Part 80

“Contemplate the suffering which these pious martyrs endured, and how wonderfully God wrought with them; how manfully, constantly and patiently they fought, through the effective and ardent love of God, confirming the truth of what is said in Cant. 8:6, namely, that ‘Love is strong as death, and jealousy cruel as the grave.’ For, here you see as in a mirror, that neither conjugal longing and love, nor parental affection and solicitude, nor the desirable company of near and confiding friends, nor anything which God has put into his creatures, for the delight of man, could move or restrain these heroes; but that they, contemning all this, and separating from wife, children, relatives and friends, house and property, they gave themselves up to severe bonds and imprisonment, to every adversity and hardship, to cruel tortures and martyrdom, undaunted by the threats of the most awful death on the one hand, and unmoved by the many fair promises, to forsake the wholesome truth, the love of God, and the blessed hope on the other; so that they could freely say with the holy apostle Paul: ‘Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword?’ Romans 8:35. But they found and showed it to be true that according to the testimony of the apostle, neither death, nor life, nor things present, nor things to come, shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus. Verses 38 and 39. Through this love they overcame all things, and performed glorious deeds beyond the power of man. Weak women exhibited more than manly strength. Maidens and young men in the bloom of youth were enabled, by the help of God, to despise the alluring world, with all her fair and great promises; and these young and tender branches, by faith and patience, conquered the mighty of this world; the simple and unlearned confounded the sage doctors; so that these, silenced frequently through the truth, disputed with threats of fire and sword, and, though in vain, defended themselves thereby; manifesting in this manner their impotence and malice. Christ strikingly fulfilled in them the promise made to his disciples, Matt. 10:19, namely, that he would give unto them what they should speak in that hour when they should be brought before kings and governors. In sight of scaffolds and wheels, of fire and sword, they fearlessly confessed the truth, so that the judges and inquisitors were sometimes astonished, sometimes confounded, and sometimes enraged and startled. Of this boldness, the martyrs themselves boasted in their letters, thanking God, for, knowing their own weakness, they experienced the strength of God in the cross, so that they could take upon themselves with a composed, yea, with a joyful mind, that from which human nature beyond measure seemed to recoil and flee. Yea, they were filled with such an exuberant and great joy, begotten in them through the unhindered contemplation of the heavenly glory in faith and hope, that they would have preferred no royal banquet to this parting feast.

They were endowed with such strength that even cruel and inhuman torture could not extort from them the names of their fellow brethren, so that, filled with divine and brotherly love, they sacrificed their bodies for their fellow believers. The brotherhood in general was thereby so enkindled with zeal and love, that each, despising the earthly and regarding the heavenly, prepared his heart for the sufferings to which his brethren were subjected, and by which he himself was daily threatened. They shunned no danger, in the way of sheltering their fellow believers, visiting them in prison, calling boldly to them in the place of execution, and comforting and strengthening them with words of Scripture. The tyrants found themselves deceived in their design; they thought they could cause these Christians to apostatize; they put them into assurance of their salvation; they supposed they could destroy and extirpate those who opposed them, but, on the contrary, they raised up more opponents; for many of the spectators, at the said spectacle of killing people, who were harmless and of good name and report, yea, who would rather die than do ought by which they supposed to offend God, were thereby brought to reflection, and thus to investigation, and ultimately to conversion.

Besides these noble examples of love, patience and constancy, we find in their writings many devout lessons, edifying teachings and comforting admonitions, written in dark prisons, hurried and negligently indeed, and on account of inconvenience and with poor materials, but sealed with the most glorious mark, their own blood. Then the words have power and weight, when their truth is confirmed and attested by the deed. Seneca, in his epistles, censures philosophising with words, and not with life, as something shameful. Here you find words which devotion has penned, which the pressure of suffering has extorted from the inmost of the heart; words which have not been warped or bent by worldly considerations or carnal passions; but which were sincerely and unfeignedly spoken to their friends, at the end of life, as a last will, and confirmed with death. Husbands in tribulation consoled their wives, admonished them to godliness, and incited them to steadfastness. Parents gave useful instructions to their children, presented to them the changeableness, vanity and perishableness of visible things; they taught, counseled and commanded them to forsake the world and the lusts thereof, and to cleave to and alone serve God, the supreme and only good. You perceive here how they were sometimes assaulted with many temptations and enticements, not only of wicked men, but of the devil; how the enemy of souls, bringing them upon the pinnacle of the temple, as it were, showed them the splendor and glory of this world, in order to entice them to worship this; Matt. 4:5,8. How he sometimes, with the terror of impending suffering, assailed the soul with fearfulness, and how, by false imaginations, he endeavored to bring the minds to apostasy, despondency and despair; which these pious heroes, arming themselves with watching and constant prayer to God, valiantly overcame, fighting manfully through all temptations, promises and threats, even unto death, and gaining the victory.

Now, even as the reading of, and meditating upon, the pious fathers, is very profitable in every case, so these persons stand as instructive and consoling examples, for all who are visited with crosses and temptations. Here manifest themselves shining beacons of living faith, of sure hope, and ardent love. Here is seen the positiveness of God’s promises, in fearless and joyful hearts, in the midst of suffering. Matt. 10:19. Here is the steadfastness of the saints, whom Christ crowns with salvation. Matt. 24:13. It is true, by the worldly-minded they are accounted as filth and offscouring (1 Cor. 4:13), and their actions stigmatized as sheer folly and madness; but they comfort themselves in God, and rely on his promises. They have learned that the cross must thus be taken up, if one would be worthy of Christ. Matt. 10:38. They know that they are strangers and pilgrims in this world, 1 Pet. 2:11, and remember the words of their Master, who says: “If ye were of the world, the world would love his own; but because ye are not of the world, therefore the world hateth you.” John 15:19. They are confident that if they lose their life here, they shall find it again hereafter. Matt. 10:39. They believe that we must confess the name of Christ, if we would have him confess us before his heavenly Father. Matt. 10:32. They know that their Lord and Master suffered himself, leaving us an example that we should follow his steps; who was thus minded, that when he was reviled, he reviled not again, and when he suffered, threatened not, but prayed for his enemies. 1 Peter 2:21,23. They hold that if they would reign with Christ, they must here suffer with him. 2 Tim. 2:12. They are mindful of the words of Christ, that the servant is not greater than his master, Matt. 10:24, and that therefore, as Christ suffered, they must arm themselves with the same mind. 1 Peter 4:1. They know themselves to be defenseless sheep, a prey to the devouring wolves. But they do not fear them, who can kill only the body, but him who holds body and soul in his hand. Matt. 10:28. They learned long ago that all that will live godly shall suffer persecution. 2 Tim. 3:12. Christ foretold them that they should be hated of all men for his name’s sake, yea, should be delivered into tribulation, and be killed; and what is still more, that those killing them should think that they do God service. Hence, they think it not strange when they are tried by suffering; but rejoice that they are partakers of the sufferings of Christ, knowing that, when his glory shall be revealed, they shall also rejoice with him. 1 Peter 4:12,13. They glory in tribulation (Rom. 5:3), believing that thereby their faith is tried and refined. 1 Pet. 1:7. They experience that patient suffering begets a glad and constant hope, and that the cross, which to those who perish, is foolishness, is to them the power of God unto salvation (1 Cor. 1:18), and esteem it as the grace of God, when for conscience they suffer wrongfully. 1 Pet. 2:19. And though they be troubled, persecuted and cast down here, yet they are not in despair, forsaken, or destroyed; but with holy Paul, they always bear about in their bodies, the dying of the Lord Jesus, that the life also of the Lord Jesus might be made manifest in their bodies. 2 Cor. 4:8–11. They feel in the abounding of the sufferings of Christ, an abounding consolation through Christ. 2 Cor. 1:5. They believe that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the future glory. Rom. 8:18. Hence they arm themselves for tribulation and suffering, as true heroes of their captain, Jesus Christ. They have before them a great brotherhood, who finished their course in this way. Cain could not bear his brother’s piety and favor with God, and slew him. Gen. 4:8. Violence and oppression ruled the first world. Gen. 6:13. Pious Lot had to be the sport and lust of the Sodomites. Gen. 19. David had to flee before Saul. The prophet Isaiah lamented already in his time that he who departed from evil had to be everyone’s prey and derision. Many holy prophets and men of God had to endure persecution and martyrdom from the wicked, as holy Zacharias, Amos, Micah, Jeremiah, Daniel, and the three young men, Eleazar, the mother with her seven sons, and others, who need not be mentioned, since the time and age of the New Testament, furnish abundant material in this respect. John, the forerunner of Jesus, had to offer his neck to the sword, in prison. Matt. 14:10. Our captain of the faith, Jesus Christ, had to enter into his glory through much derision, ignominy and suffering, and ultimately through the most shameful death of the cross. His apostles and disciples, as the chronicles state, followed their Master. Peter and Paul were put to death by Emperor Nero. James, the brother of John, was killed with the sword by Herod. Acts 12:2. Matthew was nailed to the earth, in India. Bartholomew was flayed. Andrew was crucified. Thomas was thrust through with darts. Philip was nailed to a cross, and then stoned to death. Simon Zelotes was scourged and crucified. James, the son of Alpheus, was cast down from the temple, at Jerusalem, and then beaten to death with sticks. Judas Thaddeus was killed, in Persia, by wicked heathen priests. Matthias also obtained the martyr’s crown. Mark, the evangelist, was dragged about by a cord around his neck, at Alexandria, till he died. John, the apostle, banished in the island of Patmos, adorned the Gospel with suffering [as is circumstantially recorded in the first book, first century, in the account of the martyrs]. This was the way of the holy prophets. This is the path which our Savior and his messengers, and afterwards many disciples, trod. Polycarp, the disciple of John, was burnt alive at Smyrna. Ignatius, bishop of Antioch, was torn by wild beasts [as is stated in the second century]. Even the Roman bishops, in the first three hundred years, were mostly all martyred, and subjected, with the common Christians, to persecution by the heathen Emperors [these, however, we commit to God]. Under the Emperor Diocletian, there was such an awful persecution that it seemed as though the Christian name would be utterly extirpated; so that the first churches at the time of Emperor Constantine were so accustomed to persecution, that they deliberately prepared themselves for suffering.

Since, then, the godfearing who are visited with the cross, have so many holy martyrs as predecessors; and since the cross is foretold them; yea, since such glorious promises are given to those who suffer, it is a little thing for them that they, who gladly acknowledge themselves soldiers under the bloody banner of Christ, are therefore aspersed and ridiculed as fools. The Christian reader may here perceive and firmly conclude that the cross is also the ensign of those who serve and follow Jesus Christ, the captain of the faith; and that, on the contrary, those who afflict others with crosses and sufferings, do not belong to this captain, but are under another leader. For the true Christians have never persecuted the innocent, but were always persecuted themselves; and in the primitive church, even in the time of Constantine, when the bishops began to rise a little higher in the world, and were protected by the Emperor, it was considered an abomination to persecute any one; they, however, suffered persecution themselves. It was then deemed such a detestable thing, to put to death or persecute any one for heresy, that Bishop Ithacius was excommunicated and separated from the church, because he, through the tyrant Maximus, had brought about the death of Priscilian, the heretic; as the Roman cardinal, Cesar Baronius, very plainly describes in his church history, for the year 385.

He also states further, that it is utterly incompatible with the meekness of a pastor. Again, that none of the holy fathers even commended it, that an ecclesiastic should seek to bring a heretic to his death. So that, according to him, St. Martin would have no fellowship with the aforesaid Ithacius or his adherents, because their hands were stained with the blood of Priscilian. And though, induced by the threats of the tyrant Maximus, St. Martin feigned to have fellowship for an hour with Ithacius, he nevertheless subsequently manifested great regret for it, since he felt that in consequence of his dissimulation, the gift of healing was partly taken from him.

From this it is clearly manifest, how falsely they boast of being the successors of Christ and his apostles, and of the primitive church, who have so abominably stained their hands with the blood of innocent people, people who only confessed and practiced the Gospel according to the full dictates of their conscience; yea, concerning whom the tyrants themselves frequently testified, that their life was pious; that they would not willingly lie, or speak against their conscience; and that they were not apprehended on account of any misdeeds, but only because they did not obey the mother, the holy church, and the decree of the Emperor. It is so far from such being the true and apostolical church, that there is no surer mark of the false and antichristian church, than the killing of heretics, or rather, so-called heretics; for however abominable heresy may be, this is the most abominable of all. For what indeed is more opposed to the peaceable, meek, merciful, forgiving, and revengeless character of Christ, than to persecute any one for his faith? What can we conceive of that militates more against the holy laws and commandments of Christ, which chiefly consist in love, peace, humility, meekness, lowliness, mercy, forgiveness, compassion, etc. If Christians are called (as they do) to requite hatred with love, evil with good, cursing with blessing; yea, must they, according to the doctrine of Christ, pray for them who oppress and persecute them; how, then, is it possible that they can remain Christians and themselves oppress and persecute others who have never laid a straw in their way? Can we believe, that any trace, yea, any true knowledge of the spirit and word of Christ remains where there is such a direct antichristian disposition and action? If, according to Christ, false prophets are to be known and judged from their fruits (Matt. 7:16), there can be nothing by which they may, more readily, be distinguished, than from their persecuting others; for they are witnesses unto themselves, as Christ said to the Pharisees, that they are the children of them who killed the true prophets, and who fill up the measure of their fathers. Our Savior compares them to serpents and a generation of vipers, who cannot escape the damnation of hell. Matt. 23:31–33. The disciples of Christ, who still entertained the hope of the establishing of an external and carnal Israel, asked their Lord, whether they should, according to the example of Elias, command fire to come down from heaven, upon those who did not receive him. Whereupon Christ earnestly rebuked them, saying: “Ye know not what manner of spirit ye are of. For the Son of man is not come to destroy men’s lives, but to save them.” Luke 9:54–56. But these heretic-killers, who boast of being the vice-regents and followers of Christ, yea, doctors of divinity, dare, not only without asking Christ, but even against his express prohibition and example, whet the sword, and stir up the fire, not to murder those who refuse to receive Christ, but those who are ready to adhere to and follow him even unto death. By this they clearly indicate, first, that they are governed and impelled by the spirit not of Christ, but of the devil (who was a murderer from the beginning, John 8:44); and, secondly, that they do not come like Christ and his followers, to save men’s souls, but to destroy them; since they kill not only the bodies of the innocent, thus dishonoring the image which is created after God (Gen. 5:1), and making themselves guilty of the mortal sin of blood-shedding (Gen. 9:6) but, O awful deed! they purposely and as much as lies in their power, also endeavor to kill their souls, whom, being considered by them in a state of damnation, they suddenly cut off from the time of repentance. Matt. 26:52. They would presumptuously teach Christ, the perfect wisdom; for he deemed it well, and commanded his disciples, to let the tares grow until the harvest, lest they should root up the wheat with the tares, but these teach and do the opposite. Weeding contrary to the command of Christ, they root up not only the tares, but, passing by bad, unchaste, extravagant, pompous, avaricious, mendacious, deceitful, envious, hateful, and vindictive men, they also, from the field of the world, root out the purest grain.

They usurp the office of the Most High, and would command and compel the souls who are not under them, but under the sceptre of Jesus Christ (Matt. 10:28); yea, they set themselves not only beside, but above the Divine Majesty, demanding that men should obey them rather than God. God has commanded that we should serve him with all our hearts (Deut. 6:5), but these prohibit men from serving God in this manner, and constrain them contrary to the convictions of their consciences to follow their laws and institutions. Matt. 21:37. Christ constrained the people to conversion, by words of admonition, persuasion and reproof, and of those who were offended at his doctrine, he only said: “Let them alone: they be blind leaders.” Matt. 15:14. But these compel with fire and sword, so that they deliver to the executioner those who embrace the doctrine of Christ according to all their ability, and do not feel themselves at liberty to follow these blind leaders; bringing them into a strait, where they cannot without danger, escape either to the right or to the left; for, if they obey these, they fall into the hands of God; and if they adhere to God, they cannot escape the cruelty of these men.

Now, in order to give a semblance and gloss to their unchristian and ungodly punishments of heretics, they befoul these pious people with the stain of disobedience, and, washing their hands, as it were, from innocent blood, lay the guilt upon the edicts, which, however, were devised, and are daily executed, through their bloody advice and instigation. But, pray, who has given them power to make edicts against souls and consciences, to reign thereby in the kingdom of Christ, in which they themselves can be but subjects and servants? Will this excuse them? By no means. The Jews who sought to bring the innocent Jesus to death, also said like these: “We have a law, and by our law he ought to die.” John 19:7. They know, or ought to know, that at the tribunal of Christ judgment will be rendered, not according to human edicts, but according to the divine word. “The word that I have spoken,” said the Lord, “the same shall judge him in the last day,” (John 12:48), and, therefore, every one is necessarily bound more to the law of Christ, than to their laws and edicts; yea, an account will have to be given of these edicts, at that tribunal, and that whereby they sentenced the innocent wrongfully to death, will then justly aggravate their own sentence. What will they offer as an excuse, when an account will be demanded of them, why they exercised such blood-thirsty tyranny over souls? why they wrested the sceptre out of the hand of Christ, and usurped his seat? why they made themselves masters in that kingdom in which they, as servants, must themselves give an account of their actions? why they, as evil servants, treated and beat their fellow servants so cruelly; though he (Christ) had warned and threatened, to cut such asunder, and to appoint them their portion with the hypocrites, where there is weeping and gnashing of teeth (Matt. 24:45,51)? why they did not consider, that those shall have judgment without mercy, who have showed no mercy (Jas. 2:13)? What terror, what anxious remorse and fleeing will it cause when, to convict them of their wickedness, there shall come forth those whom they fettered, chained, beat, killed and martyred, whom they then accounted fools and madmen, and whom they now behold in such great glory and esteem with God.