had life and breath in him. Such a cripple came and saluted this saint of oak, and by and by he was made whole; and, lo! here hangeth his crutch. Such an one in a tempest vowed to St. Christopher, and 'scaped; and behold, here is a ship of wax. Such an one, by St. Leonard's help, brake out of prison, and see where his fetters hang."......"The Relics we must kiss and offer unto, specially on Relic Sunday. And while we offer, (that we should not be weary, or repent us of our cost,) the music and minstrelsy goeth merrily all the offer. tory time, with praising and calling upon those saints, whose relics be then in presence. Yea, and the water also, wherein those relics have been dipped, must with great reverence be reserved, as very holy and effectuous."..... "Because Relics were so gainful, few places were there but they had Relics provided for them. And for more plenty of Relics, some one saint had many heads, one in one place, and another in another place. Some had six arms, and twenty-six fingers. And where our LORD bare His cross alone, if all the pieces of the relics thereof were gathered together, the greatest ship in England would scarcely bear them; and yet the greatest part of it, they say, doth yet remain in the hands of the Infidels; for the which they pray in their beadsbidding, that they may get it also into their hands, for such godly use and purpose. And not only the bones of the saints, but every thing appertaining to them, was a holy relic. In some place they offer a sword, in some the scabbard, in some a shoe, in some a saddle that had been set upon some holy horse, in some the coals wherewith St. Laurence was roasted, in some place the tail of the ass which our LORD JESUS CHRIST sat on, to be kissed and offered unto for a relic. For rather than they would lack a relic, they would offer you a horse bone instead of a virgin's arm, or the tail of the ass to be kissed and offered unto for relics. O wicked, impudent, and most shameless men, the devisers of these things! O silly, foolish, and dastardly daws, and more beastly than the ass whose tail they kissed, that believe such things!"......" Of these things already rehearsed, it is evident that our image maintainers have not only made images, and set them up in temples, as did the Gentiles idolaters their idols; but also that they have had the same idolatrous opinions of the saints, to whom they have made images, which the Gentiles idolaters had of their false gods; and have not only worshipped their images with the same rites, ceremonies, superstition, and all circumstances, as did the Gentiles idolaters their idols, but in many points have also far exceeded them in all wickedness, foolishness, and madness."-Homily on Peril of Idolatry, p. 193–197. It will be observed that in this extract, as elsewhere in the Homilies, it is implied that the Bishop or the Church of Rome is Antichrist; but this is a statement bearing on prophetical interpretation, not on doctrine; and one besides which cannot be reasonably brought to illustrate or explain any of the positions of the Articles; and therefore it may be suitably passed over. VOL. VI.-90. D In another place the Homilies speak as follows: "Our churches stand full of such great puppets, wondrously decked and adorned; garlands and coronets be set on their heads, precious pearls hanging about their necks; their fingers shine with rings, set with precious stones; their dead and stiff bodies are clothed with garments stiff with gold. You would believe that the images of our men-saints were some princes of Persia land with their proud apparel; and the idols of our women-saints were nice and well-trimmed harlots, tempting their paramours to wantonness: whereby the saints of GOD are not honoured, but most dishonoured, and their godliness soberness, chastity, contempt of riches, and of the vanity of the world, defaced and brought in doubt by such monstrous decking, most differing from their sober and godly lives. And because the whole pageant must thoroughly be played, it is not enough thus to deck idols, but at last come in the priests themselves, likewise decked with gold and pearl, that they may be meet servants for such lords and ladies, and fit worshippers of such gods and goddesses. And with a solemn pace they pass forth before these golden puppets, and fall down to the ground on their marrow-bones before these honourable idols; and then rising up again, offer up odours and incense unto them, to give the people an example of double idolatry, by worshipping not only the idol, but the gold also, and riches, wherewith it is garnished. Which thing, the most part of our old Martyrs, rather than they would do, or once kneel, or offer up one crumb of incense before an image, suffered most cruel and terrible deaths, as the histories of them at large do declare."......" O books and scriptures, in the which the devilish schoolmaster, Satan, hath penned the lewd lessons of wicked idolatry, for his dastardly disciples and scholars to behold, read, and learn, to God's most high dishonour, and their most horrible damnation! Have we not been much bound, think you, to those which should have taught us the truth out of GOD's Book and his Holy Scripture, that they have shut up that Book and Scripture from us, and none of us so bold as once to open it, or read in it? And instead thereof, to spread us abroad these goodly, carved, and gilded books and painted scriptures, to teach us such good and godly lessons? Have not they done well, after they ceased to stand in pulpits themselves, and to teach the people committed to their instruction, keeping silence of God's word, and become dumb dogs, (as the Prophet calleth them,) to set up in their stead, on every pillar and corner of the church, such goodly doctors, as dumb, but more wicked than themselves be? We need not to complain of the lack of one dumb parson, having so many dumb devilish vicars (I mean these idols and painted puppets) to teach in their stead. Now in the mean season, whilst the dumb and dead idols stand thus decked and clothed, contrary to God's law and commandment, the poor Christian people, the lively images of GOD, commended to us so tenderly by our SAVIOUR CHRIST, as most dear to Him, stand naked, shivering for cold, and their teeth chattering in their heads, and no man covereth them, are pined with hunger and thirst, and no man giveth them a penny to refresh them; whereas pounds be ready at all times (contrary to God's word and will) to deck and trim dead stocks and stones, which neither feel cold, hunger, nor thirst.”Homily on Peril of Idolatry, p. 219-222. Again, with a covert allusion to the abuses of the day, the Homilist says elsewhere, of Scripture, "There shall you read of Baal, Moloch, Chamos, Melchom, Baalpeor, Astaroth, Bel, the Dragon, Priapus, the brazen Serpent, the twelve Signs, and many others, unto whose images the people, with great devotion, invented pilgrimages, precious decking and censing them, kneeling down and offering to them, thinking that an high merit before GOD, and to be esteemed above the precepts and commandments of GOD."-Homily on Good Works, p. 42. Again, soon after : "What man, having any judgment or learning, joined with a true zeal unto GOD, doth not see and lament to have entered into CHRIST'S religion, such false doctrine, superstition, idolatry, hypocrisy, and other enormities and abuses, so as by little and little, through the sour leaven thereof, the sweet bread of God's holy word hath been much hindered and laid apart? Never had the Jews, in their most blindness, so many pilgrimages unto images, nor used so much kneeling, kissing, and censing of them, as hath been used in our time. Sects and feigned religions were neither the fortieth part so many among the Jews, nor more superstitiously and ungodly abused, than of late years they have been among us: which sects and religions had so many hypocritical and feigned works in their state of religion, as they arrogantly named it, that their lamps, as they said, ran always over, able to satisfy not only for their own sins, but also for all other their benefactors, brothers, and sisters of religion, as most ungodly and craftily they had persuaded the multitude of ignorant people; keeping in divers places, as it were, marts or markets of merits, being full of their holy relics, images, shrines, and works of overflowing abundance, ready to be sold; and all things which they had were called holy-holy cowls, holy girdles, holy pardons, holy beads, holy shoes, holy rules, and all full of holiness. And what thing can be more foolish, more superstitious, or ungodly, than that men, women, and children, should wear a friar's coat to deliver them from agues or pestilence; or when they die, or when they be buried, cause it to be cast upon them, in hope thereby to be saved? Which superstition, although (thanks be to God) it hath been little used in this realm, yet in divers other realms it hath been, and yet is, used among many, both learned and unlearned." Homily on Good Works, pp. 45, 46. [Once more : "True religion then, and pleasing of GOD, standeth not in making, setting up, painting, gilding, clothing, and decking of dumb and dead images (which be but great puppets and babies for old fools in dotage, and wicked idolatry, to dally and play with), nor in kissing of them, capping, kneeling, offering to them, incensing of them, setting up of candles, hanging up of legs, arms, or whole bodies of wax before them, or praying or asking of them, or of saints, things belonging only to GOD to give. But all these things be vain and abominable, and most damnable before GOD."-Homily on Peril of Idolatry, p. 223.] Now the veneration and worship condemned in these and other passages are such as these: kneeling before images, lighting candles to them, offering them incense, going on pilgrimage to them, hanging up crutches, &c. before them, lying tales about them, belief in miracles as if wrought by them through illusion of the devil, decking them up immodestly, and providing incentives by them to bad passions; and, in like manner, merry music and minstrelsy, and licentious practices in honour of relics, counterfeit relics, multiplication of them, absurd pretences about them. This is what the Article means by "the Romish doctrine," which, in agreement to one of the above extracts, it calls "a fond thing," res futilis; for who can ever hope, except the grossest and most blinded minds, to be gaining the favour of the blessed saints, while they come with unchaste thoughts and eyes, that cannot cease from sin; and to be profited by "pilgrimage-going," in which "Lady Venus and her son Cupid were rather worshipped wantonly in the flesh, than God the FATHER, and our SAVIOUR CHRIST HIS SON, truly worshipped in the SPIRIT ?” Here again it is remarkable that, urged by the truth of the allegation, the Council of Trent is obliged, both to confess the above-mentioned enormities in the veneration of relics and images, and to forbid them : "Into these holy and salutary observances should any abuses creep, of these the Holy Council strongly [vehementer] desires the utter extinction; so that no images of a false doctrine, and supplying to the uninstructed opportunity of perilous error, should be set up.....All superstition also in invocation of saints, veneration of relics, and sacred use of images, be put away; all filthy lacre be cast out of doors; and all wantonness be avoided; so that images be not painted or adorned with an immodest beauty; or the celebration of Saints and attendance on Relics be abused to revelries and drunkennesses; as though festival days were kept in honour of saints by luxury and lasciviousness."-Sess. 25. [On the whole, then, by the Romish doctrine of the veneration and worshipping of images and relics, the article means all maintenance of those idolatrous honours which have been and are paid them so commonly throughout the church of Rome, with the superstitions, profanities, and impurities consequent thereupon.] 4. Invocation of Saints. By "invocation" here is not meant the mere circumstance of addressing beings out of sight, because we use the Psalms in our daily service, which are frequent in invocations of Angels to praise and bless GOD. In the Benedicite too we address "the spirits and souls of the righteous." Nor is it a "fond" invocation to pray that unseen beings may bless us; for this [Bishop Ken does in his Evening Hymn :O may my Guardian, while I sleep, Close to my bed his vigils keep, His love angelical instil, Stop all the avenues of ill, &c.]1 On the other hand, judging from the example set us in the Homilies themselves, invocations are not censurable, and certainly not "fond," if we mean nothing definite by them, addressing them to beings which we know cannot hear, and using them as interjections. The Homilist seems to avail himself of this proviso in a passage, which will serve to begin our extracts in illustration of the superstitious use of invocations. "We have left Him neither heaven, nor earth, nor water, nor country, nor city, peace nor war to rule and govern, neither men, nor beasts, nor their diseases to cure; that a godly man might justly, for zealous indignation, cry out, O heaven, O earth, and seas 2, what madness and wickedness against GoD are men fallen into! What dishonour do the creatures to their CREATOR and MAKER! And if we remember GoD sometimes, yet, because we doubt of His ability or will to help, we join to Him another helper, as if He were a noun adjective, using these sayings: such as learn, GoD and St. Nicholas be my speed: such as neese, GOD help and St. John: to the horse, GoD and St. Loy save thee. Thus are we become like horses and mules, which have no understanding. For is there not one GOD only, who by His power and wisdom made all things, and by His providence governeth the same, and by His goodness maintaineth and saveth them? Be not all things of Him, by Him, and through Him Why dost thou turn from the CREATOR to the creatures? This is the manner of the Gentiles idolaters: but thou art a Christian, and therefore by CHRIST alone hast access to GOD the FATHER, and help of Him only."-Homily on Peril of Idolatry, p. 189. 1 [A passage here occurred in 1st edition upon Rev. i. 4.] |