But practice quickly failed: for wickedness flowed, in a
little time, as well among the professors of the reformation, as those
they reformed from; so that by the fruits of conversation they were not
to be distinguished. And the children of the reformers, if not the
reformers themselves, betook themselves, very early, to earthly policy
and power, to uphold and carry on their reformation that had been begun
with spiritual weapons; which I have often thought has been one of the
greatest reasons the reformation made no better progress, as to the life
and soul of religion. For whilst the reformers were lowly and
spiritually minded, and trusted in God, and looked to him, and lived in
his fear, and consulted not with flesh and blood, nor sought deliverance
in their own way, there were daily added to the church such as, one might
reasonably say, should be saved: for they were not so careful to be safe
from persecution, as to be faithful and inoffensive under it: being more
concerned to spread the truth by their faith and patience in tribulation,
than to get the worldly power out of their hands that inflicted those
sufferings upon them: and it will be well if the Lord suffer them not to
fall, by the very same way they took to stand.
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