An exposition with practical observations continued upon the eighth, ninth, & tenth chapters of…

From whence the Note is:¹ That superstitious people who are forward and zealous in their own way of Worship, yet they are very slight and negligent in Gods way of Worship, little regard that. Indeed their own Altars they were accounted great things, that way which they appointed themselves, they did not care what cost they were at in that way; but as for Gods way, that was as a strange thing unto them. We have seen it very evident, and do see it in great part to this ⟨p. 109⟩day, how those that are very zealous in superstitious worship, are the most negligent in Gods way of Worship; to instance:² you know in late times, what a deal of stir did men make with their own forms of Worship, with their own Ceremonies and Ways of Worship which they appointed? how zealous were they in them, and devout were they in them? when they came in public Congregations to bow and cringe, and for other Ceremonies that they said were only for the decency of Gods Worship, how stiff were they in them, that the mouths of the most Godly Ministers must be stopped if they would not conform to them? But even these men would scorn and jeer at strictness in Gods Ways, and slight any man that would be conscientious in the Ways of God, and they were Rebels that should not yield to a Ceremony, because it was disobedience to Magistracy. For men to be conscientious for little things (as they thought) in Gods Law, seemed strange, when as they would urge men to obey to the uttermost in little things in their own. & so in another point that falls out as full and reasonable for the time, as in the point of their own Festivals and Holy days, those that would persecute to the uttermost men that should work but to get bread for their families on a Holy-day, ³yet they could publish Books of Sports for the profanation of the Lords Day: ⁴And thus the great things of Gods Law they were strange things, but their own things (Holy-days) were great matters: Surely if it were such a great matter to keep the Festival of Christs Nativity we should have some hint of it from the beginning of Matthew to the end of the Revelations,