Wesley Corpus

Fourthly. “All that will live godly in Christ Jesus shall suffer persecution;” if in no other way, yet at least in this, that “men will by revilings persecute them, and say all manner of evil against them falsely, for his sake.” One unavoidable effect of this will be, that men whose subsistence depends on their daily labour will be often in want, for few will care to employ those of so bad a character; and even those who did employ them before, perhaps for many years, will employ them no amore; so that hereby some may indeed be brought to beggary. 8. What, does this touch you? Are you one of those “who will have nothing to do with those scandalous wretches?” Per haps you will say, “And who can blame me for it? May I not employ whom I please?” We will weigh this:--You employed A.B. for several years. By your own account, he was an hon est, diligent man. You had no objection to him but his follow ing “this way.” For this reason you turn him off. In a short time, having spent his little all, and having no supply, he wants bread. So does his family too, as well as himself. Before he can get into other business to procure it, through want of con venient food to eat, and raiment to put on, he sickens and dies. This is not an imaginary scene. I have known the case, though too late to remedy it. “And what then?” What then you are a murderer! “O earth, cover not thou his blood!” No; it doth not. “The cry thereof hath entered into the ears of the Lord God of Sabaoth.” And God requireth it at your hands; and will require it in an hour when you think not. For you have as effectually mur dered that man, as if you had stabbed him to the heart. It is not I then who ruin and starve that family: It is you; you who call yourself a Protestant! you who cry out against the persecuting spirit of the Papists! Ye fools, and blind! What are ye better than they? Why, Edmund Bonner would have starved the heretics in prison; whereas you starve them in their own houses! And all this time you talk of liberty of conscience! Yes, liberty for such a conscience as your own!