born, or when he died, or even designate the century when the church was distracted with his heresy; it matters not whether the heresy-hunter ever read a page of his writings, or would be able to translate a single paragraph into his own vernacular tongue; all that is needed is a facility in uttering the magic name, and straightway the crime of heresy is affixed to the suspected individual, and his opinions are branded as pestiferous and deadly. Now, if this becomes the prevailing feature of any age, or any science, how is it possible that there should be any advances? How can it be ranked among the liberal sciences? How can it be regarded as open to fair and manly discussion? We are no apologists for Pelagius. We do not know that we hold a single sentiment which he held; nor do we deem it a matter of the least moment whether we do or do not. We have no such concern about the sentiments, held by any of the fathers, good or bad, as to give ourselves much trouble whether we accord with them or not. And provided we have evidence that we agree with Paul, and with the Redeemer, we are willing that other men should spend their time in ascertaining, if they choose, and if they can, whether they have more accordance with Augustine or with Pelagius, or whether their sentiments accord best with those of Arius, or with those of Athanasius. Nay, we have no particular objection that they should spend their days in demonstrating that the sentiments advanced in modern times do, or do not, agree with those of the men of other times. But while we live, we intend to lift up the voice against the assumption that to agree or disagree with an ancient man is any proof of orthodoxy, or heresy; and to urge the essential meanness of an attempt to blast a man's name, and character, and usefulness, because he may happen. to think as some suspected man has done who has gone before him.

Our own age is beholding to a melancholy extent another mode of attempting to prevent freedom of discussion. It consists in an effort to secure an ecclesiastical sentence of condemnation on BOOKS, when the author cannot be reached. Recently, the claim has been advanced—a novel claim in this land — that one of the proper functions of ecclesiastical bodies was to review the books issued from the press that may be suspected of heresy, and to pronounce upon them a sentence of condemnation. The claim which is set up is that of bringing the power of an ecclesiastical opinion, the power of religious influence, to

aid in the work of reviewing a book, and of preventing its circulation. It does not consist in an attempt to meet the argument in a book but to settle by the bare force of an ecclesiastical decision whether it shall or shall not be allowed to be read. It is a claim that the ecclesiastical bodies are the proper guardians of the purity of the church; and this is one mode in which they are to secure its freedom from error. The mode, so far as we have been let into the manner in which it is done, is very simple and summary. It is not deemed necessary that the whole, or any considerable part of an ecclesiastical body should be doomed to the task of reading the book through, or reading any considerable portion of it, or even of reading it at all. All that is needful is, that it be referred to a committee, who may, or may not themselves read the suspected volume; who may present their views of it, and their views embody the action, and secure the sanction of the ecclesiastical tribunal. The church is to be warned against its use; and to make use of it after such decision is to be construed as presumptive proof of a leaning towards heresy. As this is one of the most extraordinary claims of this age, and as there is nothing in our country more essentially papal in its character, or more directly tending to annihilate the freedom of discussion, we may be allowed to make a few remarks on the origin and nature of the claim.

(a) It is a change in the mode of repressing freedom of inquiry from that pursued in former times to adapt it to this age, and when the former and more effectual mode would not be tolerated. It is the exercise of the small remains of power left in ecclesiastical bodies which can be wielded now, and is the only remaining mode of accomplishing an object which has always been dear to a certain order of minds by the mere use of ecclesiastical power. Step by step we can trace the efforts to repress discussion by the force of ecclesiastical power.

was formidable, and awful. Gradually its terror diminished, as the power of ecclesiastical bodies diminished; until it has been reduced to the weak, and shadowy thing now implied in the sentence of the ecclesiastical condemnation of a book. The first, and most obvious course in regard to this subject was to seize upon the author as well as his book, and to commit them both to the flames. In the height of the ecclesiastical domination, this was often done; and the spirit which prompted to this was allowed the fullest exercise in the times of the papacy previous to the reformation. Then was the time of jubilee for this spirit;

then the ecclesiastical domination had entire control of the opinions of the christian world, and could consign an author and his work to the flames at pleasure. That was the ecclesiastical spirit in its perfection—a fearful, dreaded power-of which all that is now claimed is but the faint, and harmless shadow. The next step was, where an author had died a natural death, to dehumate his bones and commit them with his books to the flames. The ecclesiastical sentence extended to both; and both were condemned with all the forms of ecclesiastical jurisprudence. Thus, it is well known, that the bones of Wicklif were disinterred and burned together with his obnoxious books. On the same principle, and in the manifestation of the same spirit the bodies of Bucer and Fagius were burned in the time of Mary. "They were cited to appear," says bishop Burnet,*" or if any would come in their name, they were required to defend them; so after three citations, the dead bodies not rising to speak for themselves, and none coming to plead for them (for fear of being sent after them), the visitors thought fit to proceed. Having examined many witnesses of the heresies that Bucer and Fagius had taught, they judged them obstinate heretics, and appointed their bodies to be taken out of the holy ground, and to be delivered to the secular power. Their bodies were taken up, and carried in coffins, and tied to stakes, with many of their books and other heretical writings, and all were burnt together." When the arm of power was so weakened that the living bodies of men could not be committed to the flames, and when the public was so much enlightened that they were shocked beyond endurance at the idea of disturbing the sacred relics of the dead and publicly burning them, the next course was to burn the book itself. It was the highest power which was left; and it was freely exercised. Many a copy of the sacred Scriptures was committed thus to the flames. Tindal was beyond the reach of the enraged bishop of London, but his books were accessible; and these books were burned again and again by the hands of the hangman. Yet here was an advance towards liberty. It was a point gained of immense advantage when the body of the living or the dead was secure; and when the vengeance was wreaked on the book. We have gone one step in advance still towards freedom of thought; and here the struggle now is

• History of the Reformation, Vol. II. p. 537, 538. Nares' Edition, London.

raging, whether there shall be unfettered freedom, or whether the ecclesiastical bodies shall retain the shadow of their former power, and be allowed to consign a book to infamy by the mere form of an ecclesiastical decision without an attempt at argument. Thanks to the God of freedom, the life of a man is not now exposed to the rack or the flames because he has published a book that is offensive to a hierarchy that deems itself constituted to secure the purity of the church. Thanks to that God who has placed us in the land sought by the Pilgrims, it is now too late in the history of the world for a man to fear that his bones will be torn from their resting place when he is dead, and bound to a stake, and burned. And it is too late to burn a volume by the hands of a hangman. To attempt it would be an insult to the spirit of freedom in this land. It would be to excite now the scorn, the derision, or the wrath of the world; and it will not be done. What then can be done? How, in default of argument, can an obnoxious book be met? The reply is simple. It is possible that there may be found in the church enough of the spirit which once tolerated the burning of the heretic, or the burning of his dead body, or the burning of his book, to tolerate a sentence of ecclesiastical condemnation. This is all the power that remains-the shade of that mighty domination which once reigned triumphant in the world; and this power will be clung to as with a grasp of death. It consists in passing a string of resolutions without argument, and by mere ecclesiastical authority, to send forth a sentence of condemnation on a book. It is the remnant of that power which once bound all Europe in chains, and extinguished the last spark of freedom in the nominally christian world. It stands in the way of freedom of discussion now; and is all that ecclesiastical authority now can do to prevent the liberty of the human mind.

(b) It is a course that is unworthy of men living in a land of freedom, and professing to adhere to the large and noble spirit of civil and religious liberty. If a book is erroneous, it can be shown to be so, and should be so demonstrated in the proper way. Mind should meet mind; thought should conflict with thought; and argument should grapple with argument. Here the field is open for all; and here only there is equality. But there is an essential and indescribable meanness in a man when he attempts to put himself on a vantage-ground by bringing in the extraneous power of an ecclesiastical decision to aid him in an argument, or to supply the place of an argument. It is a

position which no honorable mind would take, to endeavor to overwhelm a man with such a decision instead of grappling with the views which he has presented. It is, moreover, a tacit acknowledgement that a book cannot be answered; and is usually so construed by an intelligent community. If it can be answered, the obvious question is, Why has it not been done? Why has not the champion of the opposite opinion boldly and honorably taken the open field, and met him in his strength, and prostrated his foe in the fair and honorable intellectual strife? When a man, therefore, attempts to shield himself by the authority of the fathers; when he attempts to procure an ecclesiastical decision on certain mooted points; when he attempts to secure the condemnation of a book, it is prima facie evidence that he is conscious of personal inability to meet the argument, or conscious that his position is one that will not bear the light of truth.

(c) It is a reflection on a community; and an insult to a thinking age. It implies a claim that ecclesiastical bodies have a right to direct the faith of the people; that they are the conservators of the public belief; that they have a right to prescribe to men what books they may read; what books may be introduced into their families; what books may be used in the schools. It implies a supposition that the community is illqualified to form its own judgment of the doctrines at issue; and that the self-constituted ecclesiastical functionaries have a right to prescribe the mode and the form of public belief. The highest insult which has been offered to the people of the nineteenth century has consisted in the decisions of certain judicatories denouncing certain books, and prohibiting the churches under their care from their use either in their schools or families. On reading these resolutions one almost forgets that he lives in this century, or in this land, and fancies that he occupies some place in the heart of Italy, Spain, or Portugal, and that the affairs of the world have gone back for ten generations. It is sufficient to say of such decisions that if they had been made in those times and places they would have been in keeping with all that occurred then; and that nothing is wanting to complete the notion involved in such an act but the power of binding the hapless author to the stake, or the power of disinterring his bones, and of committing them and his books to the flames. It is, however, all that is now left to the spirit of domination against the freedom of thought, and the right of discussion.