Note (return) — Chapter II · —EVIDENCE OF PRIMITIVE WRITERS.

In the Roman Catholic Church, on the other hand, feasts are observed to the honour of the Virgin Mary, in which the Anglican Church cannot join; such as the Nativity of the Virgin Mary, and the immaculate conception of her by her mother. On the origin and nature of these feasts it is not my intention to dwell. I can only express my regret, that by appointing a service and a collect commemorative of the Conception of the Virgin104 in her mother's womb, and praying that the observance of that solemnity may procure the votaries an increase of peace, the Church of Rome has given countenance to a superstition, against which at its commencement, so late as the 12th century, St. Bernard strongly remonstrated, in an epistle to the monks of Lyons; a superstition which has been supported and explained by discussions in no way profitable to the head or the heart. [Epist. 174. Paris, 1632, p. 1538.]