conscience that fastings are works which appease God that sin
in a reserved case cannot be forgiven but by the authority of
him who reserved it; whereas the Canons themselves speak only
of the reserving of the ecclesiastical penalty, and not of the
reserving of the guilt.

Whence have the bishops the right to lay these traditions upon
the Church for the ensnaring of consciences, when Peter, Acts
15, 10, forbids to put a yoke upon the neck of the disciples,
and Paul says, 2 Cor. 13, 10, that the power given him was to
edification not to destruction? Why, therefore, do they
increase sins by these traditions?

But there are clear testimonies which prohibit the making of
such traditions, as though they merited grace or were
necessary to salvation. Paul says, Col. 2, 16-23: Let no man
judge you in meat, or in drink, or in respect of an holy-day,
or of the new moon, or of the Sabbath-days. If ye be dead with
Christ from the rudiments of the world, why, as though living
in the world, are ye subject to ordinances (touch not; taste
not; handle not, which all are to perish with the using) after
the commandments and doctrines of men! which things have
indeed a show of wisdom. Also in Titus 1, 14 he openly forbids
traditions: Not giving heed to Jewish fables and commandments
of men that turn from the truth.

And Christ, Matt. 15, 14. 13, says of those who require
traditions: Let them alone; they be blind leaders of the
blind; and He rejects such services: Every plant which My
heavenly Father hath not planted shall be plucked up.