purgatory, whom they list, is promised to many upon easy terms, even to the saying of their beads over with an appendant medal of the pope's benediction. Every priest, at his third or fourth mass, is as sure as may be, to deliver the souls of his parents and a thousand more such stories as these are to be seen every where and every day.

Once for all there was a book printed at Paris by Francis Regnault, A. D. 1536. May 25, called The hours of the most blessed Virgin Mary, according to the use of Sarumg' in which, for the saying three short prayers written in Rome, in a place called 'The chapel of the holy cross of seven Romans,' are promised fourscore and ten thousand years of pardon of deadly sin. Now the meaning of these things is very plain. By these devices they serve themselves, and they do not serve God. They serve themselves by this doctrine for they teach that what penance is ordinarily imposed, does not take away all the punishment that is due; for they do not impose what was anciently enjoined by the penitential canons, but some little thing instead of it: and, it may be, that what was anciently enjoined by the penitential canons, is not so much as God will exact: for they suppose that he will forgive nothing but the guilt and the eternity; but he will exact all that can be demanded on this side hell, even to the last farthing he must be paid some way or other, even when the guilt is taken away:- but therefore to prevent any failing that way, they have given indulgences enough to take off what was due by the old canons, and what may be due by the severity of God; and if these fail, they may have recourse to the priests, and they by their masses can make supply: so that their disciples are well, and the want of ancient discipline shall do them no hurt.

But then how little they serve God's end by treating the sinner so gently, will be very evident. For by this means they have found out out a way, that though, it may be, God will be more severe than the old penitential canons; and although these canons were much more severe than men are now willing to suffer; yet neither for the one or the other shall they need to be troubled : they have found out an easier way to go to heaven than so. And indulgence will be no

Tolet. Instr. Sacerd. lib. iii. c. 11. n. 6.

great charge, but that will take off all the supernumerary penances, which ought to have been imposed by the ancient discipline of the church, and may be required by God. A little alms to a priest, a small oblation to a church, a pilgrimage to the image or relics of a saint, wearing St. Francis's cord, saying over the beads with an hallowed appendant, entering into a fraternity, praying at a privileged altar, leaving a legacy for a soul-mass, visiting a privileged cemetery, and twenty other devices, will secure the sinner from suffering punishment here or hereafter, more than his friendly priest is pleased gently to impose.

To them that ask, What should any one need to get so many hundred thousand years of pardon, as are ready to be had upon very easy terms,-They answer, as before; that whereas it may be for perjury, the ancient canons enjoined penance all their life; that will be supposed to be twenty or forty years, or suppose an hundred; if the man have been perjured a thousand times, and committed adultery so often, and done innumerable other sins, for every one of which he deserves to suffer forty years' penance; and how much more in the account of God he deserves, he knows not: if he be attrite, and confessed so, that the guilt, is taken away, yet, as much temporal punishment remains due as is not paid here: but the indulgences of the church will take off so much as it comes to, even of all that would be suffered in purgatory. Now it is true, that purgatory (at least as is believed) cannot last a hundred thousand years; but yet God may, by the acerbity of the flames in twenty years, equal the canonical penances of twenty thousand years: to prevent which, these indulgences of so many thousand years are devised. A wise and thrifty invention sure, and well contrived, and rightly applotted according to every man's need, and according as they suspect his bill shall amount to,

This strange invention, as strange as it is, will be owned; for this is the account of it, which we find in Bellarmine": and although Gerson and Dominicus à Soto are ashamed of these prodigious indulgences, and suppose that the pope's questuaries did procure them, yet it must not be so dis

e Vide Concil. Tribur. c. 54. Burchard. lib. xix. Tertul. lib. de Pœnitentia.

De Indulgent. lib. i. c. 9. sect. Existit autem.

owned; truth is truth, and it is notoriously so; and therefore a reason must be found out for it; and this it is, which we have accounted. But the use we make of it, is this; that since they have declared, that when sins are pardoned so easily, yet the punishment remains so very great, and that so much must be suffered here or in purgatory; it is strange that they should not only in effect pretend to show more mercy than God does, or the primitive church did; but that they should directly lay aside the primitive discipline, and while they declaim against their adversaries, for saying they are not necessary, yet at the same time they should devise tricks to take them quite away; so that neither penance shall much smart here, nor purgatory (which is a device to make men be Mulatas, as the Spaniard calls half-Christians, a device to make a man go to heaven and to hell too) shall not torment them hereafter. However it be, yet things are so ordered, that the noise of penances need not trouble the greatest criminal, unless he be so unfortunate as to live in no country and near no church, and without priest or friend, or money, or notice of any thing that is so loudly talked of in Christendom. If he be, he hath no help but one; he must live a holy and a severe life, which is the only great calamity which they are commanded to suffer in the church of England: but if he be not, the case is plain, he may by these doctrines take his ease.

SECTION IV.

WE doubt not, but they who understand the proper sequel of these things, will not wonder that the church of Rome should have a numerous company of proselytes, made up of such as the beginnings of David's army were. But that we may undeceive them also, for to their souls we intend charity and relief by this address, we have thought fit to add one consideration more, and that is, that it is not fit that they should trust to this, or any thing of this; not only because there is no foundation of truth in these new devices, but because even the Roman doctors themselves, when they are pinched with an objection, let their hold go, and to

escape, do, in remarkable measures, destroy their own new building.

The case is this: to them who say, that if there were truth in these pretensions, then all these, and the many millions of indulgences more, and the many other ways of releasing souls out of purgatory, the innumerable masses' said every day, the power of the keys so largely employed, would, in a short time, have emptied purgatory of all her sad inhabitants, or, it may be, very few would go thither, and they that unfortunately do, cannot stay long; and consequently, besides that, this great softness and easiness of procedure would give confidence to the greatest sinners, and the hopes of purgatory would destroy the fears of hell, and the certainty of doing well enough in an imperfect life, would make men careless of the more excellent: besides these things, there will need no continuation of pensions, to pray for persons dead many years ago: to them, I say, who talk to them at this rate, they have enough to answer.

Deceive not yourselves, there are more things to be reckoned for than so. For, when you have deserved great punishments for great sins, and the guilt is taken off by absolution, and (you suppose) the punishment by indulgences or the satisfaction of others; it may be so, and it may be

not so.

For 1. It is according as your indulgence is. Suppose it for forty years, or it may be an hundred, or a thousand (and that is a great matter); yet, peradventure, according to the old penitential rate you have deserved the penance of forty thousand years; or at least, you may have done so by the more severe account of God: if the penance of forty years be taken off by your indulgence, it does as much of the work as was promised or intended; but you can feel little ease, if still there remains due the penance of threescore thousand years. No man can tell the difference, when what remains shall be so great as to surmount all the evils of this life; and the abatement may be accounted by pen and ink, but will signify little in the perception: it is like the casting out of a devil out of a miserable demoniack, when, there still remains fifty more, as bad as he that went away; the man will hardly find how much he is advanced in his,

cure.

But 2. You have, with much labour and some charge,

purchased to yourself so many quadragenes, or lents of pardon; that is, you have bought off the penances of so many times forty days. It is well; but were you well advised? it may be, your quadragenes are not carenes, that is, are not a quitting the severest penances of fasting so long in bread and water: for there is great difference in the manner of keeping a penitential lent, and it may be, you have purchased but some lighter thing; and then, if your demerit arise to so many carenes, and you purchased but mere quadragenes, without a minute, and table of particulars, you may stay longer in purgatory than you expected.

3. But, therefore, your best way is to get a plenary indulgence; and that may be had on reasonable terms: but take heed you do not think yourself secure, for a plenary indulgence does not do all that it may be you require; for there is an indulgence more full, and another most full, and it is not agreed upon among the doctors, whether a plenary indulgence is to be extended beyond the taking off those penances, which were actually enjoined by the confessor, or how far they go further. And they that read Turrecremata, Navar, Cordubensis, Fabius, Incarnatus, Petrus de Soto, Armilla Aurea, Aquinas, Tolet, Cajetan, in their several accounts of indulgences, will soon perceive, that all this is but a handful of smoke; when you hold it, you hold it not.

4. But further yet; all indulgences are granted upon some inducement, and are not ex mero motu,' or 'acts of mere grace' without cause; and if the cause be not reasonable, they are invalid: and whether the cause be sufficient, will be very hard to judge. And if there be for the indulgence, yet, if there be not a reasonable cause for the quantity of the indulgence, you cannot tell how much you get: and the preachers of indulgences ought not to declare how valid they are assertive,' that is, by any confidence; but 'opinative,' or 'recitative,' they can only tell what is said, or what is their own opinion.

5. When this difficulty is passed over, yet, it may be, the person is not capable of them; for, if he be not in the state of grace, all is nothing; and if he be, yet if he does not perform the condition of the indulgence actually, his mere endeavour, or good desire, is nothing. And when the

* Vide Joan, de Turrecremata in comment. dist. 1. de Pœnitent.