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DE CORPORE POLITICO.

gospel." And Luke xviii. 18-22, when a certain ruler asked our Saviour, what he ought to do to inherit eternal life, he propounded to him the keeping of the commandments; which when the ruler said he had kept, he propounded to him the faith, "Sell all that thou hast, and follow me." And John iii. 36: "He that believeth in the Son, hath everlasting life." And "He that obeyeth not the Son, shall not see life." Where he manifestly joineth obedience and faith together. And Rom. i. 17: "The just shall live by faith"; not every one, but the "just." For also "the devils believe and tremble." But though both faith and justice (meaning still by justice, not absence of guilt, but the good intentions of the mind, which is called righteousness by God, that taketh the will for the deed) be both of them said to justify, yet are their parts in the act of justification to be distinguished. For justice is said to justify, not because it absolveth, but because it denominates him just, and setteth him in an estate, or capacity of salvation, whensoever he shall have faith. But faith is said to justify, that is, to absolve, because by it a just man is absolved of, and forgiven his unjust actions. And thus are reconciled the places of St. Paul and St. James, that "Faith only justifieth," and "a man is not justified by faith only"; and showed how faith and repentance must concur to salvation.

11. These things considered, it will easily appear, that under the sovereign power of a Christian commonwealth, there is no danger of damnation from simple obedience to human laws; for in that the sovereign alloweth Christianity, no man is compelled to renounce that faith, which is enough for his salvation, that is to say, the fundamental points. And for other points, seeing they are not necessary to salvation, if we conform our actions to the laws, we do not only what we are allowed, but also what we are commanded by the law of nature, which is the moral law taught by our