We have often seen learned Protestants very zealous in pulling to pieces the lives of the saints of the _Romish_ church, and casting all the reproach and ridicule they can, upon their wondrous spirit; tho’ the lives of the saints of the primitive church may be exposed in the same manner. Now, whence does this proceed? Why, from a secret touch of that spirit which could not bear to have the late king of _France_ in heaven; it proceeds from a partial, selfish orthodoxy, which cannot bear to hear, or own, that the spirit and blessing of God are so visible in a church from which it is divided. But if a person be of this spirit, what does it signify where he has his outward church? If a _Romish priest_ in the north of _England_ could not bear the splendor of a life so devoted to God, so fruitful in all good works, as was that of the lady _Elizabeth Hastings_, if he should want to sully the brightness of her Christian graces, and prove her to have been no saint, lest it should appear, that the Spirit of God was not confined to the _Romish_ church, would not such a zeal shew a worse spirit, than that of superstition, a greater depravity of heart, than the saying now and then an _Ave Mary_? * The more we know of the corruptions and hindrances of piety in the church of _Rome_, the more we should rejoice, that in every age so many eminent saints, have appeared in it, whom we should thankfully behold as so many great lights hung out by God, to shew the true way to heaven, as so many joyful proofs that Christ is still present, even in that church, and that the gates of hell have not quite prevailed against it. Who that has the least spark of heaven in his soul, can help rejoicing in this manner at the appearance of St. _Bernard_, a _Teresa_, a _Francis_ de _Sales_, in that church? Who can help praising God, that her invented devotions, superstitious use of images, and invocation of saints, have not so suppressed the graces of an evangelical life, but that amongst _cardinals_, _jesuits_, _priests_, _friars_, _monks_ and _nuns_, some have been found, who seemed to live for no other end, but to give glory to God and edification to men, and whose writings have every thing in them, that can guide the soul out of the corruption of this life into union with God? And he who through a partial orthodoxy is diverted from feeding in these green pastures of life, whose abhorrence of jesuitical craft, keeps him from reading the works of an _Alvares du Pas_, a _Rodrigues_, a _Pere Surin_, and such like jesuits, has a greater loss than he can easily imagine: and if any clergyman can read the life of _Bartholomeus_ a _Martyribus_ a _Spanish_ archbishop, who sat with great influence at the very council of _Trent_, without being edified by it, and desiring to read it again and again, I know not why he should like the lives of the apostolical fathers: and if any Protestant bishop should read the _Stimulus Pastorum_ wrote by this