Massachusetts -- Church history; Massachusetts -- History -- Colonial period, ca. 1600-1775; Puritans -- Massachusetts
“They would fain have altogether excused themselves; and priest Norton
thought it sufficient to say that he did not assist in the bloody trial,
nor had advised to it. But John Copeland, whose ear was cut off at
Boston, charged the contrary upon him: and G. Fox, the elder, got
occasion to speak with them in the presence of some of his friends, and
asked Simon Broadstreet, one of the New England magistrates, ‘whether he
had not a hand in putting to death those they nicknamed Quakers?’ He not
being able to deny this confessed he had. Then G. Fox asked him and his
associates that were present, ‘whether they would acknowledge themselves
to be subjects to the laws of England? and if they did by what law they
had put his friends to death?’ They answered, ‘They were subjects to the
laws of England; and they had put his friends to death by the same law,
as the Jesuits were put to death in England.’ Hereupon G. Fox asked,
‘whether they did believe that those his friends, whom they had put to
death, were Jesuits, or jesuitically affected?’ They said ‘Nay.’ ‘Then,’
replied G. Fox, ‘ye have murdered them; for since ye put them to death
by the law that Jesuits are put to death here in England, it plainly
appears, you have put them to death arbitrarily, without any law.’
Thus Broadstreet, finding himself and his company ensnar’d by their own
words, ask’d, ‘Are you come to catch us?’ But he told them ‘They had
catch’d themselves, and they might justly be questioned for their lives;
and if the father of William Robinson (one of those that were put to
death) were in town, it was probable he would question them, and bring
their lives into jeopardy. For he not being of the Quakers persuasion,
would perhaps not have so much regard to the point of forbearance, as
they had.’ Broadstreet seeing himself thus in danger began to flinch and
to sculk; for some of the old royalists were earnest with the Quakers to
prosecute the New England persecutors. But G. Fox and his friends said,
‘They left them to the Lord, to whom vengeance belonged, and he would
repay it.’ Broadstreet however, not thinking it safe to stay in England,
left the city, and with his companions went back again to New England.”
[Footnote: Sewel, p. 288.]
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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