CHAPTER III.

THAT THE CEREMONIES THUS IMPOSED AND URGED AS THINGS NECESSARY, DO BEREAVE US OF OUR CHRISTIAN LIBERTY, FIRST, BECAUSE OUR PRACTICE IS ADSTRICTED.

Sect. 1. Who can blame us for standing to the defence of our Christian liberty, which we ought to defend and pretend in rebus quibusvis? saith Bucer.(64) Shall we bear the name of Christians, and yet make no great account of the liberty which hath been bought to us by the dearest drops of the precious blood of the Son of God? Sumus empti, saith Parcus:(65) non igitur nostri juris ut nos mancipemus hominum servitio: id enim manifesta cum injuria redemptoris Christi fieret: sumus liberti Christi. Magistratui autem, saith Tilen,(66) et ecclesioe proepositis, non nisi usque ad aras obtemperandum, neque ullum certamen aut periculum pro libertatis per Christum nobis partæ defensione defugiendum, siquidem mortem ipsius irritam fieri, Paulus asserit, si spiritualis servitutis jugo, nos implicari patiamur. Gal. v. 1, “Let us stand fast, therefore, in the liberty wherewith Christ hath made us free, and not be entangled again with the yoke of bondage.” But that the urging of the ceremonies as necessary doth take away our Christian liberty, I will make it evident in four points.

Sect. 2. First, They are imposed with a necessity of practice. Spotswood tells us,(67) that public constitutions must be obeyed, and that private men may not disobey them, and thus is our practice adstricted in the use of things which are not at all necessary, and acknowledged gratis by the urgers to be indifferent, adstricted (I say) to one part without liberty to the other, and that by the mere authority of a human constitution, whereas Christian liberty gives us freedom both for the omission and for the observation of a thing indifferent, except some other reason do adstrict and restrain it than a bare human constitution. Chrysostome, speaking of such as are subject to bishops,(68) saith, In potestate positum est obedire vel non. Liberty in things indifferent,(69) saith Amandus Polanus, est per quam Christiani sunt liberi in usu vel abstinentia rerum adiaphorarom. Calvin, speaking of our liberty in things indifferent,(70) saith, We may eas nunc usurpare nunc omittere indifferenter, and places this liberty,(71) tam in abstinendo quam in utendo. It is marked of the rites of the ancient church,(72) that liberae fuerunt horum rituum observationes in ecclesia. And what meaneth the Apostle while he saith, “If ye be dead with Christ from the rudiments of the world, why, as though living in the world, are ye subject to ordinances, (touch not, taste not, handle not, which all are to perish with the using,) after the commandments and doctrines of men?” Col. ii. 20-22. Surely he condemneth not only humana decreta de ritibus, but also subjection and obedience to such ordinances of men as take from us liberty of practice in the use of things indifferent,(73) obedience (I say) for conscience of their ordinances merely. What meaneth also that place, 1 Cor. vii. 23, “Be not ye the servants of men?” “It forbids us, (saith Paybody) to be the servants of men, that is, in wicked or superstitious actions, according to their perverse commandments or desires.”(74) If he mean of actions that are wicked or superstitious in themselves, then it followeth, that to be subject unto those ordinances, “Touch not, taste not, handle not,” is not to be the servants of men, because these actions are not wicked and superstitious in themselves. Not touching, not tasting, not handling, are in themselves indifferent. But if he mean of actions which are wicked and superstitious, in respect of circumstances, then is his restrictive gloss senseless; for we can never be the servants of men, but in such wicked and superstitious actions, if there were no more but giving obedience to such ordinances as are imposed with a necessity upon us, and that merely for conscience of the ordinance, it is enough to infect the actions with superstition, Sunt hominum servi, saith Bullinqer,(75) qui aliquid in gratiam hominum faciunt. This is nearer the truth; for to tie ourselves to the doing of anything for the will or pleasure of men, when our conscience can find no other reason for the doing of it, were indeed to make ourselves the servants of men. Far be it then from us to submit our necks to such a heavy yoke of human precepts, as would overload and undo us. Nay, we will stedfastly resist such unchristian tyranny as goeth about to spoil us of Christian liberty, taking that for certain which we find in Cyprian,(76) periculosum est in divinis rebus ut quis cedat jure suo.

Sect. 3. Two things are here replied, 1. That there is reason for adstricting of our practice in these things, because we are commanded to obey them that have the rule over us, and to submit ourselves, Heb. xiii. 17,(77) and to submit ourselves to every ordinance of man for the Lord’s sake, 1 Pet. ii. 16, and that except public constitutions must needs be obeyed, there can be no order,(78) but all shall be filled with strife and contention. Ans. 1. As touching obedience to those that are set over us, if they mean not to tyrannise over the Lord’s inheritance, 1 Pet. v. 3; and to make the commandments of God of no effect by their traditions, Mark vii. 9, they must give us leave to try their precepts by the sure will of God’s word; and when we find that they require of us anything in the worship of God which is either against or beside his written word, then modestly to refuse obedience, which is the only way for order, and shunning of strife and contention. It will be said again, that except we prove the things commanded by those who are set over us to be unlawful in themselves, we cannot be allowed to refuse obedience to their ordinances. Ans. This unlawfulness of the ceremonies in themselves hath been proved by us already, and shall yet again be proved in this dispute. But put the case, they were lawful in themselves, yet have we good reason for refusing them: “David thought the feeding of his body was cause sufficient to break the law of the shew-bread; Christ thought the satisfying of the disciples’ hunger to be cause sufficient to break the ceremony of the Sabbath. He thought, also, that the healing of the lepers’ bodies was a just excuse to break the law that forbade the touching of them; much more, then, may we think now in our estimation, that the feeding of other men’s souls, the satisfying of our own consciences, together with the consciences of other men, and the healing of men’s superstition and spiritual leprosy, are causes sufficient to break the law of the ceremonies and of the cross, which are not God’s but men’s,” saith Parker.(79) 2. As touching submission or subjection, we say with Dr Field,(80) that subjection is generally and absolutely required where obedience is not, and even when our consciences suffer us not to obey, yet still we submit and subject ourselves, and neither do nor shall (I trust) show any the least contempt of authority.

Sect. 4. Secondly, It is replied, that our Christian liberty is not taken away when practice is restrained, because conscience is still left free. “The Christian liberty (saith Paybody(81)), is not taken away by the necessity of doing a thing indifferent, or not doing, but only by that necessity which takes away the opinion or persuasion of its indifferency,” So saith Dr Burges,(82) “That the ceremonies in question are ordained to be used necessarily, though the judgment concerning them, and immediate conscience to God, be left free.” Ans. 1. Who doubts of this, that liberty of practice may be restrained in the use of things which are in themselves indifferent? But, yet, if the bare authority of an ecclesiastical law, without any other reason than the will and pleasure of men, be made to restrain practice, then is Christian liberty taken away. Junius saith,(83) that externum opus ligatur from the use of things indifferent, when the conscience is not bound; but in that same place he showeth, that the outward action is bound and restrained only quo usque circumstantiae ob quas necessitas imperata est, se extendunt. So that it is not the authority of an ecclesiastical law, but the occasion and ground of it, which adstricts the practice when the conscience is left free. 2. When the authority of the church’s constitution is obtruded to bind and restrain the practice of Christians in the use of things indifferent, they are bereaved of their liberty, as well as if an opinion of necessity were borne in upon their consciences. Therefore we see when the Apostle, 1 Cor. vii., gives liberty of marriage, he doth not only leave the conscience free in its judgment of the lawfulness of marriage, but also give liberty of practice to marry or not to marry. And Col. ii. 21, when he giveth instances of such human ordinances as take away Christian liberty, he saith not, you must think that you may not touch, &c., but “touch not,” &c., telling us, that when the practice is restrained from touching, tasting, handling, by the ordinances of men, then is Christian liberty spoiled, though the conscience be left free. Camero, speaking of the servitude which is opposed to Christian liberty, saith,(84) that it is either animi servitus, or corporis servitus. Then if the outward man be brought in bondage, this makes up spiritual thraldom, though there be no more. But, 3. The ceremonies are imposed with an opinion of necessity upon the conscience itself, for proof whereof I proceed to the next point.