FIAT LUX ON THE POPE, ETC. 821
US, he seeks nothing hut oiw good, whatever he doth in the world besides. And is it not a Avikl interpretation that you make of my words, whilst you suppose me to intimate that " absolutely the pope doth nothing in the world," or hath no other business at all that he concerns himself in, but only the seeking of our good in pai'ticular? If you cannot allow the books that you read the common civility of interpreting things indefinitely expressed in them with the limi- tations that the subject-matter whereof they treat requires, you had better employ your time in any thing than study, as being not able to understand many lines in any author you shall read. Nor are such expressions to be avoided in our common discourse. If a man, talking of your " Fiat," should say that you do nothing but seek the good of your countrymen, would you interpret his words as tliough he denied that you say mass, and hear confessions, or to intimate that you do nothing but write "■ Fiats?" And you know with wLom lies both "jus et norma loquendi."
The tenth and last principle is, " That the devotion of Catholics far transcends that of Protestants." So you now express it; what you mention being but one part of three that the "Animadversions" speak unto. Hereunto you reply, "But, sir, I never made in 'Fiat Lux' any comparisons between your devotions ; nor can I say how much the one is, or how little the other. But you are the maddest commentator that I have ever seen : you first make the text, and then animadver- sions upon it." Pray, sir, have a little patience, and learn from this instance not to be too confident upon your memory for the future. I shall rather think that fails you at present than your conscience: but a failure I am sure there is, and you shall take the liberty to charge it where you please ; which is more than every one would allow you. I would, indeed, desirously free myself from the labour of transcribing aught that you have written to this purpose in your " Fiat," and only reter you to the jilaces, which you seem to have forgotten ; but be- cause this is the last instance of this kind that we are to treat about, and you have by degrees raised your confidence in denying your own words, to that height as to accuse them of madness who do but remind you of them, I shall represent unto you once again what you have written to this purpose: and I am persuaded, upon your review of it, you will like it so well as to be sorry that ever you disowned it. I shall instance only in one place, which is sect, xxii., pp. 270, 271, where your words are these: — "When I beheld" (in the Catholic countries) " the deep reverence and earnest devotion of the people, the majesty of their service, the gravity of their altars, the decency of their priests, ' Certahily,' said I within myself, ' this is the house of God, the gate of heaven.' Alas! our churches in England, as they be now, be as short of those, either for decency, use, or piety, as stables
A'OL. XIV. 21
322 A VINDICATION OF THE ANIMADVERSIONS ON FIAT LUX.
to a princely 2:)alace ! There they be upon then- knees all the week long at their prayers, many of them constantly an hovir together in the morning, and half an hour he that is least And, ' My house,' said God, ' is the house of prayer:' but our churches are either shut up all the week, or, if they be open, are wholly taken up with boys shout- ing, running, and gamboling all about. On Sundays, indeed, our people sit quiet, and decently dressed, but to bow the knee is quite out of fashion ; and if any one chance to do it, as it is rare to behold, so he is very nimble at it, and as soon up as down, as if he made a courtship with his knees, and only tried if his nerves and sinews were as good to bow as to stand upright. And our whole religious work here
is to sit quietly whilst the minister speaks upon a text, and
that we sj^end all our days, ever learning and teaching," etc. If this discourse must be esteemed text, I pray tell me whose it is, yours or mine; or whether it doth not contain a comparison between the devotion of your Catholics and Protestants; and whether that of the former be not preferred above the other : and when yon have done so, pray also tell me whether you suppose it an honest and candid way of handling matters of this importance, or, indeed, of any sort whatever, for a man to say and unsay at his pleasure according unto what he apprehends to be for his present advantage; and whether a man may believe you that you so accurately pondered the words of your "Fiat" as you seem to pretend, seeing you dare not abide by what you have written, but disclaim it. And yet I confess this may fall out, if your design in the weighing of your words was so to place them as to deceive us by them; which, indeed, it seems to have been. But it is your unhappiness that your words are brought unto other men's scales after they had so fairly passed your own. For the devotion itself (Ijy the way) of Catholics, which you here paint forth unto us, it looks very suspiciously to be painted. The piety of your churches, wherein they exceed ours, I confess I understand not; and your people's frequenting public places to perform theu private devo- tions leans much to the old Pharisaism, which our Saviour himself hath branded to all eternity for hypocritical, and carried on with little attendance unto his precept of making the closet, and that with the door shut upon the devotionists, the most proper seat of private sup- plications. Besides, if their prayers consist, as for the most part they do, in going over by tale a set number of- sayings which they little understand, you may do well to commend your devotion to them that miderstand not one word of gospel, for those that do will not attend imto it. And so I have once more passed through the principles of your work, with a fresh discussion of some of them, — which I tell you again I suppose sufficient to satisfy judicious and ingenuous persons in the sophistiy and inconclusiveness of the whole; my farther pro-