morously rail against the critical knowledge of languages, through ignorance of which they have so long been most shamefully deceived in a thing so easy and obvious to every one. But why do they so strenuously insist on the word sacrament in this one passage, and pass it over in so many others without the least notice? For that translator has used it twice in the First Epistle to Timothy, (y) and in another place in this Epistle to the Ephesians, (2) and in every other case where the word mystery occurs. Let this oversight, however, be forgiven them: liars ought, at least, to have good memories. For, after having dignified matrimony with the title of a sacrament, what brainless versatility is it for them to stigmatise it with the characters of impurity, pollution, and carnal defilement! What an absurdity is it to exclude priests from a sacrament! If they deny that they are interdicted from the sacrament, but only from the conjugal intercourse, I shall not be satisfied with this evasion. For they inculcate that the conjugal intercourse itself is part of the sacrament, and that it represents the union which we have with Christ in conformity of nature; because it is by that intercourse that a husband and wife become one flesh. Here some of them have found two sacraments: one, of God and the soul, in the man and woman when betrothed; the other, of Christ and the Church, in the husband and wife. The conjugal intercourse, upon their principles, however, is a sacrament, from which no Christian ought to be prohibited; unless the sacraments of Christians are so incompatible, that they cannot consist together. There is also another absurdity in their doctrine. They affirm that the grace of the Holy Spirit is conferred in every sacrament; they acknowledge that the conjugal intercourse is a sacrament: yet they deny that the Holy Spirit is ever present in that intercourse.

XXXVII. And, not to deceive the Church in one thing only, what a long series of errors, falsehoods, frauds, and iniquities have they joined to that false principle! It may truly be affirmed that, when they made matrimony into a sacrament, they only sought a den of all abominations. For, when they had once established this notion, they assumed to themselves

(y) 1 Tim. iii. 9, 16.

(2) Ephes. iii. 9.

the cognizance of matrimonial causes; for matrimony was a spiritual thing, and not to be meddled with before lay judges. Then they made laws for the confirmation of their tyranny; and some of them manifestly impious towards God, and others most unjust towards men. Such as; that marriages contracted between young persons subject to the authority of parents, without the consent of their parents, remain valid and permanent: that no marriages be lawful between persons related, even to the seventh degree; and that, if any such be contracted, they be dissolved; (and the degrees themselves they state in opposition to the laws of all nations and to the institution of Moses, so that what they call the fourth degree is, in reality, the seventh): that it be unlawful for a man, who has repudiated his wife for adultery, to marry another: that spiritual relatives be not united in marriage: that no marriages be celebrated from Septuagesima, or the third Sunday before Lent, to the octaves of Easter, or eight days after that festival; for three weeks before the nativity of John the Baptist, or Mid-summer-day, instead of which three weeks they now substitute the Whitsun week and the two weeks which precede it; or from Advent to the Epiphany; and innumerable other regulations, which it would be tedious to enumerate. We must now quit their corruptions, in which we have been detained longer than I could wish: but I think I have gained some advantage by stripping these asses, in some measure, of the lion's skin, and so far unmasking their principles, and exposing them to the world in their true colours.

CHAPTER XX.

On Civil Government.

HAVING already stated that man is the subject of two kinds of government, and having sufficiently discussed that which is situated in the soul, or the inner man, and relates to eternal life; we are, in this chapter, to say something of the other kind, which relates to civil justice, and the regulation of the external conduct. For, though the nature of this argument

seems to have no connection with the spiritual doctrine of faith which I have undertaken to discuss, the sequel will shew that I have sufficient reason for connecting them together, and, indeed, that necessity obliges me to it: especially since, on the one hand, infatuated and barbarous men madly endeavour to subvert this ordinance established by God; and, on the other hand, the flatterers of princes, extolling their power beyond all just bounds, hesitate not to oppose it to the authority of God himself. Unless both those errors be resisted, the purity of the faith will be destroyed. Besides, it is of no small importance for us to know what benevolent provision God hath made for mankind in this instance, that we may be stimulated by a greater degree of pious zeal to testify our gratitude. In the first place, before we enter on the subject itself, it is necessary for us to recur to the distinction which we have already established, lest we fall into an error very common in the world, and injudiciously confound together these two things, the nature of which is altogether different. For some men, when they hear that the gospel promises a liberty which acknowledges no king or master among men, but submits to Christ alone, think they can enjoy no advantage of their liberty, while they see any power exalted above them. They imagine, therefore, that nothing will prosper, unless the whole world be modelled in a new form, without any tribunals, or laws, or magistrates, or any thing of a similar kind, which they consider injurious to their liberty. But he, who knows how to distinguish between the body and the soul, between this present transitory life and the future eternal one, will find no difficulty in understanding, that the spiritual kingdom of Christ and civil government are things very different and remote from each other. Since it is a jewish folly, therefore, to seck and include the kingdom of Christ under the elements of this world; let us, on the contrary, considering what the scripture clearly inculcates, that the benefit which is received from the grace of Christ is spiritual; let us, I say, remember to confine within its proper limits all this liberty which is promised and offered to us in him. For why is it that the same apostle who, in one place exhorts to "stand fast in the liberty wherewith Christ hath made us free, and be not entangled

aga n with the yoke of bondage," (a) in another, enjoins servants to "care not for" their servile condition; (b) except, that spiritual liberty may very well consist with civil servitude? In this sense we are likewise to understand him in these passages. "There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither bond nor free, there is neither male nor female:" (c) Again: "There is neither Greek nor Jew, circumcision nor uncircumcision, Barbarian, Scythian, bond nor free: but Christ is all, and in all:" (d) in which he signifies, that it is of on importance, what is our condition among men, or under the laws of what nation we live, as the kingdom of Christ consists not in these things.

II. Yet this distinction does not lead us to consider the whole system of civil government as a polluted thing, which has nothing to do with Christian men. Some fanatics, who are pleased with nothing but liberty, or rather licentiousness without any restraint, do indeed boast and vociferate, That since we are dead with Christ to the elements of this world, and being translated into the kingdom of God, sit among the celestials, they think it a degradation to us, and far beneath our dignity, to be occupied with those secular and impure cares which relate to things altogether uninteresting to a Christian man. Of what use, they ask, are laws without judgments and tribunals? But what have judgments to do with a Christian man? And if it be unlawful to kill, of what use are laws and judgments to us? But as we have just suggested that this kind of government is distinct from that spiritual and internal reign of Christ, so it ought to be known that they are in no respect at variance with each other. For that spiritual reign even, now upon earth, commences within us some preludes of the heavenly kingdom, and in this mortal and transitory life affords us some prelibations of immortal and incorruptible blessedness: but this civil government is designed, as long as we live in this world, to cherish and support the external worship of God, to preserve the pure doctrine of religion, to defend the constitution of the Church, to regulate our lives in a manner requisite for the society of men, to form our manners to civil justice, to promote our concord with each other, and to establish general peace and

tranquillity: all which I confess to be superfluous, if the kingdom of God, as it now exists in us, extinguish the present life. But if it be the will of God, that while we are aspiring towards our true country, we be pilgrims on the earth, and if such aids be necessary to our pilgrimage; they who take them from man deprive him of his human nature. They plead that there is so much perfection in the Church of God, that its order is sufficient to supply the place of all laws; but they foolishly imagine a perfection, which can never be found in any community of men. For since the insolence of the wicked is so great, and their iniquity so obstinate that it can scarcely be restrained by all the severity of the laws, what may we expect they would do, if they found themselves at liberty to perpetrate crimes with impunity, whose outrages even the arm of power cannot altogether prevent?

III. But for speaking of the exercise of civil polity, there will be another place more suitable. At present we only wish it to be understood, that to entertain a thought of its extermination, is inhuman barbarism; it is equally as necessary to mankind as bread and water, light and air, and far more excellent. For it not only tends to secure the accommodations arising from all these things, that men may breathe, eat, drink, and be sustained in life, though it comprehends all these things while it causes them to live together, yet I say this is not its only tendency; its objects also are, that idolatry, sacrileges against the name of God, blasphemies against his truth, and other offences against religion, may not openly appear and be disseminated among the people; that the public tranquillity may not be disturbed; that every person may enjoy his property without molestation; that men may transact their business together without fraud or injustice; that integrity and modesty may be cultivated between them: in short, that there may be a public form of religion among Christians, and that humanity may be maintained among men. Nor let any one think it strange that I now refer to human polity the charge of the due maintenance of religion, which I may appear to have placed beyond the jurisdiction of men. For I do not allow men to make laws respecting religion and the worship of God now, any more than I did before; though I approve of civil government, which provides that the true religion which