1644.] WILLIAMS EXPOSES PERSECUTION. 61 ever allowed of the validity of the charter of his own civil government until 1656. And we are now to see the cause of it more fully. For Mr. Williams published a book in London that year, which opened the evil of their conduct, beyond any thing he had done before. The title of it is, "The bloody tenet of persecution for the cause of conscience." It appeared to Mr. Cotton to be of so dangerous tendency to them, that he published an answer to it in 1647, which he called, "The bloody tenet washed, and made white in the blood of the Lamb." But Williams replied to it in 1652, and called it, "The bloody tenet yet more bloody, by Mr. Cotton's endeavour to wash it white." And I will give a few extracts from these writings. A prisoner in London wrote some reasons against persecution, which one Hall of Roxbury obtained, and sent it to Mr. Cotton, and he wrote an answer to it. But as Mr. Hall-was not satisfied therewith, he sent it to Mr. Williams, who now published the whole controversy. The prisoner first brought the case which Christ has stated, of the children of his kingdom, and the children of the devil, appearing by their fruits in the field of the world, when he said, "Let both grow together until the harvest." Matt. xiii. 30. 38. And the prisoner said, "the reason seems to be, because they who are tares, may hereafter become wheat; they who are blind, may hereafter see; they who resist him, may hereafter receive him; they who are now in the devil's snare, and averse to the truth, may hereafter come to repentance; they who are now blasphemers and persecutors, as Paul was, may in time become faithful, as he did; they who are now idolaters, as the Corinthians once were, may hereafter become true worshippers, as they did; (1 Cor. vi. 9;) they who are no people of God, nor under mercy, may hereafter become his people, and obtain mercy. 1 Peter ii. 10.* Now, though these things are very plain, yet Mr. Cotton went on for more than forty pages, before he came to the case in hand, which the prisoner said in few words, 'Tares are antichristians or false Christians." And when Mr. Cotton came to this he said, "It is not the will of Christ that antichrist and antichristianity should be tolerated in the world, until the end of the world. For God will put it into the hearts of faithful princes (as they have given their kingdoms to the beast, so) in fulness of time to hate the whore, to leave her desolate and naked, and to burn her flesh with fire. Rev. xvii. 16, 17.' Mr. Williams had before said, "This hating, and desolating, and making naked, and burning, shall not arise by way of ordinance, warranted by the institution of Christ Jesus; but by way of providence, when (as it useth to be with whores and their lovers) the church of Rome and her great lovers shall fall out; and, by the righteous vengeance of God upon her, drunk with the blood of the saints, these mighty fornicators shall turn their love into hatred, which shall make her a poor naked whore, torn and consumed." But Mr. Cotton passed this over in silence. Now if we take the word flesh here to mean riches, it is well known that the King of France did the most to enrich the pope, of any king upon earth; and the French nation have now taken the riches of the church of Rome to support war and vengeance against her, above all others in the world. And is not this according to that prophecy? Of civil government, Mr. Williams says, "The sovereign, original, and foundation of civil power lies in the people; and it is evident that such governments as are by them erected and established, have no more power, nor for no longer time, than the civil power or people consenting and agreeing shall betrust them with. This is clear, not only in reason, but in the experience of all commonweals, where the people are not deprived of their natural freedom by the power of tyrants." Yea, the experience of all America, in her deliverance from the tyranny of Britain, confirms this truth. And as to religion, Mr. Williams says, "Persons may with less sin be forced * Tenet washed, p. 42, 43. † Bloody tenet, p. 246. 1644.] COTTON'S REPLY TO WILLIAMS. 8 63 to marry whom they cannot love, than to worship where they cannot believe.* And I find no answer to this. Mr. Cotton was so far from thinking that he was a persecutor, that he said, "It is not lawful to prosecute any, until after admonition once or twice; and so the apostle directeth, and giveth the reason, that in fundamental points of doctrine or worship, the word of God is so clear, that he cannot but be convinced in conscience of the dangerous error of his way, after admonition once or twice, wisely and faithfully dispensed. And then if any one persist, it is not out of conscience, but against his conscience, as the apostle saith. Titus iii. 10, 11." Upon which Williams says, "Titus, unto whom these directions were written, was no minister of the civil state, armed with the material sword, who might inflict punishments upon the bodies of men, by imprisonments, whipping, fines, banishment, and death. Titus was a minister of the gospel, armed only with the spiritual sword of the word of God, and such spiritual weapons as were mighty through God to the casting down strongholds; yea, every high thought of the highest head and heart in the world. 1 Cor. x. 4." And he observes that the charges and exhortations which Christ gave to his ministers, are now applied to civil magistrates in this affair. But upon this Mr. Cotton says, "Look the answer through, and you shall find not one of the charges or exhortations given to ministers, ever directed by the answerer to civil magistrates: the falsehood of the discusser in this charge upon the answer is palpable and notorious." And yet in this book he says, "the good that is brought to princes and subjects by the due punishment of apostate seducers, idolaters, and blasphemers, is manifold. 1. It putteth away evil from the people, and cutteth off a gangrene, which would spread to further ungodliness. Deut. xiii. 5. 2 Tim. ii. 16-18. 2. It driveth away wolves from worrying and scattering the sheep of Christ; for false teachers be wolves. Matt. vi. 15. Acts xx. 29. And the very name of wolves holdeth † Ibid. p. 36. * Bloody tenet, p. 143. forth what benefit will redound to the sheep, by either killing them, or driving them away."* If any man will take the pains to examine Mr. Cotton's book well, he will find that his main arguments are taken from Scriptures which belong to the church, and not to the state. And that passage in the epistle to Titus, about a heretic condemned of himself, is referred to from one end of his book to the other. And it is implied in the sentence of banishment passed against Mr. Williams, where he is condemned for writing letters against their rulers" before any conviction." This idea the court evidently took from Mr. Cotton, and had great influence in their government. And as Williams denied that Christ had appointed the civil sword as a remedy against false teachers, Cotton said, "it is evident that the civil sword was appointed for a remedy in this case. Deut. xiii. And appointed it was by that angel of God's presence, whom God promised to send with his people, as being unwilling to go with them himself. Exod. xxxiii. 2, 3. And that angel was Christ, whom they tempted in the wilderness. 1 Cor. x. 9. And therefore it cannot truly be said, that the Lord Jesus never appointed the civil sword for a remedy in such case; for he did expressly appoint it in the Old Testament; nor did he ever abrogate it in the New. The reason of the law, which is the life of the law, is of eternal force and equity in all ages: Thou shalt surely kill him, because he hath sought to thrust thee away from the Lord thy God, Deut. xiii. 9, 10. This reason is of moral: that is, of universal and perpetual equity, to put to death any apostate seducing idolater or heretic, who seeketh to thrust away the souls of God's people from the Lord their God."t From hence Williams called his reply, "The bloody tenet yet more bloody by Mr. Cotton's endeavour to wash it white;" from which many extracts are made in the first volume of our history; and also an extract from Dr. Owen, who said, "He who holds the truth may be confuted, but he cannot be convinced but by the truth. That * Tenet washed, p. 88. 137, 138. † Ibid. p. 66, 67. 1646.] OPINIONS OF DR. OWEN. 65 a man should be said to be convinced of a truth, and yet that truth not shine in upon his understanding, to the expelling the contrary error, to me is strange. To be convinced is to be overpowered by the evidence of that which before a man knew not. I once knew a scholar invited to a dispute with another man about something in controversy in religion; in his own, and in the judgment of all the bystanders, the opposing person was utterly confuted and yet the scholar, within a few months, was taught of God, and clearly convinced that it was an error which he had maintained, and the truth which he opposed; and then, and not till then, did he cease to wonder that the other was not convinced by his strong arguments as he before had thought. To say a man is convinced, when either from want of skill and ability, or the like, he cannot maintain his opinion against all men, is a mere conceit. That they are obstinate and pertinacious is a cheap supposal taken up without the price of a proof. As the conviction is imposed-not owned, so is this obstinacy if we may be judges of other men's obstinacy, all will be plain; but if ever they get uppermost, they will be judges of ours."* This the great Dr. Owen published in London the year after Mr. Cotton's book came out there. But it was so little regarded here, that violent methods were still pursed in this country, though against the minds of many. When the commissioners of the united colonies met at New Haven, September 9, 1646, they said, "Upon serious consideration of the spreading nature of error, the dangerous growth and effects thereof in other places, and especially how the purity and power both of religion and civil order is already much complained of, if not wholly lost in part of New England by a licentious liberty granted and settled, whereby many, casting off the rule of the word, profess and practise what is good in their own eyes; and upon information of what petitions have been lately put up in some of the colonies against the good and straight ways of Christ, both in the churches and in the * Folio collection of his tracts, p. 312. |