An apology for the nonconformists ministry containing I. the reasons of their preaching, II.…

we hold that even a Traitor, Murderer or Felon, going to the Gallows, must be so far loved, pitied and helped, that we must do much more than forbear a thing indifferent to save their souls. For we long ago received Pauls opinion, that we should rather choose never to eat flesh while we lived, than to hinder their Salvation for whom Christ died. We believe very confidently, that if a proud or peevish man were cutting his own throat, or hanging or drowning himself, that by an ordinary obligation common to men, we are bound in charity to do our best to save his life, to cut the rope, to pull him out of the water, though we lost for it the liberty of a lawful game, or feast, or rest, yea, though it must cost us dear. And we believe that if we do not this, we do not only fail of an extraordinary height of charity, but that we are murderers; and that we do not only cross the tenderness of good nature, but common humanity; we cannot deny but we take him for a beast, and worse than an Infidel, that will not only famish his family, but stand by and let them cut their own throats, if he can but say, they are stubborn, proud and peevish, or drunk; or that will see his neighbours drown or hang themselves, if they do it in pride, or peevishness, or stubbornness, rather than he will forsake his liberty in a thing indifferent. And therefore it is contrary to our Religion to sell a soul (much more many thousands) for a Ceremony. We take the sixth Commandment to mean, Thou shalt not murder the good or the bad, the patient or the peevish by commission or by omission. And as much as Souls are more worth than Bodies, and everlasting life than temporal, so much the greater sin do we take it for, to be the murderers of Souls by omission, than of Bodies. And that it will be an insufficient excuse for omissive soul-murdering, to say, He was peevish, and I should have parted with my freedom. Could we once think that doing no harm is all our necessary Religion, and that doing good is only the work of an extraordinary height of charity, then we could be in this of another mind (and could think a stone or tree more Religious than a mortal Saint.) But we have not so learnt to be Religious.

we hold that even a Traytor, Murderer or Felon, going to the Gallows, must be so far loved, pitied and helped, that we must do much more than forbear a thing indifferent to save their souls. For we long ago received Pauls opinion, that we should rather chuse never to eat flesh while we lived, than to hinder their Salvation for whom Christ died. We believe very confidently, that if a proud or peevish man were cutting his own throat, or hanging or drowning himself, that by an ordinary obligation common to men, we are bound in charity to do our best to save his life, to cut the rope, to pull him out of the water, though we lost for it the liberty of a lawful game, or feast, or rest, yea, though it must cost us dear. And we believe that if we do not this, we do not only fail of an extraordinary height of charity, but that we are murderers; and that we do not only cross the tenderness of good nature, but common humanity; we cannot deny but we take him for a beast, and worse than an Infidel, that will not only famish his family, but stand by and let them cut their own throats, if he can but say, they are stubborn, proud and peevish, or drunk; or that will see his neighbours drown or hang themselves, if they do it in pride, or peevishness, or stubbornness, rather than he will forsake his liberty in a thing indifferent. And therefore it is contrary to our Religion to sell a soul (much more many thousands) for a Ceremony. We take the sixth Commandment to mean, Thou shalt not murder the good or the bad, the patient or the peevish by commission or by omission. And as much as Souls are more worth than Bodies, and everlasting life than temporal, so much the greater sin do we take it for, to be the murderers of Souls by omission, than of Bodies. And that it will be an insufficient excuse for omissive soul-murdering, to say, He was peevish, and I should have parted with my freedom. Could we once think that doing no harm is all our necessary Religion, and that doing good is only the work of an extraordinary height of charity, then we could be in this of another mind (and could think a stone or tree more Religious than a mortal Saint.) But we have not so learnt to be Religious.