Faith & Spirit Quote by George Gillespie

A line like this doesn’t politely ask for church-state separation; it detonates the very idea that governments get to “manage” devotion. George Gillespie, a hard-edged Scottish Presbyterian theologian in the Wars of the Three Kingdoms era, is drawing a bright, punitive boundary: worship is not a policy domain. If civil authorities legislate the forms of prayer, sacraments, vestments, holy days, or church governance, they aren’t merely overreaching; they are trespassing on God’s jurisdiction.

The phrasing matters. “Any way pertaineth” is expansive, almost prosecutorial, designed to close loopholes. And “left to the determination” implies a temptation: lawmakers will claim they’re only settling indifferent details, tidying religious life for social peace. Gillespie’s point is that “indifferent” is a political fiction when it comes to worship. The state’s supposed neutrality becomes a stealth theology, smuggling in preferences under the banner of order.

The subtext is a theory of authority built on suspicion. Human law is not simply fallible; it is structurally self-interested, eager to convert spiritual obedience into civic compliance. In 1640s Britain, that wasn’t abstract. Battles over episcopacy, the Book of Common Prayer, and enforced uniformity had turned liturgy into a flashpoint for surveillance and coercion.

Gillespie’s intent, then, is both protective and combative: to shield conscience from the magistrate and to deny rulers a key instrument of control. It’s a sentence aimed at kings, bishops, and “reformers” alike: keep your hands off the altar, because the moment the state shapes worship, it’s no longer worship - it’s governance in religious costume.