Sect. 3. The urging of these ceremonies as necessary, if there were no more, is a sufficient reason for our refusing them. “To the precepts of God (saith Balduine) nothing is to be added,[53] Deut. xii. Now God [pg 1-004] hath commanded these things which are necessary. The rites of the church are not necessary, wherefore, if the abrogation or usurpation of any rite be urged as necessary, then is an addition made to the commandment of God, which is forbidden in the word, and, by consequence, it cannot oblige me, neither should anything herein be yielded unto.” Who can purge these ceremonies in controversy among us of gross superstition, since they are urged as things necessary? But of this superstition we shall hear afterward in its proper place.
CHAPTER II.
THE REASON TAKEN OUT OF ACTS XV. TO PROVE THE NECESSITY OF THE CEREMONIES, BECAUSE OF THE CHURCH'S APPOINTMENT, CONFUTED.
The Bishop of Edinburgh, to prove that of necessity our consciences must be ruled by the will of the law, and that it is necessary that we give obedience to the same, albeit our consciences gainsay, allegeth that apostolical canon,[54] Acts xv., for an example, just as Bellarmine maintaineth, Festorum observationem ex se indifferentem esse sed posita lege fieri necessariam[55]. Hospinian, answering him, will acknowledge no necessity of the observation of feasts, except divine law could be showed for it.[56] So say we, that the ceremonies which are acknowledged by formalists to be indifferent in themselves, cannot be made necessary by the law of the church, neither doth that example of the apostolical canon make anything against us, for, according to Mr Sprint's confession,[57] it was not the force or authority of the canon, but the reason and ground whereupon the canon was made, which caused the necessity of abstaining, and to abstain was necessary for eschewing of scandal, whether the apostles and elders had enjoined abstinence or not.[58] The reason, then, why the things prescribed in that canon are called necessary, ver. 28, is not because, being indifferent before the making and publication of the canon, they became necessary by virtue of the canon after it was made, as the Bishop teacheth, but quia tunc [pg 1-005] charitas exigebat, ut illa sua libertate qui ex gentibus conversi erant, propter proximi edificationem inter judeos non uterentur, sed ab ea abstinerent, saith Chemnitius.[59] This law, saith Tilen,[60] was propter charitatem et vitandi offendiculi necessitatem ad tempus sancita. So that these things were necessary before the canon was made. Necessaria fuerunt, saith Ames,[61] antequam Apostoli quidquam de iis statuerant, non absolute, sed quatenus in iis charitas jubebat morem gerere infirmis, ut cajetanus notat. Quamobrem, saith Tilen,[62] cum charitas semper sit colenda, semper vitanda sandala. “Charity is necessary (saith Beza), even in things which are in themselves indifferent.”[63] What they can allege for the necessity of the ceremonies, from the authority and obligatory power of ecclesiastical laws, shall be answered by and by.
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 [pg 1-006] 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 [pg 1-007] 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.