laws, does discover this way that leads to heaven more certainly to
the magistrate than every private man's search and study discovers
it unto himself. I have a weak body, sunk under a languishing disease,
for which (I suppose) there is one only remedy, but that unknown. Does
it therefore belong unto the magistrate to prescribe me a remedy,
because there is but one, and because it is unknown? Because there
is but one way for me to escape death, will it therefore be safe for
me to do whatsoever the magistrate ordains? Those things that every
man ought sincerely to inquire into himself, and by meditation, study,
search, and his own endeavours, attain the knowledge of, cannot be
looked upon as the peculiar possession of any sort of men. Princes,
indeed, are born superior unto other men in power, but in nature
equal. Neither the right nor the art of ruling does necessarily
carry along with it the certain knowledge of other things, and least
of all of true religion. For if it were so, how could it come to
pass that the lords of the earth should differ so vastly as they do in
religious matters? But let us grant that it is probable the way to
eternal life may be better known by a prince than by his subjects,
or at least that in this incertitude of things the safest and most
commodious way for private persons is to follow his dictates. You will
say: "What then?" If he should bid you follow merchandise for your
livelihood, would you decline that course for fear it should not
succeed? I answer: I would turn merchant upon the prince's command,
because, in case I should have ill-success in trade, he is
abundantly able to make up my loss some other way. If it be true, as
he pretends, that he desires I should thrive and grow rich, he can set
me up again when unsuccessful voyages have broken me. But this is
not the case in the things that regard the life to come; if there I
take a wrong course, if in that respect I am once undone, it is not in
the magistrate's power to repair my loss, to ease my suffering, nor to
restore me in any measure, much less entirely, to a good estate.
What security can be given for the Kingdom of Heaven?

  Perhaps some will say that they do not suppose this infallible
judgement, that all men are bound to follow in the affairs of
religion, to be in the civil magistrate, but in the Church. What the
Church has determined, that the civil magistrate orders to be
observed; and he provides by his authority that nobody shall either
act or believe in the business of religion otherwise than the Church
teaches. So that the judgement of those things is in the Church; the
magistrate himself yields obedience thereunto and requires the like
obedience from others. I answer: Who sees not how frequently the
name of the Church, which was venerable in time of the apostles, has
been made use of to throw dust in the people's eyes in the following
ages? But, however, in the present case it helps us not. The one
only narrow way which leads to heaven is not better known to the
magistrate than to private persons, and therefore I cannot safely take
him for my guide, who may probably be as ignorant of the way as
myself, and who certainly is less concerned for my salvation than I
myself am. Amongst so many kings of the Jews, how many of them were
there whom any Israelite, thus blindly following, had not fallen
into idolatry and thereby into destruction? Yet, nevertheless, you bid
me be of good courage and tell me that all is now safe and secure,
because the magistrate does not now enjoin the observance of his own
decrees in matters of religion, but only the decrees of the Church. Of
what Church, I beseech you? of that, certainly, which likes him
best. As if he that compels me by laws and penalties to enter into
this or the other Church, did not interpose his own judgement in the
matter. What difference is there whether he lead me himself, or
deliver me over to be led by others? I depend both ways upon his will,
and it is he that determines both ways of my eternal state. Would an
Israelite that had worshipped Baal upon the command of his king have
been in any better condition because somebody had told him that the
king ordered nothing in religion upon his own head, nor commanded
anything to be done by his subjects in divine worship but what was
approved by the counsel of priests, and declared to be of divine right
by the doctors of their Church? If the religion of any Church
become, therefore, true and saving, because the head of that sect, the
prelates and priests, and those of that tribe, do all of them, with
all their might, extol and praise it, what religion can ever be
accounted erroneous, false, and destructive? I am doubtful
concerning the doctrine of the Socinians, I am suspicious of the way
of worship practised by the Papists, or Lutherans; will it be ever a
jot safer for me to join either unto the one or the other of those
Churches, upon the magistrate's command, because he commands nothing
in religion but by the authority and counsel of the doctors of that
Church?

  But, to speak the truth, we must acknowledge that the Church (if a
convention of clergymen, making canons, must be called by that name)
is for the most part more apt to be influenced by the Court than the
Court by the Church. How the Church was under the vicissitude of
orthodox and Arian emperors is very well known. Or if those things
be too remote, our modern English history affords us fresh examples in
the reigns of Henry VIII, Edward VI, Mary, and Elizabeth, how easily
and smoothly the clergy changed their decrees, their articles of
faith, their form of worship, everything according to the
inclination of those kings and queens. Yet were those kings and queens
of such different minds in point of religion, and enjoined thereupon
such different things, that no man in his wits (I had almost said none
but an atheist) will presume to say that any sincere and upright
worshipper of God could, with a safe conscience, obey their several
decrees. To conclude, it is the same thing whether a king that
prescribes laws to another man's religion pretend to do it by his
own judgement, or by the ecclesiastical authority and advice of
others. The decisions of churchmen, whose differences and disputes are
sufficiently known, cannot be any sounder or safer than his; nor can
all their suffrages joined together add a new strength to the civil
power. Though this also must be taken notice of- that princes seldom
have any regard to the suffrages of ecclesiastics that are not