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V. THE CHURCH.

THE SANCTITY OF THE CHURCH OF ROME.

FROM the first mark of the true church, as stated by Dr. Milner, UNITY, we proceed to the second-SANCTITY. On this head, Dr. Milner remarks, that "Reason itself tells us, that the God of purity and sanctity could not institute a religion destitute of this character, and the inspired apostle assures us that Christ loved the church, and gave himself for it; that he might sanctify and cleanse it, with the washing of water, by the word; that he might present it to himself a glorious church, not having spot or wrinkle. Ephes. v. 25, 27. The comparison which I am going to institute between the Catholic church and the leading Protestant societies on the article of Sanctity or Holiness, will be made on these four heads; 1st. The Doctrine of Holiness'; 2dly. The Means of Holiness; 3dly. The Fruits of Holiness; and lastly, The Divine Testimony of Holiness."*

He then proceeds to establish his first point, thus: -"To consider, first, the doctrine of the chief Protestant communions: this is well known to have been originally grounded in the pernicious and impious principles, that God is the author and necessitating cause, as well as the avenging punisher of sin; that man has no free will to avoid it; and that justification and salvation are the effects of an enthusiastic persuasion, under the name of faith, that a person is actually justified and saved, independently of any real belief in the revealed truths, independently of

* End of Controversy, p, 205, 206.

hope, charity, repentance for sin, benevolence to our fellow-creatures, loyalty to our king and country; or any other virtue; all which were censured by the first reformers as they are by the strict Methodists still, under the name of works, and by many of them declared to be even hurtful to salvation. It is asserted in the Harmony of Confessions, a celebrated work, published in the early times of the Reformation, that "all the confessions of the Protestant churches teach this primary article (of justification) with a holy consent;" which seems to imply, says Archdeacon Blackburn, "that this was the single article in which they all did agree.

Now one would naturally have expected, that after thus broadly stating those frightful charges against "the chief Protestant communions," and having alluded to the "confessions of the Protestant churches" as teaching the errors he lays to their charge,—one would naturally have expected, we repeat, that so grave an accusation would have been immediately sustained by a reference to these same documents. In any such reasonable expectation, however, the reader will be entirely disappointed. Not one single line from any one of the Protestant confessions is adduced by the learned Doctor, in support of this grievous charge. Not an iota of proof, in fact, is furnished, in support of this most extraordinary accusation! What kind of conduct is this in one who professes to receive as the command of God, the precept, "Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbour!"

But by what show of evidence, then, does the Doctor support his accusation? By seven short quotations, of three or four lines each, from Luther; four from Calvin; one from Beza; one from Fuller; one from Strype; one from Brandt; and one from BosNow of these it may be sufficient to observe, that some are the mere misrepresentations of enemies; others prove nothing whatever to the question;

suet.

* End of Controversy, p. 206.

while the remainder are merely the unguarded and strong expressions of two or three good but fallible men, writing in the heat of controversy.

Dr. Milner knows very well, that in the matter of predestination, free will, &c., these Protestant writers agreed entirely with Augustine, one of the greatest of the early fathers, to whose name the church of Rome pays the highest honour. He knows full well that the very passages he quotes from Luther and Calvin might be easily matched by others from the works of this great saint of his own calendar. He knows, too, that if whole churches are to be judged of by single expressions, culled from the writings of individual fathers, the church of Rome may be proved guilty of Montanism by the works of Tertullian, and of Platonism by those of Origen. But he knows also, that all such attempts at crimination are nothing else than the merest folly. He is well aware that a church can only be convicted by its own acts and confessions. He opens his accusation by charging "the chief Protestant communions" with grounding their doctrine "on the pernicious and impious principle, that God is the author and necessitating cause, as well as the avenging punisher of sin;"-he then alludes to "the confessions of the Protestant churches" as containing this doctrine;-but he does not produce a single line from any one of them in support of the charge! The reason is, that he could never find, among them all, a single word bearing any such meaning; in other words, the whole charge is utterly and entirely false; and this he could not but have known at the time he made it!

But after thus calumniating the whole body of Protestant churches, and yet failing to establish one iota against them, the doctor naturally comes to speak of his own church. And here we might have expected him to be a little more diffuse, and better prepared with proofs. Instead of which, though he has now to prove the more important part of his case, that the Romish church is peculiarly the HOLY Catholic church,-he glances over the subject in little

more than two pages! In fact, his whole argument, over and above some general assertions, is confined to this, that "If the doctrine of the Catholic church was once holy, namely, in the apostolic age, it is holy still; because the church never changes her doctrine, nor suffers any person in her communion to change it, or to question any part of it."

A bolder defiance to truth than this never was penned. It supposes the whole history of the past to have been blotted out of men's memories. What were all the doctrinal contests of so many successive councils caused by, if the doctrine of the Catholic church ever remained the same,-unaltered and unimpugned? Look at pope Zozimus and his synod at Rome; see the council of Frankfort in a. D. 794; both approving the heresy of Pelagius; and then behold various other councils, ending with that of Trent, anathematizing that same doctrine, and all who held it. Nay, the yet more fatal error of Arius was first condemned by the council of Nice, then accepted by the council of Sirmium; the synods of Ariminum and Seleucia subsequently confirmed the adhesion of the church to this heresy, and the words of Jerome himself are," the whole world groaned to find itself become Arian." Yet after the lapse of years this error waned and became nearly extinct, and has since been condemned by as many councils as had previously supported it. An equal changeability was exhibited by popes and councils in the cases of the Eutychian and Monothelan heresies. But enough has been said to show that this absurd boast, that "the (Romish) church never changes its doctrine," is one of the most groundless vaunts that ever came from the pen of a human being.

It may, however, be answered, that these heresies have now long since been subdued, and that the existing doctrine of the Romish church is free from such stains. This may be admitted; but still the argument of Dr. Milner, that "if the doctrine of the Catholic church was holy in the apostolic age, it must be so now, because it is never permitted to be altered or

impugned," is clearly gone, is entirely destroyed, and we have only to deal with the doctrinal standard of the Romish church as we now find it.

What, then, is the real state of the case, as to the alleged holiness of doctrine of the church of Rome?

It is this: in so far as she holds, in common with Protestants, the ancient creeds or professions of faith, called the Apostles', the Nicene, and the Athanasianshe possesses the true and orthodox doctrine. But inasmuch as she has added to that faith the whole accumulation of error contained in the creed of pope Pius the IVth, she has thereby alloyed and defiled the true faith with a mixture of many and great errors. And error in religion is never innoxious. It always leads to sin. Every single particle, therefore, of these additions to the ancient faith, is opposed to sanctity or holiness. The words of Christ exactly apply to her: "Ye have made the commandment of God of none effect by your tradition." For instance,

1. The doctrine of Purgatory removes the salutary dread of eternal woe, and encourages men in the false hope of compensating for the sins they may commit in this world, by a merely temporary punishment in the

next:

2. The doctrine of Indulgences, and of Masses for the dead, evidently aids this delusion. By this latter figment, a man revelling in sinful pleasures during his whole life-time, may console himself with the hope, that by a sufficient legacy to the priests, for masses to be said after his death, he may escape even the temporary inflictions of purgatory. And the former falsehood teaches the sinner that he may go on in the indulgence of his lusts throughout the year, so that he reserves a sufficient sum to purchase, at Christmas or Easter, an indulgence, or oblivion from the church, for the entire cancelling of his debt of sin.

3. By the erection of the saints and the Virgin into minor mediators, the resort of the sinner to Christ is greatly hindered. But neither the saints nor the Virgin can so much as hear the prayers of their worshippers, much less answer them; meanwhile