at each other without laughing." So palpable (to all sensible men) was the cheat they put upon the poor ignorant people..

It is usual with popes, when they go out into the country, to have their host or wafer carried before them as a guard and protection. I myself often saw the cross carried before the archbishop of Paris in his coach. And it is well known that popish armies have been, more than once routed upon the disgrace their patron-idol received, in their van, from a Protestant cannon-ball. This is no more than the superstitious mummery practised by the heathens as may be seen in the seventh of the acts of the apostles, where St. Stephen says, that the Jews, when they fell into idolatry, carried the ta-bernacle of Molock before them by way of guard, as the jesuit Sanctus proves in his notes on this passage. "The tabernacle, says he, was a certain case or shrine wherein Molock was carried in solêmn pomp, and which the Jews, in imitation of the Gentiles, took along with them thro' devotion and for their protection wherever they went. Now that it was usual with the heathens to carry tutelar gods along with them as companions and conductors of their voyages, we learn from Servius on the following verse of the sixth of the Eneid: errantesque deos agitataque Numina Troja. And I do not believe it was for any other reason that Rachel stole her father's gods, or that gods were carried by Jacob's servants as they went out of the Mesopotamia.* It was on this account that Laban so easily discovered his gods had been stolen from him, because he was for taking a walk abroad, and, looking for his gods to take them with him as usual, missed them. Now Jacob seems to have intimated the reason the servants had for carrying their gods with them, when he says that God was the companion

Gen. 35.

of his journey; as if he had said that they ought not to carry these gods who were rather so many scandals and stumbling-blocks than guides in their journey and that there is only one faithful guide he that conducted him in his long and perilous jour

ney.

:

The heathens believed that the sovereign gods dwelt in heaven; for which reason they were called Coelicola, inhabitants of heaven. And, notwithstanding, they believed that those gods often descended upon earth, mixed with mortals, were sometimes wounded &c. as may be seen in the battles of the gods described by Homer and others, who tell us of the immortal blood that issued from their wounds. The Romanists likewise believe, that Jesus Christ is seated at the right hand of God, and still that he comes down every day upon earth by virtue of the conseoration of the eucharist: that he may be wounded in the host, and lose some of his immortal blood, witness the famous host that is preserved still at Dijon in Burgundy, on which may be seen the gashes that a Jew gave it with a knife, as also the drops of blood that gushed out of the wounds. I have myself seen in Paris in the cloister of the Carmelites called des Billettes, the figure of a host upon the wall distilling drops of blood, that, it is pretended, were drawn from it by a Jew represented underneath with a rod in his hand.

366

The Fathers of the primitive church reproached the heathens for pretending to make their gods, and adoring the work of their own hands. Thus Lactantius: they revere and adore," says he, "the clay that was fashioned by their own hands." And St. Jerome on the 113th psalm: "you therefore make with your hands," says he, "a God that yon adore." Now, it is certain that the heathens adored not the idols themselves, but the gods or

1. 5. C. 4.

some supernatural or divine power that they believed, had been introduced into the idols by virtue of the consecration. So saith Arnobius.* "They force their gods, by virtue of the consecration, to enter into the idols and unite themselves with them." Now I appeal to any man if the same thing be not taught and practised in the church of Rome. She makes the bread herself, and pretends to force or command Jesus Christ, by virtue of the consecration, to enter into, and clothe himself with it. For according to her doctrinet let a priest be never so wicked, yet, if he has an intention to consecrate, our Saviour must obey his words, and immediately present himself in the sacrament. Witness what happened in Paris some years ago: A priest passing thro' a bread-market pronounced the words of consecration upon every loaf that was there; a report being made thereof to the clergy, orders were immediately issued for seizing upon, and burning, all the bread that was found in that market. Spectatum admissi!

By what I have just said, joined to what I observed before, under the article of image-worship and elsewhere, it is evident to demonstration that Minutius Felix, Arnobius, Tertullian, Lactantius, and the rest of the fathers, that argued against the heathen consecration and adoration of images, knew nothing of the doctrine of our modern consecration; otherwise the heathens might have retorted all their arguments upon themselves, and

* Contra gentes 1. 6.

† Principio docet sancta synodus in almo sancto eucharistiæ sacramento, post panis & vini consecrationem Dominum nostrum Jesum Christum, verum Deum atque hominem, vere, realiter ac substantialiter sub. sperię illarum rerum sensibilium contineri. Concil. Trid. sess 13. cap 1.

Si quis negaverit in sanctissimæ eucharistiae sacramento contineri, vere, realiter, & substantialiter corpus & sanguinem una cum anima & divinitate Domini nostri Jesu Christi, ac proinde totum Christum; sed dixerit. tantummodo esse in eo ut in signo vel figura aut virtute, anathema sit. Ibid. Can. 1.

proved them to be so many quibbling sophisters. For, as Arnobius confesses in the above-cited book, the heathens did not adore copper, gold, silver or other materials, whereof the images were made, nor did they believe them to be gods or deities that deserved adoration; but in these images or materials adored, what sacred consecration introduced and caused to dwell in them. Now if those fathers professed what the Romanists do, and had altars, aud unbloody sacrifices, miraculous consecrations, &c. the heathens might have answeredthem thus: " you christians reproach us for worshipping the work of men's hands, things that cannot see, hear, taste, smell, breathe, speak or move; things exposed to age rust, corruptions, dust, breaking, burning, &c. to the injuries of worms, mice, &c. subject to be locked up, stolen and the like, though we tell you that what we really adore is not subject to any of those inconveniences, viz. the gods that are introduced into them by virtue of the consecration. But are not you yourselves guilty of these very charges you make upon us? you make your host, you mould it, fashion it, bake it in an oven, you consecrate it, you bring your Christ into it by virtue of the consecration, and then you adore it though it neither sees, nor hears, nor tastes, nor smells, nor breathes, nor walks, nor moves: though it is subject to age, dust, breaking, burning; to mice, worms, &c. and as liable to be stolen as any thing else? the heathens certainly would have made those charges apon the christians if they had the least open for so doing. But, as they never did, it is evident to demonstration, that the primitive christians were strangers to the pretended effects of our modern consecrations.

The same fathers laughed at the heathens for locking up their gods for fear they should be sto

len.

Thus Arnobius in the above-cited book: why do you keep your gods locked up, says he? is it for fear that robbers might carry them off by night? if you are sure they are gods leave them to take care of themselves; let their temples be always open." But if the modern belief, and practice of locking up the eucharist, had been known among the primitive christians, the heathens would have retorted the charge upon themselves. Indeed docking up those false gods has been found necessary. For as Laban's gods were stolen from him, so is the wafer-god very often carried away for the sake of the gold and silver shrines it is locked up in.

The heathens concealed their mysteries from the public, and forbad to speak of them before such as were not initiated. "They hide their shame," says Tertullian.* And Gregory Názianzen says:† "The eleusinian mysteries are things that are concealed and deserve to be concealed." The same thing is practised in the church of Rome. The catechism of the council of Trent, treating of the virtue of consecration, says; that "those things are explained for parish priests, not in order to let the faithful into the knowledge of those sublime mysteries (except in a case of great necessity) seeing it is not expedient to let those, who are not initiated, into the secret of the mysteries of religion." The canon of the mass is ordered to be read so low that even the clerk is not to hear what the priest says. So jealous are they of their old heathen. original, that all such priests as read the canon audibly, are called jansenists and heretics. There was nothing mystical in the service our Saviour performed at the last supper. Accordingly nothing can be more plain and intelligible than the whole Protestant liturgy. The minister makes even the most ignorant person in the congregation judge of

Contra Velentin. c. I.. + Orat 39.

De Euch. c. 19.