28. (Book 28)
Excommunication ought not to be procceded unto except when extreme necessity constraineth: But whensoever the soul of the sinner cannot otherwise be healed, and that the safety of the Church requireth the cutting off of this or that Member, it behoveth to use this last remedy. In the Church of Rome indeed Excommunication hath been turned into great∣est injustice and tyranny (as the Pharisees abused the casting out of the Synagogues, which was their Excommunication) to the fulfilling of the lust of their own mindes; Yet the Ordi∣nance of Christ is not therefore by any of the Reformed Reli∣gion to be utterly thrust away and wholly rejected. What Pro∣testant knows not that the vassals of Antichrist have drawn the Lords Supper into the worst and most pernicious abuses, as also the Ordination of Ministers, and other Ordinances of the Gos∣pel? Yet who will say that things necessary (whether the ne∣cessity be that of command, or that of the 〈◊〉〈◊〉 or end) are to be taken away because of the abuse?