CHAP. LVII.
Peace.Yea, but he produceth scriptures against such toleration, and for persecuting men for the cause of conscience: “Christ,” saith he, “had something against the angel of the church of Pergamos, for tolerating them that held the doctrine of Balaam, and against the church of Thyatira, for tolerating Jezebel to teach and seduce,” Rev. ii. 14, 20.
Truth.I may answer, with some admiration and astonishment, how it pleased the Father of lights and most jealous God to darken and veil the eye of so precious a man, as not to seek out and propose some scriptures, in the proof of so weighty an assertion, as at least might have some colour for an influence of the civil magistrate in such cases: for—
Toleration. Rev. ii. 14, 20, examined.
First, he saith not that Christ had aught against the city Pergamos, where Satan had his throne, Rev. ii. 14, but against the church at Pergamos, in which was set up the throne of Christ.
Secondly, Christ’s charge is not against the civil magistrate of Pergamos, but the messenger, or ministry, of the church in Pergamos.
Thirdly, I confess, so far as Balaam’s or Jezebel’s doctrinemaintained a liberty of corporal fornication, it concerned the cities of Pergamos and Thyatira, and the angel or officers of those cities, to suppress not only such practices, but such doctrines also: as the Roman emperor justly punished Ovid the poet, for teaching the wanton art of love, leading to and ushering on lasciviousness and uncleanness.
Fourthly. Yet so far as Balaam’s teachers, or Jezebel, did seduce the members of the church in Pergamos or Thyatira, to the worship of the idolaters in Pergamos or Thyatira, which will appear to be the case—I say, so far I may well and properly answer, as himself answered before those scriptures, brought from Luke ix. and 2 Tim. ii., to prove patience and permission to men opposite, viz., “these scriptures,” saith he, “are directions to ministers of the gospel;” and in the end of that passage he adds, “Much less do they speak at all to civil magistrates.”[166]
Christ’s ministers and churches, have power sufficient from Christ to suppress Balaam and Jezebel seducing to false worship.
Fifthly. Either these churches and the angels thereof had power to suppress these doctrines of Balaam, and to suppress Jezebel from teaching, or they had not:—
That they had not cannot be affirmed, for Christ’s authority is in the hands of his ministers and churches, Matt. xvi. and xviii., and 1 Cor. v.
If they had power, as must be granted, then, I conclude, sufficient power to suppress such persons, whoever they were, that maintained Balaam’s doctrine in the church at Pergamos—although the very magistrates themselves of the city of Pergamos (if Christians): and to have suppressed Jezebel from teaching and seducing in the church, had she been lady, queen, or empress, if there were nomore but teaching without hostility. And if so, all power and authority of magistrates and governors of Pergamos and Thyatira, and all submitting or appealing to them in such cases, must needs fall, as none of Christ’s appointment.
The Christian world hath swallowed up Christianity.
Lastly. From this perverse wresting of what is writ to the church and the officers thereof, as if it were written to the civil state and officers thereof, all may see how, since the apostasy of anti-christ, the Christian world (so called) hath swallowed up Christianity; how the church and civil state, that is, the church and the world, are now become one flock of Jesus Christ; Christ’s sheep, and the pastors or shepherds of them, all one with the several unconverted, wild, or tame beasts and cattle of the world, and the civil and earthly governors of them: the Christian church, or kingdom of the saints, that stone cut out of the mountain without hands, Dan. ii. 45, now made all one with the mountain, or civil state, the Roman empire, from whence it is cut or taken: Christ’s lilies, garden, and love, all one with the thorns, the daughters, and wilderness of the world, out of which the spouse or church of Christ is called; and amongst whom, in civil things, for a while here below, she must necessarily be mingled and have converse, unless she will go out of the world, before Christ Jesus, her Lord and husband, send for her home into the heavens, 1 Cor. v. 10.[167]