This being tendered they will not take it and then we must adde more force to the Law and that is If any man refuse or neglect to take it by such a time shall pay Five pounds or depart the Colony VVhen the time is come they are the same as they were Then goes out the Marshal and fetcheth away their Cows and other Cattel Well another Court comes They are required to take the Oath again They cannot Then Five pounds more On this Account Thirty five head of Cattel as I have been credibly informed hath been by the Authority of our Court taken from them the latter part of this Summer and these People say If they have more right to them than themselves Let them take them Some that had a Cow only some Two Cows some Three Cows and many small Children in their Families to whom in Summer time a Cow or two was the greatest Outward Comfort they had for their subsistance A Poor Weaver that hath Seven or Eight small Children I know not which he himself lame in his Body had but two Cows and both taken from him The Marshal asked him what he would do he must have his Cows The Man said That God that gave him them he doubted not but would still provide for him To fill up the Measure yet more full though to the further emptying of Sandwitch Men of their outward Comforts The last Court of Assistants the first Tuesday of this Instant the Court was pleased to determine Fines on Sandwitch Men for Meetings sometimes on First Dayes of the Week sometimes on other dayes as they say They meet ordinarily twice in the week besides the Lords Day One Hundred and Fifty pounds whereof W. Newland is Twenty four pounds for himself and his Wife at Ten shillings a Meeting W. Allen Forty six pounds some affirm it Forty nine pounds The poor VVeaver afore spoken of Twenty pounds Brother Cook told me One of the Brethren at Barnstable certified him that he was in the Weavers house when Cruel Barloe Sandwitch Marshal came to demand the Sum and said he was fully informed of all the Poor Man had and thought if all laid together it was not worth Ten pounds VVhat will be the End of such Courses and Practices the Lord only knows I heartily and earnestly pray that these and such like courses neither raise up among us nor bring in upon us either the Sword or any devouring Calamity as a Just Avenger of the Lord's Quarrel for acts of Injustice and Oppression and that we may every one find out the Plague of his own heart and putting away the Evil of his own Doings and meet the Lord by Entreaties of Peace before it be too late and there be no Remedy Our Civil Powers are so exercised in things appertaining to the Kingdom of Christ in matters of Religion and Conscience that we can have no time to effect any thing that tends to the Promotion of the Civil Weal or the Prosperity of the Place But now we must have a State-Religion such as the Powers of the World will allow and no other A State-Ministry and a State-way of Maintenance And we must worship and serve the Lord Jesus as the World shall appoint us we must all go to the Publick Place of Meeting in the Parish where he dwells or be presented I am informed of Three or Four score last Court presented for not coming to Publick Meetings and let me tell you how they brought this about You may remember a Law once made called Thomas Hinckley's Law That if any neglected the Worship of God in the Place where he lives and sets up a Worship contrary to God and the Allowance of this Government to the publick Prophanation of Gods Holy Day and Ordinance shall pay Ten shillings This Law would not reach what then was aimed at Because he must do so and so that is all things therein expressed or else break not the Law In March last a Court of Deputies was called and some Acts touching Quakers were made and then they contrived to make this Law serviceable to them and that was by putting out the word and and putting in the word or which is a Disjunctive and makes every Branch to become a Law So now if any do neglect or will not come to the Publick Meetings Ten shillings for every Defect Certainly we either have less Wit or more Money than the Massachusets For for Five shillings a day a man may stay away till it come to Twelve or Thirteen pounds if he had it but to pay them And these men altering this Law now in March yet left it Dated June 6. 1651. and so it stands as the Act of a General Court they to be the Authors of it Seven years before it was in being And so you your self have your part and share in it if the Recorder lie not But what may be the Reason that they should not by another Law made and dated by that Court as well effect what was intended as by altering a word and so the whole sence of the Law and leave this their Act by the date of it charged on another Courts account Surely the chief Instruments in the business being privy to an Act of Parliament for Liberty should too openly have acted repugnant to a Law of England but if they can do the thing and leave it on a Court as making it six years before the Act of Parliament there can be no danger in this And that they were privy to the Act of Parliument for Liberty to be then in being is evident That the Deputies might be free to act it They told us That now the Protector stood not engaged to the Articles for Liberty for the Parliament had now taken the Power into their Own hands and had given the Protector a new Oath Only in General to maintain the Protestant Religion and so produced the Oath in a Paper in writing Whereas the Act of Parliament and the Oath are both in one Book in Print So that they who were privy to the One could not be ignorant of the Other But still all is well if we can but keep the People ignorant of their Liberties and Priviledges then we have liberty to Act in Our own Wills what we please We are wrapped up in a Laborynth of Confused Laws that the Freemens Power is quite gone and it was said last June-Court by one That they knew nothing the Freemen had there to do Sandwitch-men may not go to the Bay lest they be taken up for Quakers William Newland was there about his Occasions some Ten dayes since and they put him in Prison Twenty four hours and sent for divers to witness against him but they had not Proof enough to make him a Quaker which if they had he should have been whipt Nay they may not go about their Occasions in other Towns in our Colony but Warrants lie in Ambush to apprehend and bring them
New England Judged Not by Man's but the Spirit of the LORD And The SUMME sealed up of NEW-ENGLAND'S PERSECUTIONS Being A Brief Relation of the Sufferings of the People called Quakers in those Parts of AMERICA from the beginning of the Fifth Moneth 1656. the time of their first Arrival at BOSTON from ENGLAND to the later end of the Tenth Moneth 1660. Wherein The Cruel Whippings and Scourgings Bonds and Imprisonments Beatings and Chainings Starvings and Huntings Fines and Confiscation of Estates Burning in the Hand and Cutting of Ears Orders of Sale for Bond-men and Bond-women Banishment upon pain of Death and Putting to Death of those People are Shortly touched With a Relation of the Manner and Some of the Other most Material Proceedings and a Judgement thereupon In Answer To a Certain Printed Paper Intituled A DECLARATION of the General Court of the Massachusets holden at Boston the 18. October 1658. Apologizing for the same By GEORGE BISHOPE Therefore also saith the Wisdom of God I will send them Prophets and Apostles and some of them they shall slay and Persecute That the Blood of all the Prophets that was shed from the Foundation of the World may be required of this Generation From the Blood of Abel to the Blood of Zecharias which perished between the Temple and the Altar Verily I say unto you it shall be required of this Generation London Printed for Robert Wilson in Martins Le Grand 1661. NEVV ENGLAND Judged c. HAD the Government of the Massachusets in New England stated in their Printed Apologie any Particular matter of Fact whereby the Servants of the Lord William Robinson and Marmaduke Stevenson whom they caused to be put to Death were Legally convicted Or any Power from Old England to enable to such Executions and that according to the Merit of the One and the Justice of the Other they had Legally proceeded it had been something like Men of Reasonable Understandings whom the Prince of the Ayre had not darkened into a blind accusing of Themselves by the things they offer in their Justification But when their Apologie which carries in the very name of it an Implication of Guilt for Nihil Opus Justitia Ciceronis Justice needeth no Apologie hath no such thing and something as such no doubt it would have had as it's chiefest concern could they have produced it but only Generals which signifie little but a Design to slander For Generalia nihil probant Generals prove nothing as is the Maxime in Law which is grounded upon Equity Dolus versatur in Universalibus Deceit lurks or is conversant in Generals as is the received Axiome of the Antients It is Evident That in this Affair of so high a Nature as of Blood and that for Conscience they are wanting by their Own Prescription both as to Matter of Fact deserving and Power enabling to such Executions And so their Own Vindication for They have not so much as saved to themselves Liberty hereafter to Exhibit what they may have further to offer in their Own Justification a Salvo for which if it could or is intended at all ought at first to be inserted condemnes Themselves and makes Them appear not onely Legis Culpae Transgressors of the Law but Rei Sanguinis Guilty of Blood For when the life of any Man and here is of Two and a Woman is taken away be the Pretence what it will without a Legal Conviction by Plain and Particular mattter of Fact and Doe Process of Law and Power of Determining I speak of inferior Ministers of Justice and no such Matter of Fact and Due Process of Law or Power to Determine have they shewn in this their Declaration which concludes them as aforesaid there the Life of such a Man or of such Men and Women is Violently taken away and those who thus Violently take it or the lives of them away are Guilty of Blood or of that Man or Men and Women are the Trucidatores or Murderers And this being done by Men who sometimes Suffered because of Conscience and who for Conscience sake pretended to fly their Native Country to Men and Women even of their Country barely for their Conscience to God and the Exercise thereof in Obedience to the Lord as is the Case aggravates the Offence beyond Comparison and renders them the most Unreasonable of Men as it leaves them without Excuse Having given this short View and State of the Case which I suppose is clear to all Men of sober Understandings I shall descend more Particularly to the Declaration it self and therein to the Order of the Proceedings of these Men of Blood and the Gradation of their Laws from Imprisonment unto Death as themselves have set it and Convince through all what I have Asserted in the Title and these first Pages of my Book Declaration We thought it requisite to Declare for for Your Preamble or Beginning I shall Answer it in the End That about Three Years since divers Persons professing themselves Quakers of whose Pernicious Opinions and Practices we had received Intelligence from good hands from Barbados to England I suppose Ye mean from England and Barbados arrived at Boston whose Persons were only secured to be sent away the first Opportunity without Censure or Punishment although their professed Tenets Turbulent and Contemptuous Behaviour to Authority would have justified a Severer Animadversion yet the Prudence of this Court was Exercised only in making Provision to Secure the Peace and Order here Established against their Attempts whose Design we were well assured by Our own Experience as well as by the Example of their Predecessors in Munster was to Undermine and Ruine the same Answer That about Three Years before the Date of this Your Declaration that is to say in the beginning of the fifth Moneth called July 1656. Divers Persons in scorn by You and the World called Quakers Viz. Mary Fisher and Anne Austin arrived at Boston and after them in the Moneth following viz. the 7. day of the 6. Moneth 1656. Mary Prince Sarah Gibbens Mary Weatherhead Dorothy Waugh Christopher Holder Thomas Thirstone William Brend and John Copeland And upon their Arrival Ye did secure and send them away after so tedious a Passage by Sea as some Thousands of Miles in Love to Visit You and the many Inconveniences which attend on such a Voyage is Truth and what is Truth I freely Own and readily acknowledge But that They professed themselves Quakers the Tearm which in reproach ye cast upon Them Or That ye onely secured them to send them away the first Opportunity Or That ye sent them away the first Opportunity and that without Censure or Punishment Or That they are a People of such Opinions and Practises as ye call Pernicious Or of turbulent and contemptuos behaviour especially to Authority Or that their Professed Tenets or behaviour to Authority which Ye call turbulent and contemptuous did deserve any such Animadversion much less a Severer than they received at your
Prohibiting all Masters of ships to bring in of your Brethren among you who were not prohibited your selves and themselves from coming in on such a Penalty Which leads me to the next Particular viz. The Sufferings by this your Law And accordingly say you a Law was made and Published Answ This Law is put as the Port or Entrance into this Scene of Blood and Cruel Sufferings and the very Publication of it Enters it and shews the Spirit by which it was made and the Ground on which it went and poor Nicholas Upshall a VVeakly Old Man of your Town of Boston bore the Brunt of it For he hearing it proclaimed and being grieved at the heart for your sakes and the Countries that such a thing should be done which he looked upon as a sad fore-runner of some heavy Judgement gave his Dissent Which ye took so ill at his hands that though he was a Member of your Church and of good Repute among you for a man of a sober and unblamable Conversation and though in much tenderness and love he spake to you the next day when ye had him before you desiring you to take heed lest ye should be found fighters against God and some sudden Judgement follow it on the Land which was the Counsel which wise Gamaliel gave the chief Priests and Pharisees and which they received at his hands and it would have been your Wisdom so to have done Yet you fined him twenty pounds which ye Enacted I 'le not bate him one groat said your cruel Governour John Endicot and three pounds more by another Court for not coming to your Meetings and this after he was Imprisoned and into Prison ye cast him and banish him ye did out of your Jurisdiction allowing him but One Moneths space of which the time of his Imprisonment was part for his Remove neither regarding his old years who had scarce a Tooth in his head to eat his meat and bread and cheese and other Sustenance was scraped into a spoon when he received it nor the weakness of his Body nor the state of his aged Wife and Children which were amongst ye nor the season of the year it being in the beginning of Winter which with you is very cold and he might have perished therein as some have done in passing but from Town to Town though but of Three Miles distance but Out he must go and when he was departed into Plimmouth Patent Jurisdiction which was the next adjacent the Governour thereof One Bradford since dead to help on the matter hearing of his coming for after your Pipe danced that Plantation as will appear by and by in the Cruelties that Ensue which they inflicted on the Innocent issued forth a Warrant that none of Sandwitch whereunto he was come should Entertain the poor Man which not Availing for their hearts were more tender then to cast him Out such an Aged Man in time of VVinter he sent for him to Plimmouth by a special Warrant which was Twenty Miles distant but he not being able to go and writing to him that if he perished his Blood would be required at his hands through the Moderation of some of the then Magistrates he was permitted to stay till the Spring but then was he banished thence who there had done nothing but came into their Jurisdiction for a little shelter in the VVinter Season to Rhoad Island and this so earnestly prest in the early time of the year that he was like to have been cast away in his going thither A Piece of Cruelty able to soften a heart of Flint and Draw it into teares at the sence thereof and which drew such Compassion from a Sagamore or Indian Prince That he told the Old man if he would live with him he would make him a warm house calling him Friend and further he said VVhat a God have the English who deals so with one another about the VVorship of their God Or words to that purpose But from you it drew no Relentings but the spirit of Iniquity having got over you it hardned ye the more by how much the more you were Exercised therein yea upon this very Old Man as in its place I shall shew and by and by make manifest Even the Sea-Monsters draw forth their Breast and give suck to their Young but the Daughter of my People is become Cruel like the Ostrich in the VVilderness Thus Entred as I have said this Scene of Blood and what follows answers unto it For the Eight aforesaid viz. Christopher Holder Thomas Thirstone John Copeland VVilliam Brend Mary Prince Dorothy VVaugh Sarah Gibbens and Mary VVeatherhead who were Committed before this Law was made and kept close Prifoners for the space of about Eleven Weeks the very Day that Nicholas was cast into Prison as aforesaid were they by vertue of this Law conveyed on board a Ship the Ship they came in and sent for England and Nicholas came into their Room Which Prison ye have supplied with the bodies of the Saints and Servants of Jesus for the most part ever since scarce One taken Out but some One or other put into his Rome of which in its Place But how came Nicholas Upshall to be concerned in a Law for Strangers who was an Inhabitant In a Law for Quakers so called who was a Member of your Church In a Law for Masters of Ships who shall bring into your Jurisdiction any People that are called such and for any such People who themselves shall come into your Jurisdiction when as he is neither Master of a Ship nor brought in any such nor came in but is an Inhabitant a Freeman of Boston How comes he to Suffer and to have inflicted upon him a Punishment above the Penalty of the Law How came those Eight to be sent away the Day after the Publication of a Law and by Vertue thereof who were imprisoned before the Law was made These things would be Enquired into and how Repugnant they are to the Lawes of England Declaration Notwithstanding which by a Back door they found Entrance and the Penaltie inflicted on themselves proving insufficient to restrain their Impudent and insolent obtrusions was increased by the losse of the Eares of those who offended the second time Which also being too weak a defence against their Impetuous Frantick Fury necessitated us to endeavour our security and upon serious Consideration after the former Experiments by their incessant Assaults a Law was made That such Persons should be banished upon pain of Death according to the Example of England in their Provision against fesuites Which sentence being regularly pronounced at the last Court of Assistants against the Parties above-named and they either returning or continuing presumptuously in this Jurisdiction after the time limited were Apprehended and owning themselves to be the Persons banished were sentenced by the Court to Death according to the Law aforesaid which hath been Executed upon two of them Answer As the former was the Entrance
and Fines and Amercements and Searchings and Huntings and such like as I shall shew more particularly by and by Their Lives as to men became worse than Death and as Living Burials though they thought not any thing too much nor their Lives too dear as anon will be made manifest for the Truth and the Testimony of it The next day after W. Brend was so used and layd for dead Humphry Norton on whom the sence of Blood lay much and the Weight thereof pressed him sore for several days and cried in him so that he travailed Night and Day with his Friend John Rous came to Boston where in your Meeting House on your Lecture day notwithstanding the Cry of the Town of your Cruelty and Blood and the speaking of some to the said Humphry that if he loved his life he should depart the Town for otherwise he was but a Dead man they having been looking for him some Moneths which could not hinder them nor all the World such was the sence and weight upon them they appeared and having heard the Earth speaking and the Grave uttering her voice and Death feeding Death through your Painted Sepulchre John Norton Humphry Norton stood up and said after the other had ended Verily this is the Sacrifice which the Lord God accepts not for whilst with the same Spirit that ye sin ye Preach and Pray and Sing that Sacrifice is an Abomination to the Lord Whereupon yea before he had spoke out all these words but all these words he spake he was haled down and both of them had out and in the same fury had before ye and H. Norton ye charged with Blasphemy for those words he had spoken They spake to you to Act according to the Law of God or the Wholesome Laws of the English Nation and spare them not But neither of these ye would come nigh Then they Appealed to England and to the chief Magistrate there or whom he should appoint to whom they said they would freely refer their Case which they did once and again thereby to leave you without excuse but neither would ye yeild to this but slighted and disregarded such their Appeal Your Governour and Deputy Governour with one lip saying No Appeal to England No Appeal to England with other words of Dirision and sorthwith sentenced them to be whipt though charged with Blasphemy and to John Rous ye gave smooth words seeking to ensnare him because of Your knowledge of his Father Lieutenant Colonel Rous of Barbadoes who formerly lived amongst Ye of whom some of You then spake but he knowing Your Deceit and Wickedness and Cruel usuage of the Innocent and seeking by close Rooms and Denial of Food for several days together to Consume and strangle them he required in the audience of the People convenient Food for their money Or otherwise if they perished their Blood would be upon you This ye could not well deny before the People who had heard of much of Your Cruelty in this kind and who were likely to have risen up against Ye should Ye have denied it so Ye granted this when Ye could not help it to the breaking of Your Law but the seventh day of the week following this being the fifth Ye broke their Bodies in Revenge thereof with Ten Cruel stripes a piece according to Your wonted Cruelty and then tendred them to depart if they would hire a Convoy which they not doing for as to the Lord they could not who moved them thither Ye detained them there the week following and then Whipt them Fifteen stripes Each with the same Cruelty as before by vertue of the Law aforesaid of Five to be added to the Ten and to the Five Three each time they should be whipt and to be whipt twice a Week upon their old sores with the rest of their Brethren of which I have spoken Now about Three Weeks after the said Court at Salem the Court sate again at which several of the Inhabitants were presented for not coming to Meetings and the Law read for Five shillings a Week for them as should refuse each to pay for not Comming and many were listed under that Pay which ye Exacted when ye pleased but as for the Six aforesaid they were continued still in your Prison at Boston and no Course taken for their Release neither was it so much as offered them upon the Suffering of your Law to go home paying the Fees as ye used to do to the Strangers which Occasioned a Paper to be sent by them to the Court in these Words This to the Magistrates at Court in Salem Friends WHereas it was your Pleasures to Commit us whose Names are underwritten to the House of Correction in Boston although the Lord the Righteous Judge of Heaven and Earth is our Witness that we had done nothing worthy of Stripes or of Bonds and we being Committed by Court to be dealt withall as the Law provides for Forreign Quakers as ye please to tearm us and having some of us suffered your Law and Pleasures now that which we do expect is that whereas we have suffered your Law so now to be set free by the same Law as your manner is with strangers and not to put us in upon the account of one Law and Execute another Law upon us of which according to your own manner we were never convicted as the Law expresses If you had sent us upon the account of your new Law we should have expected the Goalers Order to have been on that account which that it was not appears by the Warrant which we have and the Punishment which we bare as four of us were Whipt among whom was One that had formerly been Whipt so now also according to your former Law Friends Let it not be a small thing in your Eyes the exposing as much as in you lies our families to Ruine It 's not unknown to you the Season and the time of the Year for those that live of Husbandry and what their Cattle and Families may be exposed unto and also such as live on Trade We know if the Spirit of Christ did dwell and rule in you these things would take impression on your spirits What our lives and conversations have been in that Place is well known and what we now suffer for is much for false Reports and ungrounded Jealousies of Heresie and Sedition These things lie upon us to lay before you As for our parts we have true Peace and Rest in the Lord in all our Sufferings and are made willing in the Power and Strength of God freely to offer up our Lives in this Cause of God for which we suffer Yea and we do find through Grace the Enlargements of God in our Imprisoned state to whom alone we Commit our selves and families for the disposing of us according to His Infinite Wisdom and Pleasure in whose Love is Our Rest and Life From the House of Bondage in Boston wherein we are made Captives by the
To put Man who was made after the Image of God of whom God saith He that sheddeth Man's Blood by Man shall his Blood be shed for after the Image of God made he Man into the state of a Beast who is known by his skin but a Man is not but by the spirit that is in him nor by that neither so as to judge unto Suffering but by the Effects or some Overt Act as the Law of England termeth it and it is a good word upon something done as is the Interpretation and that upon Proof To make a Man as a Beast as a Beast of Prey whom any Man may kill and it is lawful so to do To judge of Fact by Hereafter and of what a Man may do for time to come but as yet it cannot be said of him To kill a Man for hereafter and for Ages to come Yet this is Priest Chansey's and the Doctrine of your Priests and the Practice of You as the Sequel makes manifest for You had a great Consultation again and your Priests were put to it how to prove them as your Law had said And Ye had them before you again and your Priests were with you every One by his side so came ye to Your Court and John Norton must ask them Questions on purpose to ensnare them that by your standing Law for Hereticks you might condemn them as your Priests before consulted And when this would not do for the Lord was with them and made them wiser than your Teachers Ye made a Law to banish them upon Pain of Death Even all such as having suffered your Law should offend again that is to say Come into your Jurisdiction or be such a One as is called a Quaker whom ye so distinguish by the Hat in that Law viz. The not observing the Laudable Custom of the Nation that is the putting off the Hat and the Contempt of Authority that is keeping it on in the Court and these having suffered your Law again and again and that without Cause or legal Proceeding ye banish'd after all this ado whilst Ye could have nothing against them either to justifie what ye had already done by vertue of your Law which said not so or for what ye did so do unto them under colour of a Law made by you whilst they were under your hands by a Law a Postea made after they were Prisoners because they had wrongfully suffered your Law twice before What Abominable Injustice is this and hard to be parallel'd And so they suffered whose Names are Lawrence Southick Cassandra his Wife their Son Josiah see a Man and his House yea a Man and his Heritage Samuel Shattock Nicholas Phelps and Joshua Buffum of which more hereafter when I come to your Law of Banishment After this the Constables of Salem by the Instigation of William Hathorne made diligent search after their Meetings sometimes on Horseback sometimes on Foot for Money ye wanted with Power to break open Houses where they should not be let in who resisted not and Twelve more of them were had to your Court at Salem and fined Forty pounds Nineteen shillings for absenting from your Meetings which as the Spring grew on your Marshal gathered up for your Treasuries by Attaching Cattle and Land and great Fines ye took of some Men for their Wives absence though they themselves came to your Meetings of which I have touched to the Impoverishing of many Families who had but little in the Outward the Fines then taken amounting to One Hundred Pounds and upwards And VVilliam Maston of Hampton in your Colony for Two Books found in his House viz. John Lilburn's Resurrection so intituled and VV. Dusberies mighty Day of the Lord was fined Ten Pounds and the Books took away and for not coming to your Meetings Five Pounds and for your Priest Three Pounds for which certain Barrels of Beef were seized on and You took to the value of above Twenty Pounds And because whilst the aforesaid were in Prison coming through Salem he took some Provisions for Lawrence and Cassandra Southick of their Children and for Josiah of his Wife he was sent for by your Governor and Committed to Prison and continued there about Fourteen dayes in the Cold Winter season though aged about Seventy years Thus have you made a Prey of the Innocent and added Affliction to their Bonds and stopped your Ears at the Cry of their Oppression Therefore the Lord will not hear your Cry in the Day of your Calamity which shall suddenly come upon you nor deliver you His Eye will not spare you but ye shall fall and never rise again the Mouth of the Lord of Hosts hath spoken it But to return to your House of Correction and to lay in Order before you the Sufferings of the Strangers as well as of the Inhabitants and to relate what ye did unto them and the Ears ye cut off as saith Your Declaration viz. The Penalty was increased by the loss of the Ears of those that offended the second time that is to say that came into your Jurisdiction for that was the Offence and so to seal up your Sum. About the beginning of the Sixth Month 1658. Christopher Holder and John Copelan̄d were moved of the Lord to go again to Boston where they had suffered so cruelly before and on the Third of the said Month went thitherwards and came as far in their way as a Town called Dedham where they lodged that Night intending the next Morning to move to Boston but they were prevented of so doing as of themselves for the Constables came early in the Morning and told them that they had a Warrant to carry them to Boston whither they brought them before your Governor who being tormented in spirit said in a Rage Ye shall be sure to have your Ears cut off and after asking them many Questions sent them to Prison and the next day had them before the Court where he sought to ensnare them but they told him They should not answer him because he sought so to do Whereupon he had the Impudence to say That they sought to ensnare them sure enough And so at the Motion of Rawson your Secretary they were committed to Prison and ordered to be kept close at Work with Prisoners Diet only till their Ears were cut off which your Jaylor sought to put in Execution though your Law of Cutting off Ears spake no such thing and threatned them with your former Law of whipping them twice a week and every time to encrease Three from Fifteen stripes the first time to Eighteen and so forwards and shewed them the Order whereby Four of Ten Friends were so used and would have reasoned them into the thing and why they would put their Bodies to such Torture he asked them as if he had pitty of them who sought to destroy them But they could not answer him whose Demand was as well besides your Law as it was against the Lord.
it not to me And these shall go away into Everlasting Punishment but the righteous into Life Eternal And so I have sealed up your Summe THE END A Few Words to the KING and both Houses of PARLIAMENT and the Rulers and People of these Nations as a WARNING from the LORD AND now Ye Inhabitants of these Nations Ye Princes and Rulers thereof and Thou King CHARLES and Thy Two Houses of Parliament be ye all warned in the Word of the Lord Whose Word and Warning it is how ye tread the steps of these or of the Men that have gone before you Medling with Conscience the Dominion of God Persecuting Men for their Conscience to God and causing them to suffer for their Consciences as hath been in these Nations For if you do and Forget the Lord and be Unmindful of Him that formed you of the Rock that begat you who hath done great Things for you and Wonderful Things and Terrible and change your Glory into the Similitude of an Oxe that eateth Grass and persecute His People Who are Innocent as to you and have suffered with you and Desire your Welfare Against whom ye have no occasion of fault but as to the Law of their God which they may not transgress lest Evil come upon them from the Lord and his Hand be upon them Who are Meek and Patient and Resist not Evil because of Him that said it but bear All things and suffer all things and you have tryed and found it so as have those that went before you whom the Lord hath Plucked up much because of what was done unto them of which they were warned in the Day of their Deliverance which was fulfilled upon Them viz. That which they were warned of as of that which should come if they took not Warning And hath made way for you and hath done for you as it is at this Day beyond what ye could ask or think Without your Sword or Bow or Spear or your Habergeon When your Hopes were almost gone and you were Disappointed in your Stratagems and Overthrown in your Power and even at a stand to Consider Whether ever a Return of your Captivity should be Which He hath turned again as the Streams in the South and you are as it were in a Dream now that the Lord hath turned again your Captivity and as those who are so filled with the Apprehension of the thing they have and which they long desired to enjoy and were long kept out of that they are in Doubt whether it be a Dream or the Thing Thus hath the Lord done for you and He that hath done it can undo it again and overturn you as He hath done them that have gone before you and that without Sword or Spear even by the Spirit of the Lord Who hath moved Me to write to You and to warn you of these things For if you do as from the Mouth of the Lord I have said and meddle with Conscience the Dominion of God and impose upon it in Matters of Religion the Worship of God who will be worshipped in Spirit and Truth and the Father seeketh such to worship Him who is Lord of the Conscience and so intrench upon his Dominion which is an Everlasting Dominion and His Kingdom which shall never have end His Hand will be against you and his Fury will come upon you and He will visit you and your Day He will turn into Night and your Joy into Sorrow and your Rejoycing into Heaviness and you shall know that the Most High ruleth in the Kingdom of Men and giveth it to whomsoever he will So in Bowels of Love and Tenderness of Heart as One that desires your Prosperity for ever and the Wel-being of you and your Posterity after you I beseech you take heed of striking against the Rock of Ages or medling with His Kingdom which is an Everlasting Kingdom or with His Dominion which is for ever and ever or persecuting His People for if ye do Know assuredly from the Lord It will dash you to Pieces and by how much the more his Kindness hath exceeded towards you will be your Judgment Therefore my dear Friends Take heed what ye do be Advised and Cool Refuse not the Counsel of One that is your Friend On whom the sence of these things lies Who would not have God your Enemy Who would have it well with you For here have splitted All that have gone before you and here You will be split the Lord hath spoken it And so I have Discharged my Conscience of what the Lord hath laid on Me and manifested my Love and Good-will to You If ye take it well it will be the better for you if otherwise I am Clear Bristol 11th day 4th Month 1661. GEO. BISHOP AN APPENDEX To the BOOK Entituled New England Judged BEING Certain WRITINGS never yet Printed of those Persons which were there EXECUTED Together With a SHORT RELATION of the TRYAL SENTENCE and EXECUTION OF VVILLIAM LEDDRA Written by Them in the time of their Imprisonment in the Bloody Town of BOSTON LONDON Printed for Robert Wilson at the sign of the Black-spread-Eagle and Windmil in Martins Le Grand 1661. An Appendex To the BOOK Entituled New England Judged This concerns all such Rulers Priests and People in New-England who have joyned hand in hand to Persecute the Saints but especially the Rulers and Priests of Masachusets Bay in New-England who are become more Bloody and Cruel Bold and Impudent in their Wickedness than the rest of their Brethren who have attempted to make a Bloody Law and Unrighteous Decree to Banish the Children and People of God upon Death out of their Jurisdiction and by an unrighteous Decree have made a Law to put the Servants of God to Death if they return again into their Patent Therefore mark the Cruelty which is the fruits of New-England's Professors all you that Read this Paper HEarken and give Ear thou Town of Boston lend an Ear O ye Rulers chief Priests and Inhabitants thereof Listen all you that dwell therein Rich and Poor Small and Great High and Low Bond and Free of what sort so ever Give Ear be attentive to the Words of my mouth which proceed from the Spirit of the Lord and from the Power of the Almighty within me I have often considered your Conditions and your Actings have often come into my remembrance which hath caused me often to Lament because of the hardness of your hearts who do thus slight the Almighty and requite the Most High Oh foolish and unwise ye who do not regard the Lord that made you who hath often sent to you his Servants to give you warning of the mighty day of the Lord of Hosts of the terrible day of the Lord God Almighty which draweth near it hastens apace the Lord hath said it for His Elects sake and for His own Names sake will the Lord arise and plead with all His Enemies in this the day of His Eternal Power Oh