Cain and Abel malignity that is, enmity to serious godliness, that is, to an…

§ 10. But though it be notorious that Domination and Jurisdiction be the things which cause the Papal Clergy to trouble and tear the Christian world, what is it that makes the Laity so mad, & getteth this Clergy such a militant crowd against their own Tranquillity and Salvation? It's as visible as any moral thing, that the Churches Divisions and Wars, and Miseries have about a thousand years risen, from Satan's thrusting such worldly, fleshly, unholy men into holy Offices, who seek them but to serve their Pride and Covetousness, and Fleshly Appetites, and Ease, and who are Enemies at the heart to the serious obedience to Christ, which formally they preach. Christs own Apostles in their time of ignorance, ⟨p. 33⟩began to strive which of them should be greatest; of which we have recorded his sharp rebuke; which St. Peter himself did after second, in 1 Pet. 5. 1, 2, 3. in words so plain, that if his pretended Successors had not first claimed a power (as the Church) to be the determining expounders of all the Bible, they had lain under the Condemnation of Christ and Peter, Naked, without a Defence or Cloak: But this Church-expounding authority sets them above all the Word of God, which is now but what they please to make it, and an instrument to execute their wills: And indeed it is now rather the Pope and his Prelates and Councils than Christ, that are the Law-makers to the Church: For it is not he that maketh the words only that makes the Law, but he that giveth them their sense. The words are but as the body, and the sense is the Soul of the Law. The Ministerial Church now scorn the name of Ministers, and being become Praetorian and Magisterial, they give Christ and his Spirit in the Apostles leave to make the words and body of the Scripture or Divine Law, as God formed Adams body of the dust, so that they may give it the breath of Life, and also may make far more Voluminous Laws of their own, and cut off and condemn all the Children of God, that cannot believe that it's lawful to obey them.

§ 10. But though it be notorious that Domination and Jurisdiction be the things which cause the Papal Clergy to trouble and tear the Christian world, what is it that makes the Laity so mad, & getteth this Clergy such a militant crowd against their own Tranquillity and Salvation? It's as visible as any moral thing, that the Churches Divisions and Wars, and Miseries have about a thousand years risen, from Satans thrusting such worldly, fleshly, unholy men into holy Offices, who seek them but to serve their Pride and Covetousness, and Fleshly Appetites, and Ease, and who are Enemies at the heart to the serious obedience to Christ, which formally they preach. Christs own Apostles in their time of ignorance,