15. The duty of a subject who believes that all war is incompatible with Christianity
It will perhaps be asked,
“What then are the duties of a subject who believes that all war is incompatible with his religion, but whose governors engage in a war and demand his service?”
We answer explicitly, “It is his duty, mildly and temperately, yet firmly, to refuse to serve.”
There are some persons, who, without any determinate process of reasoning, appear to conclude that responsibility for national measures attaches solely to those who direct them;
that it is the business of governments to consider what is good for the community and that, in these cases, the duty of the subject is merged in the will of the sovereign.
Considerations like these are, I believe, often voluntarily permitted to become opiates of the conscience. “I have no part,” it is said, “in the counsels of the government, and am not therefore responsible for its crimes.”
We are, indeed, not responsible for the crimes of our rulers, but we are responsible for our own; and the crimes of our rulers are our own, if while we believe them to be crimes, we promote them by our co-operation.
“It is at all times,” says Gisborne, “the duty of an Englishman steadfastly to decline obeying any orders of his superiors, which his conscience should tell him were in any degree impious or unjust.”
The apostles,
who instructed their converts to be subject to every ordinance of man for conscience’ sake, and to submit themselves to those who were in authority, and who taught them that whoever resisted the power, resisted the ordinance of God,
made one necessary and uniform provision: that the magistrate did not command them to do what God had commanded them to forbear.
The apostles complied with the regulations that the government of a country thought fit to establish, whatever they might think of their wisdom or expediency,
provided, and only provided, they did not, by this compliance, abandon their allegiance to the Governor of the world.
It is scarcely necessary to observe in how many cases they refused to obey the commands of the governments under which they were placed, or how openly they maintained the duty of refusal whenever these commands interfered with their higher obligations.
It is narrated very early in Acts that one of their number was imprisoned for preaching, that he was commanded to preach no more, and was then released.
Soon afterwards all the apostles were imprisoned:
“Did we not strictly command you,” said the rulers, “that ye should not teach in this name?” The answer that they made is in point: “We ought to obey God rather than men.”
And this system they continued to pursue. If Caesar had ordered one of the apostles to be enrolled in his legions, does anyone believe that he would have served?
But those who suppose that obedience in all things is required, or that responsibility in political affairs is transferred from the subject to the sovereign, reduce themselves to a great dilemma:
It is to say that we must resign our conduct and our consciences to the will of others, and act wickedly or well, as their good or evil may preponderate, without merit for virtue or responsibility for crime.
If the government directs you to burn your neighbour’s property, or to throw him over a precipice, will you obey?
If you will not, there is an end of the argument, for if you may reject its authority in one instance, where is the limit to rejection? There is no rational limit but that which is assigned by Christianity, and that is both rational and practicable.
If anyone should ask the meaning of the words, “Whoso resisteth the power resisteth the ordinance of God,” we answer that it refers to active resistance;
passive resistance, or non-compliance, is what the apostles themselves practiced. On this point we should be distinctly understood. We are not so inconsistent as to recommend a civil war in order to avoid a foreign one. Refusal to obey is the final duty of Christians.
We think, then, that it is the business of every man who believes that war is inconsistent with our religion, respectfully, but steadfastly, to refuse to engage in it.
Let such as these remember that an honorable and an awful duty is laid upon them. It is upon their fidelity, so far as human agency is concerned, that the cause of peace is upheld.
Let them then be willing to avow their opinions and to defend them. Neither let them be contented with words if more than words – if suffering – is also required. It is only by the unyielding perseverance of good that corruption can be extirpated.
If you believe that Jesus Christ has prohibited slaughter, let not the opinion or the commands of a world induce you to join in it.
By this “steady and determinate pursuit of virtue,” the benediction that attaches to those who hear the sayings of God and do them will rest upon you, and the time will come when even the world will honor you as contributors to the work of human reformation.
THE END