§. 97.
Then, Sir, give me leave to ask you, Whether it is not another kind of special regard which we have to Sacred and Hea∣venly Objects, from that we bear to profane? as for example, Can you think fit to do all the same things in a Church, which you would have no Scruple to do in your house, or in an unclean place?
No doubt, a difference is to be made.
And would you not judg that person injurious to our Sa∣viour, or to his Blessed Mother, who should deface, spit upon, or defile the Pictures of either of them? And on the other side, whether seeing another reverently kissing, either of them, you would not collect thereby that he bore respect to the glorious Persons repre∣sented?
Let all this be granted.
And would you call such a reverent behavior of the latter person, Idolatry; especially when he (with the Church) professes* 1.1 that he acknowledges no kind of virtue or Divinity in them for which they should be honoured, or that any thing is to be beg'd of them, or any trust to be put in them: which acknowledgment the Church her self requires from him?
I confess, I see there no Marks of Idolatry: but on the con∣trary, an express renouncing of it.