_Sect._ 1. Bishop Lindsey hath told us,(85) that the will of the law must be the rule of our conscience, so that conscience may not judge other ways than the law determines. Bishop Spotswood will have the sentence of superiors to direct the conscience,(86) and will have us to esteem that to be best and most seemly which seemeth so to them. Bishop Andrews, speaking of ceremonies,(87) not only will have every person inviolably to observe the rites and customs of his own church, but also will have the ordinances about those rites to be urged under pain of the anathema. I know not what the binding of the conscience is, if this be not it: _Apostolus gemendi partes relinquit, non cogendi auctoritatem tribuit ministris quibus plebs non auscultat_.(88) And shall they who call themselves the apostles’ successors, compel, constrain and enthral, the consciences of the people of God? Charles V., as popish as he was, did promise to the Protestants,(89) _Nullam vim ipsorum conscientiis illatum iri_. And shall a popish prince speak more reasonable than protestant prelates? But to make it yet more and plentifully to appear how miserably our opposites would enthral our consciences, I will here show, 1. What the binding of the conscience is. 2. How the laws of the church may be said to bind. 3. What is the judgment of formalists touching the binding-power of ecclesiastical laws. _Sect._ 2. Concerning the first of these we will hear what Dr Field saith:(90) “To bind the conscience (saith he) is to bind the soul and spirit of man, with the fear of such punishments (to be inflicted by him that so bindeth) as the conscience feareth; that is, as men fear, though none but God and themselves be privy to their doings; now these are only such as God only inflicteth,” &c. This description is too imperfect, and deserves to be corrected. To bind the conscience is _illam auctoritatem habere, ut conscientia illi subjicere sese debeat, ita ut peccatum sit, si contra illam quidquam fiat_, saith Ames.(91) “The binder (saith Perkins(92)) is that thing whatsoever which hath power and authority over conscience to order it. To bind is to urge, cause, and constrain it in every action, either to accuse for sin, or to excuse for well-doing; or to say, this may be done, or it may not be done.” “To bind the conscience (saith Alsted(93)) _est illam urgere et adigere, ut vel excuset et accuset, vel indicet quid fieri aut non fieri possit_.” Upon these descriptions, which have more truth and reason in them, I infer that whatsoever urges, or forces conscience to assent to a thing as lawful, or a thing that ought to be done, or dissent from a thing as unlawful, or a thing which ought not to be done, that is a binder of conscience, though it did not bind the spirit of a man with the fear of such punishments as God alone inflicteth. For secluding all respect of punishment, and not considering what will follow, the very obliging of the conscience for the