2. Princes cannot claim any greater power in matters ecclesiastical than the apostle Paul had, or the church herself yet hath; that is to say, princes may not by any temporal or regal jurisdiction, urge any ceremony or form of ecclesiastical policy which the Apostle once might not, and the church yet may not, urge by a spiritual jurisdiction. But neither had the Apostle of old, nor hath the church now, power to urge either a ceremony or anything else which is not profitable for edifying. Paul could do nothing against the truth, but for the truth; and his power was given to him to edification, and not to destruction, 2 Cor. xiii. 8, 10; neither shall ecclesiastical persons, to the world's end, receive any other power beside that which is for the perfecting of the saints, and for the edifying of the body of Christ, Eph. iv. 12. Therefore, as the church's power[940] is only to prescribe that which may edify, so the power of princes is in like sort given to them for edification, and not for destruction; neither can they do aught against the truth, but only for the truth.
3. We are bound by the law of God to do nothing which is not good and profitable, or edifying, 1 Cor. vi. 12; xiv. 26. This law of charity is of a higher and straiter bond than the law of any prince in the world:—
“The general rule of all indifferent things, is, Let all things be done to edification; and, Rom. xv. 1, 2, ‘Let every man please his neighbour to edification, even as Christ pleased not himself but others.’ Whatsoever, then, is of this rank, which either would weaken or not edify our brother, be it ever so lawful, ever so profitable to ourselves, ever so powerfully by earthly authority enjoined,—Christians, who are not born unto themselves, but unto Christ, unto his church, and fellow-members, must not dare to meddle with it,” saith one[941] well to our well to our purpose.
Sect. 16. A third proposition I promit, which is this, Since the power of princes to [pg 1-289] make laws about things ecclesiastical is not absolute, but bound and adstricted unto things lawful and expedient, which sort of things, and no other, we are allowed to do for their commandments; and since princes many times may, and do, not only transgress those bounds and limits, but likewise pretend that they are within the same, when indeed they are without them, and enjoin things unlawful and inconvenient, under the name, title, and show of things lawful and convenient; therefore it is most necessary as well for princes to permit, as for subjects to take liberty to try and examine by the judgment of discretion, everything which authority enjoineth, whether it be agreeable or repugnant to the rules of the word; and if, after trial, it be found repugnant, to abstain from the doing of the same.
For, 1. The word teacheth us, that the spiritual man judgeth all things, 1 Cor. ii. 15; trieth the things that are different, Phil. i. 10; hath his senses exercised to discern both good and evil, Heb. v. 14; and that every one who would hold fast that which is good, and abstain from all appearance of evil, must first prove all things, 1 Thess. v. 21.
2. Whatsoever is not of faith is sin, Rom. xiv. 23. But whatsoever a man doth without the trial, knowledge, and persuasion of the lawfulness of it by the word of God, that is not of faith; therefore a sin. It is the word of God, and not the arbitration of princes whereupon faith is grounded. And though the word may be without faith, yet faith cannot be without the word. By it therefore must a man try and know assuredly the lawfulness of that which he doth.
3. “Every one of us shall give account of himself to God.” But as we cannot give an account to God of those actions which we have done in obedience to our prince, except we have examined, considered, and understood the lawfulness of the same; so an account could not be required of us for them, if we were bound to obey and to keep all his ordinances in such sort that we might not try and examine them, with full liberty to refuse those which we judge out of the word to be unlawful or inconvenient; for then princes' ordinances were a most sufficient warrant to us: we needed try no more. Let him make an account to God of his command; we have account to make of our obedience.
4. If we be bound to receive and obey the [pg 1-290] laws of princes, without making a free trial and examining of the equity of the same, then we could not be punished for doing, unwillingly and in ignorance, things unlawful prescribed by them. Whereas every soul that sinneth shall die; and when the blind leads the blind, he who is lead falls in the ditch as well as his leader.
5. No man is permitted to do everything which seemeth right in his eyes, and to follow every conceit which takes him in the head; but every man is bound to walk by rule, Gal. vi. 6. But the law of a prince cannot be a rule, except it be examined whether it be consonant to the word of God, index secundum legem, and his law is only such a rule as is ruled by a higher rule. In so far as it is ruled by the own rule of it, in as far it is a rule to us; and in so far as it is not ruled by the own rule of it, in as far it is not a rule to us. Quid ergo? an non licebit Christiano cuique convenientiam regulae et regulati (ut vocant) observare? saith Junius.[942]
6. The rule whereby we ought to walk in all our ways, and according to which we ought to frame all our actions, is provided of God a stable and sure rule, that it being observed and taken heed unto, may guide and direct our practice aright about all those things which it prescribeth. But the law of a prince (if we should, without trial and examination, take it for our rule) cannot be such a stable and sure rule. For put the case that a prince enjoin two things which sometimes fall out to be incompatible and cannot stand together, in that case his law cannot direct our practice, nor resolve us what to do; whereas God hath so provided for us, that the case can never occur wherein we may not be resolved what to do if we observe the rule which he hath appointed us to walk by.