essedness. But for the power of ruling there is required
the power to judge, to define, to discriminate and to decide what is
expedient or conducive to the aforesaid goal. In vain, therefore, and
futile is all that is inserted in the present article in opposition to
the immunity of churches and schools. Accordingly, all subjects of the
Roman Empire must be forbidden from bringing the clergy before a civil
tribunal, contrary to imperial privileges that have been conceded: for
Pope Clement the Martyr says: "If any of the presbyters have trouble
with one another, let whatever it be adjusted before the presbyters of
the Church." Hence Constantine the Great, the most Christian Emperor,
was unwilling in the holy Council of Nice to give judgement even in
secular cases. "Ye are gods," he says, "appointed by the true God. Go,
settle the case among yourselves, be cause it is not proper that
we judge gods." As to what is further repeated concerning Church
regulations has been sufficiently replied to above. Nor does Christian
liberty, which they bring forth as an argument, avail them, since this
is not liberty, but prodigious license, which, inculcated on the people,
excites them to fatal and most dangerous sedition. For Christian liberty
is not opposed to ecclesiastical usages since they promote what is good,
but it is opposed to the servitude of the Mosaic law and the servitude
of sin. "Whosoever committeth sin is the servant of sin," says Christ,
John 8:34. Hence their breaking fasts, their free partaking of meats,
their neglect of canonical hours, their omission of confession--viz. at
Easter--and their commission and omission of similar things, are not a
use of liberty, but an abuse thereof, contrary to the warnings of St.
Paul, who earnestly warned them, saying: "Brethren, ye have been called
unto liberty; only use not liberty for an occasion to the flesh, but by
love serve one another." Gal. 5:13. Hence no one ought to conceal
his crimes under the pretext of Gospel liberty, which St. Peter
also forbade: "As free, and not using your liberty for an cloak of
maliciousness, but as the servant of God," 1 Pet. 2:16. As to what they
have added concerning abuses, all the princes and estates of the Empire
undoubtedly know that not even the least is approved either by His
Imperial Majesty or by any princes or any Christian man, but that both
the princes and the estates of the Empire desire to strive with a common
purpose and agreement, i