Afflictions, Persecutions, and Sufferings of Christians

Edited and modernized from The Crown and Glory of Christianity by Thomas Brooks (London, 1662), pp. 413–415.

The afflictions, persecutions, and sufferings that attend Christians in these days are nothing to the fiery trials that the saints and martyrs of old have met with. Seven-fold harder measure has been measured forth to them than is this day measured forth to us; our sufferings are hardly to be named in the day wherein those sore and heavy things are mentioned, that those precious and famous worthies of old have suffered. I may say to most Christians as the apostle did to the Hebrews, ye have not yet resisted unto blood (Heb. 12:4), striving against sin; many have, but you have not. You have only met with hard words, when others have met with blows and wounds. You have been only a contending with men, when others have been a contending with beasts. You have been only whipped with rosemary branches, when others have been whipped with scorpions. You have been only bound with silken bands, when others have been bound with iron chains. Will you be so favorable to yourselves as to compare your sufferings with the sufferings of former saints? And that you may, let me give you a little abridgment of their sufferings of whom the world was not worthy (Heb. 11:38). History tells us that in the ten primitive persecutions, they exercised all manner of cruelty and torments that could be devised against the Christians:

1. In the reign of Hadrian the emperor, there were 10,000 Christians crucified in Mount Ararat, crowned with crowns of thorns, and thrust into the sides with sharp darts.
2. Others were so whipped, that their very inward arteries and veins appeared, and their entrails and bowels were seen, and afterwards they were set upon sharp shells (taken out of the sea edged and sharp), and certain nails and thorns were sharpened and pointed (called obelisci) for them to go upon, and after all this cruelty they were thrown to wild beasts to be devoured.
3. Multitudes were banished.
4. Others were torn apart with wild horses.
5. Some were racked with bars of iron.
6. Others were cast into loathsome dungeons.
7. Some were burnt in the fire.
8. Others were knocked down and had their brains beaten out with staves and clubs.
9. Some were pricked in their faces and eyes with sharp reeds.
10. Others were stoned to death with stones, as Stephen was (Acts 7:57-60).
11. Some were dashed in pieces against millstones.
12. Others had their teeth dashed out of their jaws, and their joints broken.
13. Some were cast down from very high places.
14. Others were beheaded.
15. Some were tormented with razors.
16. Others were slain with the sword.
17. Some were impaled with pikes.
18. Others were driven into the wilderness, where they wandered up and down, suffering hunger and cold, and where they were exposed both to the fury of wild beasts and also to the rage of the barbarous Arabians.
19. Some fled into caves, which by their persecutors were rammed up with stones, and there they died.
20. Others were trodden to death by the people.
21. Some were hanged on gibbets, with fire under their sides.
22. Others were cast into the sea and drowned.
23. Some were slain in metal mines.
24. Others were hanged by the feet, and choked with the smoke of a small fire, their legs first being broken.
25. Some were powdered with salt and vinegar, and then roasted with a soft fire.
26. Others were hanged by one hand, that they might feel the weight of their whole bodies, scorching and broiling over burning coals.
27. Some were shot through with arrows, and afterwards thrown into stinking latrines.
28. Others were stripped stark-naked as ever they were born, and sent outdoors in cold frosty nights, and burnt the next day.
29. In Syria, a company of Christian virgins was stripped stark-naked to be scorned by the multitude, then shaved, then covered with hogwash, and then torn in pieces and devoured by swine.
30. Lastly, many women had one joint of their bodies pulled from another, and their flesh and sides scratched with talons of wild beasts to the bones, and their breasts seared with torches until they died.

And thus you have an account of 30 several ways by which the precious sons and daughters of Zion have formerly been afflicted, tormented, and destroyed; and what heart of stone can read over this bill of particulars with dry eyes? And now tell me, sirs, whether your sufferings are worth naming in that day, wherein the sufferings of the precious servants of God in the primitive times are spoken of? Oh no! Well then, take heed of making mountains out of molehills, and of crying out, "Is there any sorrow compared to our sorrow, or any sufferings compared to our sufferings?"