their doctrine and religion.

Luther might have answered, "positive, you mean, not certain."


Chap. IX. p. 160.

But who hath power to forgive or to detain sins? Answer; the Apostles
and all Church servants, and (in case of necessity) every Christian.
Christ giveth them not power over money, wealth, kingdoms, &c; but
over sins and the consciences of human creatures, over the power of
the Devil, and the throat of Hell.

Few passages in the Sacred Writings have occasioned so much mischief,
abject slavishness, bloated pride, tyrannous usurpation, bloody
persecution, with kings even against their will the drudges, false
soul-destroying quiet of conscience, as this text, 'John' xx. 23.
misinterpreted. It is really a tremendous proof of what the
misunderstanding of a few words can do. That even Luther partook of the
delusion, this paragraph gives proof. But that a delusion it is; that
the commission given to the Seventy whom Christ sent out to proclaim and
offer the kingdom of God, and afterwards to the Apostles, refers either
to the power of making rules and ordinances in the Church, or otherwise
to the gifts of miraculous healing, which our Lord at that time
conferred on them; and that 'per figuram causce pro effecto', 'sins'
here mean diseases, seems to me more than probable. At all events, the
text surely does not mean that the salvation of a repentant and
believing Christian depends upon the will of a priest in absolution.