ith the inevitable result that each writer is, for
the most part, arguing from different premises. But on the assumption
that Hoadly is a Christian, Law's argument is an attack of great power.
He shows conclusively that if the Church of England is no more than
Hoadly imagines it to be, it cannot, in any proper historic sense, be
called the Church of England at all. For every one of the institutions
which Hoadly calls an usurpation, is believed by Churchmen to be
integral to its nature. And if sincerity alone is to count as the test,
then there cannot, for the existing world, be any such thing as
objective religious truth. It subverted not merely absolute
authority--which the Church of England did not claim--but any authority
in the Church. It impugned the authority of the Crown to enforce
religious belief by civil penalties. Hoadly's rejection of authority,
moreover, is in Law's view fatal to government of any kind. For all
lawful authority must affect eternal salvation insofar as to disobey it
is to sin. The authority the Church possesses is inherent in the very
nature of the Church; for the obligation to a belief in Christianity is
the same thing as to a belief in that Church which can be shown to
represent Christ's teaching.

From Law's own point of view, the logic of his position is undeniable;
and in his third letter to Hoadly, the real heart of his attack, he
touches the centre of the latter's argument. For if it is sincerity
which is alone important it would follow that things false and wrong are
as acceptable to God as things true and right, which is patently absurd.
Nor has Hoadly given us means for the detection of sincerity. He seemed
to think that anyone was sincere who so thought himself; but, says Law,
"it is also possible and as likely for a man to be mistaken in those
things which constitute true sincerity as in those things which
constitute true religion." Clearly, sincerity cannot be the pith of the
matter; for it may be mistaken and directed to wrong ends. The State, in
fact, may respect conscience, but Hoadly is no more entitled to assume
the infallibility of private belief than he is to deny the infallibility
of the Church's teaching. That way lies anarchy.

Here, indeed, the antagonists were on common ground. Both had denied the
absolute character of any authority; but while Hoadly virtually
postulates a Church which logically is no more than those who accept
the moral law as Christ described it,