EXTRACTS FROM “THE BATTLE AXE,”

By Timothy Watrous, Sr., and Timothy, Jr.

Satan, to all classes of the Ecclesiastical system that profess Christ’s name and prove traitors to his service.

I now address you as my sworn subjects, under full power of my authority; feeling much gratified to see my kingdom established on the ruins of God’s creation. Though I have been wounded by Christ, the invader of my possessions, yet I hold before you the greatness of my power and the glory of my kingdom. I am the great and high prince and god of this world.... I am your god, and I warn you of my great enemy Christ; that you be not found obedient to any of the requirements of his contracted plan. My ways are broad and easy. I am high in heart and teach the same to you. That in all nations you may set my worship in high places, that it may be adorned with all the splendid glory which belongs to the prince that offered Christ all the glory of this world. That your places of worship may appear beautiful to men. And let my servants, your ministers, be men of the best gifts and talents; for so were your fathers the false prophets. And be not like Christ’s apostles, who were ignorant, unlearned men. Even his great apostle, Paul, (they said) in bodily presence was weak and his speech contemptible. But let it not be so with you.... For it is my will that you should have the praise of men; and receive from them titles of honor. For the ways of Christ, our great enemy, are contrary to all men, and even to nature itself, as you may see throughout all his precepts; for example I Cor. I, 26, 27, 28. “For ye see your calling, brethren, how that not many wise men after the flesh, not many mighty, not many noble are called; but God hath chosen the foolish things of the world to confound the wise; and God hath chosen the weak things of the world to confound the things that are mighty; and base things of the world and things which are despised hath God chosen.”

This is no description of an accomplished member of society. Faithful subjects, when you execute the priest’s office in my service, put on a dress suitable to your ministration; and let your bodily presence be amiable and your speech affable, and your countenance grave and solemn. Salute the people with a comely behavior, that you may glory in your own presence. For verily I say unto you, except your outward appearance of righteousness shall exceed that of Christ’s ministers, you shall in no case deserve the world....

Agreeably to my counsel, in all cases resent an insult from your fellows and go forth to war with them; embody yourselves and march to the field of battle, with religion at your right; and appoint one of my servants, your ministers, a chaplain to pray for your success. And there encamp, one against the other; and let my servants, your priests, on both sides, put up a prayer to the God of heaven that you may gain the victory over each other; cherishing the belief that all that die gloriously in battle go immediately to heaven. And when you are coming together to do the work of human butchery, if a sense of the horrid piece of work which you are about to perform shall fill your soldiery with terror, benumb their senses with intoxicating liquor; and put on confusion and distraction, under the name of courage and valor; and fear not, for I will be with you and fill your hearts with such vengeance, through the immediate influence of my spirit, that you shall be able to perform all my will and pleasure. And, when you have sufficiently soaked the ground with the blood of your fellow men, and humbled their hearts and have gotten your wills upon them; then return and let my servant, your minister, lift up his voice before you, unto the God of heaven, with praise and thanks for the victory; that you have been able to do such deeds as to bereave parents of their sons, wives of their husbands and children of their fathers.... And then return home full of the glory of your own shame, and tell your rulers you have saved their pride, gratified their ambition and saved a little of the trash of this world; for which you have taken the lives of your fellow creatures, each one of whom is worth more than all the treasures of India. For all such things belong to the religion that I delight in.

Ye fathers, I exhort that you exercise yourselves in laying up treasure on earth. And ye, young men, that you likewise embrace every opportunity to get riches, which are an honor to youth; that in the performance thereof your hearts may be raised higher in pride.

And ye, ministers of the civil law, I counsel that you swerve not from mutual confederacy with the ecclesiastical system. That, for the sake of your honor, you strictly attend to your oaths; and put in motion all laws and modes of punishments which may tend to compel all kinds of people to submit to our precepts, which are in opposition to the rules of Christ.

A Sermon To the Priests.

It is well known that the Christian religion has been in the world 18 centuries, since she first visited the earth, and also that 300 yrs. of the first part of the time, altho’ she stood in opposition to the powers of this world, and under cruel persecutions, yet she mightily grew and flourished until about the 4th century, at which time, a general revolution took place through the governing parts of the earth and she was delivered from her persecution, being a great church and standing on her own foundation. And from that day down to this the priesthood of this religion (falsely so called) has been preaching to us a sinful world, though broken in sect, but under one lineage of ordination. Yet they have not brought the world, nor the church to a state of perfection; but much to the contrary. For when they first took the Christian church by the hand to lead her through the ensuing ages of the world, she then stood on her own feet, enjoying a well-united system of her own. And what is she now?... she is now broken all to pieces and become a house divided against herself. And this unparalleled circumstance has rendered it necessary that the sinful world unto whom you, the said priests, have been preaching, should have somewhat to preach unto you....

THE SUBSCRIBERS PETITION TO HIS COUNTRYMEN
FOR HIS RIGHTS AND
PRIVILEGES.

Whereas I am once more called to suffer for conscience’s sake, in defense of the gospel of Christ; on the account of my son, who is under age, in that it is against my conscience to send him into the train-band. For which cause, I have sustained the loss of my only cow that gave milk for my family; through the hands of William Stewart, who came and took her from me and the same day sold her at the post. Which circumstance, together with the infirmity of old age, has prevented my making my usual defence at such occasion. I have therefore thought proper and now do (for myself and in behalf of all my brethren that shall stand manfully with me in defense of the gospel of Christ) publish the following as a petition to my countrymen for my rights and privileges; and especially to those that have or shall have any hand in causing me to suffer.

Fellow Countrymen:

You esteem it a great blessing of heaven that you live in a country of light, where your rights and privileges are not invaded by a tyrannical Government. And for this great blessing of heaven do you not feel yourselves under obligation of obedience to heaven’s laws; to do unto all men as you would that men should do unto you? Or which of you on whom our Lord hath bestowed ten thousand talents should find his fellow servant that owed him fifty pence and take him by the throat, saying, “Pay that thou owest me,” and, on refusal, command his wife and children to be sold and payment to be made?

Fellow Countrymen, this case between you and me I shall now lay open before your eyes, seeing it is pending before the judgment seat of the same Lord. Our Lord and Master hath commanded us not to hate our enemies, like them of old times under the law of Moses. But hath, under the dear gospel dispensation, commanded us, saying: “I say unto you love your enemies, do good to them that hate you and pray for them that despitefully use you and persecute you, and if any man shall sue you at the law and take away your coat, forbid him not to take your cloak also.” “If thine enemy hunger, feed him, if he thirst, give him drink.” And again: “I say unto you that ye resist not evil.”

For these, and many other like commands of our Saviour, Christ, I have refused to bear arms against any man in defense of my rights and privileges of this world. For which cause, you have now taken me by the throat, saying: “Go break the laws of your Lord and Master.” And because I have refused to obey man rather than God, you have taken away the principal part of the support of my family and commanded it to be sold at the post.

And thus you, my fellow-servants (under equal obligation of obedience to the same laws of our Master) have invaded my rights and privileges and robbed me of my living, for no other reason but because I will not bear the sword to defend it. And if a servant shall be thought worthy of punishment for transgressing his master’s laws, of how much punishment shall he be thought worthy that shall smite his fellow servant, because he will not partake with him in his transgression? But I wist that through ignorance you have done it, as have also your rulers; and for this cause do I hold the case before you, that you may not stand in your own light, to stretch out against me the sword of persecution; but agree with your adversary whilst you are in the way with him. But if you shall refuse to hear this my righteous cause and shall pursue your fellow servant that owes you nothing, and who wishes you no evil, neither would hurt one hair of your head, and although you take away his goods, yet he asks them not again; but commits his cause to Him that shall judge righteously; I say if you shall follow hard after him, as the Egyptians did after Israel, God shall trouble your host and take off your chariot wheels, so that you shall drive them heavily. For I know, by experience, that no device shall stand against the counsel of God; for I am not a stranger in this warfare, neither is it only the loss of goods that I have suffered heretofore; but extreme torments of body, while my life lay at stake under the threat of my persecutors, and yet God, through his mighty power, has never suffered me to flee before my enemies, but has brought me to the 83d year of my age, though all my persecutors have been dead these many years.

Alexander Rogers.

January 7th, 1810. Waterford, New London County.