He believes it has enough of the
primitive Christian if it be but persecuted as that was, no matter for
the piety or doctrine of it, as if there were nothing required to prove
the truth of a religion but the punishment of the professors of it, like
the old mathematicians that were never believed to be profoundly knowing
in their profession until they had run through all punishments and just
escaped the fork. He is all for suffering for religion, but nothing for
acting; for he accounts good works no better than encroachments upon the
merits of free believing, and a good life the most troublesome and
unthrifty way to heaven. He canonises himself a saint in his own
lifetime, as the more sure and certain way, and less troublesome to
others. He outgrows ordinances, as an apprentice that has served out his
time does his indentures, and being a freeman, supposes himself at
liberty to set up what religion he pleases. He calls his own supposed
abilities gifts, and disposes of himself like a foundation designed to
pious uses, although, like others of the same kind, they are always
diverted to other purposes. He owes all his gifts to his ignorance, as
beggars do the alms they receive to their poverty. They are such as the
fairies are said to drop in men's shoes, and when they are discovered to
give them over and confer no more; for when his gifts are discovered
they vanish and come to nothing. He is but a puppet saint that moves he
knows not how, and his ignorance is the dull, leaden weight that puts
all his parts in motion.
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