III.--In Perils Oft

Now as I went towards Nottingham on a first-day, when I came on the top of a hill in sight of the town, I espied the great steeple-house, and the Lord said unto me, "Thou must go cry against yonder great idol, and against the worshippers therein." When I came there all the people looked like fallow ground, the priest (like a great lump of earth) stood in his pulpit above. Now the Lord's power was so mighty upon me that I could not hold, but was made to cry out.

As I spoke, the officers came and took me away, and put me into a nasty, stinking prison, the smell whereof got so into my nose and throat that it very much annoyed me. But that day the Lord's power sounded so in their ears that they were amazed at the voice. At night they took me before the mayor, aldermen, and sheriffs of the town. They examined me at large, and I told them how the Lord had moved me to come. After some discourse between them and me, they sent me back to prison again; but some time after the head sheriff sent for me to his house. I lodged at the sheriff's, and great meetings we had in his house. The Lord's power was with this friendly sheriff, and wrought a mighty change in him; and accordingly he went into the market, and into several streets, and preached repentance to the people. Hereupon the magistrates grew very angry, and sent for me from the sheriff's house, and committed me to the common prison. Now, after I was released from Nottingham gaol, where I had been kept prisoner for some time, I travelled as before in the work of the Lord.

And while I was at Mansfield-Woodhouse, I was moved to go to the steeple-house there, and declare the truth to the priest and people; but the people fell upon me in great rage, struck me down, and almost stifled and smothered me; and I was cruelly beaten and bruised by them with their hands, Bibles, and sticks. Then they haled me out, though I was hardly able to stand, and put me into the stocks, where I sat some hours. After some time they had me before the magistrate, who, seeing how evilly I had been used, after much threatening, set me at liberty. But the rude people stoned me out of the town for preaching the word.

IV.--A Willing Sufferer

While I was in the house of correction at Derby as a blasphemer, my relations came to see me, and being troubled for my imprisonment they went to the justices that cast me into prison, and desired to have me home with them, offering to be bound in one hundred pounds, and others of Derby with them in fifty pounds each, that I should come no more thither to declare against the priests. So I was had up before the justices, and because I would not consent that they or any should be bound for me--for I was innocent from any ill-behaviour, and had spoken the word of life and truth unto them--Justice Bennett rose up in a rage; and as I was kneeling down to pray to the Lord to forgive him, he ran upon me, and struck me with both his hands. Whereupon I was had again to the prison, and there kept until six months were expired.

Now the time of my commitment being nearly ended, the keeper of the house of correction was commanded to bring me before the commissioners and soldiers in the market-place, and there they offered me preferment, as they called it, asking me if I would take up arms for the commonwealth against Charles Stuart; but I told them I lived in the virtue of that life and power that took away the occasion of all wars, and was come into the covenant of peace which was before wars and strifes were.

I then passed through the country, clearing myself amongst the people; and some received me lovingly, and some slighted me. And some when I desired lodging and meat, and would pay for it, would not lodge me except I would go to the constable, which was the custom, they said, of all lodgers at inns, if strangers. I told them I should not go, for that custom was for suspicious persons, but I was an innocent man.

And I passed in the Lord's power into Yorkshire, and came to Tickhill, where I was moved to go to the steeple-house. But when I began to speak they fell upon me, and the clerk took up his Bible and struck me in the face with it, so that it gushed out with blood, and I bled exceedingly in the steeple-house. Then the people got me out and beat me exceedingly, stoning me as they drew me along, so that I was besmeared all over with blood and dirt. Yet when I got upon my legs again I declared to them the word of life. Some moderate justices, hearing of it, came to hear and examine the business, and he that shed my blood was afraid of having his hand cut off for striking me in the church (as they called it), but I forgave him, and would not appear against him.

Then I went to Swarthmore to Judge Fell's, and from there to Ulverstone, where the people heard me gladly, until Justice Sawrey--the first stirrer-up of cruel persecution in the North--incensed them against me, to hale, beat, and bruise me, and the rude multitude, some with staves and others with holly-bushes, beat me on the head, arms, and shoulders till they deprived me of sense. And my body and arms were yellow, black, and blue with the blows I received that day, and I was not able to bear the shaking of a horse without much pain. And Judge Fell, coming home, asked me to give him a relation of my persecution, but I made light of it--as he told his wife--as a man that had not been concerned, for, indeed, the Lord's power healed me again.