PREFACE.

It will therefore be enough for us at this time to have protested that we are most unworthily burdened with the slander that we are the authors of some new sect. For we have a great agreement with the ancient Church, which stood upon the Law and the Gospel, from which one source everything that pertains to our salvation must be drawn. It will be easy for anyone to judge this from our confession, in which we have used no pretense, no artifice, but have produced before men what we believe in our hearts before God, so that with His help, we may remain constant in that faith whether we live or face death. In the second place, we are accused of the crime of schism because we are infrequent in Papistic synagogues, which we rather flee, and from which we separate ourselves,