_Sect._ 2. As for the proposition I shall first explain it and then prove it. I say, “all things and rites,” for they are alike forbidden, as I shall show. I say, “which have been notoriously abused to idolatry,” because if the abuse be not known, we are blameless for retaining the things and rites which have been abused. I say, “if they be not such as either God or nature hath made to be of a necessary use,” because if they be of a necessary use, either through God’s institution, as the sacraments, or through nature’s law, as the opening of our mouths to speak (for when I am to preach or pray publicly, nature makes it necessary that I open my mouth to speak audibly and articularly), then the abuse cannot take away the use. I say, “they may not be used by us as sacred things, rites pertaining to divine worship,” because without the compass of worship they may be used to a natural or civil purpose. If I could get no other meat to eat than the consecrated host, which Papists idolatrise in the circumgestation of it, I might lawfully eat it; and if I could get no other clothes to put on than the holy garments wherein a priest hath said mass, I might lawfully wear them. Things abused to idolatry are only then unlawful when they are used no otherwise than religiously, and as things sacred. _Sect._ 3. The proposition thus explained is confirmed by these five proofs: 1. God’s own precept,—“Ye shall defile also the covering of thy graven images of silver, and the ornaments of thy molten images of gold: thou shalt cast them away as a menstruous cloth, thou shalt say unto it, Get thee hence,” Isa. xxx. 22. The covering of the idol here spoken of, Gaspar Sanctus(509) rightly understandeth to be that, _quo aut induebantur simulacra Gentilico ritu, aut bracteas quibus ligneae imagines integantur, aut quo homines idolis sacrificaturi amiciebantur_; so that the least appurtenances of idols are to be avoided. When the apostle Jude(510) would have us to hate garments spotted with the flesh, his meaning is, _detestandam essevel superficiem ipsam mali sive peccati, quam tunicae appellatione subinnuere videtur_, as our own. Rolloke hath observed,(511) If the very covering of an idol be forbidden, what shall be thought of other things which are not only spotted, but irrecoverably polluted with idols? Many such precepts were given to Israel, as “Ye shall destroy their altars, break their images, and cut down their groves,” Exod. xxxiv. 13. “The graven images of their gods shall ye burn with fire: thou shalt not desire the silver nor gold that is on them, nor take it unto thee, lest thou be snared therein; for it is an abomination to the Lord thy God,” Deut. vii. 25, 26. Read to the same purpose, Num. xxxiii. 52; Deut. vii. 5; xii. 2, 3.