A26911:674
The defence of the nonconformists plea for peace, or, An account of the matter…
The defence of the nonconformists plea for peace, or, An account of the matter of their nonconformity against Mr. J. Cheney's answer called The conforming nonconformist, and The nonconforming conformist : to which is added the second part in answer to Mr. Cheney's Five undertakings / by Richard Baxter.
London: printed for Benjamin Alsop, 1680
Modern spelling is a reading aid: the words are the author’s, only the spelling is modernized. Original shows the page as printed, with the transcription marks.
Ans. Alas, where can we say a Man will stop when he is once tumbling down the Hill!
1. Why, did you think your bare word should serve for this? That it is Jesus Christ that made this the Office of the Magistrate?
2. Is it all Magistrates, or some only that have this Power, and Jesus Christ chooseth us Pastors by? If but some, what the better are we for your Discourse, if you tell us not how to know them?
And, 3. Will you not then put the People upon a harder and more perilous Task, to judge of all Magistrates fitness for this Trust, than it would be to judge of their Pastor.
4. If it be all, then Heathens and Turks must choose Christians their Pastors. If you say, It is all Christian Magistrates, then the Protestants in France are Rebels and not Christians, for refusing Papists Priests: If it be not Papists, who are they? Must all receive Lutherans, or Socinians, or Anabaptists, or such like Pastors that live under Imposing Princes of those minds?