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Mofes or of Chrift, and call them Means of
Grace to us, because so used by them.

But as to the Reliques in your Church, many of them have been notoriously. Detected, and it has been found out, That the dead Bodies of Malefactors have been taken for the Reliques of Saints, and great Miracles faid to be done by them. The fame Relique of fuch a Saint, the Head or Finger is fhewn in feveral Places, and each Contend that theirs is the Right, and each have Miracles avouched for them. Many Instances of this, with Vouchers undeniable, you will find in The Devotions of the Roman Church. How then can you Worship fuch Reliques in Faith? without which it is a Sin!

(35.) But not only the Saints, and their Reliques, but their Images are with you made a diftinct Means of Grace; for in the Confecration of the Image of a Saint, it is faid, That whoever fhall Worfhip fuch a Saint, coram hac Imagine, before this Image, may obtain fo and fo, for which End the Image is Blessed and Sanctified. So that it is not enough to Worship the Saint, but if I do it before. fuch a Confecrated Image, I fhall obtain more Grace than otherwife. This makes the Image it felf a Means of Grace, for there is Vertue. there. Why elfe would it not do as well to Pray, and not before fuch an Image? Why elfe indeed are fuch Images fo formally Confeerated, if there be no Vertue in the Confecra

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tion? And why do Men go Pilgrimages, or fend Vows to Loretto, or any other distant Place, if they think ther is no Vertue in the Image there, more than in Forty of the fame fort which they may have at Home? And the Saint Represented by the Image is as near them in the one Place as in the other; ther must be then fome Vertue Communicated to one Image more than to another.

L. Then you are against any Pictures or 1mages of the Saints, or paying any Honour to the Holy Men departed.

G. No, My Lord, We are not so Stingy, We fcruple not Pictures for Ornament, but not for Worship, or for Worfhipping before them, as you fpeak. And we Honour the Saints departed, as far as we think Lawful, and, as we are verily Perfuaded, as far as they Defire; fince according to St. Auguftin's Rule before mentioned, if they Accepted our Adoration, it would Prove them to be Evil Spirits. And then you are to Confider, that instead of Interceffors, as you hope for by your Worship of them, they will vindicate themselves, and become your Accufers. But in our Honour of them, we firit take Care not to fpecify any particular Person as a Saint, but who is fo Recorded in Holy Scripture; for we understand not Canonizations. by Men who know not the Heart; in the next place, we limit the Honour we pay them by the Rule of God's Commandments, which we suppose most Pleafing to them. We keep particular

particular Holy Days for the Apostles, St. John Baptift, St. Stephen, &c. We blefs God for them, commemorate their Vertues, and pray that we may follow their good Examples. We have One Day for All the Saints in General, and another for St. Michael and all Angels. Thus we Honour them, and for this we bear the Reproach of our four Diffenters, as if we were too much Inclining to Popery. You think we give too little Honour to the Saints, and they think we give too much! But we hope we keep the Mean. We abftain from the Pictures or Images of the Saints in our Churches, because they have been abused to Superftition, and to avoid Offence. But in Places not Dedicated to Worship, as in private Houses, we think them not Unlawful, more than the Picture of any Good Man.

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Epiphanius was very zealous against having them brought into Churches, and tells John, Bifhop of Jerufalem, in a Letter tranflated by St. Jerom, that finding a Linnen Cloth hung up in a Church Door, (it is likely to keep out the Wind) whereon was a Picture of Chrift, or of fome Saint, he Tore it, and Ordered a dead Corps to be Buried in it. And he Lamented the Superftition he faw coming, by these PiEtures and Images then beginning to Creep into the Church.

The Abuse of things, tho' otherwise Lawful, which are not Inftituted by God for Standing Means of Grace, as Baptifm and the Lord's Supper, may juftly take away the Use of

them.

2 Kin. xviii. 4.

them. Thus the Brazen Serpent was appointed by God as a Means of Grace for Miraculous Curès in the Wilderness, and was Preferved until the Days of Hezekiah, but when they burned Incense to it, it became an Idol, was broke to pieces and called by a Contemptible Name Nehushtan, that is, A Bit of Brafs. How much more Reason is there to Remove the Pictures and Images of Saints (which God never Appointed) out of our Churches, when we fee Incense burned to them, and they Worshipped in your Churches, as Means of Grace. And yet there is no Evil in the Pictures themselves.

Deut. iv. 15,&c.

(36) But there is One Picture I think has Evil in it, and is Unlawful any where; and yet it is feen in your Churches, and commonly over the Altar, that is, the Picture or Image of God the Father, like an Old Man, &c. We are forbid to Make it, and then we cannot Worship it. See how pofitively God forbids it, Take good beed unto your felves, for ye faw no manner of Similitude (that is of God) in the Day that the Lord fpake unto you-left ye Corrupt your felves, and make you a graven Image, the Similitude of any Figure, the Likeness of Male or Female, &c. And again, Rom. i. 23. They changed the Glory of the Uncorruptible God into an Image made like to Corruptible Man, &c.

L. Both thefe Texts are Quoted and Anfwered in our Catechifm ad Parochos, upon the

First Commandment, and the Anfwer is this, (a) That the Sin here forbidden is to Paint or Carve Imaginem Divinitatis, A Picture or Image of the Divinity, or of the Divine Nature.

G. Pray, My Lord, did you ever know a Painter or Statuary who Attempted to draw a Picture or make an Image of a Thought, or of a Soul?

L. No, for they cannot be seen. Pictures and Images are made for the Eye. How then can a Likeness or Similitude be drawn of what is Invifible?

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G. And is not the Great God more Invifible, and the Divine Nature much more Incomprebenfible even to our Thoughts or Imagination? How then can it be Reprefented to our Eye? I dare fay, there never was a Man fince Adam who would own any fuch thing, or ever had fo foolifh a Thought. No, but when they drew any Picture or Similitude of God, it was only meant to Exprefs fome of His Attributes or Perfections; as by Fire His Purity, by a Giant with Many Hands His Power, with Many Eyes His Providence, &c. And fo you own that by an Old Man you only mean to Express His Antiquity. And will not this Excufe the Heathen, as well as you? See the fame Excufe made by Maximus Tyrius, Differt. 38. Whether Statues were to be made for the Gods? But here you would put an Impoffible Meaning upon the Prohibition

(a) De Cultu & Invocatione San&torum. Sect. xxxiv. xxxv.

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