circumstance of leaning upon his staff were any argu ment of Jacob's faith, or worthy the being thus particularly taken notice of by the Holy Ghost." The Septuagint translation gives the words as they are given in our Testament; namely, "worshipped upon the top of his staff," leaning being evidently understood, which is the true translation of the passage.

Any person but a Romish priest would see that the example of Jacob's faith, cited in this passage, was, that God would bless his children, and he gave GOD thanks, for allowing that he should be buried in the grave of his fathers, being as well assured that he should be there deposited as he was that he was then about to die.

But these Romanists are such sensualists in religion, that I much doubt if a spiritual man can exist amongst them. They cannot pray to GoD without having a gilded glory before their eyes; they cannot pray to the Saviour without having a senseless block before them; and in every thing by which a Romanist intends to make himself acceptable to GOD, he must. have a something, on which his regards may terminate. They cannot worship their GoD in communicating at His table, without having his body to paw and maul about; and then they think they cannot feed on him in their hearts, but they must gorge his flesh in their mouths; they cannot in confirmation (or orders) imagine the descent of the spirit, without feeling chrisms trickling down their bodies; and if a man be dying, to expire without imploring the sanctifying influence of the spirit is a trifle not worth thinking of, but if death takes place

before the greasy salving is applied, a man's eternal soul is lost for ever.

Their religion is, I repeat it, a disgusting tissue of mock-spiritual grossness and sensuality, and so it is that they cannot pray without having an image to talk to, or a relic, or any senseless inanimate thing; and by such means do they think to please their God, quite forgetting (perhaps indeed many of them have never known), that that "GOD is a spirit, and they that worship him, must worship Him in spirit and in truth." John, iv. 24.

With respect to the figure with which these men insist upon investing Jacob's staff, viz. a sceptre, they must first prove that the patriarch so considered it himself. And even supposing that it were a type of the sceptre of Christ's kingdom, this would not have justified the patriarch in offering the type worship. For so soon as the Israelites came to offer adoration to the brazen serpent which had been lifted up in the wilderness, an undoubted type of Christ, John, iii. 14, the pious king Hezekiah had it broken to pieces, and, by way of contempt, gave it the name of "Nehushtan," a brazen bauble or trifle. 2 Kings, xviii. 4.

But the fact is, that no such figure was intended to be conveyed by Jacob, and it is only another proof that these Jesuits would rather destroy the whole volume of God's word, and the whole hopes and expectations of mankind, than give up an error, however gross, however sinful. For if they could prove the truth of this that they have here asserted, the whole edifice of Scripture would at once be razed to the ground.

Oh! ye most unfortunate men; if they who, wresting the hard sayings of Scripture, turn them to their own destruction, how much greater condemnation must await you, who thus pervert the most simple truths into the means of destruction of others?! 2 Peter, iii. 16.

XXI. I do most firmly assert that the images of Christ, and of the mother of God (ever a virgin), and also of the other saints, are to be had and retained, and that due veneration is to be given unto them.

Before we enter upon the large subject of this article, let us first settle the little matter that appears in parentheses, which insists upon the eternal virginity of the mother of Jesus Christ.

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Considering that we are examining into the edicts of an "unchangeable," "perfect," and "infallible" church, it is curious to observe the insignificant trifles upon which they have, with such avidity, seized, at various times, to create, as it were, schisms in this united and unanimous body and on points really so unimportant as could not, in any way whatever, affect the salvation of a single soul, as long as they remained unimagined; but the instant they were mooted, the party that upheld the wrong suffered loss; whilst those that triumphed in the contest were none the gainers by their victory: at the same time that their endless disputes and janglings brought daily fresh disrepute upon the general body of professing Christians, and showed Mahomedans and other infidels that, notwithstanding their

boasted perfection, infallibility, and assumption of enjoying the continued presence of the Almighty, Mat. xxviii. 20, to direct their judgment, as one party must have been always in the wrong, in the confession of those who most upheld infallibility, they were not much astray when they pronounced them all to be a pack of Christian fools" together.

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Of this ridiculous character was the dispute between St. Francis and St. Dominic, and their parties respectively, touching the immaculate conception of the Virgin Mary; but, as this was only a consequence of a long continued contention between the orders, our readers will not object to hear a little of the public history and disputes which preceded the matter, that more particularly relates to our argument. Of these two wretched beings, each almost affirmed that he was the Blessed Lord in disguise; nay, so far did they carry this accursed blasphemy, that each declared he had the prints of the nails of crucifixion visible in his body. Which of these two spiritual heroes was the more vile, it is hard to say. And let it never be forgotten, that these two worthies are amongst the Saints to whom the Romanists are desired to pray every night, to secure for them their prayers and intercessions, to the Throne of Grace. (See Appendix, No. IV.) Southey says, in his Book of the Church, vol. i. 326.—

"The wildest romance contains nothing more extravagant than the legends of St. Dominic: and even these were outdone by the more atrocious effrontery of the Franciscans. They held up their founder, even during his life, as the perfect pattern of our Lord and

Saviour: and, to authenticate the parallel, they exhibited him with a wound in his side, and four nails in his hands and feet, fixed there, they affirmed, by Christ himself, who had visibly appeared, for the purpose of rendering the conformity between them complete. The plan succeeded to the fullest extent of expectation. And will it be believed, that the infallible church suffered, nay approved, this horrible imposture? Sanctioned, however, it was: a day for its perpetual commemoration was appointed in the Romish calendar, and a large volume was composed, entitled, "The Book of the Conformities between the Lives of the blessed and seraphic Father Francis and our Lord!"

In page 1149 of this folio of authorized blasphemies, it is said, “that Christ did nothing which St. Francis did not do; yea, that he did more than Christ himself.” (The 25th verse of the last chapter of St. John's Gospel renders this assertion extremely probable and highly apostolic !)

"Jealous of these conformities, the Dominicans followed their rivals in the path of blasphemy. They declared that the five wounds had been impressed also upon St. Dominic: but that, in his consummate humility, he had prayed and obtained, that this signal mark of divine grace might never be made public while he lived. They affirmed that the Virgin Mary had adopted him for her son, and that his countenance perfectly resembled the authentic description and miraculous portrait of our Saviour."

But, after all this stout swearing, they were beat out of the field of invention, for the Franciscans discovered