The goodness of a thing created is the perfection of its fitness for the use which it serves. Now that use is either particular or universal. – William Ames
From faith, hope, and love, the virtues of religion referring to God, there arises a double act which bears on the spiritual communion exercised between God and us the hearing of the word and prayer. – William Ames
Faith is the virtue by which, clinging-to the faithfulness of God, we lean upon him, so that we may obtain what he gives to us. – William Ames
Therefore, the church is not absolutely necessary as an object of faith, not even for us today, for then Abraham and the other prophets would not have given assent to those things which were revealed to them from God without any intervening help of the church. – William Ames