-- To the Reader
To advance this good work, I have written this small Treatise concerning Idols and the true worship of God. For this is the right practice of the gospel—to cast away every kind of idol and to sanctify the Lord in our hearts, serving Him in mind and spirit, with a pure heart, a good conscience, and an unspotted life.
Having completed this Treatise, I now present it to Your Lordship and venture to publish it under your name. I do so, first, because
God has made you honorable not only by civil dignity but also by a steadfast love and obedience to the gospel of Christ. Second, it is my desire to show some small token of gratitude for undeserved favor.
Thus I take my leave, praying that God would establish the heart of Your Lordship, and of all His people, blameless in holiness before Him—our Father—at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ with all
His saints.
Your Lordship's in all duty to command, W. Perkins
To the Reader If anyone asks why I have written and published this Treatise on Idolatry—now in the clear light of the gospel and within a church where idolatry is condemned to the pit of hell—let them understand that I do so for several reasons.
First, to expose and convict the Church of Rome of manifest idolatry, and thereby to show that those are mistaken who imagine
Protestants and Papists differ only in outward matters and not in the very substance of religion.
Second, to admonish our countrymen who still adhere to Rome (if they will be pleased to read and consider what I have written) that they ought rather to separate from the Church of Rome, for she is both a maintainer and a worshiper of idols.
Third, to awaken in the hearts of our fellow Englishmen a deeper detestation and abhorrence of the Romish religion. For even if it had no other error, the very crime of inexcusable idolatry with which it stands justly charged is enough to move all who care for their salvation to abhor it utterly.
Lastly, I write to instruct the ignorant multitude concerning the true worship of God. For remnants of popery still cling to the minds of many, who think that to serve God is merely to deal honestly with men and to mutter a few words morning and evening—whether at home or in the church—without any true understanding.