Of My Sufferings

Section I.

Of my public sufferifigs in general.

IT pleased the Lord, not only to exercise me with personal afflictions, but likewise for purging away and healing of my corruptions, for trial and exercise of my faith, patience, and sincerity, for humbling of me, and for manifesting His purity and holiness, and for confirmation and sealing of God’s truth and ways, to honour me with public sufferings for His name; by being reproached, oppressed, and wronged, intercommuned, troubled with citations before courts on that account, wandering from place to place many times for fear of my life, imprisoned, fined, and banished, and threatened with death itself.

The cause and occasions of my sufferings was, dissenting from, and noncomformity to, the government of prelacy in the Church; for not coming to church to hear such ministers and officers as did officiate by an unlawful (to me) authority; for adhering to the persecuted, deserted party, who stood upon their former ground, cleaving to their former principles; and for taking upon me to preach without the bishop’s authority. This, in short time, exposed me to the last of the laws against dissenters, and malice of the bishops, whose principles, ways, courses, and office, I was convinced were not of God, and by instinct was adverse to. For as to any other thing, whether immorality or sedition, I could not be charged therewith, being as to man unblameable, of sufficiently loyal principles, and kept from having hand in our concurrence with any public insurrection that was; so that there was nothing that could be laid to my charge but as concerning my God and conscience.

It is true, the very profession of religion did expose me to persecution, viz., to reproach and contempt, and made me not willing to bring my cause to their corrupt judicatories, choosing rather to suffer by unprofitable terms of peace, than to bring my cause before them to be heard publicly; for I knew both my person and principles were unfavourable, and therefore doubted much of the issue of my cause.

Hitherto my troubles reached none but myself; but now, being married, they reached others: for within a very few days after we were married, and were preparing to go to the North, a messenger came with a summons to me to appear before the council for keeping of conventicles. The Bishop of Murray, in whose diocy I had preached, and a privy counsellor, for some picque he had at my wife, did cause me this trouble. I was herewith troubled; but my wife’s friends, to whom I communicated the matter, dealt with the messenger to take of his summons, and to lay on a new summons when we were to the North, where we were to be in a day or two, and then indorse on the back of his execution, that he found us not, which would make a new summons necessary; and he did so. My adversaries were enraged at this, and, disdaining to be thus outwitted, caused send one hundred and sixty miles a new summons, which, within two months after we were come North, came to our hand. I was therewith much troubled on my wife’s account, fearing that the public would seize upon anything belonging to her; however, I prayed to the Lord, and sought advice what to do, whether I should answer the council’s citation (as my friends advised me) or not, and take my hazard. The Lord was pleased to clear it to me, that I was not to answer the citation, which light I followed; upon which I

Rev. James Frase?- of Brea. 269

was denounced and outlawed. My wife was very cheerful under this. Within a short time thereafter we came South; and then, understanding who were the authors of my troubles, I thought it wisdom to take them off; and, for this effect, employed such as had greatest influence with the privy counsellor to deal with him to abstain from such a matter and action so far below him. I likewise came myself and spoke to him; and the Lord blessed the means used so effectually, that he fell off, putting all the blame on the bishop, and was ever thereafter a good friend to me; and having the executions delivered him, he would never give them up, by which means they came to nothing, and, finally, were altogether forgotten.

After this there was “silence in heaven for half an hour,” but then the angels of war did sound their trumpets; and amongst other ministers was I sought for, and of new denounced; was many times, while in the South, made to shift my lodging; was frequently in fears and alarms, and preached in great tentations through the lying in wait of enemies; was several times interrupted in the very act of preaching by soldiers that by orders came to apprehend me; I could get no business done. The Lord by this did only manifest His goodness in preserving and delivering me, rendering enemies who did forbid us to preach inexcusable, by this causing them fill up the measure of their iniquities; my spirit by these tossings was rather distempered and jumbled than bettered.

SECTION 11.

Of my being intercommuned.

The bishops, and other wicked men, perceiving all this time that they “laboured in the fire,” for the number of dissenters increased, and the Gospel spread further and further notwithstanding of all the violent means that were used for suppressing it and the professors thereof, they bethink themselves of intercommuning the chief ministers that were most active in preaching, and the chief professors both gentlemen and others, to the number of between three or four hundred in the first or second intercommuning. It was a public writ, served by king and council’s authority, straitly discharging, under highest pains, all his majesty’s subjects to converse or speak with, harbour or receive into their houses, or administer any comfort to, the persons in the writ particularly expressed. This was proclaimed and printed; and thus for naked preaching were we processed as murderers and traitors, for such were only in use to be intercommuned. They thought this would keep the people from us, or force us, finding no shelter, to remove out of the land; and make us as ducks to decoy others, who, could they be proven to have received or harboured us, were fineable at the council’s pleasure, and to be in the same circumstances which we were in ourselves. I was, through the malice of the bishops, put in with others, for they knew that I was against the very hearing of their ministers, and had several times preached in the fields, and was very popular; they imagined also my parts were greater than they were. And, therefore, though some friends dealt that I might not be intercommuned, yet could not prevail; the bishops would have it so.

Although this seemed to be the first storm of persecution that yet had fallen upon us, and that now the adversaries had boasted of an effectual mean for suppressing conventicles, and establishing prelacy and uniformity, and that good people feared it; yet the Lord did wonderfully disappoint them, and made and turned their witty counsels, into folly; for this great noise harmed not at all, it was powder without ball: for, as for myself, never one that cared for me shunned my company; yea, a great many more carnal relations and acquaintances did entertain me as freely as ever they did; yea, so far did the goodness of the Lord turn this to my good, that I observed it was at that time I got most of my civil business expede. And as the Lord preserved myself in this storm, so I did not hear of any intercommuned, or conversers with intercommuned persons, that were in the least prejudiced thereby; nay, this matter of the intercommuning of so many good and peaceable men did but exasperate the people against the bishops the more, and procured to them, as the authors of such rigid courses, a greater and more universal hatred; so that the whole land groaned to be delivered from them.

SECTION III.

Of my first imprisotimetit in the Bass.

Some two years and a half did I continue intercommuned discharging the commission I had received from the Lord Jesus in great weakness, I confess (yet desiring to serve the Lord better, and humbled and grieved upon the account of my great failing), and in manifold tentations through the lying in wait of these who hunted after me. For the bishops knowing that I was a rigid nonconformist, who had not freedom to have any spiritual communion with their church, and that I laboured to keep some halting betwixt two opinions from joining with them, and to divert others from their (supposed by me) most sinful communion; and imagining me to be of some parts, and very active in preaching in the fields, and keeping up the Secession as they called it; they therefore did stir up the king’s council against me, representing me to them as a person of very disloyal principles and practices; so as there was a particular eye upon me, and I was one of the three that a considerable sum of money was proffered for apprehending of, to any person, although nothing could be laid to my charge of sedition or insurrection, but only that I preached without the bishop’s authority, and had influence to keep such of the nation as I had influence upon, or conversed with from going alongst or joining with the public courses established by law. Many attempts were made against me, which for some years I escaped: at last the major of the town of Edinburgh, being solicited by the archbishop, and encouraged and importuned thereto by the promises of great rewards and acknowledgments, did on the Lord’s day night, being the 28th January 1677, by the treachery of a servant-maid whom for money he had corrupted, who, being a servant-maid to a relation in whose house I ordinarily preached, had knowledge of my coming and going; thus betrayed, I was apprehended by the said major about ten o’clock at night, which was the time the maid had appointed him to come to her master’s house where I was for that day, as I was, after supper, recommending the house and family to God by prayer; I was then interrupted and carried to prison. I did not think fit to resist, lest some friends and relations which were with me might be made to suffer.

He who apprehended me went immediately to the archbishop and told him the news of my apprehension, with which the archbishop was greatly rejoiced, and by giving some small token at present, and promises of greater reward, dismissed the major. The archbishop, overjoyed with his imaginary success and prosperity in apprehending me, longed for the next day impatiently, on which, so soon as it did dawn, he (being a counsellor) sent order to the jailor that I should be kept close, and none suffered to have access to me; which was done, until some of the counsellors in a committee met the same night, before whom at five o’clock at night I appeared, where I was examined, and verbally charged as a seditious person, who did rent the Church of Christ, and was very active to make and keep up the schism; as a preacher in field conventicles, which was death by the law; which they gladly would have me acknowledge, as likewise who they were that empowered me to preach: that I was intercommuned, and despised the law so far as I never made any application to be freed from that sentence: and that I was a person of very bad principles, destructive to all government. And thereupon the archbishop, who thereby thought to ensnare me by my own words, inquired, Whether I judged it lawful upon pretence of religion to take up arms against the king’s majesty? This was the sum: and that I kept correspondence with some prisoners in the Bass, which the archbishop confidently averred he knew. These things were not charged upon me all at once, but in a confused way; and many things by way of question. I cannot say of any of the committee of the council but they were all civil and sober persons, of whom, if the instigation and fear of the archbishop had not prevailed with them, I might have been moderately dealt with: but he did, in a bitter invective oration, represent me as a very odious and criminal person to the other counsellors, and aggravated my alleged crimes vehemently. To all which I replied, That I did acknowledge I was (though most unworthy) a minister of the Gospel; and that I indeed preached frequently, as the Lord called me, and independently on the bishop: that the subjects of my discourses and sermons were not disloyal and traitorous principles and assertions, as the archbishop did allege, but, according as I was helped, I preached “repentance towards God, and faith towards Jesus Christ,” and no other thing than what was contained in the Prophets and the New Testament: that I was so far from being terrified or ashamed to own that I was a minister of Christ, that although I was of no despicable extraction, yet that I gloried most in, and counted it the greatest honour I ever attained, to “serve God in the Gospel of His Son:” that I never preached nor stirred up the people to sedition, and was indifferent though the principles of my heart were as visible and perceptible to their Lordships as the external lineaments and tracts of my face, so as they might read what was engraven upon my heart: that for rising up in arms against the king upon pretext or pretence of religion, which the archbishop alleged I maintained, I told him he was therein abused by his inferiors; for I never knew of any, even the most zealous asserters of the liberties of the people, that did maintain rising in arms upon pretence of religion, pretences giving no ground or warrant for any man’s action: that matters of prerogative and privileges were things of a ticklish and thorny nature, and of which for the present I desired not to give my thoughts, not judging the same within my sphere now, nor called to meddle with: that, for such as did ordain me, I was not free to tell them, lest thereby I should bring others to trouble, although I should be most free as to matters

concerning myself: that as I judged it not unlawful to preach the Gospel either in houses or fields as conveniency did offer, but duty, and an ordinance of Christ’s (so far was I from judging those meetings “rendezvouses of rebellion,” as the archbishop termed them), so did I not acknowledge I at any time did preach in the fields; and if they thirsted after my life, to take it away upon that account, they could not expect I should give or reach the weapon wherewith to destroy myself, or that I should be either witness or accuser against myself in a matter the law had made so criminal; and, therefore, for them to seek their proof and evidence elsewhere than from myself, for I was resolved none living should be able to make me guilty of such a weakness: that as for correspondence with any in the Bass, which the archbishop alleged, I declared, that notwithstanding the bishop’s bold and confident asserting the contrary, there was no such thing; and, if there were, I should be content to suffer the severest punishments: I denied the charge of schism, and left it to be proven by the bishop: that for my intercommuning, I was then sevenscore miles off when it was passed, and knew not of it, till I saw my name in the printed papers, and so could not prevent it; and, after I was intercommuned, I could not get any person that would so much as draw a petition up for me, being strictly charged to the contrary; and that from this, and fear of futher prejudice, and not from the contempt of the law, it was that I did not move to have myself taken out of the letters of intercommuning. In this and in all the premises I was free and ingenuous with them; that I came not to justify my breeding before their Lordships, for I acknowledged I was a rude man (for one of the Lords challenged me of unmannerliness and ill-breeding, that gave not the archbishop his titles.) And, finally, That I was now in their Lordships’ power, and ready to submit to whatsoever their Lordships should determine concerning me.

After this I was remanded to prison again, but ordered to be kept more straitly than formerly: for my pockets were searched for letters, knives; ink, paper, and pen, were taken and kept from me; all company discharged: which filled me with some melancholy apprehensions. But in my darkness was the Lord a light round about me; Him they could not shut out from me: for that night did I get a most kindly and comfortable visit from the Lord Jesus, and I had one of the most sweet nights I had for ten years before that; and lifted up, by the sense of the Lord’s love and favour, above death, sin, hell, wrath, prelates, and Papists, about one or two o’clock in the morning I fell in a sound sleep, until a little before six o’clock, I was awakened by one of the jailors, who cried to me to make myself ready against six o’clock to go to the Bass, for so the council had determined: which I very cheerfully obeyed; and so, with another person that was prisoner with me, was I by a guard of twelve horse and thirty foot convoyed to the Bass, where wre safely landed upon Wednesday morning (being one night by the way), and were delivered to the custody of the officer of that place, who commanded as governor therein a garrison of some eighteen or twenty soldiers.

The Bass is a very high rock in the sea, two miles I drstant from the nearest point of the land which is south ‘of it; covered it is with grass on the uppermost parts thereof, where is a garden where herbs grow, with some cherry trees, of the fruit of which I several times tasted. Below which garden there is a chapel for divine service; but in regard no minister was allowed for it, the ammunition of the garrison was kept therein. Landing here is very difficult and dangerous, for, if any storm blow, ye cannot enter because of the violence of the swelling ‘waves, which beat with a wonderful noise upon the rock, and sometimes in such a violent manner, that the broken waves, reverberating on the rock with a mighty force, have come up over the walls of the garrison on the court before the prisoners’ chambers, which is above twenty cubits height: and with a full sea must you land: or, if it be ebb, you must be either cranned up, or climb with hands and feet up some steps artificially made on the rock, and must have help besides of those who are on the top ot the rock, who pull you up by the hand. Nor is there any place of landing but one about the whole rock, which is of circumference some three quarters of a mile: here you may land in a fair day and full sea without great hazard, the rest of it on every side being so high and steep. Only, on the south side thereof the rock falls a little level, where you ascend several steps till you come to the governor’s house, and from that some steps higher you ascend to a level court, where a house for prisoners and soldiers is; whence likewise, by windings cut out of the rock, there is a path leading you to the top of the rock, whose height doth bear off all north, east, and west storms, lying open only to the south: and on the uppermost parts of the rock their is grass sufficient to feed twenty or twenty-four sheep, which are there very fat and good. In these uppermost parts of the rock were sundry walks of some threescore foot length, and some very solitary, where we sometimes entertained ourselves. The accessible places were defended with several walls and cannon placed on them, which compassed only the south parts. The rest of the rock, is defended by nature, by the huge height and steepness of the rock, being some forty cubits high in the lowest place. It was a part of a country gentleman’s inheritance, which falling from hand to hand and changing many masters, it was at last bought by the king, who repaired the old houses and walls, and built some new houses for prisoners; and a garrison of twenty or twenty-four soldiers therein are sufficient, if courageous, to defend it from millions of men, and only expugnable by hunger. It is commanded by a lieutenant, who does reap thereby some considerable profit, which, besides his pay, may be one hundred pounds a year and better. There is no fountain-water therein, and they are only served with rain that falls out of the clouds, and is preserved in some hollow caverns digged out of the rock. Their drink and provisions are carried from the other side by a boat, which only waits on the garrison, and hath a salary of six pounds yearly for keeping up the same, besides what they get of those persons that come either to see the prisoners, or are curious to see the garrison. Here fowls of several sorts are to be found, which build in the clefts of the rock, the most considerable of which is the Solan-goose, whose young, well fledged, ready to fly, are taken, and so yield near one hundred pounds yearly, and might be much more were they carefully improved.

To this melancholy place I came, and continued there in prison for two years and a half; for I came in January 1677, and came out in July 1679. And here I had likewise experience of the goodness of God towards me; and (1), In providing for me, without being chargeable to any for such things as I stood in need of. (2) In preserving and supporting me under great pressures of spirit from sin, sufferings, tentations, griefs, sorrows, and untenderness of brethren and friends so as I was not therewith overwhelmed. (3) In preserving me in health all that time. (4) That in this time, partly by selling household-plenishing and improving of my estate, I paid and cleared one hundred pounds of debts. (5) I had the comfort and edification of fellow-prisoners, both ministers and others, some there before me, and others brought in since my coming, whose company was sweet and edifying many times to me. (6) We had liberty, for the most part, of taking the air up the hill; my solitary walks were sometimes very pleasant to me. (7) I had the comfort of friends that came in kindness to see us from the city and country. (8) I had some special visits from God, ordinarily in private duties, and sometimes iri worshipping and conference with others. (9) Some increase (I think) I found in gifts, knowledge, and grace; some further discoveries of the knowledge of Christ and the Gospel I never had before, (to) I was made some way useful by writing of letters abroad, praying with, and preaching to, and conference with others. (11) And that I had a cleanly unexpected deliverance from this sad place. (12) Some improvement I made of this price that was put in my hand through grace that helped me: this I think I was bound to take notice of, and be thankful for to the Lord.

As for my exercises here, and improvement of my time; I judged, when I first came here, that I was called to some work and improvement of this price put in my hand: and therefore did I (1), Exercise myself in lamenting my sins, and misspent life, and great shortcoming. (2) I laboured after, and desired some further knowledge of God and Christ and grace, and to glorify God in my sufferings. Some hours, morning and evening and mid-day, I spent in meditation, in praising, in reading the Scripture, for keeping up and increasing communion with God, and increase of grace, and this constantly; besides several fast-days, which were my sweetest seasons and best times. (4) Every day I read the Scriptures, exhorted and taught therefrom, did sing Psalms, and prayed with such of our society as our masters did allow and permit to worship God together, and this two times a day. (5) I studied Hebrew and Greek, and gained some knowledge in these Oriental languages. (6) I likewise read some divinity, and wrote a Treatise of Faith, with some other miscellanies, and several letters to Christian friends and relations. Thus I spent my time, and not without some fruit.

But prisons must be prisons, and all afflictions, though never so well sweetened, will be in some measure grievous. Though the Lord was pleased to “stay his rough wind in the day of his east wind,” and to put a very light yoke upon our necks; yet was it still a yoke, and some bitter ingredients were mixed in this cup, something of the gall and vinegar we found, both that the Lord might discover and manifest to the world the cruel and unclean nature of the spirit of prelacy, and that our patience and faith might be the better exercised, and our faithfulness to Christ, and, finally, to wean us from the world, and sweeten to us the love of God in supporting under such troubles and delivering us out of them. For (1), It could not be but sad to me and my brethren to think that we were cast out of the vineyard, and become useless, our commission taken from us, and could not glorify God as we had done. (2) Absence from natural and civil relations and friends was bitter, whose company was sweet, and which now we could not enjoy. Now we might say, “Lover and friend hast thou removed from us,” Psalm lxxxviii. ult. (3) The company of the ungodly, to whose hands we were delivered, and who ruled over us, who knew nothing of God, but were enemies to Him, was grievous; that we lived among lions, wolves, and serpents, and dwelt in the tents of Kedar. (4) It was then the “days of old, when the candle of God shined upon our tabernacle, when my wife, children, and relations were about me; when I went with the multitude that kept’ holy days:” then (I say) did these things of old come and assault my remembrance with a sensible affecting grief. (5) Our own servants were turned out from us, and we made to seek servants whom we knew not; but this turned to our good and great advantage. (6) The great comfort that we had in worshipping of God together, and in eating together, was taken away from us by the folly and fears of some, and envy and malice of others, who grudged us this comfort, and who ruled us, and made us separate in worship and diet, and would not suffer us to come together, whereby our expenses were much increased, and we deprived of the benefit of the variety of gifts. (7) Our letters that came to us, or were sent by us, were all looked many times, though they had no orders for it. (8) Our drink was dear and exceeding bad, and we behoved to take it from our governors, and pay exorbitantly for it. (9) Sometimes, when they would take it in their heads, they would shut us all close up, and not suffer any of us to speak to another, and this not only without, but contrary to the council’s orders, who committed us free prisoners, and to have the liberty of the rock. This unwarranted restraint did sometimes afflict us, but our patience overcame it. (10) They vexed us by mixing in our company, and there blaspheming sometimes and other times seeking to ensnare us by the words of our lips, and tabling discourse of public matters, which, seeing their malicious ends, we shunned, (n) They laboured to debauch our servant-maids, the governor’s son offering ten shillings to a soldier if he could get such a person with child who served some of us, of purpose to reflect upon us, and which he effected, and was thereupon by the soldier challenged for his promise; insomuch that we could hardly get a servant-maid to wait upon us. (12) They by force and power kept the poor soldiers and others from conversing with or hearing us on the Lord’s day, although the poor creatures would gladly have heard us. (13) At the same time, likewise, I was very untenderly handled by some false brethren engaged in the same public cause with ourselves. (14) We were sometimes in winter and spring very hardly put to it for want of victuals and drink, insomuch that we had no other than snow water or corrupted water sprinkled over with a little oatmeal to drink, and some dry fish. These with other things made our lives something, and at some times, bitter to us.

We continued thus some of us two years and a half. While the archbishop lived, no intermission or mediation of friends could get me out, although several means were tried, which all proved ineffectual, the council not accepting the engagements I would give, wrhich were no other than compearing when called; and I refusing their terms, which were, that I should not preach in the fields any more, and that I should live peaceable and orderly according to law. Yet the Lord was pleased to answer my mind in some measure, that I should come out and be delivered, and that by giving great liberty and freedom to pray for it, and, assuring and filling my soul with the hopes and faith of it although for a great while I could not pray for my deliverance. At another time the Lord was pleased to renew my commission to preach the Gospel, even a year before I was delivered, which made mc think and write to my friends that I should be delivered. And, lastly, I was made (from Jonah ii. ult., “And God spake to the fish, and it vomited Jonah on the dry land”) to believe that the Lord would speak to this rock to give me with others of my brethren up; and, accordingly, when the fulness of the time came, I was delivered, even then when we all judged it most desperate; “at evening it was light.” For after the unhappy, rash, and unadvised attempts at Both well of some well-meaning people for recovering of their liberties, and shaking off the yoke of prelacy, and that our strength was broken and gone, such of us as were prisoners expecting every day when we should be brought out to be a sacrifice to the fury they were then in; behold, at that time did the Lord incline the heart of the king (out of what design we cannot certainly tell) to grant an Indulgence, and withal to command and order that such prisoners as were not in accession to the late rebellion should be set at liberty, or who were sentenced merely for nonconformity. Upon which we were taken out of the Bass, and carried, to the number of eight or nine of us, to the Tolbooth of Edinburgh; for though the king’s orders did require we should be freely set at liberty, yet would not the council let us go until we gave security to appear when called, under the penalty of five hundred and sixty pounds. There were about fourteen of us prisoners at the time, and in twenty-four hours’ space we found security for eight hundred pounds; for we would not give obligement not to rise in arms, nor to forbear field-meetings, because we saw no law for it, and because it was conceived by us dishonourable, and to reflect upon our ministry. Forth we came, and were set at liberty, to the joy of our friends; and, while at liberty, I preached once every Lord’s day, lived a wandering unsettled life. Whatever family I came to, I laboured to be something useful there. I looked to my affairs, paid two thousand merks of debts at that time, and so continued until November 1681, that I with my cautioners were cited to appear before the council for preaching, as afterwards ye shall hear.

SECTION IV.

Of my second imprisonment in Edinburgh and Blackness.

Now begun persecution to increase and wax hot against Dissenters; some ministers were taken and sent to the Bass; the liberty the king had given for preaching, partly because it was not universally accepted but by some contemned, and partly by the prelates’ persuasion, was recalled by the king. And when they had gotten us to forbear meetings in fields in hope of liberty to meet in houses, the king, who gave his indulgence but during pleasure recalled and discharged his grant, and ordained the execution of the laws against Dissenters; and we, being out of the road of field-meetings, could never fall into it again. But though we did forbear field-conventicles, when once they had got us from that, they drove us from house-conventicles too. The Duke of York, being then in Scotland, did much concur with the prelates against Dissenters, so that never one of us that ever appeared had any favour shown to us; and Dissenters were as much put to it as ever. Being South, as I returned I preached in a barn, to a good number of people on a Lord’s day. The council got word of this, and it was informed against me that I preached in the fields, so that orders were given to cite me and my surety both to appear before the council; but being informed better, and perceiving it was only a house-conventicle, their citation slept, and only spoke to my cautioner who was there, and who, short while thereafter, coming

North, found me lying sick of an ague; and told me howmatters went, and that he was purposed to write to the Bishop of Edinburgh and the Lord Advocate concerning my case, and that I was very sick: which I earnestly dissuaded him from; for, I said, If the prelates hear I am sick, they will certainly cause cite me, in hopes that either I cannot appear, being sick, and so fall in the forfeiture of my bond of five hundred and sixty pounds, which they would gladly be in hands with; or if I would appear, I might thereby endanger my life. This, indeed, I thought; but my surety would not be counselled by me, but acquainted the bishop of my sickness, and that I preached not in the fields. The bishop no sooner received this letter, and by which he understood of my sickness, but incontinently he revives the citation, his brother being clerk to the council. Some prejudice they had at my surety, a gentleman of good estate, and who was judged something whiggish; for he had been engaged in one thousand seven hundred pounds sterling for nonconformist ministers, and besides was of a name very odious to some great men. They thought (as was supposed) I wrould not appear, being sick, and the day of my appearance in the very dead time of winter, the twenty-second of December, upon which they would cause my surety forfeit his bond. A citation was directed North, of which we heard word about the beginning of November, and did think fit to prevent the same. Many of my friends counselled me rather to forfeit the money than to go, for both they and myself had some apprehensions that the council intended to have my life; for it was a time wherein the council was in a very bad humour, and at the very same time had found Lord Argyll guilty of treason for that which truly to us, that knew not the law, seemed to have no affinity therewith, and to some of the chief lawyers of note likewise. Moreover, I knew that preaching in the fields was death by the law to the minister; and that the law declared, That if any person stood without to hear, though the minister and body of the people were within doors, that such a meeting was a field-meeting; and it was impossible for me to hinder or know when persons were without, and I thought it hard to shut doors upon them, and had not freedom to do it. And besides all this, I was informed some notes of my sermon were in the council’s hands, and thereupon intended to stage me and process me criminally; and I knew not what they might make of popular discourses, though never so honestly meant. All these things made myself and friends have some fear of the danger of my life; but notwithstanding, getting my head above the fear of death and power of men, I resolved upon all hazards, and to venture to appear; and I was much encouraged in this by my sudden and unexpected recovery (and that without any means) of an ague that I kept but six weeks in all. I not only recovered, but was so strengthened, that I durst undertake a journey of such a length and so bad way in the midst of winter; and truly I found the Lord so gracious, that though I had been sick short while before, and that the weather was very bad, yet was I kept from any prejudice, and came the day before that of my appearance to Edinburgh in good health, and my surety with me. And the day of my appearance happened to be the next day or second after the Earl of Argyll’s escape, which did much put them in a bad humour. The council was surprised (as it seemed to me) when I appeared: and after some astonishment and silence, an indictment was commanded to be read against me, charging me with preaching in the fields and without authority, and finally charging me with venting of principles that were pernicious, seditious, and rebellious, and tending to alienate the minds of his

Majesty’s subjects from his government, and therefore ought to be severely punished to the terror of others. The advocate for the king did refer all to my oath. And being commanded by the President to depone whether I had preached any in houses or in fields since I came from the Bass; and a few days respite to answer to the indictment, which I humbly and earnestly sought, in regard that I had a tedious long journey, bad weather, long sickness before, and my spirit disordered, that I could not give so satisfying an answer as otherwise I would, and that I had come but yesterday to town, and had not time to consider the indictment (having never seen the same nor heard it till it was read); I say, this respite being denied, I told them that I was ready to swear that I was innocent of what I was charged with in the indictment, and therefore desired I might have liberty to speak for myself, which was granted. Then did I discourse to them, a large half-hour (without being interrupted) in answer to what I was charged with. My design in this was to prevent the torment of their questions, and likewise to state the true grounds of our sufferings, and vindicate myself and others of the imputations laid upon us by our enemies. The sum of what I said was: After hearty and humble thanks returned for the liberty of speaking for myself, I protested. That I endeavoured to discharge what I conceived my duty with as little offence to authority as I could; and that, were the things I was called in question about such as I could come and go upon, relating only to my own person or interest in the world, I should be loath to be heard with their Lordships, but refer myself and these things wholly to their disposal: That I should be short, ingenuous, and clear, in my answer for myself: That to the first and second head of preaching without authority and in the fields, I had acknowledged I had preached, and was neither ashamed or terrified to own this; but that I preached not in the fields since I came out of the Bass, nor yet without authority, seeing I was called by God and such of His servants as I verily did believe had power from Christ for that effect; and, therefore, was the first part of my indictment elided and answered: That as to my preaching seditious principles, I might, with a good conscience, deny it; and because that both myself and others were slandered and defamed as persons of disloyal and anti-magistratical principles, I should therefore give an account of what principles were maintained by myself and them, and what my practices were: That as to doctrines, and dogmatical points, and articles of religion, my faith was contained in, and according to, the Scriptures of the” Old and New Testament; that I was of the reformed Protestant religion, and did approve, and was ready to subscribe to that Confession of Faith in King James his time, and ratified (I supposed) by the present current Parliament: That as to the King’s Majesty’s authority and power, I acknowledge magistracy an ordinance of God, and the present King’s authority, whose subject and servant I was, and obliged to submit to, reverence and esteem, whom, for anything relating to my person or estate, I never was resolved to resist; but how far his power extended, or in what subject it was first placed, or how conveyed, I thought not so much my part as that of lawyers to determine. For the king’s power in ecclesiastical matters, I acknowledged the persons of ministers and other ecclesiastical persons subject to him; and that he had a jurisdiction civil, reaching to not only civil but likewise spiritual things, which he was to judge, that so he might, as the nursing-father of the Church, either encourage, or punish, or restrain in a coercive way, and that not implicitly, relying on

the judgment of, or seeing with others’ eyes; and that he might call synods when and where he pleased, and propose his mind to them, whose duty it not only was, but wisdom, to take the magistrate’s concurrence when it might be had; but that it was undeniable this power of the magistrate’s was not privative of any intrinsical power of the Church, granted to her by Christ, for preserving and edifying of herself; which, therefore, in case of the magistrate’s opposition to the truth, or want of access to him through distance of place or other casual emergencies they might exercise without him, as was clearly seen in the times of the Heathen, Arian, and Roman emperors. That as to the government of the Church, it was true that I did not close with that form of government by archbishops and bishops now established in the kingdom, and therefore could never concur with or submit to the same any manner of way; but whatever my dissatisfaction therewith was, or opposition thereto, I never opposed it but with spiritual weapons. And as for my practice, I can say, I have endeavoured to keep a good conscience, both before God and men, to live unblameable and peaceably, giving “to God what was God’s, and to Cesar what was Cesar’s;” was never in any insurrection, rebellion, or conspiracy against his Majesty’s person or goverment, nor never stirred up others thereto, but rather to live peaceably, and by repentance, reformation, testimony for God, quietness and confidence, and other spiritual means, to expect deliverance; not by irritating of the rulers, to make their bonds heavier, by taking the sword, and resisting by force; and this both publicly in sermons and privately in discourses. These, therefore, being our principles, which we are not ashamed of, but ready to defend, it is a wonder to me how I or any sober person of our way come to be challenged for seditious principles and practices, or charged with them. If these principles be innocent, then is the second and great part of my libel, referred to my oath, elided. And, finally, I prayed the Lord to bless his Majesty with all His blessings, both spiritual and temporal; that he might be a terror to evil-doers, an encouragement to the good; that the throne might be established in righteousness.

After this discourse, to which they hearkened very patiently, I was asked, Whether I preached since I came out of the Bass? To which I replied, I would answer to what I was charged with in my libel or indictment, which was not that I preached, but that I preached without authority, and seditiously; which I did deny. They inquired me very earnestly and pressingly, Who ordained me? I told them, I could not be free to tell them, seeing it concerned others whom I was not to stage; but that I had lawful and good authority, and that their Lordships could not compel me to answer to that matter: nor judged I myself bound to answer thereto, because it was res hactenus judicata, for which

I was formerly questioned, and satisfied the law for; and, therefore, could not now again be called in question for the same fault. And, seeing that my commission to preach was before the act of grace, any crime therein (if any was) was by the act of grace purged: and, besides, the same not being in my indictment, I was not bound to answer thereto. I was removed; and after some debate among themselves (for many of the counsellors wrere much taken with my discourse and defence I made, and voted that I might be let go), the matter being left to the bishops, I was called in, and received the following sentence: To be sent to prison to Blackness, and to continue there until I paid the fine of five thousand merks, and give security not to preach any more, or go off the kingdom. And my guard was ready to convey me to be sent to the common jail of Edinburgh, and there to remain.

Many of the bystanders (for there were multitudes there) were surprised at the severity of the sentence; yea, some of the privy council talked publicly, that I had met with hard measure. Well, I came to the jail, and had a chamber the best in the prison; the keeper and under-keepers of the prison of Edinburgh were very discreet and civil; I had abundance of visits every day from some good people and persons of quality. When I first came, I examined my ways and carriage, and found matter both of humiliation and thanksgiving unto the Lord: I saw ground to bless God that I vindicated the Lord’s people from the aspersions cast upon them of bad principles; I boldly and freely, to the conviction of all, owned our principles; and I likewise desired not only to speak for myself, but to honour God; I saw ground of humiliation for many failings in me, which did confound me; yet was glad if the Gospel did not receive prejudice by me. I got little good done; for I ordinarily slept till seven in the morning; and after supper, which was at eight o’clock, I was drowsy; and all day over I was diverted with visits: yet I got my speech written, and some letters, and preached twice every Lord’s day to the prisoners, and some few who were

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suffered to come in. Twice did I supplicate for my liberty while I was in Edinburgh, but could not obtain it, because of the bishops and the clerk of the council, the bishop’s brother, who wras my great enemy, though I never disobliged him in my lifetime.

After I had continued six weeks in Edinburgh, I was sent to Blackness, convoyed by four or five gentlemen of the guard, where I continued seven weeks. Ignorance, youth, and fear of man, made the governor of this place not so discreet as otherwise he would be to me. For, first, he kept me in a manner a close prisoner; another had still the key of my chamber, though I could command him to come and open it when I pleased, and which was not according to the council’s order. Next, he would be frequently drunk, and then was guilty of some extravagancies; he likewise kept back many of my friends from coming to see me, which did pique me at him: and the first night he was so indiscreet, as to put me into a gousty, cold, wide, dark, filthy, smoky room, where I could not have lived six days, if I had therein continued, for smoke, darkness, melancholy, and cold, although at the same time he had better rooms: but his lady, though a child not above fourteen years, and another gentleman that came along with me, prevailed so far with him as to change my room, and then was I very well. Here I continued seven weeks, doing little good, but longing and praying for deliverance out of that sad place, which the Lord thus brought to pass. My brother-in-law, unknown to me, presented a supplication to the council in my behalf, desiring my fine might be remitted, myself ordered to be set at liberty, some competent time allowed me to settle my affairs in Scotland, seeing I was content to submit to their Lordships’ sentence of banishment. Which supplication (the Duke of York and Bishop with his brother being away and gone to England) was easily granted by the council: an order was sent to the governor of Blackness immediately to set me at liberty: a month was given me to settle my affairs; whereupon I was much sooner than I thought set at liberty, and at a time when I little thought of it, and my liberty burdened with no clog or sinful engagement by my cautioner, who only bound that I should remove out of the kingdom (and not return without king or council’s leave) within such a day.

section v.

Of my Banishment.

I did not know anything of what my friends had done for me, nor could blame them for what they had done. The terms were honest upon which I was to come out; liberty was desireable, though in a strange country, and preferable to imprisonment at home. I looked upon wicked folk, though Scotsmen, as the greatest aliens, foreigners, and strangers to me; a godly man in England or Ireland is more my countryman than a wicked Scotsman. Besides, by being at liberty, I should be in greater capacity to glorify the Lord than under restraint, where I could not see a godly person, nor be anywise useful save by a few letters. And I saw much of the mercy of God, that without paying a fine, or engaging to any sinful terms, the council should have given orders for my liberation.

But notwithstanding of all this, when I thought upon my case, banishment was grievous and burdensome to me: shall I leave then (said I) my native country; shall I leave, and never see mother, children, brethren, sisters, and kindly friends and relations, and spend the residue of my days among strangers, to whom I will be as a barbarian? What care will they take of me? how shall I be maintained? Will any little thing, that after payment of debts my estate can spare, be sufficient for me to live upon in a place where all things are at a dear rate? Truly all those considerations, and such like, did make banishment no light thing to bear, and wish that I never had come out of prison, and in my heart to censure and think hardly of these who procured me my liberty; yea, such thoughts would for some whole nights keep me waking.

But, addressing myself to the Lord, and pouring out my troubled soul (as it was ordinary for me to do in such cases) to the Lord, I found that this storm calmed; and the consideration of God’s providence over and propriety in all places, experience of former favours, and especially that word, “Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life,” did sweetly stay my heart. And being made and called of God to wander from my fathers house, and land of my nativity, to a land God would show me, I laboured to fit myself for my journey, and to “take up my cross:” and the Lord so blest my endeavours, as in a short time I settled all my civil affairs, and was ready to come away at the time prefixed.

So as, leaving Scotland and all friends there, I directed my course for London about the latter end of May 1682; and after some stops, and dangers by sea, I safely arrived there June 16th 1682. My voyage was much alleviated, by the company of another countryman who came alongst with me, whose company was much satisfying to me. I brought not above twenty pounds of silver and gold with me to London, but the Lord I found was with me in all places where I was driven; for I had both meat and wages. I did resolve, indeed, as sensible of my own weakness, to forbear preaching, and any public work; as likewise, to settle myself after long and great tossings, to improve, in a private abstract station, my spiritual condition. But God did thwart this; for the more I endeavoured this way, the worse I became: and likewise, at the same time, I had calls to preach at several places, some of which I closed with, and found more of spiritual good and advantage to my soul than in private exercises. Wherefore I resolved to follow that way, and did every night preach and pray in a private family, where some five or six neighbours at night did ordinarily resort; every Lord’s day I preached to a gathered church in fellowship with Mr C., from whom I had ten shillings for every sermon; at other times I likewise preached to others, but freely. And truly the Lord gave me to find both great favour and respect from the English, and more than many others did, and whom I found to be as genteel, tender-hearted, and generous people as ever I conversed with. Some of them I found very notional, and much taken up with fancies, dreams, and singular opinions: of these I found some favourable at the beginning; but despairing to gain me to their opinion, and finding the aversion of my heart to these fancies, they became my enemies, and did labour to break my reputation as much as they could. I lived the first seven months upon my own charges for all things; but afterwards I had a call from a widow-gentlewoman to stay in her family, to pray and sometimes exhort and preach. From her I had lodging and diet free, and in whose house I prayed, read, and expounded Scripture twice a-day; and thus continued till the 21st of July 1683, that I was apprehended, and imprisoned in Newgate for six months, for refusing the Oxford oath.

SECTION VI.

Of my third imprisonment.

Upon the 20th or 21st July 1683, about the time that a plot against the king’s person and government was discovered, and some three or four days after my Lord Russel’s execution; at ten o’clock I was expeding a certain business with a gentleman in Cheapside, and one Mr A., one of the king’s messengers, searching for suspected persons in that very house where I was, and particularly for one Mr Sands, meeting me as I came down, and knowing me to be a stranger, and suspecting me as some disaffected person, did presently secure me by a constable, and brought me to his own house, kept me a close prisoner some five or six hours, and thereafter brought me before some of the council: there were the king, the Duke of York, L.K., L.S., and some others I know not. After some frivolous immaterial questions relating to my nation, and when I came here, where I lodged, and some others of that nature, I was asked, What I knew or heard of a plot against his majesty at any time? I replied, That I knew nothing of a plot against his majesty’s person or government, nor heard anything but what was discovered since that plot did break out, nor knew nor heard anything I could make them the wiser by; that I was no public person, nor frequenter of cabals or coffee-houses; that I know not any one person, either accusers or accused, in that plot; that I always lived peaceably, and was never accessory to any plot or insurrection that ever was; that in my judgment (which I declared) I was against all violent attempts against his majesty or government; and that it was not likely any who had such designs, knowing my principles, would communicate ought to me of it; yea, that I always shunned discourses of that nature. Thereafter I was asked by his majesty, What I judged of the Archbishop of St Andrew’s murder, whether I judged it so or not? I answered, That for myself I had no accession thereto, but was very grieved when I heard it; and I would not justify or have had any hand in it for the whole world: so for me to condemn it as (and to declare it) murder, was I not free; for being a doer of the law only, and not a judge of the law, I conceived it as out of my sphere to give judgment of another person’s actions, whether they were murderers or not: that this I confessed belonged to his majesty and officers of justice, who were judges of the law, but to me it did not; especially being a stranger to the fact, and legal evidences of the nature, manner, and circumstances of the same not being adduced, it was hard for me or any person to give judgment one way or other of the said fact. ilnd for my thoughts of it, that God had appointed a solemn court at the last day for judging of actionSj wordsp and thoughts, before, which court alone it was competent (I thought) to give account of thoughts; and, therefore, referring myself as to my thoughts to that court only, I was not free to give account to any human judicatory whatever of them; to whom yet I heartily submitted in the expressions and actions to be judged. And, finally, Though I was not afraid his majesty knew what were my thoughts in the matter, yet would not be a precedent to any of his subjects to be made to give an account of thoughts judicially, especially relating to other persons; and, therefore, to have me excused. Then the king was pleased to ask me, Whether I judged myself bound by the solemn league and covenant? and whether I thought there was anything of moral obligation therein? I answered, that for my part, I never took that covenant, nor was it ever tendered to me; but what was of moral import in it, I judged I was bound thereto, although I myself never took it; and that, however, the words of the decalogue and the covenant were not the same, yet might the covenant, be reduced to it, as materially

the same with the decalogue: that I remembered two chief articles of the covenant, the one was “reformation of our hearts and lives according to the Word of God;’? and this I thought might be easily reduced to every precept of the decalogue, each of which tied us to reformation and repentance. Another article I conceived to be in the covenant las, That we should “maintain and defend the king’s just privileges, his person, and government:” and this, as I judged, might easily be reduced to the decalogue; so did I judge myself by the Word of God, laws of the land, yea, and covenant itself, though never taken by me personally, bound to. After this I was asked some questions concerning my acquaintance with several persons, as Mr Fergusson, the Cesnocks, Mr Munro, Mr Baillie of Jerviswood, and others; to which I gave a true, full, ingenuous answer, and was after commanded to remove. What were their thoughts of me, I know not; but it seems they were satisfied I was not in the plot, nor could tell them ought of it, and that I dealt ingenuously with them: and yet were not willing to let me go so, but

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referred me to the lord mayor, and ordered him to put the oath of allegiance, supremacy, and Oxford oath to me.

The next day, therefore, I appeared before the lord mayor, and was much grieved and troubled that my trials should be stated on the oaths of allegiance and supremacy: for I had neither clearness to take them both, especially the oath of supremacy; nor yet was I so willing to suffer upon the account of refusing them, as being a dark case to me. But, when the messenger told me I was ordered to take the three oaths, my heart was very glad, as being very clear to suffer for refusing the Oxford oath; wherein a man is bound, besides other things, not to endeavour to make any alteration in the government either in state or church, which I thought hard to swallow. Wherefore, when asked by my lord mayor, whether I would take the said oaths, after I had asked whether Queen Elizabeth’s explication might be read to me, and proposed some reasons why I conceived myself not bound by law to take the said oaths, and overruled therein; at last my answers did issue in this, That as for the oath of allegiance, I was willing to take it, so that it would end the strife; for the oath of supremacy I demurred upon it, until I advised better; and for the Oxford oath, I simpliciter refused it presently: but, if I had not benefit by the oath of allegiance, I would take none of them at all; and in the meantime desired, if they committed me, to do it upon refusing the Oxford oath: which carried by the Lord mayor’s indulgence, and Sir J. E., who spake in my favours very much against the common Serjeant’s mind, who pressed much that I should be committed for refusing all the oaths. So an order was drawn, and I sent to Newgate.

In Newgate I continued six 1 unary months, or twenty-four weeks. Here I had experience of the Lord’s goodness and mercy, which did never leave me. I had, short while after I came, one of the best rooms in the prison, in which any person might lodge; a large, cleanly, lightsome, square room it was, and off the ground as ye come in. The captain and under-keepers were all very civil to us, carrying both wisely and discreetly. I kept my health very well all the time I was there. We had comfortable fellowship with fellow-prisoners, who might see one another all day; some I perceived notional, unlearned, yet obstinate. I stood at the greatest distance with free-willers; but such as I had greatest converse with were those of our own persuasion, who were truly the most sober and learned that were there. In general, I found all of them civil. We were abundantly refreshed and supplied by numbers of all ranks and persuasions (save Quakers) that came in to see us. We wanted nothing. So that I could hardly call it suffering. Only this was sad to us, and which made me desirous to be gone and at liberty, that (1), We had no occasion of doing good to others, for we preached none while there; for we were not suffered, nor others to come in to us. (2) It was grievous to me especially, that I had no occasions nor opportunities for retirement; for having a chamber-fellow with me, and all day oppressed with visitants, I could not in the twenty-four hours command one for myself. Wherefore I did little or no good here, and got as little; only I gave my testimony for Christ, and had experience of the Lord’s goodness. When the number of my weeks were fulfilled, I was without further work put at liberty, the turnkey getting word only from the captain to set me at liberty, and let me out when I pleased. So taking my leave of the captain, and thanking him for his civilities, I came out; my expenses in all not reaching above twenty pounds.

SECTION VII.

Observations upon my sufferings.

(1) That such as will live godly in the world must and will suffer persecution, for the trial and exercise of their faith and patience, purging away of their dross, and for weaning their hearts from a present world, and for confirmation of the truth, 2 Tim. iii. 12; 1 Pet. iv. 12; John

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xv. 3. (2) Although at some times there will be more or less of persecution, yet there is no time in which the saints shall be without daily crosses; for a wicked world will persecute with the tongue, even in Abraham’s family where piety did obtain, Gal. iv. 28, 29; Gen. xxi. 9. Even when religion was favoured, I found persecution by reproach, and contempt of wicked men. (3) There are some special days of persecution, when hell breaks loose, and when great trials come, which are called “the hour of tentation,” and “the evil day, the hour and power of darkness,” Rev. iii. 10; Eph. vi. 13; Luke viii. 13, 22, 25. (4) The Lord “stayeth His rough wind in the day of His east wind,” Isa. xxvii. 8. He many times puts an end to the extremities of His people’s personal trials ere He exercises with public sufferings; He “lays not on men more than is meet,” and therefore suffers not a multitude of evils to lie upon His poor people at once, 1 Cor. x. 10. (5) God first (I find) ordinarily exercises with personal afflictions, ere He call them to sufferings on account of Christ, that, being exercised with the one, they may better bear the other. (6) I find that the Lord doth many times affright us with troubles which never come upon us, as He did to Nineveh; and we are made to fear that which the mercy of God never suffers to touch us, Jonah i. 3. (7) But seldom or never doth a great personal or public stroke come upon the Lord’s people, but He gives them some warning, and notice of it beforehand, that we be not surprised, but prepared for it, Zeph. ii. 1, 2, 3, 4. (8) Obstinacy in sin and impenitency, and the removing of God’s precious people, with security under this, have had greatest influence upon my fears of a day of desolation, Isa. lvii. 12; Ezek. xi. 3, 4; Isa. ix. 4, 5. (9) Our fears, unbeliefs, and discouragements, with our confusions, are our greatest troubles in a day of trouble; it is a prison within a prison, Psal. cxlii., “O bring my soul out of trouble.” Our galled sore backs make our burdens more grievous to us — sin and unbelief are bad ballast in a storm. (10) The cross of Christ, when we once engage with it, is nothing so terrible, is nothing so heavy as at a distance in apprehension it is. How dreadful did a prison and appearing before synagogues appear to me! But, when I did encounter therewith, I found it nothing so terrible to me. (11) I was never in that trouble yet upon the account of Christ, but I was delivered out of it by the Lord, and that when it seemed very desperate to look for salvation, Psal. xxxiv. 19, “The troubles of the righteous are many, but the Lord delivereth out of them all.” We are to believe deliverance from all our troubles, though we cannot tell when or how. (12) Nothing contributes more to a Christian carriage under trouble, than faith of God’s support in and deliverance out of trouble, James v. 7, 8. Unbelief sinks the heart. (13) It is matter of great humiliation to us, that our troubles and afflictions do us but little good sometimes, that we are so unfruitful under the rod: and especially I observe, that small troubles have but small influence; every physic doth not work with strong constitutions. My lighter troubles, whether upon a personal or more public account, I found but little good by them. It was a deep heart-reaching stroke that did me good: and in times of greatest fears, sharpest afflictions, it was ever still best with me; and at first afflictions do not so much good, it is afterwards that they reap “the peaceable fruits of righteousness,” Heb. xii. And, even when the Lord blesses them to do good, the fruit, alas! is but small; we are not so good under them as we ought to be or might. (14) I have observed, the more the Lord’s people are afflicted and persecuted, the more they grow;

and the Gospel never thrives better than when it is persecuted, Exod. i. 12; Phil, i. 12. Such things as happened to me have been “for the furtherance of the Gospel.” All the malice of men could never have broken us, if we had not undone ourselves; they “plowed with our heifer:” for the spreading of the Gospel was the effect of a long time of their greatest severities. (15) Persecutors are ungodly, are cruel, are deceitful; and this did I see evidently, all persecutors have these three properties: and therefore let us beware of such persons, and keep at the utmost distance with them, and expect no good from them; let us not lean on them who smite us; let us suspect all their favours, for “the kisses of an enemy are deceitful;” but let “our eyes be only to the Lord.” (16) Too great love, respect to, intimacy and communion with wicked men, and not standing at due distance with them, provokes the Lord to give His people into the hands of the wicked. The Israelites’ wicked confederacy with the Canaanites made them “briers and thorns in their sides;” had we carried to the ungodly as we ought to have done, we should not have smarted as we do this day. (17) It is a very great comfort to a godly person, that his persecutors and enemies are God’s enemies, and wicked persons: “Let my enemies be as the wicked,” saith Job. We may expect good hearing from God against them. It doth much likewise to determine us in our duties, that what they are for must be ill, and what they are against must be good: and, notwithstanding of the confidence of some compilers, it is strange that in almost six thousand years one instance from Scripture or authentic history cannot be given. (18) Under public sufferings we are mostly called to submission and patience, both in reference to God and men: “In patience possess your souls;” and to Christian cheerfulness. Oh, what a comely thing is it to see a meek sufferer, like the Master, “not opening His mouth,” but “dumb as a sheep is before the shearer!” And how ordinarily do men fall in this great sin of impatience? And cheerfulness under the cross of Christ is no less beautiful; and, therefore, how frequent such precepts and examples, to “glory, rejoice in tribulation?” for this gives a good report of Christ, His cause and cross to others. (19) Sufferings on public accounts are not only our duty, but our great priviledge; to suffer for Christ is one of Christ’s love-gifts, Phil, i. ult., “It is given you to suffer for the name of Christ.” To give testimony for Christ and His truth is our greatest honour. A sufferer and witness for Christ is the most honourable person and officer in the kingdom of Christ; it is Christ’s highest and honourahlest employment, Acts v., “They rejoiced they were counted worthy to suffer shame for Christ.” (20) Reproach and shame, and ill-will of men, is the heaviest of Christ’s crosses to bear: “Reproach hath broken my heart,’’ saith David. (21) It is the great guilt of professors this day, that they not only shun the ways of God, but are ashamed of them, and of the cross of Christ, yea, and of the truths of Christ; of such will Christ be ashamed. (22) It is a very hard matter to get our sufferings stated upon Christ’s account, but yet it is very necessary we get it done; for many objections doth a poor suffering soul meet with in this case, as possibly not so clear to many as the matter of the sufferings of Christians under Heathens, and of Protestants under Papists. Nor is the call to such a thing clear at such a time; some sinful accession of our own (through want of consideration or mistake) to our trouble, sense of guilt and unworthiness, doth render our cause dark to us many times. That as it was said of these, “Ye did not fast to Me,” so may it be said of us, Ye suffer not to Me,

nor for Me, but for your sins and yourselves. (23) Outward trouble from the hands of persecutors may be both a rod and correction for sin, and a testimony for Christ and His truth. The Lord Jesus may by one rod design both the correction and chastisement of His Church and people, and likewise design a confirmation and witness to His truth, cause, and work. Heb. xii. 12, the public sufferings of the believing Hebrews were “chastisements for our profit.’’ (24) We by our sins, therefore, may provoke the Lord to deliver us into the hands of men, and by our weakness we may have some sinful hand and occasion thereto, and great failings attending our sufferings; and yet Christ accept of our sufferings, so maimed as a testimony for Him. (25) Whatever pretext wicked persecutors make of afflicting God’s people, and that they be schismatic, scandalous, seditious, that they walk disorderly; yet the true ground of their quarrel is because of their enmity to God and godliness; and, therefore, we may be assured we suffer for Christ and for His cause: “All these things will they do unto you, because the love of the Father is not in them.” And David saith, that all his enemies’ quarrel with him was, “because he followed after that which was good.” It is the enmity that is between the seed of the serpent and the seed of the woman, Gen. iii. 15; Matth. xxrii. 33; John xv. 19, 21. (26) I observe, that the Lord doth accept of the faithful ends and endeavours, and honest intention and zeal of His people, when the methods and particular means and courses they take for witnessing for Christ are sometimes not altogether justifiable; as he who scruples through want of light an oath in itself lawful, out of zeal for the glory of God which he fears by taking this oath he wrongs, and thereupon suffers, this man’s sufferings are accepted of Christ as a testimony for Him. (27) The controversy this day is as manifestly stated betwixt Christ and the devil, sin and godliness, whether the world should be Christ’s subjects, or the devil’s and sin’s subjects, as ever it was. The smaller differences, though in themselves of no great consequence, yet centre in this great gulf of rebellion against God. To touch anything belonging to this wicked generation, Christ’s stated enemies, or to have ought ado with them, is dangerous, Numb. xvi. 26; and they are the emissaries of Satan, and doing his work, who plead for union and compliance with them. (28) Yet ought not the miscarriages of superiors dissolve the civil or natural bonds of relation to them, Matth. xxiii. 1, 2. We are to do, and be submissive to, the commands of superiors, though we be not to imitate their practice. (29) Man’s wrath, and all persecution, shall tend and work to the praise of God and the good of saints, Psal. lxxvi. 10; Isa. xxxi. 9, and this is a marvellous consolation. (30) Many a time may we, in a public stroke of persecution, see our sin and guilt clearly and legibly written, as in Adonibezek, Judges i.; Gen. xix. Such as burned with unnatural lust to one another are justly consumed with fire from heaven: and it is just that lovers, whom we preferred to Christ, be the instruments of our greatest trouble. (31) Many times do the people of God find great favour and kindness at the hands of natural men, yea, and more sometimes than from the truly godly: the earth helped the woman many times. I found some professors of religion stood at greater distance with me, than did mere natural and graceless persons. (32) The preservation of some, of a remnant in a day of straits, is exceeding wonderful and marvellous sometimes. (33) “The wicked are snared in the work of their own hands,” Psal. ix., and Hamans hanged on their own gallows. The Lord makes the weapons of the wicked recoil on themselves; every mean

for a good while they take in hand doth but weaken them, and increase the other party. (34) It is the people of God that only can undo and harm themselves; and it is by division that it is done: while we stood in one spirit, we could not be overcome or prevailed against; but false brethren crept in amongst us, divided and broke us through the subtilty of adversaries, and did draw us to rash enterprises. (35) The greatest consolations do attend the greatest tribulations, 2 Cor. i. 5, 6. (36) The first brunt of the cross is saddest and sharpest: “No affliction for the present seemeth joyous, but grievous.” (37) Great outward troubles, whether personal or on public accounts, quicken and revive our apprehensions of eternity. (38) And always do us good; though not alike good to all, nor so sensibly, yet no cross but we get some good of it. (39) I found it very hard to appear before councils, and carry rightly. We seek rather to save ourselves in any lawful way, than to honour and give testimony for Christ; and there is not boldness and dependence on Christ for assistance. (40) There is not so much of the “Spirit of glory resting upon” sufferers as hath been formerly: which I think flows from these three: (1) That our testimony for Christ is not so glorious; (2) That a sadder shock is coming; and, lastly, That our sufferings are so moderate. (41) Yet, blessed be the Lord, for my part I have found the Lord in a special way with me in all my sufferings, and I never repent of anything I have suffered for Christ. (42) Though the Lord can sanctify and bless any lot to His people, yet, to speak absolutely, an afflicted condition in the world is best for God’s people. (43) The infinite condescendence of God and His gracious and tender nature, is that only which can be a bottom to our faith; to believe we suffer for Christ, and as such to be accepted and looked upon by Him. (44) There is a large allowance for sufferers for righteousness; but many live not upon their allowance, and therefore look so ill upon it.