And that they may help all the better forward, they have raised in the chm-ch a kind of faith which they call an implicit and"^ infolded faith, that people must believe what the church teacheth, though they know not in particular what the church teacheth, and so they lead people hoodwinked whither they please themselves.
To make some use of it briefly.^
Use. Let us labour to bless God that hath freed iis from, this sjuritical tyranny. 0 ! beloved ! it is a great tyranny when conscience is awaked, to be racked and tormented, and stung by scorpions ; to have conscience tor- mented with popish errors ; as in the point of satisfaction, the most of them, if their e^-es be open, they die with terror. 0 ! it is a blessed liberty that we are brought out of antichristian darkness, that we know we believe, and upon what terms we beheve ; and are taught to submit om- conscience only to the blessed trath of God ; that the soul it is the bed, as it were, only for Christ, and his Holy Spirit to dwell in, and to lodge in ; and that no man may force the conscience with any opinion of his own, further than
2 CORINTHIANS CHAP. I, VER. 24. 505
it is demonstrated out of the word of God. What a sweet enlargement of spirit do we Hve in now ! and our unthankfuluess perhaps may occasion God to bring us in some degree of popish darkness again.
I beseech you, let us stand for the liberty of Christ, and the liberty of our consciences against the spiritual tyrant of souls. Let us maintain our liberty by all we can, l\y all laws and execution of laws ; by all that may uphold our spiritual liberty ; for there is no bondage to that of the soul. Do but a little consider the misery of the implicit faith that the popish sort are under, that infolded, inwrapped faith, wherein they are bound to be- lieve, without searching, what the church determines. Hereupon they swallow in all doctrines that tend to superstition, that tend to rebellion, that tend to treason. They swallow up all under this implicit faith, as if God had set an ordinance and ministry in the church against himself; as if he had advanced any ministry against his own ordinance.
"When you thiiik of popery, consider not so much particular dotages, as about images, and transubstantiation, and relics, &c., but consider the very life and soul of popery in this opinion, the leading error of all others, the tyranny over souls of people, and holding them in blindness and darkness. It is not a device of mine. Do but read the Council of Trent in some editions. There the late Pius Quartus that sat there daily, he made more articles than the , apostles, distinct, not proved by Scripture ; he made articles of his own to be believed. People were tied upon the necessity of salvation to believe them, and to believe them with that faith that is due to Scripture (oooo).
And it is a common tenet among them. Every man is bound to be under the authority of the church of Rome, under peril of damnation. There is the gi'and error, that it is a matter necessary to salvation to be under their tyranny.
Hereby they excommunicated all the Eastern churches, and all former times wherein they were not under the Roman tyranny, for that is but of late, six hundred years since. They condemned St Cyprian's time, and other times. And they made articles of religion, and established them with this censure, that upon pain of damnation men must believe these things as well as the articles of the creed, as transubstantiation, invocation of saints, purgatory, and such things. They are so many articles, indeed, as I say, they have more articles than the twelve articles of the apostles.*
We say, an error in the foundation, it is not mended after : and the first concoction, if it be naught, all after are naught ; if there be not good con- coction in the stomach at the first, the blood is naught, and all is naught. So this is a fundamental error, and a ground of all errors, that they hold they cannot err ; and hereupon they come to tyrannise over the consciences and souls of people.
Therefore, I say, let us bless God that hath set our souls in spiritual liberty, that now we see God in the face of Christ, now we see the means of salvation. We see the bread of life broken to us, we see Christ unveiled, we see what to found our consciences upon. We cannot be sufficiently thankful for this. Thankful we may be for the peace of the kingdom that we have so long a time enjoyed, and for the outward prosperity we have so long had ; but, above all, be thankful for the peace of religion, for the peace of conscience, for the liberty of soul, that we enjoy. And, as I said, if anything move God to strip us of all, it will be our unthankfulness, and our
* The reference here and above, is to ' The Creed,' which is commonly called the Apostles'. Cf. Nichols' Pearson, (Svo, 1854). — G.
500 COMMENTARY ON