ILL CONSEQUENCES OF NON-TOLERATION.
What! it may then be demanded, shall every one be allowed to believe
only his own reason, and to think that his reason, whether true or
false, should be the guide of his actions? Yes, certainly, provided
he does not disturb the peace of the community; for man has it not in
his power to believe or disbelieve;[30] but he has it in his power
to pay a proper respect to the established customs of his country;
and if we say that it is a crime not to believe in the established
religion, we ourselves condemn the primitive Christians, our
forefathers, and justify those whom we accuse of having put them to
death.
It may be replied, that the difference here is very great, because
all other religions are of men, whereas the Catholic, Apostolic,
and Roman Church is of God alone. But let me seriously ask, whether
the divine origin of our religion is a reason for establishing it
by hatred, rage, banishment, confiscation of goods, imprisonment,
tortures, and murder, and by solemn acts of thanksgiving to the Deity
for such outrages? The more assured we are of the divine authority of
the Christian religion, the less does it become weak man to enforce
the observance of it: if it is truly of God, God will support it
without man’s assistance. Persecution never makes any but hypocrites
or rebels; a shocking alternative! Besides, ought we to endeavor to
establish, by the bloody hand of the executioner, the religion of
that God who fell by such hands, and who, while on earth, taught only
mercy and forbearance?
And here let us consider a while, the dreadful consequences of the
right of non-toleration; if it were permitted us to strip of his
possessions, to throw into prison, or to take away the life of a
fellow-creature, who, born under a certain degree of latitude, did
not profess the generally received religion of that latitude, what
is there which would exempt the principal persons of the state from
falling under the like punishments? Religion equally binds the
monarch and the beggar. Accordingly, we know that upwards of fifty
doctors or monks have maintained this execrable doctrine: that it
was lawful to depose, or even to kill, such princes as did not agree
with the established church; and we also know, that the several
parliaments of the kingdom have on every occasion condemned these
abominable decisions of still more abominable divines.[31]
The blood of Henry the Great was still reeking on the sword of his
murderer, when the Parliament of Paris issued an arret to establish
the independence of the crown as a fundamental law; whilst Cardinal
Duperron, who owed his elevation to that prince, opposed this decree
in an assembly of the states, and got it suppressed. The following
expression, made use of on this occasion by Duperron, is to be found
in all the historical tracts of these times: “Should a prince,” says
he, “turn Arian, it would be necessary to depose him.”
But here I must beg the cardinal’s pardon; for let us for a while
adopt his chimerical supposition, and say, that one of our kings
having read the “History of the Councils and of the Fathers,” and
being struck with these words, “My Father is greater than I,” and
taking them in too literal a sense, should be divided between the
Council of Nice and that of Constantinople, and adopt the opinion of
Eusebius of Nicomedia: yet I should not be the less obliged to obey
my king, nor think the oath of allegiance I had taken to him less
binding; and if you, Mr. Cardinal, should dare to oppose him, and
I were one of your judges, I should, without scruple, declare you
guilty of high treason.
Duperron carried this dispute much further; but I shall cut it very
short, by saying with every good citizen, that I should not look upon
myself as bound to obey Henry IV. because he was king; but because he
held the crown by the incontestable right of birth, and as the just
reward of his virtue and magnanimity.
Permit me then to say, that every individual is entitled by the same
right to enjoy the inheritance of his father, and that he in no wise
deserves to be deprived of it, or to be sent to the gallows, because
he may perhaps be of the opinion of Ratram against Paschasius
Ratberg, or of Berengarius against Scotus.
We are very sensible that there are many of our tenets which have
not been always clearly explained: Jesus Christ not having expressly
told us in what manner the Holy Ghost really proceeds, both the Latin
church and the Greek believed that it proceeded only from the Father;
but afterwards an article was added to the Creed in which it is said
to proceed from the Son also. Now, I desire to know whether the day
after this new article was added a person who might abide by the old
Creed would have been deserving of death? And is there less cruelty
or injustice in punishing at this day a person who may possibly think
as they did two or three centuries ago? Or was there any crime in
believing in the time of Honorius I. that Christ had not two wills?
It is but very lately that the belief of the immaculate conception
has been established: the Dominicans have not received it as yet. Now
will any one tell me the precise point of time when the Dominicans
will begin to deserve punishment in this world, and in that which is
to come?
If any one can set us an example for our conduct, it is certainly the
Apostles and the Evangelists. There was sufficient matter to excite
a violent schism between St. Peter and St. Paul. The latter, in his
Epistle to the Galatians,[32] says: “That he withstood Peter to the
face, because he was to be blamed; for before that certain men came
from James, he did eat with the Gentiles: but when they were come,
he withdrew and separated himself, fearing them which were of the
circumcision, insomuch that Barnabas also was carried away with his
dissimulation.” “But,” adds he, “when I saw that they walked not
uprightly, according to the truth of the Gospel, I said unto Peter
before them all, If thou, being a Jew, livest after the manner of
Gentiles, and not as do the Jews, why compellest thou the Gentiles to
live as do the Jews?”
Here now was a subject for a violent dispute. The question was,
whether the new Christians followed the manners of the Jews or not.
St. Paul at that very time sacrificed in the Temple of Jerusalem; and
we know that the first fifteen bishops of Jerusalem were circumcised
Jews; and that they observed the Sabbath, and abstained from the
meats forbidden by the Jewish law. Should a bishop of Spain or
Portugal at this time be circumcised, or observe the Sabbath, he
would assuredly burn at an _auto da fé_: and yet this fundamental
point did not occasion the least animosity between the Apostles, or
between the primitive Christians.
If the Evangelists had resembled our modern writers, what an immense
field was there for disputation between them. St. Matthew reckons
only eight and twenty generations from David to Jesus. St. Luke
reckons forty-one; and these generations are absolutely different.
Yet no dissension appears to have arisen between the disciples
on account of these apparent contradictions, which have been so
admirably well reconciled by the Fathers of the Church; but they
still continued in brotherly love, peace, and charity with one
another. What more noble lesson can we have of indulgence in our
disputes, and of humility in regard to those things which we do not
understand?
St. Paul, in his Epistle to certain Jews of Rome who had been
converted to Christianity, employs all the latter part of his third
chapter in telling them that by faith alone they will be glorified,
and that no man is justified by good works only. St. James, on the
contrary, in the second chapter of his Epistle to the twelve tribes
dispersed over the earth, is continually preaching up to them, that
without good works no man can be saved. This has occasioned the
separation of two great communions amongst us; but it caused no
division among the Apostles.
If the persecuting of those who differ from us in opinion is a holy
action, it must be confessed that he who had murdered the greatest
number of heretics would be the most glorious saint in heaven. If
so, what a pitiful figure would a man who had only stripped his
brethren of all they had, and thrown them to rot in a dungeon, make,
in comparison with the zealot who had butchered his hundreds on the
famous day of St. Bartholomew? This may be proved as follows:
The successor of St. Peter and his consistory cannot err; they
approved, they celebrated, they consecrated the action of St.
Bartholomew; consequently that action was holy and meritorious;
and, by a like deduction, he who of two murderers, equal in piety,
had ripped up the bellies of eighty Huguenot women big with child
would be entitled to double the portion of glory of another who had
butchered but twelve; in this manner, by the same argument also, the
enthusiasts of the Cévennes have reason to believe that they will
be exalted in glory in proportion to the number of Catholic women,
priests and monks whom they may have knocked on the head: but surely
these are strange claims to eternal happiness.