If asked what age I would have preferred to live in, much as I love the Reformation and the Puritans, I answer that anyone wishing to have lived at earlier times is an ignorant romantic. Without modern medicine I would have died 10 years ago. But what if I had been in New England in 1776? Would I have been a loyal subject of King George or a rebel against unjust taxation?
Much as I hate having to pay taxes, I have to say, I find it difficult to reason that taxation without representation is a sufficient cause to rebel against the authorities God has appointed to rule. It is not that I think that under no circumstances should a Christian rebel. I would not have been for king, but for Parliament in England in 1644. Charles I, an upright Christian king had gone beyond God's law with his divine right of kings. He had a duty to rule justly and did not.
So would I definitely been loyal to a king over the water in 1776? If my head had ruled my heart I would have been loyal as were many Presbyterians. Perhaps the strangest loyalists were Flora MacDonald and her family. She helped the rebellious Jacobites in 1745, aiding Charles Edward Stuart escape from Scotland. She then went across the ocean but was then loyal to King George and returned to Scotland after the colony broke away.
But I have a rebellious heart. If heart had ruled head, I would have been with the rebels.
I had stopped at Bandawe, a Presbyterian mission, where a dynamic young priest led a service
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2 comments:
An interesting read is _Divided Loyalties: How the American Revolution Came to New York_, by Richard M. Ketchum.
Thank you. I will order it from our local library.
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