themselves, either our opposites must repudiate what hath unadvisedly fallen from their pens hereanent, or else forsake their beaten ground of indifferency, and say plainly, that the ceremonies are urged by them, to be observed with an opinion of necessity, as worship of God, and as things in themselves necessary. Look to yourselves, O Formalists, for you stand here upon such slippery places, that you cannot hold both your feet. CHAPTER III. THAT THE CEREMONIES ARE UNLAWFUL, BECAUSE THEY SORT US WITH IDOLATERS, BEING THE BADGES OF PRESENT IDOLATRY AMONG THE PAPISTS. _Sect._ 1. It followeth according to the order which I have proposed, to show next, that the ceremonies are idolatrous, _participativè_. By communicating with idolaters in their rites and ceremonies, we ourselves become guilty of idolatry; even as Ahaz, 2 Kings xvi. 10, was an idolater, _eo ipso_, that he took the pattern of an altar from idolators. Forasmuch, then, as kneeling before the consecrated bread, the sign of the cross, surplice, festival days, bishopping, bowing down to the altar, administration of the sacraments in private places, &c., are the wares of Rome, the baggage of Babylon, the trinkets of the whore, the badges of Popery, the ensigns of Christ’s enemies, and the very trophies of antichrist,—we cannot conform, communicate and symbolise with the idolatrous Papists in the use of the same, without making ourselves idolaters by participation. Shall the chaste spouse of Christ take upon her the ornaments of the whore? Shall the Israel of God symbolise with her who is spiritually called Sodom and Egypt? Shall the Lord’s redeemed people wear the ensigns of their captivity? Shall the saints be seen with the mark of the beast? Shall the Christian church be like the antichristian, the holy like the profane, religion like superstition, the temple of God like the synagogue of Satan? Our opposites are so far from being moved with these things, that both in pulpits and private places they used to plead for the ceremonies by this very argument, that we should not run so far away from Papists, but come as near them as we can. But for proof of that which we say, namely, that it is not lawful to symbolise with idolaters (and by consequence with Papists), or to be like them in their rites or ceremonies, we have more to allege than they can answer.