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DISPUTATION 21 ON THE
ROMAN PONTIFF, AND THE PRINCIPAL TITLES WHICH ARE ATTRIBUTED TO HIM RESPONDENT: JOHN MARTINIUS
1. For many ages past, all who have had any knowledge of the Pope of
Rome, have held no low or moderate sentiments about him, but have entertained exaggerated
notions about him and uttered the most lofty and excessive eulogies. This was required by
that sublime degree of dignity to which he has been elevated. Yet the things which have
been spoken concerning him are so diverse, as well as adverse, as to render it matter of
wonder that such various and contrary judgments and eulogies about one and the same
person, can be found among men who are Christians, at least so far as their own profession
is concerned. For some persons not only adorn, but literally load him with titles the most
honorable, when they give him the appellation of the spouse, the head, the foundation of
the Catholic Church, the vicar of God and Christ on earth, the absolute lord of the whole
Christian world with regard to spiritual things, in temporal things likewise, so far as
they are ordained for spiritual things, and the Prince of Pastors and of Bishops. Others
disparage him with titles quite contrary, such as, the adulterer and pimp of the Church,
the false prophet, the destroyer and subverter of the Church, the enemy of God and the
Antichrist, the wicked and perverse servant, who neither discharges the duties of a
Bishop, nor is worthy to bear the name. Uniting ourselves with the band of those who
bestow on the Roman Pontiff the epithets last cited, we assert that he is unworthy of the
honorable titles which precede them, and that the latter disparaging epithets are
attributed to Him through his just deserts, which we now proceed to prove in a few Theses.
2. The Spouse and Husband of the church universal is one by a most
particular unity, otherwise the church would be an adulteress. His properties are these:
He has loved the church, has exposed or given himself for her, has purchased her for
himself, with his own blood, has formed her
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of his own flesh and bones by the Spirit of regeneration, hath
sanctified and cleansed her by his own blood and by his Spirit, that he might present her
holy, unblamable and glorious. (Ephesians 5:25-27; Acts 20:28.) He has sealed her for an
espoused wife to himself by the earnest of his Spirit, as with a nuptial ring, (2
Corinthians 1:21, 22; Romans 8:9, 15, 16,) and imparts to her his own blessings necessary
and sufficient for life and salvation. (Ephesians 5:23.) To Him the church has respect,
and asks, expects and receives all good things from Him alone. (Acts 4:12; Revelation
22:17.) And to Him the apostles [and their successors] are preparing to present her as a
chaste virgin to one husband." (2 Corinthians 11:2.) These properties belong to
Christ alone: But the Roman Pontiff is not Christ. Therefore, he is neither the spouse nor
the husband of the church universal. Nor can any greater affinity be framed between Christ
and the Roman Pontiff, even when conducting himself in the best manner, than that which is
signified by the word "the friend of the bridegroom," and "the
brideman." (John 3:29.)
3. The Head of the church is but one; otherwise the church would be
a monster. His properties are these: He is united to the church by the internal bond of
the Spirit and of faith (John 17:15-17; 1 Corinthians 6:17, 19; Ephesians 3:17.) The
church is subject and subordinate to Him. (Ephesians 5:24, 25.) He perfectly contains
within himself all things necessary for the life and salvation of the church. He inspires
life, sensation and motion into the church by the efficacy of the Spirit.
(Galatians 2:20.) He is affected with the evils which afflict the
whole church and the members in general and in particular. (Hebrews 4:15.) He suffers the
persecutions and afflictions which are endured by the church, feeling them as much as if
they were inflicted on his own body, and He relieves them. (Acts 9:4, 5.) In his person
the church is raised up together, and seated together in heavenly places in Him.
(Ephesians 2:6.) And therefore, she has her Politeuma "the administration of her public affairs," in heaven. (Philippians
3:20.) All these properties agree with Christ only. But the Roman Pontiff is not Christ;
and therefore, he is neither the head of the church, nor can any affinity be established
between Christ, and the Roman Pontiff, which is not signified in the name of some
particular member of the body, or of a duty belonging to some member. (Romans 12:4-8.) And
no greater dignity can belong to the Pope of Rome,
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under Christ the head, than that which is comprehended under the
words, an apostle, prophet, evangelist, teacher, pastor, bishop, [one who can exercise]
the power [of working mirades,] the gift of healing, help and government. (1 Corinthians
12:4, 6-31.) All these dignities are ascribed to the members of the body of the church.
Therefore, on account of none of them does the title of "head" appertain to this
Pontiff.
4. The Foundation of the church universal is only one, because there
is but one house of God and Christ. Its properties are these: It stands by its own power,
and does not rest on any extrinsic foundation. (1 Timothy 3:15.)
The whole house, consisting of two people, the Jews and the
Gentiles, is built upon this foundation, as upon a chief corner-stone, and is sustained,
by the power implanted in it, against all things which can assail it from without, whether
from above or from below, on its sides, on the right hand and on the left; it continues
immovable, does not totter, is not sunk or overwhelmed, and does not fall. (Hebrews 3:6;
Ephesians 2:20-22; Matthew 16:18.) This foundation is the immediate fulcrum or prop and
firm support to all the lively stones that are built upon it; "they who believe on
Him shall not be ashamed;" but it is a stone of stumbling and a rock of offense to
those who do not believe and are disobedient; it dashes them in pieces, and they perish.
(Isaiah 28:16; 1 Peter 2:4-6.) All these properties, both generally and severally, belong
to Christ alone. But the Roman Pontiff is not Christ. Therefore, neither is he the
foundation of the church. But the metonymy, by which the Prophets and Apostles are called
"the foundations of the church," (Revelation 21:14,) and by which the saints are
said to be "built upon the foundation of the Apostles and Prophets," (Ephesians
2:20,) attributes nothing more to them, than their being "laborers together with
God" in laying down Christ as this foundation, and in building up the whole house on
Him. (1 Corinthians 3:5-12.) But St. Peter was also among these; yet he excelled none of
the other Apostles in any prerogative, but was inferior to St. Paul, not indeed in power,
but in "the more abundant labor" of the latter in building up the church. (1
Corinthians 15:10.)
5. God’s Vicar-General, or Universal, is one who administers
all things in heaven and on earth in the name, at the command, and by the authority of
God. To this individual must necessarily appertain,
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(1.) A Power, inferior indeed, by
reason of the dispensation, to his who appointed him, yet most closely approaching to it,
and dependent on no other power than that of God. (John 5:22, 26, 27.) So that this power
may, not undeservedly, be called autocratorical, possessing within itself absolute
sovereignty, and pantocratorical, omnipotent or having power over all things. (John 17:2,
24.)
(2.) The Knowledge, as well as the
Power necessary to administer all things. It cannot be less than divine; for it must be
extended to all things generally, and to every thing in particular, and this in an
immediate manner if we consider the internal efficacy of government. (1 Corinthians 15:27;
Revelation 2 and 3; Philippians 3:21; Galatians 2:20.) And this Vicar of God is only
Christ, to whom alone these properties belong. But the Roman Pontiff is not Christ.
Therefore, he is not God’s Universal Vicar, not even in the church, because the same
considerations, apply to her as to the whole universe. In the same way, the Universal
Vicar of Christ will be one who pleads the cause of Christ, and who, with a power and
wisdom purely divine administers all things in His name and by his authority.
(John 1:6-8, 13-15.) And this is the Spirit of Christ, his advocate,
the Spirit of wisdom and of the power of God, who, in the name of Christ, appoints
apostles, prophets, teachers, and bishops; who leads and governs believers, but who
convinces and condemns unbelievers. (Acts 20:28; 13:2; Romans 8:14.) The Roman Pontiff is
not that Spirit, nor hath he received the Spirit without measure. (Romans 12:3.) Neither
can the Roman Pontiff, even when his conduct is most exemplary, have any other delegated
power under Christ, than that which is particular; because he is not endued with the
Spirit, except "according to the measure of the gift of Christ." (Ephesians
4:7.) And this is bestowed [on the pontiff] not with regard to Christ as a priest, (for
that office does not admit of a vicar, or substitute,) but as he is king and prophet
supreme, and only so far as concerns the external administration of some part of
Christ’s kingdom and people, either by doctrine or by government, the internal
administration in the mean time remaining entirely vested in Christ, as does also his
Spirit. (1 Corinthians 3:5-23.)
6. The Dominion Over Heaven And Earth, or over the whole church,
(for these cannot be separated,) appertains by divine gift to Him alone who has
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said,
"All things are delivered unto me of my
Father." (Matthew 11:27.)
"All things which the Father hath, are
mine." (John 17:10.)
"All power is given unto me in heaven and in
earth: Go ye therefore, and teach all nations." (Matthew 28:18.)
"As thou hast given Him power over all flesh,
that He should give eternal life to as many as thou hast given Him." (John 17:2.)
"Whom God hath set at his own right hand in the
heavens, far above all principality, and power, and might, and dominion, and every name
that is named, not only in this world, but also in that which is to come." (Ephesians
1:21.)
Who is called the beginning," or the principle, "the
first-born from the dead; that in all things He might have the preeminence."
(Colossians 1:18.) In whom the church is "complete; who is the head of all
principality and power." (Colossians 2:10.) "On whose vesture and thigh a name
is written KING of Kings, and LORD of
Lords." (Revelation 19:16.) Christ alone is thus described. But the Roman Pontiff is
not Christ. The distinction of plenary power, with regard to spiritual, and temporals, is
contrary both to plenitude of power and to the subordination of things spiritual and
temporal; and has been fabricated on account of the defect of the capability of which the
pontiff is destitute, to subject temporal things to himself, even among those nations over
whom he has obtained the power in spiritual matters.
7. The Prince of bishops, apostles, prophets, evangelists, pastors,
and teachers, is one. (1 Corinthians 12:4, 5, etc.) If it were otherwise, there would be
more than a single monarch and dictator in the church, when only one is requisite in a
monarchical state and government; but then Duumviri, two governors, would hold the
pre-eminence. His properties are these: To institute, sanctify, and set apart to the work
of the ministry, apostles, prophets, evangelists, pastors, teachers, and all bishops in
the church. (Ephesians 4:5, 6, 11-13.) To prescribe to them what they must say and do.
(Matthew 28:18-20.) To furnish them with necessary and sufficient gifts. (Romans 12:3; 2
Corinthians 3:5, 6.) To be present with them, in the power of his Spirit and grace, while
engaged in the discharge of their functions. (Matthew 28:20.) To give efficacy to their
ministrations. (Mark
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16:20; 1 Corinthians 3:6.) To compel them to render an account. To
make a distinction between the acts and omissions of each; and, according to the different
mode of their administrations, to adjudge rewards or punishments. (1 Peter 5:4; Matthew
25:19-30.) And these properties belong to Christ alone. But the Roman Pontiff is not
Christ. Therefore, he is not the Prince of bishops; but if he have any claim to this
office, even when he behaves himself in his best manner, he cannot be called by any other
name than that of a bishop, pastor, or teacher, who ought to acknowledge all bishops as
his fellow elders, without any disparity of the power which belongs to the essence of the
office. (1 Peter 5:1.)
8. Since, therefore, the Roman Pontiff either attributes these most
honorable titles of Christ to himself, or willingly suffers them to be ascribed to him;
and since he evinces no horror at the blasphemy contained in these titles, and gives no
tokens of his displeasure at this ascription of them; it follows, that he puts himself in
the place of Christ, and is supremely opposed to Him. There is no excuse in the
explanation which is given, that "the head and foundation is ministerial, and that he
attributes all these things to himself under Christ, as having been elevated by the grace
or favor of God and Christ to that dignity." For the protestation is directly
contrary to the fact; and he is so much the more the bitter enemy of God and Christ, as he
the more confidently boasts of being defended by the authority of God and Christ. Such
conduct is, in fact, under the semblance of friendship to exercise the deepest enmity,
and, under the disguised pretext of a minister of light and of righteousness, to promote
the interests of the kingdom of darkness and of unrighteousness. On this very account,
therefore, we assert that the disparaging epithets which we laid down in our first Thesis,
most justly belong to him; and this we now proceed to show by descending to particulars.
9. First. The name of the Adulterer and The Pimp of the Church is
his.
(1.) He is the Adulterer of the church,
both by the public and mutual profession of each other; because he calls the [Roman
Catholic] church his and she neither disowns the arrogance of this title nor is afraid of
the odium [attached to such assumption,] and he is the adulterer in reality. For he
practices spiritual adultery with the church, and she in return with him. He commands the
apocryphal writings to be accounted divine and
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canonical; the ancient Latin version of the Scriptures, [commonly
called] the vulgate, to be every where received as the true original, and under no
pretense whatever to be rejected; his own interpretations of the Scriptures to be embraced
with the most undoubting faith; and unwritten traditions to be honored with an affection
and reverence equal to that evinced for the written word of God. He enacts and rescinds
laws that pertain to faith and morals, and binds them as fetters on consciences. He
promises and offers plenary indulgences, and the remission of all sins, through the
plenitude of his power. "He exalteth himself above all that is worshipped," and
offers himself as some god to be adored with religious worship. In all these acts the
church, deceived by his artifices, complies with his wishes. He is, therefore, the
Adulterer of the church.
(2.) But he is also the Pimp or Pander
of the church, because he acts towards her as the author, persuader, impelling exciter and
procurer of various spiritual adulteries committed, or to be hereafter committed, with
different husbands, with angels, Mary and other deceased saints, with images of God, of
Christ, of the Holy Ghost, of the cross, of angels, of Mary, and of saints; with the bread
in the sacrament of the Lord’s Supper; and with other inanimate objects.
10. To him likewise belongs the name of The False Prophet, whom the
Scripture calls "the tail," in opposition to "the head;" (Isaiah
9:15;) and this, whether it be received in a general acceptation, or in a particular sense
and restricted to a certain and determinate person.
(1.) In its general meaning, whether it
signifies him who teaches falsehood without arrogating to himself the name of a prophet,
or him who falsely boasts of being a prophet, the latter of which seems to be the proper
signification of the word. (2 Peter 2:1; Acts 13:6.) For, first, he partly introduced into
the church many false dogmas; and partly those which were introduced when such a great
mystery of iniquity was finished, he defends, maintains and propagates. Of this kind, the
dogmas concerning the insufficiency of the scriptures without traditions, to prove and
confirm ever necessary truth, and to confute all errors; that it is of the last necessity
unto salvation for every human creature to be under subjection to the Roman pontiff; that
the bread in the Lord’s supper is transubstantiated, or changed in substance, into
the body of Christ; that in
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the mass Christ is daily offered by the priest as a propitiatory
sacrifice for the sins of the living and of the dead; that man is justified before God,
partly by faith, and partly by works; that there is a purgatory, into which the souls of
those enter who are not yet sufficiently purified, and that they are released from it by
prayers, intercessions, watchings, alms-deeds, indulgences, etc. In the Second sense, this
epithet is due to him, because he says that he is a prophet, who, on account of the
perpetual assistance of the Holy Spirit, which is attached to that chair, cannot possibly
err in things which pertain to faith and morals.
(2.) But it also belongs to him in the
restricted meaning of the word; because the Roman pontiff is "the false prophet who
works miracles before the beast, (Revelation 19:20,) "out of whose mouth comes out
three unclean spirits like frogs," (16:13,) and who is not improperly understood to
be "the tail of the great red dragon, that drew the third part of the stars of
heaven." (12:4.)
11. He is also deservedly called The Destroyer And Subverter Of The
Church. For since the superstructure of the church "is built by the faith of the
doctrine of the apostles and prophets, which rests on Jesus Christ himself, the chief
Corner-stone," since it likewise increases more and more through the obedience of
faith in the right worship of the Deity and in the pursuit after holiness; and since it is
built up in the Lord, being fitly framed together into one body through the bond of peace
and concord; (Ephesians 2:20, 21; 4:3; 2 Peter 2:5, 6;) the Roman pontiff demonstrates
himself to be, in a four-fold manner, the subverter of this edifice: First, by perverting
the faith. This he effects,
(1.) By adding the books of the
apocrypha and unwritten traditions to the prophetical and apostolical scriptures.
(2.) By joining himself, as another
foundation, with Christ who is the only foundation.
(3.) By mixing numerous false dogmas
with those which are true.
(4.) By taking away some things that
are true, or corrupting them by false interpretations. Secondly, by adulterating the
integrity of divine worship.
This he does,
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(1.) By an addition to the persons who
alone, according to God and his command, are to be objects of worship.
(2.) By the introduction of a method
which is expressly forbidden by God.
(3.) By introducing vain, ridiculous
and old wives’ superstitions.
(4.) By the institution of various
peculiar societies of devotees, separate fraternities, and newly fabricated religious
orders of Francis, Dominic, etc.
Thirdly, by vitiating the purity or soundness of holiness and
morals. This he accomplishes chiefly by the following acts:
(1.) By inventing easy methods of
obtaining remission of sins and plenary indulgences.
(2.) By declaring certain precepts in
the name of councils.
(3.) By absolving many persons from the
obligation of their duties.
(4.) By binding men to [the performance
of] those things, which no one whatever is capable of understanding or accomplishing.
(5.) By bringing into the Christian
world the worst examples of all wickedness. Fourthly, by breaking the bond of concord and
unity. This he effects chiefly by these acts and artifices,
(1.) When he arrogates to himself a
power over others, which by no right belongs to him.
(2.) When he obtrudes many false dogmas
to be believed as true, and unnecessary things as absolutely necessary.
(3.) By excommunications and senseless
fulminations, by which he madly rages against those who have not deserved such treatment,
and who are not subject to his diocese.
(4.) When he excites dissensions
between princes, republics and magistrates and their subjects; or when he foments,
increases and perpetuates such dissensions, after they have been raised in other quarters.
12. It is demonstrable by the most evident arguments that the name
of Antichrist and of The Adversary of God belongs to him. For the apostle ascribes the
second of these epithets to him when he calls him "the man of
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sin, the son of perdition, who opposeth and exalteth himself above
all that is called God, or that is worshipped; so that he, as God, sitteth in the temple
of God, shewing himself that he is God." (2 Thessalonians 2:3-8.)
It was he who should arise out of the ruins of the Roman empire, and
should occupy its vacant digaity. These expressions, we assert, must be understood, and
can be understood, solely respecting the Roman pontiff.
But the name of "The Antichrist" belongs to him
pre-eminently, whether the particle anti signifies opposition, or
the substitution of one thing for another; not indeed such a substitution as is lawfully
and legitimately made by Him who has the power of placing things in subordination, but it
signifies one by which any man is substituted, either by himself or by another person
through force and fraud. For he is both a rival to Christ, and his adversary, when he
boasts of himself as the spouse, the head, and the foundation of the church, endowed with
plenitude of power; and yet he professes himself to be the vicegerent of Christ, and to
perform his functions on earth, for the sake of his own private advantage, but to the
manifest injury of the church of Christ. He has, however, considered it necessary to
employ the name of Christ as a pretext, that under this sacred name he may obtain that
reverence for himself among Christians, which he would be unable to procure if he were
openly to profess himself to be either the Christ, or the adversary of Christ.
13. Although the Roman pontiff calls himself "the servant of
the servants of God," yet we further assert that he is by way of eminence, That
Wicked And Perverse Servant, who, when he saw that his Lord delayed his coming,
"began to smite his fellow-servants." (Matthew 24, 48.) For the Roman pontiff
has usurped domination and tyranny, not only over his fellow-servants, the bishops of the
church of God, but likewise over emperors and kings themselves, whose authority and
dignity he had himself previously acknowledged. To acquire this domination for himself,
and still further to augment and establish it, he has employed all kinds of satanic
instruments — sophistical hypocrisy, lies, equivocations, perfidy, perjury, violence,
poison, and armed forces — so that he may most justly be said to have succeeded that
formidable beast which "was like unto a leopard, a bear and a lion," and by
which the Roman empire was prefigured — and to have "had power to give life unto
the image of the beast, and to
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cause that as many as would not worship the image of the beast,
should be killed."
14. Lastly, though from all these remarks it will readily appear
that the Roman pontiff is unworthy of the name of apostle, prophet, evangelist, pastor,
teacher, and of universal bishop; (1 Corinthians 3:5; 12:28; Ephesians 4:11;) yet, by this
single argument, which is deduced from their peculiar attributes and duties, the very same
satisfactory conclusions may be rendered evident to all who search the scriptures of the
Old and the New Testament, and especially the epistles of St. Paul to Timothy and Titus.
(1 Timothy 3; Titus 1.) Nor will this evasion avail any thing, "that whatever a man
does through another who is his vicar or substitute, he seems to do it himself;" for
it is Christ alone who makes use of the vicarious aid of these persons as ministers; and
the duties which they perform, are such as ought to be discharged by those who are
distinguished by those titles. (Galatians 1:7-9.) Therefore, that rightly appertains to
the Roman pontiff which God threatens through the prophet Zechariah, that he will raise up
a foolish shepherd, and an idol shepherd, who shall devote no attention to the sheep, but
who "shall eat the flesh of the fat, and tear their claws in pieces." (Zechariah
11:15-17.) God grant that the church, being delivered from the frauds and tyranny of
Antichrist, may obtain shepherds that may feed her in truth, charity and prudence, to the
salvation of the sheep themselves, and to the glory of the chief Shepherd. Amen.
COROLLARIES
1. It is a part of religious wisdom to separate the Court of Rome
from the church, in which the pontiff sits.
2. The Roman pontiff, even when conducting himself with the greatest
propriety, must not be acknowledged by any human or positive right as the head of the
church, or the universal bishop; and such acknowledgment of him has hitherto contributed,
and does in its very nature contribute, not so much to preserve unity in the church, and
to restrain the license of thinking, speaking and teaching differently on the chief
articles of religion, as to take away necessary liberty, and that which is agreeable to
the word of God, and to introduce a real tyranny.
586 DISPUTATION 22 THE CASE OF ALL THE PROTESTANT OR REFORMED CHURCHES, WITH
RESPECT TO THEIR ALLEGED SECESSION RESPONDENT: JAMES CUSINE
We assert that the Reformed Churches have not seceded from the
church of Rome; and that they have acted properly in refusing to hold and profess a
communion of faith and of divine worship with her.
1. I feel disposed to prove, in few words, for the glory of God, for
the tranquillity of weak consciences, and for the direction of erring minds — that
those congregations who take upon themselves the title of "Reformed or Protestant
Churches," have not made a secession from the church of Rome, and that they have
acted aright, that is, wisely, piously, justly, and moderately, in refusing to hold and
profess communion of faith and worship with the Romish church.
2. By the term, "the Church of Rome," we understand, not
that congregation of men, who, confined within the walls of the city of Rome, profess the
Christian faith, (although this is the only proper interpretation of that term;) not the
court of Rome, which consists of the pope and of the cardinals united with him — not
the representative church, assembled together in council, and having the Roman pontiff as
president, nor the pope of Rome himself, who, under the cover of that title, extols and
makes merchandise of his power. But by "the church of Rome" we understand a
congregation of Christian, which was formerly dispersed through nearly the whole of
Europe, but which is now become more contracted, and in which the Roman pontiff sits,
either as the head of the church under Christ, but placed above a general council, or as
the principal bishop inferior to a general council, the inspector and guardian of the
whole church. This congregation professes, according to the canons contained in the
council of Trent, that it believes in God and Christ, and performs acts
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of worship to them; and it approves of those canons, either because
they were composed by the council of Trent, which could not err — or because it
thinks that they are agreeable to the holy Scriptures and to the doctrine of the ancient
fathers, without any regard to that council.
3. We call "Reformed churches" those congregations
professing the Christian faith which disavow every species of presidency whatever, assumed
by the Roman pontiff, and profess to believe in and to perform acts of worship to God and
Christ, according to the canons which each of them has comprised in its own confession or
catechism; and they approve of such canons, therefore, only because they consider them to
be agreeable to the Holy Scriptures, though they yield to the primitive church and the
ancient fathers severally their proper places, but always in subordination to the
Scriptures.
4. It cannot be said, that every church makes a secession, which
separates from another, neither does the church that is in any manner whatever severed
from another, to which it had been united; but a church is said to make a secession from
another church to which it was formerly united, when it first and willingly makes a
separation in that matter about which they were previously at unity. On this account it is
necessary, that these four conditions concur together in the church which can justly be
said to have made a secession. One of them is a prerequisite, as if necessarily precedent;
the other three are requisites, as if natural to the secession and grounded upon it. The
First is that it was formerly in union with the other; to which must be added, an
explanation of the matter in which this union consists. The Second is, that a separation
has been effected, and indeed in that thing about which it was formerly at unity with the
other. The Third is, that it was the first to make the secession. And the Fourth is, that
it voluntarily seceded. The whole of these conditions will come under our diligent
consideration in the disputation on the present controversy about the dissension between
the church of Rome and Reformed churches.
5. But the explanation of another matter must be given, prior to the
discussion of this question according to the circumstances now premised; and this is,
"In what generally, do the union and the separation of churches consist?" So far
as they are the churches of God and of Christ, their Union consists in the following
particulars: they have one God and Father, one
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Lord Jesus Christ, one faith, (or one doctrine of faith,) one hope
of their calling, (that is, an inheritance which has been promised and for which they
hope,) one baptism, (Ephesians 4:3-6,) one bread and wine, (1 Corinthians 10:16, 17,) and
have been joined together in one Spirit with God and Christ, by the bond of faith and
charity. (Ephesians 4:15; Philippians 2:2.)
That is, that by agreement of faith according to truth, and by
concord of the will according to charity, they may be one among themselves. This is in no
other manner, than as many members of the same body are one among themselves, because all
of them have been united with their head, from which, by the bond of the Spirit, life,
sensation and motion are derived to each; (Romans 12:4; 1 Corinthians 12:12, 13; Ephesians
1:22;) and as many children in the same family are one among themselves, because all of
them are connected with their parents by the bond of consanguinity and love. (1
Corinthians 14:33; Revelation 2:23.) For all particular churches, whether in amplitude
they be greater or less, are large or small members of that great body which is called
"the Catholic church;" and in this great family, which is called "the house
of God," they are all sisters, according to that passage in Solomon’s Song,
"We have a little sister." (8:8.) No church on earth is the mother of any other
church, (Galatians 4:26,) not even that church from which proceeded the teachers who
founded other churches. (Acts 8:1, 4; 13:1, 2.) For no church on earth is the whole body,
that is united to Christ the Head. (Hebrews 12:22, 23.)
6. From this description of union among churches, and by an
explanation made through similar things according to the Scriptures, it is evident, that,
for the purpose of binding churches together, the intervention of two means is necessary.
The First is, the bond itself by which they are united. The Second is, God and Christ,
with whom being immediately united, they are mediately further united with each other. For
the first and immediate relation is between each particular church and Christ. The second
and mediate is between a particular church and another of its own kindred. (1 Corinthians
12:12, 13; Ephesians 4:3; Romans 12:5; John 17:21; Ephesians 2:11 13; 4:16.) From these a
two-fold order may be laid down, according to which this conjunction may be considered.
(1.) One is, if it take its
commencement from Christ, and if that bond intervene, which, issuing from Him, proceeds to
every church and [adunat, makes it one,] unites it with Him. Where 589 (i.) Christ must be constituted the Head and the very center of
union.
(ii.) The Spirit, which, issuing from
Christ, proceeds hither and thither. (Ephesians 2:18; 5:23; Romans 8:9.)
(iii.) The church of Corinth, at Rome,
at Philippi, etc., each of which is united to Christ, by the Spirit that goes forth from
Him and proceeds towards the churches, and that abides in them. (1 John 3:24; 4:13.)
(2.) The other order is, if it take its
commencement from the churches, and if that bond intervene which, issuing from them,
proceeds to Christ, and binds them to Him. Where (i.) must be
placed the churches of Corinth, of Rome, of Philippi, etc.
(ii.) Then may be laid down the faith
proceeding from each of them.
(iii.) Christ, to whom the faith of all
these churches tends and connects each of them with Him. (1 John 2:24; Ephesians 3:17.)
Because the bond of charity is mutual, it proceeds from Christ to each church, and from
every church to Christ. (Ephesians 5:25.) It does not, however, remain there, but goes on
to each kindred church; yet so that every church loves her sister church in Christ and for
his sake, otherwise it is a confederacy without Christ, or rather against Christ. (1
Corinthians 16:1, 2, 19.)
7. From the relation of this union, must be estimated the Separation
which is opposed to it, and which cannot be made or explained except by an analysis and
resolution of their uniting together. Every particular church therefore must be separated
from God and Christ before it can be separated from the church which is allied to it and
of the same body; (Ephesians 2:10, 19-22;) and the bond of faith and charity must be
broken before any church can be separated from God and Christ, and thus from any other
church. (Romans 11:17-24.) But since the Spirit of Christ, the faith by which we believe,
and charity, are invisible things which belong to the very inward union and communion of
Christ and the churches, it is impossible for men to form any estimate or judgment from
them, respecting the union or separation of churches. On this account it is necessary,
that certain external things, which are objects of the senses, and which by a certain
analogy answer to those inward things, should be
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placed before men, that we may be able to form a judgment concerning
the union of the churches with Christ and among each other, and about their opposite
separation. Those external things are the word, and the visible signs annexed to the word,
by which Christ has communication with his church; the profession of faith and of worship,
and the exercise of charity by outward works, by which each church testifies its
individual union and communion with Christ and with any other church. (Isaiah 30:21;
Romans 10:15, 17, 10, 13; John 13:35.) To this is opposed its separation, consisting in
this, that Christ "removes its candlestick out of his place," and the churches
vary among themselves in the profession of the faith, omit the requisite duties of
charity, and evince and practice hatred towards each other. (Revelations 2:5; 2 Chronicles
13:8, 2, 10.)
8. But the churches of God and Christ, even those which were
instituted by prophets and apostles, may decline by degrees, and sometimes do decline,
from the truth of the faith, from the integrity of divine worship, and from their first
love, (2 Corinthians 11:3; Galatians 1:6; Revelation 2:4,) either by adding to the
doctrines of faith, to that which is the object of worship, and to the modes and rites
with which it is worshipped; or by taking away or by perverting the right meaning of
faith, by not considering in a lawful manner that which is worshipped, and by changing the
legitimate mode of worship into another form; and yet they are still acknowledged, by God
and Christ, as God’s churches and people, even at the very time when they worship
Jehovah in calves, when they pay divine honors both to Jehovah and to Baal, when they
offer to Moloch through the fire the children whom they had borne and reared for Jehovah,
(Jeremiah 2:11-13; 2 Kings 16:3; 1 Kings 18:21; Ezekiel 16:20,) and when they suffer legal
ceremonies to be appended to the faith of Christ, and the resurrection to be called in
question: (Galatians 3:1-3; 6; 1 Corinthians 15:) even under these circumstances they are
acknowledged as the churches and the people of God, according to external communion by the
word and the sacramental signs or tokens, because God does not yet remove the candlestick
out of its place, or send them a bill of divorcement. (Revelation 2:5; Isaiah 1:1.) Hence
it arises that the Union between such churches, as have something still left of God and
Christ and something of the spirit of lies and idolatry, is two-fold: the One, in regard
to those things which they have yet remaining from the first institution which was made by
the
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prophets and apostles: the Other, with respect to those things which
have been afterwards introduced by false teachers and false prophets, and especially by
that notorious false prophet, "the man of sin, the son of perdition." For though
"their word eats as doth a canker," (2 Timothy 2:17,) yet the goodness and grace
of God have prevented it from consuming the whole pure doctrine of the Christian faith. On
the other side, its corresponding Separation is as fully opposed to this last mentioned
union, as the former union is opposed to its separation. When therefore the discourse
turns on the separation of churches, we ought diligently to consider what thing it is
about which the separation has been made.
9. These things having been thus affirmatively premised, let us now
come to the hypothesis of our question, according to the conditions which we said must
necessarily be ascribed to the church that may justly be said to have made a secession
from another. With regard to the First, which we have said was required as necessarily
precedent, we own, that the churches which are now distinguished by the title of
"there formed," were, prior to that reformation, one with the church of Rome,
and had with her communion of faith and of worship, and of the offices of charity; nay,
that they constituted a part of that church, as she has been defined in the second thesis
of this disputation. But we distinctly and expressly add two particulars.
(1.) That this union and communion is
as that between equals, collaterals, sisters and members; (Solomon’s Song 8:8; 1
Corinthians 12:12, 13, 17;) and not as the union which subsists between inferiors and a
superior, between sons and their mother, between members and their head: that is, as they
speak in the schools of philosophy, the relation between them was that of equiparancy, in
which one of the things related is not more the foundation than the other, and therefore
the obligation on both sides is equal; yet the Roman pontiff, seated in the chair which he
calls apostolical, and which he says is at Rome, affirms the church of Rome to be the
mother and head of the rest of the churches.
(2.) That this union and communion is
partly according to those things which belong to God and Christ, and partly according to
those things which appertain to the defection or "falling away" predicted by the
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apostle as about to come: for "the son of perdition" is
said to be "sitting in the temple of God." (2 Thessalonians 2:2-4.) As far
therefore as the doctrine of the true faith sounded in these churches, and as far as God
and Christ were worshipped, and the offices of charity were legitimately exercised, so far
were they One Church of Christ, who patiently bore with them and invited them to
repentance. (Revelation 2:20, 21.) But as far as the faith has been interpolated with
various additions and distorted interpretations, and as far as the divine worship has been
depraved by different idolatries and superstitions, and the tokens of benevolence have
been exhibited in partaking of the parts offered to idols, so far has the union been
according to the spirit of defection and the communion of iniquity. (Revelation 2:14, 20.)
10. With regard to what belongs to the separation of the reformed
churches from that of Rome, we must discuss it in two ways; because, as we have already
seen, (Thesis 8,) the separation of churches is usually made both with respect to faith
and worship, and with respect to charity. These separations are considered to be thus far
distinguished, by the churches themselves; so that the church which is separated in
reference to faith and worship, is called heretical and idolatrous; and that which is
separated in reference to charity, is called schismatical. The first part of the question
therefore will be this: "Have the churches which are now called the reformed, made a
secession with regard to faith and worship?" Respect being had to the Second
condition, (Thesis 4,) we reply, we confess that a secession has been made with regard to
faith and worship. For the fact itself testifies, that they differ [from the church of
Rome] in many doctrines relating to faith, and that they differ in divine worship. But the
reformed deny, that they differ from the Romish church according to those articles of
faith which she yet holds through apostolical tradition, or according to [that part of]
worship which, being divinely prescribed, the church of Rome yet uses. Of this, proof is
afforded in the following brief manner.
(1.) For in addition to her laying down
the word of God as the only rule of the truth, she professes to approve, in the true and
correct sense, of the articles of belief contained in the apostles’ creed, as those
articles have been explained by the first four general councils; she likewise professes to
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esteem as certain and ratified those things which the ancient church
decreed against Pelagius.
(2.) Because she worships God and
Christ in spirit and truth, by that method, and with those rites, which have been
prescribed in the word of God. She, therefore, confesses that the separation has been made
in those things which the church of Rome holds, not as she is the church of Christ, but as
she is the Romish and popish church; but that the union remains in those things of Christ
which she still retains.
11. With regard to the Third condition, (Thesis 4,) the reformed
churches deny, that they were the first to make the secession. That this may be properly
understood, since a separation consists in a variation of faith and worship, they say that
the commencement of such variation may be dated from two periods.
(1.) Either from the time nearest to
the apostles, nay at a period which came within the age of the apostles, when the mystery anomiav, that is. of iniquity, or rather, (if leave may be granted to invent a word
still more significant,) when "the mystery of lawlessness began to work," which
mystery was subsequently revealed, and which lawlessness was afterwards openly produced by
"that man of sin, the son of perdition," who is on this very account called
"that wicked," or "that lawless one," and is said to be
"revealed." (2 Thessalonians 2:3-8.) The reformed say, that the personage thus
described is the Roman pontiff.
(2.) Or the commencement of this
variation may be dated from the days of Wickliffe, Huss, Luther, Melancthon, Zuinglius,
OEcolampadius, Bucer and Calvin, when many congregations of men in various parts of Europe
began, at first secretly, but afterwards openly, to recede from the Roman pontiff.
The reformed say, that the commencement of the detection and
secession must be dated from the former of these two periods; and they confess and lament,
that they were themselves, in conjunction with the modern church of Rome, guilty of a
defection from the purity of the apostolic and the Roman faith, which the apostle Paul
commended in the ancient church of Rome that existed in his days. The papists say that the
commencement of the defection and secession must be dated from the latter period, [the
days of Huss, Luther, etc,] and affirm that they are not to be accounted guilty of any
defection.
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12 This is the hinge of the entire controversy. Here, therefore, we
must make our stand. If the reformed churches place the beginning of the defection at the
true point, then their separation from the modern church of Rome is not a secession from
the church of Christ, but it is the termination and completion of a separation formerly
made, and merely a return and conversion to the true and pure faith, and to the sincere
worship of God — that is, a return to God and Christ, and to the primitive and truly
apostolical church, nay to the ancient church of Rome itself: But, on the other hand, if
the beginning of the defection be correctly placed by the papists, then the reformed
churches have really made a secession from the Romish church, and indeed from that church
which still continues in the purity of the Christian religion. But the difference consists
principally in this, that the Romish church is said to have added falsehoods to the truth,
and the reformed churches are said, by the opposite party, to have detracted from the
truth: this controversy, therefore, is of such a nature, that the burden of proof lies
with the church of Rome as affirming, that those things of her own which she has added are
true. Yet the reformed churches will not decline the province of proof, if the Romish
church will permit the matter to be discussed and decided from the pure Scriptures alone.
Because the church of Rome does not consent to this, but produces another unwritten word
of God, she thus again imposes on herself the necessity of proving, not only that there is
some unwritten word of God, but also that what she produces is the real word of God.
13. Lastly, the reformed churches say, what is contained in the
fourth condition, (Thesis 4,) that they did not secede voluntarily, that is, they did not
secede at their own instigation, motion, or choice, but with lingering sorrow and regret;
and they ascribe the cause [of this secession] to God, and throw the blame of it upon the
church of Rome herself, or first on the court of Rome and the pontiff, and then on the
Romish church so far as she listens to the pontiff and the court of Rome, and is ready to
perform any services for them. 1. They attribute the cause of this secession to God;
because he has commanded his people to depart out of Babylon, the mother of fornications,
and to keep themselves from idols. (Revelation 18:4; 1 John 5:21.) 2. They throw the blame
of it on the Court or Church of Rome, which in three ways drove away the protestant
churches from her communion.
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(1.) By her mixture of deadly poison in
the cup of religion, (Revelation 17:4,) from which she administered those dogmas that
relate to faith and to the worship of God. This mixture was accompanied by a double
command.
The first, a prohibitive command, that no person should draw any of
the waters of the Savior from the pure fountains of Israel; the second, a preceptive, that
all men should drink out of this her cup of abominations. (Revelation 13:15-17.)
(2.) By excommunication and anathemas;
by the former she excluded from her communion as many persons as refused to drink the
deadly poison out of the cup which she had filled with this mixture. By the latter, she
devoted them to all kinds of curses and execrations, and exposed them for plunder and
destruction to the madening fury of her own satellites.
(3.) Not only by instituting tyranny
and various persecutions, but also by exercising them against those who were unwilling to
defile their consciences by that shameful abomination. (Revelation 17:6.) But with what
lingering sorrow and regret they have departed, or, rather, have suffered themselves to be
driven away, they say, they have declared by three most manifest tokens:
(1.) By serious admonitions proposed
both verbally and in writing, in which they have shewn the necessity of the reformation,
and the method and means of it to be a free ecclesiastical council.
(2.) By prayers and supplications,
which they have employed in earnest entreaties for such an assembly, for this purpose at
least — that a serious and general inquiry should be made, whether some kind of
abuses and of corruption had not crept into the church, and whether they might not be
corrected wherever they were discovered.
(3.) By the continued patience with
which they have endured every description of tyranny, that has been exercised against
them. After all this, the only result has been that the existing corruptions and abuses
are confirmed and fully established by the plenary authority of the pope and of the court
of Rome.
14. We have hitherto discussed this separation in reference to faith
and worship. (Thesis 10.) But the reformed churches say, that they have by no means made a
separation from the church of Rome in reference to charity.
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They invoke Christ as a witness in their consciences to the truth of
this their declaration, and they think they have hitherto given sufficient proofs of it.
(1.) By the exposition of their
doctrine to the whole world, both verbally and by their writings, which disclose from the
word of God the errors of the Romish church, and solicitously invite to conversion, the
people who remain in error.
(2.) By the prayers and groans with
which they do not cease to importune the divine Majesty to deliver his miserable people
from the deception and tyranny of Antichrist, and firmly to subject them to his Son, Jesus
Christ.
(3.) By the friendly and mild behavior
which they use towards the adherents of the popish religion, even in many of those places
in which they have, themselves, the supremacy, while they neither employ force against
their consciences, nor drive them by menaces to the profession of another faith or to the
exercise of a different worship, but permit them, privately, at least, to offer that
fealty and worship to God of which they mentally approve. Protestants use only the
spiritual sword, that, after all heresy and idolatry have been destroyed, men, being
saved, even in this life, with regard to their bodies, may be eternally saved to the day
of the Lord. The prevention of the public assemblies of the Roman Catholics, and the
compelling of them by pecuniary mulct or fines to hear the sermons of the reformed, may be
managed in such a manner as will enable the latter to prove these to be offices of true
charity. The reformed also say, that those things of which the papists complain, as being
perpetrated with too much severity, and even with cruelty, against themselves and their
children, were brought upon them either through the tumultuous and licentious conduct of
the military, of which deeds they have themselves most commonly been the authors, partly
by their demerits, and partly by their previous example; or they were brought upon them on
account of crimes which they committed against the state or commonwealth, and not on
account of religion. We conclude, therefore, that neither with respect to faith and
worship, nor with respect to charity, have the reformed churches made a secession from
that of Rome, so far as the Romish church retains any thing which is Christ’s; but
they rejoice and glory in the separation, so far as she is averse from Christ.
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15. The second part of our proposition remains now to be considered,
which stands thus: "The reformed churches have acted properly in refusing to hold and
profess a communion of faith and of divine worship with the church of Rome." This may
indeed be generally collected from the preceding arguments; but it must be here more
specially deduced, that it may evidently appear in what things the corruption of faith and
of divine worship principally consists in the church of Rome, according to the judgment of
the reformed churches. The causes of this their refusal are three.
(1.) The various heresies.
(2.) The multifarious idolatry, and
(3.) The immense tyranny, which has
been approved and exercised by the church of Rome.
First. We will treat of heresies, but with much brevity; because it
would be a work of too much prolixity to enumerate all. The first, and one which does not
dash with any single article, but which is directly opposed to the very principle of
faith, is this, in which it is maintained, "That there is another word of God beside
that which is recorded in the canonical books of the Old and New Testaments, and is of the
same force and necessity with it, for the establishment of truth and the refutation of
error." To this is added "that the word of God must be understood according to
the sense of our holy mother, the church," that is, of the church of Rome. But this
sense is that which the Romish church has explained, and will hereafter explain, by her
old Vulgate Latin translation, by her confessions, catechisms and canons, in a way the
best accommodated, for the time being, to the existing necessity or prevailing opinion.
This is the first foundation of the kingdom of Antichrist, directly opposed to the first
foundation of the kingdom of Christ, which is the immovable truth and perfection of the
doctrine comprised, first, in the prophetical writings, and then, in those of the
apostles.
16. To this we next add another heresy, which is also adverse to the
principle of faith. By it the Roman pontiff is constituted the prince, the head, the
husband, the universal bishop and shepherd of the whole church on earth — a personage
who possesses, in the cabinet of his breast, all the
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knowledge of truth; and who has the perpetual assistance of the Holy
Spirit, so that he cannot err in prescribing those things which concern faith and divine
worship — that
"spiritual man who judgeth all men and all
things, yet he himself is judged of no man," (1 Corinthians 2:15,)
to whom all the faithful in Christ must, from the necessity of
salvation, be subject, and to whose decrees and commands, no less than to those of God and
Christ himself, every Christian must assent and yield obedience, with simple faith and
blind submission. This is the second foundation of the kingdom of Antichrist, directly
opposed to the second foundation of the kingdom of Christ, which God laid down when he
constituted Christ his Son, the King, the Husband, the Head, the Chief Shepherd, and the
sole Master of his church.
17. Particular heresies, and such as contravene some article of
faith, have reference either to the grace of God which has been bestowed upon us in
Christ, or to our duty to God and Christ. Those which relate to Grace are opposed either
to Christ himself and his offices, to the benefits, or to the sealing tokens of grace.
(1.) To Christ himself are opposed the
transubstantiation of bread and wine into his body and blood, with which is connected the
presence of the same person in many places.
(2.) To the Priestly office of Christ
with respect to his Oblation, is opposed, in the first place, the sacrifice of the mass,
which is erected on the same dogma of transubstantiation, and in which lies an
accumulation of heresies,
(i.) That the body and blood of our
Lord are said to be there offered for a sacrifice,
(ii.) To be truly and properly
propitiatory,
(iii.) And yet to be bloodless, for the
sins, punishments, and satisfactions not only of the living, but likewise of the dead.
United with this, or standing as a foundation to it, are a purgatory, and whatever is
dependent upon it,
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(iv.) In the sacrifice of the mass, the
body and blood of our Lord are also said to be daily offered, ten, or a hundred, or a
thousand times,
(v.) By a priest, himself a sinful man,
(vi.) Who by his prayers procures for
it, from God, the grace of acceptance. Heresies are likewise opposed to the priestly
office of Christ with respect to his Intercession, when Mary, angels, and deceased saints
are constituted mediators and intercessors, who can obtain something important, not only
by their prayers, but also by their merits. The Roman Catholics sin against the kingly
office of Christ, when they believe these intercessors of theirs to be the dispensers and
donors of blessings.
(3.) Those heresies relating to Grace
oppose themselves to the benefits of justification and sanctification.
(i.) To justification, when it is
attributed at once to both faith and works. The following have the same tendency:
"The good works of saints fully satisfy the law of God for the circumstances of the
present life, truly merit life eternal, are a real satisfaction for temporal punishment,
for every penalty, for guilt itself, and are an expiation for sins and offenses. Nay, the
good works of some saints are so far supererogatory, as, when they perform more than they
are bound to do, those [extra] good works are meritorious for the salvation of others.
Lastly, when men by suffering render satisfaction for sins, they are made conformable to
Christ Jesus, who satisfied for sins."
(ii.) They are opposed to
sanctification, when they attribute to the natural man without the grace of God,
preparatory works, which are grateful to God, and through congruity are meritorious of
greater gifts.
(4.) They are opposed to the signs or
tokens of grace in several ways: by multiplying them, by contaminating baptism with
various additions, by mutilating the Lord’s supper of its second part, [the cup,] and
by changing it into a private mass. Those heresies which infringe upon our Duty to God and
Christ as they principally relate to divine worship, and have idolatry united with them,
may be appropriately referred to the second cause of the refusal of the reformed churches.
(Thesis. 15.)
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18. The Second Cause, we have said, is the multifarious idolatry
which flourishes in the church of Rome — both that of the first kind against the
first command, when that which ought not to be worshipped is made the object of worship,
adoration, and invocation; and that of the second kind against the second command, when
the object of worship is worshipped in an image, whether that object ought or ought not to
be worshipped.
(1.) The church of Rome commits
idolatry of The First, with things animate and inanimate.
(i.) With animate things — with
angels, the virgin Mary, and departed saints; by founding churches to them; by erecting
altars; by instituting certain religious services and rites of worship, and appointing
societies of men and women by whom they may be performed, and the festival days on which
they may be observed; by invoking them in their necessities; by offering to them gifts and
sacrifices; by making them preside [as tutelary beings] over provinces, cities, villages,
streets, and houses, also over the dispensing of certain gifts, the healing of diseases,
and the removal as well as the infliction of evils; and, lastly, by swearing by their
name. She also commits idolatry with the Roman pontiff himself; by ascribing to him those
titles, powers, and acts which belong to Christ alone; and by asking of him those things
which belong to Christ and his Spirit.
(ii.) With inanimate things — with
the cross and the bread of our Lord, and with the relics of saints, whether such relics be
real, or false and fictitious.
(2.) Idolatry of The Second Kind is
when the papists worship God, Christ, angels, the virgin Mary and the rest of the saints
in an image; and when they pay to such images honor and worship by adorning them with fine
garments, gold, silver and jewels; by assigning them more elevated situations in churches
and placing them upon the altars; by parading them on their shoulders through the streets;
by uncovering their heads to them; by kissing them; by kneeling to them, and lastly, by
invoking them, or at least by addressing invocations to them, as the power or deity who is
there more immediately present. We assert that the distinction of worship into latria, supreme religious adoration, and douleia inferior worship, and uperdouleia an intermediate
adoration between LATRIA and DULIA — of
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power, into that which is superior, and that which is subordinate,
or ministerial — of the representation of any thing, into that by which any thing is
performed to some kind of an image and a carved shape as unto God and Christ, and that by
which it is performed to an image but not as unto God and Christ. These distinctions, and
the dogma of transubstantiation, we assert to be mere figments, which are either not
understood by the greatest portion of the worshipers, or about which they do not think
when they are in the act of worship; and to contain protestations which are directly
contrary to facts. This second cause is, of itself, quite sufficient to prove our thesis.
19. The Third Cause is the tyranny which the church of Rome has
usurped and exercised against those who could not conscientiously assent to these heresies
and approve these idolatries; and which that church will continue to exercise so long as
she listens to the Roman pontiff and his court. The reformed churches very properly refuse
to profess communion of faith and worship with that of Rome, because they are afraid to
involve or entangle themselves in the guilt of such great wickedness, lest they should
bring down upon their heads the blood of so many thousands of the saints and of the
faithful martyrs of Christ, who have borne testimony to the word of the Lord, "and
have washed their robes in the blood of the Lamb." (Revelation 7:14.) For, beside the
fact that such a profession would convey a sufficiently open approbation of that
persecution, (especially if they did not previously deliver a protestation against it,
which, however, the Roman pontiff would never admit,) even the papistical doctrine itself,
with the assent of the people, establishes the punishment, by the secular arm, of those
whom the church of Rome accounts as heretics; so that those who, on other points, are
adherents to the doctrine of popery, if they are not zealous in their conduct against
heretics, are slandered as men governed by policy, lukewarm creatures, and even receive
the infamous name of atheists. I wish all kings, princes, and commonwealths, seriously to
consider this, that, on this point at least, they may protest that they have seceded from
the communion of the pontiff and of the court of Rome.
Besides, this exercise of tyranny is, in itself, equal to an evident
token, that the Roman pontiff is that wicked servant who says in his heart, "My Lord
delayeth his coming," and begins to eat and drink, and to be drunken, and to beat his
fellow-servants. (Luke 12:45.)
602 DISPUTATION 23 ON IDOLATRY RESPONDENT: JAPHET
VIGERIUS
1. It always has been, and is now, the chief design of diabolical
perverseness, — that even the devil himself, should be considered and worshipped as a
deity — than which nothing can be more reproachful and insulting to the true God; or
that all thought and mention of a Deity being removed, pure atheism might obtain, and,
after conscience was taken away, men might be hurried along into every kind of flagitious
wickedness. But since he could not effect this, on account of the notion of a Deity, and
indeed of a good one, which is deeply impressed on the minds of men; and since he knew it
to be the will of the true God that he should himself alone be considered and worshipped
as God, without any image; (Exodus 20:3-5; Deuteronomy 32:17; 1 Corinthians 10:20;) the
devil has been trying to persuade men to consider and worship as God some figment of their
own brain or some kind of creature, or, at least, to worship the true God in an image. In
former days he had great success in these, his attempts; and would to God that in our
times they were utterly fruitless! We might then be emboldened to enter on this
discussion, merely for the purpose of knowing what idolatry is, and the description of it
which anciently prevailed among Jews and gentiles, without being solicitous to deliver any
admonition or caution respecting it. But since, alas, this evil holds domination far and
wide in Christendom itself, we will, by divine aid, briefly treat upon it in these theses,
both for the purpose of knowing what it is, and of giving some cautions and dehortations
against it.
2. Commencing, therefore, with the etymology of the word, we say, Eidwlon an idol, generally, signifies some representation and image, whether it be
conceived only in the mind or framed by the hands, and whether it be that of a thing which
never had an existence, or of something which does exist. But, according to Scripture
usage, and that of the sacred writers, it signifies,
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(1.) An image fashioned for the purpose
of representing and honoring a deity, whether true or false.
(2.) Every false divinity, whether it
be the pure figment of the human brain, or any thing existing among the creatures of God,
and thus real, according to its absolute essence, because it is something; but false with
regard to its relative essence, because it is not a Divinity, which yet it is feigned to
be, and for which it is accounted. (Exodus 20:4; Acts 7:41; Psalm 115:4-8; 1 John 5:21; 1
Corinthians 8:4; 1 Thessalonians 1:9; Colossians 3:5; Deuteronomy 6:13; [13:6;] Matthew
4:10; Deuteronomy 5:6-9.) Latreuein (idolatry) signifies, in
its general acceptation "to render service, or worship," "to wait
upon;" in Hebrew, db[ : But in the Scriptures, and among ecclesiastical writers, it is peculiarly
employed about [acts of] religious worship and service; such as these — to render
love, honor, and fear to God — to repose hope and confidence in him — to invoke
him — to give him thanks for benefits received — to obey his commands without
exception — and to swear by his name. (Malachi 1:6; Psalm 37:3; 1, 15; Deuteronomy
6:13.)
3. Idolatry, therefore, according to the etymology of the word, is
"service rendered to an idol;" but, with regard to fact, it is when divine
worship is paid to any other than the true God, whether that be done by an erroneous
judgment of the mind, by which that is esteemed as a God which is no God, or it be done
solely by the performance of such worship, though he who renders it be aware that the idol
is not God, and though he protest that he does not esteem it as a God, since his
protestation is contrary to fact. (Isaiah 42:8; Galatians 4:8; Exodus 32:4, 5.) In proof
of this, the belly, covetousness, and idolatry, are severally said to be the god of some
people, and covetous men are called "idolaters." (Philippians 3:19; Colossians
3:5; Ephesians 5:5.) But so far is that opinion or knowledge (by which he does not esteem
the idol as a god) from acquitting him of idolatry, who adores, invokes, and kneels to it,
that from the very circumstance of his thus invoking, adoring, and kneeling to an idol, he
may rather be said to esteem that as a god, which, according to his own opinion, he does
not consider to be a god. (1 Corinthians 10:19, 20.) This is to say to the wood, with one
portion of which he has kindled the fire of his hearth and of his oven, and from another
has fashioned to himself a god,
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"Deliver me; for thou art my god," (Isaiah 44:15, 17,) and
to a stone, "Thou hast begotten me." (Jeremiah 2:27.)
4. Idolatry is also of two kinds. The First is, when that which is
not God is accounted and worshipped as God. (Exodus 20:3-5.) The Second is, when that
which is either truly or falsely accounted for God is fashioned into a corporeal image,
and is worshipped in an image, or according to an image. The former of these is prohibited
in the first commandment: "Thou shalt not have other gods," or "another
god, before me," or "beside me." The latter, in the second command,
"Thou shalt not make unto thyself any likeness; thou shalt not bow down thyself to
them, nor serve them." (Exodus 20:3-5; 1 Corinthians 10:7.) From this, it appears,
that idolatry may also be considered in another view, and in three different ways. The
First mode is, when the true God is worshipped in an image. The Second is, when a false
god is worshipped. The Third, which partakes of both, is when a false god is worshipped in
an image. The first mode is of a more venial description than the second, according to
that passage, "And it came to pass, as if it had been a light thing, for Ahab to walk
in the sins of Jeroboam," who had worshipped Jehovah in calves, and had taught others
to do the same, "that he went and served Baal, and bowed himself down before
him." (1 Kings 16:31.) The third mode is the worst of all; for it consists of a
double falsehood, of a feigned divinity, to whom such worship does not belong, and of an
assimilated divinity, when of The One to whom it is an assimilation, it is not a likeness.
(Isaiah 40:19, 20; Jeremiah 10:14:.) Varro has observed that, by the last of these modes,
all fear of God has been taken away, and error has been added to mortals.
5. In the prohibition, that the children of Israel should have no
God except Jehovah, the Scriptures employ three words to express "another God."
The first is r j a > (Exodus 20:3:) The second, d z > and the third, r k r > (Psalm
81:9.) The first signifies, generally, "any other god;" the second, "a
strange god;, and the third, "a strange and foreign god." But though these words
are not so opposed to each other, as not occasionally to coincide, and to be
indiscriminately used about a god that is not the TRUE ONE; yet,
from a collation of them as they are used in the Scriptures, it is easy to collect that
"another god" may be conceived under a three-fold difference; for they were
either invented by their first worshipers; or they were
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received from their ancestors, or they were taken from other
nations. (Deuteronomy 31:16, 17.) The last of these occurs,
(1.) Either by some necessity, of which
David complains, when he says, "They have driven me out this day from abiding in the
inheritance of Jehovah, saying, Go, serve other gods.(1 Samuel 26:19.)
(2.) Or by persuasion; as the heart of
Solomon was inclined by his wives to worship other gods. (1 Kings 11:4, 5.)
(3.) Or by the mere choice of the will;
as Amaziah took the gods of the children of Seir, after he had come from the slaughter of
the Edomites. (2 Chronicles 25:14.) In these degrees the Scriptures present to us a
difference between a greater and a less offense. For since Jeroboam is frequently accused
of having made Israel to sin and of increasing the crime of idolatry; (1 Kings 12:30;
14:16;) and since the children of Israel are often said to have "provoked God to
jealousy with strange gods, whom they knew not and whom their fathers did not fear,"
(Deuteronomy 32:16,) it appears that the invention or fabrication of a new god is a more
grievous crime, than the adoration of "another god" whom they received from
their ancestry. And since it greatly contributes to the dishonor and reproach of Jehovah,
to take the gods of foreign nations as objects of worship, by which, those gods plainly
seem to be preferred to Jehovah, and the religion of those nations, to the law of Jehovah,
this crime, therefore, is, of all others, by far the most grievous. (Jeremiah 2:11, 13.)
6. In the prescription of the second command, that nothing which is
esteemed as a god be worshipped in an image, the Scriptures most solicitously guard
against the possibility of the human mind finding out any evasion or lurking place. For,
with regard to the matter, they forbade images to be made of gold and silver, the most
precious of the metals, and therefore, of any metal whatever, or of wood or stone. (Exodus
20:23; Isaiah 44:12 13; Jeremiah 2:27.) It prohibits every form, whether the image
represent a living creature, any thing in the heavens, the sun, the moon, or the stars;
any thing on the earth or under the earth, a man, a quadruped, a flying creature, a fish
or a serpent, or a thing that has no existence, but by the madness and vanity of the human
brain is compounded of different shapes, such as a monster, the upper parts of which are
human, and the lower parts those of an ox; or one whose upper parts are those of an ox,
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and the lower, those of a man; or one, the higher parts of which are
those of a beautiful woman, and the lower those of a fish, terminating in a tail. It
prohibits every mode of making them, whether they be formed by fusion, by sculpture, or by
painting; (Jeremiah 10:3, 9, 14; Ezekiel 8:10, 11;) because it says uinversally,
"Thou shalt not make unto thee any likeness." And it adds a reason which
excludes generally every kind of material and every method of fabrication: "For ye
saw no manner of similitude, on the day that the Lord spake unto you in Horeb out of the
midst of the fire. Take ye, therefore, good heed unto your souls, lest ye corrupt
yourselves, and make you a graven image, the similitude of any figure," etc.
(Deuteronomy 4:15-19.)
7. But with regard to the mode of worship, and to the actions
pertaining to it, scarcely any thing can be devised or invented, and can be performed to
idols, (that is, both to false deities themselves and to the images of false divinities,
and to those of the true God,) which is not expressly said in the Scriptures to be hateful
to God, that no one may have the least pretext for his ignorance. For the Scriptures take
away all honor and service from them, whatever may be the manner in which they are
performed, whether by building temples, high places or groves by erecting altars, and by
placing images upon altars; or by offering sacrifices, burning incense, by eating that
which is offered in sacrifice to idols, by bending the knees to them, by bestowing kisses
on them, and by carrying them on their shoulders. (Exodus 20:5; 1 Kings 11:7; 12:31-33; 2
Kings 17:35; Ezekiel 8:11; Numbers 25:2; 1 Kings 19:18; Isaiah 45:20; Jeremiah 10:5.) The
Scriptures also prohibit men from placing hope and trust in idols, forbid invocation,
prayers and thanksgivings to be directed to them, and will not suffer men to fear them and
to swear by them; because idols are as unable to save as to inflict injury. (Psalm 115:8;
Jeremiah 5:7.) The Scriptures do not permit men to yield obedience to idols, because a
graven image is a teacher of lies and vanity; (Jeremiah 2:5-8, 20; 11:8-13;) and false
gods often require of their worshipers those things from which all nature, created and
uncreated, that of God and of man, is most abhorrent. (Leviticus 18:21.)
8. But, because the human mind is both inclined and fitted to
excogitate and invent excuses, nay even justifications, for sins, particularly for the sin
of idolatry, and because the pretext of a good intention to honor the Deity
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serves the more readily as a plea for it, [this propensity of mind,]
on account of conscience not equally accusing a man either for the worship which he offers
to a false divinity, or for that which he presents to the true God in an image, as it does
for the total omission of worship, and for a sin committed against the rules of equity and
goodness which prevail among mankind; our attention will be profitably called to the
consideration of what is the judgment of God concerning this matter, by whose judgment we
must stand or fall. Let us take our commencement at that species by which the true Deity
is worshipped in an image, as Jehovah was in the calf which Aaron fashioned, and in those
which were made by Jeroboam. (Exodus 32:4; 1 Kings 12:28.) God has manifested this, his
judgment, by his word and by his acts.
(1.) First, by his word of declaration,
God has shewn what are his sentiments both concerning the fabrication of an image and the
worship offered to it. The Fabrication, he says, is "a changing of the glory of the
incorruptible God into the similitude of an ox that eateth grass, into an image made like
to corruptible man, and to birds, and to four-footed beasts, and creeping things."
(Psalm 104:20; Romans 1:23.) But the Worship, he says, is offered, not to God, whom they
wished to represent by an image, but to the calf itself, and to the image which they had
fabricated. (1 Kings 12:32.) For these are his words: "They have made them a molten
calf, and have worshipped it, and have sacrificed thereunto." (Exodus 32:8.) And St.
Stephen says, "They made a calf in those days, and offered sacrifice unto the
idol." (Acts 7:41.) On this account also he calls them, "gods of gold and
silver," "other gods and molten images." (Exodus 32:31; 1 Kings 14:9.)
Secondly, by His word of threatening, by which he denounces
destruction to those who worshipped the calf that Aaron formed, and to Jeroboam and his
posterity. (Exodus 32:9, 10; 1 Kings 14:10, 11.)
(2.) God has also displayed his
judgment about idolatry by his acts. He not only fulfilled this, his word of threatening,
by cutting off Jeroboam and his posterity, (2 Chronicles 13:15-20,) and by destroying many
thousands of the Israelites; (Exodus 32:28;) but likewise by chastising similar sinners by
another horrible punishment, that of blindness, and of being delivered over to a reprobate
mind." (Romans 1:24-28.)
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9. Such, then, is the judgment of God concerning that species of
idolatry which is committed with the intention of worshipping that God who is truly God.
Let us now see how severe this judgment is against that species in which the intention is
to offer worship to that which is not the true God, to another god, to Moloch, Baal,
Chemosh, Baal-peor, and to similar false gods, though they were esteemed as gods by their
worshipers. (Deuteronomy 29:17; 32:14-17.) Of this, his judgment, God has afforded most
convincing indications, both by his word and his acts. In this word of declaration two
things occur, which are most signal indications of this.
First is, that he interprets this act as a desertion of God, a
defection from the true God, a perfidious dissolution of the conjugal bond by spiritual
adultery with another, and a provoking of God himself to jealousy. The Second is, that he
says this adultery is committed with demons and devils.
For these are some of the strains of Moses in his very celebrated
song: "They sacrificed unto devils, not to God; to gods whom they knew not,"
etc. (Deuteronomy 32:17.) And the royal psalmist sings thus: "They sacrificed their
sons and their daughters unto devils, unto the idols of Canaan," (Psalm 104:37, 38,)
which they did when they compelled any of their offspring to pass through the fire to
Moloch. (Leviticus 18:21.) The apostle Paul agrees with this when he says, "The
things which the gentiles sacrifice, they sacrifice to devils and not to God;" (1
Corinthians 10:20;) whether this signifies, that some demon lay concealed in those images;
or that those sacred rites were performed according to the will and prescription of
demons, either openly, by oracles, responses, and the verses of prophesying poets, or
secretly by the institutes or maxims of the world, (Arnob. lib. 6; Aug. de Civ. Del. lib.
8, 23,) that is, of wicked people, of whom Satan is called "the prince," and
among whom he is said to have his throne. (1 Peter 4:3; 2 Corinthians 4:4; Revelation
2:13.) The denunciations of punishments for this crime, and the execution of these
threats, are described generally throughout the whole of the sacred Scriptures.
10. If the things, thus explained from the Scriptures, be applied to
Latriav, the divine adorations,
and to Qrhskeiav, the religious
ceremonies or superstitions which are employed in the popish church; it will clearly
appear, that she is guilty of the crime of the two-fold idolatry which has now been
described. (Thesis 4.) Of the First Kind she renders
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herself guilty, because she presents divine worship to the bread in
the Lord’s supper, to the virgin Mary, to angels and departed saints, to the relics
of Christ’s cross and of the saints, and to things consecrated. Of the Second Kind
she renders herself guilty, because her members worship, in an image, God, Christ, the
cross of Christ, the virgin Mary, angels and saints. Each of these charges shall be
demonstrated; and, we will confirm them in as brief a manner as possible, after having
closed up all the evasions, through which the worshipers of idols try to creep out when
they are held fast bound.
11. 1. First. Concerning the sacrament of the Lord’s supper, to
which "all the faithful in Christ, according to the method always received in the
[Roman] Catholic church, present in veneration the worship of latria, or supreme
adoration, [which is due to the true God.] Nor is this most holy sacrament to be the less
adored because it was instituted by Christ our Lord, that it might be received, as the
Council of Trent says, (Session 13, 5,) when it frees us from one part of the sacrament.
To this we subjoin, in the discharge of another part of the duty we have undertaken: But
the worship of latria or supreme adoration, cannot be paid to the sacrament of the
eucharist without idolatry.
(1.) It cannot be paid even in the use
of the eucharist, because bread continues to be bread still, with regard to its substance,
and it is not transubstantiated or changed into the body of Christ by consecration. For
the eucharist would thus cease to be a sacrament, of whose essence it is to consist of an
external thing; and the body of Christ would thus begin to exist anew; for nothing can be
changed into that which had no previous existence.
(2.) Much less can this worship be paid
to the sacrament in its abuse. Because, though a legitimate consecration might [be
supposed to] have the power of transubstantiating, yet an illegitimate consecration cannot
effect a transubstantiation. For all right of consecration depends on the divine
institution: but a consecration to adore, and not to receive, is foreign to the design of
the institution, and therefore inefficacious. (Matthew 26:26;1 Corinthians 10:16; 11:25.)
Therefore, the Roman Catholic church commits idolatry, as she presents to the sacrament of
the eucharist the service of latria, or supreme adoration, which is due to the true God
alone.
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12. Secondly. In the worship which the papists perform to the virgin
Mary, angels and departed saints, we say they commit idolatry in two ways — in
reference to the act of adoring them, and to that of invoking them. (1 Kings 19:18; 2
Kings 17:11,16, 35.)
(1.) In adoring them, when they do
reverence to all and to each of them by altars, masses, festivals or holy days, vigils,
fasts, images, candles, offerings, by burning incense, by vows, pilgrimages, and
genuflections. All these acts relate to latria or supreme adoration, and to divine
worship, when presented to the true God according to his will, or to false gods through
the superstition of men.
(2.) In invoking them, when the papists
"betake themselves to the prayers, and to the help and assistance, afforded by the
saints," as the Council of Trent says, (Session 25,) and when they return thanks to
them for the benefits which they receive. (Lombard. lib. 4, dist. 25.) But they have this
recourse to the Prayers of angels and saints, as their intercessors, mediators, patrons
and advocates, who intercede.
(1.) With a pious affection, by which
they desire the wishes of those who pray to them, to be fulfilled.
(2.) With their glorious and most holy
merits, which are presented in favor of those who, with suppliant entreaties, require
their prayers. They have this recourse, also, to the Help and Assistance of angels and
saints, as to auxiliaries or helpers, preservers and the guardians of grace and glory;
that is, the liberal dispensers of all blessings, their deliverers in necessities, whom
they also denominate their life, salvation, safety, hope, defense, refuse, solace, yea,
their only hope, and their safe fortress. But these are titles which belong to God and
Christ alone, as the decorations of the highest excellence, wisdom, benevolence and power;
than which nothing can be conceived more illustrious, as is manifest from the Scriptures,
in which these titles are read as attributed to God and Christ; (Psalm 46:1, 2; 18:1, 2;
36:7, 10; 62:2, 3, 6; Isaiah 45:20; Acts 4:12;) when the supreme honor of invocation and
adoration is offered to them by holy men. And though the turpitude of this idolatry be
exceedingly foul and disgusting, yet how immensely is it aggravated by rendering the
reason which serves as a pretext to them for that deed; than which reason nothing can be
imagined to be more injurious to God and Christ.
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(1.) To God, when the papists say that
our heavenly Father has given half of his kingdom to the blessed virgin, the queen of
heaven, whom they also denominate "the mistress of the world," "the star of
the sea," "the haven or port of salvation," and "God;" (Gul.
Biel. in Can. Miss. Lect. 80;) and when they say that since God has both justice and
mercy, he retains the former of these himself, but has granted the exercise of mercy to
his virgin mother, and therefore, that we must appeal from the court of the justice of God
to the court of the mercy of his mother.
(2.) To Christ, nothing can be more
injurious than this; because the papists say that Christ is not only an advocate, but that
he is a judge, and as such, will discuss all things, so that nothing will remain
unpunished; and therefore, that God has provided for us a female advocate, who is full of
mildness and suavity, and in whom is found nothing that is harsh or unpleasant, who is,
also, on this account, called "the throne of Christ," on which he reposed.
(Anton. page 4, tit. 15, cap. 14.)
13. Thirdly. That the papists defile themselves with idolatry in
paying reverence to the relics of the cross of Christ and of the saints, by performing
unto them acts both of adoration and of invocation, is proved, partly from their own
confession, and partly from the very exercise of those religious acts which they offer to
them.
(1.) The Council of Trent publishes the
confession, when it says, (Session 25,) "Those persons are to be wholly condemned,
who affirm that honor and veneration are not due to the relics of saints; or that those
relics, and other sacred monuments, are unprofitably honored by the faithful; and that
resort is vainly made to the sepulchers of saints, for the purpose of obtaining their
assistance." The next confessor on this subject is "the angelical doctor,"
who is believed to have written all things well concerning Christ. For he says, (Sum. p.
3, Qu, 25,) that the adoration of latria, or supreme worship, must be given to the cross
of Christ on account of the contract [into which it came] with the members of the body of
Christ. This is a reason quite sufficient to Antoninus to affirm (Anton. p. 3, tit. 12, c.
5) that not only is the cross of Christ to be adored, but likewise all things belonging to
it — the nails, the spear, the vestments, and even the sacred tabernacles. In
accordance with these confessions, the Roman Catholic
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church sings, "Behold the wood of the Cross! We adore thy
cross, O Lord."
(2.) Another method the papists have of
declaring their idolatry by various acts — when they adorn the relics of the cross of
Christ and of the saints, with gold, silver, and jewels; when they wrap them in fine lawn
napkins and in pieces of silk or velvet; when they carry them about with great pomp, in
processions instituted for the purpose of returning thanks and making requests; when they
place them on altars; when they suspend before these relics gifts and curses; when they
present them to be viewed, kissed, and adored by kneeling, and thus themselves adore them;
when they light wax candles before them, burn incense to them; when they consecrate
churches and altars by their presence, and consider them as rendered holy; when they
institute festivals to them; when they celebrate masses to their honor, under this idea,
that masses celebrated upon an altar on which relics are placed, become more holy and
efficacious; when they undertake pilgrimages to them; when they carry them about as
amulets and preservatives; when they put them upon sick people; when they sanctify their
own napkins or handkerchiefs, their garlands, and other things of the same kind, by
touching them with these relics, that they may serve for the same purposes; because they
think that grace and a divine virtue exist in them, which they seek to obtain from them by
invocations, and other services performed before them; they use them for driving away and
expelling devils and bad spirits; and they do all these things which the heathen did to
the relics of their idolatry. To all these particulars, must be added that most shameful
illusion — the multiplication of relics, and the substitution of such as belong to
other persons than to those whose names they bear. Hence, the origin of that witty saving,
"The bodies of many persons are honored on earth, whose souls are burning in
everlasting torments." (Cal. de relig.)
14. The Fourth specimen, partly of the same idolatry, and partly of
a superstition much worse than that of the heathens, the papists afford not only in the
dedications and consecrations of churches, alters, vases, and ornaments which belong to
them, such as the cross, the chalice and its covers, linen clothes, the vestments of
priests, and of censers; also in the consecration of easter wax candles, holy water, salt,
oil for extreme unction, bells, small waxen figures like dolls, each of which they call
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"Agnus Dei," and of cemeteries or burial grounds, and
things of a similar kind, but likewise in the use of things thus consecrated, for the
papists pray in these consecrations, that God would furnish or inspire the things now
enumerated, with grace, virtue and power to drive away and expel bodily and spiritual
evils, and to bestow the contrary blessings; they use them as actually possessed of such
grace and virtue; and perform to them religious worship. We will here produce the
following few instances of this matter: They have ascribed remission of Sins to
visitations of churches thus consecrated. They use the following words, among others, in
their formularies of consecrations, on the cross to be consecrated: "Deign, O Lord,
to bless this wood of the cross, that it may be a saving remedy to mankind, that it may be
the solidity of faith, the advancement of good works, the redemption of souls, and a
safeguard against the fierce darts of enemies." In the formularies on holy water,
these words occur: "I exorcise or adjure thee, O creature of water, that thou become
exorcised water to put to flight all the power of the enemy, to root him out, and to
displant friendly greetings with his apostate angels," etc. This is part of the
formulary in the consecration of salt: "I exorcise or adjure thee, O creature of
salt, that thou be made exorcised salt for the salvation of believers, that thou mayest be
healthful soundness of soul and body to those who receive thee," etc. Also, the
following words: "Deign, O Lord, to bless and sanctity this creature of salt, that it
may be, to all who take it, health of mind and body; and that what thing soever shall be
sprinkled with it, may be devoid of all filth or uncleanliness, and of every attack of
spiritual wickedness." But they attribute to the consecrated small wax figures, which
they call "Agni Dei," the virtue of breaking and removing every sin, as the
blood of Christ does; and, according to this opinion, they use the same things, reposing
their hope and confidence in them, as if they were actually endued with any such power.
15. But that the papists commit the second species of idolatry in
the worshipping of images, (Theses 4, 6, & 10,) is abundantly proved from their own
confession, the forms of consecration, and their daily practice.
(1.) Their own confession may be found
in the canons and decrees of the Council of Trent, in which it is affirmed, (Session 25,)
"The images of Christ, of the blessed virgin, and of other saints, are to be held and
retained, especially in churches; and due honor and veneration are to be
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exhibited to them; so that by the images which we kiss, and before
which we uncover our heads, and prostrate ourselves, we adore Christ, and venerate the
saints whose likenesses those images bear; this is what was sanctioned by the second
Nicene Council." Let the acts of that Council be inspected, and it will appear that
the adoration and invocation which were established by it, are mere idolatry. To these,
let Thomas, and the multitude of their divines, be added, who are of opinion that images
must receive the same services of adoration, as those with which the prototypes which they
represent are worshipped.
(2.) The formularies of their
consecrations make a similar declaration; for the image of the virgin Mary is consecrated
in the following form: "O God, sanctify this image of the blessed virgin, that it may
bring the help of saving aid to thy faithful people, if thunder and lightning prevail;
that hurtful things may be the more speedily expelled; that inundations caused by rains,
the commotions of civil wars, or the devastations committed by pagans, may be repressed
and appeased at its presence. (1 Kings 8.) In the consecration of the image of John the
Baptist, the following words occur: "Let this sacred image be the expeller of devils,
the invoker of angels, the protector of the faithful, and let its intercession powerfully
flourish in this place."
(3.) In the daily practice of the
papist, most of those acts, both of adoration and invocation, are performed to images,
which we have already mentioned as having been exhibited to the saints themselves; and
they usually perform those acts [which they think due] to the saints, to their images, or
in their images, but seldom indeed do they by a pure [mental] glance look up to the saints
themselves, being under the influence of this opinion — that the honors [which they
thus pay to images] belong to the prototypes themselves, and therefore that the prayers
which they address to them will by this means be the more readily and speedily heard and
answered.
16. The papists do not indeed deny, that they present this worship,
these services, and acts both of adoration and invocation, to the sacrament of the
eucharist, to the virgin Mary, to angels and departed saints, to relics and things
consecrated, and to these images: at least they are unable to deny this, except by an
evident untruth. Yet they excuse themselves under the
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pretense of certain exceptions and distinctions, which they consider
to be of such value and power, as to exempt from idolatry those acts which are performed
by themselves with such an intention of mind, but which, when performed by others, are
really idolatrous. These exceptions are, First.
According to the three-fold excellence of divine, human and
intermediate, there is a three-fold honor. And here the distinction is produced of Latreia "latria" or divine worship, douleia "dulia" or human worship, and uperdouleia "hyperdulia" or intermediate, or between both. To this may be added
what they say, that most of the acts which relate to this worship are analogous. The
Second exception is from the intention of those who offer those religious services. The
Third is in the difference between intercession and bestowing, that is, between the office
of mediator as discharged by the [popish] saints, and as discharged by Christ Jesus.
The Fourth is in the distinction between an image and an idol.
17. The First subterfuge has three members. To the first of these we
reply,
(1.) The Scriptures do not acknowledge
any excellence that is called "hyperdulia or intermediate," or that is different
from divine excellence except what is according to the functions, graces and dignities
through which some rational creatures, by divine command, preside over others and minister
to them — men as long as they remain in this mortal life — and angels to the end
of the world. Therefore, no homage paid to a creature is pure from idolatry, except that
which is offered to superiors who live in this world, and which is approved by the
Scriptures. (Psalm 82:1, 6; John 10:35.)
(2.) That intermediate excellence, and
the worship which is accommodated to it, are rejected by the Scriptures, since they
condemn the "worship paid to angels" (Colossians 2:18,) and commend Hezekiah for
having "broken in pieces the brazen serpent that Moses had made; for unto those days
the children of Israel did burn incense to it." (2 Kings 18:4) To the second monster
of this subterfuge we reply, the distinction of worship into latria and dulia is vain in
this case; for the apostle claims the worship of dulia [which the papists call an inferior
or human adoration] for the true God alone, when he blames the gentiles for having
"done service to those which by nature are no gods." (Galatians 4:8.) And this
word, in its general acceptation, signifies the service which ought to be performed, or
which
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lawfully can be, to those only with whom we have to do according to
godliness, and this according to the law which is either common to mutual charity,
(Galatians 5:13,) or that which has a more particular reference to such persons as have
constant transactions with each other. (Ephesians 6:5, 6.) But with those persons to whom
the present discussion relates, (placing the angels as an exception,) we have according to
godliness no transactions, neither are we bound, by any law, to them for service. To the
third member our answer is,
(1.) To offer sacrifice, to burn
incense, to erect churches and altars, to make vows, to institute festivals, fasts and
pilgrimages, [to angels or saints,] and to swear by their names, and not analogical or
relative services, but univocal or having one purpose, and such as are due only to the
true God.
(2.) Though prostration itself is law
fitly given to men on account of their analogical similitude to God, yet, when it is an
act of religion, it is considered as so peculiarly due to God, that the whole of divine
worship is designated by it alone. (1 Kings 19:18; Matthew 9:18.) Christ likewise denies
prostration to the devil, (Matthew 4:8,) and the angel in the Apocalypse refuses it when
offered to himself. (Revelation 19:10.)
18. The distinct intention of the worshipers, is the Second
subterfuge that they use to remove from themselves the idolatries of every kind of which
they have been accused. In the first of these intentions they say, concerning the
adoration of the sacrament of the Lord’s supper, that their intention is to honor,
not the bread, but the true body of Christ. In the second, that the adoration, even divine
adoration itself, which they perform to a creature, is not offered to it as to God; that
is, they perform the acts of worship with the design of procuring for the creature such
esteem and veneration as in reality belongs only to the divine Majesty. In the third, that
by giving honor to a creature, they do not stop there, but that God may be glorified in
and through the creature. (Greg. de Val. lib. 2, c. 1 & 3.) In the fourth, that they
do not honor the image itself, but its prototype. To all these distinctions we reply,
(1.) The deed is in every case contrary
to the intention; and they in reality do the very thing which, in their intention, they
profess themselves desirous to avoid.
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(2.) The judgment of God is adverse to
their intention; for he does not interpret the deed from the intention, but forms his
judgment of the intention from the deed. God himself has exposed an intention that is in
accordance with such a deed, although the man who does it puts in his protestation about
his contrary intention. This intention is evident from the following passages:
"They have made them a molten calf and have
worshipped it, and have sacrificed thereunto, and said, these be thy gods, O Israel, which
have brought thee up out of the land of Egypt." (Exodus 32:8.)
"He falleth down unto it and worshippeth it,
and prayeth unto it, and saith, Deliver me, for thou art my god." (Isaiah 44:17.)
"They sacrificed unto devils, not to God,"
etc. (Deuteronomy 32:17.)
(3.) We add, if these distinctions
possess any validity, neither Jews nor heathens could at any time have been accused of
having committed idolatry; for, by the same distinctions as these, they would be able to
justify all their acts of worship, whether offered to a true or to a false deity, to the
supreme God, to inferior divinities, or to an image. For [on these principles] their
intention never feared the works of their own fingers, but those persons after whose image
such works were formed, and to whose names they were consecrated. Their intention never
honored angels, demons, or the minor gods, except that such services should redound to the
honor of the supreme Deity; (Lactan. Inst. 1. ii c. 2;) it never wished to procure such
esteem and veneration for them as belongs solely to the majesty of God supreme; and it
never worshipped a false deity.
19. The Third exception has a special tendency to justify the
invocation of the virgin Mary and the saints; (Thesis 16;) for the papists say that they
invoke them, not as the prime authors and donors of blessings; nor as Christ, whom God the
Father hath constituted the high priest, and to whom he has given all power in heaven and
on earth; but that they invoke them, in truth, as friends, intercessors and donors, yet in
subordination to Christ. To this we reply, First, from the premises which they grant, they
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may themselves be convicted of idolo-dulia, or inferior worship
offered to idols; for they confess that the invocation which they practice to the virgin
Mary and to saints is the adoration of dulia. But they fabricate idols of the virgin Mary
and of saints before they invoke them by heresy, both by falsely attributing to them the
faculty of understanding their prayers, of interceding for sinners, not only feelingly,
but also meritoriously, and of granting the things requested, and by presenting to them,
as possessed of these qualifications, the worship of invocation; for this is the mode by
which an idol is fabricated of a thing that has had a real existence. To this argument
strength is added from the circumstance that, although these saints might know the things
for which the papists pray, might intercede for them with a pious feeling, and, as
spirits," might bestow what they have requested; yet as they could not bestow them,
"with power" they ought not to be invoked. Secondly. By the words,
"insubordination to Christ," they in reality destroy such a subordination and
introduce a collaterally. If this be true, then on that very account they are likewise
idolaters; because the worship, which God the Father wishes to be given to his Son, is
that of latria, or divine adoration. For it is the will of the Father, "that all men
should honor the Son, even as they honor the Father." (John 5:23.) But subordination
is removed, and collaterally is introduced,
(1.) Universally, when all these saints
are said, by their own merits, to intercede for and to obtain blessings, and to dispense
the blessings thus obtained, which are two tokens of the eversion of subordination and of
the introduction of collaterally.
(2.) Specially, this collaterally
exists [from their own showing] between Christ and the virgin Mary; as is evident,
(1.) the names under which they invoke
her, when they denominate her "the queen of heaven," "the mistress of the
world," "our salvation, harbor, defense, refuge and solace," who is able to
command our Redeemer in virtue of her authority as his mother. These expressions place
Christ in subordination to her.
(2.) But this is likewise evident, from
the cause on account of which they say she ought to be invoked. As a Female Advocate,
because, since Christ is not only a man and an advocate, but likewise God and a Judge,
"who will suffer nothing to pass unpunished; the virgin Mary, as having in her
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nothing that is harsh and unpleasant, but being all mildness and
suavity," (Thesis 12,) ought to act as intercessor between him and sinners. And as a
Female Dispenser of Blessings; because "God the Father has given half of his kingdom
to her, (that is, to administer his mercy while he reserves the exercise of justice to
himself,") and has conferred upon her a plenitude of all grace, that out of her
fullness all men may receive. This is nothing less than to hurl Christ from his throne,
and to exalt the virgin Mary in his place.
20. The Fourth subterfuge is the distinction between an image and an
idol.
The papists say, an image is the likeness of something real; an
idol, that of something false. When Bellarmine explains this definition, he commits a
fallacy; for, in interpreting "something false," he says, since it is a being,
it is not that which it is feigned to be, that is, God. But that the difference which he
here makes is a false one, many passages of Scripture prove. The image which Rachael
purloined from her father, is called "anidol;" but it was the image of a man.
(Genesis 31:34.) Stephen calls the molten calf "anidol," and it was made to
represent the true God. (Acts. 7:41.) The calves of Jeroboam were representations or
images of Jehovah, yet they are called "idols" by the Greek and Latin
translators. (1 Kings 12:28.) Micah’s image is also called "an idol" and
yet it was "set up" to Jehovah. (Judges 17:4; 18:31.) Among the "dumb
idols" unto which, the apostle says, the Corinthians "were carried away,"
were statues of men, and probably images of "four-footed beasts, of creeping things,
and of birds." (Romans 1:23.) Yet Bellarmine would with difficulty prove that these
are things, which have no existence. Wherefore if an idol be that which is nothing, that
is, a sound without reality and meaning, this very distinction, which is purely an
invention of the human brain, is itself the vainest idol, nay one of the veries |
