I might proceed, would the time permit me, to discover all the rest of their politic arts, the mysteries of their spiritual trade; for such are all their peculiar tenets, that were discarded at the Reformation. What availed it to the clergy, that the Scriptures expressly said, marriage is honourable in all: let a bishop, let a presbyter, be the husband of one wife: one that ruleth well in his own house, having faithful children, kept in subjection with all gravity? This did not suit with popish politic; this tied* and attached the clergy to the common interest of mankind; their affection to their own children made their country also dear to 'em, made them love and pity the abused laity; they were not vassals devoted enough to the service of a foreign master; the riches of the church did not flow in one channel, nor all revert at last to that one fountain and receptacle. And for these pious reasons, in spite of plain Scripture, of the authority of ages before, of all the lusts and impurities that must necessarily follow, a chaste legitimate marriage shall be forbidden to the clergy, and an adulterous celibacy shall be enjoined universal.

But what can plain Scripture avail against the avarice and pride of Popery, when both common sense internal, and the joint testimony of all our outward senses, must submit to its decrees, when 'tis to advance its profit or power? That due respect ever paid to rà ayia, the consecrated bread and wine at the holy communion, was easily raised by superstition and ignorance to the highest excess, to notions improbable and impossible. This fair handle was not neglected by Popery : by slow degrees transubstantiation was enacted into an article of faith; and a very beneficial one to the priests, since it made them the makers of god, and a sort of gods among the people. But we must think better and juster of the contrivers of it, than that they themselves believed it; they did or could believe it no more, than a proposition made up of the most disparate ideas, that sound may be turned into colour, a syllogism into a stone. "Twas not ignorance nor stupidity, but the most subtle and crafty politic, that produced tran

[* tied; so 1st ed. ed. 1735, "tried."-D.]

substantiation. Thence the awful pomp, the august cavalcades, in the procession* of the hostie; as if they would outdo the pagan ones of Cybele;

Ingratos animos atque impia pectora vulgi

Conterrere metu quæ possint numine Divæ :†

thence the presence of God continually resident corporeal at the high altar: thence, to exhibit it perpetually there, the wafer, panis älvμos, unleavened unfermented bread, was taken into the solemnity, both against ancient practice and the perpetual custom of the Greek church; because common bread would soon have grown mouldy, and not pass with the palate of the multitude for the body of God: thence, at last, in the xiiith century, was the cup denied to the laity; not for not seeing the plain words of the Scripture, Drink ye ALL of this; not for the dearness or scarcity of wine, which is cheap and common in those climates; not for the then pretended reason, that the mustaches or whiskers in the mode of that age used to dip into the holy cup; but because it was inconsistent with the rest of the show. So small a quantity of wine, even after consecration, would soon grow dead and vapid; would discover its true nature, if tasted after long standing. The wine, therefore, because it interferes with the standing ceremony and continued pageantry of transubstantiation, has not the honour to be reposited with the wafer on the altar, nor to accompany it in the solemn processions.

I might now go on to shew you a more dismal scene of impostures, their judicia Dei, the judgments of God, as they blasphemously called 'em, when no human evidence could be found: their trials by ordeal; by taking a red-hot iron in the hand; by putting the naked arm into hot boiling water; by sinking or swimming in pools and rivers when bound fast hand and foot all of them borrowed or copied from pagan knavery and superstition, and so manageable by arts and slights, that the party could be found guilty or innocent just [+ Lucret. ii. 622.—D.}

[ procession; 1st ed. "processions."-D.]

as the priests pleased, who were always the triers. What bribes were hereby procured! what false legacies extorted! what malice and revenge executed! on all which if we should fully dilate and expatiate, the intended tragedy of this day, which now calls for our consideration, would scarce appear extraordinary. Dreadful indeed it was, astonishing to the imagination; all the ideas assembled in it of terror and horror. Yet, when I look on it with a philosophical eye, I am apt to felicitate those appointed for that sudden blast of rapid destruction; and to pity those miserables that were out of it, the designed victims to slow cruelty, the intended objects of lingering persecution. For, since the whole plot (which will ever be the plot of Popery) was to subdue and enslave the nation, who would not choose and prefer a short and despatching death, quick as that by thunder and lightning, which prevents pain and perception, before the anguish of mock trials, before the legal accommodations of gaols and dungeons, before the peaceful executions by fire and faggot? Who would not rather be placed direct above the infernal mine than pass through the pitiless mercies, the salutary torments of a popish inquisition, that last accursed contrivance of atheistical and devilish politic? If the other schemes have appeared to be the shop, the warehouse of Popery, this may be justly called its slaughter-house and its shambles. Hither are haled poor creatures (I should have said rich, for that gives the frequentest suspicion of heresy), without any accuser, without allegation of any fault. They must inform against themselves, and make confession of something heretical; or else undergo the discipline of the various tortures; a regular system of ingenious cruelty, composed by the united skill and long successive experience of the best engineers and artificers of torment. That savage saying of Caligula's,* horrible to speak or hear, and fit only to be writ in blood, Ita feri, ut se mori sentiat, is here heightened and improved: Ita se mori sentiat, ut ne moriatur, say these merciful inquisitors. The force, the effect of every rack, every agony, are [* Suet. Calig. 30.-D.]

exactly understood: this stretch, that strangulation, is the utmost nature can bear, the least addition will overpower it; this posture keeps the weary soul hanging upon the lip, ready to leave the carcass, and yet not suffered to take its wing ;* this extends and prolongs the very moment of expiration, continues the pangs of dying without the ease and benefit of death. O pious and proper methods for the propagation of faith! O true and genuine vicar of Christ, the God of mercy, and the Lord of peace!

And now, after this short, but true sketch and faithful landscape of Popery, I presume there's but little want of advice or application. If this first character in the text belongs to Popery, let us secure the other to ourselves, that we handle the word in sincerity, as of God, as in the sight of God in Christ. The Reformation without this must forfeit its name, and the Church of England must lose its nature. Let every one, therefore, that thinks he stands, take heed lest he fall. Our very text informs us, that in the apostle's own days, when the church was in its greatest purity and simplicity, there were even then many кáπŋλοi, fraudulent dealers, among its members; though the traffic must needs run low when the whole community was so poor. But when the emperors became Christian, and the immense revenues of the pagan priesthood were (as indeed they ought to be) all confiscated and distributed, without doubt the spoil and the

[* This powerful passage has been borrowed by Sterne. Part of the celebrated "sermon" introduced into Tristram Shandy is as follows:-"Go with me for a moment into the prisons of the Inquisition ..... Hark! hark! what a piteous groan! See the melancholy wretch who uttered it just brought forth to undergo the anguish of a mock trial, and endure the utmost pains that a studied system of cruelty has been able to invent. Behold this helpless victim delivered up to his tormentors, his body so wasted with sorrow and confinement, you will see every nerve and muscle as it suffers. Observe the last movement of that horrid engine; see what convulsions it has thrown him into! Consider the nature of the posture in which he now lies stretched, what exquisite tortures he endures by it. 'Tis all nature can bear! Good God! see how it keeps his weary soul hanging upon his trembling lips,—willing to take its leave, but not suffered to depart."-Sterne's Works, vol. i. pp. 247-250, ed. 1788.-D.]

plunder attracted crowds of new converts, and the courtiers found it useful to declare themselves good Christians. Even the Reformation itself did not make the slower progress for the vast riches of the monasteries that were to be dissolved; nor had it been less honour to it, if, as the lands and manors of the abbeys were justly restored to the laity, so their impropriations had reverted to the parochial clergy, from whom they had been robbed. To say the truth, the spirit of Popery is near as old as human race; 'tis in all ages and places, and even then exerts itself when it demolishes Popery. The generality of men, οἱ πολλοὶ, were always κάπηλοι, traders in a profession. The Epicureans of old, though they denied and derided the heathen gods, would yet gladly accept of a fat benefice, opimum sacerdotium, and, to gain an ample revenue, would officiate at those altars which they silently laughed at. Think not, therefore, that all the priests were the vilest of men, but that some of the vilest of men got in to be priests. They saw the opportunity of enslaving and pillaging mankind, if they could but manage the priesthood upon atheistical principles. This was the temptation, this gave the original to Popery; and nothing to be accused for it but human nature in common. What profession, what conjunction of laymen, if not continually watched, if not curbed and regulated by authority, have not abused the like advantage and ascendant in their several ways, to their private emolument, and the oppression of the public? Let us watch, therefore, against this fatal degeneration, incident to all things. He that aims malis artibus to arrive at church preferment, by sinful or servile compliance, by turbulency and faction, what is he but κáπηλos, a trafficker for sordid lucre? He that zealously vends his novelties, or revives dead and buried heresies to the disturbance of the community, what is he but a trader for the fame of singularity? He that labours to dig up all the fences of the church; to throw down her articles and canons, her liturgy and ceremonies; to extinguish her nurseries of learning; and when he has made her a mere waste and a common, shall call that a comprehension;