304 The Great Controversy Between Christ and Satan
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Church; so that belief would become a heap of confusion.” 441 Attendance at the services of the established church was required under a penalty of fine or imprisonment.“ Williams reprobated the law; the worst statute in the English code was that which did but enforce attendance upon the parish church. To compel men to unite with those of a different creed, he regarded as an open violation of their natural rights; to drag to public worship the irreligious and the unwilling, seemed only like requiring hypocrisy....‘ No one should be bound to worship, or,’ he added,‘ to maintain a worship, against his own consent.’‘ What!’ exclaimed his antagonists, amazed at his tenets,‘ is not the laborer worthy of his hire?’‘ Yes,’ replied he,‘ from them that hire him.’” 442
Roger Williams was respected and beloved as a faithful minister, a man of rare gifts, of unbending integrity and true benevolence; yet his steadfast denial of the right of civil magistrates to authority over the church, and his demand for religious liberty, could not be tolerated. The application of this new doctrine, it was urged, would“ subvert the fundamental state and government of the country.” 443 He was sentenced to banishment from the colonies, and finally, to avoid arrest, he was forced to flee, amid the cold and storms of winter, into the unbroken forest.
“ For fourteen weeks,” he says,“ I was sorely tossed in a bitter season, not knowing what bread or bed did mean.” But“ the ravens fed me in the wilderness,” and a hollow tree often served him for a shelter. 444 Thus he continued his painful flight through the snow and the trackless forest, until he found refuge with an Indian tribe whose confidence and affection he had won while endeavoring to teach them the truths of the gospel.
Making his way at last, after months of change and wan-
441 Martyn, Vol. V, p. 340. 442 Bancroft, Part I, ch. 15, par. 2. 443 Idem, par. 10. 444 Martyn, Vol. V, pp. 349, 350.