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PERSECUTION 
 
 AND 
 
 TOLERANCE 
 
 BEING THE HULSEAN LECTURES 
 
 PREACHED BEFORE THE UNIVERSITY OF CAMBRIDGE 
 IN 1893-4 
 
 BY 
 
 MANDELL CREIGHTON, D.D., D.C.L., LL.D., ETC. 
 
 SOMETIME BISHOP OF LONDON 
 
 NEW IMPRESSION 
 
 LO'NGMANS, GREEN, AND CO. 
 
 39 PATERNOSTER ROW, LONDON 
 NEW YORK AND BOMBAY 
 
 1906 
 
 All rights reserved 
 
C7 
 
PEBFACE 
 
 No one can feel more strongly than myself 
 the triviality of this book as a contribution 
 to the investigation of a large subject. It 
 is only published in the hope that it may 
 inspire some one to enter upon that subject 
 with the thoroughness that it deserves. I 
 have merely put together some conclusions 
 which, in the course of my reading, came 
 before my mind. They are fragmentary 
 and incomplete ; but I found that any 
 serious attempt at expansion would en- 
 tirely alter the form of the book. All 
 that I have done, in preparing them for 
 the press, is to divide the second lecture 
 into two parts for greater clearness, and to 
 expand the first portion of it. I have also 
 put into the Introduction the substance of 
 recapitulations which were necessary to 
 
 M227939 
 
vi Preface. 
 
 carry on the argument after intervals. In 
 this revision I have been greatly helped 
 by the Rev. J. O. F. Murray, Fellow of 
 Emmanuel College. 
 
 M. PETKIBUEG. 
 
 THE PALACE, PETERBOROUGH, 
 9th January, 1895. 
 
CONTENTS 
 
 PAGE 
 
 Preface v 
 
 Contents vii 
 
 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 Statement of the subject 1 
 
 The conclusions set forth in this treatise ... 2 
 
 Their difference from the current opinion, that perse- 
 cution arose from the sense of exclusive salvation 
 
 through Christ 3-5 
 
 But Christianity was not propagated by the sword - 5 
 
 Persecution was directed only to the maintenance of 
 
 the Church 6 
 
 Nor was persecution peculiar to Christianity, but was 
 
 advocated by Plato for political expediency 7 
 
 And was so used in the Roman Empire ... 8 
 
 Suppression of opinion always a matter of State 
 
 policy 9 
 
 The harmlessness of divergent opinions was a dis- 
 covery hi politics - - - - 9-10 
 
 Politics, when founded on principles, appeal to 
 
 religion -------- 10 
 
 Religion, not the cause, but the cloak of political 
 
 contests -------- 11 
 
 The spirit of Christianity hostile to persecution 12 
 
viii Contents. 
 
 I. 
 
 THE PERSECUTING SPIRIT. 
 St. Luke ix. 54-6. 
 
 PAGE 
 
 Textual criticism of the passage .... 13-14 
 
 Its meaning obvious, yet neglected .... 15-16 
 Question, Why ? to be answered by considering the 
 
 incident recorded 16 
 
 (1) The zeal of the Apostles prompted them to action 17 
 
 (2) But their motive a desire for revenge 18 
 
 (3) Cloaked by patriotism 19 
 
 (4) Stimulated by personal inconvenience - - 20 
 
 (5) Sheltered behind precedent- 21 
 Kebuked by Jesus - 22 
 
 Their precedent not sound 23-4 
 
 Their error moral, not intellectual ... - 25 
 The Church, in persecuting, followed their example 
 
 and forgot the Lord's rebuke .... 26 
 
 Allied itself with the State and grasped at power - 27 
 
 The errors of the Church to be admitted - - - 28-9 
 
 Moral errors not to be excused as intellectual mistakes 30 
 
 If men had thought, they might have known - - 31 
 
 Statesmen too frequently judged by their success - 32 
 
 Church to be judged by its fidelity to its Master 33 
 
 Was it misled by Old Testament precedents ? - 34 
 
 Meaning of the Old Testament history to us - 35-6 
 
 Understood in the same sense by St. Chrysostom - 37 
 The Church, hi persecuting, assumed that the wrath 
 
 of man could work the righteousness of God - 37 
 
 Result of this assumption in the writings of Paramo 38-41 
 But persecution not confined to any particular form 
 
 of the Church 41 
 
 It misrepresents God's attitude to man - 42 
 Springs from man's natural desire to have his own 
 
 way --.-..--- 43-4 
 Was rebuked by Jesus and is in open contradiction 
 
 to the principles of Christianity - 45 
 
Contents. ix 
 
 II. 
 
 THE INTOLERANCE OF THE NEW TESTAMENT, 
 Gal. i. 9. 
 
 PAGE 
 
 Persecution defined as the infliction of punishment for 
 
 erroneous opinions as such .... 46 
 
 The New Testament contains condemnation of false 
 
 opinions, which must be considered 47 
 
 (1) In the Gospels our Lord denounces religious 
 teachers for abuse of their position, for sub- 
 stituting tradition, for insincerity and selfishness 48 
 
 But He used no weapons save words 49 
 
 (2) St. Paul unmasks impostors who pervert the 
 truth through unworthy motives - - - 50-1 
 
 He asserts that there is a definite Gospel which 
 
 may not be changed 52-3 
 
 His method is unsparing denunciation of error - 54 
 St. John agrees, and makes the Incarnation the 
 
 test of Christianity ------ 54 
 
 (3) Visible punishment accompanied some cases of 
 
 discipline -------- 56 
 
 As that of the Corinthian adulterer 57 
 
 And Hymenaeus and Alexander - 57 
 These cases rare, and the punishment came from 
 
 God - 58 
 Wrong opinion is denounced but not punished - 59-60 
 No ground for the claim of coercive authority by 
 
 the Church 60 
 
 (4) Need for some sternness to keep Christianity free 
 
 from pagan and Jewish errors .... 61 
 
 These warnings necessary for all times 62 
 For the truth has an exclusive claim on man's 
 
 allegiance 68 
 
 There are always dangers of compromising it - 64-5 
 The world wishes to fit Christianity to its own 
 
 purposes ---- * 65-6 
 
x Contents. 
 
 PAGE 
 
 But the historic Christ must be maintained - 67 
 And the Church, as it holds the truth, must guard it 
 
 against error, though not with worldly weapons - 68-9 
 
 III. 
 THE CHURCH IN RELATION TO PERSECUTION. 
 
 The early history of the Church was a struggle, first 
 against the power of the world, then the wisdom 
 
 of the world 70 
 
 Imperfections visible even in martyrs 71 
 
 More in controversialists 72 
 
 Yet no wish to constrain opinion - - - - 72 
 
 Persecution came from desire for uniformity by State 73 
 At first shocked the Christian conscience in the case 
 
 of Priscillian 74-5 
 
 Yet this case quoted with approbation by Pope 
 
 Adrian V. - - - 76 
 Early protest soon forgotten, and Church accepts the 
 
 position of defender of the social order - - 77 
 Which was the function of the State - 78-9 
 Thus the system of the Church, as educator of man- 
 kind, suffered 80 
 
 And its discipline became legal 81 
 
 Heresy regarded as high treason .... 81 
 Spiritual work of Church distinct from its temporal 
 
 authority ----- 82 
 
 And always felt to bs so 83 
 
 But power more convenient than influence 84 
 And hardened into a system which was used for 
 
 political ends 85-7 
 
 Yet the Christian consciousness struggled against the 
 
 system, as in the Mendicant Orders 87 
 
 Which were, however, enslaved by it after a time - 88-9 
 
Contents. xi 
 
 IV. 
 
 THE EVOLUTION OF TOLERANCE. 
 St. John xii. 32. 
 
 PAGE 
 
 The contradictory attitude of men's minds about per- 
 secution illustrated by St. Louis - - - 91-3 
 " The faith in honest doubt " recognised - - - 93-4 
 Intellectual grounds for tolerance fully expressed by 
 
 Marsiglio of Padua ...--. 94-8 
 Though known to Liberalism were not acted upon - 99 
 
 Example of Gerson 100-4 
 
 Of Thomas More 104-10 
 
 Of Luther 110-12 
 
 Of Calvin and Melanchthon - - - - 112 
 
 The Eeformation in Protestant countries made per- 
 secution avowedly a matter of expediency - - 113-4 
 By changes in political relations tolerance became 
 
 more expedient ------- 114-5 
 
 Thus tolerance grew from public expediency - - 115 
 A testimony to the solidarity of common life - - 116 
 Tolerance can only be maintained by being elevated 
 
 to a principle 117 
 
 This principle found in the work of the Incarnation - 118-20 
 
 V. 
 
 THE NATURE OF TOLERANCE. 
 Phil. iv. 5, 
 
 Tolerance arose from a denial of the right to persecute 121 
 
 Like other protests has rested on various grounds - 122 
 Kegarded as a virtue, it is a just attitude towards the 
 
 opinions of .others 123 
 
 This excludes alike coercion and indifference - - 123-4 
 
 For the indifferent man is not really tolerant - - 125 
 
xii Contents. 
 
 PAGE 
 
 Absolute freedom of opinion impossible, for freedom 
 
 implies responsibility 126 
 
 Every organisation must define its basis 127 
 
 The Church cannot alter the Divine purpose for 
 
 which it exists ------- 128 
 
 And ought not to be accused of intolerance for refus- 
 ing to do so 129-30 
 
 Indeed it alone fosters a spirit of independent judg- 
 ment of events 131 
 
 Tolerance rests on the respect for man as a spiritual 
 
 being 132-4 
 
 Embodies the idea of forbearance while waiting for 
 
 the judgment of God 135-6 
 
 Faith in Him alone saves us from the temptations of 
 
 self-will 137-8 
 
 The lessons of the past history of the Church enforce 
 
 this 139 
 
 Liberty is always unsafe in the world, and must be 
 guarded by the Church, which alone knows man's 
 destiny 140 
 
INTRODUCTION. 
 
 THE existence of persecution in the Christian 
 Church is a fact which is more frequently com- 
 mented on than explained. Greater attention has 
 been paid to the methods and extent of persecu- 
 tion than to the causes which produced it, or the 
 causes which brought it to an end. 
 
 It is indeed difficult to approach the subject in 
 an impartial spirit. Those who write the history 
 of any period of persecution tend either to exag- 
 gerate or to apologise. On the one side, there 
 is a desire to represent persecution as especially 
 inherent in all religious systems, or it may be, as 
 especially inherent in Christianity. On the other 
 side, there is a tendency to plead the generally 
 beneficent action of a particular form of religious 
 organisation in relation to the world's progress 
 as an extenuation of its particular misdoings. 
 
 The history of persecution is a large subject, 
 and requires accurate discrimination of its separ- 
 
2 Persecution and Tolerance. 
 
 ate phases. The meaning of tolerance, its basis, 
 and the causes which produced it, form a neces- 
 sary complement to any such inquiry. On so 
 wide a field it is presumptuous to enter without 
 complete equipment. Yet I feel that it may be 
 possible to turn attention to some aspects of the 
 question which have been overlooked ; and I am 
 not without hopes that even a few fragmentary 
 thoughts may perhaps awaken an interest in the 
 mind of some one who may be enabled to pursue 
 the subject more systematically. It seemed to me 
 that, sometimes at least, the object of the founder 
 of this lecture might be fulfilled by propounding a 
 large question, rather than by working out some 
 point of detail. 
 
 It may be well, for the sake of clearness, to state 
 at once the main conclusions which I have en- 
 deavoured to set forth in the following pages. 
 These are (1) that persecution, or the infliction of 
 punishment for erroneous opinions, was contrary 
 to the express teaching of Christ, and was alien 
 to the spirit of Christianity ; (2) was adopted by 
 the Church from the system of the world, when 
 the Church accepted the responsibility of main- 
 taining order in the community ; (3) was really 
 
Introduction. 3 
 
 exercised for political rather than religious ends ; 
 (4) was always condemned by the Christian 
 conscience ; (5) was felt by those who used it to 
 land them in contradictions ; (6) neither origin- 
 ated in any misunderstanding of the Scriptures 
 nor was removed by the progress of intellectual 
 enlightenment, but (7) disappeared because the 
 State became conscious that there was an ade- 
 quate basis for the maintenance of political society 
 in those principles of right and wrong which 
 were universally recognised by its citizens, apart 
 from their position or beliefs as members of any 
 religious organisation. 
 
 Such opinions differ materially from those 
 which are generally current on this subject. 
 The origin of persecution is commonly found 
 in the overwhelming claim which Christianity 
 makes on its adherents. Christianity, it is said, 
 regards man's life on earth as but the beginning 
 of an eternal destiny, and asserts that eternity 
 can only bring happiness to those who are with- 
 in the fold of the Church. Consequently the 
 maintenance of right opinion about religious 
 matters is a point of primary importance for 
 human happiness, rightly understood, and ought 
 
4 Persecution and Tolerance. 
 
 in the interests of mankind to be enforced even at 
 the cost of immediate suffering to obdurate and 
 misguided individuals. 1 This is doubtless a 
 logical position and is warranted by the language 
 of the advocates of persecution. But a line of dis- 
 tinction must be drawn between the motives 
 which prompted to persecution, and the argu- 
 ments by which it was defended, when once it was 
 undertaken. It is obvious that this reasoning was 
 the only one by which persecution could be de- 
 fended, and it is equally obvious that persecution 
 needed a defence. 
 
 But persecution was never upheld as being a 
 method of general application ; it was always 
 described as a surgical operation, as cutting out 
 plague spots that the health of the body politic 
 might be preserved. Its object was not the 
 salvation of the greatest number, in spite of 
 themselves, but the protection of the purity of 
 the Church, on the basis which it had laid down 
 for itself. In fact persecution was directed against 
 heretics and schismatics rather than against un- 
 believers. 
 
 1 This is briefly the position taken up by Mr. Lecky, 
 History of Rationalism, chap, iv., which is probably ohe best 
 statement of the current view of the subject. 
 
Introduction. 5 
 
 Now if the motive of persecution had been the 
 overpowering sense of exclusive salvation through 
 the Church, the whole history of Christianity 
 would have been different. In the first place, it 
 would have been bound to spread its dominion by 
 the sword ; and this it did not attempt to do. 
 Its missionary enterprise was great ; but even 
 the ideal motive of the crusades was not the 
 forcible conversion of the Mussulman, but the 
 recovery of an heirloom of Christendom. More- 
 over, even within the limits of Christendom itself, 
 coercion was not employed against those who 
 were not Christians. Let me quote the words of 
 one who believes that persecution arose from 
 mistaken zeal, but recognises facts that make 
 against his view : 
 
 " Man is seldom wholly consistent in the practical 
 application of his principles, and the persecutors 
 of the thirteenth century made one concession 
 to humanity and common-sense which was fatal 
 to the completeness of the theory on which they 
 acted. To carry it out fully they should have 
 proselytised with the sword among all non- 
 Christians whom fate threw in their power ; but 
 from this they abstained. Infidels who had 
 
6 Persecution and Tolerance. 
 
 never received the faith, such as Jews and 
 Saracens, were not to be compelled to Christi- 
 anity. Even their children were not to be 
 baptised without parental consent, as this would 
 be contrary to natural justice, as well as dangerous 
 to the purity of the faith. It was necessary that 
 the misbeliever should have been united to the 
 Church by baptism in order to give her jurisdic- 
 tion over him." * 
 
 There is no inconsistency in these opinions, 
 which are quoted from the writings of St. Thomas, 
 if we recognise that persecution was used for the 
 maintenance of the organisation of the Church ; 
 and that the opinions of the heretics, against 
 whom persecution was directed, were regarded by 
 the State as endangering social order. Jews and 
 Saracens were not citizens, but aliens who might 
 be expelled at any moment. Their existence 
 within the limits of Christendom constituted no 
 menace to the framework of civil society. 
 
 Moreover, this theory of the basis of persecution 
 assumes that persecution had its origin purely in 
 the Christian belief. But this was not so. The 
 
 1 H. C. Lea, History of the Inquisition of the Middle Ages, i., 
 242. 
 
Introduction. j 
 
 ancient conception of the State as a community 
 for the purpose of civilised life accepted man as 
 he was, recognised the operative motives of 
 conduct, and tried to bring them under State 
 control. It was a matter of political expediency 
 that men should at least profess to hold the 
 same religious opinions. The language of Plato 
 did not materially differ from that of the Inquisitor: 
 "Let this then be the law: No one shall possess 
 shrines of the Gods in private houses, and he 
 who is found to possess them, and perform any 
 sacred rites not publicly authorised, shall be in- 
 formed against to the guardians of the law ; and 
 let them issue orders that he shall carry his 
 private rites to the public temples, and if he do 
 not obey, let them inflict a penalty until he 
 comply. And if a person be proven guilty of 
 impiety, not merely from childish levity, but such 
 as grown-up men may be guilty of, let him be 
 punished with death." 1 
 
 These were the matured principles of Plato, 
 
 after he had seen them applied in some degree to 
 
 the case of Socrates. Yet Plato had no belief in 
 
 exclusive salvation, but was concerned only with 
 
 1 Plato, Laws, 908-10 ; Jowett's translation. 
 
8 Persecution and Tolerance. 
 
 the problem of a well-ordered State. I need not 
 recall the existence of similar principles in the 
 Koman Empire. Koman religion was willing to 
 make a place for every cult which could be 
 trusted not to outstep the bounds of political 
 convenience : but it had its illicitae religiones, 
 and Christianity was one of them. Koman civili- 
 sation fell, because the old motives for patriotism, 
 public spirit, duty, and helpfulness were worn out, 
 and could not be renewed from any elements 
 which the State had at its command. It was 
 conquered by Christianity, because Christianity 
 had a new power of binding men together. Then 
 came the temptation to the Christian Church to 
 permit the State to make this power the outward 
 framework, as well as the inner principle, of 
 social life. 
 
 I am concerned only with persecution in 
 its ecclesiastical aspect. But the considerations 
 which I have just put forward, lead into a larger 
 field. Persecution is supposed to be an iniquity 
 peculiar to ecclesiastical institutions. I have not 
 striven, in the following pages, to extenuate the evil 
 doings of Church or Churchmen; they must bear the 
 responsibility of allowing the struggle for liberty of 
 
Introduction. g 
 
 opinion to be fought on religious grounds. But 
 the struggle in itself was inevitable. Those re- 
 sponsible for the maintenance of any form of 
 social order, think it wise to prevent new opinions 
 from finding premature expression. They seek to 
 keep them within harmless limits, and constitute 
 themselves judges of what is harmful. The con- 
 scious and deliberate expression of man's attitude 
 towards the great issues of life will always awaken 
 discord. Political sagacity is always employed in 
 preventing the possibility of a revolution. There 
 would have been suppression of opinion, if there 
 had been no Christian Church. But this does not 
 lessen the responsibility of the Church, which set 
 up Inquisitors in aid of the civic police. 
 
 I have spoken so fully of the evils of persecu- 
 tion, that I may be allowed to dwell for a moment 
 on some faint gleams of compensation. If we 
 attempt a general survey of political progress, 
 it may be said that persecution is concerned with 
 that period of social development in which the in- 
 dividual made good his right to form his own 
 opinions; but he made it good by proving that 
 a great diversity of opinions was compatible with 
 the existence of social order. It must be remem- 
 
io Persecution and Tolerance. 
 
 bered that this was a discovery to be made, a 
 truth to be proved. States and individuals alike 
 needed training before it could be accepted. 
 From the point of view of the Church, it is abso- 
 lutely indefensible that she should have allowed 
 the conflict to be waged round her teaching 
 or her organisation. But the battle on such a 
 ground was at least fruitful of results ; and the 
 cry of liberty of conscience raised the issue in its 
 noblest form. The combatant, or the sufferer, 
 for such an object knew the responsibility attach- 
 ing to freedom ; and the struggle brought to light 
 great principles of common life, which had to be 
 recognised before the fight was won. Dreadful as 
 are the records of wars of religion, it must be 
 admitted that these wars had causes which were 
 entirely independent of religion, and corresponded 
 to national aspirations, which found expression in 
 religious differences, but were not religious in 
 their real origin. In fact religion is almost the* 
 necessary covering for principles; and war must 
 be waged in behalf of a principle, if it is not 
 waged merely for greed. Parties formed for the 
 maintenance of a principle rest after all on a 
 nobler basis than do shifting combinations for 
 
Introduction. 1 1 
 
 material ends. The wars of the fifteenth century, 
 when princes and people, emancipated from all re- 
 ligious and moral considerations, pursued an ever- 
 changing policy of personal, or national, aggran- 
 disement, were not so fruitful for the future as 
 were the religious wars of the sixteenth century. 
 " Tantum religio potuit suadere malorum " is 
 an old exclamation, which has oft times been 
 repeated. But there are evils in the world even 
 where there is no religion. Any form of religion 
 implies some limitation on arbitrary caprice. It 
 must always be remembered, in surveying the past, 
 that the contrast is not between oppression, in the 
 particular form which it took, and freedom ; but 
 between one form of oppression and another. 
 Mediaeval England was singularly free from 
 religious persecution, but it was not free from 
 injustice. Persecution only began in England 
 when new forces in society made themselves felt ; 
 and religious differences, in this country, have 
 always been closely connected with social distinc- 
 tions. 
 
 But these are considerations which lead be- 
 yond my immediate subject, which is, to main- 
 tain that Christianity cannot justly be charged 
 
12 Persecution and Tolerance. 
 
 with persecution. It arose from impulses of 
 human nature, common at all times, which 
 Christianity did not immediately succeed in sub- 
 duing, and which succeeded for a time in cloaking 
 themselves with the semblance of doing God 
 service by promoting the common welfare. The 
 spirit of Christianity never ceased to protest, and 
 finally supplied the force before which persecution 
 fell. 
 
 Though persecution, as expressed in legal penal- 
 ties, may be a thing of the past, the temper which 
 produced it may still survive in altered forms. 
 The desire to have one's own way, because it is 
 one's own, may still wear the appearance of zeal 
 for the common good, or care for the purity of an 
 institution. Penalties may still be inflicted after 
 trial with closed doors. Discussion may be pre- 
 maturely checked by means as efficacious as the 
 threat of the faggot and the stake. In surveying 
 the mistakes of the past, it is well to remember 
 that their causes are not removed. 
 
I, 
 
 THE PEESECUTING SPIEIT. 
 
 11 When His disciples James and John saw this, they said, 
 Lord, wilt Thou that we bid fire to come down from heaven 
 and consume them ? But He turned and rebuked them. And 
 they went to another village." (St. Luke ix. 54-6) Revised 
 Version. 
 
 SUCH is the account of this remarkable incident in 
 the simple form to which it has been reduced by 
 recent criticism of the sacred text. It is better 
 known to us in the more elaborate form in which 
 it has been current in the Church, probably since 
 the end of the second century. 1 The fact that 
 this passage was selected as needing expansion 
 and explanation is in itself significant of the im- 
 portance which was in very early times attached 
 
 1 " When His disciples James and John saw this, they 
 said, Lord, wilt Thou that we command fire to come down 
 from heaven, and consume them, even as Elias did ? But 
 He turned, and rebuked them, and said, Ye know not what 
 manner of spirit ye are of. For the Son of man is not come 
 to destroy men's lives, but to save them. And they went to 
 another village." (St. Luke ix. 54-6) A.V. 
 
 B 
 
*t: 44 ****** Persecution and Tolerance* 
 
 to it. " He turned and rebuked them ; " though 
 the evangelist did not record the nature of the 
 rebuke, it may well be that tradition treasured 
 the weighty words, " Ye know not what manner 
 of spirit ye are of," and they were added to 
 the original. A further expansion was given 
 by the adaptation of recorded utterances of 
 Jesus : " For the Son of man came not to 
 destroy men's lives, but to save them." 1 In 
 the same way the cause of the apostles' zeal was 
 at a later period rendered more obvious and in- 
 telligible by the explanatory reference to the pro- 
 phet of the Old Dispensation, whom they had just 
 seen on the Mount of Transfiguration ; and the 
 words, " as Elijah did," made explicit what was 
 before implied in the question : " Wilt Thou that 
 we bid fire to come down from heaven and con- 
 sume them ? " 2 In this way, it would seem, the 
 original narrative of St. Luke was enriched by a 
 careful commentary, calculated to impress its 
 meaning more forcibly on the mind, and leave no 
 room for misunderstanding. 
 
 I have dwelt upon the history of the text, 
 
 1 St. John iii. 17 ; St. Luke xix. 10. 
 
 2 For the history of the text see Westcott & Hort, New 
 Testament, Appendix, 59-60. 
 
The Persecuting Spirit. 15 
 
 because it seems to indicate a progressive anxiety 
 to grasp and explain the purport of the incident 
 here recorded. A suggestion was made to the 
 Lord that He should use His supernatural power 
 for the purpose of punishing those who refused 
 to receive Him. He not only repudiated the 
 suggestion, but rebuked the spirit from which it 
 sprang, as being alien to the method of His teach- 
 ing and repugnant to the spirit of His mission. 
 Such an incident, emphasised in such a way, 
 was admirably fitted to guide His Church in all 
 ages. A great principle could not have been 
 expressed more clearly, or in a form better cal- 
 culated to arrest attention. Not only was perse- 
 cution itself condemned, but also the temper from 
 which it sprang, and the arguments by which 
 it was supported. Yet in spite of all this, the 
 history of the Christian Church shows us that 
 this solemn warning failed of its purpose, so 
 much so that the spirit of Christianity is some- 
 times represented as essentially a persecuting 
 spirit. 
 
 In early days the Christian consciousness went 
 out of its way to make clear the proclamation of 
 its Master that the kingdom of heaven was to 
 
16 Persecution and Tolerance. 
 
 spread from within, and was to find its home in 
 the hearts and consciences of ransomed and re- 
 generate men. In latter days a dominant organi- 
 sation caught at every argument which could 
 enable it to hold men subject to its sway, and 
 welcomed compulsion as an aid to its efforts. We 
 may well ask ourselves how such a change was 
 wrought. 
 
 For the purpose of answering this question let 
 us return to the incident recorded in the text, and 
 consider it as an illustration of the motives which 
 prompt to persecution, and their relation to the 
 arguments to which they turn for support. 
 
 Jesus was churlishly refused hospitality in a 
 village of the Samaritans because His face was 
 set to go to Jerusalem. The refusal was an out- 
 rage, and an insult: an outrage to the great 
 Teacher, who at least deserved respect ; an insult 
 to the national sentiment of His followers. It 
 came at a time when the hearts of the apostles 
 had been uplifted by the splendid vision of the 
 Mount of Transfiguration. The great lawgiver, 
 and the foremost prophet of the law, had sub- 
 mitted themselves to Jesus and acknowledged 
 that He was sent to accomplish and perfect their 
 
The Persecuting Spirit. 17 
 
 mission. For a moment the kingdom of heaven 
 had seemed to have a local habitation upon earth. 
 Never before had those who saw that vision been 
 so deeply impressed with a sense of their Master's 
 greatness. It is true that He had spoken of im- 
 pending disaster, but this counted for little; so 
 far as the hearers attended to His forebodings 
 they were only an incitement to their zeal. Dan- 
 gers yes, there were dangers ; but surely they 
 could be overcome by One whose power was so 
 far-reaching and so deeply seated. Courage and 
 resoluteness were the qualities necessary for success. 
 So the affront to their Master and to their nation 
 seemed doubly intolerable. Why possess power 
 and not use it ? Why have a policy and not give 
 it effect? The sense of power, the consciousness 
 of a noble and far-reaching policy, created in 
 their minds a desire for strong and vigorous 
 action ; and action involved the overthrow of 
 gainsayers. Is not this natural reasoning? Does 
 it not apply to the conduct of great affairs ? 
 Does it not express the necessary method of 
 success ? 
 
 But there was more than a desire for action 
 in the minds of the energetic apostles. Con- 
 
1 8 Persecution and Tolerance. 
 
 siderations of policy might enable them to explain 
 their action to themselves and give it a fair 
 colour; but the motive was one of human im- 
 patience, irritation and desire for revenge. Their 
 sense of right and wrong was shocked by the 
 insult offered them by the Samaritans. Doubt- 
 less it seemed to them that they were free from 
 selfish feeling; for they were moved only in 
 behalf of their Master, and of their nation. But 
 their Master's cause was after all their own. 
 They had left all and followed Him ; but if they 
 were prepared to share His hardships at first, it was 
 partly in the hope that one day they might share 
 His glory. When He was welcomed with respect, 
 some reflection of the honour paid to Him fell 
 upon themselves. They felt resting upon them 
 the blessing of Moses and Elijah ; was not that 
 to be realised by some form of human recognition, 
 which should brighten their path through life? 
 When they were brought into sudden contact 
 with human churlishness they experienced a 
 sense of personal wrong, of deprivation of an 
 undoubted right. The extent of this personal 
 feeling was hidden from them by the fact that it 
 was concealed beneath the veil of a further insult 
 
The Persecuting Spirit. ig 
 
 to their nation. The Samaritan villagers expressed 
 their immemorial hatred for the Jews by refusing 
 to admit to hospitality one who was journeying 
 towards the Holy City. Personal resentment 
 cloaked itself behind the cover of patriotic zeal 
 for the national honour. Surely " salvation was 
 of the Jews " : should not that truth be placed 
 beyond dispute? Nothing is better for the 
 world's progress than to make its great issues 
 clear. A nation conscious of a mission must 
 assert its right to fulfil its mission. A timely 
 resort to force is the shortest and most humane 
 method in the long run. A signal act of 
 vengeance on a handful of insolent peasants 
 would be a warning to the rest, and would 
 doubtless lead to the submission of the whole 
 Samaritan people. There was a good oppor- 
 tunity for a decisive act which, though severe 
 in its outward appearance at first sight, would 
 be seen on reflection to be entirely merciful in 
 its end. 
 
 Moreover, while thus they seemed to them- 
 selves to reason, while great considerations of 
 future good flashed through their excited minds, 
 they scarcely stopped to think of the immediate 
 
 - 
 
2O Persecution and Tolerance. 
 
 cause of their perturbation. Indeed who, without 
 a resolute struggle, ever faces the truth about in- 
 dividual self, or the pettiness of his individual 
 frailty? The disciples were wearied with a day's 
 journey. They had for some time been walking 
 on with the assured confidence that rest was close 
 at hand. They had consoled themselves with 
 expectations of honourable reception and grateful 
 repose. Their hopes were suddenly dashed; 
 their pleasant visions faded away. What was 
 to be done ? It was a practical question. They 
 shrank from the miserable prospect of resuming 
 their journey aimlessly, amid the jeers of the 
 inhuman folk who triumphed over their discom- 
 fiture. Could not that ignominious ending be 
 averted? Was it not a time for vengeance? 
 Were there not good reasons for vengeance? 
 The desire came first from the promptings of 
 purely human frailty. The reasons came after- 
 wards, almost unsought for and unasked. And 
 the reasons were so grand, so noble, so satis- 
 factory, so convincing, so easily expressed in 
 stately phrases, that anger at the loss of a lodging 
 was in a moment draped with the dignity of 
 lofty patriotism; wounded vanity became zeal 
 
The Persecuting Spirit. 21 
 
 for the Master's service ; vindictiveness claimed 
 the high sounding title of deliberate policy. 
 
 These are motives, this is a method, common 
 to all human affairs. There is nothing peculiarly 
 ecclesiastical about them. They apply to any 
 body of men who have a leader, and an object, 
 and believe themselves to be in the possession of 
 power. 
 
 But when the apostles proceeded to formulate 
 a course of action, they seem to have felt the 
 need of sheltering themselves under precedent, 
 and claiming a divine sanction. " They said, 
 Lord, wilt Thou that we bid fire to come down 
 from heaven and consume them?" The refer- 
 ence is clear enough, without the explanatory 
 addition "even as Elijah did." They had in 
 their minds the life of the prophet whom they 
 had just seen. He had overthrown his enemies 
 by the power which God committed to him: 
 surely Jesus also was possessed of a like power 
 which might be called to their aid. At first 
 they gazed on the untroubled face of their Master, 
 and felt some difficulty in framing their thoughts. 
 They were dimly conscious that it was useless 
 to ask Him to take action in His own behalf. Yet 
 
22 Persecution and Tolerance. 
 
 He had once committed some of His powers to 
 their hands ; might He not do so now ? So the 
 question was asked: "Lord, wilt Thou, that we 
 call down fire from heaven?" They wished for 
 permission from Him to do on His behalf what 
 they felt He would not do for Himself. It might 
 be that the time had come when the Master 
 would cast aside His strange reserve, and boldly 
 advance His claims on men's allegiance. At all 
 events, sheltering themselves behind precedent, 
 and offering themselves as the willing agents for 
 a new departure, they preferred their request. It 
 must have been with stammering tongues, and 
 with a quick sense of shame before they reached 
 the end of the sentence. They read the answer 
 on the Lord's face, even before He " turned and 
 rebuked them." 
 
 It may be said: "Did not the precedent to some 
 extent justify them ? Was not their mistake, if 
 mistake it was at that time, natural ? " We can- 
 not admit that this was so ; for Jesus did not 
 explain, as He would have done in the case of 
 pardonable ignorance : " He turned and rebuked 
 them." Indeed, a little reflection will show that 
 there was ample reason for rebuke. First of all, it 
 
The Persecuting Spirit. 23 
 
 was presumptuous on their part to interfere at all, 
 still more to suggest a line of action which experi- 
 ence had shown them to be contrary to the whole 
 tenor of their Master's teaching. But more 
 than this, we know that the rebukes of Jesus 
 were of the nature of revelations ; they tore away 
 the trappings of plausibility and left men face to 
 face with their real motives. The Boanerges 
 brethren had taken their stand on precedent. 
 The rebuke of Jesus tore away that plea. It was 
 not the thought of precedent which prompted the 
 suggestion ; on the other hand, the precedent had 
 been hastily and thoughtlessly caught at to give 
 colour to their own passionate desires ; and they 
 knew it, but tried to act as though they thought 
 otherwise. They assumed a precedent to enable 
 them to be at once advocates and judges of their 
 own cause. For how did the precedent they 
 hinted at bear on the case before them ? A body 
 of wayfarers asked for hospitality, and it was re- 
 fused them, ungraciously and insolently, by those 
 from whom they asked it. What parallel was 
 there in this to the case of a solitary man, sur- 
 rounded by a body of soldiers who were ordered 
 to lead him before a threatening king? There 
 
24 Persecution and Tolerance. 
 
 was in their case no imperious motive of self- 
 preservation, nothing save disappointment and 
 inconvenience. 
 
 Moreover, the action of Elijah, which they 
 quoted, was part of a method of teaching which 
 God applied to the circumstances of a particular 
 time. It was part of a stern protest against 
 national apostasy. It was a continuation of the 
 warning, decisively given and shamefully neglected, 
 on Mount Carmel, when it was proved that Baal 
 was unreal and that Jehovah alone could send 
 down fire on the sacrifice. The warning which 
 Elijah was empowered to give at the beginning of 
 his mission was repeated at its close. Nothing 
 but fire from heaven could appeal to an age which 
 preferred the corrupt nature-worship of Baal to 
 the pure worship of Jehovah. 
 
 Again there was no parallel between the two 
 cases, and the apostles had ample means of knowing 
 it. They had followed their Master for long ; they 
 had seen His method, and listened to His teaching. 
 Nothing that He had done or said afforded them a 
 shred of reason for suggesting recourse to violence. 
 What they did was really this. They yielded to a 
 sudden access of resentment, and then picked up 
 
The Persecuting Spirit. 25 
 
 an isolated fact in the past, which happened to 
 have been lately brought before their minds, and 
 proposed to Jesus that they should imitate it. 
 "He turned and rebuked them." Did men wish 
 to know the significance of that rebuke ? It was 
 because the apostles were entirely wrong, wrong 
 from the very beginning ; they had lost all hold of 
 their Master's meaning. Human frailty had for 
 the time put them utterly out of sympathy with 
 Him, had made them forget all that they had 
 learned from Him. The gust of human passion had 
 blown away all the gentle atmosphere with which 
 the companionship of Jesus had surrounded them. 
 His spirit which usually sheltered them was gone : 
 the spirit of the world had driven it away, and 
 they hastened to clothe its promptings in some 
 garb which might seem to bear God's mark upon 
 it. "Ye know not," ye do not stop to think, 
 "what manner of spirit ye are of." It was not 
 intellectual error that caused moral confusion ; it 
 was moral error which welcomed intellectual con- 
 fusion as an ally. They knew not, when they 
 ought to have known ; for the god of this world 
 had blinded their eyes, so that they had no wish 
 to see. 
 
26 Persecution and Tolerance. 
 
 So then we have in this passage the account 
 of a great mistake which the apostles made, for 
 which they were rebuked. It was a moral mis- 
 take, in its origin, and only made a flimsy pretence 
 of concealing its true nature by retreating under 
 the covert of intellectual confusion. As such it 
 was rebuked by Jesus in terms of unmistakable 
 clearness. 
 
 How, then, we ask again, has the Church of 
 Christ ever dared to persecute ? There can only 
 be one answer : because it was exposed to the same 
 insidious temptations as beset the apostles, and it 
 closed its ears to the Lord's rebuke. For we must 
 recognise that persecution is not merely some- 
 thing horrible and hideous, but something which 
 is terribly natural in itself. The desire of every 
 man to have his own way becomes all the stronger 
 when he knows that his way is a good way. It is 
 appallingly easy to cover this natural desire with 
 a fair appearance, to claim as from God authority 
 which He has not conferred, and to misapply 
 Scripture in justification of such a claim. This 
 is what the Church unfortunately did in the fourth 
 century, and I do not see that any extenuation can 
 be pleaded for its misdoing. The Church was in 
 
The Persecuting Spirit. 27 
 
 possession of an abiding and unalterable standard 
 by which to judge its motives and try its actions. 
 It was untrue to itself if it did not always act 
 up to its knowledge. It was wrong when it 
 deliberately abandoned its standard from reasons of 
 expediency or self-interest. Its aims were higher 
 than those of the world, and the two powers came 
 into inevitable collision. The Church conquered 
 by suffering, and then, in the moment of victory, 
 yielded to the attraction of an alliance with 
 the world to put down the foes who were 
 undermining the faith within. The alliance, it 
 is true, failed of its purpose ; and the power of 
 the State was invoked by both parties in turn. 
 But none the less the precedent was established. 
 Orthodoxy prevailed by its inherent truth. But 
 the weapons once grasped remained in the Church's 
 armoury, where for long intervals of peace they 
 lay unused. When battle was impending they 
 were furbished up anew, and it was claimed that 
 they had received God's consecration. Popes and 
 prelates, with their minds made up on purely 
 worldly grounds, sought for precedents and rejoiced 
 to find them. They perverted God's message, with 
 which they were entrusted, to the level of the 
 
28 Persecution and Tolerance. 
 
 world's maxims. They stifled conscience, they 
 drowned the voice of understanding, they went 
 far to quench the shining of the Light of the 
 world, they certainly obscured its power to illu- 
 minate the dark places of politics and society. 
 
 Does this seem to be too harsh a judgment, 
 too sweeping a condemnation of many great 
 men in the past, who were in their day and 
 generation benefactors to mankind? God forbid 
 that we should rejoice in any false sense of 
 superior enlightenment, or boast of freedom from 
 like temptations. It is not without terror that 
 we can face the awful lessons to be drawn from 
 the imperfections of good men. It is only in a 
 spirit of profound humility that we can approach 
 such a subject, and its teaching ought to sink 
 deep into our souls. But in considering the ways 
 of man in the past, we are also considering the 
 ways of God; and when these ways parted, we 
 may neither shrink from saying so nor from 
 estimating the true cause of their divergence. It 
 may be natural to frame apologies for man; but that 
 is only possible by lessening the fulness of God's 
 revelation " They were entrusted with the 
 oracles of God= What if some were without 
 
The Persecuting Spirit. 29 
 
 faith? shall their want of faith make of none 
 effect the faithfulness of God ? God forbid : yea, 
 let God be found true, but every man a liar." 1 
 We are judging man's execution of God's pur- 
 poses. We have only too pressing need to learn 
 how man's want of faith is ever striving " to 
 make of none effect the faithfulness of God." 
 It is well to learn this lesson in a ground 
 where all right-minded men are agreed. It 
 is well to abandon every shred of attempted 
 palliation, and discover the root of bitterness, 
 growing not in any particular age, or any parti- 
 cular institution, but inherent in human nature 
 itself, and so stubbornly obstinate to spiritual 
 influences that it even turns them from their 
 purpose and perverts them to its own. 
 
 But, it may be urged, ought not some allow- 
 ance to be made for intellectual error? It is 
 a thought borne home to the mind of any 
 one who reflects upon the past, that the sphere 
 of human error in matters of morality is smaller 
 than is generally supposed, and the sphere of 
 sin is greater. We must not be misled by the 
 success of nations, of movements, or of indivi- 
 
 1 Rom. iii. 2, 3, 
 C 
 
30 Persecution and Tolerance. 
 
 duals, to condone their misdoings. We must 
 not be overcome by the glamour of great names. 
 ''It is not history which teaches conscience 
 uprightness, it is conscience which teaches it to 
 history. The accomplished fact is corrupting : 
 it is for us to correct it by persisting in our 
 ideal. The soul moralises the past that it may 
 not be demoralised by it. Like the alchemists 
 of the Middle Ages, it only finds in the crucible 
 of experience the gold which itself has poured 
 in before." 1 Men did wrong, not because they 
 erred through ignorance, but because they took 
 the shortest and most obvious means to secure 
 their own immediate objects. This is seen clearly 
 enough in the case of individuals. The rule, " Do 
 unto others as ye would they should do unto 
 you," is in some form or other universally known 
 and recognised. If it were universally acted upon, 
 the world would be a very different place. But 
 man waives it, as agent, and only pleads for its 
 observance as patient. His desires are his own, 
 and his first struggle is to attain their fulfilment. 
 The severity of others' judgment on this outburst 
 of selfishness tends to vary in proportion as they 
 1 Ainiel, Journal Intime, i., 32. 
 
The Persecuting Spirit. 31 
 
 feel themselves personally menaced by it. They 
 feel in themselves a certain kinship with the of- 
 fender, which prompts them to plead in his behalf 
 when his endeavour does not threaten any danger 
 to themselves. "He was ignorant," they say, 
 " ignorant of the amount of punishment which his 
 act might bring upon himself, ignorant of the 
 amount of suffering which it would entail on others. 
 Had he known this, he would have paused; there is 
 hope that the more perfect realisation of these 
 things may bring into play counteracting motives 
 which may be powerful enough to restrain him in 
 the future." This may be true. But it cannot be 
 pleaded that he was ignorant that his act was 
 wrong, that he would not have condemned it if it 
 had been wrought upon himself. If he had thought 
 he might have known ; but he did not wish for 
 knowledge lest it might restrain him. Chris- 
 tianity comes to man's help by developing this 
 knowledge. It sets over against what man is, an 
 ideal of what he may become; against desires 
 pressing from without, a sense of possibilities 
 within ; against the natural self, the spiritual self ; 
 against the tempter, the vision of the Incarnate 
 Lord. It creates a consciousness which acts as 
 
32 Persecution and Tolerance. 
 
 instantaneously as the evil against which it is 
 directed. 
 
 In the case of a society such as the State, the 
 same holds good as holds good of the individual. 
 The State aims at satisfying the dominant inter- 
 ests of the community, and is generally judged 
 simply by reference to its immediate success. 
 Statesmen are counted great if they did what they 
 intended to do. The rightness or wrongness of 
 their aims or methods is only taken into account 
 when they result in ultimate failure. Whatever 
 succeeds is assumed to be a step in human pro- 
 gress; and it is justified by reference to some 
 general principle which resolves itself into grate- 
 ful acceptance of the accomplished fact. The 
 actors in great affairs are, as a rule, leniently dealt 
 with, till the results of their activity have been out- 
 lived. Their public crimes are often less harshly 
 judged than their private vices. They are some- 
 times condemned as individuals, but extolled as 
 bodies of men. Their misdeeds are obscurely 
 palliated by reference to some supposed standard 
 of morality peculiar to their age and generation. 
 But, it may be asked, did mankind in Christian 
 times ever think that deceit, treachery, violence or 
 
The Persecuting Spirit. 33 
 
 murder were other than sinful ; or that their 
 criminality diminished if they were perpetrated on 
 a sufficiently large scale ? 
 
 The standard of ethical judgment in dealing 
 with secular history needs raising ; but in treating 
 the history of the Christian Church we are con- 
 cerned with the actions of a body which possessed 
 principles above the motives of temporary ex- 
 pediency. It is some satisfaction to find that 
 men's consciences are more sensitive when they 
 judge the Church, than when they judge the State. 
 They are ready to admit, with sorrow or with 
 exultation according as they approach the subject, 
 the discrepancy, too frequently apparent, between 
 the professed aims of the religious organisation and 
 the actual means by which those aims were pur- 
 sued. I do not think it right to shrink from 
 learning the lessons which the contrast teaches. 
 I think it well that they should be accepted to the 
 full, and that no extenuation should be pleaded 
 on the ground of ignorance of principles. Men 
 failed because they did not wish to apply the 
 principles which they professed. 
 
 " But," it may be said, " there, were in the Old 
 Testament precedents for persecution, and there 
 
34 Persecution and Tolerance. 
 
 were severe sayings in the New Testament, which 
 may have lent themselves to misunderstanding.'* 
 Reserving for the present the question of the 
 influence of the New Testament, let us consider 
 if the Church had any ground for finding in the Old 
 Testament a sanction for persecution. Now the 
 citation of precedent is always a forensic method 
 of procedure. The man who cites a precedent 
 claims, by doing so, that he has thought the matter 
 over, and is not arguing merely from utility, but 
 from reference to some principle, which is more 
 apparent in another instance of a parallel kind. 
 It is obvious that it is not enough to plead, " This 
 was once done, therefore I do it again." It must 
 be shown that the same law applies to both 
 cases with the same authority and the same 
 sanction. A knowledge of the principles of legal 
 interpretation was not wanting when persecution 
 first began. 
 
 Did men misunderstand or did they misuse 
 the Old Testament Scriptures ? Was their ignor- 
 ance pardonable, because they lacked guidance, 
 or did they wilfully neglect the guidance which 
 they amply enjoyed ? 
 
 Nowadays we are familiar with the conception 
 
The Persecuting Spirit. 35 
 
 of the Old Testament as being a record of man's 
 gradual training to apprehend spiritual know- 
 ledge. We see in it the history of God's work 
 for man's restoration. We trace the process of 
 selection, and of gradual discipline within the 
 selected sphere. The historical books of the Old 
 Testament contain the annals of a nation's life. 
 That national life passed through the phases and 
 incidents with which we are familiar in the his- 
 tory of other nations ; but it was animated by a 
 divine purpose, which in times of national forget- 
 fulness was recalled to the popular mind by sig- 
 nificant manifestations, in forms intelligible to the 
 conditions into which they had sunk. What we 
 learn from this record is the difficulty attending 
 on man's restoration. What strikes us is not the 
 frequency or the continuousness of divine inter- 
 position, but its rarity. A body of men were 
 raised from savagery to industry by the stern dis- 
 cipline of slavery, then were trained into a nation 
 by the hardships of wandering and the severities 
 of military life. At great crises God manifests 
 His presence for their encouragement; for long 
 periods they are left to work out their problems 
 by themselves ; appeals are made to their intelli- 
 
36 Persecution and Tolerance. 
 
 gence and their moral sense by purely human 
 means. Only when all else had failed and national 
 apostasy was imminent, only when the remnant 
 that did not bow the knee to Baal was scanty, 
 isolated and depressed, only then was a manifes- 
 tation of God's power vouchsafed for a brief 
 period to check the threatened corruption of the 
 nation. Then that nation, somewhat invigorated 
 from within, was left to learn from the miseries 
 of political downfall, and from the sufferings and 
 yearnings of the exile, which again selected a 
 remnant sufficiently resolute to take in hand a 
 restoration of the national life, based on a firm 
 hold of the national religion. Such are the les- 
 sons which we learn from the Old Testament. 
 Was there ever any reason why it should have 
 been regarded as a collection of examples, to be 
 imitated in the letter without any consideration 
 of circumstance or occasion ? 
 
 I can only answer that writers of the fourth 
 century regarded the Old Testament much as we 
 do now; and that St. Chrysostom laid down 
 principles for its practical use which apply forcibly 
 to the question before us. Commenting on the 
 Sermon on the Mount, he discusses the educational 
 
The Persecuting Spirit. 37 
 
 value of the Old Testament, and concludes : "Let 
 us then not merely look at the facts, but also care- 
 fully investigate the occasion, the cause, the motive, 
 the difference of persons, and all the surrounding 
 circumstances : for only so can we reach the 
 truth." * It was not defective exegesis of the 
 Old Testament which led men to adopt persecu- 
 tion. They acted from the same motives as did 
 James and John in my text, and like them caught 
 at precedents to justify their actions without 
 considering "the manner of spirit they were 
 of." The fairest statement of their error would 
 perhaps be this. They knew that there was a 
 wrath of God working for righteousness ; they 
 chose to assume that their own wrath, the 
 wrath of man, could work the righteousness of 
 God. Yet it was precisely this assumption which 
 our Lord rebuked in the case of two of His 
 apostles. 
 
 When once the false assumption had been made, 
 men ceased to turn to God's Word for guidance, 
 but used it to give sanction to their own devices. 
 When a man sets up idols in his heart, God 
 
 1 Chrysostoin, Homil. in Matthceum, xvii., quoted by Mr. 
 Gore in Lux Mmidi, 830, where other references also are 
 given. 
 
38 Persecution and Tolerance. 
 
 answers him according to his idols. Kebellion 
 against the Holy Spirit is punished by increasing 
 deadness of conscience. 
 
 These reflections are prompted by the fact that 
 the passage which Ihave taken for my text is actually 
 quoted by a writer of the sixteenth century as an 
 argument in favour of persecution. This may 
 seem an act of incredible audacity, but it is in 
 accordance with the whole tenor of a bulky 
 volume. The Spanish theologian, Paramo, re- 
 gards the development of the Inquisition as the 
 central fact in human history. It was instituted 
 by God Himself in the case of Adam and 
 Eve. The call, "Adam, where art thou?" was 
 a formal summons to the accused. On his 
 appearance the court was opened, and he was 
 interrogated about the facts of the accusation 
 laid to his charge. Adam accused Eve, who was 
 called in turn ; Eve accused the serpent, who was 
 not called, as incapable of repentance. Then 
 Adam was condemned, on his own admission, on 
 seven counts : pride, immoderate love of his wife, 
 unbelief, curiosity, particular disobedience, false 
 excusation, and finally wrong-doing to his neigh- 
 bour, for " in Adam all die." 
 
The Persecuting Spirit. 39 
 
 Paramo shows how the Inquisitors follow this 
 procedure. They cite the accused, who, like 
 Adam, try to hide themselves, and give, as their 
 reason, fear of the court, which is in itself a sign 
 of guilt. Then they confess their offence like 
 Adam, " not humbly seeking pardon, but proudly 
 excusing themselves, and casting the blame on 
 others." The Inquisitor follows the Divine ex- 
 ample in pursuing all who are thus inculpated, 
 so as to reach the origin and source of evil. As 
 God judged by Himself, not in the presence of the 
 angels, so the Inquisitors hold their court in 
 secrecy. As God made for Adam and Eve coats 
 of skins, so the Inquisitors clothe their culprits in 
 san benitos. As God expelled Adam and Eve 
 from Paradise, so the Inquisitor confiscates the 
 goods of heretics. 
 
 After this Paramo has no need of precedent 
 drawn from human history. He pays little heed to 
 the records of the Old Testament, but claims our 
 Lord Himself as " the head of the present Inqui- 
 sition, and the producer of the most complete 
 results " ; because the authority of the Inquisition 
 proceeds from that which was committed by 
 Christ to St. Peter and his successors. Its legal 
 
40 Persecution and Tolerance. 
 
 basis is, that all baptised persons, if they deviate 
 from the faith, must be compelled to keep it. 
 This principle is, in his eyes, so self-evident that 
 it needs no proof. He only searches Scripture for 
 mentions of the nature of the penalty to be in- 
 flicted, and so remarks, with entire unconscious- 
 ness: "Our Lord, passing through Galilee and the 
 midst of Samaria, sends messengers into a village 
 of the Samaritans, to make ready for Him. The 
 Samaritans did not receive Him, and James and 
 John were of opinion that they should be punished 
 by fire from heaven. Here is the punishment of 
 heretics, namely, fire; for the Samaritans were 
 the heretics of that age." l 
 
 True, fire was the punishment which the un- 
 regenerate heart proposed ; but the Lord rebuked 
 the proposal. The unregenerate heart at any age 
 longs to work its will by force, and catches at 
 the suggestion wherever it comes from. It is 
 the words and deeds of men, recorded in the 
 Scriptures, which it welcomes : the Divine re- 
 buke, the Divine comment, the Divine interpreta- 
 tion it passes by. Are we to excuse such a use of 
 
 1 Paramo, De Origine et Progress^ Officii Sanctce Inquisitionis, 
 qusque dignitate et utilitate. Madrid, 1598, p. 84. 
 
The Persecuting Spirit. 41 
 
 Scripture ? Are we to allow God's Word to suffer 
 that man's wickedness may be excused? Para- 
 mo's leading principle was really this, that any 
 organisation had the right to use such means 
 as it thought fit to maintain itself in power. 
 The Church was the keeper of God's message 
 to mankind, a message to the soul, to the con- 
 science, to the heart. When God's message 
 was turned into the Church's message ; when it 
 was no longer the allegiance of the heart to 
 God, but the obedience of the person to the 
 Church which was sought ; then the Church 
 ceased so far to be the Church, and became a 
 section of the world. Then it used the Word of 
 God as a book of human laws, and showed the 
 same perverse ingenuity, which man has always 
 shown, in paring down obligation till it fitted 
 the mould of his ambitious desire. 
 
 I have taken a conspicuous example from the 
 history of the most ancient organisation of the 
 Western Church. Do not, however, suppose 
 that the spirit of persecution disappeared when 
 the old system was remodelled. It found its way 
 into the reformed organisations : it was thought 
 necessary for the maintenance of civil society by 
 
42 Persecution and Tolerance. 
 
 Luther ; it was practised by Calvin ; it was 
 carried to the New World ; it was advocated by 
 the Puritans ; it was embodied in the laws of 
 England. No religious body, of any antiquity, 
 which obtained the possession of power, can plead 
 that it did not wish to use it for its own support. 
 
 We cannot overestimate the serious conse- 
 quences of such delinquency. The organisation, 
 which owed its origin to its mission to represent 
 the spirit of its Master, misrepresented that spirit 
 in its primary aspect. For what is the Bible but 
 a record of God's infinite patience and long- 
 suffering, of His respect for man's freedom, His 
 care for the maintenance of personal responsi- 
 bility? The Incarnation meant, and was under- 
 stood to mean, that man's ransom, man's redemp- 
 tion, was wrought by patient endurance, and was 
 to be brought home to individual consciences by 
 like means throughout the ages. The kingdom 
 of heaven was within; it came not by observa- 
 tion. Its spread was to be gradual and natural, 
 due to its own intrinsic power, the little leaven, 
 the grain of mustard seed. When our attention 
 is turned to this particular point we cannot fail 
 to be struck with the fact that the parables and 
 
The Persecuting Spirit. 43 
 
 teaching of Jesus avoid any analogy drawn from 
 human action, and refer instead to the peaceful 
 processes of nature. Men may be called to do 
 violence to themselves, never to others. Judg- 
 ment is never committed to men ; it is reserved 
 for the tribunal of God. 
 
 The origin of the spirit of persecution is made 
 clear in the story recorded in my text. It comes 
 from the universal sense of inconvenience, when 
 we do not at once get our own way. Then 
 follows impatience, irritation, and resentment. 
 Then reason is called in to help passion, and 
 clothe the feelings with the semblance of de- 
 liberate action founded on policy and expediency. 
 The love of power comes next, suggesting the 
 future good to be obtained from a prompt display 
 of resoluteness. Power supplies its own justi- 
 fication ; for would it be there if it were not 
 meant to be used ? And who can blame it when 
 it has succeeded? Then comes "that last in- 
 firmity of noble minds," the hope for fame, 
 the gratification that attends success, the proud 
 consciousness of having cleared a difficulty out 
 of the way. 
 
 All this is so natural, and yet so wrong. It 
 
44 Persecution and Tolerance. 
 
 is the form taken by our analysis of motives 
 dominant in the direction of current politics, 
 when that direction does not commend itself to 
 ourselves. We are keenly conscious of the im- 
 perfections of those from whom we differ, and 
 deny that in their case the end justifies the means. 
 When things are going in the direction which we on 
 the whole approve, we are not so severely critical. 
 We condone the action necessary to give effect to 
 what we call a principle, but what often is the ar- 
 rangement which gives us the least trouble, which 
 does not affect our own interests, and removes 
 immediate difficulties from the way. Let us re- 
 member that the message of Jesus, the proclama- 
 tion of the Kingdom, was a call to every man to 
 rid himself of prejudices and prepossessions, even 
 the most respectable and the most venerable ; to 
 rise above the world's method, and test action 
 not by its seeming claims, but by its actual 
 correspondency with the righteousness of God. 
 Success, the success to which God calls us, is 
 the triumph of inward influence, not of outward 
 power. When power takes the place of influence, 
 it wins the triumph of the world, not of God. So 
 long as the desire for outward achievement over-. 
 
The Persecuting Spirit. 45 
 
 masters the primary duty of care to preserve the 
 delicacy and sensitiveness of conscience, the root ol 
 the persecuting spirit remains in the heart. That 
 spirit itself may be dormant because things are 
 going well with us ; it may be held in check by a 
 temporary equilibrium of social forces ; but it is 
 there, and the spirit of Christ alone can overcome it. 
 Persecution was condemned by Christ in the 
 most emphatic way. It is unfair to charge 
 against Christianity that which is in open contra- 
 diction to its principles, that which Christianity 
 more than anything else has taught us to abhor. 
 
n. 
 
 THE INTOLERANCE OF THE NEW TESTAMENT. 
 
 " If any man preacheth unto you any gospel other than 
 that which ye received, let him be anathema." (Gal. i. 9.) 
 
 I HAVE maintained that the spirit of persecution 
 was alien from the teaching of Christ, and was ex- 
 pressly condemned by Him ; that its presence in 
 the Church was due to causes and motives which 
 are ever present and operative in human nature ; 
 that we can only deplore the imperfections of those 
 who admitted it ; and that we may not assign 
 their error to intellectual but to moral deficien- 
 cies. I have pointed out that the possession of 
 power, the desire for tangible results, and the 
 worship of success, are subtle and insidious 
 temptations from which it is difficult for any 
 organisation to escape scathless. 
 
 Having laid down these general principles I 
 propose to pursue their application to actual 
 facts. But before doing so, there is need of 
 
Intolerance of the New Testament. 47 
 
 some definition. By persecution I mean the 
 infliction of punishment for erroneous opinions, 
 as such. It has been asserted, with some appear- 
 ance of plausibility, that there is only one way to 
 escape from this necessity, and that is by the 
 conviction, or assumption, that opinions are a 
 matter of indifference. It is then argued that 
 as the Christian Church cannot admit this 
 assumption, it contains of necessity the germs 
 of the persecuting spirit, and indeed its earliest 
 organisation shows signs of them. The New 
 Testament itself contains examples of the inflic- 
 tion of punishment on erring members of the 
 Church ; so that it may be argued that the 
 fact of admission to the Christian Church was 
 regarded in the earliest times as subjecting the 
 individual to the possibility of the severest penalty 
 at the hands of the ecclesiastical authorities. In 
 fact, the claim to a possession of truth leads 
 to the condemnation of what is opposed to it, and 
 the step from the condemnation of falsehood to its 
 forcible suppression is inevitable. 
 
 Reserving the consideration of this latter pro- 
 position, I would consider the intolerance displayed 
 in the New Testament that is, the nature of the 
 
48 Persecution and Tolerance. 
 
 false opinions there condemned, the character of 
 the condemnation, and the means by which it was 
 applied. 
 
 (1) The Gospels contain stern and unsparing 
 denunciation uttered by our Lord against the 
 Pharisees, together with statements of the reasons 
 for which they were uttered. The Pharisees were 
 the religious teachers of the nation, and the mode 
 in which they discharged their function was 
 dragged to light and criticised. They were 
 judged by the standard which they professed to 
 follow, and were convicted of being untrue to 
 their trust. They " made void the Word of God 
 because of their tradition." 1 They "left the 
 commandments of God, and held fast the tradition 
 of men." 2 They were, therefore, " blind guides " 
 in relation to those whom they professed to lead ; 3 
 as their motives were those of self-interest they 
 were consciously "hypocrites " ; 4 as their method 
 consisted in frittering away great principles, while 
 professing to apply them to details, they were 
 " foolish." 5 
 
 The setting forth of new truth must necessarily 
 
 1 St. Mott. xv. 6. 2 St. Mark vii. 8. 3 St. Matt. xv. 14. 
 4 St. Matt, xxiii. 1-34 ; St. Luke xi. 42-4. 5 St. Luke xi. 40. 
 
Intolerance of the New Testament. 49 
 
 involve some criticism of the prevailing system, to 
 determine where it is defective, to show how it is 
 to be supplemented, and to discover the points of 
 attachment of the new system. This is what our 
 Lord did. He declared that He came to extend 
 existing knowledge; and if that knowledge had 
 been held in its purity, His extension of it would 
 seem natural and obvious. But the old know- 
 ledge had been corrupted, and He had to waken 
 men to a sense of its corruption. He traced the 
 process to its source in the moral defects of those 
 who were its authorised teachers. They had 
 abused their position and their privileges for their 
 own ends ; they had substituted their "tradition" 
 for the Law ; they had done so by methods which 
 would not stand the test of intelligence; they 
 were radically insincere and selfish. In short, 
 our Lord's denunciations were directed against 
 the rulers of a faithless Church, who were power- 
 ful, popular, and domineering. They were con- 
 demned, but no judgment was executed upon 
 them. No weapons were used save words. They 
 were addressed with arguments ; with appeals 
 to conscience ; with satire which might rend 
 the veil of habit ; with solemn warnings of judg- 
 
50 Persecution and Tolerance. 
 
 ment to come. Everything was said which might 
 carry conviction and reach the heart or the head. 
 But there was no hint of human interference, no 
 call upon men to constitute themselves the instru- 
 ments of God's judgment. 
 
 (2) Let us consider the relation of the apostles 
 to false teaching and false teachers. The apostles 
 were entrusted with a message, and they met 
 with opposition of various kinds. The opposition 
 of the dull, hard world was encountered only with 
 patience. Some special forms of opposition roused 
 indignation. Thus Elymas, who was jealous of the 
 victory of the truth, as likely to reduce his own 
 importance, was denounced by St. Paul as " full 
 of all guile and all villainy, a son of the devil, an 
 enemy of all righteousness " because he "perverted 
 the right ways of the Lord." 1 He was told that the 
 hand of the Lord was upon him, and the punish- 
 ment of physical blindness was a sign of his mental 
 condition. This was the unmasking of a powerful 
 and successful impostor, who applied all his capa- 
 cities to forward his own interests. In the same 
 way St. Paul in his Epistles warns his disciples 
 against some teachers who perverted the truth 
 1 Acts xiii. 10, 
 
Intolerance of the New Testament. 51 
 
 through unworthy motives. There are "false 
 apostles, deceitful workers, fashioning themselves 
 into apostles of Christ." 1 They " served not our 
 Lord Jesus Christ, but their own belly; and by 
 their smooth and fair speeches beguiled the hearts 
 of the innocent." 2 They are " the enemies of the 
 cross of Christ ; whose end is perdition ; whose 
 god is their belly; who mind earthly things." 3 
 In the Pastoral Epistles he reminds Timothy of 
 his responsibility for the character of the teaching 
 which was given in the name of Christ. He was 
 to "take heed to himself and to the doctrine." He 
 was to "charge certain men not to teach a differ- 
 ent doctrine." 4 He was to guard his flock against 
 the evils of the " hypocrisy of men that speak lies, 
 branded in their conscience as with a hot iron," 5 
 "men corrupted in mind and bereft of the truth, 
 supposing that godliness is a way of gain." 6 In 
 like manner he bids Titus " stop the mouths of 
 men who teach what they ought not for filthy 
 lucre's sake." 7 
 
 In all this, the grounds of St. Paul's condemua- 
 
 1 2 Cor. xi. 13-15. 2 Kom. xvi. 18. 3 PhiL iii. 18, 19. 
 4 1 Tim. i. 3. 5 1 Tim. iv. 2. 6 1 Tim. vi. 5. 
 
 7 Tit i. U. 
 
52 Persecution and Tolerance. 
 
 tion are mainly moral ; his censures are directed 
 against the character of the false teachers, whose 
 insincere motives are exposed to view. 
 
 What does he say about wrong opinion ? We 
 need not go beyond the Epistle to the Galatian 
 Churches an Epistle which bears traces of 
 serious disappointment and distress, and is 
 couched in language of strong personal feeling, 
 natural to a man who sees his authority attacked, 
 and his work being undone. The strongest ex- 
 pression used by St. Paul is that which I have 
 taken as my text : " Though we or an angel from 
 heaven should preach unto you any Gospel 
 other than that which we preached unto you, let 
 him be anathema." This certainly states that 
 there is a definite Gospel, which may not be 
 changed; and further, that perversion of it 
 (/-leracrrpeSjrat), the turning it backwards, the re- 
 versal of it, put a man outside the claim to Chris- 
 tian privileges. Whether avdQepa refers to ecclesi- 
 astical excommunication, or to the spiritual con- 
 dition of the offender, is not material to our pur- 
 pose. St. Paul strongly asserts that the Gospel 
 message, on which the Church was built, was 
 something definite and was not to be explained 
 
Intolerance of the New Testament. 53 
 
 away. Those who held the contrary of the Gospel 
 could not obtain the gifts which the Gospel had 
 to give. We know what were the opinions about 
 which St. Paul was speaking. They were opinions 
 which would have made Christianity a sect of 
 Judaism, and would have laid upon Gentile con- 
 verts all the ritual of the ceremonial law. St. 
 Paul does not meet these opinions with any other 
 weapon than argument. He does not inflict any 
 punishment on these Judaisers. He only insists 
 strongly that what they are teaching is not 
 Christianity, and must not be regarded as such. 
 Let the Jews stand by their own system, if they 
 will ; but let them not lead those who have ac- 
 cepted the liberty of Christ back again into the bond- 
 age of the law. St. Paul, in fact, is protecting the 
 tender young plant of spiritual freedom, which 
 had not yet taken firm root, against a canker 
 which would destroy its growth. He insists upon 
 a full realisation of what Christianity means ; he 
 urges the Galatian converts to accept the respon- 
 sibility of their new position. 
 
 The attitude of St. Paul towards false teaching 
 follows close on that of our Lord. His object is 
 to preserve the purity of the Divine revelation, to 
 
54 Persecution and Tolerance. 
 
 prevent it from being degraded to an instrument 
 of human ambition. His method is unsparing 
 denunciation of error, unveiling of motives, and 
 keenly argumentative refutation of fallacies. His 
 position, both positively and negatively, is best 
 explained in his own words. He worked, "not 
 handling the word of God deceitfully ; but by 
 the manifestation of the truth commending our- 
 selves to every man's conscience in the sight of 
 God. But and if our Gospel is veiled, it is veiled in 
 them that are perishing ; in whom the god of this 
 world hath blinded the minds of the unbelieving, 
 that the light of the Gospel of the glory of Christ, 
 who is the image of God, should not dawn upon 
 them." ! 
 
 The utterances of St. John correspond closely 
 with those of St. Paul, in their general spirit. 
 It is true that, having to face more decided forms 
 of error, he has a more decided standard by which 
 to try them. To him the false teachers are Anti- 
 christ, 2 and are not to be received or welcomed 
 by the faithful. 3 Those who are to be thus ex- 
 cluded are they who "confess not that Jesus Christ 
 
 1 2 Cor. iv. 2-4. 2 1 John ii. 18-22 ; iv. 1-3, 
 
 3 2 John 7-11. 
 
Intolerance of the New Testament. 55 
 
 cometh in the flesh." The Incarnation was to St. 
 John the test of Christianity. 
 
 (3) Account must also be taken of the growth 
 of the Church as an organised body, and of the 
 discipline which was consequently involved. The 
 apostles were endowed with extraordinary powers, 
 necessary for the establishment of the Church, 
 but not necessary for its permanent maintenance. 
 These powers were exercised for healing the sick 
 and for conveying special gifts of the Holy Spirit ; 
 sometimes, but rarely, they were used for punish- 
 ment. But in such the action of the apostles 
 was declaratory of God's purpose. The* punish- 
 ment came from Him, just as the healing came 
 from Him, or the visible manifestation of the 
 gift of the Holy Spirit descended directly from 
 on high. These special powers were committed 
 to the Church as a means of teaching it the 
 abiding presence of God. They were withdrawn 
 when they had served their purpose of indicating 
 the duties to be permanently performed. To 
 "gifts of tongues" succeeded orderly human 
 teaching ; to " gifts of healing " succeeded healing 
 by educated human skill ; to supernatural punish- 
 ment succeeded discipline by orderly human 
 
56 Persecution and Tolerance. 
 
 agency. The record of punishment establishes 
 the need of discipline ; but it is to be noted that 
 the punishment was inflicted, not for erroneous 
 opinion, but for moral offences. 
 
 For the purpose of each penalty recorded in the 
 New Testament was to tear away the veil of hypo- 
 crisy, and to assert that the primary requisite to be 
 maintained in the Christian Church was integrity 
 of conscience. The sin of Ananias was not avarice 
 but an hypocritical attempt to obtain credit for 
 greater self-sacrifice than he was capable of, 
 in other words of professing a deeper faith than 
 he really possessed. 1 How profoundly significant 
 it is that this should have been the first truth 
 about the conditions of membership which was 
 seared with almost startling emphasis into the 
 consciousness of the rising Church. So too it 
 was with the punishment, whatever it might be, 
 inflicted on the Corinthian adulterer. 2 His offence 
 was moral ; he was visited by some form of 
 physical affliction, that through bodily pain he 
 might learn to curb the unlawful desires of the 
 flesh, and so be brought to penitence. We have 
 set before us a revelation of God's dealings with 
 i Acts v. 3-5. 2 lCor. v. 1-5. 
 
Intolerance of the New Testament. 57 
 
 an erring servant. The sins of the flesh dull and 
 deaden the conscience, and their luckless slave 
 can often combine them with religious profession. 
 They have eaten the heart out of him, and left 
 a hollow shell which still retains the semblance 
 of a former self. How is such an one to be 
 aroused save by some sharp chastisement, which 
 withdraws from him the power of indulgence, 
 forces him to see himself as he really is, stings 
 him into a recognition of his sin, and leads him 
 to an inward destruction of the flesh, from which 
 the spirit emerges sorrowful but cleansed ? It is 
 not an example of human punishment which is 
 set before us, but is rather a special and authori- 
 tative declaration of the moral purpose of God's 
 physical laws. 
 
 So too in the case of Hymenaeus and Alexander, 
 who are only mentioned incidentally, but the cause 
 of their punishment is clear in the reference. 1 It 
 was not for wrong opinion as such, but because 
 "they put away from themselves a good conscience, 
 and so made shipwreck concerning the faith." It 
 was some form of evil living, entirely at variance 
 with their Christian profession, which destroyed the 
 i 1 Tim. i. 18-20. 
 
5& Persecution and Tolerance. 
 
 integrity of their conscience and turned them 
 into avowed enemies of the Gospel. They re- 
 tained the appearance of Christians only that 
 they might lead others astray. Bodily suffering 
 was in their case also to be a sharp discipline to 
 teach them not to blaspheme. It was a warning 
 that God punished hypocrisy, and hated every 
 form of outward profession which did not corre- 
 spond with genuine belief. 
 
 Thus, not only do the punishments inflicted by 
 the apostles as rulers of the Church afford no pre- 
 cedent for subsequent times, because the punish- 
 ment came from God, and required no human 
 intervention ; but the offence for which the 
 penalty was inflicted was beyond the ken of 
 human judgment. The cases were rare, and the 
 apostolic intervention was exceptional. It was 
 just enough to be markedly significant to after 
 times of the primary need of absolute sincerity on 
 the part of every one who professed to be a soldier 
 of Christ. It reminds us of the dangers which may 
 lie hid under a fair appearance. It warns us against 
 the futility of outward uniformity. It insists that 
 the Christian body, however small it may be, must 
 be above all things sincere. It tells us of the pre- 
 
Intolerance of the New Testament. 59 
 
 eminent need of a good conscience, of the awful sin 
 of lying unto God. The Church is warned that it 
 must preserve its purity by separating from offend- 
 ers ; but it is not authorised by anything contained 
 in the New Testament to force by punishment the 
 acceptance of formulae on its members. For, be 
 it noted, there were many forms of sin and error 
 prevalent in the Corinthian Church ; but one case 
 only was selected for punishment. There are many 
 formsof sin and errorwhich St. Paul exhorts Timothy 
 to combat, but only one concerning which he cites 
 an example of penalty inflicted. Errors that came 
 from thoughtlessness, pride, vanity, frailty, folly, 
 intellectual narrowness or prejudice, these are 
 mentioned in abundance, and were to be met by 
 rebuke, exhortation, and persuasion. There were 
 many things that needed to be set in order, but 
 not by punishment. That was reserved for 
 typical and conspicuous instances of deliberate 
 attempts to ally Christianity with unrighteousness, 
 and make it a vehicle, not for the spirit of God, 
 but for the spirit of the world. God's spirit could, 
 and did, operate slowly upon the rudimentary 
 conscience of the natural man, who was not all at 
 once weaned from his frailty and made master of 
 
60 Persecution and Tolerance. 
 
 himself. Imperfect knowledge, imperfect faith, im- 
 perfect love, imperfect worship, imperfect aspiration, 
 these could be remedied by the working of the Spirit 
 in the souls which admitted Him. But such cases 
 must be distinguished from those others who chose 
 to call themselves by the name of Christ, but were 
 none of His ; who strove to strew the path of the 
 rising Church with the whited sepulchres which 
 lined the road it had abandoned. Its beginnings 
 at least should be clear of such deceitful adorn- 
 ments. It should go forth with unmistakable 
 warnings that sincerity was to be the one true 
 mark of every structure that it raised. 
 
 Thus the punishments inflicted by the apostles 
 afford no ground for the claim of coercive author- 
 ity by the Church in after times. 
 
 (4) But, it is urged, the language used by apostles 
 favours the conception of a rigid orthodoxy which 
 admits of no deviation, and pronounces other 
 opinions to be sinful. The step from St. Paul's 
 denunciations of false teaching to the practice of 
 the Inquisition is one which can be filled in by a 
 series of small gradations. If right opinion is of 
 primary importance, it is natural for men to 
 enforce it when they have the power. Indeed, 
 
Intolerance of the New Testament. 61 
 
 it is said, % in the later books of the New Testa- 
 ment a progressive increase of severity against 
 erroneous opinions can be clearly traced, and St. 
 John speaks even more strongly than does St. 
 Paul. The denunciations, it is said, in the Second 
 Epistle of St. Peter, the Epistle of St. Jude, and 
 the Apocalypse, wax louder and sharper. 
 
 But what these apostles denounce is the incur- 
 sion of the profligacy of paganism into the assem- 
 blies of Christian worshippers. I need not pursue 
 this point into detail ; but surely indignation was 
 called for against men " revelling in their love- 
 feasts while they feast with you ; having eyes 
 full of adultery and that cannot cease from sin " ; 
 men who defile the flesh and bring into the 
 community the insidious temptation wherewith 
 Balaam perverted the children of Israel ; women 
 who seduce God's servants to commit fornication. 
 Surely it was needful that Christianity should be 
 rescued from the danger of assimilating in any 
 form the orgiastic spirit of Oriental worship. 
 Indignation at moral obliquity cannot be claimed 
 as a justification for persecution, which I have 
 defined to be the infliction of punishment for 
 erroneous opinions as such. 
 
62 Persecution and Tolerance. 
 
 Without the warnings contained in the apos- 
 tolic letters the Divine record would have been 
 incomplete for our guidance. The Gospels tell 
 us of God's revelation in the person of the Lord, 
 of the manifestation there made of the purpose 
 of man's life, and of the means by which that 
 purpose could be attained. The Acts of the 
 Apostles tell us of the way in which that reve- 
 lation was made known by human agents, and 
 the way in which it was accepted. The Epistles 
 afford us an insight into the difficulties which 
 were experienced in giving expression to this new 
 truth in the individual life of the early converts, 
 the difficulties of co-ordinating their new attitude 
 towards life and its duties with the facts and ten- 
 dencies of human society. 
 
 Let us see what these difficulties were. God's 
 truth about life was revealed to the world. Those 
 who accepted it did so from conviction, and only 
 asked to be allowed to act up to it. But the 
 society in which they lived would not allow them 
 to do so ; it tried to explain away God's truth 
 and turn it into its own shapes and forms. St. 
 Paul in my text utters a warning which applies 
 to every age. The truth of God's revelation has 
 
Intolerance of the New Testament. 63 
 
 an exclusive claim on man's allegiance, and must 
 be accepted for what it professes to be. It is not 
 one element out of many which make up human 
 morality or promote human civilisation ; it is all- 
 sufficient in itself. Jesus is not a way, a truth, a 
 life : He is the Way, the Truth, the Life. Some 
 may be willing to weave His teaching into their 
 own opinions, and in so doing may frame for 
 themselves an imaginary Christ. But the Church 
 sets forth the historical Christ of the Gospel re- 
 cord, as being in Himself the Truth, in whom 
 and through whom alone truth could be perfectly 
 known. The distinction between opinions about 
 Him, as one element in human knowledge, and 
 Himself as the all-comprehensive source of truth, 
 must be clearly maintained. The Church had to 
 learn the contents of its eternal testimony. 
 
 This testimony is equally necessary in every age. 
 Man is born into a world which has grown old in 
 its own devices. He is surrounded by habits, con- 
 ventions, systems, thoughts and feelings which have 
 been developed by the wit and the wisdom of all the 
 ages which have gone before. He may know that 
 he bears a talisman which will guide him safely 
 through the labyrinth. He may begin his quest 
 
64 Persecution and Tolerance. 
 
 with a firm grasp of the sword of the Spirit. 
 Will he always have the constancy to use it 
 against the dragons which confront him in menac- 
 ing array ? Will he have the strength to hew his 
 way through the darkening jungle till he reach 
 the hidden palace of his dreams? There are 
 many temptations to rest in pleasant meadows 
 and let the sword drop from his nerveless hand. 
 There are many trim abodes of grey-haired 
 dotards who seek to dissuade him by the wise 
 saws of experience. The sword is heavy; why 
 not exchange it for another ? Others have done 
 well enough with lighter weapons. 
 
 The apostolic writings come to us as the voices 
 of leaders who steadfastly wielded their weapons 
 because they knew their value ; who uttered the 
 needful warnings to their followers, and repelled 
 the insidious influences of the world-spirit. For 
 the object of the world- spirit is ever the same, 
 to induce man to trust in his natural strength, to 
 let go his heavenly weapons, and content himself 
 with some nearer goal than that which he was 
 bidden to pursue. " What," say some, with an air 
 of superior wisdom, " what, that the only sword ? 
 Nay, our museums of antiquities contain many 
 
Intolerance of the New Testament. 65 
 
 just like it, which have now fallen into merited 
 disuse." " Stop," say others, " and fit it with a 
 more practicable handle ; you will never be able to 
 use it as it is." There is no lack of sage advice. 
 "It is too new." "It is too old." "How are 
 you sure that it is right ? " The cries are endless, 
 and are often contradictory. Each age repeats 
 the process. Each man who grasps the sword 
 has to endure the same trial. How precious is 
 the knowledge that it was so from the beginning ! 
 How invigorating the accents of those whom God 
 appointed to encourage the pilgrims who first 
 began their progress through a world forlorn ! 
 
 For from the very first the difficulty was to 
 escape the snares, not of the world at its worst, 
 but of the world at its best. Faithful souls saw the 
 truth of the Gospel, and thought that they had made 
 it their own. But the world-spirit in its most 
 attractive form gathered round them. They were 
 men of sincerity, men who were in earnest. It is 
 just such men of whom the world stands most in 
 need. Judaism would not let them go ; paganism 
 would not let them go. They pleaded that they 
 were ancient systems ; they asserted that they 
 contained much that was true ; they professed 
 
66 Persecution and Tolerance. 
 
 that they were willing to be reformed, to be spirit- 
 ualised, to be extended : they urged the vastly 
 superior field of influence which they could offer 
 to those who would make use of them in modera- 
 tion; they warned the inconspicuous body struggling 
 into existence of the futility of their hopes ; they 
 suggested partnership. Many of the new con- 
 verts were ready to listen. The experiment was 
 worth trying. We know as a matter of history 
 how little the experiment availed. We hear in 
 the utterances of the apostles the cries of leaders 
 who saw the real issue, the disastrous issue, of 
 this futile compromise. Men may accept or re- 
 ject the Christian faith, they assert ; but if they 
 accept it, they must accept it as it is. Jesus Christ 
 cannot be obscured by Jewish ritual, nor will He 
 receive men's souls while their bodies are left to 
 paganism. Yet the old systems, which were in 
 possession, strove desperately to lay their hands 
 on Him, ftid make Him and His their own. 
 
 This is a necessary lesson, a most necessary 
 lesson for future times ; for no time more than 
 our own. Much of the prevalent indifference to 
 religion is due to an impression that there can be 
 no such thing as truth in religion, or that it cannot 
 
Intolerance of the New Testament. 67 
 
 be apprehended as truth. The Church maintains 
 that Jesus Christ is the Truth. " His own nature 
 must be so inwardly at one with the nature of 
 man, and of every world in which man can move, 
 that in the knowledge of Him must be folded up 
 the knowledge of all things." x Philosophers and 
 philanthropists are ready to praise Christianity as a 
 system of morals, while they destroy it as a religion. 
 The life of Jesus was beautiful; His precepts were 
 admirable ; His temper was most attractive ; His 
 death was most touching. He is through all ages 
 a type, a symbol, an example, round which all the 
 sentiments which are noblest and most permanent 
 in man's nature will certainly gather. If this were 
 all, there would have been no difficulties, because 
 there would have been few advantages. A noble 
 example added to the list of those whose refining 
 influence is acknowledged by thoughtful minds, 
 would have raised no question and created no 
 disturbance. But the apostles preached that 
 Jesus was the Son of God, who died to redeem 
 men from sin, who rose again to assure them of 
 immortality, who ascended into heaven, whence 
 
 1 Hort, The Way, the Truth, and the Life, p. 53. The 
 whole of this very pregnant essay is worthy of the closest 
 study. 
 
68 Persecution and Tolerance. 
 
 He sends down the perpetual gifts of the Holy 
 Spirit. Such a statement was the beginning of a 
 new conception of life among those who received 
 it. It challenged the acceptance or rejection of 
 all who heard it. It suggested to many minds 
 that at least it could be partially adopted to their 
 own purposes. 
 
 It was this last design which the warnings of 
 the apostles were intended to frustrate. " The 
 faith of Christ," they said, "stands by itself: it 
 cannot be mixed with previous systems, nor 
 adjusted to the standard of the world." " What 
 a pity," says the superior person of the present 
 day, "what a pity that they insisted so much 
 on this point. Their insistence certainly opened 
 the door to wrong-doing and produced much 
 misery. Christianity by being made dogmatic 
 lost much of its spiritual meaning and wasted 
 its force in barren controversy." This is the line 
 of argument of an age in which moral philosophy 
 as a basis for practical philanthropy is the fashion. 
 When the apostles wrote, Judaism was the fashion 
 amongst some, and Paganism amongst others. 
 Excellent people among the Jews and the Pagans 
 were willing to absorb something of the spirit of 
 
Intolerance of the New Testament. 69 
 
 Christianity. The apostles had to warn the disciples 
 that this was not what Jesus came to accomplish. 
 Tolerance, sympathy and charity are Christian 
 virtues ; but they must be cultivated without the 
 sacrifice of truth. The maintenance of the truth 
 above all things, by living in it, suffering for it, 
 dying for it : this was what the apostles taught. 
 But there is no warrant in this for compelling 
 others to accept it, or impressing it upon them 
 by force. Absolute and unswerving faith, fervent 
 zeal, persistent courage in witnessing the good 
 confession, these are necessary elements in the 
 Christian character at all times ; but these are 
 possible without the use of worldly weapons, nay, 
 they die away and become inoperative if they rest 
 upon any other basis than that which trust in 
 God supplies. 
 
III. 
 
 THE CHUECH IN EELATION TO PEESECUTION. 
 
 HAVING discussed the principles laid down in the 
 New Testament relating to the preservation of the 
 faith and the means by which it was to be accom- 
 plished, I would point out briefly the causes which 
 induced the Church to deviate from the lines there 
 traced for its guidance, and the evils which conse- 
 quently ensued. 
 
 It would be impossible for me to follow the his- 
 tory of the infant Church. The prevalent systems 
 of the world tried to lay hold of it as soon as it 
 came into being. The world-power of the empire 
 tried to destroy it. The world-wisdom of philo- 
 sophy tried to explain it away. The age of the 
 martyrs has a powerful attraction even to the 
 casual reader ; the age of the heresies leaves him 
 bewildered and depressed. Yet the agents in 
 both were discharging an equally necessary func- 
 tion. Both were upholding the truth of the 
 
The Church and Persecution. Jl 
 
 Gospel ; the one against the power of the world, 
 the other against the wisdom of the world. The 
 martyrs had this advantage, that the force of their 
 testimony was concentrated into one supreme mo- 
 ment, was expressed in one heroic act, which com- 
 mands universal sympathy. The controversialists 
 had to live through a protracted struggle, and are 
 judged by all their utterances, and all their 
 human weakness which the conflict remorselessly 
 revealed. But there were traces of imperfection 
 in both, imperfection which we dare not refuse to 
 recognise. " Even while we read with tears," 
 writes Dean Church, 1 " and with a thrill of awe 
 and joy, the Acta Marty rum, can we help wishing 
 sometimes that things had been different ; that 
 sometimes there had been more self-restraint, less 
 defiance, more command over the over- wrought 
 and over- strained heart, more quietness and calm 
 in the eye of the storm, amid the provoking of all 
 men? Are we not compelled to see, amid so 
 much that was universal, so much that was loftier 
 and wider than anything the world had known, 
 the occasional narrowness, the occasional fierce- 
 
 1 "The Imperfections of Keligious Men," in Cathedral and 
 University Sermons, 279. 
 
72 Persecution and Tolerance. 
 
 ness, the occasional self-satisfaction and despising 
 of others, which was the natural growth of cir- 
 cumstances, when the greatest and most divine of 
 societies was forced into the apparent position of 
 a little sect ? " If this be true of martyrs, how 
 much more evident are such defects in contro- 
 versialists ! We can only say that many of the 
 greatest of them said things which we could have 
 wished unsaid. Yet despite occasional outbursts 
 of unrestrained indignation against erroneous 
 opinions, there is clearly to be traced the profound 
 consciousness that God will accept nothing save 
 the homage of a willing heart. " No one," says 
 Tertullian, 1 "would wish to be venerated un- 
 willingly, not even a man." "It is for us," says 
 Cyprian, 2 "to do our utmost that we may be vessels 
 of gold or of silver; to God only is it given to 
 break the vessels of clay. The servant cannot 
 be greater than his Lord. No one may take upon 
 himself what the Father has given to the Son 
 only. No one may undertake to purge the thresh- 
 ing floor or sever the wheat from the tares by 
 human judgment. This is proud obstinacy, and 
 sacrilegious presumption springing from wicked 
 1 Apologeticus, c. xxiv. 2 Epistola, 51. 
 
The Church and Persecution. 73 
 
 anger." " Belief," says Lactantius, 1 " cannot be 
 enforced, for he who lacks piety is useless to 
 God." 
 
 When Christianity became the religion of the 
 Roman Empire, it passed into a sphere which 
 was not of its own creation. It is natural for 
 any human society to wish for order, and to find 
 order in uniformity. The massive organisation 
 of the Eoman State had tried to crush Chris- 
 tianity, because it claimed an independent exist- 
 ence ; when Christianity could not be crushed it 
 was adopted. It is ever so : the State must 
 accept any power that exists, and must use it 
 for its purposes. Uniformity of religious belief 
 was ruled by the State to be necessary, and was 
 enforced accordingly. This was contradictory to 
 the spirit of the Church, and was long felt to be 
 so. Yet the Church gave way to the supposed 
 necessities of its new position. Paganism was 
 forbidden : heretics were reduced to obedience by 
 the strong arm of the law. When the penalty of 
 death was first inflicted for erroneous opinions, 
 the Christian conscience was profoundly shocked. 
 
 1 Div. Instit.j v., 29. I owe these references to Lea, His- 
 tory of the Inquisition of the Middle Ages, i., 212. 
 
74 Persecution and Tolerance. 
 
 It is worth while to recall the circumstances, 
 because they carry with them a valuable lesson. 
 
 A Spaniard, Priscillian, attracted many followers 
 by his mystical and somewhat pantheistic teaching. 
 He was accused of reviving rnanichaean and gnostic 
 doctrines, and his opinions were condemned by a 
 synod. He contrived, however, to obtain the sup- 
 port of the emperor, till a revolt in Britain placed 
 in Gaul a successful usurper, Maximus ; and two 
 orthodox bishops brought before him their com- 
 plaints against Priscillian. Maximus condemned 
 to death Priscillian and six of his adherents. 1 
 Against this proceeding Bishop Martin of Tours 
 protested with all his might : he wrote to the over- 
 zealous prosecutors that they should abstain ; he 
 implored Maximus to abstain from bloodshed ; it 
 was enough that heretics should be judged by their 
 bishops and be suspended ; it was an unheard-of 
 horror that a secular court should punish for 
 ecclesiastical offences. When his remonstrances 
 were of no avail, Martin marked his sense of 
 reprobation by refusing to communicate with the 
 prosecuting bishops, or with any who communi- 
 cated with them. He was driven to break this 
 1 Sulpicius Severus, Hist. Sacra, ii., 63-5. 
 
The Church and Persecution. 75 
 
 resolve on one occasion, when he visited Maximus 
 to implore him not to continue his persecution 
 of the Priscillianists in Spain. Maximus refused 
 to listen to him unless he removed his protest 
 against what had already been done. Martin, 
 for the sake of obtaining mercy for others, con- 
 sented; but his qualms of conscience were such 
 on his homeward journey that he sat down 
 in mental agony till he received comfort from 
 an angelic message that his compliance was 
 justified. 1 This occurred in 385 ; the downfall of 
 Maximus before the arms of Theodosius, three 
 years later, was regarded as a just punishment 
 for his crime, and he was always looked upon 
 as a usurper. 
 
 I have told this story in detail, because, strange 
 to say, the punishment of Priscillian passed also 
 into a precedent, and was cited at an important 
 crisis of history as teaching the proper method of 
 dealing with Luther. Pope Adrian VI. was a 
 German, a profound theologian, a man of learning 
 and of high character. For these very reasons it 
 doubtless seemed in his eyes all the more in- 
 tolerable that Luther should not recognise his 
 
 1 Id., Dialogiy iii., 15. 
 
76 Persecution and Tolerance. 
 
 authority. He wrote in 1522 to the Princes of 
 Germany and detailed his grievances. Both by 
 temper and from regard to the office which he 
 held he was disposed to pardon ; but when an 
 ulcer-breeding cancer would not yield to mild 
 remedies cautery was necessary. So God swal- 
 lowed up the schismatics Dathan and Abiram in 
 the gulf: so St. Peter denounced death to Ana- 
 nias and Sapphira who lied unto God : so pious 
 emperors of old time removed with the sword of 
 the secular power the heretics Jovinian and Pris- 
 cillian. 1 So wrote the Pope ; but the piety of 
 Maximus was certainly unknown to his contem- 
 poraries, and the deed for which he earned that 
 title from Adrian rendered him infamous in the 
 eyes of St. Ambrose and St. Martin. It is not 
 only Scripture that is perverted to men's purposes. 
 No fact in history can be writ so clearly that men 
 will not misrepresent it and turn it to the very 
 opposite of its true meaning. The fact supplies 
 the precedent, the protest is forgotten. 
 
 Indeed the protest was soon forgotten by those 
 who lived near the time : by the middle of the next 
 century, Leo the Great accepted as a duty the sup- 
 1 Baynaldus, Annaks, 1522, G4, 
 
The Church and Persecution. 77 
 
 pression of heresy, and raised no objection to legis- 
 lation which treated heresy as a crime against civil 
 society, and declared it punishable with death. 
 Thus the divine law and the human law were put 
 on the same footing, and the truth of God was 
 no longer to be borne in upon the consciences of 
 men by gentle pleading, but to be enforced as 
 part of the necessary framework of social order. 
 We are so familiar with this process and its 
 results, that we regard them as inevitable. It 
 was indeed inevitable that the State should wish 
 to run the Church into its own mould. Was it 
 equally inevitable that the Church should eagerly 
 consent? I do not say that the Church should 
 have stood aloof from society, or have refused to 
 recognise the social order as proceeding from 
 God through the agency of man's intelligence, 
 and as capable of receiving further development 
 from the application of Christian principles. 
 The Church was sure to influence society by her 
 example: but she was willing to adopt the world's 
 arms before she had proved them. She took the 
 gift of power and set herself to frame a strong 
 organisation. She was no longer content to 
 work from within, but strove to act also from 
 
78 Persecution and Tolerance. 
 
 without. Thenceforth, the Church, regarded as 
 co-extensive with society, was to be the guardian 
 of established order. 
 
 The Church was co-extensive with society in 
 the sense that she claimed the allegiance of the 
 whole world for Christ ; but this allegiance was to 
 be won by the urgency of persuasion only. The 
 Church had received no commission from her 
 Lord as the guardian of any established order of 
 society. That was the work of the State, riot of 
 the Church ; and the State could claim a divine 
 origin, and a divine sanction within its sphere. 
 The Church transcended the limits of the State ; 
 it was the teacher of spiritual truth, wherein 
 were contained the principles on which all 
 social life rested. But Jesus repudiated inter- 
 ference with matters which were within the 
 sphere of man's natural capacity to determine : 
 " Who made Me a ruler and a divider over you? " 
 There is a divergence of function between Church 
 and State : one is the inspirer, the other the 
 executor, of man's endeavours for the improve- 
 ment of common life. Philosophy had striven to 
 establish the identity between the good man and 
 the good citizen ; and an admission of certain 
 
The Church and Persecution. 79 
 
 principles of conduct is necessary to secure a basis 
 for the activity of the State. But it is the office 
 of the State to protect rights and to define them ; 
 to maintain justice as the binding link of society ; 
 to forbid and to punish injuries, " bearing not the 
 sword in vain." It appeals to men's sense of 
 order, and operates on the will through the body. 
 The Church inspires the power to fulfil duties. It 
 enjoins love as the fruit of that knowledge which 
 comes through faith. Its injunctions are willingly 
 accepted because they appeal to the whole nature 
 of man. It has no weapon save conviction. It 
 controls the body by mastering the will, which it 
 trains to a knowledge of its power. 
 
 When the Church allowed the State to enforce 
 its system upon all, it abandoned its position as 
 the divinely appointed educator of mankind. Its 
 teaching was increasingly encumbered with tem- 
 poral enactments ; its principles suffered from 
 being subjected to forensic limitations ; the forms 
 and methods of secular organisation disastrously 
 affected its relations towards its members. At 
 first excommunication, or the withdrawal of the 
 privileges of Church membership, was a neces- 
 sary protection for the purity of the Christian 
 
8o Persecution and Tolerance. 
 
 body. The man whose life did not correspond 
 to his profession, and who by open sin brought 
 discredit on the community, was by solemn 
 sentence put outside the fold. If he repented, 
 made satisfaction, and by public penance gave 
 token of the sincerity of his repentance, he 
 might be again restored to communion. But as 
 congregations grew in number, and were no longer 
 connected by the bond of personal knowledge, 
 such cases multiplied and passed under the ex- 
 clusive cognisance of the priesthood. The object 
 of penance gradually changed from being primarily 
 the maintenance of the purity of the Christian 
 community to being the discipline of the individual 
 character. As the whole of society recognised the 
 Church, the Church had to assume responsibility 
 for all. Penance became a system, and the Church 
 framed her law books after the model of the State. 
 Human society found it necessary to classify 
 offences against the common well-being and impose 
 a penalty in each case ; the ecclesiastical society 
 followed the same example, classified sins, and 
 imposed penance. True penitence remitted the 
 eternal penalty of sin and merited God's forgive- 
 ness ; but the satisfaction to be made to man, the 
 
The Church and Persecution. 81 
 
 temporal punishment of sin, was still to be paid. 
 Thus the Church developed a judicial system of 
 her own, and became familiar with a legal pro- 
 cedure, which owed much to the State and reacted 
 upon it. 
 
 Thus it was that the Church became in its 
 organisation to a great extent the counterpart of 
 the world. And we know that any great and 
 organised system regards its own preservation as 
 the first object of its care. From this point of 
 view heresy was equivalent to treason, and must 
 be dealt with accordingly. This was accepted as 
 a self-evident maxim. Just as no civil society 
 could allow the plea of fervent and aspiring 
 patriotism to condone disobedience to the law, so 
 the Church did not allow integrity of purpose to 
 palliate disobedience to the ecclesiastical system. 
 
 This analogy seemed to be complete, the infer- 
 ence accurate. But the Church, as a spiritual 
 society, was bidden to exert her energy by per- 
 suasion, not by compulsion. This truth was 
 not unknown, but it was disregarded. Hence it 
 comes that in the history of the Church we can 
 trace two streams which by no means run in 
 the same course. There is the rushing torrent 
 
82 Persecution and Tolerance. 
 
 formed by the ecclesiastical system as it spread 
 its power over every land, fertilising and beneficent 
 in many ways, opening up communications, bind- 
 ing men together, a conspicuous highway for 
 human progress, yet working havoc at times and 
 spreading devastation, bearing on its bosom many 
 impurities, and sometimes choked by the wreck- 
 age which it wrought. Besides this are the many 
 streamlets of purely spiritual sweetness which 
 wander at will amongst the meadows, and gladden 
 the hearts of men ; along whose banks the child- 
 ren play without fear, while the wavelets ripple 
 onwards towards the ocean of God. 
 
 Does not the history of the Church bear record 
 to the superior greatness of the achievements 
 wrought by influence over those which were 
 wrought by power ? Who can read unmoved the 
 story of the foundation of the Northumbrian 
 Church or the lives of St. Francis and his com- 
 panions? Does he feel the same charm in the 
 lives of Pope Gregory VII. or Thomas of Canter- 
 bury ? Who can fail to see the difference between 
 those who strove to do God's work in God's way, 
 and those who laboured to do God's work in man's 
 way? 
 
The Church and Persecution. 83 
 
 Do not let us think that this is purely a modern 
 reflection. It was common in the mouths of 
 whole-hearted men at all times. Few texts were 
 more commonly quoted throughout the Middle 
 Ages than the warning of Jesus : " The kings of 
 the Gentiles have lordship over them, but ye shall 
 not be so." There was a keen perception that the 
 Church had become corrupted by the possession 
 of power. 1 " Praesis ut prosis " was the cry of St. 
 Bernard to Pope Eugenius IV., " Eule that you may 
 serve. Act up to this ; and do not you, a man, 
 affect to dominate over men, lest all injustice domi- 
 nate over you. I dread no poison, no sword, so 
 much as I dread the lust of power. In your power 
 you are the successor not of Peter but of Con- 
 stantine." 2 The root of the whole matter lay 
 there. The power claimed by the ecclesiastical 
 authorities came to them, not from their Master, 
 but from the world : and the gift of the world 
 could only be used for worldly purposes. It was 
 a fatal gift, recognised as fatal, but still regarded 
 as necessary, a burden that could neither be borne 
 nor be resigned. There were centuries when the 
 Church was at peace, occupied in the splendid work 
 1 J)e Consideratione, iii., c. 1. 2 Jd f , c. 3. 
 
84 Persecution and Tolerance. 
 
 of christianising and civilising the wild Teutonic 
 races ; of mitigating the savagery of invading 
 hordes ; of providing teaching for the young, and 
 practising in solitary wastes the hard labours of 
 pioneers of industry. But then, as society grew 
 settled, and civilisation became more complicated, 
 and men's minds grew restless and inquiring, the 
 assumed necessities of Church and State demanded 
 that order should be maintained at any cost. The 
 public peace seemed to be threatened by the spread 
 of unauthorised opinions, and the Church was ex- 
 horted to still the minds of men lest their actions 
 should leave the accustomed grooves. And the 
 Church had little faith in argument or persuasion. 
 Her ministers, immersed in worldly business, were 
 not prepared to speak words of reconciliation ; 
 her theologians, accustomed to logical argument 
 beginning from belief, not in Jesus, but in His 
 Church, were unable or unwilling to advance to 
 first principles. Entrenched behind the bulwarks 
 of a vast system, they would not venture into the 
 open plain, and were indignant that they should 
 be called upon so to do. There were soldiers ready 
 to sally forth and drag back the rebels captive. 
 It was a shorter and an easier method, The ob- 
 
The Church and Persecution. 85 
 
 ject was good, and the means were lawful. True, 
 quite true ; but it was the building of Constantine 
 that they were defending, and the arms with 
 which they fought were those which were inherited 
 from the Roman Empire, not from the teaching 
 of the Lord or His apostles. 
 
 It is possible, it is even easy, to account for 
 this as a necessary phase in the development of 
 European civilisation, by imposing a useful dis- 
 cipline which restrained within due limits pre- 
 mature outbursts of speculation, which would 
 have had disastrous effects on social order. I am 
 not concerned to discuss this position. It is 
 enough to say that the Church received no com- 
 mission from her Master to exercise any such 
 coercive discipline : so far as she did so, she acted 
 as part of the world-power and must be judged 
 accordingly. Nor is it difficult to judge the 
 result of applying worldly methods to spiritual 
 convictions. There are periods in the past when 
 the temporal power acted tyrannously and un- 
 justly in putting down the possibility of revolt, 
 and in constructing accusations of treason. But 
 such precautions did not crystallise into a system, 
 nor are we ever asked to condone or palliate 
 
86 Persecution and Tolerance. 
 
 injustice which was committed. At the bar of 
 historical judgment we are sensitive to the accu- 
 sation of tyranny. A ruler who put numbers of his 
 subjects to death on the charge of treason is held 
 to be responsible for proving that such a step was 
 justifiable. We require evidence of the danger, 
 in each case, and judge according to our opinion 
 of the urgency of the necessity. In cases of 
 religious persecution such evidence is not forth- 
 coming. Speculations might be unsound, but the 
 weapons to be used against them were those of 
 argument. The purely preventive substitution 
 of punishment for argument was not designed 
 really for the suppression of wrong opinion, but 
 for the maintenance of an ecclesiastical organisa- 
 tion, which was allowed to develop from above, 
 but might never be criticised from below. More- 
 over the great outbursts of persecution were not 
 purely ecclesiastical, but the Church lent her 
 sanction to secular policy. The war against the 
 Albigensians was for the strengthening of the 
 French monarchy; the persecution in Bohemia 
 was to uphold the German dominion over the 
 Czechs ; the Spanish Inquisition was established 
 to supply the Spanish monarchy with the means 
 
The Church and Persecution. 87 
 
 of welding together a people with divers tradi- 
 tions. It is not too much to say that persecu- 
 tion for religious opinions merely cast a cloak of 
 religion over unworthy political ends, and was 
 powerless to check the growth of absolute ir- 
 religion when it became fashionable in high 
 places. 1 
 
 There is a pathetic interest in the struggles 
 made from time to time by the Christian con- 
 sciousness to escape from the fetters of an outward 
 system of repression. Such an attempt was em- 
 bodied in the great religious movement of the 
 thirteenth century, which found expression in 
 the foundation of the Mendicant Orders. The 
 object of St. Dominic and St. Francis was the 
 same to overcome the evils of their time, not 
 by the power of a system, but by the beauty of a 
 life founded on true faith. " By their fruits ye 
 shall know them" was the thought which prompted 
 the activity of Dominic. " Meet example by 
 example; set against pretended sanctity a true 
 religion," was the maxim which prompted his 
 efforts to cope with materialistic heresy in 
 Languedoc. Francis, with no consciousness of 
 1 gee Lea, History of the Inquisition, iii. ? 650, 
 
88 Persecution and Tolerance. 
 
 any practical aim, yielded himself to the over- 
 powering impulse to lead a Christ-like life, freed 
 from all worldly ties, yet living in the world, and 
 loving it because it was God's world, and was full 
 of the traces of His presence. The lives and 
 methods of both were a tacit protest against per- 
 secution. They had other answers, of a spiritual 
 kind, to heresy and indifference ; and so long as 
 their spirit remained, their answers were powerful. 
 But outward things were strong ; and as the first 
 fervour died away, the dominant organisation of 
 the Church appropriated its results and used them 
 for its own purposes. The Dominican Order was 
 turned into the organ of the Inquisition. The 
 Franciscans, despite the revolt of their more 
 spiritual members, sunk into the flying squadron 
 of the forces of the Papal monarchy. The tragedy 
 of all great spiritual movements lies in the desire 
 to maintain their results, not by cherishing their 
 original spirit, but by organising them into insti- 
 tutions ; as though men still possessed the lofty 
 motives of their founders, when they had been 
 choked by the mechanism devised for their pre- 
 servation. 
 
IV. 
 
 THE EVOLUTION OF TOLERANCE. 
 
 " I, if I be lifted up from the earth, will draw all men unto 
 Myself." (St. John xii. 32.) 
 
 AFTER this brief survey of persecution, as it 
 existed in the Church of the Middle Ages, we 
 have to consider how it came to an end. My 
 argument has hitherto been that persecution was 
 opposed to the spirit of Christianity ; I have now 
 to show that persecution ceased because the spirit 
 of Christianity asserted itself, and broke the bands 
 of an artificial and imperfect system which hemmed 
 it in. 
 
 I have already pointed out that Christendom was 
 in possession of truth which ought to have pre- 
 vented a mistake, contrary to the whole spirit of 
 the Gospel, and condemned by the actual teaching 
 of Christ. I have further indicated that there 
 was a perpetual protest on the part of high-minded 
 men against the false position into which the 
 
go Persecution and Tolerance. 
 
 Church had fallen through the claim to exercise 
 power. 
 
 It is worth while to estimate the mental atti- 
 tude of a good simple soul, and see how the 
 limitations set by surrounding conditions checked 
 spiritual insight. Few men deserve the title of 
 saint better than King Louis IX. of France. 
 His biographer gives samples of his table-talk 
 which enable us to estimate some of his opinions. 
 St. Louis was not ignorant of the existence of 
 religious doubt, and sympathised with those 
 whose faith was tried. He bade them pray and 
 persevere, and warmly praised the advice given 
 by a bishop to a great master of theology who 
 confessed his doubts about the Sacrament of 
 the Altar. "The King of France," said his 
 spiritual adviser, "is at war with the King of 
 England, and the castle nearest the frontier is 
 that of Eochelle. If the King of France gave you 
 the Castle of Kochelle to guard, and gave me a 
 castle in the interior, which of us would be 
 esteemed most highly at the end of the w r ar?" 
 "Why, I should," was the answer, "for holding 
 Eochelle against the foe." "Master," said the 
 bishop, " my heart is like the fort at peace, for I 
 
The Evolution of Tolerance. gi 
 
 have no temptation to doubt. God will give you 
 four times what He gives me, if you keep your 
 heart safe in the war of tribulation. Believe me, 
 you with your doubts are more pleasing to our 
 Lord than I am without them." 
 
 Yet while St. Louis thus recognised the trial 
 of faith as an element of life's probation, he 
 was in favour of making short work with un- 
 believers. He praised the example set by an 
 old knight, who, visiting a monastery, and find- 
 ing the monks engaged in disputation with some 
 Jewish rabbis, summarily closed the argument 
 by felling the chief of the Jews with his crutch. 
 " Clerks may dispute," said Louis, " but the 
 layman who hears the Christian faith spoken 
 against, ought to defend it only with his sword, 
 which he should drive home into the gain- 
 sayer." x 
 
 How are we to reconcile the different spirit 
 displayed in these two stories ? Only, I think, by 
 reference to the current ideal of secular life which 
 was applicable to the case of the unbeliever, and 
 not to that of the doubter. In the case of the 
 doubter St. Louis judged for himself, and referred 
 1 Joinville, Vie de S. Louis. 
 
92 Persecution and Tolerance. 
 
 to the Spirit of Christ ; in the case of the unbeliever 
 he merely transferred to religious duty the entirely 
 inapplicable analogy of martial honour. Chivalry 
 regarded it as the highest virtue of the knight to 
 fight against desperate odds, but was unsparing 
 of the foe, however unprotected he might be, if he 
 on his part refused to surrender. Courage was 
 but another name for force ; and that was truest 
 which men most fiercely asserted. Faith was to 
 be maintained by discipline, and honour recoiled 
 from unbelief. Individual responsibility was re- 
 cognised, but it was limited by the need of 
 corporate unity. Uniformity was so necessary 
 that every discordant element must be ruthlessly 
 removed. This was the conception of the Middle 
 Ages ; and the Church, adopting the ideal of 
 secular society, strove to fit it to its own purposes. 
 But the ideal was secular, and remained opposed 
 to the spirit of the Gospel. 
 
 We learn, however, from the example which I 
 have quoted that the theory of the rightfulness 
 of persecution never entirely prevailed. The 
 clergy in St. Louis's story were prepared to 
 convert the Jews by argument : force was the 
 resort of the intellectually feeble. The Church 
 
The Evolution of Tolerance. 93 
 
 as part of the framework of society might perse- 
 cute ; but the Church as a body of believers must 
 convince. The two currents flowed on side by 
 side, and in many minds never converged. It 
 might be argued, with some plausibility, that the 
 Church never originated any measure of perse- 
 cution, but accepted it at the suggestion of the 
 State. I am not concerned to examine this view, 
 because, if it were true, it would not lessen the 
 responsibility of the Church for adopting on 
 grounds of policy a method that was alien to 
 her real purpose. 
 
 It was not long before this inherent contradic- 
 tion in the position of the Church was subjected to 
 criticism, and suggestions were made for the organi- 
 sation of civil society on an independent basis. It 
 is generally assumed nowadays that toleration is 
 a purely modern virtue, and that its discovery 
 was due to certain phases in the development 
 of modern thought. This is scarcely an accurate 
 account of the development of its intellectual 
 basis. For the infliction of punishment for 
 erroneous opinion was condemned by the Church 
 before the fifth century, and after a brief 
 
 period slumbered till the middle of the twelfth 
 
 G 
 
94 Persecution and Tolerance. 
 
 century. As soon as persecution was organised 
 it was criticised ; and the first criticism expressed 
 opinions almost identical with those which now 
 prevail. For I take it that the principles on 
 which legal toleration is founded are chiefly two : 
 first, that no ecclesiastical organisation can claim 
 to exercise coercive jurisdiction over civil society ; 
 and secondly, that the civil power is not concerned 
 with opinions as such. Now both these opinions 
 were clearly and incisively stated as early as 1327 
 by Marsiglio of Padua in his great work the 
 Defensor Pads. In this admirable treatise on 
 jurisprudence Marsiglio investigated the source of 
 coercive authority. He found it in the "com- 
 munity of citizens, determining that anything 
 should be done or omitted regarding men's civil 
 acts under pain of temporal punishment." This 
 was the origin of all power ; the prince was 
 the executor of the law, and consequently, the 
 sole holder of the right to punish. Priests can 
 have no authority save what was given by Christ; 
 and the question is, not what power Christ might 
 have given them, but what He actually gave. 
 He Himself exercised no coercive power, and so 
 far from conferring it on the apostles, warned 
 
The Evolution of Tolerance. 95 
 
 them by example and precept to abstain from 
 it. The priesthood have only the power which 
 Christ gave them, to preach His doctrine and 
 administer His sacraments. All else belonged to 
 the civil power. From this it followed, that 
 neither actions nor opinions could be punished, 
 unless they were condemned by law. Christ's 
 kingdom had its own rewards and punishments, 
 which were to be assigned hereafter by Christ 
 Himself. The duty of the priest is to teach what 
 is necessary for the soul's health, as the doctor 
 teaches what is necessary for the health of the 
 body. The first expounds God's law, and applies 
 God's remedies : " but it is vain and to none 
 effect to compel any man unto the observing 
 of them. For to him that should observe them 
 only on compulsion they should be nothing avail- 
 able unto eternal health. And, therefore, a priest 
 may be conveniently likened to a physician, who 
 hath authority given him to teach or judge of 
 those things which are profitable to be done, or 
 to be left undone, for the obtaining of bodily 
 health, and the avoidance of sickness or death. 
 For the which cause also Christ in the state, and 
 for the state of this present life, called Himself a 
 
96 Persecution and Tolerance. 
 
 physician or leech, not a prince or a judge." 1 
 Heresy, therefore, was not to be punished by 
 penalties, unless the State for its own purposes 
 made it punishable. Marsiglio, as a jurist, insisted 
 both on the omnipotence and on the limitations of 
 the civil power : " I say it is not lawful for any man 
 to judge a heretic or misbeliever, or compel him 
 to any pain or punishment in the state of this 
 life. For no man though he sinneth never so 
 greatly against any manner of discipline, specula- 
 tive or practical, is punished in this world precisely 
 in that he is such an one; but in that he sinneth 
 against the law of man." The laws of civil 
 society are in his eyes purely utilitarian, and 
 neither can, nor ought to, have any relation to 
 man's higher aspirations. He scorns the feeble 
 efforts of the Church to set forth in this world 
 the principles of God's judgment of the world. 
 Certainly no man could enforce more urgently 
 the separation between the aims and methods 
 of divine and huirfan justice, than does Marsiglio 
 
 1 1 quote from the translation of William Marshall, pub- 
 lished in 1535, p. 70. It is not surprising that Marshall 
 found no public in England to read his translation, and 
 complained that " though it was the best book in English 
 against the usurped power of the Bishop of Rome, it has 
 not sold." 
 
The Evolution of Tolerance. 97 
 
 in the following passage : "In the heavenly 
 kingdom Christ promised that He would give 
 rewards and punishments, according to men's 
 good works or evil works ; but He never promised 
 that He would do such things in this world, but 
 rather doeth and worketh contrariwise to the 
 princes and governors of this world, for most 
 commonly He scourgeth and punisheth just men 
 and the workers of good deeds, or else suffereth 
 them to be afflicted in this world, and so bringeth 
 them to the rewards of His kingdom. But the 
 princes of this world, do, and ought to do clean 
 contrariwise to the order in God's kingdom, in 
 keeping and observing justice. For they do dis- 
 tribute in this world rewards to the keepers of the 
 law, and punishments to malefactors ; and it is 
 so to be done ; for if they did the contrary they 
 should trespass both against the law of man and 
 also of God." 
 
 I need not multiply quotations to make good 
 my point. The principles of tolerance are no 
 modern discovery, and the secular spirit is not 
 special to our own times. Men never thought 
 persecution right ; but they valued social order, 
 and regarded the ecclesiastical organisation as a 
 
98 Persecution and Tolerance. 
 
 necessary factor in its maintenance. I am not 
 concerned with the sagacity of their politics. It 
 is enough for me to point out that the question 
 was approached from the political and not from 
 the spiritual side. Men of piety deprecated per- 
 secution, men of intelligence demonstrated its 
 lack of foundation ; but it was maintained for the 
 same reason for which it had been admitted, namely, 
 political convenience. The machinery of the 
 Church had been adapted to the world's pur- 
 poses, and the world used its additional source 
 of power. 
 
 If we would understand the secret of the at- 
 traction which coercion of opinions possesses for 
 the natural man, we must study it in the records 
 of the time when men began to overstep the old 
 barriers and indulge in greater freedom of specu- 
 lation. If it be argued that excellent men who 
 inherited a traditional conception, in which perse- 
 cution had a place, were free from any personal 
 responsibility, what are we to say of those who 
 discarded tradition, when it was convenient for 
 themselves, and yet denied the same right to 
 others ? It is in the rise and progress of liberalism 
 that the causes of persecution and the limitations 
 
The Evolution of Tolerance. gg 
 
 of free thought are most apparent. Perhaps a 
 few instances will make this clear. 
 
 The traditional view of the organisation of the 
 Church received a severe shock in the fourteenth 
 century from the schism in the Papacy ; and the 
 necessity of restoring unity led to much theologi- 
 cal speculation. Foremost among the theologians 
 of that time was Jean Gerson, Chancellor of the 
 University of Paris, who put forth the hitherto 
 unheard-of theory that a Pope might be deposed 
 for the good of the Church. He is content to 
 found one of his arguments on Aristotle's dictum 
 that the State, i.e. the community, has the power 
 to correct or depose its ruler. " This power," he 
 proceeds, " is inalienable from a free community, 
 which cannot by any law be suspended from its 
 rights ; how much more then has the Church 
 such power? " l Again he asserts, " neither Pope 
 nor any one else ought to endeavour to set up for 
 universal obedience positive canons or traditions 
 of men. The opposite view has caused the 
 rupture of the Greek and Latin Churches, and 
 daily gives occasion to strifes and scruples, by 
 the attempt to set human law, be it canon law 
 1 Gerson, Op., ii., 916. 
 
ioo Persecution and Tolerance. 
 
 or civil law, on an equality with the law of 
 God." ! 
 
 Those were principles which Gerson was willing 
 to adopt for the purpose of ending the schism. 
 But it happened that at the same time there lived 
 in Bohemia a teacher who wished to apply the 
 same principles to a revival of spiritual religion. 
 John Hus used language very like that of Gerson 
 when he said : " True Christians ought to resist 
 any pretence of power which strives either by 
 force or guile to remove them from the imitation of 
 Christ." "If a man knows truly that a command 
 of the Pope stands in the way of a command or 
 counsel of Christ, or tends to the detriment of 
 the Church, he ought boldly to resist lest by 
 his consent he become a party to the crime." 2 
 But Gerson entirely declined to recognise his 
 own principles except for his own purpose. 
 They were valid for that and for nothing else. 
 In the mouth of Hus they became the rankest 
 heresy. 
 
 This may be assigned to intellectual inconsist- 
 ency. But is not inconsistency the result of 
 
 1 Gerson, Op., ii., 213. 
 
 2 See my History of the Papacy, i., 329, for references on this 
 point. 
 
The Evolution of Tolerance, lot 
 
 time-serving? Is it an intellectual and not a 
 moral defect ? It arises because men first 
 determine from motives of expediency what they 
 mean to do, and then call in their intellect to 
 supply them with plausible reasons. These 
 reasons and principles are not to be used for 
 anything except the immediate business in hand. 
 If an attempt is made to extend their scope, 
 immediately fine distinctions are drawn, prin- 
 ciples which have already been accepted are 
 repudiated, and the barrier of orthodoxy, which 
 has been set forward just far enough to in- 
 clude the actual thing which the innovator 
 wishes to achieve, is again erected. The successful 
 rebel becomes the sternest represser. " Indeed," 
 he argues, " authority has already been somewhat 
 shaken by my success ; it is my business to see that 
 it does not totter. Because my attempt has suc- 
 ceeded, I am bound to see that others fail." This 
 was exactly what Gerson did. His own action must 
 be proved harmless by dissociating it from any 
 other action of a like kind. He was restoring peace 
 in Europe : all was well except for the mutiny in 
 Bohemia ; and this must promptly be suppressed. 
 So before the meeting of the Council of Constance, 
 
IO2 Persecution and Tolerance. 
 
 in which Gerson's principles were to be applied 
 to promote the reunion of Western Christendom, 
 Gerson prepared the way for the destruction of 
 Hus. He had his mind made up, and felt no 
 scruples. Listen to his own words : "The most 
 pernicious error as regards the preservation of 
 civil order, whose pestilent root has already been 
 cut down by the axe of many pontifical decrees, 
 seems to me to be this : that one living in mortal 
 sin has no power or jurisdiction over others of the 
 Christian people." Now it may be granted that 
 this proposition needs qualification and explana- 
 tion, which might have been found in the writings, 
 as well as in the practical teaching, of Hus and 
 his master, Wyclif . But it was not widely different 
 from Gerson' s own view that the Christian com- 
 munity has an inalienable right to correct, and, if 
 necessary, to depose, an erring ruler. Surely a 
 little discussion might have led to an understand- 
 ing. But Gerson proceeds: "It seems to my 
 littleness, that against this error all authority, 
 spiritual and temporal alike, ought to rise, and 
 exterminate it rather with fire and sword than 
 with curious reasoning. For they who with such 
 arrogant and seditious rashness despise alike the 
 
The Evolution of Tolerance. 103 
 
 teaching of the apostles and of philosophy are 
 utterly wanting, I do not say in intellect, but in 
 public feeling." 1 
 
 I need not tell you how Gerson had his way ; 
 how a Pope was deposed according to his 
 principles, and how Hus was burned as a warning 
 that these principles were not really meant. The 
 liberalism of the Council of Constance was re- 
 sponsible for a recrudescence of persecution, 
 which could thenceforth claim the sanction of 
 conciliar recognition. It was not the existence 
 of old tradition which ushered in a new period of 
 persecution. Men had looked behind tradition, 
 but they thirsted for power; and when they had 
 accomplished their own designs had no scruple 
 in calling on authority to prevent further inquiry. 
 It was not the growth of intelligence that was 
 hostile to persecution. The man of intelligence 
 knew how to secure his own freedom, but had no 
 sympathy with the zeal which would go farther 
 than himself. 
 
 This was the characteristic of the New Learn- 
 ing. Each scholar and man of letters asserted 
 
 1 Palacky, Documenta Magistri Joan. Hus. Vita/m Illus- 
 trantia, 528. 
 
IO4 Persecution and Tolerance. 
 
 his freedom to his own opinions, but had little 
 interest that others should enjoy the same 
 measure of tolerance. Those who asserted liberty 
 of thought, as a speculative right, showed little 
 capacity for acting upon their principles. Again, 
 I would call your attention to the fact that the 
 advantage of free utterance of opinions and the 
 danger of its suppression were well known in 
 the fifteenth century, and men did not continue 
 to persecute because they thought it desirable 
 in itself. Listen to the words of an eminent 
 Englishman, Thomas More: 
 
 "King Utopus made a decree that it should 
 be lawful for every man to favour and follow 
 what religion he would, and that he might do 
 the best he could to bring others to his opinion, 
 so that he did it peaceably, gently, quietly, and 
 soberly, without hasty and contentious rebuk- 
 ing and inveighing against others. If he could 
 not by firm and gentle speeches induce them 
 into his opinion, yet he should use no kind 
 of violence, and refrain from displeasant and 
 seditious words. This law did King Utopus 
 make not only for the maintenance of peace, 
 which he saw through continual contention and 
 
The Evolution of Tolerance. 105 
 
 mortal hatred utterly extinguished ; but also 
 because he thought this decree should make for 
 the furtherance of religion. Though there be one 
 religion which alone is true and all others vain 
 and superstitious, yet did he well foresee that the 
 truth of the one power would at last issue out 
 and come to light. But if contention and debate 
 should be continually used as the worst men be 
 most obstinate and stubborn, and in their evil 
 opinion most constant he perceived that then 
 the best and holiest religion could be trodden 
 underfoot and destroyed by most vain supersti- 
 tions. Therefore all this matter he left undis- 
 cussed, and gave to every man free liberty and 
 choice to believe what he would." Even those 
 who held the most noxious opinions "were put 
 to no punishment, because they be persuaded that 
 it is in no man's power to believe what he list. 
 No, nor they constrain him not with threatenings 
 to dissemble his mind and show countenance 
 contrary to his thought. For deceit and all 
 manner of lies they do marvellously detest and 
 abhor." 1 
 
 So wrote More, the cultivated man of letters, in 
 1 Utopia, ed. Arber, 145-6. 
 
io6 Persecution and Tolerance. 
 
 1516. But what was suitable for Utopia would 
 not suit the actual England of the day. More, 
 the religious controversialist, did not rise above 
 the ordinary level of scurrility, and cast to the 
 winds his maxim that it be done " peaceably, 
 gently, quietly and soberly, without hasty and 
 contentious rebuking and inveighing against 
 others." More, the Chancellor, had still less in 
 common with his former self. Let us listen to 
 his official style, as contrasted with his literary 
 style : 
 
 " Seeing the king's gracious purpose in this point, 
 I reckon that being his unworthy chancellor, it 
 appertaineth to my part and duty to follow the 
 example of his noble grace, and after my poor wit 
 and learning, with opening to his people the 
 malice and poison of those pernicious books, to 
 help, as much as in me is, that his people abandon- 
 ing the contagion of all such pestilent writing, 
 may be far from all infection, and thereby from all 
 such punishment as following thereupon doth 
 oftentimes rather serve to make others beware 
 that are yet clear, than to cure and heal well 
 those that are already infected : so hard is that 
 carbuncle, catching once a core, to be by any 
 
The Evolution of Tolerance. 107 
 
 means well and surely cured. Howbeit God so 
 worketh and sometimes it is. Toward the help 
 whereof, or if it haply be incurable, then to the 
 clean cutting out that part for infection of the 
 remnant, am I, by mine office, in virtue of mine 
 oath, right especially bounden. 
 
 " Wherefore I reckon myself deeply bounden to 
 show you the peril of these books, whereof the 
 makers have such mischievous mind that they 
 boast and glory when their ungracious writing 
 bringeth any man to death. And yet make they 
 semblance as though they were sorry for it. And 
 then Tindal crieth out upon the prelates and 
 upon the temporal princes, and calleth them 
 murderers and martyr-quellers, dissimuling that 
 the cruel wretch with his wretched books, 
 murdereth the man himself while he giveth him 
 the poison of his heresies, and thereby compelleth 
 princes, by occasion of their incurable and con- 
 tagious pestilence, to punish them according to 
 justice by sore painful death, both for example 
 and for infection of others." * 
 
 I have selected More, as a typical instance of 
 that pseudo-liberalism, so common at all times, 
 1 Preface to the Confutation of Tindal, written 1532. 
 
io8 Persecution and Tolerance. 
 
 which obscures and confuses every question 
 which it touches. I have chosen More, because 
 he is familiar to all, as a man of learning, of 
 culture, of piety, and of practical capacity ; a man 
 who had the courage to lay down his life in behalf 
 of his opinions, when his own personal honour 
 was at stake. I have put before you, in his own 
 words, two contradictory utterances. If I mis- 
 take not, the very style and mode of expression 
 will tell you which was More's real belief. " They 
 be persuaded that it is in no man's power to 
 believe what he list ; they constrain him not 
 with threatenings to dissemble his mind and 
 show countenance contrary to his thought. For 
 deceit and all manner of lies they do marvellously 
 detest and abhor." Thus spoke the real head 
 and heart of the man, with the serenity that 
 comes of a grasp of truth, and an insight into 
 abiding principles. How different from the stilted 
 language of the official, engaged in justifying what 
 was convenient for the moment, deceiving himself 
 with the belief that he was saving society by 
 putting his principles aside, repeating well-worn 
 platitudes about cutting out the infected parts 
 for the preservation of the rest ; following the 
 
The Evolution of Tolerance. 109 
 
 example of the king's noble grace, till the king 
 was ready to apply to him the same measure of 
 justice as himself had applied to others. 
 
 Again, I repeat, it was neither mistaken zeal 
 nor intellectual error that fostered persecution ; 
 it was merely expediency and the thirst for power. 
 Leo X. was tolerant of the philosophic doubts of 
 Pomponazzo concerning the immortality of the 
 soul, because such speculations were not likely to 
 affect the position of the Papacy; but he could 
 not allow Luther to discuss the dubious and com- 
 plicated question of indulgences, because it might 
 have disastrous effects upon the system of papal 
 finance. Luther in return asserted the freedom 
 of every Christian man, and frankly asked the 
 enlightened conscience of Germany to undertake 
 the work of ecclesiastical reconstruction. He 
 believed that good intentions, common-sense, and 
 an open Bible were all that was required. He 
 would have no compulsion, " for however straitly 
 men may command, however stoutly they rage, 
 they cannot bring people farther than to follow 
 them with mouth and hand; the heart they 
 cannot compel, should they even tear at it. For 
 
 true is the proverb : ' Thoughts are toll-free.' 
 
 H 
 
no Persecution and Tolerance. 
 
 Heresy can never be kept off by force : another 
 grip is wanted, another quarrel and conflict than 
 that of the sword. God's Word must contend : if 
 that avails nothing, temporal power will never 
 settle the matter, though it fill the world with 
 blood. Heresy is a spiritual thing, which no 
 iron can hew down, no fire burn, no water 
 drown." 1 
 
 So wrote Luther before human perversity 
 crossed his path. When the German peasants 
 took his principles literally and applied them to 
 matters of immediate interest to themselves, 
 Luther, who saw his prospects damaged by a 
 popular rising, flung himself on the side of repres- 
 sion. It was not enough for him to detach 
 himself and his cause from followers whom he 
 thought misguided ; he clamoured for their blood. 
 " Let there be no pity," he cries ; " it is the time 
 of wrath, not of mercy. He who dies fighting for 
 authority is a martyr before God. So wondrous 
 are the times that princes can merit heaven 
 better by bloodshed than by prayers. Therefore, 
 dear lords, let him who can, stab, smite, destroy. 
 
 1 Werke, ed. Walch, x., 456, 461 ; see other passages quoted 
 by Beard, Reformation of the Sixteenth Century, 171, etc. 
 
The Evolution of Tolerance. in 
 
 If you fall, well is it for you : you could never die 
 a happier death. If any man think this too 
 harsh, let him remember that rebellion is irrepar- 
 able, and that the destruction of the world may 
 be expected at any moment." 
 
 Luther had his reward ; his movement fell into 
 the hands of secular princes, who were authorised 
 by theologians to decide controversies among 
 preachers, and put down dissensions by the 
 secular arm. Melanchthon, the mild and re- 
 tiring student, wrote against heretics in language 
 which might have been borrowed from papal 
 bulls ; the precedents of Christian emperors sup- 
 pressing the Arians were again cited, and rigid 
 orthodoxy was again enforced. Calvin, without 
 a shred of claim to jurisdiction, condemned 
 Servetus to the flames, and Melanchthon wrote 
 to congratulate him on his firmness : " The 
 Church, both now and in all generations, owes, 
 and will owe, you a debt of gratitude. I en- 
 tirely assent to your judgment. And I say 
 that your magistrates did right, in that, after 
 solemn trial, they put the blasphemer to death." x 
 
 It was not the progress of intelligence, nor was 
 1 Corpus Reformatorum, viii., 362. 
 
H2 Persecution and Tolerance. 
 
 it the proclamation of the right of private judg- 
 ment, that caused the downfall of persecution. 
 Yet the religious movement of the sixteenth cen- 
 tury indirectly promoted that result by altering 
 the basis on which persecution rested. Before 
 that time Europe was regarded as a great reli- 
 gious commonwealth, and its rulers were bound 
 to maintain the orthodox faith. The sixteenth 
 century saw the growth of national States accele- 
 rated by the growth of national differences about 
 religious observances. "Cujus regio, ejus religio" 
 was a bald expression of the need universally felt 
 for internal unity on some recognised principle 
 however crude it might be. On whatever grounds 
 religious persecution might be justified in Protes- 
 tant States, it was practised from political expedi- 
 ency ; and of this the State, not the Church, was 
 the judge. Thus England under Elizabeth was 
 exposed to dangers from foreign intervention, 
 which could only be averted by internal union. 
 This was hard to effect; and the desire of her 
 rulers was to unite religious opinions on as 
 broad a basis as was consistent with maintaining 
 the essential characteristics of a branch of the 
 Catholic Church. The majority of Englishmen 
 
The Evolution of Tolerance. 113 
 
 were satisfied ; but ancient sentiment still held 
 some, and the new theology attracted others. 
 Neither body of dissentients wished for toleration 
 for themselves, as a permanent solution of the 
 question. Each wished to impose upon England 
 universally their own system. The State re- 
 garded such conduct as dangerous, and punished 
 it as unpatriotic. Those who suffered, suffered 
 under the laws of the State. The Church made 
 no claim to compel all Englishmen to enter her 
 fold. 
 
 It was this which rendered the question of toler- 
 ance possible for discussion. In Eoman Catholic 
 countries persecution hardened into a necessary 
 principle, which no man might question. In 
 Protestant countries it was a matter of national 
 policy. Changes in foreign relationships, and 
 growth of national feelings, gradually wrought out 
 a basis for common life, which was steadfast and 
 secure independently of religious opinions. The 
 literature of the seventeenth, and even of the 
 eighteenth century, adds little to the cogency of 
 arguments which had long been known. It 
 all came to this principle, which was stated 
 by an English writer in 1644 : " The compel- 
 
114 Persecution and Tolerance. 
 
 ling of a man to anything against his own 
 conscience, especially in matters of faith, is a 
 doing evil." l Men had always known that truth, 
 but it was not always convenient to act up to 
 their knowledge. At the time those words were 
 written, many men, perhaps the majority, recog- 
 nised their truth. But there was the practical 
 question, Who was to begin? If you were to 
 tolerate your neighbour and allow him to win a 
 majority of one, would he tolerate you ? Crom- 
 well would " meddle with no man's conscience," 
 but he would not allow him "to exercise the 
 mass," or to use the Anglican Liturgy. Tolerance 
 was not the doctrine of any sect or party. It was 
 not the product of superior enlightenment, still 
 less of growing indifference to religious questions. 
 It was the result of social development ; and it 
 rests solely on the basis of empiricism. Practically 
 we are tolerant because no harm comes of our 
 being so. 
 
 This may seem an impotent conclusion ; but 
 
 1 From a rare pamphlet, Liberty of Conscience, of which 
 Mr. S. K. Gardiner gives an account in the English Historical 
 Review, i., 144. Mr. Firth (id., ix., 715) has 'identified the 
 author as a merchant, by name Henry Robinson. For the 
 growth of opinion about the toleration in England see 
 Masson, Life of Milton, iii., 98, etc. 
 
The Evolution of Tolerance. 115 
 
 I think it is not really so. It is a testimony to 
 the solidarity of our common life, as resting on 
 principles which lie deeper than anything which 
 can be enforced by human law or appraised by 
 human judgment. Tongues may refuse to utter 
 formulae ; language may be unable to find expres- 
 sion for sentiments ; men, when they have to 
 speak, may babble incoherently, or may take pride 
 in airing petty differences ; but national life goes 
 on, quietly and strongly, because it has been pene- 
 trated by the principles which live in the Gospel 
 of Christ. There may be talk of change : we may 
 think such talk wise or foolish ; but we feel toler- 
 ably sure that changes in laws and institutions 
 can only register the sense of the community; 
 and in that sense we are prepared to trust. 
 We too have the power of speech, the oppor- 
 tunity for persuasion. We know that our fellow- 
 men are willing to listen, and we believe that 
 they are at the bottom just. 
 
 It is worth while to pause and realise what this 
 conclusion involves. 
 
 First, it carries with it a solemn and necessary 
 warning. If tolerance came into being as a 
 matter of political expediency, let us see that 
 
n6 Persecution and Tolerance. 
 
 we establish it upon a secure basis, and accept 
 it as a principle. It was not won by enlighten- 
 ment, and it cannot be maintained merely by a 
 trust in enlightenment. Christianity was con- 
 verted into the basis for social order, and men 
 were bidden to accept it for the maintenance of 
 that order. Opinions which are judged necessary 
 for social organisation tend to be exacting in 
 their demands for entire allegiance. They ad- 
 vance at first by persuasion ; then their upholders 
 chafe at the slowness of progress. Why not 
 quicken advance by compulsion? Why not 
 reduce obstinacy by force? The temptation is 
 always present ; the spirit of persecution is ever 
 ready to reassert itself unless it be checked by 
 some controlling sense of duty. 
 
 Secondly, we find in the process which I have 
 endeavoured to trace an overpowering testimony 
 to the imperishable spirit of Christianity. For 
 the change which I have described would have 
 been impossible unless, behind the political mo- 
 tives of statesmen, there had been a conviction 
 that persecution was not only inexpedient, but 
 wrong. The growth of this conviction is a sign of 
 the triumph of the spirit of Christianity ; it is a 
 
The Evolution of Tolerance. 117 
 
 proof of the operative energy of the truth to which 
 the Church testified, though she failed at times to 
 express it fully. 
 
 "The development of society" is not merely a 
 secular phrase. It is rather the testimony of the 
 world to the work of the Incarnation. Silently, 
 quietly, in spite of men's misdoings and perver- 
 sions, that work has been accomplishing itself. It 
 has created a mental attitude ; it has engendered 
 hopes and aspirations ; it has turned life into an 
 opportunity ; it has raised and is still raising the 
 standard of human possibilities. And it has done 
 this for all who have come within the sphere of 
 its influence, whether they accept it as a doctrine 
 or no, whether they live up to their belief in it or 
 no. Still the truth itself urges them on, and 
 wraps them in an atmosphere from which they 
 cannot escape despite their wilfulness. The 
 world, society, civilisation, call it what you will, 
 is part of the Divine order, and is affected by the 
 results of His revelation. And the progress of 
 society, the growth of the manifold ties which the 
 increasing complexity of human relationships is 
 ever establishing, this too is God's doing, and it is 
 marvellous in our eyes. When the Church erred, 
 
n8 Persecution and Tolerance, 
 
 by leaving her original purpose in obedience to the 
 world's behest, it is not wonderful that the world 
 was the first to perceive the error. No loyalty to 
 a system should prevent us from admitting its 
 serious mistakes. The Church throughout the 
 ages, in spite of faults and of corruptions, was 
 true to its mission as upholding the testimony to 
 the presence amongst men of the Incarnate Lord. 
 That presence wrought in divers ways upon the 
 hearts and consciences of men. It created a new 
 sense of human relationship ; it engendered new 
 feelings of duty ; it revealed the hideousness of 
 selfishness ; it proclaimed the beauty of self- 
 sacrifice. The world absorbed somewhat of its 
 meaning, and its efforts grew nobler from what it 
 learned. The Church, which has seen many of 
 its projects undertaken by the world, can afford 
 to bow its head before merited correction. It has 
 been taught the meaning of its Master's promise : 
 " I, if I be lifted up from the earth, will draw all 
 men unto Myself." It is for the Church to lift 
 up her Lord : the attractive power comes from 
 Him, and human compulsion is abhorrent to His 
 Spirit. Alas, that for so long a time human frailty 
 and human sin should have obscured the high 
 
The Evolution of Tolerance. ng 
 
 mission of the Church of Christ, and led her to 
 set the coarse methods of the world by the side 
 of the commission of her Master. What wonder 
 that she should be condemned to bear her burden 
 of the world's scorn ? Oh, how the world is re- 
 morseless to its instruments as soon as they have 
 served its purpose. The world seems so lofty, so 
 powerful, so magnanimous that it is hard to resist 
 its demands for help, hard to refuse to sacrifice 
 principles for the purpose of some beneficent 
 activity. But it is useless for the individual to 
 turn to the world for pity when oppressed by the 
 sense of wrong done from a mistaken desire for 
 its service: "I have sinned in that I have 
 shed innocent blood." How terrible the cry, 
 how pitiful ! Yet the answer rings out in the 
 sneer, which is unassailable alike for its justice 
 and its harshness, "What is that to us? See 
 thou to that." 
 
THE NATUEE OF TOLEEANCE. 
 
 " Let your forbearance be known unto all men. The Lord 
 is at hand." (Phil. iv. 5.) 
 
 As I began with investigating the causes in man 
 of the spirit of persecution, so I would end by an 
 attempt to estimate the meaning of tolerance, 
 round which, as round persecution, misleading 
 notions have tended to gather. 
 
 I pointed out that persecution was a natural 
 impulse to man, the desire to have his own 
 way at any cost, and to have it thoroughly, by 
 removing those who differed from him. Its danger 
 lay in the plausibility by which it clothed power 
 with a right to maintain itself, and furnished it 
 with arguments which made natural vengeance 
 seem to be a lofty duty. Now tplerance__came 
 into being as a denial of this right to exercise 
 coercion as against opinions only. As was natural 
 in a protest, it has rested on different principles 
 
The Nature of Tolerance. 121 
 
 at different ^times. At_one time it s ..gr gaud. ..was 
 political, and its pleadings were directed against 
 the mere endorsement by the State of the judg- 
 ment of the Church. At another time its ground 
 was moral, and it urged that coercion could not 
 produce conviction, but only engendered hypo- 
 crisy. Later still, its plea was intellectual, and it 
 
 *"***** ,**; 
 
 argued that, in a subject where there was so much 
 diversity of opinion, no one ought to feel so certain 
 that he was right as not to wish to learn from 
 discussion, rather than to punish for variation from 
 the established standard. Finally, tolerance won 
 its way on the practical ground that men were 
 sufficiently agreed on the fundamental questions 
 of right and wrong for the State to have a work- 
 ing basis sufficient for its purposes, without setting 
 opinions in the forefront. 
 
 Now all these pleas may be true, but the 
 acceptance of all of them does not constitute a 
 virtue. They only prove that persecution is not 
 worth while ; they leave toleration as merely 
 "one of the most valuable empirical maxims of 
 modern politics." 1 But tolerance, by which I 
 mean the habit of mind which toleration has 
 1 A. J. Balfour, Essays, 275. 
 
\ 
 
 122 Persecution and Tolerance. 
 
 engendered, is rightly reckoned as a virtue, and 
 deserves careful consideration as such. 
 
 Let me adopt, for the sake of clearness, the 
 Aristotelian method of defining virtues, and say 
 Uthat the subject matter with which tolerance is 
 concerned is man's attitude towards the opinions 
 of his fellowmen. Then tolerance is the mean 
 state in which virtue consists ; persecution is the 
 excess, and indifference is the defect. But it is 
 clear that in this case the defect is more easily 
 confounded with the virtue than is the excess ; and 
 indifference, which is wrong in itself, may wear 
 the garb of excellence. The attitude of the per- 
 secutor is clear, he wishes to impose his own 
 opinions on every one ; the attitude of the in- 
 different man is also clear, he has no opinions 
 and therefore is heedless. The virtue of the 
 tolerant man lies in having opinions, but not 
 wishing to impose them by any external pressure 
 or enforce them by any means save argument. \*\ 
 
 But it is obvious that the consideration of our 
 attitude towards the opinions of others must have 
 some influence on our attitude towards our own 
 opinions. It may be said, indeed it has been said, 
 that men who are certain of their opinions must 
 
The Nature of Tolerance. 123 
 
 naturally wish to impose them on all, and that 
 tolerance is only possible when opinions are re- 
 garded as open questions. This, however, gives 
 a false meaning to tolerance, and abolishes it en- 
 tirely as a virtue ; for tolerance is concerned with 
 the mode of holding our own opinions and applying 
 them to others> A man of vague and uncertain 
 opinions cannot lay claim to tolerance ; he is exer- 
 cising no self-restraint, he is not guiding himself 
 towards any moral purpose ; he is simply indifferent 
 and incapablej The tolerant man, on the other 
 hand, has decided opinions, but recognises the 
 process by which he reached them, and keeps 
 before himself the truth that they can only be 
 profitably spread by repeating in the case of 
 others a similar process to that through which he 
 passed himself. He always keeps in view the 
 hope of spreading his own opinions, but he 
 endeavours to do so by producing conviction. 
 He is virtuous, not because he puts his own 
 opinions out of sight, nor because he thinks 
 that other opinions are as good as his own, 
 but because his opinions are so real to him that 
 he would not have any one else hold them with 
 less reality. 
 
124 Persecution and Tolerance. 
 
 It must be admitted that the current conception 
 of tolerance frequently uses language which goes 
 beyond this view, and tends to favour indifference 
 as being the most useful attitude. True, it is 
 not called indifference, but broad-mindedness or 
 liberal-mindedness. When, however, we attempt 
 to analyse this conception, we find the two things 
 confused which I have attempted to separate, 
 the contents of a man's own opinions, and 
 his attitude towards the opinions of others. 
 Now broad-mindedness is properly speaking con- 
 cerned with the last of these. Society has a right 
 to demand that every one should respect the 
 opinions of others, as he wishes his own to be 
 respected ; but part of this process is that every 
 one should be allowed to express his positive 
 opinions, which should be submitted to intellec- 
 tual criticism, and not be stifled by social pressure. 
 It is not desirable that we should utter in public 
 only safe platitudes, and reserve our real opinions 
 for private propagandism. Yet it must be ad- 
 mitted that the tendency of the present day is to en- 
 rol every man as a member of some party, political, 
 ecclesiastical, or social, and to hold him up to 
 reprobation if he wanders for a moment beyond 
 
The Nature of Tolerance. 125 
 
 the shibboleths of the party to which he is 
 supposed to belong. Tolerance must mean a 
 respect for freedom of opinion. It must not set up 
 a standard of its own, and establish an orthodoxy 
 of latitudinarianism which may not be spoken 
 against. ^ 
 
 Only when this is admitted is it possible to 
 place on a right footing the principle upon 
 which tolerance must rest. Correlative with 
 freedom is responsibility; and in nothing is the 
 sense of responsibility more necessary than in the 
 expression of opinions. In all things the free- 
 dom of the individual has to be limited by 
 reference to the effect which its exercise will \ 
 have upon others. Speech is as important as 
 action, indeed it reaches farther in its effects,, 
 because it is more continuous. Of course the 
 responsibility attaches in the first place to the 
 formation of opinions ; but of this process outside 
 authority cannot take cognisance. It can only 
 deal with opinions when they find utterance. " 
 Concerning opinions there must always be some 
 judgment pronounced by authority, and some 
 limitations must be set. This is true not only 
 of opinions about ecclesiastical matters, but about 
 
126 Persecution and Tolerance. 
 
 civil matters as well. Civil society cannot grant 
 the absolute right of every man to propagate 
 any opinions he pleases : it is bound to con- 
 sider the possible consequences to social order. 
 Though in England the State is loath to inter- 
 fere, because it thinks the sense of community 
 can be trusted to deal with extravagance, yet 
 it reserves the right of interference. So, too, 
 every religious organisation must have a basis for 
 its own existence, which its professing members 
 must not overthrow. Such a basis must be 
 determined by authority with a full sense of 
 responsibility, and must be from time to time 
 revised. Limitations are not to be lightly im- 
 posed, nor are they to be lightly violated. We 
 find the essential principles for man's guidance 
 laid down in Scripture. " They called them and 
 charged them not to speak at all nor teach in the 
 name of Jesus. But Peter and John answered 
 and said unto them, "Whether it be right in the 
 sight of God to hearken unto you rather than 
 unto God, judge ye : for we cannot but speak 
 the things which we saw and heard." 1 
 
 The Church is a witness to the Truth, and her 
 1 Acts iv. 18-20. 
 
The Nature of Tolerance. 127 
 
 primary duty is to see that her witness is true. 
 The means by which she is to accomplish that 
 duty is to see that no teaching is given under 
 her authority which contradicts or impairs the 
 essential elements of that Truth committed to 
 her charge. To those who claim an irre- 
 sponsible liberty of speculation, the Church 
 must always seem intolerant, for she must 
 deny such a claim. Of such it has been well 
 said : " They confuse the right of the individual 
 to be free with the duty of the institution to 
 be something." x 
 
 " The duty of the institution to be something " 
 is imperative on the Christian Church, which 
 exists as a witness to God's truth, and as a 
 channel through which the grace of God flows 
 into the souls of men. It is not a creation of 
 society, existing for the purposes of general 
 utility. The truth which it sets forth was not 
 evolved by man, but was revealed by God. It 
 holds up for man's perpetual guidance, a Divine 
 Person, who is the Truth respecting God and man 
 alike. It points as the one possibility of human 
 progress to the realisation of that Divine presence 
 1 Amiel, Journal Intime, ii., 59. 
 
128 Persecution and Tolerance. 
 
 \ 
 
 as really abiding in the world. This it must 
 maintain, or it has no reason for existing. 
 
 The value of the human activities proceeding 
 from these beliefs was once felt to be so great 
 that society held it could not exist without them. 
 It committed to the Church the work of maintain- 
 ing social order on these principles. The Church 
 was allured by the dignity of such a commission, 
 and girded itself to regulate the world. We 
 have seen the mistakes into which it consequently 
 fell : but we must remember that, in spite of 
 these mistakes, the Church was educating the 
 world to do its own work. " The growth of the 
 secular spirit " is a formula which is used to ex- 
 plain much. What does it mean? I think it 
 means simply this that the Church, once the 
 director of the State, undertook much business 
 for society, which society gradually grew capable 
 of doing for itself. It is not too much to say 
 that every beneficent organisation which the 
 State now works for the good of the community 
 was taken over from the Church. The con- 
 sequence is that the Church is sometimes re- 
 garded as an agency for doing good, a useful 
 pioneer to the State. It is often praised for 
 
The Nature of Tolerance. 129 
 
 its beneficent activity, is called upon to under- 
 take some particular task, and is valued for its 
 readiness to contribute to the solution of some 
 particular problem. This is quite right ; but 
 many of those who are loudest in calling upon the 
 Church to help them, regard the Church with 
 secret or open disquiet when it states the principles 
 of its action, or uses them to criticise the sugges- 
 tions of popular politics or fashionable philan- 
 thropy. Why is this? I answer, because no 
 one engaged in practical affairs likes to admit 
 that there exists any form of influence which he 
 cannot manipulate, or any body of opinion which 
 he cannot, if necessary, explain away. I am not 
 concerned with discussing the wisdom or the 
 correctness of any particular opinions relating 
 to society which are maintained by Christian 
 Churches on the ground of their religious neces- 
 sity. That is in each case a matter for discus- 
 sion on religious grounds. There need be 
 no collision between ecclesiastical politics and 
 secular politics. A State need not necessarily 
 maintain a lower standard of moral rectitude 
 than the Church. The Church welcomes the 
 gradual transference to the State of many de- 
 
130 Persecution and Tolerance. 
 
 partments of social activity which have been 
 quietly organised by her officers, till they were 
 brought within the sphere of practical capacity to 
 apply universally. There is work enough to be done 
 beyond these limits, new regions to be occupied 
 where the State is entirely unable to penetrate. 
 But this activity rests upon a basis of its own. 
 The members of a religious body must have views 
 of human rights and duties, and of human rela- 
 tionships, which appeal to something beyond 
 present expediency, whereas politics are increas- 
 ingly concerned with expediency only, and are 
 sensitively jealous of the existence of principles. 
 The spiritual consciousness, however organised, 
 is beyond the control of current opinion ; and its 
 voice is sure to be the most powerful voice, and 
 will ring through the ages when the questions 
 which awakened it are forgotten. The politics of 
 past ages, and all the activity which they generated, 
 are often rescued from oblivion only by the protest 
 which they called forth from some seer, who raised 
 his voice in vain, but who spake oat eternal prin- 
 ciples which never cease to inspire mankind. The 
 Christian Church will always have to bear the 
 charge of being intolerant in the sense in which 
 
The Nature of Tolerance. 131 
 
 Isaiah was intolerant, in the sense in which 
 Micaiah the son of Imlah answered the appeal : 
 " Behold the words of the prophets declare good 
 with one mouth; let thy word, I pray thee, be 
 like the word of one of them, and speak thou 
 good." " And Micaiah said : As the Lord liveth, 
 what the Lord saith unto me, that will I 
 speak." Such a spirit of independent judgment 
 will never be explained away or cultivated out 
 of existence : its maintenance is the greatest 
 gift which the Church of Christ can bestow on 
 civil society. 
 
 I have spoken of tolerance in its outward aspect 
 and have attempted to disentangle it from some 
 qualities with which it is often compared. It 
 does not rest upon indifference, or complacency, 
 or abandonment of principles in deference to 
 popular opinion; but it rests upon respect for 
 human nature, of which our own individual 
 nature, however enlightened, intellectually or 
 spiritually, still forms a part. If toleration, as a 
 principle of civil policy, is the result of the dis- 
 covery that a community is bound together by 
 moral principles which underlie and survive 
 differences of opinion, so tolerance as an indi- 
 
132 Persecution and Tolerance. 
 
 vidual virtue is the recognition of the great truth 
 about human nature on which that discovery 
 rests. To the pious mind it was no new 
 discovery. The earliest message that we have 
 on record respecting man's estate was : " God 
 said, Let us make man in Our image, after Our 
 likeness." In Christ Jesus the dignity of man 
 was revealed in its fulness. Men were created 
 that they might become both seers and prophets 
 of God's truth, which each man who perceived it 
 was to help in making known to his fellows. 
 " The true light lighteth every man, coming into 
 the world." 1 Every man is capable of becoming 
 the home of God's Spirit. Every man is charged 
 with a message which none but he can hear and 
 deliver, for which he is solely responsible. Hence 
 the first practical application which St. Peter 
 drew from the Incarnation was not, " Love the 
 brotherhood," but, " Honour all men." How 
 could it be otherwise to one who had himself 
 experienced the infinite tenderness of Jesus? 
 What, he must ask himself, had prompted such 
 condescension? what save God's inexplicable re- 
 spect for the creature of His hand? "Honour 
 1 St. John i. 9. 
 
The Nature of Tolerance. 133 
 
 all men : " had not God honoured them in a way 
 which passed understanding and so penetrated 
 the soul? "Honour all men:" had not Jesus 
 endured what was more intolerable even than the 
 pangs of death, endured man's ignorance, and 
 arrogance, and triviality, and vulgarity? Had 
 He not listened patiently to their superficial 
 smartness, and been the object of their paltry 
 intrigues ? He bore the sins of the world, and 
 we think sometimes that we can examine and 
 classify the contents of His overpowering burden. 
 " The sins of the world," they defy the power of 
 man's analysis ; our crude categories can only 
 take account of acts which disturb society; we 
 condone the wilful ignorance, the selfishness, the 
 jealousies, the harsh judgment, the deliberate 
 misrepresentation by which many of the noblest 
 causes are marred. It is not the wickedness of 
 bad men, but the failings of good men which 
 reveal the dominion of sin. It was not only the 
 jeers of the soldiers, or the bloodthirsty cries of 
 the mob which rent the heart of Jesus ; but the 
 curses and the denial of Peter. So the apostle 
 felt and knew that for him too Christ died. To 
 him the Cross of Christ was the manifestation of 
 
134 Persecution and Tolerance. 
 
 man's baseness and man's dignity alike. Strength- 
 ened by the knowledge which he gained from 
 gazing on it, he could steadily face the actual facts 
 of life, and say : " So is the will of God that by 
 well-doing ye should put to shame the ignorance 
 of foolish men. Honour all men." 
 
 This then is the basis of tolerance; and it& 
 further contents are expressed in the words of 
 my text: "Let your forbearance be known unto 
 all men. The Lord is at hand." TO eVtet/ce? vpav, 
 the reflex in you of that eVtet/ceta which was 
 so manifested in Christ. " Forbearance " is a 
 poor word to express its meaning. It is the 
 quick sympathy with another, by which you 
 unconsciously put yourself in his place and ap- 
 praise not his actual words or deeds, but their 
 origin and their intent. It is the quality by which 
 you throw away the rude measures and standard 
 of the world, and trust yourself to the surer 
 guidance of that " spirit of man" which is in you. 
 It is a splendidly human virtue, known and 
 valued by those who contemplated man's excel- 
 lence. Listen to Aristotle's penetrating descrip- 
 tion : "It is 7riitcia to pardon human failings, 
 and to look to the lawgiver not to the law ; tc- 
 
The Nature of Tolerance. 135 
 
 the spirit and not to the letter ; to the intention 
 not to the action ; to the whole and not to the 
 part; to the character of the actor in the long 
 run and not in the present moment; to remember 
 good, rather than evil, and good that one has 
 received rather than good one has done ; to bear 
 being injured ; to wish to settle a matter by words 
 rather than by deeds." 1 
 
 The forbearance, the equitableness, the fair- 
 mindedness of Christ, surely this should be the 
 spirit of the Christian life, and this is what the 
 Christian means by tolerance. It comes from 
 the confidence of an assured hope, from the out- 
 look on a vast horizon. The kingdom of heaven 
 was to begin on earth ; it has its place here and 
 now, and before its contemplation the petty 
 activities of actual life fall into due proportion. 
 " The Lord is at hand ; " that is the great motive 
 for forbearance. Before His judgment all things 
 will be tried, our aims among the rest. That 
 thought is a mighty call to effort, but is a warning 
 that more valuable than the thing done is the spirit 
 in which it is done, and the motive from which 
 it springs. 
 
 1 Rhet., i., xiii. 
 
136 Persecution and Tolerance. 
 
 It is for us to see that our motive is pure ; 
 then, though we fail to accomplish what we 
 aim at, in the exact form in which we set it 
 before ourselves, still a result remains, grander it 
 may be than any we could fancy. " In nothing 
 be anxious; but in everything let your requests 
 be made known unto God. And the peace of 
 God which passeth all understanding shall guard 
 your hearts and your thoughts in Christ Jesus." 
 This is the secret of true tolerance, a genuine 
 faith in God which rises above the temptation to 
 identify God's will with our own will 
 
 None 
 
 Could trace God's will so plain as you, while yours 
 Kemained implied in it. 
 
 Success may be well ; but the peace of God is 
 better. He who has gained it for Himself has 
 assuredly shed it on others, and that is a greater 
 boon than any outward organisation can bestow. 
 Success is not worth having, unless it be fairly 
 won ; for force may coerce, and fraud may beguile, 
 but only persuasion and conviction can bring last- 
 ing benefits. " The ignorance of foolish men : " it 
 is always with us. We cannot escape it ; but we 
 are not to trample it down, and think that so we 
 
The Nature of Tolerance. 137 
 
 have got rid of it. It is a nobler work to make the 
 foolish wise, and turn their ignorance into know- 
 ledge. This is a long task, but meanwhile "it is 
 the will of God that we put them to silence by 
 well-doing." There is an eloquence beyond that 
 of speech. There is the persuasive significance of 
 a devoted life, whose silence is indeed golden. It 
 knows not misrepresentation, and uses no un- 
 sound arguments, and avoids clap-trap, and sows 
 its seed for eternity. 
 
 Tolerance is not merely a negative virtue. It is 
 needful on the part of the Church, as an organised 
 body ; for only by its liberal exercise can the sin- 
 cerity of its individual members be preserved. No 
 educator can discharge his task unless he en- 
 courages frankness, outspokenness, and sincerity 
 amongst those whom he undertakes to teach. 
 The Church, as the divinely appointed educator of 
 mankind, must cherish these qualities. Tolerance 
 is needful to the individual ; for it is the expres- 
 sion of that reverence for others, which forms a 
 great part of the lesson which Christ came to 
 teach him. It is the means whereby he learns to 
 curb self-conceit, and submit to the penetrating 
 discipline imposed by Christian love. 
 
138 Persecution and Tolerance. 
 
 I have traversed a large field. Let me point 
 out one conclusion which I would leave with 
 you. The fatal policy of persecution in the past 
 has brought its own punishment, and the present 
 divisions of Christendom owe their origin to that 
 cause. Man's claim to freedom of thought has 
 been asserted unmistakably, even wilfully. The 
 Church has been taught afresh truths which she 
 really knew, but which she overlooked concern- 
 ing her organisation and its uses. Shall we not 
 frankly accept the lesson, and put away any 
 root of bitterness which remains? The day 
 is past when any organisation can claim to do 
 God's work by the exercise of power; and the 
 attempt so to do has left its heritage of disaster. 
 Ecclesiastical power will never be revived ; but 
 any lingering desire after it prevents the growth 
 of ecclesiastical influence. God has taught us that 
 He works by influence, not by power. He taught 
 it by His own dealings with man ; He declared it 
 in the Incarnation. But men would not entirely 
 learn God's lesson, and chose their own way 
 instead of His. He has written His condem- 
 nation of their error on the record of history. 
 He has put His Church to shame at the bar 
 
The Nature of Tolerance. 139 
 
 of human judgment. In the place of that uni- 
 formity which she strove to enforce on Christen- 
 dom He has afflicted her with discord and 
 schism. Why? Because unity is undesirable 
 or impossible ? Not so. It was the subject of 
 our Lord's last prayer for His Church : its restor- 
 ation is an aim which can never be absent 
 from the mind of any one who calls him- 
 self by Christ's name. Why, then, I ask again ? 
 Because in times past that uniformity was en- 
 forced by carnal means, when the Church 
 grasped the weapons of the world. The hope of 
 the future lies in the entire abandonment of those 
 weapons. The Church will affect society as it 
 shows its capacity to persuade, rebuke, exhort in 
 its Master's name, not as it claims to command. 
 The reunion of Christendom will be possible, 
 when Christians have abandoned those prejudices 
 which are the legacy of the days of persecution, 
 and recognise that unity of the spirit which alone 
 can make controversy profitable. 
 
 Meanwhile I do not know that the tolerance 
 which is now praised by the world is very firmly 
 established. It rests at present mainly on an 
 equilibrium of forces which might easily be upset. 
 
140 Persecution and Tolerance. 
 
 There is always a temptation to the possessors of 
 power be they an individual, an institution, or a 
 class to use it selfishly or harshly. Liberty is 
 a tender plant and needs jealous watching. It is 
 always unsafe in the world, and is only secure under 
 the guardianship of the Church ; for the Church 
 possesses the knowledge of man's eternal destiny 
 which alone can justify his claim to freedom. 
 
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