The Death-Blow of Popery

“When Dr. Day discoursed with Stephen Gardiner co7icerning free jicstification by Christy saith he, ‘O, Mr. Doctor, open that gap to the people, and we are undone ‘The more gospel there is discovered, the more Anti-Christ is discovered. Free grace puts the fou7idation of Popery out of course?’ The doubtful doctrine of many Protestants is a greater encouragement to Romanisn than all her own finery can bring to her. Rome has gained more by Oxford than by all her cardinals. The glorious doctrines of grace are the great guns with which the Papal galleys may be blown out of the water. Grace is a word which is as obnoxious to Popery as the name of Jesus to the devil. Reptiles cannot bear salt, nor can Jesuits and priests endure sovereign grace. Their trade is gone when salvation is free. Their honour is gone when Christ is all. When people think much of Jesus and his redemption, they are sure to think little of priests and their fiddle-faddle. It was not Luther’s arguments, but Luther’s plain teaching of justification by faith, which shook the corner-stone of the Vatican. If men are saved by believing, they are not likely to waste money on purgatory pick-purse, nor on any other of the papal schemes for enriching the church.

Let us then keep gospel truth always to the front, for in our own hearts the best preservative against error is a hearty acceptance of the living Christ and his own sure gospel.