3. That the ordinance of superiors cannot make the ceremonies necessary, I have proved in the first part of this dispute. This is given for one of the chief marks of the man of sin,[414] “That which is indifferent, he by his laws and prohibitions maketh to be sin;” and shall they who profess to take part with Christ against antichrist, do no less than this? It will be replied, that the ceremonies are not thought necessary in themselves, nor non-conformity unlawful in itself, but only in respect of the church's ordinance. Just so the Papists profess,[415] that the omission of their rites and observances is not a sin in itself, but only in respect of contemning the church's customs and commandments. How comes it, then, that they are not ashamed to pretend such a necessity for the stumbling-blocks of those offending ceremonies among us, as Papists pretend for the like among them?
Sect. 14. But the English Formalists have here somewhat to say, which we will hear. Mr Hooker tells us,[416] that ceremonies are scandalous, either in their very nature, or else through the agreement of men to use them unto evil; and that ceremonies of this kind are either devised at first unto evil, or else having had a profitable use, they are afterwards interpreted and wrested to the contrary. As for the English ceremonies, he saith, that they are neither scandalous in their own nature, nor because they were devised unto evil, nor yet because they of the church of England abuse them unto evil.
Ans. 1. Though all this were true, yet forasmuch as they have been abused by the Papists unto idolatry and superstition, and are monuments of Popery, the trophies of Antichrist, and the relics of Rome's whorish bravery,—they must be granted, at least for this respect, to be more than manifest appearances of evil, and so scandalous.
But secondly, It is false which he saith; for kneeling in receiving the communion is, in its own nature, evil and idolatrous, because [pg 1-108] religious adoration before a mere creature, which purposely we set before us in the act of adoring, to have state in the worship, especially if it be an actual image in that act representing Christ to us (such as the bread in the act of receiving) draweth us within the compass of co-adoration or relative worship, as shall be copiously proved afterwards.
Other of the ceremonies that are not evil in their own nature, yet were devised to evil; for example, the surplice. The replier[417] to Dr Mortoune's particular defence, observeth, that this superstition about apparel in divine worship, began first among the French bishops, unto whom Cælestinus writeth thus:—Discernendi, &c. “We are to be distinguished from the common people and others by doctrine, not by garment,—by conversation, not by habit,—by the purity of mind, not by attire; for if we study to innovation, we tread under foot the order which hath been delivered unto us by our fathers, to make place to idle superstitions; wherefore we ought not to lead the minds of the faithful into such things, for they are rather to be instructed than played withal; neither are we to blind and beguile their eyes, but to infuse instructions into their minds.” In which words Cælestinus reprehends this apparel, as a novelty which tended to superstition, and made way to the mocking and deceiving of the faithful.
Lastly, Whereas he saith the ceremonies are not abused by them in England, I instance the contrary in holidays. Perkins saith,[418] that the feast of Christ's nativity, so commonly called, is not spent in praising the name of God, but in rifling, dicing, carding, masking, mumming, and in all licentious liberty, for the most part, as though it were some heathen feast of Ceres or Bacchus. And elsewhere[419] he complaineth of the great abuses of holidays among them.
Sect. 15. As touching the rule which is alleged against the ceremonies out of Paul's doctrine, namely, that in those things from which we may lawfully abstain, we should frame the usage of our liberty with regard to the weakness of our brethren. Hooker answereth to it, 1. That the weak brethren among them were not as the Jews, who were known to be generally weak, whereas, saith he, the imbecility of ours is not common to [pg 1-109] so many, but only here and there some such an one is found. 2. He tells us that these scandalous meats, from which the Gentiles were exhorted to abstain for fear of offending the Jews, cannot represent the ceremonies, for their using of meats was a matter of private action in common life, where every man was free to order that which himself did, but the ceremonies are public constitutions for ordering the church, and we are not to look that the church is to change her public laws and ordinances, made according to that which is judged ordinarily and commonly fittest for the whole, although it chance that, for some particular men, the same be found inconvenient, especially when there may be other remedies also against the sores of particular inconveniences. Let them be better instructed.
Ans. 1. This is bad divinity that would make us not regard the scandalising of a few particular men. Christ's woe striketh not only upon them who offend many, but even upon them who offend so much as one of his little ones, Matt. xviii 6.
2. That which he saith of the few in England, and not many, who are scandalised by the ceremonies, hath been answered by a countryman of his own.[420] And as for us, we find most certainly that not a few, but many, even the greatest part of Scotland, one way or other, are scandalised by the ceremonies. Some are led by them to drink in superstition, and to fall into sundry gross abuses in religion, others are made to use them doubtingly, and so damnably. And how many who refuse them are animated to use them against their consciences, and so to be damned? Who is not made to stumble? And what way do they not impede the edificatlon of the church?
3. What if there had been a public constitution, commanding the Gentiles to eat all meats freely, and that this hath been judged ordinarily and commonly fittest for the whole, even to signify the liberty of the church of the New Testament? Should not the Gentiles, notwithstanding of this constitution, have abstained because of the scandal of the Jews? How comes it then, that that which the Apostle writeth against the scandal of meats, and the reasons which he giveth, are found to hold over good, whether there be a constitution or not?