Béarne, against whom all these deeds of sedition and violence must have been committed, are represented as not only enduring, but protecting, such miscreants; and when the Roman church, in its great goodness, offered to purge the land of these pollutions, they became such advocates of plunder, rapine, fire, sword, blasphemy, and sedition, as not only to make common cause with their subjects, but to endure in their defence every calamity which their enemies could inflict.

Supposing, however, that the Albigenses had been all that the catholic writers represent, upon what ground could the Roman church make a war of extermination against them? The sovereigns of those countries did not seek her aid to suppress the seditions of their subjects, nor even to regulate their faith. The interference was not only without their authority, but absolutely against their consent, and was resisted by them in a war of twenty years continuance. If they refer to the authority of the king of France, as liege lord, he had not, in that capacity, the right of interference with the internal affairs of his feudatories; and, as will appear from the following history, he had, in fact, no share in these transactions, any farther than to come in at the close of the contest, and reap the fruits of the victory. We are therefore from every point brought to the same conclusion-that the church claims a divine right to extirpate heresy and exterminate

heretics, with or without the consent of the sovereigns in whose dominions they may be found.

The author of the following history observes, p. 6, that "the most ancient historian of the persecution affirms, that Toulouse, whose name, says he, ought rather to have been Tota dolosa, had been scarcely ever exempt, even from its first foundation, from that pest of heresy which the fathers transmitted to their children," and that "their opinions had been transmitted, in Gaul, from generation to generation, almost from the origin of Christianity." That is, in other words -that the pure and original principles of Christianity had been handed down in Gaul, from the first planting of that religion there-that the people had, as far as their opportunities would allow, resisted the usurpations and corruptions of the church of Rome-and that the Albigenses were the inheritors of those principles, mingled doubtless with various errors, which their slender means of true religious instruction would not allow them to escape.*

4 The means of religious instruction must, in the early ages of the church, have been very different from what they are in the present. Those churches which used the Greek language, though they had the New Testament scriptures in their original tongue, were still, on account of the great difficulty of procuring manuscripts, able to derive scarcely any advantage from them, except what arose from the public readings in the church. To the Latin Christians, the difficulty was increased by the inferiority of the Latin versions; and when this ceased to be a living language, the people must have been in a state of still greater destitution with regard to scriptural knowledge. As this increased, the corruptions of the church increased in like propor

The corruptions of Christianity did not arrive at that height to which they finally attained on the full establishment of the church of Rome, but by slow and gradual steps, and even sometimes by the abuse of what, in its origin and intention, was wise and good. They originated chiefly with the episcopal order. That order became, in the age which immediately followed that of the apostles, to a great degree the depositary, as well as the interpreter, of Christian truth, and the regulator of Christian practice. But there was a constant tendency in the bishops to magnify their office and extend their authority. This tendency belongs to human nature, and its effects were especially foretold, on various occasions, by the apostle Paul. Every innovation in

tion, and when recourse was had to translations into the vulgar tongues, to the difficulty of procuring these was added that of procuring sound and valuable instruction from the regular teachers. It is not therefore a matter of surprise, that heresies should have existed, of various degrees of extravagance, and yet there is abundant testimony, that the sound principles of scriptural truth generally prevailed.

5 Paul says to the elders or bishops of the church at Ephesus, Acts xx, 29, "For I know this, that after my departing shall grievous wolves enter in among you, not sparing the flock. Also of your own selves shall men arise speaking perverse things, &c.....therefore watch-and remember that by the space of three years I ceased not to warn every one, night and day, with tears." And in his second epistle to the Thessalonians, ch. ii, v. 5, having foretold the rise of the man of sin, he adds, "Remember ye not that when I was yet with you I told you these things? And now you know what withholdeth....for the mystery of iniquity doth already work; only he who now letteth will let until he be taken out of the way." From a comparison of these two passages it seems probable, that the mystery of iniquity was the tendency to selfishness and pride which appeared among the Christian teachers, against which the apostle struggled at Ephesus, at Corinth,

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doctrine, or discipline, or ceremonies, was invariably made to bear on this point. The doctrines taught in the second and third centuries, respecting the nature and indispensable necessity of baptism and the eucharist—the secrecy adopted with regard to what were called the Christian mysteries-the effects of excommunication-the right asserted by the councils to determine articles of faith and to condemn heresies-the power of ordination and deposition claimed by the bishops-all tended to increase the power of the episcopal order and to give it an influence scarcely to be conceived of in modern times, and especially amongst protestants.

Whilst, however, this general effort was making by the episcopal body towards the attainment of antichristian authority, another power was arising within itself which was destined to complete the "mystery of iniquity." The rich and the great always rise to supremacy both in the world and the church, and the bishops of Rome had abundant opportunity for the attainment and exercise of both these qualities. With a steady and undeviating purpose they pursued their object of becoming the head of the christian body.

and other churches-that he checked its progress during his own life, but foresaw that upon his removal, it would go on with increasing vigour till it should terminate in the full establishment of the man of sin, whom he also calls the son of perdition. This process may be clearly shewn, from the time of Ignatius, to the pontificate of Gregory VII.

They boldly advanced the most unfounded claims, encouraged and invited all appeals to themselves, arrogantly interfered in all disputes, asserted the right of excommunication, expended their wealth and exerted their influence, till, after a lapse of ages and various political revolutions which they, with consummate policy, turned to their own advantage, the see of Rome attained to a universal and nearly undisputed authority. And such is the mighty influence of long established prejudices and habits, that the greater part of the christian world does still, in some form or other, yield obedience to its despotic sway. Against these usurpations the christians in Gaul made, as appears from various indications in history, a long continued struggle. They were at different times assisted by eminent men in their opposition to the Romish innovations; but when the pope had obtained the victory over the episcopal order, the people were obliged to continue the contest alone, and, under the names of various heresies, given them by their enemies, to maintain their christian liberty and the purity of the christian profession. The Waldenses and Albigenses have become celebrated by the boldness of their resistance, and the extent of their sufferings. The persecutions which they endured scat

6 See the account of Irenæus, Hilary, Vigilantius, and others in the second to the tenth chapters of Allix's History of the ancient churches of the Albigenses; in which the opposition to the bishop of Rome is traced from the 2nd century to the 10th.