heretick's understanding, confute his errours, and bring him to the belief of what he disbelieved before. That by such methods he may be constrained to profess what he disbelieves still, nobody can deny, or even doubt. But to extort a hypocritical profession, is so far from being to promote the cause of God and religion, that nothing, by the acknowledgment of men of all parties, can stand more directly in opposition to it. Nihil est tam voluntarium quam religio, says Lactantius, in qua, si animus sacrificantis aversus est, jam sublata, jam nulla est.

Thirdly, it is a false, though a very common notion, that errours concerning the divine nature and perfections ought to be denominated blasphemies, or considered as civil crimes.. Blasphemy, in regard to God, corresponds to calumny in regard to man. The original name for both is the same. As the latter always implies what, in the language of the law, is called malus animus, a disposition to calumniate, so does the former. Mere mistake, in regard to character, especially when the mistake is not conceived by him who entertains it to derogate from the character, constitutes neither of those crimes. That no imputation, however, is commoner, can be ascribed solely to that malevolence, which bigotry and contention never fail to produce. Thus the arminian and the calvinist, the protestant and the papist, the jesuit and the jansenist, throw and retort on each other the unchristian reproach of blasphemy. Yet each is so far from intending to lessen, in the opinion of others, the honour of the divine majesty, that he is fully convinced that his own principles are better adapted to raise it than those of his antagonist, and for that very reason he is so strenuous in maintaining them. But to blacken, as much as possible, the designs of an antagonist, in order the more easily to bring odium on his opinions, is the too common, though detestable, resource of theological controvertists*.

I proceed to show the advances which, from time to time, were made, till that system of persecution which, in a great part of the world, still obtains, was brought to maturity and established. For ages after the opinion first took place among christians, that it was the magistrate's duty to restrain hereticks by the infliction of civil penalties, they retained so much moderation, as not to think that the punishment could justly extend to death, or mutilation, or even to the effusion of blood. But now that the empire was become christian, there gradually arose in it diverse laws against this new crime heresy, which are still extant in the codes of Theodosian and Justinian, imposing on the delinquents fines, banishments, or

see

For the scripture import of blasphemy, and the nature of that crime, "Preliminary Dissertations to a Version of the four Gospels," by the Author, vol. 1, p. 395, &c.

confiscations, according to the circumstances, and supposed degree, of the delinquency. All that regarded the execution of those laws, the trial as well as the sentence, devolved on the magistrate. Only the nature of the crime, what was heresy or schism, was determined by the ecclesiastical judge. One step in an evil course naturally leads to another. The first step was made when civil penalties were denounced against particular opinions and modes of thinking. This may be considered as the first stage of the doctrine and practice of intolerance, in the christian church. Nor could any thing be more explicitly, or more universally, condemned than this had been, by the fathers of the first three centuries, and several of the fourth. Humani juris et naturalis potestatis est, said Tertullian, in the beginning of the third century, unicuique quod putaverit colere. and Hilary of Poitiers, in the fourth, in opposition to those who favoured the interposition of the magistrate. Deus cognitionem sui docuit, potius quam exegit, et operationum cœlestium admiratione, præceptis suis concilians auctoritatem coactam confitendi se aspernatus est voluntatem. Again, Deus universitatis est, obsequio non eget necessario, non requirit coactam confessionem; non fallendus est sed promerendus, simplicitate quarendus est, confessione discendus est, charitate amandus est, timore venerandus est, voluntatis probitate retinendus est. At vero quid istud, quod sacerdotes timere Deum vinculis coguntur, pænis jubentur? Sacerdotes carceribus continentur ? Men's system of conduct may come, we see, to be totally reversed. But this is always the work of time. Every advance has its difficulty, and is made with hesitation. But one difficulty surmounted emboidens a man, and renders it easier for him to surmount another. That again makes way for the next, and so on till the change be total.

Several bishops and pastors, who had not yet been able to divest themselves of the more pure and harmless maxims of primitive times, or rather of their divine master, who totally reprobated all secular weapons in this warfare, thought, that after they had declared opinions heretical, and denied their communion to those who held them, they could not innocently intermeddle further, or give information to the magistrate, dreading that such a conduct would be irreconcileable to the great law of charity. Others more hardy, (for there will always be such differences among men) resolved, by any means, to silence such as they could not confute, and to compel those to dissemble, whom they despaired of convincing: the plain language of which conduct was, If we cannot make them better, we will make them worse,-If they will not be believers, they shall be hypocrites. And whoever will not be a induced to be of what we account the family of God, we shall

be sure to render twofold more the children of the devil than they were before.

People of this stamp, possessed of a pride, (misnamed zeal) which cannot brook contradiction, were forward in giving information to the magistrate on those whom they called hereticks, and in prompting him, where there appeared a remissness, to inflict the punishments which the imperial edicts had denounced. To such are these words of Hilary very pertinently addressed: Misereri licet nostræ ætatis laborem, et præsentium temporum stultas opiniones congemiscere, quibus patro cinari Deo humana creduntur, et ad tuendam Christi ecclesiam ambitione seculari laboratur. Oro vos, episcopi, quibusnam suffragiis ad prædicandum evangelium apostoli usi sunt? Quibus adjuti potestatibus Christum prædicaverunt, gentasque fere omnes ex idolis ad Deum transtulerunt? Anne aliquam sibi assumebant e palatio dignitatem, hymnum Deo in carcere inter catenas et flagella cantantes? Edictisque regis Paulus Christo ecclesiam congregabat? Nerone se, credo, aut Vespasiano patrocinantibus, tuebatur, quorum in nos odiis confessio divinæ prædicationis ef floruit? At nunc, proh dolor! divinam fidem suffragia terrena commendant inopsque virtutis suæ Christus, dum ambitio nomini suo conciliatur, arguitur. Terret exiliis et carceribus ecclesia, eredique sibi cogit, quæ exiliis et carceribus credita est ; pendet a dignatione communicantium, quæ persequentium est consecrata terroré; fugat sacerdotes, quæ fugatis est sacerdotibus propa gata, diligi sese gloriatur a mundo, quæ Christi esse non potuit, nisi mundus eam odisset. Such were the sentiments of St. Hilary, for he has obtained a place in the kalendar, which I take notice of the rather, that we may perceive, in the stronger light, the different temperaments which prevailed in the saints acknowledged by Rome, who belong to different ages. Light and darkness are not more opposite than the spirit of a St. Hilary, in the fourth century, and the spirit of a St. Dominick, the inventor of the inquisition, and the butcher of the Albigenses, in the thirteenth. But this by the way. I return to the early times.

It happened, not often at first, that on account of sedition, real or pretended, the person accused of heresy was punished capitally. This, if people were not satisfied of the reality of the sedition, rarely failed, for some ages, to raise against the informers, especially if pastors, much clamour and scandal. Our Lord's words, I came not to destroy men's lives, but to save them, had not yet totally lost their force among christians. The spirit of the master, and that of the servant, made too glaring a contrast to escape the notice of those who had any knowledge and reflection. Indeed, for several ages, those ministers who thought themselves warranted to call in the se

be

cular arm, did not think themselves authorized to proceed so far, as to be aiding in what might affect either life or members. They therefore abstained not only from giving information where there was any danger of this kind, but from appearing at the secular tribunal in any capacity, unless that of interces sor in behalf of the accused. And this office was not in them, as it is in the clergy of some Romish countries at present, under a disguise of mercy, quite transparent, a downright insult upon misery. But a long tract of time was necessary fore matters could be brought to this pass. St. Martin, in France, (another instance of humanity and moderation, even in those whom Rome now adores as saints) excommunicated a bishop in the fifth century, for accusing certain hereticks to the usurper Maximus, by whose means he procured their death. That worthy minister declared, that he considered any man as a murderer, who was accessary to the death of another, for being unfortunate enough to be mistaken in his opinions. On this foot, however, things remained till the year 800. It belonged to councils and synods to determine what is heresy, but (except in what relates to church censures) the trial, as well as the punishment, of the heretick, was in the magistrate. Neither was the punishment legally capital, unless when the heresy was accompanied with crimes against the state. That this pretence was often made without foundation, by men of an intolerant temper, there is little ground to doubt.

About this time happened what is called the great schism of the east, the breach betwixt the Greek and the Latin churches, since which time, till the destruction of the eastern empire by the Turks, the cause of heresy and schism remained in the Greek churches on the same footing as before. In the west, however, it has undergone immense alterations; insomuch, that the popular sentiments concerning zeal and charity have long stood in direct opposition to those which obtained, and rendered the christian character so completely amiable, as well as venerable, in the days of the martyrs. Indeed, for some centuries, particularly the eighth, ninth, and tenth, remarkable for nothing so much as the vilest superstition and grossest ignorance, and for insurrections, revolutions, and confusions, every where, hereticks and sectaries made but little noise, and were as little minded. With the revival of knowledge, even in its dawn, these also revived. There is no human blessing without some foil. But considering the gross ness of the reigning superstition, one might be at a loss to say, whether any new absurdity could be, comparatively, pronounced an evil. Whatever served to rouse men out of their lethargy, seemed to promise good in its consequences.

AFTER the year 1100, in consequence of the perpetual jars which had been betwixt the popes and emperours for more than fifty years back, and which still subsisted, and in consequence of the frequent wars and scandals in the christian world, and the irreligious lives of the clergy, innumerable hereticks sprang up, whose heresies (as they are called) were commonly levelled against ecclesiastical authority, the abuse of which was, indeed, so excessive, and so flagrant, as to give but too much weight with every body, to the severest reupon received proaches that could be uttered. All attacks doctrines must ultimately affect the power by which they are established. But when the assault is made directly on that power, the fabrick of church authority is in the most imminent danger. The aim of the former is only to make a breach in the wall of the edifice, but that of the latter is an attempt to sap the foundation. As we have seen all along that the darling object of Rome is power, to which every other consideration is made to yield, we may believe that attempts of this kind would excite a more than ordinary resentment. This, in fact, was the consequence: an unusual degree of rancour in the ecclesiasticks, more especially in the pontiff and his minions, mingled itself with their bigotry or mistaken zeal, (for it would be unjust to impute the effect to either cause separately) and produced the many bloody, and, till then, unexampled scenes of cruelty, which ensued. The popes, by letter, frequently excited the bishops as well as princes, the bishops instigated the magistrates, by all possible means, to subdue or exterminate the enemies of the church. When the number of these enemies was so great, that it was impossible