Quest. CXLIII. What is the use of various church confessions or articles of faith?

Answ. I will pass by the very ill use that is made of them in too many countries, where unnecessary opinions or uncertain are put in, and they that can get into favour with the secular power, take advantage under pretence of orthodoxness and uniformity, truth and peace, to set up their opinions and judgments to be the common rule for all to bow to, though wiser than themselves: and to silence all ministers, and scatter and divide the flocks that will not say or swear as they do, that is, that they are wise men, and are in the right.

The true and commendable use of various church professions, or confessions of faith, is, 1. To be an instruction to the more ignorant how to understand the Scriptures in most of the most weighty points. 2. To be an enumeration of those doctrines, against which no minister shall be allowed to preach, and according to which he is to instruct the people. 3. To be a testimony to all neighbour or foreign churches in a heterodox, contentious, and suspicious age, how we understand the Scriptures, for the confuting of scandals and unjust suspicions, and the maintaining communion in faith, and charity, and doctrine.