the church of Rome hath much reason not to be so decretory in her sentences against persons of a differing persuasion: for if their cause were entirely the cause of God, they have given wise people reason to suspect it, because some of them have gone to the devil to defend it. And if it be remembered what tragedies were stirred up against Luther, for saying the devil had taught him an argument against the mass; it will be of as great advantage against them, that they go to the devil for many arguments to support not only the mass, but the other distinguishing articles of their church. I instance in the notorious forging of miracles, and framing of false and ridiculous legends. For the former I need no other instances than what happened in the great contestation about the immaculate conception, when there were miracles brought on both sides to prove the contradictory parts: and though it be more than probable that both sides played the jugglers, yet the Dominicans had the ill-luck to be discovered, and the actors burnt at Berne. But this discovery happened by Providence; for the Dominican opinion hath more degrees of probability than the Franciscan, is clearly more consonant both to Scripture and all antiquity; and this part of it is acknowledged by the greatest patrons themselves, as Salmeron, Posa, and Wadding: yet because they played the knaves in a just question, and used false arts to maintain a true proposition, God Almighty, to shew that he will not be served by a lie, was pleased rather to discover the imposture in the right opinion than in the false, since nothing is more dishonourable to God than to offer a sin in sacrifice to him, and nothing more incongruous in the nature of the thing, than that truth and falsehood should support each other, or that true doctrine should live at the charges of a lie. And he that considers the arguments for each opinion, will easily conclude, that if God would not have truth confirmed by a lie, much less would he himself attest a lie with a true miracle. And by this ground it will easily follow, that the Franciscan party, although they had better luck than the Dominicans, yet had not more honesty, because their cause was worse, and therefore their arguments no whit the better. And, although the argument drawn from miracles is good to attest a holy doctrine, which by its own worth will support itself after way is a little made by

d

miracles; yet of itself and by its own reputation it will not support any fabric: for instead of proving a doctrine to be true, it makes that the miracles themselves are suspected to be illusions, if they be pretended in behalf of a doctrine, which we think we have reason to account false. And therefore the Jews did not believe Christ's doctrine for his miracles, but disbelieved the truth of his miracles, because they did not like his doctrine. And if the holiness of his doctrine, and the Spirit of God by inspirations and infusions, and by that which St. Peter calls "a surer word of prophecy," had not attested the divinity both of his person and his office, we should have wanted many degrees of confidence, which now we have upon the truth of Christian religion. But now since we are foretold by this "surer word of prophecy," that is, the prediction of Jesus Christ, that antichrist should come in all wonders and signs and lying miracles, and that the church saw much of that already verified in Simon Magus, Apollonius Tyaneus, and Manetho, and divers heretics, it is now come to that pass, that the argument, in its best advantage, proves nothing so much as that the doctrine which it pretends to prove, is to be suspected; because it was foretold, that false doctrine should be obtruded under such pretences". But then when not only true miracles are an insufficient argument to prove a truth since the establishment of Christianity, but that the miracles themselves are false and spu rious, it makes that doctrine, in whose defence they come, justly to be suspected; because they are a demonstration, that the interested persons use all means, leave nothing unattempted, to prove their propositions; but since they so fail as to bring nothing from God, but something from the devil, for its justification, it is a great sign that the doctrine is false, because we know the devil, unless it be against his will, does nothing to prove a true proposition that makes against him. And now then those persons who will endure no man of another opinion, might do well to remember how by their exorcisms, their devils' tricks at Lowdon, and the other side pretending to cure mad folks and persons bewitched, and the many discoveries of their juggling, they have given so much reason to their adversaries to suspect

d Vid. Baron. A. D. 68. n. 22. Philostrat. 1. 4. p. 485. Compend. Ced, p. 202. Stapleton prompt. Moral, pars æstiva, p. 627,}

their doctrine, that either they must not be ready to condemn their persons who are made suspicious by their indirect proceeding in attestation of that which they value so high as to call their religion; or else they must condemn themselves for making the scandal active and effectual.

6. As for false legends, it will be of the same consideration, because they are false testimonies of miracles that were never done; which differs only from the others as a lie in action; but of this we have witness enough in that decree of Pope Leo X., session the eleventh of the last Lateran council, where he excommunicates all the forgers and inventors of visions and false miracles: which is a testimony that it was then a practice so public as to need a law for its suppression. And if any man shall doubt whether it were so or not, let him see the centum gravamina' of the princes of Germany, where it is highly complained of. But the extreme stupidity and sottishness of the inventors of lying stories is so great, as to give occasion to some persons to suspect the truth of all church story: witness the legend of Lombardy: of the author of which the bishop of the Canaries gives this testimony; "In illo enim libro miraculorum monstra sæpius quàm vera miracula legas. Hanc homo scripsit ferrei oris, plumbei cordis, animi certè parùm severi et prudentis." But I need not descend so low, for St. Gregory and Venerable Bede themselves reported miracles, for the authority of which they only had the report of the common people: and it is not certain that St. Jerome had so much in his stories of St. Paul and St. Anthony, and the fauns and the satyrs which appeared to them, and desired their prayers. But I shall only by way of eminency, note what Sir Thomas More says in his epistle to Ruthal, the king's secretary, before the dialogue of Lucian Philopseudes;' that therefore he undertook the translation of that dialogue, to free the world from a superstition that crept in under the face and title of religion. For such lies, says he, are transmitted to us with such authority, that a certain impostor had persuaded St. Austin, that the very fable which Lucian scoffs and makes sport withal in that dialogue, was a real story, and acted in his own days.

6

• Τὰ γὰρ μὴ εἰρημένα ἐκβιαζόμενοι, καὶ τὰ ἀβιάστως εἰρημένα ὑποπτεύεσθαι παρασ κευάζουσιν. Isid. Pelus. Vide Lib. 11. lec. Theol. cap. 6. Canus ib.

f Viz. De duobus spuriis, altero decedente, altero in vitam redeunte post

The epistle is worth the reading to this purpose: but he says this abuse grew to such a height, that scarce any life of any saint or martyr is truly related, but is full of lies and lying wonders; and some persons thought they served God, if they did honour to God's saints by inventing some prodigious story or miracle for their reputation. So that now it is no wonder if the most pious men are apt to believe, and the greatest historians are easy enough to report, such stories, which serving to a good end, are also consigned by the report of persons otherwise pious and prudent enough. I will not instance in Vincentius's speculum,-Turonensis,―Thomas Cantipratanus,-John Herolt,-Vita Patrum,—nor the revelations of St. Bridget, though confirmed by two Popes, Martin V. and Boniface IX. Even the best and most deliberate amongst them, Lippoman, Surius, Lipsius, Bzovius, and Baronius, are so full of fables, that they cause great disreputation to the other monuments and records of antiquity, and yet do no advantage to the cause under which they serve and take pay. They do no good, and much hurt; but yet accidentally they may procure this advantage to charity, since they do none to faith, that since they have so abused the credit of story, that our confidences want much of that support we should receive from her records of antiquity,—yet the men that dissent and are scandalized by such proceedings, should be excused, if they should chance to be afraid of truth, that hath put on garments of imposture: and since much violence is done to the truth and certainty of their judging, let none be done to their liberty of judging; since they cannot meet a right guide, let them have a charitable judge. And since it is one very great argument against Simon Magnus and against Mahomet, that we can prove their miracles to be impostures; it is much to be pitied if timorous and suspicious persons shall invincibly and honestly less apprehend a truth which they see conveyed by such a testimony, which we all use as an argument to reprove the Mahometan superstition.

7. Sixthly: here also come in all the weaknesses and trifling prejudices, which operate not by their own strength,

viginti dies; quam in aliis nominibus ridet Lucianus. Vide etiam argumentum Gilberti Cognati, in Annotat, in hunc Dialog. Vic. Palæot. de Sacra sindone par. 1. Epist. ad Lector.

but by advantage taken from the weakness of some understandings. Some men, by a proverb or a common saying, are determined to the belief of a proposition, for which they have no argument better than such a proverbial sentence. And when divers of the common people in Jerusalem were ready to yield their understandings to the belief of the Messias, they were turned clearly from their apprehensions by that proverb, "Look and see, does any good thing come from Galilee?" and this, "When Christ comes, no man knows from whence he is;" but this man was known of what parents, of what city. And thus the weakness of their understanding was abused, and that made the argument too hard for them. And the whole seventh chapter of St. John's Gospel is a perpetual instance of the efficacy of such trifling prejudices, and the vanity and weakness of popular understandings. Some whole ages have been abused by a definition, which being once received, as most commonly they are upon slight grounds, they are taken for certainties in any science respectively, and for principles; and upon their reputation men use to frame conclusions, which must be false or uncertain according as the definitions are. And he that hath observed any thing of the weaknesses of men, and the successions of groundless doctrines from age to age, and how seldom definitions which are put into systems, or that derive from the fathers, or are approved among schoolmen,—are examined by persons of the same interests, will bear me witness how many and great inconveniences press hard upon the persuasions of men, who are abused, and yet never consider who hurt them. Others, and they very many, are led by authority or examples of princes and great personages: દદ Numquis credit ex principibus ?" Some by the reputation of one learned man are carried into any persuasion whatsoever. And in the middle and later ages of the church this was the more considerable, because the infinite ignorance of the clerks and the men of the long robe gave them over to be led by those few guides, which were marked to them by an eminency, much more than their ordinary: which also did the more amuse them, because most commonly they were fit for nothing but to admire what they understood not. Their learning then was some skill in the Master of the Sentences, & John, vii.