⚫ human bodies are buried, it maketh no dif•ference. The temple of the great God is the whole ' world; they confine his majefty, who build churches, monafteries, and oratories, as if the divine goodness would be found more propi• tious in them. • Sacerdotal veftments, ornaments of altars, palls, corporals, chalices, patins and veffels of this fort are of no moment. A priest in any place, at any time can confecrate the body of Chrift, and administer it to those who defire it; it is fufficient, if he repeat only the facramental words. The fuffrages of the faints reigning with • Chrift in heaven are implored in vain, foras⚫ much as they cannot help us. The time is confumed in vain in finging and faying the canonical hours. • We fhould ceafe from work on no day, except that which is now called the Lord's day. The festivals of faints are altogether to be rejected. The fasts also inftituted by the church have no merit in them.' These were the opinions of the Bohemians or Huffites, for which they fought as well as dif puted puted against the pope and emperor. At first they were victorious under the conduct of the famous John Zifka; and when they were beaten at laft, they retired into the mountains and caves, where they continued distinguished by the name of the Bohemian brethren till the time of the Reformation. Even in the bofom of the church of Rome there were many good men, who called aloud for a reformation in faith as well as in morals, in doctrin as well as in disciplin. One instance is more particularly worthy of our attention. Jeronimo Savonarola (3) was a Dominican, celebrated in all Italy, and especially in Florence, for the great purity and ftrictness of his life and doctrin. He preached freely against the vices of the age, the luxury, avarice, and debauchery of the Roman clergy in general, and the tyranny and wickedness in particular of pope Alexander VI and his fon Cæfar Borgia. In his difcourfes fermons and writings, he preffed the neceffity of holding a general council and of making a general reformation: and he wrote particularly a treatise (4) intitled The lamentation of the Spouse of Chrift against falfe apofties, or an exhortation to the faithful (3) Spanhem. ibid. Cap. 5. Sect. 3. H.Wharton in Append. ad Cave p. 198. &c. Guicciardin. B. 3. toward the end. Phil. de Comines. B. 8. Chap. 19. Dupin. ibid. Chap. 4. Bayle's (4) Lamentatio Chrifti fponfa adverfus Pfeudapoftolos, five exhortatio ad fideles, ut preceptur Dominum faithful that they would pray unto the Lord for the renovation of the church. But what was the fruit and confequence of all his pious zeal? He was excommunicated, he was imprifoned, he was tortured, he was burnt; which he fuffered with all poffible conftancy on the 23d of May 1498, and in the 46th year of his age. All perfons of any note and eminence bear a double character in the world, and fo doth Savonarola, his admirers extolling him as the best of men and the prophet of God, his enemies reviling him as the worst of impoftors and hypocrits; but if his works may speak for him, they are, in the (5) opinion of Dupin, full of grace ' and of maxims of piety; he speaketh freely t 'there against the vices, and teacheth the most pure and the moft exalted morality.' We are now arrived at the fixteenth century, fæculum reformatum as it hath been called, or the age of reformation. The materials had in great measure been collected, and the foundations had been laid deep before, but this age had the happiness of feeing the fuperftru&ture raised and completed. All the chriftian world almost ין had groaned earneftly for a reformation: and pope Adrian himself (6) acknowleged the neceffity of it, and promised to begin with reforming the court of Rome, as the fource and origin of evil. Erasmus and others led the way; and Luther began (7) publicly to preach against the pope's indulgences in the year 1517, which is usually reckoned the era of the Reformation. So that during all the dark ages of popery, from the first rife of the beaft down to the Reformation, there have conftantly been fome true and faithful witnesses of Jefus Chrift, who, tho' they may have fallen into fome errors and mistakes, (as indeed who is altogether free from them?) yet it may charitably be prefumed, held none which are contrary to the fundamentals of the christian faith, and deftructive of falvation. Many more there were without doubt than have come to our knowlege; many more might have been collected, and this deduction drawn out into a greater length: but I have ftudied brevity as much as I well could; and they who are defirous of seeing a larger and more particular account of the witneffes may find (6) Sleidan's Hift. of the (7) Sleidan. B. 1. Father Paul. B. 1. Se&t. 18, &c. (8) Matthias Flaccius in Catalogo teftium veritatis. Hift. Ecclefiatt. Magdeburg. Ufher de Chriftian. find it in (8) Flaccius Illyricus, in the Centuriators of Magdeburg, in Ufher, in Allix, in Spanheim, and other authors. Here only fome of the principal inftances are felected: but this deduction, short and defective as it is, evidently demonftrates however, that there hath not been that uninterrupted union and harmony, which the members of the church of Rome pretend and boaft to have been before the Reformation: and at the fame time it plainly evinces, that they betray great ignorance, as well as impertinence, in asking the queftion Where was your religion before Luther? Our religion, we fee, was in the hearts and lives of many faithful witneffes; but it is fufficient, if it was no where elfe, that it was always in the Bible. "The Bible, as Chillingworth (9) fays, the Bible only "is the religion of protestants.” 15 And the feventh angel founded, and there were great voices, in heaven, faying, The kingdoms of this world are become the kingdoms of our Lord, and of his Chrift, and he shall reign for ever and ever. Chriftian. Ecclef. fucceffione et ftatu. Allix's Remarks upon the ancient church of Piedmont,and the ancient churches of the Albigenfes. Frederici Spanhemii 16 And Hift. Chriftiana et Hift. Imaginum. (9) Chillingworth's Religion of Proteftants. Chap. 6. Sect. 56. O 3 |