The Bloudy Tenent of Persecution for Cause of Conscience...

[201] [“Is it a miracle for Elijah, with the aid of so many thousand people of Israel, to put to death 450 men, whose spirits were discouraged, being convinced of their forgery and idolatry?” Ib. p. 179.]

[202] [See before, p. 17.]

[203] [See before, p. 30.]

[204] [An answer to thirty-two questions by the elders of the churches in New England. Published by Mr. Peters; Lond., 1643.]

[205] [“If princes be nursing fathers to the church, then they are to provide that the children of the church be not nursed with poison instead of milk. And in so doing they keep the first table.... Princes sit on the bench over the church in the offensive government of the church: and yet may themselves, being members of the church, be subject to church censure in the offensive government of themselves against the rules of the gospel.” Cotton’s Reply, p. 194.]

[206] [Under the influence of Calvin the legislation of Geneva was entirely theocratic. Idolatry, adultery, cursing and striking parents, were punishable with death. Imprisonment was inflicted for every immorality at the instance of the church courts. Women were forbidden to wear golden ornaments, and not more than two rings on their fingers. Even their feasts were regulated: but three courses were allowed, and each course to consist of only four dishes. Great efforts were also made, which gave rise to many civil commotions, to remove from office under the state persons excommunicated by the church. Henry’s Das Leben Calvins, p. 173, edit. 1843.]

[207] Chamier. De Eccles. p. 376. Parker, part. polit. lib. i. cap. 1.

[208] [That is, baptism and the Lord’s supper.]

[209] [See Broadmead Records, Introd. pp. xli., lxxxvii.]

[210] [“If a prince should, by covenant and oath, make his whole kingdom a national church, he should do more than he hath any word of Christ to warrant his work.” A Survey of the Sum of Ch. Discipline, &c., part 2, Argument 12.]

[211] [Among the early settlers were two brothers of the name of Brown, who, still attached to the rites of the church of England, set up a separate assembly, and when summoned before the governor, accused the ministers of departing from the usages of that church, adding that they were separatists, and would soon become anabaptists. To this the ministers made reply, “That they were neither separatists nor anabaptists, that they did not separate from the church of England, nor from the ordinances of God there, but only from the corruptions and disorders of that church; they came away from the Common Prayer and ceremonies ... because they judged the imposition of these things to be sinful corruptions of the word of God.” Neal’s Hist. of New England, i. p. 144. The two brothers were sent back to England in the same ship that brought them over.]

[212] [The law concerning heresy stood thus in New England: “Whoever denies the immortality of the soul, the resurrection of the body, or the evil done by the outward man is sin, or that Christ gave himself a ransom for sins, or that we are justified by his righteousness, or the morality of the fourth command, or the baptizing of infants, or the ordinance of magistracy, or their authority to make war, or punish offenders against the first table; whoever denies any of these, or seduces others to do so, must be banished the jurisdiction.” Neal’s Hist. of New England, ii. p. 344.]

[213] [See note before, p. 164.]

[214] [Diana, in the original copy.]

[215] [“I do not disapprove of the use frequently made of it by St. Augustine against the Donatists, to prove that godly princes may lawfully issue edicts to compel obstinate and rebellious persons to worship the true God, and to maintain the unity of the faith; for although faith is a voluntary thing, yet we see that such means are useful to subdue the obstinacy of those who will not until compelled obey.” Calvin in loc. tom. ii. 43. edit. Tholuck.]

[216] [In the Platform of Church Discipline, agreed upon at Cambridge in New England in 1648, it is provided that not only members of churches, but hearers of the word also, shall contribute to the maintenance of the ministry: if the deacons failed to obtain it, recourse was then to be had to the magistrate, whose duty it was held to be to see that the ministry be duly provided for. C. Mather’s Magnalia, book v. p. 31. Neal’s Hist. of New England, ii. p. 301.]

[217] [Mr. Henry Ainsworth, the most eminent of the Brownists, was the author of a very learned commentary on the Pentateuch and Canticles, as also of several other minor works. “He was,” says Mr. Cotton, “diligently studious of the Hebrew text, hath not been unuseful to the church in his exposition of the Pentateuch, especially of Moses’s rituals.” Way of Cong. Churches, p. 6. Stuart’s edit. of his Two Treatises, p. 55.]

[218] [The composition of the first book of Homilies is generally attributed to Cranmer, Ridley, Latimer, Hopkins, and Becon. Jewel is said to have had the largest share in the second, although Archbishop Parker speaks of them as “revised and finished, with a second part, by him and other bishops.” The first edition of the first book appeared in July, 1547, 1 Edward VI. The use of the Apocrypha in the church service was an early complaint of the Puritans. The apocryphal books were commanded to be bound up with the other books of scripture by Archbishop Whitgift. Short’s Hist. of Church of England, p. 239. Strype’s Whitgift, i. 590. Neal, i. 427.]

[219] [A Letter of many Ministers in Old England requesting the judgment of their reverend brethren in New England concerning nine positions: written A.D. 1637. Together with their answer thereto returned, anno 1639, &c. Published 1643, 4to. pp. 90. For a condensed view of it, see Hanbury’s Hist. Memorials, ii. pp. 18-39.]

[220] [Sentiments precisely similar to the above were embodied in the seventeenth chapter of the Cambridge Platform, and continued to be for many years the ruling principles of the congregational churches of New England. See C. Mather’s Magnalia, book v. p. 37.]

[221] [See Tracts on Lib. of Conscience, Introd. p. xxxii.]

[222] [The Assembly of Divines was at this time engaged in forming a directory of worship for the entire nation.]

[223] [The central part of a target, which anciently was painted white.]

[224] [There are two chapters numbered CXX. in the original copy.]

[225] Nero and the persecuting emperors were not so injurious to Christianity, as Constantine and others who assumed a power in spiritual things. Under Constantine Christianity fell into corruption, and Christians fell asleep.

[226] [Martial, De Spectaculis Libellus, Ep. ix.]

[227] [See Neal’s Hist. of Puritans, i. 353, edit. 1837.]

[228] Is not this too like the pope’s profession of servus servorum Dei, yet holding out his slipper to the lips of princes, kings, and emperors?

[229] [For elucidations of the references made by Mr. Williams in this preface to his sufferings, and for Mr. Cotton’s reply, see the Biographical Introduction.]

[230] [It is] a monstrous paradox, that God’s children should persecute God’s children, and that they that hope to live eternally together with Christ Jesus in the heavens, should not suffer each other to live in this common air together, &c. I am informed it was the speech of an honourable knight of the parliament: “What! Christ persecute Christ in New England?”[231]

[231] [“Though God’s children may not persecute God’s children, nor wicked men either, for well-doing: yet if they be found to walk in the way of the wicked—their brethren may justly deprive them in some cases not only of the common air of the country, by banishment, but even of the common air of the world by death, and yet hope to live eternally with them in the heavens.” Master John Cotton’s Answer to Master Roger Williams, p. 14.]

[232] [That is, of the church at Salem, of which Mr. Williams was then the pastor.]

[233] [This should be four hundred and fifty. See 1 Kings xviii. 19-22:—or including the “prophets of the groves,” 850.]

[234] [“The truth is, I did not publish that discourse to the world—A brief discourse in defence of set forms of prayer was penned by Mr. Ball—that a religious knight sent over with desire to hear our judgment of it. At his request I drew up a short answer, and sent one copy to the knight and another to Mr. Ball divers years ago. How it came to be published I do not know.” Cotton’s Answer, p. 23. See Hanbury’s Hist. Mem. ii. 157, for an abstract of it.]

[235] [See also Biographical Introduction to this volume.]

[236] [“The scope of my letter was, not to confirm the equity of his banishment, but to convince the iniquity of his separation.” Cotton’s Answer, p. 41.]

[237] [“He that shall withdraw or separate the corn from the people, or the people from the corn; the people have just cause to separate either him from themselves, or themselves from him. And this proportion will hold as well in spiritual corn as bodily.” Cotton’s Answer, p. 44.]

[238] [“If men hinder the enjoyment of spiritual good things, may they not be hindered from the enjoyment of that which is less, carnal good things?” Ib. p. 46.]

[239] [“I spent a great part of the summer in seeking by word and writing to satisfy his scruples, until he rejected both our callings, and our churches. And even then I ceased not to follow him still, ... whereof this very letter is a pregnant and evident demonstration.” Cotton’s Answer, p. 47.]

[240] [“I intended not a cordial of consolation to him, ... but only a conviction, to abate the rigour of his indignation against the dispensation of divine justice.” Cotton’s Answer, p. 48.]