Continued from Part II. Popery A Moral Pestilence. Chapter VI. The Worship of of Images

CHAPTER VII.
THE PRIEST IN THE PLACE OF GOD

We have already considered those doctrines and practices which constitute the chief elements in the Romish pestilence. There still remains, however, another feature of Popery equally destructive, which runs through the whole system, viz., the awful extent to which the priest usurps the place of God! or in the figurative language of prophecy, “sitteth in the Temple of God, shewing himself that he is God.” (2 Thess. ii. 4.)

In the great work of man’s salvation, human agency, of itself, is altogether useless, and God is all in all. It is true, that the Almighty is pleased to use means, in renewing and sanctifying the heart; but He is wholly independent of them. He can, and often does, work without them; nor do they possess the smallest inherent efficacy, to produce the desired end, apart from the divine blessing. “Who is Paul and who is Apollos, but ministers (lit. servants) by whom ye believed; even as the Lord gave to every man.” “So then, neither is he that planteth any thing, neither he that watereth, but God that giveth the increase.”

Man, however, is the creature of sense. He is ever disposed to “look at the things which are seen,” and to lose sight of “the things which are not seen.” This tendency remains with us, after we have become “new creatures in Christ Jesus”: and it is to the ceaseless operation of this principle of our nature, age after age, that we ascribe the introduction of that figurative person, who is styled, in the Scripture, “The Man of Sin and Son of perdition.”

Jesus Christ has instituted certain external rites, in his Church, as symbolical of spiritual truths:—baptism and the Lord’s Supper. These are, doubtless, channels of divine grace, when administered to believers. But, under the influence of the principle just mentioned, the invisible God and his work were gradually lost sight of, in the visible and material emblems, which he had appointed—and which the clergy had represented as in themselves of supreme importance.

“Those consolatory truths,” as a living writer has observed, “on which all stress was laid by Paul, John, Peter, and James; truths of rational import, and of elevating influence, though not denied or forgotten, had sunk into a secondary place, in favour of notions which attributed unutterable value, and a mysterious efficacy to the Christian ceremonies. Here we trace the first footmarks of clerical encroachment; nor is it easy to acquit the early promoters of these superstitions, of a conscious intention, thereby, to magnify their office. The administration of the sacraments, or at least the Eucharist, was the inviolable prerogative of priests; and these symbols, rather than the great principles they held forth, were insisted upon as of vital energy; it was upon touching, tasting, handling the material elements, or upon being duly touched, and handled by the dispensers of the ‘awful mysteries,’ that eternal life depended. Not to have been washed in the laver of regeneration, not to eat of the divine flesh, not to drink the blood, not to be anointed with the oil of remission, was to perish everlastingly. Salvation and perdition turned, not on the condition of the heart in God’s sight, but upon having a share of the consecrated fluid, or solid matter, which the priest might bestow or refuse.” (Spiritual Despotism, p. 195)

So early as the third century, these superstitious notions concerning the rites of Christianity were very prevalent. During the fourth, however, when the whole visible church sunk down into a state of mere lifeless formality, they became general; and, under their influence, the priestly office soon came to be regarded with the highest veneration. This, in fact, was the natural result of such mischievous errors. If eternal life does depend on being washed in the laver of regeneration—or partaking of the flesh and the blood of the Son of God—then are the authorised dispensers of those mysteries as much above monarchs, as the soul is above the body.

And this very comparison is used in a work, called The Apostolic Constitutions, compiled about the middle of the fourth century. Chrysostom, at the close of that age, in one of his homilies, speaks of the priesthood as above the crown. But the most striking instance of priestly arrogance found in the fourth century is that of Martin, Bishop of Tours, when at the court of Maximus. The emperor, it is related, offered him the cup first, but instead of returning it to him after drinking, he handed it to the presbyter. At another time, the empress waited upon him while he dined. (Sulp. Sev. de Vita Mart. c. 20)

Such was the effect of this transition of sentiment in the visible church, under the favorable influence of external prosperity. And when the priesthood had thus far occupied “the place of God,” by assuming the power to renew and sanctify the soul; it was only natural that they should treat the other prerogatives of the Deity, which have to do with man’s salvation, in the same manner. In the East, the constant interference of the emperor with theological matters, and the dependence of the priesthood upon the crown, prevented spiritual despotism from making any remarkable advances there. But in the West—the civil power, “he which letteth,” was “taken out of the way,” and a free course thus set open for the rise of the Man of Sin. So early as the fourth century, the Latin Fathers give indications of the ascendency of the Church, which are nowhere found in those of the East.

It is to the Romish priesthood, then, that we are to look for the accomplishment of that important prediction of the Man of Sin, “He shall sit in the Temple of God, shewing himself that he is God.” And as a matter of fact we find, that the Romish priesthood have usurped the place of God in his temple, which is the church. (1 Cor. iii. 16.) In his holy Word, the Lord reveals himself as—The Author of Forgiveness—The Source of Grace—The Judge of all the Earth—The Sacrifice by which alone we can be saved—and lastly, The Arbiter of man’s eternal destiny. In each, and all of these infinite prerogatives, the priest of Rome has usurped the place of God. On this ground, therefore, we hurl the charge against that apostate hierarchy of being “The Antichrist” of Scripture—represented in the epistle to the Thessalonians, as “The Man of Sin and Son of perdition, who exalteth and opposeth himself against all that is called God, or is worshipped, sitting in the temple of God, and shewing himself that he is God”; and in the 17th chap. of Revelation, as a “Great Whore, the Mother of Harlots, and Abominations of the earth, with whom the kings of the earth have committed fornication; and the inhabitants thereof have been made drunk with the wine of her fornication.”

All that God is to fallen man, in relation to eternity, that did priests make themselves, in the Western Church; and henceforth, man had nothing to do with the blessed Jehovah—the priest was God in his place. In the estimation of the people, the priest of Rome possessed the power:

I. TO ABSOLVE FROM THE GUILT AND PUNISHMENT OF SIN.

The Scriptures every where describe the forgiveness of transgressions against the Law of God, to be the sole prerogative of the great Lawgiver himself; and the Jews themselves justly inferred the assumption of divine power by Christ, when he exclaimed to the sick of the palsy, “Thy sins are forgiven thee.” It is true, that the language of Christ to his ministers, “whose soever sins ye retain, they are retained,” etc., appears to contain this doctrine; but precisely similar language is found in other parts of the Scriptures, which no one would attempt to interpret literally; and the blasphemy involved in ascribing the power of absolution to any order of men, one would think would deter any from doing so, but those, who are “under a strong delusion that they should believe a lie.”

“The Ministers of the New Testament,” says the pious Ussher, “have received this ministry of the Lord Jesus Christ, ‘to testify the gospel of the grace of God’; and so by their function being appointed witnesses rather than conferrers of that grace. Though it be the Lord that speaketh concerning a nation, to pluck up, and to pull down, and to destroy, or on the other side, to build and to plant. Yet he, in whose mouth God put those words of his, is said to be set by Him over the nations, and over the kingdoms, to root out, to pull down, and to destroy, and to throw down;’ as if he himself were a doer of those great matters, who was only ordered to be a prophet unto the nations, to speak the things unto them, which God had commanded him.

Thus likewise in Leviticus 13, where the laws are set down that concern the leprosy, which was a type of the pollution of sin, we often meet with these speeches, ‘The Priest shall cleanse him, and the Priest shall pollute him; and the Priest with pollution shall pollute him,’ (ver. 44.) ‘Not,’ saith St. Jerome, ‘that he is the author of the pollution, but that he declareth him to be polluted, who before did seem to many to be clean.’ Upon which, the Master of the Sentences, in remitting or retaining sins, the Priests of the Gospel have that right and office, which the legal Priests had, of old, under the law, in healing the lepers. These, therefore, (says he) forgive sins, or retain them, while they shew and declare that they are retained by God.” (Pet. Lomb. lib. 4. dist. 14)

It was not until a late period, that the Romish hierarchy invaded the prerogative of Deity, by claiming, and exercising the power to absolve from sin. In the time of Innocent the Third, however, (A.D. 1215), it was enacted by a general council, “that every one should confess to the Priest, at least once a year,” and “from this time,” says Gieseler, “the notion grew up that confession was the only means for obtaining forgiveness of deadly sins; and that the Priest, as God’s representative, could bestow it, and only the Priest.”—(Vol. II, p. 352.)

The form of absolution now imposed upon the clergy was, “I absolve thee from all thy sins, in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost,” just as it now stands in the Romish ritual. This form plainly ascribes to the priest himself the forgiveness of sins, and it was accordingly objected by some, at the time of its introduction, “That the Priest ought not to say ‘I absolve thee from,’ etc., since THIS BELONGS ONLY TO THE POWER OF GOD; and also, because the priest could not be certain, that the sinner was really absolved: adding that scarce thirty years had passed, since the form ‘Absolutionem et remissionem tribuat tibi Deus,’ etc., i.e. ‘May the Lord grant thee absolution and remission,’ etc., was used.” Such language however did not suit the papal doctors, because, by these words, the priest did not declare that absolution had taken place; but merely prayed that it might. (Gieseler, ubi supra)

The doctrine of priestly absolution may be considered as the doctrine of the papal church, from this period to the present. The Council of Trent formally set their seal to this monstrous dogma; and thus entailed it upon ages yet unborn.

“From the institution of the sacrament of Penance,” says the Council, “the whole Church has always understood, that the entire confession of sin was also instituted by our Lord, and that this confession, by divine right, is necessary for all who fall after baptism, because our Lord Jesus Christ, about to ascend into heaven, left the Priests his Vicars, with the authority of judges, to whom all grievous crimes into which men may fall, must be referred; in order that they may pronounce sentence on them, by the power of the keys, that is the power of binding and loosing. For it is plain, if the cause be unknown, such sentence cannot be pronounced, nor equity, in the enjoining of punishment, be enforced, if sins generally, and not each one particularly be declared.” (Con. Tri. Ses. XIV. c. 5)

In the Catechism of the Council of Trent also, we are told, “The voice of the Priest who is legitimately constituted a minister for the remission of sins, is to be heard as that of Christ himself, who said to the paralytic, ‘Son be of good cheer, thy sins are forgiven thee.’” (p. 255)

Such is the doctrine inculcated by the Council of Trent; and accordingly there is no doctrine more generally received by Papists, than that of priestly absolution. Even in Protestant countries, the members of the Church of Rome universally believe that the power of absolving from the guilt and punishment of sin belongs to the priest.

As already observed, this is only one of several grounds, on which we rest the charge, that the Romish priesthood, in usurping the high prerogatives of Deity, fulfils, in the plainest manner, the inspired prediction, “He sitteth in the Temple of God, shewing himself that he is God.” But were this the only particular that could be brought against them, it would be amply sufficient to establish the charge. The power to forgive sin is, every where, in Scripture, described as the peculiar prerogative of God.

Besides, this power is one of such infinite importance to fallen beings, that the acknowledged possession of so great a right by the minister of heaven, must render him to the people of his charge, that which God himself is to the Christian, the object of all those hopes and fears, which have reference to the future state. When David had fallen into gross sin, on awakening to a consciousness of his crime, he immediately approaches God, confesses his sin, and implores forgiveness. “Have mercy upon me, O God, according to thy loving kindness: according unto the multitude of thy tender mercies, blot out my transgressions… Against thee, thee only, have I sinned, and done this evil in thy sight,” etc.

But the Papist, when conscious of sin, and alarmed by the terrors of an evil conscience, does not think of imitating the conduct of the Psalmist. Influenced by that conviction which, ever since the twelfth century, has led the Romish Church, viz., that auricular confession “was the only means of obtaining forgiveness of deadly sins; and that the Priest, as God’s representative, could bestow such forgiveness, and only the Priest” (Gieseler, ubi sup.)—the Papist, instead of drawing near to God, will have recourse to the priest, to ease him of the burden of sin. Nor will the voice of praise and thanksgiving ascend unto the Father, who seeth in secret, “I confessed my fault unto thee, and thou forgavest the iniquity of my sin!”

There is the strongest possible ground then here afforded, for convicting “The Man of Sin, of sitting in the Temple of God and shewing himself that he is God.” If the members of the Romish Church, as we have just seen, when burdened with the consciousness of guilt, go to the priest, what need have such persons of God—provided they obtain forgiveness from the priest; and perform the penance prescribed, as the condition of the validity of the absolution?

If this assumption of the power to absolve from sin, be not to sit in the spiritual Temple of God.—If the Romish clergy, in declaring that “no one is admitted into Heaven until the doors be opened by the Priests, to whose care God has committed the keys,” (Cat. Con. Trid. Pt. 2. c. 5. § 25) are not thereby proved to be the “Great Whore, with whom the kings of the earth have committed fornication, and the inhabitants thereof been made drunk with the wine of her fornication;”—we confess we know not, how such a prediction could be more fully accomplished. Throughout the Old Testament, Jehovah being the husband of the Jewish Church; to attribute divine power, or to place any confidence in any other God was uniformly denounced as “adultery.” And in entire harmony with this; if the Man of Sin sits in the Temple of God and shews that he is God, the recognition of this assumption of divine power by kings and people, the full acknowledgment of his claim, which is involved in seeking pardon and absolution, at his hands, instead of from God, is plainly—to “commit fornication with the Whore of Babylon and to be made drunk with the wine of her fornication!”

II. TO IMPART RENEWING AND SANCTIFYING GRACE.

We have already had occasion to notice the superstitious notions relative to the Lord’s Supper, which prevailed, in the fourth age, in the whole visible church, both in the East and West; and the effect which these mischievous errors had, in elevating the priesthood. It was reserved for the Romish hierarchy, however, expressly to claim the power to regenerate and purify man’s nature, by the sacraments of baptism, the Eucharist, and Extreme Unction. Nor do we think it possible, that any impartial reader, who calmly considers the subject can doubt, that the popish dogmas of opus operatum and “priestly intention” do, in reality, attribute to the priests of Rome, divine power, so far as it is possible to be ascribed to mortal men.

The acknowledged doctrine of this apostate church, as contained in the Catechism of the Council of Trent, is, that the sacraments of the church are essential to salvation; and that they confer grace by the mere operation itself. “If any one shall say that grace is not conferred by the sacraments of the New Testament, by the very act performed, ex opere operato, let him be accursed.” (Concil. Trid. Sess. VII. can. 8) And their necessity to salvation is declared in the 4th canon: “The sacraments are necessary to salvation.” Hence, obviously, the common belief entertained by the people must be, that the priest is the source of all spiritual blessing; God must be virtually excluded from the thoughts of Papists—and a mere mortal constituted ALL IN ALL.

But as though this were insufficient to stamp that priesthood with the mark of Antichrist, it is further declared by the doctors of the papacy, and believed by the people, that the whole efficacy of the sacraments depends entirely on the intention of the priest; so that if his will and purpose go not along with the external act, baptism and the Lord’s Supper and extreme unction are mere forms, destitute of all saving power. In the Council of Florence (held A.D. 1438), this doctrine was set forth in the following words: “All these sacraments are made up of three parts, that is to say, of things as the matter, of words as the form, and of the person of the minister, who confers the sacrament, with the intention of doing that which the church does: of which if any one be wanting, the sacrament is not perfected.” (Crabbe. Conc. Tom. XIII. p. 535) The Council of Trent devotes to perdition all who deny this doctrine: “If any say, that the intention to do, what the Church does, is not necessary, in the Priest, when they make, or confer the sacrament, let him be accursed.”

Here then, at least, is unequivocal proof, that Rome is the “Great Whore,” that was to “intoxicate all nations with the wine of her fornication.” The charge, that she makes herself God, by declaring, that the priests confer grace, in the sacraments, may possibly be evaded, on the ground, that they are simply the channels, through which the Most High communicates blessing. But by obliging all, on pain of perdition, also to believe, that the will of the priest is necessary, to render baptism, the Eucharist, etc., of any saving power—places the question beyond dispute. The blessing of the Most High is virtually declared unnecessary by the doctrine that the sacraments confer grace by the mere operation itself (ex opere operato);—whilst the will of the priest is expressly declared necessary to give efficacy to the work.

With one hand—with reverence be it spoken—God is dethroned; and, with the other, man is exalted to the vacant seat. Who then can doubt that the Romish priesthood do “sit in the Temple of God, shewing themselves, that they are God?”

III. TO CONTROL AND JUDGE THE THOUGHTS AND CONSCIENCES OF MEN.

“Vengeance is mine, I will repay, saith the Lord,” is the language in which the blessed God claims the sole prerogative to punish the guilty. It is true he has instituted civil magistrates, to be a terror unto evil doers; but it is only crimes against the welfare of society, that are cognizable before earthly tribunals. Thought, conscience, and private conduct, are beyond their control and are reserved for the judgment of Him who “will bring to light the hidden things of darkness, and make manifest the counsels of the hearts.”

Here again, however, “the Man of Sin” meets us, “sitting in the temple of God, and shewing himself that he is God.” The churchmen of the middle ages snatched this prerogative out of the hand of the Most High—anticipated future retribution, and punished mankind for such sins as ought only to be accounted for, at the judgment of the last day.

“The Christian Church,” says a philosophic writer, “did, or wished to do, exactly the reverse of what other governments did. Human thought, human liberty, private manners, and individual opinions were what it endeavoured to rule over. It did not make a code, like other powers, and define the actions at once morally culpable, and socially dangerous; and so, award them punishment, according as they had this double character; but it set out a catalogue of all actions morally culpable, under the name of sins, and punished and acted on the design of repressing them all. In a word, the government was not applied, like modern governments, to the outward man, and to the purely civil relations of men amongst themselves; it was applied to the inward man, to the thought and conscience.” (Guizot, Hist. of Civilization, ch. V)

The author of Spiritual Despotism also has well illustrated the practice of the Romish Church in this particular:

“The Church took care… to make her members feel that her power was of an intimate and refined sort,—as well as public and judicial: and that it was spiritual more than carnal. The magistrate could enquire concerning overt acts only, and could punish nothing but crimes. The Church, on the contrary, penetrated the bosoms of men, dived into motives, put secret dispositions to the question, and dealt with men on the ground of a divine discernment of hearts. She professed to treat the subjects of her discipline not according to evidence, but according to truth. Auricular confession, therefore, was not an accident of this system of despotism, but one of its indispensable elements, and a chief means of its efficacy. The inferences by which this engine of power was compacted were very close;—pardon is lodged with the church; the means of remission by e [the eucharist] are also under direction; but the priest, who in each instance administers this authority, can do so only when he knows the full extent of guilt, and all its circumstances, as well of aggravation as extenuation. To expose the bosom to the priest is, therefore, the only way in which remission of sin can be obtained; whoever, therefore, would escape punishment, must lay open, to the dispenser of mercy, his entire consciousness.” (p. 319)

In thus usurping the right of the Almighty, to rule the thoughts and consciences of men—the Romish priesthood, for many centuries, has “sat in the Temple of God—shewing himself that he is God.” Those who are acquainted with the ecclesiastical history of the middle ages, need not be reminded, that the punishments inflicted by the church were of the severest kind.

“The punishments, or penances, enjoined by the church (wherever she was actually in position to give effect to her rules of discipline) were by no means of a sort to be contemned. The conscience-stricken culprit, who sought a restoration to hope, and the consolations of religion, submitted himself often to five, ten, or twenty years of public humiliation and private torture, bodily and mental. As much of misery as human nature can sustain, was, as a common thing, inflicted by the church, upon her guilty sons and daughters. The penalties of modern law are trivial, compared with those of the church: she was indeed ‘a terror to evil doers.’” (p. 320)

IV. TO MAKE ATONEMENT FOR THE SINS OF THE LIVING AND THE DEAD.

Christianity teaches that the only sacrifice for human guilt is that which the Lord Jesus Christ offered up upon the cross. When no other atonement could be accepted by divine justice, but the blood of the Son of God himself, the Lord of Glory came down from heaven, and, in the form of man, endured the sentence which we had incurred. “Christ has redeemed us from the law, being made a curse for us.” “He was wounded for our transgressions; he was bruised for our iniquities; the chastisement of our peace was upon him; and with his stripes we are healed.”

But Popery virtually rejects the sacrifice of Christ and puts forth as the great propitiation for human guilt, the daily sacrifice of the mass. It thus snatches the work of salvation out of the hands of Christ, and puts it into the hands of priests.

The Mass, as every one knows, was originally the celebration of the death of Jesus by his people; the bread being broken, to signify his wounded body; and the wine poured out, to signify the shedding of his blood. So early as the fourth century, much absurd ceremony, and many superstitious notions, had become mixed with this simple rite. But Gregory the Great, who lived at the end of the sixth century, must certainly be styled the author of the Romish Mass.

“He prescribed,” says Mosheim, “a new method of administering the Lord’s Supper, with a magnificent assemblage of pompous ceremonies. This institution of his was called ‘The canon of the Mass;’ and if any are unwilling to give it the name of a new appointment, they must, at least, acknowledge, that it was a considerable augmentation of the ancient canon for celebrating the Eucharist, and occasioned a remarkable change in the administration of that ordinance.”

Still, the Mass, though nothing better than a splendid piece of mummery, did not contain those deadly elements which were afterwards infused into it. It was not then considered “a sacrifice for the sins of the living and the dead.” But after the doctrine of transubstantiation was openly declared and defended, in the tenth century—a doctrine which affirms “the actual conversion of the whole substance of the bread into the substance of Christ’s body, and the conversion of the whole substance of the wine into the substance of Christ’s blood”—the Mass assumed quite a new character, and various alterations were made in its form.

Pope Innocent III., who presided at the Lateran Council, which formally established transubstantiation as the doctrine of the church (A.D. 1215), says, “The sacrifice of the Mass is offered, for original, venial, and mortal sins”; (de Missa) and from his time to the present, the sacrifice of the Mass has effectually obscured the sacrifice of the cross. The language of the Council of Trent is a faithful exposition of the doctrine held on this subject by the Romish church for centuries previous. In the Catechism of that celebrated Council, we read:

“The most holy sacrifice of the Mass is not a mere sacrifice of praise and thanksgiving; nor a simple commemoration of the sacrifice offered upon the cross: but it is also A TRUE PROPITIATORY SACRIFICE, BY WHICH GOD IS APPEASED, AND RENDERED PROPITIOUS TO US.” (Pars. II. § LXXXIV.)

The canon of the Mass itself gives the same view of its nature. When the priest offers the host upon the altar, he prays, “Receive, Holy Father, this immaculate sacrifice, which I offer unto thee, for my own sins, and for the sins of all the faithful, both living and dead; THAT IT MAY PROFIT ME AND THEM TO SALVATION AND ETERNAL LIFE.”

Similar language is used in the present text-books of the Romish Church. “The sacrifice of the Mass,” says Peter Dens, “is propitiatory; because, according to the Apostle (Heb. v.), the principal office of priests is to offer up sacrifices for sins. But the church certainly has its priests, therefore they are appointed that they might offer sacrifices for sins. Now, for a sacrifice to be offered for sins, and for it to be propitiatory, is the same thing. Hence, therefore, the sacrifice of the Mass is offered up, for obtaining the remission of sins, and appeasing an offended God.”

It is, therefore, an unquestionable fact, that the Mass is held by the Romish Church to be a true propitiation for human guilt; and thus the priest does away with the sacrifice of the cross, and assumes to himself the power of satisfying the offended justice of God! It is true that, in order to save appearances, Papists allege, that “this sacrifice is the same as that offered up on the cross.” Instead of mending the matter, however, it appears to us that this declaration only fixes the charge more firmly upon the Church of Rome of “sitting in the Temple of God, and shewing himself that he is God.” Since for a man to “reiterate the sacrifice of the cross”—to offer up “the same sacrifice” as that which the Son of God offered up on Mount Calvary—and thus to assert that “the value of the sacrifice of the Mass is infinite,” and that “there are no blessings too great for it to procure,” (Dens. Tom. v. p. 382) is plainly to claim for the priest the power to do all which the Scriptures teach us the Lord has already and perfectly done, and to put man in the place of Christ.

We suppose it will now be granted by all that in the popish sacrifice of the Mass, the deadly character of Antichrist is more revealed than in anything else. Were the Mass a trifling ceremony only among Papists, or were it but occasionally performed, it would be unfair to dwell upon its destructive character as we have done. The fact is, however, that the mass-sacrifice is everything in the religion of Rome. It is the Papist’s Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the end, the sum and substance of all their religion. In short, what the cross of Christ is to the Christian, that is the Mass to the Papist.

“They contend more warmly for the mass,” says an old writer, “than for all the other articles of their faith. In a word, this they make the mark of the papal religion. Going to Mass, hearing Mass, is a symbol by which the Papists and Protestants are distinguished. They place the sum of their religion in it. Indeed the mass is the chief part of the service and worship which they pay to God in the church: and the whole practice of their religion stands principally in hearing and saying mass.” (Pendlebury on the Mass, Lond. 1768)

Finally, in the hour of death, when, if ever, a man shows on what his hopes of salvation are founded, instead of looking at that great sacrifice which has been offered once for all for the sins of the world, the Papist is taught to trust first in the saving power of the viaticum and extreme unction, and then in the efficacy of the masses which are to be said hereafter for his soul!

V. TO DISPOSE OF DESTINIES IN THE INVISIBLE WORLD

It is generally granted that the control of the invisible world belongs exclusively to God. Indeed, if there be any prerogative which more than another stamps its possessor with deity, it is that claimed by the Lord Jesus himself at the opening of the Apocalypse, when he appeared to the beloved disciple: “I am he that liveth and was dead, and behold, I am alive for evermore. Amen: and have the keys of hell and of death.” If then we find that the Pope and his clergy, in addition to the usurped prerogatives of deity which have been already noticed, do also claim jurisdiction over heaven and hell, we shall have further undeniable proof that the Church of Rome is “the Man of Sin and Son of perdition, sitting in the Temple of God, and shewing himself that he is God.”

The following extract from a living author shows that we are not exaggerating the matter in order to make out a case:

“The church, not only claimed and exercised all power on earth, but stretched her tremendous hand over Hades, and disposed of destinies in the future world. She was Sovereign of souls; and without this awful prerogative her authority would have been at once incomplete and insecure. The wretched objects of her vengeance might have sought to hide themselves in the grave; or might have sighed and comforted themselves in expectation of that clemency, which the Divine tribunal admits. But there could be no escape from the arm of the Church; the fires of purgatory were blown and quenched at her beck; her hand even delved into the cold sepulchre, and wreaked vengeance upon the guilty dust of her foes…

The torments of eternity were heaped upon her enemies, and the thrones of glory were bestowed upon her friends. Nothing which the human mind can imagine or rest in, as an ideal solace, was free to be hoped for without the leave of the church; nor was there any thing terrible which she might not inflict. Instead of its being said to the faithful at large, as it had been by an Apostle: ‘All things are yours;’ the church, that is to say, the rulers turned to the laity, and proclaimed their own universal lordship. ‘All things are ours,’ said they, ‘whether life or death, or things present, or things to come, ALL ARE OURS.’

“That complicated system of observances and superstitious notions, which had reference to the condition of souls in the unseen world, was an integral part of the great scheme of despotism, and was employed to sustain and extend it, in every way, which the idle or well-founded fears of the people made practicable, or which their corrupt inclinations invited—the viaticum and extreme unction,—the prayers for the dead, and masses for the delivery of the souls—the intercession of saints—the practice of canonization, and the pronouncing of anathemas, were all so many expressions, or practical exhibitions of the invisible jurisdiction of the church. From whatever source these opinions and usages had at first sprung up; and most of them are of very high antiquity; the church of a later time wrought them into her frame work, and they became indispensable to her security.” (Spiritual Despotism, pp. 320–2)

It must be evident to every reader that the priests of the Romish Church do claim the power to dispose of destinies in the world to come. And in thus doing, they clearly fulfil the prophecy of the Man of Sin and Son of perdition, who was to “sit in the temple of God, shewing himself that he is God.” (See Frontispiece.)

We have thus laid before the reader the principal forms in which the priest discharges the offices of deity in the Church of Rome. And as a matter of fact, it is notorious that, by virtue of these claims, they were considered gods by the people of the Middle Ages. From an early period, according to Mosheim, “the clergy were held in the highest veneration, and were honoured as a sort of deities by the submissive multitude.”

The doctrine of transubstantiation, more than any other, tended to augment these superstitious notions. It was employed by the Romish clergy to exalt themselves to a level with the Deity himself.[1]

In the eleventh century, for example, Pope Urban II. convoked a council at Rome (A.D. 1097) against the Emperor Henry IV. and all other princes who should claim a right to the investiture of bishops, abbots, etc., and declared “that it was an abominable thing that those hands which create God, should be obliged to so much ignominy, as to do honour to those hands, which night and day are defiled with filthy and dishonourable touches.” (Simeon Dunelm, lib. 2. Chr. Vigner in his Eccles. hist. p. 300)

Biel says, “The priest has great power over both the bodies of Christ,” that is, the church of Christ and his corporeal body. (Lesson 1st, of the Canon of the Mass) And in the 4th lesson he says, “Whoever saw such a thing? He that created me (if I may so speak) has given me power to create him; and he that created me without my help, is created by my means.”[2]

In an old satirical book called The Romish Beehive (Lond. 1686), we read:

“It is also a great reason, they should be called Gods, because they themselves can make God, and are (as we have taught before) creators of their Creator. And now there is a perpetual and infallible rule, among the doctors of Louvain, which cannot fail, for that it is fetched out of their master Aristotle, and it is this, ‘Whensoever any thing doth get any virtue out of the power or gift of another; the same by whom he doth receive that virtue, must needs have very much more like virtue in himself.’[3] Seeing, then, that by the power and knowledge of the priests, a piece of bread may be made God, how much rather are the priests themselves Gods.” (Beehive, fol. 185)

Nothing is more frequent in Spanish and Portuguese books of devotion than the expression “Creating the Creator” in reference to the Mass. Mr. Beste, a famous preacher of the seventeenth century, in his book of the priestly office, says, “The priesthood and the deity have, I know not what in common, and are almost of an equal grandeur, FOR THEY HAVE THE SAME POWER.” And again, “Seeing that the priesthood IS EQUAL TO THE DEITY, AND THAT ALL PRIESTS ARE GODS, therefore it far exceeds the kingly office.”

Petrus Aurelius too, a doctor of the Sorbonne, about the same period, wrote a work with the approbation of the Sorbonne called Spongia. In the 75th page, he says: “A power is given to priests to produce Christ, that is God himself (Christum, id est Deum ipsum producendi).” He adds that “the power of the priests has in it a certain emulation of the eternal operations, by which the divine persons are produced.” (Both quoted in the Capucin, by Du Moulin. Lond. 1675)

Further testimonies of this kind are quite needless, and it surely will not now be questioned that the Romish priesthood, from the Pope down to the parish priest, constitutes “the Man of Sin and Son of perdition, exalting himself, and opposing himself against all that is called God, or is worshipped, and shewing himself that he is God.”

Such were the claims made by the priests and admitted by the laity of the Church of Rome. But it should be remembered that, as the Church of God has one supreme head—the Lord Jesus Christ—so has the visible Church of Rome one head—the Roman Pontiff. If the priests of Rome, therefore, sit “in the Temple of God showing themselves that they are God,” much more might we expect such conduct on the part of their rulers.

Accordingly we find that the most blasphemous assumptions have been made by them, and by their creatures, on their behalf. So early as the eighth century, we hear Pope Gregory II. declaring that “all the nations of the West reverenced him AS A GOD UPON EARTH!”

Gregory VII., the notorious Hildebrand, gave out that he was THE REPRESENTATIVE OF GOD in the administration of the affairs of this world, “and from that time,” says Gieseler, “the idea became generally prevalent” (A.D. 1080); and kings and emperors were hurled from the throne at the pleasure of the Pope. In the twelfth century, “the canonists or expounders of the canon law, made the Pope a deity on earth. The language in which they taught his supremacy, is truly astonishing. In respect of his names, attributes, omnipotence, and infallibility, of his divine worship, of his prophetical office, and sacerdotal and regal power, he is represented to be an equal with God, instead of a weak and sinful mortal.” (Spanheim Eccl. Hist. Cent. XII. § 3)

The idea of the papal power continued to grow, and was carried out in its most revolting absurdity in the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries. “The king did according to his will, and exalted himself and magnified himself above every god, and spake marvellous things against the God of gods” (Dan. xi. 36). Almost every attribute of the Most High was ascribed to him; he performed the offices of deity, and divine honours were considered his due.

It is impossible, within our own limits, to repeat half the monstrous blasphemies taught by the doctors of the papacy during this period; none of which have ever been contradicted by papal authority. It was then held for truth:

That “All power in heaven and earth, was given to the Pope.”[4]
That he was “omnipotent; and in him dwelt the plenitude of power.”[5]
That “the Pope could do all things, sin excepted.”[6]

And in short, that “his power was of the same extent as that of God himself.” They taught, too, that the Pope “was the judge, both of the living and the dead.”[7] That “he could make justice, injustice; by correcting or changing laws.”[8] And “dispense, contrary both to the Old and New Testament.”[9]

They maintained “that the sentence of the Pope and of God were both one,” and that his “indulgences remitted even the punishment of hell.”[10] That “he was above all laws.[11] And that “no appeal could be made from the Pope to God; because he is the Christ of God.” (Christus Domini, in Wolf.

Such being the high prerogatives of the papal power, we can not wonder that divine honours should be paid to the Romish pontiffs. In the fourteenth century it was determined by a high authority that:

“The same honor which is due to Christ as God, is also due to the Pope, because the honor is paid to the power: and the power of Christ and that of the Pope are one.”[12] And “Latria also, which is that service due to God, must be rendered to the Pope, because all service is due to the Pope; therefore, Latria is due to him.”[13]

Only one higher step could be taken, viz., to style the Pope God. This was accordingly done in numerous instances. The Canon Law says that “Constantine the Great called the Pope God, and therefore God cannot be judged by man” (Dist. 96. c. Satis evidenter).

Some of the papal doctors distinctly said “the Pope is God.”[14] Others said, “All the princes of the earth adore and worship him, as the highest God,”[15] And that “a dispensation from sin, granted by the Pope must be valid, because HE IS GOD UPON EARTH,” And “the Pope lawfully elected, is called God upon earth.”[16]

Lastly, the Gloss to the Extravagants of John XXII. (Tit. xiv. c. 4. in fine) distinctly calls him “OUR LORD GOD THE POPE!” All the editions since that at Paris, 1612, omit the word God. But Gieseler states that it is found in the Lyons editions of 1504 and 1606, as also in the Paris editions of 1585, 1601, and 1612 (Vol. III. p. 47). Foulis mentions ten editions in which it occurs in his History of Romish Usurpations (Book I. ch. 4).

We have thus attempted to exhibit one of the most horrible evils of Popery—the fearful extent to which the priest occupies the place of God in the visible church, himself discharging the high and incommunicable offices of the Deity:

• Absolving the sinner from the guilt and punishment of sin;
• Renewing and sanctifying the heart by the instrumentality of the sacraments of the church;
• Sitting in judgment on the thoughts and consciences of men;
• Claiming the power, by the sacrifice of the Mass, to propitiate divine justice and atone for human guilt; and lastly,
• Fixing irrevocably the eternal destinies of men.

All of these charges have been by an overwhelming variety of evidence proved against that apostate hierarchy—yet any one of them is sufficient to convict the Church of Rome of the crime of making herself God. There is then no refuge, no escape from the charge—the most awful which any being or community can incur—that the Romish hierarchy have usurped the high prerogatives of deity, “sitting in the Temple of God, and showing themselves that they are God!”

To men of the world, this assumption of the offices of deity may appear a light matter. By every devout mind, however, it will be regarded as the highest crime which man could possibly commit. And the higher our ideas of the supreme excellence and glory of that Infinite Being whose place priests usurped, and the deeper our sense of the obligations under which we are laid by His creating and redeeming love, the higher will be our ideas of the surpassing guilt—the unparalleled wickedness—of the Man of Sin and Son of Perdition.

Nothing to equal this can be found in the whole history of pagan worship. It is true, the ministers of paganism were, to some extent, the objects of worship by the people. But how absurd, how despicable, and degraded was the religion of which they were the gods! The priests of Rome, on the contrary, stood forth as the representatives of the one true God. They presented themselves to the view of the whole visible church, arrayed in the incommunicable perfections of Deity—discharging the high offices and functions of the Father, Son, and Spirit! In a word, it was the glory of the God of redemption—the God of grace—that priests had stolen: and from their usurped seat in the Temple of God, they called upon all Christendom to come and transact with them all the affairs of the soul and of eternity!

But there yet wants one consideration in order to place this frightful feature of Popery in its true light. It should be remembered that the very class of men who thus arrayed themselves in the attributes of the Most High and his throne in the Western Church were, as a whole, the most abandoned and licentious class of men that ever lived. For many centuries—as the next chapters will too clearly establish—the popes, cardinals, prelates, and priests were profligates of depravity whose wickedness was only equalled by their monstrous claims. How awful then is the bare idea of the guilt involved in such individuals as these assuming the attributes and discharging the functions of God and of Christ! And does not this pre-eminent guilt of the Church of Rome explain the circumstance of that apostate body being specially designated in the oracles of God—THE MAN OF SIN!

To form any adequate idea of the amount of spiritual evil thus inflicted upon the nations of Europe by the Romish Church is wholly impossible. It is not merely that she has stood between man and his God, and thus hidden the great source of light and life from a benighted world—but she has actually, as we have seen, held up herself as God, assumed divine prerogatives, discharged the functions of deity, and thus caused kings and people to commit spiritual fornication with herself—“Babylon the great, the Mother of Harlots, and Abominations of the earth!” And thus for many centuries the whole continent, as well as our own land, was defiled with the filth of the fornication of the Great Whore, and all Europe stank in the eyes of a holy and a jealous God!

Away then for ever with the absurd idea that Popery and Protestantism are fundamentally the same, and the difference between them merely speculative. So far as light differs from darkness—and sin from holiness—so far as Christ is removed from Belial—so far is Popery, as to all its essential doctrines, at variance with Christianity!

Footnotes

[1] The following extract is strikingly to the point: “And, on a tyme, as this holy man, as a legate, came in that provynce for to reconcile the Duke of Guyan to the chirche, and he refused to be reconciled in all manners. The holy man went to the aulter for to singe masse, and the duke abode without the chirche as excomyned. And whan he had sayd, Pax domini, he laide the body of our Lorde upon the patene, and bare it without the chirche, and went out, with a face flammynge, and brennynge, and assaylled the duke by ferdfull wordes, sayenge, ‘We have prayed the, and thou hast despysest us. Loo, here is the sone of the virgyne, whiche is comen to the, and is lorde of the chirche whom thou persecutest; this ia thy Juge, in the name of whom all knees bowen; in the hondes of whom thy soule shall come; despise hym not, as thou hast his servauntes; treat hym yf thou moyst!’ And thane, anon, the duke wered all and was impotent in his membres. And then he fell downe. And the holy man put his foot at hym, and commanded hym to aryse, and to here the sentence of God.” (Lyf of St. Bernard, in Golden Legend)

[2] Qui creavit me dedit mihi creare se: et qui creavit me sine me, creatur mediante me.

[3] Propter quod unumquodque tale est, illud ipsum magis est tale. (Stella clericorum ch. x. par. 1)

[4] Papa tradita est omnis potestas in cælo et terra. (Wolf. I. p. 995.)

[5] Papa est omnipotens, et in eo est plenitudo potestatis. (Andr. Gambat, in Wolf, I. p. 1002.)

[6] Jur. de Griffis, decisiones. Aur. pars. I. c. 81. Jo. Ruber Bonif. 8. p. 216.

[7] Papa est judex vivorum et mortuorum. (in Wolf. I. 1002.)

[8] De inJustitia potest facere justitiam, corrigendo jura et mutando.j (Decret. Greg. lib. I. Tit. 7. in Wolf.)

[9] Corneus I. 2. const. Jno. Neuz. apud Wolf. ubi sup.

[10] Angelus de Clav. in Sum. Ang. Wolf. I. p. 991.

[11] Gond. de Vill. in Wolf.

[12] Utrum Papæ debetur honor qui debetur Christo secundum quod Deus? Videtur quia, &c. (Augustini Triumphi. Qu. IX. Art. 1. apud Giesel.)

[13] Idem. Art 3.

[14] Papa est Deus. Felinus et Joan de Capistro apud Wolfium.

[15] Blondus Apud Wolfium. Lect. Mem. I. 994.

[16] Papa legitime electus dicitur Deus in terris. (Apud Wolf. Vol. I. 999)

(To be continued.)