losophy, and not to be deceived by those shews of humility, ART. or the speculations of men, who pretended to explain that XXII. which they did not know, as intruding into things which they had not seen, vainly puffed up by their fleshly mind. If any degrees of invocating saints or angels had been consistent with the Christian religion, this was the proper place of declaring them: but the condemning that matter so absolutely, looks as a very express prohibition of all sort of worship to angels. And when St. John fell down to worship the angel, that had made him such glorious discoveries upon two several occasions, the answer he had was, See thou do it not worship God: I am thy fellow-ser- Rev. xix. vant. It is probable enough that St. John might imagine, Rev. xxii. that the angel, who had made such discoveries to him, was 9. Jesus Christ but the answer plainly shews, that no sort of worship ought to be offered to angels, nor to any but God. The reason given excludes all sorts of worship, for that cannot be among fellow-servants. 10. As angels are thus forbid to be worshipped, so no mention is made of worshipping or invocating any saints that had died for the faith, such as St. Stephen and St. James. In the Epistle to the Hebrews, they are required to re- Heb. xiii. 7. member them which had the rule over them, and to follow their faith; but not a word of praying to them. So that if either the silence of the Scriptures on this head, or if plain declarations to the contrary could decide this matter, the controversy would soon be at an end. Christ is always proposed to us as the only person by whom we come unto God: and when St. Paul speaks against the worshipping of angels, he sets Christ out in his glory in opposition to it. For in him dwelleth all the fulness of the Godhead bo- Col. ii. 9, dily; and ye are complete in him, which is the head of all 10. principality and power; pursuing that reason in a great many particulars. From the Scriptures, if we go to the first ages of Christianity, we find nothing that favours this, but a great deal to the contrary. Irenæus disclaims the invocation of angels. The memorable passage of the Church of Smyrna, formerly cited, is a full proof of their sense in this matter. Clemens Alexandrinus and Tertullian do often mention Clem. the worship that was given to God only by prayer; and Protrep. so far were they at that time from praying to saints, that they prayed for them, as was formerly explained: they thought they were not yet in the presence of God, so they could not pray to them as long as that opinion continued. That form of praying for them is in the Apostolical Constitutions. In all that collection, which seems to be a Tertul. Apol.c. 17. XXII. ART. work of the fourth or fifth century, there is not a word that intimates their praying to saints. In the Council of Laodicea a, there is an express condemnation of those who invocated angels; this is called a secret idolatry, and a forsaking of our Lord Jesus Christ. The first apologists for Christianity do arraign the worship of demons, and of such as had once lived on earth, in a style that shewed they did not apprehend that the argument could be turned against them, for their worshipping either angels or departed saints. When the Arian controversy arose, the invocation of Christ is urged by Athanasius, Basil, Cyril, and other Fathers, as an evident argument that he was neither made nor created; since they did not pray to angels, or any other creatures; from whence they concluded that Christ was God. These are convincing proofs of the doctrine of the three first, and of a good part of the fourth century. Aug. con. c. 29. con. c. 4. Aug. de It is true, as was confessed upon the former head, they began with martyrs in the end of the fourth century. They fancied they heard those that called to them; and upon that it was no wonder, if they invocated them, and so private prayers to them began. But, as appears both by the Constitutions, and several of the writers of that time, the public offices were yet preserved pure. St. Austin says plainly, The Gentiles built temples, raised altars, ordained priests, and offered sacrifices to their Gods: but we do not erect temples to our martyrs, as if they were Gods ; but memories as to dead men, whose spirits live with God: nor do we erect altars, upon which we sacrifice to martyrs; but to one God only do we offer, to the God of martyrs, and 1. 8. c. 27. our God; at which sacrifice they are named in their place and order, as men of God, who in confessing him have overcome the world; but they are not invocated by the priest that sacrifices. It seems the form of praying for the saints mentioned in the Constitutions, was not used in the Churches of Afric in St. Austin's time: he says very positively, that they did not pray for them, but did praise God for them: and he says in express words, Let not the worship of dead men be any part of our religion; they ought so to be honoured, that we may imitate them, but not worshipped. God was indeed prayed to, in the fifth century, to hear the intercession of the saints and martyrs; but there is a great 1. 22. c. 10. Aug. de vera Rel. c. 55. • Con. Laod. c. 35. Just. Mart. Apol. 2. Iren. 1. 2. c. 35. Orig. con. Cels. 1. 8. Tert. de Orat. c. 1. Athanas. cont. Arian. Orat. 1, 3, 4. Greg. Nazianz. Orat. 40. Greg. Niss. in Basil. cont. Eunap. Basil. Hom. 27. cont. Eunom. 1. 4. Epiph. Hæres. 64, 69, 78, 79. Theod. de Hær. Fabul. 1. 5. c. 3. Chrysost. de Trinit. difference between praying to God to favour us on their account, and praying immediately to them to hear us. The praying to them imports either their being every where, or their knowing all things; and as it is a blasphemous piece of idolatry to ascribe that to them without a divine communication; so it is a great presumption in any man to fancy that they may be prayed to, and to build so many parts of worship upon it, barely upon some probabilities and inferences, without an express revelation about it. For the saints may be perfectly happy in the enjoyment of God without seeing all things in him; nor have we any reason to carry that farther than the Scripture has done. But as the invocating of martyrs grew from a calling to them at their memories, to a general calling to them in all places; so from the invocating martyrs, they went on to pray to other saints; yet that was at first ventured on doubtfully, and only in funeral orations; where an address to the dead person to pray for those that were then honouring his memory, might, perhaps, come in as a figure of pompous eloquence; in which Nazianzen, one of the first that uses it, did often give himself a very great compass; yet he and others soften such figures with this, If there is any sense or knowledge of what we do below. From prayers to God to receive the intercessions of martyrs and saints, it came in later ages to be usual to have Litanies to them, and to pray immediately to them; but at first this was only a desire to them to pray for those who did thus invocate them, Ora pro nobis. But so impossible is it to restrain superstition when it has once got head, and has prevailed, that in conclusion all things that were asked either of God or Christ, came to be asked from the saints in the same humility both of gesture and expression; in which if there was any difference made, it seemed to be rather on the side of the blessed Virgin and the saints, as appears by the ten Ave's for one Pater, and that humble prostration in which all fall down every day to worship her: the prayer used constantly to her, Maria, Mater gratiæ, Mater misericordiæ, tu nos ab hoste protege, et hora mortis suscipe, is an immediate acknowledgment of her as the giver of these things; such are, Solve vincla reis, profer lumen cæcis; with many others of that nature. The collection of these swells to a huge bulk, Jure Matris impera Redemptori, is an allowed address to her; not to mention an infinity of most scandalous ones, that are not only tolerated, but encouraged in that Church. Altars are consecrated to her honour, and to the honour of other ART. XXII. XXII. ART. saints; but which is more, the sacrifice of the mass is offered up to her honour, and to the honour of the saints: and in the form of absolution, the pardon of sins, the increase of grace, and eternal life, are prayed for to the penitent by the virtue of the passion of Christ, and the merits of the blessed Virgin, and of all the saints. The pardon of sins and eternal life are also prayed for from angels, Angelorum concio sacra, arch-angelorum turma inclyta, nostra diluant jam peccata, præstando supernam cœli gloriam. Many strains of this kind are to be found in the hymns and other public offices of that Church: and though in the late corrections of their offices, some of the more scandalous are left out, yet those here cited, with a great many more to the same purpose, are still preserved. And the Council of Trent did plainly intend to connive at all these things, for they did not restrain the invocation of saints, only to be an address to them to pray for us, which is the common disguise with which they study to cover this matter: but by the decree of the Council, the flying to their help and assistance, as well as to their intercession, is encouraged : which shews that the Council would not limit this part of their devotion to a bare Ora pro nobis; that might have seemed flat and low, and so it might have discouraged it; therefore they made use of words that will go as far as superstition can carry them. So that if the invocating them, if the making vows to them, the dedicating themselves to them; if the flying to them in all distresses, in the same acts, and in the same words that the Scriptures teach us to fly to God with; and if all the studied honours of processions, and other pompous rites towards their images, that are invented to do them honour; if, I say, all this does amount to idolatry, then we are sure they are Rom. i. 25. guilty of it; since they honour the creature not only besides, but (in the full extent of that phrase) more than the Cre ator. And now let us see what is the foundation of all these devotions, against which we bring arguments, that, to speak modestly of them, are certainly such that there should be matters of great weight in the other scale to balance them. Nothing is pretended from Scripture, nor from any thing that is genuine, for above three hundred and fifty years after Christ. In a word, the practice of the Church, since the end of the fourth century, and the authority of tradition, of Popes and Councils, must bear this burthen. These are consequences that do not much affect us; for though we pay great respect to many great men that flourished in the fourth and fifth centuries, yet we cannot compare that age with the three that went ART. before it. Those great men give us a sad account of the XXII. corruptions of that time, not only among the Laity, but the Clergy; and their being so flexible in matters of faith, as they appeared to be in the whole course of the Arian controversy, gives us very just reason to suspect the practices of that age, in which the protection and encouragements that the Church received from the first Christian Emperors, were not improved to the best advantage. The justest abatement that we can offer for this corruption, which is too manifest to be either denied or justified, is this, they were then engaged with the Heathens, and were much set on bringing them over to the Christian religion. In order to that it was very natural for them to think of all methods possible to accommodate Christianity to their taste. It was, perhaps, observed how far the Apostles complied with the Jews, that they might gain them. St. Paul had said, that to the Jews he became a Jew; and to them 1 Cor. ix. that were without Law, that is, the Gentiles, as one without 20, 21, 22. Law; that by all means he might gain some. They might think that if the Jews, who had abused the light of a revealed religion, who had rejected and crucified the Messias, and persecuted his followers, and had in all respects corrupted both their doctrine and their morals, were waited on and complied with, in the observance of that very Law which was abrogated by the death of Christ, but was still insisted on by them as of perpetual obligation; and yet that after the Apostles had made a solemn decision in the matter, they continued to conform themselves to that Law; all this might be applied with some advantages to this matter. The Gentiles had. nothing but the light of nature to govern them; they might seem willing to become Christians, but they still despised the nakedness and simplicity of that religion. And it is reasonable enough to think that the Emperors and other great men might in a political view, considering the vast strength of heathenism, press the Bishops of those times to use all imaginable ways to adorn Christianity with such an exterior form of worship, as might be most acceptable to them, and might most probably bring them over to it. The Christians had long felt the weight of persecution from them, and were, no doubt, much frightened with the danger of a relapse in Julian's time. It is natural to all men to desire to be safe, and to weaken the numbers of their implacable enemies. In that state of things we do plainly see they began to comply in lesser matters: for whereas in the first ages the Christians were often re |