Day #1... Extra Addition John Locke's Government Treatise: A Letter Concerning Toleration
https://isaiah58ministries.blogspot.com/2025/03/extra-addition-tjohn-lockes-government.html
A Letter Concerning Toleration by John Locke
Translated by William Popple [1689]
http://fs2.american.edu/dfagel/www/Philosophers/Locke/Letter Concerning Toleratin PDF.pdf
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| DAY 31 |
PG here, Extra Addition "A Letter if Concerning Toleration," Day 31,
Page 16b of pdf. 17a : to restore me in any measure, much less entirely, to a good estate. What security can be given for the Kingdom of Heaven? fs2.american.edu/dfagel/www/Philosophers/Locke/Letter Concerning Toleratin PDF.pdf The individual's right to seek salvation, like medical help for an ailing body, is his free choice. Those things that Every man ought sincerely to inquire into himself and, by meditation, study, search, and his own endeavours, attain the knowledge of, cannot be looked upon as the peculiar possession of any sort of men.
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| SAME |
Princes, indeed, are born superior unto other men in power, but in nature equal. Neither the right nor the art of ruling does necessarily carry along with it the certain knowledge of other things, and least of all of true religion. For if it were so, how could it come to pass that the lords of the earth should differ so vastly as they do in religious matters? But let us grant that it is probable the way to eternal life may be better known by a prince than by his subjects, or at least that in this incertitude of things the safest and most commodious way for private persons is to follow his dictates. You will say: “What then?” If he should bid you follow merchandise for your livelihood, would you decline that course for fear it should not succeed? I answer: I would turn merchant upon the prince’s command, because, in case I should have ill-success in trade, he is abundantly able to make up my loss some other way. If it be true, as he pretends, that he desires I should thrive and grow rich, he can set me up again when unsuccessful voyages have broken me. But this is not the case in the things that regard the life to come; if there I take a wrong course, if in that respect I am once undone, it is not in the magistrate’s power to repair my loss, to ease my suffering, nor to restore me in any measure, much less entirely, to a good estate. What security can be given for the Kingdom of Heaven?
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| DAY 32 |
to restore me in any measure, much less entirely, to a good estate. What security can be given for the Kingdom of Heaven? Perhaps some will say that they do not suppose this infallible judgement, that all men are bound to follow in the affairs of religion, to be in the civil magistrate, but in the Church. What the Church has determined, that the civil magistrate orders to be observed; and he provides by his authority that nobody shall either act or believe in the business of religion otherwise than the Church teaches. So that the judgement of those things is in the Church; the magistrate himself yields obedience thereunto and requires the like obedience from others. I answer: Who sees not how frequently the name of the Church, which was venerable in time of the apostles, has been made use of to throw dust in the people’s eyes in the following ages? But, however, in the present case it helps us not. The one only narrow way which leads to heaven is not better known to the magistrate than to private persons, and therefore I cannot safely take him for my guide, who may probably be as ignorant of the way as myself, and who certainly is less concerned for my salvation than I myself am. Amongst so many kings of the Jews, how many of them were there whom any Israelite, thus blindly following, had not fallen into idolatry and thereby into destruction? Yet, nevertheless, you bid me be of good courage and tell me that all is now safe and secure, because the magistrate does not now enjoin the observance of his own decrees in matters of religion, but only the decrees of the Church. Of what Church, I beseech you? of that, certainly, which likes him best. As if he that compels me by laws and penalties to enter into this or the other Church, did not interpose his own judgement in the matter.
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| DAY 33 |
PG here, Sunday, April 6, 2025. The topic is, should anyone submit their will to another person for salvation? Can the law or magistrate demand a certain religion over another? Socinians were members of a 16th and 17th-century Christian group, named after the Italian theologian Faustus Socinus, who rejected the Trinity, the divinity of Christ, and other traditional Christian doctrines, emphasizing reason and moral living. `Church Papist' was a nickname, a term of abuse, for those English Catholics who outwardly conformed to the established Protestant Church and yet inwardly remained Roman Catholics.
Quote: 17b: What
difference is there whether he lead me himself, or deliver me over to be led
by others? I depend both ways upon his will, and it is he that determines
both ways of my eternal state. Would an Israelite that had worshipped
Baal upon the command of his king have been in any better condition
because somebody had told him that the king ordered nothing in religion
upon his own head, nor commanded anything to be done by his subjects in
divine worship but what was approved by the counsel of priests, and
declared to be of divine right by the doctors of their Church? If the religion
of any Church become, therefore, true and saving, because the head of that
sect, the prelates and priests, and those of that tribe, do all of them, with
all their might, extol and praise it, what religion can ever be accounted
erroneous, false, and destructive? I am doubtful concerning the doctrine of
the Socinians, I am suspicious of the way of worship practised by the
Papists, or Lutherans; will it be ever a jot safer for me to join either unto
the one or the other of those Churches, upon the magistrate’s command,
because he commands nothing in religion but by the authority and counsel
of the doctors of that Church?
But, to speak the truth, we must acknowledge that the Church (if a
convention of clergymen, making canons, must be called by that name) is
for the most part more apt to be influenced by the Court than the Court by the church.
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| DAY 34 |
PG here, April 7, 2025, Monday, Day 34 Martin Luther of the Reformation. Wrote the first Declaration of Independence from the Catholic Church with 95 wrongs the church was doing called The 95 Theses" in 1517. It is called Reformation Day. October 31. He testified before a court: "I can not recant; I will not recant (his writings and pamphlets). To do so is to go against my conscience, and that is a very dangerous thing." John Locke is expressing the same TRUTH of the gospel of Jesus Christ, who delivers us and sets us free from sin. The bottom sentence here, ***"No way whatsoever that I shall walk in against the dictates of my conscience will ever bring me to the mansions of the blessed."***
The "vicissitude of orthodox and Arian emperors" refers to the fluctuating fortunes and political shifts experienced by emperors who supported either orthodox Nicene Christianity or the Arian heresy, particularly in the 4th century, with emperors like Constantine and Constantius playing pivotal roles.
vicissitude: a change of circumstances or fortune, typically one that is unwelcome or unpleasant.
How the Church was under the vicissitude of orthodox and
Arian emperors is very well known. Or if those things be too remote, our
modern English history affords us fresh examples in the reigns of Henry
VIII, Edward VI, Mary, and Elizabeth, how easily and smoothly the clergy
changed their decrees, their articles of faith, their form of worship,
everything according to the inclination of those kings and queens. Yet were
those kings and queens of such different minds in point of religion, and
enjoined thereupon such different things, that no man in his wits (I had
almost said none but an atheist) will presume to say that any sincere and
upright worshipper of God could, with a safe conscience, obey their several
decrees. To conclude, it is the same thing whether a king that prescribes
laws to another man’s religion pretend to do it by his own judgement, or
by the ecclesiastical authority and advice of others. The decisions of
churchmen, whose differences and disputes are sufficiently known, cannot
be any sounder or safer than his; nor can all their suffrages joined together
add a new strength to the civil power. Though this also must be taken
notice of—that princes seldom have any regard to the suffrages of
ecclesiastics that are not favourers of their own faith and way of worship.
But, after all, the principal consideration, and which absolutely determines
this controversy, is this: Although the magistrate’s opinion in religion be
sound, and the way that he appoints be truly Evangelical, yet, if I be not
thoroughly persuaded thereof in my own mind, there will be no safety for
me in following it. No way whatsoever that I shall walk in against the
dictates of my conscience will ever bring me to the mansions of the
blessed.
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| DAY 35 |
PG here, Day 35 Page 18b, according to the pdf of our Extra Addition. "A Letter Concerning Toleration." Considerations from John Locke. PG here, April 8, 2025. I have been sharing 1/2 a page a day. I loved the opening sentence here in 18b. And when you are really close to God and all the people you know are, people speak this way by the unction of the Holy Spirit. When all the laws and people are Christian, as America is. No way whatsoever that I shall walk in against the dictates of my conscience will ever bring me to the mansions of the blessed. If you know it is wrong, it would be great harm to you if you did what you knew to be wrong. The blessed are people who died and went to heaven. Jesus said he has built each person a mansion in heaven to live in for eternity. Jesus's earthly father was Joseph, a carpenter. Maybe you know a contractor or a person who builds homes, a construction worker.
.... No way whatsoever that I shall walk in against the
dictates of my conscience will ever bring me to the mansions of the
blessed. I may grow rich by an art that I take not delight in; I may be cured
of some disease by remedies that I have not faith in; but I cannot be saved
by a religion that I distrust and by a worship that I abhor. It is in vain for
an unbeliever to take up the outward show of another man’s profession.
Faith only and inward sincerity are the things that procure acceptance
with God. The most likely and most approved remedy can have no effect
upon the patient, if his stomach reject it as soon as taken; and you will in
vain cram a medicine down a sick man’s throat, which his particular
constitution will be sure to turn into poison. In a word, whatsoever may be
doubtful in religion, yet this at least is certain, that no religion which I
believe not to be true can be either true or profitable unto me. In vain,
therefore, do princes compel their subjects to come into their Church
communion, under pretence of saving their souls. If they believe, they will
come of their own accord, if they believe not, their coming will nothing
avail them. How great soever, in fine, may be the pretence of good-will and
charity, and concern for the salvation of men’s souls, men cannot be forced
to be saved whether they will or no. And therefore, when all is done, they
must be left to their own consciences.
Having thus at length freed men from all dominion over one another in
matters of religion, let us now consider what they are to do. All men know
and acknowledge that God ought to be publicly worshipped;
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