midnight
To scrutinize the spiritual estate of others will neither promote your holiness nor your security . Think not the further you go from the church of Rome , the nearer ye approach to God ; nor confound the superstitious observances , which she mis-named good works , with the deeds of righteousness that Scripture requires you to perform , not as bestowing a right to eternal life , but as your part of the covenant of grace to which you have been admitted . Be not misled by the quoted opinions of early reformers . They depreciated not acts of piety , integrity , and social kindness , but ` masses , dirges , obsequies , rising at midnight , going barefoot , jubilees , invocation of saints , praying to images , vows of celibacy , pardons , indulgences , founding of abbeys ' -LSB- 2 -RSB- , and other supererogatory performances , by which Popery in effect invalidated the true atonement , and pretended that sinners might merit heaven . Against these vain devices of men our glorious martyrs lifted up their voices ; these were the good works they decried ; but when ye misapply their just anathemas , to condemn the fruits of faith acting by love , ye belie their memory , and tear asunder those strong pillars of belief and practice which support the Christian doctrine . Lamentable are the effects which schism produces . At the very beginning of our divisions the pious Jewell doubted how to address those who preferred contending for trifles to peace .