A second volume of discourses or sermons on several scriptures

Though an Action be in it self indifferent, yet if it appear evil and sinful to us, we ought not in any case, while that mis-persuasion continues, to venture upon the doing of it; no, though by doing of it, we might avoid the greatest Evil: Yea, we are rather, if Providence bring us to that sad choice, to lose our very Lives, than to do any thing against the persuasions of our own Consciences, though in it self it be not evil or sinful. The reason of this is clear; because we are rather to choose the greatest Affliction ⟨p. 122⟩and Suffering, than to commit the least Sin; but now to go contrary to the Dictates and Persuasions of our own Consciences, this is Sin. Rom. 14.23. Whatever is not of Faith, is Sin; that is, whatever a Man doth, if he be not fully persuaded and convinced of the lawfulness thereof in his own Conscience, that is a Sin to him that ventures upon it while he is unsatisfied, though the Thing in it self may be lawful. And he that doubteth, says the Apostle, in the same Verse, is damned if he eateth; that is, though there be no real difference betwixt one kind of Meat and another, but all are alike lawful; yet if a scrupulous Conscience puts a difference betwixt them, where there is none, and if it account it unlawful to eat of some sorts of Meat, if after this, a Man ventures to eat them, hereby he sins, says the Apostle, and incurs damnation, by doing that against his Conscience, that yet, were his Conscience otherwise informed, were lawful for him to do. And so, in Rom. 14.20. For Meat destroy not the Work of God; all things are pure, but it is evil for him who eateth with offence. These and many other Places ⟨p. 123⟩clearly prove that what is done against a Man's own Conscience, that is sinful, to that Man. Conscience hath the privilege of a Negative Vote in the Soul; nothing can lawfully be done by us but what hath the full consent and approbation of our Consciences, and though every thing we think is lawful, doth not thereupon presently become lawful to us, yet what we think is unlawful, doth thereupon become unlawful for us to do, and we ought, whatever the case be, wholly to abstain from the doing of it.

Though an Action be in it self indifferent, yet if it appear evil and sinful to us, we ought not in any case, while that mis-perswasion continues, to venture upon the doing of it; no, though by doing of it, we might avoid the greatest Evil: Yea, we are rather, if Providence bring us to that sad choice, to lose our very Lives, than to do any thing against the perswasions of our own Consciences, though in it self it be not evil or sinful. The reason of this is clear; because we are rather to chuse the greatest Affliction