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Chapter VIII. Credulity. (2 Thess. 2:11; and 1 Tim. 4:2.)

ON examining the leading characteristics of Popery one instinctively asks, how can rational men even pretend to believe such monstrous absurdities, such palpable errors? Paul gives apparently the only possible explanation. Referring to the adherents of the “man of sin,” “the great apostasy,” he affirms :—God shall send them strong delusion, that they should believe a lie.” Surely, in perfect fairness we may ask, has there ever been, or is there now, among those who have fallen from the faith, a more conspicuous fulfilment of this prophecy than is furnished by the victims of Popish superstition?

If, as the best authority affirms, it was because “God gave them over to a reprobate mind,” that the heathen became guilty of such revolting immoralities and “worshipped and served the creature more than the Creator,’ how else shall we account for the deeper degradation and the grosser idolatry of Papists? Paganism never sanctioned such enormities as have found strenuous advocates in the bosom of “Holy Mother.” True, in some ages they deified every vile passion that rankles in the heart of man. Those gods, however, were never placed on loftier thrones than Jupiter. Venus and Bacchus were not allowed to purchase Jove’s pardon of unbridled indulgence. Over all other gods there was ever one whose anger could be appeased, and whose favor could be secured only by earnest effort after a life of virtue. It was left for “the trader in human souls” to promulgate the doctrine that by gold and silver given to the priest forgiveness of all sins, even the most heinous, could be purchased from the High and Holy one who inhabits eternity, the King of kings and Lord of lords. He who in his Word so repeatedly proffers a free salvation, is thus represented as conferring upon an arrogant and corrupt priesthood the right of selling pardons to the highest bidders; nay, worse, of granting indulgences, permission to sin to the wealthiest knaves, and the most unprincipled miscreants. The heathen worshipped gods which their own hands had made, it is true. They never so far degraded themselves, however, as to bow in adoration before a morsel of consecrated flour. Such disgusting idolatry is found only among the advocates of transubstantiation.

Except that God had given them up to believe a lie, how could Papists found a hope of heaven on the absolution granted by a priest? Turning from the throne of free grace, they hasten to a confessor for pardon. A frail, sinning man, forgives sins committed against God! A criminal pardons his fellow-criminal! A creature forgives the violation of the Creator’s laws! Rome’s most honored Council has pronounced an anathema against all who deny that the act of the priest in granting absolution is properly a judicial act. “He sits on the judgment seat representing Christ, and doing what Christ does.” In the catechism sanctioned by the Council of Trent, it is said:—“In the minister of God, who sits in the tribunal of penance, as his legitimate judge, the penitent venerates the power and person of our Lord Jesus Christ; for, in the administration of this, as in that of the other sacraments, the priest represents the character and discharges the functions of Jesus Christ.” When a large number of the ignorant are so credulous as to believe that this claim is founded in truth, is it any wonder that we witness from even the most atrocious murderers such disgusting exhibitions of hopes belonging alone to the devoutly penitent? And certainly it need scarcely strike us with surprise, if in almost every community not a few were found who, goaded by conscience to seek remission of sin, bow at the feet of the priest confidently expecting to purchase forgiveness with a part of the wages of iniquity. This done, why should they not return with even intensified delight to their former mode of life? An earnest, long-continued endeavor to imitate the pure life of Christ could not be expected from those who are taught to believe that the favor of God can be purchased with dollars and cents. Even if left to the promptings of nature, untutored by an infallible church, man would be far more likely to become enamored of virtue. Consciously burdened with a sense pf guilt, he might be driven to him who alone “has power on earth to forgive sin.”

That Paul’s prophecy finds a fulfillment in the history of Romanism is apparent in the doctrine of the real presence. In this the faithful, on pain of eternal damnation, are expected to believe that bread and wine, by the enunciation of the magic words, “Hoc est corpus meum,” are changed into Christ’s “ body, blood, soul, and divinity.” It is flesh, though it tastes like bread. It is blood, though it tastes like wine. Did ever delusion equal this? Men claiming common sense deliberately profess disbelief in the testimony of their own senses. On the mere declaration of a priest, they contemn one of God’s immutable laws, that to which they are indebted for all the knowledge they have of an external world. In being faithful to Rome, they become the worst of infidels, without faith in themselves and without faith in the God that made them.

Instead of denominating this a delusion, perhaps, so far as intelligent Papists are concerned, it were more charitable to characterize it as a “lie spoken in hypocrisy.” Evidently it is “a commandment of men,” defended as an essential part of a perfected system of extortion. Without it there would be a manifest absurdity in claiming ability to forgive sins. Represented, however, as a “bloodless sacrifice,” offered by the priest to the Father of all mercies, the appearance of consistency is retained. Merit purchasable is also marketable. “Transubstantiation, like the doctrine of supererogation (acts performed beyond what God requires), is food for the hen that lays the golden egg.

And what shall we denominate (call) the doctrine of purgatory,—a profitable delusion, or a lie spoken in hypocrisy? What could be better calculated to make market for masses? “Saints,” says the Council of Florence, “go to heaven; sinners to hell; and the middling class to purgatory.” Among the middlings, the priests now cunningly manage, for an obvious reason, to include nearly all. Saints in heaven, and sinners in hell, are beyond the reach of further extortion. From the fires of purgatory, however, unbloody sacrifices, if well paid for, can secure release. Whilst belief in this intermediate state is either a delusion borrowed from Paganism, or a hypocritical falsehood intended to fill Rome’s coffers, the pretence that the offering of a consecrated wafer can open to the soul the gates of paradise, is a delusion or hypocrisy still more inexplicable; and most unaccountable of all is the claim that the Church can determine when the soul is released from the purifying flames. To those whom God has given up to believe a lie, is any delusion too great for credence?—any profitable falsehood too hypocritical for advocacy?

This monstrous doctrine of purgatory the deluded victims of Popish superstition believe, notwithstanding it is written, “The blood of Christ cleanseth from all sin;” notwithstanding the Saviour’s promise to the thief on the cross, “This day shalt thou be with me in paradise;” notwithstanding the parable of the rich man and Lazarus, in which the former is represented as lifting up his eyes in hell, being in torments, the latter as safely folded in Abraham’s bosom. They credit this absurdity whilst professing to accept as of inspired authority the declarations of Paul, “I have a desire to depart and to be with Christ, which is far better;” “For me to live is Christ, and to die is gain;” “To be absent from the body is to be present with the Lord.” Blinded of God, the intelligent strenuously advocate, and the ignorant superstitiously believes a doctrine which effectually “makes merchandise of the souls of men.”

And her doctrine of supererogation is a delusion no less absurd. It is gravely said, “Men can do more than God’s holy law demands.” Many have done so. These works have merit. This merit, collected from the deeds of thousands of worthies, has been gathered into a treasury of which the Pope has the key. Hence he can deal out these good works in the form of indulgences and absolutions. What a mine of wealth! And every man, however wicked, may thence derive merit that will atone for any sin he may commit, even theft, adultery, or murder, on the simple condition that the price of the requisite amount of treasured goodness is paid for in current coin. Is this a delusion?—or is it rascality? With the ignorant masses it is no doubt the former. But the educated—do they really believe that the Pope collects the merits of those who are more virtuous than God requires into a fund for insuring souls against the torments of perdition, and sells life policies to the highest bidder? If so, alas for frail humanity! Superstition, it would seem, can silence common sense!

That the Popes are legitimate successors of St. Peter, bishops over alt Christendom, is another of Rome’s delusions. Though unable to determine whether the rock upon which Christ founded his Church was Peter, the Apostles, Peter’s faith, Peter’s confession, or the Saviour’s own meritorious offering, infallibility yet confidently affirms that upon the Pope in Rome is founded the true, holy, Catholic, Apostolic Church, out of which none can even hope for salvation. Supposing the Apostolic office still continues—a purely gratuitous assumption, since none can show the requisite qualifications, personal knowledge of our Saviour’s resurrection, a call direct from his lips, infallibility in teaching truth, the gift of tongues, the power of working miracles, and a commission to teach truth to the entire human family in all countries and all ages—the claim of an unbroken succession from Peter has never been established. No Papist, even with the aid of inerrancy, has been able to trace the line. On the concession of Rome’s most honored historians, Bellarmine, Alexander, Du Pin and others, at least 240 years remain from the beginning of the Christian era in which no vestiges of Papal authority can be discovered. The most ancient of the fathers, Irenaeus, Justin, and Clemens of Alexandria, make no mention of it, direct or indirect. And it is undeniably true that in the tenth century abandoned women ruled in Rome, by whom false pontiffs, their paramours, were intruded into the Papal chair. Will any Romanist have the hardihood to affirm that grossly immoral men, thus illegally thrust into office, were successors of the holy Apostles? Moreover, there have been times in the history of the Church when the line of succession cannot be traced even through such monsters of iniquity, no one even claiming universal spiritual sovereignty. For fifty years there were two infallible pontiffs, one at Avignon, another at Rome, each claiming to be the only legitimate successor of St. Peter. Both of these were deposed by the Council of Pisa, and Alexander elected. This resulted in giving Holy Mother three infallible heads. These being deposed by the Council of Constance, each took solemn oath to yield obedience. Each immediately resumed the claim: thus there were three, all perjured. In the face of such facts, admitted by‘all candid historians, Papal as well as Protestant, it evidently requires no small amount of credulity to believe not merely that the Popes are true successors of St. Peter, but that the Church founded on them is the only Church of Christ on earth.

The Church of Rome assumes to be in possession of the keys of heaven, although it has forsaken the fundamental doctrines of the Gospel. It denies that regeneration of heart and purity of purpose are necessary to salvation. Christ’s meritorious offering, the only sufficient atonement, is practically rejected. That justification is solely by faith in the Lord’s righteousness, and that sanctification is the work of God’s spirit, are repeatedly and emphatically denied. It condemns the declaration of Paul, that “there is no righteousness in us,” claiming merit from nature and justifying righteousness from the deeds of the law. Contradicting the teaching of the Apostle, it affirms, “Man can be just before God, yea, holier than his law requires.” The assertion of Scripture, “By the deeds of the law there shall no flesh be justified,” is met with the declaration, “We are set free from sin on account of our works.” That “God desires or wills that all men should repent,” and that “repentance is the gift of God,” are condemned in severe terms. These propositions: “Believers are about to enter into their rest,” “The Bible is the only infallible rule of faith and practice,” are pronounced “damnable heresies.” And although the New Testament has given this, “forbidding to marry,” as one of the marks of the man of sin, yet they prohibit marriage in the clergy while permitting concubinage. Could delusion surpass this, that men should believe themselves the true Church of Christ whilst they have apostatized from almost every essential doctrine of the Gospel? Unless we accept one or other of Paul’s explanations —either believing them strongly deluded or hypocritically false—how shall we account for their use of incense; their solemn consecration of bells and burial places; their burning of wax candles; and their sprinkling of horses, asses, and cattle? Formerly pious solicitude was taken in the proper solution, by an infallible Church, of the vitally important question, “Shall the hair of the monks be shaved in the form of a semicircle or circle?” Do not such things evidence the presence of seducing spirits cunningly turning the thoughts from the state of the heart to unmeaning forms?

And by what terms shall we characterize those endless frauds by which superstitious people were made to believe pretended miracles; or those silly dreams by which the most unprincipled impostors that ever disgraced humanity pretended to be directed to the tombs of saints and martyrs? And the bones thus obtained, how powerful! “By them,” so says an infallible Church, “Satan’s cunningest machinations were successfully defeated: diseases both of body and mind, otherwise incurable, were instantaneously healed.” In one thing at least they were exceedingly potent. They filled Rome’s empty treasury. That, in the Romish code of morals, is all that need be demanded. “It is an act of virtue to deceive, and lie, when, by that means, the interests of the Church can be promoted.” Falsehood, sometimes adroitly conceived, always persistently adhered to, has ever been one of Rome’s most efficient agencies in establishing and perpetuating her power.* “God,” says Paul, “shall send them strong delusion, that they should believe a lie.” “The spirit speaketh expressly, that in the latter times some shall depart from the faith, giving heed to seducing spirits, and doctrines of devils; speaking lies in, hypocrisy, having their conscience seared with a hot iron; forbidding to marry,” etc.—1 Tim. 4:1-3.

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* As specimens of the agencies employed by Rome to keep her children from straying from the fold, take these drafts upon the credulity of the ignorant: “The Holy Scriptures are far more extensively read among Catholics than they are by Protestants.””—Plain Talk about the Protestantism of To-Day, p. “Tradition has in itself as much authority as the Gospel.””—Idem, p. 127.‘Heresy is in itself a more grievous sin, an evil far greater and more baneful, than immorality and the inordinations of sensuality.”—Idem, p. 27. “Christianity and Catholicity are one and the same thing.”—Idem, p. 56. “To be a Christian is to be a Catholic: outside of Catholicity you may be a Lutheran, a Calvinist, a Mahommedan, a Mormon, a Free Thinker, a Buddbist, but you are not, you cannot be a Christian.”— p. 58. “It’s not very hard to be a good Protestant. Believe whatever you please in matters of religion. Believe nothing at all, if it suits you better. Be honest, as the world understands it. Read the Bible or not, as it pleases you; go to church, or do not go; forget not to subscribe to one, or two, or three Bible and evangelical societies; but, above all, hold the Catholic Church in abomination—and you shall be a good Protestant.”—p. 20. “One is poor, and wishes to emerge from his poverty; another is swayed by passions, which he does not wish to control; a third has too much pride, and is loath to subdue it; a fourth is ignorant, and allows himself to be led away. For such reasons people become Protestant.”—p. 87. “As for him who becomes a Protestant. . . . . Poor apostate! for him, no more the beautiful ceremonies of the Church, The images of our Lord, of the Blessed Virgin, and of the saints, become emblems of idolatry! —no more crucifix, no more the sign of the cross: it is idolatry! —no more prayers: no more respect or love for the Mother of God; idolatry! —no more trusting the intercession of saints, patrons in heaven, advocates, protectors near God : idolatry!”

“And when the hour of death is drawing near—when the unfortunate man is left to himself, about standing before God, covered with the sins of his whole life—no priest to administer the last sacraments of the Church, no priest to tell him, with all the power of divine authority, ‘ Poor sinner, take courage; thou canst die in peace, because Jesus has given me the power to forgive thee thy sins.’”—Idem, p. 233.

“The death-bed of the founders of Protestantism—all apostates, and, for the most, apostate priests—bears us out in our assertions, and with terribly overwhelming evidence.”

“ Luther despaired of the salvation of his soul. Shortly before his death, his concubine pointed to the brilliancy of the stars in the firmament.

‘See, Martin, how beautiful that heaven is!?

“’Tt does not shine in our behalf,’ replied the master, moodily.

“’Is it because we have broken our vows?’ resumed Kate, in dismay.

“May be,’ said Luther.

“’If so, let us go back.’

“‘Too late! the hearse is stuck in the mire.” And he would hear no more.

“At Eisleben, on the day previous to that on which he was stricken with apoplexy, he remarked to his friends: ‘I have almost lost sight of the Christ, tossed as I am by these waves of despair which overwhelm me.’ And after a while, ‘I, who have imparted salvation to so many, cannot save myself.’

“He died forlorn of God—blaspheming to the very end. His last words were an attestation of his impenitence. His eldest son, who had doubts about the Reformation and the Reform, asked him for a last time whether he persevered in the doctrine he preached. ‘Yes,’ replied a gurgling sound from the old sinner’s throat—and Luther was before his God. The last descendant of Luther died not long ago a fervent Catholic.”

“Schusselburg, a Protestant, writes: ‘Calvin died of scarlet fever, devoured of vermin, and eaten up by ulcerous abscess, the stench whereof drove away every person.’ In great misery he gave up his rascally ghost, despairing of salvation, evoking the devils from the abyss, and uttering oaths most horrible and blasphemies most frightful.

“Spalatin, Justus, Jonas, Isinder, and a host of other friends of Luther, died either in despair or crazy, Henry VIII. died bewailing that he had lost heaven ; and his worthy daughter Elizabeth breathed her last in deep desolation, stretched on the floor—not daring to lie in bed, because, at the first attack of her illness, she thought she saw her body all torn to pieces and palpitating in a cauldron of fire.

“Let, then, in the presence of such frightful deaths and of the thought of eternity, those of our unfortunate brethren who may be tempted to abandon their Church, remember that a day will come when they will also be summoned to appear before God! Let them think, in their sober senses, of death, and of judgment, and of hell, and I pledge my word they will not think of becoming Protestants.” Plain Talk about the Protestantism of To-Day, p. 236. Boston: Patrick Donahoe, 1870. Imprimatur, Joannes Josephus, Episcopus Boston.

Among the delusions of Romanism, none, perhaps, is more transparently absurd than their much-vaunted immutability. Bossuet, the celebrated Bishop of Meaux, detailed, with seemingly intense delight, the alleged variations of Protestantism, assuming, indeed asserting, that “Catholicity ever has been, is, and ever will be, as unchangeable as its Author.” In face of all the facts, for a Protestant to listen to this claim without a smile, certainly requires no ordinary measure of gravity. And for Papists to yield it cordial belief, imperatively demands either extreme ignorance, obstinate credulity, or gross bigotry. No doubt the Church which once condemned the revolution of the earth upon its axis, must now be, as it ever has been, immutuble. Unchangeable as Deity, and lasting as time, Popery’s great argument is a pathetic appeal to antiquity. By this the doubting faithful are confirmed, and heretics silenced. It is an end of all controversy. This question, “Where was your Protestant Church before the Reformation?” is the rallying cry of the advancing hosts of Papacy, and is expected to be the requiem sung over the lifeless corpse of soulless, godless Protestantism, “that spawn of hell,” destined, as infallibility assures us, speedily to go to his own place. Where was Protestantism three hundred years ago? Where were the Augean stables before they were cleansed by Hercules?—where the decaying palace before its crumbling towers, and ivy bound walls, and tottering foundations were repaired, strengthened, and beautified? The doctrines of Protestantism are as old as the promulgation of the Gospel. Romanism is the intruder. Its characteristic doctrines are mere novelties in the religious world.

By what terms shall we characterize that blindness which, disregarding the foul stains upon her history, denominates the Papal Antichrist “Holy Mother,” the one true, Catholic, Apostolic Church, out of which is no salvation? Pope John XII. was guilty of blasphemy, perjury, profanation, impiety, simony, sacrilege, adultery, incest, and murder. “ He was,” says Bellarmine, “nearly the wickedest of the Popes.”* John XXIII, however, exceeded him.

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* When summoned to attend a Council and answer the charges brought against him, he refused, and excommunicated the Council in the name of God. Though deposed, he regained the Papal throne. Caught in adultery, he was killed, probably by the injured husband. See Edgar’s “Variations of Popery,” p. 110.

His Holiness, Infallible Judge in faith and morals, was, by the Council of Constance, convicted of denying the accountability of man, the immortality of the soul, the resurrection of the body, and all the institutions of revealed religion. But his errors in faith were venial and few compared with his immoralities. He was found guilty of almost every crime of which it is possible to conceive. The list enumerated no less than seventy; among these, simony, piracy, exaction, barbarity, robbery, murder, massacre, lying, perjury, fornication, adultery, incest, and sodomy.

Of Alexander VI, another infallible Pope, a trustworthy historian says: “His debauchery, perfidy, ambition, malice, inhumanity, and irreligion, made him the execration of all Europe.” He died from drinking one of the poisoned cups prepared by him for the rich cardinals whose possessions he intended to seize. Humanity disowns the monster. His successor, Julius II., inherited, along with the tiara, all the immoralities of the Papacy. Having secured the triple crown by bribing the cardinals, no crime was too great to appal his unterrified conscience. Assassination, adultery, sodomy, and bestial drunkenness, are scarcely a moiety (part) of his enormities. “He was a scandal to the whole Church, He filled Italy with rapine, war, and blood.” Pope Leo X. denied the immortality of the soul, and in fact every doctrine of Christianity, denominating it a “lucrative fiction.” “Paul III., and Julius III, were such licentious characters that no modest man can write or read their lives without blushing.” The former, the convener of the Council of Trent, made large sums of money by selling indulgences and licenses to houses of ill fame. At least four pontiffs, Liberius, Zosimus, Honorius, and Vigilius, were convicted of heresy; seventeen of perjury, and twenty-five of schism. According to Genebrard, “For nearly 150 years about fifty Popes deserted wholly the virtue of their predecessors, being apostate rather than apostolic.” Baronius, himself a Papist, as if unable to repress the intensity of his disgust for the abominations of the Papal See, exclaims: “The case is such, that scarcely any one can believe, or even will believe it, unless he sees it with his eyes, and handles it with his hands, viz., what unworthy, vile, unsightly, yea, execrable and hateful things the sacred Apostolic See, on whose hinges the universal Apostolical Church turns, has been compelled to see.

To our shame and grief, be it spoken, how many monsters, horrible to behold, were intruded by them (the secular princes) into that seat which is reverenced by angels!” “The Holy See is bespattered with filth,” “infected by stench,” “defiled by impurities,” and “blackened by perpetual infamy!” Guiciardini, another defender of Holy Mother, speaking of the Popes of the sixteenth century, says: “He was esteemed a good Pope, in those days, who did not exceed in wickedness the worst of men.”

Of the Councils which have given us the dogmas of Romanism, some have been immortalized not less by villainy than by heresy. That of Constantinople is described by Nazianzen as “A cabal of wretches fit for the house of correction.” That of Nice, in approving a disgusting story, sanctioned perjury and fornication. Of the Council of Lyons, Cardinal Hugo, in his farewell address to the retiring president, Pope Innocent, presents this picture: “Friends, we have effected a work of great utility and charity in this city. When we came to Lyons, we found three or four brothels in it, and we have left at our departure only one. But this extends, without interruption, from the eastern to the western gate of the city.” The Council of Constance, composed of 1000 holy fathers, which solemnly decreed that “no faith shall be kept with heretics,” and consigned John Huss to the flames, although he had given himself into their hands only on the express pledge of protection given by the Emperor, was attended by 1500 public prostitutes. This same Council ordered the bones of Wyckliffe to be “dug up and thrown upon a dung-hill.” Well does Baronius exclaim: “What is, then, the face of the holy Roman Church! How exceedingly foul it is!” To believe that an organization, characterized, according to the assertions of its own historians, by such unheard-of abominations, is the only true Church, demands a credulity fitly termed, “delusion sent of God.”

On pain of unending woe, every genuine Romanist must now believe that Pius IX. is infallible. Here is a specimen of his inerrancy. Arguing for his temporal power (since needing stronger support than infallible reasoning), His Holiness, jumbling together two passages of Scripture entirely separate and distinct, said:

“In the garden of Olives, on the night before Christ’s crucifixion, the multitude with Judas came to him. And they said, ‘Art thou a king?’ and he answered, ‘I am.’ And they went back and fell on the ground.” Certainly this is no small tax on the credulity of those who so loudly proclaim the Pope infallible, especially and pre-eminently in interpreting Scripture.. This argument is only exceeded by that of Pope Boniface IV., who employed his infallibility in establishing this proposition : Monks ARE ANGELS.

Major Premise: All animals with six wings are angels.

Minor Premise: Monks have six wings, viz., the cowl, two; the arms, two; the legs, two.

Ergo: Monks are angels. Quod erat demonstrandum.