; bowing being an act of worship appropriated to God?

P. D.

Will the same reason hold against bowing out of Reverence to Almighty God? which I have told you again and again, is all our Church allows in that which you call, bowing to the Altar. I see you are very hard put to it, to bring in this single Instance, upon every turn, against the plain sense and declaration of our Church. If this be all T. G. upon so long consideration hath to say in this matter, it is not hard to judge, who hath much the better Cause.

R. P.

I pray hold from triumphing a while; for there is a fresh charge behind, wherein you will repent, that p. 347ever you undertook to defend Dr. St., it is concerning the unjust parallel he hath made between the Heathen and Romish Idolatry.

P. D.

I see no cause to repent hitherto. And I hope I shall find as little when I come to that.