Neither wish we that men should do any thing which in their hearts they are persuaded they ought not to do, but this persuasion ought (we say) to be fully settled in their hearts; that in litigious and controversed causes of such quality, the will of God is to have them do whatsoever the sentence of judicial and final decision shall determine, yea, though it seem in their private opinion to swerve utterly from that which is right: as no doubt many times the sentence amongst the Jews did seem unto one part or other contending, and yet in this case, God did then allow them to do that which in their private judgment it seemed, yea and perhaps truly seemed, that the law did disallow. For if God be not the author of confusion but of peace, then can he not be the author of our refusal, but of our contentment, to stand unto some definitive sentence; without which almost impossible it is that either we should avoid confusion, or ever hope to attain peace. To small purpose had the Council of Jerusalem been assembled, if once their determination being set down, men might afterwards have defended their former opinions. When therefore they had given their definitive sentence, all controversy was at an end. Things were disputed before they came to be determined; men afterwards were not to dispute any longer, but to obey. The sentence of judgment finished their strife, which their disputes before judgment could not do. This was ground sufficient for any reasonable man’s conscience to build the duty of obedience upon, whatsoever his own opinion were as touching the matter before in question. So full of wilfulness and self-liking is our nature, that without some definitive sentence, which being given may stand, and a necessity of silence on both sides afterward imposed, small hope there is that strifes thus far prosecuted will in short time quietly end.

Now it were in vain to ask you, whether ye could be content that the sentence of any court already erected should be so far authorized, as that among the Jews established by God himself, for the determining of all controversies: “That man which will do presumptuously, not hearkening unto the Priest that standeth before the Lord to minister there, nor unto the Judge, let him die.” Ye have given us already to understand, what your opinion is in part concerning her sacred Majesty’s Court of High Commission; the nature whereof is the same with that amongst the Jews⁶, albeit the power be not so great. The other way haply may like you better, because Master Beza, in his last book save one⁷ written about these matters, professeth himself to be now weary of such combats and encounters, whether by word or writing, inasmuch as he findeth that “controversies thereby are made but brawls;” and therefore wisheth “that in some common lawful assembly of churches all these strifes may at once be decided.”

[5.] Shall there be then in the meanwhile no “doings?” Yes. There are the weightier matters of the law, “judgment, and mercy, and fidelity⁸.” These things we ought to do; and these things, while we contend about less, we leave undone. Happier are they whom the Lord when he cometh shall find “doing” in these things, than disputing about “Doctors, Elders, and Deacons.” Or if there be no remedy but somewhat needs ye must do which may tend to the setting forward of your discipline; do that which wise men, who think some statute of the realm more fit to be repealed than to stand in force, are accustomed to do before they come to parliament where the place of enacting is; that is to say, spend the time in re-examining more duly your cause, and in more throughly considering of that which ye labour to overthrow. As for the orders which are established, sith equity and reason, the law of nature, God and man, do all favour that which is in being, till orderly judgment of decision be given against it; it is but justice to exact of you, and perverseness in you it should be to deny, thereunto your willing obedience.

Not that I judge it a thing allowable for men to observe those laws which in their hearts they are steadfastly persuaded to be against the law of God: but your persuasion in this case ye are all bound for the time to suspend; and in otherwise doing, ye offend against God by troubling his Church without any just or necessary cause. Be it that there are some reasons inducing you to think hardly of our laws. Are those reasons demonstrative, are they necessary, or but mere probabilities only? An argument necessary and demonstrative is such, as being proposed unto any man and understood, the mind cannot choose but inwardly assent. Any one such reason dischargeth, I grant, the conscience, and setteth it at full liberty. For the public approbation given by the body of this whole church unto those things which are established, doth make it but probable that they are good. And therefore unto a necessary proof that they are not good it must give place. But if the skilfullest amongst you can shew that all the books ye have hitherto written be able to afford any one argument of this nature, let the instance be given. As for probabilities, what thing was there ever set down so agreeable with sound reason, but some probable shew against it might be made? Is it meet that when publicly things are received, and have taken place, general obedience thereunto should cease to be exacted, in case this or that private person, led with some probable conceit, should make open protestation, “I Peter or John disallow them, and pronounce them nought?” In which case your answer will be, that concerning the laws of our church, they are not only condemned in the opinion of “a private man, but of thousands,” yea and even “of those amongst which divers are in public charge and authority⁹.” As though when public consent of the whole hath established any thing, every man’s judgment being thereunto compared were not private, howsoever his calling be to some kind of public charge. So that of peace and quietness there is not any way possible, unless the probable voice of every entire¹⁰ society or body politic overrule all private of like nature in the same body. Which thing effectually proveth, that God, being author of peace and not of confusion in the church, must needs be author of those men’s peaceable resolutions, who concerning these things have determined with themselves to think and do as the church they are of decreeth, till they see necessary cause enforcing them to the contrary.

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Footnotes

1. [Hebr. vi. 16. “An oath for confirmation is to them an end of all strife.”] ↩

2. Rom. iii. 17. ↩

3. Deut. xvii. 8. ↩

4. Acts xv. ↩

5. [Gal. i. 8.] ↩

6. [See George Cranmer’s notes on B. vi.] ↩

7. Præf. Tract. de Presbyt. et Excom. [“Ab illis peto, … . ut me jampridem istarum concertationum pertæsum, quibus in rixas evadere potius quam mitigari, nedum extingui controversias apparet, non inviti patiantur vel partes istas minus occupatis aliis fratribus relinquere, si fuerit opus, obeundas; vel tacitum expectare, donec aut Ecclesiæ suæ sic domi et foris vexatæ precibus hoc tribuat Dominus, ut lites omnes istæ communi aliquo legitimo ecclesiarum conventu decidantur; vel mihi denique septuagesimum primum jam annum in terris peregrinanti portus ille beatæ et perennis quietis, ad quem totus anhelo, per clementissimi Servatoris mei misericordiam patefiat.”] [Præf. sign. A. 7. Beza’s pamphlet against Erastus, dated, “Genevæ à Duce Sabaudo, contra jus et fas omne circumvallatæ Kal. Mart. anno temporis ultimi 1590.”] 1886. ↩

8. Matt. xxiii. 23. ↩

9. T. C. lib. iii. p. 181. ↩

10. [“intier;” and so vii. 7. ed. 1594.] ↩