3. Yea, an oppressor is not only the agent of the devil, but his image: it is the devil that is the destroyer, and the devourer, who maketh it his business to undo men, and to bring them into misery and distress. He is the grand oppressor of the world: yet in this he is far short of the malignity of men-devils, 1. That he doth it not by force and violence, but by deceit, and hurteth no man till he hath procured his own consent to sin; whereas our oppressors do it by their brutish force and power. 2. And the devil destroyeth men, who are not his brethren, nor of the same kind; but these oppressors never stick at the violating of such relations.
4. Oppression is a sin that greatly serveth the devil, to the damning of men's souls, as well as to the afflicting of their bodies. And it is not a few, but millions, that are undone by it. For as I showed before, it taketh up men's mind and time so wholly, to get them a poor living in the world, that they have neither mind nor time for better things. They are so troubled about many things, that the one thing needful is laid aside. All the labours of many a worthy, able pastor, are frustrated by oppressors: to say nothing of the far greatest part of the world, where the tyranny and oppression of heathen infidels and Mahometan princes, keepeth out the gospel, and the means of life; nor yet of any other persecutors: if we exhort a servant to read the Scriptures, and call upon God, and think of his everlasting state, he telleth us that he hath no time to do it, but when his weary body must have rest. If we desire the masters of families to instruct and catechise their children and servants, and pray with them, and read the Scriptures and other good books to them, they tell us the same, that they have no time, but when they should sleep; and that on the Lord's day their tired bodies, and careful minds, are unfit to attend and ply such work: so that necessity quieteth their conscience in their ignorance and neglect of heavenly things, and maketh them think it only the work of gentlemen and rich men, who have leisure (but are further alienated from it by prosperity, than these are by their poverty): and thus oppression destroyeth religion, and the people's souls as well as their estates.
5. Oppression further endangereth both the souls of men, and the public peace, and the safety of princes, by tempting the poor multitude into discontents, sedition, and insurrections. Every man is naturally a lover of himself above other: and the poor, as well as the rich and rulers, have an interest of their own which ruleth them; and they will hardly honour, or love, or think well of them by whom they suffer. It is as natural almost for a man under oppression, to be discontented and complain, as for a man in a fever to complain of sickness, heat, and thirst. No kingdom on earth is so holy and happy as to have all or most of the subjects such confirmed, eminent saints, as will be contented to be undone, and will love and honour those that undo them. Therefore men must be taken as they are. If "oppression maketh wise men mad," Eccles. vii. 7, much more the multitude, who are far from wisdom. Misery maketh men desperate, when they think that they cannot be much worse than they are. How many kingdoms have been thus fired (as wooden wheels will be when one part rubbeth too hard and long upon the other)! Yea, if the prince be never so good and blameless, the cruelty of the nobles and the rich men of the land, may have the same effects. And in these combustions, the peace of the kingdom, the lives and souls of the seditious, are made a sacrifice to the lusts of the oppressors.