their duty truly, and they may ascribe these suggestions to a moral sense, or to the native capacity of the human intellect, when in fact they are nothing more than the public opinion, reflected from their own minds; an opinion, in a considerable degree, modified by the lessons of Christianity. Certain it is, and this is a great deal to say, that the generality, even of the meanest and most vulgar and ignorant people, have truer and worthier notions of God, more just and right apprehensions concerning his attributes and perfections, a deeper sense of the difference of good and evil, a greater regard to moral obligations and to the plain and most necessary duties of life, and a more firm and universal expectation of a future state of rewards and punishments, than, in any heathen country, any considerable number of men were found to have had."1

After all, the value of Christianity is not to be appreciated by its temporal effects. The object of revelation is to influence human conduct in this life; but what is gained to happiness by that influence, can only be estimated by taking in the whole of human existence. Then, as hath already been observed, there may be also great consequences of Christianity, which do not belong to it as a revelation. The effects upon human salvation, of the mission, of the death, of the present, of the future agency of Christ, may be universal, though the religion be not uni versally known.

Secondly, I assert that Christianity is charged with many consequences for which it is not responsible. I believe that religious motives have had no more to do in the formation of nine-tenths of the intolerant and persecuting laws, which in different countries have been established upon the subject of religion, than they have had to do in England with the making of the game-laws. These measures, although they have the christian religion for their subject, are resolvable into a principle which Christianity certainly did not plant (and which Christianity could not universally condemn, because it is not universally wrong), which principle is no other than this, that they who are in possession of power do what they can to keep it. Christianity is answerable for no part of the mischief which has been brought upon the world by persecution, except

1 Clark, Ev. Nat. Rev. p. 208, ed. v.

2

Now

that which has arisen from conscientious persecutors. these perhaps have never been, either numerous, or powerful. Nor is it to Christianity that even their mistake can fairly be imputed. They have been misled by an error not properly christian or religious, but by an error in their moral philosophy. They pursued the particular, without adverting to the general consequence. Believing certain articles of faith, or a certain mode of worship, to be highly conducive, or perhaps essential to salvation, they thought themselves bound to bring all they could, by every means, into them. And this they thought, without considering what would be the effect of such a conclusion, when adopted amongst mankind as a general rule of conduct. Had there been in the New Testament, what there are in the Koran, precepts authorizing coercion in the propagation of the religion, and the use of violence towards unbelievers, the case would have been different. This distinction could not have been taken, or this defence made.

I apologize for no species nor degree of persecution, but I think that even the fact has been exaggerated. The slave trade destroys more in a year, than the inquisition does in a hundred, or perhaps hath done since its foundation.

If it be objected, as I apprehend it will be, that Christianity is chargeable with every mischief, of which it has been the occasion, though not the motive; I answer, that, if the malevolent passions be there, the world will never want occasions. The noxious element will always find a conductor. Any point will produce an explosion. Did the applauded intercommunity of the Pagan theology preserve the peace of the Roman world? Did it prevent oppressions, proscriptions, massacres, devastations? Was it bigotry that carried Alexander into the East, or brought Cæsar into Gaul? Are the nations of the world, into which Christianity hath not found its way, or from which it hath been banished, free from contentions? Are their contentions less ruinous and sanguinary? Is it owing to Christianity, or to the want, of it, that the finest regions of the East, the countries inter quatuor maria, the peninsula of Greece, together with a great part of the Mediterranean coast, are at this day a desert? or that the banks of the Nile, whose constantly renewed fertility is not to be impaired by neglect, or destroyed by the ravages of war, serve

only for the scene of a ferocious anarchy, or the supply of unceasing hostilities? Europe itself has known no religious wars for some centuries, yet has hardly ever been without war. Are the calamities, which at this day inflict it, to be imputed to Christianity? Hath Poland fallen by a christian crusade ? Hath the overthrow in France, of civil order and security, been effected by the votaries of our religion, or by the foes? Amongst the awful lessons, which the crimes and the miseries of that country afford to mankind, this is one, that, in order to be a persecutor, it is not necessary to be a bigot: that in rage and cruelty, in mischief and destruction, fanaticism itself can be outdone by infidelity.

Finally, If war, as it is now carried on between nations, produce less misery and ruin than formerly, we are indebted perhaps to Christianity for the change, more than to any other cause. Viewed therefore even in its relation to this subject, it appears to have been of advantage to the world. It hath humanized the conduct of wars; it hath ceased to excite them.

The differences of opinion, that have in all ages prevailed amongst Christians, fall very much within the alternative which has been stated. If we possessed the disposition which Christianity labours, above all other qualities, to inculcate, these differences would do little harm. If that disposition be wanting, other causes, even were these absent, would continually rise up, to call forth the malevolent passions into action. Differences of opinion, when accompanied with mutual charity, which Christianity forbids them to violate, are for the most part innocent, and for some purposes useful. They promote inquiry, discussion, and knowledge. They help to keep up an attention to religious subjects, and a concern about them, which might be apt to die away in the calm and silence of universal agreement. I do not know that it is in any degree true, that the influence of religion is the greatest, where there are the fewest dissenters.

ANNOTATIONS.

'Christianity, in every country in which it is professed, hath obtained a sensible, though not a complete influence on the public judgment of morals.'

A very intelligent traveller who has resided in various parts of Europe, Asia, and Africa, told me that one of the circumstances that most struck him in all the regions he had visited, was, the effects of the religion professed by each class of men, in reference to their state of civilization, and the superiority obtained-peaceably and silently-by one class over another. He found the Mahometans thus gaining ground everywhere on Pagans; the Jews, on Mahometans; the Christians, on Jews; and the Christians of reformed Churches, on those of the unreformed.

It is from a general and wide view like this, that we can most fairly estimate the true tendency of any cause that is in operation.

'The slave-trade destroys more in a year, than the Inquisition does in a hundred.'

It would be a great mistake however to measure the evil of persecution by the amount of destruction of human life which it has occasioned. The chief part of that evil consists in the terror, the suspicions - the mutual distrust-the debasing mental slavery—the insincere profession, and covert infidelity, which spring from it. But as for the destruction of life, we should remember that that will always be the least, wherever the system of persecution has been the most fully and efficiently carried out. No tree is withered by the piercing frosts of the Polar regions, or by the scorching drought of the African deserts; because no tree can exist there. And whenever allso-called-heretics have been either exterminated, or forced into outward conformity, the fires of an Inquisition go out for lack of fuel.

I have mentioned among the evils of persecution the secret infidelity caused by it. When any one is haunted with doubts concerning a religion which he is compelled to profess, he cannot discuss such doubts with persons who might perhaps help to clear them up, because he dares not acknowledge them

at all. And he has always reason to suspect that his neighbours may be secret unbelievers; since he knows, that, if they are so, they dare not avow it.

It is pretty well known accordingly that in those European States where the utmost intolerance prevails, utter disbelief of Christianity among the educated classes, is rather the rule than the exception.

And the like takes place, though in a minor degree, wherever the intolerant principle is less fully carried out: that is, where Christians, or those of a particular Church, claim, as such, a monopoly of political power, and exclude others, merely on the ground of religious error, from civil rights and privileges.

Considering how utterly foreign from the whole character of the Gospel is all intolerance, and how much the Gospel itself was for a long time the subject of persecution, there is no need for any attempt to palliate it by an advocate of Christianity. But it is important to observe that a strong evidence of the truth of our Religion is afforded by the deplorable spectacle of persecution practised by its votaries. For when we see how strong is the proneness to persecution, in Man in his unregenerate state, so strong, that it is practised, and even vindicated, by the professors of a Religion most emphatically opposed to it, this affords a very strong presumption that such a religion could not have proceeded from Man.'

A religion of human devising, would, we may be sure, have been as intolerant in its principles as the Mahometan. Persecution therefore, as well as other corruptions which have crept into Christianity in manifest opposition to the spirit of it, while they prove a stumbling-block to the perverse and the thoughtless, furnish to the candid and diligent a confirmation of faith.

CHAPTER VIII.

The Conclusion.

I we

N religion, as in every other subject of human reasoning, much depends upon the order in which we dispose our inquiries. A man who takes up a system of divinity with a

1 See Essays, 4th Series, ' On the Dangers to the Christian Faith.'