CHAP. II.
Peace.Dear Truth, I have two sad complaints.
Two great complaints of Peace.
First. The most sober of thy witnesses, that dare to plead thy cause, how are they charged to be mine enemies—contentious, turbulent, seditious!
Secondly. Thine enemies, though they speak and rail against thee, though they outrageously pursue, imprison, banish, kill thy faithful witnesses, yet how is all vermilioned over for justice against the heretics! Yea, if they kindle coals, and blow the flames of devouring wars, that leave neither spiritual nor civil state, but burn up branch and root, yet how do all pretend an holy war! He that kills, and he that is killed, they both cry out, “It is for God, and for their conscience.”
Persecutors seldom plead Christ, but Moses, for their author.
It is true, nor one nor other seldom dare to plead the mighty Prince Christ Jesus for their author, yet both (both protestant and papist) pretend they have spoke with Moses and the prophets, who all, say they, before Christ came, allowed such holy persecutions [and] holy wars against the enemies of holy church.
[Prov. xvii. 14.]
Truth.Dear Peace, to ease thy first complaint, it is true, thy dearest sons, most like their mother, peace-keeping, peace-making sons of God, have borne and still must bear the blurs of troublers of Israel, and turners of the world upside down. And it is true again, what Solomon once spake:The beginning of strife is as when one letteth out water, therefore, saith he,leave off contention before it be meddled with.This caveat should keep the banks and sluices firm and strong, that strife, like a breach of waters, break not in upon the sons of men.
Strife distinguished.
Yet strife must be distinguished: it is necessary, or unnecessary, godly or ungodly, Christian or unchristian, &c.
1. Ungodly strife.
It is unnecessary, unlawful, dishonourable, ungodly, unchristian, in most cases in the world: for there is a possibility of keeping sweet Peace in most cases, and,if it be possible, it is the express command of God that Peace be kept, Rom. xii. [18.]
2. Godly strife.
Again, it is necessary, honourable, godly, &c., with civil and earthly weapons to defend the innocent, and to rescue the oppressed from the violent paws and jaws of oppressing, persecuting Nimrods, Psal. lxxiii. Job xxix.
It is as necessary, yea, more honourable, godly, and Christian, to fight the fight of faith, with religious and spiritual artillery, and to contend earnestly for the faith of Jesus, once delivered to the saints, against all opposers, and the gates of earth and hell, men or devils, yea, against Paul himself, or an angel from heaven, if he bring any other faith or doctrine, Jude 4, 9; Gal. i. 8.
Peace.With a clashing ofsucharms am I never wakened. Speak once again, dear Truth, to my second complaint of bloody persecution, and devouring wars, marching under the colours of upright justice and holy zeal, &c.
A threefold doleful cry.
Truth.Mine ears have long been filled with a threefold doleful outcry—
Christ’s worship is his bed, Cant. i. 16. False worship, therefore, is a false bed.
First. Of one hundred forty-four thousand virgins, Rev. xiv., forced and ravished by emperors, kings, governors, to their beds of worship and religion; set up, like Absalom’s, on high, in their several states and countries.
The cry of the souls under the altar.
Secondly. The cry of those precious souls under the altar, Rev. vi. [9,] the souls of such as have been persecuted and slain for the testimony and witness of Jesus, whose blood hath been spilt like water upon the earth; and that because they have held fast the truth and witness of Jesus, against the worship of the states and times, compelling to an uniformity of state religion.
These cries of murdered virgins, who can sit still and hear? Who can but run, with zeal inflamed, to prevent the deflowering of chaste souls, and spilling of the blood of the innocent? Humanity stirs up and prompts the sons of men to draw material swords for a virgin’s chastity and life, against a ravishing murderer; and piety and Christianity must needs awaken the sons of God to draw the spiritual sword, the word of God, to preserve the chastity and life of spiritual virgins, who abhor the spiritual defilements of false worship, Rev. xiv.
A cry of the whole earth.
Thirdly. The cry of the whole earth, made drunk with the blood of its inhabitants slaughtering each other in their blinded zeal for conscience, for religion, against the catholics, against the Lutherans, &c.
What fearful cries, within these twenty years, of hundred thousands, men, women, children, fathers,mothers, husbands, wives, brethren, sisters, old and young, high and low, plundered, ravished, slaughtered, murdered, famished! And hence these cries, that men fling away the spiritual sword and spiritual artillery, in spiritual and religious causes, and rather trust, for the suppressing of each other’s gods, conscience, and religion, as they suppose, to an arm of flesh and sword of steel.
Truth.Sweet Peace, what hast thou there?
Peace.Arguments against persecution for cause of conscience.
Truth.And what there?
Peace.An answer to such arguments, contrarily maintaining such persecution for cause of conscience.
Truth.These arguments against such persecution, and the answer pleading for it, [are] written, as Love hopes, from godly intentions, hearts, and hands, yet in a marvellously different style and manner—the arguments against persecution in milk, the answer for it, as I may say, in blood.
The wonderful providence of God in the writing of the arguments against persecution in milk.
The author of these arguments against persecution, as I have been informed, being committed by some then in power close prisoner to Newgate, for the witness of some truths of Jesus, and having not the use of pen and ink, wrote these arguments in milk, in sheets of paper brought to him by the woman, his keeper, from a friend in London as the stopples of his milk bottle.
In such paper, written with milk, nothing will appear; but the way of reading it by fire being known to this friend who received the papers, he transcribed and kept together the papers, although the author himself could not correct, nor view what himself had written.
It was in milk, tending to soul nourishment, even for babes and sucklings in Christ:—
It was in milk, spiritually white, pure and innocent,like those white horses of the word of truth and meekness, and the white linen or armour of righteousness, in the army of Jesus, Rev. vi. and xix.:—
It was in milk, soft, meek, peaceable, and gentle, tending both to the peace of souls, and the peace of states and kingdoms.
The answer writ in blood.
Peace.The answer, though I hope out of milky pure intentions, is returned in blood—bloody and slaughterous conclusions—bloody to the souls of all men, forced to the religion and worship which every civil state or commonweal agrees on, and compels all subjects to, in a dissembled uniformity:—
Bloody to the bodies, first of the holy witnesses of Christ Jesus, who testify against such invented worships:—
Secondly, of the nations and peoples slaughtering each other for their several respective religions and consciences.