Adin Ballou

“ Till then, the law and standard of righteousness must not be relaxed to suit human convenience. Duty must be insisted on without abatement, and whoever exhibits weakness, imperfection, frailty, sin, must bear the shame and condemnation.
It is in these small matters that every virtue suffers its greatest betrayals. A continual dropping wears the hardest stone. A continual unscrupulousness in little things undermines all moral principle. ”

“ Who is to be the judge of what is possible - God, or man? Who is to judge what and how much shall be required - Jesus Christ, or his disciples? Are we to set at nought a duty because it seems to us difficult of performance? Are we to doubt that God's grace is sufficient for the weakest of his trusting children, to enable them to perform any duty HE may lay upon them? Are we to accommodate divine truth and duty to the convenience of our fellow men, in order to multiply superficial disciples? ”

“ Righteousness is an aggregate of the littles of life. He that is faithless habitually in small matters is not to be depended on in great matters. He may, or may not do right. A principal reason why public institutions, laws and measures are so repugnant to justice and humanity, is that the individual consciences of the people, in the small matters of ordinary life, are habitually unscrupulous. If, then, non-resistance is to be insisted on at all, as a duty, it is to be insisted on in small matters as well as large. ”

“ Does it become them to complain that the duties of love are hard, that non-resistance is impracticable, impossible, or extremely difficult; when its principle is so godlike, its spirit so heavenly, its exemplification so beautiful, its fruits so refreshing, and its achievements so glorious! ”

“ There is truth in the assertion that a practical exemplification of non-resistance in the small matters of everyday life is more difficult than in great matters on extraordinary occasions. And is not this true of all the great virtues enjoined in Law or Gospel? It may be easier to eschew idolatry, adultery, fornication, murder, robbery, theft, falsehood, covetousness, &c., in the open gaze of public scrutiny and public opinion, even under the mightiest temptation, than in private unobserved life. ”

“ The practice of non-resistance, if not impossible for the great majority of Christians, is certainly extremely difficult, even for the most advanced. It seems like overstraining duty. It is urging on men so much more than they feel able to perform, that multitudes will faint under the burden, and abandon Christianity altogether, as a system wholly beyond their reach. It is unwise to require what must discourage so many thousands from attempting anything at all, as avowed disciples of Christ. ”

“ And shall those who ought to be "the light of the world" and "the salt of the earth," dishonor their high calling, and defile their garments, by engaging in the conflicts of human ambition, violence and revenge? Shall they lust after the dainties of cannibalism, admire the splendors of martial idolatry, and delight themselves in the acts of mortal cruelty! ”

“ The practice of non-resistance is more difficult in small than large matters. It is not in abstaining from war and battle, or in enduring great and notorious injuries with forbearance, that non-resistance imposes the heaviest burdens. Men gather strength in such cases from the consciousness of public admiration and sympathy, and even from the magnitude of the conflict and the consequent glory of a triumph. ”

“ If we will be Christians, let us try with all our might to do our duty, and see how far we shall be left to fall short. Let men earnestly try to carry out Christian non-resistance, with this full purpose of heart, and though they may experience the pain of the cross sometimes, they will soon rejoice in a crown of triumph. ”

“ Ought not each true Christian's heart to be a germ of the millennium, and each Christian community a proximate miniature of it? If not, what is the evidence that men have been born again - that there is any such thing as regeneration? If professing to be disciples of Christ, they are unable, even by divine grace, to practice the precepts of their Lord and Master, merely because the unregenerate around them are so wicked ”

“ There can be no occasion for non-resistance where there is no aggression, injury, or insult. So that the objector virtually makes the Son of God appear in the highest degree ludicrous and absurd. He makes him say, "Ye have heard that it hath been said, An eye for an eye, and a tooth. for a tooth; but I say unto you that ye resist not evil," in the millennium, when there will be none. And if any man smite thee on thy right cheek - in the millennium, when all shall be love and kindness - turn unto him the other also. ”

“ Plead how difficult it is in everyday life not to lie a little, deceive a little, defraud a little, extort a little, hate your neighbor a little, steal a little, be murderous a little, idolatrous a little, and lascivious a little. Get your indulgence from heaven for all this, and then doubtless an indulgence will not be withheld to resist injury with injury a little, and to render evil for evil a little, in ordinary matters. ”

“ But the extreme hollowness of the objection before us becomes at once obvious, when I turn the tables, and demand whether the practice of injurious resistance offers immunity from extreme trial, danger, hardship and suffering? How happens it that human beings enough to people from eighteen to forty such globes as ours, have perished in war? ”

“ It is difficult always to do right in this, as it is in respect to other departments of duty; and no more so. There is no virtue which does not involve some painful and almost overwhelming trials. If we were to cast off all obligations that ever required the hazard of mortal life, we should reject every single commandment of the living God. For there is not one that has not had its martyrs - and also its apostates under great temptation. But to the faithful how blessed is even death itself - if duty obliges the sacrifice? ”

“ And whosoever will sue thee at the law - in the millennium, when the law of love shall be universally obeyed - and take away thy coat, let him have thy cloak also. Love your enemies - in the millennium, when you have no enemies. Bless them which curse you, when there are none to curse; do good to them that hate you, when all love you ”

“ It may be easier to suffer the martyrdom of death before a gaping and amazed, perhaps admiring multitude, than the petty martyrdom of a taunt, a kick, a cuff, or a wrung nose, of which the multitude know nothing, and for which they might care as little. ”

“ Impracticable till the millennium Objection. Your doctrine may be true in its principles, and in its ultimate requirements; but it must be impracticable till the millennium. Then, when the whole human race shall have become regenerate, its sublime morality will be the spontaneous development of all hearts. Under existing circumstances, while there is so much depravity, and such multitudes of men are restlessly bent on aggression, it is obviously impracticable. The wicked would shortly exterminate the righteous, were the latter to act on non-resistant principles. ”

“ God reigns and not man. He declares the law of perfect rectitude through his Son. That Son is the head of every man - the Lord and Master of all true disciples. He has enjoined the practice of non-resistance on his professed followers as their indispensable duty. ”

“ What they have endured, as the servants of sin, is a proof of what they are capable of enduring for righteousness' sake. The latter service requires not a thousandth part of the physical and mental suffering of the former. How flimsy then is the objection we are considering! Let it never be repeated by any man calling himself a Christian. A true heart, a sound principle of action, and a conscientious will, can never find Christian non-resistance either an unattainable or an unsupportable virtue.
Objection 3: More difficult in small than large matters Objection. ”

“ I affirm the exact contrary: viz. that the righteous would exterminate the wicked, in the best sense of the word, were they to act on strict non-resistant principles. They would immediately usher in the millennium, with all its blessings, were they to act on these principles in true and persevering fidelity. How else is it imaginable that any such state as the millennium should ever be developed among mankind? ”

“ But your doctrine obliges the abused wife of a brutal husband, and the insulted and smitten victim of insolent scoundrelism, to refrain from defensive violence, and even from prosecutions at law, at least under the existing type of human government. It does not appear that you would allow even a mob to be repelled with military force, or so much as a demand to be made on the government for the protection of one's property, family or life. ”

“ But in everyday life, where people pass through a thousand trials, consuming to the vital spirits of their being, unnoticed, unsympathized with, unpitied and uncared for, it if, by no means so easy to endure the mean, vexatious aggressions, wrongs and insults of petty injurers. ”