20 History of Methodism 



He chose the word of God as the book of his study and 

 the rule of his life. He was the well-known friend 

 and avowed advocate of religious freedom, and was 

 accustomed to say that "at the day of judgment it 

 would not be asked whether he was a follower of Xai- 

 ther or of Calvin, but whether he embraced the truth 

 in the love of it." In the Fundamental Constitutions 

 which he framed, the perplexing problem of a union 

 between Church and State was solved not by giving 

 a legal preference to one sect or denomination over 

 another, but by making the national religion of the 

 province broad enough to embrace in the enjoyment 

 of equal rights and privileges each and every Church 

 of seven or more persons agreeing in any religion, and 

 subscribing to the three following terms of communion: 



"1. That there is* a God. 



" 2. That God is to be publicly worshiped. 



" 3. That it is lawful, and the duty of every man 

 being thereunto called by those that govern, to bear 

 witness to the truth." 



In his view, Jews, heathens, and other dissenters 

 from the purity of the Christian religion, if not kept 

 at a distance from it by legal discriminations against 

 them, " would have better opportunity of acquainting 

 themselves with the truth and reasonableness of its 

 doctrines and the peaceableness and inoffensiveness 

 of its professors, and by good usage, and persuasion, 

 and all those convincing methods of gentleness and 

 meekness suitable to the rules and designs of the gos- 

 pel, would be won over to embrace and unfeignedly 

 receive the truth." 



The proprietaries approved and signed, July 21, 

 1669, the Fundamental Constitutions, as drawn by Mr. 

 Locke, and the original copy, which was given by 



