'¦¦ . '¦ 4-4> Tale University Library The 4V •$• 4J-4-4J-4- #4- tt Francis P. Garvan || |* Colleaion |$ || ne gift of || FRANCIS P. QARVAN 4^* $** B.A. YALE 1897 4*-4- 4-4i- 4'-•4i, •$• 4*- 4s- 4s- •#• •#¦ •#• ¦$• •#• ^ •$" •#¦ ¦# -^ •$• •#¦ nfi-^-^S" THE END OP 3&eltsious Controvert IK A FRIENDLY CORRESPONDENCE BETWEEN A Religious Society of Protestants, AND A Roman Catholic Divine. Addressed to the Right Rev. Dr. Burgess, Lord Bishop of St. David's, in Answer to his Lordship's Protestant's Catechism. IN THREE PARTS. Part I..,. On the Rule op Faith ; or, the Method of finding out the True Religion. By the Rev. J. M.— D. D.— F. S. A. — >>^o« * SECOND EDITION, REVISED AND CORRECTED. ->&©«S<*S Ho noon : PRINTED AND PUBLISHED By Keating, Brown, and Co. No. 33, Duke-Street, Giosvenor-Square. SOLD ALSO BY EooKEn, Bond-street j Longman and Co. and Sherwood and Co. Paternoster- Row; Ridgw ay, Piccadilly ; Miller, Burlington Arcade ; by Messrs. Todd h, and by Bolland, York; Heaton, Newcastle ; Sharrock, Preston; Craven and Co. Manchester ; Gillow, Liverpool ; Simpson, Wol verhampton; Emery, Cobridgc; and HirpisiEY, Bath.. is ia. ' Let those treat you harshly, wlip are not acquainted with the difficulty ' of attaining to truth and avoiding error. Let those treat you harshly, ' who know not how hatd it is to get rid of ord prejudices. Let those treat * you harshly, who have not learned how. very hard it is to purify the ' interior eye and render it capable of contemplating the sun of the soul, ' truth. But as to us : we are far from this disposition towards persons, ' who are separated from us, not by errors of their own invention, but by ' being entangled in those of others. We are so far from this disposition, ' that we pray to God, thatj in refuting the false opinions of those, whom ' you follow, not from malice, but imprudence, he would bestow upon us ' that spirit of peace, which feels no other sentiment than Charity, no * other interest than that of Jesus Christ, no other wish but for your sal- ' vation.' — St. Augustin, Doctor of the Church, A. D. 400, contra Ep. Fund. ]. i. c. ii. ADDRESS. ¦^ » TO THE RIGHT REVEREND LORD BISHOP OF ST. DAVID'S. MT LORD, The following Letters, with some others belonging to the' same series, were written in the latter part of the year 1801, and the first months of 180fi, though they have since that time been re vised, and, in some respects, altered. They grew out of the controversy, which the principal writer of them was obliged to sustain agamst an eminent author, a Prebendary -of the Cathedral, and the Chancellor of the Diocese of Winchester, who had personally challenged him to the field of argument, in a book, called Reflec tions «n Papery, That controversy having made some noise in the public, and even in the Houses of Parlia ment, particularly in the Upper House, where the Lord Chancellor (l) and a predecessor of your Lord ship, tben the light and glory of the Established Church {2), expressed opposite opinions on the issue of it, certain powerful personages expressed an earnest wish for its termination. For this purpose the usual method of silencing authors was at first resolved upon with respect to the writer, and a Catholic Gentleman of name, still living, was commissioned to sound him (1) The Right Hon. the Earl of Loughborough. (3) The Right Rev, Dr. Horsley, successively Bishop of St. Davirf*?, Rochester, and St. Asaph's. PART I. b IV ADDRESS. on the, business : but, in conclusion, it was thought most adviseable to employ the influence which the Prelate alluded to, had so justly acquired over him, This method succeeded; and, accordingly, these Let ters, which, otherwise, would have been published fifteen year's ago, have slept in silence ever since. I trust your Lordship will not be thel person to ask me, why the Letters, after having been so long sup pressed, now appear? — You are witness, my Lord, of the increased and increasing virulence of the press. against Catholics; and this, in many instances, di rected by no ignoble or profane hand s.ct Abundant proofs of this will be seen in the following work. For the present, it is sufficient to mention, that One of ' your most venerable colleagues publishes and re-pub lishes that we stand5 convicted of Idolatry, Blasphemy*, and Sacrilege. Another proclaims to the clergy, as sembled in Synod, that we are enemies of all law, hu man and divine. More than one of them has charged ua with the guilt of that Anti-Christiau conspiracy on the continent, of which we were exclusively the victims. This dignitary accuses us of Antinomianism ; that maintains our religion to he. fit only for persons weak in body and in mind. In short, we seldom find our-! selves, or our religion mentioned, in modern ser mons, or other theological works, unaccompanied with the epithets of superstitious, idolatrous, impious, dis loyal, perfidious, and sangubiary. One of the theo- logues alluded to, who, like many others, has gained promotion by the fervour of his NO POPERY zeal. has exalted his tone to the pitch of proclaiming that our Religion is calculated for the meridian of hell ! .'¦*— Thus solemnly, and almost continually, charged be- ADDRESS; V fore the tribunal of the public, -with crimes against Society and our Country, no less than against Reli gion, and yet conscious, all the while, of our entire innocence, it is not only lawful, but also a duty, which we owe to our fellow-subjects and ourselves, to repel these charges by proving that there was reason, and religion, and byalty, and good faith among Christians, before Luther quarrelled with Leo X., and Henry Villi fell in love with Ann Bullen ; and that, if we ourselves have not yet been persuaded by the arguments, either ofthemonkor the monarch, to relinquish the faith originally preached in this island, above 1300 years before their time, we are, at least, possessed of common sense, virtuous principles, and untainted loyalty. The writer might assign another reason for making the present publication; namely, the number and acrimony of his own public opponents on subjects of religion. To say nothing of the groundless charges, by word of mouth, of certain privileged personages, the following writers are some of those - who have published books, pamphlets, essays, or notes against him, on subjects of a religious nature ; the Deans of Winchester and Peterborough ; Chancellor Sturges ; Prebendary Poulter ; the Doctors Hoadley-Ash, Ryan, Ledwich, Le Mesurier ^1), and Elrington ; Sir Rich ard Musgrave, John Reeves, Esq. ; the Reverend Messr.s, (1) To one only objection of his adversaries the writer wishes here tp_give, arf answer, that of having quoted falsely ; which, however, has been advanced by very few of them, and is confined, as far as he knows, to two instances. The first of these is that the writer in his History of Winchester, vol. i. p. 61, * quotes Gildas, for the exploits of King Arthur, who never once mentions his name.' This objection was first started, by Dr. ©'Conor, in his Coixfmbanta, was borrowed) from him by the Rev. Mr. Le Mesurier^ in VI ADDUESS. Williamson, -Bazeley, ChurtoD, Grier, and Roberts ; besides numerous anonymous riflemen in the Gentle man's Magazine, the Monthly Magazine, the Anti- jacobin Review-,: the Protestant Advocate, the Anti- biblion, and other periodical works, including news papers. By some of these he has been challenged into the field of controversy, and when he did not appear there, he has been posted as a coward. A- still more cogent reason,, my Lord, for the ap pearance of this work, which was heretofore suppressed, at the desire of a former Bishop of St. David's, his been furnished by his present successor, in a work which the latter has recently published, called THE PRO TESTANT'S CATECHISM. This is no ordinary effu sion of NO POPERY zeal. It was not. called for by the increase of the Ancient Religion in his Lordship's diocese, which teems with Methodist Jumpers, to" the danger of his Cathedral and Parish Churches being left quite empty ; while not one Catholic family is, perhaps, to be found in it. It was not provoked by his Hampton Lectures, arid was adopted from the latter by. the Rev. Mr. Drier, in his Ansaer ta Ward's Ef rata. ~~~ After all, this pretended forgery of the writer will be found, oti consulting the passage referred to above, ta be nothing else but a blunder of his critics ; since it will appear that he quptes William of Malmsbury for the exploits, of Arthur, and Gildas barely fofthiyear in which otfCof them, the battle of Mous Badonicus, took plaCe ! The second accusation of this nature was inserted by one of the abo*e- named writers ia the Gentleman's Magazine, namely, that the writer had advanced, without any historical authority, that James I. used to call November 5, • Cecil's Holiday.' In answer to this charge, he gave notice in the next number of the Magazine, that he had sent up to the Editor's office, a» he had, done, there to remain, during a month, for public inspection, Lord Castlemain's Catholique Apology, which contains the fact, and the authorities oil which it is advanced.— The writer is far from claiming inerrancy; but he should despise himself, if he hwzvingfy published any falsehood, or hesitated $o retract any one that he was proved to have fallen into. ADDRESS. Vii any late attempt on the Established Church, or on Protestantism in general; as the Bishop does not pre tend that such thing has taken place. Nevertheless he comes forward in his episcopal mitre, bearing in his hands a new Protestant Catechism, to be learnt by Protestants of every description, which teaches their* to hate and persecute their elder brethren, the authors of their Christianity and civilization! In fact, thi* Christian Bishop begins and ends his Protestant Cafe* chism, with a quotation from a Puritan Regicide, de claring, that ' Popery is not to be tolerated, either hi ' public or in private, and that it must be thought hdto * to remove it, and hinder the growth thereof;' adding, ' If they say that by removing their idols we violate" then* ' consciences, we have no warrant io regard conscience 1 which is not grounded on Scripture (l).' This, your Lordship must know, is the genuine cant of a Mar- Prelate Independant; the same cant which brought (1) Milton's prose works, vol. 4. Tho prose writings of this Secretary «f the Long Parliament are as execrable for their Regicide and Anti-prelatic prin ciples, as his poetry is super-excellent for its sublimity and sweetness". Four' other English authors are brought fofward by the Bishop Of St. David's, te justify that persecution ef Catholics, which he recommends. The first of these is the Socinian Locke, who will not allow of Catholics being tolerat ed, OH the demonstrated false pretext that they cannot tolerate other Christians. The true cause was, that his hands being stained by the blood Of twenty ift*. nocent Catholics, who were immolated by the sanguinary policy of hi* master Shaftsbury, m Oates' infamous plof, he was obliged to find a pretext fe* excluding them from the legal toleration which he stood in ne"ed of himself. — Bishop Hoadley, who had no religion at all of his own, would not allow thtf Catholics to enjoy theirs, because, he says: ' No oaths and solemn assur- ' ances, no regard to truth, justice, or honour, can restrain them.' This i* the hypocritical plea for the intolerance of a man, who was in the constant habit of violating all his oaths and engagements to a Church which had raised him to rank and fortune, and who systematically pursued its degrada tion into his own Ariti-Christian Socinianism, by professed deceit arid treachery, as will be seen in the Letters. Blackstone, being a crown VIII ADDRESS. Laud and Charles I. to the block ; the same cant which overthrew the Church and State in the Grand Rebellion. But what- chiefly concerns my present purpose in this the Bishop's twice repeated quotation from Milton, is to observe that it breathes the whole persecuting spirit of the sixteenth century, and calls for the fines and forfeitures, the dungeons, halters and knives of Elizabeth's reign, against the devoted Catholics; since it is evident that the Idolatry of Popery, as it is termed, exercised in private, cannot be removed without such persecuting and sanguinary measures. The same thing is plain from the nature of the different, legal offences which the Right Reverend Prelate lays to their charge. In one place he accuses the Catholics of England and Ireland, that is to say, more than a quarter of his Majesty's European sub jects, of 'acknowledging the jurisdiction of the Pope- ' in defiance of the laws, and of the allegiance due to ' their rightful Sovereign ;' though he well knows^ that they have abjured the Pope's jurisdiction in all civil and temporal cases, which is all that the King, Lords and Commons required of them, in their acts of 179.1 and 1793. Again the Prelate describes their opposi tion to the Veto (though equally opposed, in the ap pointment of their respective Pastors, by all Pro- lawyer, and writing when the penal laws were in force, could not but defend them: but, Judge as he was, and writing at the above-mentioned time, he in the passage following that quoted by Dr. Burgess, expressed a hope, that the time ' was not distant, when the fears of a Pretender having vanished, ' and the influence of the Pope becoming feeble, the rigorous edicts against ' the Cathohcs would be revised,' b. iv. c. 4.; which event accordingly soon. took place. As to Burke, the last author whom the Bishop quotes against Catholic emancipation, it is evident from his speech at Bristol, his letter to Lord Kenmare, and the whole tenor of his conduct, that he was. not onry a warm friend, but, in some degree, a martyr to it. ADDRESS. IX testaut Dissenters, who constitute more than another fourth part of his Majesty's subjects), as ' Trea- ' sonable by Statute,' p. 35. Now, every one knows that the legal punishment of a subject, acting in defiance of his allegiance, and contracting the guilt of treason, is nothing less than death. Nay ; so much bent on the persecution of Catholics is this modern Bishop, as to arraign Parliament itself as guilty of a breach of the Constitution, by the latter of the above-mentioned tolerating Acts ; where he says : ' If the elective franchise be really inconsistent with ' the Constitutional Statutes of the Revolution; it * ought to be repealed, like all other concessions that ' are injurious to loyalty and religion.' He adds, ' But it does not follow that because Parliament had ' been guilty of one act of prodigality, that it should 'therefore, like a thoughtless and unprincipled spend- ' thrift, plunge itself into inextricable ruin,' pp. 53, 54. Thus, my Lord, though the Prelate alluded to, after advertising in his Table of Contents, A CONCLUSION, shewing, ' the means of co-operating ' with the laws for preventing the danger and in- ' crease of Popery,' apologises, indeed, for deferring its publication, when he comes to the proper place for inserting it, as ' being connected with the credit of the * Ecclesiastical Establishment ;' yet, we see, as clearly, from the substance and drift of the Protestanfs Cate chism, what his Conclusion is, as if he had actually published it. We perceive that he would have the whole code of penal laws, with all their incapacities, fines, imprisonment, hanging, drawing, and quartering re-enacted, to prevent even the private practice of idolatry ; and that he would have the Bishops, Clergy, X APDBESS. Churchwardens, and Constables employed in enforc ing them, according to the form* of Inquisition, pre scribed by the Canons of 1597, 1603, and 1640. Before the writer passes from the present subject of loyalty and the laws, to others more congenial with his studies, aud those of the Prelate, he wishes to sub mit tu your Lordship's reflection two or three ques tions connected with it. First: js it strictly legal; fven for ;t Lord of Pa iii am end, and is it edifying fot a Bishop to instruct the public, especially in these days pf insubordination and commotion, that the reigntog }£i»g, and the two Houses of Parliament, have acted against the Constitutional Statutes, by affording reli gious relief to a forge and loyal portion of British sub jects ; in the same manner as King William, George I. and George II had afforded it to other portions of them ? We all know what outcries are continually raised ahotit violating the Constitution, and we know what effect these are intended to produce. Now, if a turbulent populace are made to believe, that the present Legislature has acted illegally and unconstitutionally in some of its acts, is triere no danger that they may form the same notion concerning some of its other acts, which are peculiarly obnoxious to them, and that they may rank these among the Fictitious $£atutes, as this Prelate terms the Acts of Parlia ment of three former reigns ?— Secondly : the writer wishes to ask your Lordship, whether or no you think it is for the peace and safety of the sister isle, to alarm the bulk of its inhabitants with the threat of their being dispossessed of the elective franchise, which fbey have now enjoyed for a quarter of a century ? In like manner, is it conducive td this important end, for a ADDRESS. XI person of his Lordship's character and consequence to assure this people, that the Pope's jurisdiction and Eng land's dominion over them 'were introduced into Ire- ' land by the mercenary compact of the Pope and Henry ' II.' p. 24, ' founded on a fiction of the grossest kjndj ' the pretended donation of Constantine,* p. v. though, by the by, this was never once mentioned or hinted at by either of the parties ? — Lastly : the writer would be glad to be informed by your Lordship, whether it be for the advantage of the Established Church so highly to extol John Wickliffe, who maintained that Clergymen ought to have no sort of temporal posses sions ? And, merely because Lord Cobham was a Wickliffite, is it for the security of the State, to hold him up as 'a great and good man, and the Martyr of ' Protestantism,' p. vii. (l), though he was convicted in the King's Bench, and in open Parliament, of raising an insurrection of £0,000 men, for the purpose of killing the King, his brother, and the Lords Spi ritual and Temporal, and was executed for the same offences ? — How innocent was Colonel Despard, com pared with Sir John Oldcastle, called Lord Cobham ! The writer has spoken of the object of the publica tion which has lately appeared, under the name of a Rt. Rev. Bishop of the Established Church : he now proceeds to say something of its contents. It professes to be THE PROTESTANT'S CATE CHISM. From this title, most people will suppose it to be an elementary book, for the instruction of Protes tants of every description in the doctrine and morality taught by Jesus Christ : but not a word can the writer (1) See Walsjngham's Historia Major. Knighton Leicest. Collier's Eccles. Hist. Stow,&c. PART I. C Xll ADDRESS. find in it about Christ, or God, or any doctrinal matter whatever; except that, 'They, who do not hold the ' worship of the Church of Rome to be idolatrous, are ' not Protestants, whatever they may profess to ' be,' p. 46. ; which is a sentence of excommunication against many of the brightest lights and chief orna ments of the Bishop's own Church. Nor does this novel Catechism contain any moral or practical lesson ; except that ' Every member of Parliament's con- ' science is pledged against the Catholic claims;' and, what has been mentioned before, that as ' Popery is ' idolatrous, it is not io be tolerated, either in public or in * private, and that ' it must be now thought how to re- ' move it,' p. 3- Had the Catechism appeared without a name, it might be supposed to be a posthumous work of Lord George Gordon ; but, had its origin been traced to the mountains of Wales, it would cer tainly be attributed to some itinerant Jumper, rather than to a successor of St. Dubritius and St. David; What, however, chiefly distinguishes The Protestant Catechism from other No Popery publications, is, not so -much the strength of its acrimony, as the boldness of its paradoxes. These, for the most part, stand in con tradiction to all ancient records, and modern authors, Protestant as well as Catholic, being supported by the bare word of the Bishop of St. David's : and what is still more extraordinary, they sometimes stand in contradiction to the word of the Bishop of St. David's himself; resting in this case, on the word Of Dr. Thomas Burgess.— I purpose exhibiting a few of the paradoxes I refer to. The great and fundamental paradox of the Right Rev. Catechist is, that Protestantism subsisted many ADDRESS. Xlll hundred years before Popery ; at the same time that he makes its essence consist in a renunciation of and opposition to Popery! for his Lordship lectures his Protestant pupils in the following manner : ' Question. ' What is Protestantism ? Answer. The abjuration of ' Popery and the exclusion of Papists from all power ' ecclesiastical and civil.' P. 12. 'Question. What is ' Popery ? Answer. The Religion of the Church of 1 Rome, so called because the Church of Rome is sub- 'ject to the jurisdiction of the Pope.' P. 11. ' Q. When ' was tliis jurisdiction assumed over the whole Church? 'A. At the beginning of the seventh century.' P. 15. The writer does not here refute the various errors of the Right Rev. Bishop on these heads -.this refutation will be found in the following letters ; he barely exhi bits one of the Bishop's leading paradoxes.—- It may be here stated as another very favourite paradox of the Prelate, since he has maintained it in a former work, that, because Venantius Fortunatus, a poet of the sixth century sings that f the stylus or writings of St. ' Paul had run East, West, North, and South, and passed ' into Britain and the remote Thule,' and because Theo- doret, an author of the fifth century, says that, ' St. ' Paul brought salvation to the islands in the sea,' (namely, Melita and Sicily, Acts xxviii.) it follows that the British Church was founded by St. Paul ! p. 19- (l). This paradox might be stated and even granted, for any thing it makes in favour of the Bishop's object, which is to invalidate the supremacy of St. Peter. For it (l) The falsity of this inference and the weakness and unfairness of ihe Bishop's arguments on the whole suhject, have been well exposed by au able and learned writer, The Rev. John Lingard, in his Examination of Certain Opinions advanced by the Rev. Dr. Burgess, fyc. 1813. Syers, Manchester j, Keating and Brown, London. XIV ADDRESS. matters not which Apostle founded this Church or that Church, while it is evident, from the words of Christ in St. Matthew c. xvi. v. 18, and in other texts', and/ from the concurring testimony of the Fathers and all antiquity, that Christ built the whole Church on the foundation of the Apostles and Prophets, he him self being the chief corner stone, so as still to ground it, next after himself, on the Rock, Peter (1). This will be found demonstrated in the following work: Letter xivi. — A third paradox of the Prelatic Catechist is this. Having undertaken to prove that ' The Church ' of Rome was founded by St. Paul,' p. 13, no less than the Church of Britain, he attempts to draw an argn- ment from their different discipline in the observance of Easter; that the latter was ' independent' if tlig former, p. 23. Hence it would follow that St. Paul established one discipline at Rome, which the Prelate himself now follows, and another in Britain, namely ' that of the Church of Ephesus and the Eastern 'Churches.' P. 17. The truth is, his Lordship has quite bewildered himself in the ancient controversy about the right time of keeping Easter. He will learn, how- ," ever, from the following letters, that the British Church originally agreed with that of Rome, in this, no less than in the other points, as the Emperor Constantine expressly declares in his letter on that subject (2), and as farther appears by the Acts of the Council of Aries, (1) The Right Rev. Prelate seems to have been forced out of his former cavil concerning the difference of gender between TlsTpoc and lilrpet in the text, Matt. xvi. by a learned colleague of his [Landaff from remote ages was a thorn in the side of Menevia] who has shewn him that Christ did not speak Greek but Syriac, and on this occasion, made use of the word Cephas, Rock, which admits of no variation of genders. (?) Euseb. Vit. Constant. L. iii. c. 19. ADDRESS." XV which the British Bishops, there present, joined with the rest in subscribing. And when, after the Saxon invasion, the British Churches got into a wrong com putation, they did not follow that of the Asiatic Quarto-decimans, but always kept Easter-day on a Sunday, differing from the practice of the Continent only once in seven years. — A fourth paradox of the Catechism maker,' is, that, admitting, as he does, the existence of our Christian King, Lucius, in the second Century, he, nevertheless, rejects his conversion by the missionaries of Pope Eleutherius, Fugatius and Duvi- anus, as ' a mere Romish fiction and a monkish fable,' p. 23. ; notwithstanding both facts rest on exactly the same authority, namely, that of all the .original writers, British, Saxon, English, Roman, and Gal* lie (1). — A fifth paradox of the Bishop's is, that ' The ' British Churches were Protestant before they were ' Popish,' p. 23. ; — 'that six centuries elapsed before Po- ' pery had any footing in this island,' p, 28. ; and that ' the British Bishops shewed their independence of the ' Pope's authority by rejecting the overtures of Aus* ' tin, and by refusing to acknowledge any authority • but that of their own metropolitan,' p. 24. And yet it is demonstrated that the British Bishops were present, not only at the Councils of Aries and Nice, which ac knowledged the Pope's authority, but also at that of Sardica in lllyrium, held in 347 (2), where the right (1) Nennius' Hist. Briton, c. xviii. Girald. Cambr. De Jur. Menev. P. ii. Angl. Sac. p. 541. Silvest. Girald. Camb. Descript. c. xviii. The A ncient Re gister of Landaff, quod Teilo vocatur. Angl. Sacra, vol. ii. Gildas Histori- cus, quoted by Rudborn. Galfrid Monumet. Ven. Bede, L. i. c. 4. The Saxon Chronicle. Gul. Malm. Antiq. Glaston. Martyr. Rom. Raderus, &c, &c (2) St. Athan Apolog. 2. See also Usher. XVI ADDRESS. of appeal to the Pope in all Ecclesiastical causes from every part of the world was confirmed (l). It is equally certain that in the former part of the following century, Pope Celestine sent St. Palladius to convert the Scots, St. Patrick to convert the Irish, and St. Germanus to reclaim such Britons as had fallen into the Pelagian heresy (2). Each of these facts is express ly affirmed by a contemporary author of the highest character, St. Prosper ; and the last mentioned fact is conformable to the British records, which represent this foreign Bishop, as exercising high acts of juris- dictibn in Britain, which he never could have exercised but in virtue of the Papal Supremacy, of which he and his companion, St. Lupus, Bishop of Treves, were the delegates; such as consecrating Bishops in different parts of the island, and constituting St. Dubritius Archbishop of the Right Side of it, or of Wales (3). But how many other proofs of the dependency of the ancient British Church on the See of Rome has not our Episcopal Antiquary met with in his own favourite author and predecessor, Giraldus Cambrensis (4), es- (1) Can. iii. (2) St. Prosper. ' Papa Gelestinus Germanum Antisidorensem Episco- ' pum, VICE SUA mittit, et deturbatis hsreticis, Britannos ad Catholicam ' fidem dirigit.' Chron. ad An. 429. See also Archbish. Usher. De Brit. Eccl. Prim. (3) ' Postquam prajdicti Seniores (Germanus et Lupus) Pelagianam hsre- ' sim extirpaverant ; Episcopos in pluribus locis Britannia Insulie conse- ' craverunt. Super omnes autem Britannos dextralis partis Britannije B. ' Dubritium, summum Doctorem, a Rege et ab omni parochia electum, Ar- ' chiepiscon>im consecraverunt.' Ex Antiq. Eccl. Laudav. Registro. Angl. Sacr. P. ii. p. 667. (4) The New Biographical Dictionary divides Silvester Giraldus Cam brensis into two different persons, whereas, it is plain, from this author's De scription of Wales, p. 882, Edit. Cambdcn, that these three names belong to one and the same author. ADDRESS. XV11 pecially where the latter gives an account of his pleading before the Pope for the Archiepiscopal dignity of St. David's, which he asserted was formerly decorated even with the Pallium, the mark of Papal legatine jurisdiction ; till one of his predecessors, Sampson, flying into Brittany, transferred it to Dol ? He maintained, however, that, excepting the use of the Pallium, the Church of St. David possessed the whole Metropolitical dignity, and was ' subject to ' no other Church except that of Rome, and to that im- ' mediately (l).' — The modern Prelate does but add to the wonder of his learned readers by appealing to the conference between St. Austin, Pope Gregory's Mis sionary and Legate in Eugland, and the Welsh Bishops, A. D. 502, and to the latter's 'rejecting the overtures' of the former, in proof of their 'rejecting the Pope's ' authority,' p. 24. For, what were these overtures ? They were these three: that they, the Welsh Bishops, would keep Easter at the right time ; that they would adopt the Roman Ritual in the administration of Bap tism ; and that they would join with the Roman Mis sionaries in preaching the word of God to the Pagan English (,2). This last, overture demonstrates, that neither on the two former points, nor on any other point, and least of all on that of the Pope's Supremacy, (l)' Usque ad Anglorum Regem Henricum I. totam Metropoliticam dig- ' nitatem, prater usum Pallii, Ecclesia Menevensis obtinuit ; nulli Ecclesise ' prorsus, nisi Romana tantum, et i 11 i immediate, sicut nee Ecclesia Scotica, ' subjectionem deheus.' De Jur. Menev. Ecc. Angl. Sac. P. ii. p. 541. — The Rival See of Landaff bears equal testimony to the Supremacy of Rome. ' Si- ' cut Romana Ecclesia excedit dignitatem omnium Ecclesiarum Catholics * fidei, ita Ecclesia ilia Landavia excedit omnes Ecclesias totius dextralis Br:- ' tannia.' Ex Antiq. Regist. Landav. Angl. Sac. P. ii. p. 669. (2) ' Ut genti Anglorum una nobiscum pradicetis vcrbum Domini.' Bed. Eccl. Hist. L. ii. c. 2. Xviii ADDRESS. was there, in the opinion of St, Austin, any difference, of essential consequence, between his doctrine and that of the Welsh Bishops. For, if there had been such a difference, and especially if tbey had denied the Su premacy of his master, the Pope, would he have invited and even pressed them to join with him in preaching the Gospel to his new and increasing flock in England ? As well may we believe that a faithful shepherd, would collect together and turn into his fold a number of hun gry wolves ! It is true they then said, they would not receive St. Augustin for their Archbishop ( 1 ) : but neither did he nor the Pope require them to do so ; nor is the vindication of the rights of an ancient Church, at any time, a denial of the Pope's general Supremacy., So far from this, within two years from the holding of that conference, we find Oudoceus, Bishop of Landaff, going to Canterbury to reoeive consecration from the same St. Austin, and we find him received, on his return into Wales, by the King, Princes, Clergy and people, with the highest honour (2). We have, moreover, the testimony of the above quoted British Register, that the Bishops of Landaff, from this period, were always subject and obedient to the Archbishop of Canterbury, who was at all times the Pope's Legate. The Right Rev. Bishop's argument to prove that the Irish Church was not, anciently, in communion with the Church of Rome, because it was in communion with the British Bishops, p. 24, is as great a paradox as any of the above men tioned ; since it has been proved that the British Bishops themselves were always in communion with (1) Bed. Eccl. Hist. L. ii. c. 2, (2) Vita Oudocei, quoted by Godwin De Prasul, and Usher, ADDRESS. XlX the Church of Rome. Of the same description are the assertions, that no legate was appointed by the Pope in Ireland ' before Gillebert in the twelfth century,' and that ' the Pope's jurisdiction was first introduced into ' Ireland by the mercenary compact of the Pope and 'Henry II.' p. 25. To expose the inconsistency of these assertions nothing more is necessary than to con sult the Antiquities of Usher himself, on whose autho rity they are said to be grounded. This Protestant Archbishop, then, testifies from ancient records, which he cites, that first St. Palladius, and after him St. Pa trick, was sent into Ireland by Pope Celestine, to con vert its inhabitants from Pagan Idolatry ; the former in 431, the latter in 432 ; that St. Patrick ' having es- ' tablished the Church of Ireland and ordained Bishops ' and Priests throughout the whole island, went to ' Rome, in 462, where he procured from Pope Hilary ' the confirmation of whatever he had done in Ireland, ' together with the Pallium and the title of Pope's Le- f gate (l) ;' that in 540 the celebrated St. Finan, of Clonard, having spent seven years at Rome, and being consecrated Bishop, returned into Ireland, where he instituted schools and convents, one of which con tained 3000 monks (2). It appears from the same annalist, that in 580 the renowned St. Columban passed from Ireland to the continent, where he was protected by different Bishops and Princes, for his orthodoxy and piety, and even by the Popes themselves with whom he corresponded ; that in 630 a deputation of learned and holy . men was sent from Ireland ' to the foun- ' tain of their baptism, like children to their mo- ' ther (3),' namely, to the Apostolic See of Rome, to (1) Usher's Antiq. Index Chronol. (2) Usher Primerd. (3) Usher. PART I. d XX ADDRESS,. consult with it on matters of religion ; that among these was St. Lasrean, who was consecrated Bishop by Pope Honorius, and appointed his Legate in Ire land (1); that in 640 Tomianus and four other Bishops, being still anxious about the right observance of Easter, and about the Pelagian heresy, wrote to consult Pope Severinus, and that they received an answer to their letter from his successor Pope John.— Numerous other testimonies, not only of the communion of the Church of Ireland with that of Rome, but also of its acknowledging the Pope's Supremacy, may be col lected from Usher, Ware, and other Protestant, no less than from the original Catholic writers, down to, the very time of .Gillebert, Bishop of Limeripk, whom the Catechist admits to have been the Pope's Legate in Ireland. This happened, according to Usher, in 1130, twenty-five years before the date of what the Catechist calls ' the mercenary compact of the Pope and Henry ' II. by which,' he says, ' the Pope's Jurisdiction was 1 first introduced into Ireland,' and forty years before the latter invaded Ireland ; which island, after all, as every child knows, he invaded, not as the executor of Pope Adrian's legacy, but as the ally of the dethroned King, Dermot. In speaking of the beginning and progress of the Religion of our own ancestors, the English, it might be expected the Right Rev. Catechist would have paid more attention to truth and consistency, than he has done with respect to the foregoing more obscure (1) Gillebert was succeeded in the Legatine Office by St. Malachy, who by a special authority erected the SeeofTuam into an Archbishopric. After his death, namely in 1151, Cardinal Papario was sent by Pope EugeniusIII, into Ireland, with four Palliums for the four Archbishoprics. So false is the Prelate's account of the origin of the Pope's jurisdiction in Ireland ! ADDRESS. X.\i histories. This,^owever, is not the case. But, previ ously to the writer's entering on this particular subject, he wishes to observe what is more fully demonstrated in the following work, that the Catechist, totally mis- « represents our Apostle, Pope Gregory the Great, as having * reprobated the Spiritual Supremacy,' and alsb ' his successor Boniface as being the first Pope to as- ' sume it,' p. 16. In short, the question, at issue, is not. concerning the title, but the power of a head Bishop; which power, as it will appear below, no Pope exercised more frequently or extensively than ' the learned and ' virtuous St. Gregory,' to use the Prelate's own epithets. His Lordship does not deny that our ancestors, the Anglo-Saxons, were converted to Christianity by 'the 'Pope's Missionaries,' p. 28, namely, by St. Austin and his companions, sent hither by the same Pope Gregory, in 597 ; nor does he contradict the account of our venerable historian, Bede, who de scribes the whole jurisdiction and discipline of our Church, as being regulated by that Pope and his suc cessors. Still the Prelate most paradoxically denies that ' the Pope ever exercised jurisdiction in England ' or Ireland, except during the four centuries before ' the Reformation !' p. 11; and he maintains, in parti cular, ' that the Anglo-Saxon Churches differed from ' the Church of Rome in their objection to Image wor- '• shipping, the Invocation of Saints, Transubstantiation, ' and other errors,' p. 28. Here are two paradoxes to be refuted ; one concerning the spiritual power, the Other concerning the doctrine of the See of Rome. With respect to the former : is it not a fact, my Lord, known to every ecclesiastical antiquary, that each one of pur Privates, from St.. Austin down,: to rStigandA d2 XXU ADDRESS. exclusively, who was deposed soon aflter the Conquest, either went to Rome to fetch, or had transmitted to him from Rome, the emblem and jurisdiction of lega tine authority, by which he held and exercised the power of a Metropolitan over his suffragan Bishops? An original author, Radulph Diceto, exhibits a succinct but clear demonstration of this, in a series of all the Archbishops, and a list of the different Popes, from whom the former respectively received the Pal lium. Did not St. Wilfrid, Archbishop of York, appeal to the Pope from the uncanonical sequestration of his diocese by the Primate Theodore ? Did not Offa, the powerful Mercian King, engage Pope Adrian, to transfer six suffragan Bishoprics from the See of Canterbury to that of Litchfield, constituting it, at the same time, an Archbishopric ? A hundred other in stances of "the exercise of the Pope's ecclesiastical jurisdiction in England, previously to the Conquest, could be produced, if they were wanted. — As to the pretended difference between the doctrine of the Anglo- Saxons and the Church of Rome, the Catechist was bound to inform his readers when it took place ; and who were the authors of it ; that is, who first persuaded the whole English nation to reject the Religion they had been taught by their Apostles, Pope Gregory and his Missionaries ; and whether this change was effected by slow degrees, or all of a sudden ( 1 ), If so absurd (1) To make some brief confutation of each of the Catechist's alledged differences between the Anglo-Saxon Church and that of Rome : Bede testi fies, that when St. Austin and bis fellow Missionaries preached the Gospel to King Ethel be-rt, they carried across for their ensign with a painted picture of Christ, L. i. c. 25. Will.Malmsb. mentions that, among other pious images, preserved at Glastonbury, were those of Christ and his Apostles, made of Silver afld given by King Ina. De Antic-. Glaston. We learn from Arch- ADDRESS. XX1U a paradox, as the above-mentioned, required a serious refutation, it might be stated that, in 610, Bishop Meltjtus, who afterwards became Primate, went to Rome to obtain the Pope's Confirmation of certain re gulations which had been made in England ; that he subscribed to the Acts of an Episcopal Synod, then held in that city, which Acts he brought back with him to England (l); and that, in 680, St. Wilfrid, going to Rome, to prosecute his appeal, was present at a Council of 125 Bishops, where, 'In the name of all the Churches ' in the North Part of Britain, in Ireland, and the na- ' tions of the Scots and Picts, he made open profession ' of the true Catholic Faith, confirming it also by his ' subscription (2).' Other paradoxes of the Right Rev. Prelate, relating to matters of a later date, are these : that Pope Adrian IV. grounded his right to give away Ireland on ' the ' forged donation of Constantine,' though he never once alluded to it, but assigned quite other grounds for what he did ; and that ' the Pope now owes the ' whole of his temporal and spiritual power on the ' Continent, to this gross fiction, and the Decretal ' Epistles,' p. v. Alas ! what must the learned Catho- bishop Cuthred's letter to Lullus, successor of St. Boniface, Bishop and Martyr of Mentz, that a Synod of Anglo-Saxon Bishops had chosen this Saint, and St. Gregory, and St. Austin, to be their * patrons and intercessor!.' Inter Epist. Bonif. That our ancestors believed in Transubstantiation, is clear, irom Osbern's relation of Archbishop Odo's rendering this visible. Angl. Sac. P. ii. p. 82. One of his successors, Lanfrank, was the principal defender of this doctrine against Berengarius. It may be added, that the original faith concerning Purgatory, the Mass, and, perhaps, every other controverted point, can be proved from Bede's History alone. (1) Bede, L. ii. c. 4. (S) Ibid, I. v, e. 20. XXIV ADDRESS. lies of the Continent, who were the first to detect these literary frauds of the eighth century, and to trace them to the place of their birth in Lower Germany, think of the literature of this country, when they hear a BISHOP, and a Member of our learned Societies, telling them that they would not acknowledge the Pope to be Prince of Rome or Head of the Church, were it not for those spurious pieces !— Asimilar paradox is, that 'The Popish ' Bishops and Popish Clergy were the real authors of ' the fictitious statutes (Acts of Parliament) of Richard ' II. Henry IV. and Henry V.' against the Lollards ; though they neither did, nor were permitted, to inter fere in those Acts ; and though it is notorious from all contemporary history, that these severe edicts were occasioned by what that anarchical faction had done and threatened to do. They had, under the command of Wat Tyler, and John Ball, a Wickliffite Priest, ac tually put to death, by public execution, the Lord Chancellor, the Lord Treasurer, and the Lord Chief Justice of England : and they had threatened to kill the King, the Lords Spiritual and Temporal, and all the pen and ink-horn men, as they called the lawyers ; as also to put down all the Clergy, except the begging Friars, and to divide among themselves all their lands and property (1).. Such were the levellers of the fif teenth century, whom a modern Bishop eulogizes !— The following are Theological Paradoxes, and such as will infallibly non-plus every regular student in Divinity. 1st, ' The Apostles were not Bishops,' p. 15. By thesame. rule. Bishops are not Priests. — 2dly, 'To (1) Hist. Major T. Walsibgharo, Knighton De Event. Angl, Colberts Eccl. Hist. ADDRESS. XXV ' retain the obsolete language of ancient Rome, in ' prayer, is an error,' p. 39.— ^dly, The Irish were ' guilty of a heresy of discipline !' p. 60. But the political paradoxes, my Lord, of this new Catechism, are still more inexplicable than the theo logical ones. The first of them, which I shall mention, is contained in the following question and answer, ' Q. What is it excludes Pagans, Jews, and Mahome- ' tans, from our Churches, and from Parliament ? A. ' Religion,' p. 44. — Your Lordship will permit the writer to observe, in the first place, that it is impossible either for the simple Catechumens of Wales, or even for the learned Reviewers of England, to gather from this passage, whether the Right Rev. Prelate means to say, that it is the Religion of Pagans, Jews, and Turks, or that of Protestants, which excludes the former from Parliament. However, the passage, taken either way, is perfectly paradoxical. For can that Prelate, or any one else, cite a precept of the Ve- dam, of the Talmud, or of the Koran, which prohibits its respective votaries from sitting and voting in the British Parliament, if they can get entrance into it ? Or can he shew any thing in Protestantism (which he defines to be • The abjuration of Popery, and the ex- ' elusion of Papists from all power, ecclesiastical or ' civil)* that prevents a man, who publicly proclaims Mahomet, or who publicly denies Jesus Christ, or who publicly worships the obscene and blood-stained idol Jaggernaut, from being a member of either House of the Legislature ? No, my Lord, there is no one article in any one of these Religions, if they may be called by that name, which excludes themfromourParliament; the only condition for rendering them fit and worthy to enter XXVi ADDRESS. into it, and becoming legislators, being their calling God I o witness, that ' there is no Transubstantiation in ' the Mass,' and that * the worship of the Virgin Mary ' and the Saints, as practised in the Church of Rome,' (upon both which points the worshippers of Jaggernaut and English Protestants are, for the most part, equally well instructed), ' are idolatrous /' A second political paradox in this Ca techism is, that ' the inviolable covenants of the two ' Unions shew the injustice and unconstitutional na- ' ture of the Roman Catholic claims,' p. viii. This, my Lord, is equally incomprehensible ; since the Aet of Union with Scotland neither mentions these claims, nor alludes to them ; and since that of the Union with Ireland expressly admits the principle of their being conceded, and prepares the minds of men, for their actual concession ; as it is therein enacted, that ' Mem- ' bers of the United Parliament shall take and subscribe ' the usual oaths and declarations UNTIL THE SAID ' 'PARLIAMENT SHALL OTHERWISE PRO- ' VIDE.' Art. IV. The last of these Paradoxes, which the writer will extract from the incomprehensi ble Catechism, is the following. It teaches at page 35, that ' Not to consent to the Veto, is not to ac- ' knowledge the King's Supremacy, which it is treason- ' able, by Statute, to oppose.' And immediately after, at p. 36, it teaches that * the Veto, or the King's nomina- ' tion, is unprotestant and illegal:' to which the Bishop adds in the words of his friend, Mr. Sharp ; ' it is * highly improper and even illegal for the Crown of ' England to accept the power of the proposed Veto ; ' or to have any concern in the appointment of uni formed Bishops,' p. 56. Can any one, my Lord, re- ADDRESS. XXVll concile these opposite doctrines ? To the plain sense of the writer it appears, that if it be illegal for his Majesty to accept of the Veto, it would be criminal in the Catholics to offer it to him ; so far from its being treasonable to refuse giving it ! MY LORD BISHOP, The wise man has said, in the sacred text, of making many books there is no end, Eccles. xii. 12. ; and we are certain, from reason and experience, that, least of all, will there be an end of making books, and disput ing on subjects of Religion, with respect to those who have no fixed rule, or none but a false one for deciding on religious controversies ; or who suffer worldly interest, pride, or the prejudices of education, to take place of the sincerity, humility and piety, which ought to guide them in a matter of such infinite moment. The writer trusts that, in the First Part of the following Letters he has shewn the Rule, appointed by Christ, for clearly discerning the truths he has revealed, and conducting to them ; and that he has, in his Second Part, clearly pointed out Christ's True Church, which cannot but teach his True Doc trine. By men of good will, who follow either of these ways in the uprightness and fervour of their souls, a satisfactory end to their religious discus sions and doubts will quickly be found. But who can subdue or soften the above-mentioned passions and prejudices ? No one, certainly, but God alone; and, as the greater part of mankind is notoriously under their influence, the writer is so far from expect ing to make these persons proselytes to his demonstra tions, that he has prepared his mind for the opposition and obloquy, which he is sure to experience from part i. e xxviii ADDRESS. them. He is aware, that most Statesmen, and other great personages, regard religion, merely as a political engine, for managing the population, and therefore, wish to keep one as well as the other as quiet as possi ble. On this principle, had they been counsellors to King Ethelbert, they would have persuaded him to banish St. Austin, and to continue the worship of Thor and Woden. The multitude, in this age of in fidelity and dissipation, nauseate religious inquiries and instructions ; and, when they must hear them, like the Jews of old ; they say to the Seer, see not ; and to the Prophet, prophesy not to us right things : speak unto ns smooth things ; prophesy deceits, Isa. xxx. 10. The Critics and Reviewers are, for the most part, as smooth, in this respect, as the prophets : if they lead the public opinion in matters of less consequence, they follow it in those of greater. — But whatever excuse there may be for the inconsistency of other men, there would, evidently, he none, in religious matters, for persons of your Lordship's and the writer's profession and situa tion, should they, for their temporal advantage, or from their prejudices, mislead others in a matter of eternal consequence. Such conduct would be hypocritical and doubly perfidious and ruinous. It would be perfidious to the individual so misguided, and to the Church or Sect which they profess to serve ; since nothing can injure that so much, as the appearance of insincerity and human passions in its official defenders. Accord ingly it will be seen, in the following work, that the most fruitful source of conversions to the Catholic Church, are the detected calumnies and misrepresenta tions of her bitterest enemies. Such conduct would also be utterly ruinous : first, to its immediate victims ; ADDRESS. XXIX and, secondly, to the persons of your Lordship's and the writer's profession and character. In fact, my Lord, if, as Christ assures us, at the great day of universal trial, some of the arraigned will rise up in judgment against others, and condemn them for their peculiar guilt, Matt. xii. 41. ; how heavy a condemnation will poor bewildered souls call down upon those faithless guides, who have led them astray ! Or rather, how- severe a vengeance will the Good Shepherd himself (then also the Judge of the living and the dead) who hath laid down his life for his sheep, take of those hire lings, who have not only left his sheep to be caught and scattered by the zeolf, but have themselves, killed and destroyed them .' John x. For all these important motives, let us, my Lord, dismiss every selfish interest, human respect, and pre judice from our minds, in the discussion of religious. subjects, and follow Truth, whithersoever she leads lis, with the utmost sincerity and ardour of our souls., The writer of this, for his part, disgusted, as he is, at seeing the most serious and sacred of all subjects be-> come a mere field of exercise for the talents, the learn ing, and the passions of different writers, and averse, as, he is, from taking a part in such contests, neverthe less holds himself bound, not only to render an ac count of the hope that is in him, to every one who asketh it of him, in the sincerity of an upright heart, but also to yield the palm to your Lordship thankfully and, publicly, should you be able to prove (not, however, by extravagant and unsupported assertions, but by sound and convincing theological arguments) that the Rule of Faith, which he maintains, is not the one appointed by Christ and his Apostles, for guiding Christians into all, e2„ XXX ADDRESS. truth ; or that the Church, to which he adheres, has not exclusively those marks of the True Church, which your Lordship ascribes to it, in the Creeds you repeat, equally with the writer. Until one or other of these points is proved, he will hold himself bound to stick close both to the Rule and the Church, in spite of calumny, misrepresentation, ridicule, cla mour, and persecution, and to maintain, in opposition to your Lordship, that there is no just cause for either making or continuing any penal laws against the pro fessors of the Original Faith. The writer has the honour to remain, My Lord, Your Lordship's obedient Servant, J.M. D.D. W , May 3, 1818. THE END OF RELIGIOUS CONTROVERSY. PART I. ON THE RULE OF FAITH; or, THE METHOD OF FINDING OUT THE TRUE RELIGION. LETTER I. From JAMES BROWN, Esq. to the Rev. J. M. D. D. E. S. A. INTRODUCTION. New Cottage, near Cressage, Salop, Oct. 13, 1801. REVEREND SIR, JL Should need an ample apology for the liberty I take in thus addressing you, without having the honour of your acquaintance, and still more for the heavy task I am endeavouring to impose upon you, if I did not consider your public character, as a Pastor of your Religion, and as a writer in defence of it, and likewise your personal character for benevo lence, which has been described to me by a Gentle man of your communion, Mr. J. C — ne, who is well acquainted with us both. Having mentioned this, I need only add, that I write to you in the name of a society of serious and worthy Christians of different persuasions, to which society I myself belong, who are as desirous as I am, to receive satisfaction from you on certain doubts, which your late work in answer to Dr. Sturges has suggested to us (l). (1) Letters to a Prebendary, in answer to Reflections on Popery, by th« Rev. Dr. Sturges, Prebendary and Chancellor of Winchester, PART I. A 2 LETTER T. However, in making this request of our Society to you, it seems proper, Rev. Sir, that I should bring you acquainted with the nature of it ; by way of convincing you, that it is not unworthy of the attention, which I am desirous you should pay to it. We consist then of above twenty persons, including the Ladies, who, living at some distance from any considerable town, meet together once a week, generally at my habitation of New Cottage j not so much for our amusement and refection, as for the improvement of our minds, by reading the best publications of the day which I can procure from my London Bookseller, and sometimes an original essay written by one of the company. I have signified that many of us are of different religious persuasions : this will be seen more distinctly from the following account of our members. Among these I must mention, in the first place, our learned and worthy Rector, Dr. Carey. He is, of course, of the Church of England ; but like most others of his learned and dignified brethren, in these times, he is of that free, and as it is called, liberal turn of mind, as to explain away the mysteries and a great many of its other articles, which, in my younger days, were considered essential to it. Mr. and Mrs. Topham are Methodists of the Predestinarian and Antinomian class, while Mr. and Mrs. Askew are mitigated Arminian Methodists of Wesley's connec tion. Mr. and Mrs. Rankin are honest Quakers. Mr. Barker and his children term themselves Rational Dissenters, being of the old Presbyterian lineage, which is now almost univerally gone into Sociniauism. I, for my part, glory in being a stanch member of our happy establishment, which has kept the golden meau INTRODUCTION. 3 among the contending sects, and which I am fully persuaded, approaches nearer to the purity of the Apostolic Church, than any other which has ex isted since the age of it. Mrs. Brown professes an equal attachment to the Church ; yet, being of an inquisitive and ardent mind, she cannot refrain from frequenting the meetings, and even supporting the missions of those self-created apostles, who are under mining -this Church on every side, and who are no where more active than in our sequestered valley. With these differences among us, on the most in teresting of all subjects, we 'cannot help having fre quent religious controversies : but reason and charity enable us to manage these without any breach of either good manners, or good will to each other. Indeed, I believe that we are, one and all, possessed of an unfeigned respect and cordial love for Christians of every description, one only excepted. Must I name it on the present occasion? — Yes, I must; in order to fulfil my commission in a proper manner. It is then the Church that you, Rev. Sir, belong to ; which, if any credit is due to the eminent divines, whose works we are in the habit of reading, and more particularly to the illustrious Bishop Porteus in his celebrated and standing work, called A BRIEF CONFUTA TION OF THE ERRORS OF THE CHURCH OF ROME, extracted from Archbishop Seeker's V. SER MONS AGAINST POPERY (1), is such a mass of absurdity, bigotry, superstition, idolatry, and immo- (1) The Norrisian Professor of Divinity in the University of Cambridge, speaking of this work says: ' The Refutation of the Popish errors is now ' reduced into a small compass by Archbishop Seeker and Bishop Porteus.' — Lectures in Divinity, Vol. IV. p. 71. LETTER I. rality, that to say we respect and love those who obstinately adhere to it, as we do other Christians, would seem a compromise of reason, scripture, and virtuous feeling. And yet even of this Church we have formed a less revolting idea, in some particulars, than we did for merly. This has happened from our having just read over your controversial work against Dr. Sturges, called LETTERS TO A PREBENDARY, to which our attention was directed by the notice taken of it in the Houses of Parliament, and particularly by the very unexpected compliment paid to it by that ornament of our Church, Bishop Horsley. We admit then (at least I, for my part, admit) that you have refuted the most odious of the charges brought against your reli gion, namely, that it is, necessarily, and, upon princi ple, intolerant and sanguinary, requiring its members to persecute with fire and sword all persons of a different creed from their own, when this is in their power. You have also proved that Papists may be good sub jects to a Protestant Sovereign ; and you have shewn, by an interesting historical detail, that the Roman Catholics of this kingdom have been conspicuous for their loyalty from the time of Elizabeth down to the present time. Still most of the absurd and antiscrip- tural doctrines and practices alluded to above, relating to the worship of Saints and Images, to Transubstantia- tion and the half Communion, to Purgatory and Shut ting up the Bible, with others of the same nature, you have not, to my recollection, so much as attempted to defend. In a word, I write to you, Rev. Sir, on the present occasion, in the name of our respectable So ciety, to ask you whether yodf fairly give up these ESSAY I. 6 doctrines aftd practices of Popery, as untenable ; or otherwise, whether you will condescend to interchange a few letters with me on the subject of them, for the satisfaction of me and my friends, and with the sole view of mutually discovering aud communicating reli* gious truths. We remark that you say in your first Letter to Dr. Sturges : ' Should I have occasion to ' make another reply to you, I will try if it be not * possible to put the whole question at issue between ' us into such a shape, as shall remove the danger of * irritation on both sides, and still enable us, if we are * mutually so disposed, to agree together in the ac- * knowledgment of the same religious truths.* — If you still think that this is possible, for God's sake and your neighbours' sake, delay not to undertake it. The plan embraces every advantage we wish for, and excludes every evil we deprecate. You shall manage the discussion in your own way, and we will give you as little interruption as possible. — Two of the essays above alluded to, with which our worthy Rector lately furnished us, I, with your permission, enclose, to con vince you that genius and sacred literature are cul tivated round the Wrekin, and on the banks of the Severn. I remain, Rev. Sir, with great respect, Your faithful and obedient servant, JAMES BROWN. ESSAY I. ON THE EXISTENCE OF GOD, AND OF NATURAL RELIGION. By the Rev. SAMUEL CAREY, LL. D. Foreseeing that my health will not permit me, for a considerable time, to meet my respected friends part i. B Q ESSAT I. at New Cottage, I comply with the request, which several of them have made me, in sending them in writing, my ideas on the two noblest subjects which can occupy the mind of man : the existence of God, and the Truth of Christianity. In doing this, I pro fess not to make new discoveries, but barely to state certain arguments, which I collected, in my youth, from the learned Hugo Grotius, our own judicious Clark, and other advocates of Natural and Revealed Religion. I offer no apology for adopting the words of Scripture, in arguing with persons, who are sup posed not to admit its authority, when these express my meaning as fully as any others can do. The first argument for the existence of God is thus expressed by the Royal Prophet : Know ye that the Lord he is God: it is he that hath made us, and not we ourselves. Ps. c. 3. In fact, when I ask myself that question, which every reflecting man must sometimes ask himself : How came I into this state of existence? Who has bestowed upon me the being which I enjoy ? I am forced to answer : It is not I that made myself; and each of my forefathers, if asked the same question, must have returned the same answer. In like manner, if I interrogate the several beings with which I am surrounded, the earth, the air, the water, the stars, the moon, the sun, each of them, as an ancient Father says, will answer me, in its turn: It xoas not I that made you ; I, like you, am a creature of yesterday, as incapable of giving existence to you as I am of giving it to myself. In short, however often each of us re peats the questions : Hoxv came I hither ? Who has made me what I am ? we shall never find a rational an&wer to them, till we come to acknowledge that there is an ESSAY I. Eternal, Necessary, Self-existent Being, the author of all contingent beings, which is no other than GOD. It is this Necessity of being, this Self-existence, which constitute the nature of God, and from which all his other perfections flow. Hence, when he deigned to reveal himself, on the flaming mountain of Horeb, to the holy legislator of his chosen people, being asked by this prophet; what was his proper name ? he answered: I AM THAT I AM. Exod. iii. 14. This is as much as to say : I alone exist of myself : all others are created beings, which exist by my will. From this attribute of Self-existence, all the other perfections of the Deity, eternity, immensity, omni potence, omniscience, holiness, justice, mercy, and bounty, each in an infinite degree, necessarily flow ; because there is nothing to limit his existence and at tributes, and because, whatever perfection is found in any created being, must, like its existence, have been derived from this universal source. This proof of the existence of God, though demon strative and self-evident to reflecting beings, is, never theless, we have reason to fear, lost on a great pro portion of our fellow-creatures 5 because they hardly reflect at all ; or, at least, never consider, Who made them, or, what they were made for. But that other proof, which results from the magnificence, the beauty, and the harmony of the creation, as it falls under the senses, so it cannot be thought to escape the attention of the most stupid or savage of rational beings. The starry heavens, the fulminating clouds, the boundless ocean, the variegated earth, the organized human body\ all these, and many other phenomena of nature, must strike the mind of the untutored savage, no less than Bg 8 ESSAY I. that of the studious philosopher, with a conviction that there is an infinitely powerful, wise and bountiful Being, who is the author of these things : though, doubtless, the latter, in proportion as he sees more clearly and ex? tensively than the former the properties and ceconomy of different parts of the creation, possesses a stronger physical evidence, as it is called, of the existence of the Great Creator. In fact, if the Pagan physician, Galen (1), from the imperfect knowledge which he possessed of the structure of the human body, found himself compelled to acknowledge the existence of an infinitely wise and beneficent being, to make the.hody such as it is ; what would he not have said, had he been acquainted with the circulation of the blood, and the uses and harmony of the arteries, veins, and lacteals ! Jf the philosophical orator, Tully, discovered and en larged on the same truth, from the little knowledge of astronomy which, he possessed (3), what strains of eloquence would he not have poured forth upon it, had he been acquainted with the discoveries of Galileo and Newton, relative to the magnitude and distances of the stars, the motions of the planets and the co mets ! Yes, all nature proclaims that there is a Being who is wise in heart and mighty in strength : — who doeth great things and past finding out ; yea wonders. Without number ; — who stretcheth out the North over the empty places and hangeth the earth upon nothing. — The pillars of heaven tremble and are astonished at his reproqf.-r-JU) ! these are a part of his ways ; but how little a portion is heard of him / The thunder of his -power who can understand ! Job. ix, — xxvi. The proofs, however, of God's existence, which can, (*) De Usu Partium, <$ pe Na.tm;a peorum^ 1, «.. ESSAY I. 9 least be evaded, are those which come immediately home to a man's own heart ; convincing him, with the same evidence which he has of his own existence, that there is an all-seeing, infinitely just, and infinitely boun tiful Master above, who is witness of all his actions and words, and of his very thoughts. For whence arises the heartfelt pleasure which the good man feels on re sisting a secret temptation to sin, or in performing an act of beneficence, though in the utmost secresy ? Why does he raise his countenance to heaven, with devotion, and why is he prepared to meet death with cheerful hope, unless it be that, his conscience tells him of a munificent rewarder of virtue, the spectator of what he does ? And why does the most hardened sinner tremble and faulter in his limbs and athis heart, when he commits his most secret sins of theft, ven geance, or impurity? Why, especially, does he sink into agonies of horror and despair at the approach of death, unless it be that, he is deeply convinced of the constant presence of an all-seeing witness, and of an infinitely holy, powerful, and just Judge, into whose hands it is a terrible thing to fall ! — In vain does he say : Darkness encompasseth me and the walls cover me : no one seeth : of whom am I afraid ? — for his con science tells him that, The eyes of the Lord are far brighter than the sun, beholding round about all the, ways of men. Ecclus. xxiii. £fj, 28. This last argument, in particular, is so obvious and convincing, that I cannot bring myself to believe there ever was a human being, of sound sense, who was really an Atheist. Those persons who have tried to work themselves into a persuasion that there is no God, will generally be found, both in ancient and 10 ESSAY I. modem times, to be of the most profligate manners, who dreading to meet him as their Judge, try to per- suade themselves that he does not exist. This has been observed by St. Augustin, who says : ' No man 'denies the existence of God, but such a one whose 'interest it is that there should be no God.' Yet even they who, in the broad day-light, and among their profligate companions, pretend to disbelieve the existence of a Supreme Being; in the darkness of the night, and still more, under the apprehension of death, fail not to confess it ; as Seneca, I think, has some where observed ( 1 ). A son heareth his father, and a servant his master, says the Prophet Malachi. If then I be a father, where is mine honour ? and if I be a master, where is my fear ? saith the Lord of Hosts, (i. 6".) In a word: it is impossible to believe the existence of a Supreme Being, our Creator, our Lord, and our Judge, with out being conscious, at the same time, of our obliga tion to worship him interiorly and exteriorly, to fear him, to love him, and to obey him. This constitutes Natural Religion ; by the observance of which the an cient Patriarchs, together with Melchisedec, Job, and, we trust, very many other virtuous and religious per sons of different ages and countries, have been ac ceptable to God in this life, and have attained to everlasting bliss in the other : — still we must confess, (1) It is proper here to observe, that a large proportion of the boasting Atheists who signalized themselves by their impiety, during the French Re volution, or a few years previous to its eruption, acknowledged, when they came to die, that their irreligion had been affected, and that they never doubted, in their hearts, of the existence of God and the truths of Christianity. Among these were the Marquis d'Argens, Boulanger, La Metrje, Collot d'Herbois, Egalite Duke of Orleans, &c. ESSAY II. 11 with deep sorrow, that the number of such persons has been small, compared with those of every age and nation, who, as St. Paul says : When they knew God, glorified him not as God ; neither were they thankful^ but became vain in their imaginations ; and their foolish hearts were darkened; — they changed the truth of God into a lie, and zvonskipped and served the creature more than the Creator, who is blessed for ever more. Rom. i. 21*, 25. SAMUEL CAREY. ESSAY II. ON THE TRUTH OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. By the Rev. SAMUEL CAREY, LL. D. Though the light of nature is abundantly sufficient, as I trust I have shewn in my former essay, to prove the existence of God, and the duty of worshipping and serving him, yet this was not the only light that was communicated to mankind in the first ages of the world concerning these matters, since many things relat ing to them were revealed by God to the Patriarchs, and, through them, to their contemporaries and descendants. At length, however, this knowledge was almost uni versally obliterated from the minds of men, and the light of reason itself was so clouded by the boundless indulgence of their passions, that they seemed, every where, sunk almost to a level with the brute creation. Even the most polished nations, the Greeks and the Romans, blushed not at unnatural lusts, and boasted of the most horrid cruelties. Plutarch describes the celebrated Grecian sages, Socrates, Plato, Xenophon, 1*2 ESSAY II. Cebes, &c. as indulging freely in the former (l), and every one knows that the chief amusement of the Ro man people, was to behold their fellow-creatures mur* dering one another in the amphitheatres, sometimes by hundreds and thousands at a time. But the depravity and impiety of the ancient pagans, and I may say the same of those of modern times, appear chiefly in their religious doctrines and worship. What an absurd and disgusting rabble of pretended Deities, marked with every crime that disgraces the worst of mortals, lust, envy, hatred and cruelty, did not the above-named refined nations worship ; and that, in several instances, by the imitation of their crimes ! Plato allows of drunkenness in honour of the Gods; Aristotle admits of indecent representations of them, How many tem ples were every were erected, and prostitutes consecrated to the worship of Venus (2) ? And how generally were human sacrifices offered up in honour of Moloch, Saturn, Thor, Diana, Woden, and other pretended Gods, or rather real demons, by almost every Pao-an nation, Greek and barbarian, and, among the rest, by the ancient Britons, inhabitants of this island ! It is true, some few sages of antiquity, by listening to the dictates of nature and reason, saw into the ab surdity of the popular religion, and discovered the existence and attributes of the true God; but theri how unsteady and imperfect was their belief, even in this point! and when they knew God they did not (1) De Isid. et Osirid. Even the refined Cicero and Virgil did not blush •t these infamies. (*) Strabo tells us, that there were 1000 prostitutes attached to the Tem ple of Venus, at Corinth. The Athenians attributed the preservation of their fljtj to the prayer* of its prostitutes. ESSAY II. 13 glorify him as God, nor give him thanks, but became vain in their thoughts. Rom. i. 21. In short, they were so bewildered on the whole subject of religion, that Socrates, the wisest of them all, declared it ' impose ' sible for men to discover this, unless the Deity him-, ' self deigned to reveal it to them (1).' Indeed it was** an effort of mercy, worthy the Great aud Good God, to make such a revelation of himself, and of his ac ceptable worship, to poor, benighted, and degraded man. This he did, first, in favour of a poor, afflicted, captive tribe on the banks of the Nile, the Israelites, whom he led from thence into the country of their ancestors, and raised up to be a powerful nation, by a series of astonishing miracles ; instructing and con firming them in the knowledge and worship of himself by his different prophets. He afterwards did the same thing, in favour of all the people of the earth, and to a far greater extent, by the promised Messiah, and his Apostles. It is to this latter Divine Legation I shall here confine my arguments : though, indeed, the one confirms the other; since Christ and the A*postles cOn-? tinuaily bear testimony to the mission of Moses. -*. ¦: i All history, then, and tradition prove, that in the reign of Tiberius, the second Roman Emperor after Julius Caesar, an extraordinary personage, Jesus Christ, appeared in Palestine, teaching a new system of religion and morality, far more sublime and perfect than any which the Pagan Philosophers, or even the Hebrew Prophets had inculcated. He confirmed the truths of natural Religion and of the Mosaic -re velation ; but then he vastly extended their sphere', (1) Plalo Dialug.Akio.iad. ... k: ;.-.-. ..-..'.. - ; t, PART I. C 14 ESSAY II. by the communication of many heavenly mysteries, concerning the nature of the one true God, his eeco- nomy in redeeming man by his own vicarious suf ferings, the restoration and future immortality of our bodies, and the final, decisive trial we are to undergo before him our destined Judge. He enforced the obligation of loving our heavenly Father, above all things, of praying to him continually, and of refer ring all our thoughts, words, and actions to his divine honour. He insisted on the necessity of denying, not one or other of our passions, as the philosophers had done, who, Tertullian says, drove out one nail with another; but the whole collection of them, dis orderly and vitiated as they are, since the fall of our first parent. In opposition to our innate avarice, pride, and love of pleasure; he opened his mission by teaching that : Blessed are the poor in spirit ; Blessed are the meek ; Blessed are they . that mourn, Spc. Teaching, as he did, with respect to our fellow-creatures, every virtue, he singled out fraternal charity for his peculiar and characteristic precept ; requiring that his disciples should love one another as they love them selves, and even as he himself has loved them ; he who laid down his life for them ! and he extended the obli gation of this precept to our enemies, equally with our friends. Nor was the Morality of Jesus a mere speculative system of precepts, like the systems of the philosophers : it was of a practical nature, and he himself confirmed, by his example, every virtue which he inculcated, and more particularly that hardest of all others to reduce to practice, the love of our enemies. Christ had o-one about, as the sacred text expresses it, doing good ESSAY ir. 15 to all, Acts x. 38. and evil to no one. He had cured the sick of Judea and the neighbouring countries, had given sight to the blind, hearing to the deaf, and even life to the dead; but, above all things, be had enlightened the minds of his hearers with the knowledge of pure and sublime truths, capable of leading them to present and future happiness : yet was he every where calumniated and persecuted, till at length, his inveterate enemies fulfilled their malice against him, by nailing him to a cross, thereon to expire, by lengthened torments. Not content with this, they came before his gibbet, deriding him in his agony with insulting words and gestures! — And what is the return which the author of Christianity makes for such unexampled barbarity ? He excuses the authors of it ! He prays for them! Father, for give them : for they knozo not zvhat they do t Luke xxiii. 34. No wonder this proof of supernatural charity should have staggered the most hardened infi dels ; one of whom confesses that, ' if Socrates has 'died like a philosopher, Jesus alone has died like 'a God!" (1). The precepts and the example of the master have not been lost upon his disciples. — These have ever been distinguished by their practice of virtue, and, particularly,.. by their charity and forgiveness of injuries. The first of them who laid down his life for Christ, St. Stephen, while the Jews were stoning him to death, prayed thus, with his last voice : Lord, lay not this sin to their charge !¦ Acts vii. 59. Having considered the several systems of Paganism, (1) Rousseau Emile. eg lb ESSAY II. which have prevailed, and that still prevail in different parts of the world, both as to belief and practice, to gether with the speculations of the wisest infidel philo sophers concerning them ; and having contemplated, on the other hand, the doctrine of the New Testa ment both as to theory and practice ; I would ask any candid unbeliver, where he# thought Jesus Christ could have acquired the idea of so sublime, so pure, so efficacious, a religion as Christianity is ; espe cially when compared with the others above alluded to ? Could he have acquired it in the workshop of a poor artisan of Nazareth, or among the fishermen of the lake of Genezareth ? Then, how could he and his poor unlettered Apostles succeed in propagating this religion, as they did throughout the world, in op position to all the talents and power of philosophers and Princes, and all the passions of all mankind? No other answers can be given to these questions, than that the religion itself has been divinely revealed, and that it has been divinely assisted, in its progress through out the world. In addition to this internal evidence of Christianity, as it is called, there are external proofs, which must not be passed over. Christ, on various occasions, appealed to the miracles which lie wrought, in confirmation of his doctrine and mission; miracles public and indis putable, which, from the testimony of Pilate himself, were placed on the records of the Roman Empire (l), and which were not denied by the most determined enemies of Christianity, such as Celsus, Porphyrius, Unci Julian, the apostate. Among these miracles, there (1) Tertul. in Apolog. ESSAY II. 17 is one of so extraordinary a nature, as to render it quite unnecessary to mention any others, and which is there fore always appealed to by the Apostles, as the grand proof of the gospel they preached : I mean the Resur rection of Christ from the dead. To the fact itself must be added also its circumstances; namely, that he raised himself to life by his own power, without the intervention of any living person ; and that he did this in conformity with his prediction, at the time, which he had appointed for this event, and in defiance of the efforts of his ene mies, to detain his body in the sepulchre. To elude the evidence resulting from this unexampled prodigy, one or other of the following assertions must be main tained ; either that the Disciples were deceived in believ ing him to be risen from the dead, or that they com bined to deceive the world into a belief of that imposition. — Now it cannot be credited that they themselves were deceived in this matter, being many in number, and having the testimony of their eyes, in seeing their Master repeatedly during forty days ; of their ears in hearing his voice; and. one, the most incredulous among them, the testimony of his feeling, in touching his person and probing his wounds. Nor can it be believed that they conspired to propagate an unavailing falsehood of this nature throughout the nations of the earth ; name ly, that a person, put to death in Judea, had risen again to life,: — and this too, without any prospect to them selves for this world, but that of persecution, torments and a cruel death, which they successively endured, as did their numerous disciples after them, in testi mony of this fact ; without any prospect_/br the other zvorld, but the vengeance of the God of truth. Next to the miracles, wrought by Christ, is the ful-. 18 ESSAY II. fihnent of the ancient prophecies concerning him, in proof of the religion which he taught. To mention a few of these : He was born just after the sceptre had departed from the tribe of Juda, Gen. xlix. 10. ; at the end of seventy -two zveeks of years from the restoration of Jerusalem, Dan. ix. 24.; while the Second Temple of Jerusalem was in being, Hagg. ii. 7. He was born in Bethlehem, Mic. v. 2. ; worked the identical miracles foretold of him, Isai. xxxv. 5. He was sold by his perfidiousdisciple for thirty pieces of silver, which were laid out in the purchase of a potter's field, Zach. xi. 13. He was scourged, spit upon, Isai. 1. 6". ; placed among malefactors, Isai. xxxiii. 12. His hands and feet were transfixed with nails, Ps. xxii. 16. ; and his side was opened with a spear, Zach. xii. 10. Finally, he died, was buried with honour, Isai. liii. 9- ; and rose again to life without experiencing corruption, Ps. xvi. 10. The sworn enemies of Christ, the Jews, were, during many hundred years before his coming, and still are in pos session of the Scriptures, containing these and many other predictions concerning him, which were strictly fulfilled. The very existence, and other circumstances respect- ting this extraordinary people, the Jews, are so many arguments in proof of Christianity. They have now subsisted, as a distinct people, for more than four thou sand years, during which they have again and again been subdued, harassed, and almost extirpated. Their mighty conquerors, the Philistines, the Assyrians, the Persians, the Macedonians, the Syrians, and the Ro mans have, in their turns, ceased to exist, and can no where be found as distinct nations : while the Jews ex ist in great numbers, and are known in every part of PRELIMINARIES. 19 the world. How can this be accounted for ? Why has God preserved them alone, amongst the ancient nations of the earth ? The truth is, they are still the subject of prophecy, with respect to both the Old and the New Testament. They exist, as monuments of God's wrath against them ; as witnesses to the truth of the Scriptures which condemn them ; and as the de stined subjects of his final mercy before the end of the world. They are to be found in every quarter of the globe; but in the condition with which their great Legislator Moses threatened them, if they forsook the Lord; namely, that he would remove them into all the kingdoms of the earth, Deut. xxviii. 25., that they should become an astonishment, and a by-word, among aU nations, ibid. 37. That they should find no ease, neither should the sole of their foot have rest, ibid. 65. Finally, they are every where seen, but carry ing, written on their foreheads, the curse which they pronounced on themselves in rejecting their Messiah : His blood be upon us and upon ou?' children. Matt. xxvii. 25. Still is this extraordinary people preserved, to be, in the end, converted, and to find mercy- Rom. xi. 26, &e. SAMUEL CAREY. LETTER II. To JAMES BROWN, Esq. Sfe. PRELIMINARIES. Winton, October, 20, 1801. PEAR SIR, You certainly want no apology for writing to me on the subject of your letter. For if, 20 LETTER II. as St. Peter inculcates, each Christian ought to be Ready alzvays to give an answer to every man that asketh him a reason of the hope that is in him, 1 Pet. iii. ]5., how inexcusable would a person of my ministry and commission be, who am a debtor both to the Greeks and to the Barbarians, both to the wise and the unwise, Rom. i. 14., were I unwilling to give the utmost satisfaction, in mjr power, respecting the Catholic Religion, to any human being, whose inquiries appear to proceed from a serious and candid mind, desirous of discovering and embracing religious truth, such as I must believe yours to be. And yet this disposition is exceedingly rare among Christians. Infinitely the greater part of them, in choosing a system of religion, or in adhering to one, are guided by motives of interest, worldly honour or convenience. These inducements not only rouse their worst passions, but also blind their judgment ; so as to create hideous phantoms to their intellectual eyes, and to hinder them from seeing the most conspicuous ob jects which stand before them. To such inconsistent Christians nothing proves so irritating as the attempt to disabuse them of their errors, except the success of that attempt, by putting it out of their power to defend them any longer. These are they ; and O ! how infinite is their number, of whom Christ says : They love dark ness rather than light, John iii. 16. ; and who say to the Prophets : Prophesy not unto us righi things : speak unto us smooth things. Isai. xxx. 10. They form to themselves a false conscience, as the Jews did when they murdered their Messiah, Acts iii. 17. ; and as he himself foretold many others would do, in mur dering his disciples. John xvi. 2. I cannot help say ing that, I myself have experienced something of this PRELIMINARIES. 21 spirit in my religious discussions, with persons who have been loudest in professing their candour and charity. Hence, I make no doubt, if the elucidation which you call for at my hands, for your numerous Society, should happen, by any means to become pub lic, that I shall have to eat the bread of affliction, and drink the water of tribulation, 1 Kings xxii. 27-, for this discharge of my duty, perhaps for the remainder1 of my life. But, as the Apostle writes, none of these things move me ; neither count I my life dear to me, so that I may finish my course with joy and the ministry which I have received of the Lord Jesus. Acts xx. 24. It remains, Sir, to settle the conditions of our cor respondence. What I propose is, that, in the first place, we should mutually, and indeed all of us who are concerned in this friendly controversy, be at perfect liberty, without offence to anyone, to speak of doctrines, practices, and persons, as we judge best for the disco very of truth : secondly, that we should be disposed, in common, as far as poor human nature will permit, to investigate truth with impartiality ; to acknowledge it, when discovered, with candour; and, of course, to renounce every error and unfounded prejudice that may be detected, on any side, whatever it may cost us in so doing. I, for my part, Dear Sir, here solemnly promise, that I will publicly renounce the Religion, of which I am a Minister, and will induce as many of my flock, as I may have influence over, to do the same, should it prove to be that 'mass of absurdity, bigotry, ' superstition, idolatry, and immorality,' which you, Sir, and most Protestants conceive it to be ; nay, even if I should not succeed in clearing it of these respective PART I. D 22 LETTER HI. charges. To religious controversy, when originating in its proper motives, a desire of serving God and se curing our salvation, I cannot declare myself au enemy, without virtually condemning the conduct of Christ himself, who, on every occasion, arraigned and refuted the errors of the Pharisees : but I cannot conceive any hypocrisy so detestable as that of mounting the pulpit or employing the pen on sacred subjects, to serve our temporal interests, our resentment or our pride, under pretext of promoting or defending religious truth. — To inquirers, in the former predicament, I hold myself a debtor, as! have already said ; but the circumstances must be extraordinay, to induce me to hold a commu nication with persons in the latter. Lastly, as you appear, Sir, to approve of the plan I spoke of in my first letter to Dr. Sturges, I mean to pursue it on the present occasion. This, however, will necessarily throw back the examination of your charges to a con siderable distance ; as several other important inquiries must precede. I am, &c. J. M. LETTER III. From JAMES BROWN, Esq. to the Rev. J. M. D. D. PRELIMINARIES. New Cottage, Oct. 30, 1801. REVEREND SIR, I have been favoured, in due course, with yours of the 20th instant, which I have communi cated to those persons of our Society, whom I have PRELIMINARIES. 23 had an opportunity of seeing. No circumstance could strike us with greater sorrow, than that you should suffer any inconvenience from your edifying prompt ness to comply with our well meant request, and we confidently trust that nothing of the kind will take place through our fault. We agree with you, as to the necessity of perfect freedom of speech, where the dis covery of important truths is the real object of inquiry. Hence, while we are at liberty to censure many of your Popes and other clergy, Mr. Topham will not be of fended with any thing that you can prove against Cal vin, nor will Mr. Rankin quarrel with you for exposing the faults of George Fox, and James Naylor, nor shall I complain of you for any thing that you may make out against our venerable Latimer or Cranmer ; I say the same of doctrines and practices as of persons. If you are guilty of idolatry, or we of heresy, we are respec tively unfortunate, and the greatest act of charity we can perform, is to point out to each other the danger of our respective situations to their full extent. Not to renounce error and embrace truth of every kind, when we clearly see it, would be folly ; and to neglect doing this, when the question is about religious truth, would be folly and wickedness combined together. Finally, we cheerfully leave you to follow what course you please, and to whatever extent you please, provided you only give us such satisfaction as you can give, on the subjects I mentioned in my former letter. I am, Rev. Sir, &c. JAMES BROWN. D2 24 LETTER IV. To JAMES BROWN, Esq. 4c DISPOSITIONS FOR RELIGT0U8 INQUIRY. DEAR SIR, The dispositions which you profess, on the part of your friends, as well as yourself, I own, please me, and animate me to undertake the task you impose upon me. Nevertheless, availing myself of the liberty of speech which you and your friends allow me, I am forced to observe that there is nothing, in which men are more apt to deceive themselves, than in thinking themselves to be free from religious preju dices, sincere in seeking after, and resolved to em brace the truth of religion, in opposition to their preconceived opinions and worldly interests. How many imitate Pilate, who, when fie had asked our Saviour the question ;• What is truth f presently went Out of his company, before he could receive an an swer to it ! John xviii. 38. How many others resem ble the rich young man, who, having interrogated Christ ; What good thing shall I do that I may have eternal life ? when this Divine Master answered him : If thou wilt be perfect, go and sell zvhat thou hast and give to the poor ; — went away sorrowful J Matt. xix. 22. Finally, how many more act, like certain presumptu ous disciples of our Lord, who, when he had pro pounded to them a mystery beyond their conception, that of the Real Presence, in these words: My flesh is meat indeed, and my blood is drink indeed; — said, this is a hard saying ; zvho can hear it ? — andztent back cmdwalkedno more with him ! John vi. 56. O ! if all Christians, of the different sects and opinions, were but DISPOSITIONS. 25 possessed of the sincerity, disinterestedness and ear nestness to serve their God and save their souls, which a Francis Walsingham, kinsman to the .great states man of that name, a Hugh Paulin Cressy, Dean of Laughlin and Prebendary of Windsor, and an Antony Ulric, Duke of Brunswick and Lunenburgh, prove themselves to have been possessed of, the first in his Search into Matters of Religion, the second in his Exomologesis, or Motives of Conversion, &c. and the last in his. Fifty Reasons ; how soon would all and every one of our controversies cease, and we be all united in one faith, hope, and charity ! I will here transcribe, from the Preface to the Fifty Reasons, M'hat the illus trious relative of his Majesty says concerning the dis positions, with which he set about inquiring into the grounds and differences of the several systems of Chris tianity, when he began to entertain doubts concerning the truth of that in which he had been educated, namely, Lutheranism. He says — ' First, I earnestly implored the aid and grace of the Holy Ghost, and with all my power begged the light of true faith, from God, the Father of lights,' &c. Secondly, I made a strong resolution, by the grace of God, to avoid sin, well knowing that Wisdom will not enter into a corrupt mind, nor dwell in a body subject to sin,' Wisd. 4. ' and I am convinced, and was so then, that the reason why so many are ignorant of the true faith, and do not embrace it, is because they are plunged into several vices, and particularly into carnal sins.' ' Thirdly, I renounced all sorts of prejudices, whatever they were, which incline men to one Religion more than another, and which, unhappily I might have formerly espoused ; and I brought myself to 26 letter v. ' a perfect indifference, so as to be ready to embrace ' whichsoever the grace of the Holy Ghost and the * light of reason should point out to me, without any ' regard to the advantages and Inconveniences that ' might attend it in this world.' ' Lastly, I entered ' upon this deliberation and this choice, in the manner ' I should have wished to have done it at the hour of ' my death, and in a full conviction that, at the day ' of judgment, I must give an account to God why I ' followed this Religion in preference to all the rest.' — The Princely inquirer finishes this account of himself with the following awful reflections : ' Man has but ' one soul, which will be eternally either damned or ' saved. What doth it avail a man to gain the whole 1 zvorld and to lose his own soul ? Matt. xvi. 26. — Eter- ' nity knows no end. The course of it is perpetual. ' It is a series of unlimited duration'. There is no com- ' parison between things infinite and those which are ' not so. O 1 the happiness of the eternity of the ' Saints ! O ! the wretchedness of the eternity of the ' damned. One of these two eternities awaits us !' I remain, Sir, yours, &c. J. M. LETTER V. To JAMES BROWN, Esq. METHOD OF FINDING OUT THE TRUE RELIGION. DEAR SIR, It is obvious to common sense that, in order to find out any hidden thing, or to do any diffi cult thing, we must first discover, and then follow, the METHOD, 27 proper method for such purpose. If we do not take the right road to any distant place, it cannot be ex pected that we should arrive at it. If we get hold of a wrong clue, we shall never extricate ourselves from a labyrinth. Some persons choose their religion as they do their clothes, by fancy. They are pleased, for ex ample, with the talents of a preacher, when presently they adopt his Creed. Many adhere to their religious system, merely because they were educated in it, and because it was that of their parents and family ; which, if it were a reasonable motive for their resolution, would equally excuse Jews, Turks, and Pagans, for persisting in their respective impiety, and Would im peach the preaching of Christ and his Apostles. Others glory in their religion, because it is the one established in this their country, so renowned for science, literature, and arms : not reflecting that the polished and conquering nations of antiquity, the Egyptians, Assyrians, Persians, Greeks, and Romans, were left, by the inscrutable judgments of God, in darkness and the shadow of death, while a poor oppressed and despised people, on the banks of the Jordan, were the only depositary of divine truth, and the sole truly enlightened nation. But, far the greater part even of Christians, of every denomination, make the business of eternity subservient to that of time, and profess the religion which suits best with their interest, their repu tation, and their convenience. I trust that none of your respectable society fall under any cf these descrip tions. They all have, or fancy they have, a rational method of discovering religious truth ; in other words, an adequate Rule of Faith. Before I enter into any disquisition on this all-important controversy concern- 28 letter v. in g the* Right Rule of Faith, on which the determina tion of every other depends, I will lay down three fundamental maxims, the truth of which, I believe, no rational Christian will dispute. First, Our Divine Master, Christ, in establishing a Religion here oti earth, to which all the nations of it zvere invited, Matt, xviii. 19., left some RULE or Method, by which those persons, who sincerely seek for it, may certainly find it. Secondly, This Rule or Method'must be SECURE and neoerfaiMng ; so as not to be ever liable to lead a rational, sincere inquirer into error, impiety, or immo rality of any kind. Thirdly, This Rule or Method must be UNIVER SAL, that is to say, adapted to the abilities and other circumstances of all those persons for whom the Reli gion itself was intended ; namely, the great bulk of mankind. By adhering to these undeniable maxims, we shall quickly, Dear Sir, and clearly discover the Method appointed by Christ for arriving at the knowledge of the truths which he has taught ; in other words, at The Right Rule of Faith. Being possessed of this Rule, we shall, of course, have nothing else to do, than to make use of it, for securely, and, I trust, amicably settling all our controversies. This is the short and satisfactory Method of composing religious differences, which I alluded to in my above-mentioned letter to Dr. Sturges. To discuss them all, separately, is an endless task, whereas this Method reduces them to a single question. I am, &c. j. M, 29 LETTER VI. To JAMES BROWN, Esq. THE FIRST FALLACIOUS RULE OF FAITH. DEAR SIR, 1 Among serious Christians, who pro fess to make the discovery and practice of Religion their first and earnest care, three different Methods or Rules have been adopted for this purpose. The first consists in a supposed Private Inspiration, or an im mediate light and motion of God's Spirit, communi cated to the individual. This was the Rule of Faith and conduct formerly professed by the Montanists, the Anabaptists, the Family of Love, and is now pro fessed by the Quakers, the Moravians, and different classes of the "Methodists. The second of these Rules, is the Written Word of God, or THE BIBLE, accord ing as it is understood by each particular reader or hearer of it. This is the professed Rule of the more regular sects of Protestants, such as the Lutherans, the Calvinists, the Socinians, the Church-of- England- men. The third Rule is THE WORD OF GOD, at large, whether written in the Bible, or handed down from the Apostles in continued succession by the Catholic Church, and as it is understood and explained by this Church. To speak more accurately, besides their Rule of Faith, which is Scripture and Tradition, Ca tholics acknowledge an unerring judge of controversy, or sure guide in all matters, relating to salvation ; — namely, THE CHURCH. I shall now proceed to shew that the hist mentioned Rule, namely, a sup posed Private Inspiration, is quite fallacious, in as PART I. E 30 LETTER VI. much as it is liable to conduct, and has conducted many into acknowledged errors and impiety. About the middle of the second age of Christianity, Montanus, Maximilla and Priscilla, with their fol lowers, by adopting this enthusiastical rule, rushed into the excess of folly and blasphemy. They taught that the Holy Spirit, having failed to save mankind, by Moses, and afterwards by Christ, had enlightened and sanctified them to accomplish this great work. The strictness of their, precepts, and the apparent sanctity of their lives, deceived many; till at length, the two former proved what spirit they were guided by, in hanging themselves (1). Several other heretics be came dupes of the same principles in the primitive and the middle ages: but it was reserved for the time of religious licentiousness, improperly called the Re formation, to display the full extent of its absurdity and impiety. In less than five years after Luther had sounded the trumpet of evangelical liberty, the sect of Anabaptists arose in Germany and, the- Low Countries. They professed to hold immediate communication with God, and to be ordered by him to despoil and kill all the wicked, and to establish a king dom of the just (2), who to become such, were all to be rebaptized. Carlostad, Luw.er's first disciple of note, embraced this Ultra- Reformation ; but its ac knowledged head, during his reign, was John Bock- hold, a taylor of Leyden, who proclaimed himself (1) Euseb. Eccles. Hist. 1. v. c. 15. (2) ' Cum Deo colloquium esse et mandatum habere se dicebant, ut, ' impiis omnibus interfectis, novum constituerent mundum, in quo pit ' solum et innocentes viverent et rerura potirentur;' — Sleidan. De Stat. Rt-1. ei Reip. Comment. 1. iii, p. 45. FIRST FALLACIOUS RULE. 31 King of Sion, and, during a certain time, was really sovereign of Munster, in Lower Germany, where he committed the greatest imaginable excesses, marrying eleven wives at a time, aud putting them, and numberless others of his subjects to death, at the motion of his supposed interior spirit (1). He de-* clared that God had made him a present of Amster dam and other cities, which he sent parties of his dis ciples to take possession of. These ran naked through the streets, howling out, ' Woe to Babylon; woe to the * wicked ;' and, when they were apprehended, and on the point of being executed, for their seditions and murders, they sang and danced on the scaffold, exult ing in the imaginary light of their spirit (2). Herman, another Anabaptist, was moved by his spirit to declare himself the Messiah, and thus to evangelize the people, his hearers: 'Kill the priests, kill all the magistrates • 'in the world. Repent : your redemption is at hand (3).* One of their chief and most accredited preachers, David George, persuaded a numerous sect of them, that ' the doctrine both of the Old and the New Tes- ' tament was imperfect, but that his own was perfect, 'and that he was the True Son of God (4).' I' do not notice these impieties and other crimes for their sin-. gularity or their atrociousness, but because they were committed upon the principle and under a full con viction of an individual and uncontrollable inspiration, on the part of their dupes and perpetrators. Nor has our own country been more free from this enthusiastic principle than Germany and Holland. (i) Hist. Abreg. dela Reform, par Gerard Brandt, torn. i. p. 46. Moiheim, Eccles. Hist. by'Maclaine, vi.l, iv. p. 45;'. (2) Brandt, p. 49, &c. (3) Idem. p. 51. (4) Mosheim, vol. iv. p. i;;-i. E4 32 LETTER VI. Nicholas, a disciple of the above-mentioned David George, came over to England with a supposed com mission from God, to teach men that the essence of Religion consists in the feelings of divine love, and that all other things relating either to faith or worship, are of no moment (]). He extended this maxim even to the fundamental precepts of morality, professing to continue in sin that grace might abound. His fol lowers, under the name of the Familists, or The Family of Love, were very numerous at the end of the six teenth century, about which time, Hacket, a Calvinist, giving way to the same spirit of delusion, became deeply persuaded that the spirit of the Messiah had de scended upon him ; and, having made several proselytes, he sent two of them, Arthington and Coppinger, to .proclaim, through the streets of London, that Christ was come thither with his fau in his hand. This spi rit, instead of being repressed, became still more un- governable at the sight of the scaffold and the gibbet, prepared in Cheapside for his execution. Accord ingly he continued, till the last, exclaiming : ' Jehova 'Jehova; don't you see the heavens open, and Jesus ' coming to deliver me ?' &c. (2). Who has not heard of Venner, and his Fifth Monarchy-men ? who, o-uided by the same private spirit of inspiration, rushed from their meeting-house in Coleman street, proclaiming that they would, ' acknowledge no Sovereign but Kin* 'Jesus, and that they would not sheath their swords', ' till they had made Babylon (that is monarchy) a ' hissing and a curse, not only in England, but also 'throughout foreign countries; having an assurance (1) Ibid. Brandt. {V Fuller's Church Hist. b,h. p. U3. Stow's Annals A. D. 1591. > FIRST FALLACIOUS RULE. 33 ' that one of them would put a thousand enemies to ' flight, and two of them ten thousand.' Venner being ' taken and led to execution, with several of his fol- ' lowers, protested it was not he but Jesus, who had ' acted as their leader (l).' I pass over the unexam pled follies, and the horrors of the Grand Rebellion, having detailed many of them elsewhere (*2). It is enough to remark that, while many of these were com mitted from the licentiousness of private interpretation of Scripture, many others originated in the entnusiastic opinion which I am now combatting, that of an im mediate individual inspiration, equal, if not superior, to that of the Scriptures themselves (3). It was in the midst of these religious and civil com motions that the most extraordinary people, of all those who have adopted the fallacious rule of private . •¦-V-.,*t.. n, started up at the call of George Fox, a shoe- maker of Leicestershire. His fundamental pro positions, as laid down by the most able of his fol lowers (4), are, that ' The Scriptures are not the ade quate, primary Rule of Faith and Manners, — but u 1 secondary Rule, subordinate to the Spirit, from which ' they have their excellency and certainty (5):' that ' the testimony of the Spirit is that alone by which the ' true knowledge of God hath beeu, is, and can be (1) Echard's Hist, of Eng. &c. (2) Letters to a Prebendary. Reign of Charles I. (3) See the remarkable history of the military preachers at Kingston. Ibid. (4) Robert Barclay's Apology for the Quakers. (5) Propos. III. In defending this proposition, Barclay cites some of the Friends, who being unable to read the scriptures, even in the vulgar lan guage, and being pressed by adversaries with passages from it, boldly denied, from the manifestation of truth in their own hearts, that such passages were coitaincd in the Scriptures, p. 82. 34 LETTER VI. ' revealed (l) :' that 'all true and acceptable worship ' of God is offered in the inward and immediate mov- ' ing and drawing of his own Spirit, which is neither ' limited to places, times, nor persons (2).' Such are the avowed principles of the people called Quakers: let us now see some of the fruits of those principles, as recorded by themselves in their founder and first apostles. George Fox tells of himself, that at the beginning of his mission he was ' Moved to go to several Courts ' and Steeple-houses (churches) at Mansfield, and ' other places, to warn them to leave off oppression 'and oaths, and to turn from deceit, and to turn to ' the Lord (3).' On these occasions the language and behaviour of his spirit, was very far from the meekness and respect for constituted authorities nf the Gospel Spirit, as appears from different passages, in his Journal (4). He tells us of one of his disciples, William Sympson, who was ' moved of the Lord to ' go, at several times, for three years, naked and bare- ' foot before them, as a sign unto them, in markets, '.courts, towns, cities, to Priests' houses, and to great (1) Propos. II. (2) Propos. XI. (3) See the Journal of George Fox, written by himself, and published by. his disciple Penn, son of Admiral Penn, folio, p. 17. (4) I shall satisfy myelf with citing part of his letter, written in 1660, to Charles II. ' King Charles, Thou earnest not into this nation by sword ' nor by victory of war, but by the power of the Lord. And if thou dost ' bear the sword in vain, and let drunkenness, oaths, plays, May-cames, ' with fiddlers, drums, and trumpets to play at them, with such like abomi- ' nations and vanities be encouraged, or go unpunished, as setting up of ' May-poles, with the image of the crown atop of them, the nation will ' quickly turn, like Sodom and Gomorrah, and be as bad as the old world, ' who grieved the Lord, till he overthrew them: and so he will you; if < these things be not suddenly prevented.' 6fc. G. F.'s Journal, p. 325, FIRST FALLACIOUS RULE. 35 ' men's houses, telling them : so should they be all ' stripped naked. Another friend, one Robert Hunt- ' ingdon, was moved of the Lord to go into Carlisle ';Steeple-house with a white sheet about him (l).' We are told of a female Friend who went 'stark-naked, in ' the midst of public worship, into Whitehall Chapel, 'when Cromwell was there,' and another woman, who ' came into the Parliament House with a trencher in ' her hand, which she broke in pieces, saying : lThus ' shall he be broke in pieces' — One came to the door of the Parliament House with a drawn sword, and wounded several, saying : ' he was inspired by the 'Holy Spirit to kill every man that sat in that 'House (2).' But on no one occasion have the Friends, with George Fox himself, been so embarrased to save their Rule of Faith, as they have been to reconcile with it the conduct of James Naylor (3). When cer tain low and disorderly people, in Hampshire, dis graced their society and became obnoxious to the laws, G. Fox disowned them (4), but, when a Friend, of James Naylor's character and services (5), became the laughing stock of the nation, for his presumption and blasphemy, there was no other way for the Society to separate his cause from their own, but by abandoning their fundamental principle, which leaves every man to follozv the spirit within him, as he himself feels it. The fact is, Jamts Naylor, like so many other dupes of a supposed private spirit, fancied himself to be the (1) Journal, p. 239. (2) Maclaine's note on Moshcim, vol. v. p. 470. (3) See History of the Quakers by William Sewel, folio, p. 138. Journal of G. Fox, p. 220. (4) Journal of G. Fox, p. 320. (5) Ibid. p. 220. Sewel's Hist, of Quakers, p. 1-10. 36 LETTER VI. Messiah, and in this character rode into Bristol, his dis ciples spreading their garments before him and crying, Holy, Holy, Holy, Hosannah in the. Highest ; and when he had been scourged by order of Parliament, for his impiety, he permitted the fascinated women, who fol lowed him, to kiss his feet and his wounds, and to hail him ' the Prince of Peace, the Rose of Sharon, the 'fairest often thousand,' &c. (l). I pass over many sects of less note, as the Muggle- tonians, the Labbadists, &c. who, by pursuing the meteor of a supposed inward light, were led into the most impious and immoral practices. Allied to these are the Moravian Brethren, or Hernhutters, so called' from Hernhuth in Moravia, where their Apostle, Count Zinzendorf, made an establishment for them. They are now spread over England, with Ministers and Bishops appointed by others resident at Hernhuth. Their rule of faith, as laid down by Zinzendorf, is an imaginary inward light, against which the true believer cannot sin. This they are taught to wait for in quiet, omittfmg prayer, the reading of the Scriptures and other works (2). They deny that even the moral law (1) Echard's Hist. Maclaine's Mosheim. Neal's Hist, of Puritans. Inclos ing this account of the Quakers we may remark that there is no appearance yet of the fulfilment of the confident prophecy with which Barclay eoncludes his Apology: 'That little spark (Quakerism) that hath appeared, shall grow ' t,0 the consuming of whatsoever shall stand up to oppose it. The mouth of ' the Lord hath spoken it ! Yea ; he that hath risen in a small remnant, shall ' arise and go on by the same arm of power in his spiritual manifestation, ' until he hath conquered all his enemies : until all the kingdoms of the ' earth become the kingdom of Jesus Christ.' (2) Wesley, in a letter which he inscribes ' To the Church of God at Hern- '-huth,' says, 'There are many whom your brethren have advised, though ' not in thSir public preaching, not to use the Ordinances — reading the Scrip- ' ture, praying, communicating ; as the doing these thing? is seeking «ahahei FIRST FALLACIOUS RULE. 37 contained in the Scriptures is a rule of life for be lievers. Having considered this system in all its bear ings, we are the less surprised at the disgusting obsce nity, mingled with blasphemy, which is to be met with in the theological tracts of the German Count (1). The next system of delusion which I shall mention, as proceeding from the fatal principle of an Interior Rule of Faith, was also, though framed in England, the work of a foreign Nobleman, the Baron Sweden borg. His first supposed revelation was at an Eating- house in London, about the year 1745. ' After I had dined,' says he, 'a man appeared to me sitting in the corner of the room, who cried out to me, with a terrible voice : Dont eat so much. The fol lowing night the same man appeared to me, shin ing with light, and said to me : I am the Lord, your Creator and Redeemer : I have chosen you to explain to men the interior and spiritual sense of the Scrip tures : I will dictate to you what you are. to write (2). His imaginary communications with God and the An gels were as frequent and familiar as those of Mahomed, and his conceptions of heavenly things were as gross and incoherent as those of the Arabian impostor. Suf fice it to say that his God is a mere man, his Angels are male and female, who marry together and follow ' by works. Some of our English brethren (Moravians) say; you will never ' have faith till you leave off the Church and the Sacraments : as many go to ' hell by praying as by thieving.' Journal, 1740.— -Juhn Nelson in his own Journal tells us, that the Moravians call their Religion The Liberty, and the Poor Sinnership; adding, that they Sill their pr.iycr-books and leave off '''- reading and praying to follow the Lamb.' (1) See Maclaine, Hist. vol. vi. p. 23, and B;shop Warburton's Doctrine of Qrace, quoted by him. (2) Baruel's Hist, du Jacobinisme, Tom. iv. p. 1 13. PART I. F 88 LETTER VI. various trades and professions. Finally, his New Jeru salem, which is to be spread over the whole earth, is so little different from this sublunary world, that the en trance into it is imperceptible (l). So far is true, that the New Jerusalemites are spread throughout England, and have Chapels in most of its principal towns (2). I am sorry to be obliged to enter, upon the same list with these enthusiasts, a numerous class, many of them very respectable, of modern religionists, called Metho dists; yet, since their avowed system of Faith is, that this consists in an instantaneous illapse of God's Spirit into the souls of certain persons, by which they are con vinced of their justification and salvation, without re ference to Scripture or any thing else, they cannot be placed, as to their Rule of Faith, under any other denomination. This, according to their founder's doc- (1) Baruel's Hist, du Jacobinisme, Tom. iv. p. 118. (2) Since the above letter was written, another Sect, the Joannites, or dis ciples of Joanna Southcote, have risen to notice by their number and the singularity of their tenets. This female Apostle has been led by her spirit, to believe herself to be the Woman of Genesis, destined to crush the head of the infernal serpent, with whom she supposes herself to have had daily battles, to the effusion of his blodd. She believes herself to be, likewise, the woman of the Revelations crowned with twelve stars, which are so many Ministers of the Established Church. In fact, or.e of these, a richly bene ficed Rector and of a noble family, acts as her secretary in writing and seal ing passports to heaven, which she supposes herself authorized to issue, to the number of 144,000, at a very moderate piice. One of these passports in due form is in the writer's possession. It is sealed with three seals. The first exhibits two stars, name),-, the morning star, to represent Christ, the evening sr.ar, to represont.herself. The second seal exhibits the lion of Juda, supposed to allude to the insane Prophet, Richard Brothers. The third shews the face of Joanna herself. Of late her inspiration has taken anew turn: she believes herself to be pregnant of the Messiah, and her followers have prepared silver vessels of various sorts for his use, when he is born. FIRST FALLACIOUS RULE. 39 trine, is the only article of Faith ; all other articles he terms opinions, of which he says, 'the Methodists ' do not lay any stress, on them, whether right or ' wrong (l).' He continues: 'I am sick of opinions; ' I am weary to bear them ; my soul loaths this frothy ' food (2).' Conformably to this latitudinarian system, Wesley opens heaven indiscriminately to Churchmen, Preshyterians, Indepeudants, Quakers, and even to Catholics (3). Addressing the last named he exclaims : ' O that God would write in your hearts the rules of ' self-denial and love laid down by Thomas a Kempis; ' or -that you would follow in this and in good works, ' the burning and shining light of your own Church, ' the Marquis of Renty (4). Then would all who know ' and love the truth, rejoice to acknowledge you as ' the Church of the living God (5).' At the first rise of Methodism in Oxford, A. D. 1729, John Wesley and his companions were plain, serious, Church-of-England-men, assiduous and methodical in praying, reading, fasting and the like. What they practised themselves, they preached to others both in England and in America; till becoming intimate with the Moravian brethren, and particularly with Peter Bohler, one of their elders, John Wesley, ' became con- ' vinced, of unbelief, namely, a want of that faith (1) Wesley's Appeal, P. iii. p. 134. (2) Ibid. p. 135, (3) Appeal. (4) His life is written in French, by Pere St. Jure, a Jesuit, and abridged in English" by J. Wesley. (5) In his Popery Calmly Considered, p. 20, Wesley writes : ' I firmly be- ' lieve that many members of the Church of Rome have been holy men, and ' that many are so now.' He elsewhere says, ' Several of them (Papists). ' have attained to as high a pitch of sanctity, as human nature is capable of ' arriving at.' F8 40 LETTER VL * whereby alone we are saved (l).' Speaking of hii past life and ministry, he says : ' I was fundament ' tally a Papist and knew it not (2).' Soon after this persuasion, namely, on May 24, 1739, 'Going into a Society in Aldersgate-street,' he says, ' whilst a person ' was reading Luther's Preface to the Romans, about ' a quarter before nine, I felt my heart strangely ' warmed: I felt I did trust in Christ, in Christ alone ' for salvation, and an assurance was given me that he f had taken azvay my sins, even mine, and saved me from ' the law of si?i and death (3).' What were, now, the unavoidable consequences of a diffusion of this doctrine among the people at large ? Let us hear them from Wesley's most able disciple and destined successor, Fletcher of Madeley. ' Antino- ' mian principles and practices,' he says, ' have spread ' like wild fire among our Societies. Many persons, ' speaking in the most glorious manner of Christ and ' their interest in his complete salvation, have been ' found living in the greatest immoralities. — How few ' of our Societies, where cheating, extorting, or some ' other evil hath not broke out, and given such shakes ' to the Ark of the Gospel, that, had not the Lord in- ' terposed, it must have been overset ! (4*) — ' I have ' seen them, who pass for believers, follow the strain of (1) Whitehead's Life of John and Charles Wesley, vol ii. p. 68. (2) Journal, A. D. 1739. — Elsewhere. Wesley says : * O what a work has, ' God begun since Peter Bohler came to England ! such a one as shall never ' come to an end, till heaven and earth pass away.' (3) Vide Whitehead, vol. ii. p. 79. In a letter to his brother Samuel, John Wesley says: 'by a Christian I mean one who so believes in Christ ' that death hath no dominion over him, and in this obvious sense of the ' word I was not a Christian till 24th of May last year.' Ibid. 105. (4) Checks to Antinom. vol, ii. p. 22. FIRST FALLACIOUS RULE. 41 'corrupt nature; and when they should have exclaimed ' against Antinomianism, I have heard them cry out ' against the legality of their wicked hearts, which, ' they said, still suggested that they zvere to DO some thing for their salvation (l).' — 'How few of our 'celebrated pulpits, where more has not been said for f si JAMES BROWN, Esq. <$¦<¦, OBJECTIONS ANSWERED. DEAR SIR, I have just received a letter from Friend Rankin of Wenlock, written much in the style of .George Fox, and another from Mr. Ebenezer Topham of Broseley. They both consist of objections to my last letter to you, which the) had perused at New Cot tage, and the writers of them both request, that I would address whatever answer I might give them, to your ' Villa. 44 LETTER VII. Frierld Rankin is sententious yet civil : he asks, 1st, Whether ' Friends at this day and in past times, and ' eve'tt the faithful servant of Christ, George Fox, ' have not condemned the vain imaginations of James ' Nayldr, Thomas Bushel, Perrot, and- the sinful ' doings of many others, through whom the word of ' life was blasphemed in their day among the ungodly ? t-fe asiks, 2dly, Whether ' numberless follies, blasphe- ' rflies, and crimes have not risen up in the Roman Ca- ' tholic, as well as in other Churches ?' He asks, 3dly, Whether ' learned Robert Barclay, in his glorious ' Apology, hath not shewn forth, that ; The testimony ' of the spirit is that alone by which the true knowledge ' of God hath been, is, andean be revealed and confirmed, ' and this not only by the outward testimony of Scrip- * ture, but also by that of Tertullian, Hierom, Augus- ' tin, Gregory the Great, Bernard, yea also by Thomas 'iKempis, F. Pacificus Baker (l), and many others ' of the Popish Communion who, says Robert Barclay, 1 have known and tasted the love of God, and felt the ' power and virtue of God's Spirit working within them ' for their salvation ?' (2) I will first consider the arguments of Friend Rankin. I grant him, then, that his Founder, George Fox, does blame certain extravagances of Naylor, Perrot, and others, his followers, at the same. time that h§ boasts of several committed by himself, by Simpson, and others (3). But how does he confute them, and guard others against them ?— Why, he calls their authors Ranters, and charges them with Running (1) An English Benedictine Monk,,author of Sancta Sophia, which is quoted at length by Barclay. (9) Apology, p. 351. (3) S«e Jeurnal of G. Fox, paseim. OBJECTIONS. 4 5 i>ui (l)/ Now what kind of an argument is this in the mouth of G. Fox against any fanatic, however furious, when he himself has taught him, that he is to listen to the Spirit of God zvithin himself, in preference to the authority of any man and of all men, and even of the Gospel ? G. Fox was not more strongly moved to be lieve that he was the Messenger of Christ, than J. Naylor was, to believe that he himself was Christ : nor had he a firmer conviction that the Lord forbad Hat- worship, as it is called, out of prayer, than J. Perrot (2) and his company had that they were forbidden to use it in prayer (3). — 2dly, With respect to the excesses and crimes committed by many Catholics of different ranks, as well as by other men, in all ages, I answer, that these have beerr committed, not in virtue of their Rule of Faith and Conduct ; but in direct opposition to it ; as will be more fully seen when we come to treat of that Rule : whereas the extravagances of the Quakers were the immediate dictates of the imaginary spirit, which they followed as their guide. — lastly, when the Doctors of the Catholic Church teach us, after the in spired writers, not to extinguish, but to walk in the spirit (1) Speaking of James Naylor, he says : ' I spake with him, for I saw he • reas out and wrong — he slighted what I said, and was dark and much, out.' Journ. p. 220. (%) Journ. p. 310. This and another friend, J. Love, went on a mission to Rome, to convert the Pope to Quakerism; but his Holiness not understand ing English, when they addressed him with some coarse English epithets in St. Peter's Church, they had no better success than a female friend, Mary Fisher, had, who went into Greece to convert the Great Turk. See Sewel's Hist. (3) ' Now he (Fox) found also that the Lord forbad him to put off his hat ' to any men high or low ; and he required to Thou and Tucc every man and ' woman without distinction, and not to bid people, Good Morrow, or Good Evening ; neither might he bow, or scrape with his leg.' Sewel's Hist, p, 18. See there a Dissertation on Hut-worship. PART T. G 46 LETTER VII. of God ; they tell us, at the same time, that this Holy Spirit invariably and necessarily leads us to hear the Church, and to practise that humility, obedience, and those other virtues which she constantly inculcates: so that, if it were possible for an Angel from heaven to preach another gospel than what we have received, he ought to be rejected, as a spirit of darkness. Even Luther, when the Anabaptists first broached many of the leading tenets of the Quakers, required them to demonstrate their pretended commission from God, by incontestable miracles (l), or submit to be guided by his appointed Ministers. I have now to notice the letter of Mr. Topham (2). Some of his objections have already been answered in my remarks on Mr. Rankin's letter. What I find par ticular in the former is the following passage : ' Is it ' possible to go against conviction and facts ? namely, ' the experience that very many serious Christians feel, ' in this aay of God's power, that they are made parta- ' kers of Christ and of the Holy Ghost? Of very ' many that hear him saying to the melting heart, with ' his still, small, yet penetrating and renovating voice: ' Thy sins are forgiven thee : Be thou clean : Thy faith ' hath made thee whole ? If an exterior proof were ' wanting to shew the certainty of this interior con- • viction, I might refer to the conversion and holy life ' of those who have experienced it.' — To this 1 answer, that the facts and the conviction, which your friend talks of, amount to nothing more than a certain (1) Sleidan. (2) It was origiually intended to insert these and the other letters of the same description : but as this would have rendered the work too bulky; and, as the whole of the objections may be gathered from the answers to them, that intention has been abandoned. OBJECTIONS. 47 strength of imagination and warmth of sentiment, which may be natural, or may be produced by that lying spirit, whom God sometimes permits to go forth, and to persuade the presumptuous to their destruction. 1 Kings xxii. 22. I presume Mr. Topham will allow, that no experience which He has felt or witnessed, exceeds that of Bockhold, or Hacket, or Naylor, men tioned above; who, nevertheless, were confessedly be trayed by it into most horrible blasphemies and atro cious crimes. The virtue most necessary for enthu siasts, because the most remote from them, is an hum ble diffidence in themselves. When Oliver Cromwel wason his death-bed, Dr. Godwin, being present among other Ministers, prophesied that the Protector would recover. Death, however, almost immediately ensu ing, the Puritan, instead of acknowledging his error, cast the blame upon Almighty God, exclaiming : ' Lord thou hast deceived us; and we have been de- ' ceived !' (l). With respect to the alledged purity of Antinomian Saints, I would refer to the history of the lives and deaths of many of our English Regicides, and to the gross immoralities of numberless Justified Methodists, described by Fletcher in his Checks io An- tinomianism (2). I am, &c. J. M. (1) See Birch's Life of Archbishop Tillotson, p. 17. (2) This candid and able writer says: ' The Puritans and first Quakers * soon got over the edge of internal activity into the smooth and easy path ' of Laodicean formality. Most of us, called Methods, have already follow- ' edthem. We fall asleep under the bewitching power; we dream strange * dreams; our salvation is finished; we have got above legality; we have • attained Christian liberty; we have nothing to do; our covenant is sure.' Vol. ii. p. 233. He refers to several instances of tlie most flagitious conduct, G2 4S LETTER VIII. To JAMES BROWN, Esq. SECOND FALLACIOUS RULE. DEAR SIR, I take it for granted that my answers to Messrs. Rankin and Topham have been communicated to you, and I hope that, in conjunction with my pre ceding letters, they have convinced those Gentlemen, of what you, Dear Sir, have all along been convinced of, namely, the inconsistency and fanaticism of every pretension on the part of individuals, now-a-days, to a new and particular inspiration, as a Rule of Faith. The question which remains for our inquiry is, whether the Rule or Method prescribed by the Church of Eng land and other more rational classes of Protestants, or that prescribed by the Catholic Church, is the one de signed by our Saviour Christ for finding out his true Religion. You say that the whole of this is comprised in the Written Word of God, or The Bible, and that every individual is a judge for himself of the sense of the Bible. Hence in every religious controversy, more especially since the last change of the inconstant Chil- lingworth (1), Catholics have been stunned with the cries of jarring Protestant sects and individuals, pro- which human nature is capable of, in persons who had attained to what they call, finished salvation. (1) Chillingworth was first a Protestant, of the Establishment : he next became a Catholic, and studied in one of our Seminaries. He then returned^ in part, to his former Creed : and last of all he gave into Socinianism, which, his writings greatly promoted. SECOND FALLACIOUS RULE. 49 claiming that, The Bible, The Bible alone is their Re ligion : and hence, more particularly at the present day, Bibles are distributed by hundreds of thousands, throughout the Empire and the four quarters of the Globe, as the adequate means of uniting and reforming Christians, and of converting infidels. On the other hand, we Catholics hold that The Word of God in gene ral, both written and unwritten, in other words, The Bible and Tradition, taken together, constitute the Rule of Fait.h, or Method appointed by Christ for finding out the true Religion : and that, besides the Rule itself, he has provided in his Holy Church, a living, speaking Judge to zcatch over it and explain it in all matters of controversy. That the latter, and not the former, is the True Rule, I trust I shall be able to prove, as clearly as I have proved that Private Inspiration does not constitute it: and this I shall prove by means of the two maxims I have, on that occasion, made use of; namely, The Rule of Faith, appointed by Christ must be CERTAIN and UNERRING, that is to say, it must be one which is not liable to lead any rational and sincere inquirer into inconsistency or error : Secondly, this Rule must be UNIVERSAL; that is to say, it must be proportioned to the abilities and circumstances of the great bulk of mankind. I. If Christ had intended that all mankind should learn his Religion from a Book, namely, The Nezv Testament, he himself would have written that Book, and would have enjoined the obligation of learning to read it, as the first and fundamental precept of his Religion ; whereas, he never wrote any thing at all, unless perhaps the sins of the Pharisees with his finger 50 letter viii. upon the dust, John viii. 6. (l). It does not even appear that he gave his Apostles any command to write the Gospel; though he repeatedly and empha tically commanded them to preach it, {Matt, x.) and that to all the nations of. the earth, Matt, xxviii. 19. In this ministry they all of them spent their lives, preaching the Religion of Christ in every country from Judea to Spain, in one direction, and to India in ano ther; every where establishing Churches, and commend ing their doctrine to faithful men zvko should be fit to teach others also. 2 Tim, ii. 2. Only a part of them wrote any thing, and what these did write was, for the most part, addressed to particular persons or congre gations, and on particular occasions. The ancient Fathers tell us that St. Matthew wrote his Gospel at the particular request of the Christians of Palestine (2), and that St. Mark composed his at the desire of those at Rome (3). St. Luke addressed his Gospel to an individual, Theophilus, having written it, says the holy Evangelist, because it seemed good to him to do so. Luke i. 3. St. John wrote the last of the Gospels in com pliance with the petition of the Clergy and people of Lesser Asia (4), to prove, in particular, the Divinity of Jesus Christ, which Cerinthus, Ebion, and other heretics began then to deny. No doubt the Evange lists were moved by the Holy Ghost, to listen to the requests of the faithful, in writing their respective (1) It is agreed upon among the learned, that the supposed letter of Christ to Abgarus King of Edessa, quoted by Eusebius, Hist. Eccl. 1. i. is spurious. (2) Euseb. 1. 3. Hist. Eccl. Chrysos. in Mat. Horn. 1. Iren. 1. 3. c. V Hieron. de Vir Must. (3) Euseb. 1. 2. c. 15. Hist. Eccl. Epiph. Hierou. de Vir Must. (4) Euseb. 1. 6. Hist. Eccl. Hieron. SECOND FALLACIOUS RULE. 51 Gospels ; nevertheless there is nothing in these occa sions, nor in the Gospels themselves, which indicates that any one of them, or all of them together, contain an entire, detailed and clear exposition of the whole Religion of Jesus Christ. The Canonical Epistles in the New Testament, shew the particular occasions on which they were written, and prove, as the Bishop of Lincoln observes, that 'They are not to be consi- ' dered as regular treatises on the Christian Reli- 'gion(l).' II. In supposing our Saviour to have appointed his bare written word for the Rule of our Faith, with out any authorized judge to decide on the unavoidable controversies growing out of it, you would suppose that he has acted differently from what common sense has dictated to all other legislators. For where do we read of a legislator, who, after dictating a code of laws, neglected to appoint judges and magistrates to decide their meaning, and to enforce obedience to such decisions. You, Dear Sir, have the means of knowing, what would be the consequence of leaving any Act of Parliament, concerning taxes, or inclosures, or any other temporal concerns, to the interpretation of the indi viduals whom it regards. Alluding to the Protestant Rule, the illustrious Fenelon has said : ' It is better to ' live without any law, than to have laws which all *• men are left to interpret accoriiug to their several ' opinions and interests (£).' The Bishop of London appears sensible of this truth, as fir as regards tem poral affairs, where he writes : ' In matters of property (1) Elera. of Chris. Rel. vol. i. p. 277. (2) Life of Archbp. Fenelon, by Ramsay. 52 LETTER VIII. ' indeed, some decision, right or wrong, must be 'made: society could not subsist without it (1):' just as if peace and, unity were less necessary in the one Sheepfold of the one Shepherd, the Church of Christ, than they are in civil society ! III. The fact is : this method of determining reli gious questions by Scripture only, according to each individual's interpretation, has always produced, when ever and wherever it has been adopted, endless and in curable dissensions, and of course errors; because truth is one, while errors are numberless. The ancient Fathers of the Church reproached the sects of heretics and schismatics with their endless internal divisions. ' See,' says St. Augustin, ' into how many morsels, ' those are divided, who have divided themselves from ' the unity of the Church !' (2). Another Father writes : ' It is natural for error to be ever changing (3). ' The disciples have the same right in this matter that ' their masters had.' To speak now of the Protestant Reformers. No sooner had their progenitor, Martin Luther, set up the tribunal of his private judgment on the sense of Scrip ture, in opposition to the authority of the Church, ancient and modern (4), than his disciples, proceeding on this principle, undertook to prove from plain texts of the Bible that his own doctrine was erroneous, and that the Reformation itself wanted reforming. Carlostad (5), (1) Brief Confut. p. 18. (2) St. Aug. (3) Tertul. de Prascrip. (4) This Happened in June 1520, on his doctrine Being censured by the Pope. Till this time he had submittr d to the judgment of the Holy See. (5) He was Luther's first disciple of distinction, being Archdeacon of Wittemberg. He declared against Luther in 1521. SECOND FALLACIOUS RULE. 53 Zuinglius (l), fficolompadius (2), Muncer (3), and a hundred more of his followers wrote and preached against him and against each other, with the utmost virulence, still each of them, professing to ground his doctrine and conduct on the written word of God alone. In vain did Luther claim a superiority over them ; in vain did he denounce hell-fire against them (4) ; in vain did he threaten to return back to the Catholic Re ligion (5) : he had put the Bible into each man's hand to explain it for himself, and this his followers con tinued to do in open defiance of him {6) ; till their mutual contradictions and discords became so riumer- (1) Zuinglius began the Reformation in Switzerland some time after Luther began it in Germany, but taught such doctrine that the latter termed him a Pagan, and said, he despaired of his salvation. (2) CEcolompadius was aBrigittine Friar in the monastery of St.'Lawrence^ near Augsburgh : but soon quitted the cloister, married, and adopted the sentiments of Zuinglius, respecting the Real Presence, in preference to those' of Luther. His death was sudden, and by Luther it is asserted, that he was strangled by the devil. (3) Muncer was the disciple of Luther, and founder of the Anabaptists, •who in quality of The Just, maintained that the property of The Wicked be longed to them, quoting the second Beatitude : Blessed are the meek, for they shall possess the land. Muncer wrote to the several Princes of Germany to give up their possessions to him, and, at the head of 40,000 of his followers marched to enforce this requisition. (4) He says to them : ' I can defend you against the Pope, — but when ' the devil shall urge against you (the/ heads of these changes) at your death, ' these passages of Scripture ; they run and I did not send them, how shall ' you withstand him ! He will plunge you headlong into hell.' — Oper. torn. vii. fol. 2r4. (5) ' If you continue in these measures of your common deliberations, I * will recant whatever I have written or said, and leave you. Mind what I ' I say.'— Oper. torn. vii. fol. 270. edit. Wittemb. (6) See the curious challenge of Luther to Carlostad to write a book agairist the Real Presence, \v'ie.i one wishes the other to break his neck, and the other retorts : may I see thee broken on the wheel. — Variat. b. ii. n. 12. PART I. II 54 LETTER VIII. ous and scrndalous, as to overwhelm the thinking part of them with grief and confusion (l). To point out some few of the particular variations alluded to ; for to enumerate them all would require a work vastly more voluminous than that of Bossuet on this subject : it is well known that Luther's funda mental principle was that of imputed justice, to the exclusion of all acts of virtue" and good works whatsoever. His favourite disciple and bottle com panion, Amsdorf, carried this principle so far as to maintain, that Good works are a hinderance to salva- tion(Q). In vindication of his fundamental tenet, Luther vaunts as follows: ' This article shall remain, ' iu spite of all the world : it is I, Martin Luther, ' Evangelist, who say it : let no one therefore attempt ' to infringe it, neither the Emperor of the Romans, ' nor of the Turks, nor of the Tartars ; neither the 'Pope, nor the Monks, nor the Nuns, nor the Kings, ' nor the Princes, nor all the Devils in hell. If they ' attempt it, may the infernal flames be their recom- (1) Capito, minister of Strasburg, writing to Farel, pastor of Geneva, thus Complains to him: ' God has given me to understand the mischief we have ' done by our precipitancy in breaking with the Pope, &c. The people say ' to us : I know enough of the Gospel. I can read it for myself. I have no ' need of you.' Inter Epist. Calvini. — In the same tone Dudith writes to his friend Beza : ' Our people are carried away with every wind of doctrioe. * If you know what their religion is to-day, you cannot tell what it will be ' to-morrow. In what single point are those Churches which have declared ' war against the Pope agreed amongst themselves ? There is not one point ' which is not held by some of them as an article of faith, and by others as ' an impiety,' In the same sentiment, Calvin writing to Melancthon, says, ' It is of great importance that the divisions, which subsist among us, should ' not be known to future ages : for nothing can be more ridiculous than that < we, who have broken off from the whole world, should have agreed so ill ' among ourselves from the very beginning of the Reformation.' (2J Mosheim Hist, by Maclaine, vol. iv. p. 323. ed. 1790, SECOND FALLACIOUS RULE. 35 e p-ense. What I say here is to be taken for an in- ' spiration of the Holy Ghost (l).' Notwithstanding, however, these terrible threats and imprecations of their master, Melancthon, with the rest of the Lu therans, abandoned this article, immediately after his death, and went over to the opposite extreme of Semi- pelagianism ; not only admitting the necessity of good works, but also teaching that these are prior to God's grace. Still on this single subject Osiander, a Lu theran, says, ' there are twenty several opinions, all ' drawn from the Scripture, and held by different ' members of the Augsburg, or Lutheran Confes sion (2).' Nor has the unbounded licence of explaining Scrip ture, each one in his own way, which Protestants claim, been confined to mere errors and dissensions . it has also caused mutual persecution and blood shed (3) : it has produced tumults, rebellions, and anarchy beyond recounting. Dr. Hey asserts, that ' The misinterpretation of Scripture brought on the ' miseries of the Civil War (4) ;' and Lord Claren don, Madox, and other writers shew that there was not a crime committed by the Puritan rebels, in the course of it, which they did not profess to justify by texts and instances drawn from the sacred volumes(5). Leland, Bergier, Barruel, Robison, and Kett, abundant- (1) Visit. Saxon. (2) Archdeacon -Blackburn's Confessional, p. 10, (3) See Letters to a Prebendary, chapter, Persecution. Numberless other proofs of Protestants persecuting, not only Catholics, but also their fellow Protestants to death, on account of their religious opinions, can be < d- fluced. (4) Dr. Hey's Theological lectures, vol. i. p. 77. (5) Hist, of Civ. War. Ex min. ofNeal's Hist,, of Purtans. 56 LETTER VIII. ly prove that the poisonous plant of infidelity, which has produced such dreadful effects of late years on the pontinent, was transplanted thither from this Pro* testant island, and that it was produced, nourished, and increased to its enormous growth by that princi ple of private judgment in matters of religion, which is the very foundation of the Reformation. Let us hear the two last- mentioned authors, both of them Protestant Clergymen, on this important subject. ' The spirit of free inquiry,' says Rett, quoting Ro bison, ' was the great boast of the Protestants, and 'their only support against the Catholics; securing f them, both in their civil and religious rights. It * was therefore encouraged by their governments, and ' sometimes indulged to excess. In the progress of ' this contest their own Confessions did not escape cen- ' sure ; and it was asserted, that the Reformation, ' which these Confessions express, was not complete. ' Further Reformation was proposed. The Scriptures, ¦ the foundation of their faith, were examined by ' clergymen of very different capacities, dispositions, ' and views, till, by explaining, correcting, allegorizing, 'and otherwise twisting the Bible, men's minds had ' hardly any thing to rest on, as a doctrine of Revealed ' Religion. This encouraged others to go further, and ' to say that Revelation was a solecism, as plainly ap- ' pears by the irreconcileable differences among the ' enlighteners of the public, so they were, called ; and ' that man had nothing to trust to, but the dictates of ' natural reason. Another set of writers, proceeding ' from this as from a point settled, proscribed all Re ligion whatever, and openly taught the doctrines of ' Materialism and Atheism, Most of these innovations, SECOND FALLACIOUS RULE. 57 ' were the work of Protestant Divines, from the causes ' that I have mentioned. But the progress of infidelity ' was much accelerated by the establishment of a ' Philanthropine, or Academy of general education in ' the principality of Anhalt-Dessau. The professed 4 object of this institution was to unite the three ' Christian communions of Germany, and to make it ' possible for the members of them all not only to live ' amicably and to worship God in the same Church, ' but even to communicate together. This attempt ' gave rise to much speculation and refinement ; and ' the proposal for the amendment of the Formulas and ' the instructions from the pulpit were prosecuted with * so much keenness, that the ground-work of Chris- ' tianity, was refined and refined till it vanished alto- ' gether, leaving Deism, or natural, or, as it was called, ' Philosophical Religion in its place. The Lutherans and ' Calvinists, prepared by the causes before-mentioned, to ' become dupes to this masterpiece of art, were en- ' ticed by the specious liberality of the scheme, and ' the particular attention which it promised to the 'morals of youth: but not one Roman Catholic could ' Basedow allure to his seminary of practical Ethics (]).' IV. You have seen, Dear Sir, to what endless errors and impieties the principle of private interpre tation of Scripture, no less than that of private in spiration of faith, has conducted men, and of course is ever liable to conduct them ; which circumstance, therefore, proves, according to the self-evident maxim stated above, that it cannot be the Rule which is to (1) Robisdn's Proofs of a conspiracy against all Religions, &c. Rett's History the Interpreter of Prophecy, Vol. ii. p. 158. 58 LETTER VIII. bring us to religious truths. Nor is it to be ima gined that, previously to the formation of the different National Churches and other religious associations, which took place in several parts of Europe, at what is called " The Reformation," the Scriptures had been diligently consulted by the founders of the new Sects ; or that the ancient system of Religion was exploded, or the new systems adopted, in conformity with the apparent sense of the sacred text, as Protestant controvertists would have you believe. No, Sir, Princes and Statesmen had a great deal more to do with these changes, than Theologians; and most of the parties concerned in them were evidently pushed on by very different motives from those of religion. As to Martin Luther, he testifies, and calls God to witness the truth of his testimo ny, that it was not willingly (that is, not from a previous discovery of the falsehood of his religion) but from accident (namely, a quarrel with the Domi nican Friars, and afterwards with the Pope) that he fell into his broils about religion (l). With respect to (1) ' Casu non voluntate in has turmas incidi: Deum testor.'— The Pro testant historian, Mosheim, with whom Hume agrees, admits that several ¦' of the principal agents in this revolution were actuated, more by the ' impulse of passions, and views of interest, than by a zeal for true reli- ' gion.' Maclaine, vol. iv. p. 135. He had before acknowledged that King Gustavus introduced Lutheranism into Sweden, in opposition to the clergy and bishops, ' not only as agreeable to the genius and spirit of the gospel, ' but also as favourable to the temporal state and political constitution of the ' Swedish dominions,' pp. 79, 80. He adds, that Christiern, who introduced the Reformation into Denmark, was animated by no other motives than those of ambition and avarice, p. 82. Grotius, another Protestant, testifies that it was ' sedition and violence which gave birth to the Reformation in ' his country,' Holland. Append, de Antichristo. The same was the case in France, Geneva, and Scotland. It is to be observed, that in all these coun^ SECOND FALLACIOUS RULE. 59 the Reformation in our own country, we all know that Henry VIII. who took the first step towards it, was, at the beginning of his reign, so zealous against it, that he wrote a book, which he dedicated to Pope Leo X. in opposition to it, and in return obtained from this Pontiff, for himself and Successors, the title of Defender of the Faith. Becoming afterwards ena moured of Ann Bullen, one of the maids of honour to the Queen, and the reigning Pope having refused to sanction an adulterous marriage with her, he caused a statute to be passed, abrogating the Pope's Supremacy, and declaring himself Supreme Head of the Church of England (l). Thus he plunged the nation into schism, and opened a way for every kind of heresy and impiety. In short, nothing is more evident than that the King's inordinate passion, and not the word of God, was the rule followed in this first important change of our National Religion. — The unprincipled Duke of Somerset, who next succeeded to supreme power in the church and state, under the shadow of his youthful nephew Edward VI, pushed on the re formation, so called, much further than it had yet been carried, with a view to the gratification of his own am ines the Reformers, as soon as they got the upper hand, became violent persecutors of the Catholics. Bergier defies Protestants to name so much as a town or village in which, when they became masters of it, they tolerated a single Catholic. (1) Archbishop Parker records, that the Bishops assembled in Synod in 1531 offered to sign this new title, with the following salvo : ' In quantum ' per Christi leges licet :' but that the King would admit of no such modifi cation. Antiq. Brit. p. 325. In the end, they surrendered the whole of their spiritual jurisdiction to him (all except the religious Bishop of Rochester, Fisher^ who was put to death for his refusal) and were content to publish Articles of Religion devised by the King's Highness. Heylin Hist, of Reform. Collier, &c.> fJO LETTER VIII. bitious and' avaricious purposes. He suppressed the remaining college's and hospitals, which the profligacy of Henry had spared, converting their revenues to his own and his associates' uses. He forced Cranmer. and the other bishops to take out fresh commissions for governing their dioceses during his nephew's, that is to say, his own good pleasure (1). He made a great number of important changes in the public worship by his own authority or that of his visi tors (2) ; and when he employed certain bishops and divines in forming fresh Articles and a new Li turgy, he punished them with imprisonment if they were not obsequious to his orders (3). He even took upon himself to alter their work, when sanction ed by Parliament, in compliment to the Church's greatest enemy, Calvin (4). Afterwards, when Elizabeth came to the throne, a new Reformation, different in its Articles and Liturgy from that of Ed ward VI. was set on foot, and moulded, not accord ing to Scripture, but to her orders. She deposed (l) ' Licentiam concedimus ad nostrum beneplacitum dumtaxat duratu- ram.' Burnet Hist. Ref. Rec. P. II. B. i. N. 2. (2) See the Injunctions of the Council to Preachers, published before the Parliament met, concerning the Mass in the Latin language, Prayers for the Dead, &c. See also the order sent to the Primate against Palms, Ashes, &c. in Heylin, Burnet, and Collier. The boy Edward VI. just thir teen years old, was taught by his uncle to proclaim as follows : ' We would ' not have our subjects so much to mistake our judgment, &c. as though ' we could not discern what is to be done, &c. God be praised, we know ' what, by his word, is fit to be redressed,' &c. Collier, vol. ii. p. 246. (3) The Bishops Heath and Gardiner were both imprisoned for non compliance. (4) Heylin complains bitterly of Calvin's pragmatical spirit, in quarrelling with the English Liturgy, and soliciting the Protector to alter it. Preface to Hist, of Reform. His letters to Somerset on the subject may be seen in Fox's Acts and Mmum. SECOND FALLACIOUS RULE. fjl all the bishops except one, ' his calamity of the see,' as he was called (l); and required the new ones, whom she appointed, to renounce certain exercises, which they declared to be agreeable to the Word of God (2), but which she found not to agree with her system of politics. She even in full Parliament threatened to depose them all, if they did not act conformably to her views (3). V. The more strictly the subject is examined, the more clearly it will appear, that it was not in con sequence of any investigation of the Scriptures, either public or private, that the ancient Catholic Religion was abolished, and one or other of the new Protestant Religions set up in the different northern kingdoms and states of Europe, but in consequence of the poli tics of princes and statesmen, the avarice of the no bility and gentry, and the irreligion and licentiousness of the people. I will even advance a step further, and affirm that there is no appearance of any indi vidual Protestant, to whatever sect he belongs, hav ing formed his creed by the rule of Scripture alone. For do you, Sir, really believe that those persons of your communion, whom you see the most diligent and devout in turning over their Bibles, have really found out in them the Thirty-nine Articles, or any other creed which they happen to profess? To judge more certainly of this matter, I wish those gentlemen who (1) Anthuny Kitchin, so called by Godwin, De Pra:sul, and Camden. •(2) This took place with respect to what was termed prophesying, then practised by many Protestant5, and defended by Archbishop Grindal and the other bishops, as agreeable to God's word : nevertheless, the Queen obliged them to suppress it. Col. Eccl. Hist. P. II. p. 554, eec. (3) See her curious sprech in Parliament, March 25, 15135, in Stow's Annals. PART I. I 62 LETTER VIII. are the most zealous and active in distributing Bibles anions: the Indians and Africans in their different countries, would procure, from some half dozen of the most intelligent and serious of their proselytes, who have heard nothing of the Christian faith by any other means than their Bibles, a summary of what they re spectively understand to be the doctrine and the mo rality taught in that sacred volume. What inconsis tent and nonsensical symbols should we not witness ! The truth is, Protestants are tutored from their in fancy, by the help of catechisms and creeds, in the sys tems of their respective sects ; they are guided by their parents and masters, and are influenced by the opini ons and example of those with whom they live and converse. Some particular texts of Scripture are strongly impressed upon their minds, and others of an apparently different meaning are kept out of their view or glossed over; and above all, it is constantly incul cated to them, that their religion is built upon Scrip ture alone. Hence, when they actually read the Scrip- tuies, they fancy they see there, what they have been otherwise taught to believe ; the Lutheran, for exam ple, that Christ is really present in the Sacrament; the Calvinist, that he is as far distant from ' it, as heaven ' is from earth ;' the Churchman, that Baptism is ne cessary for infants; the Baptist that it is an impiety to eonfer it upon them ; and so of all the other forty sects of Protestants enumerated by Evans in his Sketch of the different denominations of Christians, and of twice forty other sects whom he omits to mention. When I remarked that our blessed Master Jesus Christ wrote no part of the New Testament himself, SECOND FALLACIOUS RULE. 63 and gave no orders to his Apostles to write it, I ought to have added that, if he had intended it to be, toge ther with the Old Testament, the sole Rule of Religion, he would have provided means for their being able to follow it; knowing, as he certainly did, that 99 in every 100, or rather 999 in every 1000, in different ages and countries, would not be able to read at all, and much less to comprehend a page of the sacred writings. Yet no such means were provided by him : nor has he so much as enjoined it to his followers in general to study letters. Another observation on this subject, and a very obvious one is, that among those Christians, who pro fess that the Bible alone is the Rule of their Religion, there ought to be no articles, no Catechisms, no Ser mons, nor other instructions. True it is, that the abolition of these, however incompatible they are with the Rule itself, would quickly undermine the Esta blished Church, as its clergy now begin to understand, and, if universally carried into effect, would, in the end, efface the whole doctrine and morality of the Gos pel (1); but this consequence (which is inevitable) only shews more clearly the falsehood of this exclusive rule. In fact, the most enlightened Protestants, find themselves here in a dilemma, and are obliged to say and unsay, to the amusement of some persons and the pity of others (2). They cannot abandon the Rule of (1) The Protestant writers, Kett and Robison, have shewn, in the pas sage above quoted, how the principle of private judgment tends to under mine Christianity at large; and Archdeacon Hook, in his late Charge shews, by an exact statement of capital convictions in different years, that the in crease of immorality has kept pace with that of the Bible Societies. (2) One of the- latest instances of the distress in question was exhibited by the Rt. Rev. Dr. Marsh. In his publication, The Inquiry, p. 4. he said, 12 64 LETTER VIII. the Bible alone, as explained by each one for himself, without proclaiming their guilt in refusing to hear the Church, and they cannot adhere to it, without opening the flood-gates to all the impiety and immorality of the ao-e upon their own communion. — I shall have oc casion hereafter to notice the claims of the Established Church to authority, in determining the sense of Scripture, as well as in other religious controversies: in the mean time I cannot but observe, that her most able defenders are frequently obliged to abandon their own, and adopt the Catholic Rule of Faith. The judi cious Hooker, in his defence of the Church of Eng land, writes thus : ' Of this we are right sure that ' nature, Scripture, and experience itself have taught ' the world to seek for the ending of contentious by ' submitting to some judicial and definite sentence, ' whereunto neither parties that contendeth, may, un- ' der any pretence or colour, refuse to stand. This ' must needs be effectual and strong. As for other ' means, without this, they seldom prevail (l).' Ano ther most clear-headed writer, and renowned defender of the Establishment, whom I had the happiness of being acquainted with, Dr. Balguy (2), thus expresses very truly, that ' the poor (who constitute the bulk of mankind) cannot ' without assistance understand the Scriptures :' Being congratulated on this important, yet unavoidable concession, by the Rev. Mr. Gandolphy, he tacks about in a public letter to that Gentleman, and says, that what he wrote in his Inquiry concerning the necessity of a further rule than mere Scripture, only regards the establishment of religion, not the truth of it: just as if that rule were sufficient to conduct the people to the truth of Religion, while he expressly says they cannot understand it ! (1) Hooker's Eccles. Politic. Pref. art. 6. (2) Discourses on various Subjects, by T. Balguy, D. D. Archdeacon and Prebendary of Winchester. Some of these Discourses were preached at the consecration of Bishops, a,nd published by order of the Archbishop ; some in SECOND FALLACIOUS RULB. 65 himself in a Charge to the Clergy of his Archdeaconry : ' The opinions of the people are and must be founded ' more on authority than reason. Their parents, ' their teachers, their governors, in a great measure, ' determine for them, what they are to believe and ' what to practise. The same doctrines, uniformly ' taught, the same rites constantly performed, make ' such an impression on their minds, that they hesitate ' as little in admitting the articles of their faith, as in ' receiving the most established maxims of common 'life(l).' With such testimonies before your eyes, can you, Dear Sir, imagine that the bulk of Protestants have formed their religion by the standard of Scrip ture? He goes on to say, speaking of controverted points : ' Would you have them (the people) think for ' themselves ? Would you have them hear and decide ' the controversies of the learned ? Would you have 'them enter into the depths of criticism, of logic, of ' scholastic divinity ? You might as well expect ' them to compute an eclipse, or decide between the ' Cartesian and Newtonian philosophy. Nay, I will ' go farther: for I take upon myself to say, there are ' more men capable, in some competent degree, of 'understanding Newton's philosophy, than of forming ' any judgment at all concerning the abstruser ques- ' tions in metaphysics and theology.' Yet the persons, of whom the doctor particularly speaks, were all fur nished with Bibles ; and the abstruse questions, which he refers to, are : ' Whether Christ did, or did not, come Charges to the clergy. The whole of them is dedicated to the King, whom the writer thanks for naming him to a high dignity (the Bishopric of Glou cester), and for permitting him to decline accepting of it. (1) Discourses on various Subjects, by T. Balguy, D. D. p. 257. 66 LETTER VIII. ' down from heaven ?' whether ' he died, or did not ' die, for the sins of the world ?' whether ' he sent his ' Holy Spirit to assist and comfort us, or whether he 'did not send him (1)?' The learned Doctor else where expresses himself still more explicitly on the subject of Scripture, without Church authority. He is combatting the Dissenters, but his weapons are evidently as fatal to his own Church as to theirs. ' It has long been held among them that Scripture only ' is the rule and test of all religious ordinances ; and ' that human authority is to be altogether excluded. ' Their ancestors, I believe, would have been not a * little embarrassed with their own maxim, if they had ' not possessed a singular talent of seeing every thing * in Scripture which they had a mind to see. Almost ' every sect could find there its own peculiar form of ' church-government ; and while they enforced only * their own imaginations, they believed themselves to be ' executing the decrees of heaven (2)-' I conclude this long letter with a passage to the present purpose from our admired theological poet; ' As long as words a different sense will bear, ' And each may be his own interpreter, ' Our airy faith will no foundation find: ' The word's a weathercock for ev'ry wind (3).' I am, Dear Sir, &c. J. M. (1) Discourses oh various Subjects, by T. Balguy, D. D. p. 25T, (S) Discourse VII. p. 126. (3) Dryden's Hind and Panther, Part I. 67 LETTER IX. To JAMES BROWN, Esq. Src. SECOND FALSE RULE. DEAR SIR, After all that I have written con cerning the Rule of Faith, adopted by yourself and other more rational Protestants, I have only yet treated of the extrinsic arguments against it. I now there fore proceed to investigate its intrinsic nature, in order to shew more fully the inadequacy, or rather the falsehood of it. When an English Protestant gets possession of an English Bible, printed by Thomas Basket, or other ' Printer to the King's Most Excellent Majesty,' he takes it in hand with the same confidence, as if he had immediately received it from the Almighty himself, as Moses received the tables of the Law on Mount Sina, amidst thunder and lightning. But how vain is this confidence, whilst he adheres to the foregoing Rule of Faith ! How many ques tionable points does he assume, as proved, which cannot be proved, without relinquishing his own principles and adopting ours ! I. Supposing then you, Dear Sir, to be the Protestant I have been speaking of; I begin with asking you : by what means have you learnt what is the Canon of Scrip ture, that is to say, which are the books that have been written by Divine inspiration; or indeed, how have you ascertained that any books at all, have been so written? You cannot discover either of these things by your Rule, because the Scripture, as your great authority Hooker 68 LETTER IX. shews (1) and Chillingworth allows, cannot bear testi mony to itself. You will say that the Old Testament was written by Moses and the Prophets, and the New Testament by the Apostles of Christ and the Evange lists. But admitting all this; it does not of itself prove that they always wrote, or indeed that they ever wrote under the influence of inspiration. They were, by nature, fallible men : how have you learnt that they were infallible writers? In the next place, you receive books, as canonical parts of the Testament, which were not written by Apostles at all, namely, the Gospel's of St. Mark and St. Luke; whilst you reject an authentic work of great excellence(2), written by one who is term ed in Scripture an Apostle (3), and declared to be full of the Holy Ghost (4), I speak of St. Barnaby. Lastly, you have no sufficient authority for asserting, that the sacred volumes are the genuine composition of the holy personages whose names they bear, except the tradition and living voice of the Catholic Church ; since numerous apocryphal Prophecies and spurious Gospels and Epistles, under the same or equal venera ble names, were circulated in the Church, during its early ages, and accredited by different learned writers and holy Fathers : while some of the really canonical books were rejected or doubted of by them. In short, it was not until the end of the fourth century, that the genuine Canon of Holy Scripture was fixed : and then it was fixed by the tradition and authority of the Charch, declared in the Third Council of Carthage and a Decretal of P. Innocent I. Indeed it is so clear (1) Eccles. Polit. B. iii. sec. 8. (2) St. Barnaby. See Grabe's Spicileg. and CotlsruTs Collect. (3) Acts xiv. 24, (4) Acts xi. U. SECOND FALSE RULE. 69 that the Canon of Scripture is built on the Tradition of the Church, that most learned Protestants (1), with Luther himself, have (2) been forced to acknowledge it, in terms almost as strong as those in the v/ell-known declaration of St. Augustin (3). II. Again; supposing the Divine authority of the Sacred Books themselves to be established ; how do you know that the copies of them translated and printed in your Bible are authentic? It is agreed upon amongst the learned, that, together with the Temple and city of Jerusalem, the original text of Moses, and the ancient Prophets were destroyed by the Assyrians, under Nebuchadnezzar (4) ; and, though they were re placed by authentic copies, at the end of the Babylonish captivity, through the pious care of the Prophet Esdras or Ezra, yet that these also perished in the subsequent persecution of Antiochus (5) ; from which time we have no evidence of the authenticity of the Old Testament, till this was supplied by Christ and his Apostles, who transmitted it to the Church. In like manner, granting, for example, that St. Paul wrote an inspired Epistle to the Romans and another to the Ephesians; yet as the former was entrusted to an individual, the Deaconess Phebe, to be conveyed by her to its destination (6), and the latter to his disciple, Tychicus(7), for the same (1) Hooker, Eccl. Polit. C. iii. S. 8. Dr. Lardner, in Bishop Watson's Col. vol. ii. p. 20. (2) ' We are obliged to yield many things to the Papists— that with them ' is the word of God, which we received from them ; otherwise we should ' have known nothing at all about it.' Comment, on John c. 16. (3) ' I should not believe the Gospel itself, if the authority of the Catholic ' Church did not oblige me to do so.' Contra Epist. Fundam. (4) Brett's Dissert, in Bishop Watson's Collect, vol. iii. p. 5. (5) Ibid. (6) Rom. xvi. See Calmet, &c. (7) Ephes. vi. 21. PART I. K 70 LETTER IX. purpose, it is impossible for you to enterrtain a rational conviction that these Epistles, as they stand in your Testament, are exactly in the state, in which they issued from the Apostle's pen, or that they are his genuine Epistles at all ; without recurring to the tradition and authority of the Catholic Church concerning them. To- make short of this matter, I will not lead you into the labyrinth of Biblical criticism, nor will I shew you the endless varieties of readings with respect to words and whole passages, which occur in different copies of the Sacred Text, but will here content myself with re ferring you to your own Bible Book, as printed by authority. Look then at Psalm xiv, as it occurs in The Book of Common Prayer, to which your Clergy swear their 'consent and assent;' then look at the same Psalm in your Bible : you will find four whole verses in the former, which are left out of the latter ! What will you here say, Dear Sir ? You must say that your Church has added to, or else that she has taken azvay from the zvords of this Prophecy ! (l) III. But your pains and perplexities concerning your Rule of Faith must not stop eveu at this point : for though you had demonstrative evidence, that the several books in your Bible are Canonical and authentic, in the originals, it would still remain for you to in quire whether or no they are faithfully, translated in your English copy. In fact, you are aware that they were written, some of them in Hebrew, and some of (1) The verses in question being quoted by St. Paul, Rom. iii. 13, &c. there is no doubt but the Common Bible is defective in this passage.— On the other hand, the Bishop of Lincoln has published his conviction that the most im portant passage in the New Testament, 1 John v. 7, for establishing the Divinity of Jesus Christ ' is spurious.' Elem. of Theo. vol. ii. p. 90. SECOND FALSE RULE. 71 them in Greek ; out of which languages they were translated, for the last time, by about fifty different men, of various capacities, learning, judgment, opi nions, and prejudices (l). In this inquiry the Catholic Church herself can afford you no security to build your faith upon; much less can any private individuals whosoever. The celebrated Protestant Divine, Epis- copius, .was so convinced of the fallibility of modern translations, that he wanted all sorts of persons, la bourers, sailors, women, &c. to learn Hebrew and Greek. Indeed it is obvious, that the sense of a text may depend upon the choice of a single word in the translation : nay, it sometimes depends upon the mere punctuation of a sentence, as may be seen below (2). Can you then, consistently, reject the authority of the great Universal Church, and yet build upon that of some obscure translator in the reign of James I. ? No, Sir, you must yourself have compared your English Bible with the originals, and have proved it to be a faithful version, before you can build your faith upon it as upon The Word of God. — To say one word now of the Bibles themselves, which have been published by authority, or generally used by Protestants in this country : Those of Tindal, Coverdale and Queen Elizabeth's Bishops, were so notoriously corrupt, as to cause a general outcry against them among learned Pra- (1) See a list of them in Ant. Johnson's Hist. Account. Theo. Collect, p. 95. (2) One of the strongest passages for the Divinity of Christ is the follow.- ing, as it is pointed in the Vulgate : Ex quibus est Christus, secundum came it qui est super omnia Deus benedictus in stecuta. Rom. ix. 5. But see how Gro* ius and Socinus deprive the text of all its strength by merely substituting a point for a comma : Ex t/uibus est Christns, secundum carnem. Qui est super oinnia. Veus benedictus in scccula. K2 72 LETTER IX. testants, as well as among Catholics, in which the King himself (James I.) joined (1) ; and accordingly ordered a n£w version of it to be made ; being the same that is now in use, with some few alterations made after the Restoration (2). Now, though these new translators have corrected many wilful errors of their predecessors, most of which were levelled at Catholic doctrines and discipline (3) ; yet they have left a sufficient number of these behind, for which I do not find that their advo cates offer any excuse (4). IV. I will make a further supposition, namely, that you had the certainty even of Revelation, as the Cal- vinists used to pretend they had, that your Bible is not only Canonical, authentic, and faithful, in its English garb ; yet what would all this avail you, towards esta blishing your Rule of Faith, unless you could be equally certain of your understanding the whole of it rightly ? For, as the learned Protestant Bishop Walton says (5) : 'The Word of God does not consist ' in mere letters, whether written or printed, but in (1) Bishop Watson's Collect, vol. iii. p. 98. (2) Ibid. (3) These may be found in the learned Greg. Martin's Treatise on the subject, and in Ward's Errata to the Protestant Bible. (4) Two of these I had occasion to notice in the Inquiry into the Character of the Irish Catholics, namely, 1 Cor. xi. 27, where the conjunctive and is put for the disjunctive or, and Matt. xix. II, where cannot is put for do not, to the altering of the sense in both instances. Now, though these corruptions stand indirect opposition to the original, as the Rev. Mr. Grier and Dr. Ryan themselves quote it; yet these writers have the confidence to deny they are corruptions, because they pretend to prove from other texts that the cup is necessary, and that continency is not necessary > ! Answer to Ward's Errata, p. 13, page 33. (i) In the Prolegomena to his Poliglott, cap. v. SECOND FALSE RULE. 73 'the true sense of it(l); which no one can better ' interpret than the true Church, to which Christ ' committed this sacred pledge.' This is exactly what St. Jerom and St. Augustin had said many ages before him. ' Let us be persuaded,' says the former, ' that the Gospel consists not in the words, but in the ' sense. A wrong explanation turns the Word of God ' into the word of man, and what is worse, into the ' word of the Devil; for the Devil himself could quote ' the text of Scripture (2).' Now that there are in Scripture things hard to be understood, zohich the un learned and unstable wrest unto their ozcn destruction, is expressly affirmed in the Scripture itself (3). The same thing is proved by the frequent mistakes of the Apostles themselves, with respect to the words of their Divine Master. These obscurities are so numberless throughout the sacred volumes, that the last quoted Father, who was as bright and learned a divine, as ever took the Bible in hand, says of it : 'There are more ' things in Scripture that I am ignorant of, than those ' I know (4).' Should you prefer a modern Protestant authority to an ancient Catholic one; listen to the clear-headed Dr. Balguy. His words are these : ' But ' what, you will reply, is all this to Christians ? to those ' who see by a clear and strong light, the dispensation ' of God to mankind r We are not as those who have no 'hope. The Day-spring from on high hath visited us. ' The spirit of God shall lead us into all truth. — To this (1) This obvious truth shews the extreme absurdity of our Bible Societies and modern schools, which regard nothing but the mere reading of the Bible, leaving persons to embrace the most opposite interpretations of the same texts. (2) In Ep. ad Galat. contra Lucif. (3) 2 Pet. iii. 16. (4) St. Aug. Ep.- ad Januar. 74 LETTER IX. < delusive dream of human folly, founded only on mis- ' taken interpretations of Scripture; I answer, in one 'word: Open your Bibles: take the first page that ' occurs in either Testament, and tell me, without dis- ' guise ; is there nothing in it too hard for your under- ' standing ? If you find all before you clear and easy, 1 you may thank God for giving you a privilege which 'he has denied to many thousands of sincere be- 'lievers(l).' Manifold is the cause of the obscurity of Holy writ; 1st, the sublimity of a considerable part of it, which speaks either literally or figuratively of the Deity and his attributes ; of the Word Incarnate ; of Angels and other spiritual beings : — 2dly, the mysterious nature of prophecy in general: — 3dly, the peculiar idioms of the Hebrew and Greek languages : — lastly, the numerous and bold figures of speech, such as allegory, irony, hyperbole, catachresis, antiphrasis, which are so fre quent with the sacred penmen, particularly the ancient prophets (2.). I should like to hear any one of those, who pretend to find the Scripture so easy, attempting to give a clear explanation of the 6"7th, alias the 6'8th, Psalm ; or the last chapter of Ecclesiastes. Is it an easy matter to reconcile certain well-known speeches of each of the Holy Patriarchs Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, with the incommutable precept of truth ? I may here notice, among a thousand other such difficulties, that when our Saviour sent his twelve Apostles to preach the Gospel to the lost sheep of the house of Israel, he told them, according to St. Mattheiv x. 10, %o (1) Dr. Balguy's Discourses, p. 133. (2) See examples of these in Bonfrerius's Prreloquia and in the Appendixes to them, at the end of Menochius. SECOND FALSE RULE. 75 Provide neither gold nor silver — neither shoes nor yet staves : whereas St. Mark vi. says : He commanded them that they should take nothing for their journey, save a staff only. — You may indeed answer, with Chil- lingworth and Bishop Porteus, that whatever obscuri ties there may be in certain parts of Scripture, it is clear in all that is necessary to be known. — But on what au thority do these writers ground this maxim? They have none at all ; but they beg the question, as logicians express it, to extricate themselves from an absurdity, and in so doing they overturn their fundamental Rule. They profess to gather their articles of faith and mo rals from mere Scripture : nevertheless, confessing that they understand only a part of it, they presume to make a distinction in it, and to say this part is neces sary to be known, the other part is not necessary. But to place this matter in a clearer light, it is obvious that if any articles are particularly necessary to be known and believed, they are those which point to the Go"d whom we are to adore, and the moral precepts which we are to observe. Now, is it demonstratively evident, from mere Scripture, that Christ is God, and to be adored as such ? Most modern Protestants of eminence answer NO ; and, in defence of their assertion, quote the following among other texts : The Father is greater than I, John xiv. 28 ; to which the orthodox Divines oppose those texts of the same Evangelist, i" and the Father are one, x. SO. — The Word was God, &c. i. 1. — Again, we find the following among the moral precepts of the Old Testament : Go thy way ; eat thy bread with joy, and drink thy wine with a merry heart : for God nozo accepteth thy works. Let thy garments be always zvhite, and let thy head lack no ointment. Live joyfully with 76" LETTER IX. the wife whom thou lovest, &c. Eccles. ix. 7, 8-, 9- In the New Testament we meet with the following seem ingly practical commands. Swear not at all, Matt. v. 34.' Call no man Father upon earth — neither be you called Masters, for one is your Master, Christ, Matt. xxiii. 9, 10. If any man sue thee at lazo, to take away thy coat, let him have thy cloak also, v. 46. Give to eve ry man that asketh of thee ; and of him that taketh away thy goods ask him not again, Luke vi. 33. When thou makest a dinner or a supper, call not thy friends nor thy brethren, xiv. 12.-^These are a few among hundreds of other difficulties, regarding our moral duties, which, though confronted by other texts, seemingly of a con trary meaning, nevertheless shew that the Scripture is not, of itself, demonstratively clear in points of first rate importance, and that the Divine Law, like human laws, without an authorized interpreter, must ever be a source of doubt and contention. V. I have said enough concerning the contentions among Protestants, I will now, by way of concluding this letter, say a word or two of their doubts. In the first place, it is certain, as a learned Catholic contro^ vertist argues (1), that a person who follows your Rule cannot make an act of faith, this being, according to your great authority, Bishop Pearson, an assent to the revealed articles, with a certain and full persuasion of their revealed truth (2) : or, to use the words of your Primate; Wake : * When I give my assent to what God ' has reveal'efd, I do it, not only with a certain assurance 1 tha% what I believe is true, but with an absolute secu- ' rity that it cannot be false (3).' Now the Protestant, (1) Sheffmacher Lettres d'un Docteur Cat. a un Gentilhomme Prot. vol, i. p. 48. («) On the Creed, p. 15. (3) Princip. of Christ, Rel. p. 27. SECOND FALSE RULE. 77 who has nothing to trust to but his own talents, in in terpreting the Books of Scripture, especially with all the difficulties and uncertainties which he labours un der, according to what I have shewn above, never can rise to this certain assurance and absolute security, as to what is revealed in Scripture. The utmost he can say is : such and such appears to me, at the present mo ment, to be the sense of the texts before me : and, if he is candid, he will add : but perhaps, upon further con sideration, and upon comparing these with other texts, I may alter my opinion. How far short, Dear Sir, is such mere opinion from the certainty of faith ! I may here refer you, to your own experience. Are you accus tomed in reading your Bible to conclude, in your own mind, with respect to those points which appear to you most clear : I believe in these, with a certain assur ance of their truth, and an absolute security that they cannot be false ; especially when you reflect that other learned, intelligent, and sincere Christians have under stood those passages in quite a different sense from what you do ? For my part, having sometimes lived and conversed familiarly with Protestants of this de scription, and noticed their controversial discourses, I never found one of them absolutely fixed in his mind, for any long time together, as to the whole of his be lief. I invite you to make the experiment on the most intelligent and religious Protestant of your acquaint ance. Ask him a considerable number of questions, on the most important points of his religion : note down his answers, while they are fresh in your memorj-. Ask him the same questions, but in a different order, a month afterward-; when, I can almost venture to say, you will be surprised at the difference you will find,, PART ie L 78 LETTER IX. Between his former and his latter creed.— After all, we need not use any other means to discover the state of doubt and uncertainty, in which many of your greatest Divines and most profound Scriptural Students have passed their days, than to look into their publications. I shall satisfy myself with citing the Pastoral Charge of one of them, a living Bishop to his Clergy. Speaking of the Christian doctrines he says ; ' I think it safer to 'tell you, where they are contained, than, what they are. ' They are contained in the Bible, and if, in reading < that book, your sentiments concerning the doctrines ¦ of Christianity should be different from those of your ' neighbour, or from those of the Church, be persuaded '. on your part, that infallibility appertains as little to. ' you as it does to the Church (l ).' Can you read this, my Dear Sir, without shuddering ? If a most learned and intelligent Bishop and Professor of Divinity, as Dr. Watson certainly is, after studying all the Scrip tures and all the Commentators upon them, is forced publicly to confess to his assembled clergy, that he can not tell them what the doctrines of Christianity are, how unsettled must his mind have been ! and of course, how far removed from the assurance of faith ! In the next place, how fallacious must that Rule of the mere Bible be, which, while he recommends it to them, he plainly signifies, will not lead them to a uniformity of sentiments, one with another, nor even with their Church ! There can be no doubt, Sir, but those who enter tain doubts concerning the truth of their religion, in the course of their lives, must experience the same, (1) Bishop Watson's Charge to his Clergy, in 179?. SECOND FALSE RULE. 79 with redoubled anxiety, at the approach of death. Accordingly there are, I believe, few of our Catholic priests in an extensive ministry, who have not been frequently called in to receive dying Protestants into the Catholic Church (]), while not a single instance can he produced, of a Catholic wishing to die in any other communion than his own (2). O Death, thou great enlightener ! O truth-telling Death, how power ful art thou in confuting the blasphemies, and dissipat ing the prejudices of the enemies of God's Church ! — Taking it for granted, that you, Dear Sir, have not been without your doubts and fears about the safety of the road in which your are walking to eternity, more particularly in the course of the present controversy, and being anxious, beyond expression, that you should be free from these, when you arrive, at the brink of that vast ocean, I cannot do better than address you in the words of the great St. Augustin, to one in your situation : ' If you think you have been sufficiently ' tossed about, and wish to see an end to your an- ' xieties, follow the rule of Catholic discipline, which (1) A large proportion of those Grandees who were the most forward in promoting the Reformation, so called, and among the rest Cromwell, Earl of Essex, the King's Ecclesiastical Vicar, when they came to die, returned to the Catholic Church. This was the case also with/Luther's chief pro tector, the Elector of Saxony, the persecuting Queen of Navarre, and many other foreisn Protestant Princes. Some Bishops of the Established Church; for instance, Goodman and Cheyney, of Gloucester, and Gordon of Glasgow, probably also Halifax of St. Asaph's, died Catholics. A long list of titled or otherwise distinguished personages, who have either returned to the Catholic faith, or, for the first time, embraced it on their de:tll .-beds, in modern times, might be named here, if it were prudent to du so. (2) Tnis is remarked by Sir Toby M-ilhev.-s, son of the Archbishop of York, Hugh Cressy, Canon of Windsor and Dean of Laughlin, F. Walsmg- ham and Ant. Uln*-- Duke of Brunswick, all illustrious converts. Also by Beurier in his Conferences, p. 400. L2 80 LETTER X. ' came down to us through the apostles from Christ ' himself, and which shall descend from us to the 'latest posterity (1).' Yes, renounce the fatal and foolish presumption of fancying that you can interpret the Scripture better than the Catholic Church, aided, as she is, by the tradition of all ages, and the Spirit of all truth (2).— But I mean to treat this latter subject at due length in my next letter. I am, Dear Sir, &c. ' J. M. — ?M*?t*4-*»— LETTER X. To JAMES BROWN, Esq.fc. THE TRUE RULE. DEAR SIR, I have received your letter, and also two others from gentlemen of your Society, on what I have written to you concerning the insuffi ciency of Scripture, interpreted by individuals, to constitute a secure Rule of Faith. From these it is < plain, that my arguments have produced a considerable sensation in the Society ; insomuch that I find myself obliged to remind them of the terms on which we mutually entered upon this correspondence ; namely, that each one should be at perfect liberty to express his sentiments on the important subject under consi- (i) De Utilit. Crcd. c. 8. (2) Bossuet in his celebrated Conference with Claude, which produced the conversion of Mile. Duras, obliged him to confess that, by the Protestant Rule, ' every artisan and husbandman may and ought to believe that he can ' understand the Scriptures better than all the Fathers and Doctors of the ' Church, ancient and modern, put together.' THE TRUE RULE. SI deration, without complaint or offence of the other. The strength of my arguments is admitted by you all : yet you all bring invincible objections, as you con- •ider them, from Scripture and other sources against them. I think it will render our controversy more simple and clear, if, with your permission, I defer answering these, till after I have said all that I have to say concerning the Catholic Rule of Faith. The Catholic Rule of Faith, as I stated before, is not merely The Written Word of God, but The Whole Word of God, both Written and Unzvritten ; in other words Scripture and Tradition, and these propounded mid explained by the Catholic Church. This implies that we have a twofold Rule, or Lazo, and that we have an Interpreter, or Judge, to explain it, and to decide upon it in all doubtful points. I. I enter upon this subject with observing, that all xnritten laws necessarily suppose the existence of ««- written laws, and indeed depend upon them for their force and authority. Not to run into the depths of ethics and metaphysics on this subject; you know, Dear Sir, that, in this kingdom, we have Common or Unwritten Law, and Statute or Written Law, both of them binding ; but that the former necessarily pre cedes the latter. The Legislature, for example, makes a written statute, but we must learn before hand, from the common law, what constitutes the Legislature, and we must also have learnt from the Natural and the Di vine Laws, that the Legislature is to be obeyed in all things which these do not render unlawful. ' The mu- ' nicipal law, of England,' says Judge Blackstone, ' may be divided unto Lex Non Scripta, the Unwritten ' or Common Law, and the Lex Scripta, or Statute 82 LETTER X. ' Law (l). He afterwards calls the Common Law, ' the first ground and chief corner-stone of the Laws ' of England (2).' If, continues he, 'The question ' arises : hozv these customs or maxims are to be known, ( and by whom their validity are to be determined ? The; ' answer is : by the Judges in the several courts of 'justice, They are the depositaries of the laws, the ' living oracles, who must decide in all cases of doubt, 'and who are bound by oath to decide according to ' the law of the land (3).' — So absurd is the idea of binding mankind by written laws, without laying an adequate foundation for the authority of those laws, and without constituting living judges to decide upon them ! Neither has the Divine Wisdom, in founding the spiritual kingdom of his Church, acted in that in consistent manner. The Almighty did not send a Book, the New Testament, to Christians, and, without so much as establishing the authority of that Book, leave them to interpret it, till the end of time, each one according to his own opinions or prejudices. But our blessed Master and Legislator, Jesus Christ, having first demonstrated his own divine legation from his heavenly Father by undeniable miracles, commis sioned bis chosen Apostles, by zvord of mouth, to pro claim and explain, by word of mouth, his doctrines and precepts to all nations, promising to be with them in the execution of this office of his heralds and judges, even to the end of the world. This in. plies the power, he had given them, of ordaining successors in this (1) Comment, on the Laws, Introduct. sect. 3. (2) Ibid. sect. iii. p. 73, 8th edit. (3) Ibid. p. 69. THE TRUE RULE. 83 office, as ¦ they themselves were only to live the or dinary term of human life. True it is that, during the execution of their commission, he inspired some of them, and of their disciples, to write certain parts of these doctrines and precepts, namely, the Canonical Gospels and Epistles, which they addressed, for the most part, to particular persons and on particular occasions : but these inspired writings, by no means, rendered void Christ's commission to the Apostles and their successors, of preaching and explaining his word to the nations, or his promise of being zvith them till the end of time. On the contrary, the inspiration of these very writings rs not otherwise known than by the viva voce evidence of these depositaries and judges of the revealed truths. — This Analysis of Revealed Religion, so conformable to Reason and the Civil Constitution of our country, is proved to be true, by The Written Word itself — by the. Tradition and conduct of the Apos tles — and by the constant testimony and practice of the Fathers and Doctors of the Church in all ages. II. Nothing then, Dear Sir, is further from the doctrine and practice of the Catholic Church than to slight the HolyScriptures. So far from this, she had religiously preserved and perpetuated them from age to age, during almost 1500 years, before Protestants existed. She has consulted them, and confirmed her decrees from them in her several councils. She enjoins her Pastors, whose business it is to instruct the faithful, to read and studv them without intermission, know ing, that All Scripture is given by inspiration o) God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, j or correc tion, for instruction in righteousness. 2 Tim. iii. lfj. Finally, she proves her perpetual right to announce 84 LETTER X. and explain the truths and precepts of her Divint Founder, by several of the strongest and clearest pas sages contained in Holy Writ (l). Such, for example, is the last commission of Christ, alluded to above : Go ye therefore and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost i teaching them to observe all the things whatsti* ever I have commanded you. And lo ! I am with you all days, even to the end of the world. Matt xxviii. 19, 20. And again : Go ye into all the world and preach the Gospel to every creature. Mark xvi. 15. It is preaching and teaching then, that is to say the Un* written Word, which Christ has appointed to be the general method of propagating his divine truths ; and, whereas he promises to be with his Apostles to the end of the world, this proves their authority in expound ing, and proves that the same authority was to de scend to their legitimate successors in the sacred mini stry; since they themselves were only to live the ordinary term of human life. In like manner the fol lowing clear texts prove the authonty of the Apostles and their successors for ever ; that is to say, the au thority of the ever living and speaking tribunal of the Church, in expounding our Saviour's doctrine. I mil pray the Father, and he shall give you another Com forter, tttut he may abide with you for ever. — The Com forter, which is the Holy Ghost, whom the Father will send in my name ; he shall teach you all things, and bring all things to your remembrance, whatsoever I hace said unta you. Johnxiv. 16, 26. St. Paul, speak- (1) St. Austin uses this argument against the Donatists, ' In Siriptwis • diseimus Christum, in scrrpturjp discimus Ecclesiam. Si Christum tent* ' fe, qua« Eccfesiam non tenetis )' THE TRUE RULE. 85 ing of both the Unwritten and the Written Word, puts them upon a level, where he says : Therefore, Brethren, stand fast and hold the tradition ye have been taught, whether by word or our epistle. 2Thess. v. 13. Finally, St. Peter pronounces that : No prophecy of Scripture is of any private interpretation. 2 Pet. i. 20. III. That the Apostles, and the Apostolical men whom they formed, followed this method prescribed by their Master, is unquestionable ; as we have positive proofs from Scripture, as well as from ecclesiastical history, that they did so. St. Mark, after recording the above-cited admonition of preaching the Gospel, which Christ left to his Apostles, adds: And they went forth and preached every where ; the Lord working with them, and confirming the word with signs follozving. Mark xvi. 20. St. Peter preached throughout Judea, and Syria, and last of all in Italy and at Rome; St. Paul throughout Lesser Asia, Greece, and as far as Spain; St. Andrew penetrated into Scythia ; St. Tho mas and St, Bartholomew into Parthia and India, and so of the others ; every where converting and instruct ing thousands, by zvord of mouth ; founding Churches, and ordaining Bishops and Priests to do the same. 'They ordained them Priests in every Church. Acts xiv. 22. For this cause,'s&y & St. Paul to Titus, I left thee in Crete, that thou shouldest set in order the things that are zoanting, and shouldest ordain Priests in' every city; as I had appointed thee. Tit. r. 5. And1 1* Timothy : The things that thou hast heard of me among many wit?tes$est the same commit thou to those faithful .men, who shall be able to teach others also. 1 Tim. ii. 2. If any of them wrote, it was oa-s.on*xe .particular occasion,; and,, for the most part, to a particula^pe»60«V-'e*-«#*g«gateon, 86 LETTER X. without either giving directions, or providing means of communicating their Epistles or their Gospels to the rest of the Christians throughout the world. Hence it happened, as I have before remarked, that it was not till the end of the fourth century, that the Canon of Holy Scriptures was absolutely settled as it now stands. True it is, that the Apostles, before they separated to preach the Gospel to different nations, agreed upon a short symbol or profession of Faith, called, The Apostles' Creed; but even this they did not commit to writing (l) : and whereas they made this, among other articles of it, I believe in the Holy Church (2), they made no mention at all of the Holy Scriptures. This circumstance confirms what their example proves, that the Christian doctrine and discipline might have been propagated and preserved by the Unwritten Word, or Tradition, joined with the authority of the Church, though the Scriptures had not been composed ; how ever profitable these most certainly are for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, and for instruction in righte ousness. 2 Tim. iii. 16. I have already quoted one of the ornaments of your Church, who says, that ' the ' Canonical Epistles' (and he might have added the Gospels) ' are not regular treatises upon the Christian ' Religion (3),' and I shall have occasion to shew from an ancient Father, that this religion did prevail and flourish .soon after the age of the Apostles, among na tions which did not even know the use of letters. IV. -However light Protestants of this age may make (1) Ruffin. inter Opera Ilieron. (2) The title Catholic w.is afterwards added, when heresies increased. (3) Elements of Theology, vol. ii. THE TRUE RULE. 87 of the ancient Fathers, as theological authorities (l), they cannot object to them as faithful witnesses of the doctrine and discipline of the Church in their respective times. It is chiefly in the latter character that I am goino- to brine; forward a certain number of them, to prove that, during the five first ages of the Church, no less than in the subsequent ages, the Unwritten Word, or Tradition, was held by Her %\ equal estimation with the Scripture itself, and that she claimed a divine right of propounding aud explaining them both. I begin with the disciple of the Apostles, St. Igna tius, Bishop of Antioch. It is recorded of him that, in his passage to Rome, where he was sentenced to be devoured by wild beasts, he exhorted the Christians, who got access to him, ' to guard themselves against ' the rising heresies, and to adhere with the utmost ' firmness to the tradition of the Apostles (2).' The same sentiments appear in this Saint's epistles, and also in those of his fellow martyr, St. Polycarp, the angel of the Church of Smyrna (3). One of the disciples of the last-mentioned holy Bi shop was St. Irenaeus, who passing into Gaul became Bishop -of Lyons. He has left twelve books against the heresies of his time, which abound with testimo nies to the present purpose; some few of which I shall (1) Jewel, Andrews, Hooker, Morton, Tearson, and other Protestant divines of the 16th and 17th centuries, laboured hard to press the Fathers into their service, but with such bad success, that the succeeding contro versialists gave them up in despair. The learned Protestant, Causabon, confessed that the Fathers were all on the Catholic side; the equally league il Obrecht testifies that, in reading their works, 'he was frequently provoke 1 'to throw them on the ground, finding them so full of Popery;' while Alid- dleton heaps every kind of obloquy upon them. (2) Euseb. Hist. 1. iii. c. 30. (3). Revel, ii. 8, M 2 88 LETTER X. here insert. — He writes : ' Nothing is easier to those ' who seek for the truth, than to remark in every f Church the tradition, which the Apostles have mani- ' fested to all the world. We can name the Bishops * appointed by the Apostles in the several Churches, f and the successors of those Bishops down to our own ¦ time, none of whom ever taught, or heard of such f doctrines as these heretics dream of (l)-' This holy Father emphatically affirms that, ' In explaining the ' Scriptures, Christians are to attend to the Pastors of f the Church, who, by the ordinance of God, have re- ' ceived the inheritance of truth, with the succession f of their Sees (2).'— He adds, 'The tongues of na- - tions vary, but the virtue of tradition is one and the ' same every where : nor do the Churches in Germany ' believe^ or teach differently from those in Spain, ' Gaul, the East, Egypt, or Lybia (3).' — ' Since it f would be tedious to enumerate the succession of all ' the Churches, we appeal to the faith and tradition of - the greatest, most ancient, and best known Church, • that of Rome, founded by the Apostles, SS. Peter * and Paul ;— for with this Church all others agree, * in as much as in her is preserved the tradition which f comes down from the Apostles (4).'— 'SUPPOSING -c. OBJECTIONS ANSWERED. DEAR SIR, I am not forgetful of the promise I made in my last letter but one, to answer the contents of those which I had then received from yourself, Mr. Topham, and Mr. Askew. Within these few days I have received other letters from yourself and Mr. Top- ham, which, equally with the former, call for my at tention to their substance. However, as it would take up a great deal of time to write separate answers to each of these letters, and, as I know, that they are arguments, and not formalities, which you expect from me, I shall make this letter a general reply to the several objections contained in them all, with the ex ception of such as have been answered in my last to you. Conceiving, also, that it will contribute to the brevity and perspicuity of my letter, if I arrange the several objections, from whomsoever they came, under their proper heads ; and if, on this occasion, I make use of the scholastic instead of the epistolary style ; I sij.Jl adopt both these methods. 1 must, however, remark, before I enter upon my task, that most of the PART i. Q 118 LETTER XII. objections appear to have been borrowed from the Bishop of London's book, called a Brief Confutation (>f the Errors of Popery. This was extracted from Archbishop Seeker's Sermons on the same subject; which, themselves, were culled out of his predecessor Tillotson's pulpit controversy. Hence you may justly consider your arguments, as the strongest which can be brought against the Catholic Rule and Religion. Under this persuasion, the work in question has been selected for gratuitous distribution by your Tract So cieties, wherever they particularly wish to restrain or suppress Catholicity. Against the Catholic Rule it is objected that Christ referred the Jews to. the Scriptures : Search the Scrip tures ; for in them ye think ye have eternal life : and they are they which testify of me. John v. 35. Again, the Jews of Berea are commended by the sacred pen man, in that they, search the Scriptures daily, whether these things were so. Acts xvii. 1 ], Before I enter on the discussion of any part of Scrip ture, with you or your friends, I am bound, Dear Sir, in conformity with my Rule of Faith, as explained by the Fathers, and particularly by Tertullian, to protest, against your and their right to argue from Scripture; and, of course, must deny that there is any necessity of my replying to any objections which you may draw from it. For I have reminded you that : No prophecy Qf Scripture is of any private interpretation ; and I have proved to you that the whole business of the Scrip tures belongs to the Church. She has preserved them, she vouches for them, and, she alone, by confronting the several passages with each other, and by the help of Tradition, authoritatively explains them. Hence OBJECTIONS ANSWERED. 1 ]§ it is impossible that the real sense of Scripture should ever be against her and her doctrine ; and hence, of course, I might quash every objection which you can draw from any passage in it by this short reply : The Church understands the passage differently from you ; therefore you mistake its meaning. Nevertheless, as Charity beareth all things and never faileth, I will, for the better satisfying of you and your friends, quit my vantage ground for the present, and answer dis tinctly to every text not yet answered by me, which any of your Gentlemen, or which Dr. Porteus him self, has brought against the Catholic method of Religion. By way of answering your first objection, let me ask you, whether Christ, by telling the Jews to search the Scriptures, intimated that they were not to believe in his unwritten word, which he was then preaching j nor to hear, his Apostles and their successors, with whom he promised to remain for ever? I ask, second ly, on what particular question Christ referred to the Scripture, namely, the Old Scripture ? — for no part of the New was then written. — Was it on any question that has been or might be agitated among Christians ? No, certainly : the sole question between him and the infidel Jezvs, was, whether he was or was not the Mes siah : in proof that he was the Messiah, he adduced the ordinary motives of credibility, as they have been detailed by your late worthy Rector, Mr. Carey, the miracles he wrought, and the prophecies in the Old Testament that were fulfilled in him, as likewise the testimony of St. John the Baptist. The same is to be said of the commendations bestowed by St. Luke un the Bereans ; they searched the ancient prophecies, Qa 120 LETTER XII. to verify that the Messiah was to be born at such a time and in such a place, and that his life and his death were to be marked by such and such circum stances. We still refer Jews and other infidels to the same proofs of Christianity, without saying any thing yet to them about our Rule or Judge of con troversies. Dr. Porteus objects what St. Luke says at the be ginning of his Gospel : It seemed good to me also, hav ing had perfect understanding of all things from the very first, to write unto thee in order, Most Excellent Theo philus, that thou might est know the certainty of those things wherein thou hast been instructed. Again St. John says, c. xx. : These things are zvritten that ye might believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God ; •and that believing, ye might have life through his name. Answer. It is difficult to conceive how his Lordship can draw an argument from these texts against the Catholic Rule. Surely he does not gather from the words of St. Luke, that Theophilus did not believe the articles in which he had been instructed by word of mouth till he read this Gospel ! or that the Evangelist gainsaid the authority given by Christ to his disciples : He that heareth you heareth me, which he himself re cords, Luke x. 16. In like manner the Prelate cannot suppose, that this testimony of St. John sets aside other testimonies of Christ's Divinity, or that our be lief in this single article without other conditions, will insure eternal life. Having quoted these texts, which to me appear so inconclusive; the Bishop adds, by way -of provin" that Scripture is sufficiently intelligible : ' Surely the OBJECTIONS ANSWERED. 121 ' Apostles were not worse writers, with divine assist- ' ance, than others commonly are without it (l).' I will not here repeat the arguments and testimo nies already brought (2) to shew the great obscurity of a considerable portion of the Bible, particularly with respect to the bulk of mankind; because it is sufficient to refer to the clear words of St. Peter, de claring that there are in the Epistles of St. Paul, Some things hard to be understood, which the unlearned and unstable zvrest, as they do all the other Scriptures, unto their own destruction, (2 Peter iii. 16.), and to the in stances, which occur in the Gospels, of the very Apostles frequently misunderstanding the meaning of their Divine Master. The learned Prelate says elsewhere (3) : ' The New ' Testament supposes them (the generality of people) ' capable of judging for themselves, and accordingly, ' requires them not only, to try the Spirits whether they ' be of God, (1 John iv. 1.); but to prove all things, and ' holdfast that which is good.' 1 Thess. v. 21. Answer. True : St. John tells the Christians, to whom he writes, to try the spirits zvhether they are of God : because, he adds, many false prophets are gone out into the world : but then he gives them two rules for making trial : Hereby ye know the Spirit of God. Every spirit that confesseth that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh is of God. And every spirit that confesseth not that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh (which was denied by the Heretics of that time, the disciples of Simon and Cerinthus) is not of God. In this the Apostle tells the Christians to see whether the doctrine (1)P. 4. (8) Letter ix. (3) P. 19. 122 LETTER XII. of these spirits was, or was not conformable to that which they had learnt from the Church. The second rule was : He that knozveth God heareth us ; he that is not of God heareth not us. Hereby knowzve the spirit of truth and the spirit of error : namely, he bids them observe, whether these teachers did or did not listen to the divinely-constituted Pastors of the Church. Dr. P. is evidently here quoting Scripture for our rule, not against it. — The same is to be said of the other text. Prophecy was exceedingly common at the beginning of the Church; but as we have just seen, there were false prophets, as well as true prophets. Hence, while the Apostle defends this supernatural gift in general : Despise not prophesyings, he admonishes the Thessalonians to prove them,; not certainly by their private opinions, which would be the source of endless discord ; but by the established rules of the Church, and particularly by that which he tells them to hold fast, (2 Thess. ii. i5.), namely, Tradition. Dr. P. in another place (1), urges the exhortation of St. Paul to Timothy : Continue thou in the things which thou hast learned and hast been assured of, knozv- ing of whom thou hast learned them : and that from a child thou hast knozvn the holy Scriptures, which are able to make thee wise to salvation, through faith in Christ Jesus. All Scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, 8$c. 2 Tim. iii. Answer. Does, then, the Prelate mean to say, that the form of sound words which Timothy had heard from St. Paul, and which he was commanded to hold (1) p: 69. OBJECTIONS ANSWERED. 123 fast, 2 Tim. i. 13., was all contained in the Old Testa ment, the only Scripture which he could have read in his childhood? Or that, in this he could have learned the mysteries of the Trinity and the Incarnation, or the ordinances of Baptism, and the Eucharist ? The first part of the question is a general commendation of Tradition, the latter of Scripture. Against Tradition, Dr. P. and yourself quotes (1) Mark vii., where the Pharisees and Scribes asked Christ : Why walk not thy disciples . according to the tradition of the elders, but eat bread with unwashed hands ? He answered and said to them : in vain do they zvx>rship me, leaching FOR (2) doctrines the command ments of men. For, laying aside the commandment of God, ye hold the tradition of men, as the zvashing of pots and cups, c^c. Answer. Among the traditions which prevailed at the time of our Saviour, some were divine, such as the inspiration of the Books of Moses and the other pro phets, the resurrection of the body, and the last judg ment, which assuredly Christ did not condemn but confirm. There were others merely human, and of a recent date, introduced, as St. Jerom informs us, by Sammai, Killel, Achiba, and other Pharisees, from which the Talmud is chiefly gathered. These, of course, were never obligatory. In like manner there are among Catholics Divine Traditions, such as the inspiration of the Gospels, the observation of the (l) P. n. (2) This particle FOR, which in some degree affects the sense, is a corrupt interpolation, as appears from the original Greek. N. B. The texts which Dr. P. refers to, I quote from the common Bible: his citations of it arc frequently inaccurate. 124 LETTER XII. Lord's Day, the lawfulness of invoking the prayers of the Saints, and other tilings not clearly contained in Scripture ; and there are among many Catholics, his torical and even fabulous traditions (1 ). Now it is to the former, as avowed to be Divine by the Church, that we appeal : of the others every one may judge as he thinks best. You both, likewise, quote Coloss. ii. 8. Beware lest any man spoil (cheat) you through philosophy and vain deceit, after the tradition of men, after the rudiments of the world, and not after Christ. Answer. The Apostle himself informs the Colos sians what kind of traditions he here speaks of, where he says : Let no man therefore judge you in meal or drink, or in respect of any holiday, or of the new-moon, or of the Sabbath-days. The ancient Fathers and eccle siastical historians inform us that, in the age of the Apostles, many Jews and Pagan philosophers professed Christianity, but endeavoured to ally with it their re spective superstitions, and vain speculations, abso lutely inconsistent with the doctrine of the Gospel. It was against these St. Paul wrote; not against those traditions which he commanded his converts to hold fast to, whether they had been taught by word or by epistle, 2 Thess. ii. 15.; nor against those traditions which he commended his other converts for keeping, 1 Cor. xi. 2. (2). Finally, the Apostle in that passage (1) Such are the Acts of several Saints condemned by Pope Gelasius ; such also was the opinion of Christ's reign upon earth for a thousand years. (2) The English Testament puts the word Ordinances here for Traditions, contrary to the sense of the original Greek, and even to the authofity of Bcza, OBJECTIONS ANSWERED. 12.5 did not abrogate this his awful sentence: Now zve com mand you, brethren, in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that ye withdraw yourselves from every brother that zvalketh disorderly, and not after the Tradition which he received of us. 2 Thess. iii. 6. Against the infallibility of the Church in deciding questions of faith, I am referred to various other ar guments made use of by Dr. Porteus ; and, in the first place, to the following: — ' Romanists themselves own ' that men must use their eyes to find this guide ; why ' then must they put them out to follow him (1) ?'— I answer by the following comparisons. Every prudent man makes use of his reason to find out an able physi cian to take care of his health, and an able lawyer to secure his property ; but having found these to his full satisfaction, does he dispute with the former about the quality of medicines, or with the latter about forms of law? Thus the Catholic makes use of his reason to ob serve which, among the rival communions, is the Church that Christ established and promised to remain with : having ascertained that, by the plain acknowledged marks which this Church bears, he trusts his soul to her unerring judgment, in preference to his own fluc tuating opinion. Dr. Porteus adds : ' Ninety-nine parts in every ' hundred of their (the Catholic) communion, have no ' other Rule to follow but what a few priests and pri- ' vate writers tell them (2).' According to this mode of reasoning, a loyal subject does not make any act of the Legislature the rule of his civil conduct, because, perhaps, he learns it only from a printed paper, or the (1) P. 19. (2) Ibid. PART I. R 126 LETTER XII. proclamation of the bell-man. Most likely the Ca tholic peasant learns the doctrine of the Church from his Parish-priest ; but then he knows that the doc trine of this Priest must be conformable to that of his Bishop, and that otherwise he will soon be called to an account for it : he knows also that the doctrine of the Bishop himself must be conformable to that of the other Bishops and the Pope ; and that it is a fum- damental maxim with them all, never to admit of any tenet, but such as is believed by all the Bishops, and was believed by their predecessors up to the Apostles themselves, The Prelate gives a ' Rule for the unlearned and ' ignorant in Religion (that is to say of ninety-nine in ' every hundred of them), which is this : Let each man ' improve his own judgment and increase his own • knowledge as much as he can : and be fully assured ' that God will expect no more.' — What? If Christ has given some Apostles, and some Prophets, and some Evangelists, and some Pastors and Teachers; for the perfecting the Saints, for the work of the mi* nistry, Ephes. iv. 1 1, does he not expect that Chris tians should hearken to them, and obey them? The Prelate goes on : 'In matters, for zvhich he must rely ' on authority,' (mere Scripture then and private judg ment, according to the Bishop himself, are not always a sufficient rule even for Protestants, but they must in some matters rely on Church authority), ' in * matters, for' which he must rely on authority, let ' him rely on the authority of that Church which ' God's Providence has placed him under,' (that is to say, whether Catholic, Protestant, Socinian, An tinomian, Jewish, &c.) ' rather than another which he OBJECTIONS ANSWERED. 127 hath nothing to do with,' (every Christian has, or ought to have, something to do with Christ's true Church) and ' trust to those, who, by encouraging free inquiry, ' appear to love truth; rather than such as, by requir- ' ing all their doctrines to be implicitly obeyed, ' seem conscious that they will not bear to be fairly ' tried.' What, My Lord ; — would you have me trust those men who have just now deceived me, by assuring me that I should not stand in need of guides at all, rather than those who told me, from the first, of the perplexities in which I find myself entangled ! Again, do you advise me to prefer these conductors, who are forced to confess that they may mislead me, to those others, who assure me, and this upon such strong grounds, that they will conduct me with perfect safety ! Our Episcopal controvertist finishes his admonition To the ignorant and unlearned' with an address cal culated for the stupid and bigotted. He says ; ' Let ' others build on Fathers and Popes, on traditions and ' councils, what they will : let us continue firm, as we ' are, on the foundation of the Apostles and Prophets, ' Jesus Christ himself being the chief corner stone.' Ephes.ii. Whatempty declamation! DothentheFathers, Popes, and Councils profess or attempt to build religion on any other foundation than the Revelation made by God to the Apostles and Prophets ? His Lordship knows full well that they do not, and that the only questions at issue are these three ; 1st, Whether this Revelation has not been made and conveyed by the unwritten, as well as by the written word of God ? 2dly, Whether Christ did not commit this word to his Apostles and their successors till the end of the zvorld% 112 12S LETTER XII. for' them to preserve and announce it ? Lastly, whether, independently of this commission, it is consistent with common sense, for each Protestant ploughman and mechanic, to persuade himself that he, individually, (for he cannot, according to his rule, build on the opi nion of other Protestants, though he could find any whose faith exactly tallied with his own) that he, I say, individually, understands the Scriptures better than all the Doctors and Bishops of the Church, who now are, or ever have been since the time of the Apostles ! (1) One of your Salopian friends, in writing to me, ridi cules the idea of infallibility being lodged in any mor tal man, or number of men. Hence it is fair to con clude that he does not look upon himself to be infalli ble : now nothing short of a man's conviction of his own infallibility, one might think, would put him on preferring his own judgment, in matters of religion, to that of the Church of all ages and all nations. Secondly, if this objection were valid, it would prove that the Apostles themselves were not infallible. Finally, I could wish your friend to form a right idea of this matter. The infallibility, then, of our Church is not a power of telling all things past, present and to come, such as the Pagans ascribed to their oracles; but merely the aid of God's Holy Spirit, to enable her truly to de cide what her faith is and ever has been in such articles as have been made known to her by Scripture and Tra dition. This definition furnishes answers to diverse ether objections and questions of Dr. P. — r-The (i) The great Bossuet obliged the Minister, Claude, in his conference with him, openly to avow this principle ; which, in fact, every consistent Protestant must avow, who^maintains his private interrelation of the Bible te be the only rule of his faith. 0RJECTI0NS ANSWERED. 129 Church does not decide the controversy concerning the conception of the Blessed Virgin, and several other dis puted points, because she sees nothing absolutely clear and certain concerning them, either in the written or the unwritten word ; and therefore leaves her children to form their own opinions concerning them. She does not dictate an exposition of the whole Bible, because she has no tradition concerning a very great propor tion of it, as for example, concerning the prophecy of Enoch, quoted by Jude 14, and the Baptism for the dead, of which St. Paul makes mention, 1 Cor xv. 29, and the chronologies and genealogies in Genesis. — The Prelate urges that the words of St. Paul, where he declares that ; The Church of God is the pillar and ground of truth, 1 Titn. iii. 15, may be translated a different way from that received. — True: they may, but not without altering the original Greek, as also the common Protestant version. — He says : it was ordained in the Old Law that every controversy should be de cided by the Priests and Levites, Deut. xvii. 8, and yet that these avowedly erred in rejecting Christ. — True: but the Law had then run its destined course, and the divine assistance failed the Priests in the very act of their rejecting the promised Messiah, who was then before them. — He adds, that St. Paul in his Epistle to the Church of Rome, bids her not be high minded, but fear : for (he adds) if God spared not the Jews, take heed lest he also spare not thee, Rom. xi. — Supposing the quotation to be accurate, and that the threat is par ticularly addressed to the Christians of Rome ; what is that to the present purpose ? We never supposed the promises of Christ to belong to them or their succes sors, more than to the inhabitants of any other city. 130 LETTER XII. Indeed it is the opinion of some of our most learned commentators, that before the end of the world, Rome will relapse into its former Paganism (l). In a word, the promises of our Saviour, that Hell's gates shall not prevail against his Church — that his Holy Spirit shall lead it into all truth — and that he himself will remain with it for ever, were made to the Church of all nations and all times, in communion with St. Peter ano his suc cessors, the Bishops of Rome : and as these promises have been fulfilled, during a succession of eighteen centuries, contrary to the usual and natural course of events, and by the visible protection of the Almighty, so we rest assured that he will continue to fulfil them, 'till the Church Militant shall be wholly trans formed into the Church Triumphant in the heavenly kingdom. Finally, his Lordship, with other controvertists, objects against the infallibility of the Catholic Church, that its advocates are not agreed where to lodge this prerogative ; some ascribing it to the Pope, others to a, General Council, or to the Bishops dispersed throughout the Church. — True, schoolmen discuss some such points : but let me ask his Lordship, whe ther he finds any Catholic who denies or doubts, that a General Council, with the Pope at his head, or that the Pope himself, issuing a doctrinal decision, which is received by the great body of Catholic Bishops, is secure from error ? Most certainly not : and hence he may gather where all Catholics agree in lodging infalli bility. In like manner, with respect to our national constitution ; some lawyers hold that a Royal pro- (1) See Cornel, a Lapid. in Apocalyp. OBJECTIONS ANSWERED. ]31 clamation, in such and such circumstances, has the force of a law ; others that a vote of the House of Lords, or of the Commons, or of both Houses together, has the same strength ; but all subjects acknowledge that an Act of the King, Lords and Commons, is binding upon them ; and this suffices for all practical pur poses. But when, Dear Sir, will there be an end of the objections and cavils of men, whose pride, ambition, or interest leads them to deny the plainest truths ! You have seen those which the ingenuity and learning of the Porteus's, Seekers, and Tillotsons have raised against the unchangeable Catholic Rule and interpreter of Faith : say, is there any thing sufficiently clear and certain in them to oppose to the luminous and sure principles, on which the Catholic method is placed ? Do they afford you a sure footing, to support you against all doubts and fears on the score of your Re ligion, especially under the apprehension of approach ing dissolution ? If you answer affirmatively ; I have nothing more to say : but if you cannot so an swer; and, if you justly dread undertaking your voyage to eternity on the presumption of your pri vate judgment, a presumption which you have clearly seen has led so many other rash Christians to cer tain shipwreck, follow the example of those who have happily arrived at the port which you are in quest of. In other words, listen to the advice of the Holy Patriarch to his son : Then Tobias answered his Father — 7 know not the way, §c. : — then his Father said — Seek thee a faithful guide. Tob. v. You will no sooner have sacrificed your own wavering judgment, and have sub mitted to follow the guide, whom your Heavenly Fa- 132 LETTER XII. ther has provided for you, than you will feel a deep conviction that you are in the right and secure way ; and very soon you will be enabled to join with the happy converts of ancient and modern times (1), in this hymn of praise : ' I give thee thanks, O God, my ' Enligh tener and Deliverer; for that thou has opened ' the eyes of my soul to know thee. Alas ! too late ' have I known thee, O ancient and eternal Truth ! ' too late have I known thee.' I am, Dear Sir, yours, Sec. J. M. (1) St. Austin's Soliloquies, c, 3s, quoted by Dean Cressy, Exomol. p. 655. THE END OF PART I. Keating, Brown and Co. Printers, 38, Duke-Street, Grosvenor-Square, London. PART I. Pag6 Address to the Right Rev. Lord Bishop of St. David's • iii LETTER I.— Introduction. Mr. Brown's Apology to Dr. M.- -Account of the Friendly Society of New Cottage 1 ESSAY I. — On the Existence of God and of Natural Religion, by the Rev. Samuel Carey, LL. D. • 5 ESSAY II.— On the Truth of the Christian Religion, by Do lt LETTER II.— To James Brown, Esq. Dr. M 's Conditions for entering on the Correspondence.- -Freedom of Speech.- -Sincerity and Candour.. -A Conclusive Method 19 LETTER III.— From James Brown, Esq. Agreement to the Conditions on the part of the Society 82 LETTER IV.— To James Brows, Esq. Dispositions for success in Religious Inquiries.- -Renunciation of pre judices, passions, and vicious inclinations.- -Fervent Prayer 24 LETTER V.— To Do. Rule or Method of finding out the True Religion.. -Christ lias left a Rule. • -This Rule must be sure and unerring. • -It must be adapted to the capacity and situations of the bulk of mankind 36 PART I, * R 134* CONTENTS. LETTER VI.— To Do. Page First fallacious Rule; Private Inspiration.. -This has led numberless Christians into errors, impiety, and vice, in ancient and in modern times.- -Account of Modern Fanatics, Anabaptists, Quakers, Mora vians, Swedeiiborgians, Methodists, &c. • 29 LETTER VII.— To Do. Objections of certain Members of the Society answered * • • 4S LETTER VIII.— To Do. Second fallacious Rule; the Scripture according to each person's particular interpretation of it.- -Christ did not intend that mankind, in general, should learn his Religion from a Book.- -No Legislator ever made Laws without providing Judges and Magistrates to explain and en force them.- -Dissensions, divisions, immorality, and infidelity whlsb have arisen from the private interpretation of Scripture.- -Illusions of Protestants in this matter.- -Their inconsistency in making Articles, Catechisms, &c. • -Acknowledgement of learned Protestants on this head 48 LETTER IX.— To Do. The subject continued. — Protestants have no evidence of the Inspira tion of Scripture ;•• nor of its authenticity :• -nor of the fidelity of their copies:- -nor of its sense.- -Causes of the obscurity of Scrip ture :• -Instances of this.- -The Protestant Rule affords no ground - for Faith. •• Doubts in which those who follow it live — and also. die 67 LETTER X.— To Do. The True Rule, namely, The Whole Word of God, unwritten as well as written, subject to the interpretation of the Church. • -In this and in every other country, the written law is grounded upon the un written law.- -Christ taught the Apostles by word of mouth, and sent them to preach it by word of mouth.- -This method was fol lowed by them and their disciples and successors.- -Testimonies of this from the Fathers of the five first centuries • • • • 80 LETTER XI.— To Do. The suhject continued.- -Protestants forced to have recourse to the Ca tholic Rule, in different instances.- -Different instances of this.- - CONTENTS. J35 Pajje Their vain attempts to adopt it in other instances. • • Quibbling evasions of the Articles, Canons, Oaths, and Laws respecting uniformity.- -Ac knowledged necessity of deceiving the people.- -Bishop Hoadley the patron of this hypocrisy.- -The Catholic Rule confessed by Bishop Marsh to be the Original Rule.. -Proofs that it has never been abro gated. •• Advantages of this Rule to the Church at large, and to its in. dividual members 94 LETTER XII.— To Do. Objections answered.- -Texts of Scripture.- -Other objections.- -Illu sory declamation of Bishop Porteus.- -The advice of Tobias, when he sent his Son into a strange country, recommended to the Society of New Cottage lir ADDITIONAL NOTES. To page 41. — Richard Kill, the author of the Six Letters in defence of Antinomianism, was not the head of the honourable family of that name in Shropshire, but a branch of it. To page 113 — Certain respectable persons having expressed a wish that the writer had given a more detailed answer to the vulgar objection, that Catho lics argue in what Logicians call a Circulus vitiosus, by proving, The Church from the Scripture, and the Scripture from the Church ; he here adds the following analysis, or explanation of his faith. 1 believe the Catholic Church, and, therefore, every thing which she teaches, upon the motives of credibility, namely, her Unity, Sanctity, &c. which accompany her.- • Now, among other things, which she teaches me, is this, that a certain Book, which she has always carefully kept in her possession, called The Scriptures, is The Inspired Word of God. Examining this book, among many things, hard to be understood, I find several things very easy and clear, particularly those, which regard the Church herself; namely, that she is founded on a Rock, against which the Gates of Hell shall not prevail ; that Christ will remain with her for ever ; and that his Holy Spirit shall teach her all truth; finally, that she is the pillar andfoundution of truth. These divine testimonies confirm and encrease my veneration for and my confi dence in the Church, which Church, however, I had learnt to revere and believe, before I opened the Scriptures. Thus the phantom of a Circulut 136* Vitiosus, in which two unproved things are adduced to prove each other, which Protestants have conjured up against the faith of Catholics, quite disappears. To elucidate this matter more clearly: — I will suppose my self to live in a remote part of the Island, where a personage, with all the insignia and other moral evidence of his being the King's delegate, presents himself to me and delivers me a letter, which he assures me was written to me by His Majesty. My first care, in common prudence, is to ascertain the character and credibility of the messenger. These being made out, to my entire satisfaction, I open the Royal letter, in which, among other things, I read as follows : ' The bearer of this letter is fully informed of our Royal ' meaning and will as to the contents of it, and of every thing relating to ' your duty and our service : you will therefore give the same credit to his ' declarations, as if they were personally given you by ourselves.' — Having perused this passage of the letter, my respect for the Messenger cannot but encrease, though, at first, I believed it to come from the King upon his testimony. ERRATA TO PART I. Page 18, line 5, for seventy-two read seventy. 61, 1, for his calamity of the see read the calamity qfhh sed 91, Note (3), for %Uov read %heov. THE END OF REIJGIOUS CONTROVERSY, §c. %c. Sec. PART H. ' There are many other things which keep me in the bosom of the ' Catholic Church. — The agreement of different people and nations keeps ' me there. — The authority established by Miracles, nourished by hope, encreased by charity and confirmed by antiquity, keeps me there. — The succession of Bishops in the See of St. Peter, the Apostle, (to whom 'our Lord, after his Resurrection, committed his sheep, to be ted) down to * the present Bishop, keeps me there. — Finally, the very name of CA- ' THOLIC, which, among so many heresies, this Church alone possesses, ' keeps me there.' St. Augustin, Doctor of the Church, A. D. 400, contra Epist. Fundatn. c. 4, THE END OF RELIGIOUS CONTROVERSY. PART II. ON THE CHARACTERISTICS OF THE TRUE CHURCH. LETTER XIII. To JAMES BROWN, Esq. <§•<;. ON THE TRUE CHURCH. DEAR SIR, _L HE Letters which I have received from you, and some others of your Religious Society ^ satisfy me that I have not altogether lost my labour, in endeavouring to prove to you, that the Private In terpretation of Holy Scripture is not a more certain Rule of Faith, than an imaginary Private Inspiration is ; and, in short, that the Church of Christ is the only sure expounder of the doctrine of Christ. Thus much you, Sir, in particular, candidly acknowledge : but you ask me, on the part of some of your friends as well as yourself, why, in case you ' must rely on ' authority,' as Bishop Porteus confesses ' the un- ' learned must,' that is to say, the great bulk of man kind, why you should not, as he advises you, ' rely on ' the authority of that Church, which God's Providence ' hath placed you under, rather than that of another ' which you have nothing to do with (1),' and why you may not trust to the Church of England, in (1) Confutation of Errors of Popery, p. 20. PART II. B £ LETTER XIII. particular, to guide you in your road to heaven,', with equakl security as to the Church of Rome ?- Before I answer you, permit me to congratulate with you on your advance, towards the clear sight of the whole truth of revelation. As long as you professed to hunt out the several articles of divine revelation, one by one, through the several books of Scripture, and under all the difficulties and uncertainties, which I have clearly shewn to attend this study, your task was interminable, aril your success hopeless : whereas, now, by taking the Church of God for your guide, you have but one simple inquiry to make: Which is this Church? a question that admits of being solved by men of good will, with equal certainty and facility. I say, there is but one inquiry to be made : Which is the true Church ? because if there is any one religious truth more evident than the rest from reason, from the Scriptures, both Old (]) and New (2), from the Apos tles' Creed (3), and from constant tradition, it is this, (1) Speaking of the future Church of the Gentiles, the Almighty pro mises, by Isaiah : Sing, 0 barren, thou that didst not bear, S,-c. . as I have sworn that the waters of Noah should no more go over the earth, so I have sworn that I would not be wroth with thee, nor rebuke thee. For the moun tains shall depart and the hills be removed, but my kindness shall not depart from thee, &c. liv. See also lix. Ix. lxiii. Jerem. xxxiii. Ezech. xxxvii. Dan. ii. Psalm lxxxix. (2) Upon this rock I will build my Church, and the gates of hell shall not prevail' against it. Matt. xvi. 18. I am with you all days even until THE END OF THE WORLD. Matt, xxviii. 20. I will pray the Father and he will give you another comforter, that he may abide zcithyou FOR EVER even the Spirit of Truth — he will teach you ALL TRUTH. John xiv. 1G, &c. The House of God, xohich is the Church of the living God, THE PILLAR AND GROUND OF TRUTH. 1 Tim. iii. 14. (3) I BELIEVE THE HOLY CATHOLIC CHURCH; or, I BELIEVE IN THE HOLY CATHOLIC CHURCH. Art. ix. The article is read differently by different Holy Fathers; but either way mean's the same thins. THE TRUE CHURCH. 3 that ' the Catholic Church preservesthe true worship 'of the Deity; she being the fountain of truth, the * house of faith, and the temple of God,' as an an cient Father of the Church expresses it (l). Hence it is as clear as the noon-day light, that by solving this one question : Which is the true Church ? you will at once solve every question of religious controversy that ever has been, or that ever can be agitated. You will not need to spend your life in studying the Sa cred Scriptures in their original languages, and their authentic copies, and in confronting pas sages with each other, from Genesis to Revelations, — a task by no means calculated, as is evident, for the bulk of mankind : — you will only have to hear what the Church teaches upon the several articles of her faith, in order to know with certainty what God has revealed concerning them. Neither need you hearken to contending sects, and doctors of the pre sent, or of past times: you will need only to hear the Church, which indeed Christ commands you to hear, under pain of being treated as a heathen or a publican. Matt, xviii. 17. I now proceed, Dear Sir, to your question; why, ad mitting the necessity of being guided by the Church, may not you and your friends submit to be guided by the Church of England, or any other Protestant Church to which you respectively belong ? — My answer is ; be cause no such Church professes, or, consistently with the fundamental Protestant Rule of private judgment, can profess to be a guide in matters of Religion. If you admit, but for an instant, Church-authority, then (1) Lactan. De Divin. Iustft. 1. 4. B 2 4 LETTER XIII. Luther, Calvin, and Cranmer, with all the other foun ders of Protestantism, were evidently heretics, by re belling against it. In short, no other Church but the Catholic, can claim to be a religious Guide; because evidently she alone is the True Church oj Christ This assertion leads me to the proof of what I assertedf above, respecting the facility and certainty, with which persons of good will may solve that most im portant question : Which is the True Church f Luther (]), Calvin (2), and the Church Qi Eng land (3), assign as the characteristics, or n a l k -. of the true Church of Christ, Truth of Doctrine, m.u the right Administration of the Sacraments. Bui tn follow this method of finding out the true Church, would be to throw ourselves back into those endless controversies concerning the true doctrine, and the right discipline, which it is my present object to put an end to, by de monstrating, at once, Which is the True Church. To shew the inconsistency of the Protestant method ; let us suppose that, at the levee, some person were to in quire of his neighbour, Which of the personages present is the Prince Regent ? and that he was to receive for answer : It is the King's eldest son : would this answer, however true, be of any use to the inquirer ? Evidently not- Whereas, if he were told that the Prince wore such and such clothes and ornaments, and was seated ¦ in such or such a place, these exterior marks would, at once, put him in possession of the information he was in search of. Thus we Catholics, when we are asked; which are the marks of the True Church ? point out certain exterior, visible marks, such as plain, unlearned (!) De Concil, Eccles, (2) Instit, 1, 41, (3) Art, 19. THE TRUE CHURCH. 5 persons can discover, if they will take ordinary pains ibr this purpose, no less than persons of the greatest abilities and literature : at the same time that they are the very marks of this Church, which, as I said above, natural Reason, the Scriptures, the Creeds, and the Fathers, assign and demonstrate to be the true marks, by which it is to be distinguished. Yes, my Dear Sir, these marks of the True Church are so plain in them selves, and so evidently point it out, that, as the Pro phet Isaias has foretold, xxxv. 8., fools cannot err, in their road to it. They are the flaming beacons, which for ever shine on the mountain at the top of the moun tains of the Lord's house. Isai. ii. 2. In short, the particular motives for credibility, which point out the True Church of Christ, demonstrate this with no less certitude and evidence, than the general motives of credibility demonstrate the Truth of the Christian Religion. The chief marks of the True Church, which I shall here assign, are not only conformable to Reason, Scrip ture, and Tradition, but, which is a most fortunate circumstance, they are such as the Church of England, and most other respectable denominations ot Pro testants, acknowledge and profess to believe in, no less than Catholics, Yes, Dear Sir, they are contained in those Creeds which you recite in your daily prayers, and proclaim in your solemn worship. In fact, what do you say of the Church you believe in, when you repeat the Apostles' Creed ? You say, I BELIEVE IN THE HOLY CATHOLIC CHURCH Again, how is this Church more p^rticularl) described in the Nicene Creed, which makes part of your public li turgy. In this you say: I BELIEVE IN ONE 6 LETTER XIV. CATHOLIC AND APOSTOLIC CHURCH (1). Hence it evidently follows that the Church which you,1 no less than we, profess to believe in, is possessed of these four marks: UNITY, SANCTITY, CATHO LICITY, and APOSTOLICITY.— It is agreed upon, then, that all we have to do, by way of discovering the True Church, is to find out which of the rival Churches, or communions, is peculiarly OME — HOLY— CATHOLIC— and APOSTOLIC— Thrice happy, Dear Sir, I deem it, that we agree together, by the terms of our common Creeds, in a matter of such infinite importance, for the happy termination of all our controversies, as are these qualities, or charac ters of the True Church, which ever that may be found to be ! Still, notwithstanding this agreement in our Creeds, I shall not omit to illustrate these characters, or marks, as I treat of them, by argu ments from Reason, Scripture, and the ancient Fa thers. I am, Dear Sir, &c. J. M. LETTER XIV. 2b JAMES BROWN, Esq. $c. UNITY OF THE CHURCH. DEAR «IR, Nothing is more clear to natural reason, than that God cannot be the author of dif ferent Religions : for being the Eternal Truth, he cannot reveal contradictory doctrines ; and, being at (l) Order of Administration of the Lord's Supper. UNITY OF THE CHURCH. 7 the same time, the Eternal Wisdom, and the God of Peace, he cannot establish a kingdom divided against itself. Hence it follows, that the Church of Christ must be strictly ONE; one in doctrine, one in zvor- ship, and one in government. This mark of Unity in the True Church, which is so clear from reason, is still more clear from the following passages of Holy Writ. Our Saviour, then, speaking of himself, in thecharac- ter of the good Shepherd, says : I have other sheep (the Gentiles) which are not of this fold ; them also I must biding, and they shall hear my voice, and there shall be ONE FOLD, and one Shepherd. John x. Ir7. To the same effect, addressing his heavenly Father, previously to his passion, he says : / pray for all that shall believe in me, that THEY MAY BE ONE, as thou, Father, art in me and I in thee. John xvii. 20, 21. In like manner St. Paul emphatically incul cates the Unity of the Church, where he writes : Tie being many are ONE BODY in Christ, and every one menbers one of another. Rom. xii. 5. Again he writes : There is ONE BODY and one spirit, as you are called in one hope of your calling ; one, Lord, ONE FAITH, and one Baptism. Ephes. iv. 4. 5. Conformably to this doctrine, respecting the necessary unity of the Church, this Apostle reckons HERESIES among the sins which exclude from the kingdom of God, Gal. v. 20. and he requires that a man who is a heretic,*after the first and second admonition, be rejected. Tit. iii. 10. The Apostolical Fathers, St. Polycarp and St. Igna tius, in their published Epistles, hold precisely the same language on this subject with St. Paul ; as does also their disciple St. Irenaeus, who writes thus : ' No re- 8 LETTER XIV. ' formation can he so advantageous as the evil of 'schism is pernicious (l).' The great light of the third century, St. Cyprian, has left us a whole book on the Unity of the Church, in which, among other similar passages, he writes as follows : ' There is but ' one God, and one Christ, and one Faith, and a peo- ' pie joined in one solid body with the cement of con- ' cord. This unity cannot suffer a division, nor this ' one body bear to be disjointed. — He cannot have * God for his Father, who has not the Church for his ' mother. If any one could escape the deluge out of ' Noah's ark, he who is out of the Church may also ' escape. — To abandon the Church is a crime, which ' blood cannot wash away. Such a one may be killed,, ' but he cannot be crowned (2).' In the fourth cen tury, the illustrious St. John Chrysostom, writes thus : ' We know that salvation belongs to the Church alone, ' and that no one can partake of Christ, nor be saved ' out of the Catholic Church and Faith (5).' The lan guage of St. Augustin, in the fifth century, is equally strong on this subject, in numerous passages. Among others, the synodical Epistle of the Council of Zerta, in 412, drawn up by this Saint, tells the Donatist schismatics: 'Whoever is separated from this Catholic * Church, however innocently he may think he lives, * for this crime alone, that he is separated from the ' unity of Christ, will not have life, but the anger ' of God remains upon him (4).' Not less emphatical, and to the same effect, are the testimonies of St. Ful- gentius and St. Gregory the Great, in the sixth cen tury, in various passages of their writings. I shall (1) De Hair. 1. i. c. S. (2) Cypr. deUnit. Oxon, p, 109. (3) Horn, 1. in Pase. (4) Condi. Labbe, torn. ii. p. 15.20, PROTESTANT DISUNION. Q content myself with citing one of them. ' Out of this 'Church,' says the former Father, 'neither the name ' of Christian avails, nor does baptism save, nor is a c clean sacrifice offered, nor is there forgiveness of ' sins, nor is the happiness of eternal life to be ' found (1).' In short, such has been the language of the Fathers and Doctors of the Church in all ages, concerning her essential Unity, and the indispensable obligation of being united to her. Such also have been the formal declarations of the Church herself, in those decrees, by which she has condemned and ana thematized the several heretics and schismatics that have dogmatized in succession, whatever has been the quality of their errors, or tbe pretext for their dis union. I am, Dear Sir, &c. J. M. LETTER XV. To JAMES BROWN, Esq. «$-c. PROTESTANT DISUNION. DEAR SIR, In the inquiry I am about to make respecting the Church or Society of Christians, to (1) Lib. de Remiss. Peccat. c. 23. — N. B. This doctrine concerning the Unity of the Church, and the necessity of adhering to it, under pain of damnation, which appears so rigid to modern Protestants, was almost uni versally taught by their predecessors: as, for example, by Calvin, 1. iv.Instit. 1, and Beza, Confess. Fid. c.v.; by the Huguenots in their Catechism; by the Scotch, in their Profession of 1568; by the Church of England, Art. 18; by the celebrated Bishop Pearson, &c. The last named writes thus : ' Christ ' never appointed two ways to heaven ; nor did he build a Church, to save ' some, and make another institution for other men's salvation. As none ' were saved from the deluge but such as were within the ark of Noah — so ' none shall ever escape the eternal wrath of God, which belqng uot to the ' Church of God.'— Exposit. of Creed, p. 349. PART II. T 10 LETTER XV. which this mark of Unity belongs, it will be sufficient for my purpose to consider, that of Protestants, on one hand, and that of Catholics on the other. To speak properly, however, it is an absurdity to talk of the Church * or Society of Protestants ; for the term PROTESTANT expresses nothing positive, much less any union or association of persons: it barely signi fies one who protests, or declares, against some other person or persons, thing or things; anr! in the present instance it signifies those who protest against the Ca tholic Church. Hence, there may be and there are, numberless sects of Protestants, divided from each other in every thing, except in opposing their true Mother, the Catholic Church. St. Augustin reckons up 90 heresies which had protested against the Church before his time, that is, during the first four hundred years of her existence ; and ecclesiastical writers have counted about the same number, who rose up since that period, down lo the asra of Luther's Protestation, which took place early in the sixteenth century : whereas, from the last-mentioned sera, to the end of the same century, Staphylusand Cardinal Hosius, enume rated 270 different sects of Protestants : and, alas ! how have Protestant sects, beyond reckoning and descrip tion, multiplied, during the last 200 years ! Thus has the observation of the above-cited holy Father been verified in modern, no less than it was in former ages, where he exclaims : ' Into how many morsels have those ' sects been broken who have divided themselves from ' the unity of the Church (1).' You are not ignorant that the illustrious Bossuet has written two considerable (1) St. Aug. contra Peiillian. PROTESTANT DISUNION. 11 volumes on the Variations of the Protestants; chiefly on those of the Lutheran and the Calvinistic pedigrees. Numerous other variations, dissensions and mutual persecutions, even to the extremity of death ( 1), which have taken place among them, I have had occasion to mention in my former letters and other works (2). I have also quoted the lamentations of Calvin, Duditfi, and other heads of the Protestants, on the subject of these divisions. You will recollect, in particular, what the latter writes concerning those differences : ' Our ' people are carried away by every wind of doctrine. ' If you know what their belief is to-day, you cannot ' tell what it will be to-morrow. Is there one article ' of religion, in which these Churches, who are at war ' with the Pope, agree together? If you run over all ' the articles, from the first to the last, you will not ' find one, which is not held by some of them to be (1) Luther pronounced the Sacramentarians, namely, the Calvinists, Zuingliaus, and those Protestants, in general, who denied the Real Presence of Christ in the Sacrament, heretics, and damned souls, for whom it is not law- fultopray. Epist. ad Arginten. Catech. Parv. Comment, in Gen. His fol lowers persecuted Bucer, Melanchton's nephew, with imprisonment, and Crellius to death, for endeavouring to soften their master's doctrine in this point. Mosheim by Maclaine, vol. iv. p. 341 — 353. Zuinglius, while he deified Hercules, Theseus, &c. condemned the Anabaptists to be drowned, pronouncing this sentence on Felix Mans : ' Qui iterum mergunt mergantur ;' which sentence was accordingly executed at Zurich. Limborch. Introd. TI. Not content with anathematizing and imprisoning those Reformers, who dissented from his system, John Calvin caused two of them, Servetus and Gruet, to be put to death. The Presbyterians of Holland and New England were equally intolerant with respect to other denominations of Prulestants. The latter hanged four Quakers, one of them a woman, on account of their Religion. In England, itself, frequent executions of Anabaptists and other Protestants took place, from the reign of Edward VI. till that of Charles i. and other less sanguinary persecutions till the time of James II, (?) LETTERS TO A PREBENDARY, &c. T2 12 LETTER XV. ' an article of faith, and rejected by others, as an * impiety (1).' With these and numberless other historical facts, of the same nature, before his eyes, would it not, Dear Sir, I appeal to your own good sense, be the extremity of folly, for any one to lay the least claim to the mark of unity in favour of Protestants, or to pretend that they, who are united in nothing but their hostility towards the Catholic Church, can form The One Church we pro fess to believe, in the Creed ! Perhaps, however, you will say that the mark of unity, which is wanting among the endless divisions of Protestants in general, may be found in the Church to which you belong, the Established Church of England. — I grant, Dear Sir> that your communion has better pretensions to this, and the other marks of the Church, than any other Protestant Society has. She is, as ou'r controversial Poet sings, ' The least deform'd, because reform'd the ' least (2).' You will recollect the account I have given, in a former letter (3), of the material changes which this Church has undergone, at different times, since her first entire formation in the reign of the last Edward, and which place her at variance with herself. You will also remember the proofs of Hoadlyism, in other words, of Socinianism, that damnable and cursed heresy, as this Church termed it in her last Synod (4*), which I brought against some of her most illustrious Bishops, Archdeacons and other Dignitaries of modern times. These teach in official charges to the clergy, (1) Epist. ad Capiton. inter Epist. Beza:. (2) Dryden, Hind and Panther. (3) Letter viii. (4) Constitutions and Canons A. D, 1640. Sparrow's Collect, p. 355, PROTESTANT DISUNION. 13 in consecration sermons, and in publications addressed to the throne, that the Church herself is nothing more than a voluntary association of certain people for the benefit of social worship; that they themselves are in no other sense Ministers of God, than civil officers are ; that Christ has left us no exterior means of grace, and that, of course, Baptism and the Lord's Supper (which are declared necessary for salvation in the Ca techism) produce no spiritual effect at all ; in short, that all mysteries, and among the rest those of the Trinity and Incarnation, (for denying which the Pre lates of the Church of England have sent so many Arians to the stake in the reigns of Edward, Eliza beth, and James I.) are mere nonsense (l). When I had occasion to expose this fatal system, (the pro fessors of which, Cranmer and Ridley would have sent, at once, to the stake) I hoped it was of a local nature, and that defending, as I was in this point, the Articles and Liturgy of the Established Church, as well as my own, I should, thus far, be supported by its Dignitaries and other learned members. I found, however, the contrary to be generally the case (2), and that the irreligious infection was infinitely more ex tensive than I apprehended. In fact, I found the most celebrated professors of Divinity in the Universities, delivering Dr. Balguy *s doctrine to the young clergy (1) See extracts from the Sermons of Bishop Hoadley, Dr. Balguy, and Dr. Sturges, in Letters to a Prebendary, Let. viii. The most perspicuous and nervous of these Preachers, unquestionably, was Dr. Balguy. See his Dis courses and Charges preached on public occasions and dedicated to the King. Lockyer Davis, 1785. (2) That great ornament of the Episcopal bench, Dr. Horsley, Bishop of St. Asaph's, does not fall under this censure; as he protected the present writer, both in and out of Parliament. 14 LETTER XV. in their Public Lectures, and the most enlightened Bishops publishing it in their Pastorals and other •works. Among these, the Norrisian Professor of The ology at Cambridge, carries his deference to the Arch deacon of Winchester so far, as to tell his scholars : ' As I distrust my own conclusions more than his (Dr. 4 Balguy's), if you judge that they are not reconcile** ' ble, I must exhort you to confide in him rather than ' roe (1).' In fact, his ideas concerning the mysteries of Christianity, particularly the Trinity and our Re demption by Christ, and indeed concerning most other theological points, perfectly agree with those of Dr. Balguy. He represents the difference between the members of the Established Church and the Socinians, to consist in nothing but ' a few unmeaning words,' and asserts, that ' they need never be upon their guard ' against each other (2).' Speaking of the custom, as he calls it, ' in the Scripture, of mentioning Father, • ' Son, and Holy Ghost together, on the most solemn oc- ' casions, of which Baptism is one,' — he says, ' Did I ' pretend to understand what I say, I might be a Tri- ' theist or an Infidel ; but I could not worship the one ' true God, and acknowledge Jesus Christ to be Lord 'of all (3).' Another learned Professor of Divinity, who is also a Bishop of the Established Church, teaches his clergy ' Not to esteem any particular ' opinion concerning the Trinity, satisfaction and ori- ' ginal sin necessary to salvation (4).' Accordingly, (1) Leetures in- Divinity, delivered in the University of Cambridge by J. Hey, D. D. as Norrisian Professor, in four volumes, 1797. Vol. ii. p. 104. (2) Vol. ii. p. 41. (3) Vol. ii. pp. 250, 251. (4) Dr. Watson, Bishop of Landaff 's Charge, 1795. PROTESTANT DISUNION. 15 he equally absolves the Unitarian from impiety, in re fusing divine honour to our blessed Saviour, and ' the ' worshipper of Jesus,' as he expresses himself, from idolatry, in paying it to him, on the score of their com mon good intention (l). This sufficiently shews what the Bishop's own belief was, concerning the adorable Trinity and the Divinity of the second person of it. — I have given, in a former letter, a remarkable passage from the above quoted charge, where Bishop Watson, speaking of the doctrines of Christianity, says to his assembled clergy : ' I think it safer to tell you where 1 they are contained, than what they are. They are ' contained in the Bible ; and if, in reading that book, ' your sentiments should be different from those of ' your neighbour, or from those of the Church, he per- ' suaded that infallibility appertains as little to you, as ' it does to the Church.' I have elsewhere exposed the complete Socinianism of Bishop Hoadley and his scho lars (2), among whom we must reckon Bishop Shipley in the first rank. Another celebrated writer, who was himself a digni tary of the Establishment (3), arguing, as he does most powerfully, against the consistency and efficacy of public confessions of faith, among Protestants of every denomination, says, that out of a hundred ministers of the establishment, who, every year, subscribe the Ar ticles made ' to prevent diversity of opinions,' he has reason to believe ' that above one fifth of this number ' do not subscribe or assent to these articles in one (1) Collect, of Theol. Tracts, Pref. p. 17. (2) Letters to a Prebendary. (3) Dr. Blackburn, Archdeacon of Cleaveland, author of the Confes sional. 16" LETTER XV. ' uniform sense (1).' He also quotes a Right Rev. au thor who maintains, that ' No two thinking men ever ' aoreed exactly in their opinion, even with regard to ' any one article of it (2).' He also quotes the famous Bishop Burnet, who says, that ' The requiring of sub- ' scription to the 39 Articles is a great imposition (3), ' and that the greater part of the clergy subscribe the ' Articles, without ever examining them, and others do ' it because they must do it, though they can hardly sa- ' tisfy their consciences about some things in them (4).' He shews that the advocates for subscribtion, Doctors Nichols, Bennet, Waterland, and Stebbing, all vindi cated it on opposite grounds; and he is forced to con fess the same thing, with respect to the enemies of subscription, with whom he himself ranks. Dr. Clark pretends there is a Salvo in the subscription, namely, / assent to the articles, in as much as they are agreeable to Scripture (5), though the Judges of England have declared the contrary (rj). Dr. Sykes alledges that the Articles were either purposely or negligently made equivocal (7). Another writer, whom he praises, un dertakes to explain, how ' these Articles may be sub- ' scribed, and consequently believed, by a Sabellian, an ' Orthodox Trinitarian, a Tritheist, and an Arian, so ' called.' After this citation Dr. Blackburn shrewdly adds : ' One would wonder what idea this writer had ' of Peace, when he supposed it might be kept by the ' act of subscription among men of these different 'judgments (8).' If you will look into Overton's (1) Confess. 3 Ed. p. 45. (2) Dr. Clayton, Rishop of Clogher. (3) Confess, p. 83, (4) P. 91. • (5) P. c*J.'. (6) P- 183. (7) P. 237. (8) P. 239, PROTESTANT DISUNION. 17 True Churchman Ascertained, you will meet with addi tional proofs of the repugnance of many other Digni taries and distinguished Churchmen to the Articles of their own Church, as well as of their disagreement in faith among themselves. Hence you will not wonder that a numerous body of them should, some years ago, have petitioned the Legislature to be relieved from the grievance, as they termed it, of subscribing to these Ar ticles (1), and that we should continually hear of the mutilation of the Liturgy by so many of them, to avoid sanctioning those doctrines of their Church, which they disbelieve and reject, particularly the Athanasian Creed and the Absolution (2). I might disclose a still wider departure from their original confessions of faith, and still more signal dis sensions among the different Dissenters, and particularly among the old stock of the Presbyterians and Inde pendents, if this were necessary. Most of these, says Dr. Jortin, are now Socinians, though we all know, they heretofore persecuted that sect with fire and sword. The renowned Dr. Priestley, not only denied the Divinity of Christ, but with horrid blasphemy, accused him of numerous errors, weaknesses and faults (3) : and when the authority of Calvin, in burn ing Servetus was objected to him, he answered; ' Cal- ' vin was a great man, but, if a little man be placed on ' the shoulders of a mant he will be enabled to see far- o (1) Particularly in 1772. (2) The omission of the Athanasian Creed, in particular, so often took place in the public service, that an Act of Parliament has just passed, among other things, to enforce the repetition of it. But, if the clergymen alluJcd to really believe that Christ is not God, what is the Legislature doing :? forcing them to worship him as God ! (3) Theolog. Reposit. Vol. 4, PART II. U 18 LETTER XV. ' ther than the giant himself.' The Doctrine now preached in the fashionable Unitarian Chapels of the Metropolis, I understand, greatly resembles that of the late Theophilanthropists of France, instituted by an infidel, one of the five Directors. The chief question, however, at present is whether the Church of England can lay any claim to the first character or mark of the true Church, pointed out in our common Creed, that of UNITY ? On this subject I have to observe, that in addition to the dissensions among its members, already mentioned, there are whole Societies, not communicating with the ostensible Church of England, who make .very strong and plau sible pretensions to be, each of them, the real Church of England. Such are the Non-jurors, who maintain the original doctrine of this Church, contained in the Homilies concerning Passive Obedience and Non- resistance, and who adhere to the first Ritual of Edward VI. (l) : such are the Evangelical Preachers aud their disciples, who insist upon it that pure Calvinism is the Creed of the Established Church (2): finally, such are the Methodists, whom Professor Hey, describes as forming The Old Church of England (3). And, even (1) To this Church belonged Ken, and the other six Bishops, who were deposed at the Revolution, Leslie, Collier, Hicks, Bret, and many other chief ornaments of the Church of England. (2) It is clear from the Articles and Homilies, and still more from the per secution of the assertors of Free-will in this country, that the Church of England was Calvinistic till the end of the reign of James I. in the course of which he sent Episcopal representatives from England and Scotland to the great Protestant Synod of Dort. These, in the name of their respective Churches, signed that ' The Faithful who fall into atrocious crimes, do not ? forfeit justification, or incur damnation.' (3) Vol. ii. p. 73. CATHOLIC UNITY. 19 now, it is notorious that many clergymen preach in the Churches in the morning, and in the Meeting houses in the evening ; while their opulent patrons are purchasing as many Church- livings as they can, in order to fill them with incumbents of the same de scription. Tell me now, Dear Sir, whether, from this view of the state of the Church of England, or from any other fair view which can be taken of it, you will venture to ascribe to it that first mark of the True Church, which you profess to belong to her, when, in the face of heaven and earth, you solemnly declare : i" believe in ONE Catholic Church ? Say : is there any single mark or principle of real unity in it ! I antici pate the answers your candour will give to these questions. I am, &c J. M. LETTER XVI. To JAMES BROWN, Esq. $c. CATHOLIC UNITY. DEAR SIR, We have now to see whether that first mark of the True Church, which we confess in our Creeds, but which we have found to be wanting to the Protestant Societies, and even to the most osten sible and orderly of them, the Established Church of England, does or does not appear in that principal and primaeval stock of Christianity, called The Catholic Church. In case this Church, spread, as it is, through out the various nations of the earth, and subsisting, US 20 LETTER XVI. as it has done, through all ages, since that of Christ and his Apostles, should have maintained that religi ous Unity, which the modern sects, confined to a sin gle people, have been unable to preserve, you will allow that it must have been framed by a consummate Wisdom, and protected by an omnipotent Pro vidence. Now, Sir, I maintain it, as a notorious fact, that this original and great Church is, and ever has been strictly ONE in all the above-mentioned particulars, and first in her Faith and terms of communion. The same Creeds, namely, the Apostles' Creed, the Nicene Creed, the Athanasian Creed, and the Creed of Pope Pius IV. drawn up in conformity with the definitions of the Council of Trent, are every where recited and professed, to the strict letter ; the same articles of Faith and morality are taught in all our Catechisms, the same Rule of Faith, namely, the. Revealed Word of God, contained iii Scripture and Tradition, and the same expositor and interpreter of this Rule, the Ca tholic Church speaking by the mouth of her Pas-. tors, are admitted and proclaimed by all Catholics throughout the four quarters of the globe, from Ire land to Chili, and from Canada to India. You may convince yourself of this any day, at the Royal Ex change, by conversing with intelligent Catholic mer chants, from the several countries in question. You may satisfy yourself respecting it, even by interro gating the poor illiterate Irish, and other Catholic fo reigners, who traverse the country in various directions. Ask them their belief as to the fundamental articles of Christianity, the Unity and Trinity of God, the Incar nation and death of Christ, his Divinity, and Atone- CATHOLIC UNITY. 21 ment for sin by his passion and death, the necessity of Baptism, the nature of the Blessed Sacrament; question them on these and other such points, but with kindness, patience, and condescension, particularly with respect to their language and delivery, and, I will venture to say, you will not find any essential variation in the answers of most of them ; and much less such as you will find by proposing the same questions to an equal number of Protestants, whether learned or unlearned, of the self same denomination. At all events, the Gatholics, if properly interrogated, will confess their belief in one comprehensive article ; namely this : I believe what ever the Holy Catholic Church believes and teaches. Protestant divines, at the present day, excuse their dissent from the Articles, which they subscribe and swear to, by reason of their alledged antiquity and ob soleteness (l), though none of them are yet quite two centuries and a half old (2) ; and they feel no difficulty in avowing, that ' a tacit Reformation,' since the first pretended Reformation, has taken place among them (3). This alone is a confession that their Church is not one and the same : whereas all Catholics believe as firmly in the doctrinal decisions of the Council of Nice, passed 1500 years ago, as they do in those of the Council of Trent, confirmed in 1564, and other still more recent decisions ; because the Catholic Church, like its Divine Founder, is the same yesterday, to day, and for ever. Heb. xiii. 8. Nor is it in her Doctrine only, that the Catholic ( 1) Dr. Hey's Lectures in Divinity, vol. ii, pp. 49, 50, 5 1, &c. (2) The 39 Articles were drawn in 1562, and confirmed by the Queen and the Bishops in 1571. (3) Hey, p. 48. 22 LETTER XVI. Church is one and the same ; she is also uniform in what ever is essential in her Liturgy. In every part of the world, she offers up the same unbloody Sacrifice of the Holy Mass, which is her chief act of Divine worship ; she administers the same seven sacraments, provided by infinite wisdom and mercy for the several wants of the faithful ; the great festivals of our Redemption are kept holy on the same days, and the Apostolical fast of Lent is every where proclaimed and observed. In short, such is the Unity of the Catholic Church, that when Catholic Priests or laymen, landing at one of the neighbouring ports, from India, Canada, or Brazil, come to ray chapel (1), I find them capable of joining with me in every essential part of the Divine service. Lastly, as a regular, uniform, ecclesiastical consti tution and government, and a due subordination of its members, are requisite to constitute a uniform Church, and to preserve in it Unity of doctrine and liturgy ; so these are undeniably evident in the Catholic Church, and in her alone. She is, in the language of St. Cyprian : 'The habitation of Peace and Unity (2),' and in that of the inspired text, like an army in battle array (3). Spread, as the Catholics are, over the face of the earth, according to my former observation, aud disunited, as they are, in every other respect, they form one uniform body in the order of Religion. Whether roaming in the plains of Paraguay, or con fined in the palaces of Pekin, each simple Catholic, in point of ecclesiastical ceconomy, is subject to his (1) At Winchester, where the writer resided when this letter was written. (2) ' Domicilium pacis et unitatis.' St, Cyp. (3) Cant, vi. 4, CATHOLIC UNITY. 23 Pastor ; each Pastor submits to his Bishop, and each Bishop acknowledges the supremacy of the successor of St. Peter, in matters of faith, morality, and spi ritual jurisdiction. In every case of error, or in subordination, which, from the frailty and malice of the human heart, must, from time to time, disturb her, there are found canons and ecclesiastical tribunals andjudges, to correct and put an end to the evil, while similar evils in other religious Societies are found to be interminable. I have said little or nothing of the varieties of Pro testants, in regard to their liturgies and ecclesiastical governments, because these matters being very intri cate and obscure, as well as diversified, would lead me too far a-field for my present plan. It is sufficient to remark, that the numerous Protestant sects, expressly disclaim any union with each other in these points ; — that a great proportion of them reject every species of liturgy and ecclesiastical government whatever ; — that, in the Church of England herself, very many of her dignitaries, and other distinguished members, ex press their pointed disapprobation of certain parts of her liturgy, no less than of her articles (1) ; — and that none of them appear to stand in awe of any authority* except that which is enforced by the civil power. Upon a review of the whole matter of Protestant Dis union and Catholic Unity, I am forced to repeat with (l) Archdeacon Paley very naturally complains that, ' the doctrine of the ' Articles of the Church of England,' which he so pointedly objects to, f are interwoven with much industry into her forms of public worship.' 1 have not met with a Protestant Bishop, or other eminent divine, from Archbishop Tillotson down to the present Bishop of Lincoln, who approves altogether of the Athanasian Creed, which, however, is appointed to be said or sung on thirteen chief festivals in the year. 24 LETTER XVII. Tertullian : ' It is the character of error to vary^; but ' when a tenet is found to be one and the same among ' a great variety' of people, it is to be considered not ' as an error but as a Divine Tradition (1).' I am, Dear Sir, &c. J. M. LETTER XVII. From JAMES BROWN, Esq. OBJECTIONS TO THE CLAIM OF EXCLUSIVE SALVATION. REVEREND SIR, I -am too much taken up myself with the present subject of your letters, willingly, to interrupt the continuation of them : but some of the Gentlemen, who frequent New Cottage, having com municated your three last to a learned dignitary, wjio is upon a visit in our neighbourhood, and he having made certain remarks upon them, I have been solicited by those Gentlemen to forward them to you. The terms of our correspondence render an apology from me unnecessary, and still more the conviction that I believe you entertain of my being, with sincere respect and regard, Rev. Sir, &c. JAMES BROWN. (1) De Praescrip. contra Hser. The famous Bishop Jewel, in excuse for the acknowledged variations of his own Church, objects to Catholics that there are varieties in theirs ; namely, some of the Friars are dressed in black, and some in white, and some in blue : that some of them live on meat, and some on fish, and some on herbs : they have also disputes in their schools, as Dr. Porteus also remarks; but they both omit to mention, that these disputes are not about articles of Faith, CATHOLIC UNITY. 25 Extract of a Letter from the Rev. N. N. Prebendary ofN. to Mr. N. It is well known to many Roman Catholic Gentle men, wi^h whom I have lived in habits of social inter course, that I was always a warm advocate for their Emancipation, and, that so far from having any ob jections to their religion, I considered their hopes of future bliss a3 well founded as my own. In return, I thought I saw in them a corresponding liberality and charity. But these letters which you liave sent me from the correspondent of your Society at Winchester, have quite disgusted me with their bigotry and un- charitableness. In opposition to the "Chrysostomes and Augustins, whom he quotes so copiously, for his doctrine of exclusive salvation, I will place a modern Bishop of my Church, no way inferior to them, Dr. Watson, who says : ' Shall we never be freed from the ' narrow-minded contentious of bigots, and from the ' insults of men who knozv not what spirit they are of, ' when they stint the Omnipotent in the exercise of his ' mercy, and bar the doors of heaven against every sect ' but their own ? Shall we never learn to think more ' humbly of ourselves and less despicably of others ; to ' believe that the Father of the Universe accommodates ' not l)is judgmepjts to the wretched wranglings of ' pedantic theologues ; but that every one, who, with L an honest intention, and to the best of his abilities, ' seeketh truth, whether he findeth it or not, and 4 worketh righteousness, will be accepted of by him (1):' (1) Bishop Watson's Thcolog., Tracts, Pref. p. 17.* Part ii.: X gt3 LETTER XVII. These, Sir, are exactly my sentiments, as they were those of the illustrious Hoadley in his celebrated Ser mon, which had the effect of stifling most of the remaining bigotry in the Established Church (]). There is not any prayer which I more frequently or fervently repeat, than that of the liberal-minded Poet, who himself passed for a Roman Catholic, particularly the following stanza of it : • Let not this weak and erring hand ' Presume thy bolts to throw, , ' And deal damnation round the land ' On each I judge thy foe (?).' I hope your Society will require its Popish correspon. dent, before he writes any more letters to it on other subjects, to answer what our Prelate and his own Poet have advanced against the bigotry and uncharitable- ness, of excluding Christians, of any denomination, from the mercies of God and everlasting happiness. He may assign whatever marks he pleases of the True Church, but I,' for my part, shall ever consider qharity as the only sure mark of this, conformably with what Christ says : By this shall all know that ye are my dis ciples, if ye have love one to another. John xiii. 35. (1) Bishop Hoadley's Sermons On the Kingdom of Christ. This made the choice of religion a thing indifferent, and subjected the whole business of Religion to the Civil Power. Hence sprung the famous Bangorian Contro versy, which was on the point of ending in a censure upon Hoadley from the Cojivocation, when the latter was interdicted by Ministry, and has never since, in the course of a hundred years, been allowed to meet again, (2) Pope's Universal Prayer, 27 LETTER XVIII. To JAMES BROWN, Esq. OBJECTIONS ANSWERED. DEAR SIR, In answer to the objections of the Reverend Prebendary, to my letters ou the mark of Unity in the True Church, and the necessity of being incorporated in this Church, I must observe, in the first place, that nothing disgusts a reasoning Divine more than vague charges of bigotry and intolerance ; inasmuch as they have no distinct meaning, and are equally applied to all sects and individuals, by others, whose religious opinions are more lax than their own. These odious accusations which your Churchmen bring against Catholics, the Dissenters bring against you, who are equally loaded with them by Deists, as these, are, in their turn, by Atheists and Materialists., Let us then, Dear Sir, in the serious discussions of Religion, confine ourselves to language of a defined meaning, leaving vague and tinsel terms to poets and novelists. It seems then, that Bishop Watson, with the Rev, N. N. and other fashionable Latitudinarians of the day, are indignant at the idea of ' stinting the Omnipotent ' in the exercise of his mercy, and barring the doors of ' heaven against any sect,' however heterodox or im pious. Nevertheless in the very passage, which I have quoted, they themselves stint this mercy to those who * work righteousness,' which implies a restraint on men's passions. Methinks I, now hear some epicure Dives or elegant libertine, retorting on, these liberal, charitable Divines, in their own words : ' Pedantic Theologues, X 2 28 LETTER XVIII. ' narrozv- minded bigots, who stint the Omnipotent in the ' exercise of his mercy, and bar the doors of heaven ' against me, for following the impulse which he ' himself has planted in me !'— The same language might, with equal justice, be put into the mouth of Nero, Judas Iscariot, and of the very demons them selves. Thus, in pretending to magnify God's mercy, these men would annihilate his justice^ his sanctity, and his veracity ! Our business then is, riot to form arbitrary theories concerning the Divine attributes, but to attend to what God himself has revealed concerning them aud the ex ercise of them. What words can be more express than those of Christ on this point : He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved ; but he that believeth hot shall be damned ! Mark xvi. 16, or than those of St. Paul: Without faith it is impossible to please God, Heb. xi. 6". Conformably to this doctrine, the same Apostle classes heresies with murder and adultery ; concerning which he says i they who do such things shall hot inherit the kingdon} of God, Gal. v. 20, 21. Accordingly, he orders that a man, zvho is a heretic, shall be rejected, Tit. iii. 10, and the Apostle of Charity, St. John, for bids the faithful to receive him into their houses ; or even to bid him God speed who bringeth not this doctrine of Christ, 2 John i. 10. This Apostle acted up to his iule, with respect to the treatment of persons out of the Church, when hehastily withdrew from a public building, in which he met the heretic Cerinthus, * lest,' as he said, ' it should fall down upon him (l).' I have given, in a former letter, some* of the nurnber- (1) S. Iren. 1. iii. Euseb. Hist. 1. iii. OBJECTIONS ANSWERED. 29 less passages, in which the Holy Fathers -speak home to the present point ; and, as these are far more expressive and emphatical than what I myself have said upon it, I presume they have chiefly contributed to excite the bile of the Rev. Prebendary. However he may slight these venerable authorities, yet, as I am sure that you, Sir, reverence them, I willson account of their peculiar appositeness to the point in question, add two more similar quotations from the great Doctor of the fifth century, St. Augustin. He says : ' All the assemblies ' or rather divisions, who call themselves Churches of ' Christ, but which, in fact, have separated themselves ' from the congregation of Uuity, do not belong to ' the true Church. — They might indeed belong to her, ' if the Holy Ghost could be divided against him- ' self: but as this is impossible, they do not belong to 'her (1).' In like manner, addressing himself to cer tain sectaries of his time, he says : ' If our communion ' is the Church of Christ, yours is not so : for the ' Church of Christ is one, whichsoever she is ; since it is ' said of her : My dove, my uhdefiled is one ; she is the ' only one of her mother.' Cantic. vi. 9. But, setting aside Scripture and Tradition, let us consider this matter, as Bishop Watson and his asso ciates affect to do, on the side of natural reason alone. These modern philosophers think it absurd to suppose, that the Creator of the Universe concerns himself about what we poor mortals do or do not believe ; or, as the Bishop expresses himself, that he ' accommo- '. dates his judgments to the wrangling of* pedantic ' theologues.' With equal plausibility, certain ancient philosophers have represented it as unworthy the (l) Le Verb. Dom. 8erm. ii. 30 LETTER XVIII. Supreme Being, to busy hitnself about the actions of such reptiles as we are in his sight ; and thus have opened a door to an unrestrained violation of his eter nal and immutable laws ! In opposition to both these schools, I maintain, as the clear dictates of reason, that, as God is the author, so he is necessarily the supreme Lord and Master of all beings, with their several powers and attributes, and therefore of those noble and distinguishing faculties of the human soul, reason and free-zvill; that he cannot divest himself of this supreme dominion, or render any being or any faculty indepen dent of himself or of his high laws, any more than he can cease to be God ; — that of course, he does, and must, require our reason to believe in his Divine revela tions, no less than our will to submit to his supreme commands} — that he is just, no less than he is merci ful ; — and therefore that due atonement must be made to him for every act of disobedience to him, whether by disbelieving what he has said, or by disobeying what he has ordered. I advance a step further, in op position to the Hoadley and Watson school, by assert ing, as a self-evident truth ; that, there being a more deliberate and formal opposition to the Most High, in saying: I will not believe what thou hast revealed, than in saying : Izvill not practice what thou hast command ed ; so, ceteris paribus, WILFUL infidelity and heresy involve greater guilt than immoral frailty. You will observe, Dear Sir, that, in the preceding passage, I have marked the word Wilful ; because Ca tholic Divines and the Holy Fathers, at the same time that they strictly insist on the necessity of adhering to the docitrine aud communion of the Catholic Church, make an express exception in favour of M'hat is termed OBJECTIONS ANSWERED. 31 Invincible Ignorance ; which occurs, when persons, out of the True Church, are sincerely and firuly resolved, in spite of all worldly allurements on one hand, and opposition to the contrary on the other, to enter into it, if they could find it out, and when they use their best endeavours for this purpose. This exception in favour of the invincibly ignorant is made by the same Saint Augustin, who so strictly insists on the general rule. His words are these : ' The Apostle has told us, to reject ' a man that is a heretic : but, those who defend a false ' opinion, without pertinacious obstinacy, especially if ' they have not themselves invented it, but havederiv- ' ed it from their parents, and who seek the truth, with ' anxious solicitude, being sincerely disposed to re- ' nounce their error, as soon as they discover it, such ' persons are not to be deemed heretics (1).' Our great controvertist, Bellarmine, asserts that suchf Christians, 'in virtue of the disposition of their ' hearts, belong to the Catholic Church (2).' Who the individuals, exteriorly of other commu nions, but, by the sincerity of their dispositions, belong ing to the Catholic Church, who, and in what numbers they are, it is for the Searcher of hearts, our future Judge, alone to determine. Far be it from me and from every other Catholic ' to deal damnation' on any person in particular ! — still thus much, on the grounds already stated, I am bound, not only in truth, but also •in charity, to say and to proclaim, that nothing short of this sincere disposition, and the actual use of such means as Providence respectively affords, for discover ing the true Church, to those who are out of it, can (t) Epist. ad Episc. Donat, (2) Controv. Tom. ii. lib. iii. c. 6. 32 LETTER XVIII. secure their salvation i-^to say nothing of the Catholic Sacraments and other helps for this purpose, of which such persons are necessarily deprived. I just mentioned the virtue of charity ; and I must here add, that on no one point are Latitudinarians and genuine Catholics more at variance than upon this. The former consider themselves charitable in propor tion as they pretend to open the gate of heaven to a greater number of religionists of various descriptions : but, unfortunately, they are not possessed of the keys of that gate ; and when they fancy they have opened the gate as wide as possible, it still remains as narrow and the way to it as strait.,, as our Saviour describes these to be in the Gospel, Matt.vi'u 14. Thus they lull men into a fajal indifference about the truths of revelation, and a. false security, as to their salvatiop. Genuine Catholics, on the other hand, are persuaded that, as there is but one God, one Faith, and one Bap tism, Ephes- iv. 5, so there is but ONE SHEEP- FOLD, namely ONE CHURCH. Hence they omit no opportunity of alarming their wandering brethren, on the danger they are in, and of bringing them into this one Fold of the one Shepherd^ John x. 16. To form a right judgment in this case, we need but ask : Is it charitable or uncharitable in the physician to warn his patient of his danger in eating unwholesome food? Again, is it charitable or uncharitable in the Watchman, who sees the sword coming, to sound the trumpet of alarm ? Ezech. xxxiii. 6. But to conclude, the Rev. Prebendary may continue, with most modern Protestants, to assign his Latitudi- narianism, which admits all Religions to be light, as a mark of the truth of his sect ; thus dividing SANCTITY OF DOCTRINE. 33 Truth, which is essentially indivisible : yet will the Catholic Church continue to maintain, as she ever has maintained, that there is only One Faith and one True Church, and that this her uncompromising firmness, in retaining and professing this Unity, is the first mark of her being this Church. The subject admits of being illustrated by the well-known judgment of the wisest of men. Two women dwelt together, each of whom bad an infant son ; but, one of these dying, they both contended for possession of the living child, and carried their cause to the tribunal of Solomon. He, finding them equally contentious, ordered the infant they dis puted abbut, to be cut in two, and one half of it to be given to each of them ; which order the pretended mo ther agreed to, exclaiming : Let it be neither mine nor thine, but divide it. Then spake the zvoman, zvhose the living child was, unto the King ; for her bowels yearned upon her son, and she said ; O, my Lord, give her the living child, and in no wise slay it. Then the King an swered and said : Give her the living child and in no wise slay it ;— SHE IS THE MOTHER THEREOF.' 1 Kings iii. 26, 27. I am, Dear Sir, &c. J. M. LETTER XIX. To JAMES BROWN, Esq. S,c. ON SANCTITY OF DOCTRINE. DEAR SIR, The second mark by which you, as well as I, describe the Church in which you be- PART II. Y 34* LETTER XIX. lieve, when you repeat the Apostles' Creed, is that of SANCTITY. We, each of us, say ; / believe in the HOLY Catholic Church. Reason itself tells us, that the God of purity and sanctity could not institute a religion destitute of this character, and the inspired Apostle assures us that ; Christ loved the Church, and gave himself for it ; that he might sanctify and cleanse it, zvith the washing of water, by the word ; that he might present it to himself a glorious Church, not hav ing spot or wrinkle. Ephes. v. 25, 27. The compa rison which I am going to institute between the Ca tholic Church and the leading Protestant Societies in the article of Sanctity or Holiness, will be made on these four heads :' 1st, The Doctrine of Holiness ; — 2dly, the Means of Holiness ; — 3dly, the Fruits of Holiness ; — and lastly, the Divine Testimony of Holiness. To consider, first, the doctrine of the chief Pro testant communions : this is well known to have been originally grounded in the pernicious and impious prin ciples, that God is the author and necessitating cause, as well as the everlasting punisher of sin ; — that man has no free will to avoid sin ; — and that justification and salvation are the effects of an enthusiastic persua sion, under the name of Faith, that the person is ac tually justified and saved, without any real belief in the revealed truths, without hope, charity, repentance for sin, benevolence to our fellow-creatures, loyalty to our King and country, or any other virtues; all which were censured by the first Reformers, as the}' are by the strict Methodists still, under the name of works, and by many of them declared to be even hurtful to salvation. It is asserted in The Harmony of Confessions, a celebrated work, published in the early times of the SANCTITY OF DOCTRINE. 35 Reformation, that ' all the Confessions of the Pro- ' testaut Churches teach this primary article (of justi- ' fication) with a holy consent;' which seems to imply, says Archdeacon Blackburn, ' that this was the 'single article in which they all did agree (1).* Bishop Warburton expressly dedans, that 'Protest- ' antism was built upon it (2) :* and yet, 'what im- ' piety can be more execrable,' we may justly exclaim with Dr. Balguy, ' than to make God a tyrant (3) !' And M'hat lessons can be taught more immoral, than that men are not required to repent of their sins to obtain their forgiveness, nor to love either God or man to be sure of their salvation ! To begin with the Father of the Reformation : Lu ther teaches, that ' God works the evil in us as well as 'the good,' and that 'the great perfection of Faith ' consists in believing God to be just, although, by ' his ozvn will, he necessarily renders us zoorthy of ' damnation, so as to seem to take pleasure in the tor- ' merits of the miserable^).' — Again he says, and repeats it, in his work De Servo Arbitrio, and his other works, that ' free-will is an empty name;' adding, ' if God 'foresaw that Judas would be a traitor, Judas neces- ' sarily became a traitor : nor was it in his power to be ' otherwise (5).' — ' Man's will is like a horse : if God ' sit upon it, it goes as God would have it; if the ' devil ride it, it goes as the devil would have it : ' nor can the will choose its rider, but each of them (1) Archdeacon Blackburn's Confessional, p. 10. (2) Doctrine of Grace, cited by Overton, p. 31. (3) Discourses, p. 59. (4) Luth. Opera, cd. Wittenb. torn. ii. fpL 137. (5) De Serv. Arbit. fol. 400. Y2 36 LETTER XIX. ' strives which shall get possession of it(l).' Conforma bly to this system of necessity he teaches : ' Let this be ' your rule in interpreting the Scriptures ; wherever ' they command any good work, do you understand ' that they forbid it ; because you cannot perform ' it (2).' — Unless Faith be without the least good 'work, it does not justify : it is not faith (3).' — 'See ' how rich a Christian is, since he cannot lose his soul, ' do what he will, unless he refuses to believe : for no ' sin can damn him but unbelief (4).' Luther's fa vourite disciple and bottle- companion, Amsdorf, whom he made Bishop of Nauburg, wrote a book, expressly to prove, that, good works are not only unnecessary, but that they are hurtful, to salvation ; for which doctrine he quotes his master's works at large (5). Luther himself made so great account of this part of his system, which denies free-will, and the utility and possibility of good works, that, writing against Eras mus upon it, he affirms it to be the hinge on which the whole turns; declaring the questions about the Pope's Supremacy, Purgatory, and Indulgences, to be trifles, rather than subjects of controversy (6), In a former letter I quoted a remarkable passage from this Patriarch of Protestantism, in which he pretends to prophesy, that this article of his shall subsist for ever, in spite of all the Emperors, Popes, Kings, and (1) De Serv. Arbit. torn. ii. (2) Ibid. torn. iii. fol. 171. (3) Ibid. torn. i. fol. 361. • (4) De Captiv. Babyl. torn. ii. fol. 74. (5) See Brierley's Protest. Apol. 393. See also Mosheim and Maclaine Eccles. Hist. vol. vi. pp. 324, 328. (6) See the passage, extracted from the work de Servo Arbitrio, in Letters to a Prebendary, Letter V. SANCTITY OF DOCTRINE. 37 devils; concluding thus : 'If they attempt to weaken ' this article, may hell-fire be their reward * let this be ' taken for an inspiration of the Holy Ghost, made to ' me, Martin Luther.' However, in spite of these prophecies and curses of their father, the Lutherans in general, as I have be fore noticed, shocked at the impiety of this his primary principle, soon abandoned it, and even went over to the opposite impiety of Semi-pelagianism, which attri butes to man the first motion, or cause of conversion and sanctification. Still it will always be true to say, that Lutheranism itself originated in the impious doc trine described above (1). — As to the second branch of the Reformation, Calvinism, where it has not sunk into Latitudinarianism or Socinianism (2), it is still distinguished by this impious system. To give a few passages from the works of this second Patriarch of Protestants : Calvin says, ' God requires nothing of us ' but faith ; he asks nothing of us, but that we be- ' lieve (3).' I do not hesitate to assert that the will ' of God makes all things necessary (4).' ' It is plainly ' wrong to seek for any other cause of damnation than ' the hidden counsels of God (5).' 'Men, by the free- ' will of God, without any demerit of thtii own, are ' predestinated to eternal death (6).' It is useless to cite the disciples of Calvin, Beza, Zanchius, &c. as they (1) Bossuet's Variat. 1. viii. pp. 23, 54, &c. Mosheim and Maclaine, vol. v. p. 446, &c. (2) Ibid. p. 458. (3) Calv. in Joan. vi. Rom, i. Galat. ii. (4) Instit. 1. iii. t. 28. (5) Ibid. (6) Instit. 1. iii. c. 23. 38 LETTER XIX. all stick close to the doctrine of their master ; still I will give the following remarkable passage from the works of the renowned Beza. — ' Faith is peculiar to the ' elect, and consists in an absolute dependence each ' one has on the certainty of his election, which im- ' plies an assurance of his perseverance. — Hence we ' have it in our power to know, whether we be pre- ' destinated to salvation ; not by fancy, but by conclu- ' sions, as certain, as if we had ascended into heaven ta ' hear it from the mouth of God himself (1).' And is there a man that, having been worked up by such dog matizing, or his own fancy, to this full assurance of his indefeasible predestination and impeccability, who, under any violent temptation to break the laws of God or man, can be expected to resist it ! After all the pains which have been taken by mo dern Divines of the Church of England to clear her from this stain of Calvinism, nothing is more certain than that she was, at first, deeply infected with it. The 42 Articles of Edward VI. and the 39 Articles of Elizabeth are evidently grounded in that doctrine (2); which, however, is more expressly inculcated in the Lambeth Articles (3), approved of by the two Arch bishops, the Bishop of London, &c. in 1595; 'whose ' testimony,' says the renowned Fuller, ' is an infalli- ( ble evidence, what was the general and received doq- (1) Exposit. cited by Bossuet, Variat. 1. xiv. pp. 6, 7. (2) Particularly the 11th, 12th, 13th, and 17th of the 39 Articles. By the tenor of tbe 13th, among the 39, it would appear, that the patience ©f Socrates, the integrity of Aristides, 'the continence of Scipio, and the pa triotism of Cato, ' had the nature of sin,' because they were * works done ' before the grace of Christ.' (3) Fuller's Church History, p. 230. SANCTITY OF DOCTRINE. 39 ' trine of the Church of England in that age about ' the forenamed controversies (l.)' In the History of the University of Cambridge, by this author, a strict Churchman, we have evident proof that no other doc trine but that of Calvin was so much as tolerated by the Established Church, at the time I have been speak ing of. 'OneW Barret, fellow of Gon ville and Caius College, preached ad Clerum for his degree of Batchelor in Divinity, wherein he vented such doc trines, for whioh he was summoned, six days after, before the Consistory of Doctors, and there enjoined the following retractation : — \st, 1 said that, No man is so strongly underpropped by the certainty of faith, as to be assured of his salvation: but, now, I protest, before God, that they which are justified by faith, are assured of their salvation with the certainty of faith. — 3dly, I said that, Certainty concerning the time to come is proud : but now I protest that justified faith can never be rooted out of the minds of the faithful. — 6thly, These words escaped me in my sermon : I believe against Calvin, Peter Martyr, &;c. that sin is the true, proper, and first cause of reprobation. But, now, being better instructed, I say that the reproba tion of the zvicked is from everlasting ; and I am of the same mind concerning election, as the Church of England teacheth in the Articles of Faith. — Last of all, I uttered these words rashly against Calvin, a man that hath very well deserved of the Church of 'God; that he durst presume to lift himself above the High God : (1) Fuller, p. 232. — N.B. On the point in question Dr. Hey, vol. iv. p. 0, quotes the well-known speech of the great Lord Chatham in Parlia ment : ' We have a Calvinistic Creed, and an Arminian Clergy.' 40 LETTER XIX. ' by which words I have done great injury to that ' learned and right-godly man. I have also uttered many ' bitter words against Peter Martyr, Theodore Beza, « &c. being the lights and ornaments of our Church, call- 4 ing them by the odious name of Calvinists, &e. (l).' Another proof of the former intolerance of the Church of England, with respect to that moderate system, which all her present dignitaries hold, is the order drawn up by the Archbishops and Bishops in 1566', for government to act upon ; namely, that ' All incor- ' rigible Free-will-men, &c. should be sent into some ' castle in North Wales, or at Wallingford, there to ' live of their own labour, and no one to be suffered ' to resort to them, but their keepers, until they be 'found to repent their errors (2).' A still stronger, as well as more authentic evidence of the former Cal vinism of the English Church, is furnished by the history and Acts of the General Calvinistic Synod of Dort, held against Vorstius, the successor of Arminius, who had endeavoured to modify that impious system. Our James I. who had the principal share in assem bling this Synod, was so indignant at the attempt, that in aletter to the States of Holland, he termed Vorstius, ' the enemy of God, and insisted on his being ex pelled ; declaring, at the same time, that ' it was his ' own duty, in quality of Defender of the Faith, with ' which title,' he said, ' God had honoured him, to ' extirpate those cursed heresies, and to drive them to (1) Fuller's Hist, of Univ. of Camb. p. 150.— 1SLB. It will be evident to the reader that I have greatly abridged this curious Recantation, which wan too long to be quoted at length. (2) Strype's Annals of Reform, vol. i. p. 21.4. SANCTITY OF DOCTRINE. 4*1 (hell!'(l). To be brief, he sent Carlton and Daven port, the former being Bishop of Landaff, the latter of Salisbuiy, with two other dignitaries of the Church of England, and Balcanqual, on the part of the Church of Scotland, to the Synod ; where they appeared among the foremost in condemning the Arminians, and in de fining, that ' God gives true and lively faith to those, ' whom he resolves to withdraw from the common ' damnation, and to them alone ; and that the true 'faithful, by atrocious crimes, do not forfeit the grace ' of adoption and the state of justification !' (2). It might have been expected that the decrees of this Synod would have greatly strengthened the system of Calvinism; whereas it is from the termination of it, which corresponds with the concluding part of the reign of James I. that we are to date the decline of it ; especially in England (3). Still great numbers of its adherents, under the name of Calvinists, and profess* ing, not without reason, to maintain the original tenets of the Church of England, subsist in this country, and their ministers arrogate to themselves the title of Evan gelical Preachers. In like manner ; the numerous and diversified Societies of Methodists, whether Wesleyans or Whitfieldites, Moravians or Revivalists, New Itine rants or Jumpers (4), are all partisans of the impious and immoral system of Calvin. The founder of the first-mentioned branch of these sectaries witnessed the follies and climes which flowed from it, and tried (1) Hist. Abreg. de Gerard Brandt, toim i. p.417. ton;, ii. p.". (2) Bossuet's Variat. vol. ii. pp. 291, 294, 304. (3) Mosheim and Maclaine, vol. v. pp. 369, "89, (4) See Evans's Sketch of all Religion'*. PART II. '/ 42 LETTER XIX. to reform them by means of a laboured but groundless distinction (I). After all, the first and most sacred branch of Holy Doctrine consists in those Articles which God has been pleased to reveal concerning his own Divine Nature and operations, namely, the Articles of The Unity and Trinity of the Deity, and of the Incarnation, Death and Atonement of the consubstantial Son of God. It is ad mitted that these mysteries have been abandoned by the Protestants of Geneva, Holland, and Germany. With respect to Scotland ; a well informed writer says, ' It is certain that Scotland, like Geneva, has run ' from high Calvinism, to almost as high Arianism or ' Socinianism : the exceptions, especially in the cities, ' are few.' It will be 'gathered from many passages, which I have cited in my former letters, how widely extended, throughout the Established Church, is that ' Tacit Reform,' which a learned Professor of its Theo logy, signifies to be the same thing with Socinianism. A judgment may also be formed of the prevalence of this system, by the Act of July 21, 1813, exempting the professors of it from the penalties to which they were before subject. And yet this system, as I have before observed, is pronounced by the Church of Eng land, in her last-made Canons, ' damnable and cursed ' heresy, being a complication of many former here- ' sies, and contrariant to the Articles of Religion now ' established in the Church of England (2).' I say nothing of the numerous Protestant victims, who have been burnt at the stake in this country, during the reigns of Edward VI. Elizabeth and James I. for the (1) Postscript, p. 56. (2) Constit. and Can. A. D. 1640. SANCTITY OF DOCTRINE. 43 errors in question, except to censure the inconsistency and cruelty of the proceeding : all that I had occasion to shew was, that most Protestants, and, among the rest, those of the English Church, instead of uniform ly maintaining at all times the same Holy Doctrine, heretofore abetted an impious and immoral system, namely, Calvinism, which they have since been con strained to reject ; and that they have now compro mised with impieties, which formerly they condemned as ' damnable heresies,' and punished with fire and faggot. But it is time to speak of the Doctrine of. the Ca tholic Church. — If this was once Holy, namely, in the Apostolic age, it is Holy still ; because the Church never changes her doctrine, nor suffers any persons in her communion to change it, or to question an)7 part of it. Hence the adorable mysteries of the Trinity, the Incarnation, &c. taught by Christ and his Apos tles, and defined by the four first General Councils, are now as firmly believed by every real Catholic, throughout her whole communion, as they were when those Councils were held. Concerning the article of man's justification, so far from holding the impious and absurd doctrines imputed to her by her unnatural children, (who sought for a pretext to desert from her) she rejects, she condemns, she anathematizes them ! It is then false and notoriously false, that Catholics believe, or in any age did believe, that they could jus tify themselves by their own proper merits; — or that they can do the least good, in the order of salvation, without the grace of God, merited for them by Jesus Christ ; — or that we can deserve this grace, by any thing we have the power of doing; or that leave to Z 2 44 LETTER XIX. commit sin, or even the pardon of any sin, which has been committed, can be purchased of any person whom soever ;— or that the essence of Religion and our hopes of salvation consist in forms and ceremonies, or in other exterior things These and such other calumnies, or rather blasphemies, however frequently or confi dently repeated in popular Sermons and controversial tracts, there is reason to think are not really believed by any Protestant of learning (1). In fact, what ground is there for maintaining them ? Have they been defined by our Councils ? No : they have been condemned by them, and particularly by that of Trent. Are they taught in our Catechisms, such as the Catechismos ad Parochos, the General Catechism of Ireland, the Doway Catechism ; or in our Books of Devotion; for example, those written by an a Kempis, a Sales, a Granada, and a Challoner? No: the con trary doctrine is, in these, and in our other books, uniformly maintained. — In a word, the Catholic Church teaches, and ever has taught, her children to trust for mercy, grace and salvation, to the merits of Jesus Christ. Nevertheless, she asserts that we have free-will, and that this being prevented by divine grace, can and must co-operate to our justification by faith, sorrow for our sins, and other corresponding acts of virtue, which God will not fail to bestow upon us, (1) The Norrisian Professor, Dr. Hey, says: 'The Reformed have de- '. parted so much from the rigour of their doctrine about faith, and the Ro- '. manists from theirs about good works, that there seems very little differ- ' ence between them.' Lect. vol. iii. p. 262. True, most of the Reformers, after building their Religion on Faith alone, have now gone into the opposite heresy of Pelagianism, or at least Semi-Pelagiunism : but Catholics hold ex actly the same tenets regarding good works, which they ever held, and which were always very different from what Dr. Hey describes them to have been. Yul.ih. p. 261. SANCTITY OF DOCTRINE. 45 if we do not throw obstacles in the way of them. Thus is all honour and merit ascribed to the Creator, and every defect and sin attributed to the creature. The Catholic Church inculcates moreover, the indis pensable necessity of humility, as the ground-work of all virtues, by which, says St. Bernard, 'from a tho- s rough knowledge of ourselves we become little in our ' own estimation.' I mention this Catholic lesson, in particular, because however strongly it is enforced by Christ and his disciples, it seems to be quite overlooked by Protestants ; insomuch that they are perpetually boasting in their speeches and writings of the opposite vice, pride^ In like manner, it appears from the above- mentioned Catechisms and spiritual works, what pains our Church bestows, in regulating the interior no less than the exterior, of her children, by repressing every thought or idea, contrary to Religion or Morality; of •\hich matter, I perceive little or no notice is taken in the Catechisms and Tracts of Protestants. Finally, :he Catholic Church insists upon the necessity of Deing perfect even as our heavenly Father is perfect, Malt. v. 48, by such an entire subjugation of our pas sions, and conformity of our will with that of God, that our conversation may be in heaven, while we are yet living here on earth. Philip, v. 20. I am, &c. J. M. POSTSCRIPT TO LETTER XIX. [The Life of the late Rev. John Wesley, founder of the Methodists, which has been written by Dr. White head, Dr. Coke, and ethers of his disciples, shews, in 46 LETTER XIX. the clearest light, the errors and contradictions to which even a sincere and religious mind is subject, that is destitute of the clue to revealed truth, the living authority of the Catholic Church; as also the impiety and immorality of Calvinism. At first, that is to say, in the year 1729, Wesley was a modern Church-of- England-man, distinguished from other students at Oxford by nothing but a more strict and methodical form of life. Of course his doctrine then, was the pre vailing doctrine of that Church ; this he preached in England and carried with him to America, whither he sailed to convert the Indians. Returning, however, to England in 1738, he writes as follows : ' For many ' years I have been tossed about by various winds of 1 doctrine,' the particulars of which and of the different schemes of salvation, which he was inclined to trust in, he details. Falling, at last, however, into the hands of Peter Bolder and his Moravian brethren, who met in Fetter-lane, he became a warm proselyte to their system ; declaring at the same time, with respect to his past religion, that, hitherto he had been a Papist with out knozving it. We may judge of his ardour by his exclamation when Peter Bohler left England : ' O what ' a work hath God begun since his (Border's) coming ' to England ; such a one as shall never come to an ' end till heaven and earth shall pass away.' To cement his union with this society, and to instruct himself more fully in its mysteries, he made a journey to Hern huth in Moravia, which is the chief seat of the United Brethren. It was whilst he was a Moravian, namely, ' on the 24th of May, 1738, a quarter of an hour be- ' fore nine in the evening,' that John Wesley, by his own account, was ' saved from the law of sin and SANCTITY OF DOCTRINE. 47 'death.' This all-important event happened 'at a ' Meeting-house, in Aldersgate-street, while a person ' was reading Luther's Preface to the Galatians.' Nevertheless, though he had professed such deep obli gations to the Moravians, he soon found out and de clared that theirs was not the right way to heaven. In fact, he found them, and 'nine parts in ten of the Me- ' thodists' who adhered to them, 'swallowed up in ' the dead sea of stillness, opposing the ordinances, ' namely, prayer, reading the Scripture, frequenting ' the Sacrament and public Worship, selling their ' Bibles, &c. in order to rely more fully "on the blood ' of the Lamb." ' In short, Wesley abandoned the Mo ravian connexion and set up that which is properly his own Religion, as it is detailed by Nightingale, in his Portrait of Methodism. This happened in 1740, soon after which he broke off from his rival Whitfield. In fact, they maintained quite opposite doctrines on seve ral essential points : still the tenet of instantaneous jus tification, without repentance, charity, or other good works, and the actual feeling and certainty of this aud of everlasting happiness, continued to be the essential and vital principles of Wesley's system, as they are of the Calvinistic sects in general ; till having witnessed the horrible impieties and crimes to which it conduct ed, he, at a conference or Synod of his preachers, in 1744, declared that he and they had ' leaned too much ' to Calvinism and Antinomianism.' In answer to the question: 'What is Antinomianism ?' Wesley in the same conference answers : ' The doctrine which makes void ' the law through faith. Its main pillars are, that Christ ' abolished the moral law ; — that, therefore, Christians ' are not obliged to keep it; — that Christian liberty, is 43 L LITER XIX. ' liberty from obeying the commands of God ;-— that it ' is bondage to do a thing because it is commanded, or ' forbear it because it is forbidden ; — that a believer is ' not obliged to use the ordinances of God, or to do ' good works; — that a preacher ought not to exhort to 'good works,' &c. See here the essential morality of the Religion which Wesley had hitherto followed and preached, as drawn by his own pen, and which still con tinues to be preached by the other sects of Methodists ! We shall hereafter see in what manner he changed it. The very mention, however, of a change in this ground work of Methodism, inflamed all the Methodist con nexions. Accordingly, the Hon. and Rev. Mr. Shirley, Chaplain to Lady Huntingdon, in a circular letter, written at her desire, declared against the dreadful heresy of Wesley, which, as he expressed himself, ' in- 'jured the foundation of Christianity.' He, therefore, summoned another conference, which severely cen sured Wesley. On the other hand, this Patriarch was strongly supported, and particularly by Fletcher of Madeley, an able writer, whom he had destined to suc ceed him, as the head of his connexion. Instead"of being offended at his master's change, Fletcher says : ' I admire the candour of an old man of God, who, ' instead of obstinately maintaining an old mistake. ' comes down like a little child, and acknowledges it ' before his preachers, whom it is his interest to secure.' The same Fletcher published seven volumes of Checks to Antinomianism, in vindication of Wesley's change in this essential point of hisreligion. In these he brino-s the most convincing proofs and examples of the impiety and immorality, to which the enthusiasm of Antino mian Calvinism had conducted the Methodists. He SANCTITY OF DOCTRINE. 49 mentions a highwayman, lately executed in his neigh bourhood, who vindicated his crimes upon this princi ple. He mentions other more odious instances of wickedness, which, to his knowledge, had flowed from it. All these, he says, are represented by their preachers to be ' damning sins in Turks and Pagans, ' but only spots in God's children. ' He adds, ' There ' are few of our celebrated pulpits, where more has not ' been said for sin than against it !' He quotes an Hon. M. P. 'once my brother,' he says, ' but now my * opponent,' who, in his published treatise, maintains, that ' Murder and Adultery do not hurt the pleasant ' children (the elected), but even work for their good :' adding, ' My sins may displease God, my person is ' always acceptable to him. — Though I should outsin ' Manasses himself, I should not be less. a pleasant child, ' because God always views me in Christ. — Hence, in ' the midst of adulteries, murders and incests, he can ' address me with : Thou art all fair, my love, roy uude- * filed ; there is no spot in thee. — It is a most perni- ' cious error of the schoolmen to distinguish sins ac~ ' Cording to the fact, not according . to the person.-— ' Though I highly blame those who say ; let us sin that 'grace may abound ; yet adultery, incest and murder, ¦ shall, upon the whole, make me holier on earth and ' merrier in heaven!' — It only remains to shew in what manner Wesley purified his Religious System, as he thought, from the defilement of Antinomianism. To be brief, he invented a two-fold mode of justification, one without repentance, the love of God, or other works ; the other, to which these works were esseutial : the former was for those who die soon after their pre tended experience of saving faith, the latter for those part ii. A a 50 LETTER XX. who have time and opportunity of performing them. Thus, to say no more of the system, a Nero and a Robespierre might, according to it, have been estab lished in the grace of God, and in aright to the realms of infinite purity, without one act of sorrow for their enormities, or so much as an act of their belief in God ! LETTER XX. To JAMES BROWN, Esq. $c ON THE MEANS OF SAKCTITY. DEAR SIR, The efficient cause of justification, or sancti ty, according to the Council of Trent (1), is the mercy of God through the merits of Jesus Christ; still, in the usual economy of his grace, he makes use of certain instruments or means, both for conferring and increas ing it. The principal and most efficacious of these are THE SACRAMENTS. Fortunately, the Established Church agrees in the main sense with the Catholic and other Christian Churches, when she defines a Sacra ment to be ' An outward and visible sign of an inward ' and spiritual grace, given unto us, and ordained by ' Christ himself, as a means whereby we receive the * same, and a pledge to assure us thereof (2).' But (1) Sess. vi. cap. 7. (2) Catechism in Com. Prayer. — N. B. The l?.st clause in this definition is far too strong, as it seems to imply, that every person, who is partaker of the outward part of a Sacrament, necessarily receives the grace of it, whatever niay be his dispositions : an impiety which the Bishop of Lincoln calumni- ouily attributes to the Catholics, Elements of Theol. vol, ii. p. 436. MEANS OF SANCTITY. 51 though she agrees with other Protestant communions in reducing the number of these to two, Baptism and the Lord's Supper, she differs with all others, namely, the Catholic, the Greek, the Russian, the Armenian, the Nestorian, the Eutychian, the Coptic, the Ethio pian, &c. all of which firmly maintain, and ever have maintained, as well since, as before their respective defections from us, the whole collection of the seven Sacraments (l). This fact alone refutes the airy speculations of Protestants concerning the origin of the five Sacraments, which they reject, and thus de monstrates that they are deprived of as many divinely instituted instruments or means of sanctity. — As these seven channels of grace, though all supplied from the same fountain of Christ's merits, supply,, each of them, a separate grace, adapted to the different wants of the faithful, and as each of them furnishes matter of ob servation for the present discussion, so I shall take a cursory view of them. The first Sacrament, in point of order and necessity, is Baptism. In fact, no authority can be more express than that of the Scripture, as to this necessity. Ex cept a man be born of water and of the Spirit, says Christ, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God. John iii. 5. Repent, cries St. Peter, and be baptized every one of you, in the name of Jesus, for the remission of sins. Acts ii. 38. Arise, answered Ananias to St. Paul, and be baptized, and wash away thy sins. Acts xxii. 16. This necessity was heretofore acknowledged by the Chujch of England, at least ; as appears from her Ar- (1) This important fact is incontrovertibly proved in the celebrated work Lo Perpetuite de la Eoi, from original documents procured by Louis xiv. and preserved in the King's Library at Paris. Aa 2 52 LETTER XX. tides, and still more clearly from her Liturgy (l) and the works of her eminent Divines (2). Hence, as Baptism is valid, by whomsoever it is conferred, the English Church may be said to have been upon an equal footing with the Catholic Church, as much as concerns this instrument or means of holiness. But the case is different now, since that Tacit Reformation, which is acknowledged to have taken place in her. This has nearly swept out of her both the belief of Ori ginal Sin and of its necessary remedy, Baptism. 'That 5 we are born guilty,' the great authority, Dr. Balguy, says, 'is either unintelligible or impossible.' Accord ingly, he teaches that ' the rite of Baptism is no more ' than a representation of our entrance into the Church ' of Christ.' — Elsewhere he says : ' The sign (of a Sa- ' crament) is declaratory, not efficient (3).* Dr. Hey says, the negligence of the parent, with respect to pro curing Baptism, ' May affect the child : to say it will ' affect him, is to run into the error I am condemn- ' ing (4).' Even the Bishop of Lincoln calls it, 'An ' unauthorized principle of Papists, that no person ' whatsoever can be saved who has not been baptiz- ' e'd (5).' Where the doctrine of baptism is so lax, we may be sure the practice of it will not be more strict. (1) Common Prayer. (2) See B. Pearson on the Creed, Art. x. Hooker, Ecel. Polit. B. v. p. 60. (3) Charge vii. pp. 298, 800. (4) Lectures in Divinity, vol. iii. p. 182. (5) Vol. ii. p. 470. The learned Prelate can hardly be supposed ignorant that many of our martyrs, recorded in our Martyrolqgy and our Breviary, are expressly declared not to have been actually baptized;, or that our Divines unanimously teach, that not only the baptism of blood by martyrdom, but also a sincere desire of being baptised suffices, where the means of baptism are wanting. MEANS OF SANCTITY. 53 Accordingly, we have abundant proofs that, from tlve frequent and longdelays, respecting the administration of this Sacrament, which occur in the Establishment, very many children die without receiving it, and that, from the negligence of Ministers, as to the right matter and form of words, many more children receive it invalidly. Look, on the other hand, at the. Catholic Church : you will find the same importance still attached to this sacred rite, on the part of the people and the clergy, which is observable in the Acts of the Apostles and in the writings of the Holy Fathers ; the former being ever impatient to have their children baptized, the latter equally solicitous to administer it in due time, and with the most scrupulous exactness. Thus, as matters stand now, the two Churches are not upon a level with respect to this first and common means of sanctification : the members of one have a much greater moral certainty of the remission of that sin, in which we were all born, and of their having been here tofore actually received into the Church of Christ, than the members of the other have. It would be too tedious a task to treat of the tenets of other Protestants, on this and the corresponding matters: let it suffice to say that, the famous Synod of Dort, representing all the Calvinistic States of Europe, formally decided, that the children of the elect are included in the covenant, made with their parents, and thus are exempt from the necessity of Baptism, as likewise of faith and morality ; being thus insured, themselves and all their posterity, till the end of time, of their justification and salva tion (1) ! (1) Bossuet, Variat. Book \iv. p. 46. 54 LETTER XX. Concerning the second channel of grace, or means ofsanctitv, Confirmation, there is no question. The Church * f England, which among the different Pro testant societies, alone, I believe, lays claim to any part of this rite, under the title of The Ceremony of laying on of hands, expressly teaches at the same time that it is no Sacrament, as not being ordained by God,. oran effectual sign of grace (1). But the Catholic Church, instructed by the solicitude of the Apostles, to strengthen the faith of those her children, who had re ceived it in baptism (2), and by the lessons of Christ himself, concerning the importance of receiving that Holy Spirit, which is communicated in this Sacra ment (3), religiously retains and faithfully administers it to them, for the self same purpose, through all ages. In a word, those who are true Christians, by virtue of baptism, are not made perfect Christians, except by virtue of the Sacrament of Confirmation, which none of the Protestant Societies so much as lays a claim to. Of the third Sacrament, indeed, The Lord's Supper, as they call it, the Protestant Societies, and particularly the Church of England, in her Prayer-Book, say great things : nevertheless, what is it, after all, upon her own shewing ? — Mere bread and wine received in memory of Christ's passion and death, in order to excite the receiver's faith in him : that is to say, it is a bare type or memorial of Christ. Anything may be instituted to be the type or memorial of another thing ; but cer tainly the Jews in their Paschal Lamb, had a more lively figure of the death, of Christ, and so have Christians in each of the four Evangelists, than eating bread and (1) Art. xxv. (2) Acts viii. l4.--xix. 2. (3) John svi. MEANS OF SANCTITY. 55 drinking xvine can be. Hence I infer, that the com munion of Protestants, according to their belief and practice in this country, cannot be more than a feeble excitement to their devotion, and an inefficient help to their sanctification. — But, if Christ is to be believed upon his own solemn declaration, where he says : Take ye and eat ; this is my body : — drink ye all of this ; for this is my blood, Matt. xxvi.%6.—-Myfiesh is meat indeed, and my blood is drink indeed, John vi. 56'.; then the Holy Communion of Catholics is beyond all expres sion and all conception, not only the most powerful stimulative to our faith, our hope, our love, and our contrition ; but also the most efficacious means of ob taining these arid all other graces from the Divine bounty. Those Catholicswho frequent this Sacrament with the suitable dispositions, are the best judges of the truth of what I here say : nevertheless, many Pro testants have been converted to the Catholic Church from the ardent desire they felt, of receiving their Sa viour Christ himself into their bosoms, instead of a bare memorial of him, and from a just conviction of the spiritual benefits they would derive from this intimate union with him. The four remaining instruments of grace, Penance, Extreme Unction, Order, and Matrimony, Protestants, in general, give up to us, no less thanConfirmation. The Bishop of Lincoln (l), Dr. Hey (2), and other controvertists, pretend that it was Peter Lombard, in the 12th century, who made Sacraments of them. True it is, that this industrious theologian collected toge ther the different passages of the Fathers, and arranged (1) Elem. vol. ii. p. 414. (2) Lect, vol, iv, p. 199. 56 LETTER XX. them, with proper definitions of each subject, in their present scholastic order, not only respecting the Sa craments, but likewise the other branches of Divinity; on which account he is called The Master of the Sen tences : — but this writer could as soon have introduced Mahometanism into the Church, as the belief of any one Sacrament, which it had not before received as such. Besides, supposing him to have deceived the Latin Church into this belief; I ask by what means were the schismatical Greek Churches fascinated into it. In short, though these holy rites had not been endued by Christ with a sacramental grace, yet, practised, as they are in the Catholic Church, they would still be great helps to piety and Christian morality. What I have just asserted concerning these five Sacraments, in general, is particularly true, with re spect to the Sacrament of Penance. For what does this consist of ? and what is the preparation for it, as set forth by all our Councils, Catechisms, and Prayer- books ? There must first be fervent prayer to God for his ligtyt and strength ; next an impartial examina tion of the conscience, to acquire that most impor tant of all sciences, the knowledge of ourselves ; then true sorrow for our sins, with a firm purpose of amendment, which is the most essential part of the sacrament. After this there must be a siucere ex posure of the state of the interior to a confidential, and, at the same time, a learned, experienced and disinterested Director. If he could afford no other benefit to his penitents, yet how inestimable are those, of his making known to them many defects and many duties, which their self-love had probably overlooked; of his prescribing to them the proper remedies for MEANS OF SANCTITY. 57 their spiritual maladies ; and of his requiring them to make restitution for every injury done to each injured neighbour ! But we are well assured, that these are far from being the only benefits, which the Minister of this Sacrament can confer upon the subject of it : for it was not an empty compliment which Christ paid to his Apostles, when, Breathing on them, he said to them : Receive ye the Holy Ghost, zvhose sins you shall remit, they are remitted, and zvhose sins you shall retain, they are retained. John xx. 22, 23. O sweet balm of the wounded spirit ! O sovereign restorative of the soul's life and vigour ! best known to those who faithfully use thee, and not unattested by those who neglect and blaspheme thee ! (l). It might appear strange, if we were not accustomed to similar inconsistencies, that those who profess to make Scripture, in its plain obvious sense, the sole rule of their faith and practice, should deny Extreme Unction to be a Sacrament, the external sign of which, anointing the sick, and the spiritual effect of which, the forgiveness of sins, are so expressly declared by St. James, in his Epistle v. 14. Martin Luther, indeed, who had taken offence at this Epistle, for its insisting so strongly on good works (2), rejected the authority of this Epistle, alledging that it was ' not lawful for ' an Apostle to institute a Sacrament (3).' But, I trust, that you, Dear Sir, aud your conscientious Society, will agree with me, that it is more incredible that an (1) See the Form of ordaining Priests in Bishop Sparrow's Collect p. 158, also the Form of Absolution, in the Visitation of the Sick in the Common- Prayer. (2) Luther, in his original Jena edition of his work?, calls this Epistle ' h dry and chaffy Epistle, unworthy an Apostle.' * p) Ibid. PA RT 1 1. B h 58 LETTER XX. Apostle of Christ should be ignorant of what he was authorized by him to say and do, than that a pro fligate German Friar should be guilty of blasphemy. Indeed, the Church of England, in the first form of her Common-Prayer in Edward's reign, enjoined the Unction of the sick, as well as the prayer for them (1). It was evidently well worthy the mercy and bounty of our Divine Saviour, to institute a spe cial Sacrament for purifying and strengthening us at the time of our greatest need and terror. Owing to the institution of this, and the two other Sacraments, Penance and the Real Body and Blood of our Lord, it is a fact, that few, very few Catholics die without the assistance of their clergy ; which assistance the latter are bound to afford, at the expence of ease, fortune, and life itself, to the most indigent and ab ject of their flock, who are in clanger of death, no less than to the rich and the great : while, . on the other hand, very few Protestants, in that extremity, partake at all of the cold rites of their religion ; though one of them is declared, in the Catechism, to be 'necessary ' for salvation !' It is equally strange that a Clergy, with such high claims, and important advantages, as those of the Establishment, should deny that the Orders of Bishops, Priests, and Deacons, are sacramental, or that the Episcopal form of Church-government, and of ordain ing the Clergy, is in preference to any other required by Scripture. In fact, this is telling the legislature and the nation that, if they prefer the less expensive mi nistry of the Presbyterians or Methodists, there is no thing divine or essential in the ministry itself, which (1) See Collier's Eccles. Hist. vol. ii. p. 257. MEANS OF SANCTITY. 59 will he injured by the change; and that Clergymen may be as validly ordained by the town-crier with his bell, as by the Metropolitan's imposition of hands ! Nevertheless, strange as it appears, this is the doc trine, not only of Hoadley's Socinian school, as I have elsewhere demonstrated (l), but also of those modern Divines and Dignitaries, who are the standard of Or thodoxy (2). Thus are the Clergy of the English Church, as well as all other Protestant ministers, by their owa confession, destitute of all sacramental grace for performing their functions holily and bene ficially (3). But, we know, conformably to the doc trine of St. Paul, in both his Epistles to Timothy, 1 Tim. iv. 14. 2 Tim. i. 6. with the constant doctrine of the Catholic Church, and of all other aucient Churches, that this grace is conferred on those who are truly or dained and in fit dispositions to receive it. We know, moreover, that the persuasion which the faithful en tertain of the divine character and grace of their Clergy,' gives a great additional weight to their lessons and ministry. — In like manner, with respect to Matrimony^ which the same Apostle expressly calls a Sacrament, Ephes. v. 32, the very idea of its sanctity, independ ently of its peculiar grace, is a preparation for enter ing into that state with religious dispositions. Next to the Sacraments of the Catholic Church, as lielps to holiness and salvation, I must mention heF public service. We continually hear the advocates of the Establishment crying up the beauty and perfection (1) Dr. Balguy, Dr. Hey, &c. (2) The Bishop of Lincoln's Eleni. of Theol.vol. ii. pp. 3f6, 396, (3) See Letters to a Prebendary, Letter VIII. BbS 60 LETTER XX. of their liturgy (1); but, they have not the candour to inform the public that it is all, in a manner, borrowed from the Catholic Missal and Ritual. Of this any one may satisfy himself, who will compare the prayers, lessons and gospels, in these Catholic Books with those in the Book of Common- Prayer. But, though our ser vice has been thus purloined, it has, by no means been preserved entire, : on the contrary, we find it, in the latter, eviscerated of its noblest parts ; particularly with respect to the principal and essential worship of all the ancient Churches, the Holy Mass, which, from a true propitiatory Sacrifice, as it stands in all their Missals, is cut down to a mere verbal worship, in The Order for Morning Prayer. Hence, our James I. pronounced of the latter, that it is an ill-said Mass; The servants of God had, by his appointment, SA CRIFICE both under the law of Nature and the Written Law; it would then be extraordinary, if un der the Law of Grace they were left destitute of this, the most sublime and excellent act of Religion, which man can offer to his Creator. But we are not left destitute of it : on the contrary, that prophecy of Malachy is fulfilled, Mal. i. 11. In every place, from the rising to the setting of the sun, sacrifice is offered and a pure oblation ; even Christ himself, who is really present and mystically offered on our altars in the Sacrifice of the Mass. I pass over the solemnity, the order and the magni ficence of our public worship and ritual in Catholic countries, which most candid Protestants, who have (1) Dr. Rennel calls the Church Liturgy ' the most perfect of human conir t positions and the sacred legacy of the first Reformers.' Disc. p. 237. FRUITS OF SANCTITY. 61 witnessed them, allow to be exceedingly impressive, and great helps to devotion, and which, certainly, in most particulars, find their parallel in the worship and ceremonies of the Old Law, ordained by God himself. Nevertheless, it is a gross calumny to assert that the Catholic Church does, or ever did make the essence of Religion to consist in these externals ; and we chal lenge them to our Councils and doctrinal books in re futation of the calumny. In like manner, I pass over the many private exercises of piety which are generally practised in regular Catholic families and by indivi duals ; such as daily meditation and spiritual reading, evening prayers and examination of the conscience, &c. These, it will not be denied, must be helps to at tain sanctity for those who are desirous of it. — But I have said more than enough to convince your friends, in which of the rival communions the means of sanctity are chiefly to be found. I am, Dear Sir, &c. J. M. LETTER XXI. To JAMES BROWN, Esq. $c. ON THE FRUITS OF SANCTITY. DEAR SIR, The fruits of Sanctity are the virtues practised by those who are possessed of it. Hence the present question is, whether these are to be found, for the most part, among the members of the ancient Ca tholic Church, or among the different innovators, who 6'2 LETTER XXI. undertook to reform it in the 16th and 17th centuries? In considering the subject, the first thing which strikes me is, that all the Saints, and even those who are re- corded as such in the Calendar of the Church of Eng land, and in whose names their churches are dedicated, lived and died strict members of the Catholic Church, and zealously attached to her doctrine and disci pline (1). For example, in this calendar, we meet with a Pope Gregory, March 12, the zealous assertor of the Papal Supremacy. (2), and other Catholic doctrines; a St. Benedict, March 21, the Patriarch of the Western monks and nuns ; a St. Dunstau, May 19, the vindi cator of clerical celibacy ; a St. Augustin of Canter bury, May 26, the introducer of the whole system of Catholicity into England ; and a venerable Bede, May 27, the witness of this important fact. It is sufficient to mention the names of other Catholic Saints, for ex ample, David, Chad, Edward, Richard, Elphege, Mar tin, Swithun, Giles, Lambert, Leonard, Hugh, Ethel- dreda, Remigius, and Edmund ; all of which are in serted in the calendar, and give names to the churches of the Establishment. Besides these, there are very many of our other Saints, whom all learned and candid Protestants unequivocally admit to have been such, for the extraordinary purity and sanctity of their lives. (1) I must except King Charles I. who is rubricated as a Martyr on Jan. 30 : nevertheless, it is confessed that he was far from possessing either the "purity of a saint or the constancy of a martyr : for he actually gave up Episcopacy and other essentials of the established religion by his last treaty in the Isle of Wight. (2) Many Protestant writers pretended that St. Gregory disclaimed the Supremacy because he asserted against John of C. P. that neither he nor any other Prelate, ought to assume the title of Universal Bishop ; but that he claimed and exercised the Supremacy, his own works and the History of Bede incontrovertibly demonstrate. FRUITS OF SANCTITY. 63 Even Luther acknowledges St. Antony, St. Bernard, St. Dominic, St. Francis, St. Bonaventure, &c. to have been Saints, though avowed Catholics, and defenders of the Catholic Church, against the heretics and schisma tics of their times. But, independently of this and of every other testimony, it is certain that the superna tural virtues and heroical sanctity of a countless num ber of holy personages of different countries, ranks, professions, and sexes, have illustrated> the Catholic Church in every age, with an effulgence which cannot be disputed or withstood. Your friends, I dare say, are not much acquainted with the histories of these bright est ornaments of Christianity : let me then invite them to peruse them ; not in the legends of obsolete writers, but in a work which, for its various learning and lumi nous criticism, was commended even by the infidel Gib bon, I mean The Lives of Saints, in twelve octavo volumes, written by the late Rev. Alban Butler, Presi dent of St. Omer's College. Protestants are accus tomed to paint, in the most frightful colours, the alledged depravity of the Church, when Luther erected his standard,, in order to justify him and his follow ers' defection from it. But to form a right judg ment in the case, let them read the works of the con temporary writers, an a Kempis, a Gerson, an Antoni nus, &c. or let them peruse the lives of St. Vincent Ferrer, St. Laurence Justinian, St. Francis Paula, St. Philip Neri, St. Cajetan, St. Teresa, St. Francis Xa- verius, and of those other Saints, who illuminated the Church about the period in question. Or let them, from the very accounts of Protestant historians, com pare, as to religion and morality, Archbishop Cran- mer with his lival Bishop Fisher ; Protector Seymour 64 LETTER XXI. with Chancellor More; Ann Bullen with Catha rine of Arragon ; Martin Luther and Calvin with Francis Xaverius and Cardinal Pole ; Beza with St. Francis of Sales ; Queen Elizabeth with Mary Queen of Scots ; these contrasted characters having more or less relation with each other. From such a compari son, I have no sort of doubt, what the decision of your friends will be concerning them in point of their respective holiness. I have heretofore been called upon to consider the virtues and merits of the most distinguished Re formers (1) ; and certainly we have a right to expect from persons of this description finished models of virtue and piety. But, instead of this being the case, I have shewn that Patriarch Luther was the sport of his unbridled passions (2), pride, resentment, and lusj,; that he was turbulent, abusive, and sacrilegious, in the highest degree; that he was the trumpeter of sedition, civil war, rebellion, and desolation ; and finally, that by his own account, he was the scholar of Satan, in the most important article of his pretended Reforma tion (3). I have made out nearly as heavy a charge against his chief followers Carlostad, Zuinglius, Ochin, Calvin, Beza, and Cranmer. With respect to the last named, who under Edward VI. and his fratricide uncle, the Duke of Somerset, was the chief artificer of the Anglican Church, I have shewn that, from his youth ful life in a college, till his death at the stake, he exhi- (1) Reflections on Popery, by Dr. Sturges, L. L. D. &c. (2) Letters to a Preb. Let. V. p. 173. (3) Ibid. p. 183, where Satan's conference with Luther and the arguments by which he induced this Reformer to abolish the Mass are detailed from Luther's works. Tom. vii. p. 32.B. FRUITS OF SANCTITY. 65 bited such a continued scene of libertinism, perjury, hypocrisy, barbarity (in burning his fellow Protestants), profligacy, ingratitude, and rebellion, as is, perhaps, not to be matched in history. I have proved that all his fellow labourers and fellow sufferers were rebels like himself, who would have betn put to death by Elizabeth, if they had not been executed by Mary. I adduced the testimony not only of Erasmus and other Catholics, but also of the gravest Protectant historians, and of the very Reformers themselves, in proof that the morals of the people, so far from being changed for the better, by embracing the new religion, were greatly changed for the worse (l). The pretended Reforma tion, in foreign countries, as in Germany, the Nether lands, at Geneva, in Switzerland, France and Scot land, besides producing popular insurrections, saccages, demolitions, sacrileges, and persecution beyond de scription, excited also open rebellions and bloody civil wars (2). In Eugland, where our writers boast of the (1) Letters to a Prebendary, Letter V. (2) The Huguenots in Dauphiny alone, as one of their writers confesses, burnt down 900 towns or. villages, and murdered 378 Priests or Religious, in the course of one rebellion. The number of Churches destroyed by them throughout France is computed at 20,000. — The History of England's Re formation (though this was certainly more orderly than that of other coun tries) has caused the conversion of many English Protestants : it produced this effect on James II. and his first consort, the mother of Queen Mary, and Queen Ann. The following is the account which the latter hasleft of this change, and which is to be found in Dodd's last volume, and in the 50 Rea sons of the Duke of Brunswick. 'Seeing much of the devotion of the Ca- ' tholics, I made it my constant prayer that, if I were not, I might, before I ' died, be in the true religion. I did not doubt but that I was so till Novem- ' berlast, when, reading a book called The History of the Reformation, by ' Dr. Heylin, which! had heard very much commended, and had been told, if ' ever I had any doubts in my Religion that would settle me : instead of 1 which I found it the description of the horridest sacrileges in the world, and PART II. C c 66 LETTER XXII. orderly manner in which the change of religion was carried on, it, nevertheless, most unjustly and sacrile giously seized upon, and destroyed, in the reign of Henry VIII. 645 monasteries, 90 colleges, and 110 hospitals, besides the bishopric of Durham; and, under Edward VI. or rather his profligate uncle, it dis solved 2374 colleges, chapels or hospitals, in order to make princely fortunes of their property for that uncle and his unprincipled comrades, who, like ban ditti, quarrelling over their spoils, soon brought each other to the block. Such were the fruits of sanctity, every where produced by this Reformation ! I am, &c. J. M. LETTER XXII. To Mr. J. TOULMIN. OBJECTIONS ANSWERED. DEAR SIR, I have received your letter, animad verting upon mine to our common friend, Mr. Brown, respecting the fruits of sanctity, as they appear in our respective communions. I observe, you do not con- ' could find no cause why we left the Church, but for three the most abomi- 'nableones: 1st, Henry VIII. renounced the- Pope, because he would not * give him leave to part with his wife and marry another: 2dly, Edward VI. ' was a child and governed by his uncle, who made his estate out of the ' church lands : 3dly, Elizabeth not being lawful heiress to the crown, had ' no way to keep it but by renouncing a Church which would not suffer so « unlawful a thing. I confess I cannot think the Holy Ghost could ever be ' in such councils.' OBJECTIONS ANSWERED. 67 test my general facts or arguments, but resort to ob jections which have been already answered in these, or in my other letters now before the public. You assert, as a notorious fact, that for several ages, prior to the Reformation, the Catholic Religion was sunk into ceremonies and pageantry, and that it sanctioned the most atrocious crimes. In refutation of these calum nies, I have referred to our councils, to our most ac credited authors of religion and morality, and to the lives and deaths of our most renowned Saints, during the ages in question. I grant, Sir, that you hold the same language on this subject that other Protestant writers do ; but I maintain that none of them make good their charges, and that their motive for advancing them, is to find a pretext for excusing the irreligion of the pretended Reformation. You next extol the al- ledged sanctity of the Protestant sufferers, called Martyrs, in the unhappy persecution of Queen Mary's reign. I have discussed this matter at some length in The Letters to a Prebendary, and have shewn, in op position to John Fox and his copyists, that some of these pretended martyrs were alive when he wrote the history of their death (l); that others of them, and the five. Bishops in particular, so far from being Saints, were notoriously deficient in the ordinary duties of good subjects and honest men (2) ; that others again were notorious assassins, as Gardener, Flower, ''and Rough ; or robbers, as Debenham, King, Marsh, Cauches, Gilbert, Massey, &c. (3) ; while not a few of them retracted their errors, as Biluey, Taylor, Was- (1) See Letter IV. on Persecution. (2) See Letter V. on UV Reformation. (3) Letter IV, C Cg 6S LETTER XXII. salia, and died, to all appearance, Catholics. To the whole ponderous folio of Fox's falsehoods, I have op posed the genuine and edifying Memoirs of Missionary Priests and other Catholics, who suffered death for their Religion, during- the reigns of Elizabeth and the Stuarts. Finally, you reproach me with the scandalous lives of some of our Popes, during the middle ages, and of very many Catholics of different descriptions, throughout the Cjjurch at the present day ; and you refer me to the edifying lives of a great number of Protestants now living in this country. My answer, Dear Sir, to jour concluding objections, is briefly this, that I,, as well as Baronius. Bellarmin, and other Catholic writers, have unequivocally ad mitted, that some few of our Pontiffs have disgraced themselves by their crimes, and given just cause of scandal to Christendom (1); but I have remarked that the credit of our cause is not affected by the per sonal conduct of particular pastors, who succeed one another in a regular way, in the same manner, in which the credit of yours is affected by the behaviour of your Founders, who professed to have received an ex traordinary commission from God to reform Religion (2.) I acknowledge, with the same unreserveduess, that the lives of a great proportion of Catholics, in this and other parts of the Church, is a disgrace to that Holy Catholic Church, which they profess to believe in. Un happy members of the true Religion by whom the name of God (and of his Holy Church) is blasphemed among the nations ! Rom. ii. 24. Unhappy Catholics, u who live enemies of the cross of Christ, whose end is destrucr (1) See Letter II. on Supremacy. (2) Ibid. OBJECTIONS ANSWERED. 69 tion, who mind only earthly things! Philip, iii. 18. But, it must needs be that scandals should come : never theless, wo to that man by whom the scandal cometh ! Matt xviii. 7. In short, I bear a willing testimony to the public and private worth of very many of my Protestant countrymen of different Religions, as citi zens, as subjects, as friends, as children, as parents, as moral men, and as Christians, in the general sense of the word ; still I must say that I find the best of them far short of the holiness, which is prescribed in the Gospel, aud is exemplified in the lives of those Saints, whom I have mentioned. On this subject I will quote an authority, which, I think, you will not object to. Dr. Hey says : 'In England, I could almost say, we ' are too little acquainted with contemplative Reli- ' gion. The monk, painted by Sterne, may give us a ' more favourable idea of it, than our prejudices gene- ' rally suggest. I once travelled with a Recolet, and * conversed with a Minim at his Convent; and they ' both had that kind of character which Sterne gives to ' his monk : that refinement of body and mind ; that 'pure glow of meliorated passion, that polished piety ' and humanity (l). In a former letter to your So ciety, I have stated that sincere humility, by which, from a thorough knowledge of our sins and misery, we become little in our own eyes, and try to avoid, rather than to gain the praise and notice of others, is the very ground-work of all other Christian virtues. It has been objected to Protestants, ever since the de fection of their arrogant Patriarch, Luther, that they have said little, and have appeared to understand less (1) Lectures in Divinity, vol. 1. p. 364. 70 LETTER XXII. of this essential virtue. I might say the same with respect to the necessity of an entire subjugation of our other congenial passions, avarice, lust, anger, intem perance, envy, and sloth, as I have said of pride and vain glory ; but I pass over these to say a few words of certain maxims expressly contained in Scripture.- It cannot then be denied that our Saviour said to the rich young man : If thou wilt be perfect, go sell all thou hast and give to the poor, and thou Shalt have treasures. in heaven; or that he declared on another occasion: There are eunuchs who have made themselves eunuchs (continent) for the kingdom of heaven's sake. He that is able to receive it, llet him receive it. Matt. xix. 12. Now it is notorious that this life of voluntary poverty* and perpetual chastity continues to be vowed and ob served by great numbers of both sexes in the Catholic Church; while it is nothing more than a subject of ridicule to the best of Protestants. Again : ' that we ' ought to fast is a truth more manifest than it should ' here need be proved:' I here use the words of the Church of England in her Homily iv p. 11; con formably with which doctrine your Church enjoins, in her Common Prayer Book, filename days of fasting and abstinence, as the Catholic Church does ; namely, the 40 days of Lent, the Ember-days, all the Fi r*jys in the year, &c. : nevertheless, where is the Protestant1 to be found who will submit to the mortification of fasting, even to obey his own Church ? 1 may add, • that Christ enjoins constant prayer, Luke xviii. ]. j Conformably to which injunction, the Catholic Church requires her clergy at least, from the Subdeacon up to the Pope, daily to say the seven Canonical Hours, consisting chiefly of Scriptural Psalms and Lessons ; ATTESTATION OF SANCTITY. 71 which take up in the recital, near an hour and a half, in addition to their other devotions. Now, what pre text had the Protestant clergy, whose pastoral duties are so much lighter than ours, to lay aside these in spired prayers, except indevotion ? Luther himself said his office, for some time after his apostasy. — But, to conclude : as it is of so much importance to ascertain which is the Holy Church, mentioned in your Creed ; and as you can follow no better rule for this purpose, than to judge of the tree by its fruits ; so let me ad vise you and your friends, to make use of every means in your power, to compare regular families, places of education, and especially ecclesiastical establishments of the different communions, with each other, as to morality and piety, and to decide for yourselves ac cording to what you observe in them. I am, Sec. J. M„- LETTER XXIII. To JAMES BROWN, Esq. Sjc. ON DIVINE ATTESTATION OF SANCTITY. DEAR SIR, Having demonstrated the distinctive Holiness of the Catholic Church, in her Doctrine, her Practices, and her Fruits of Sanctity, I am prepared, to shew that God himself has borne testimony to her Holiness and to those very doctrines and practices,,. which Protestants object to as unholy and super-!. stitious, by the many incontestable miracles he. has 72 LETTER XXIII. wrought in her and in their favour, from the age of the Apostles down to the present age. The learned Protestant advocates of Revelation, such as Grotius, Abbadie, Paley, Watson, &c. in defending this common cause against infidels, all agree in the sentiment of the last-named, that 'Miracles are the ' criterion of truth.' Accordingly they observe, that both Moses, Exod. iv. xiv. Numb. xvi. 29. and Jesus Christ, John x. 37, 38.— xiv. 12.— xv. 24. con stantly appealed to the prodigies they wrought, i nat- testation of their Divine mission and doctrine. In deed the whole history of God's people, from the be ginning of the world down to the time of our Blessed Saviour, was nearly a continued series of miracles (l). The latter, so far from confining the power of working them to his own person or time, expressly promised the same, and even a greater power of this nature to his disciples, Mark xvi. If. John xiv. 12. For both the reasons here mentioned, namely, that the Almighty was pleased to illustrate the society of his chosen ser vants, both under the law of nature and the written law, with frequent miracles, and that Christ promised a continuance of them to his disciples under the new law, we are led to expect, that the True Church should be distinguished by miracles, wrought in her, and in proof of her divine origin. Accordingly, the Fathers and Doctors of the Catholic Church, among other proofs in her favour, have constantly appealed to the (1) To say nothing of the Urim and Thummim, the Water af Jealousy, and the superabundant harvest of the sabbatical year, it is incontestable, from the Gospel of St. John v. 2, that the probatical pond was endowed by an Angel with a miraculous power of healing every kind of disease, in the time of Christ. ATTESTATION OF SANCTITY. 73 miracles, by which she is illustrated, and reproached their contemporary heretics and schismatics with -the want of them. Thus St. Ireneeus, a disciple'of St. Polycarp, who himself was a disciple of St. John the Evangelist, reproaches the heretics, against whom he writes, that they could not give sight to the blind, hearing to the deaf, cast out devils, or raise the dead to life ; as he testifies was frequently done in the True Church (l). Thus also his contemporary, Tertullian, speaking of the heretics, says : ' I wish to see the ' miracles they have wrought (2).' St. Pacian, in the fourth century, writing against the schismatic Nova- tus, scornfully asks : ' Has he the gift of tongues or ' prophecy? Has he restored the dead to life?' (3). The great St. Augustin, in various passages of his works, refers to the miracles wrought in, the .Catholic Church, in evidence of her veracity (4). St, Nicetas, Bishop of Treves, in the sixth century, in order to convert her husband, Alboin, King of the Lombards, from Arianism, advises Queen Clodosind to induce him to send confidential messengers, to witness the miracles wrought at the tombs of St. Martin, St. Ger- manus, or St. Hilary, in giving sight to the blind, speech to the dumb, &c. adding: 'Are such things ' done in the Churches of the Arians ?' (5). About the (1) Lib. ii. contra Haer. c. 31. (2)-Eib. de Praescr. (8) Ep. ii. ad Symphor. (4) ' Dubitamus nos ejus Ecclesise condere gremio, qua usque ad confes- * sionem generis humani ab Apostolica sede, per successionem Episcoporum ' (frustra hsereticis circumlatrantibus, et partim plebis ips'ms judicio, partim ' Conciliorum gravitate, partim etiam Miraculorum mujestate damnatrs) cul- ' men auctoritatis obtinuit ?'— De Utilit. Cred. civ. (5) Labbe's Concil. torn. v. p. 835. PART II. D d 74 LETTER XXIII. same time Levigild, King of the Goths in Spain, an Arian, who was converted, or nearly so, by his Catho lic son St. Hermengild, reproached his Arian Bishops that no miracles were wrought among them, as was the case, he said, among the Catholics ( ;). The seventh century was illustrated by the miracles of our Apostle St. Augustin of Canterbury, wrought in con firmation of the doctrine which he taught, as was re corded on his tomb (2): and this doctrine, by the confession of learned Protestants, was purely the Ro man Catholic (3). In the eleventh century, we hear a celebrated Doctor, speaking of the proofs of the Catholic Religion, exclaim thus : * O Lord ! if what ' we believe is an error, thou art the author of it, since ' it is confirmed amongst us by those signs and pro- * digies which could not be wrought but by thee (4).' In short, St. Bernard, St. Dominic, St. Xaverius, &c. all appealed to the miracles, which God wrought by their hands in proof of the Catholic doctrine. I need not mention the controversial works of Bellarmin and other modern schoolmen ; nevertheless, I cannot help observing, that even Luther, when the Anabaptists, adopting his own principles, had proceeded to ex cesses of doctrine and practice which he disapproved of, required them to prove their authority for their (1) Greg. Turon. 1. ix. c. 15. (2) ' Hie requiescit D. Augustinus, &c. qui operatione miraculorum suffultus, * Edelberthum Regem ac gentem illius ab idolorum cultu ad fidem Christi ' convertit.' — Bed. Ecclcs. Hist. 1. ii. t. 3. See, in particular, the account of this Saint's restoring sight to a blind man in confirmation of his doctrine. Ibid. c. 2. (3) The Centuriators of Magdeburg, Sax. 6. Bale. In Act. Rom. Pont. Humphrey's Jesuit, Ike. (4) Ric. a S. Vict, de Trinit. 1. i. ATTESTATION OF SANCTITY. 75 innovations by the performance of miracles! (l). You will naturally ask, Dear Sir, how Luther himself got rid of the argument, implied by this requisition, which, it is evident, bore as strongly against him, as against the Anabaptists ? On one occasion, he an swered thus : ' I have made an agreement with the 4 Lord not to send me any visions, or dreams, or an- ' gels,' &c. (2). On another occasion, he boasts of his visions as follows : ' I also was in spirit,' and, ' if I ' must glory in what belongs to me, I have seen more ' spirits than they (the Swinkfeldians, who denied the ' Real Presence) will see in a whole year (3).' Such has been the doctrine of the Fathers and Catho lic writers concerning miracles in general, as Divine Attestations in favour of that Church in which God is pleased to work them. I will now mention, or refer to a few particular miraculous events of unquestion- ble evidence, which have illustrated this Church, dur ing the eighteen centuries of her existence. No Christian questions the miracles and prophecies of the Apostles ; and if they do not, why should any Christian question the vision and prophecy of the Apostolic Saint Polycarp, the Angel of the Church of Smyrna, Rev. ii. 8, concerning the manner of his future martyrdom, namely, by fire (4) ? or the testi mony of his episcopal correspondent, who was likewise a disciple of the Apostles, St. Ignatius Bishop of Antioch, who testifies that the wild beasts, let loose upon the martyrs, were frequently restrained by a divine (1) Sleidan. (2) Manlius in loc. comrnun. See Brierlev's Apology, p. 418, (3) Luth. ad Senat. Civil. Germ. (4) Genuine Acts by Ruinart. P '1 2 76 LETTER XXIII. power from hurting them ? In consequence of this, he prayed that it might not be the case with him ( l). St. Irenaeus, Bishop of Lyons, was the disciple of St. Polycarp, and* like him, an illustrious martyr. Shall we then call in question his testimony, when he de clares, as I have noticed above, that miracles, even to the revival of the dead, frequently took place in the Catholic Church, but never among the heretics (2). Or shall we disbelieve the testimonies of the learned Origen, in the next century ; who says that it was usual with the Christians of his time to drive away de vils, heal the sick, and foretel things to come ? ad ding ; ' God is my witness, I would not recommend 4 the religion of Jesus by fictitious stories, but only ' by clear and certain facts (3).' One of Origen's scho lars was St. Gregory, Bishop of Neocesarea, sirnamed Thaumaturgus, or Wonderworker, for the numerous and astonishing miracles which God wrought by his means. Many of these, even to the stopping the course of a flood, and the moving of a mountain, are recorded by the learned Fathers, who, soon after, wrote his life(4). St. Cyprian, the great ornament of the third century, recounts several miracles which took place in it ; some of which proves the blessed Eucharist to be a Sacrifice, and the lawfulness of receiving it under One Kind. In the middle of the fourth century happened that won derful miracle, wheu, the Emperor Julian the Apos tate, attempting to rebuild the Temple of Jerusalem, in order to disprove the prophecy of Daniel, concern ing it, Dan. ix. 27, tempests, whirlwinds, earth* (1) Ep. ad. Roman. (2) Contra Iter. 1. ii. c. 31, (S) Contra Cels. 1. i. (4) Greg. Nyss, Euseb. 1, vi, St, Basil, St. Jerom. ATTESTATION OF SANCTITY* 7/ quakes, and fiery eruptions convulsed the scene of the undertaking, maiming or blasting the thousands of Jews and other labourers employed in the work, and, in short, rendering the completion of it utterly im possible. In the mean time a luminous cross, surround ed with a circle of rays, appeared in the heavens, and numerous crosses were impressed on the bodies and garments of the persons present. These prodigies are so strongly attested by almost all the authors of the age, Arians and Pagans, no less than Catholics (1), that no one but a downright sceptic can call them in ques tion. They have accordingly been acknowledged by the most learned Protestants (2). Another miracle, which may vie with the above-mentioned, for the number and quality of its witnesses, took place in the following century, at Typassus in Africa; where a whole congregation of Catholics being assembled to perform their devotions, contrary to the orders of the Arian tyrant, Hunneric, their right hands were chop ped off, and their tongues cut out to the roots, by his command : nevertheless they continued to speak as perfectly as they did before this barbarous act (3). I pass over numberless miracles recorded by SS. Basil, (1) Besides the testimony of the Fathers, St. Gregory Nazianzen, St. Chrysostom, St. Ambrose, and of the historians Socrates, Sozomen, Theo- doret, &c. these events are also acknowledged by Philostorgius the Arian, Ammianus Marcellinus the Pagan, &c. (2) Bishop Warburton published a book called Julian, in proof of these miracles. They are also acknowledged by Bishop Halifax, Disc. p. 23. (3) The vouchers for this miracle are Victor Vitensis, Hist. Persec. Vandal. 1. ii. the Emperor Justinian, who declares that he had seen some of the sufferers, Codex Just. Tit. 27, the Greek historian Procopius, who says he had conversed with them, L. i. de Bell. Vand. c. 8, ^Eneas of Geza, a Platonic philosopher, who, having examined their mouths, protested that he was not bo much surprised at their being able to talk as at their being able 78 LETTER XXIII. Athanasius, Jerom, Chrysostom, Ambrose, Augus tin, and the other illustrious Fathers and Church- historians, who adorned the fourth, fifth, and sixth centuries of Christianity ; and shall barely mention one miracle, which both the last-mentioned holy Bishops relate, as having been themselves actual wit nesses of it, that of restoring sight to a blind man,* by the application to his eyes of a cloth which had touched the relics of SS. Gervasius and Protasius (1). The latter Saint, one of the most enlightened men who ever handled a pen, gives an account, in the work to which 1 have just referred (2), of a great number of mi racles, wrought in Africa, during his Episcopacy, by the relics of St. Stephen ; and among the rest, of seventy wrought in his own diocese of Hippo, and some of them in his own presence, in the course of two years. Among these was the restoration of three dead bodies to life. From this notice of the great St. Augustin of Hippo, in the fifth century, I proceed to observe, concerning St. Augustin of Canterbur}7, at the end of the sixth, that the miracles wrought by him, were not only re corded on his tomb, and in the history of the Venerable Bede and other writers, but that an account of them was transmitted, at the time they took place, by St. Gregory to Eulogius, Patriarch of Alexandria, in an Epistle, still extant, in which this Pope compares them with those performed by the Apostles (3). The latter Saint wrote likewise an Epistle to St. Augustin to live. De Immort. Anim. Victor. Turon. Isid. Hispal. Greg. Magn. *ic. The miracle is admitted by Abbadie, Dodwell, Mosheim, and other learned Protestants. (1) Aug. De Civil. Dei, 1. xxii. p. 8. (2) Ibid, 1. xxii, (3) Epbt, S, Greg. 1. vii, ATTESTATION OF SANCTITY. 79 himself, which is still extant in his works, and in Bede's history, cautioning him against being elated with vain-glory, on the occasion of these miracles, and reminding him that God had bestowed the power of working them, not on his own account, but for the conversion of the English nation (l). On the sup position that our Apostle had wrought no miracles, what farces must these Epistles have exhibited among the first characters of the Christian world ! Among the numberless and well-attested miracles which the histories of the middle ages present to our view, I stop at those of the illustrious AbbotSt. Bernard, in the twelfth century, to whose sanctity the most emi nent Protestant writers have borne high testimony (2). This Saint, in the life of his friend, St. Malachy of Armagh, among other miracles, mentions the cure of the withered hand of a youth, by the application of his friend's dead hand to it (3). But this, and all the miracles which St. Bernard mentions of other Saints, quite disappear, when compared with those wrought by himself; which for their splendour and publi city, never were exceeded. All France, Germany, Switzerland, and Italy bore testimony to them ; and Prelates, Princes, and the Emperor himself, were often the spectators of them. In a journey which the Saint made into Germany, he was followed by Philip, Arch deacon of Liege, who was sent by Sampson, Arch bishop of Rheims, to observe his actions (4). This (1) Ibid, et Hist. Bed. 1. i. c. 31. (2) Luther, Calvin, Bucer, CEcolompadius, Jewel, Whitaker, Mosheim, &e. (3) Vita Malach. inter Oper. Bern. (4) St. Bernard's Life was written by his three contemporaries, William Abbot of Thierry, Arnold Abbot of Bonevaux, and Geoffery the Saint's Secretary, and by other early writers : his own eloquent Epistles, andotlur woiks, furnish mar;\ particulars. 80 LETTER XXIII. writer accordingly, gives an account of a vast number of instantaneous cures, which the holy Abbot perform ed on the lame, the blind, the paralytic, and other dis eased persons, with all the circumstances of them. Speaking of those wrought at Cologne, he says : ' They 4 were not performed in a corner ; but the whole city ' was witness to them. If any one doubts or is curious, 4 he may easily satisfy himself on the spot, especially 4 as some of them were wrought on persons of no in- ' considerable rank and reputation (1).' A great num ber of these miracles were performed, in express con firmation of the Catholic doctrine which he defended. Thus, preaching at Sarlat against the impious and im pure Henricians, a species of Albigenses, he took some loaves of bread and blessed them : after which he said ; ' By this you shall know that I preach to you the true 4 doctrine, and the heretics a false doctrine : all your ' sick, zvho shall eat of this bread, shall recover their ' health ;' which prediction was confirmed by the event (2). St. Bernard himself, in the most celebrated of his works (3), addressed to Pope Eugenius III. refers to the miracles, which God enabled him to work, by way of justifying himself for having preach ed up the second Crusade (4); and, in his letter to the people of Thotilouse, he mentions his having de tected the heretics among them, not only by words, but also by miracles (5). The miracles of St. Francis Xaverius, the Apostle of India, who was contemporary with Luther, in number, splendour, and publicity, may vie with St. Bernard's. They consisted in foretelling future events, speaking- unknown languages, calming tempests at sea, curing (1) Published by Mabillon. (2) Geof. in Vit. Bern. (3) Dc Cotisideratione, (4) De Consid. 1. ii. (5) Ad Tolos, Ep. 241. ATTESTATION OF SANCTITY. '81 various maladies, and raising the dead to life ; and, though they took place in remote countries, yet they were verified in the same, soon after the Saint's death, by virtue of a commission from John III. King of Por tugal, and were generally acknowledged, not only by Europeans of different religions in the Indies ( ' ., but also by the native Mahometans and Pagans (2). At the same time with this Saint, lived the holy contemplative St. Philip Neri, in proof of whose miracles 300 wit nesses, some of them persons of high rank, were juridi cally examined (3). The following century was illus trated by the attested miracles of St. Francis of Sales(4), even to the resurrection of -the dead ; as it was also by those of St. John Francis Regis ; concerning which, twenty-two Bishops of Languedoc wrote thus to Pope Clement XI. : ' We are witnesses that, before the ' tomb -of F. J. F. Regis, the blind see, the lame walk, 4 the deaf hear, the dumb speak (.5).' You will understand, Dear Sir, that I mention but a few of the Saints, and with respect to these, but a few of their miracles ; as my object is to prove the single fact that God has illustrated the Catholic Church with undeniable miracles, chiefly by means of his Saints, in the different ages of her existence. What now will you, Dear Sir, and your friends say to the evidence, here adduced ? Will you say that all the Holy Fathers, up to the Apostolic age, and that all the (1) See the testimonies of Hackluyt, Baldeus, and Tavernier, all Pro testants, in Bouhour's Life of St.Xaverius, translated by the PoetDryden. (2) Ibid. (3) See Butler's Saints' Lives, May 26. (4) See Marsollier's Life of St. F. de Sales, translated by Dr. Coombes. (5) See his Life by Daubenton, which is abridged by Butler, June 16. PART II, E e 82 LETTER XXIII. Ecclesiastical writers down to the Reformation ; and, since this period, that all Catholic Authors, Pre lates and Officials, have been in a league to deceive mankind ? In short, that they are all liars and impos tors alike? Such, in fact, is the absurd and horrible system, which, to get rid of the DIVINE ATTES TATION, in favour of the Catholic Church, the ce lebrated Dr. Conyers Middleton has declared for ; as have most Protestant writers who have handled the subject, since the publication of his Free Inquiry. This system, however, which is a libel on human nature, does not only lead to general scepticism in other respects, but also undermines the credit of the Gospel itself. For if all the ancient Fathers and other writers are to be disbelieved, respecting the miracles of their times, and even those which they themselves wit nessed, upon what grounds are we to believe them, in their report of the miracles which they had heard of Christ and his Apostles, those main props of the Gos pel and our common Christianity ? Who knows but they may have forged all the contents of the former and the whole history of the latter ? It was impossi ble these consequences should escape the penetration of Middleton : but, in his opinion, a worse consequence, namely, a Divine Attestation of the Sanctity of the Catholic Church, which would inevitably follow from admitting the veracity of the Holy Fathers, banished his dread of the former. Let him now speak to this point for himself, in his own flowing periods. Hebe- gins with establishing an important fact, which I also have been labouring to prove, where he says: 'It ' must be confessed, that the claim to a miraculous ' power was universally asserted and believed in all ATTESTATION OF SANCTITY. 83 4 Christian countries and in all ages of the Church, till ' the time of the Reformation : for Ecclesiastical Ilis- 4 tory makes no difference between one age and ano- ' ther, but carries on the succession of its miracles,, as ' of all other common events, through all of them iii- ' differently to that memorable period (l).' As far as 4 Church-historians can illustrate any thing, there is / not a single point, in all history, so constantly, 4 explicitly, and unanimously affirmed by them, as the 4 continual succession of those powers, through all * ages, from the earliest Father, who first mentions 4 them, down to the Reformation ; which same suc- 4 cession is still further deduced by persons of the same 4 eminent character for probity, learning and dignity, 4 in the Romish Church, to this very day ; so that the 4 only doubt which can remain with us is, whether 4 Church-historians are to be trusted or not : for if ' any credit be due to them in the present case, it must 4 reach to all or none : because the reason for believ- 4 ing them in any one age will be found to be of equal 4 force in all, as far as it depends on the character of 4 the persons attesting, or on the thing attested (2).' We shall now hear Dr. Middleton's decision on this weighty matter, and upon what grounds it is formed. He says : ' The prevailing opinion of Protestants, 4 naniely, of Tillotson, Marshal, Dodwell, &c. is, that 4 miracles continued during the three first centuries. * Dr. Waterland brings them down to the fourth, Dr. 4 Beriman to the fifth. These unwarily betrayed the ' Protestant cause into the hands of its enemies : (1) Free Inquiry, Introduct. Disc. p. xiv. (2) Ibid. Preface, p. 15. Ee2 84 LETTER XXIII. 4 for it was in those primitive ages, particularly in the 4 3d, 4th, and 5th, those flourishing times of mira- 4 cles, in which the chief corruptions of Popery, mon- 4 kery, the worship of relics, invocation of Saints, 4 prayers for the dead, the superstitious use of images 4 and of Sacraments were introduced (1).' 'We shall 4 find, after the conversion of the Roman empire, the 4 greater part of their boasted miracles were wrought 4 either by monks, or relics, or the sign of the cross, ' &c. : wherefore, if we admit the miracles, we must ad- ' mit the rites for the sake of which they were wrought : 4 they both rest on the same bottom (2).' ' Everyone 4 may see what a resemblance the principles and practice ' cf the fourth century, as they are described by the ' most eminent Fathers of that age, bear to the present 'rites of the Popish Church (3).' 'When we reflect 4 on the surprising confidence with which the Fathers ' of the fourth age affirmed, as true,* what they them- ' selves had forged, or knew to be forged, it is natural ' to suspect that so bold a defiance of truth could not ' be acquired or become general at once, but must have ' been gradually carried to that height by the example ' of former ages (4).' Such are the grounds on which this shameless declaimer accuses all the most holy and learned men, whom the world has produced during 1800 years, of forgery and a combination to cheat mankind. He does not say a word to shew that the combination itself is either probable or possible ; all he advances is, that this libel on human nature, is necessary for the support of Protestantism ; for he says, and this with evident truth : ' By granting the Ro- (1) Introd. p. li. (2) Ibid. p. lxvi. (3) Ibid. lxv. (4) Ibid. p. lxxxiv. ATTESTATION OF SANCTITY. 85 4 manists but a single age of miracles, after the time of 4 the Apostles, we shall be entangled in a series of ' difficulties, whence we can never fairly extricate our- 4 selves, till we allow the same powers also to the pre- 4 sent age (1).' Methinks I hear some of your Society thus asking me : Do you then pretend that your Church possesses the miraculous powers at the present day ? — I answer, that the Church never possessed miraculous powers, in the sense of most Protestant writers, so as to be able to effect cures or other supernatural events at her mere pleasure : for even the Apostles could not do this ; as •we learn from the history of the lunatic child. Matt. xvii. 16. But this I say, that the Catholic Church, being always the beloved Spouse of Christ, Rev. xxi. 9, and continuing at all times to bring forth children of heroical sanctity, God fails not in this, any more than in past ages, to illustrate her and them by unquestion able miracles. Accordingly, in those processes which are constantly going on, at the Apostolical See, for the canonization of new Saints (2), fresh miracles of a re cent date continue to be proved with the highest degree of evidence, as I can testify from having perus ed, on the spot, the official printed account of some of them (3).' For the further satisfaction of your friends, (1) Introd. p. xcvi. (2) Among the late canonizations are those, in 1807 and 1808, of S. F. Caracciolo, founder of the Regular Clerks ; of St. Angela de Mercis, foundress of the Ur^uline Nuns, of St. Mary of the Incarnation, Mile. Acarie, &c. One Of the latest beatifications is that of B. Alfonso Liguori, Bishop of St. Agata de Goti. (3) One of these, proved in the process of the last mentioned Saint, con sisted in the cure and restoration of an amputated breast of a woman, who was at the point of death from a cancer. 86' LETTER XXIII. I will inform them that I have had satisfactory proof, that the astonishing catastrophe of Louis XVI, and his Queen, in being beheaded on a Scaffold, was foretold by a nun of Fougeres, Soeur Nativity, 20 years before it happened ; and that the banishment of the French Clergy from their country, long before it happened, was predicted by the holy French pilgrim, Benedict Labre, whose miracles caused the conversion of the late Rev. Mr. Thayer, an American clergyman, who being at Rome, witnessed several of them. With re spect to miraculous cures of a late date, I have the most respectable attestation of several of them, and I am well acquainted with four or five persons who have experienced them. The following facts are respective ly attested, but at much greater length, by the Rev. Thomas Sadler, ofTrafford, near Manchester, and the Rev. J. Crathorne, of Garswood, near Wigan : — Jo seph Lamb, ofEccles, near Manchester, now 28 years old, on the 12th of August, 1814, fell from a hay-rick, four yards and a half high, by which accident it was conceived the spine of his back was broken. Certain it is, that he could neither walk nor stand without crutches, down to the 2d of October, and that he de scribed himself as feeling the most exquisite pain in his back. On that day, having prevailed with much diffi culty upon his father, who was then a Protestant, to take him in a cart with his wife and two friends, Thos. Cutler and Eliz. Dooley, to Garswood, near Wigan, where the hand of F. Arrowsmith, one of the Catholic Priests who suffered death at Lancaster, for the exercise of his religion, in the reign of Charles I, is preserved and has often caused wonderful cures, he got himself conveyed to the altar rails of the chapel, and there to ATTESTATION OF SANCTITY. 87 be signed, on his back, with the sign of the cross, by that hand ; when, feeling a particular sensation and total change in himself, as he expressed it, he exclaimed to his wife : Mary, I can walk! — This he did, without any help whatever, walking first into an adjoining room, and thence to the cart which conveyed him home. With his debility, his pains also left him, and his back has continued well ever since (l). These particulars the above named persons, all still living, are ready, as they were respectively witnesses of them, to declare upon oath. I have attestations of incurable cancers and other disorders being suddenly remedied by the same instrument of God's bounty ; but it would be a tedious work to transcribe them, or the other attesta tions in my possession of a similar nature. Among those of my personal acquaintance who have experienced supernatural cures, I will mention Mary Wood, now living at Taunton Lodge, where several other witnesses of the facts I am going to state live •with her. ' On March 15, 1809, Mary Wood, in at- ' tempting to open a sash window, pushed her left hand * through a pane of glass, which caused a very large 4 and deep transverse wound in the inside of the left 4 arm, and divided the muscles and nearl}' the whole of 1 the tendons that lead to the hand ; from which acci- 4 dent, she not only suffered, at times, the most acute * pain, but was from the period I first saw her (March 4 15), till some time in July, totally deprived of the use ' of her hand and arm (2).' — What passed between the (1) The Rev. Mr. Sadler's letter to me is dated Aug. 6, 1817. (2) This account is copied from a letter to Miss F. T. Bird, dated Sept. 89, 1809, by Mr. Woodford, an eminent Surgeon of Taunton, who attended 3Iary Wood. 88 LETTER XXIII. latter end of July, when, as the Surgeon elsewhere says ' he left his patient,' having no hopes of restoring her, till theo'th of August, on the night of which she was perfectly and miraculously cured, I shall copy from a letter to me, dated Nov. 19, 1809, by her amanuensis, Miss Maria Hornyold. 4 The Surgeon gave little or rao ' hopes of her ever again having the u*se of her hand, ' which, together with the arm, seemed withered a-nd ¦' jsormewibat contracted; only saying, in some years, 4 nature might give Jier some little use of it, which was f considered by her superiors as a mere delusive com- 4 fort. Despairing ©f further human assistance towards '¦her cure, she determined, with the approbation of her *¦ said superiors, the 4 intercession of St. Winefrid, Iby a Novena(l)/ Accord- 'inglvy on the 6t*h of August she put a piece of moss, 4 from the Saint's Well on her arm, continuing recal- 4 leofeed and praying, &c. when, to her great surprise, 4 'the next morning she found she could dress herself, 4 put her arm behind 'her and to her head, having re- 4 gained the free use and full strength of it. In short, 4 she was perfectly cured !' In this state I myself saw her a few years afterwards, when I examined her hand; and in the same state she still continues, at the above named place, with many other highly credible vouchers who are ready respectively to attest these particulars. 4 On the 16th of the month, the Surgeon was sent for ; ' and, (being asked his opinion concerning Mary ¦ Wood's arm, he gave no hope of a perfet cure, and ' very little of her ever having even the least use of it ; ' when, she being introduced to him and shewing him (1) Certain prayers continued during nine days. ATTESTATION OF SANCTITY. 89 4 the arm, which he thoroughly examined and tried, he 4 was so affected at the sight and the recital of the man- ' nerofthe cure, as to shed tears, and exclaim, it was ' a special interposition of Divine Providence.' I shall say little of the miraculous cure of Winefrid White, a young woman of Wolverhampton, on the 28th of June, 1805, at Holywell, having published a detail ed account of it, soon after it happened, which has been republished in England and in Ireland (1). Let it suffice to say ; 1st, that the disease was one of the most alarming topical ones which are known, namely, acurvature of the spine, as her Physician and Surgeon ascertained, who treated it accordingly, by making two great issues, one on each side of the spine, of which the patient's back still bears the marks ; 2dly, that, besides the most acute pains, throughout the whole nervous system, and particularly in the brain, this disease of the spine produced a hemiplegia or palsy on one side of the patient, so that when she could feebly crawl, with the help of a crutch under her right arm, she was forced to drag her left leg and arm after her, just as if they made no part of her ; 3dly, that her disorder was of long continuance, namely, of three years standing ; though not in the same degree, till the latter part of that time ; and that it was publicly known to all her neighbours and a great many others; 4thly, that having performed the acts of devotion which she felt herself called to undertake, and having bathed in the fountain, she, in one instant of time, on the 28th of June, 1805, found herself freed from all her (1) By Keating and Brown, Duke-street, Grosvcnor-square, London ; Coyne, Dublin. PART II. F f r}() LETTER XXI Vj pains and disabilities, so as to be able to walk, run and jump, like any other young person, and to carry a Greater weight with the left arm than she could with the right ; 5thly, that she has continued in this state these thirteen years down to the present time;, and that all the above-mentioned circumstances have been ascertained by me in the regular examination of the several witnesses of them, in the places of their respec tive residence, namely, in Staffordshire, Lancashire, and Wales ; they being persons of different countries, no less than of different religions and situations in life. The authentic documents of which examination, as well as of the whole proceeding, are contained in the work referred to above. Several of the witnesses are still living, as is Winefrid White herself. I am, &c. J. M. LETTER XXIV. To JAMES BROWN, Esq. <$c OBJECTIONS ANSWERED. DEAR SIR, I subscribe to the objection, which you say has been suggested to you by your learned friend, on the subject of miracles. Namely, I admit that a vast number of incredible and fals'e miracles, as well as other fables, have been forged by some, and be lieved by other Catholics in every age of the Church, OBJECTIONS ANSWERED. 91 including that of the Apostles (l). I agree with him and you in rejecting the Legenda A urea of Jacobus de Voragine, the Speculum of Vincentius Belluacensis, the Saints' Lives of the Patrician Metaphrastes, and scores of similar legends, stuffed, as they are, with rela tions of miracles of every description. But, Sir, are we to deny the truth of all history, because there are num berless false histories ? Are we to question the four Evangelists, because there have been several fabricated Gospels? Most certainly not : but we must make the best use we can of the discernment and judgment which God has given us, to distinguish false accounts of every kind from those which are true ; and we ought, I allow, to make use of double diligence and caution, in ex amining alledged revelations and events contrary to the general laws of nature. Your friend's second objection, which impeaches the diligence, integrity and discernment of the Cardi nals, Prelates, and other Ecclesiastics ac Rome, ap pointed to examine into the proofs of the miracles there published, shews that he is little acquainted with the subject he talks of. In the first place, then, a ju ridical examination of each reported miracle must be made in the place where it is said to have happened, and the depositions of the several witnesses must be given upon oath; this examination is generally repeat ed two or three-different times at intervals. In the next place, the examiners at Rome are unquestionably men (1) St. Jerom, in rejecting certain current fables concerning St. Paul and St- Thecla, mentions a Priest who was deposed by St. John the Evangelist, for inventing similar stories. De Script. Apost. — Pope Gelasius, in th? 5th century, condemned several apochryphal Gospels and Epistles, and legenda of Saints, and among the latter the common ones of St. George. Ffa 92 LETTER XXIV. of character, talents and learning, who, nevertheless, are not permitted to pronounce upon any cure or other effect in nature, till they have received a regular report of physicians and naturalists upon it. So far from being precipitate, it employs them whole years to come to a decision, on a few cases, respecting each Saint; this is printed and handed about among indifferent persortSj previously to its being laid before the Pope. In short, so strict is the examination, that, according to an Italian proverb: It is next to a miracle to get a mi racle proved at Rome. It is reported by F. Daubenton, that an English Protestant Gentleman, meeting, in that pity, with a printed process of 40 miracles, which had been laid before the Congregation of Rites, to which the examination of them belonged, was so well satisfied with the respective proofs of them, as to express a wish that Rome would never allow of any miracles, but such as were as strongly proved, as these appeared to be ; when, to his great surprise, he was informed that every one of these had been rejected by Rome as not suffici ently proved ! Nor can I admit of the third objection of .your friend, by which he rejects our miracles, on the alledg- ed ground, that there was no sufficient cause for the performance of them ; for not to mention that many of them weFe performed for the conversion of infidelsj I am bound to cry out with the apostle: Who hath known the mind of the Lord, or who hath been his coun sellor ! Rom. xi. 34. Thus much is certain from Scrip ture, tliat the same Deity who preserved Jonas in the whale's belly, to preach repentance to the Ninivites, created a gourd to shelter his head from the heat of the sun, Jonas iv. 6. ; and that as he sent fire from heaven OBJECTIONS ANSWERED. 93 to save his prophet Elias, so he caused iron to swim, in order to enable the son of a prophet to restore the axe which he had borrowed, 2 Kings vi. 6. In like man ner, we are not to reject miracles, sufficiently proved, under pretext that they are mean, and unworthy the hand of Omnipotence; for we are assured, that God equally turned the dust of Egypt into lice, as he turn ed the waters of it into blood, Exod. viii. Having lately perused the works of several of the most celebrated Protestant writers, who, in defending the Scripture-miracles, endeavour to invalidate the credit of those they are pleased to call Popish Miracles, I think it just, both to your cause and my own, to state the chief arguments they make use of, and the answers which occur to me, in refutation of them. On this head, I cannot help expressing my surprise and concern that writers of character, and some of them of high dignity, should have published several gross jalsehoods ; not, I trust, intentionally, but from the blind precipitancy and infatuation which a panic fear of Popery generally produces. The late learned Bishop of Salisbury, Dr. J. Douglas, has borrowed from the infidel Gibbon what he calls 'A most satis- 4 fying proof that the miracles ascribed to the Romish 4 Saints are forgeries of an age posterior to that they 'lay claim to (l).' The latter says: 'It may seem ' remarkable, that Bernard of Clairvaux, who records ' so many miracles cf his friend St. Malachy, never ' takes notice of his own, which, in their turn, how- (1) The Criterion, or Rules by which the true Miracles of the New Tes tament are distinguished from the spurious Miracles of Pagans and Papists, ly John Douglas, D. D. Lord Bishop of Salisbury, p. 71, note. 94 LETTER XXIV. 'ever, are carefully related by his companions and ' disciples. In the long series of Ecclesiastical His- ' tory, does there occur a single instance of a saint 4 asserting that he himself possessed the gift of mira- 'cles ?'(]). Adopting this objection, the Bishop of Salisbury says : ' I think I may safely challenge the 4 admirers of the Romish saints to produce any writing 4 of any of them, in which a power of working mira- 4 cles is claimed (2).' Elsewhere he says : ' From Xa- 4 verius himself (namely, from his published letters) ' we are furnished, not only with a negative evidence 4 against his having any miraculous power, but also ' with a positive fact,* which is the strongest possible ' presumption against it (3).' Nevertheless, in spite of the confident assertions of these celebrated authors, jt is certain (though the last things which true saints choose to speak of are their own supernatural favours) that several of them, when the occasion required it, have spoken of the miracles, of which they were the instruments (4) ; and among the rest, those two identi cal saints, St. Bernard and St. Francis Xaverius, whom Gibbon and Dr. Douglas instance, to prove their asser tion. I have already referred to the passages in the works of St. Bernard, where he speaks of his miracles as of notorious facts; and I here again insert them in a note (5). With respect to St. Xaverius, he not only *v (1) Hist, of Decline and Fall, chap. xv. (2) Criterion, p. 369. (3) Ibid. p. 76. (4) The great St. Martin acknowledged his own miracles, since, according to his friend and biographer, Sulpicius, Dialogue 2, he used to say, that he was not endowed with so great a power of working them, after he was a Bishop, as he had been before. (5) Addressing himself to P. Eugenius III. in answer to his enemies, wiie reproached him with the ill success of the second crusade, he says: 'Sed OBJECTIONS ANSWERED. 95 mentions, in those very letters which Dr. Douglas appeals to, a miraculous cure, which he wrought upon a dying woman in the kingdom of Travancor ; but he expressly calls it a Miracle, and affirms that it caused the conversion of the whole village in which she resided (l). A second palpable falsehood is thus confidently ad vanced by the capital enemy of miracles, Dr. Middle- ton : ' I might risk the merit of my argument on this 4 single point, that, after the apostolic times, there is 4 not, in all history, one instance, either well attested, 4 or even so much as mentioned, of any particular person ' who had ever exercised that gift (of tongues) or pre- ' tended to exercise it, in any age or country whatso- 4 ever (2).' In case your learned friend is disposed to take up the cause of Middleton, I beg to refer him to the history of St. Pacomius, the Egyptian Abbot, and founder of the Cenobites, who, 4 though he never 4 learned the Greek or Latin languages, yet sometimes 4 miraculously spoke them,' as his disciple and biogra pher reports (3) ; and to that of the renowned preacher, St. Vincent Ferrer, who, having the gift of tongues, preached indifferently to Jews, Moors, and Christians, in their respective languages, and converted incredi- • dicnnt forsitan isti : Unde scimus quod a Domino sermo egressus sit ? Qua ' signa tufacis ut credarmis tibH ? Non est quod ad ista ipse respondeam : ' parcendum verecundiae meae : responde tu pro me et pro te ipso, secundum ' ea quje vidisti et audisti.' De Consid. 1. ii. c. 1. In like manner, writing te the people of Thoulouse, of his miracles wrought there, he says: 'Mora ' quidem brevis apud vos sed non infructuosa : veritate nimirum per nos ma- ' nifestatft, non solum in sermone sed etiam tn virtule.' Ep. 541. (1) Epist. S. F. Xav. L. i. Ep. iv. (3) Inquiry into Mirac. Powers, p. 130, &c. (3) Tillemont, Mem. Ecc. torn, vii. 96 LETTER XXIV. ble numbers of each of these descriptions (l). In like manner, the bnll of the canonization of St. Lewis Ber- trand, A. D. 1671, declares that he possessed the gift of tongues, bv means of which he converted as mawv as 10,000 Indians of different tribes in South Ame rica, in the space of three years (2). Lastly, let your friend peruse the history of the great Apostle of the East Indies, St. Xaverius, who, though he ordinarily studied the languages of the several nations to whom be announced the word of God, yet, on particular occasions, he was empowered to speak those which he had not learned (3). This was the case in Travancor, as his companion Vaz testifies ; so as to be enabled to convert and instruct 10,00© infidels, all of whom he baptized with his own hand. This was the case again at Amaiiguchi, were he met with a number of Chinese merchants. Finally, the bull of St. Xaverius's canonization by Urban VIII. proclaims to the world, that this saint was illustrated with the gift of tongu-es. So false is the bold assertion of Middleton, adopted in part by Bishop Douglas and other Protestants, that " there is not, in all history, one instance, either well \ attested, or so much as mentioned, of any person * who had ever exercised the gift -of tongues, or pre- ' tended to exercise it.' Nor is there more truth in what the Bishop of Sa lisbury, Dr. Paley, See. maintain, namely, that ' the 4 Popish miracles,' as they Insultingly call rhem, (1) See his Life by Lanzaoo, Bishop of Lucca, ajso Spondans*; ad An, 1403. (2) See Alban Butler's Saints' Lives, Oct. 9. (S) See Bcuhour'j Life of St. Xaverius, translated by Dryden, &c. OBJECTIONS ANSWERED. 9? ' were not wrought to confirm any truth, and that no 4 converts were made by them !' (l). In refutation ef this, I may again refer to the epitaph of our apostle, St. Augustin, and to the miracles of St. Bernard at Sarlat, mentioned above. To these instances, I may add the prodigy of St. Dominic, who, to prove the truth of the Catholic doctrine, threw a book contain ing it into the flames, in which it remained uncon- sumed ; at the same time challenging the heretics, whom he was addressing, to make the same experi ment on their Creed (2). In like manner, St. Xaverius, on a certain occasion, finding his wolds to have no effect on his Indian auditory, requested them to open the grave of a corpse that had been buried the day before, when, falling on his knees, he besought God to restore it to life for the conversion of the infidels present ; upon which, the dead man was instantly re stored to life and perfect health, and the country round about received the faith (3). It is chiefly through the sides of the Apostle of India, that the author of The Criterion endeavours to wound the credit of the other Saints and the Catholic Church on the point of miracles. Hence, in the ap plication of his three laboured rules of criticism, he objects, that the alledged miracles of St Xaverius were (1) Criterion, p. 369. View of Evidences, by Dr. Paley, vol. i. p. 346, (2) Petrus Vallis Cern. Hist. Alb. Butler's Saints' Lives, Aug. 4. (3) This was one of the miracles referred to by the Paravas of Cape Comorin, when the Dutch sent a minister from Batavia, to proselyte them to Protestantism. On this occasion, they answered this minister's discourse thus : The great father (St. Xaverius) raised to life five or six dead persons ; do you raise twice as many ; do you cure all our sick, and make the sea twice as productive offish as it now is, and then we will listen to you. Du Halde's Re- eueil, vol. v. Berault Bercastel's Hist. Ecc. torn, xxiii. p. 454. PART II. G g 98 LETTER XXIV. performed in the extremities of the East;— that the accounts of them were published, not on the spot, but in Europe, at an immense distance ; — and this not till 35 years after the Saint's death (l). A single document, of the most public nature, at once overturns all the three rules in regard of this Saint. He died at the end of 1552, and on the 28th of March, 1556, a letter was sent from Lisbon by John III. King of Portugal, to his Viceroy in India, Don Francisco Barretto, 'enjoin- 4 inghim to take depositions upon oath, in all parts of 4 the Indies, where there is a probability of finding 4 witnesses, not only concerning the life and manners 4 of Francis Xaverius, and of all the things con> ' mendably done by him, for the salvation and exam^ 4 pie of men, but also concerning the miracles, which ' he has wrought, both living and dead. You shall ' send these authentic instruments, with all the evi- ' dences and proofs, signed with your hand-writing, ' and sealed with your ring, by three different convey- 4 ances (2).' But the author of The Criterion, it seems, has more positive, and what he calls ' conclusive evi- 4 dence, that during this time, (35 years from his ' death) Xaverius's miracles had not been heard of. ' The evidence,' he says, ' I shall alledge, is that of ' Acosta, (namely, Joseph Acosta) who himself had 4 been a missionary among the Indians. His work, ' De Procuranda Indorum Salute, was printed in 1589, ' that is, about 37 years after the death of Xaverius, (l) Criter. pp. 78, 81, &c. (2) This letter is extant in Tursellinus, but had been published several years before by Emanuel Acosta, in his Re rum in Oriente Gestarum. Dilin- gen, 1571. Paris, 1572. OBJECTIONS ANSWERED. 99 * and in it we find an express acknowledgment, that ' no miracles had ever been performed by missionaries ' among the Indians. — Acosta was himself a Jesuit, 4 and therefore, from his silence, we may infer unex- ' ceptionably, that between 30 and 40 years had 4 elapsed before Xaverius's miracles were thought 'of(l).' — The argument has been thought so conclu sive, that Mr. Le Mesurier (2), Hugh Farmer (3), the Rev. Peter Roberts (4), and other Protestant writers on miracles, have adopted it with exultation, and it has probably contributed as much to the author's title of Detector Douglas, as his exposure of the two impostors, Lauder and Archibald Bower. But what will the admirers of this Detector say, if it should appear that Acosta barely says, that ' there was not 4 the same faculty or facility of working miracles - among the missionaries, which there was among the ' Apostles ?' (5). Or rather, what will they say, if this same Acosta, in the very work which Dr. Douglas quotes, expressly asserts, that signs and miracles too numerous to be related, accompanied the preaching of the Gospel both in the East and the West Indies in his ozon time ! (6). And when, with respect to this illus trious personage, he further adds : 4 Blessed Father (1) Criterion, p. 73. (2) Bampton Lectures, p. 288. (3) Dissertation on Miracles, p. 205. (4) Observations on a pamphlet. (5) 'Altera causa in nobis est cur Apostolica pradicatio institui omnino ' non possit Apostolice, quod miraculorum nulla facultas sit, qua? Apostoli ' plurima perpetrarunt.' — Acosta, De Proc. 1. ii. c. 8. (6) ' Et quidem dona Spiritus signa et miracula, quffi ficlei pradicatione in- ' noluerunt, his etiam temporibus, quando chantas usque adeo refrixit, en- ' numerare longum esset, turn in Orientali ilia India, turn in hac Occi- ' dentali.' — De Procur. 1, i, c. 6. p. 141. Gg2 10© LETTER XXIV. ' Francis,' as he calls him, ' being a man of an Apos- 4 tolical life, so many and such great signs have 4 been reported of him by numerous and credible wit- ' nesses, that hardly more in number or greater in ' magnitude are read of any one, except the Apos- ' ties' ?'(1). Now all this I affirm Acosta does say, in the very work quoted by Bishop Douglas, a copy of which I beg leave to inform your learned friend, (and through him, other learned men) is to be found in the Bodleian library at Oxford, under the title which I insert below (2). The author of The Criterion is hardly entitled to more mercy, for his cavils on what Ribadeneira says of the miracles of St. Ignatius, than for those on what Acosta says of the miracles of St. Xaverius. The fact is, the Council of Trent, having recently prohibited the publication of any new mira cles, until they had been examined and approved of by the proper ecclesiastical authority, Ribadeneira, in the first edition of his life of St. Ignatius, observed due caution in speaking of this Saint's miracles. How ever, in that very edition, he declared that many such had been wrought by him; which having been after wards juridically proved, in the process of the Saint's canonization, his biographer published them without scruple, as he candidly and satifactorily informs his (l) ' Convertamus ocuios in nostri saeculi hominem, B. Magistrum Fran- ' ciscum^ virum Apostolicas vita, cujus tot et tain magna signa referuntur ' per plurimos, eosque idoneos testes, ut vix de alio, exceptis Apostolis, * plura legantur. Quid Magister Gaspar aliique socii, &c.' — De Procur. Ind. Salut. 1. ii. c. 10. p. 226. (2) The book is to be inquired for at the Bodleian library by the following quaint description : Johanna Papissa toti Orbi manifestata, 8° c. 39, 4rf« Seld. OBJECTIONS ANSWERED. 101 readers in that third edition ; which edition now stands in his folio work of The Saints' Lives (I). I shall close this very long letter with a very few words respecting a work which has lately appeared, animadverting on my account otThe Miraculous Cure oj Winefria I White (2). The writer sets out with the system of Dr. Middleton, by admitting none except Scripture-miracles ; but very soon he undermines these miracles also, where he says : ' An independent 4 and express- divine testimony is that alone, which ' can assure us whether effects are miraculous or not, 4 except in a few cases.' He thus reverses the proofs of Christianity, as its advocates and its Divine Founder himself have laid them down. He adds : ' No mortal 4 ought to have the presumption to say, a thing is oris ' not contrary to the established laws of nature.' Again he says : 4 To provea miracle there must be a proof of (1) ' Mihi tantum abest ut ad vitam Ignatii illustrandam miracula deesse ' videantur, ut multa eaque prastantissima judicem in media luce versari.' The writer proceeds to mention several cures, &c. edit. 1572 1 cannot close this article without protesting against the disingenuity of several Pro testant writers, in reproaching Catholics with the impositions practiced by the Jansenists at the tomb of Abb6 Paris. In fact, who detected those impositions, and furnished Dr. Campbel, Dr. Douglas, &c. with arguments against them, except our Catholic Prelates and theologians ? In like manner, Catholics have reason to complain of these and other Protestant writers, for the manner in which they discuss the stupendous miracle tbat took place at Saragossa in 1640, on one Michael Pellicer, whose leg, having been amputated, he, by his prayers, obtained a new, natural leg ; jus>t as if this miracle rested on no better foundation than the slight mention which Cardinal Retz makes of it in his Memoirs. In fact, we might have expected that learned Divines would have known that this miracle had been amoly discussed, soon after it happened, between Dr. Stillingtieel and the Jesuit Edward Worsley; in which discussion, the latter produced such attestations of the fact as it seems impossible not to credit. — See Reason and, Religion, p. 3*38. (a) By the Rev. Peter Roberts, Rector of Llanarmon, &c. 102 LETTER XXIV. 4 the particular divine agency.' According to this sys tem we may say : No one knows but the motion of the funeral procession, or some occult quality of nature, raised to life the widow of Nairn's son 1 Mr. Roberts will have no difficulty in saying so, as he denies that the resurrection of the murdered man from the touch of the prophet Elisha's bones, 2 Kings xiii. was a mi racle ! Possessed of this opinion, the author can rea dily persuade himself, that a curvated spine ard he miplegia, or any other disease whatever, may be cur ed, in an instant/ by immersion in cold, water, or by any thing else ; but as it is not likely that any one else will adopt it, I will say no more of his physical argu ments on this subject. — He next proceeds to charge W. White and her friends with a studied imposition ; in support of which charge, he asserts, that ' the Church 4 of Rome had not announced a miracle for many 4 years.' This only proves, that his ignorance of what is continually going on in the Church, is equal to his bigotry against it. The same ignorance and bigotry are manifested in the ridiculous story concerning Six- tus V, which he copies from the unprincipled Leti, as also in his account of the exploded and condemned book, the Taxaz Cancellarice, Sec. (1). Towards the con clusion of his work, he expresses a doubt whether I have read Bishop Douglas's Criterion, though I have so frequently quoted it; because, he says, if I had read it, I must have known that Acosta proves that St. Xaverius wrought no miracles among the Indians, and that the same thing appears from the Saint's own letters. Now the only thing, Dear Sir, which these (1) Euseb. Eccles. Hist, 1, iv. c. 15, CATHOLICITY. 103 assertions prove is that Mr. Roberts himself, no more than Bishop Douglas, ever read either Acosta's work, or St. Xaverius's letters, notwithstanding they so frequently refer to them ; for this is the only way of acquitting them of a far heavier charge. I am, &c. J. M. LETTER XXV. To JAMES BROWN, Esq. #c. ON THE TRUE CHURCH BEING CATHOLIC, DEAR SIR, In treating of this third mark of the True Church, as expressed in our common Creed, I feel my spirits sink within me, and I am al most tempted to throw away my pen, in despair. For what chance is there of opening the eyes of candid Protestants to the other marks of the Church, if they are capable of keeping them shut to this ? Every time that each of them addresses the God of Truth, either in solemn worship or in private devotion, he fails not to repeat : / believe in THE CATHOLIC Church : and yet if I ask him the question : Are you a CA THOLIC f he is sure to answer me: No, I am a PROTESTANT .'—Was there ever a more glaring in stance of inconsistency and self-condemnation among rational beings ! At the first promulgation of the Gospel, its followers were distinguished from the lews by the name of Christians, as we learn from Scripture, Acts xi. 26. 104 LETTER XXV. Hence the title of Catholic did not occur in the pri mitive edition of the Apostles' Creed (]); but no sooner did heresies and schisms arise, to disturb the peace of the Church, than there was found to be a ne cessity of discriminating the main stock of her faith ful children, to whom the promises of Christ belonged, from those self-willed choosers of their articles of be lief, as the word heretic signifies, and those disobe dient separatists, as the word schismatic means. For this purpose the title of CATHOLIC, or Universal, was adopted, and applied to the True Church and her children. Accordingly, we find it used by the im mediate disciples of the Apostles, as a distinguishing mark of the True Church. One of these was the illus trious martyr St. Ignatius, Bishop of Antioch, who, writing to the Church of Smyrna, expressly says, that *- Christ is where the CathoHic Church is.' In like manner, the same Church of Smyrna, giving a re lation of the martyrdom of their holy Bishop St. Polycarp, who was equally a disciple of the Apos tles, addresses it to 4The Catholic Churches (2).' This characteristical title of the True Church conti nued to be pointed out by the succeeding Fathers in their writings and the acts of their Councils (3). St. Cyril, Bishop of Jerusalem, in the 4th century, gives the following directions to his pupils : ' If you go in- 4 to any city, do not ask merely, Where is the Church, ' or House of God? because the heretics pretend to 4 have this : but ask, Which is the Catholic Church ? (1) See four collated copies of it in Dup'in's, Bib. Eccl. torn. i. (2) Euseb. Ecc. Hist. 1. iv. c. 15. (3) SS. Justin. Clem. Alex. Appolin. 1 Nicsan. can. 8. 1. C. P. can, 7. &c. CATHOLICITY. 105 4 because this title belongs alone to our Holy Mo- ' ther (l).' 'We,' says a Father of the 5th century, ' are called Catholic Christians (2).' His contempo rary, St. Pacian, describes himself as follows : ' Chris- ' tian is my name, Catholic is my sirname : by the for- 4 mer I am called, by the latter I am distinguished. 4 By the name of Catholic, our society is distinguished 4 from all heretics (3).' But there is not one of the Fathers or Doctors of antiquity, who enlarges so copi ously or so pointedly on this title of the true Church, as the great St. Augustin, who died in the early part of the 5th century. 4 Many things,' he says, 4 detain me in ' the bosom of the Catholic Church the very name 4 of CATHOLIC detains me in it, which she has so * happily preserved amidst the different heretics ; that ' whereas they are all desirous of being called Catho- ' lies, yet, if any stranger were to ask them, Which is 4 the assembly of the Catholics ? none of them would 4 dare to point out his own place of worship (4).' To the same purpose, he says elsewhere : 'We must hold 4 fast the communion of that Church which is called 4 Catholic, not only by her own children, but also by 4 all her enemies. For heretics and schismatics, whe- 4 ther they will or not, when they are sneaking of the 4 Catholic Church with strangers, or with their own 'people, call her by the name of Catholic ; inasmuch ' as they would not be understood, if they did not ' call her by the name by which all the world calls 4 her (5)' In proportion to their affection for the fflorious name of Catholic, is the aveision of these pri- (1; Catech. 18. (2) Salvian de Guberri. Dei, 1. iv. (3) S. Pacian, Ep. i. ad Symp. (4) Contra Epist. Pundam. e. 1. (5) De Ver. Relig. c, 7. PART II. H li 106 ' LETTER XXV. mitive doctors, to every ecclesiastical name or title derived from particular persons, countries, or opini ons. 'What new heresy,' says St. Vincent of Lerins, in the 6th century, ' ever sprouted up, without bearing * the name of its founder, the date of its origin,' &c. ?(])• St. Justin, the philosopher and martyr, had previously made the same remark in the 2d cen tury, with respect to the Marcionite, Valentinian, and other heretics of his time (2). Finally, the nervous St. Jerom lays down the following rule on this subject : 4 We 'must live and die in that Church, which, hav- ' ing been founded by the Apostles, continues down ' to the present day. If, then, you should hear of 4 any Christians not deriving their name from Christ, 4 but from some other founder, as the Marcionites, the 4 Valentinians, &c. be persuaded that they are not of ' Christ's society, but of Antichrist's (3).' I now appeal to you, Dear Sir, and to the respecta ble friends who are accustomed to- deliberate with you on religious subjects, whether these observations and arguments of the ancient Fathers are not as strik ingly true in this 19th century, as they were during the six first centuries, in which they wrote ? Is there not, among the rival churches, one exclusively known and distinguished by the name and title of THE CATHOLIC CHURCH, as well in England, Hot- land, and other countries, which protest against this Church, as in those which adhere to it ? Does not this effulgent mark of the true religion so incontesta- bly belong to us, in spite of every effort to obscure it, (1) Common. Advers. Haer. c. 34. (2) Advers. Tryphon. (3) Advers. Luciferan. CATHOLICITY. 07 by the nick-names of Papists, Romanists, Sec. (1), that the rule of St. Cyril and St. Augustin is as good and certain now, as it was in their times? What I mean is this : if any stranger in London, Edinburgh, or Am sterdam, were to ask his May to the Catholic Chapel, I would risk my life for it, that no sober Protestant in habitant would direct him to any other place of wor ship than to ours. On the other hand, it is notori ous, that the different sects of Protestants, like the heretics and schismatics of old, are denominated either from their founders,' as the Lutherans, the Cal- vinists, the Socinians, &c. or from the countries in which they prevail, as the Church of England, the Kirk of Scotland, the Moravians, &c. or from some novelty in their belief or practice, as the Anabaptists, the Independants, the Quakers, &c. The first father of Protestants was so sensible that he and they were destitute of every claim to the title of Catholic, that in translating the Apostles' Creed into Dutch, he substituted the word Christian for that of Catholic. The first Lutherans did the same thing in their Cate chism, for which they are reproached by the famous Fulke, who, to his own confusion, proves that the % True Church of Christ must be Catholic in name, as well as in substance (2). I am, &c. J. M. (1) St. Gregory of Tours, speaking of the Arians, and other contemporary heretics of the 6th century, says : 'Romanorum nomine vocitant nostra; ' religionis homines.' Hist. 1. xvii. c. 25. C.i) On the New Testament, p. 378. Hh 2 108 LETTER XXVI. To JAMES BROWN, Esq. Sfc. ON THE QUALITIES OF CATHOLICITY. DEAR SIR, To proceed now, from the name Catholic, to the signification of that name : this is to be gathered from the etymology of the word itself, and from the sense in which the Apostolical Fathers and other Doctors of the Church have constantly used it. It is derived from the Greek word KafloMtes, which means Universal ; and, accordingly, it has ever been employed by those writers, to discriminate the great body of Christians, under their legitimate Pastors, and subsisting in all nations and all ages, from those comparatively small bodies of Christians, who, in cer tain places and at certain times, have been separated from it. 'The Catholic Church,' says St. Augustin, 4 is so called, because it is spread throughout the 4world(l)/ 4 If your Church,' adds he, addressing certain heretics, 4 is Catholic, shew me that it spreads 4 its branches throughout the world ; for such is the 4 meaning of the word Catholic (2)-' — ' The Catholic 4 or Universal doctrine,' writes St. Vincent of Lerins, 4 is that, which remains the same through all ages, and ' will continue so till the end of the world. — He is a 4 true Catholic, who firmly adheres to the faith which 4 he knows the Catholic Church has universally taught (1) Epist. 170. ad S. Sever. (2) Contra Gaudent. ]. iii. c. J, CATHOLICITY. 109 'from the days of old(l).' It follows, from these and other testimonies of the Fathers, and from the meaning of the term itself, that the true Church is Catholic or Universal in three several respects, as to Persons, as to Places, and as to Time. It consists of the most numerous body of Christians ; it is more or less diffused wherever Christianity prevails ; and it has visibly existed ever since the time of the Apostles. Hence, Dear Sir, when you hear me glorying in the name of Catholic, you are to understand me as equivalently proclaiming thus : — I am not a Lutheran, nor a Cal. vinist, nor a Whitfieldite, nor a Wesleyan; I am not of the Church of England, nor of the Kirk of Scotland, nor of the Consistory of Geneva : I can tell the place where, and the time when, each of these sects began ; and I can describe the limits within which they are respectively confined : but Tarn a member of that great Catholic Church, which was planted by Christ and his Apostles, and has been spread throughout the world, and which still constitutes the main stock of Christi anity ; that, to which all the Fathersof antiquity and the Saints of all ages have belonged on earth, and still belong in the bright regions above; that, which has endured and overcome the persecutions and heresies of eighteen centuries : in short, that, against which the gates of hell have not prevailed, and we are assured, never shall prevail. All this is implied by my title of Catholic. But to form a more accurate opinion of the number and diffusiveness of Catholics, compared with any sect (1) Commonit. The same Father briefly and accurately defines the Ca tholic doctrine to be, that which has been believed Semper et ubigut et ab omnibus. 110 LETTER XXVI. of Protestants, it is proper to make a slight survey of their state in the four quarters of the world. In Eu rope, then, notwithstanding the revolutionary perse cution which the Catholic Religion has endured and is enduring, it is still the Religion of the several States of Italy, of most of the Swiss Cantons, of Piedmont, of France, of Spain, of Portugal, and of the Islands in the Mediterranean, of three parts in four of the Irish, of far the greater part of the Netherlands, Poland, Bohemia, Germany, Hungary and the neighbouring Provinces ; and, in those Kingdoms and' States in which it is not the established Religion, its followers are very numerous, as in Holland, Russia, Turkey, the Lutheran and Calvinistic States of Germany and Eng land. Even in Sweden and Denmark several Catholic congregations, with their respective Pastors, are to be found. — The whole vast continent of South America, inhabited by many millions of converted Indians, as Avell as by Spaniards and Portuguese, may be said to be Catholic ; the same may be said of the Empire of Mexico, and the surrounding kingdoms in ^sorth Ame rica, including California, Cuba, Hispaniola, &c. Ca nada and Louisiana are chiefly Catholic; and through out the United Provinces, the Catholic Religion, with its several establishments, is completely protected, and unboundedly propagated.- To say nothing of the Islands of Africa, inhabited by Catholics, such as Malta, Madeira, Cape Verd, the Canaries, the Azores, Mauritius, Goree, &c. there are numerous Churches of Catholics, established and organized under their Pas tors, in Egypt, Ethiopia, Algiers, Tunis, and the other Barbary States on the northern coast ; and thence, in all the Portuguese settlements along the western coast, CATHOLICITY. 11] particularly at Angola and Congo. Even on the east ern coast, especially in the Kingdom of Zanquebar anti Monomotapa, are numerous Catholic Churches. There are also numerous Catholic Priests and many Bishops, with numerous flocks, throughout the greater part of Asia. All the Maronites about Mount Libanus, with their Bishops, Priests and Monks, are Catholics ; so are many of the Armenians, Persians, and other Christi ans, of thesurrounding kingdoms and provinces(l). In whatever Islands or States the Portuguese or Spanish power does prevail, or has prevailed, most of the inha bitants, and in some all of them, have been converted to the Catholic faith. The whole population of the Philippine Islands, consisting of two millions of souls, is all Catholic. The Diocese of Goa contains 400,000 Catholics. In short, the number of Catholics is so great throughout all the Peninsula of India within the Ganges, notwithstanding the power and influence of Britain, as to excite the jealousy and complaints of the celebrated Protestant Missionary, Dr. Bucha nan (2 '. In a late Parliamentary record, it is stated, that in Travancor and Cochin is a Catholic Arch bishopric and two Bishoprics, one of which contains 35,000 communicants (3). There are numerous Ca tholic flocks, with their Priests and even Tjishops, in all the Kingdoms and States beyond the Ganges, particu larly in Siam, Cochin-china, Tonquin, and the different provinces of the Chinese Empire. I must add, on, this subject, that, whereas none of the great Protestant (1) See Sir R. Steele's Account of the Catholic Religion throughout the world. f2) See Christian Researches in Asia, p. 131. Mem. Eccl. (3) Dr. Kerr's Letter, quoted in the late Parliamentary Report on the Ca. tholic question, p. 437. 112 LETTER XXVI. sects was ever much more numerous or widely spread |han it is at present, the Catholic Church, heretofore, prevailed, in all the countries which they now collec tively inhabit. The same may be said with respect to the Greek Schismatics, and in a great measure to the Mahometans. It is in this point of view that the Right Rev. Dr. Marsh ought to institute his compari son between the Church of England and the Church of Rome(l); or rather the Catholic diurck, in commu nion with the See of Rome. In the meantime, we are assured by his fellow prelate, the Bishop of Lincoln, that 4 The Articles and. Liturgy of the Church of * England do not correspond with the sentiments of 4 the eminent Reformers on the continent, or with the 4 Creeds of any Protestant Churches there establish- 4ed(2).' And with respect to this very Church, no thing would be more inconsistent, than to ascribe the greater part of the population of our two Islands to it. For if the Irish Catholics, the Scotch Presbyterians, the English Methodists and other Dissenters, together with the vast population who neither are, nor profess to be, of any religion at all, are subtracted, to what a comparatively small number would the Church of Eng land be reduced ! And, how utterly absurd would it be, for her to pretend to be the Catholic Church ! Nor are these the only subtractions to be made from her numbers, and indeed from those of all other Christian Societies, divided from the True Church ; since, there being but one baptism, all the young children who have been baptized in them, and all invincibly ignorant (1) See his comparative view of the Churches of England ami Rome ! ('.>; Charge in 1803. CATHOLICITY. 113 Christians, who exteriorly adhere to them, really be long to the Catholic Church, as I have shewn above. In finishing this subject, I shall quote a passage from St. Augustin, which is as applicable to the sec taries of this age as it was to those of the age in which he lived. 4 There are heretics every where, but not 4 the same heretics every where. For there is one sort * in Africa, another sort in the East, a third sort in 4 Egypt, and a fourth sort in Mesopotamia, being dif- 4 ferentin different countries, though all produced by 4 the same mother, namely, pride. Thus also the faifh- 4 fuJ are all born of one common mother, the Catholic 4 Church ; and though they are every where dispersed, 4 they are every where the same (l).' But it is still more necessary that the True Church should be Catholic or Universal, as to lime than as to numbers or to place. If there ever was a period since her foundation, in which she has failed, by teaching or promoting error or vice, then the promises of the Al mighty in favour of the seed of David and the King dom of the Messiah, in the Book of Psalms (2), and in those of Isaiah, Jeremiah, and Daniel have failed (3) ; then the more explicit promises of Christ, concerning this Church and her Pastors, have failed (4); then the Creed itself, which is the subject of our present discus sion, has been false (o). — On this point learned Protes tants have been wonderfully embarrassed, and have in volved themselves in the most palpable contradictions. A great proportion of them have maintained that the (1) Lib. de Pact, c 8. (2) Ps. Ixxxviii. alias Ixxxix. iic (3) Is. c. liv. lix. Jerem. xxxi. 31. Dan. ii. 44. (4) Mat. xv. 13— xxviii. 19, 30. (5) I believe in the Holy Catholic Church. PART II. I i 114 LETTER XXVI. Church, in past ages, totally failed, and became the Synagogue of Satan, and that its head pastor, the Bishop of Rome, was and is the man of Sin, the identical Antichrist : but they have never been able to settle among themselves, when this most remarkable of all Revolutions since the world began, actually took place ; or who were the authors, and who the opposers of it; or by what strange means the former prevailed on so many millions of people of different nations, languages, aud interests throughout Christendom, to give up the supposed pure religion, which they had learned from their fathers, and to embrace a new and false system, which its adversaries now call Popery ! In a word, there is no way of accounting for the pre tended change of Religion, at whatever period this may be fixed, but by supposing, as I have said, that the whole collection of Chsistians on some one night went to bed Protestants, aud awoke the next morning Papists ! That the Church in communion with the See of Rome is the original, as well as the most numerous Church, is evident in several points of view. The stone cries out of the wall, as the prophet expresses it (l), in testimony of this. I mean that our venerable cathe drals and other stone churches, built by Catholic hands and for the Catholic worship, so as to resist, in some sort, that which is now performed in them, pro claim that ours is the ancient and original Church. This is still more clear from the ecclesiastical historians ofourownas well as other nations. Venerable Bede, in particular, bears witness (2) that the Roman Mis- (1) Habak. ii. 11. (2) Hist. Eccles. CATHOLICITY. 115 sionary, St. Augustin of Canterbury, and his com panions, converted our Saxon ancestors, at the end of the sixth century, to the belief of the Pope's Supremacy, Transubstantiation, the Sacrifice of the Mass, Purga tory, the Invocation of Saints, and the other Catholic doctrines and practices ; as learned Protestants in general agree (1). Now, as these Missionaries were found to be of the same faith and Religion, not only with the Irish, Picts, and Scots, who were con verted almost two centuries before them, but also with the Britons or Welch, who became Christians in the second century, so as only to differ from them about the time of keeping Easter and a few other unessential points, this circumstance alone proves the Catholic Religion to have been that of the Church in the aforesaid early age. Still the most demonstrative proofs of the antiquity and originality of pur Religion, are gathered from comparing it, with that contained in the works of the ancient Fathers. An attempt was made, during a certain period, by some eminent Pro testants, especially in this country, to press the Fa thers into their service. Among these, Bishop Jewel of Sarum, was the most conspicuous. He not only boasted that those venerable witnesses of the primitive doctrine were generally on his side, but also published the following challenge to the Catholics: ' Let them ' shew me but one only Father, one Doctor, one sen- ' tence, two lines, and the field is theirs {%).' However, (T.) Bishop Bale. Humphreys the Centur. of Magdeb. &c. (2) Jewel's Sermon at St. Paul's Cross, likewise his Answers to Dj;. Coje. Ii3 116 LETTER XXVI. this his vain boasting, or rather deliberate impugn ing of the known truth, only served to scandalize sober and learned Protestants, and among others, his biographer, Dr. Humphreys, who complains that he thereby ' Gave a scope to the Papists, and spoiled 4 himself and the Protestant Church (l).' In fact, this hypocrisy, joined with his shameful falsifications of the Fathers, in quoting them, occasioned the conver sion of a beneficed clergyman, and one of the ablest writers of his age, Dr. W. Reynolds (2)- Most Pro testant writers of later times (3) follow the late Dr. Middleton, and Luther himself, in giving up the ancient Fathers to the Catholics without reserve, and thereby the faith of the Christian Church during the six first centuries, of which faith these Fathers were the witnesses and the teachers. Among other passages to this purpose, the above-named Doctor writes as follows:' 'Every one must see what a resemblance * the principles and practice of the fourth century 4 bear to the present rites of the Popish Church (4).' Thus, by the confession of her most learned adversa ries, our Church is not less CATHOLIC or Universal, as to time, than she is with respect to name, locality , and numbers. I am, &c, J. M. (1) Life of Jewel, quoted by Walsingham, in his invaluable Search into, flatters tf Religion, p. 172. (2) Dodd's Church Hist. vol. ii. (3) See the acknowledgment on this head of the learned Protestants, Qbretcht, Doumoulin, and Causabon. (4) Inquiry into Miracles, Introd. p. 4,$,. 117 LETTER XXVII. To JAMES BROWN, Esq. OBJECTIONS ANSWERED. DEAR SIR, I have received the letter written by your visitor, the Rev. Josuah Clark, B. D. at the re quest, as he states, of certain members of your Society, animadverting on my last to you ; an answer to which letter I am requested to address to you. The Reverend Gentleman's arguments are by no means consistent one with another ; for like other determined controvertists, he attacks his adversary with every kind of weapon that comes to his hand, in the hopes per fas et nefas of demolishing him. He maintains, in the first place, that, though Protestantism Avas not visible before it was unveiled by Luther, it subsisted in the hearts of the true faithful, ever since the days of the Apostles, and that the believers in it constituted the real primi tive Catholic Church.-— To this groundless assumption I answer, that an invisible Church is no Church at all; that the idea of such a Church is at variance with the predictions of the prophets respecting Jesus Christ's future Church, where they describe it as a Mountain on the top of mountains, Is. ii. 2, Mic. iv. 2, and as a city, whose zvatchmen shall never hold their peace, Is. lxii. 6, and, indeed, with the injunction of our Lord himself, to tell the Church, Mat-t. xviii. J 7, in a certain case, which he mentions. It is no less repug nant to the declaration of Luther, who says of him- 118 letter xxvii. self: ' At first I stood alone (l ) ;' and to that of Cal vin, who says ; The first Protestants were obliged to 4 break off from the whole world (2) ; as also to that of the Church of England in her Homilies, where she says: Laity and Clergy, learned and unlearned, all 4 ages, sects and degrees, have been drowned in abo- ' minable idolatry, most detested by God and dam- 4 nable to man, for 800 years and more (3) ' As to the argument in favour of an invisible Church, drawn from 1 Kings xix. 18, where the Almighty telis Elijah :- i" have left me 7000 in Israel, zvhose knees have not been bowed to Baal; our divines fail not to observe, that however invisible the Church of the Old Law was in the schismatical kingdom of Israel, at the time here spoken of, it was most conspicuous and flourishing in its proper seat, the kingdom of Judah, under the pious King Josaphat. Mr. Clark's second argument is borrowed from Dr. Porteus, and consists in a mere quibble. In answer to the question ; 'Where was the ' Protestant Religion before Luther?' this Prelate re plies; 'It was just where it is now: only that then it 4 was corrupted with many sinful errors, from which 4 it is now reformed (4). — But this is to fall back into the refuted system of an invisible Church ; it is also to contradict the Homilies, or else it is to confess the real truth, that Protestancy had no existence at all be fore the sixteenth century. The Reverend Gentleman next maintains, on quite opposite grounds, that there have been large and visi ble societies of Protestants, as he calls them, who have (1) Opera Pref. (3) Perils of Idolatry, P. iii. (2) Epist. 171. (4) Confut. p. 79. OBJECTIONS ANSWERED. 119 stood in opposition to the Church of Rome, in all past ages/ — -True, there have been heretics and schismatics of one kind or other during all that time, from Simon Magus, down to Martin Luther; many sects of whom, such as the Arians, the Nestorians, the Eutychians, the Monotholites, the Albigenses, the Wickliffites, and the Hussites, have been exceedingly numerous and powerful in their turns, though most of them now have dwindled away to nothing: but observe, that none of the ancient heretics held the doctrines of any descrip tion of modern Protestants, and all of them maintained doctrines and practices which modern Protestants re probate, as much as Catholics do. Thus the Albigen ses were real Manicheans, holding two First Princi ples or Deities, attributing the Old Testament, the propagation of the human species, to Satan, and acting up to these diabolical maxims (1). The Wickliffites and Hussites were the levelling and sanguinary Jaco bins of the times and countries in which they lived (2) ; in other respects these two sects were Catholics, pro fessing their belief in the Seven Sacraments, the Mass, the Invocation of Saints, Purgatory, &c. If, then, your Reverend Visitor is disposed to admit such com pany into his religious communion, merely because they protested against the Supremacy of the Pope, and some other Catholic tenets, he must equally admit Jews, Mahometans and Pagans into it, and acknow ledge them to be equally Protestants with himself. Your Reverend Visitor concludes his letter with a long dissertation, in which he endeavours to shew, (1) See an account of them, and the authorities on which this rests, in Let ters to a Prebendary. Letter IV. (2) Ibid. 120 LETTER XXVII. that however we Catholics may boast of the antiquity and perpetuity of our Church iu past times, our tri umphs must soon cease by the extinction of this Church, in consequence of the persecution now car rying on aaainst it in France, and other parts of the continent (*l) ; and also from the preponderance of the Protestant power in Europe; particularly that of our own country, which, he says, is nearly as much interested in the extirpation of Popery as of Jaco binism. — My answer is this : I see and bewail the Anti-catholic persecution which has been, and is car ried on in France and its dependent states; where to decatholicize, is the avowed order .of the day. This was preceded by the less sanguinary, though equally anti-catholic persecution of the Emperor Joseph II. and his relatives in Germany and Italy. I hear the exul tations and menaces on this account, of the Wrang- hams, De Coetlegons, Towsons, Bichenos, Ketts, Fabers, Daubenys, and a crowd of other declamatory preachers and writers, some of whom proclaim that the Romish Babylon is on the point of falling, and others that she is actually fallen. In the mean time, though more living branches of the mystical Vine should be cut of by the sword, and more rotten branches should fall of, from their own decay (2), I am not at (1) Namely, in 1802. {2) Since the present letter was written many circumstances have -occur red to shew the mistaken politics of our Rulers, in endeavouring to weaken and supplant the Religion of their truly loyal and conscientious Catholic subjects. Among other measures for this purpose, may be mentioned the late instructions sent to the Governor of Canada, which Catholic province alone remained faithful at the time of trial, when all the Protestant provinces abjured their allegiance. To the same intent may be cited the letter of Dr. Kerr, Senior Chaplain of Fort St. George, quoted in the late Parliamentary OBJECTIONS ANSWERED. 121 ail fearful for the life of the tree itself ; since the Di vine veracity is pledged for its safety, as long as the sun and moon shall endure, Ps. lxxxix. ; and since the experience of eighteen centuries has confirmed our faith in these divine promises. During this long in terval, kingdoms and empires have risen and fallen, the inhabitants of every country have been repeatedly changed ; in short, ever} thing has changed except the doctrine and jurisdiction of the Catholic Church, which are precisely the same now as Christ and his Apostles left them. In vain did Pagan Rome, during three centuries, exert its force to drown her in her own blood ; in vain did Arianism and other heresies sap her foundations; during two centuries more ; in vain did hordes of barbaritns, from the north, and of Maho ¦ e- tans, from the South, labour to overwhelm her ; in vain did Luther swear that he himself would be her death (l): she has survived these, and numerous other Report. By this it appears that the Catholics in that province generally converted about SCO infidels to Christianity every year, and that there was a prospect of their converting many of the Hindoo Chiefs, but tha*. our Go vernment set its face against these conversions. Thus is the infamous worship of Jaggernaut itself preferred to the Religion which converted and civilized pur ancestors. Jaggernaut, as Dr. Buchanan informs us, is a huge idol, carved with the most obscene figures round it, and publicly worshipped before hundreds of thousands with obscene songs and unnatural rites, too gross to be described. It is placed on a carriage, under the wheels of which great numbers of its votaries are encouraged to throw themselves in order to be crushed to death by tbem. Now this infernal worship is not barely per mitted, but even supported by our Government in India, as it takes a tribute from each individual wliois present at it, and likewise defrays the expence of it, to the amount, says Dr. Buchanan, of 8700 132 LETTER XXVllI. for in all the other Churches, founded by the Apostles, as those of Jerusalem, Antioch, Alexandria, Corinth, a- likewise in the followers of the innovator Berengarius ; it received fresh ,* trength and increase from the conversion of the Hungarians, and of the Normans and Danes, who before had desolated England, France, and the two Sicilies. CENT. XII. In this century heresy revived with fresh vigour, and in a variety of forms, though mostly of the Manicbean family. Mahometanism also again threalei ed to overwhelm Christianity. To" oppose these, the Almighty was pleased to raise up a succession of as able and virtuous. Popes as ever graced the Tiara, with a proportionable number of other Catholic champions to defend his cause. These were Paschal IT, Gelasius II, Calixtus II, Hono- rius II, Innocent II, who held the second General Council of Lateran, Celestin II, Lucius II, Eugenius III, Anastasius IV, Adrian IV. an Eng lishman, Alexander III, who held the third Lateran Council, Lucius III, Urban III, Gregory VIII, Clement III, and Celestine III. The Doctors of note were, in the first place, the mellifluous Bernard, a Saint, however, who was not more powerful in word than in work; likewise the Venerable Peter, Abbot of Clugni, St. Ansclm and St. Thomas, Archbishops of Can terbury, Peter Lombard, Master of the Sentences, St. Otto, Bishop of Bamberg, St. Norbert of Magdeburg, St. Henry of Upsal, St. Malachy of Armagh, St. Hugh of Lincoln, and St. William of York. The chief heresies, alluded to, were those propagated by Marsilius of Padua, Arnold of Brescia, Henry of Thoulouse, Tanchelm, Peter Bruis, the Waldenses, or disciples of Peter Waldo, and the Bogomilians, Patarini, Cathari, Puritans, and Albigenses, all the latter being different sects of Manicheans. To make up for the loss of these, the Church was increased by the conversion of the Norwegians and Livonians, chiefly through the labours of the above-named Adrian IV, then an Apostolic Missionary, called Nicholas Brcakspear. Courland was converted by St. Meinard, and even Iceland was engrafted in the Apostolic Tree by the labours of Catholic Missionaries. CENT. XIII. The successors of St. Peter in this age were Innocent III, who held the fourth Lateran Council, at which 412 Bishops, 800 Abbots, and Am bassadors from most of the Christian Sovereigns were present, for the ex tinction of the impious and infamous Albigcnsian or Manichcan heresy. Honorius III, Gregory IX, Celestin IV, Innocent IV, who hold the first General Council of Lyons, Alexander IV, Urban IV, Gregory X, who held the second Council of Lyons, in which the Greeks renounced their APOSTOLICITY. 133 Ephesus, Smyrna, &c, owing to internal dissensions aud external violence, the succession of their Bishops schism, though they soon fell back into it. Innocent V, Adrian V, John XXI, Nicholas III, Martin IV, Honorius IV, Nicholas IV, Celestin V, who abdi cated the Pontificate and was afterwards canonized, and Boniface VIII. The most celebrated Doctors of the Church were St. Thomas of Aquin, St. Bona- venture, St. Antony of Padua, and St. Raymund of Pennafort. Other illustrious supporters and ornaments of the Church, were St. Lewis, King of France, St. Elizabeth, Queen of Hungary, St. Hedwige of Poland, St. Francis of Assisium, St. Dominic, St. Edmund, Archbishop of Canterbury, St. Thomas of Hereford, and St. Richard of Chichester. The chief heretics were the Be- guardi and Fratricelli, whose gross immoralities Mosheim himself confesses. In the mean time Spain was, in a great measure, recovered to the Catholic Church from the Mahometan impiety ; Courland, Gothland, and Estonia, were converted by Baldwin, a. zealous missionary : the Cumani, near the mouths of the Danube, were received into the Church, and several tribes of Tartars, with one of their Emperors, were converted by the Franciscan missionaries, whom the Pope sent among them,, not, however, without the martyrdom of many of them. CENT. XIV. Still did the promise of Christ, in the preservation of his Church, contrary to all opposition, and beyond the term of all human institutions, continue to be verified. The following were the Head-Pastors, who successively pre sided over it; Benedict XI, Clement V, who held the General Council of Vienna, John XXII, Clement VI, Innocent VI, Urban V, Gregory XI, Ur ban VI, and Boniface IX. Among the chief ornaments of the Church, in this age, may be reckoned St. Elizabeth, Queen of Portugal, St Bridget of Sweden, Count Elzear and his spouse Delphina, St. Nicholas of Tolentino, St. Catharine of Sienna, John Rusbrock, Peter, Bishop of Autun, &c. The Manichean abominations maintained and practised by the Turlupins, Dul- cinians and other sects, continued to exercise the vigilance and zeal of the Catholic Pastors; and the Lollards of Germany, together with the Wyckliffites of England, whose errors and conduct were levelled at the foundations of Society, as well as of Religion, were opposed by all true Catholics in their respective stations. The chief conquests of the Church in this century were in Lithuania, the prince and people of which received her faith, and in Great Tartary, where the Archbishopric of Cambalu and six suffragan Bishoprics were established by the Pope. Odoric, the missionary, who furnished the aeeount of these events, is known himself to have baptized 20,000 con verts, 't 134 LETTER XXVIII. has, at different times, been broken and confounded. Hence the See of Rome is emphatically and for a dou- CENT. xv. The succession of Popes continued through this century, though among numerous difficulties and dissensions, in the following order: Innocent VII, Gregory X II, Alexander V, John XXIII, Martin V, Eugenius IV, who held the General Council of Florence, and received the Greeks, once more, into the Catholic communion, Nicholas V, Calixtus III, Pius II, Paul II, Sixtus IV, Innocent VIII, and Alexander VI. In this age flourished St. Vincent Ferrer, the wonder-worker, both in the order of grace and in that of na ture, St. Francis of Paula, whose miracles were not less numerous or extra ordinary, St. Laurence Justinian, Patriarch of Venice, St. Antoninus, Arch bishop of 1 lorence, St. Casimir, Prince of Poland, the Venerable Thomas a Kempis, Dr. John Gerson, Thomas Wraldensis, the learned English Car melite, Alphonsus Tostatus, Cardinal Ximenes, &c. At this period the Canary Islands were added to the Church, as were, in a great measure, the kingdoms of Congo and Angola, with other large districts in Africa and Asia, wherever the Portugueze established themselves. The Greek schismatics also, as I have said, together with the Armenians and Mono- tholites of Egypt, were, for a time, engrafted on the Apostolic Tree. These conquests, however, were dampt by the errors and violence of the various sects of Hussites, and the immoral tenets and practices of the Adamites, and other remnants of the Albigenses. CENT. XVI. This century was distinguished by that furious storm from the North, which stripped the Apostolic Tree of so many leaves and branches in thr- quarter. That arrogant Monk, Martin Luther, vowed destruction to the Tree itself, and engaged to plant one of those separated branches instead of it: but the attempt was fruitless; for the main stock was sustained by the arm of Omnipotence, and the dissevered boughs splitting into numberless fragments, withered, as all such boughs had heretofore done. It would be im possible to number up all these discordant sects; the chief of them were, the Lutherans, the Zuinglians, the Anabaptists, the Calvinists, the Anglicans, the Puritans, the Family of Love, and the Socinians. In the mean time, on the trunk of the Apostolic Tree grew the following Pontiffs : Pius III, Julius II, who held the fifth Lateran Council, Leo X, Adrian VI, Cle ment VII, Paul III, Julius III, Marcellus II, Paul IV, Pius IV, who con cluded the Council of Trent, where 231 Prelates condemned the novel- lies of Luther, Calvin, &c, St. Pius V, Gregory Xllf, Sixtus V, Urban APOSTOLICITY. 135 hie reason called the APOSTOLICAL SEE; and being the head See and the centre of Union of the VII, Gregory XIV, Innocent IX, and Clement VIII. Other supporters of the Catholic and Apostolic Church against the attacks, made upon her, were Fisher, Bishop of Rochester, Sir Thomas More, Chancellor, Cuthbert Maine and some hundreds more of Priests and Religious who were martyred under Henry VIII and Elizabeth in this cause ; also the Cardinals Pole, Hosius, Cajctan and Allen, with the writers Eckius, Cochleu, Erasmus, Campion, Parsons, Stapleton, \-c , together with that constellation of great Saints which then appeared, SS. Charles Borromco, Cajetan, Philip Neri, Ignatius, F. Xaverius, F. Borgia, Teresa, &c. In short, the damages sustained from the Northern storm were amply repaid to the Church, by innumerable conver sions in the new Eastern and Western worlds. It is computed that St. Xa verius alone preached the faith in 5*2 kingdoms or independent states, and baptized a million of converts with his own hand, in India and Japan. St. Lewis Bertrand, Martin of Valentia, and Bartholomew Las Casas, with their fellow missionaries, converted most of the Mexicans, and great progress was made in the conversion of the Brazilians, though not without the blood of many martyred Preachers in these aud the other Catholic Missions. David, IKmperor of Abyssinia, with many of his family and other subjects, was now reclaimed to the Church, and Pulika, Patriarch of the Nestorians in Assyria, came to Rome, in order to join the numerous Churches under him to the centre of unity aud truth. CENT. XVII. The Sects, of which I have been speaking, were, at the beginning of this century, in their full vigour ; and though they differed in most other re spects, yet they combined their forces, under the general name of Protestants, to overthrow Christ's everlasting Church. These attempts, however, like tiie waves of the troubled ocean, were dashed to pieces against the Rock on which he had built it. On the contrary, they weakened themselves by civil wars and fresh divisions. The Lutherans split into Diaphorists and Adia- phorists, the Calvinists into Gtimarists and Arminians, and the Anglicans into Episcopalians, Presbyterians, Independents, and Quakers. A vain effort was now set on foot, through Cyril Lucaris, to gain over the Greek Churches to Calvinism, which ended in demonstrating their inviolable attachment to all the controverted doctrines of Catholicity. Another, more fatal attempt, was made to infect several members of the Church itself with the distinguishing error of Calvinism, under the name of Jansenism. But the successors of St. Peter continued, through the whole of this century, equally to make head against Protestant innovation*, Jansenistical rigour, and casuistical laxity. 136* LETTER XXVIII. whole Catholic Church, furnishes the first claim to its title of THE APOSTOLICAL CHURCH.— But you Their names, in order, were these, Leo XI, Paul V, Gregory XV, Urban VIII, Innocent X, Alexander VII, Clement IX, Clement X, Innocent XI, Alexander VIII, and Innocent XII. Their orthodoxy was powerfully sup ported by the Cardinals Bellarmin, Baronius and Perron, with the Bishops Huetius, Bossuet, Fenelon, Richard Smith, and the Divines Petavius, Tille- mont, Pagi, Thomassin, Kellison, Cressy, &c. Nor were the canonized Saints of this age fewer in number or less illustrious than those of the for mer, namely, St. Francis of Sales, St. Frances Chantal, St. Camillus,. St. Fi- delis Martyr, St. Vincent of Paul, &c. Finally, the Church continued to be crowded with fresh converts, in Peru, Chili, Terra Firma, Canada, Louisiana, Mingrelia, Tartary, India, and many Islands both of Africa and Asia. She had also the consolation of receiving into her communion the several Patri archs of Damascus, Aleppo and Alexandria, and also the Nestorian Archbi shops of Chaldaea and Meliapore, with their respective Clergy. CENT. XVIII. At length we have mounted up the Apostolic Tree to our own age. In it, heresy having sunk, for the most part, into Socinian indifference, and Jansenism into philosophic infidelity, this last waged as cruel a war against the Catholic Church, [and," O glorious mark of truth ! against her alone] as Decius and Dioclesian did heretofore: but this has only proved her internal •strength of constitution, and the protection of the God of heaven. The Pon tiffs, who have stood the storms of this century, were Clement XI, Innocent XIII, Benedict XIII, Clement XII, Benedict XIV. Clement XIII, Clement XIV, Pius VI, as at the beginning of the present century Pius VII has done. Among other modern supporters and ornaments of the Church, may be men tioned the Cardinals Thomasi and Quirini, the Bishops Languet, La Motte, Beaumont, Challoner, Hornyold, Walmesley, Hay and Moylan. Among the writers are Calmet, Muratori, Bergier, Feller, Gother, Manning, Hawarden, and Alban Butler ; and among the personages distinguished by their piety, the Good Dauphin, his sister Louisa the Carmelite nun, his heroical daughter Elizabeth, bis other daughter Clotilde, whose beatification is now in pro gress, as are those of Bishop Liguori, and Paul of the Cross-, founder of the Passionists; asalso FF. Surenne, Nolhac and L. Enfant, with their fellow- martyrs, and the Venerable Labre, &c. Nor has the apostolical work of converting Infidels been neglected by the Catholic Church, in the midst of such persecutions. In the early part of the century numberless souls were gained by Catholic preachers in the kingdoms of Madura, Cochin-china, Tonquin, and in the empire of China, including the peninsula of Corca. At APOSTOLICITY. 137 also see, in the sketch of this mystical Tree, an unin terrupted series of other Bishops, Doctors, Pastors, Saints and pious personages, of different times and countries, through these eighteen centuries, who have, in their several stations, kept up the perpetual succes sion : those of one century having been the instructors of those who succeeded them in the next ; all of them following the same. twofold Rule, Scripture and Tradi tion ; all of them acknowledging the same expositor of this rule, the Catholic Church ; arid all of them ad hering to the main trunk or centre of union, the Apos tolic See. Some of the General Councils or Synods likewise appear, in which the Bishops from different parts of the Church assembled, from time to time, under the authority of the Pope, to define its doctrine and regulate its discipline. The size of the sheet did not admit of all the Councils being exhibited. Again you behold, in this Tree, the continuation of the apos tolical work, the conversion of nations ; which, as it was committed by Christ to the Catholic Church, so it has never been blessed by him with success in any hands but in hers. This exclusive miracle, in the order of grace, like those in the order of nature, which I treated of in a former letter, is itself a Divine the same time numerous savages were civilized and baptized among the Hurons, Miamis, Illinois, and other tribes of North America. But the most glorious conquest, because the most difficult and most complete, was that gained by the Jesuits in the interior of South America over the wild savages of Paraguay, Uraguay, and Parona, together with the wild Canisi- ans, Moxosand Chiquites, who, after shedding the blood of some hundreds of their first preachers, at length opened their hearts to the mild and sweet truths of the Gospel, and became models of piety and morality, nor less so of industry, civil order and polity. PART II. M m 138 LETTER XXIX. Attestation on her behalf. Speaking of the conver sion of nations, I must not fail, Dear Sir, to remind your Society, that this our country has twice been reclaimed from Paganism, and each time by the apos tolic labours of Missionaries, sent hither by the See of Rome. The first conversion took place in the second century, when Pope Eleutherius sent Fugatius and Duvianus for this purpose, to the Ancient Britons', or Welch, under their king or governor, Lucius; as Bede and other historians relate. The second conversion was that of our immediate ancestors, the English Saxons and Angles, by St. Augustin and his compa nions, at the end of the sixth century, who were sent from Rome, on this apostolical errand, by Pope Gre gory the Great. Lastly, you see in the present sketch, a series of unhappy children of the Church, who, instead of hearing her doctrines, as it was their duty to do, have pretended to reform them ; and thus, losing the vital influx of their parent stock, have wi thered and fallen off from it as mere dead branches. I am, Sec. J. M. —*»>?¦)»«.¦¦ LETTER XXIX. To JAMES BROWN, Esq. 4<\ ON THE APOSTOLICITY OF THE GATHOLIC MINISTRY. DEAR SIR, In viewing The Apostolical Tree, you are to consider it as representing an uninterrupted succession of Pontiffs and Prelates, who derive not APOSTOLICITY. 13$ barely their Doctrine, but also, in a special manner, their Ministry, namely their Holy Orders, and the Right or Jui'isdiction to exercise those Orders, in a right line, from the Apostles of Jesus Christ. In fact, the Catholic Church, in all past ages, has not been more jealous of the sacred deposit of Orthodox Doc trine, than of the equally sacred deposits of Legitimate Ordination, by Bishops who themselves had been rightly ordained and consecrated, and of Valid Juris diction or Divine Mission, by which she authorizes her ministers to exercise their respective functions in such and such places, with respect to such and such per sons, and under such and such conditions, as she, by the depositaries of this jurisdiction, is pleased to or dain. Thus, my Dear Sir, every Catholic Pastor is authorized and enabled to address his flock as follows : The word of God wluch I announce to you, and the Holy Sacraments which I dispense to you, I am QUALIFI ED to announce and dispense by such a Catholic Bishop, who was consecrated by such another Catholic Bishop, and so on, in a series, which reaches lo the Apostles themselves: and I am AUTHORIZED to preach and minister to you by such a Prelate, zvho received authority, for this purpose, from the Successor of St. Peter, in the Apostolic See of Rome. Heretofore, during a con siderable time, the learned and conscientious divines of the Church of England held the same principles, on both these points, that Catholics have ever held, and were no less firm in maintaining the Divine Right of Episcopacy and the Ministry than we are. This ap pears from the works of one who was, perhaps, the most profound and accurate amongst them, the cele- M m V 140 LETTER XXIX. brated Hooker. He proves, at great length, that the ecclesiastical Ministry is a Divine function, instituted by Gori, and deriving its authority from God, ' in a ' very different manner from that of Princes and Magis- ' trates :' that it is 'a wretched blinduess not to admire ' so great a power as that, which the clergy are en- ' dowed with, or to suppose that any but God can ' bestow it :' that ' it consists in a power over the ' mystical body of Christ, by the remission of sins, and ' over his natural body in the Sacrament, which anti- ' quity doth call the making of Christ's body(i ).' He distinguishes between the power of Orders and the au thority of Mission or Jurisdiction, on both which points he is supported by the canons and laws of the establishment. Not to speak of prior laws ; the Act of Uniformity (2), provides that no Minister shall hold any living, or officiate in any Church, who has not received Episcopal Ordination. It also requires that he shall be approved and licensed for his particular ])\ace and function. This is also clear from the form of Induction of a clerk into any cure (3). In virtue of this system, when Episcopacy was re-established in Scotland, in the year \66c2, four Presbyterian Ministers having been appointed by the King to that office, the English Bishops refused to consecrate tht m, unless they consented to be previously ordained Deacons and Priests ; thus renouncing their former ministerial cha racter, and acknowledging that they had hitherto been (1) Ecclesiast. Politic. B. v. Art. ZZ. (ii) Stat. 13 and 14 Car. II, c. 4. (3) ' Curam et regimen animarum parochianorutn tibi commUtimus.' APOSTOLICITY. 14*1 mere laymen(l). In like manner, on the accession of KingWilliam, who was a Dutch Calvinist, to the throne, when a commission of ten Bishops and twenty Divines was appointed to modify the Articles and Liturgy of the Established Church, for the purpose of forming a coalition with the Dissenters; it appeared that the most lax among them, such as Tillotson and Burnet, together with Chief Baron Hales and other lay Lords, required that the Dissenting Ministers should, at least, be conditionally ordained (2), as being, thus far, mere laymen. In a word, it is well known to be the prac tice of the Established Church, at the present day, to ordain all Dissenting Protestant Ministers of every description, who go over to her; whereas, she never attempts to re-ordain an Apostate Catholic Priest, who offers himself to her service, but is satisfied with his taking the oaths prescribed by law (3). This doctrine of the Establishment, evidently unchurches, as Dr. Heylin expresses it, all other Protestant communions ; (1) Collier's Eccl. Hist. Vol. ii. p. 887. It appears from the same History that four other Scotch Ministers, who had formerly permitted themselves to be consecrated Bishops, were, on that account, excommunicated and de graded by ihe Kirk. Records, N. cxiii. (2) Life of Tillotson by Dr. Birch, pp.42, 1T6. (3) Notwithstanding these proofs of the doctrine and practice of the Es tablished Church, a great proportion of her modern Divines consent, at the present day, to sacrifice all her pretensions to Divine authority and uninter rupted succession. It has been shewn in The Letters to a Prebendary, that in the principles of the celebrated Dr. Balguy, a Priest or a Bishop can as well be made by the Town Crier, if commissioned by the Civil Power, as by the Metropolitan. To this system, Dr. Sturges, Dr Hey, Dr. Paley, and a crowd of other learned theologians subscribe their names Even tut Bishop of Lincoln, in maintaining Episcopacy to be an Apostolical institution, denies. it to be binding on Christians to adopt it : which, in fact, is to reduce it to a mere civil and optional practice. Elem. Vol. ii. Art. 23. 142 LETTER XXIX. as it is an established principle, that, No ministry, no Church (1), and with equal evidence, it unchristians them also j since this Church unanimously resolved, in 1575, that Baptism cannot be performed by any person but a lawful minister (2). But, dismissing these uncertain and wavering opi nions* we know what little account all other Protes tants, except those of England, have made of Aposto lical Succession and Episcopal Ordination. Luther's principles on these points are clear from his famous Bull against the FALSELY CALLED Order of Bishops (3), where he says : ' Give ear now, you 4 Bishops, or rather you visors of the Devil : Doctor ' Luther will read you a Bull and a Reform, which 4 will not sound sweet in your ears. Dr. Luther's Bull 4 and Reform is this : whoever spend their labour, per- 4 sons and fortunes, to lay waste your Episcopacies, 4 and to extinguish the government of Bishops, — they 4 are the beloved of God, true Christians, and opposers 4 of the Devil's ordinances. On the other hand, who- 4 ever support the government of Bishops, and willingly 4 obey them,— they are the Devil's ministers,' &c. True it is, that afterwards, uamely in 1542, this Arch- Reformer, to gratify his chief Patron, the Elector of Saxony, took upon himself to consecrate his bottle companion, Amsdorf, Bishop of Naumburgh (4) : but, then, it is notorious, from the whole of his conduct, that Luther set himself above all law, and derided all consistency and decency. Nearly the same may be (1) 'Ubi nullus est Sacerdos nulla est Ecclesia.' St. Jerom, ccc. (2) Eleoi. of Theol. Vol. ii. p. 4,71. (2) Adversus falso Nojoin. Torn- ii. Jen. A. D. 15x'i. (4) Sleidan, Comment, L, 14. APOSTOLICITY. J4J said of another later Reformer, John Wesley, who, professing himself to be a Presbyter of the Church of England, pretended to ordain Messrs. Whatcoat, Ve- sey, &c. Priests, and to consecrate Dr. Coke a Bi shop ! (1 ) With equal inconsistency the Elders of Hernhuth, in Moravia, profess to consecrate Bishops for England and other kingdoms. On the other hand, how averse the Calvinists, and other Dissenters, are to the very name, as well as the office of Bishops, all mo dern histories, especially those of England and Scot land, demonstrate. But, in short, by whatever name, whether of Bishops, Priests, Deacons, Of Pastors, these Ministers respectively call themselves, it is un deniable, that they are all self-appointed, or, at most, they derive their claim from other men, who them selves were self-appointed, fifteen, sixteen, or seven teen hundred years subsequent to the time of the Apostles. The chief question which remains to be discussed concerns the Ministry of the Church of England; namely, whether the first Protestant Bishops, appoint ed by Queen Elizabeth, when the Catholic Bishops were turned out of their Sees, did or did not receive valid consecration from some other Bishop, who, him self, was validly consecrated ? The discussion of this question has filled many volumes, the result of which is that the orders are, to say the least, exceedingly doubt ful. For, first, it is certain that the doctrine of the Fathers of this Church was very loose, as to the neces- (i) Dr. Whitehead's Life of Charles and John Wesley. It appears that Charles w*as horribly scandalized at this step of his brother John, and that a lasting schism among the Wesleyan Methodists was the Consequence of it.- 144 LETTER XXIX. sity of consecration and ordination. Its chief founder, Cranmer, solemnly subscribed his name to the position, that Princes and Governors, no less than Bishops, can make Priests, and that no consecration is appointed by Scripture to make a Bishop or Priest ( l). In like man ner, Barlow, on the validity of whose consecration that of Matthew Parker and of all succeeding Anglican Bi shops chiefly rests, preached openly that the King's appointment, without any orders or ordination what soever, suffices to make a Bishop (2). This doctrine seems to have been broached by him, to meet the ob jection that he himself had never been consecrated : in fact, the record of such a transaction has been hunted for in vain, during these 200 years. Secondly, it is evident from the books of controversy, still extant, that the Catholic Doctors, Harding, Bristow, Staple- ton, and Cardinal Allen, who had been fellow students and intimately acquainted with the first Protestant Bishops, under Elizabeth, and particularly with Jewel, Bishop of Sarum, and Home, Bishop of Winton, con stantly reproached them, in the most pointed terms, that they never had been consecrated at all ; and that the latter, in their voluminous replies, never accepted of the challenge or refuted the charge, otherwise than by ridiculing the Catholic consecration. Thirdly, it appears that after an interval of fifty years from the beginning of the controversy, namely in the year \6\3, when Mason, Chaplain to Archbishop Abbot, (1) Burnet's Hist, of Reform. Records, B. iii. N. 81. See also his Rec. Part ii. N. 2, by which it appears that Cranmer and the other complying Prelates, on the death of Henry VIII, took out fresh commissions, from Ed ward VI, to govern their dioceses, durante beneplacito, like mere civil officers, (2) Collier's Eccl. Hist. Vol. ii. p. 135. APOSTOLICITY; 14 i> published a work, referring to an alledged register at Lambeth, of Archbishop Parker's consecration by Barlow, assisted by Coverdale and others, the learned Catholics universally exclaimed that the Register was a forgery, unheard of till that date; and asserted, among other arguments, that, admitting it to be true, it was of no avail, as the pretended consecrator of Parker, though he had sat in several sees, had not himself been consecrated for any of them (l). These, however, are not the only exceptions, which Catholic Divines have taken to the Ministerial Orders of the Church of England. They have argued, in particular, against the form of them, as Theologians term it. In fact, according to the Ordinal of Edward VI, restored by Elizabeth, Priests were ordained by the Power of forgiving sins (2), without any power of offering up Sacrifice, in which the essence of the Sa- cerdotium, or Priesthood, consists ; and, according to the same Ordinal, Bishops were consecrated without the communication of any fresh power whatsoever, or even the mention of Episcopacy, by a form which might be used to a child, when confirmed or bap tized (3). This was agreeable to the maxims of the principal author of that Ordinal, Cranmer, who so lemnly decided that 'Bishops and Priests were no two (1) Richardson in his notes on Godwin's Commentary is forced to confess as follows : ' Dies consecrationis ejus (Barlow) nondum apparet.' P. 642. (2) ' Receive the Holy Ghost : whose sins thou dost forgive, they are for- ' given ; and whose sins thou dost retain, they are retained : and be thou a, ' faithful dispenser of the word of God, and of his Holy Sacraments/—* Bishop Sparrow's Collection, p. 158. (3) ' Take the Holy Ghost, and remember that thou stir up the-grace of • God, which is in thee by the imposition of hands.'— Ibid. p. 161. PART II. N 11 14$ LETTER XXIX. 4 things, but one and the same office (l)/ On this* subject our controvertists urge, not only the authority of all the Latin and Greek ordinals, but also the con fession of the above-mentioned Protestant Divine, Mason, who says, with evident truth, ' Not every 4 form of words will serve for this institution (con- 4 veying Orders) but such as are significant of the * power conveyed by the Order (2).' In short, these objections were so powerfully urged by our Divines, Dr. Champney, J. Lewgar, S. T. B. (3), and others, that almost immediately after the last-named had pub lished his work, called Erastus Senior, in 1662, con taining them, the Convocation, being assembled, altered the form of ordaining Priests and consecrating Bishops, in order to obviate these objections (4). Bat, admitting that these alterations are sufficient to obvi ate all the objections of our Divines to the Ordinal, which they are not, they came above a hundred years- too late for their intended purpose ; so that if the Priests and Bishops of Edward's and Elizabeth's reigns were invalidly ordained and consecrated, so must those (1) Blirnet's Hist, of Reform, vol. i. Record, B. iii. n. 21,- quest. 10. O) Ibid. B. ii. c. 16. (3) Lewgar was the friend of Chillingworth, and by him converted to the Catholic faith, which, however, he refused to abandon, when the latter re lapsed intoLatitudinarianism. (4) The form of ordaining a Priest was thus altered : ' Receive the Holy ' Ghost for the office and work of a Priest in the Church of God, now com- ' mitted to thee by the imposition of our hands : Whose sins thou shalt ' forgive, they are forgiven,' &c. — The form of consecrating a Bishop was ' thus enlarged: ' Receive the Holy Ghost for the office and work of a Bishop ' in the Church of God, now committed unto thee by the imposition of our 'hands, in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost; v and remember, that thou stir up the grace of God, which is iu thee.' APOSTOLICITY. 147 •of Charles the Second's reign, and their successors, have been also. However long I have dwelt on this subject, it is not yet exhausted. The case is, there is the same ne cessity of an Apostolical succession of mission, or au thority to execute the functions of Holy Orders, as tiiere is of the Holy Orders themselves. This mission, or authority, was imparted by Christ to his Apostles, when he said to them : As the Father hath sent me, I also send you, Matt. xx. 21, and of this St. Paul also speaks, where he says of the Apostles : How can they preach, unless they are sent ? Rom. x. 15. I believe, Sir, that no regular Protestant Church, or Society, admits its ministers, to have, by their ordination or appointment, unlimited authority in every place and congregation. Certain it is, from the Ordinal and: Articles of the Established Church, that she confines the jurisdiction of her ministers to ' the 4 Congregation to which they shall be appointed (1).' Conformably to this, Dr. Berkley teaches, that ' a de- ' feet in the Mission of the Ministry, invalidates the ' Sacraments, affects the purity of public worship, and " therefore deserves to be investigated by every sincere 4 Christian (2.) To this Archdeacon Daubeny adds, that ' Regular Mission only subsists in the Churches ' which have preserved Apostolical succession.'— I moreover believe, that in all Protestant Societies the Ministers are persuaded, that the authority by which they preach and perform their functions is, some how or other, Divine. But, on this head, I must observe to (1) Article 23. form of ordaining Priests and Deacons. (?) Serm. atCo.iseer. of Bishop Home. Nn 2 148 LETTER XXIX. you, Dear Sir, and your Society, that there are only two ways, by which Divine Mission or authority can be proved or communicated ; the one ordinary, the other extraordinary. The former takes place, when this authority is transmitted in regular succession from those who originally received it from God ; the other, when the Almighty interposes, in an extraordinary manner, and immediately commissions certain indivi duals to make known his will to men. The latter mode evidently requires indisputable miracles to attest it ; and accordingly Moses and our Saviour Christ, who were sent in this manner, constantly appealed to the prodigies they wrought in proof of their Divine mission. Hence even Luther, when Muncer, Storck, and their followers, the Anabaptists, spread their errors and devastations through Lower Germany, counselled the magistrates to put these questions to them (not reflecting that the questions were as applicable to him self as to Muncer), 'Who conferred upon you the ' office of preaching ? And who commissioned you to ' preach ? If they answer, God : then let the magis- ' trates say ; Prove this to us by some evident miracle : 4 for so God makes known his will, when he changes ' the institutions, which he had before established (]).' Should this advice of the first Reformer to the masris- trates be followed in this age and country, what swarms of sermonizers and expounders of the Bible would be reduced to silence ! For, on one hand, it is notorious, that they are self-appointed prophets, who run without being sent ; or, if they pretend to a com mission, they derive it from other men, who them-; (1) Slpidan. De Stat, Relig. 1. v, APOSTOLICITY. 149 selves had received none, and who did not so much as claim any, by regular succession from the Apostles. Such was Luther himself j such also were Zuinglius, Calvin, Muncer, Menno, John Knox, George Fox, Zinzendorf, Wesley, Whitfield, and Swedenburg. None of these preachers, as I have signified, so much as pretended to have received their mission from Christ in the ordinary way, by uninterrupted succes sion from the Apostles. On the other hand, they were so far from undertaking to work real miracles, by way of proving they had received an extraordinary Mission from God, that, as Erasmus reproached them, they could not so much as cure a lame horse, in proof of their divine legation. Should your friend, the Rev. Mr. Clark, see this letter, he will doubtless exclaim, that, whatever may be the case with Dissenters, the Church of England, at least, has received her Mission and authority, together with her orders, by regular succession from the Apos tles, through the Catholic Bishops, in the ordinary way. In fact, this is plainly asserted by the Bishop of Lincoln (1). — But take notice, Dear Sir, that though we were to admit of an Apostolical succession of Orders in the Established Church, we never could admit of an Apostolical succession of Mission, Jurisdic tion, or right to exercise those orders in that Church: nor can its clergy, with any consistency, lay the least daim to it. For, first, if the Catholic Church, that is to say, its 'Laity and Clergy, all sects and degrees, ' were drowned in abominable idolatry, most detested * of God and damnable to man, for the space of 800 -:¦*) Elem. of Theol. voj. ii. p. ',00. 150 LETTER XXIX. 4 years,' as the Homilies affirm {l ), how could she retain this divine mission and jurisdiction, all this time, and all this time employ them, in commissioning her Cler gy to preach up this ' abominable idolatry ?' Again, was it possible for the Catholic Church to give juris diction and authority, to Archbishop Parker, for ex ample, and the Bishops Jewel and Home, to preach against herself ? Did ever any insurgents against an established government, except the Regicides in the Grand Rebellion, claim authority from that very go vernment to fight against it, and destroy it? In a word, we perfectly well know, from history, that the first English Protestants did not profess, any more than foreign Protestants, to derive any Mission or au thority whatsoever from the Apostles, through the exist ing Catholic Church. Those of Henry's reign preached and ministered in defiance of all authority, ecclesiastical and civil (2). Their successors in the reign of Edward and Elizabeth claimed their whole right and mission to preach and to minister from the Civil Power only (3). This latter point is demonstratively evident from the Act and the Oath of Supremacy, and from the homage of the Archbishops and Bishops to the said Elizabeth ; in which the Prelate elect ' acknowledges and confesses, 1 that he holds his Bishopric, as well in spirituals as 4 in temporals, from her alone and the Crown Royal.' f 1) Against the Perils of Idolatry, P. iii. (2) Collier's Hist. vol. iL p. 81. (3) In the reign of James I, Archbishop Abbot having incurred suspen sion by the canon law, for accideutly shooting a man, a Royal commission was issued to restore him. On another occasion, he was suspended by the King himself, for refusing to licence a book. In Elizabeth's reign the Bi shops approved of prophesying, as it was called ; the Queen disapproved of it, and she obliged them to condemn it, APOSTOLICITY. 1.51 The same thing is clear from a series of Royal Ordi nances respecting the Clergy, in matters purely spiri tual, such as the pronouncing on doctrine, the prohibi tion of prophesying, the inhibition of all preaching, the giving and suspending of spiritual faculties, &c. Now, though I sincerely and cheerfully ascribe to my So vereign all the Temporal and Civil power, jurisdiction, rights, and authority, which the Constitution and laws ascribe to him, I cannot believe that Christ ap pointed any temporal prince to feed his mystical flock, or any part of it, or to exercise the power of the keys of the kingdom of heaven at his discretion. It was foretold by Bishop Fisher in Parliament, that the Royal Ecclesiastical Supremacy, if once acknowledged, might pass to a child or to a woman (I), as, in fact, it soon did to each of them. It was afterwards trans ferred, with the crown itself, to a foreign Calvinist, and might have been settled, by a lay assembly, on a Mahometan. All, however, that is necessary for me here to remark is, that the acknowledgment of a Royal Ecclesiastical Supremacy ' in all Spiritual and Eccle- 4 siastical things or causes (2),' (as when the question is, who shall preach, baptize, &c. and who shall not ; what is sound doctrine, and what is not;) is decidedly a renunciation of Christ's commission given to his Apostles, and preserved by their successors in the Catholic Apostolic Church. — Hence it clearly appears that there is, and can be, no Apostolical succession of Ministry in the Established Church, more than in the other congregations or Societies of Protestants. All (1), See his Life by Dr. Bailey ; also Dodd's Ecclcs. Hist. vol. i. (2) Oath of Supremacy, Homage of Bishops, &(.. ]52 LETTER XXIX. their preaching and ministering, in their several de crees, is performed by mere human authority (1). On the other hand, not a sermon is preached, nor a child baptized, nor a penitent absolved, nor a priest or dained, nor a Bishop consecrated, throughout the whole extent of the Catholic Church, without the Mi nister of such function being able to shew his autho rity from Christ for what he does, in the commission of Christ to his Apostles: All power in heaven and on earth is given to me : Go therefore teach all nations, baptizing them, §c. Matt, xxviii. 19 ; and without his being able to prove his claim to that commission of Christ, by producing the table of his uninterrupted succession from the Apostles. — I will not detain you by entering into a comparison, in a religious point of view, between a Ministry, which officiates by Divine authority, and others which act by mere human autho rity ; but shall conclude this subject by putting it to the good sense and candour of your Society, whether, from all that has been said, it is not as evident, which among the different communions is THE APOSTO LIC CHURCH we profess to believe in, as which is THE CATHOLIC CHURCH? I am, &c. j. u. (1) Tt is curious to see in Queen Elizabeth's Injunctions, and in the 37th Article, the disclaimer of her ' actually ministering the Word und the Sacra- ' ments.' The question was not about this, but about the jurisdiction or Mi.' sion of the Ministry. LETTER XXX. T" JAMES BROWN, Esq. S,c. OBJECTIONS ANSWERED. DEAR SIR, I find that your visitor, the Rev. Mr. Clark, had not left you at the latter end of last week ; since it appears, by a letter which I have received from him, that he had seen my two last letters, addressed to you at New Cottage. He is much displeased with their contents, which I am not surprised at ; and he uses some harsh expressions against them and their author, of which I do not complain, as he was not a party to the agreement entered into at the beginning of our correspondence ; by the tenor of which, I was left at full liberty to follow up my arguments to what ever lengths they might conduct me, without any per son of the society being offended with me on that ac count. I shall pass over the passages in the letter which seem to have been dictated by too warm a feeling, and shall confine my answer to those which contain some thing like argument against what I have advanced. The Reverend Gentleman, then, objects against the claim of our Pontiffs to the Apostolic succession; that in different ages this succession has been interrupted, by the contentions of rival Popes ; and that the lives of many of them have been so criminal, that, according to my own argument, as he says, it is incredible that such Pontiffs should have been able to preserve and convey the commission and authority given by Christ to his Apostles.- 1 grant, Sir, that, from the various com* PART II. O o J54 LETTER XXX« motions and accidents to which all sublunary things are subject, there have been several vacancies, or in terregnums in the Papacy; but none of them have been of such a lengthened duration, as to prevent a moral continuation of the Popedom, or to hinder the execution of the important offices annexed to it. I grant also, that there have been rival Popes and un happy schisms in the Church, particularly one great schism, at the end of the 14th and the beginning of the 15th century : still the true Pope was always clearly discernible at the times we are speaking of, and in *he end was acknowledged even by his opponents. Lastly, I grant that a few of the Popes, perhaps a tenth part of the whole number, swerving from the example of the rest, have, by their personal vices, disgraced their holy station : but even these Popes ..always ful filled their public duties to the Church, by maintain ing the Apostolical doctrine, moral as well as specula tive, the Apostolical Orders, and the Apostolical Mission; so that their misconduct chiefly injured their own souls, and did not essentially affect the Church. But if what the Homilies affirm were true, that the whole Church had been ' drowned in idolatry 4 for 800 years,* she must have taught and commission ed all those, whom she ordained to teach this horrible apostasy ; which she never could have done, and at the same time have retained Christ's commission and authority to teach all nations the gospel. This demon strates the inconsistency of those clergymen of the Establishment, who accuse the Catholic Church of Apostasy and Idolatry, and at the same time boast of having received, through her, a spiritual jurisdiction and ministry from Jesus Christ. OBJECTIONS ANSWERED. 155 Your Visitor next expatiates, in triumphant strains, on the exploded fable of Pope Joan ; for exploded it certainly may be termed, when such men as the Cal- vinist Minister Blondel, and the infidel Bayle, have abandoned aud refuted it. But the circumstances of the fable themselves sufficiently refute it. According to these, in the middle of the ninth century, an Eng lishwoman, born at Mentz, in Germany (l), studied philosophy at Athens, where there was no school of phi losophy in the ninth century, more than there is now, and taught divinity at Rome. It is pretended that, being elected Pope, on the death of Leo IV in 855, she was delivered of a child, as she was walking in a solemn procession near the Colliseum, and died on the spot ; and moreover, that a statue of her was there erected in memory of the disgraceful event ! There have been great debates among the learned, concerning the first author of this absurd tale, and concerning the inter polations in the copies of the first chronicles which mention it (2). At all events, it was never heard of for more than 200 years after the period in question : and, in the mean time, we are assured, from the ge nuine works of contemporary writers and distinguish ed Prelates, some of whom then resided at Rome, such as Anastashis the Librarian, Luitprand, Hinc- mar, Archbishop of Rheims, Photius of C. P. Lupus Ferrar, &c. that Benedict III was canonically elected Pope in the said year 855, only three days after the death of Leo IV, which evidently leaves no interval for the Pontificate of the fabulous Joan. From the warfare of attack, my Reverend Antago- (l) Ita Pseudo Uartinus Polouus, &c. (S) See Breviarium Historico— Chronologico— criticum Pontif. Roman. studio R, F. Pagi, tom.ii. p. 7i. Oo2 156 LE'I'f Eit XXX. nist passes to that of defence, as he terms it. In this he heavily complains of my not having done justice to the Protestants, particularly in the article of Foreign Missions. On this head, he enumerates the different societies, existing in this country, for carrying them on, and the large sums of money which they annually raise for this purpose. The societies, I learn from him, are the following: 1st, The society for promot ing Christian Knowledge, called the Bartlet Building Society; which, though strictly of the Establishment, employs missionaries in India to the number of six, all Germans, aud it should seem, all Lutherans. 2dly, There is the Society for propagating Christianity in the English colonies ; but I hear nothing of its doings. Sdly, There is another for the conversion of Negro slaves, of which I can only say, ditto. 4thly, There is another for sending Missionaries to Africa and the East, concerning which we are equally left in the dark. 5thly, There is the London Missionary Society, which sent out the ship Duff, with certain preachers and their wives, to Otaheite, Tongabatoo, and the Marquesas, and published a journal of the voyage, by which it appears that they are strict Calvinists and Independents. 6thly, The Edinburgh Missionary Society fraternizes with the last mentioned. 7thly, There is an Arminian Missionary Society under Dr. Coke, the head of the Wesleyan Methodists. 8thly, There is a Moravian Missionary Society, which appears more active than any other, particularly at the Cape, and in Greenland and Surinam. To these, your Visitor says, must be added, the Hibernian Society for diffusing Christian Knowledge in Ireland ; as also, and still more particulaily, the Bible Society, with OBJECTIONS ANSWERED. 157 all its numerous ramifications. Of this last named, he speaks glorious things, foretelling that it will, in its progress, purify the world from infidelity and wicked ness. In answer to what has been stated, I have to men tion several marked differences between the Protest ant and the Catholic Missionaries. The former preach various discordant religions ; for what religions can be more opposite than the Calvinistic and the Ar minian ? And how indignant would a Churchman feel, if I were to charge him with the impiety and obscenity of Zinzendorf and his Moravians? The very preachers of the same sect, on board of the Duff, had not agreed upon the creed they were to teach, when they were within a few days sail of Otaheite (]). Whereas the Catholic Missionaries, whether Italians, French, Por tuguese, or Spaniards, taught and planted precisely the same religion in the opposite extremities of the globe. Secondly, the envoys of those, societies had no commission or authority to preach, but what they derived from the men and women, who contributed money to pay for their voyages and accommodations. / have not sent these prophets, says the Lord, yet they ran ; I have not spoken to them, yet they prophesied, Jer. xxiii, 21. On the other hand, the apostolical men, who, in an cient and in modern times, have converted the nations cf the earth, all derived their mission and authority from the centre of the Apostolic Tree, the See of Peter —Thirdly, I cannot but remark the striking difference between the Protestant and the Catholic (1) ' By the middle of January, the Committee of eight (among the SO ' missionaries) had nearly finished the articles of faith. Two of the number ' dissented, but gave in.' — Journal of the Duff. 158 LETTER !*XX. Missionaries, with respect to their qualifications and method of proceeding. The former were, for the most part, mechanics and laymen, of the lowest order, without any learning infused or acquired, beyond what they could pick up from the English translation of the Bible ; they were frequently encumbered with wives and children, and armed with musquets and bay onets, to kill those whom they could not convert (l). Whereas the Catholic Missionaries have always been Priests, or ascetics, trained to literature and religious exercises, men of continency and self-denial, who have had no other defence than their Breviary and Crucifix, no other weapon than the sword of the spirit, which is the word of God, Ephes. vi. 17. -Fourthly, I do not find any portion of that lively faith, and that heroic constancy, in braving poverty, torments, and death, for the gospel, among the few Protestant con verts, or even among their preachers, which have so frequently illustrated the different Catholic Missions. Indeed, I have not heard of a single martyr of any kind, in Asia, Africa, or America, who can be considered as the fruit of the above named societies, or of any other Protestant mission whatsoever. On the other hand, few are the countries in which the Christian religion has been planted by Catholic Priests, without being watered with some of their own blood and of that of their converts. To say nothing of the martyrs of a late date in the Catholic Missions of Turkey, Abyssinia, Siam, Tonquin, Cochin-china, &c. there has been an almost continual persecution of the Catholics in the (1) The 18 preacheTs who remained at Otaheite ' took up arms by way of 'precaution'. — Ibid. It appears, from subsequent accounts, that the preadhcrs made use of their arms, to protect their wiv«s from the men whom they came to convert. Of the nine preachers destined for Tongabatoo, six wei* for carrying fire-arms oh shore, and three against it.— Journal. OBJECTIONS ANSWERED. 159 empire of China, for about a hundred years past, which, besides confessors of the faith, who have en dured various tortures, has produced a very great number of martyrs, native Chinese as well as Europe ans ; laity as well as priests and bishops (1). Within these two years (2), the wonderful Apostle of the great Peninsula of Corea, to the east of China, James Ly, with as many as 100 of his converts, has suffered death for the faith. In the islands of Japan, the anti- christian persecution, excited by the envy and avarice of the Dutch, raged with a fury unexampled in the records of Pagan Rome. It began with the crucifixion of 26 martyrs, most of them missionaries. It then proceeded to other more horrible martyrdoms, and it concluded with putting to death as many as eleven hundred thousand Christians (3). Nor were those numerous and splendid victories of the Gospel in the provinces of South America atchieved without tor rents of Catholic blood. Many of the first preachers were slaughtered by the savages to whom they an nounced the gospel, and not unfrequently devoured by them, as was the case with the first Bishop of Bra zil.— —In the last place, the Protestant missions have never been attended with any great success. Those (1) Hist. del'Eglise par Berault Bercastel, torn. 22, 23. Butler's Lives of the Saints, Feb. 5. Mem. Eccles. pour le 18 Siec. (2) Namely, in 1801. While this work is in the press, we leceive an ac count of the martyrdom of Mgr. Dufresse, Bishop of Tabraca, and Vicar Apostolic of Sutchuen, in China, who was beheaded there Sept. 14, 18LS, and of F. J. de Frior, missionary in Chiensi," who, after various torments., was strangled, Feb. IS, 1816. (3) Berault Bercastel says two millions, torn. 2Q. 160 LETTER XXX. heretofore carried on by the Dutch, French, and American Calvinists, seem to have been more le velled at the destruction of the Catholic missions, than at the conversion of the Pagans ( l). In later times, the zealous Wesley went on a mission to convert the savages of Georgia, but returned without making one proselyte. His companion Whitfield afterwards went to the same country on the same errand, but returned without any greater success. Of the Missionaries who went out in the Duff, those who were left at the Friendly Islands and the Marquesas, abandoned their posts in despair, as did eleven of the eighteen left at Otaheite. The remaining seven had not, in the course of six years, baptized a single Islander. In the mean time, the depravity of the natives in killing their in fants and other abominations, encreased so fast, as to threaten their total extinction. In the Bengal go vernment, extending over from 30 to 40 millions of (1) It is generally known, and not denied by Mosheim himself, that the extermination of the flourishing missions in Japan is to be ascribed to the Dutch. When they became masters of the Portuguese settlements in India, they endeavoured, by persecution as well as by other means, to make the Christian natives abandon the Catholic religion, to which St. Xaverius and his companions had converted them. The Calvinist preachers having failed in their attempt to proselyte the Brazilians, it happened that one of their party, James Sourie, took a merchant vessel at sea with 40 Jesuit missionaries, under F. Azevedo, on board of it, bound to Brazil; when, in hatred of them and their destination, he put them all to death. The year following, F. Diaz, with 11 companions, bound on the same mission, and falling into the hands of the Calvinists, met with the same fate. Incredible pains were taken by the ministers of New England to induce the Hurons, Iroquois, and other converted savages, to abandon the Catholic religion, when the latter answered them : ' You never preached the word to us while we were ' Pagans; and now that we are Christians, you try to deprive us of it.' OBJECTIONS ANSWERED. \6l people, with all its influence and encouragement, not more than 80 converts have been made by the Protest ant Missionaries in seven years, and those were almost all Chandalas or outcasts from the Hindoo religion, who were glad to get a pittance for their support (l) ; 4 for the perseverance of several of whom,' their in structors say, ' they tremble. '(2) — How different a scene do the Catholic Missions present ! To say no thing of ancient Christendom, all the kingdoms and states of which were reclaimed from Paganism and converted to Christianity by Catholic preachers, and not one of them by preachers of any other description : what extensive and populous Islands, Provinces and States, in the East and in the West, were wholly, or in a great part, reclaimed from Idolatry, soon after Lu ther's revolt, by Catholic Missionaries ! But to come still nearer to our own time: F. Bouchet, alone, in the course of his twelve years labours in Madura, instructed and baptized 20,000 Indians, while F. Britto, within fifteen months only, converted and regenerated 8000, when he sealed his mission with his blood. By the latest returns, which I have seen, from the Eastern Missionaries to the Directors of the French Missions Etrangeres, it appears that in the Western District of Tonquin, during the five years preceding the beginning of this century 4,101 adults and 26,915 children were received into the Church by baptism, and that in the (1) Extract of a Speech of C. Marsh, Esq. in a Committee of the H. of C. July 1, 1815. See also Major Wiring's Remarks on Oxford Sermons. (3) .Transact, of Prot.Miss. quoted in Edinb. Review, April 1803. PART II. P P Jg£ LETTER XXX. lower part of Cochin-china 900 grownpersons had beera baptized in the course of two years, besides vast num bers of children. The Empire of China contains six Bishops and some hundreds of Catholic Priests. In a single Province of it, Sutchuen, during the year 1796, 1500 adults were baptized, and 2,527 Catechumens were received for instruction. By letters of a later date from the above mentioned Martyr Dufresse, Bishop of Tabraca, and Vic. Ap. of Sutchuen, it ap pears, that during the year 1810, in spite of a severe persecution, 965 adults were baptized ; and that during 1814, though the persecution encreased, 829, without reckoning infants, received baptism. Bishop Lamote, Vic. Ap. of Fokien, testifies that, in his district, dur ing the year 1810, 10,384 infants and 1,677 grown per sons were baptized and 2,674 Catechumens admitted. — From this short specimen, I trust, Dear Sir, it will appear manifest to you, on which Christian Society God bestows his grace to execute the work of the Apostles, as well as to preserve their Doctrine, their Orders, and their Mission. As to the wonderful effects which your Visitor ex pects in the conversion of the Pagan world, from the Bible Society, and the three score and three translati ons, into foreign tongues, of the English translation of the Bible, I beg leave to ask him ; who is to vouch to the Tartars, Turks and Idolaters, that the Testa ments and Bibles, which the Society is pouring in upon them, were inspired by the Creator ? Who is to an swer for these Translations, made by Officers, Mer chants and Merchants' Clerks, being accurate and faithful ? Who is to teach these barbarians to read, OBJECTIONS ANSWERED. ] 63 and, after that, to make any thing like a connected sense of the mysterious volumes ? Does Mr. C. really think that an inhabitant of Otaheite, when he is en abled to read the Bible, will extract the sense of the 39 Articles or of any other Christian system whatever from it r In short, has the Bible Society, or any of the other Protestant Societies, converted a single Pa gan or Mahometan by the bare text of Scripture? When such a convert can be produced, it will be time enough for me to propose to him those further gra velling questions which result from my observations on the Sacred Text in a former letter to you. In the mean time, let your Visitor rest assured that the Ca tholic Church will proceed in the old and success ful manner, by which she has converted all the Chris tian people on the face of the earth ; the same, which Christ delivered to his Apostles and their successors : Go ye into all the world and preach the Gospel to every creature. Mark xvi. 15. On the other hand, how illusory the Gentleman's hopes are, that the depravity of this age and country will be reformed by the efforts of the Bible Society, has been victoriously proved by the Rev. Dr. Hook, who, with other clear sighted churchmen, evidently sees that the grand principle of Protestantism, strictly reduced to practice, would un dermine their establishment. One of his brethren, the llev. Mr. Gisborne, had publicly boasted that, in pro portion to the opposition, which the Bible Society had met with, its annual income had increased, till it reached near a 100,000/. in a year : Dr. Hook, in return, shewed, by lists of the convictions of criminals, dur ing the first seven years of the Society's existence, that P p 2 164 POSTSCRIPT. the wickedness of the country, instead of being dimi nished, had almost been doubled !(l). Since that period up to the present year, it has encreased three fold, and four-fold, compared with its state before the Society began. POSTSCRIPT. I have now, Dear Sir, completed the second task which I undertook, and therefore proceed to sum up my evidence. Having then proved in my twelve for mer letters, the rough copies of which I have preserved, that the two alledged Rules of Faith, that of Private Inspiration and that of Private Interpretation of Scrip- lure, are equally fallacious, and that there is no certain way of coming to the truth of Divine Revelation, but by hearing that Church, which Christ built on a rock XI) List of Capital convictions in London and Middlesex in the following years : from Dr. Hook's Charge and the London Chronicle : In the yeai 1808 728 180911810 863 884 1811 871! 1812 998 1813 1012 1814 1027 1815 2299 1816 2592 1817 3177 1 Convictions It appears, by a return made to the House of Commons, in obedience to their order June 5, in the last year (1818) that the number of criminals committed for trial, and of those sentenced to death, during the last thir teen years, nearly corresponding with those of the Bible Society's progress, has been about tripled, namely : Committed for Triul. Sentenced to Death. In 1805 1605 In 1805 350 In 1817 13932 111 1817 ISO',2 POSTSCRIPT. 165 and promised to abide with for ever ; I engaged, in this my second series of letters, to demonstrate, which, among the different Societies of Christians, is the Church that Christ founded and still protects. For this purpose, I have had recourse to the principal cha racters or marks of Christ's Church, as they are pointed out in Scripture, and formally acknowledged by Pro testants of nearly all descriptions, no less than by Catholics, in their Articles and in those Creeds, which form part of their private prayers and public Liturgy ; namely Unity, Sanctity, Catholicity and Apostolicity. In fact, this is what every one acknowledges who says in the Apostles' Creed : I believe, in the Holy Catholic Church; and, in the Nicene Creed (l), I believe one Catholic Apostolic Church. Treating of the first mark of the true Church, I proved from natural reason, Scrip ture and Tradition, that Unity is essential to her; I then shewed that there is no Union or principle of Union among the different sects of Protestants, except their common Protestation against their Mother Church ; and that the Church of England, in particular, is divided against itself, in such a manner, that one of its most learned Prelates has declared himself afraid to say, zvhat is its doctrine. On the other hand, I have shewn that the Catholic Church, spread as she is over the whole earth, is one and the same in her doctrine, in her liturgy, and in her government ; and, though I detest religious persecution, I have, in defiance of ridicule and clamour, vindicated her unchangeable ¦tl-octrine, and the plain dictate of reason, as to the in- (1) See the Communion Service in Com. Prayer. 166 POSTSCRIPT. dispensable obligation of believing what God teaches ; in other words, of a Right Faith : I have even proved that her adherence to this tenet is a proof both of the Truth and the Charity of the Catholic Church. On the subject of Holiness, I have made it clear, that the pretended Reformation every where originated in the pernicious doctrine of salvation by faith alone, without woodworks: and that the Catholic Church has ever taught the necessity of them both; likewise that she possesses many peculiar means of sanctity, to which mo dern sects do not make pretension ; likewise that she has, in every age, produced the genu'mefruits of sanc tity ; while the fruits of Protestantism have been of quite an opposite nature : finally, that God himself has borne zvitness to the sanctity of the Catholic Church, by undeniable miracles, with which he has illustrated her in every age. — It did not require much pains to prove, that the Catholic Church possesses, exclu sively, the name of CATHOLIC; and -not much more to demonstrate, that she alone has the qualities signified by that name. — That the Catholic Church is also APOSTOLICAL, by descending in a right line from the Apostles of Christ, is as evident as that she is Catholic. However, to illustrate this matter, I have sketched out a Genealogical, or, as I call it, The Apostolical Tree , which, with the help of a note subjoined, shews the uninterrupted succession of the Catholic Church in her chief Pontiffs and other illustrious Prelates, Doctors and renowned Saints, from the Apostles of Christ, during eighteen centuries, to the present period ; together with the continuation in her of the apostolical work of converting nations aud POSTSCRIPT. 167 people. It shews also a series of unhappy heretics and schismatics, of different times and countries, who, refusing to hear her inspired voice and to obey her di vine authority, have been separated from her commu nion and have withered away, like branches, cut off from a vine, which are fit for no human use. Ezek. xv. — Finally, I have shewn the necessity of an uninter rupted succession from the Apostles, of Holy Orders and Divine Mission, to constitute an Apostolical Church ; and have proved that these, or at least the latter of them, can only be found in the Holy Catholic Church. — Having demonstrated all this in the forego ing Letters, I am justified, Dear Sir, in affirming that the motives of credibility, in favour of the Christian Religion, in general, are not, one whit, more clear and certain, than those in favour of the Catholic Religion in particular. But without inquiring into the degree of evidence attending the latter motives, it is enough for my present purpose, that they axe suffi ciently evident to influence the conduct of dispassionate and reasonable persons, who are acquainted with them, and who are really in earnest to save their souls. Now, in proof, that these motives are, at least, so far clear, I may again appeal to the conduct of Catholics on a death-bed, who, in that awful situation, never wish to die in any religion but their own : I may also appeal to the conduct of many Protestants in the same situation, who seek to reconcile themselves to the Catholic Church. Let us, one and all, my Dear Sir, as far as in our power, adopt those sentiments in eve,ry respect now, which we shall entertain, when the transitory scene of this world is closing to oui 168 POSTSCRIPT. sight, and during the countless ages of Eternity. O the length, the breadth, and the depth of the abyss of ETERNITY ! * Nb security,' says a holy man, 'can be too great where Eternity is at stake.' (1 ). I am, &c. J. M. (1) 'Nulla satis magna securitas ubi periclitatur Eternitas.' THE END OF PART II. Keating, Brown and Co. Printers, 38, Duke-StrcCt, Grosvenor-Square, London. CONTENTS. PART IL LETTER XIII.— To James Brown, E«q. Page Congratulation with the Society of New Cottage on their acknowledge ment of the right Rule of Faith. -.Proof that the Catholic Church alone is possessed of this Rule.. -Characters or Marks of the True Church - ¦ 1 LETTER XIV.— To Do. Unity, the first Mark of the true Church.- -This proved from Reason- • from Scripture* .and from the Holy Fathers £ LETTER XV.— To Do. Want of Unity among Protestants in general.- -This acknowledged by their eminent writers.. -Striking instances of it in the Established Church.- -Vain attempts to reconcile diversity of belief with uniform Articles ,....,..,., .,.,,..., 9 LETTER XVI.— To Do. Unity of the Catholic Church- -in Doctrine- -in Liturgy- -in Govern ment, and Constitution 19 LETTER XVII.— To Dr. M. from James Brown, Esq. Objections against the exclusive claims of Catholics. ••Extract of a Letter from the Rev. N. N. Prebendary of N.-- Bishop Watson's doctrine on this head • < ¦•••«••. %4 PART II. * Pp 170 CONTENTS. LETTER XVIII.— To James Brown, Esq. Page Objections answered.- -Bishop Watson, by attempting to prove too much, proves nothing.- -Doctrine of the Holy Scriptures and the Fathers on this head- -Exclusive claim of the Catholic Church a proof of her truth 27 LETTER XIX— To Do. Second Mark of the True Church, Sanctity.- -Sanctity of Doctrine want ing to the different Protestant Communions--to Luther's System- -to Calvin'*- -to that of the Establisbed'Church- -to those of Dissenters and Methodists. ¦ • Doctrine of the Catholic Church Holy 33 POSTSCRIPT. — Variations and impiety of the late Rev. John Wesley's doctrine • 45 LETTER XX.— To Do. Means of Sanctity.- -The Seven Sacraments- -possessed by Catholics.- • Protestants possess none of them, except Baptism.- -The whole Li turgy of the Established Church borrowed from the Catholic Missal pnd Ritual.- -Sacrifice the most acceptable worship of God.- -The most perfect Sacrifice offered in the Catholic Church.- -Protestants destitute of Sacrifice.-' -Other means of Sanctity in the Catholic com munion 50 LETTER XXL— To Do. Fruits of Sanctity.- -All. the Saints were Catholics. •• Comparison of eminent Protestants with contemporary Catholics.- -Immorality caus ed by changing the Ancient Religion 61 LETTER XXII.— To Mr. J. Toulmin. Objections answered.- -False accounts of the Church before the Re- formation, so called.- -Ditto of John Fox's Martyr's.- -The vices of a few Popes no impeachment of the Church's Sanctity.- -Scriptural piactices and exercises common among Catholics., but despised by Protestants » • .... 66 LETTER XXIIL— To James Brown, Esq. Divine Attestation of Sanctity in the Catholic Church.- -Miracles the Criterion of Truth. • -Christ appeals lo them, and promises a continu ation of them.- -The Holy Fathers and Church writers attest their continuation, and appeal to them, in proof of the True Church.- -Evi dence of the Truth of many Miracles.- -Irreligious scepticism of Dr. Conyers Middleton:- -this undermines the Credit of the Gospel.- • CONTENTS. 171 Continuation of mirar.les down to the present time :• -living wit nesses of it- • 71 LETTER XXIV.— To Do. Objections answered.- -False and unauthenticatcd miracles no disproof of true and authenticated ones. • -Strictness of the examination of re ported miracles at Rome.- -Not necesary to know God's design in working each miracle.- • Examination of the arguments of celebrated Protestants against Catholic miracles.- -Objection of Gibbon and the late Bishop of Salisbury (Dr. John Douglas) against St. Bernard's mi racles refuted. • • St. Xaverius's miracles proved from the authors quoted against them. • -Dr. Middleton's confident assertion clearly refuted.- • Bishop Douglas's Conclusive Evidence from Acosta, against St. Xaveri us's rftiracles, clearly refuted by the testimony of the said Acosta. ¦ -Tes timony of Ribadeneira concerning St. Ignatius's miracles truly stated. • -True Account of the miracle of Saragossa.- -Impostures at the tomb of Abbe Paris.- -Refutation of the Rev. Peter Roberts' pamphlet con cerning the miraculous cure of Winefrid White 90 LETTER XXV.— To Do. The True Church, Catholic- -Always Catholic in name, by the testimony of the Fathers.- -Still distinguished by that name in spite of all oppo sition IOS LETTER XXVI.— To Do. Qualities of Catholicity. -.The Church Catholic as to its members:- -as to its extent : • • as to its duration • • The original Church of this country IOS LETTER XXVII.— To Do. Objections of the Rev. Josuah Clark answered.- -Existence of an intisii hie Church disproved. • -Vain attempt to trace the existence of Protest antism through the discordant heresies of former ages.- -Vain prog nostication of the failure of the True Church.- -Late attempts to un dermine it 117 LETTER XXVIIL— To Do. The True Church, Apostolical : ¦ -so described by the ancient Fathers.- • APOSTOLICAL TREE of the Catholic Church explained, by a brief account of the Popes and of distinguished Pastors, also of nations converted by ber, and of heretics and schismatics cut off from the True Church ^ 172 CONTENTS. LETTER XXIX.— To Do. Page Apostolical succession of Ministry in the Catholic Church.. -Among Protestant Societies the Church of England alone claims such succes sion.- -Doctrine and conduct of Luther, and of different Dissenters, on this point. • • Uncertainty of the Orders of the Established Church from the doctrine of its founders • • from the history of the times • • from the defectiveness of the form.- -Apostolic Mission, evidently wanting to all Protestants. - -They cannot shew an ordinary mission:- -they can not work miracles to prove an extraordinary one « • • 138 LETTER XXX.— To Do. Objections of the Rev. Josuah Clark answered.- -Apostolical ministry not interrupted by the personal vices of certain Popes. • • Fable of Pope Joan refuted.- -Comparison between the Protestant and the Catholic Missions for the conversion of Infidels.- -Vain prediction of conver sions and of reformation by the Bible Societies.- -Increase of crimes commensurate with that of the Societies 153 POSTSCRIPT. Recapitulation of things proved in the foregoing Letters 164 ADDITIONAL NOTE TO PAGE 48. The Wesleyan Methodists deny that the Whitfieldit.es, now called Lady Huntingdon's Connection, the Kilhamites, &c. have a right to the name of Methodists. Certainly George Whitfield, when a fellow student with John Wesley at Oxford, was equally with him, termed a Methodist by the other students. They also deny that the Rev. Mr. Coke is their head, or has any jurisdiction over them in England, though they allow him to be a Bishop over their brethren in America ; having been consecrated, they say, for that department by their venerated father, the Rev. John Wesley. ERRATA TO PART II. Page -14, line 14, for Catechismos read Catechismus. 59, 14, for with read and to. 91, 4, Note, for apochryphal read apocryphal. 135, o, Note, for Coch'eu read Cochleus. THE END OF RELIGIOUS CONTROVERSY, fyc. &jc. 8$c. PART III. ' It is a shame to charge men with what they are not guilty of, in order to ' make the breach wider, already too wide.' — Dr. 'Montague, Bishop of Norwich. Invoc. of Saints, p. 60. ' Let them not lead people by the nose to believe they can prove their ' supposition, that the Pope is Antichrist, and the Papists idolaters, when 'they cannot.' — Dr. Herbert Thorndike, Prebendary of Westminster. Jus*. Weights and Measures, p. 11. ' The object of their (the Catholics) adoration of the B. Sacrament is the ' only true and eternal God, hypostatically joined with his Holy Humanity, ' which humanity they believe actually present under the veil of the sacra- ' mental signs: and if they thought him not present, they are so far from ( worshipping the bread in this case, that themselves profess it to be idolatry ' to do so.' — Dr. Jeremy Taylor, Bishop of Dozen. Liberty of Prophesying, chap. xx. THE END OF RELIGIOUS CONTROVERSY. PART III. ON RECTIFYING MISTAKES CONCERNING THE CATHOLIC CHURCH. LETTER XXXI. From JAMES BROWN, Esq. to tlte Rev. J. Af. D. D. F. $. A. INTRODUCTION. REVEREND SIR, 1 HE whole of your letters have again been read over in our Society ; and they have produced important though diversified effects on the minds of its several members. For my own part, I am free to own that, as your former letters convinced me of the truth of your Rule of Eaith, namely the entire Word of God, and of the right of the true Church to expound it in all questions concerning its meaning; so your subsequent letters have satisfied me, that the characters or marks of the true Church, as they are laid down in our common Creeds, are clearly visible in the Roman Catholic Church, and not in the col lection of Protestant Churches, nor in any one of them. This impression was, at first, so strong upon my mind, that I could have answered you nearly in the words of King Agrippa to St. Paul : Almost thou persuades t me to become a Catholic, Acts xxvi. 28. The same appear to be the sentiments of several of my PART ITI. Q q y LETTER XXXI. friends : but when, on comparing our notes together, we considered the heavy charges, particularly of super stition and idolatry, brought against your Church by our eminent Divines, and especially by the Bishop of London (Dr. Porteus), and never, that we have heard of, refuted or denied, we cannot but tread back the steps we have taken towards you, or rather stand still, where we are, in suspense, till we hear what answer you will make to them. I speak of those contained in the Bishop's well-known treatise called A Brief Confuta tion of the Errors of the Church of Rome. With re spect to certain other members of our Society, I am sorry to be obliged to say that, on this particular sub ject, I mean the arguments in favour of your Religion, they do not manifest the candour and good sense, which are natural to them, and which they shew on every other subject. They pronounce, with confidence and vehe mence, that Dr. Porteus's charges are all true, and that you cannot make any rational answer to them * at the same time, that several of these Gentlemen, to my know ledge, are very little acquainted with the substance of them. In short, they are apt to load your Religion and the professors of it, with epithets and imputations too gross and injurious for me to repeat, convinced as I am of their falsehood. I shall not be surprised to hear, that some of these imputations have been trans-r mitted to you by the persons in question, as I have declined making my letters the vehicle of them ; it is a justice, however, which I owe them to assure you, Rev. Sir, that it is only since they have understood the inference of your arguments to be such, as to im ply an obligation on them of renouncing their own respective religions, and embracing yours, that they CHARGES AGAINST THE CHURCH. 3 have been so unreasonable and violent. Till this period, they appeared to be nearly as liberal and charitable with respect to your communion as to any other. I am, Rev. Sir, &c. JAMES BROWN. LETTER XXXII. To JAMES BROWN, Esq. ON THE CHARGES AGAINST THE CATHOLIC CHURCH. DEAR SIR, I should be guilty of deception, were I to disguise the satisfaction I derive from your and your friends near approach to the House of Unity and Peace, as St. Cyprian calls the Catholic Church : for such I must judge your situation to be, from the tenor of your last letter ; by which it seems to me, that your entire reconciliation with this Church depends on my refuting Bp. Porteus's objections against it. And yet, Dear Sir, if I were to insist on the strict rules of rea soning, I might take occasion of complaining of you, from the very concessions which afford me so much pleasure. In fact, if you admit that the Church of God, is, by his appointment, the interpreter of the en tire word of God, you ought to pay attention to her doctrine on every point of it, and not to the suggestions of Dr. Porteus, or your own fancy, in opposition to it. Again; if you are convinced that the One, Holy, Catholic and Apostolical Church is the True Church of God, you ought to be persuaded that it is utterly Qq2 4 LETTER XXXII. impossible that she should inculcate idolatry, supersti tion, or any other wickedness, and, of course, that those who believe her to be thus guilty, are, and must be, in a fatal error. I have proved from reason, tradition and Holy Scripture, that, as individual Christians can not of themselves judge with certainty of matters of faith, God has therefore provided them with an un erring guide, in his Holy Church ; and hence that Catholics, as Tertullian and St. Vincent of Lerins em phatically pronounce, cannot strictly and consistently, be required by those who are not Catholics, to vindi cate the particular tenets of their belief, either from Scripture or any other authority : it being sufficient for them to shew, that they hold the doctrine of the True Church, which all Christians are bound to hear. Nevertheless, as it is my duty, after the example of the Apostle, to become all things to all men, 1 Cor. ix. 227 and as we Catholics are conscious of being able to meet our opponents on their own ground, as well as on ours, I am willing, Dear Sir, for your satisfaction, and that of your friends, to enter on a brief discussion of the leading points of controversy, which are agitated between the Catholics and the Protestants, particularly those of the Church of England. I must, however, previously stipulate with you for the following condi tions, which I trust you will find perfectly reasonable. 1st. I require that Catholics should be permitted to lay dozvn their own principles of belief and practice, and, of course, to distinguish between their articles of faith, in which they must all agree, and mere scholastic opinions, of which every individual may judge for him self ; as, likewise, between the authorized liturgy and discipline of the Church, and the unauthorized devotions CHARGES AGAINST THE CHURCH. 5 and practices of particular persons. I insist upon this preliminary, because it is the constant practice of your controversialists, to dress up a hideous figure, composed of their own misrepresentations, or else of those un defined opinions and unauthorized practices, which they call Popery ; and then to amuse their readers or hearers with exposing the deformity of it and pulling it to pieces. And I have the greater right to insist upon this preliminary, because our Creeds and Professions of Eaith, the Acts of our Councils and our approved Ex positions and Catechisms, containing the Principles of our belief and practice, from which no real Catholic, in any part of the world, can ever depart, are before the public and upon constant sale among booksellers. 2dly. It being a notorious fact that certain indivi dual Christians, or bodies of Christians, have departed from the faith and communion of the Church of all nations, under pretence that they had authority for so doing; it is necessary that their alledged authority should be express, and incontrovertible. Thus, for example, if texts of scripture are brought for this pur pose, it is evidently necessary that such texts should be clear in themselves, and not contrasted'by any other texts seemingly of an opposite meaning. In like man ner, when any doctrine or practice appears to be un deniably sanctioned by a Father of the Church, for example, of the third or the fourth century, without an appearance of contradiction from any other Father, or ecclesiastical writer, it is unreasonable to affirm that he or his contemporaries were the authors of it, as Protestant Divines are in the habit of affirming. On the contrary, it is natural to suppose that such Father has taken up this, with the other points of his Religion, 6 LETTER XXXII. from his predecessors, who received them from the Apostles. This is the sentiment of that bright lumi nary St. Augustin, who says : ' Whatever is found to ' be held by the Universal Church, and not to have ' had its beginning in Bishops and Councils, must be ' esteemed a Tradition from those by whom the Church ' itself was founded (l).' You judged right in supposing that I have received some letters, containing virulent and gross invectives against the Catholic Religion, from certain members of your Society. These do not surprise or hurt me, as the writers of them have probably not yet had an opportunity of knowing much more of this Religion, than what they could collect from fifth of November sermons, and others of the same tendency ; or from circulated pamphlets expressly calculated to inflame the population against it and its Professors. But what truly surprisesand afflicts me is, that so many other personages in a more elevated rank of life, whose education and studies enable them to form a more just idea of the religious and moral principles of their ancestors, bene factors, and founders, in short of their acknowledged Fathers and Saints, should combine to load these Fa thers and Saints, with calumnies and misrepresenta tions, which they must know to be utterly false. But, a bad cause must be supported by bad means. They are unfortunately implicated in a revolt against the True Church ; and not having the courage and self-denial to acknowledge their error, and return to her commu nion, they endeavour to justify their conduct, by inter posing a black and hideous mask, before the fair coun- (1) Lib. ii. De Bapt, CHARGES AGAINST THE CHURCH. 7 tenance of this their true mother, Christ's spotless Spouse. This is so far true, that when, as it often happens, a Protestant is, by dint of argument, forced out of his errors and prejudices against the true Reli gion, if he be pressed to embrace it, and want grace to do it, he is sure to fly back to those very calumnies and misrepresentations, which he had before renounced. The fact is, he must fight with these, or yield himself unarmed to his Catholic opponent. That you and your friends may not think me, Dear Sir, to have complained without just cause of the pub lications and sermons of the respectable characters I have alluded to, I must inform you that I have now lying before me a volume called Good Advice to the Pulpits, consisting of the foulest and most malignant falsehoods, against the Catholic Religion and its pro fessors, which tongue or pen can express, or the most envenomed heart conceive. It was collected from the sermons and treatises of Prelates and Dignitaries, by that able and faithful writer, the Rev. John Gother, soon after the gall of calumnious ink had been mixed up with the blood of slaughtered Catholics ; a score of whom were executed as traitors, for a pretended plot to murder their friend and proselyte, Charles II ; for a plot, which was hatched by men, who themselves were soon after convicted of a real assassination plot against the King. At that time, the Parliaments were so blinded, as repeatedly to vote the reality of the plot in question. Hence it is easy to judge with what sort of language the pulpits would resound against the poor devoted Catholics at that period. But without quot ing from former records, I need only refer to a few of the publications of the present day, to justify my 8 LETTER XXXII. complaint. — To begin with some of the numberless slanders contained in the No Popery Tract of the Bishop of London, Dr. Porteus : he charges Ca tholics with ' senseless Idolatry to the infinite 'scandal of Religion (1) ;' with trying ' to make the ' ignorant think that indulgences deliver the dead * from hell (2) ;' and that by means of ' zeal for Holy ' Church, the worst man may be secured from future mi- ' sery (3) :' and the Bishop of St. Asaph, Dr. Halifax, charges Catholics with ' Antichristian Idolatry (4), ' the worship of demons (5), and Idol Mediators (6*).' He, moreover, maintains it to be the doctrine of the Church of Rome, that ' pardon for every sin, whether ' committed or designed, may be purchased for ' money (7). The Bishop of Durham, Dr. Shute Bar- rington, accuses them of ' Idolatry, Blasphemy, ' and Sacrilege (8).' The Bishop of Landaff, Dr. Watson, impeaches the Catholic Priests, Martyro- logists, and Monks without exception, of the ' hy- ' pocrisy of liars (9) ;' and he lays it down, as the moral doctrine of Catholics, that 'humility, tem- ' perance, justice, the love of God and man, are not ' laws for all Christians, but only counsels of perfec- ' tion (10).' He elsewhere says : ' That the Popish Reli- ' gion is the Christian Religion, is a false position (l l).' He has, moreover, adopted and republished the senti ments, of some of his other mitred brethren to the same (1) Confutation, p. 39, edit. 1796. (2) Ibid. p. 53. (3) Ibid. p. 55. (4) Warburton's Lectures, p. 191. (5) Ibid. p. 355. (6) Ibid. p. 358. (T) Ibid. p. 347. (8) Charge, p. 11. (9) Letter II. to Gibbon. (10) Bishop Watson's Tracts, vol. i. (11) Ibid. vol. v. Contents. CHARGES AGAINST THE CHURCH. 9 purpose. One of these asserts that, ' instead of* wor- ' shipping God through Christ, they (the Catholics) ' have substituted the doctrine of demons (I).' ' They ' have contrived numberless ways to make a holy life ' needless, and to assure the most abandoned of salva - ' tion, without repentance, provided they will suffi- ' ciently pay the priest for absolution (2).' ' They ' have consecrated murders, Sec' (3). ' The Papists ' stick fast in filthy mire — by the affection they bear ' to other lusts, which their errors are fitted to gra- ' tif\ (4).' ' It is impossible that any sincere person ' should give an implicit assent to many of their 'doctrines: but, whoever can practice upon them, can ' be nothing better than a most shamefully debauched ' and immoral wretch (5).' Another Prelate, of later promotion, gives a comprehensive idea of Catholics, where he calls them ' Enemies of all law, human and 'divine(6).' If such be the tone of the episcopal bench, it would he vain to expect more moderation from the candidates for it: but I must contract my quotations in order to proceed to more important matter. One of these, who, while he was content with an inferior dignity, acted and preached as the friend of Catholics ; since he has arrived at the verge of the highest, proclaims 'Popery to be Idolatry and Anti- ' christianism ;' maintaining, as does also the Bishop of (1) Bishop Benson's Tracts, vol. v. p. 272. (2; Ibid. p. 273. (3) Ibid. p. 282. (4) Bishop Fowler, vol. vi. p. 386. (5) Ibid. p. 387. (6) Dr. Sparke, Bi hop of Ely, Concio. ad Synod. l;-ji>7. TART III. R r 10 LETTER XXXII. Durham, that it is ' the parent of Atheism, and of that • Antichristian persecution' (in France) of which it was exclusively the victim ( l). Another dignitary of the same Cathedral, taking up Dr. Sparke's calumny, seriously declares that the Catholics are Antinomians(Q), which is the distinctive character of the Jumpers, and other rank Calvinists. Finally, the celebrated City Preacher, C. De Coetlogon, among similar graces of oratory, pronounces, that ' Popery is calculated only for the ' meridian of hell. To say the best of it that can ' be said : Popery is a most horrid compound of Idola- ' try, superstition, and blasphemy (3).' 'The exercise ' of Christian virtues is not at all necessary in its ' members ; nay, there are many heinous crimes, which * are reckoned virtues among them, such as perjury ' and murder, when committed against heretics (4).r — And is such then, Dear Sir, the real character of the great body of Christians throughout the world ? Is such a true picture of our Saxon and English ances tors ? Were such the Clergy, from whom these mo dern preachers and writers derive their liturgy, their ritual, their honours and benefices, and from whom they boast of deriving their Orders and mission also? But, after all, do these preachers and writers them selves seriously believe, such to be the true character of their Catholic countrymen, and the primitive Reli gion? — No, Sir, they do not seriously believe it (.5): (1) Discourses of Dr. Rcnnel,Deau of Wiuchcsirr,p. 110, C\c. (2) Charge of Dr. Hook, Archdeacon, &c. p. 5,&c. (3) Seasonable Caution against the Abominations of the Church of Rome, Pref. p. 5. (4) Ibid. p. 14. (5) This may be exemplified by the conduct of Dr. Wake, Archbishop oi' Canterbury. Few writers had misrepresented the Catholic Religion more CHARGES AGAINST THE CHURCH. ] | but being unfortunately engaged, as I said before, in an hereditary revolt against the Church, which shines forth conspicuous, with every feature of truth in her countenance, and wanting the rare grace of ac knowledging their error, at the expence of temporal advantages, they have no other defence for themselves but clamour and calumny, no resource for shrouding those beauteous features of the Church, but by placing before them the hideous mask of misre presentation ! Before I close this letter, I cannot help expressing an earnest wish, that it were in my power to suggest ioully, than he had done in his controversial works : even in his commentary on the Catechism, he accuses it of heresy, schism, and idolatry; but, having entered into a correspondence with Dr. Dupin, for the purpose of uniting their respective Churches, he assures the Catholic divine, in his last letter to him, as follows : ' In dogmatibus, prout a te candide proponuntur, nou ' admodum dissentimus : in regimine ecclesiastico minus : in fundamenta- ' libus, sive doctrinam, sive disciplinam spectemus, vix omniuo.' Append. to Mosheim's Hist. vol. vi. p. 121. The present writer has been informed, on good authority, that one of the Bishops, whose calumnies are here quoted, when he found himself on his death-bed, refused the profered ministry of the primate, and expressed a great wish lo die a Catholic. When urged to satisfy his conscience, he exclaimed : What then will become of my lady and my children ! Certain it is, that very many Protestants, who had been the most violent in their language and conduct against the Catholic Church, as for example, John, Elector of Saxony, Margaret, Queen of Navarre, Cromwell, Lord Essex, Dudley, Earl of Northum berland, King Charles IIj the late Lords Montague, Nugent, Dun- boyne, &c. did actually reconcile themselves to the Catholic Church in that situation. The writer may add, that another of the calum niators here quoted, being de^rous of stilling the suspicion of his having written an anonymous No-Popery publication, when first he took part in that cause, privately addressed himself to the writer in these terms : How can you suspect me of writing against your Religion, when you so well know my attachment lo it! In fact, this modern Luther, among other similar concessions, has said thus to the writer : I sucr.ci in a love for the Catholic Religion uith my mother's milk. Rr3 J2 LETTER XXXII. three most important considerations to all and every one of the theological calumniators in question. I pass over their injustice and cruelty towards us ; though this bears some resemblance with the barbarity of Nero towards our predecessors, the first Christians of Rome, who disguised them in the skins of wild beasts, and then hunted them to death with dogs. But Christ has warned us as follows: // is enough for the disciple to be as his master ; if they have calledt he master of the house Beelzebub : how much more them of his household. In fact, we know that those our above- mentioned predecessors were charged with worshipping the head of an ass, of killing and eating children, &c. The first observation which I am desirous of making to these cantrovertists is, that their charges and in vectives against Catholics never unsettle the faith of a single individual amongst us; much less do they pause any Catholic to quit our communion. This we are sure of, because, after all the pains and expenses of the Protestant Societies to distribute Dr. Porteus's Confutation of Popery, and other Tracts, in the houses and cottages of Catholics, not one of the latter ever comes to us, their Pastors, to be furnished with an answer to the accusations contained in them. The truth is, they previously know from their catechisms, the falsehood of them. Sometimes, no doubt, a disso lute youth, ' from libertinism of principle and prac- ' tice,' as one of the above-mentioned Lords loudly pro claimed of himself, on his death bed; and sometimes an ambitious or avaricious Nobleman or Gentleman, to get honour or wealth; finally, sometimes a profligate Priest, to get a wife, or a living, forsakes our com munion : — but, I may challenge Dr. Porteus to pro- CHARGES AGAINST THE CHURCH. 13 duce a single proselyte from Popery throughout the Dioceses of Chester and London, who has been gained by his book against it; and I may say the same, with respect to the Bishop of Durham's No Popery Charges throughout the Dioceses of Sarum and Durham. A second point of still greater importance for the consideration of these distinguished preachers and writers is, that their flagrant misrepresentation of the Catholic Religion, is constantly an occasion of the conversion of several of their own most upright mem bers to it. Such Christians, when they fall into company with Catholics, or get hold of their hooks, cannot fail of inquiring, whether they are really those monsters of idolatry, irreligion and immorality, which their Divines have represented them to be; when, dis covering how much they have been deceived in these respects, by misrepresentation ; and, in short, viewing now the fair face of the Catholic Church, instead of the hideous mask which had been placed before it, they seldom fail to become enamoured of it, and, in case Religion is their chief concern, to become our very best Catholics. The most important point, however, of all others for the consideration of these learned theologues, is the following : We must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, to be examined on our observance of that commandment, among the rest, thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbour. Supposing then these their clamorous charges against their Catholic neighbours, of idolatry, blasphemy, perfidy, and thirst of blood, should then appear, as they most certainly will appear, to be calumnies of the worst suit; what will it avail their authors, that these have H LETTER XXXIII. answered the temporary purpose of preventing the emancipation of Catholics, and of rousing the popular hatred and fury against them ! — Alas ! what will it avail them ! I am, Dear Sir, yours, &c. J. M. —?**?»??•+«— LETTER XXXIII. To JAMES BROWN, Esq. ON THE INVOCATION OF SAINTS. DEAR SIR, The first and most heavy charge which Protestants bring against Catholics, is that of Idolatry. They say, that the Catholic Church has been guilty of this crime, and of apostasy, by sanc tioning the Invocation of Saints, and the worship of images and pictures ; and that on this account they have been obliged to abandon her communion, in obedience to the voice from heaven saying : Come out of her, my people, that ye be not partakers of her sins, and that ye receive not of her plagues. Rev. xviii. 4. Nevertheless, it is certain, Dear Sir, that Protestantism was not founded on this ground either in Germany or in England : for Luther warmly defended the Catholic doctrine in both the aforesaid particulars ; and our English reformers, particularly King Edward's uncle, the Duke of Somerset, only took up this pretext of Idolatry, as the most popular, in order to revolu tionize the ancient religion ; a measure they were ac tively carrying on, from motives of avarice and ambi- INVOCATION OF SAINTS. 15 tion. The same reason, namely a persuasion that this charge of Idolatry is best calculated to inflame the ignorant against the Catholic Church, and to furnish a pretext for deserting her, has caused Protestant con- trovertists to keep up the outcry against her ever since, and to vie with each other in the foulness of their misrepresentation of her doctrine in this par ticular. To speak first of the Invocation of Saints : Arch bishop Wake, [who afterwards, as we have seen, ac knowledged to Dr. Dupin, that there was no funda mental difference between his doctrine and that of Catholics] in his popular Commentary on the Church Catechism, maintains that ' The Church of Rome has ' other Gods besides the Lord (1).' Another Prelate, whose work has been lately republished by the Bishop of Landaff, pronounces of Catholics, that, ' Instead ' of worshipping Christ, they have substituted the doc- ' trine of demons (2).' In the same blasphemous terms, Mede, and a hundred other Protestant controvertists, speak of our Communion of Saints. The Bishop of London, among other such calumnies, charges us with 'Bringing back the heathen multitude of deities into ' Christianity ;' that we ' Recommend ourselves to ' some favourite saint, not by a religious life, but by ' flattering addresses and costly presents, and often ' depend much more on his intercession, than on our ' Blessed Saviour's ;' and that, ' being secure of the ' favourof these courtiers of heaven, we pay little regard ' to the King of it (3).' Such is the misrepresentation (1) Sect. 2— S. (2; 3 shop Watson's Theol. Tracts, vol. v. p. 1'Cl. [Z) Brhi Confut, pp. 'i'i, 25. 16 LETTER XXXUIj of the doctrine and practice of Catholics on this point, ¦which the first ecclesiastical characters in the nation publish; because, in fact, their cause has not a leg tc stand on, if you take away misrepresentation ! Let us now hear what is the genuine doctrine of the Catholic Church in this article, as solemnly defined by the Pope, and near 300 Prelates of different nations, at the Council of Trent, in the face of the whole world : it is simply this, that ' The Saints reigning ' with Christ offer up their prayers to God for men ; ' that it is good and useful suppliantly to invoke them, ' and to have recourse to their prayers, help, and as- 1 sistance, to obtain favours from God, through his Son ' Jesus Christ our Lord, who is alone our Redeemer and ' Saviour (l).' Hence the Catechism of the Council of Trent, published in virtue .of its decree (2), by order of Pope Pius V, teaches, that ' God and the ' Saints are not to be prayed to in the same manner ; ' for we pray to God that he himself would give us good ' things, and deliver us from evil things ; but we beg of ' the Saints, because they aie pleasing to God, that ' they would be our advocates, and obtain from God ' what we stand in need of(3).' Our first English Catechism for the instruction of childrefy says : ' We ' are to honour saints and angels as God"s special ' friends and servants, but not with the honour which ' belongs to God.' Finally, The Papist Misrepresented and Represented, a work of great authority among Catholics, first published by our eminent divine Go- ther, and republished by our venerable Bishop, Challo- (1) Concil. Trid. Sess. 25. de Ir.voe . (2) Sess. 24. de Ref. c. 7. (3) Pars IV. Quis oraihiu?, INVOCATION OF SAINTS. J7 ner, pronounces the following anathema against that idolatrous phantom of Catholicity, which Protestant controvertists have held up for the identical Catholic Church: ' Cursed is he that believes the saints in hea ven to be his redeemers, that prays to them as such, or that gives God's honourto them, or to any creature whatsoever. Amen.' ' Cursed is every goddess- worshipper, that believes the B. Virgin Mary to be any more than a creature ; that worships her, or puts his trust in her more than in God ; that believes her above her Son, or that she can in any thing command him. Amen (1).' You see, Dear Sir, how widely different the doctrine of Catholics, as defined by our Church, and really held by us, is from the caricature of it, held up by in terested preachers and controvertists, to scare and inflame an ignorant multitude. So far from making gods and goddesses of the saints, we firmly hold it to be an article of faith, that, as they have no virtue or excellence, but what has been gratuitously bestowed upon them by God, for the sake of his Incarnate Son, Jesus Christ, so they can procure no benefit for u? but by means of their prayers to the Giver of all good gifts, through their and our common Saviour, Jesus Christ. In short, they do nothing for us mortals in heaven, but what they did while they were here on earth, and what all good Christians are bound to do for each other; namely, they help us by their prayers. The only difference is, that as the saints in heaven are free from every stain of sin and imperfection, and are confirmed in grace and glory, so their prayers are far (1) Pap. Misrep. Abridg. p. 78. PART III. S S 18 LETTER XXXHI* more efficacious for obtaining what they ask for, than are the prayers of us imperfect and sinful mortals. Our Protestant brethren will not deny that St. Paul was in the practice of soliciting the prayers of the churches to which he addressed his epistles, Rom. xv. 30, &c. ; that the Almighty himself commanded the friends of Job to obtain his prayers for the pardon of their sins, Job xlii. 8 ; — and moreover, that they themselves are accustomed to pray publicly for one another. Now these concessions, together with the authorized exposition of our doctrine, laid down above, are abundantly sufficient to refute most of the remaining objections of Protestants against it. In vain, for example, does Dr. Porteus quote the text of St. Paul, 1 Tim. ii. 5, There is one Mediator betzveen God and men, the man Christ Jesus : for we grant that Christ alone is the Mediator of Salvation. But if he argues from thence, that there is no other mediator of intercession, he would condemn the conduct of St. Paul, of Job's friends, and of his own Church. In vain does he take advantage of the ambiguous meaning of the word worship, in Matt. iv. 10 ; because, if the question be about a divine adoration, we restrain this as strictly to God, as he can do ; but if it be about merely honouring the saints, we cannot censure that, without censuring other passages of Scripture (1), and (1) The word worship, in this place, is used for supreme divine homage, as appears by the original Greek; whereas in St. Luke xiv. 10, the English translators make use of it for the lowest degree of respect . Thou, shalt have worship in the presence of them that sit at meat with thee. The latter is the proper meaning of the word worship, as appears by the marriage service j With my body I thee worship, and by the designation of the lowest order of magistrates, his Worship Mr. Alderman N. Nevertheless, as the word may be differently interpreted, Catholics abstain from applying it to persons or INVOCATION OF SAINTS. ]Q condemning the Bishop himself, who expressly says : ' The saints in heaven we love and honour (l).' In vain does he quote Revel, xix. 10, where the angel refused to let St. John prostrate himself, and adore him ; because, if the mere, act itself, independently of the Evangelist's mistaking him for the Deity, was for bidden, then the three angels, who permitted Abraham to bow himself to the ground before them, were guilty of a crime, Gen. xviii. 2, as was that other angel, be fore whom Josuah fell on his face and worshipped. Jos. v. 14. The charge of Idolatry against Catholics, for merely honouring those whom God honours, and for desiring them to pray to God for us, is too extravagant, to be any longer published by Protestants of learning and character ; accordingly, the Bishop of Durham is con tent with accusing us of Blasphemy, on the latter part of the Charge. What he says is this : ' It is blasphe- ' my, to ascribe to angels and saints, by praying to ' them, the divine attribute of universal presence (2).' To say nothing of his Lordship's new-invented blas phemy, I should be glad to ask him, how it follows, from my praying to an angel or a saint in any place, where I may be, that I necessarily believe the angel or saint to be in that place? Was Eiisha really in Syria when he saw the ambush prepared there for the King of Israel ? 2 Kings vi. 9- Again : we know that There things inferior to God : making use of the words honour and veneration in their regard ; words which, so applied, even Bishop Porteus approves in us. Thus it appears, that the heinous charge of idolatry brought against Cathot lies for their respect towards the saints, is grounded on nothing but the mis taken meaning of a word ! (1) P. 33. (2) Charge 1810, p. 12, Ssg 20 LETIER XXXIII. joy before the angels of God over one sinner that repent- eth, Luke xv, 10. Now, is it by visual rays, or undu lating sounds, that these blessed spirits in heaven know what passes in the hearts of men upon earth? How does his Lordship know, that one part of the saint's felicity may not consist in contemplating the wonder ful ways of God's providence with all his creatures here on earth? But, without recurring to this sup position, it is sufficient, for dissipating the Bishop's uncharitable phantom of blasphemy, and Calvin's pro fane jest about the length of the Saint's ears, that God is able to reveal to them the prayers of Christians who address them here on earth.— In case I had the same opportunity of conversing with this Prelate, which I once enjoyed, I should not fail to make the following observation to him : My Lord, you publicly maintain, that the act of praying to Saints, ascribes to them the divine attribute of universal presence; and this you call blasphemy. Now it appears, by the Articles and Injunctions of your Church, that you believe in the existence and efficacy of ' sorceries, enchantments, 'and witchcraft, invented by the devil, to procure his ' counsel or help (l),' wherever the conjuror or witch may chance to be; do you, therefore, ascribe the di vine attribute of universal presence to the devil? You must assert this, or you must withdraw your charge of blasphemy against the Catholics, for praying to the Saints. That it is lawful and profitable to invoke the prayers of the Angels, is plain from Jacob's asking and oh- (1) Injunction's, A. D. 1559. Bishop Sparrow's Collection, p. 89. Arti cle, ibid. p. ISO. INVOCATION OF SAINTS. 21 taining the Angel's blessing, with whom he had mys tically wrestled, Gen. xxxii. 26, and from his invok ing his own Angel to bless Joseph's sons, Gen. xi vii. 16. The same is also sufficiently plain, with respect to the Saints, from the Book of Revelations; where the four and twenty Elders in heaven, are said to have Golden vials full of odours, zohich are the prayers of the Saints. Rev. v. 8. The Church, however, derived her doctrine, on this and other points, immediately from the Apostles, before any part of the New Testa ment was written. The tradition was so ancient and universal, that all those Eastern Churches, which broke off from the central Church of Rome, a great many ages before Protestantism was heard of, perfectly agree with us in honouring and invoking the Angels and Saints. I have said that the Patriarch of Protestant ism, Martin Luther, did not find any thing idolatrous in the doctrine or practice of the Church with respect to the Saints. So far from this, he exclaims: Who ' can deny that God works great miracles at the tombs ' of the Saints ! 1 therefore, with the whole Catholic ' Church, hold that the Saints are to be honoured and ' invocated by us (l). In the same spirit he lecom- ' mends this devotion to dying persons : ' Let no ' one omit to call upon the B. Virgin and the Angels ' and Saints, that they may intercede with God for ' them at that instant (2).' I may add that several of the brightest lights of the Established Church, such as Archbishop Sheldon and the Bishops Blanford (3), (1) In Purg. quoramd. Artie. Tom. i. Germet. Ep. ad Georg. Spalat. (2) Luth. Prep, ad Mort. (3) See Duchess of York's Testimony in Brunswick's 50 Reasons. 22 LETTER XXXI11. Gunning (1), Montague, &c. have altogether aban doned the charge of idolatry against Catholics on this head. The last mentioned of them says : 'I own that ' Christ is not wronged in his mediation. It is no 'impiety to say, as they (the Catholics) do: Holy ' Mary pray for me ; Holy Peter pray for me (2) ;' whilst the candid Prebend ary of Westminster warns his brethren 'not to lead people by the nose, to be- ' lieve they can prove Papists to be idolaters, when they ' cannot (3).' In conclusion, Dear Sir, you will observe that the Council of Trent, barely teaches that it is good and profitable to invoke the prayers of the Saints; hence our Divines infer, that there is no positive law of the Church, incumbent on all her children, to pray to the Saints (4). Nevertheless, what member of the Catho lic Church militant will fail to communicate with his brethren of the Church triumphant ! What Catholic, believing in the Communion of Saints, and that ' the ' Saints reigning with Christ pray for us, and that it is ' good and profitable for us to invoke their prayers,' will forego this advantage ! How sublime and consol ing ! how animating is the doctrine and practice of true Catholics, compared with the opinions of Protest ants ! We hold daily and hourly converse, to our un speakable comfort aud advantage, with the Angelic Choirs, with the venerable Patriarchs and Prophets of ancient times, with the heroes of Christianity, the Blessed Apostles and Martyrs, and with the bright (1) Burnet's Hist, of his own Times, Vol. i. p. 437. (2) Treat, of Invoc. of Saints, p. 118. (3) Thorndike, Just Weights, p. 10. (•4) Petavius, Suarez, Wallenburg, Muratori, Nat. Alex. INVOCATION OF SAINTS. 23 ornaments of it in later ages, the Bernards, the Xavc- rii, the Teresas and the Sales's. They are all members of the Catholic Church ! — Why should not you par take of this advantage? Your soul, you complain, Dear Sir, is in trouble ; you lament that your prayers to God are not heard : — continue to pray to him with all the fervour of your soul ; but why not engage his friends and courtiers to add the weight of their pray ers to your own ? Perhaps his Divine Majesty may hear the prayers of the Jobs when he will not listen to those of an Eliphaz, a Bildad, or a Zophar. Job xlii. You believe, no doubt, that you have a Guardian An gel, appointed by God to protect you, conformably to what Christ said of the children presented to him : Their Angels do alzvays behold the face of my Father zvho is in heaven, Matt, xviii. 10 : — address yourself to this blessed spirit with gratitude, veneration and con fidence. You believe also that, among the Saints of God, there is one of supereminent purity and sanctity, pronounced by an Archangel to be, not only gracious, but 'full of grace;' the chosen instrument of God in the incarnation of bis Son, and the intercessor with this her Son, in obtaining his first miracle, that of turning water into wine, at a time, when his ' time' for ap pearing to the world by miracles, was ' not yet come.' John iii. 4. ' It is impossible,' as one of the Fathers says, 'to love the son, without loving the mother :' — beg then of her, with affection and confidence, to intercede with Jesus, as the poor Canaanites did, to change the tears of your distress into the wine of gladness, by affording you the light and grace you so much want. You cannot refuse to join with me in the Angelic salutation : Hail full of grace, our Lord 24 LETTER XXXIV. is with thee (l) ; nor in the subsequent address of the inspired Elizabeth : Blessed art thou among women, and blessed is the fruit of thy womb, Luke i. 42. — Cast aside, then, I beseech you, Dear Sir, prejudices, which are not only groundless but also hurtful, and devoutly conclude with me, in the words of the whole Catholic Church, upon earth : Holy Mary, mother of God, pray for us sinners, now and at the hour of our death. Amen. I am, &c. J. M. LETTER XXXIV. To JAMES BROWN, Esq. ON RELIGIOUS MEMORIALS. DEAR SIR, If the Catholic Church has been so grievously injured by the misrepresentation, of her doctrine respecting prayers to the Saints, she has been still more grieyously injured by the prevailing calum nies against the respect which she pays to the memo rials, of Christ and his Saints ; namely to crucifixes, relicks, pious pictures and images. This has been misrepresented, from almost the first eruption of Pro- testanism (2), as rank idolatry, and as justifying the (1) Luke i. 28. The Catholic version is here used as more conformable to the Greek, as well as the Vulgate, than the Protestant, which renders the passage : Hail thou who art highly favoured. (2) Martin Luther, with all his hatred of the Catholic Church, found no idolatry in her doctrine respecting erosses and images : on the contrary, he RELIGIOUS MEMORIALS. 25 necessity of a Reformation. To countenance such misrepresentation, in our own country in particular, avaricious courtiers and grandees seized on the costly shrines, statues and other ornaments of all the churches and chapels, aud authorized the demolition or defac ing of all other religious memorials, of whatever nature or materials, not only in places of worship, but also in market places and even in private houses. In support of the same pious fraud, the Holy Scriptures were cor rupted in their different versions and editions (1), till religious Protestants, themselves, became disgusted with them (2), and loudly called for a new translation. warmly defended it against Carlostadius and his associates, who had de stroyed those in the Churches of Wittenberg. Epist. ad Gasp. Guttal. In the title pages of his volumes', published by Melancthon, Luther is exhibited on his knees before a Crucifix. Queen Elizabeth persisted for many years in retaining a Crucifix on the altar of her chapel, till some of her Puritan courtiers engaged Patch, the fool, to break it: 'no wiser man,' says Doctor Heylin, (Hist, of Reform, p. 124,) ' daring to undertake such a service.' James -I. thus reproached the Scotch Bishops, when they objected to his pkcing pictures and statues in his chapel at Edinburgh : ' You can endure ' Lions and Dragons (the supporters of the Royal Arms) and Devils, (Queen ' Elizabeth's Griffins) to be figured in your churches, but will not allow the ' like place to Patriarchs and Apostles.' Spotswood's History, p. 530. (1) See in the present English Bible, Colos. iii. 5. Covetousness which is idolatry: this in the Bibles of 1563, 1577, and 1579 stood thus: Covetousness which is the worshipping of images. In like manner, where we read a covetous mun, who is an idolater ; in the former editions we read : a covetous man u'hich is a worshipper of idols. Instead of, What agreement hath the Temple oj God uilh idols, 2 Cor. vi. 1G : it used to stand: How agreeth the Temple of God with images. Instead of: Little children keep yourselves from idols, 1 John v. 21 : it stood during the reigns of Edward and Elizabeth : Babes hecp yourselves from images. There were several other manifest corruptions in this as well as in other points in the ancient Protestant Bibles; some of which remain in the present version. (2) See the account of what passed on this subject, at the Conference of Hampton" Court, in Fuller's and Collier's Church listones, and in Neal's History of the Puritans. PART III. T t %6 LETTER XXXIV. This was accordingly made, at the beginning of the first James's reign. In short, every passage in the Bible and every argument, which common sense su,g: gests against idolatry, was applied to the decent re**- spect which Catholics shew • to the memorials .of Christianity. "* . The misrepresentation, in question, still continues to be the chosen topic of Protestant controvertists, for inflaming the minds of the ignorant against their Ca tholic brethren. Accordingly, there is hardly a lisping infant, who has not been taught that the Romanists pray to images ; nor is there a secluded peasant who has not been made to believe, that the Papists worship wooden Gods. The Book of Homilies repeatedly affirms that our images of Christ and his Saints are idols ; that we ' pray and ask of them what it belongs to God alone ' to give ;' and that ' images have beene and bee wor- ' shipped, and so/ idolatry committed to them by infi-> ' nite multitudes to the great offense of God's Ma- 'jestie, and danger of infinite soiiles ;, that idolatrie ' can not possibly be separated from, images set up in ' churches, and that God's horrible wrath and our most 'dreadful danger cannot beavoided without the de- ' struction and utter abolition of all such images and 'idols out of the Church and Temple of God (1),' Archbishop Seeker teaches that 'The Church of Ronre 'has other Gods, besides the Lord,' and that ' there ' never was greater idolatry among heathens in the ' business of image-worshipping thap in the Church of (1) Against the Perils of Idol. P. iii —This admonition was quickly car ried into effect, throughout England. All statues, bas-relievws and crosses were demolished in all the Churches, and all pictures were defaced ;• wjiilc they continued to hold their places, as they do still, in the Protestant RELIGIOUS MEMORIALS, 27 'Rojne^)/ Bishop Porteus, though he does not charge us with idolatry, by name, yet intimates the same thing, where he applies to us one of the strongest passages of Scripture against Idol worship: They, that make them are like unto them ; and so is every one that trust eth in them. O Israel, trust thou in the Lord. Ps. cxiii. (2); Let us now hear what the Catholic Church herself has solemnly pronounced on the present subject, in her General Council of Trent. She says: 'The images of 'Christ, of the Virgin-Mother of God, and the other ' Saints, are to be kept and retained, particularly in the '" churches, and due honour and veneration is to be paid ' them : not that we beli&oe there is any divinity or ' power in them; forwhich we respect them, or that any ' thing is to^Jre asked of them, Or that trust is to be ' plactd in them, as the" heathens of old trusted in 'their idols (3).' In conformity with this doctrine of our- Church, the following question and answer are seen in our first Catechism* for the instruction of Children : ' Question : May we pray to relics or ' images ? Answer: No ; by no means, for they have ' no life or sense to hear or help us.' Finally, that work of the able Catholic writers Gother and Chal loner, which I quoted above, The Papist Misrepre sented and Represented, contains the following anathe ma, in which I am confident every Catholic existing Churches of Germany. At length common sense regained its rights, even in this country. Accordingly vte see the cross exalted at the top of its prin cipal church (St. Paul's), which is also ornamented, all round, with the sta tues of Saints ; m,ost of the cathedrals and collegiate churches now contain pictures, and some of the.n, as for example, Westminster Abbey, carved images. (l) Comment, an Ch. Catecfc. sect. 24. (3) P, sj, (3) Sess. ixv. Tt?. 28 LETTER XXXIV. will readily join. ' Cursed is he that commits idola- f try; that prays to images or relics, or worships them ' for God. Amen.' Dr. Porteus is very positive, that there is no Scrip tural warrant for retaining and venerating these exte rior memorials ; and he maintains that no other me morial ought to be admitted than the Lord's Supper (1). Does he remember the Ark of the Covenant, made by the command of God, together with the punishment of those who profaned it, and the blessings bestowed on those who revered it? And what was the Ark of the Covenant after all ? A cheat of Settim wood, con taining the Tables of the Law and two golden pots of manna ; the whole being covered over by two carved images of Cherubim ; in short, it was a memorial of God's mercy and bounty to his people. But says the Bishop: ' The Roman Catholics make images of Christ * and of his Saints after their own fancy : before these ' images and even that of the cross they kneel down ' and prostrate themselves ; to these the} lift up their ' eyes and in that posture they pray (2).' Supposing all this to be true; has the Bishop never read that, when the Israelites were smitten at Ai, Joshua fell to the earth upon his face, before the Ark of the Lord, until the even tide, he and the elders of Israel, and Joshua said : Alas, O Lord God, &;c. Jos. vii. 6. Does not he himself oblige those, who frequent the above- mentioned memorial, to kneel and prostrate themselves before it, at which time it is to be supposed they lift • iip their eyes to the Sacrament and say their prayers ? Does not he require of his people that ' when the (1)P, 18. (2) Confut. p. 27. RELIGIOUS MEMORIALS. £9 ' name of JESUS is pronounced in any lesson, &c. ' due reverence be made of all with lowness of cour- ' tesie (l)r' And does he consider as well founded, the outcry of Idolatry against the Established Church,. on this and the preceding point, raised by the Dissen ters ?: Again, is not his Lordship in the habit of kneel ing to his Majesty, and of bowing, with the other Peers, to an empty chair when it is placed as his throne ? Does he not often reverently kiss the mate rial substance of printed paper and leather, I mean the Bible, because it relates to, and represents, the Sacred word of God? When the Bishop of London shall have well considered these several matters, methinks he will better understand, than he seems to do at pre sent, the nature of relative honour ; by which an in ferior respect may be paid to the. Sign, for the sake of the thing signified; and he will neither directly nor in directly charge the Catholics with Idolatry, on account of indifferent ceremonies, which take their nature from the intention of those who use them. During the dispute about pious images, which took place in the eighth century, St. Stephen of Auxence, having en deavoured in vain, to make his persecutor, the Em peror Copronimus, conceive the nature of relative ho nour and dishonour in this matter, threw a piece of money, bearing the Emperor's figure, on the ground, and treated it with the utmost indignity; when the latter soon proved, by his treatment of the Saint, that the affront regarded himself, rather than the piece of :ietal (2). (1) Injunctions, A. D. 1559, n. 52. Cations 1603, n. 18. .j) Floury, Hist, Ecc. L. xliii, n. il. 30 . LETTBR XXXIV. The Bishop objects* that the Catholics 'make pic- t tures of God the Father under the likeness of a vene- ' rable old man.' Certain painters indeed have repre sented him so, as in fact he was pleased to appear so to some of the prophets, Isa. vi. • 1. Dan vii 9; but the Council of Trent says nothing concerning that repre sentation ; which, after all, is not so common as that of a triangle among Protestants, to represent the Tri nity. Thus much, however, is most certain that if any Christian were obstinately to maintain,- that the Divine nature resembles the human-form, he would be an anthropomorphic heretic. TheBishop moreover signifies, what most other Protestant controvertists ex press more coarsely, that, to screen, our idolatry, we have suppressed the seeond Commandment of the De calogue, and to make up the deficiency, we have split the tenth Commandment into two. My answer is, that I apprehend many of these disputants are ignorant enough to believe, that the division of the command ments, in the-ir Common Prayer Book, was copied, if not from the identical Tables .of Moses; at least from his original text of the. Pentateuch ¦: but the Bishop, as a man of learning, must know, that in the original Hebrew, and in the several copies and versions of it, during some thousands of years, there was no mark of separation between one Commandment and another ; so that we have no rules to be guided by, in making the distinction, but the sense of the context and the authority of the most approved Fathers (l); both which we follow. In the mean time, it is a gross ca- (1) St. Augustin, Quaest. in Exod. Clem. Alex. Strom, 1. >i. Ilicren, in Ps. xxxii. RELIGIOUS MEMORIALS. SI lumny to pretend, that we suppress any part of the Decalogue ; for the whole of it appears in all our Bibles, and in all our most approved Catechisms (]). To be brief: the words; Thou shalt not make to thyself any graven thing, are either a prohibition of all images, and, of course, those round the Bishop's Own Cathedral and that of St. Paul; of; those likewise that are Seen upon all existing coins, which I am sure he will not agree to; or else, if is a mere prohibition of images" made to receive divine worship, in which we perfectly agree with him. You will observe, Dear Sir, that, among religious memorials, Hntend to include Relics ; meaning things which have, some way, appertained to, and been left by, personages of eminent sanctity. In deed the ancient Fathers generally call them by that name* Surely Dr, Porteus will not say, that there is no warrant in Scripture for honouring these, when he recollects, that From, the body of St. Paul, were brought unto the sick handkerchiefs and aprons, and the diseases departed from them, Acts xix.12; and that: When the dead man was let dozen and touched the bones of Eiisha, he rextived and stood upon his feet. 2 Kings xiii. SI. But to make an end of the present discussion ; no thing, but the pressing want of a strong pretext for breaking communion with the ancient Church, could have put the revolters upon so extravagant an attempt, as that of confounding the inferior and relative honour which Catholics pay to the memorials of Christ and his Saints (an honour which they themselves pay to (1) Catech. Roman ad Parochi The folio Catech. of Montpelier. Douay. Catech. Abridgment of Christian Doctrine. 3g LETTER XXXI?. the Bible- book, to the name of JESUS, aud even to the King's throne) with the idolatry of the Israelites to their golden Calf, Exod. xxxii 4, and of the ancient heathens to their idols, which they believed to be in habited by their Gods. In a word, the end for which pious pictures and images are made and retained by Catholics, is the same for which pictures and images are made and retained by mankind in general, to put us in mind of the persons and things they represent. They are not primarily intended for the purpose of being venerated ; nevertheless, as they bear a certain relation with holy persons and things, by representing them, they become entitled to a relative, or secondary veneration ; in the manner already explained. I must not forget one important use of pious pictures, men tioned by the holy Fathers, namely, that they help to instruct the ignorant (1). Still, it is a point agreed upon among Catholic Doctors and Divines, that the memorials of religion -form no essential part of it (2). Hence if you should become a Catholic, as I pray God you may, I shall never ask you, if you have a pious picture or relic, or so much as a crucifix in your possession : but then, I trust, after the declarations I have made, that you will not account me an Idolater, should you see such things in my oratory or study, or (1) St. Gregory calls pictures Idiotarum Ubri. Epist. L. ix. 9. (2) The learned Pctavius says : 'We must lay it down as a principle that ' images are to he reckoned among the adiaphora, which do not belong to the ' substance of religion, and which the Church may retain or take away as ' she judges best.' L. xv. de Incar. Hence Dr. Hawarden, of Images, p. 353, teacbes, with Delphinus, that, if, in any place, there is danger of real Aa- latry or superstition from pictures, they ought to be removed by the Pastor ; as St. Epiphanius destroyed a certain pious picture, and Ezechias destroyed the brazen serpent. OBJECTIONS ANSWERED. 33 should you observe how tenacious I am of my cruci fix, in particular. Your faith and devotion may not stand in need of such memorials ; but mine, alas ! do. I am too apt to forget what my Saviour has done and suffered for me ; but the sight of his representation often brings this to my memory, aud affects my sen timents. Hence I would rather part with most of the books in my library, than with the figure of my crucified Lord. I am, &c. J. AL LETTER XXXV. To the Rev. ROBERT CLAYTON, M. A. OBJECTIONS ANSWERED. REV. SIR, J I learn by a letter from our worthy friend, Mr. Brown, as well as by your own, that I am to consider you, and not him, as the person charged to make the objections, which are to be made, on the part of the Church of England, against my theological positions and arguments in future. I congratulate the Society of New Cottage, on the acquisition of so valuable a member as Mr. Clayton, and I think my self fortunate in having to contend with an opponent, so clear-headed and candid, as 'his letter shews him to be. " You admit that, according to my explanation, which is no other than that of our Divines, our Catechisms part in. U u 34 LETTER XXXV. and our Councils in general, we are not guilty of Ido latry in the honour we pay to Saints and their memo rials, and that the dispute between your Church and mine upon these points, is a dispute about words ra ther than about things ; as Bishop Bossuet observes, and as several candid Protestants, before you, have confessed. You and Bishop Porteus agree with us, that ' the Saints are to be loved and honoured;' on the other hand, we agree with you, that it would be idolatrous to pay them divine zvorship, or to pray to their memorials in any shape whatever. Hence, the only question remaining between us is concerning the utility of desiring the prayers of the Saints: for you - say it is useless, because you think that they cannot hear us, and that, therefore, the practice is supersti tious : whereas I have vindicated, the practice itself, and have shewn that the utility of it no way depends on the circumstance of the blessed Spirits immediately hearing the addresses made to them. Still you complain that I have not answered all the Bishop's objections against the doctrine and practices in question. — My reply is, that I have answered the chief of them : and whereas they are, for the most part, of ancient date, and have been again and again solidly refuted by our Divines, I shall send to New Cottage, together with this letter, a work of one of them, who; for depth of learning and strength of argu ment, has not been surpassed since the time of Bellar min (1). There, Rev. Sir, you will find all that you (1) The True Church of Christ, by Edward Hawarden, D. D. S. T. P. The author was engaged in successful contests with Dr Clark, Bishop Bull, Mr. Leslie, and other eminent Protestant Divines. The work has been lately re published in Dublin by Coyne. OBJECTIONS ANSWERED. 35 inquire after, and you will discover, in particular, that the worship of the Angels, which St. Paul condemns in his Epistle to the Colossians, chap. ii. 18, means, that of the fallen or wicked Angels, whom Christ despoiled, ver. 15, and which was paid to them by Simon the Magician and his followers, as the makers of the world. As to the doctrine of Bellarmin concerning images, it is plain that his Lordship never consulted the author himself, but only his misrepresenter Vitringa ; other wise, he would have gathered from the whole of this precise theologian's distinctions, that he teaches pre cisely the contrary to that which he is represented to teach (1). You next observe that I have said nothing con cerning the extravagant forms of prayer, to the Blessed Virgin and other Saints, which Dr. Porteus has col lected from Catholic prayer books, and which, you think, prove that we attribute an absolute and un bounded power to those heavenly citizens. 1 am aware, Rev. Sir, that his Lordship, as well as another Bishop (2), who is all sweetness of temper, except when Popery is mentioned in his hearing, and indeed a crowd of other Protestant writers, has employed himself in making such collections, but from what sources, for the greater part, I am ignorant. If I were to charge his faith, or the faith of his Church, with all the conclusions that could logically be drawn, from different forms of prayer to be met with in the books of her most distinguished Prelates and' (1) See De Imag. L. ii. c. 24. (2) The Bishop of Hereford, Dr. Huntingford, who has squeezed a largo quantity of this irrelevant matter into his examination of The Catholic Petition. U u % 36 LETTER XXXV. Divines, or from the Scriptures themselves, I fancy the Bishop would strongly protest against that mode of reasoning. If, for example, an anthropomorphite were to address him : You say, my Lord, in your Creed, that Christ ' ascended into heaven, and sitteth 'at the right hand of God,' therefore it is plain you believe with me, that God has a human shape ; or if a Calvinist were to say to him : Yoir pray to God that he ' would not lead you into temptation,' there fore you acknowledge that it is God who tempts you to commit sin : in either of these cases the Bishop would insist upon explaining the texts here quoted ; he would argue on the nature of figures of speech, especially in the language of poetry and devotion ; and would maintain, that the belief of his Church is not to be collected from these, but from her defined articles. — Make but the same allowance to Catholics and all this phantom of verbal idolatry will dissolve into air.. Lastly, you remind me of the Bishop's assertion, that ' neither images nor pictures were allowed in Churches ' for the first hundred years.' To this assertion you add your own opinion, that during that same period, no prayers were addressed by Christians to the Saints. — A fit of oblivion must have overtaken Dr. Porteus, when he wrote what you quoted from him, as he cannot be ignorant, that it was not till the conversion of Con- stantine, in the fourth century, that the Christians were generally allowed to build churches for their worship, haying been obliged, during the ages of persecution, to practise it in subterraneous catecombs, or other ob- . scure recesses. We learn, however, from Tertullian, that it was usual, in his time, to represent our Saviour, OBJECTIONS ANSWERED. 37 in the character of the good Shepherd, on the chalices used at the assemblies of the Christians (1): and we are informed by Eusebius, the father of Church-his tory, and the friend of Constautine, that he himself had seen a miraculous image of our Saviour in brass, which had been erected by the woman, who was cured by touching the hem of his garment ; and also different pictures of him, and of St. Peter and St. Paul, which had been preserved since their time (2). The historian Zozomen adds, concerning that statue, that it was mutilated in the reign of Julian the Apostate, and that the Christians, nevertheless, collected the pieces of it, and placed it in their Church (3). St. Gregory of Nyssa, who flourished in the fourth century, preach ing on the martyrdom of St. Theodore, describes his relics as being present in the Church, and his sufferings as being painted on the walls, together with an image of Christ, as if surveying them (4). It is needless to carry the history of pious figures and paintings down to the end of the sixth century, at which time St. Augustin and his companions, coming to preach the Gospel to our pagan ancestors, ' carried a silver Cross before ' them as a banner, and a painted picture of our Savi- ( our Christ (5).' The above-jnentioned Tertullian testifies that, at every movement and in every em ployment, the primitive Christians used to sign their foreheads with the sign of the Cross (6) ; and Eusebius and St. Chrysostom fill whole pages of their works with (1) Lib. de Pudicitia, c. io. (2) Hist 1. vii. c. 18. (3) Hist. Eccles. 1. v.c. *31. (4) Orat. in Theod. (5) Bede's Eccles. Hist. 1. i. c. 25. (6) Deo Coron.Milit.c. 3. 38 LETTER XXXV. testimonies of the veneration in which the figure of the Cross was anciently held ; the latter of whom expressly says, that the Cross was placed on the altars (1) of the churches. The whole history of the Martyrs, from St. Ignatius and St. Polycarp, the disciples of the Apos tles, whose relics, after their execution, were carried away by the Christians, as ' more valuable than gold ' and precious stones (2),' down to the latest martyr, incontestably proves the veneration which the Church has ever maintained for these sacred objects. With respect to your own opinion, Rev. Sir, as to the earliest date of prayers to the saints, I may refer you to the writings of St. Ireneeus, the disciple of St. Polycarp, who introduces the Blessed Virgin praying for Eve (3) ; to the Apology of his contemporary St. Justin the Martyr, who says : ' We venerate and worship the ' angelic host, and the spirits of the prophets, teaching ' others as we ourselves have been taught (4) ;' and to the light of the fourth century, St. Basil, who expressly refers these practices to the Apostles, where he says : ' I invoke the Apostles, Prophets, and Martyrs to pray 'forme, that God may be merciful to me, and for- ' give me my sins. I honour and reverence their ' images, since these things have been ordained by ' tradition from the Apostles, and are practised in all ' our Churches (5).' You will agree. with me, that. I need not descend lower than the fourth age of the Church. I am, Sec. J. M. (1) InOrat. Quod Christus sit Deus. (2) Euseb. Hist. 1. iv. c. 15. Acta Sincer. apud Ruinart. (3) Contra Hares. 1. v. c. 19. (-1) Apol. 2. prope Init. (5) Epist. 205. t. iii. edid. Paris. 39 LETTER XXXVI. To JAMES BROWN, Esq. ON TRANSUBSTANTIATION. DEAR SIR, It is the remark of the Prince of modern controvertists, Bishop Bossuet, that, whereas in most other subjects of dispute between Catholics and Protestants, the difference is less than it seems to be, in this of the Holy Eucharist or Lord's Supper, it is greater than it appears (l). The cause of this is, that our opponents misrepresent our doctrine concern ing the veneration of Saints, pious Images, In dulgences, Purgatory, and other articles, in order to strengthen their arguments against us ; whereas their language approaches nearer to our doctrine than their sentiments do on the subject of the Eucharist, because our doctrine is so strictly conformable to the zvords of Holy Scripture. This is a disingenuous artifice; but I have to describe two others of a still more fatal ten dency: first, with respect to the present welfare of the Catholics, who are the subjects of them, and secondly, with respect to the future welfare of the Protestants, who deliberately make use of them. The first of these disingenuous practices consists, in misrepresenting Catholics as zvorshippers of bread and wine in the Sacrament, and therefore as Idolaters, at the same time that our adversaries are perfectly aware that we firmly believe, as an article of faith, that there (1) Exposition of the Doctrine of the Catholic Church, Sect. XVI. 40 LETTER XXXVI. is no bread nor wine, but Christ alone, true God, as well as man, present in it. Supposing, for a moment, that we are mistaken in this belief, the worst we could be charged with, is an error, in supposing Christ to be where he is not; and nothing but uncharitable ca lumny, or gross inattention, could accuse us of the heinous crime of Idolatry. To illustrate this argument, let me suppose, that, being charged with a loyal ad dress to the Sovereign, you presented it, by mistake, to one of his courtiers, or even to an inanimate figure of him, M'hich, for some reason or other, had been dressed up in royal robes, and placed on the throne ; would your heart reproach you, or would any sensible person reproach j'ou, with the guilt of treason in this case ? Were the people who thought in their hearts that John the Baptist was the Christ, Luke iii. 15, and who probably worshipped him as such, Idolaters, in conse quence of their error ? The falsehood, as well as the uncharitableness of this calumny, is too gross to escape the observation of any informed and reflecting man ; yet, in order to keep alive their prejudices against us, it is upheld and vociferated to the ignorant crowd, by Bishop Porteus (l) and the Protestant Preachers and Writers in general ; while it is perpetuated by the Le gislature, for the purpose of defeating our civil claims ! (2). It is not, however, true, that all Pro- (1) He charges Catholics with ' senseless idolatry,' and with ' worship- ' ping the creature instead of the Creator.' Confut. P. ii. c. 1. (2) The Declaration against Popery, by which Catholics were excluded from the Houses of Parliament, was voted by them during that time of na tional frensy and disgrace, when they equally voted the reality of the pre tended Popish Plot, which cost the Catholics a torrent of innocent blood, and which was hatched by the unprincipled Shaftesbury, with the help of TRANSUBSTANTIATION. 41 testant Divines have laid this heavy charge at the door of Catholics, for worshipping Christ in the Sacrament ; as all those eminent prelates in the reigns of Charles I and Charles II must be excepted, who generally ac quitted us of the charge of idolatry, and more espe cially the learned Gunning, Bishop of Ely, who repro bated the above signified Declaration, when it was brought into the House of Lords, protesting that his conscience would not permit him to make it(l). The candid Thorndyke, Prebendary of Westminster, argues thus on the present subject : ' Will any Papist ac- ' knowledge that he honours the elements of the Eu- ' charist for God ? Will common sense charge him ' with honouring that in the Sacrament, which he does ' not believe to be there !' (2). The celebrated Bishop of Down, Dr. Jeremy Taylor, reasons with equal fair ness, where he says : ' The object of their (the Catho- ' lies') adoration in the Sacrament is the only true and ' eternal God, hypostatically united with his holy hu- ' manity, which humanity they believe actually present ' under the veil of the Sacrament. And if they thought ' him not present, they are so far from worshipping the * bread, that they profess it idolatry to do so. This is ' demonstration that the soul has nothing in it that is ' idolatrical ; the will has nothing in it, but what is a 'great enemy to idolatry (3).' The other instance of disingenuity and injustice on the part of Protestant Divines and Statesmen, con- Dr. Tongue, and the infamous Oates, to prevent the succession of James I to the Crown. See Echard's Hist. North's Exam. (1) Burnet's Hist. Own Times. (2) Just Weights and Measures, c. 19. (3) Liberty of Prophesying, Sect. 20. PART III. X X 42 LETTER XXXVI. sists in their overlooking the main subject in debate, namely, zvhether Christ is or is not really and per sonally present in the Sacrament; and in the mean time directing all the force of their declamation and ridi cule, and all the severity of the law to a point of in ferior, or at least secondary consideration ; namely, to the mode in which he is considered by one particular party as being present. It is well known that Catholics believe, that, when Christ took the bread and gave it to his Apostles, saying, THIS IS MY BODY, he changed the bread into his body, which change is called Transubstantiation. On the other hand, the Lutherans, after their master, hold that the bread and the real body of Christ are united, and both truly present in the Sa crament, as iron and fire are united in a red-hot bar(l). This sort of presence, which would be not less miraculous and incomprehensible than Transub stantiation, is called Consubstanliation : while the Cal vinists and Church-of-England-men in general (though many of the brightest lumiuaries of the latter have ap proached to the Catholic doctrine) maintain that Christ is barely present in figure, and received only by faith. Now all the alledged absurdities, in a manner, and ail the pretended impiety and idolatry, which are attributed to Transubstantiation, equally attach to Consubstantiation and to the Real Presence professed by those eminent Divines of the Established Church. Nevertheless, what controversial preacher or writer ever attacks the latter opinions ? What iaw excludes (1) De Capt. Babyl. Osiandcr, whose sister Cranmer married, taught Impanation, or an hypostatical and personal union of the bread with Christ's body, in consequence of which * person might truly say : This bread is Christ's body. Tit A NSUBSTANTIATION. 43 Lutherans from Parliament, or even from the Throne? So far from this, a Chapel Royal has been founded and is maintained in the Palace itself, for the propagation of their Cousubstantiatiou and the participation of their Real Presence ! In short, you may say with Luther, the bread is the body of Christ, or with Osian- der, the bread is one and the same person zvith Christ, or with Bishop Cosin, that ' Christ is present really ' and substantially by an incomprehensible mys- 'tery(l),' or with Dr. Balguy, that there is no mystery at all, but a mere ' federal rite, barely signify- ' ing the receiver's acceptance of the benefit of redemp- ' tion (2). In short, you may say any thing you please concerning the Eucharist, without obloquy or incon venience to yourself, except what the words of Christ, this is my body, so clearly imply, namely that he changes the bread into his body. In fact, as the Bishop of Meaux observes, ' the declarations of Christ operate ' what they express ; when he speaks, nature obeys, ' and he does what he says: thus he cured the Ruler's 'son, by saying to him: Thy son liveth ; and the ' crooked woman, by saying, Thou art loosed from thy ' infirmity (3).' The Prelate adds, for our further observation, that Christ did not say, My body is here ; this contains my body, but, this is my body : this is my blood. Hence Zuinglius, Calvin, Beza, and the defen ders of the figurative ssense in general, ail except the Protestants of England, have expressly confessed, that, admitting the Real Presence, the Catholic doctrine is far more conformable to Scripture than the Lutheran, I shall finish this letter with remarking that, as Tran- (1) Hist, of Transub. p. j i. (2) Charge vii. * (3) Variat. T. ii. p. 34. X X 2 44 LETTER XXXVII. substantiation, according to Bishop Cosin, was the first of Christ's miracles, in changing water into wine; so it may be said to have been his last, during his mortal course, by changing bread and wine into his gacred body and blood. I am, &c. J. M. LETTER XXXVII, To JAMES BROWN, Esq. ON THE REAL PRESENCE OF CHRIST IN THE B. SACRAMENT. It is clear, from what I have stated in my last letter to you, that the first and main question to be settled between Catholics and Church- Protestants is concerning the real or figurative presence of Christ in the Sacrament. This being determined, it will be time enough, and, in my opinion, it will not require a long time, to conclude upon the manner of his presence, namely, whether by Consubstantiation or Transubstantiation. To consider the authorized ex position or Catechism of the Established Church, it might appear certain that she herself holds the Real Presence; since she declares that, 'The body ' and blood of Christ are verily and indeed taken ' and received by the faithful in the Lord's Supper.' To this declaration I alluded, in the first place, where I complained of Protestants disguising their real te-, THE REAL PRESENCE. 45 nets, by adopting language of a different meaning from their own sentiments, and conformable to the senti ments of Catholics, in consequence of such being the language of the sacred text. In fact, it is certain and confessed that she does not, after all, believe the real body and blood to be in the Supper, but mere bread and wine, as the same Catechism declares. This involves an evident contradiction ; it is saying : you receive that in the Sacrament, zvhich does not exist in the Sacrament (1) : it is like the speech of a debtor, who should say to his creditor : Thereby verily and indeed (1) Dryden, in his Hind and Panther, ridicules this inconsistency as follows: ' The literal sense is hard to flesh and blood ; ' But nonsense never could be understood.' Even Dr. Hey calls this ' an unsteadiness of language and a seeming incon- • sistency.' Lect. vol. iv. p. 333. X. B, It is curious to trace, in the Liturgy of the Established Church, her variations on this most important point of Christ's presence in the Sacra ment. The first Communion Service, drawn up by Cranmer, Ridley, and other Protestant Bishops and Divines, and published in 1548, clearly ex presses the Real Presence, and that ' the whole body of Christ is received ' under each particle of the Sacrament.' Burnet, P. ii. b. 1. Afterwards, when the Calvinistic party prevailed, the 29th of the 42 Ar ticles of Religion, drawn up by the same Prelates and published in 1552, expressly denies the Real Presence, and the very possibility of < ,'hrist heing in the Eucharist, since he hasascended up to heaven. Ten years afterwards, Elizabeth being on the throne, who patronized the Real Presence, (see Hey lin, p. 124) when the 42 Articles were reduced to 39, this declaration, airainst the Real and Corporal Presence of Christ, was left out of the Common Prayer Book for the purpose of comprehending those persons who believed in it, as was also the whole of the former Rubric, which explained that ' by kneeling ' at the Sacrament no adoration was intended to any corporal presence of 'Christ's natural flesh and blood.' Burnet, P. ii. p. 392. So the Liturgy stood for just 100 years, when in 1662, during the reign of Charles II, among other alterations of the Liturgy, which then took place, the old Ru bric against the Real Presence and the adoration of the Sacrament was again restored as it stands at present ! 46 LETTER XXXVII. pay you the money I owe you ; but I have not verily and indeed the money wherewith, to pay you. Nothing proves more clearly the fallacy of the Calvi nists and other Dissenters, as likewise of the Established Churchmen in general, who profess to make the Scrip ture in its plain and literal sense, the sole Rule of their Faith, than their denial of the real Presence of Christ in the Sacrament which is so manifestly and emphati cally expressed therein. He explained and promised this divine mystery near one of the Paschs, John vi. 4, pre vious to his institution of it. He then multiplied five loaves and two fishes, so as to afford a superabundant meal to five thousand men, besides women and chil dren, Mat. xiv. 21 ; which was an evident sign of the future multiplication of his own person on the several altars of the world ; after which he took occasion to speak of this mystery, by saying : / am the living bread, zvhich came down from heaven. If any man eat of this bread, he shall live for ever : and the bread that I will give, is my flesh, for the life of the world. John vi. 51. The sacred text goes on to inform us of .the perplexity of the Jews, from their understanding Christ's words in their plain and natural sense, which he, so far from removing by a different explanation, confirms by expressing that sense, in other terms still more emphatical. The Jezvs therefore strove amongst themselves, saying : Hozv can this man give us his flesh to eat ? Then Jesus said unto them : Verily verily I say unto you : except ye eat the flesh of the son of man, and drink his blood, ye have no life in you. — For my flesh is meat indeed, and my blood is drink indeed. Ver. 52, 53, 55. Nor was it the multitude alone, who took offence at this mystery of a real and corporal reception of Christ's THE REAL PRESENCE. 47 person, so energetically and repeatedly expressed by him, but also several of his own beloved disciples, whom certainly he would not have permitted to desert him to their own destruction, if he could have remov ed their difficulty by barely telling them, that they were only to receive him by faith, and to take broad and wine in remembrance of him. Yet this merciful Saviour permitted them to go their way ; and content ed himself with asking the Apostles, if they would also leave him ? They were as incapable of comprehending the mystery, as the others were; but they were assur ed that Christ is ever to be credited upon his word, and accordingly they made that generous act of faith, which every true Christian will also make, who seri ously and devoutly considers the sacred text before us. Many therefore of his disciples, when they had heard this, said : This isa hard saying : who can hear it ? From that time many of his disciples went back and zvalked no more with him. Then Jesus said to the tzvelve : will ye also go away ? Then Simon Peter answered him : Lord, to whom shall zve go ? Thou hast the words of eternal life. Ver. 60, 66, 67, 68. The Apostles, thus instructed by Christ's express and repeated declaration, as to the nature of this Sacra ment, when he promised it to them, were prepared for the .sublime simplicity of his words in instituting it. For, zvhilst they were at supper, Jesus took bread and blessed it and brake it and gave it to the disciples and said: take ye and eat : THIS IS MY BODY. And takins. the chalice he gave thanks, and gave it to them saying: drink ye all of this; FOR THIS IS MY BLOOD OF THE NEW' TESTAMENT, WHICH 48 LETTER XXXVII. SHALL BE SHED FOR MANY UNTO THE RE MISSION OF SINS. Mat. xxvi. 26, 27, 28. This account of St. Matthew is repeated by St. Mark, xiv. 22, 23, 24, and nearly, word for word, by St. Luke, xxii. \9, 20, and by St. Paul, 1 Cor. xi. 23, 24, 25; who adds : Therefore zvhoever shall eat this bread, or drink the chalice of the Lord unworthily, shall be guilty of the body and blood of the Lord — and eateth and drinketh judgment (the Protestant Bible says damnati on) lo himself. 1 Cor. xi. £7, 29. To the native evi dence of these texts I shall add but two words. First, supposing it possible that Jesus Christ had deceived the Jews of Capharnaum, and even his Disciples and his very Apostles, in the solemn asseverations which he, six times over, repeated of his real and corporal pre sence in the Sacrament, when he promised to institute it; can any one believe that he would continue the deception on his dear Apostles, in the very act of in stituting it ? and when he was on the point of leav ing them ? in short, when he was bequeathing them the legacy of his love ? In the next place, what pro priety is there in St. Paul's heavy denunciations of profaning Christ's person, and of damnation, on the part of unworthy communicants, if they partook of it only by faith and in figure ? For, after all, the Paschal Lamb, which the people of God had, by his command, every year eaten, since their deliverance out of Egypt, and which the Apostles themselves eat, before they received the Blessed Eucharist, was, as a mere figure, and an incitement to faith, far more strik ing, than eating and drinking bread and wine are : hence the guilt of profaning the Paschal Lamb, and the THE REAL PRESENCE. 4.9 numerous other figures of Christ, would not be less heinous than profaning the Sacrament, if He were not really there. I should write a huge folio volume, were I to tran scribe all the authorities in proof of the Real Presence and Transubstantiation, which may be collected from the ancient Fathers, Councils and historians, anterior to the origin of these doctrines, assigned by the Bi shops of London (l) and Lincoln. The latter, who speaks more precisely on the subject, says : ' The idea of Christ's bodily presence in the Eucharist was first started in the beginning of the eighth century. In the twelfth century, the actual change of the bread and wine into the body and blood of Christ, by the consecration of the Priest, was pronounced to be a Gospel truth. The first writer who maintained it was Paschasius Radbert. It is said to have been brought into England by Lanfranc (2).' What will the learned men of Europe, who are versed in ecclesias tical literature, think of the state of this science in England, should they hear that such positions, as these, have been published by one of its most celebrated Prelates ? I have assigned the cause, why I must content myself with a few of the numberless docu ments which present themselves to me in refuta tion of such bold assertions. — St. Ignatius, then, an apostolical Bishop of the first century, describing cer tain contemporary heretics, says : ' They do not ad- ' mit of Eucharists and oblations, because they do not 'believe the Eucharist to be the flesh of our Saviour (1) Page 38. (2) Elem. of Theol. vol. ii. p. 380. PART III. Y y SQ LETTER XXXVII. ' Jesus Christ, wh® suffered for our sins (lj.3 I pass over the testimonies, to the same effect, of St. Justin Martyr (2), St. Irenaeus (3), St. Cyprian (4), and other Fathers of the second and third centuries ; but will quote the following words from Origen, because the Prelate appeals to his authority, in another pas sage, which is nothing at all to the purpose. He says then, 'Manna was formerly given, as a figure; but, ' now, the flesh and blood of the Son of God is speci- ' fically given, and is real food (5).' I must omit the clear and beautiful testimonies for the Catholic doc trine, which St. Hilary, St. Basil, St. John Chrysostom, St. Jerom, St. Augustin, and a number of other illus trious Doctors of the fourth and fifth ages furnish ; but I cannot pass over those of St. Cyril of Jerusalem and St. Ambrose of Milan, because these occurring in ca techetical discourses, or expositions of the Christian doctrine to their young neophytes, must evidently be understood in the most plain and literal sense they can bear. — The former says : ' Since Christ himself affirms ' thus of the bread : This is my body ; who is so daring ' as to doubt of it ? And since he affirms : This is my ' blood; who will deny that it is his blood ? At Cana ' of Galilee, he, by an act of his will, turned water ' into wine, which resembles blood ; and is he not then ' to be credited when he changes wine into blood ? ' Therefore, full of certainty, let us receive the body 1 and blood of Christ : for, under the form of bread, is (3) Ep. ad Smyrn. (2) Apolog. to Emp. Antonin. (8) L. v. c. 11. (4) Ep. 54 ad Corr.e! . (;>) Hjuj. 7, in Levit, THE REAL PRESENCE. 51 ' given to thee his body, and, under the form of wine, 'his blood (1).' St. Ambrose thus argues with his spiritual children : ' Perhaps you will say : Why do ' you tell me that I receive the body of Christ, when I ' see quite another thing ? We have this point there- ' fore to prove. — How many examples do we produce ' to shew you, that this is not what nature made it, ' but what the benediction has consecrated it ; and ' that the benediction is of greater force than nature, ' because, by the benediction, nature itself is changed ! ' Moses cast his rod on the ground, and it became a ' serpent ; he caught hold of the serpent's tail, and it ' recovered the nature of a rod. The rivers of Egypt, ' &c. — Thou hast read of the creation of the world : ' if Christ, by his word, was able to make something * out of nothing, shall he not be thought able to ' change one thing into another ?' (2). But I have quoted enough from the ancient Fathers, to refute the rash assertions of the two modern Bishops. True it is that Paschasius Radbert, an Abbot of the ninth century, writing a treatise on the Eucharist, for the instruction of his novices, maintains the real cor poral presence of Christ in it : but so far from teach ing a novelty, he professes to say nothing but what all the world believes and professes (3). The truth of this appeared when Berengarius in the eleventh century, among other errors, denied the Real Presence ; for then the whole Church rose up against him : he was attacked by a whole host of eminent writers, and among others by our Archbishop Lanfranc ; all of (1) Catech. Mystagog. 4. (2) De his qui Myst. Init. c. 9. !S) ' Quod totus orbis credit et confitetur.' See Pcrpetuite de la FflL Yy a 52 LETTER XXXVII. whom, in their respective works, appeal to the belief of all nations; and Berengarius was condemned in no less than eleven Councils. I have elsewhere shewn the absolute impossibility, that the Christians of all the Nations in the World should be persuaded into a be lief, that the Sacrament, which they were in the habit of receiving, was the living Christ, if they had before held it to be nothing but an inanimate memorial of Him: even though, by another impossibility, all the plergy of the nations were to combine together for ef fecting this. On the other hand, it is incontestable, and has been carried to the highest degree of moral evidence (l), that all the Christians of all the nations of the world, Greeks as well as Latins, Africans as well as Europeans, except Protestants and a handful of Vaudois peasants, have, in all ages, believed and still believe in the Real Presence and Transubstantiation. I am now, Dear Sir, about to produce evidence of a different nature, I mean Protestant evidence, for the rnain point under consideration, the Real Presence. My first witness is no other than the father of the pre tended Reformation, Martin Luther himself. He tells ps how very desirous he was, and how much he labour ed in bis m»nd to overthrow this doctrine, because, says he (observe bis motive), ' J clearly saw hovy much ' I should thereby injure Popery : but I found my- ' self caught, without any way of escaping : for the * text of the Gospel was too plain for this purpose (2).' Hence he continued, till his death, to condemn those (1) See in particular ihq last named victorious work, which has proved fhe conversion of many Protestants, and among the rest of a distinguished phurchman now living. (3) Epist. ad Argenten, torn, 4, fol. 502, Ed.Witten. THE REAL PRESENCE. 53 Protestants who denied the corporal Presence ; em ploying, for this purpose, sometimes the shafts of his coarse ridicule (l), and sometimes the thunder of his vehement declamation and anathemas (2 '). To speak now of former eminent Bishops and Divines of the Establishment in this country ; it is evident from their works, that many of them believed firmly in the Real Pesence; such as the Bishops Andrews, Bilson, Morton, Laud, Montague, Sheldon, Gunning, Forbes, Bramhall and Cosin, to whom I shall add the justly esteemed Divine, Hooker; the testimonies of whom, for the Real Presence, are as explicit as Catholics themselves can wish them to be. I will transcribe in the margin a few words from each of the three last named authors (3). — The near, or rather close ap- (1) In one place he says, that ' The Devil seems to have mocked those, ' to whom he has suggested a heresy so ridiculous and contrary to Scripture ' as that of the Zuinglians,' who explained away the words of the Institution in a figurative way. He elsewhere compares these glosses with the following translation of the first words of Scripture : In principio Deus creavit calum et terram : — In the beginning the cuckoo eat the sparrow and his feathers. De- fens. Verb. Dom. (2) On one occasion he calls those who deny the Real and corporal Pre sence; ' A damned sect, lying heretics, bread-breakers, wine-drinkers, and ' soul- destroyers.' In Parv. Catech. On other occasions he says : ' They are 4 iudevilized and superdevilized.' Finally he devotes them to everlastin" flames, aud builds his own hopes of finding mercy at the tribunal of Christ on his having, with all his soul, condemned Carlostad, Zuinglius, and other believers in the symbolical presence. (3) Bishop Bramhall writes thus: 'No genuine son of the Church (of ' England) did ever deny a true, real presence. Christ said : This is my body, ' and what he said we steadfastly believe. He said neither CON nor SUB ' nor TRANS : therefore we place these among the opinions of schools, ' not among articles of faith.' Answer to Militiaire, p. 74.— —"Bishop Cosin is not less explicit in favour of the Catholic doctrine. He says: ' It is a ' monstrous error to deny ,that Christ is to be adored in the Eucharist ¦ • • • z We confess the necessity pf a supernatural and heavenly change, and that 54 LETTER XXXVII. proach, of these and other eminent Protestant Divines, to the constant doctrine of the Catholic Churcb,on this principal subject of modern controversy, is evi dently to be ascribed to the perspicuity and force of the declaration of Holy Scripture concerning it. As to the Holy Fathers, they received this, with her other doctrines, from the Apostles, independently of Scrip ture : for, before even St. Matthew's Gospel was pro mulgated, the sacrifice of the Mass was celebrated, and the body and blood of Christ distributed to the faith ful throughout a great part of the known world. In finishing this letter I must make an important remark, on the object or end of the institution of the Blessed Sacrament. This, our Divine Master tells us, was to communicate a new and special grace, or life, as he calls it, to us his disciples of the New Law. The bread that I will give is my fiesh, for the life of the zvoidd. As the living Father hath sent me, and I live by the Father ; so he that eateth me, the same shall also live by me. This is the bread that came down from hea ven ; not as your fathers did eat manna, and are dead : he that eateth this bread shall live for ever. John vi. 52, 58, 59- He explains, in the same passage, the particular nature of this spiritual life, and shews in what it consists, namely, in an intimate union with ' the signs cannot become sacraments but by the infinite power of God. If ' any one make a bare figure of the Sacrament, we ought not to suffer him in ' our Churches.' Hist, of Transub. Lastly, the profound Hooker expresses himself thus : ' I wish men would give themselves more to meditate, with * silence, on what we have in the sacrament, and lessto dispute of the man- ' uer how. Sitli-we all agree that Christ, by the Sacrament, doth really and ' truly perform in. us his promise, why do we vainly trouble ourselves with so ' fierce contentions whether by Consubstantiation, or else by Transubstan- « UationJ' Eccles. Polit. 15, v. 67. THE REAL PRESENCE. 55 him ; where he says : He that eateth my fiesh, and drinketh my blood, abideth in me and I in him. Ver. 5J. Now the servants of God, from the beginning of the Avorld, had striking figures and memorials of the pro mised Messiah, the participation of which, by faith and devotion, was, in a limited degree, beneficial to their souls. Such were the Tree of life, the various sacrifices of the Patriarchs, and those of the Mosaic Law; but more particularly the Paschal Lamb, the Loaves of Proposition, and the Manna of which Christ here speaks : still, these signs, in their very in stitution, were so many promises, on the part of God, that he would bestow upon his people the thing signi fied by them ; even his incarnate Son, who is at once our victim and our food, and who gives spiritual life to the worthy communicants, not in a limited measure, but indefinitely, according to each one's preparation. The same tender love which made him shroud the rays of his Divinity, and take upon himself the form of a servant, and the likeness of man, in his Incarnation ; Avbich made him become as a worm and not a man, the reproach of men and the outcast of the people, in his immolation on Mount Calvary; has caused him to de scend a step lower, and to conceal his human nature also, under the veils of our ordinary nourishment, that thus we may be able to salute him with our mouths and lodge him in our breasts ; in order that we may thus, each one of us, abide in him and he abide in us, fo; the life of our souls. No wonder that Protestants, who aie strangers to these heavenly truths, and whe* are still immersed in the clouds of types and figures, not pretending to any thing more in their sacrament, than what the Jews possessed in their ordinances, 56 LETTER XXXVIII. should be comparatively so indifferent, as to the pre paration for receiving it, and, indeed, as to the recep tion of it at all ! No wonder that many of them, and among the rest Antony Ulric, Duke of Brunswick (l), should have reconciled themselves to the Catholic Church, chiefly for the benefit of exchanging the figure for the substance ; the bare memorial of Christ, for his adorable Body and Blood. I am, &c. j, M. — »»*>?*)¦«?»— LETTER XXXVHI. To the Rev. ROBERT CLAYTON, M. A. OBJECTIONS. ANSWERED. REV. SIR, Though I had not received the letter with which you have honoured me, it was my intention to write to Mr. Brown, by way of answering Bishop Porteus's objections against the Catholic doc trine of the Blessed Eucharist. As you, Rev. Sir, have in some manner adopted those objections, I address my answer to you. You begin with the Bishop's arguments from Scrip ture, and say, that the same Divine personage who says : Take, eat, this is my body, elsewhere calls him self a door and a vine : hence you argue, that, as the two latter terms are metaphorical, so the first is also. (1) Lettres d'un Docteur Allemand, par Seheffinacker, Vol. i. p. 393. OBJECTIONS ANSWERED. 57 I grant that Christ makes use of metaphors, when he calls himself a door and a vine; but then he explains that they are metaphors, by saying ; I am the door of the sheep, by me if any man enter he shall be saved, John x. 9. ; and again, / am the vine, you the branches : he that abideth in me, and I in him, heareth much fruit : for without me you can do nothing. John xv. 5. But, in the institution of the Sacrament, though he was then making his last will, and bequeathing that legacy to his children, which, in his promise of it, he had assured them should be meat indeed and drink in deed ; not a word falls from him, to signify that his le gacy is not to be understood in the plain sense of the terms he makes use of. Hence those incredulous Chris tians, who insist on allegorizing the texts in question, (professing at the same time to make the plain, natural sense of Scripture their only rule of faith) may allegorize every other part of Holy Writ, as ridiculously as Lu ther has translated the first words of Genesis ; and thus gain no certain knowledge from any part of it. His Lordship adds, that the Apostles did not understand this institution literally, as they asked no questions, nor expressed any surprise concerning it. True, they did not; but then they had been present on a former occa sion, at a scene in which the Jews, and even many of the disciples, expressed great surprise at the annuncia tion of this mystery, and asked : Hozv can this man give us his fiesh to eat ? On that occasion, we know that Christ tried the faith of his Apostles, as to this mystery ; when they generously answered : Lord, to whom shall we go ? Thou hast the zvords of eternal life. You may quote, after Dr. Porteus, Christ's answer part in. Z z 58 LITTER XXXVIII. to the murmur of the Jews on this subject : Doth this offend you ? If then you shall see the Son of Man as cend up zvhere he was before ? It is the spirit that quickeneth ; the fiesh profiteth nothing. The words that I have spoken to you are spirit and life. John vi. 63, 64. To this I answer, that if there were an apparent con tradiction, between this passage and those others in the same chapter, in which Christ so expressly affirms, that his fiesh is meat indeed, and his blood drink indeed, it would only prove more clearly the neces sity of inquiring into the doctrine of the Catholic Church concerning them. But there is no such ap pearance of contradiction : on the contrary, our con trovertists draw an argument from the first part of this passage, in favour of the Real Presence (1). The utmost that can be deduced from the remaining part is, that Christ's inanimate flesh, manducated, like that of animals, according to the gross idea of the Jews, would not confer the spiritual life which he speaks of: though some of the Fathers understand these words, not of the Body and Blood of Christ, but of our unen lightened natural reason, in contradistinction to inspired faith ; in which sense Christ says to St. Peter : Blessed art thou, because flesh and blood has not revealed this to thee, but my Father who is in heaven. Matt. xvi. 17. — You add from St. Luke, that Christ says in the very institution: Do this in memory of me. Lukexxii. 19. — I answer, that neither here is there any contradiction : for the Eucharist is both a memorial of Christ and the Real Presence of Christ. When a person stands visibly (1) Verite de la llclig. Cat. prouve"e par l'Ecriture, par M. Des Mahis, p. 163. OBJECTIONS ANSWERED. J9 before us, we have no need of any sign to call him to our memory ; but if he were present, in such manner as to be concealed from all our senses; we might with out a memorial of him, as easily forget him, as if he were at a great distance from us. These words of Christ then, which we always repeat at the consecra tion, and the very sight of the sacramental species, serve for this purpose. The objections, however, which you, Rev. Sir, and Bishop Porteus, chiefly insist upon, are tfie testimony of our senses. You both say ; the bread and wine are seen, and touched, and tasted in our Sacrament, the same as in yours. ' If we cannot believe our senses,' the Bishop says, ' we can believe nothing.' This was a good popular topic for Archbishop Tillotson, from whom it is borrowed, to flourish upon in the pulpit; but it will not stand the test of Christian theology. It would undermine the Incarnation itself. With equal reason the Jews said of Christ : Is not this the carpenters son ? Is not his mother called Mary ? Matt. xiii. 55. Hence they concluded that he was not what he proclaimed himself to be, the Son of God. In like manner, Josuah thought he saw a man, Josuah v. 13, and Jacob that he touched one, Gen. xxxii. 24, and Abraham that he eat with three men, Gen. xviii. 8, when in all these instances there were no real men, but unbodied spirits present; the dif ferent senses of those Patriarchs misleading them. Again, were not the eyes of the disciples going to Emmaus, held so that they should not know Jesus ? Luke xxiv. \6. Did not the same thing happen to Mary Magdalen and the Apostles ? John xx. 15. But in dependently of Scripture, philosophy and. experience, 7 z 2 60 LETTER XXXVIII. shew, that there is no essential connexion between our sensations and the objects which occasion them, and that, in fact, each of our senses frequently deceive us. How unreasonable then is it, as well as impious, to oppose their fallible testimony to God's infallible word !(]), But the Bishop, as you remind me, undertakes to shew that there are absurdities and contradictions in the doctrine of Transubstantiation ; he ought to have said of the Real Presence : for every one of his al ledged contradictions is equally found in the Lutheran Consubstantiation, in the belief of which our gracious Queen was educated, and in the corporal presence, held by so many English Bishops- He accordingly asks how Christ's body can be contracted into the space of a Host ? How it can be at the right-hand of his Father in heaven, and upon our altars at the same time?&c. I answer first, with an ancient Father, that if we insist on using this HOW of the Jews, with respect to the mysteries revealed in Scripture, we must renounce our faith in it? (2). 2dly, I answer that we do not know what constitutes the essence of matter and of space. I say, 3dly, that Christ transfigured his body, on Mount Thabor, Mark ix. 1, bestowing on it many properties of a spirit, before his passion; and that after he had ascended up to heaven, he appeared to St. Paul (1) For example, we think we see the setting sun in a line with our eyes ; but philosophy demonstrates that a large portion of the terraqueous globe, is interposed between therh, and that the suit is considerably below the horizon. As we trust more to our feeling than any other sense: let any person cause his neighbour to shut his eyes, and then crossing the two first fingers of pither hand, make him rub a pea, or any other round substance between them, he will then protest that he feels two such objects. (?) Cyril. Alex. 1. 4, in Joan. COMMUNION UNDER ONE KIND. 6l on the road to Damascus, Acts ix. 17, and stood by him in the Castle of Jerusalem, Acts xxiii. 11. Lastly, I answer, that God fills all space, and is whole and entire in every particle of matter; likewise, that my own soul, is in my right-hand and my left, whole and entire ; that the^bread and wine, which I eat and drink, are transubstantiated into my own flesh and blood ; that this body of mine, which some years ago was of a small size, has now increased to its present bulk; that soon it will turn into dust, or perhaps be devoured by animals or cannibals, and thus become part of their substance ; and that, nevertheless, God will restore it entire, at the last day. Whoever will enter into these considerations, instead of employing the Jewish HOW, will be disposed with St. Augustin,* to ' admit that God can do much more than we can ' understand,' and to cry out with the Apostles, re specting this mystery : Lord, lo zvhom shall we go f Thou hast the zvords of eternal life. I am, &c. J. M. LETTER XXXIX. To JAMES BROWN, Esq. COMMUNION UNDER ONE KIND. DEAR SIR, I trust you have not "forgotten, what I demonstrated in the first part of our corres pondence, that the Catholic Church was formed and instructed in its divine doctrine and rites, and espe cially in its Sacraments and Sacrifice, before any part 62 LETTER XXXIX. of the New Testament was published, and whole cen turies, before the entire New Testament was collected and pronounced by her to be authentic and inspired. Indeed Protestants are forced to have recourse to the Tradition of the Church, for determining a great num ber of points, which are left doubtful by the Sacred Text ; particularly with respect to the two Sacraments, which they acknowledge. From the doctrine and practice of the Church alone they learn, that, although Christ, our pattern, was baptized in a river, Mark i. 9, and the Ethiopian Eunuch was led by St. Philip into the water, Acts viii. 38, for the same purpose, the ap plication of it by infusion or aspersion is valid ; and that, although Christ says: He that BELIEVETH and is baptized shall be saved, Mark xvi. 16, infants are susceptible of the benefits of baptism, who are incapa ble of making an act of faith. In like manner, re specting the Eucharist, it is from the doctrine and practice of the Church alone, Protestants learn, that, though Christ communicated the Apostles, at an evening supper, after they had feasted on a lamb, and their feet had been washed, a ceremony which he ap pears to enjoin on that occasion with the utmost strictness, John xiii. 8, 15, none of these rites are essential to that ordinance, or necessary to be prac tised at present. With what pretension to con sistency then can they reject her doctrine and prac tice in the remaining particulars of this myterious institution? A clear exposition of the institution itself, and of the doctrine and discipline of the Church, concerning the controversy in questiou, will afford the best answer to the objections raised against the latter. COMMUNION UNDER ONE KIND. 63 It is true that our B. Saviour instituted the Holy Eucharist under two kinds ; but it must be observe*! that he then made it a Sacrifice as well as a Sacrament, and that he ordained Priests, namely his twelve Apos tles, (for none else but they were present on the occa sion) to consecrate this Sacrament, and offer this Sa crifice. Now, for the latter purpose, namely a Sacri fice, it was requisite that the victim should be really present, and, at least, mystically immolated ; which was then, and is still, performed in the Mass, by the symbolical disunion, or separate consecration of the Body and the Blood. It was requisite, also, for the completion of the Sacrifice, that the Priests, who had immolated the victim, by mystically separating its body and its blood, should consummate it in both these kinds. Hence it is seen, that the command of Christ, on which our opponents lay so much stress, drink ye all of this, regards the Apostles, as Priests, and not the laity, as communicants (1 ) True it is, that when Christ promised this Sacrament to the faithful in general, he promised, in express terms, both his Body and his Blood, John vi. : but this does not imply that they must, therefore, receive them under the different appearances of bread and wine. For as the Council of Trent teaches : 'He who said : Unless ' you shall eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his ' blood, you shallnot have life in you, has likewise said ; (1) The acute Apologist of the Quakers has observed, how inconclusively. Protestants argue from the words of the institution. He says :'I would glad - ' ly know how from the words, they can be certainly resolved that thesa 'words (Do this) must be understood of the Clergy. Take, bless and break ' this bread, and give it to others ; but to the laity only : Tal.e and cat, bit' ' donolblcss,' &c. — Barclay's Apology, Prop. xiii. p. 7. 64 LETTER XXXIX. ' If any one shall eat of this bread, he shall Iwe for etter. ' And he who has said : Whoso eateth my flesh, and drink- ' my blood, hath life everlasting, has also said : The ' bread which I will give, is my flesh, for the life of the ' zvorld. And lastly, he who has said : He who eateth my 'flesh, and drinketh my blood, abideth in me and I in ' him : has nevertheless said : He zvho eateth this bread ' shall live for ever ( 1 ).' The truth is, Dear Sir, after all the reproaches of the Bishop of Durham concerning our alledged sacri lege, in suppressing half a Sacrament, and the general complaint of Protestants, of our robbing the laity of the cup of salvation (2), that the precious Body and Blood, being equally and entirely present under each species, is equally and entirely given to the faithful, whichever they receive: whereas the Calvinists and Anglicans do not so much as pretend to communicate either the real body or the blood ; but present mere types or memorials of them. I do not deny, that, in their mere figurative system, there may be some reason for receiving the liquid as well as the solid substance, since the former may appear to represent more aptly the blood, and the latter the body ; but to us Catho lics, who possess the reality of them both, their spe cies or outward appearance is no more than a matter of changeable discipline. It is the sentiment of the great lights of the Church, St. Chrysostom, St. Augustin, St. Jerom, &c. and seems clear from the text, that, when Christ, -on the (1) Sess. xxi. c. 1. (2) Conformably to theabove doctrine, neither our Priests nor our Bishops receive under more than one kind, when they do not offer up the Holy Sacrifice. COMMUNION UNDER ONE KIND. 0^ day of his Resurrection, took bread, and blessed and brake, and gave it to Cleophas and the other disciple, whose guest he was at Emmaus, on his doing which their eyes zvere opened, and they knew him, and he vanished out of their sight, Luke xxiv. 30,31, he administered the holy communion to them under the form of bread alone. In like manner, it is written of the baptized converts of Jerusalem, that, they were persevering in the doctrine of the Apostles, and in the communication of the BREAKING OF BREAD, and in prayer, Act* ii. 42; and of the religious meeting at Troas : on the first day af the zveek, when zve zvere assembled io BREAK BREAD, Acts xx. 7, without any men tion of the other species. These passages plainly sig nify, that the Apostles were accustomed, sometimes at least, to give the Sacrament under one kind alone, though Bishop Porteus has not the candour to confess it. Another more important passage for communion under either kind, he entirely overlooks, where the Apostle says : Whosoever shall eat this bread, OR drink the chalice of the Lord unworthily, shall be guilty of the body and the blood of the Lord (l). True it is (1) HffVVfl, or drink, 1 Cor. xi. 27. The Rev. Mr. Grier, who has at tempted to vindicate the purity of the English Protestant Bible, has nothing rise to say for this alteration of St. Paul's Epistle, than that in what they falsely call ' the parallel texts of Luke and Matthew,' the conjunctive and occurs! Grier's Answer to Ward's Errata, p. 13.— I may here notice the horrid and notorious misrepresentation of the Catholic doctrine concerning the Eucharist, of which two living dignitaries are guilty in their publicati ons. The Bishop of Lincoln says : ' Papists contend that the mere receiving ' of the Lord's Supper merits the remission of sin, ex opere operato, as ' it were mechanically, whatever may be the character or disposition of ' the communicants.' Elem. ofTheol. vol. ii. p. 491. Dr. Hey repeats the charge in nearly the same words. Lectures, vol. iv. p. 355. What Catholic will not lift up his hands in amazement at the gro&sness of this calumny, PART III. 3 A 66 LETTER XXXIX. that, in the English Bible, the text is here corrupted, the conjunctive AND being put for the disjunctive OR, contrary to the original Greek, as well as to the Latin Vulgate, to the version of Beza, &c. : but as his Lordship could not be ignorant of this corruption, and the importance of the genuine text, it is inexcusable in him to have passed it over unnoticed. The whole series of Ecclesiastical History proves, that the Catholic Church, from the time of the Apos tles clown to the present, ever firmly believing that the whole Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity of Jesus Christ, equally subsist under each of the species or appear ances of bread and wine, regarded it as a mere matter of discipline, which of them was to be received in the Holy Sacrament. It appears from Tertullian, in the second century (l), from St. Dennis of Alexan dria (2) and St. Cyprian (3), in the third; from St. Basil (4) and St. Chrysostom, in the fourth, &c. (5) that the Blessed Sacrament, under the form of bread, was preserved in the oratories and houses of the primi tive Christians, for private communion, and for the vi aticum in danger of death. There are instances also of its being carried on the breast, at sea, in the orarium or neckcloth (6). On the other hand, as it was the knowing, as he does, from his catechism and all his books, what purity of soul, and how much greater preparation, is required for the reception of our Sacrament, than Protestants require for receiving theirs. See Concil. Trid_ Sess. xiii. c. 7. Cat. Rom. Douay Catech. &c. (1) Ad Uxor. 1. ii. (2) Apud Euseb. 1. iv. c. 41. (3) De Lapsis. (4) Epist. ad Cesar. (5) Apud Soz. 1. viii. c. 5. (CJ St. Ambros. In obit. Prat. — It appears also that St. Birinus, the Apostle of the West Saxons, brought the Blessed Sacrament with him into COMMUNION UNDER ONE KIND. 67 custom to give the B. Sacrament to baptized children, it was administered to those who were quite infants, by a drop out of the chalice (l). On the same principle, it being discovered, in the fifth century, that certain Manichasan heretics, who had come to Rome from Africa, objected to the sacramental cup, from an er roneous and wicked opinion, Pope Leo ordered them to be excluded from the communion entirely (2) ; and Pope Gelasius required all his flock to receive under both kinds (3). It appears that, in the twelfth centu ry, only the officiating Priest and infants received un der the form of wine; which discipline was confirmed at the beginning of the fifteenth century by the Coun cil of Constance (4), on account of the profanations, and other evils, resulting from the general reception of it in that form. Soon after this, the more orderly sect of the Hussites, namely the Calixtins, professing their obedience to the Church in other respects, and petitioning the Council of Basil to be indulged in the use of the Chalice, this was granted them (5). In like manner Pope Pius IV, at the request of the Emperor this Island in an Orarium. Gul. Malm. Vit..Pontif. Florent. Wigom, Higden, &c. (1) St. Cypr. deLaps. (2) Sermo. iv. de Quadrag. (3) Decret. Comperimus Dist. iii. (4) Dr. Porteus, Dr. Coomber, Kemn,itius, &c. accuse this Council of de creeing that ' notwithstanding (for so they express it) our Saviour ministered ' in both kinds, one only shall, in future, be administered to the laity :" as if the Council opposed its authority to that of Christ ; whereas it barely defines that some circumstances of the institution (namely, that it took place, after supper, that the Apostles received without being fasting, Jm<\. that both species, were consecrated), are not obligatory on all Christians. See Can. xiii. (5) Sess. ii. 3 A 3... 6$ LETTER XXXIX. Ferdinand, authorized several Bishops of Germany to allow the use of the cup to those persons of their re spective dioceses, who desired it(l). The French Kings, since the reign of Philip, have had the pri vilege of receiving under both kinds, at their coro nation and at their death (2). The officiating deacon and sub-deacon of St. Dennis, and all the monks of the order of Cluni, who serve the altar, enjoy the same (3). From the above' statement Bishop Porteus wili learn, if not that the manner of receiving the Sacra ment under one or the other kind, or under both kinds, is a mere matter of variable discipline, at least that the doctrine and the practice of the Catholic Church is consistent with each other. I am now going to pro duce evidence of another kind, which, after all his, and the Bishop of Durham's anathemas against us, on account of this doctrine and discipline, will de monstrate, that, conformably with the declarations of the three principal denominations of Protestants, either the point at issue is a mere matter of discipline, or else, that they are utterly inconsistent with them-' selves. To begin with Luther ; he reproaches his disciple Carlostad, who in his absence had introduced some new religious changes at Wittenberg, with having ' placed Christianity in things of no account, such as 5 communicating under both ki?ids, ' &c. (4). On another; (1) Mem. Granv. t. xiii. Gdorhainak (2) Annal. Pagi. (3) Nat. Alex. t. i. p. 48a (4) Epist. ad GaspA Gusto]. COMMUNION UNDER ONE KIND. 69 occasion, he writes : 'if a Council did ordain or per- ' mit both kinds ; in spite of the Council, we would ' take but one, or take neither, and curse those who 'should take both (1).' Secondly, the Calvinists of France, in their Synod at Poictiers in 1560, decreed thus : ' the bread of our Lord's Supper ought to be ' administered to those who cannot drink wine, on ' their making a protestation that they do not refrain ' from contempt (2).' — Lastly, by separate Acts of that Parliament and that King, who established the Pro testant Religion in England, and, by name, Communi on in both kinds, it is provided that the latter should only be commonly so delivered and ministered, aud an exception is made in case ' necessity did otherwise re- ' quire (3).' — Now I need not observe that, if the use of the cup were, by the appointment of Christ, an essen tial part of the Sacrament, no necessity can ever be pleaded in bar of that appointment, and men might as Avell pretend to celebrate the Eucharist without bread as without wine (4), or to confer the Sacrament of Baptism without water. The dilemma is inevitable. Either the ministration of the Sacrament under one or under both kinds is a matter of changeable discipline, or each of the three principal denominations of Pro- (1) Form. Miss. t. ii. pp.384, 386. (2) On the Lord's Supper, c. iii. p. 7. (3) Burnet's Hist, of Reform, Partii. p. 41. Heylin's Hist, of Reform. p. 58. For the Proclamation, see Bishop Sparrow's Collection, p. 17. (4) The writer has heard of British made wine being frequently used by Church Ministers in their Sacrament for real wine. The Missionaries, who were sent to Otaheite, used the bread fruit for real bread, on the like oc casion. See Voyage of the Ship Duff. 70 LETTER XL. testants has contradicted itself. I should be glad to know which part of the alternative his Lordship may choose. I am, &c. J. M. LETTER XL. To JAMES BROWN, Esq. ON THE SACRIFICE OF THE NEW LAW. DEAR SIR, The Bishop of London leads me next to the consideration of the Sacrifice of the New Law, commonly called THE MASS, on which, however, he is brief and evidently embarrassed. As I have already touched upon this subject, in treating of the means of sanctification in the Catholic Church, I shall be as brief upon it asi well can. A Sacrifice is an offering up, and immolation of, a living animal, or othersensible thing, to God, in testi mony that he is the master of life and death, the Lord of us and all things. It is evidently a more expressive act of the creature's homage to his Creator, as well as one more impressive on the mind of the creature itself, than mere prayer is ; and therefore it was revealed by God to the Patriarchs, at the beginning of the world, and afterwards more strictly enjoined by him to his chosen people, in the revelation of his written law to Moses, as the most acceptable and efficacious worship, that could be offered up to his Divine Majesty. The SACRIFICE OF THE NEW LAW. 71 tradition of this primitive ordinance, and the notion of its advantageousness, have been so universal that it has been practised, in one form or other, in every age, from the time of our first parents down to the present, and by every people, whether civilized or barbarous, except modern Protestants. For when the nations of the earth changed the glory of the incorrup tible God into the likeness of the image of corruptible man, and of birds and four-footed beasts, Rom. i. 23, they continued the rite of sacrifice, and transferred it to these unworthy objects of their idolatry. From the whole of this I infer, that it would have been truly surprising, if under the most perfect dispensa tion of God's benefits tomen, the New Law, he had left them destitute of sacrifice. But he has not so left them ; on the contrary, that prophecy of Malachy is evidently verified in the Catholic Church, spread as it is over the surface of the earth : From the rising of the sun, even to the going down thereof, my name is great among the Gentiles ; and, in every place, there is SACRIFICE ; and there is offered to my name a clean oblation. Malac. i. 1 1. If Protestants say : we have the sacrifice of Christ's death; I answer, so had the servants of God under the law of nature and the written law : for it is impossible that with the blood of oxen and goats sin should be taken away. Nevertheless, they had per petual sacrifices of animals to represent the death of Christ, and to apply the fruits of it to their souls. In the same manner Catholics have Christ himself really present, and mystically offered on their altars daily, for the same ends, but in a far more efficacious man ner, and, of course, a true propitiatory sacrifice. That Christ is truly present in the blessed Eucharist, Thave 72 LETTER XL. proved by many arguments ; that a mystical immola tion of him takes place in the Holy Mass, by the se parate consecration of the bread and of the wine, which strikingly represents the separation of his blood from his body, I have likewise shewn. Finally, I have shewn you, that the officiating Priest performs these mysteries by command of Christ, and in memory of what he did at the last supper, and what he endured on Mount Calvary : DO THIS IN MEMORY OF ME. Nothing then is wanting in the Holy Mass, to constitute it the true and propitiatory sacrifice of the New Law ; a sacrifice which as much surpasses, in dignity and efficacy, the sacrifices of the Old Law, as the chief Priest and victim of it, the Incarnate Son of God, surpasses in these respects, the sons of Aaron, and the animals which they sacrificed. No wonder then that, as the Fathers of the Church have, from the ear liest times, borne testimony to the reality of this sacri fice (1), so they should speak, in such lofty terms, of its awfulness and efficacy : no wonder that the Church of God should retain and revere it, as the most sacred, and the very essential part of her sacred liturgy: — (1) St. Justin, who appears to have been, in his youth, contemporary with St. John the Evangelist, says, that ' Christ instituted a Sacrifice in bread ' and wine, which Christians offer up in every place,' quoting Malachy i. 19, Dialog, cum Tryphon. St. Irenseus, whose master, Polycarp, was a disciple of that Evangelist, says, that ' Christ in consecrating bread and wine, has ' instituted the Sacrifice of the New Law, which the Church received from ' the Apostles, according to the prophecy of Malachy.' L. iv. 32. St. Cy prian calls the Eucharist 'A true and full Sacrifice;' and says, that ' as ' Melchisedech offered bread and wine, so Christ offered the same, namely « his body and blood.' Epist. 63. St. Chrysostom, St. Augustin, St. Am brose, &c. are equally clear and expressive on this point The last men tioned rails this sacrifice by the name of Misw or Ma6s, so do St. Leo St. Gregorv, unr Ven. Bede Ike. SACRIFICE OF THE NEW LAW. 73 and I will add, no wonder that Satan should have per suaded Martin Luther, to attempt to abrogate this worship, as that which, most of all, is offensive to him (1). The main arguments of the Bishops of London and Lincoln, and of Dr. Hey with other Protestant con trovertists, against the sacrifice of the New Law, are drawn from St. Paul's Epistle to the Hebrews ; where, comparing the sacrifice of our Saviour with the sacri fices of the Mosaic Law, the Apostle says : that Christ being come a High Priest of the good things to come, by a greater and more perfect tabernacle, not made with, hands, that is, not of this creation : neither by the blood of goats, or of calves, but by his own blood, entered once into the Holies, having obtained eternal redemption. Heb. ix. 11, 12. Nor yet that he should offer himself often, as the High Priest entereth into the Holies every year. Ver. 25. Again, St. Paul says: Every Priest standeth indeed daily ministering and often offering the same sacrifices, which can never take away sins : but this man offering one sacrifice for sins, sitteth at the right hand of God. Chap. x. 1], 12. Such are the texts, at full length, which modern Protestants urge so confi dently against the sacrifice of the New Law ; but in which neither the ancient Fathers, nor any other description of Christians, but themselves, can see any argument against it. In fact, if these passages (1) Luther, in his Book de Unct. et Miss. Priv. torn. vii. fol. 228, gives an account of the motive which induced him to suppress the sacrifice of the Mass among his followers. He says that the Devil appeared to him at mid night, and in a long conference with him, the whole of which he relates, convinced him that the worship of the Mass is Idolatry. See Letters to a Prebendary. Let. v. PART III. 3 B 74 LETTER XL. be read in their context, it will appear that the Apostle is barely proving to the Hebrews (whose lofty ideas and strong tenaciousness of their ancient rites appear from different parts of the Acts of the Apostles) how infinitely superior the sacrifice of Christ is, to those of the Mosaic Law ; particularly from the circumstance, which he repeats, in different forms, namely, that there was a necessity of their Sacrifices being often repeated, which, after all, could not, of themselves and indepen dently of the one they prefigured, take azvay sin; whereas the latter, namely Christ's death on the cross, obliterated at once the sins of those who availed them selves of it. Such is the argument of St. Paul to the Jews, respecting their sacrifices, which, in no sort, militates against the Sacrifice of the Mass; this being the same sacrifice with that of the cross, as to the vie* tim that is offered, and as to the Priest who offers it, differing in nothing but the manner of offering (l) ; in the one there being a real, and in the other a mysti cal, effusion of the victim's blood (2). So far from invalidating the Catholic doctrine on this point, the Apostle confirms it, in this very Epistle; where, quot ing and repeating the sublime Psalm of the Royal Prophet concerning the Messiah; Thou art a Priest for ever ACCORDING TO THE ORDER OF MEL- CHISEDECH, Ps. 109, alias 110, he enlarges on the dignity of this Sacerdotal Patriarch, to whom Aaron himself, the High Priest of the Old Law, paid tribute, as to his superior, through his ancestor Abraham. Heb. v. — vii. Now in what did this Order of Melchisedech consist ? In what, I ask, did his sacrifice differ from (1) Concil. Trid. Sess. xxii. cap. 2. (2) Cat. ad. Paroc. P. ii, p. 81, SACRIFICE OF THE NEW LAW. 75 those which Abraham himself and the other Patriarchs, as well as Aaron and his sons offered ? Let us consult the sacred text, as to what it says concerning this Royal Priest, when he came to meet Abraham, on his return from victory: Melchisedech, the King of Salem, bring ing forth BREAD AND WINE, for he zvas the Priest of the Most High God; blessed him. Gen. xiv. 18. It was then in offering up a sacrifice of Bread and JVine (l), instead of slaughtered animals, that Melchi- sedech's sacrifice differed from the generality of those in the Old Law, and that he prefigured the sacrifice, which Christ was to institute in the New Law, from the same elements. No other sense but this can be elicited from the Scripture as to this matter ; and ac cordingly, the Holy Fathers unanimously adhere to this meaning (2). In finishing this letter, I cannot help, Dear Sir, making two or three short but important observations. — The first regards the deception practised on the un learned by the above named Bishops, Dr. Hey, and most other Protestant controvertists, in talking,- on every occasion, of the Popish Mass, and representing the tenets of the Real Presence, Transubstantiation, and a subsisting true propitiatory Sacrifice, as peculiar to Catholics; whereas, if they are persons of any learning, they must know that these are, and ever have been held, by all the Christians in the world, except the comparatively few who inhabit the noithern parts (1) The sacrifice of Cain, Gen. iv. 3, and that ordered in Levit. ii. 1, of flour, oil and incense, prove that inanimate things were sometimes of old offered in sacrifice. (2) St. Cypr. Ep. 03. St. Aug. in Ps. xxxiii, St. Chry3. Horn. 3,:>. St. Jerom, Ep. 126, ice. 3B 2 76 LETTER XL. of Europe. I speak of the Melchite or common Greeks of Turkey, the Armenians, the Muscovites, the Nestorians, the Eutychians or Jacobites, the Christians of St. Thomas in India, the Cophts and Ethiopians in Africa ; all of whom maintain each of those articles, and almost every other on which Protestants differ from Catholics, with as much firmness as we ourselves do. Now as these sects have been totally separated from the Catholic Church, some of them 800 and some 1400 years, it is impossible they should have de rived any recent doctrines or practices from her; and, divided, as they .ever have been among themselves, they cannot have combined to adopt them. On the other hand, since the rise of Protestantism, attempts have been repeatedly made, to draw some or other of them to the novel creed; but allin vain. Mel an c- thon translated the Augsburg Confession of Faith into Greek, and sent it to Joseph, Patriarch of C. P., hoping he would adopt it ; whereas the Patriarch did not so much as acknowledge the receipt of the pre sent (1). Fourteen years later Crusius; Professor of Tubigen, made a similar attempt on Jeremy, the suc cessor of Joseph, who wrote back, requesting him to v, rite no more on the subject, at the same time mak ing the most explicit declaration of his belief in the seven Sacraments, the sacrifice of the Mass, Transub stantiation, &c, (2). In the middle of the 17th cen tury, fresh overtures being made to the Greeks by the Calvinists of Holland, the most convincing evidence of the orthodox belief of all the above mentioned (1) Sheffmac. torn, ii, p, 7. (2) Ibid, SACRIFICE OF THE NEW LAW. 77 communions, on the articles in question, were fur nished by them ; the original of which was deposited in the French king's library at Paris (1).— I have to remark, in the second place, on the inconsistencies of the Church of England, respecting this point; she has Priests (2), but, no sacrifice! She has altars (3), but* no victim ! She has an essential consecration of the sacramental elements (4), zvithout any the least effect upon them I Not to dive deeper into this chaos, I would gladly ask Bishop Porteus; what hinders a Deacon, or even a layman, from consecrating the sa cramental bread and wine, as validly as a Priest or a Bishop can do, agreeably to his system of consecra tion ? There is evidently no obstacle at all, except such as the mutable law of the land interposes. — In the last place, I think it right to quote some of the absurd and irreligious invectives of the renowned Dr. Hey against the Holy Mass, because they shew the extreme ignorance of our religion, which generally prevails among the most learned Protestants, who write against it. The Doctor first describes the Mass as ' blasphemous, in dragging down Christ from hea- ' ven,' according to his expression; 2dly, as ' perni- ' cious in giving men an eas.y way,' as he pretends, ' of ' evading all their moral and religious duties;' 3dly, as (1) Perpetuite de la Foi. (2) See the Rubrics of the Communion Service. (3) See ditto in Sparrow's Collec. p. 20. (4) ' If the consecrated bread or wine be all spent, before all hate com- ' municated, the Priest is to consecrate more.' Rubr. N. B. Bishop War- burton and Bishop Cleaver earnestly contend that the Eucharist is a feast upon a sacrifice ; but as, in their dread of Popery, they admit no change, nor even the reality of a victim, their feast is proved to be an imaginary banquet -jn an ideal viand. 78 LETTER XL. ' promoting infidelity :' in conformity with which laU ter assertion, he maintains, that ' most Romanists of ' letters and science are infidels.' He next proceeds seriously to advise Catholics, to abandon this part of their sacred lituTgy, namely the adorable sacrifice of the New Law; and he then concludes his theological farce, with the following ridiculous threats against this sacrifice. ' If the Romanists will not listen to our ' brotherly exhortations ; let them fear our threats. ' The rage of paying for Masses will not last for ever : ' as men improve (by the French Revolution), it will ' continue to grow weaker ; as Philosophy (that of 1 Atheism) rises, Masses will sink in price and super- ' stition pine away (1).' — I wish I had an opportunity of telling the learned Professor, that I should have ex pected, from the failure of Patriarch Luther, coun selled and assisted as be was by Satan himself, in his attempts to abolish the Holy Mass, he would have been more cautious in dealing prophetic threats against it ! [In fact he has lived to see this Divine Worship publicly restored in every part of Christen dom, where it was proscribed, when he vented his me naces : for as to the private celebration of Mass, this was never intermitted, not even in the depth of the gloomiest dungeons, and where no pay could be had. by the Catholic Priesthood. What other religious worship, I ask, could have triumphed over such a per secution ! The same will be the case in the latter clays ; when the Man, of sin shall have indignation (1) Dr. Hey's Theol. Lectures, vol. iv., p. 385. The Professor tells us in a note, that this lecture wa,s delivered in the year 1793 ; the hey-day of that antichribtian and antisocial Philosophy, which attempted, through an ocean. of blood, to subvert every altar and every throne. ABSOLUTION FROM SIN. 79 against the covenant of the sanctuary — and shall take away the continual sacrifice, Dan. xi. 30, 34 ; for even then, the mystical zvoman zvho is clothed with, the sun, and has the moon under her feet, — shall fiy into the zvil- derness, Rev. xii. ], 6, and perform the Divine Myste ries of a God Incarnate, in caverns and catacombs, as she did in early times ; till that happy day, when her heavenly Spouse, casting aside those sacramental veils, under which his love now shrouds him, shall shine forth in the glory of God the Father, the Judge of the living and the dead.] I am, &c. J. M. LETTER XLI. To the Rev. ROBERT CLAYTON, M. A. ON ABSOLUTION FROM SIN. REV. SIR, I perceive that, in selecting objec tions against the Church, although you chiefly follow B. Porteus, who mixes, in the same chapter, the hete rogeneous subjects of the Mass and the Forgiveness of Sins, you adopt some others from the Tracts of Bishop Watson, and even from writers of such little repute as the Rev. C. De Coetlogon. This Preacher, in venting the horrid calumnies, which a great proportion of other Protestant preachers and controvertists of dif ferent sects, equally with himself, instil into the minds of their ignorant hearers and readers, expresses him- 80 LETTER XLI. self as follows : ' In the Church of Rome you may ' purchase not only pardons for sins already com- ' mitted, but for those that shall be committed : so 4 that any one may promise himself impunity, upon ' paying the rate that is set upon any sin he hath a ' mind to commit. And so truly is Popery the Mother ' of Abominations, that if any one hath wherewithal to ' pay, he may not only be indulged in his present ' transgressions, but may even be permitted to trans- ' gress in future (l) .' — And are these shameless ca lumniators real Christians, who believe in a judgment to come ! And do they expect to make us Catholics renounce our religion, by representing it to us as the very reverse of what we know it to be ! — It is true, Bishop Porteus, in his attack upon the Catholic doc trine of absolution and justification, does not go the lengths of the pulpit-declaimer above quoted, and of (1) Abominations of the Church of Rome, p. 13. The preacher goes on to state the sums of money for which, he, says, Catholics believe they may commit the most atrocious crimes : ' For incest, &c. five sixpences ; for de- 1 bauching a virgin, six sixpences; for perjury, ditto ; for him who kills his ' father, mother, &c. one crown and five groats!' This curious account is borrowed from the Taxa Cancellaris Romana, a book which has been fre quently published, though with great variations both as to the crimes and the prices, by the Protestants of Germany and France, and as frequently condemned by the See of Rome. It is proper that Mr. Clayton and his friends should know, that the Pope's Court of Chancery has no more to do, nor pretends to have any more to do, with the forgiveness, of sins, than his Majesty's Court of Chancery does. In case there ever was the least real ground-work for this vile book, which I cannot find there was, the money paid into the Papal Chancery, could be nothing else but the fees of office, on restoring certain culprits to the civil privileges which they had forfeited by their crimes. When the proceedings in Doctors Commons in a case of incest are suspended (as I have known them suspended during the whole life of one of the accused parties) fees of office are always required : but would it not be .: vile calumny to say, that leave to caminit incest may be purchased in I ngland for certain sins of money ? ABSOLUTION FROM SIN. SI the other controvertists alluded to ; still he is guilty of much gross misrepresentation of it. As his lan guage on the subject, is confused, if not contradic tory, I will briefly state what the Catholic Church has ever believed, and has solemnly defined in her last General Council, concerning it. The Council of Trent teaches, that ' All men ' lost their innocence, and become defiled, and cllit- ' 'dren of wrath, in the prevarication of Adam ;' — that, ' not only the Gentiles were unable, by the force of ' nature, but that even the Jews were unable, by the ' Law of Moses, to rise, notwithstanding free-will was ' not extinct in them, however weakened and de- ' praved (l) ;' — that ' The heavenly Father of mercy ' and God of all consolation sent his Son, Jesus ' Christ, to men, in order to redeem both Jews and ' Gentiles (2) ;'— that, ' Though he died for all, yet all ' do not receive the benefit of his death ; but only ' those to whom the merit of his passion is communi- ' cated (3) ;' — that, for this purpose, ' Since the ' ' preaching of the Gospel, Baptism, or the desire of it, 'is necessary (4) ;' — that ' The beginning of justifica- ' tion, in adult persons (those who are come to the ' use of reason) is to be derived from God's preventing ' grace, through Jesus Christ, by which, without any ' merits of their own, they are called ; so that they ' who, by their sins, were averse from God, are, by his ' exciting and assisting grace, prepared to convert ' themselves to their justification, by freely consenting ' to and co-operating with his grace (5) ;' — that, ' Be- (1) Sess. vi. cap. i. (2) Cap. ii. (3) Cap. iii. (4) Cap. iv. (5) Cap. v. PART III. 3 C. 82 LETTER XLI. ' ing excited and assisted by Divine grace, and receiv- ' ing faith from hearing, they are freely moved towards ' God, believing the things which have been divinely 1 revealed and promised — they are excited to hope that ' God will be merciful to them for Christ's sake, and ' they begin to love him, as the fountain of all justice ; ' and therefore are moved to a certain hatred and de- ' testation of sins.' — Lastly, ' They resolve on receiv- ' ing baptism, to begin a new life and keep God's com- ' mandments (1).' — Such is the doctrine of the Church concerning the justification of the adult in Baptism. With respect to the pardon of sins, committed after baptism, the Church teaches that, ' The penance of a. ' Christian, after his fall, is very different from that of ' baptism, and that it consists, not only in refraining ' from sins, and sincerely detesting them ; that is, in ' a contrite and humble heart ; but also in a sacramen- ' tal confession of them, in desire at least, and at a pro- ' per time ; and the priestly absolution. Likewise in ' satisfaction ; by fasting, alms, prayers and other ' pious exercises of a spiritual life; not indeed for the 1 eternal punishment, which, together with the crime, ' is remitted in the Sacrament, or the desire of the Sa- ' crament, but for the temporal punishment, which the ' Scripture teaches is not always and wholly remitted, ' as in baptism (2).' Such is, and always was, the doctrine of the Catholic Church, which thus ascribes the whole glory of man's justification, both in its beginning and its progress, to God, through Jesus Christ ; iu opposition to Pelagians and modern Lu- (1) Cap. vi. (2) John xx. 22, ABSOLUTION FROM SIN. 83 therans, who attribute the beginning of conversion to the human creature. On the other hand, this doctrine leaves man in possession of his free-will, for co operating in this great work ; and thereby rejects the pernicious tenet of the Calvinists, who deny free-will and ascribe even our sins to God. In short, the Ca tholic Church equally condemns the enthusiasm of the Methodist, who fancies himself justified, in some un expected instant, without faith, hope, charity, or con trition ; and the presumption of the unconverted sin ner, who supposes that exterior good works and the reception of the Sacrament will avail him, without any degree of the above-mentioned Divine virtues. Such, I say, is the Catholic doctrine, in spite of all the ca lumnies of the Rev. C. De Coetlogon and Bishop Porteus. This Prelate is chiefly bent on disproving the necessity of sacramental Confession, and on de priving the sacerdotal Absolution of all efficacy what soever. Accordingly, he maintains, that when Christ breathed upon his Apostles and said to them : Receive ye the Holy Ghost: WHOSE SINS YOU SHALL FORGIVE, THEY ARE FORGIVEN TO THEM: AND WHOSE SINS YOU SHALL RETAIN, THEY ARE RETAINED, John xx. 22, 23, he did not give them any real power to remit sins, but only ' a power of declaring who were truly penitent, and ' of inflicting miraculous punishments on sinners ; as ' likewise of preaching the word of God,' &c (1) And is this, I appeal to you, Rev. Sir, following the plain natural sense of the written word r But, instead of arguing the case myself, I will produce an authority (1) P. 4.5. 3 C 2 LETTER XLI. against the Bishop's vague and arbitrary gloss on this decisive passage, which I think he cannot object to or withstand ; it is no other than that of the re nowned Protestant champion, Chillingworth. Treat ing of this text he says : ' Can any man be so unrea- ' sonable as to imagine, that, when our Saviour, in so ' solemn a manner, having first breathed upon his dis- ' ciples, thereby conveying and insinuating the Holy ' Ghost into their hearts, renewed unto them, or rather ( confirmed that glorious commission, &c. whereby ' lie delegated to them an authority of binding and ¦' loosing sins upon earth, &c. can any one think, I ' say, so unworthily of our Saviour as to esteem these f words of his for no ¦better than compliment ? There- ' fore, in obedience to his gracious will, and asi am ¦ warranted and enjoined by my holy Mother, the ' Church of England, I beseech you that, by your ' practice and use, you will not suffer that commis- f sion, which Christ hath given to his Ministers, to be ¦ a vain form of words, without any sense under them. ' When you find yourselves charged and oppressed, ' &c. have recourse to your spiritual physician, and f freely disclose the nature and malignancy of your ( disease, &c. And come not to him, only with such ' mind as you would go to a learned man, as one that ' can speak comfortable things to you ; but as to , f one that hath authority, delegated to him from ' God himself, to absolve and acquit you of your * &ins{\).' Having quoted this great Protestant authority, against the Prelate's cavils concerning Sacerdotal ab^ \\) Scrra, vii, Relig. of Prot, pp. 408, 409, ABSOLUTION FROM SIN. 85 solution, I shall produce one or two more of the same sort, and then return to the more direct proofs of the doctrine under consideration. The Lutherans, then, who are the elder branch of the Reformation, in their Confession of Faith and Apology for that Confession, expressly teach, that absolution is no less a Sacrament than Baptism and the Lord's Supper ; that particular absolution is to be retained in Confession ; that to reject it is the error of the Novatian heretics ; and that, by the power of the keys, Matt. xvi. 19, sins are remitted, not only in the sight of the Church, but also in the sight of God (1). Luther himself, in his Catechism, re quired that the penitent, in confession, should expressly declare, that he believes 'the forgiveness of the Priest ' to be the forgiveness of God (2). What can Bishop Porteus and other modern Protestants say to all this, except that Luther and his disciples were infected with Popery ? Let us then proceed to inquire into the doc trine of the Church itself, of which he is one of the most distinguished heads. In The Order of the Com munion, composed by Cranmer, and published by Edward VI, the Parson, Vicar or Curate, is to pro claim this among other things : ' If there be any of you ' whose conscience is troubled and grieved at any ' thing, lackiug comfort or counsel, let him come to ' me, or to some other discreet and learned Priest, and ' confess and open his sin and grief secretly, &c. and ! that of us, as a Minister of God and of the Church, ' he may receive comfort and absolution (3).' Conform- (1) Confess. August. Ait. xi. xii, xiii. Apol. (2) In Catech, Parv. See also Luther's Table Talk, c. xviii. on Auricular Confession. (3) Bishop Sparrow's Collect, p, 2Q, 8f5 LETTER XLI. ably with this admonition, it is ordained in the Common Prayer Book that when the minister visits any sick person, the ' latter should be moved to make a special ' confession of his sins, if he feels his conscience troubled 'with any weighty matter; after which confession, ' the Priest shall absolve him, if he humbly and heartily ' desire it, after this sort : Our Lord Jesus Christ, who c hath left power to his Church to absolve all sinners, who 1 truly repent and believe in him, of his great mercy, for- ' give thee thine offences; and, by his authority commit- ' ted to me, I ABSOLVE THEE FROM ALL THY * SINS, in the name of Ihe Father, and of the Son, and of ' the Holy Ghost, Amen (1).' I may add, that, soon after James I. became, at the same time, the member and the head of the English Church, he desired his Prelates to inform him, in the Conference at Hampton Court, what authority this Church claimed in the article of Absolution from sin ; when Archbishop Whitgift began to entertain him with au account of the general Con fession and Absolution, in the Communion Service; with which the King not being satisfied, Bancroft, at that time Bishop of London, fell on his knees, and said : 'It becomes us to deal plainly with your Ma- ' jesty : there is also in the book a more particular and ' personal Absolution in the visitation of the sick. Not ' only the Confession of Augusta, (Augsburg) Bo- ' hernia and Saxony, retain and allow it, but also Mr. s Calvin doth approve both such a general and such a (1) Order for the Visitation of the Sick. N. B. To encourage the secret confession of Sins, the Church of England has made a Canon, requiring her .Ministers not to reveal the same. See Canones Eccles. A. D. l. Protestant. Hist, of his own Times. (2) See the Form of Ordering Prie-.t-., g& LETTER XLI. the forgiveness of sins committed before baptism, to the reception of this sacrament with the requisite disposi tions : Do penance, said St. Peter to the Jews, and be baptized every one of you, in the name of Jesus Christ, for the remission of your sins, Acts ii. 38 ; so he is pleased to forgive sins committed after baptism, by means of contrition, confession, satisfaction, and the priest's absolution. Against the obligation of confessing sins, which is so evidently sanctioned in scripture : Many that believed, came and confessed, and declared their deeds, Acts xix. 18 ; and so expressly commanded therein,- Confess your sins one to another, James v. 16, the Bishop contends that ' It is not know- ' ing a person's sins that can qualify the priest to * give him absolution, but knowing he hath re- ' pented of them (]).' In refutation pf this objec tion, I do not ask: Why, then, does the English Church move the dying man to confess his sins? but I say, that the priest, being vested by Christ with a judicial power to bind or to loose, to forgive or to retain sins, cannot exercise that power, without tak ing cognizance of the cause on which he is to pro nounce, and without judging in particular of the dis positions of the sinner, especially as to his sorrow for his sins, and resolution to refrain from them in future. Now this knowledge can only be gained from the peni tent's own confession. From this may be gathered, whether his offences are those of frailty or of malice, whether they are accidental or habitual : in which lat ter case they are ordinarily to be retained, till his (1) P. 16. Absolution from sin. *m< amendment gives proof of his real repentance. Con fession is also necessary, to enable the minister of the sacrament to decide, whether a public reparation for the' crimes committed, be or be not requisite ; and whether4 there is or is not restitution to be made to the neigh bour who has been injured in person, property, or re putation. Accordingly, it is well known, that such restitutions are frequently made by those who makfi use of sacramental confession, and very seldom by those who do not use it. I say nothing of the incal culable advantage it is to the sinner, in the business of his conversion, to have a confidential and experienced pastor, to withdraw the veils behind which self-love is apt to conceal his favourite passions and worse crimes, and to expose to him the enormity of his guilt, of which before he had perhaps but an imperfect notion ; and to prescribe to him the proper remedies for his entire spiritual cure.: — After all, it is for the Holy Catholic Church, with whom the word of God and the Sacraments were deposited by her Divine Spouse, Jesus Christ, to explain the sense of the former, and the constituents of the latter : and this Church has uniformly taught, that Confession and the Priest's Absolution, where they can be had, are required for the pardon of the penitent sinner, as well as contrition and a firm purpose of amendment. But, to believe the Bi shop, our Church does not require contrition at all, for the justification of the sinner ; nor ' any dislike to Sin ' or love to God(]).' I will make no further answer to this shameful calumny, than by referring you and your friends to my above citations from the (1)P.47. PART III. 3 V) yu letter xli. Council of Trent. In these, you have seen that \hc requires ' a hatred and detestation of sin;' that is, 'a * contrite and humble heart, which God never despises f and moreover, ' an incipient love of God, as the foun- ' tain of all justice.' Finally, his Lordship has the confidence to main tain, that 'The Primitive Church did not hold Con- ' fession and Absolution of this kind to be necessary,* and that ' Private Confession was never thought of as ' a command of God, for 900 years after Christ, nor * determined to be such till after 1200(1).' The few following quotations from ancient Fathers and Councils, will convince our Salopian friends, what sort of trust they are to place in this Prelate's assertions on theological subjects. Tertullian, who lived in the age- next to that of the Apostles, and is the earliest Latin writer, whose works we possess, writes thus: 'If you ' withdraw from confession, think of hell fire, which ' confession extinguishes (2).' Origen, who wrote soon after him, inculcates the necessity of confessing our most private sins, even those of thought (3), aud advises the sinner ' to look carefully about him in ' choosing the person to whom he is to confess his 'sins (4).' St. Basil, in the 4th century, wrote thus: ' It is necessary to disclose our sins to those, to whom ' the dispensation of the divine mysteries is com- ' mitted (5).' St. Paulinus, the disciple of St. Am brose, relates, that this holy Doctor used to ' weep ' over the penitents whose confessions he heard, but 1 never disclosed their sins to any but to God (1) P. 47. (2) Lib. de Pcenit. (3) Horn, 3 in Levit. (¦'.*; Horn. 2 in Ps. xxxvii. (5) Rule 229. ABSOLUTION FROM SIN. $\ ' alone (l).' The great St. Augustin writes : 'Our mer- * ciful God wills us to confess in this world, that we ' may not be confounded in the other (2) ; and else where he says : ' Let no one say to himself: I do pe- ' nance to God in private. Is it then in vain that ' Christ has said : Whatsoever you loose on earth shall be 1 loosed in heaven? Is it in vain that the keys have ' been given to the Church (3) ?' 1 could produce a long list of other passages to the same effect, from Fathers and Doctors, and also from Councils of the Church, anterior to the periods he has assigned to the commencement and confirmation of the doctrine in question : but I will have recourse to a shorter, and perhaps a more convincing proof, that this doctrine could not have been introduced into the Church, at any period whatsoever subsequent to that of Christ and his Apostles. My argument is this : it is impossi ble it should have been at anytime introduced, if it was not from the first necessary. The pride of the human heart would at all times have revolted at the imposition of such a humiliation, as that of confessing all its most secret sins, if Christians had not previously believed that this rite is of divine institution, and even necessary for the pardon of them. Supposing, however, that the clergy, at some period, had fasci nated the laity, kings and emperors, as well as pea sants, to submit to this yoke; it will still remain to be accounted for, how they took it up themselves; for Monks, and Priests, and Bishops, and the Pope himself, must equally confess their sins with the mean- Ct) In Vit. Ambros. (2) Horn. 20. (3) Hom. 4°-.. 3D 2, 92 LETTER XLI. est of the people. And if even this could be explained, it would still be necessary to shew, how the numerous organized churches of the Nestorians and Eutychians, spread over Asia and Africa, from Bagdad to Axum, all of whom broke from the communion of the Catho lic Church in the fifth century, took up the notion of penance being a sacrament, and that confession and absolution are essential parts of it, as they all believe at the present day. With respect to the main body of the Greek Christians, they separated from the Latins much about the period which our prelate has set down for the rise of this doctrine ; but though they re proached the Latin Christians with shaving their beards, singing Alleluja at wrong seasons, and other such like minutia?, they never accused them of any error respecting private confession or sacerdotal abso lution. — T° support the Bishop's assertions on this and many other points, it would be necessary to suppose, as I have said before, that a hundred million of Greek and Latin Christians lost their senses on some one and the same day or night ! In finishing this Letter, I take leave, Rev. Sir, to advert to the case of some of your respectable society, who, to my knowledge, are convinced of the truth of the Catholic Religion, but are deterred from embrac ing it, by the dread of that sacrament of which I have been treating. Their pitiable case is by no means sin gular: we continually find persons, who are not only desirous of reconciling themselves to their true Mother, the Catholic Church, but also of laying the sins of their youth and their ignorances, Ps. xxiv. alias xxv. 7, at the feef of some one or other of her faithful ministers. ABSOLUTION FROM SIN. 93 convinced that thereby they would procure ease to their afflicted souls ; yet have not the courage to do this. Let the persons alluded to, humbly and fervently pray to the Giver of all good gifts for his strengthening grace, and let them be persuaded of the truth of what an unexceptionable witness says, who had experienced, while he was a Catholic, the interior joy he describes ; where, persuading the penitent to go to his confessor, ' not as to one that can speak comfortable and quiet- ' ing words to him, but as to one that hath authority ' delegated to him from God himself, to absolve and ' acquit him of his sins,' he goes on : 'If you shall do ' this, assure your souls, that the understanding of ' man is not able to conceive that transport, and ex- ' cess of joy and comfort, which shall accrue to that ' man's heart, who is persuaded he hath been made par- ' taker of this blessing (1).' On the other hand, if such persons are convinced, as I am satisfied they are, that Christ's words to his Apostles, Receive the Holy Ghost : zvhose sins you shall remit, they are re mitted, mean what they express, they must know, that confession is necessary to buy off overwhelming con fusion, as the Fathers I have quoted signify, at the great day of manifestation, and, with this, never-end ing punishment. I am, &c. J. M. (1) Chillingworth, Sermon vii. p. 409, 94 LETTER XLII. To the Rev. ROBERT CLAYTON, M. A. ON INDULGENCES. REV. SIR, I trust you will pardon me, if I do not send a special answer to the objections you have stated against my last letter to you, because you will find the substance of them answered in this and my next letter, concerning Indulgences and Purga tory. Bishop Porteus reverses the proper order of these subjects, by treating first of the latter: indeed his ideas are much confused, and his knowledge very imperfect concerning them both. This Prelate de scribes an Indulgence to be, in the belief of Catholics, (without, however, giving any authority whatever for his description) ' a transfer of the overplus of the Saints' ' goodness, joined with the merits of Christ, &c. by ' the Pope, as Head of the Church, towards the re- ' mission of their sins, who fulfil, in their life time, ' certain conditions appointed by him, or whose friends ' will fulfil them, after their death (l).' He speaks of it, as 'a method of making poor wretches believe, that ' wickedness here may become consistent with happi- ' ness hereafter — that repentance is explained away or ' overlooked among other things joined with it, as ' saying so many prayers and payiug so much (1.) ?¦ 53. INDULGENCES. 95 ' money (1).' Some of the Bishop's friends have pub lished much the same description of Indulgences, but in more perspicuous language. One of them, in his attempt to shew that each Pope, in succession, has been the Man of Sin, or Antichrist, says : ' Besides ' their own personal vices, by their indulgences, ' pardons, and dispensations, which they claim a ' power from Christ of granting, and which they have ' sold in so infamous a manner, they have encouraged ' all manner of vile and wicked practices. — They have ' contrived numberless methods of making a holy life 'useless, and to assure the most abandoned ofsalva- ' tion, provided they will sufficiently pay the priests 'for absolution (2).' With the same disregard of charity and truth, another eminent divine speaks of the matter thus : ' the Papists have taken a notable ' course to secure men from the fear of hell, that of ' penances and indulgences. — To those, who will pay ' the price, absolutions are to be had for the most ' abominable and not to be named villanies, and li- ' cence also for not a few wickednesses (3).' — In treating of a subject, thernost intricate of itself among the common topics of controversy, and which has been so much confused and perplexed by the misrepresenta tions of our opponents, it will be necessary, for giving you, Rev. Sir, and my other Salopian friends, a clear and just idea of the matter, that I should advance, step by step, in my explanation of it. In this man ner I propose shewing you, first, what an Indulgence is not, and, next, what it really is. (1) P. 54. Benson on the Man of Sin, republished by Bishop Watson, Tracts, vol. v. p. 273. (2) Bishp Fowler's Design of Christianity, Tracts, vol. vi. p. 3B2. (3) Benson on the Man of Sin, Collect. 96 LETTER XLII. I. An Indulgence, then, never was conceived by any Catholic to be a leave to commit a sin of any kind, as De Coetlogon, Bishop Fowler, and others charge them with believing. The first principles of natural Religion must convince every rational being, that God himself, cannot give leave to commit sin. The idea of such a licence, takes away that of his sanctity, and, of course, that of his very being. — II. No Catholic ever believed it to be a pardon for fu ture sins, as Mrs. Hannah More, and a great part of other Protestant writers represent the matter. This Lady describes the Catholics as ' procuring indemnity ' for future gratifications by temporary abstractions and ' indulgences, purchased at the Court of Rome (l). Some of her fraternity, indeed, have blasphemously written : ' Believers ought not to mourn for sin, because ' it was pardoned before it was committed (2) ;' but every Catholic knows, that Christ himself could not pardon sin before it was committed, because this would imply, that he forgave the sinner without repentance. — III. An Indulgence, according to the doctrine of the Catholic Church, is not, and does not include, the pardon of any sin at all, little or great, past, present, or to come, or the eternal punishment due to it, as all Protestants suppose. Hence, if the pardon of sin is mentioned in any Indulgence, this means nothing more, than the remission of the temporary punishments an nexed to such sin.— IV. We do not believe an In dulgence to imply any exemption from repentance, as B. Porteus slanders us ; for this is always enjoined or im- (1) Strictures on Female Education, vol. ii. p. 239. (2) Eaton's Honeycomb of Salvation. See also Sir Richard Hill's Letters, INDULGENCES. ¦)'/ plied ill the grant of it, and is indispensably necessary for the effect of every grace (1); nor from the works of penance, or other good works ; because our Church teaches, that the ' life of a Christian ought to be a perpetual penance (2), and that to enter into life, we must keep God's commandments (3), and must abound in every good work (4). Whether an obligation of all this can be reconciled with the Articles of being 'justified by faith only (5),' and that ' works done ' before grace partake of the nature of sin(6),' I do not here enquire. — V. It is inconsistent with our doctrine of Inherent Justification^), to believe, as the same Prelate charges us, that the effect of an Indulgence is to transfer ' the overplus of the goodness,' or justifica tion of the Saints, by the ministry of the Pope, to us Catholics on earth. Such an absurdity may be more easily reconciled with the system of Luther and other Protestants concerning Imputed Justification -¦; which, being like a 'clean, neat cloak, thrown over a filthy le- ' per(8),' may be conceived transferable from one per son to another. — Lastly, whereas the Council of Trent calls Indulgences Heavenly Treasures (9), we hold that . (1) Concil. Trid. Sess. vi. c. 4, c. 13, &c. ' (2) Sess. xiv. De Extr. Unc. (3) Sess. vi. can. 19. (4) Ibid. cap. 16. — N. B. There are eight Indulgences granted to the Ca tholics of England, at the chief festivals in every year ; the conditions of which are, confession with sincere repentance, the II. Communion, alms to the poor, (without distinction of their religion) prayers for the Church and strayed souls, the peace of Christendom, and the blessing of God on this nation; finally, a disposition to hear the word of God, and to assist the sick. — See Laity's Directory, the Garden of the Soul, and other Catholic Books of Prayer. London : Keating and Brown, Printers to the R. II. the Vic, Ap. (5) Art. XI. of 39 Art. (6) Art. XIII. (7) Trid. Sess. vi. can. 11. (8) Becanus de Justif, (9) Sess, xxi. c. 9. PART II T. 3 E 98 LETTER XLIII. it would be a sacrilegious crime in any person whomso ever, to be concerned in buying or selling them. I am far, however, Rev. Sir, from denying that Indulgences have ever been sold (l) : — alas ! what is so sacred that the avarice of man has not put up to sale ! Christ him self was sold, and that by an Apostle, for thirty pieces of silver. I do not retort upon you the advertisements I frequently see in the Newspapers, about buying and selling benefices, with the cure of souls annexed to them, in your Church ; but this I contend for, that the Catholic Church, so far from sanctioning this detesta ble simony, has used her utmost pains, particularly in the General Councils of Lateran, Lyons, Vienne, and Trent, to prevent it. To explain, now, in a clear and regular manner, what an Indulgence is; I suppose, first, that no one will deny, that a Sovereign Prince, in shewing mercy to a capital convict, may either grant him a remission of all punishment, or may leave him subject to some lighter punishment : of course he will allow that the Almighty may act in either of these ways, with respect to sinners. — II. I equally suppose that no person, who is versed in the Bible, will deny, that many instances occur there of God's remitting the essential guilt of sin, and the eternal punishment due to it, and yet leaving a temporary punishment to be endured by the penitent sinner. Thus, for example, the sentence of spiritual death and everlasting torments, was remitted to our first father, upon his repentance ; but not that of corporal death. Thus, also, when God reversed (1) The Bishop tells us that he is in possession of an Indulgence, lately- granted at Rome, for a small sum of money ; but he does not say who granted it. In like manner he may buy forged Bank notes and counterfeit coin iu London very cheap, if he pleases. INDULGENCES. «j») his severe sentence against the idolatrous Israelites, he added : Nevertheless, in the day, zvhen I visit, I zvill visit their sin upon them. Exod. xxxii. 34. Thus, again, when the inspired Nathan said to the model of penitents, David : The Lord hath put away thy sin, he added : nevertheless, the child that is bom unto thee shall die. 2 Kings, alias Sam. xii. 14. Finally, when David's heart smote him, after he had numbered the people, the Lord, in pardoning him, offered him by his Prophet, Gad, the choice of three temporal punish ments, war, famine, and pestilence. Ibid. xxiv. — III. The Catholic Church teaches, that the same is still the common course of God's mercy and wisdom, in the forgiveness of sins committed after baptism ; since she has formally condemned the proposition, that ' every penitent sinner, who, after the grace of 'justification, obtains the remission of his guilt and ' eternal punishment, obtains also the remission of all 'temporal punishment (1).' The essential guilt and eternal punishment of sin, she declares, can only be expiated by the precious merits of our Redeemer, Jesus Christ; but a certain temporal punishment God reserves for the penitent himself to endure, ' lest the easiness of his pardon should make him care- ' less about falling back into sin (2).' Hence satisfacti on for this temporal punishment, has been instituted by Christ, as a part of the Sacrament of penance ; and hence 'a Christian life,' as the Council has said above, 'ought to be a penitential life.' This Council, at the same time, declares, that this very satisfaction (1) Cone. Trid. Sess. vi. can. 30. (2) Sess. vi. cap. 7, cap. 14. Sess. xiv. cap. 8. 3E3 100 LETTER XLII I". for temporal punishment, is only efficacious through Jesus Christ (1). — Nevertheless, as the promise of Christ to the Apostles, to St. Peter in particular, and to the successors of the Apostles, is unlimited ; WHATSOEVER you shall loose upon earth, shall be loosed also in heaven, Matt, xviii. 18, — xvi. 19 : — hence the Church believes and teaches, that her juris diction extends to this very satisfaction, so as to be able to remit it wholly or partially, in certain circum stances, by what is called an INDULGENCE (2). St. Paul exercised this power in behalf of the incestu ous Corinthian, on his conversion, and at the prayers of the faithful, 2 Cor. ii. 10 ; and the Church has claim ed and exercised the same power, ever since the time of the Apostles down to the present (3). — V- Still this power, like that of absolution, is not arbitrary; there must be a just cause for the exercise of it ; namely, the greater good of the penitent, or of the faithful, or of Christendom in general : and there must be a certain proportion, between the punishment remitted and the good work performed (4). Hence, no one can ever be sure that he has gained the entire benefit of an indul gence, though he has performed all the conditions ap pointed for this end (5) : and hence, of course, the pastors of the Church will have to answer for it, if they take upon themselves to grant indulgences for unworthy or insufficient purposes. — VI. Lastly, it is the received doctrine of the Church, that an indul- (1) Sess. xiv. 8. (2) Trid. Sess. xxv. De Indulg. (3) Tertul. in Lib. ad Martyr, c. i. St. Cypr. 1. 3. Epist. Concil. i. Ki. Ancyr. &c. (4) Bellarm. Lib. i. De Indulg. c. 12. (5; Ibid. INDULGENCES. 101 getice, when truly gained, is not barely a relaxation of the canonical penance enjoined by the Church, but also an actual remission by God himself, of the whole or part of the temporal punishment due to it in his sight. The contrary opinion, though held by some theologians, has been condemned by LeoX(l) and Pius VI (2) : and, indeed, without the effect here men tioned, indulgences would not be heavenly treasures, and the use of them would not be beneficial, but ra ther pernicious to Christians; contrary to two decla rations of the last General Council, as Bellarmin well argues (3). The above explanation of an Indulgence, conforma bly to the doctrine of Theologians, the decrees of Popes and the definitions of Councils, ought to silence the objections, and suppress the sarcasms of Protest ants, on this head : but if it be not sufficient for such purpose, I would gladly argue a few points with them concerning their own indulgences. Methinks, Rev. Sir, I see you start at the mention of this, and hear you ask ; what Protestants hold the doctrine of Indul gences ? — I answer you ; all the leading sects of them, with which I am acquainted. — To begin with the Church of England : One of the first articles, I meet with in it's canons, regards indulgences and the use that is to be made of the money paid for them (4). In the (1) Art. 19, inter Art. Damn. Lutheri, (2) Const. Auctor. Fid. (3) L. i. c. 7, Prop. 4. (4) 'Ne qua fiat posthac solemnis penitentiae commutatio nisi rationibus, 1 gravioribusque de causis, &c. Deinde quod mulcta ilia uecuniaria vel in ' relevam pauperum, vel in alios pios usus erogetur.' Articuh |,ru Clero, A. D. 1584, Sparrow, p. 194. The next article is, ' De mpderandis quilms- ]02 LETTER XLII. Synod of J 640 a Canon was made, which authorized the employment of commutation-money, namely, of such sums as were paid for indulgences from ecclesiasti cal penances, not only in charitable, but also in public uses(l). At this period the established clergy were devoting all the money they could any way procure, to the war which Charles I. was preparing, in defence of the Church and State, against the Presbyterians of Scotland and England : so that, in fact, the money then raised by indulgences was employed in a real Crusade. — It has been before stated, that the second offspring of Protestantism, the Anabaptists, claimed an indulgence from God himself, in quality of his chosen ones, to despoil the impious, that is, all the rest of mankind, of their property ; while the genuine Cal vinists, of all times, have ever maintained, that Christ has set them free from the observance of every law, of God as well as of man. Agreeably to this tenet, Sir Richard Hill says: ' It is a most pernicious error of ' the schoolmen to distinguish sins according to the ' dam Indulgeutiis pro celebratione matrimonii,' &c. p. 195. These Indul gences were renewed, under the same titles, in the Synod held in London in 1597. Sparrow, pp. 248, 252. (1) ' That no Chancellor, Commissary or Official, shall have power to ' commute any penance, in whole or in part; but either, together with the * Bishop, &c. that he shall give a full and just account of such commutati- ' ons, to the Bishop, who shall see that all such moneys shall be disposed ' of for charitable and public uses, according to law — saving always to Ecclc- ' siastical Officers their due and accustomablefces,' Canon 14. Sparrow, p. 368. — In the Remonstrance of grievances presented by a Committee of the Irish Parliament to Charles I, one of them was, that ' Several Bishops ' received great sums of money for commutation of penance (that is for Indul- ' gences) which they converted to their own use.' Commons Journ. quoted, by Curry, Vol. i. p. 1S9. INDULGENCES. 103 1 fact, and not according to the person (1).'— With re spect to Patriarch Luther, it is notorious that he was in the habit of granting indulgences, of various kinds, to himself and his disciples. Thus, for example, he dispensed with himself and Catherine Boren, from their vows of a religious life, and particularly that of celiba cy : and even preached up adultery in his public ser mons (2). In like manner he published Bulls, autho rizing the robbery of Bishops and Bishoprics, and the murder of Popes and Cardinals. But the most cele brated of his indulgences, is that which, in conjunc tion with Bucer and Melancthon, he granted to Phi lip, Landgrave of Hesse, to marry a Second Wife, his former being living ; in consideration, for so it is stated, of his protection of Protestantism (3). But if any credit is due to this same Bucer, who, for his learn ing, was invited by Cranmer and the Duke of So merset into England, and made the Divinity Professor of Cambridge, the whole business of the pretended Reformation was an indulgence for libertinism. His words are these : ' The greater part of the people seem ' only to have embraced the Gospel, in order to shake ' off the yoke of discipline and the obligation of fast- ' ing, penance, &c. which lay upon them in Popery, ' and to live at their pleasure, enjoying their lusts and ' lawless appetites, without controul. Hence they ' lent a willing ear to the doctrine that we are saved by (1) Fletcher's Checks, vol. iii. (2) 'Si nolit Domini, veniat ancilla, &c.' Serm. de Matrim. t. v. (3) This infamous indulgence, with the deeds belonging to it, was pub lished from the original by permission of a descendant of the Landgrave, and republished by Bossuet. Variat. book vi. 104 LETTER XLIII. * faith alone, and not by good works, having no relish 'for them(l).* I am, &c. J. M. LETTER XLIII. To the Rev. ROBERT CLAYTON, M. A. ON PURGATORY AND PRAYERS FOR THE DEAD. REV. SIR, In the natural order of our contro versies, this is the proper place to treat of Purgatory and Prayers for the Dead. On this subject, Bishop Porteus begins with saying, ' There is no Scripture ' proof of the existence of Purgatory : heaven and hell ' we read of perpetually in the Bible ; but purgatory ' we never meet with : though surely, if there be such ' a place, Christ and his Apostles would not have con- ' cealed it from us (2).' I might expose the incon- clusiveness of this argument by the following parallel one; The Scripture no where commands us to keep the first day of the week holy : we perpetually read of sanc tifying the Sabbath, or Saturday; but never meet with the Sunday, as a day of obligation ; though, if there be such an obligation Christ and his Apostles would not have concealed it from us ! I might likewise an swer, with the Bishop of Lincoln, that the inspired Epistles (and I may add the Gospels also) ' are not to (1) Bucer, De Regu, Chris. 1. i. c. 4. (2) Confut. p. 48. Purgatory. 105 e be considered as regular treatises upon the Christian ' Religion (1).' But I meet the objection in ftont, by saying, first, that the Apostles did teach their converts the doctrine of purgatory, among their other doctrines, as St. Chrysostom testifies, and the tradition of the Church proves ; secondly, that the same is demonstra tively evinced from both the Old and the New Testa ment. To begin with the Old Testament; I claim a right of considering the two first Books of Machabees as an integral part of them ; because the Catholic Church so considers them (2), from whose tradition, and not from that of the Jews, as St. Augustin signifies (3), our sacred canon is to be formed. Now in the second of these books, it is related that the pious General, Judas Machabeus, sent 1£,000 drachmas to Jerusalem, for sacrifices, to be offered for his soldiers, slain in battle ; after which narration, the inspired writer con cludes thus : It is therefore a holy and a wholesome thought to pray for the dead, that they may be loosed from their sins. 2 Mach. xii. 46. I need not point out the inseparable connexion there is, between the practice of praying for the dead, and the belief of an intermediate state of souls ; since it is evidently need less to pray for the Saints in heaven, and useless to pray for the reprobate in hell. But, even Protestants, who do not receive the Books of Machabees, as cano nical Scripture, venerate them as authentic and holy records : as such, then, they bear conclusive testi- (1) Elem. of Theol. vol. i. p. 277. (2) Concil. Cartag. iii. St. Cyp. St. Aug. Innoc. I. Gelas. &c. (3) Lib. 18. De Civ. Dei. PARTIH. 3F 106 LETTER XLIII. mony of the belief of God's people, on this head, 150 years before Christ. That the Jews were in the habit of practising some religious rites, for the relief of the departed, at the beginning of Christianity, is clear from St. Paul's first Epistle to the Corinthians, where he mentions them, without any censure of them (1) ; and that this people continue to pray for their deceased brethren, at the present time, may be learned from any living Jew. To come now to the New Testament : What place, I ask, must that be, which our Saviour calls Abraham's bosom, where the soul of Lazarus reposed, Luke xvi. 22, among the other just souls, till he by his sacred passion paid their ransom ? Not heaven, otherwise Dives would have addressed himself to God instead of Abraham ; but evidently a middle state, as St. Augustin teach es (2). Again, of what place is it that St. Peter speaks, where he says : Christ died for our sins ; being put to death in the fiesh, but enlivened in the spirit ; in which also coming, he preached to those spirits that zaere in prison. 1 Pet. iii. 19. It is evidently the same which is mentioned in the Apostles' Creed : He descended into hell : not the hell of the damned, to suffer their torments, as the blasphemer, Calvin, as serts (3), but the prison above mentioned, or Abra ham's bosom; in short a middle state. It is of this prison, according to the Holy Fathers (4), our blessed Master speaks, where he says : I tell thee, thou shalt not depart thence, till thou hast paid the very last mite. (1) Else what shall they do who are baptized for the dead, if the dead rise not at all ? Why are they then baptized for them f 1 Cor. XV. 29. (2) De Civit. Dei, 1. xv. c. 20. (3) Instit. 1. ii. c. 16. (4) Tertul. St.Cypr, Origen, St, Ambrose, St. Jerom, &c, PURGATORY. 107 Luke xii. 59. — Lastly, what other sense can that passage of St. Paul's Epistle to the Corinthians bear, than that which the Holy Fathers affix to it { 1), where the Apostle says : The day of the Lord shall be revealed by fire, and the fire shall try every man s work of urn at sort it is. If any man's zvork abide, he shall receive a reward. If any man's work be burnt, he shall suffer loss ; hut he himself shall be saved, yet so as by fire. 1 Cor. iii. 13, 15. The Prelate's diversified ai tempts to explain away these scriptural proofs of Purgatory, are really too feeble and inconsistent to merit being even mentioned. I might here add, as a further proof, the denunciation of Christ, concerning blasphemy against the Holy Ghost; namely, that this sin shall not be forgiven, either in this world or in the zvorld to come, Mat. xii. 32 : which words clearly imply, that some sins are forgiven in the world to come, as the ancient Fathers shew (2) : but I hasten to the proofs of this doctrine from tradition, on which head the Pre late is so ill advised as to challenge Catholics. II. Bp. Porteus, then, advances, that ' Purgatory, in ' the present Popish sense, was not heard of for 400 ' years after Christ ; nor universally received for 1000 ' years, nor almost in any other Church than that of ' Rome to this day (3).' Here are no less than three egregious falsities, which I proceed to shew ; after (1) Origen, Horn. 14 in Levit. &c. St. Ambrose in Ps. 118. St. Jerom, 1. ?, contra Jovin. St. Aug. in Ps. 37, where he prays thus : ' Purily me, ' O Lord, in this life, that I may not need the chastising fire ot~ tlur-ewhq < will be saved, yet so as by fire.' (2) St. Aug. De Civit. Dei, 1. 21, c. $4. St. Greg. 1. 4. Dialog. Bed. in cap. 3, Marc. (3) P. 50. 3F2. 108 LETTER XLIII. Stating what his Lordship seems not to know, name ly, that all which is necessary to be believed, on this subject, is contained in the following brief de claration of the Council of Trent : ' There is a Pius ' gatory, and the souls, detained there, are helped * by the prayers of the faithful, and particularly * by the acceptable Sacrifice of the altar (l).' — St, Chrysostom, the light of the eastern Church, flou-> rished within 300 years of the age of the Apos tles, and must be admitted as an unexceptionable witness of their doctripe and practice. Now he writes as follows : ' It was not without good reason OR- ' DAINED BY THE APOSTLES, that mention should ' be made of the dead in the tremendous mysteries, ' because they knew well that these would receive great ' benefit from it (2).' Tertullian, who lived in the age next to that of the Apostles, speaking of a pious widow, says : ' She prays for the soul of her husband, and ' begs refreshment (3) for him.' Similar testimonies of St. Cyprian, in the following age, are numerous. I shall satisfy myself with quoting one of them. ; where, describing the difference between some souls, which are immediately admitted into heaven, and others, which are detained in Purgatory, he says : ' It is one thing ' to be waiting for pardon ; another to attain to glory : ' One thing to be sent to prison, not to go from thence ' 'till the last farthing is paid ; another to receive im- c mediately the reward of faith and virtue : One thing to ' suffer lengthened torments for sin, and to be chastised ' and purified for a long time in that fire ; another to * have cleansed away all sin by suffering (4),/ namely, (1) Sess. xxv. De Purg. (2) In cap. i. Philip. Horn. 3. (?) L- ^e Monogam. c. 10. (4) S. Cypr. 1, 4. ep. 2. PURGATORY. 109 by martyrdom. It would take up too much time to quote authorities on this subject from St. Cyril of Jerusalem, Eusebius, St. Epiphanius, St, Ambrose, St. Jerom, St. Augustin, and several other ancient Fathers aud writers, who demonstrate, that the doctrine of the Church was the same that it is now, not only within a thousand, but also within 400 years from the time of Christ, with respect both to prayers for the dead, and an intermediate state, which we call Purgatory. How express is the authority of the last-named Father, in particular, where he says and repeats : ' Through ' the prayers and sacrifices of the Church and alms- ' deeds, God deals more mercifully with the departed ' than their sins deserve (1) !' How affecting is this Saint's account of the death of his mother, St. Monica, when she entreated him to remember her soul at the altar, and when, after her decease, he performed this duty, in order, as he declares, ' to obtain the pardon of ' her sins (2) !' — As to the doctrine of the Oriental Churches, which the Bishop signifies is conformable to that of his own, I affirm, as a fact, which has been demonstrated (3), that there is not one of them which agrees with it, nor one of them which does not agree with the Catholic Church, in the only two points de fined by her, namely, as to there being a middle state, which we call Purgatory, and as to the souls detained in it, being helped by the prayers of the living faithful. True it is, they do not generally believe, that these souls are punished by a material fire ; but neither does (1) Serm. 172. Encbirid. cap. 109, 110. (2) Confess. 1. ix. c. 13. (3) See the Confessions of the different Oriental Churches in the Perpc- Juite, &c. 110 LETTER XLIII. our Church require a belief of this opinion ; and, ac cordingly, she made a union with the Greeks in the Council of Florence, on their barely confessing and subscribing the aforesaid two articles. III. I should do an injury, Rev. Sir, to my cause, were I to pass over the concessions of eminent Protes tant Prelates, and other writers, on the matter in debate. On some occasions Luther admits of Purgatory, as an article founded on Scripture (1). Melancthon con fesses that the ancients prayed for the dead, and says, that the Lutherans do not find fault with it (2). Cal vin intimates, that the souls of all the just are detained in Abraham's bosom till the day of judgment i 3). In the first Liturgy of the Church of England, which was drawn up by Cranmer and Ridley, and declared by Act of Parliament to have been framed by inspiration of the Holy Ghost, there is an express prayer for the departed, that ' God would grant them mercy and everlasting peace(4).' It can be shewn that the fol lowing Bishops of your Church believed that the dead ought to be prayed for, Andrews, Usher, Montague, Taylor, Forbes, Sheldon, Barrow of St. Asaph's, and Blandford (5). To these I may add the religious Dr. Johnson, whose published Meditations prove, that he constantly prayed for his deceased wife. But what need is there of more words on the subject, when it is clear that modern Protestants, in shutting up the Catholic (1) Assertiones, Art. 37. Disput. Leipsic. (2) Apolog. Conf. Aug. (3) Instit. 1. iii. c. 5. (4) See the form in Collier's Ecc. Hist. vol. ii. p. 257. (5) Collier's Hist. — N. B. The present Bishop of Exeter, in a sermon just published, prays for the soul of our poor Princess Charlotte, ' as far as ' this is la,wful and profitable,' PURGATORY. Ill Purgatory for imperfect just souls, have opened another general one for them, and all the wicked of every sort whatsoever ! It is well known that the disciples of Calvin, at Geneva, and, perhaps, every where else, instead of adhering to his doctrine, in condemning mortals to eternal torments, without any fault on their part, now hold that the most confirmed in guilt and the finally impenitent shall, in the end, be saved (l) : thus establishing, as Fletcher of Madeley observes, ' a general Purgatory (2).' A late celebrated theolo gical, as well as philosophical writer of our own country, Dr. Priestly, being on his death-bed, called for Simp son's work On the Duration of Future Punishment, which he recommended in these terms : ' It contains ' my sentiments : we shall all meet finally : we only ' require different degrees of discipline, suited to our ' different tempers, to prepare us for final happiness (3).' Here again is a general Protestant Purgatory : and why should Satan and his crew be denied the benefit of it ? But to confine myself to eminent Divines of the Established Church : One of its celebrated preachers, who, of course, ' never mentions hell to ears polite,' expresses his wish, ' to bauish the subject of everlasting ' punishment from all pulpits, as containing a doc- ' trine, at once improper, and uncertain (4) ;' which sentiment is applauded by another eminent Divine, who reviews that sermon in the British Critic (5). Another modern Divine censures ' the threat of eternal perdi- (1) Encyclo. Art. Geneva. (2) Checks to Antinom. vol. 1. (3) See Edinb. Review, Oct. 1806. (4) Sermons by the Rev. W. Gilpin, Preb. of Sarum. (5) British Critic, Jan. 1802. 112 LETTER XLIII. 4 tion as a cause of infidelity (1). The renowned Dr. Paley, ("but here we are getting into quite novel sys tems of theology, which will force a smile from its old students, notwithstanding the awfulness of the subject) Dr. Paley, I say, so far softens the punishment of the in fernal regions, as to suppose that, ' There may be very ' little to chuose between the condition of some who ' are in hell, and others who are in heaven ! (2). In the same liberal spirit the Cambridge Professor of Divinity teaches, that ' God's wrath and damnation are more ' terrible in the sound than the sense ! (3), and that ' being damned does not imply any fixed degree of ' evil (4).' In another part of his Lectures, he expresses his hope, and quotes Dr. Hartley, as expressing the same, that ' all men will be ultimately happy, when ' punishment has done its work in reforming princi- ' pies and conduct (5).' If this sentiment be not suf ficiently explicit in favour of Purgatory, take the fol lowing from a passage in which he is directly lec turing on the subject. ' With regard to the doctrine ' of Purgatory, though it may not be founded either ' in reason or in Scripture, it is not unnatural. Who ' can bear the thought of dwelling in everlasting tor- 'ments? Yet who can say that a God everlastingly 'just, will not inflict them ? The mind of man seeks ' for some resource : it finds one only ; in conceiving ' that some temporary punishment, after death, may (1) Rev. Mr. Polwhele's Let. to Dr. Hawker. (2) Moral and Polit. Philos. (3) Lect. vol. iii. p. 154. (4) Ibid. (5) Vol.ii. p. 390. It is to be obseived that the doctrine of the final salvation of the wicked is expressly condemned in the 42d Article of the Church of England, A. D. 1552, PURGATORY. 1 13 '' purify the soul from its moral pollutions, and make ' it, at last, acceptable, even to a Deity, infinitely •pure (1).' IV- Bishop Porteus intimates, that the doctrine of a middle state of souls Was borrowed from Pagan fable and philosophy.— -In answer to this, I say, that, if Plato (2), Virgil, and other heathens, ancient and modern, as likewise Mahomet and his disciples, toge ther with the Protestant writers quoted above, have embraced this doctrine, it only shews how conforma ble it is to the dictates of natural Religion. I have proved, by various arguments, that a temporary punish ment generally remains due to sin, after the guilt and eternal punishment, due to it, have been remitted. Again, we know from Scripture, that even the just man falls seven times, Prov. xxiv. \7, and that men must give an account of every idle word that they speak, Matt. xii. 36. On the other hand, we are conscious that there is not an instant of our life, in which this may not suddenly terminate, without the possibility of our calling upon God for mercy. What, then, I ask, Will become of souls which are surprised in either of those predicaments ? We are sure, from Scripture and rea son, that nothing defiled shall enter heaven, Revt xxi. L17 : will then our just and merciful Judge make no distinction in guiltiness, as Bishop Fowler and other rigid Protestants maintain (3)? Will he con demn to the same eternal punishment, the poor child who has died under the guilt of alieof excusej and the abandoned wretch who has died in the act of murdering (1) Vol. iv. p. 112. (2) Plato in Gorgia, Virgil's iEneid, 1. 6, the Korari; (3) Calvin, 1. iii. c. 12, Fowler in Watson's Tracts, vol. vi. p»382. PART m4 3 G 114 LETTER XLIII. his father ! To say that he will, is so monstrous a doc* trine in itself, and so contrary to Scripture, which de clares that God will render to every man according to his deeds, Rom. ii. 6, that it seems to be universally exploded (l). The evident consequence of this is, that there are some venial or pardonable sins, for the expiation of which, as well as for the temporary pu nishment due to other sins, a place of temporary pu nishment is provided in the next life; where, however, the souls detained may be relieved, by the prayers, alms, and sacrifices of the faithful here on earth. — O I how consoling are the belief and practice of Catholics in this matter, compared with those of Protestants ! The latter shew their regard for their departed friends in costly pomp and feathered pageantry ; while their burial service is a cold, disconsolate ceremony : and as to any further communication with the deceased, when the grave closes on their remains, they do not so much as imagine any. — On the other hand, we Catho lics know, that death itself cannot dissolve the Com munion of Saints, which subsists in our Church, nor pre vent an intercourse of kind, and often beneficial offices, between us and our departed friends. Oftentimes we can help them more effectually, in the other world, by our prayers, our sacrifices, and our alms-deeds, than we could in this by any temporary benefits we could bestow upon them. Hence we are instructed to celebrate the obsequies of the dead by all such good works ; and, accordingly, our funeral service consists of psalms and prayers, offered up for their repose and eternal felicity. These acts of devotion pious Catho- (1) See Dr. Hey, vol. iii. pp. 384, 451, 453. EXTREME UNCTION. 115 lies perform for the deceased, who were near and dear to them, and indeed for the dead in general, every day, but particularly on the respective anniversaries of the deceased. Such benefits, we are assured, will be paid with rich interest, by those souls, when they, attain to that bliss, to which we shall have contributed and if they should not be in a condition to help us, the God of mercy at least will abundantly reward our charity. On the other hand, what a comfort and support must it be to our minds, when our turn comes to descend into the grave, to reflect that we shall continue to live in the constant thoughts and daily devotions of our Catholic relatives and friends ! I am, &c, J. M, LETTER XLIV. To the Rev. ROBERT CLAYTON, M. A. EXTREME UNCTION. REV. SIR, The Council of Trent terms the Sacrament of Extreme Unction, the Consummation of Penance ; and, therefore, as Bishop Porteus makes this the subject of a charge against our Church, here is the proper place for me to answer it. His Lordship writes a long chapter upon it, because his business is to gloss over the clear testimony, which the Apostle St. James bears to the reality of this Sacrament: in return, I shall write a short letter in refutation of his chapter, 3 G % 116 LETTER XLIV. because I have little more to do, than to cite that testimony, as it stands in the New Testament, Jt is as follows. Is any man sick among you, let him bring in the Priests of the Church, and let fhem pray over him, anointing him with oil, in the name of the Lord. And the Prayer of faith shall save the sick man ; and the Lord shall raise him up : and jf he be in sins, they shall be forgiven him, James v. 14, 15. Here we see all that is requisite, according to the English Protestant Catechism, to constitute a Sacrament (1): for there 'is an outward visible sign,' namely the anointing with oil; there 'is an inward ¦ spiritual grace, given unto us,' namely the saving of fhe sick, and the forgiveness of his sins. Lastly, there is ' the ordination of Christ, as the means by which the ' same is received :' unless the Bishop chooses to aj- ledge, that the Holy Apostle fabricated a Sacrament, Or means of grace, without any authority for this pur pose from his heavenly Master. What then does his Lordship say, in opposition to this divine warrant for our Sacrament ? He says, that the anointing of the sick by Elders or old men, was the appointed method of miraculously curing them in primitive times ; which would imply, that no Christian died in those times, except when either oil or old men were not to be met with ! I|e adds, that the forgiveness of the sick man's sins, means the cures of his corporal diseases /(2). And after all this, he boasts of building his religion on jv.ere Scripture, in its plain, unglossed meaning ! (3). In reading this, I own I cannot help revolving in (1) In the Book of Common Prayer. (2) P, 59, (3) P, u9. EXTREME UNCTION. 117 my mind the above quoted profane parody of Luther, on the first words of Scripture, in which he ridicules the distortion of it by many Protestants of his time(l). With the same confidence his Lordship adds : ' Our ' laying aside a ceremony (the anointing) which has ' long been useless, &c. can be no loss, while every ' thing that is truly valuable in St. James's direction is ' preserved in our office for visiting the sick (2).' Exactly in this manner our friends, the Quakers, un dertake to prove, that, in laying aside the ceremony of washing catechumens with water, they ' have pre- ' served every thing that is truly valuable' in the Sa crament of Baptism ! (3). But where shall we find an end of the inconsistencies and impieties of deluded Christians, who refuse to hear that Church which Christ has appointed to explain to them the truths of Religion ! There is not more truth in the Prelate's assertion, that there is no mention of anointing with oil, among the primitive Christians, except in miraculous cures, during the first 600 years ; for the celebrated Origen, who was born in the age next to that of the Apostles, after speaking of an humble confession of sins, as a mean of obtaining their pardon, adds to it, the anoint ing with oil, prescribed by St. James (4). St. Chrysos- tom, who lived in the fourth century, speaking of the power of priests, in remitting sin, says, they exert it when they are called in to perform the rite mentioned by St. James, &c. (5). The testimony of Pope In- (1) ' In principio Deus creavit coelum et terrain : In the beginning the f cuckoo devoured the sparrow and its feathers.' (2) P. 61. (3) Barclay's Apology, Prop. 12.. (4) Horn, ii. in Levit, (5) De Sacerd, l.iii, 118 LETTER XLIV. nocent I, in the same age, is so express as to the war rant for this sacrament, the matter, the minister, and the subjects of it (1) ; that though the Bishop alluded to the testimony, he does not choose to grapple with it, or even to quote it (£). I pass over the irrefraga ble authorities of St. Cyril of Alexandria, Victor of Antioch, St. Gregory the Great, and our Venerable Bede, in order once more to recur to that short but convincing proof, which I have already adduced on other contested points, that the Catholic Church has not invented those Sacraments and doctrines in latter ages, which Protestants assert were unknown in the primitive ages. Let it then be remembered, that the Nestorians broke off from the communion of the Church in 431, and the Eutychians in 451 ; that these rival sects exist, in numerous congregations, through out the East, at the present day ; and that they, as well as the Greeks, Armenians, &c. maintain, in be lief and practice, Extreme Unction, as one of the seven Sacraments. Nothing can so satisfactorily vindicate our Church from the charge of imposition or innova tion, in the particulars mentioned, as these facts do. How much more consistently has the impious Friar, Martin Luther acted, in denying at once the autho rity of St. James's Epistle, and condemning it as ' a chaffy composition, and unworthy an Apostle (3),' than Bp. Porteus and his confederates do, who attempt to explain away the clear proofs of Extreme Unction, contained in that Epistle ! In the mean time, in spite of every insult offered to the divine institutions, and (1) Epist. ad Decent. Eugub. (2) P.61. (3) ' Straminosa.' Prefat. in Ep. Jac. Jense de Captiv. Babyl, ANTICHRIST. 119 every uncharitable reflection cast on themselves or their religious practices, pious Catholics will con tinue to receive, in the time of Man's greatest need, that inestimable consolation and grace, which this, and the other helps of their Church, were provided by our Saviour Jesus Christ to impart. I am, &c. J. M. LETTER XLV. To the Rev. ROBERT CLAYTON, M. A. WHETHER THE POPE BE ANTICHRIST? REV. SIR, There remains but one more ques tion of doctrine to be discussed between me and your favourite controvertist, Bishop Porteus, which is con cerning the character and power of the Pope; and this he compresses into a narrow compass, among a variety of miscellaneous matters, in the latter part of his book. However, as it is a doctrine of first-rate importance, against which I make no doubt, but several of your Salopian Society have been early and bitterly prejudic ed, I propose to treat it, at some length, and in a re gular way. To do this, I must begin with the in quiry, whether the Pope be really and truly, The Man of Sin, and the Son of Perdition, described by St. Paul, 2 Thess. ii. 1, 10 ; in short, the Antichrist spoken of by St. John, 1 John ii. 18, and called by 120 LETTER XLV. him, A beast with seven heads and ten horns, Revel. xiii. 1, whose See, or Church, is, the great harlot, the mother of the fornications and abominations of the earth, Ibid. xvii. 5. I shudder to repeat these blasphemies, and I blush to hear them uttered by my fellow Chris tians and countrymen, who derive their Liturgy, their Ministry, their Christianity, and civilization, from the Pope and the Church of Rome ; but they have been too generally taught by the learned, and believed by the ignorant, for me to pass them by in silence on this occasion. One of Bishop Porteus's colleagues, Bishop Hallifax, speaks of this doctrine concerning the Pope and Rome, as long being ' the common symbol ' of Protestantism (l).' Certain it is, that the author of it, the outrageous Martin Luther, may be said to have established Protestantism upon this principle. Fie had at first submitted his religious controversies to the decision of the Pope, protesting to him thus: ' Whether you give life or death, approve or reprove, ' as you may judge best, I will hearken to your voice, ' as to that of Christ himself (2) :' but no sooner did Pope Leo condemn his doctrine, than he published his book 'Against the execrable Bull of Antichrist(3),' as he qualified it. In like manner, Melancthon, Bullinger, and many others of Luther's followers, publicly maintained, that the Pope is Antichrist, as did afterwards Calvin, Beza, and the writers of that party in general. This party considered this doctrine (1) Sermons by Bishop Hallifax, preached at the Lecture founded by the late Bishop Warburton, to prove the apostasy of Papal Rome, p. 27. (3) Epist. ad Leon X. A. D. 1518. (3) Tom. ii. ANTICHRIST. 12l so essential, as to vote it an Article of Faith, in their SytfodofGap, held in 1603 (l). The writers in defence of this impious tenet in our island, are as nu merous as those of the whole continent put together, John Fox, Whitaker, Fulke, Wilier, Sir Isaac Newton^ Mede, Lowman, Towson, Bicheno, Rett, &c. with the Bishops, Fowler, Warburton, Newton, Hallifax, Hurdj Watson, and others, too numerous to be here menti oned. One of these writers, whose work has but just appeared, has collected from the Scriptures a new, and quite whimsical system concerning Antichrist. Hi therto, Protestant expositors have been content, to apply the character and attributes of Antichrist, to a succession of Roman Pontiffs ; but the Rev. H. Kett professes to have discovered, that the said Antichrist is, at the same time, every Pope who has filled the See of Rome, since the year 756, to the number of 160, to gether with the whole of what he calls ' the Mahome-» ' tan power,' from a period more remote by a century and a half, and the whole of infidelity, which he traces to a still more ancient origin than even Mahometan* ism (2). That the first Pope, St. Peter, on whom Christ de clared, that he built his Church, Mat. xvi. 18, was not Antichrist, I trust, I need not prove ; nor, indeed* his third successor in the Popedom, St. Clement ; since St. Paul testifies of him, that his name is written in the book of life, Phil. iv. 3. In like manner, there (1) Bossuet's Variat. P. ii. B. 13. (2) History the Interpreter of Prophecy, byH. Kett, B. D. This writer's attempt to transform the great supporters of the Pope, St.Jerom, Pope Gregory I, St. Bernard, &c. into witnesses that the Pope is Antichrist, be cause they condemn certain acts as Antichristian, is truly ridiculous, PART III, 3 H ]22 LETTER XLV. is no need of my demonstrating, that the See of Rome was not the Harlot of Revelations, when St. Paul certified of its members, that their faith was spo ken of throughout the zvhole world, Rom. i. 8. At what particular period, then, I now ask, as I asked Mr. Brown, in one of my former letters, did the grand apostasy take place, by which the Head Pastor of the Church of Christ, became his declared enemy; in short, the Antichrist; and by which the Church, whose faith had been divinely authenticated, became the great har lot, full of the names of blasphemy ? This revolution, had it really taken place, would have been the great est, and the most remarkable, that ever happened since the deluge. Hence, we might expect, that the wit nesses, who profess to bear testimony to its reality, would agree, as to the time of its taking place. Let us now observe how far this is the fact. The Lutheran Braunbom, who writes the most copiously, and the most confidently of this event, tells us, that the Popish Antichrist was born in the year of Christ 86, that he grew to his full size in 376, that he was at his greatest strength in 636, that he began to decline in 1086, that he would die in 1640, and that the world would end in 1711 (l). Sebastian Francus affirms, that An tichrist appeared immediately after the Apostles, and caused the. external Church, with its faith and sacra ments, to disappear (2). The Protestant Church of Transilvania published, that Antichrist first appeared A. D. 200 (3). Napper declared that his coming was about 313, and that Pope Silvester was the man (4). (1) Bayle's Diet. Braunbom. (2) De Alvegand. Slat, Ecsles, (3) De Abolend. Christ, per Antichris. (4) Upon tire Revel. ANTICHRIST. 123 Melancthon says, that Pope Zozimus, in.. 420, wai the first Antichrist (1) ; while Beza transfers this character to the great and good St, Leo, A. D. 440 (2). Fleming fixes on the year 606 as the year of this great event; Bp. Newton on the year 727 ; but all agree, says the Rev. Henry Kett, ' that the Anti- ' christian power was fully established in 7.57, or ' 758 (3).' Notwithstanding this confident assertion, Cranmer's brother-in-law, Bullinger, had, long be fore, assigned the year ?63 as the oera of this grand revolution (4), and Junius had put it off to 1073. Musculus could not discover Antichrist in the Church till about 1200, Fox not till 1300(5), and Martin Luther, as we have seen, not till his doctrine was condemned by Pope Leo in 1520. Such are the inconsistencies and contradictions of those learned Protestants, who profess to see so clearly the verifica-* tion of the prophecies concerning Antichrist in the Roman Pontiffs. I say contradictions, because those among them, who pronounce Pope Gregory, or Leo the Great, or Pope Silvester, to have been Antichrist, must contradict those others, who admit them to have been respectively, Christian Pastors and Saints. Now what credit do men of sense give to an account of any sort, the vouchers for which contradict each other ? Certainly none at all. Nor are the predictions of these egregious inter preters, concerning the death of Antichrist, and the destruction of Popery, more consistent with one another, than their accounts of the birth and pro- (1) In locis postremo edit. (2) In Confess. General. (3) VoJ. ii. p. 53. (4) In Apoc. (5) In Kandem, 3H2 124 LETTER XLV. gress of them both. We have seen above, that Braun bom prognosticated, that the death of the Papal An tichrist would take place in the year 1640. John Fox foretold it would happen in \666. The incomparable Joseph Mede, as Bishop Hallifax calls him (1), by a particular calculation of his own invention, undertook to demonstrate that the Papacy would be finally de stroyed in 1653 (2). The Calvinist Minister Jurieu, who had adopted this system, fearing that the event would not verify it, found a pretext to lengthen the term, first to I69O, and afterwards to 1710. But he lived to witness a disappointment at each of these periods (3). Alix, another Huguenot preacher, pre dicted that the fatal catastrophe would certainly take place in 1716(4). Whiston, who pretended to find out the longitude, pretended also to discover that the Popedom would terminate in 1714: finding himself mistaken, he guessed a second time, and fixed on the year 1735 (5). At length, Mr. Kett, from the success pf his Antichrist of Infidelity against his Antichrist of Popery, about twenty years ago, (for he feels no, difficulty in dividing Satan against himself, Mat. xii. 6.), foretold that the long wished for event was at the eve of being accomplished (6) ; and Mr. Daubeny having, with several other preachers, witnessed Pope Pius VI in chains, and Rome possessed by French Atheists, sounds the trumpet of victory, and exclaims, all is ac complished (7). In like manner G. S. Faber, in his two Sermons before the University of Oxford, in 1799., boasts that ' the immense Gothic structure of Popery, (1) P. 236. (2) Bayle's Diet. (3) Ibid. (4) Ibid. (5) Essay on Revel. (0) Vol, ii.chap, 1. (7) The fall of Papal Rorne. ANTICHRLST. 125 • built on superstition and buttressed with tortures, has ' crumbled to dust.' Empty triumphs of the enemies of the Church ! They ought to have learned, from her lengthened history, that she never proves the truth of Christ's promises so evidently, as when she seems sinking under the waves of persecution ; and that the chair of Peter never shines so gloriously, as when it is filled by a dying Martyr, like Pius VI, or a captive Confessor, like Pius VII ; how triumphant, for a time, their persecutors may appear ! But these dealers in prophecy undertake to demon strate from the characters of Antichrist, as pointed out by St. Paul and St. John, that this succession of Popes is the very man in question. Accordingly, the Bishop of Landaff says : ' I have known the infidelity ' of more than one young man happily removed, by ' shewing him the characters of Popery delineated by * St. Paul, in his prophecy concerning The Man of Sin, * 2 Thess. ii. and in that concerning the apostasy of ' the latter times, 1 Tim. iv. 1.' (i). In proof of this point, he republishes the Dissenter Benson's Disser tation on The Man of Sin {%). I purpose, therefore, making a few remarks on the leading points of this adoptive child of his Lordship, as also upon some of the Rev. Mr. Kett's illustrations of them. — First, then, we all know that the Revelation of the Man of Sin will be accompanied with a revolt or falling off, in other words, with a great apostasy ; but it is a question to be discussed between me and Bishop Watson, whether this character of Apostasy is more applicable to the Catholic Church, or to that class of Religionists who (1) Bp. Watson's Collect, p. 7. (2) Ibid. p. 268. 126 LETTER XLV. adopt his opinions ? To decide this point, let me ask, what are the first and principal articles of the three Creeds professed by his Church as well as by ours, that of the Apostles, that of Nice, and that of St. Athanasius, as likewise of his Articles, his Liturgy, and his Canons ? Incontestably those which profess a belief in the Blessed Trinit\, and the Incarnation of the ConsubstantialSon of the Eternal Father. Now it is notorious, that every Catholic throughout the world, holds these the funda mental articles of Christianity as firmly now as St. Atha nasius himself did 1500 years ago : but what says his Lordship, with numberless other Protestant Christians of this country, on these heads ? Let the Preface to his Collection be consulted (1) ; in which, if he does not openly deny the Trinity, he excuses the Unitarians, who deny it, on the ground that they are afraid of becoming idolaters by zvorshipping Jesus Christ (2). Let his Charges be examined : in one of which he says to his clergy, that ' he does not think it safe to tell them ' what the Christian doctrines are (3) ;' no, not so much as the Unity and Trinity of God. In another Charge, however, the Bishop assumes more courage, and informs his clergy, that 'Protestantism consists in ' believing what each one pleases, and in profess ng ' what he believes.' How much should I rejoice to have this question of Apostasy, between the Bishop of Landaff and me, decided by Luther, Calvin, Beza, Cran-. rner, Ridley, and James I, were it not for the proofs which history affords me, that, not content with exclud- inghim from the class of Christians, they would assuredly: (1) Vol. i. Pref. p. 15, &c. (2) p. ir. (3) Bishop Watson's Charge, 1795._ ANTICHRIST. 127 hum him at the stake as an Apostate. — The second character of Antichrist, set down by St. Paul, is, that he opposeth and is lifted up above all that is called God, or that is worshipped, so that he sitteth in the Temple of God, shewing himself as if he were God, 2 Thess. ii. 4. This character Mr. Benson and Bishop Watson think appli cable to the Pope, who, they say, claims the attributes and homage due to the Deity. I leave you, Rev. Sir, and yourfriends, to judge of the truth of this character, when I inform you, that the Pope has his Confessor, like other Catholics, to whom he confesses his sins in private ; and that every day, in saying Mass, he bows before the altar, and in the presence of the people con fesses, that he has ' sinned in thought, word, and deed,' begging them to pray to God for him ; and that after wards, in the most solemn part of it, he professes ' his ' hopes of forgiveness, not through his own merits, but ' through the bounty and grace of Jesus Christ our ' Lord (1).' — The third mark of Antichrist is, that his coming is according to the zvorking of Satan, in all power, and signs, and lying wonders, 2 Thess. ii. 9- From this passage of Holy Writ, it appears that Antichrist, whenever he does come, will work false, illusive prodi gies, as the magicians of Pharaoh did. But, from the divine promises, it is evident that the disciples of Christ would continue to work true miracles, such as he him self wrought ; and from the testimony of the Holy Fathers and all ecclesiastical writers, it is incontestable, that certain servants of God have been enabled to work them, from time to time, ever since this his promise. This I have elsewhere demonstrated ; as likewise, that (1) Canon of th* Ma:s 128 LETTER XLV. the fact is denied by Protestants, not for want of evi dence, as to its truth, but because this is necessary for the defence of their system (1). Still it is false that the Catholic Church ever claimed a power of working miracles in the order of nature, as her opponents pretend. All that we say is, that God is pleased, from time to time, to illustrate the true Church with real miracles, and thereby to shew that she belongs to him. The latest dealer in prophecies, who boasts that his books have been revised by the Bishop of Lincoln (2), by way of shewing the conformity between Antichris- tian Popery and the beast, that did great signs, so that he madefire to comedown from heaven unto the earth, in the sight of men, Rev. xiii. 13, says of the former : 'even 1 fire is pretended to come down from heaven, as in the ' case of St. Antony's fire (3).' I am almost ashamed to refute so illiterate a cavil. True it is, that the Hos pital monks of St. Antony were heretofore famous for curing the Erysipelas with a peculiar ointment, on which account that disease acquired the name of St. Antony's fire (4) ; but neither these monks, nor any other Catholics, were used to invoke that inflammation, or any other burning whatsoever from heaven or else where. — I beg that you and your friends will suspend your opinion of the fourth alledged resemblance be tween Antichrist and the Pope, that of persecuting the Saints, till I have leisure to treat that subject in greater detail than I can at present. — I shall take no notice at all of this writer's chronological calculations, (1) Part ii. Letter xxiii. (2) Interpret, of Prophecy, by H. Kett, LL. B. Pref. (3) Kett, vol. ii. p. 22. (4) Paquotius, la Molanum De Sacr. Imag. SUPREMACY. 129 nor of the anograms and chronograms, by which many Protestant expounders have endeavoured to extract the mysterious number 666 from the name or title of certain Popes, farther than to observe, that ingenious Catholics have extracted the same number from the name Martinus Lutherus, and even from that of David Chrytheus, who was the most celebrated inventor of those riddles. Such are the grounds on which certain refractory children, in modern ages, have ventured to call their true Mother a Prostitute, and the common Father of Christians, the author of their own conversion from Paganism, The Man of Sin, and the very Antichrist. But they do not really believe what they declare ; their object being only to inflame the ignorant multitude. I have sufficient reason to think this, when I hear a Luther threatening to unsay all that he had said against the Pope, a Melancthon lamenting, that Protestants had renounced him, a Beza negotiating to return to him, and a late Warburton-lecturer lamenting, on his death-bed, that he could not do the same. I am, &c. J, u LETTER XLVI. To the Rev. ROBERT CLAYTON, M.A. ON THE POPE'S SUPREMACY. REV. SIR, This acknowledges the honour of three different letters from you, which I have not, till now, PART III, 3 I 130 LETTER XLVI. been able to notice. The objections, contained in the two former, are either answered, or will, with the help of God, be answered by me. The chief purport of your last, is to assure me, that the absurd and impious tenet, of the Pope being Antichrist, never was a part of your faith, nor even your opinion ; but that having; read over Dr. Barrow's Treatise of the Pope's Supre macy, as well as what Bishop Porteus has published upon it, you cannot but be of Archbishop Tillotson's. mind, who published the abovena-med treatise ; namely,. that ' The Pope's Supremacy is not only an indefensi- ' ble, but also an impudent cause ; that there is not one ' tolerable argument for it, and that there are a thou- ' sand invincible reasons against it (l).' — Your libe rality, Rev. Sir, on the former point, justifies the idea I had formed of you r with respect to the second, whether the Pope's claim of supremacy, or Tillotson's assertion concerning it, is impudent, I shall kave you to deter mine, when you shall have perused the present letter. But, as this, like other subjects of our controversy, has been enveloped in a cloud of misrepresentation, I must begin with dissipating this cloud, and with clearly stating what the faith of the Catholic Church is, concerning the matter in question. It is not, then, the faith of this Church, that the Pope has any civil or temporal Supremacy, by virtue of which he can depose Princes, or give or take away the property of other persons, out of his own domain : for even the Incarnate Son of God, from whom he de rives the Supremacy, which he possesses, did not claim,, hereupon earth, any right of the above-mentioned kind: on the contrary, he positively declared, that his King' (l) Tillotson's Preface to Barrow's Trea tise. SUPREMACY. 131 dom is not of this world ! Hence, the Catholics of both our Islands, have, without impeachment even from Rome, denied, upon oath, that ' the Pope has any ' civil jurisdiction, power, superiority, or pre-eminence, ' directly or indirectly, within this realm (1).' But, as it is undeniable, that different Popes, in former ages, have pronounced sentence of deposition against cer tain contemporary Princes, and, as great numbers of Theologians have held (though not as a matter of faith) that they had a right to do so; it seems proper, byway of mitigating the odium which Dr. Porteus and other Protestants raise against them, on this head, to state the grounds, on which the Pontiffs acted, and the Divines reasoned, in this business. Heretofore, the Kingdoms, Principalities, and States, composing the Latin Church, when they were all of the same religion, formed, as it were, one Christian Republic, of which the Pope was the accredited head. Now, as mankind have been sensible at all times, that the duty of civil allegiance and submission cannot extend beyond a certain point, and that they ought not to surrender their property, lives and morality, to be sported with by a Nero or afHeliogabalus ; instead of deciding the nice point for themselves, when resistance becomes lawful, they thought it right to be guided by their chief pastor. The Kings and Princes themselves ac knowledged this right in the Pope, and frequently ap plied to him to make use of his indirect, temporal power, as appears in numberless instances (2). In (1) 31 Geo. III. c. 32. (2) See in Mat. Paris, A. D. 1195, the appeal of our King Richard I, to. Pope Celestin III, against the Duke of Austria, for having detained him prir soner at Trivallis, and the Pope's sentence of excommunication against thas Duke, for refusing to, do him justice. 3 I 2 I 32 LETTER XLVI. latter ages, however, since Christendom has been dis turbed by a variety of religions, this power of the Pon tiff has been generally withdrawn. Princes make war upon each other, at their pleasure, and subjects rebel against their Princes, as their passions dictate (l), to the great detriment of both parties, as may be gathered from what Sir Edward Sandys, an early and zealous (1) In every country, in which Protestantism was preached, sedition and rebellion, with the total or partial deposition of the lawful Sovereign, en sued, not without the active concurrence of the Preachers themselves. Luther formed a league of Princes and States in Germany against the Em peror, which desolated the Empire for more than a century. His disciples, Muncer and Stork, taking advantage of the pretended evangelical liberty, which he taught, at the head of 40,000 Anabaptists, claimed the empire and possession of the world, in quality of the meek ones, and enforced their de mand with fire and sword, dispossessing Princes and lawful owners, &c. Zuinglius lighted up a similar flame throughout Switzerland, at Geneva, &c. and died fighting, sword in hand, for the Reformation, which he preached. The United States embraced Protestantism, and renounced their Sovereign, Philip, at the same time. The Calvinists of France, in conformity with the doctrine of their master, namely, that ' Princes deprive themselves of their ' power, when they resist God, and that it is better to spit in their faces ' than obey them,' Dan. vi. 22, as soon as they found themselves strong enough, rose in arms against their Sovereigns, and dispossessed them of half their dominions. Knox, Goodman, Buchanan, and the other Preachers of Presbyterianism in Scotland, having taught the people, that ' Princes may ' be deposed by their subjects, if they be tyrants against God and his truth :' and that ' It is blasphemy to say that Kings are to be obeyed, good or bad, disposed them for the perpetration of those riots and violences, including the murder of Cardinal Beaton, and the deposition and captivity of their lawful Sovereign, by which Protestantism was established in that country. With respect to England, no sooner was the son of Henry dead, than a Pro testant usurper, Lady Jane, was set up, in prejudice of his daughters, Mary and Elizabeth, and supported by Cranmer, Ridley, Latimer, Sandys, Poynet, and every Reformer of any note, because she was a Protestant. Finally, it was upon the principles of the Reformation, especially that of each man's explaining the Scripture for himself, and a hatred of Popery, that the Grand Rebellion was begun and carried on, 'till the King was beheaded and the con stitution destroyed. Has then the cause of humanity, or that of peace and order, been benefited by the change in question f SUPREMACY. 133 Protestant writes. ' The Pope was the common Father, ' adviser, and conductor of Christians, to reconcile 'their enmities, and decide their differences ( 1).' I have to observe, secondly, that the question here, is not about the personal qualities, or conduct of any particular Pope, or of the Popes in general ; at the same time, it is proper to state, that in a list of 253 Popes, who have successively filled the Chair of St. Peter, only a small comparative number of them, have dis graced it, while a great proportion of them have done honour to it, by their virtues and conduct. On this head, I must again quote Addison, who says : ' the ' Pope is generally a man of learning and virtue, ma- ' ture in years and experience, who has seldom any ' vanity or pleasure to gratify at his people's expense, ' and is neither encumbered with wife and children, ' or mistresses (2).' In the third place, I must remind you, and my other friends, that I have nothing here to do with the doctrine of the Pope's individual infallibility, (when pronouncing Ex Cathedra, as the term is, he addresses the whole Church, and delivers the faith of it upon some contested article) (3), nor would you, in case (1) Survey of Europe, p. 202. (2) Remarks on Italy, p. 112. (3) The following is a specimen of Barrow's and Tillotson's chicanery in their Treatise of the Supremacy. Bellarmin, in working up an argument on the Pope's infallibility, says, hypothetic ally, by way of proving the falsehood of his opponents' doctrine, that ' this doctrine would oblige the Church to ' believe vices to be good and virtues to be bad, in case the Pope were to err in ' teaching this.' Bell. De Rom. Pont. 1. iv. c. 5. Hence these wrilers take occasion to affirm, that Bellarmin positively teaches, that ' if the Pope should * err, by enjoining vices, or forbidding virtues, the Church would be bound to ' rJftfieve vices to be good and virtues evil !' p. 203. This shameful mis representation has been taken up by most subsequent Protestant coritio- vertists. 134 LETTER XLVI. you were to become a Catholic, be required to believe in any doctrines, except such as are held by the whole Catholic Church, with the Pope at its head. But, without entering into this, or any other scholastic question, I shall content myself with observing, that it is impossible for any man of candour and learning, not to concur with a celebrated Protestant author, namely Causabon, who writes thus : ' No one, who is ' the least versed in Ecclesiastical History, can doubt, ' that God made use of the Holy See, during many ' ages, to preserve the doctrines of faith !'(l). At length we arrive at the question itself, which is : Whether the Bishop of Rome, who, by pre-eminence, is called Papa (Pope, or Father of the faithful) is, or is-not, intitled to a superior rank and jurisdiction, above other Bishops of the Christian Church, so as to be its Spiritual Head here upon earth, and his See the centre of Catholic Unity ? All Catholics necessarily hold the affirmative of this question ; while the above- mentioned tergiversating Primate denies, that there is a tolerable argument in its favour (2). — Let us begin with consulting the New Testament, in order to see, whether or no the first Pope or Bishop of Rome, St. Peter, was any way superior to the other Apostles. (1) Exercit. xv. ad Anna]. Baron. (2) Tillotson's father was an Anabaptist, and he himself was professedly a Puritan Preacher, till the Restoration ; so that there is reason to doubt, whether he ever received either Episcopal Ordination or Baptism. His suc cessor, Seeker, was also a Dissenter, and his baptism has been called in question. The former, with Bishop Burnet, was called upon to attend Lord Russel at his execution, when they absolutely insisted, as a point necessary for salvation, on his disclaiming the lawfulness of resistance in any oase whatever. Presently after, the Revolution happening, they themselves de-. clared for Lord Russel's principles. SUPREMACY. 13J St. Matthew, in numbering up the Apostles, expressly says of him : THE FIRST, Simon, who is called Peter, Mat. x. 2. In like manner, the other Evangelists, while they class the other Apostles differently, still give the first place to Peter (l). In fact, as Bossuet observes (2), ' St. Peter was the first to confess his ' faith in Christ (3); the first to whom Christ appear- ' ed, after his resurrection (4) ; the first to preach the ' belief of this to the people (5) ; the first to convert ' the Jews (6) ; and the first to receive the Gen- ' tiles (7).' Again, I would ask, is there no distinction implied, in St. Peter's being called upon by Christ, to declare three several times, that he loved him, and even that he loved him more than his fellow Apostles, and in his being each time charged to feed Christ's lambs, and, at length, to feed his sheep also, whom the lambs are used to follow (8). What else is here signified, but that this Apostle was to act the part of a shepherd, not only with respect to the flock in general, but also with respect to the Pastors themselves ? The same is plainly signified, by our Lord's prayer for the faith of this Apostle, in particular, and the charo-e that he subsequently gave him : Simon, Simon, behold Satan has desired to have you, that he may sift you, as wheat : but I have prayed for thee, that thy faith fail not ; and thou, being once converted, confirm thy bre thren. Luke xxii. 32. Is there no mysterious mean ing in the circumstance, marked by the Evangelist, of Christ's entering into Simon's ship in preference to that (1) Mark iii. 16. Luke vi. 14. Acts i. 13. (2) Orat. ad Cler. (S) Mat. xvi. 1C, (4) Luke xxiv. 34. (5) Acts ii. 14. (C) Ver. 37. (7) Ibid. x. 47. (3) Acts >xi. 15, 136 LETTER XLVI. of James and John, in order to teach the people out of it; aud in the subsequent miraculous draught of fishes, together with our Lord's prophetic declaration to Simon : Fear not, from henceforth thou shalt catch men? Luke v. 3, 10. But the strongest proof, of St. Peter's superior dignity and jurisdiction, consists in that explicit and energetical declaration, of our Sa viour to him, in the quarters of Cesarea Philippi, upon his making that glorious confession of our Lord's Divinity : Thou art Christ, the Son of the living God. Our Lord had mysteriously changed his name, at his first interview with him, when Jesus, looking upon him, said : Thou art Simon, the son of Jona ; thou shalt be called Cephas, which is interpreted Peter, John i. 42 : and, on the present occasion, he explains the mystery, where he says : Blessed art thou Simon, Bar- Jona : because flesh and blood hath not revealed it to thee, but my Father, who is in heaven : And I say to thee: that thou art Peter (a Rock), and UPON THIS ROCK I WILL BUILD MY CHURCH, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it : and I zvill give to thee the keys of the Kingdom of Heaven : and zvhatsoever thou shalt bind on earth, shall be bound in heaven ; and whatsoever thou shalt loose on earth, shall be loosed also in heaven. Mat. xvi. 17, 18, 19. — Where now, I ask, is the sincere Christian, and especially the Christian who professes to make Scripture the sole rule of his faith, who, with these passages of the inspired text before his eyes, will venture, at the risk of his soul, to deny that any special dignity or charge was conferred upon St Peter, in preference to the other Apostles ? I trust no such Christian is to be found in your Society. Now, as it is a point agreed upon, at least in your SUPREMACY. i:,7 Church and mine, that Bishops, in general, succeed to the rank and functions of the Apostles; so, by the same Rule, the successor of St. Peter, in the See of Rome, succeeds to his primacy and jurisdiction. This cannot be questioned by any serious Christian, who reflects, that, when our Saviour gave his orders about feeding his flock, and made his declaration about building his Church, he was not establishing an order of things to last during the few years that St. Peter had to live, but one that was to last as long as he should have a flock and a Church on earth, that is, to the end of time ; conformably with his promise to the Apostles, and their successors, in the concluding words of St. Matthew : Behold I am with you alzvays, even to the end of the zvorld. Mat. xxviii. 20. That St. Peter (after governing, for a time, the Pa triarchate of Antioch, the capital of the East, and thence sending his disciple, Mark, to establish that of Africa at Alexandria) finally fixed his own See at Rome, the Capital of the World ; that his successors there have each of them exercised the power of Su preme Pastor, and have been acknowledged as such by all Christians, except by notorious heretics and schismatics, from the Apostolic age down to the pre sent, the writings of the Fathers, Doctors, and His torians of the Church unanimously testify. St. Paul, having been converted, and raised to the Apostleship in a miraculous manner, thought it necessary to go up to Jerusalem to see Peter, where he abode zvith him fifteen days. Galat. i. 18. St. Ignatius, who was a dis ciple of the Apostles, and next successor, after Evo- dius, of St Peter in the See of Antioch, addiesses his most celebrated Epistle to the Church, which he says PART III. 3 K 138 LETTER XLVI. * PRESIDES in the country of the Romans (l).' About the same time, dissensions taking place in the Church of Corinth, the case was referred to the Church of Rome, to which the Holy Pope Clement, whose name is zvritten in the book of life, Philip, iv. 3, returned an Apostolical answer of exhortation and instruction (2). In the second century, St. Irenarus, who had been in structed by St. Polycarp, the disciple of St. John the Evangelist, referring to the tradition of the Apostles, preserved in the Church of Rome, calls it ' the greatest,, ' most ancient, and most universally known, as having ' been founded by St. Peter and St. Paul; to which ' (he says) every Church is bound to conform, by 'reason of its superior authority (3).' Tertullian, a priest of the Roman Church, who flourished near the same time, calls St. Peter, ' the Rock of the ' Church,' and says, that ' the Church was built upon ' him (4).' Speaking of the Bishop of Rome, he terms him in different places, ' the Blessed Pope, the ' High Priest, the Apostolic Prelate,' &c. I must add, that, at this early period, Pope Victor exerted his su perior authority, by threatening the Bishops of Asia with excommunication, for their irregularity in cele brating Easter, and the other moveable feasts ; from which rigorous measure he was deterred, chiefly by St. Irenaeus (5). In the third century, we hear Oii- (1) TIfflX«flt*rT«M Epist. Ignat. Cotelcro. (2) Coteler. (3) ' Ad banc ccclesiam convcnire neccssc est omnent ccclesiam.' Contra*. Ilaeres. 1. iii. c. 3. (1) Prcscrip. 1. i. c. 22. Dc Monogam, (5) Euseb. Hist. Eccles. 1. v. e. 2d. SUTREMACV. ' -J'A gen(l) and St. Cyprian repeatedly affirming, that th<; Church was ' founded on Peter,' that he ' fixed his ' Chair at Rome,' that this is ' the Mother Church,' and ' the root of Catholicity (2).' The latter expresses great indignation, that certain African schismatics should dare to approach ' the See of Peter, the head ' Church and source of ecclesiastical unity (3).' It is true, this Father afterwards had a dispute with Pope Stephen, about re- baptizing converts from heresy ; but this proves nothing more, than that he did not think the Pope's authority superior to general tra dition, which, through mistake, he supposed to be on his side. To what degree, however, he did admit this authority, appears by his advising this same Pope, to depose Marcian, a schismatical Bishop of Gaul, and to appoint another Bishop in his place (4). At the beginning of the fourth century, we have the learned Greek historian, Eusebius, explaining in clear terms, the ground of the Roman Pontiff's claim to superior authority, which he derives from St. Peter (5) ; we have also the great champion of orthodoxy, and the Pa triarch of the second See in the world, St. Athanasius, appealing to the Bishop of Rome, which See he terms ' the Mother and the Head of all other Churches (6).' In fact, the Pope reversed the senteuce of deposition, pronounced by the Saint's enemies, and restored him to his Patriarchal Chair (7). Soon after this, the (1) Horn. 5 in Exod. Horn. 17 in Luc> (2) Ep. ad Cornel. Ep. ad Anton. De Unit. ice. (3) Ep. ad Cornel. 55. (4; Ep. 29. (5) Euseb. Chron. An. 44. (6) Epist. ad Marc. . (7) Socrat. Hist. 1. ii. c, 2. Zozoiu. "3 K 2 140 LETTER XLVT. Council of Sardica, confirmed the Bishop of Rome, in his right of receiving appeals from all the Churches in the world (1). Even the Pagan Historian, Ammianus, about the same time, bears testimony to the superior authority of the Roman Pontiff (2). In the same century, St. Basil, St. Hilary, St. Epiphanius, St. Am brose, and other Fathers and Doctors, teach the same thing. Let it suffice to say, that the first named of these, scruples not to advise, that the Pope should send visitors to the Eastern Churches, to correct the dis orders, which the Arians had caused in them (3) ; and that the last mentioned represents communion with the Bishop of Rome, as communion with the Catholic Church (4). I must add, that the great St. Chrysostom, having been, soon after, unjustly deposed from his seat in the Eastern Metropolis, was restored to it by the authority of Pope Innocent ; that Pope Leo termed his Church ' the head of the world,' be cause its spiritual power, as he alledged, extended farther than the temporal power of Rome had ever extended (5). Finally, the learned St. Jerom, being dis tracted with the disputes among three parties, which divided the Church of Antioch, to which Church he Wd.5 then subject, wrote for directions, on this head, to Pope Damasus, as follows : ' I, who am but a sheep, ' apply to my shepherd for succour. I am united in (1) Can. 3. (2) Rerum Gest. 1. xv. (3) Epist. 52, (4) Orat. in Obit. Satyr. (1) Serin, de Nat. Apos. This sentiment another Father of the Church, in the following century, St. Prosper, expressed in these lines : ' Sedes Roma Petri, qiice, pastoralis honoris ' Facta caput mundo, quidquid non possidet armis, ' Religione tenet,' SUPREMACY. 141 ' communion with your Holiness; that is to say, with ' the Chair of Peter. I know that the Church is built ' upon that Rock. He who eats the Paschal- lamb ' out of that house, is profane. Whoever is not in ' Noah's Ark will perish by the deluge. I know nothing ' ofVitalis, I reject Meletius, I am ignorant of Paulinus: ' he who does not gather with thee scatters,' &c (1). — It were useless, after this, to cite the numerous testi monies to the Pope's Supremacy, which St. Augustin, and all the Fathers, Doctors, and Church Historians, and all the General Councils bear, down to the present time. However, as the authority of our Apostle, Pope Gregory the Great, is claimed by most Protestant Di vines on their side, and is alluded to by Bp. Porteus(2), merely for having censured the pride of John, Patri arch of C. P. in assuming to himself the title of CEchu- menical or Universal Bishop ; it is proper to shew, that this Pope, like all the others who went before him, and came after him, did claim and exercise the power of Supreme Pastor, throughout the Church. Speaking of this very attempt of John, he says : ' The care of ' the whole Church was committed to Peter, and yet ' he is not called the Universal Apostle (3) ' With re spect to the See of C. P. he says : ' Who doubts but it ' is subject to the Apostolical See ;' and again : ' When ' Bishops commit a fault, I know not what Bishop ' is not subject to it,' (the See of Rome.) (4). As no Pope was ever more vigilant, in discharging the duties of his exalted station, than St. Gregory, so none of them, perhaps, exercised more numerous or widely (1) Ep. ad Damas. (2) P. 78. (3) Ep. Greg. 1. v. 20. (4) L. ix, 59> 142 LETTER XLVI. extended acts of the Supremacy, than he did. It is sufficient to cite here his directions to St Augustin of Canterbury, whom he had sent into this Island, for the conversion of our Saxon ancestors, and who had con sulted him, by letter, how he was to act with respect to the French Bishops, and the Bishops of this island, namely, the British Prelates in Wales, and the Pictish and Scotch in the northern parts ? To this question Pope Gregory returns an answer in the following words : ' We give you no jurisdiction over the Bishops 'of Gaul, because, from ancient times, my predecessors ' have conferred the Pallium (the ensign of legatine 'authority) on the Bishop of Aries, whom we ought ' not to deprive of the authority he has received. But ' we commit all the Bishops of Britain to your care, ' that the ignorant among them may be instructed, the 1 weak strengthened, and the perverse corrected by ' your authority (1).' After this, is it possible to be lieve that Bp. Porteus and his fellow writers ever read Venerable Bede's History of the English nation ? But if they could even succeed in proving, that Christ had not built his Church upon St. Peter and his successors, and had not given to them the keys of the kingdom of heaven ; it would still remain for them to prove, that he had founded any part of it on Henry VIII, Edward VI, and their successors, or that he had given the mys tical keys to Elizabeth and her successors. I have shewn, in a former letter, that these Sovereigns exercis ed a more despotic power, over all the ecclesiastical and spiritual affairs of this realm, than any Pope ever did, even in the city of Rome; and that the changes (!) Hist. Bed. 1. i. c. 27. Resp.9. Spelm. Condi, p. 05. SUPREMACY. 143 in Religion, which took place in their reigns, were ef fected by them and their agents, not by the Bishops or any clergy whatever ; and yet no one will pretend to shew from Scripture, tradition, or reason, that these Princes had received any greater power from Christ, over the doctrine and discipline of his Church, than he conferred upon Tiberius, Pilate, or Herod, or than he has given, at the present day, to the great Turk or the Lama of Thibet, in their respective dominions. Before I close this letter I think it right to state the sentiments of a few eminent Protestants, respecting the Pope's Supremacy. I have already mentioned, that Lu ther acknowledged it, and submissively bowed to it, during the three first years of his dogmatizing about justification ; and till his doctrine was condemned at Rome. In like manner, our Henry VIII asserted it, and wrote a book in defence of it; in reward of which the Pope conferred upon him and his successors the new title of Defender of the Faith. Such was his doc trine ; till, becoming amorous of his Queen's maid of honour, Ann Bullen, and finding the Pope conscien tiously inflexible, in refusing to grant him a divorce from the. former, and to sanction an adulterous con nexion with the latter, he set himself up, as Supreme Head of the Church of England, and maintained his claim by the arguments of halters, knives, and axes. James I, in his first speech in Parliament, termed Rome ' the Mother Church,' and in his writings allowed the Pope to be ' The Patriarch of the West.' The late Archbishop Wake, after all his bitter writings against the Pope and the Catholic Church, coming to discuss the terms of a proposed union between this Church and that of England, expressed himself willing to allow 144 LETTER XLVI. a certain superiority to the Roman Pontiff(l). — Bishop Bramhall had expressed the same sentiment (2), sensi ble, as he was, that no peace or order could subsist in the Christian Church, any more than in a political state, without a supreme authority. Of the truth of this maxim, two others, among the greatest men whom Protestantism has to boast of, the Lutheran Melanc- thon, and the Calvinist Hugo Grotius, were deeply persuaded. The former had written to prove the Pope to be Antichrist ; but, seeing the animosities, the di visions, the errors, and the impieties of the pretended Reformers, with whom he was connected, and the ut ter impossibility of putting a stop to these evils, with out returning to the ancient system, he wrote thus to Francis I, of France : ' We acknowledge, in the first ' place, that ecclesiastical government is a thing holy 'and salutary; namely, that there should be certain ' Bishops to govern the Pastors of several churches, •and that THE ROMAN PONTIFF should be ' above all the Bishops. For the Church stands in need ' of governors, to examine and ordain those who * are called to the ministry, and to watch over their ' doctrine ; so that, if there were no Bishops, they ' ought to be created (3).' The latter great man, Grotius, was learned, wise, and always consistent. In proof of this he wrote as follows, to the Minister, Rivet : ' All who are acquainted with Grotius, know (1) ' Suo Gaudeat qualicunquc Primatu.' See Maclain's Third Appendix to Mosheim's Eccl. Hist. vol. v. (2) Answer to Militiere. (3) D'Argentre, Collect. Jud. t. i. p. 2. — Bercastel and Feller relate, that Melancthon's mother, who was a Catholic, having consulted him about her religion, he persuaded her to continue in it. LANGUAGE OP THE LITURGY*. 145 how earnestly he has wished to see Christians united together in one body. This he once thought might have been accomplished by a union among Protes tants ; but afterwards, he saw that this is impossible. Because, not to mention the aversion of Calvinists to every sort of union, Protestants are not bound by any ecclesiastical government, so that they can neither be united at present, nor prevented from splitting into fresh divisions. Therefore Grotius now is fully convinced, as many others are also, that Protestants never can be united among them selves, unless they join those who adhere to the Roman See ; without which there never can be any general Church-government. Hence, he wishes that the revolt and the causes of it may be removed ; among which causes, the Primacy of the Bishop of Rome was not one, as Melancthon confessed, who also thought that Primacy necessary to restore union (1).' I am, &c. J. M. LETTER XLVII. To JAMES BROWN, Jun. Esq. ON THE LANGUAGE OF THE LITURGY, AND ON READING THE HOLY SCRIPTURES. DEAR SIR, I agree with your worthy Father, that the departure of the Rev. Mr. Clayton, to a (1) Apol.ad Rivet. PART III. 3 L ]l4rj letter xLvrr. foreign country, is a loss to your Salopian Society iw more respects than one; and as it is his wish that 1 shouldaddress the few remaining letters I have to write, in answer to Bishop Porteus's book, to you, Sir, who, it seems, agree with him in the main, but not altogether, on religious subjects, I shall do so^ for your own satis faction and that of your friends, who are still pleased to hear me upon them. Indeed the remaining contro versies between that Prelate and myself are of light moment, compared with those I have been treating of -r as they consist chiefly of disciplinary matters, subject lo the control of the Church, or of particular facts,, misrepresented by his Lordship. The first of these points of changeable discipline,. which the Bishop mentions, or rather declaims upon throughout a whole chapter, is the use of the Latin- tongue in the public liturgy of the Latin Church. It is natural enough that the Church of England, which is of modern date, and confined to its own domain, should adopt its own language, in its public worship ;. and, for as similar reason, it is proper that the Great Western or Latin Church, which was established by the Apostles, when the Latin tongue was the vulgar tongue of Europe, and which still is the common lan guage of educated persons in every part of it, should* retain this language in her public service. When the Bi shop complains of ' our worship being performed in ait ' unknown tongue (l),' and of our 'wicked and cruel 'cunning in keeping people in darkness '-(2),' by this- nxeans, under pretext that ' they reverence what they do* ' not understand (3)/ he must be conscious of the iirg- (.1) P. 76. (2) P, 63. (3) P. 65. LANGUAGE OF LITURGY. 147 Irgious calumnies he is uttering ; knowing, as he does, that Latin is, perhaps, still the most general lauguage of Christianity (1), and that, where it is not commonly understood, it is not the Church which has intro duced a foreign language among the people, but it is the people who have forgotten their ancient language. So far removed is the Catholic Church from ' the 4 wicked and cruel cunning of keeping people in ig- ' norance,' by retaining her original Apostolical lan guages, the Latin and the Greek; that she strictly commands her Pastors every where, ' to inculcate the ' word of God, and the lessons of salvation, to the ' people in their vulgar tongue, every Sunday and * Festival throughout the year (2),' and ' to explain to ' them the nature and meaning of her Divine Worship * as frequently as possible (3).' In like manner, we are so far from imagining, that the less our people under stand of our liturgy, the more they reverence it, that we are quite sure of precisely the contrary ; particu larly with respect to our principal liturgy, the adorable Sacrifice of the Mass. True it is, that a part of this is performed by the priest in silence, because, being a sacred action, as well as a form of words, some of the prayers which the priest says, would not be pro per or rational in the mouths of the people. Thus, the High priest of old went alone into the tabernacle, to make the atonement (4) ; and thus Zachary offered (1) The Latin language is vernacular in Hungary and the neighbouring countries: it is taught in all the Catholic settlements of the universe, and it approaches so near to the Italian, Spanish, and French, as to be under*. stood, in a general kind of way, by those who use these languages. (2) Concil. Trid. Sess. xxiv. c. 7. (3) Idem. Sess. xxii. t..3. (4) Levit. xvi. 17. 3 L 2 148 letter xlvii. incense in the Temple by himself ; while the multitude prayed without(l). But this is no detriment to the faithful, as they have translations of the liturgy, and other books in their hands, by means of which, or of their own devotion, they can join with the priest in every part of the solemn worship; as the Jewish peo ple united with their priests, in the sacrifices above- mentioned. But we are referred by his Lordship to 1 Cor. xiv. in order ' to see what St. Paul would have judged of ' the Romanists' practice, in retaining the Latin lj- turgy ; which, after all, he himself and St. Pen r esta blished where it now prevails. — I answer, that there is not a word in that chapter which mentions or alludes to the public liturgy, which at Corinth uas, as it is still, performed in the old Greek ; the whole of it regarding an imprudent and ostentatious use of the gift of ton gues, in speaking all kinds of languages ; which gift many of the faithful possessed, at that time, in common v.ith the Apostles. The very reason, alledged by St. Paul, for prohibiting extemporary prayers and ex hortations, which no one understood, namely, that all things should be done decently and according to order, is the principal motive of the Catholic Church, for retaining, in her worship, the original languages employed by the Apostles. She is, as I before remarked, a Universal Church, spread over the face of the globe, and composed of all nations, and tribes, and tongues, Rev. vii. 9, and these tongues constantly changing; so that instead of the uniformity of worship, as well as of faith, which is so necessary for that decency and order, (1) Luke i. 10. LANGUAGE OF LITURGY. 149 there would be nothing but confusion, disputes, and changes in every part of her liturgy, if it were per formed in so many different languages, and dialects; with the constant danger of some alteration or other in the essential forms, which would vitiate the very Sacrament and Sacrifice. The advantage of an ancient language, for religious worship, over a modern one, in this and other respects, is acknowledged by the Cam bridge Professor of Divinity, Dr. Hey. He says, that such a one ' is fixed and venerable, free from vul garity, and even more perspicuous (I).' But to return to Bishop Porteus's appeal to the judgment of St. Paul, concerning ' the'Romanists' practice, in re taining the language with the substance of their pri mitive liturgy, I leave you, Dear Sir, and \our friends, to pronounce upon it, after I shall have stated the following facts : 1st, that St. Paul himself wrote au Epistle, which forms part of the liturgy of all Chris tian Churches, to these very Romanists, in the Greek language, though they themselves made use of the Latin (2): 2dly, that the Jews, after they had ex changed their original Hebrew for the Chaldaic tongue, during the Babylonish captivity, continued to per form their liturgy in the former language, though the vulgar did not understand it. (3) ; and that our Saviour Christ, as well as his Apostles, and othei devout friends, attended this service in the Temple, and the Synagogue, without ever censuring it : 3dly, that the Greek Churches, in general, no less than the Latin Church, re tain their original pure Greek tongue in their liturgy, (1) Lecture^, vol. iv. p. 191. (2) St. Jerom, Epist. 123. (3) Walton's Polyglot Prolog. Hey, &c. 150 LETTER XLVII. though the common people have forgotten it, and adopted different barbarous dialects instead of itfl) : 4thly, that Patriarch Luther maintained, against Car lostad, that the language of public worship, was a matter of inrlifference. Hence, his disciples professed, in their Augsburg Confession, to retain the Latin lan guage in certain parts of their service. Lastly, that when the Establishment endeavoured, under Eliza beth, and afterwards, under Charles I, to force their liturgy upon the Irish Catholics, it was not thought necessary to translate it into Irish, but it was con stantly read in English, of which the natives did not understand a word : thus ' furnishing the Papists with ' an excellent argument against themselves,' as Dr. Heylin observes (2). The Bishop has next a long letter on what he calls, the Prohibition of the Scriptures, by the Romanists ; in which he confuses aud disguises the subjects he treats of, to beguile and inflame ignorant readers. I have treated this matter, at some length, in a former letter, and therefore shall be brief in what I write upon it in this : but what I do write shall be explicit and clear. It is a wicked calumny then, that the Catholic Church undervalues the holy Scriptures, or prohibits the use of them. On the contrary, it is she that has religiously preserved them, as the inspired word of God, and his invaluable gift to man, during these eighteen centuries : it is she alone, that can and does vouch for their authenticity, their purity, aud their inspiration. But, then, she knows that there is an unwritten Word of God, called Tradition, as well as a (1) Mosheim, by Maclaine, vol. ii. p. 575. (2) Ward has successfully ridiculed this attempt in his England's Re^. formation, Canto II9 PR0HIB. OF SCRIPTURES. 151 written word, the Scriptures; that the former is the evidence for the authority of the latter, and that, when nations had been converted, and Churches formed by the unwritten word, the authority of this was no wise abrogated by the inspired Epistles and Gospels, which the Apostles and Evangelists occasionally sent to such nations or Churches. In short, both these words to gether form the Catholic Rule of Faith. On the other hand, the Church, consisting, according to its more general division, of two distinct classes, the Pastors and their flocks, the Preachers and their hearers ; each has its particular duties in the point under considera tion, as well as in other respects. The Pastors are bound to study the Rule of Faith in both its parts, with unwearied application, to be enabled to acquit themselves of the first of all their duties, that of preaching the Gospel to their people (l). Hence St. Ambrose calls the Sacred Scripture the Sacer dotal Book, and the Council of Cologn orders that it should ' never be out of the hands of Ecclesias- ' tics.' In fact, the Catholic Clergy must, and do employ no small portion of their time, every day, in reading different portions of Holy Writ. But no such obligation is generally incumbent on the flock, that is on the laity; it is sufficient for them to hear the word of God, from those whom God has appointed to announce and to explain it to them, whether by sermons, or catechisms, or other o-0(KJ books, or in the tribunal of penance Thus, it is not the bounden duty of all good subjects to read and study the laws of their country : it is sufficient for (l) Trid. Sess v. cap. 2. Sess, xxv. cap. 4. 152 LETTER XLVII. them to hear and to submit to the decisions of the Judges, and other legal officers, pronouncing upon them ; and, by the same rule, the latter would be in excusable if they did not make the law and constitu tion their constant study, in order to decide right. Still, however, the Catholic Church, never did prohibit the reading of the Scriptures to the Laity : she only required, by way of preparation, for this most difficult and important study, that they should have received so much education, as would enable them to read the sacred books in their original languages, or in that ancient and venerable Latin version, the fidelity of which she guarantees to them ; or, in case they were desirous of reading it in a modern tongue, that they should be furnished with some attestation of their piety and docility, in order to prevent their turning this salutary food of souls into a deadly poison, as, it is universally confessed, so many thousands constantly have done. At present, however, the chief pastors- have every where relaxed these disciplinary rules; and vulgar translations of the whole Scripture are upon sale, and open to every one, in Italy itself, with the express approbation of the Roman Pontiff. In these Islands, we have an English version of the Bible, in folio, in quarto, and in octavo forms, against which our opponents have no other objection to make, ex cept that it is too literal (1), that is, too faithful. — But Dr. Porteus professes not to admit of any re striction whatever ' on the reading of what heaven hath ' revealed, with respect to any part of mankind.' No doubt, the revealed truths themselves are to be made (1) See the Bishop of Lincoln's Elements of Theol. vol. ii. p. 16. PR0HIB. OF SCRIPTURES. 153 known as much as possible, to all mankind ; but it does not follow from hence, that all mankind are to read the scriptures: there are passages in them, which I am confident, his Lordship would not wish his daughters to peruse ; and which, in fact, were prohi bited to the Jews, till they had attained the age of thirty (l). Again, as Lord Clarendon, Mr. Grey, Dr. Hey, -&c agree, that the misapplication of scripture was the cause of the destruction of Church and State, and of the murder of the King in the grand rebellion; and as he must be sensible, from his own observation, that the same cause exposed the nation to the same calamities in the Protestant riots of 1780, I am confi dent the Bishop, as a Christian, no less than as a Bri tish subject, would have taken the Bible out of the hands of Hugh Peters, Oliver Cromwell, Lord George Gordon, and their respective crews, if this had been in his power. I will affirm the same, with respect to Count Emanuel Swedenborg, the founder of the mo dern sect of New Jerusalemites, who taught, that no one had understood the Scriptures, till the sense of them was revealed to him ; as also with respect to Jo anna Southcote, foundress of a still more modern sect, and who, I believe, tormented the Bishop himself with her rhapsodies, in order to persuade him, that she was the woman of Genesis, destined to crush the serpent's head, and the woman of the Revelations, clothed with the sun, and crowned with twelve stars. Nay, I greatly deceive myself if the Prelate would not be glad to take away every hot-brained Dissenter's Bible, who employs it in persuading the people, that the Church (1) St.Jerom in Proem to Ezpch.. St. C:'-.i,s[>, PART III. 3 M ]5-t LETTER XLV1I. of England is a rag of Popery, and a spawn of the whore of Babylon. In short, whatever Dr. Porteus may choose to say of an unrestricted perusal and in terpretation of the Scriptures, with respect to all sorts of persons, it is certain, that many of the wisest and most learned Divines of his Church have lamented this, as one of her greatest misfortunes. I will quote the words of one of them. ' Aristarchus of old, ' could hardly find seven wise men in all Greece: but, ' amongst us, it is difficult to find the same number of ' ignorant persons. They are all Doctors and divinely ' inspired. There is not a fanatic or a mountebank, ' from the lowest class of the people, who does not ' vent his dreams for the word of God. The bottom- i less pit seems to be opened, and there come out of it * locusts with stings ; a swarm of sectaries and here- ' tics, who have renewed all the heresies of former * ages, and added to them numerous and monstrous ' errors of their own ( 1 ).' Since the above was written, the Bibliomania, or rage for the letter of the Bible, has been carried, in this country, to the utmost possible length, by persons of almost every description, Christians and Infidels ; Trinitarians, who worship God in three persons, and Unitarians, who hold such worship to be idolatrous ; Predobaptists, who believe they became Christians by baptism ; Anabaptists, who plunge such Christians into the water, as mere Pagans ; and Quakers, who ridicule all Baptism, except that of their own imagi nation ; Arminian Methodists, who believe themselves to have been justified without repentance, and Anti- (1) Walton's Polyglot Prokgom. PR0HIB. OF SCRIPTURES. 15,') nomian Methodists, who maintain, that they shall be saved without keeping the laws cither of God or man ; Churchmen, who glory in having preserved the whole Orders and part of the Missal and Ritual of the Catho lics ; and the countless sects of Dissenters, who join in condemning these things as Antichristian Popery. All these have forgotten, for a long time, their characteris- tical tenets, and united in enforcing the reading of the Bible, as the only thing necessary ! The Bible So cieties are content, that all these contending Religion ists should affix whatever meaning they please to the Bible, provided only they read the text of the Bihle ! Nay, they are satisfied if they can but get the Hindoo worshippers of Jaggernaut, the Thibet adorers of the Grand Lama, and the Taboo cannibals of the Pacific Ocean, to do the same thing ; vainly fancying, that this lecture will reform the vicious, reclaim the erro neous, and convert the Pagans. In the mean time, the experience of fourteen years proves, that theft, forgery, robbery, murder, suicide, and other crimes go on increasing with the most alarming rapidity ; that every sect clings to its original errors, that not one Pagan is converted to Christianity, nor one Irish Ca tholic persuaded to exchange his faith for a Bible Book. When will these Bible-enthusiasts comprehend, what learned and wise Christians of every age have known and taught, that The zvord of God consists not in the letter of Scripture, but in the meaning of it ! Hence it follows, that a Catholic child, who is grounded in his short but comprehensive First Cate chism, so called, knows more of the revealed word cf God, than a Methodist Preacher docs, who ha> it ad the whole Bible ten times over. The sentiment e>;- 3 M 2 ]56 LETTER XLVIII. pressed above is not only that of St. Jerom(l) and other Catholic writers, but also of the learned Pro testant Bishop, whom I have already quoted. He says : ' The word of God does not consist in mere ' letters, but in the sense of it, which no one can ' better interpret than the True Church, to which * Christ committed this sacred deposit (2),' I am, &c. J. M. LETTER XLVIII. To JAMES BROWN, Jun. Esq. ON VARIOUS MISREPRESENTATIONS, DEAR SIR, The learned Prelate, who is celebrated for having concentrated the five sermons of his Pa tron, Archbishop Seeker, and the more diffusive decla mation of Primate Tillotson against Popery, having gone through his regular charges on this topic, tries, in the end, to overwhelm the Catholic cause, with an accumulation of petty, or, at least, secondary objec tions, in a chapter which he entitles: Various Corrup tions and Superstitions of the Church of Rome. The first of these is, that Catholics ' equal the Apocryphal ' with the canonical books' of Scripture (3) : to which I answer, that the same authority, namely, the autho rity of the Catholic Church, in the fifth century, (1) Cap. 1. ad GaUu. (2) Walton's Proleg. (3) P. 70, VARIOUS MISREPRESENTATIONS. 157 which decided on the canonical character of the Epistle to tfie Hebrews, the Revelations, and five other books of the New Testament, on the character of which, till that .time, the Fathers and ecclesiastical writers were not agreed, decided also on the canonicity of the Books of Toby, Judith, and five other hooks of the Old Testament, being those which the Prelate alludes to as Apocryphal. If the Church of the fifth century deserves to be heard in one part of her testi mony, she evidently deserves to be heard in the other part. — His second objection is, that ' The Romish ' Church/ as he palls the Catholic Church, has made ' a modern addition of five new Sacraments to the two, ' appointed by Christ ; making also the Priest's inten- ' tion necessary to the benefit of them.' I have, in the course of these letters, vindicated the Divine insti tution of these live Sacraments, and have shewn, that they are acknowledged to be Sacraments, no less than the other two, by the Nestorian and Eutjchian here tics, &c. who separated from the Church almost 1400 years ago, and, in short, by all the Christian congre gations of the world, except a comparatively few mo dern ones, called Protestants, in the North of Eul'°pe- Is it from ignorance, or wilful misrepresentation, that the Bishop of London charges ' the Romish Church ' with the modern addition of five new Sacraments ?' With respect to the intention of the Minister of a Sacrament, I presume there is no sensible person who does not see the essential difference there is between an action that is seriously performed, and the mimicking or mockery of it by a comedian or buffoon. Luther, indeed, wrote, that ' the Devil himself would perform 4 a true Sacrament, if he used the right matter and 158 LETTER XLVIII. ' form :' but I trust, that you, Sir, and my other friends, will not subscribe to such an extravagance. I have also discussed the subjects of relics and miracles, which the Prelate next brings forward ; so that it is not necessary for me to say any thing more about them, than that the Church, instead of ' venerating ' fictitious relics, and inventing lying miracles,' as he most calumniously accuses her of doing, is strict to an excess, in examining the proofs of them both ; as he would learn, if he took the pains to inquire. In short, there are but about two or three articles in his Lord ship's accumulated charges against his Mother Church, which seem to require a particular answer from me at present. One of these is the following. ' Of the ' same bad tendency is their (the Catholics) engaging ' such multitudes of people in vows of celibacy and ' useless retirement from the world, their obliging ' them to silly austerities and abstinences, of no real 'value, as matters of great merit (l).' In the first place, the Church never engages any person whomso ever in a vow of celibacy ; on the contrary, she exerts her utmost power and severest censures, to prevent this obligation from being contracted rashly, or under any undue influence^). True it is, she teaches, that continency is a state of greater perfection than matri mony ; but so does St. Paul (3), and Christ himself (4), in words too explicit and forcible to admit of contro versy on the part of any sincere Christian. True it is, also, that having the choice of her sacred ministers, (1) P. 70. (2) Concil. Trid. Sess. xxv. Dc Reg. cap. 15, 16, 17, 1?. (3) See the whole chapter vii. of 1 Cor, (1) Mat. six. 12. VARIOUS MISREPRESENTATIONS, 159 she selects those for the service of her altar, and for assisting the faithful in their spiritual wants, who vo luntarily embrace this more perfect state (l) : but so has the Establishment expressed her wish to do also, in that very act which allows her clergy to marry (2). In like manner, I need go no further than the Homily on Fasting, or the ' Table of Vigils, Fasts, and Days ' of Abstinence, to be observed in the year,' prefixed to The Common Prayer-Book, to justify our doctrine and practice, which the Bishop finds fault with, in the eyes of every consistent Church-Protestant. I believe the most severe austerities of our Saints never sur passed those of Christ's precursor, whom he so much commended (3), clothed as he was with hair-cloth, and fed with the locusts of the desert. In a former letter to your Society, I have replied to what the Bishop here says, concerning the deposing of Kings by the Roman Pontiff, and have established facts by which it appears, that more princes were ac tually dispossessed of the whole, or a large part, of their dominions by the pretended Gospel-liberty of the Re formation, within the first fifty years of this being pro claimed, than the Popes had attempted to depose dur- (1) The second Council of Carthage, can. 3, and St. Epiphanius liar. 48 59, trace the discipline of sacerdotal continence up to the Apostles. (2) ' Although it were not only better for the estimation of Priests and ' other Ministers, to live chaste, sole, and separated from women, and the ' bond of marriage, but also they might thereby the better attend to the ad- ' ministration of the Gospel; and it were to be wished that they would wil- ' lingly endeavour themselves to a life of chastity,' &c. 2 Edw. vi. c. 21. See the injunction of Queen Elizabeth, against the admission of women into col leges, cathedrals, &c. in Strype's Life of Parker. See likewise a remarkable instance of her rudeness to that Archbishop's wife. Ibid, and in Nir hoi's Progresses, A. D. 1501. (3) Mat. xi. 9. ICO letter xtvrir. iris; fhe preceding fifteen hundred years of their: Su premacy.— To this accusation another of a1 more alarming nature is tacked, that of oat ' annu-Fr'r'n'g •' the most sacred promises and engagements, when ' made to the prejudice of the Church (l).-' These' ate other words, for the vile hackneyed calunfny of our riot keeping faith with heretics (Q). In refutation of this, I might appeal to the doctrine of our Theologians (3), and to the oaths of the British Catholics ; but 1 choose ra'ther to appeal to historical facts, and to the practical lessons of the leading men by whom these have been conducted. I have mentioned, that when the Catholic Queen Mary came to the throne, a Protestant usurper, Lady Jane, was set up against her, and that the Bishops, Cranmer, Ridley, Latimer, Hooper, Rogers-, Poynet, Sandys, and every other Protestant of any note, broke their allegiance and en gagements to her, for no other reason than because she was a Catholic, and the usurper, a Protestant. On the other hand, when Mary was succeeded by her Protestant sister, Elizabeth, though the Catholics were then far more numerous and powerful than the Protestants, not a hand was raised, nor a seditious sermon preached against her. In the mean time, on the other side of the Tweed, where the new Gospellers had deposed their Sovereign, and usurped her power, their Apostle Knox, publicly preached, that ' neither (1) P. 71. (2) In the Protestant' Charter-school Catechism, which is taught by au thority, the following question and answer occur, p. 9. ' Q. How do Papists ' treat those whorti they call Heretics ? A. They hold that Faith is flot ' to be kept with heretics ; aud that the Pope can absolve subjects from their 1 oath of allegiance to their Sovereigns.' (3) See in particular the Jesuit Becanus De Fide Hareticis prestanda. VARIOUS MISREPRESENTATIONS. 16T ' promise nor oath can oblige any man to obey or 'give assistance to tyrants against God(l);' to which lesson his colleague, Goodman, added: 'It ' Governors fall from God, to the gallows with ' them (2).' A third fellow-labourer in the same Gospel cause, Buchanan, maintained, that ' Princes ' may be deposed by their people, if they be tyrants ' against God and his truth, and that their subjects 'are free from their oaths and obedience (3).' The same, in substance, were the maxims of Calvin, Besa, and the Huguenots of France, in general: the tem poral interest of their religion was the ruling principle of their morality. But, to return to our own country : the enemies of Church and State having hunted down the Earl of Strafford, and procured him to be attainted of High Treason, the King, Charles I, declared, that he could not, in conscience, concur to his death ; when, the case being referred to the Archbishops, Usher and Williams, and three other Anglican Bishops, they decided (in spite of his Majesty's conscience, and his oath to administer justice in mercy) that he might, in conscience, send this innocent Peer to the block, which he did accordingly (4). I should like lo ask (1) In his book addressed to the Nobles and People of Scotland. (2) De Obedient. (8) History of Scotland. — The same was the express doctrine of the Geneva Bible, translated by Coverdale, Goodman, &c. in that city, and in common use among the English Protestants, till King James's reign : for in a note on ver. 12 of 2d Mat these translators expressly say, ' A promi:e ' ought not to be kept, where God's honour, and preaching of his truth ii ' injured.' Hist. Account of Eng. Translations, by A. Johnson, in Watson's Collect, vol. iii. p. 93. (4) Collier's Church Hi, lory, vol ii. p. 801. — On the other hand, when several of the Parliament's soldier:, who had been taken piisuiicr^ al J3rent- PART III. 'J N Ifjo LETTER XLVIII. Bishop Porteus, whether this decision of his predeces sors was not the dispensation of an oath, and the an nulling of the most sacred of all obligations f In like manner, most of the leading men of the nation, with most of the Clergy, having sworn to the Solemn League and Covenant, ' for the more effectual extirpation of 'Popery,' they were dispensed zvith from the keeping of it, by au express clause in the Act of Uniformity (]). But whereas, by a clause of the oath in the same Act, all subjects of the realm, down to constables and school masters, were obliged to swear, that ' It is not lawful^ ' upon any pretence zvhatsoever, to take up arms against ' the King ;' this oath, in its turn, was universally dis pensed with, in the Churches and in Parliament, at the Revolution. I have mentioned these few facts and maxims, concerning Protestant dispensations of oaths and engagements, in case any of your Society, may object, that some Popes have been too free in pro nouncing such dispensations. Should this have been the case, they alone, personally, and not the Catholic Church, were accountable for it, both to God and man. I have often wondered, in a particular manner, at the confidence with which Bishop Porteus asserts and denies facts of ancient Church-History, in opposition to the known truth. An instance of this occurs in the con clusion of the chapter before me, where he says : ' The ' primitive Church did not attempt, for several hun- ' dreds of years, to make any doctrine necessary, which ford, bad sworn never again to bear arms against the King, tbey were ' absolved from that oath,' says Clarendon, * by their divines.' Exan). of Kcal's Hist, by Grey, vol. iii. p. 10. (1) Statute 13 and 11 Car. II, Cap. -1. VARIOUS MISREPRESENTATIONS. 16'3 1 we do not : as the learned well know from their ' writings (1).' The falsehood of this position must strike you, on looking back to the authorities adduced by me from the ancient Fathers and historians, in proof of the several points of controversy which 1 have maintained : but, to render it still more glaring, I will recur to the histories of AERIUS and VIGILAN TIUS, two different heretics of the fourth century. Both St. Epiphanius (2), and St. Augustin (3), rank Aerius among the heresiarchs, or founders of heresy, and both give exactly the same account of his three characteristical errors ; the first of which is avowed by aU Protestants, namely, that 'Prayers and Sacrifices f are not to be offered up for the dead ;' and the two others by most of them; namely, that ' there is no ob- ' ligation of observing the appointed days of fasting, ' and that Priests ought not to be distinguished, in any ' respect, from Bishops(4).' So far were the primitive Christians from tolerating these heresies, that the sup porters of them were denied the use of a place of wor ship, and were forced to perform it in forests and ca verns (5). Vigilantius likewise condemned prayers for the dead, but he equally reprobated prayers to the Saints, the honouring of their relics, and the celibacy of the clergy, together with vows of con tinence in general. Against these errors, which I need not tell you, Dr. Porteus now patronizes, as Vigilantius formerly did, St.Jerom directs all the (1) P. 73. (2) Hasresis 75. (3) De Haeres. torn. vi. Ed. Frob. (4) Ibid. St. John Damascen and St. Isidore equally «ondcnin these tenets as heretical. (5) Fleury;s Hist, ad An. 392. 3N£ J64 LEITEIl XLVIII. thunder of his eloquence, declaring them to be sacri legious, and the author of them to be a detestable heretic (l). The learned Fleury observes, that the impious novelties of this heretic made no proselytes, and, therefore, that there was no need of a Council to condemn them (2). Finally, to convince yourself, Dear Sir, how far the ancient Fathers were from to lerating different communions or religious tenets in the Catholic Church, conformably to the Prelate's monstrous system, of a Catholic Church, composed of all the discordant and disunited sects in Christendom, be pleased to consult again the passages which 1 have collected from the works of the former, in my four teenth letter to your Society ; or, what is still more demonstrative, on this point, observe, in Ecclesiastical History, how the Quartodecimans, the Novatians (S), the Donatists, and the Luciferians, though their re spective errors are mere mole-hills, compared with the mountains, which separate the Protestant communions from ours, were held forth as heretics by the Fathers, and treated as such by the Church, in her Councils. J am, &c. J. M. - (1) Epist. 1 and 2, advcrsus Vigilan. (2) Ad An. 405. (3) St. Cyprian being consulted about the nature of Novatian's errors, answers : ' there is no need of a strict inquiry what errors he teaches while ' he teaches out of the Church.' He elsewhere writes : ' The Church being ' one, cannot be, at the same time, within and without. If she be with ' Novatian, she is not with (Pope) Cornelius; if she be with Cornelius, No- '¦ vatian is not in her.' Epist. 76 ad Mag. 165 LETTER XLIX. To JAMES BROWN, Jun. Esq. ON RELIGIOUS PERSECUTION. DEAR SIR, I promised to treat the subject of Religious Persecution apart ; a subject of the utmost importance in itself, and which is spoken of by the Bishop of London in the following terms : ' They, the ' Romish Church, zealously maintain their claim of ' punishing whom they please to call heretics, with 'penalties, imprisonment, tortures, death (1).'- Ano-. ther writer, whom I have quoted above, says, that this Church ' breathes the very spirit of cruelty and 'murder (2):' indeed most Protestant controvertists seem to vie with each other, in the vehemence and bitterness of the terms, by which they endeavour to affix this most odious charge, of cruelty and murder, on the Catholic Church. This is the favourite topic of preachers, to excite the hatred of their hearer* against their fellow Christians : this is the last re source of baffled hypocrites. If you admit the Pa* pists, they cry, to equal rights, these wretches must and will certainly murder you, as soon as they can : the fourth Lateran Council has established the principle, and the bloody Queen Mary has acted upon it. I. To proceed regularly in this matter : I begin with (1) P. 71. (2) De Coetlogon's Seasonable Caution, p. 15. 165 LETTER XLIX. expressly denying the Bishop of London's Charge; namely, that the Catholic Church 'maintains a claim ' of punishing heretics with penalties, imprisonment, ' tortures, and death ;' and I assert, on the contrary, that she disclaims the power of so doing. Pope Leo the Great, who flourished in the fourth century, writ ing about the Manichean heretics, who, as he asserted, ' laid all modesty aside, prohibiting the matrimonial ' connexion, and subverting all law, human and divine,' says, that ' the ecclesiastical lenity was content, even *in this case, with the sacerdotal judgment, and ' avoided all sanguinary punishments (1),' however the secular Emperors might inflict them for reasons of state. In the same century, two Spanish Bishops, Ithacius and Idacius, having interfered in the capital punishment of certain Priscillian heretics, both St. Ambrose and St. Martin refused to hold communion with them ; even to gratify an Emperor, whose cle mency they were soliciting in behalf of certain clients. Long before their time, Tertullian had taught, that, ' It does not belong to religion to force religion (2);' and a considerable time after, when St. Augustin and his companions, the envoys of Pope Gregory the Great, had converted our King Ethelbert, to the Christian faith, they particularly inculcated to him, not to use forcible means to induce any of his subjects to follow his example (3). But what i|ieed of more authorities on this head, since our canon law, as it stood in ancient times, and as it still stands, renders all those who have actively concurred to the death or (1) Epist. ad Turib. (?) Ad ScapuU (3) Bed. Ecc, Hist. 1. i. c. 2d. PERSECUTION. 167 mutilation of any human being, whether Catholic or heretic, Jew or Pagan, even in a just war, or by exer cising the art of surgery, or by judicial proceedings, irregular ; that is to say, such persons cannot be pro moted to Holy Orders, or exercise those orders, if they have actually received them. Nay, when an eccle siastical Judge or tribunal has, after due examination, pronounced that any person, accused of obstinate he resy, is actually guilty of it, he is required by the ' Church, expressly, to declare in her name, that her power extends no further than such decision ; and, in case the obstinate heretic is liable, by the laws of the State, to suffer death or mutilation, the Judge is re quired to pray for his pardon. Even the Council of Constance, in condemning John Huss of heresy, de clared that its power extended no further (l). II. But, whereas many heresies are subversive of the established governments, the public peace, and1 natural morality, it does not belong to the Church to prevent Princes and States from exercising their just authority in repressing and punishing them, when tin's is judged to be the case; nor would any clergyman incur irregularity by exhorting Princes and Magis trates to provide for those important objects, and the safety of the Church itself, by repressing its distur bers ; provided he did not concur to the death or mu tilation of any particular disturber. Thus it appears that, though there have been persecuting laws in many Catholic States, the Church itself, so far from claim ing, actually disclaims the power of persecuting. III. But Dr. Porteus signifies (2), that the Church (1) Sess. xv. See Labbe's Concil. t. xii. p.. 129. (2) P. 47. 168 LETTER XLIX. itself has claimed this power in the third canon of the Fourth Laterarr Council, A. D. 1215, by the tenor of which, temporal Lords and Magistrates were required to exterminate all heretics from their respective terri tories, under pain of these being confiscated to their Sovereign Prince, if they were laymen, and to their severalchurches, in case they were clergymen. From this canon, it has been, a hundred times over, argued against Catholics, of late years, not only that their Church claims a right to exterminate heretics, but also requires those of her communion, to aid and assist in this work of destruction, at all times, and in all places. But it must first be observed, who were present at this Council, and by whose authority these decrees, of a temporal nature, were passed. There were then pre sent, besides the Pope and the Bishops, either in per son or by their Ambassadors, the Greek and the Latin Emperors ; the Kings of England, France, Hungary, the Sicilies, Arragon, Cyprus, and Jerusalem ; and the representatives of a vast many other Principalities and States: so that, in fact, this Council, was a Congress of Christendom, temporal, as well as spiritual. We must, in the next place, remark the principal business which drew them together. It was the common cause of Christianity and human nature ; -namely, the extir pation of the Manichean heresy ; which taught, that there were two First Principles, or Deities; one of them the creator of devils, of animal flesh, of wine, of the Old Testament, &c. ; the other, the author of good spirits, of the New Testament, &c. ; that unnatural lusts were lawful, but not the propagation of the human species ; that perjury was permitted to them, PERSECUTION; 169 &c. (1). This detestable heresy, which had caused so much wickedness and bloodshed in the preceding- centuries, broke out with fresh fury, in the twelfth century, throughout different parts of Europe, mote particularly in the neighbourhood of Albi, in Langue- doc : where they were supported by the powerful Counts of Thoulouse, Comminges, Foix, and other feudatory Princes ; as also by numerous bodies of ban ditti, called Rotarii, whom they hired for this purpose. Thus strengthened, they set their Sovereigns at de fiance, carrying fire and sword through their do-1 minions, murdering their subjects, particularly the Clergy, burning the Churches and Monasteries ; in short, waging open war with them, and, at the same time, with Christianity, morality, and human na ture itself: casting the Bibles into the jakes, profaning the altar-plate, and practising their detestable rites for the extinction of the human species. It was to put an end to these horrors, that the Great Lateran Council was held, in the year 1215, when the heresy itself was condemned by the proper authority of the Church, and the lands of the feudatory Lords, who protected it, were declared to be forfeited to the So vereign Princes, of whom they were held, by an au thority derived from those Sovereign Princes. The decree of the Council regarded only the prevailing heretics of that time ; who, ' though wearing different ' faces,' being indifferently called Albigens:s, Cathari, Poplicolas, Paterini, Bulgari, Bogomillii, Beguini, Be- (1) See the Protestant historian Moshtim's account of the shcckinz viola- tion of decency and other crimes, of which the Albigenses, Brethren of the Free Spirit, &c. were guilty in the 13lh century. Vol. iii. p. viii PART III. 3 C) 170 LETTER XLIX. guardi, and Brethren of the Free Spirit, &c. were * all tied together by the tails,' as the Council ex presses it, like Sampson's foxes, in the same band of Manicheism (1). Nor was this exterminating Canon ever put in force, against any other heretics except the Albigenses ; nor even against them, except in the case of the above-named Counts. It was never so much as published, or talked of, in these islands : so little have Protestants to fear from their Catholic fellow-subjects, by reason of the third Canon of the Council of Lateran (2). IV- But they are chiefly the Smithfield fires of Queen Mary's reign, which furnish matter for the in exhaustible declamation of Protestant controvertists, and the unconquerable prejudices of the Protestant populace against the- Catholic Religion ; as breathing ' the very spirit of cruelty and murder,' according to the expression of one of the. above-quoted orators. Nevertheless, I have unanswerably demonstrated else where (3), that, ' if Queen Mary wes a persecutor, it ' was not in virtue of the tenets of her religion that she ' persecuted.' I observed, that during almost two years of her reign, no Protestant was molested on account of his religion; that in the instructions, (1) For a succinct, yet clear account of Manicheism, see Bossuet's Varia tions, Book xi ; also, for many additional eixcumstances relating to it, sec Letters to a Prebendary, Letter IV. (2) For an account of the rebellions and antisocial doctrine and practices of the Wickliffites and Hussites, see the last-quoted work, Letter IV; also History of Winchester, vol. i. p. 296. (3) Letters to a Prebendary, Letter IV, on Persecution ; also History ©f Winchester, vol. i. p. 354, &c. See in the former, p. 149, &c. proofs, of the infidelity of the famous martyrologist, John Fox, and of the great abate ments which are to be made ift his account of the Protestant Sufferers-. PERSECUTION. 171 which the Pope sent her for her conduct on the throne, there is not a word to recommend persecution ; nor is there in the Synod, which the Pope's Legate, Cardinal Pole, held at that time, one word, as Burnet remarks, in favour of persecution. This representative of his Holiness even opposed the persecution project, with all his influence, as did King Philip's chaplain also, who even preached against it, and defied the advo cates of it to produce an authority from Scripture in its favour. In a word, we have the arguments, made use of in the Queen's Council, by those advocates for persecution, Gardiner, Bonner, &c. by whose advice it was adopted ; yet none of them pretended, that the doctrine of the Catholic Church required such a mea sure. On the contrary, all their arguments are ground ed on motives of state policy. At the same time, it can not be denied, that the first Protestants, in this, as in other countries, were possessed of, and actuated by a spirit of violence and rebellion. Lady Jane was set up, and supported in opposition to the daughters of King Henry, by all the chief men of the party, both Churchmen and laymen, as I have already observed. Mary had hardly forgiven this rebellion, when a fresh one was raised against her, by the Duke of Suffolk, Sir Thomas Wyat, and all the leading Protestants. In the mean time, her life was attempted by some of them, and her death was publicly prayed for by others ; while Knox and Goodman, on the other side of the Tweed, were publishing books Against the monstrous Regimen of Women, and exciting the people of this country, as well as their own, to put their Jezabel to death. Still, I grant, persecution was not the way to diminish either the number or the violence of the en- 3 0 2 172 LETTER XLIX. thusiastic insurgents. With toleration and prudence, on the part of the governors, the paroxysm of the go verned would quickly have subsided. V. Finally ; whatever may be said of the intolerance of Mary, I trust, that this charge will not be brought against the next Catholic Sovereign, James II. I have elsewhere ( 1 ) shewn, that, when Duke of York, he used his best endeavours to get the Act, De Here- tico Comburendo, repealed, and to afford an asylum to the Protestant exiles, who flocked to England, from France, on the Revocation of the Edict of Nantz, and, in short, that, when King, he lost his crown in the cause of toleration : his Declaration of Liberty of Conscience having been the determining cause of his deposition. But what need of words to disprove the odious calumny, that Catholics ' breathe the spirit of ¦ cruelty and murder, 'and are obliged, by their religion, to be persecutors, when every one of our gentry, who has made the tour of France, Italy, and Germany, has experienced the contrary ; and has been as cordially received by the Pope himself, in his metropolis of Rome, where he is both Prince and Bishop, in the character of an English Protestant, as if he were known to be the most zealous Catholic !— Still, I fear, there are some individuals in your Society, as there are many other Protestants of my acquaintance elsewhere, who cling fast to this charge against Catholics, of persecur tion, as the last resource for their own intolerance; and, it being true, that Catholics have, in some times and places, unsheathed the sword against the hetero dox, these persons insist upon it, that it is an essential (1) History of Winchester, vol. i. p. 437, tetters lo a Prebendary, p. 376. PERSECUTION. 173 part of the Catholic religion to persecute. On the other hand, many Protestants, either from ignorance or policy, now a days, claim for themselves, exclu sively, the credit of toleration. As an instance of this, the Bishop of Lincoln writes : ' I consider to- ' leration as a mark of the true Church, and as a prin- ' ciple, recommended by the most eminent of our Re- ' formers and Divines (]).' In these circumstances, I know but of one argument to stop the mouths of such disputants; which is to prove to them, that Persecu tion has uot only been more generally practised by Protestants than by Catholics, but also, that it has been more warmly defended and supported by the most eminent ' Reformers and Divines' of their party, than by their opponents. I. The learned Bergier defies Protestants to men tion so much as a town, in which their predecessors on becoming masters of it, tolerated a single Catho lic (2). Rousseau, who was educated a Protestant, says, that ( the Reformation was intolerant from its ' cradle, and its authors universally persecutors (3).' Bayle, who was a Calvinist, has published much the same thing. Finally, the Huguenot Minister, Jurieu, acknowledges, that 'Geneva, Switzerland, the Re- ' publics, the Electors and Princes of the Empire, Eno-- ' land, Scotland, Sweden, and Denmark, had all em- ' ployed the power of the State to abolish Popery, and ' establish the Reformation (4).' — But to proceed to other more positive proofs of what has been said : the (1) Charge in 1312. (2) Trait. Hist, et Dogmat. (3) Lettres de la Mont. (4) Tab. Lett, quoted by Bossuet, Avertiss, p. 025. 174 LETTER XLIX. first Father of Protestantism, finding his new Re ligion, which he had submitted to the Pope, con demned by him, immediately sounded the trumpet of persecution and murder against the Pontiff, and all his supporters, in the following terms : ' If we send ' thieves to the gallows, and robbers to the block, ' why do we not fall on those masters of perdition, the ' Popes, Cardinals, and Bishops, with all our force, 'and not give over, till we have bathed our hands in ' their blood?' (1), He elsewhere calls the Pope, 'a ' mad wolf, against whom every one ought to take arms, ' without waiting for an order from the magistrate.' He adds, ' if you fall before the beast has received its ' mortal wound, you will have but one thing to be sorry ' for, that you did not bury your dagger in its breast. ' All that defend him must be treated like a band of ' robbers, be they Kings or be they Cassars (2).' By these and similar incentives, with which the works of Luther abound, he not only excited the Lutherans themselves to propagate their religion by fire and sword, against the Emperor and other Catholic Princes, but also gave occasion to all the sanguinary and frantic scenes, which the Anabaptists exhibited, at the same time, through the lower part of Germany. Coeval with these was the civil war, which another Arch-Reformer, Zuinglius, lighted up in Switzerland, by way of pro pagating his peculiar system, and the persecution which he raised equally against the Catholics and the Anabaptists. Even the moderate Melancthon wrote a book in defence of religious persecution (3), and (1) Ad Silvest. Pereir. (2; Theses apud Sleid. A. D, 1545. Opera Luth. torn. i. (3) Beza, De Hceret. puniend. PERSECUTION. 175 the conciliatory Bucer, who became Professor of Divinity at Cambridge, not satisfied with the burning of the heretic, Servetus, preached that ' his bowels ' ought to have been torn out, and his body chopped to •pieces (l).' II. But the great champion of persecution, every one knows, was the founder of the second great branch of Protestantism, John Calvin. Not content with burning Servetus, beheading Gruet, and persecut ing other distinguished Protestants, Castallo, Bolsec, and Gentilis,(who being apprehended in the neighbour ing Protestant Canton of Berne, was put to death there) he set up a consistorial inquisition at Geneva, for forc ing every one to conform to his opinions, and required, that the Magistrates should punish whomsoever this consistory condemned. He was succeeded in his spirit, as well as in his office, by Beza, who wrote a folio work in defence of Persecution (2). In this he shews, that Luther, Melancthon, Bullinger, Capito, no lesr than Calvin, had written works, expressly in defence of this principle, which, accordingly, was firmly main tained by Calvin's followers, particularly in France. Bossuet refers to the public records of Nismes, Mont- pelier and other places, in proof of the directions, issued by the Calvinist Consistories to their Generals, for 'forcing the Papists to embrace the Reformation by ' taxes, quartering soldiers upon them, demolishing ' their houses, &c.' and he says, ' the wells into which ' the Catholics were flung, and the instruments of ' torture which were used at the first-mentioned city, ' to force them to attend the Protestant sermons, arc (1) Ger. Brandt, Hist. Abreg. Refor. Pais Bas, vol. i. p. 454. (2) De Hsereticis ptiniendis a Civili Magistralu,&c. a Theod, Beza . 176* LETTER XLIX. 'things of public notoriety (1).' In fact, who has not read of the infamous Baron Des Adrets, whose savage sport it was, to torture and murder Catholics, in a Catholic kingdom, and who forced his son literally to wash his bands in their blood ? Who has not heard of the inhuman Jane, Queen of Navarre, who massa cred Priests and Religious persons, by hundreds, merely on account of their sacred character ? In short, Ca tholic France, throughout its extent, and during a great number of years, was a scene of desolation and slaughter, from the unrelenting persecution of its Huguenot subjects. Nor was the spectacle dissimilar in the Low Countries, when Calvinism got a footing in them. Their first Synod, held in 1574, equally pro scribed the Catholics and the Anabaptists, calling upon the Magistrates to support their decrees (2), which decrees were renewed in several subsequent Sy nods. I have elsewhere quoted a late Protestant writer, who, on the authority of existing public records, de* scribes the horrible torments with which Vandermerk and Sonoi, two Generals of the Prince of Orange, put to death incredible numbers of Dutch Catholics (3). Other writers furnish more ample materials of the same kind (4). But while the Calvinist Ministers con tinued to stimulate their Magistrates to redoubled severities against the Catholics (for which purpose, among other means, they translated into Dutch and published the above-mentioned work of Beza) a new object of their persecution arose in the bosom of their (1) Variat. L. x. m. 52. (2) Brandt, vol. i. p. 227. (3) P. 283. Letters to a Prebend, p. 103. (4) See the learned Estius's History of the Martyrs of Gorcum ; De Brandt, &c. PERSECUTION. 177 own Society ; Arminius, Vossius, Episcopius, and some other Divines, supported by the illustrious statesmen, Barnevelt and Grotius, declared against the more rigorous of Calvin's maxims. They would not admit, that God decrees men to be wicked, and then punishes them everlastingly for what they cannot help ; nor that many persons are in his actual graee and favour, while they are immersed in the most enormous crimes. For denying this, Barnevelt was beheaded (1), Grotius was condemned to perpetual imprisonment, and all the Re monstrant clergy, as they were called, were banished from their families and their country, with circum stances of the greatest cruelty, at the requisition of the Synod of Dort. In speaking of Lutheranism, I have passed by many persecuting decrees and practices of its adherents against Calvinists and Zuinglians, and many more of Calvinists against Lutherans ; while both parties agreed in shewing no mercy to the Ana baptists. Before I quit the continent, I must mention the Lutheran kingdoms of Denmark and Sweden, in- both which, as Jurieu has signified above, the Catholic Religion was extirpated, and Protestantism established, by means of rigorous, persecuting laws, which de nounced the punishment of death against the former. Professor Messenius, who wrote about the year IfJOO, mentions four Catholics who had recently been put to death, in Sweden, on account of their religion, and eight others who had been imprisoned and tortured on that account, of whom he himself was one (2). III. To pass over now, to the Northern pai;t of our (1) Diodati, -quoted by Brandt, says that the canons of Dort carr'ie*.! jit the head of Barnevelt. (2) Scandia Illustrat. quoted by Le Brim. Mess. Er.plic. t. iv. p. HO. PART III. 3 P 178 LETTER XLIX. own Island : the first Reformers of Scotland, having deliberately murdered Cardinal Beaton, Archbishop of St. Andrews (1), and riotously destroyed the churches, monasteries, and every thing else, which they termed monuments of Popery, assembled in a tumultuous and illegal manner, and before even their own Religion was established by law, they condemned the Catho lics to capital punishment for the exercise of theirs: ' such strangers,' says Robertson, 'were men, at that ' time, to the spirit of toleration and the laws of hu- ' manity 1' (2). Their chief Apostle was John Knox, an Apostate Friar, who, in all his publications and sermons, maintained, that ' it is not birth, but God's ' election, which confers a right to the throne and to ' magistracy ;' that ' no promise or oath, made to an ' enemy of the truth, that is to a Catholic, is binding;' and that 'every such enem}', in a high station, is to be ' deposed (3).' Not content with threatening to de pose her, he told his Queen, to her face, that the Pro testants had a right to take the sword of justice into their hands, and to punish her, as Samuel slew -Agag, and as Elias slew Jezabel s pro phets (4). Conformably with this doctrine, lie wrote into England, that 'the ' nobility and people were bound in conscience, not ' only to withstand the proceedings of that Jezabel, ' Mary, whom they call Queen, but also to put her to ' death, and all her priests with her (5).' His fellow Apostles, Goodman, Willox, Buchanan, Rough, Black, (1) Gilb. Stuart's Hist of Ref. in Scot. vol. i. p. 47, &c. (2) Ilist. of Scotland, An. 1560. (:'*) See Collier's Eccl. Hist. vol. ii. p. 412. (4) Stuart's Hist. vol. i. p. 59. (5) Cited by Dr. Paterson, in hi- Jcrus, and Babel. PERSECUTION. 179 &c. constantly inculcated to the people the same sedi tious and persecuting doctrine; and the Presbyterian Ministers, in general, earnestly pressed for the execu tion of their innocent Queen, who was accused of a murder, perpetrated by their own Protestant leaders (1), The same unrelenting intolerance was seen among 'the ' most moderate' of their clergy, ' when they were ' assembled by order of King James and his Council ' to inquire, whether the Catholic Earls of Huntly, ' Errol, and their followers, on making a proper con- ' cession, might not be admitted into the Church, and ' be exempt from further punishment r' These Mini sters then answered, that 'Though the gates of mercy * are always open for those who repent, yet, as these ' noblemen had been guilty of idolatry, (the Catholic ' Religion) a crime deserving death by the laws both ' of God and man, the civil Magistrate could not ' legally pardon them, and that, though the Church ' should absolve them, it was his duty to inflict punish- ' ment upon them (2).' But we need not be surprised at any severity of the Presbyterians against Catholics, when, among other penances, ordained by public au thority, against their own members who should break the fast of Lent, whipping in the Church was one (3.) IV. The father of the Church of England, under the authority of the Protector Seymour, Duke of Somerset, was confessedly Thomas Cranmer, whom Henry VIII raised to the Archbishopric of Canterbury ; of whom it is difficult to say, whether his obsequi ousness to the passions of his successive masters, Henry, (1) Stuart's Hist. vol. i. p. 255. (2) Robertson's Hist. Ann. low.. (3) Stuart, vol. ii. p. 94. 3 P 2 180 LET I EI. XL1X. Seymour, and Dudley, or his barbarity to the sectaries who were in his power, was the more odious. There is this circumstance, which distinguishes him from almost every other persecutor, that he actively pro moted the capital punishment, not only of those who differed from him in religion, but also of those who agreed with him in it. It is admitted by his advo cates (]), that he was instrumental, during the reign of Henry, in bringing to the stake the Protestants, Lambert, Askew, Frith, and Allen ; besides condemn ing a great many others to it, for denying the corporal presence of Christ in the Sacrament, which he disbe lieved himself (2) ; and it is equally certain, that dur ing the reign of the child Edward, he continued to convict Arians and Anabaptists capitally, aud to press for their execution. Two of these, Joan Knell and George Van Par, he got actually burnt; pieventing the young King, Edward, from pardoning them, by telling him, that 'Princes being God's deputies, ought ' to punish impieties against him (3).' The two next most eminent Fathers of the English Church were, unquestionably, Bishop Ridley, and Bishop Latimer, both of them noted persecutors, and persecutors of Protestants to the extremity of death, no less than of Anabaptists and other sectaries ! (4). Upon the second establishment of the Protestant Religion in England, when Elizabeth ascended the throne, it was again buttressed up here, as in every (1) Fox, Acts and Monurn. Fuller's Church Hist. b. v. (2) See Letters to a Preb. p. 20G. (3) Burnet's Church Hist. P. ii. b. i. (4) See the proofs of these facts collected from Fox, Burnet, Heylin, and Collier, in Letters to a Preb. Letter V, PERSECUTION. 181 other country, where it prevailed, by the most severe, persecuting laws. I have elsewhere shewn, from authentic sources, that above 200 Catholics were hanged, drawn, and quartered during her reign, for the mere profession or exercise of the religion of their ancestors for almost 1000 years. Of this number 15 were condemned for denying the Queen's spiritual supremacy, 126 for the exercise of their Priestly func tions, and the rest for being reconciled to the Catho lic Church, for hearing Mass, or aiding and abetting Catholic Priests (l). When to these sanguinary scenes are added those of many hundreds of other Catholics, who perished in dungeons, who were driven into exile, or who were stripped of their property, it will appear, that the persecution of Elizabeth's reign, was far more grievous, than that of her sister Mary ; es pecially when the proper deductions are made from the sufferers under the latter (2).-^ Nor was persecution confined to the Catholics; for, when great numbers of foreign Anabaptists, and other sectaries, had fled into England, from the fires and gibbets of their Protestant brethren in Holland, they found their situation much worse here, as they complained, than it had been in their own country. To silence these complaints, the Bishop of London, Edwin Sandys, published a book in vindication of Religious Persecution (3). In short, (1) Certain opponents of mine have publicly objected to me, that these Catholics suffered for High Treason. True ; the laws of persecution declared so: but their only treason consisted in their religion. Thus the Apostles, and other Christian martyrs, were traitors in the eye of the Pagan law; and the Chief Priests declared, with respect to Christ himself; we have a law, and according to that he ought to die. (2) See Letters to a Prebendary, pp. 149, 150. (3) Oer. Brandt, Hist. Reform. Abreg. vol. i. p. 234. 182 LETTER XLIX. the Protestant Church and State concurred to their extirpation. An Assembly of them, to the number of 27, having been seized upon in 1575, some of them were so intimidated as to recant their opinions, some were scourged, two of them, Peterson andTerwort, were burnt to deafh in Smithfield, and the rest banished (1). Besides these foreigners, the English Dissenters were also grievously persecuted. Several of them, such as Thacker, Copping, Greenwood, Barrow, Penry, &c. were put to death, which rigours they ascribed prin cipally to the Bishops, particularly to Parker, Aylmer, Sandys, and Whitgift (2). The last-named, they ac cused of being the chief author of the famous inqui sitorial court, called the Star Chamber, which court, in addition to all its other vexations and severities, em ployed the rack and torture, to extort confession (3). The doctrines and practice of persecution, in England, did not end with the race of Tudor. James I, though he was reproached with being favourable to the Ca tholics, nevertheless signed warrants for 25 of them to be hanged and quartered, and sent 128 of them into banishment, barely on account of their religion; be sides exacting the fine of 201. per month from those who did not attend the Church-Service. Still he was repeatedly called upon by Parliament to put the penal laws in force with greater rigour ; in order, say they, ' to advance the glory of Almighty God, and the ' everlasting honour of your Majesty (4) ;' and he was warned by Archbishop Abbot, against tolerating Ca tholics, in the following terms: "Your Majesty hath (1) Brandt, vol. i. p. 234. Hist, of Churches of Eng. and Scotl. vol. ii. p. 199. (2) Ibid. (3) Moshcim, vol. iv. p. 40. (4) Rushwurth's Collect, vol. i. p. 111. PERSECUTION. 183 ' propounded a toleration of religion. By your act ' you labour to set up that most damnable and heretical ' doctrine of the Church of Rome, the whore of Baby- ' Ion ; — and thereby draw down upon the kingdom 'and yourself God's heavy wrath and indignation(l).' In the mean time, the Puritans complained loudly of the persecution, which they endured from the court of High Commission, and particularly from Archbishop Bancroft, and the Bishops Neale of Lichfield, and King of London. They charged the former of these, with not only condemning Edward Wightman for his opinions, but also, with -getting the King's warrant for his execution, who was accordingly burnt at Lich field ; and the latter, with treating, in the same way, Bartholomew Legat, who was consumed in Smith- field (2 j;. The same unrelenting spirit of persecution, which had disgraced the addresses presented to James, prevailed in those of Parliament and of many Bishops to his son Charles. One of these; signed by the re nowned Archbishop Usher, and eleven other Irish Bishops of the establishment, declares, that 'to give ' toleration to Papists, is to become accessary to su- 'perstition, idolatry, and, the perdition of souls; and ' that, therefore, it is a grievous sin (3).' At length the Presbyterians, and Independents, getting the up per hand, had an opportunity of giving full scope to their characteristic intolerance. Their Divines, being assembled at Sion college, condemned, as an error, the (1) Rushworth's Collect. (2) Chandler's^Inlroduct. to Limborche's Hist, of Inquis. p. 80. Neal'* Hist, of Purit. vol. ii. (3) Lcland's Hist, of Ireland, vol. ii. p. 482. Neal's H.-t. vol. ii. p. -it ^ 184 LETTER XLIX. doctrine of toleration, ' under the abused term,' as they expressed it, ' of liberty of conscience (l).* Conformably with this doctrine, they procured from their Parliament a number of persecuting acts, from those of fining, up to those of capital punishment. The objects of them were not only Catholics, but also Church-of-England-men (2), Quakers, Seekers, and Arians. In the mean time, they frequently appointed national fasts to atone for their pretended guilt, in be ing too tolerant (3). Warrants for the execution of four English Catholics, were extorted from the King, while he was in power, and near twenty others were publicly executed under the Parliament and the Pro tector. This hypocritical tyrant afterwards invading Ireland, and being bent on exterminating th? Catholic population there, persuaded his soldiers, that they had a divine commission for this purpose, as the Israelites liad to exterminate the Cananites (4). To make an end of the Clergy, he put the same price upon a Priest's as upon a wolf's head (5). Those Puritans who, previously to the Civil War, had sailed to North America, to avoid persecution, set up a far more cruel one there; particularly against the Quakers; whip ping them, cropping their ears, boring their tongues with a hot iron, and hanging them. We have the names of four of these sufferers, one of them a wo man, who were executed at Boston (6). (1) Hist, of Churches of Eng. and Scoll. vol. iii. (2) Ibid. (3) Ibid. Neal's Hist. (4) Anderson's Royal Geneal. quoted by Curry, vol. ii. p. 11. (5) Ibid. p. 63. (6) Neal's Hist of Churches. PERSECUTION. 1S5 IV. During the whole of the war, which the Puri tans waged against the King and Constitution, the Catholics behaved with unparalleled loyalty. It has been demonstrated (l), that three-fifths of the Noble men and Gentlemen who lost their lives on the side of Royalty, were Catholics, and that more than half of the landed property, confiscated by the rebels, be longed to Catholics. Add to this, that they were chiefly instrumental in saving Charles II, after his defeat at Worcester : they had, consequently, reason to expect, that the Restoration of the King and Con stitution, would have brought an alleviation, if not an end, of their sufferings. But the contrary proved to be the case : for then all parties seemed to have com bined to make them the common object of their per secuting spirit and fury. In proof of this, I need alledge nothing more, than that two different Parlia ments voted the reality of Oates's Plot ! and that eigh teen innocent and loyal Catholics, one of them a Peer, suffered the death of traitors, on account of it : to say nothing of seven other priests, who, about that time, were hanged and quartered for the mere exercise of their priestly functions. Among the absurdities of that sanguinary plot, such as those of shooting the King with silver bullets, and invading the Island with an army of pilgrims from Compostella, &c. (2), it was not the least, to pretend that the Catholics wished. to kill the King at all ; that King whom they had heretofore saved in Staffordshire, and whom they well knew to be secretly devoted to their Religion. But (1) Lord Castlemain's Catholic Apology. (2) Echard's Hist. PART III, 3Q 186 LETTER XLIX. any pretext was good which would serve the purposes of a persecuting faction. These purposes were, to exclude Catholics, not only from the throne, but also from the smallest degree of political power, down to that of a constable ; and to shut the doors of both Houses of Parliament against them. The faction suc ceeded in its first design by the Test Act, and in its second, by the Act requiring the Declaration against Popery ; both obtained at a period of national deli rium and fury. What the spirit of the Clergy was, at that time, with respect to the oppressed Catholics, ap peared at their solemn procession at Sir Edmundbury Godfrey's funeral (l), and still appears in the three folio volumes of invective and misrepresentation then published, under the title of A Preservative against Popery. On the other hand, such was the unchristian hatred of the Dissenters against the Catholics, that they promoted the Test Act with all their power(2), though no less injurious to themselves than to the Ca tholics ; and on every occasion, they refused a tolera tion which might extend to the latter(3). — There is no need of bringing down the history of persecution in this country, to a later period than the Revolution, at which time, as I observed before, a Catholic King was deposed, because he would not be a persecutor. Suffice it to say, that the number of penal laws against the professors of the ancient Religion, and founders of the Constitution of this country, conti nued to increase in every reign, till that of his present Majesty. In the course of this reign most of the old (1) North's Exam. Echard. (2) Ned's Hist, of Puritans, vol. iv. Hist, of Churches, vol. iii. (3) Ibid. PERSECUTION. 187 persecuting laws have been repealed, but the two last- mentioned, enacted in a moment of delirium, which Hume represents as our greatest national disgrace, I mean the impracticable Test Act, and the unintelligi ble Declaration against Popery, are rigidly adhered to under two groundless pretexts. The first of these is, that they are necessary for the support of the Esta blished Church : and yet it is undeniable, that this Church had maintained its ground, and had. flourished much more during the period which preceded these laws, than it has ever done since that event. - The second pretext is, that the withholding of honours and emoluments is not persecution. On this point, let a Protestant dignitary of first-rate talents be heard : ' We agree, that persecution, merely for conscience ' sake, is against the genius of the gospel : and so is ' any law for depriving men of their natural and civil ' rights, which they claim as men. We are also ready ' to allow, that the smallest negative discouragements, ' for uniformity's sake, are so many persecutions. An ' incapacity by law for any man to be made a judge or ' a colonel, merely on point of conscience, is a negative ' discouragement, and, consequently, a real persecu- 'tion,' &c. (1). In the present case, however, the persecution, which Catholics suffer from the disabilities in question, does not consist so much in their being deprived of those common privileges and advantages, as in their being held out by the Legislature, as unzvov thy of them, and thus being reduced to the condition of an inferior cast, in their own country, the country (1) Dean Swift's works, vol. viii. p. 58. 3 Q2 188 LETTER XLIX. of freedom : this they deeply feel, and cannot help feeling. V. But to return to my subject: I presume, that if the facts and reflections, which I have stated in this letter, had occurred to the R. Rev. Prelates, men tioned at the beginning of it, they would have lowered, if not quite altered, their tone on the present subject. The Bishop of London would not have charged Ca tholics with claiming a right to punish those whom they call heretics, ' with penalties, imprisonment, tor- ' tines, and death:' nor would the Bishop of Lincoln have laid down ' toleration as a mark of the True ' Church, and as a principle, recommended by the most ' eminent Reformers and (Protestant) Divines.' At all events, I promise myself, that a due consideration of the points here suggested, will efface the remaining prejudices of certain persons of your Society against the Catholic Church, on the score of her alledged ' spi-. c rit of persecution, and of her supposed claim to punish 1 the errors of the mind with fire and sword.' They must have seen, that she does not claim, but that, in her very General Councils, she has disclaimed all power of this nature ; and that, in pronouncing those to be obstinate heretics, whom she finds to be such, she always pleads for mercy, in their behalf, when they are liable to severe punishment from the secular power : a conduct which many eminent Protestant Churchmen, were far from imitating, in similar circumstances. They must have seen, moreover, that, if persecuting laws have been made and acted upon by the Princes and Magistrates in many Catholic countries, the same conduct has been uniformly practised in every. persecution; 189 country, from the Alps to the Arctic Circle, in which Protestants, of any description, have acquired the power of so doing. But, if, after all, the friends alluded to, should not admit of any material dif ference, on one side or the other, in this matter, I will here point out to them two discriminating cir cumstances of such weight, as niust, at once, decide the question about persecution in disfavour of Pro testants. In the first place, when Catholic States and Princes have persecuted Protestants, it was done in favour of an ancient Religion, which had been established in their country, perhaps, a thousand or fifteen hundred years, and which had long preserved the peace, order, and morality of their respective subjects; and when, at the same time, they clearly saw, that any attempt to alter this religion would, unavoidably, produce incalculable disorders, and sanguinary contests among them. On the other hand, Protestants, every where, persecuted in behalf of New Sytems, in opposition to the established laws of the Church, and of the respective states. Not content with vindicating their own freedom of worship, they endeavoured, in each country, by persecution, to force the professors of the old religion to abandon it and adopt theirs; and they acted in the same way by their fellow Protestants, who had adopted opinions different from their own. In many countries, where Calvinism got a head, as in Scotland, in Holland, at Geneva, and in France, they were riotous mobs, which, under the direction of their Pastors, rose in rebellion against their lawful Princes, and having secured their independence, proceeded to sanguinary extremities against the Catholics. }Q0 LETTER XLIX. In the second place, if Catholic States and Princes have enforced submission to their Church by persecu tion, they were fully persuaded, that there is a Divine authority in this Church to decide in all Controversies of religion^ and that those Christians who refuse to hear her voice, when she pronounces upon them, are obsti nate heretics. But on what ground can Protestants persecute Christians of any description whatsoever ? Their grand rule and fundamental charter is, that the Scriptures were given by God for every man to interpret them, as he judges best. If, therefore, when I hear Christ declaring, Take ye and eat, this is my body, I believe what he says ; with what consistency can any Protestants require me, by pains or penalties, to swear that I do not believe it, and that to act conformably with this persuasion is idolatry ?— But religious per secution, which is every where odious, will not much longer find refuge in the most generous of nations : much less will the many victorious arguments which demonstrate the True Church of Christ, our common Mother, who reclaimed us all from the barbarous rites of Paganism, be defeated by the calumnious outcry, that she herself, is a bloody Moloch, that requires human victims. I am, Sec. J; M. 191 LETTER L. To tht FRIENDLY SOCIETY of NEW COTTAGE. CONCLUSION. MY FRIENDS AND BRETHREN IN CHRIST, Having, at length, in the several letters addressed to your worthy President Mr. Brown, and others of your Society, completed the task which, eight months ago, you imposed upon me ; I address this, my concluding letter, to you, in com mon, as a slight review of the whole. 1 observed to you, that, to succeed in any inquiry, it is necessary to know and to follow the right method of making it. Hence, I entered upon the present important search after the truths of the Christian Revelation, with a discussion of the rules or methods, followed, for this purpose, by different classes of Christians. Having taken for granted the following maxims, — that Christ has appointed some rule or method of learning his revelation; — that this rule must be an unerring one; and that it must be adapted to the capacities and situations of mankind, in general ; I proceeded to shew, that a supposed, private spirit, or particular inspiration, is not that rule ; because this persuasion has led numberless fanatics, in every age, since that of Christ, into the depths of error, folly, and wickedness of every kind. — I proved, in the second place, that the written word or scripture, according to each one's conception of its meaning, is not that rule; because it is not adapted to the capacities and situations J0.2 LETTER L. of the bulk of mankind ; a great proportion of them not being able to read the Scripture, and much less to form a connected sense of a single chapter of it; and, because innumerable Christians have, at all times, by following this presumptuous method, given into heresies, impieties, contradictions, and crimes, almost as numerous and flagrant as those of the above-men tioned fanatics. — Finally, I demonstrated, that there is a two-fold word of God, the unwritten and the writ ten ; that the former was appointed by Christ, and made use of by the Apostles, for converting natious ; and that it was not made void by the inspired Epistles and Gospels, which some of the Apostles, and the Evangelists, addressed, for the most part, to particular churches or individuals ; that the Catholic Church is the divinely commissioned Guardian and Interpreter of the word of God, in both its parts ; and that, there fore, the method, appointed by Christ for learning what he has taught, on the various articles of his Re ligion, is to HEAR THE CHURCH propounding them to us from the whole of his Rule. This method, I have shewn, continued to be pointed out by the Fa thers and Doctors of the Church, in constant succes sion, and that it is the only one which is adapted to the circumstances of mankind, in general ; the only one, which leads to the peace and unity of the Chris tian Church; and the only one, which affords tran quillity and security to individual Christians during life, and at the trying hour of their dissolution. At this point, my labours might have ended ; as the Catholic Church alone follows the Right Rule, and the Right Rule infallibly leads to the Catholic Church. But, since Bishop Porteus, and other Protestant CONCLUSION. 193 controvertists, raise cavils, as to which is the True Church ; and whereas this is a question, that admits of a still more easy and more triumphant answer, than that concerning the Right Rule of Faith, I have made it the subject of a second series of Letters, with which, I flatter myself, the greater part of you are acquainted. In fact, no inquiry is so easy, to an attentive and up right Christian, as that which leads to the discovery of the True Church of Christ; because, on one hand, all Christians agree, in their common Creeds, concerning the characters, or marks, which she bears ; and be cause, on the other hand, these marks are of an exteri or and splendid kind, such as require no extensive learning or abilities, and little more than the use of our senses and common reason, to discern them. In short, among the numerous and "jarring societies of Christi* ans, [all pretending to have found out the truths of Revelation] to ascertain which is the True Church of Christ, that infallibly possesses them, we have only to observe, which among them is distinctively, ONE, HOLY, CATHOLIC, and APOSTOLICAL;— and the discovery is made. — In treating of these characters, or marks, I said it was obvious to every beholder, that there is no bond of union whatever among the different Societies of Protestants ; and that no articles, canons, oaths, or laws, have the force of confining the members of any one of them, as experience shews, to a uniformity of belief, or even profession, in a single kingdom or island ; while the great Catholic Church, spread as it is over the face of the globe, and consisting, as it does, of all nations, and tribes, and peoples, and tongues, is strictly united toge ther, in the same faith, the same sacraments, and the PART III. 3 R ]04 LETTER L. same church- government ; in short, that it demonstra tively exhibits the first mark of the True Church, Unity. — With respect to the second mark, Sanctity, I shewed, that she, alone, teaches and enforces the whole doctrine of the Gospel ; that she is the mother of all the Saints, acknowledged as such by Protestants themselves ; that she possesses many Means of attain ing to sanctity, which the latter disclaim ; and that God himself attests the truth of this Church, by the miracles with which, from time to time, he illustrates her exclusively. And, whereas many eminent Protes tant writers, have charged the Catholics with decep tion and forgery on this head, I have unanswerably retorted the charge upon themselves. — No words were wanting to shew, that the Catholic Church bears the glorious name of CATHOLIC, and very few to de monstrate, that she is Catholic or Universal, with re spect both to place and time, and that she is also Apos tolical. The latter point, however, I exhibited in a more evident and sensible manner, by means of a sketch of An Apostolical Tree, or Genealogical Table of the Church, which I sent you, shewing the succession of her Pontiffs, her most eminent Bishops, Doctors and Saints, as also that of the most notorious heretics and schismatics, who have been lopped off from this Tree, in every age, from that of the Apos tles down to the present. ' No Church, but the ' Catholic, can exhibit any thing of this kind,' as Tertullian reproached the seceders of his time. Un der this head, you must have observed, in particular, the want of an Apostolical succession of Ministry, under which I shewed that all the Protestant Societies labour; and their want of success in attempting CONCLUSION. 195 the work of the Apostles, the conversion of Pagan nations. The third series of my letters has been employed in tearing off the hideous mask, with which calumny and misrepresentation had disfigured the fair face of Christ's true Spouse, the Catholic Church. In this endeavour, I trust, I have been completely successful, and that there is not one of your Society, who will any more reproach Catholics with being Idolaters, on account of their re spect for the Memorials of Christ and his Saints, or of their desiring the prayers of the latter ; or on account of the adoration they pay to the divine Jesus, hidden under the Sacramental veils. Nor will they hereafter, accuse us of purchasing, or otherwise procuring leave to commit sin, or the previous pardon of sins, to be committed ; or, in short, of perfidy, sedition, cruelty, or systematic wickedness of any kind. So far from this, I have reason to hope, that the view of the Church herself, which I have exhibited to your Society, instead of the caricature of her, which Dr. Porteus, and other bigotted controvertists have held up to the public, has produced a desire in several of them to return to the communion of this original Church; bearing, as she clearly does, all the marks of the True Church; gifted, as she mani festly is, with so many peculiar helps for salvation ; and possessing the only safe and practicable rule for ascer taining the truths of Revelation. The consideration which, I understand, has struck some of them, in the most forcible manner, is that, which I suggested from my own knowledge and experience, as well as from the observation of the eminent writers whom I named; that No Catholic, at the near approach of death, is ever found desirous of dying in any other religion, zvhile 3 R 2 igtj LETTER L. numbers of Protestants, in that situation, seek to be reconciled to the Catholic Religion. Some of your number have said, that, though they are of opinion that the Catholic Religion is the true one, yet they have not that evidence of the fact, which they think sufficient to justify a change in so important a point as that of Religion. — God forbid that I should advise any person to embrace the Ca tholic Religion, without having sufficient evidence of its truth : but I must remind the persons in question, that they have not a metaphysical evidence, nor a mathematical certainty of the truth of Christianity in general. In fact, they have only a high moral evi dence and certainty of this truth : for, with all the miracles and other arguments, by which Christ and his Apostles proved this divine system, it was still a stumbling block to the Jezvs, and folly to the Gentiles, 1 Cor. i. 23. In short, according to the observation of St. Augustin, there is light enough in it, to guide the sincere faithful, and obscurity enough, to mislead perverse unbelievers ; because, after all, faith is not merely, a divine illustration of the understanding, but also, a divine, and yet voluntary motion of the will. Hence, if, in travelling through this darksome vale, as Locke, I think, observes with respect to Revelation in general, God is pleased to give us the light of the Moon or of the Stars, we are not to stand still on our journey, because he does not afford us the light of the Sun. The same is to be said, with respect to the evidence in favour of the Catholic Re ligion : it is moral evidence of the first quality ; far superior to that on which we manage our temporal affairs, and guard our lives; and not, in the least, CONCLUSION. 1.0/ below that which exists for the truth of Christianity, at large. — At all events, it is wise to choose the safer part ; and it would be madness to act otherwise, when eternity is at stake. The great advocates of Chris tianity, St. Augustin, Pascal, Abbadie, and others, argue thus, in recommending it to us, in preference to in fidelity : now, the same argument evidently holds good, for preferring the Catholic Religion to every Pro testant system. The most eminent Protestant Divines, such as Luther, Melancthon, Hooker, Chillingworth, with the Bishops, Laud, Taylor, Sheldon, Blandford, and the modern Prelates, Marsh and Porteus himself, all acknowledge, that salvation may be found in the communion of the original Catholic Church : but no divine of this Church, consistently with her charac- teristical Unity, and the constant doctrine of the Holy Fathers and of the Scripture itself, as I have elsewhere demonstrated, can allow, that salvation is to be found out of this communion ; except in the case of invinci ble ignorance. It remains, My Dear Friends and Brethren, for each of you to take his and her part: but remember, that the part you severally take, is taken for ETERNITY ! On this occasion, therefore, if ever, you ought to reflect and decide seriously and conscientiously, dismissing all worldly respects, of whatever kind, from your minds ; for zvhat exchange shall a man receive for his soul ! (1) and what will the prejudiced opinion of your fellow mortals avail you at the tribunal, where we are all so soon to appear ! and in the vast abyss of eternity in which we shall quickly be all ingulfed ! Will any of (1; Mat. xvi. ci0. 198 LETTER L. them plead your cause at the bar ? Or will your pu nishment be more tolerable from their sharing in it ? Finally, with all the fervour and sincerity of your souls, beseech your future Judge, who is now your merciful Saviour, to bestow upon you that light to see your way, and that strength to follow it, which he merited for you, when he hung, for three hours, your agonizing victim, on the cross. Adieu, My Dear Friends and Brethren: we shall soon meet together at the tribunal I have mentioned ; and be assured, that I look forward to that meeting with a perfect confidence, that you and I, and the Great Judge himself, shall all concur, in approbation of the advice I now give you. I am, &c. W , May 29, 1802. J. M. THE END OF THE THIRD AND LAST PART. A POSTSCRIPT TO THE SECOND EDITION OP THE ADDRESS TO THE RIGHT REV. LORD BISHOP OF ST. DAVID'S, OCG-ASIONED BY HIS LORDSHIP'S ' ONE WORD TO THE REV. DR. MILNER.7 My Lord, Should a grave and dignified author be found unsettled in his opinions and contradictory in his assertions, he would unavoidably puzzle his readers to make out his meaning, and distress his literary opponents to preserve a due respect towards him; but much more so, should such a venerable character descend to the regions of burlesque and of ridiculous absurdity. In the course of last summer, the Right Reverend Bishop of St. David's published, what he called, THE PROTESTANT'S CATECHISM, a work professedly intended, not only to defeat the claims of them Catholics to more extensive religious and civil freedom, but also to deprive them of that portion of it which they actually enjoy. Among the other articles, announced in The Table of Contents, at the head of this work, is the following : ' Sectiou ' the 24th : Means of co-operating with the laws for preventing ' the danger and increase of Popery.' From this and other pas sages in bis Lordship's work, we bad too much reason to fear, tliat he was disposed to vote for and promote, to the utmost of 200 POSTSCRIPT. his power, the re-enactment of Elizabeth's sanguinary Statutes 'against us : which fear was augmented by his twice quoting the following awful words fram Milton's prose works : ' Popery, as ' being idolatrous, is not to be tolerated, either in public or in 'private : it must now be thought how to remove it, and hinder ' the growth thereof. If they say that, by removing their idols, ' we violate their consciences, zee have no warrant to regard ' conscience, which is not grounded on Scripture.' The adop tion of these intolerant sentiments by a Lord of Parliament na turally alarmed us, not barely for our own lives, that is to say, for those of five millions of his Majesty's European subjects, who, though they are not idolaters, yet pass for such in his Lordship's eyes, but also for the. lives of fifty more millions of His Majesty's subjects in Asia, Africa and America, who are, in the strict sense of the word, idolaters. Accordingly, when I had read the Contents of the Catechism, I hastily turned over the leaves of it to page 54, where these Contents had informed ine I should find the means in question, that is to say, the precise nature and extent of the religious persecution with which the Bishop of St. David's threatens us. But, instead of finding these, 1 met with the following note : 'The means of co-operating with ' the laws for preventing the danger and increase of Popery, in- ' tended for the Conclusion, as noticed in The Table of Contents, ' being intimately connected with the credit and usefulness of our ' Ecclesiastical establishment, as I conceive, but admitting a ' difference of opinion, are omitted for further consideration.' Now, my Lord, I appeal to your Lordship's knowledge of lite rature, whether another author can be named, who in the same Work exhibits such an opposition of sentiment and language, as this Prelate does in his Catechism ? In a word, can either his readers or his critics pay any serious attention to what he writes, when it is evident that he has not made up his mind, and contradicts himself concerning it f Soon after the appearance of this Catechism, its Right Rev. author advertised, at the head of the Gentleman's Magazine, a new work, as being then actually in the press, under the title of THE GRAND SCHISM. Being then engaged in answering POSTSCRIPT. C01 the Catechism^ I own, I hailed this promise of fresh paia,lr>\. -:, to support those which I was refuting; for I was pcrlecily aware that the farther his Lordship advanced in the thorny and miry lane, in which he was resolved lo walk, the more he would get entangled in contradictions, and the deeper he would sink into absurdity. Accordingly, month after month, I enquired of all his publishers for The Bishop of St. David's GRfSD SCHISM : but none of them had heard a word about it. In the end, it appeared that his Lordship had changed his mind about this publication also; but, whether ' for the credit and ' usefulness of the Establishment,' or his own, he best knows. Hitherto the Prelate had not, to my knowledge, taken any pub/- lic notice of my End to Controversy, or of my Address to him, at the beginning of it; but, meeting soon after with The Pro testant Advocate 'sRelrospect for October , I found them both men tioned by his Lordship, or by some one else, who professed to know his mind, and who was evidently imbued with his bigotted notions, in the following manner. Speaking of this chef d'auvre, as the Prelate or his intimate friend sarcastically calls the present work, he says : ' The Address is made to the ' Bishop of St. David's in a style of peculiar acrimony and ' insolence, assuredly intended to prevent that most estimable ' and learned Prelate from descending to notice such an arro- ' gant writer. Then he will cry Victory, and his partizans will ' re-echo the exclamation, and will attribute to their arguments ' what is due only to their insolence.' Now, my Lord, as I know that this is not the general character of my publication, and, otherwise, as I feel that no language can be too strong in arguing with any man who himself has the insolence to tell me that 1 am a traitor and an idolater, when I know and have de monstrated the contrary, I considered the passage, I have quoted, as an apology for the Prelate's declining lo meet inc in the field of argument; and such I believe to have been his in tention, till very lately, when he again changed his mind, aud put forth his THREE WORDS ON GENERAL THORN TON'S SPEECH, AND ONE WORD ON DOCTOR MILNER'S END OF CONTROVERSY: which work, it ?ART in; 3 S, £Q-2 POSTSCRIPT. self betrays the greatest unsteadiness and inconsistency in its author. In fact, THE THREE WORDS take up nine octavo pages, and the ONE WORD fourteen ! It is true, the Prelate excuses himself for 'expanding', as he calls it, his ONE WORD ; but could he not, while the manuscript was in his possession, have made his title accord with his work; as, in a former instance, he might have made his Table of Contents agree with the Sections of his Catechism ! But, after all, such instances of fickleness, are not calculated to raise more than a smile at any grave and venerable character, who might exhibit them; but, should such a character, with a m'tre on his head, and a Catechism in his hand, begin an Epis copal lecture with the travesty or burlesque of an immoral sen timent, borrowed from a loose poet(l), and should we hear him venting, with oracular sententiousness and solemnity, a great number of whimsical falsehoods and glaring contradic tions ; what educated man or woman could refrain from laughing in his face ? Indeed who could suppose that such a personage meant any thing else but to be laughed at? No*, my Lord, has not the Public lately witnessed the verification of this sup position ? In fact, what other lectures does this burlesquing Prelate, alluded to, deliver, as a system of religious instructions to the ignorant Welsh Jumpers, English Methodists, Baptists, Independents, 8cc. but these: I bring you here, good people, a new Catechism, and Three Words and One Word more, in de-r fence of it, which I have just composed, for your common use. This Catechism will not perplex you with any articles of belief, concerning God, or Christ, or Redemption, or Grace ; nor will jt incommode you with any ordinances of the Commandments, (1) The motto of the Bishop's last theological lecture is the following: ' Let him write now who never wrote before : ' Let those, who always wrote, now write the more. — Trav. Anon.' These lines are burlesqued from the following, which are inscribed on the Temple of Venus, in certain celebrated gardens, and are borrowed from the pervigilium Veneris, ascribed to Catullus : ' Cras amet, qui nunquam amavit : ' Quique amavit, cras amet.' See the translation of this distich in Parnel's Poems. POSTSCRIPT. 203 the Sacraments, the love of God and man, and the like: it re quires nothing of you but to adhere to your common Protestancy; which essentially consists in two points ; first, in ' the abjuration ' of Popery and the exclusion of Papists from all power, ecclesi- ' astical or civil(\) :' and secondly, in ' holding that the worship ' of the Church of Rome is idolatrous : for they, who do not hold ' this latter doctrine, are not Protestants, whatever they may pro- ' fess to be (2).' You have hitherto believed that the Catholics (as all the zeorld calls them, but whom [call Papists) existed before the Protestants, and, unfortunately, all zcriters of all countries, ancient and modern, have combined to propagate this false opi nion ; but I, the present Bishop of St. David's, assure you, upon my own authority, that, ' the Catholics are not our elder but our ' younger brothers (3) :' that ' their Religion, consisting, as it ' does, in acknowledging the Pope's supremacy (4) is a novelty of ' the seventh century (5).' Hence you clearly see that the Pro testants abjured Popery and excluded the Papists from all power, six hundred years before Popery was invented: you see, moreover, that all their Popes, to the number of sixty-six, who lived during those ages, and, among the rest, Gregory the Great, ' the most learned and virtuous of the Roman Popes (6),' whose missionaries converted our ancestors from Paganism, were all Protestants. But, though Gregory himself zeas a Protestant and ' reprobated the supremacy (7),' yet, his missionary, Augustin and his other Papal envoys, laboured to bring over our British and (1) Prot. Catech. p. 12. (2) Ibid. p. 46. (3) THREE WORDS, p. 17. (4) Catech. p. 11. (5) Ibid. p. 14. — N. B. This learned Prelate, contradicting himself, says in another page of his Catechism, p. 22, that ' the Papal domination did not ' exist before the time of Hildebrand, whom he calls Clement VII, in the eleventh century.' Now, we have hitherto been taught that Clement VII was not chosen Pope till the year 1523, and that he was the Pope who refused to divorce Henry VIII from his lawful wife, and thus gave occasion to the English schism ! What a system of new lights is this Protestant's Catechism ! (6) Catech. p. 16. (7) Ibid. S S 2 204 POSTSCRIPT. Irish Bishops lo submit to his supremacy, that is to embrace P&> pery (I) ! You are further to learn that, althongh Popery is essentially Idolatry, it did not become a schism till the sixteenth century ! ' Happy would it be if their (the Catholics) eyes ' could be opened to the false foundations of a foreign jurisdic- ' tion, which led to that most unnalional schism of the sixteenth ' century, and could be induced to repair the evils of their past ' defection, by returning to the bosom of their Mother Church ' in England and Ireland ('&) !' But, alas ! these ' Catholics ' separated from their Mother Church, and this separation was 'THE GRJND SCHISM of the sixteenth century (3).' Such, my Lord, are the humorous self-confuting lectures which this good-natured Bishop puts on his Mitre to deliver to us in. his Protestant's Catechism ; and which, besides the amusement they afford us, inform us of what I so much wanted to learn, namely at what period the Prelate dates the defection of Catholics from the Protestant Church, and the commencement of his Grand Schism. It is probable, however, that some difficulties which he met with in bringing the reigns of Queen Mary and Oliver Cromwell in England, as well as that of Francis I, in France, and of Philip II, in Holland, into his system, caused him to give up his promised work on the Grand Schism in despair. In proof, however, that his Lordship was serious, when he published his Catechism, he offers different pleas in his Three IFords, aud One Word. He says, in the first place: ' If I ' taught nothing about God, or Christ, or the commandments, ' in my Catechism, Dr. M. may see these subjects treated in ' some of my other works (4).' To this I answer, very possibly this may be the case ; still, a Bishop's Catechism, which con tains not a word of Christian doctrine or practice, and which teaches nothing but intolerance and persecution, is an unexam pled phenomenon in Christianity. — Besides this, I may say, that 1 hav% applied at the shops of all the Bishop's pub lishers lo purchase some of his best publications, and at the (1) Catech. T. CI. (2) Three Words, Advertism. p. iv. (3) Do. p. 16. (4) Do. p. 19., POSTSCRIPT. 205 shop in the Strand, No. 107, barely fo get a sight of them, without success.— The Prelate adds, 'There is, at least, one ' great moral and practical lesson inculcated in the Protestant's 1 Catechism, which Dr. M. has overlooked, though taught by ' St. Peter himself, namely, submission to the king's entire ' sovereignty (1).' — And does the Right Rev. author of the Catechism alledge this, in proof of his seriousness in composing and publishing it, which, if it means any thing, evidently means that we are always to submit the business of Religion to the supreme power of the state, whether Christian, Jewish, or Pagan ! In fact, did St. Peter so submit, when he answered the Magistrates, who had forbidden him and his fellow Apostles to preach the name of Christ : We ought to obey God rather than men, Acts v. 29. ? And if the first Protestants had adopted this doctrine, may we not presume, that the Bishop of St. David's would be found, at the present day, delivering lectures of an opposite tenor to those contained in his Protestant's Catechism ? But the Prelate advances in his career, so far as to say : * The six and thirty pages addressed to the author of the Pro- ' testant's Catechism, afford no answer to that Catechism, ' and invalidate none of his positions (3).' — Heu prisca fides ! Heu Candida Veritas! whither are you fled, when a Chris tian Bishop, professing * to follow truth, whithersoever she * leads in the utmost sincerity and ardour of his soul (4),' with the Protestant Catechism in one hand, and the Address td the Bishop of St. David's in the other, can deliberately affirm, that the latter work is no answer to the former, and that it does not so much as invalidate its positions ! Is it then no answer to his loose conjectures concerning St. Paul's having visited Britain, and his still more groundless assertion of St. Paul having con- Tei'ted its inhabitants, to refer to the positive testimony of all ¦the original writers of our history, British, Saxon, Roman, and Gallic, in proof that the Britons were generally converted by Fugatius and Duvianus, legates of Pope Eleutherius, jn the (1) P. 20. (2) P. 15. (3) P. 15. (4) P. 20, 206 POSTSCRIPT. second century f — Does it not invalidate his positions (o trace a succession of communications with, and of submission to the See of Rome, on the part of the British Bishops, by their fre quenting her synods and receiving her legales, and to demon strate, that even the Prelate's own predecessor in the See of St. David's, and his favourite author, Giraldus Cambrensis, claimed before the Pope himself, in the twelfth century, to have lega tine jurisdiction throughout Wales, by the grant of St. Ger- manus, one of these Papal envoys! — Are not his positions inva lidated by the evidence I have brought from authentic docu ments, and acknowledged by Usher himself, that the Irish and Anglo-Saxon Christians were equally indebted, for their conver sion, to the Popes ; the former to Pope Celestine, the latter to Pope Gregory the Great ; and that they ever continued united with the See of Rome in the belief of Purgatory, the Invocation of Saints, the Sacrifice of the Mass, Transubstantiation, and the Pope's Supremacy? Have I not shaken his system, when I evinced, in particular, that every one of our Primates, from St. Augustin, in the sixth century, down to Cranmer, in the six teenth, received his confirmation or institution [from which alone he derives his Archiepiscopal jurisdiction,] by a Special grant of the Pope.— Should the Right Rev. Prelate, after this, signify, in my hearing, that I have not sufficiently answered him, he will not find me backward in so doing. But, it seems, the work itself was, in the opinion of the Prelate to whom the Address is made, answered a century before it was written. In fact, he says : ' In this elaborate correspon- * dence, though not without its interest of learning and re- ' search, there is nothing material advanced in defence of ' Popery, to which the reader will not find an answer in Bishop ' Bull's Letters to Bossuet, and Smith's Errors of the Church of ' Rome detected (\).' Bull, who was Bishop of St. David's at the beginning of the last century, was certainly an able and learned divine, and drove his Arian adversaries before him ; but, after this, levelling his horns at the rock of St. Peter, they were broken short off by a Catholic Divine of equal talents' and (1) P. 11. POSTSCRIPT- 207 superior learning, Dr. Edward Hawarden, S. T. P. (I). Smith, of Dover, was one of those wretched Priests, who, wanting the grace necessary for living up to the strictness of their obligations, have attempted to excuse their breach of them, by abusing the Church which imposes them upon them. His puny embryo was stifled in the birth, and he himself, soon after his fall, met with that awful end, which has been the general fate, within our own memory, of this, class of converts^), as the Prelate calls them (3). But, my Lord, as that admantine chain of demon stration, which encircles the three parts of the work in question, was not broken before it was knit together, so it never will (1) See Preface to his True Church of Christ, vol. ii. (2) Dean Swift used to say of such ' converts from Popery :' I wish, when the Pope weeds his garden, he would not throw his nettles over our zcall. (3) Smith dropped down dead in Canterbury Cathedral, about the year 1780. About the same time an unprincipled priest of Staffordshire, of the name of Tayler, met with the same awful fate in stepping into a stage coach. Another still more unprincipled priest, who chose to incur excom munication, and wbo even denied the inspiration of Scripture, Dr. Geddes, used to send for the helps of the Church when he was sick, and to laugh at them when he recovered. At last a priest actually coming to reconcile him to God and the Church, found that he had unexpectedly expired. Lewis of Leominster, having sent his concubine to bring up his breakfast lo his bed, was found a corpse by her. Holmes of Essex, and Rogers, alias Rosier, of Birmingham, who, the evening before ailed nothing, were found in the morning breathless. James Quesnel and James Nolan, having both been warned by their friends, to my certain knowledge, of the fate they might ex pect, but continuing to waver about returning to their duty, dropped down dead in the streets, the former at Worcester, the latter in London. My townsman, Billinge, finding himself summoned away, sunk into despair, starting continually, and exclaiming : I am a tost man ! I am a lost man ! I dream of nothing but of hell-fire! How unlike the end of his confrere, Austin Jennison, who having been struck dumb by his conscience, in the pulpit, which so ill became him, hurried the same day from his living near Edinburgh, his pretended wife and property, first to London and thence into France, about the year 1788, where he died in penance and peace. Doran blew out his brains, near Newbury. A detailed history of the converts to, aud apostates from, the Catholic Church, in this kingdom, since the defec tion of Henry VIII, would form a most interesting and useful work. 203 POSTSCRIPT. be broken, till the Gates of Hell prevail against the Church of Christ. The Right Rev. author evidently flatters himself that, at all events, he has solved three of the aenigmas, or paradoxes, which 1 had pointed out in his Catechism : nevertheless, they still are as fast closed as ever. For is it not evident, that Religion, of no description whatever, excludes any man from Parliament, except the Catholic? Did not Lord George Gordon, a M. P. profess himself a Jew, wear a beard about a foot long, and die 5n the embraces of a Jewish harlot ? Did not Edward Wortley Montague, another M. P. believing himself to be the son of the Great Turk, declare himself a Mahometan ? And those our civil and military officers, who, in the island of Ceylon, a few years ago, joined in the public worship of Budho, the brother idol of the blood-stained Jaggernaut, are they excluded from Parliament on this account ? — As to ' the inviolable covenants of f the two unions,' which the Prelate maintains, must ever ex clude Catholics from all power : it is still matter of demon stration that one of them, which, according to him, has been violated more than once, does not so much as allude to them ; and that the other alludes to them for the express purpose of acknowledging, that they may be admitted into Parliament! — As to his third paradox, it suffices to say, that its Right Rev. Author still maintains that his Majesty cannot lawfully accept of The Veto, and yet that we violate our allegiance, by not con ferring it upon him ! Thus, according to the Prelate, we are trailors for not committing an unlawful act ! • Thus much I have said, in answer to the Prelate's ONE WORD to me, which word, however, is seen to embrace so great a variety of subjects ! With respect to his Lordship's THREE WORDS to General Thornton, they are confined to The Declaration, by which every Member of Parliament is required to swear — not his belief in the Articles of the Church of England; — nor in the truth of Christianity: — nor in the existence of God — but that ' the invocation of any Saint, and ' the Sacrament, (as it is ignorantly termed of the Mass) as ' tin v are now used in the Church of Rome, are superstitious POSTSCRIPT. 209 ' and idolatrous.' Thus we see that a M. P. may invoke the, Dtvil to take away his own soul or that of his neighbour, and may proclaim that the Mass, as used by the Russians, Greeks, and many other sects, believing in Transubstantiation, is holy and salutary, and still keep his seat; provided he swear that these selfsame things, as used by Catholics, are idolatrous ! Gracious heaven ! was ever such a qualification for legislating devised or thought of by any human beings, except by the last Parliament of Charles II ! If history had been quite silent on the subject, would not the Act itself prove that the Parliament and the nation were in a crisis of frenzy when it was passed ? In fact, history does inform us, that they both. were then worked up, by an unprincipled hypocrite, who was brought up a rebel and died a regicide assassin(l), assisted by the perjury of an unnatural monster (2)], to believe that the Catho lics, who had saved the King's life in their Priests' hid ing- holes, when he was a Protestant, at the risk of their own lives, and when they might have gained =£.100,000 by betraying him, had plotted, now that he was a Catholic, to murder him, by stabbing him, by poisoning him, and by shooting him with silver bullets, and afterwards to bring over 30,000 pilgrims, armed with black bill-hooks, from St. Jago in Spain, to overturn the government ! History tells us, moreover, that, on the credit of this plot, near 20 Catholics were actually hanged and quartered, and all their nobility confined in prison! 1 I have spoken of our ancestors, I now speak of our posterity, concerning whom I will confidently affirm, that if any thing will equal their astonishment, that so unjust, false, malicious, and absurd an Act, as that containing the Declara tion, should have passed through the Houses in the 17th cen tury, and this under the hypocritical pretext of ' An Act for ' the better Preservation of his Majesty's Person and Govem- ' ment,' it will be, that the same Act, and under the same hy pocritical title, should have remained unrepealed till the present period in the nineteenth century. And yet it does stand unre- (1) Lord Shaftshury, (2) Dr. Titus Oatest PART III. ST *2'.t) ?ostscript. peakd at the present hour, — a signal monument of the religion® and moral integrity of the Catholics, in still refusing to pur chase honours and emoluments at the expence of a false oathy [which persons of other religions have taken, with the consci ousness either of swearing a falsehood, or of swearing what they do not understand, when they swear that the Catholic worship is idolatrous'] as likewise in their bearing the infamy of perjury rather than the guilt of it. In fact, the whole latter part of the Declaration is swelled out with implied charges against Catholics, of evading the obligation of oaths by 'equi- ' vocations, mental reservations, and Papal dispensations/ which vile expedients, if they actually possessed them, it is self- evident, would render the whole Declaration nugatory. General Thornton, in his late Parliamentary Speech against the Declaration, which pronounces the Catholics guilty of Idolatry, takes up the subject on the grounds just stated, that is to say, upon Protestant grounds. Accordingly, he feelingly appeals to the Members of Parliament themselves, whether it be not * abhorrent from their religious and moral feelings,' to charge their fellow Christians upon oath, with the guilt of idolatry, while they not only clear themselves of that crime, but also were acquitted of it by the most learned Protestant Bishops and Divines this country could boast of, when the Declaration was devised(l). The General then argues as follows: 'How is it ' to be accounted for, on any just principle, that those, who, ' preparatory to their going into holy orders, are called upon to ' subscribe to the 39 Articles of Religion, after it has been their ' duty to make this subject their particular study, should only ' be required to consider the practice as having given occasion io ' many superstitions, when the Members of both Houses of ' Parliament, on taking their seats, are obliged to declare thai (1) Such as the Bishops Jeremy Taylor, Blandford, Montague, Forbes, Gunning, Archbishop Sheldon, Prebendary Thorndike, Chillingworth, &r. When the Declaration was under consideration in the House of Peers, Bi shop Gunning, of Ely, protested that he could not in conscience swear it.— Burnet's Hist, of his own Times. VOSTSCRIPT. 211 * they solemnly and sincerely, in the presence of God, do believe * the practice, not only to be superstitious, but likewise idola- ' trous ? — Let me beseech the House to consider well the con- ' sequences of it.' Here the Rt. Rev. Prelate chooses to make a vigorous assault upon the General, by way of proving that the law requires no stronger declarations against the Ca tholics, from Members of Parliament, than it does from the Clergy of the Establishment ; and that the latter, in subscrib ing the S9 Articles, do, in fact, charge the Catholics with idolatry. Let us now attend to his proofs. He says : ' The ' Articles, besides saying that the doctrine of Trausubstantia * tion has given occasion to many superstitions, say moreover, ' that it is repugnant to the plain sense of scripture, and over- ' throweth the nature of a Sacrament : and that the Sacrament ' was not, by Christ's ordinance, reserved, carried about, lifted ' up, and worshipped.' Atqui : — Ergo. Now, my Lord, I appeal to your Lordship's theological learning, first, whether a thousand tenets and practices may not be repugnant to scrip ture, and may not overthroze the nature of a Sacrament, with out constituting idolatry ? Secondly, whether a Member of Parliament, for example, or his worship the Ma\'or, or a wor shipful Alderman, or any man's own wife, whom he has married according to the form in The Common Prayer Book, may not be reserved, and carried about, and lifted up, and worshipped, without making such a person an object of idolatry? In case your Lordship answers these two ques tions, as every other man of sense will do, it is evident at once, that the Act of 30 Car. II, by the Declaration in question, does impose an infinitely heavier burden on the consci ences of Parliament-men, than the S9 Articles do on those of Churchmen. Thus it is demonstrated, that the Right Rev. Bishop has made a false attack on the gallant General ; and that he has been completely beaten on his own ground. -As to the Prelate's disingenuous statements of the arguments in my foregoing Letters on the Real Presence and Transubstantiation, and his feeble nibbling at them, in his Appendix, I shall leave them to make whatever effect they are capable of making on 3T2 Q12 POSTSCRIPT. the minds of intelligent readers, satisfying myself with barely requesting them, after they have perused the Prelate's state ments and objections, to look back again upon the arguments themselves. In conclusion, my Lord, I am so little apprehensive that the Catechism and the Defence of it, put together, will induce a single member of the Great Universal Church to quit what the Prelate, whimsically and by Antonomasia, calls The Grand Schism of the sixteenth century, that I might safely promise, without danger of being called upon to make my promise good, that, upon satisfactory proof of this having happened in one instance, I would furnish a second instance in myself. Nor am I, in the least, fearful that a single Peer or Gentleman, who is not otherwise induced to vote in Parliament against the Catholic Claims, will be influenced to do so by these episcopal lectures. All I dread is, that, as the Catechism is now reduced in size and expence, for the evident purpose of being widely circulated among the furious jumpers of Wales, and the no less ignorant and infuriate mobility of the metropolis, who have already deeply im bibed his Lordship's grand principle of Protestantism, the swear ing against Popery, they may be worked up by it to equal de monstrations of zeal, with those which we witnessed jm the former champion of Protestantism, Lord George Gordon, and his associators. These, we remember, argued the Catholic Question against Members of the Legislature with their fists and clubs, confuted the Catholics by burning down their cha pels and houses, and demonstrated the purity of their Religion, by demolishing the prisons and storming the Bank. I have the honour to remain, my Lord, Your Lordship's obedient Servant, J.-M. P. D. Wolverhampton, March 7, 1819, FINIS. CONTENTS. PART III. LETTER XXXI,— To the Rev. J. M.— D. D. Page IsTRODCCTtON.. -Effects produced by the foregoing Letters on the minds of Mr. Brown, and others of his Society.. -This in part counteracted by the Bishop of London's (Dr. Porteus's) Charges against the Catholic Religion • • • • • -• • • • 1 LETTER XXXII.— To James Brown, Esq. Observations on the Charges in question. "Impossibility of the True Church being guilty of them. ..Just conditions to be required by a Catholic Divine in discussing them.- -Calumny and misrepresentation necessary weapons for the assailants of the True Church. • • Instances of gross calumny published by eminentProtestant writers now living.- • Effects of these calumnies.- -No Catholic ever shaken in his faith by them.- -They occasion the conversion of many Protestants.. -They reader their authors dreadfully guilty before God •-.../.. 3 LETTER XXXIIL— To Do. Charge of Idolatry. ••Protestantism not originally founded on this.-- Invocation of the Prayers of Angels and Saints grossly misrepresented by Protestants : • • truly stated from the Council of Trent, and Ca tholic Doctors.- -Vindication of the practice.- -Evasive attack of the Bishop of Durham;- -Retorted upon his Lordship.- -The practice re commended by Luther:- -vindicated by distinguished Protestant Bishops.- -Not imposed upon the faithful :• -highly consoling and beneficial >••• ..^ • •• ii Q14 CONTENTS. LETTER XXXIV.— To Do. Page Religious Memorials.- -Doctrine and Practice of Catholics, most of all, misrepresented on this head.- -Old Protestant versions of Scripture corrupted to favour such misrepresentation. • • Unbounded calumnies in the Homilies, and other Protestant publications. • -True doctrine of the Catholic Church defined by the Council of Trent, and taught in her books of instruction. • -Errors of Bishop Porteus, in fact and in reasoning.- -Inconsistency of his own practice.- -No obligation on Catholics of possessing pious images, pictures, or relics . • • 24 LETTER XXXV.— To the Rev. Rob. Clayton, M. A. Objections refuted- -That the Saints cannot hear us.- -Extravagant addresses to Saints.- -Want of candour in explaining them.- -These no evidence of the Eaith of the Church. • -Notorious falsehoods of the Bishop of London, concerning the ancient doctrine and practice . • • ¦ S3 LETTER XXXVI.— To James Brown, Esq. Transubstantiation.- -Important remark of Bishop Bossuet concerning it. • • Catholics not worshippers of bread and wine. • • Acknowledgement of some eminent Protestants- -Disingenuity of others, in concealing the main question, and bringing forward another of secondary im portance.- -The Lutherans and the most respectable Prelates of the Establishment agree with Catholics on the main point ¦ • • • • 39 LETTER XXXVIL— To Do. The Real Presence.- -Variations of the Established Church on this point.- -Inconsistency of her present doctrine concerning it.- -Proofs of the Real Presence from Christ's promise of the Sacrament : • • From his institution of it.- -The same proved from the ancient Fathers.- • Absurd position of Bishop Porteus, as to the origin of the tenet.- -The reality strongly maintained by Luther.- -Acknowledged by the most learned English Bishops and Divines.- -Its superior excellence and sublimity • 44 LETTER XXXVIII.— To the Rev. Rob. Clayton, M. A. Objections answered.- -Texts of Scripture examined.- -Testimony of the senses weighed.. -Alledged Contradictions disproved • • 56 CONTENTS. 215 LETTER XXXIX.— To James Brown, Esq. Pa&c Communion under one or both kinds a matter of discipline.* -Pro testants forced to recur to Tradition and Church discipline.- -The Blessed Eucharist a Sacrifice as well as a Sacrament. - - As a Sacrifice both kinds necessary :• -as a Sacrament, whole and entire under either kind.- -Protestants receive no Sacrament at all.- -The Apostles some times administered the communion under one kind.- -The Text, 1 Cor. xi. i7, corrupted in the English Protestant Bible.- -Testimonies of the Fathers for communion in one kind. ¦• Occasion of the Ordinances «f St. Leo and Pope Gelasius.- -Discipline of the Church different at different times in this matter.- -Luther allowed of Communion in one kind;--abo the French Calvinists ;-»also the Church of England • 61 LETTER XL.— To Do. Excellence of Sacrifice.- -Appointed by God. ••Practised by all People, except Protestants.- -Sacrifice of the New Law, promised of old to the Christian Church. •• Instituted by Christ.- -The Holy Fathers bear testimony to it, and performed it.- -St. Paul's Epistle to the Hebrews misinterpreted by the Bishops of London, Lincoln, &c- -Deception of talking of the Popish Mass.. -Inconsistency of the Established Church ia ordaining Priests without having a Sacrifice. • -Irreligious invectives «f Dr. Hey against the Holy Mass, without his understanding it ! - - 70 LETTER XII.— To the Rev. Rob. Clayton, M. A. Absolution from sin. •• Horrid misrepresentation of Catholic doctrine. •• Real doctrine of the Church, denned by the Council of Trent.- - This pure and holy.- -Violent distortion of Christ's words concerning the forgiveness of sins by Bishop Porteus. • • Opposite doctrine of Chillingworth.-.-and of Luther and the Lutherans :•- and of the Established Liturgy.- -Inconsistency of Bishop P.- -Refutation of his arguments about confession :¦ -and of his assertions concerning the ancient doctrine.- -Impossibility of imposing this practice on man kind.- -Testimony of Chillingworth as to the comfort and benefit of a good confession ¦ 79 LETTER XLII.— To Do. Indulgences.- -Unsupported false definition of them by the Bishop of London. --His further calumnies on the subject.- -Similar calumnies of other Protestant Prelates and Divines.-- The genuine doctrine of £16* CONTENTS. Page Catholics.' -No permission to commit sin. • -No pardon of any future sin.--No pardon of sin at all.- -No exemption from contrition or doing penance.- -No transfer of superfluous holiness.- -Retorsion of the charge on the Protestant tenet of imputed justice.- -A mere relaxa tion of temporal punishment.- -No encouragement of vice; but ra ther an encouragement of virtue.- -Indulgences authorized in all Protestant Societies.- -Proofs of this in the Church of England, •• Among the Anabaptists.- -Among the ancient and modern Calvi nists.. -Scandalous Bulls, Dispensations, and Indulgences of Luther andhis Disciples • 94 LETTER XLIIL-r-To Do. Purgatory and Prayers for the Dead,- -Weak objection of Dr. Porteus against a middle state. •• Scriptural arguments for it.- -Dr. F.'s Ap peal to Antiquity defeated.- -Testimonies of Lutherans and English Prelates in favour of Prayers for the Dead. • • Eminent modern Pro testants, who proclaim a Universal Purgatory.- -Consolations attend ing the Catholic belief and practice * • 104 LETTER XLTV.— To Do. J Extreme Unction.* -Clear proof of this Sacrament from Scripture. •• Impiety and inconsistency of the Bishop in slighting this.- -His Ap peal to Antiquity refuted •.... lib LETTER XLV.— To Do. Antichrist: Impious assertions of Protestants concerning him.' 'Their absurd and contradictory systems.- -Retorsion of the charge ofApos- tasy. • • Other charges against the Popedom refuted ••- 119 LETTER XLVI— To Do. Tire Pope's Supremacy truly stated.- -His spiritual authority proved from Scripture.- -Exercised and acknowledged in the primitive ages. ¦ .St. Gregory's contest with the Patriarch of C. P. about the title of (Ecumenical. • • Concessions of eminent Protestants • ? 12P LETTER XLVIL— To James Brown, Jun. Esq. Th« language of the Liturgy and Reading the Scriptures.- -Language a Matter of discipline," Reasons for the Latin Church retaining the CONTENTS. 217 Page Latin Language.-- Wise ceconomy of the Church as to reading the Holy Scriptures.- -Inconsistencies of the Bible Societies 145 LETTER XLVIII.— To Do. Various misrepresentations. • • Canonical and Apocryphal Books of Scripture.- .Pretended invention of five new Sacraments.- -Intention of Ministers of the Sacraments.- -Continence of the Clergy.- -Recom mended by Parliament.- -Advantages of Fasting.- -Deposition of Sovereigns by Popes far less frequent than by Protestant Reformers. ¦ • The Bishop's egregious falsehoods respecting the primitive Church ..-..- • 156 LETTER XLIX.— To Do. Religious Persecution.- -The Catholic Church claims no right to inflict sanguinary punishments, but disclaims it.- -The right of temporal Princes and States in this matter.- -Meaning of Can. 3, Lateran iv. truly stated. ¦ • Queen Mary persecuted as a Sovereign, not as a Ca tholic- -James II deposed far refusing to persecute.- -Retorsion of the tharge upon Protestants the most effectual way of silencing them upon it. • -Instances of Persecution by Protestants in every Pro testant country : in Germany • in Switzerland : at Geneva, and in France: in Holland: in Sweden: in Scotland: in England.- -Vio lence and long continuance of it here.- -Eminent loyalty (-1 Catholics. • -Two circumstances which distinguish the persecution exercised by Catholics from that exercised by Protestants 1 65 LETTER L.— To the Friendly Society of New Cottage. Conclusion.- -Recapitulation of points proved in these letters.- -The True Rule of Faith:— The True Church of Christ -• Falsity of the charges alledged against her.- -An equal moral evidence for the Catholic as for the Christian Religion.- -The former, by the confes sion of its adversaries, the safer side. ¦ • No security too great where Eternity is at stake ! lg. A POSTSCRIPT To the second Edition of the Address to the Right Rev. the Lord Bishop of St. David's, occasioned by his Lordship's ' One Word'to" the Rev. Dr. Milner' 19- PAItT m. 3 U ADDITIONAL NOTE TO PAGE 125. Benson, the author of The Man of Sin, was not a Bishop, but a Dis senter; his work, however, has been adopted by Bishop Watson. ERRATA TO PART III. Page Line 31 7, for and that of St. Paul, read that of St. Paul. 41 1, Note, for James I, read James II. 89 26, after sinners; add, though she has declared it to be one of the necessary parts of Sacramental Penance; 120 l,/or anograms read anagrams. 141 10, for (Echumenical read (Ecumenical. TO THE BINDER. The Print of the Apostolical Tree to face Letter XXVIII. Part II. Page 193, Keating, Brown and Co. Printers, 38, Duke-street, Grosvenor-square, London.