iii. 12. A man may have many faint wishes and cold desires after godliness, and yet escape persecution ; yea, he may make some essays and attempts as if he would be godly, and yet escape persecution ; but when a man is thoroughly resolved to be godly, and sets himself in good earnest upon pursuing after holiness, upon living a life of holi- ness, upon growing up in holiness, then he must expect to meet with afflictions and persecutions. The history of the ten persecutions, and that little Book of Martyrs, the eleventh of the Hebrews, and Mr Foxe his Acts and Monuments, with many other histories that are extant, do abundantly evidence thaJt from age to age, and from one generation to another, they that have been ' born after the flesh have persecuted them that have been born after the Spirit,' Gal. iv. 29 ; and that ' the seed of the serpent hath Jjeen still a-multiplying of troubles upon the seed of the woman," Gen. iii. 15. As there was ' no way to paradise but by a flaming sword, nor no way to Canaan but through a howling wilderness, so there is no way to heaven but by the gates of hell ; there is no way to a glorious exaltation but through a sea of tribulation, of persecution, Acts xiv. 21, 22. The way to heaven is not strewed with roses, but full of thorns and briars, as those ' of whom this world is not worthy ' have always experienced, Heb. xi. The serpentine brood takes a very great pleasure to be still a-representing the people of God as foolish, hypocritical, precise, proud, schismatical, seditious, factious, and as persons against order and government, against good laws and customs, as disturbers and troublers of the peace. Thus Ahab accounts Elijah ' the troubler of Israel,' 1 Kings xviii. 17 ; and Haman laid it to the charge of the Jews, that * they were disobedient to the king's laws,' Esth. iii. 8 ; and the adversaries of the Jews told Artaxerxes the king that ' Jerusalem was a rebellious city, hurtful unto kings and princes,' Ezra iv. 15 ; and the unbelieving Jews at Thessalonica did as much for the apostles, they said they were the men ' that turned the world upside down,' Acts xvii. 6. So Luther was called 'the trumpet of rebellion ; ' and Tertullus calls Paul ' a pestilent fellow, and a mover of sedition,' Acts xxiv. 5 ; Aocfiov, a pestilence, a botch. Foolish Tertullus mistook the antidote for the poison, the remedy for the disease. Now if so precious a man as Paul, than whom, saith Chrysostom, the earth never bare a better since it bore Christ, were accounted and called a pest, a botch, let us think i much if the choicest saints in our days are accounted and esteemed as so many pests and botches. This is the reward the ungrateful world gives the servants of Christ for their zeal and faithfulness in the cause of Christ ; instead of encouraging them, they load them with ignominious and hateful terms of rebellion and turbulency, &c., labouring thereby to make them odious, and to enrage the people against them, as the persecutors of old used to wrap the Christians up in bears' skins, and lions' skins, &c., and then to bait them with dogs. It is a very great vanity to think of pass- ing to heaven without suffering. The saints in all ages have found the way thither paved with troubles, and it would be a foolish, childish thing for any of us to think of finding it otherwise now. Constantine the Great, as piously as wittily, told Acesius the Novatian, that if he would not take up with persecution, and such like dealing, he must
1 Query, 'not think'?— Ed.
TO ALL SUFFERING SAINTS. 419
provide him a ladder and climb alone to heaven.i We must go to heaven some other way than the saints have done of old, except we resolve of going thither through much tribulation, Acts xiv, 22.
3. Thirdly, That no person 07' persons on earth inay sinfully shift off sufferings, or avoid sufferings. There being infinitely more evil in the least sin than there can be in the greatest sufferings that can )?efall us in this world, it is best, it is safest to choose suffering rather than sinning, as Moses did. So Daniel chose rather to be cast among lions than that his conscience should be a lion within him, Dan. vi. ; and the three children, or champions rather, who were holily wilful, chose rather to burn in the fiery furnace than to bow to the image that the king had set up, Dan. iii. He that values peace with God, and peace with conscience, and the honour of God, and the credit of religion, the silencing of sinners, and the rejoicing of the saints, must choose to suffer rather than to sin. 2 When storms arise, and troubles and dangers approach, many begin to consult, not how they may glorify God by suffering, but how they may provide for their own safety by sinning. Plato knew much of God, but, as Josephus shews, durst not set it down for fear of the people ; and Lactantius charges the same upon Tully : ' Thou darest not,' saith he, ' undertake the patronage of the truth, for fear of the prison of Socrates ;' and Augustine doth as much for Seneca ; he spends a whole chapter in shewing how he held the truth in unrighteousness, telling us how he reverenced that which he reproved, did that which he condemned, and worshipped that which he found fault with.^ Though these wise men saw the vanity of the heathenish deities, and the worship that was given to them, and looked upon them as utterly unworthy of respect from wise and sober men, nay, secretly scorned and derided them ; yet would they not openly declare against them, and that for fear of the people who so much doted upon them. But Daniel's three young worthies were men of that heavenly gallantr}', that they peremptorily resolved upon this, that though they should not be delivered by their God, yet they would not sin against their God, nor so much as demur, deliberate, or take time to consider whether they should suffer or sin ; it was past dispute with them, brave and noble souls that tliey were. It is observable that when Paul speaks of his afilictions, his suffer- ings, he calls them 'light,' 2 Cor. iv. 17; but when he speaks of his sin, he speaks of it as a burden that pressed him down, and made him cry out, ' 0 wretched man that I am ! ' and to cry out again, ' we groan, being burdened,' Rom. vii, 23 ; 2 Cor. v. 2, 4. Moses his choice is famous, and celebrated all the world over ; for it was not made when he was a child, but when he came to forty years of age, Heb. xi. 25-27 ; then he preferred suffering, not only before sinning, but before all the honours, riches, and pleasures of Egypt, accounting the worst of Christ, viz., reproaches, better than the best of the world. When Eleazar was promised to be saved from torments and death if he would but make show of yielding, he courageously answered, ' It becometh not our age in anywise to dissemble,' 2 Mac.
' Socrat. Hist. Eccl., lib. i. cap. 10.