52 CHAPTER IV. OF THE PERSECUTION INVOLVED IN THE EXISTENCE OF "Partiality and law are contradictory terms: neither the merits nor the ill deserts, neither the wealth and importance, nor the indigence and obscurity, of the one part or of the other, can make any alteration in this fundamental truth. For if we once prevail upon ourselves to depart from the strictness and integrity of this principle in favour even of a considerable party, the argument will hold for one that is less so; and thus we shall go on narrowing the bottom of public right, until step by step we arrive, though after no very long or very forced deduction, at what one of our poets calls the enormous faith-the faith of the many created for the advantage of a single person. I can see no glimmering of distinction to evade it, nor is it possible to allege any reason for the proscription of a large part of the kingdom which would not hold equally to support, under parallel circumstances, the proscription of the whole."- - BURKE, Tracts on the Popery Laws, chap. iii. part i. 1. In stating broadly that persecution is essentially involved in all systems framed and supported by the government for the diffusion of opinions without the unanimous consent of the people, we state a fact which, it is hoped, will appear obvious in the end, but which is very often forgotten, even by dissenters themselves. The common answer to this charge is curious, though by no means remarkable either for novelty or truth" The liberty of toleration," it is said, "is allowed. Dissenters have sufferance, if not power; permission to worship God as they please: and what can they wish more? The factious opponents of the 6 powers that be' are proverbially ungrateful; and dissenters should be careful lest their ingratitude induce others to class them rather with the friends of faction than with the friends of truth. Besides, they should remember the apostolic precept, 6 Study to be quiet,' and that other, Meddle not with them that are given to change.' 999 2. The liberty of toleration! Was ever heard so gross a contradiction of terms? Toleration is a mitigation of punishment, not a definition of liberty; and when that punishment is inflicted for conscientious views, the mitigation of it deserves no other thanks than are due to moderate persecution; and even these must be given, not to the church, but to the people and the state. The working of the system may be lenient, but the system itself is unchanged. It is now what it has ever been; it retains the same offices, principles, and canons, and refuses to alter or repeal them. The toleration of dissenters is the proof of its weakness, not of its love.* * The clergy have ever been the enemies of religious freedom. All bills introduced into parliament, during the last fifty years, for And even if this boasted boon had been as certainly granted by the church as it has ever been denied, "for the ease of weak consciences," and in pity for the ignorant and the erring, there were no gratitude due for the gift. We should still regard her as we might a soft-hearted thief, who first asked our money, and then, on our pleading poverty and hunger, gave us a shilling out of it to carry us to the The rights of religious equality are all next town. the protection of dissenters, were received coldly by the bishops. In their most liberal hours, the ministers intimated that " they would not oppose them ;" and here their praise ends. Now, either these measures were just or unjust; if unjust, how are we to explain the submission of the bench; if just, how their hostility or indifference? To this general character there are, doubtless, noble exceptions; but the high-church party are the fair representatives of the spirit and tendencies of the system. The language of Guizot, descriptive of every ecclesiastical establishment, may be applied most appropriately to the English church :-"L'église s'est toujours présentée comme l'interprète, le défenseur de deux systèmes, du système théocratique ou du système impérial Romain, c'est à dire, du despotisme, tantôt sous la forme religieuse, tantôt sous la forme civile. Faible, l'église se mettait à couvert sous le pouvoir absolu des empéreurs; forte, elle le revendiquait pour son propre compte, au nom de son pouvoir spirituel. Sans doute, l'église a souvent invoqué les droits des peuples contre le mauvais gouvernement des souverains; souvent même elle a approuvé et provoqué l'insurrection. Souvent aussi elle a soutenu auprès des souverains les droits et les intérêts des peuples. Mais quand la question des garanties politiques s'est posée entre le pouvoir et la liberté, quand il s'est agi d'établir un système d'institutions permanentes, qui missent véritablement la liberté à l'abri des invasions du pouvoir, en général, l'église s'est rangée du côté du despotisme."– VIme Leçon. our own; and to boast of allowing the exercise of some of them is to take credit for giving us one part of our property while three parts are withheld. 3. By persecution is meant, in its ecclesiastical sense, the infliction of penalties on persons of another religious persuasion than our own for the rejection of our favourite faith; and with this crime-this act of treason against the very majesty of truth-we hold all governments that endow a particular order of clergy, however tolerant, to be chargeable. If it be possible, let the charge be repelled. But let us examine, for one moment, what this grave accusation involves. By religion is meant the truths and the feelings which God has approved in relation to his own worship and character, and which he has written, as some unhappily think, on the tablet of the heart only; or as others, more justly, in the pages of the Bible. Of the meaning of the terms in which he has been pleased to reveal them, there is confessedly a diversity of opinion. Some deny what others allow; some practise what others condemn. Now, amidst this diversity of faith, this one rule must be universally acknowledged, that every man must believe and act as in his judgment the highest authority has enjoined; so that the immediate guide of the belief and the actions of men in matters of religious worship is their own conscience. To obey its dictates is right; to reject or violate them is wrong. If any prefer to add to the Bible another judge, either tradition or the church, the duty of men is still unchanged. If, in my judgment, the new arbiter is unscriptural, his decisions I am bound to resist, when they are opposed to what I believe to be decisions of the Bible; or, if they be admitted, I must still act upon them according to my own persuasion of their meaning. My opinion of what is right or wrong may be changed; my rule of action and my rule of faith is the same as before. In spite of the sneers of Chesterfield and the calumnies of modern papists," it must be allowed, that in matters of religion his own conscience-his own intrepretation of the divine law— must ever be the rule of the life of the Christian.† * The authority of the New Testament on the duty of private judgment is overwhelmingly conclusive. * One word here. Popery is nothing more or less than the compulsion of conscience-spiritual despotism; protestantism aims at the establishment of religious equality or religious liberty—the overthrow of all systems that seek forcibly the repression or the propagation of religious tenets. The answer to Chesterfield is obvious. Whenever the religious creed of a sect professedly interferes with the person or property of the subject, the magistrate is bound to interpose. Religious liberty has no connexion with secular licentiousness. The fashion of our times is to call upon men to "hear the church," and to suspect their own judgment. A more useless exhortation was never given; it is like bidding men to close their |