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&c: "the sounder Schoolmen disliked that opinion of Thomas Aquine, who held, that the Image is to be worshipped with the same adoration, which is due to the thing represented by it;" reckoning up Durand, Holcot, Biel.

Not to spend many words, in a clear case: what the judgment and practice of our ancestors in this island was concerning this point, appears sufficiently by the relation of Roger Hoveden, our historian; who tells us, that, in the year 792, Charles, the King of France, sent into this isle a Synodal Book directed unto him from Constantinople, wherein there were divers offensive passages; but especially this one, that, by the unanimous consent of all the Doctors of the East and no fewer than three hundred Bishops, it was decreed, that images should be worshipped: quod Ecclesia Dei execratur, saith he; "which the Church of God abhors." "Against which error, Albinus," saith he, "wrote an Epistle, marvellously confirmed by authority of Divine Scriptures; and, in the person of our Bishops and Princes, exhibited it, together with the said book, unto the French King." This was the settled resolution of our predecessors and if, since that time, prevailing superstition have encroached upon the ensuing succession of the Church, rà apxuĩa, Let the old rules stand, as those Fathers determined: away with novelties.

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But, Good Lord, how apt men are to raise or believe lies, for their own advantages! Urspergensis, and other friends † of idolatry, tell us of a Council held at London, in the days of Pope Constantine, Anno 714: wherein the Worship of Images was publicly decreed. The occasion whereof was this: Egwin, the Monk, after made Bishop, had a vision from God, wherein he was admonished, to set up the Mother of God in his church: the matter was debated; and brought before the Pope, in his See Apostolic: there, Egwin was sworn to the truth of his vision: thereupon, Pope Constantine sent his Legate Boniface into England, who called a Council at London; wherein, after proof made of Egwin's visions, there was an act made for Image-Worship. A figment so gross, that even their Baronius and Binius fall foul upon it, with a facilè inducimur, &c. "we are easily induced to believe it to be a lie." Their ground is, that it is destitute of all testimony of Antiquity; and, besides, that it doth directly cross the report of Beda, who tells us that our English, together with the Gospel received the use of images from their Apostle Augustin, and therefore needed not any new vision for the entertainment thereof. Let us enquire then a little into the words of Beda ‡. At illi, "but they," (Augustin and his fellows) non demoniaca &c. " came armed, not with the power of devils, but of God; bearing a silver cross for their standard, and the Image of our Lord and Saviour painted in a table; and singing Litanies, both for the salvation of themselves and of them whom they came to convert." Thus he. This shews, indeed, that Augustin and his fel

*Rog. Hoveden. Part. Annal. i. anno 792. fol. 3. + Vid. Binium in Vitâ Const. P.

Beda Eccles. Hist. Angl. l. i. c. 25, &c.

lows brought Images into England, unknown here before; a point, worthy of good observation: but, how little this proves the allowed worship of them, will easily appear to any reader, if he consider, that Gregory, the First and Great, was he, that sent Augustin into England; whose judgment concerning Images is clearly published by himself to all the world, in his fore-cited Epistle, absolutely condemning their adoration: Augustin should have been an ill Apostle, if he had herein gone contrary to the will of him, that sent him. If, withal, he shall consider, that, within the very same century of years, the Clergy of England, by Albinus, Bede's scholar, sent this public declaration of their earnest disavowing, both of the doctrine and practice of Image-Worship.

SECT. 2.

Image-Worship, against Scripture.

As for Scripture, we need not to go farther than the very Second Commandment the charge whereof is so inevitable, that it is very ordinarily (doubtless, in the guiltiness of an apparent check) left out in the devotional books to the people.

Others *, since they cannot raze it out, would fain limit it to the Jews; pretending, that this precept against the Worship of Images was only temporal and ceremonial, and such as ought not to be in force under the times of the Gospel: wherein, they recal to my thoughts that, which Epiphanes the son of Carpocrates answered, when his lust was checked with the command of Non concupisces. "True," said he, "that is to be understood of the heathen, whose wives and sisters we may not indeed lust after."

Some more modest spirits are ashamed of that shift; and fly to the distinction of Idols and Images: a distinction, without a difference t; of their making, not of God's: of whom we never learned other, than, as every idol is an image of something, so every image worshipped turns idol. The language differs; not the thing itself. To be sure, God takes order for both: Ye shall make you no idol, nor graven image; neither rear you up any standing image: neither shall ye set up any image of stone in your land, to bow down to it; Lev. xxvi. 1. Yea, as their own Vulgate turns it, Non facies tibi &c. statuam: Thou shalt not set thee up a statue, which God hateth; Deut. xvi. 22.

The Book of God is full of his indignation, against this practice .

Azorius Instit. 1. ix. c. 6. cites, for this opinion, Alex. p. 3. q. 30. memb. 3. art. 3. Albert. 3. d. 9. art. 4. Bonavent. 3. d. 9. 1. q. Richard. 3. d. 9. art 2. q. 1. Palud. 3. d. 9. q. 1. Marsil. 3. q. 8. Henric. quodlib. 10. q. 6. Cent. 2. c. 5.

+ "Eidwhov sæpe simulachrum vers. Acts vii. 41. xv. 20. 1 Cor. xii. 2. 1 John v. 21.

Isa. xlii. 17. xlv. 16. Mich. v. 13. Hab. ii. 18, 19. Zech. x. 2. Isa. ii. 8. xxx. 22. xli. 7, 22, 23, 24, 29. xliv. 12. Jer. vii. 18. viii. 9. x. 8. Ezek. vi. 4, 13. xx. 28, 32. xxii. 27. Hos. viii. 4, 5. Mic. i. 7.

We may well shut up all, with that curse in Mount Gerizzim; Cursed be the man, that maketh any graven or molten image, an abomination unto the Lord, the work of the hands of the craftsman; and putteth it in a secret place. And all the people shall say, Amen ; Deut. xxvii. 15. Surely, their Durandus, after he hath cited divers scriptures against idols, as Exod. xx. Lev. xxvi. Deut. iv. Num. xxi. &c. at last concludes, Ex his et similibus, &c: "By these and the like authorities, is condemned the too much use of Images *."

Now, because many eyes are bleared with a pretence of worshipping these, not as God's, but as resemblances of God's friends; let any indifferent man but read the Epistle of Jeremiah (Baruch vi.) canonical to them, though not to us, and compare the estate and usage of those ancient Idols, with the present Images of the Roman Church, and if he do not find them fully paralleled, let him condemn our quarrel of injustice.

But, we must needs think them hard driven for Scripture, when they run for shelter under that text, which professedly taxeth them, EvaDELLÍTOIC &c. In illicitis idolorum cultibus; saith St. Peter: In unlawful idolatries; speaking of the Gentiles +: "Therefore," saith Valentia, "there is a lawful worship of Idols." As if that were an epithet of favour, which is intended to aggravation. So he, that should call Satan an unclean devil, should imply, that some devil is not unclean; or deceivable lust, some lusts deceitless; or hateful wickedness, some wickedness not hateful. The man had forgot that the Apostle spake of the heathenish idolatry; wherein himself cannot plead any colour of lawfulness. May this, therefore, befriend them, to call idolatry abominable, the Scripture is theirs: neither can they look for any other countenance, from those Sacred Monuments.

SECT. 3.

Image-Worship, against Reason.

WHAT need we seek any other Reason of God's prohibition, than his will? And yet God himself hath given abundant reason of his prohibition of Images erected to himself.

To whom will ye liken God? or what likeness will ye compare unto him? Is. xl. 18. Ye saw no manner of similitude, in the day that the Lord spake to you in Horeb; Deut. iv. 15. It is a high injury to the infinite and spiritual nature of God, to be resembled by bodily shapes. And, for the Worship of Images erected to him

Durand. Ration. I. i. c. 3. Ex his et similibus authoritatibus, reprobatur nimius imaginum usus.

+ Pet. iv. 3. We turn it well, abominable idolatries.

Greg. Val. 1. ii. Apol. de Idol. c. 7. Neque absurdè profectò putaveris R. Pe• trum insinuavisse cultum aliquem simulachrorum rectum esse, &c. contra Her brandum.

self, or his creature; I am the Lord: that is my name and my glory will I not give to another; nor my praise to molten images; Is. xlii. 8. The holy jealousy of the Almighty will not abide any of his honour divided with his creature; and, whatever worship more than mere human is imparted to the creature, sets it in rivalry with our Maker *.

The man is better, than his picture; and, if religious worship will not be allowed to the person of man †, or angel, how much less to his image! not to man; St. Peter forbids it; Acts x. 26: not to angel; himself forbids it; Rev. xix. 10. What a madness then is it, for a living man to stoop unto a dead stock; unless, as that Cynic had wont to speak unto statues ‡, to use himself to repulses! This courtesy was too shameful, in the Pagans of old: how much more intolerable in Christians!

And, as for their last shift of this unlawful devotion, That they Worship not the Image, but, by it, the Person represented §; Hec à Paganis afferri solebat, "This," saith Cassander ||, out of the evidence of Arnobius and Lactantius, to whom he might have added St. Augustin," was the very evasion of the old Heathen." Nec valebat tunc illa ratio: “Neither would this colour then serve. How can it hope now, to pass and find allowance ?

The doctrine, therefore, and practice of Image-Worship, as late as erroneous, is justly rejected by us; who, according to St. Jerome's profession ¶, worship not the relics of martyrs, nor sun, nor moon, nor angels, nor archangels, nor cherubim, nor seraphin, nor any name that is named in this world, or in the world to come; and unjustly are we hereupon ejected.

CHAP. VII.

ON INDULGENCES AND PURGATORY.

SECT. 1.

The Newness of Indulgences and Purgatory.

NOTHING is more palpable, than the Novelty of INDULGENCES or PARDONS, as they are now of use in the Roman Church: the intolerable abuse whereof, gave the first hint to Luther's enquiry.

Si quis puram creaturam, propter quamcunque excellentiam, colit cultu et honore majori quàm puro humano, cultus hic jam accedit ad cultum religiosum, et, per conseq., ad divinum. Spalat. de Rep. Eccl. 1. vii. c. 12.

+ Sed neque Elias adorandus est, etiamsi in vivis sit: neque Johannes adorandus, &c. Epiphan. cont. Collyrid. Her. 79.

Diog. Laert.

Per illa colitur Deus. Less. de Jure, &c. de Relig. l. ii. 36. dub.
Cassand. Cons. Art. 21.

¶ Nos non dico Martyrum reliquias, &c. Hier. ad Riparium.

Pope Leo had gratified his sister Magdalen, with a large monopoly of German Pardons *. Aremboldus, her factor, was too covetous; and held the market too high. The height of these overrated wares caused the chapmen to enquire into their worth.

They were found as they are, both for age and dignity.

For age, so new, as that Cornelius Agrippa †, and Polydore Virgil, and Machiavel (and who not?) tell us Boniface the Eighth, who lived Anno 1300, was the first §, that extended Indulgences to Purgatory; the first, that devised a jubilee for the full utterance

of them.

The Indulgences of former times were no other, than relaxations of canonical penances, which were enjoined to heinous sinners; whereof Burchard, the Bishop of Worms, set down many particulars, about the year 1020. For example, if a man had committed wilful murder, he was to fast forty days together, in bread and water; which the common people call a Lent: and to observe a course of Penance, for seven years after. Now these years of Penance and these Lents were they, which the Pardons of former times were used to strike off or abate, according as they found reason in the disposition of the penitent; which may give light to those terms of so many Lents and years remitted in former Indulgences.

But, that there should be a sacred treasure of the Church, wherein are heaped up piles of satisfactions of Saints, whereof only the Pope keeps the keys, and hath power to dispense them where he lists, is so late a device, that Gregory of Valence is forced to confess ||, that not so much as Gratian, or Peter Lombard (which wrote about 400 years before him), ever made mention of the name of Indul. gence.

Well, therefore, might Durand and Antonine grant it not to be found either in the Scriptures, or in the writings of the ancient Doctors; and, our B. Fisher goes so far in the acknowledgment of the newness hereof, that he hath run into the censure of late Jesuits.

Just and warrantable is that challenge of learned Chemnitius ¶, that no testimony can be produced of any Father, or of any ancient Church, that either such doctrine, or practice of such Indulgences, was ever in use, until towards one thousand two hundred years after Christ. Talium Indulgentiarum; some, there were, in the time immediately foregoing; but such as now, they were not. Besides Eugenius's time, which was too near the verge, (for the words of Chemnitius ** are, Per annos fermè mille ducentos, "For well near a thousand two hundred years:") Bellarmin instances in the Third Council of Lateran, about the year 1116; wherein Pope Paschal the Second gave Indulgences of forty days to those,

*Histor. Concil. Trid. 1. i.

+ De Vanit. Scient. c. 16.

De Invent. Rer. lib. viii. c. 1. Dies Indulgentiarum referuntur ad pœnitentias pro vitá injunctas. Gers. Reg. Moral.

Greg. de Val. et Bell. 1. ii. de Indulgent.
Chemn. Exam, de Indulgen. c. 4.

** Ibid.

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