The true fear of God will teach men to live and dye in patience. But while you your selves think that those that you afflict are wicked, and know that cruelty is the most powerful temptation to sinful self-defence, do you think that you will be innocent by such temptations? What if it were felony to cry! Were he innocent that would scourge men, women and children till they bleed, and then call out for Justice against the felons that cried? Some men will think that your cruelties are of purpose to constrain or tempt some hypocrites into seditious words or deeds, that you may have matter to accuse the rest of. Rehoboams young Counsellors, in my opinion, could not justify themselves from the guilt of all the sufferings of that King, by saying, It was the rebellious ten Tribes that did forsake him: It was an unhappy proof of their own Loyalty, to be the Counsellors of so great a temptation. We hate Rebellion and Treason so much more than such as these, that we would not have you say, The King shall have no Loyal Subjects that will not lay down their lives to show their Loyalty: He that striketh the flint, is guilty of the fire: He that will kill, or banish, or undo men for nothing, to try if he can find any among them all that loveth his life better than his Loyalty or Subjection to Superiors, that he may prick him forward to Sedition by torments, will prove no Loyal Subject himself at last. I remember a person of Quality, more great than good, was reported to assault a Farmers house, to have defiled his daughters: But the door being bolted, and no threats would open them, one of his company bid him throw drown the Hive of Bee's in the Garden in revenge: The Bees, when the Hive was broken down, had almost stung the great man and his company to death. If the question was, Whether the owner or the Bees must be accused of the crime? I can only say, that the Counsellor was not innocent. And if a Thief should break into a Bishops house, and bind his Servants, and set a Pistol to the breast of one, and bid him disclose his Lords money, and he should dye rather than be guilty of disclosing it, and all the rest should dye save one, and that one should confess to save his life; I do not think it would be congruous for him that did affright him to it, to say, I am innocent (though perhaps he took not the gold himself);
The true fear of God will teach men to live and dye in patience. But while you your selves think that those that you afflict are wicked, and know that cruelty is the most powerful temptation to sinful self-defence, do you think that you will be innocent by such temptations? What if it were felony to cry! Were he innocent that would scourge men, women and children till they bleed, and then call out for Justice against the felons that cryed? Some men will think that your cruelties are of purpose to constrain or tempt some hypocrites into seditious words or deeds, that you may have matter to accuse the rest of. Rehoboams young Counsellors, in my opinion, could not justifie themselves from the guilt of all the sufferings of that King, by saying, It was the rebellious ten Tribes that did forsake him: It was an unhappy proof of their own Loyalty, to be the Counsellors of so great a temptation. We hate Rebellion and Treason so much more than such as these, that we would not have you say, The King shall have no Loyal Subjects that will not lay down their lives to shew their Loyalty: He that striketh the flint, is guilty of the fire: He that will kill, or banish, or undo men for nothing, to try if he can find any among them all that loveth his life better than his Loyalty or Subjection to Superiors, that he may prick him forward to Sedition by torments, will prove no Loyal Subject himself at last. I remember a person of Quality, more great than good, was reported to assault a Farmers house, to have defiled his daughters: But the door being bolted, and no threats would open them, one of his company bid him throw drown the Hive of Bee's in the Garden in revenge: The Bees, when the Hive was broken down, had almost stung the great man and his company to death. If the question was, Whether the owner or the Bees must be accused of the crime? I can only say, that the Counsellor was not innocent. And if a Thief should break into a Bishops house, and bind his Servants, and set a Pistol to the breast of one, and bid him disclose his Lords money, and he should dye rather than be guilty of disclosing it, and all the rest should dye save one, and that one should confess to save his life; I do not think it would be congruous for him that did affright him to it, to say, I am innocent (though perhaps he took not the gold himself);
