commenced against Protagoras; a price set upon the head of Diagoras; the danger of Alcibiades; Aristotle obliged to fly; Stilpo banished; Anaxagoras hardly escaping death; Pericles himself, after all his services to his country, and all the glory he had acquired, compelled to appear before the tribunals, and make his defence; a priestess executed for having introduced strange gods; Socrates condemned and drinking the hemlock, because he was accused of not recognizing those of his country, &c.: these facts attest too loudly, to be called in question, the religious intolerance of the most humane and enlightened people in Greece."

'4th.-THE ROMANS.-The laws of Rome were not less express and severe. The intolerance of foreign religions reaches, with the Romans, as high as the laws of the twelve tables; the prohibitions were afterwards renewed at different times. Intolerance did not discontinue under the Emperors; witness the counsel of Mæcænas to Augustus. This counsel is so remarkable that I think it right to insert it entire. "Honour the gods yourself," says Mæcænas to Augustus, "in every way according to the usage of your ancestors, and compel others to worship them. Hate and punish those who introduce strange gods, not only for the sake of the gods (he who despises them will respect no one), but because those who introduce new gods engage a multitude of persons in foreign laws and customs. From hence arise unions bound by oaths, and confederacies and associations, things dangerous to a monarchy."

'Even the laws which the philosophers of Athens and of Rome wrote for their imaginary republics are intolerant. Plato does not leave to his citizens freedom of religious worship; and Cicero expressly prohibits them from having other gods than those of the state.' (Milman's Notes to chapter xv. sec. 1. of Gibbon's Decline and Fall.)

'Cicero (de Legibus, c. ii., s. 8.) gives us the following extract from the most ancient laws of Rome. "Let no one have any separate worship, nor hold any new gods; neither to strange gods, unless they have been publicly adopted, let any private worship be offered; men should attend the temples erected by their ancestors, &c." From Livy (b. iv., c. 30) we learn that about 430 years before Christ orders were given to the Ediles to see "that none except Roman gods were worshipped, nor in any other than the established forms." Somewhat more than 200 years after this edict, to crush certain external rites which were then becoming common in the city, the following edict was published:-"that whoever possesses books of oracle, or prayer, or any written act of sacrifice, deliver all such books and writings to the Prætor before the calends of April; and that no one sacrifice on public or sacred ground after new or foreign rites." But it may seem needless to produce separate instances, when, from the same historian, (b. xxxix. c. 16) we learn that it had been customary in all the early ages of the republic, to empower the magis"to prevent all foreign worship, to expel its ministers from the forum, the circus, and the city, to search for and burn the religious books (vaticinos libros), and to abolish every form of sacrifice except the national and established form."

trates

The authority of Livy is confirmed by that of Valerius Maximus, who wrote under the Emperor Tiberius, and bears testimony to the jealousy with which all foreign religions were prohibited by the Roman republic (b. i., c. 3). That the same principle, which had been consecrated by the practice of seven hundred years was not discontinued by the Emperors, is clearly attested by the historian, Dio Cassius (p. 490-2). It appears that Mæcænas, in the most earnest terms, exhorted Augustus "to hate and punish" all foreign religions, and to compel

all men to conform to the national worship; and we are assured that the scheme of government thus proposed, was pursued by Augustus, and adopted by his suc

cessors.

Now, from the first of the passages before us it appears, that all right of private judgment in matters of religion was expressly forbidden by an original law of Rome, which was never repealed. We know not what stronger proof it would be possible to adduce of the inherent intolerance of Roman Polytheism. The four next references prove to us that the ancient law, subversive of the most obvious right of human nature, was strictly acted upon during the long continuance of the commonwealth.'

Y

Rev. G. Waddington's History of the Church, chapter iv. sub init. (In the Library of Useful Knowledge.)

NOTE 4. p. 61.

That persecution is the result of an evil spirit, rather than of any particular opinions, may be still further illustrated by the following remarks.

An authority which will not be suspected of any leaning towards Christianity, L'Encyclopédie, under the article Intolerant, justly says, 'The intolerant person ought to be regarded in every place of the world as a man who sacrifices the spirit and the precepts of his religion to his pride; he is the rash character who thinks that the arch must be sustained by his hands; persecutors are generally men without religion, and who find it more easy to manifest zeal, than to acquire excellence.'

There is reason to believe that in many cases persons holding infidel opinions have, under the cloak and pretext of religion, manifested a persecuting spirit. It is of the philosophers of the age of the Antonines-an age in which philosophy itself was seen associated with

the practice of persecution, that Gibbon speaks in the following passage—a passage which, with but too many others in his celebrated work, will perpetuate the dishonesty of the writer's mind, as long as his genius shall secure the popularity of the work :-' Viewing with a smile of pity and indulgence, the various errors of the vulgar, they diligently practised the ceremonies of their fathers, devoutly frequented the temple of the gods; and sometimes condescending to act a part in the theatre of superstition, they concealed the sentiments of an Atheist under the sacerdotal robes.' So then, Atheists themselves have been persecutors. If the criminality of persecution can be enhanced, it is, surely, in the case of those who have no religious convictions for the furtherance of which to be solicitous.

I am not ignorant of the services which Voltaire and others of the French philosophical school of the 18th century, rendered to the cause of religious toleration, by the exposition and enforcement of many of its most important principles. For this work-a work specially needed in their day and country, I yield to no one in the meed of praise which I award to them. But it is possible to defend toleration in an intolerant spirit, and to persecute with the very pen with which you assail persecution. And that several of these philosophers acted in this way, the reader may easily learn by reference to their writings, and especially to that more intimate and confidential expression of their feelings which their correspondence with each other exhibits. See Diderot, Correspondence; and Grimm, Correspondence litteraire. Extracts from the correspondence of Voltaire with D'Alembert and others, may be found in the 17th vol. of Priestley's Works by Rutt, where that true Christian and eminent philosopher has rightly characterised the scoffing, disdainful, not to say inhuman spirit which these men frequently displayed. Of the nature of Voltaire's

attack on religion, some idea may be formed from the following passage, translated from a work in which he is highly eulogized-De l'influence de la philosophie du 18e siècle, by E. Lerminer. Voltaire felt that it was necessary to conquer or die; he courted kings and nobles, but was implacable towards his literary adversaries, and the knights of the Church, and of darkness. He gave them neither quarter nor mercy; he cut their throat in the breach. The moment he has overthrown the imprudent person who has offered himself to his blows, he insults and degrades him, strips him of his dignity, even if in the struggle he loses some of his own. He rallies in every tone and in every style. He mocks and outrages his adversary; he stuns him by his bitter and discordant clamours; he astounds, and stupifies him, and tortures him by the inexhaustible abundance of his insulting mockery. Still more closely does he press his enemy: grapples and chokes him, throws him in the dust, and rolls about with him; a mortal struggle ensues. Sometimes Voltaire appears vanquished, but he rises again; he thrusts into the very depth of the wounds he has given, his pitiless irony, as a cutting sword; he sings the pœan of victory, and increases by his vengeance his titles to immortality. Montesquieu carried, even into his pleasantry, a native majesty; Voltaire triumphed by his cynical spirit, by his fury, and by his revolting mockery, which is a corroding and deadly poison.'

The author of the article, D'Alembert in the Penny Cyclopædia, remarks -'When we blame the two latter (Diderot and Voltaire), it is not for the opinions they held, but for their offensive manner of expressing them, and the odious intolerance of all opinions except their own which runs through their writings. Men of the best and of the worst lives appeared to be equally offensive to them, if they professed Christianity.'