There goes many a ship to sea, with many hundred souls in one ship, whose weal and woe is common, and is a true picture of a commonwealth or a human combination or society. It hath fallen out sometimes that Papists, Protestants, Jews, and Turks may be embarked in one ship; upon which supposal I affirm that all the liberty of conscience that ever I pleaded for turns upon these two hinges: that none of the Papists, Protestants, Jews, or Turks be forced to come to the ships prayers or worship, nor be compelled [restrained] from their own particular prayers or worship, if they practice any.
Roger WilliamsThe greatest crime is not developing your potential. When you do what you do best, you are helping not only yourself, but the world.
Roger WilliamsIf any refuse to obey the common laws and orders of the ship concerning their common peace or preservation; if any shall mutiny or rise up against their commanders and officers; if any should preach or write that there should be no commanders or officers because all are equal in Christ, therefore no master or officers, no laws nor orders, nor corrections nor punishments - I say I never denied that in such cases, the commander may judge, resist, compel, and punish such transgressors according to their deserts and merits.
Roger WilliamsBut who is to decide who truly fears the Lord? The magistrate has no power to enforce religious demands. The laws of the First Table of the Ten Commandments are not regulations for a civil society or a political order. They belong to the realm of religion, not politics.
Roger WilliamsThe ministry or service of prophets and witnesses, mourning and prophesying in sackcloth, God has directly commissioned and upheld all during the reign of the beast and antichrist of Rome. This witness is probably near finished, and the bloody storm of slaughter is yet to be expected and prepared for.
Roger Williams