IV. CHAP. ing into office, nor curb their lawless passions when in office of course, their pretended institution of celibacy was, in every sense, contrary both to the convincing law of Moses, and the redeeming power of the genuine gospel. Rist. of P. 434. 27. Hence their mock institutions were, eventually, productive of millions of lazy, useless beings, who for ages were a common pest to civil society. True these monastics and conventuals professed continence, and chastity, and virginity, and under this profession claimed a sumptuous living from more virtuous citi zens. 28. But how abundantly was their hypocrisy detected, and their horrid licentiousness exposed! So much indeed, that a convent or nunnery is a very proverb of contempt to this day! And not only they, but every rank of the priesthood, even to the pope himself, bore the same general character, and gave the most unlawful reins to secret debauchery, which has rendered the very name of continence and chastity odious to the sense of a long deceived world. 29. If the Catholic Church had been truly convinced of the abominations of a carnal nature, and had possessed the power of salvation, there would never have been occasion for those indulgences, which the bold blasphemers dared to dispense through the pretended virtue of Christ's blood. 30. But such was the degree of presumption and Redemp. wickedness in this Mother of Harlots, that she could fix her fees of absolution, license, and indulgence Note[m.] for the perpetration of the most horrid crimes; and publish, so much for defiling a virgin-for lying with mother or sister for a priest who keeps a concu bine-for lying with a woman in the church-for perjury-forgery-robbery, and even for murder; and this presumptuous merchandize she carried on under the pretended seal of the court of heaven. 31. Could then, any crime be too enormous to be committed, when money could discharge the guilt? And could money be wanting while orthodoxy marked out the more frugal, industrious and virtuous part of mankind as objects of destruction, of prey and spoil, to those booted apostles, and their infernal monkish rabble? IV. 32. Had this sink of corruption let the rest of man- CHAP. kind alone, her abominations would have been more tolerable; but how deeply tinged are the crimes of this scarlet coloured whore, when her thirst for blood is as insatiable as her love of pleasure! 6. 33. And I saw the woman drunken with the blood Revvik of the saints, and with the blood of the martyrs of Jeaus. Blood was always a principal part of the Catholic feast. And so fond were these ravenous beasts of this kind of drink, that they fancied they could even turn wine into blood, and drink it in memory of the bloody actions of their forefathers, who had slain the true witnesses of God. 34. Jesus never taught his disciples either to shed blood or to drink it, or any superstitious emblem of it. He gave them a cup to drink, but it was to be no more of the fruit of the vine and the New-Testament, or testimony which they received, was, that instead of superstitious rites and ceremonies, they were to eat their bread and drink their cup, in singleness of heart, and in a life of innocence and virtue, after his example. 35. But the Mother of Harlots had another kind of cup, which contained, first, the filthiness of every abominable action; next, a superstitious commemoration of the blood of saints and martyrs, from which she grew raving mad with orthodoxy; and lastly, her cup of filth must needs be mingled with fresh blood from the veins of those who retained the least appearance of the real life and virtuous manners of the ancient saints. tory, vol. 36. Paul of Samosata, in the third century, had Eccl. His been condemned and deposed by a council of Catholic i. p. 298. fathers, for his wrong notions about God and Christ : nevertheless he left behind him, a numerous train of followers, called Paulicians, who greatly troubled the church. Constans, Justinian II. and Leo the Isauri- bid. an, exerted their zeal, in the seventh and eighth cen- vol. ii. p. turies, against the Paulicians with a peculiar degree 35+ of bitterness and fury. 37. The cruel rage of persecution, which had been for some years suspended, broke forth with redoubled violence in the ninth century, under the reigns of Curopalates, and Leo the Armenian, who caused the strict A a IV. CHAP. est search to be made after those heretics in all the Grecian provinces; and death was the certain doom of all such as refused to conform to the abominable superstition of the times. Eccl. His tory, 38. But the cruelty of these bloody heresy-hunters vol surpassed all bounds, under the furious zeal of the p. 355. empress THEODORA. In one campaign into Armenia, these relentless persecutors, after confiscating the goods of above a hundred thousand Paulicians, put their possessors to death in the most barbarous manner, and made them expire slowly in a variety of the most exquisite tortures. Dil. vol. i. p. 390. 39. Such as escaped were driven to madness, and finally into the most desperate measures of defence, after escaping to the more humane Saracens, by whom they were protected against the rage of their Catholic persecutors.. 40. The Manicheans, in the fourth century, are said to have increased above the other denominations of Heretics in their influence and progress. During Eccl. Re- the time of their existence, "The civil and canon laws searches, of those times (says Robinson,) mention seventy or eighty sorts of Heretics," of whom the penal statThe Donatists and Manicheans were the P. 166. Eeel. His i. p. 390. utes say, 'worst." 66 41. St. Augustin, that Catholic oracle of Africa, had once himself been a professed Manichean, and had he remained a heretic, he might have continued a stranger to the diabolical work of persecuting others for their sentiments, and been exempted from the just and highly merited charge of insulting the reason and abusing the rights of mankind. 42. But when he "returned from his errors," (as tory, vol. Mosheim is pleased to express it,) and became a true orthodox Catholic, then indeed, the whole force of his much admired genius and flowing eloquence, was employed to stir up persecution against the heretics, and he, and other such godly men, endeavoured to inflame the passions of those in power, to extirpate the root of this "horrible disease" which so much troubled their catholic peace. ilid. 43. Through the influence of such bloody and bootNote [c] ed saints as Augustin, severe laws were enacted by the emperors against the Manicheans. Their assemblies were prohibited-heavy penalties were imposed on their teachers-they were branded with infamy, and deprived of all the rights and privileges of citizens besides many edicts more dreadful, which are said to be recorded in the ancient historics of those times. 44. The Donatists also suffered immense cruelties-numbers were sent into banishment, and many of them were persecuted with brutal barbarity, until they enjoyed some peace under the reign of the Pagan emperor Julian, who permitted the exiles to return to their country, and restored them to the enjoyment of their former liberty. 45. But no sooner did the self-stiled orthodox ecclesiastics recover the dominion, than the scene changed; and who more fit to heighten the crimson dye of the scarlet beast in causing the blood of heretics to be shed than St. Augustin?" He (says Mosheim,) 'animated against them, not only the province of 'Africa, but also the whole christian world, and the 'imperial court." CHAP. IV. Eccl. His i. p.398. tory, vol and vol. . p. 55. 46. The Mother of Harlots could not, at that age of apostacy, have conceived and brought forth a more genuine offspring, to help fill up the cup of her abominations, than that "learned and ingenious prelate" St. Augustin-a divine oracle to her adulterous seed; but the most contemptible tool in the eyes of the virtuous. He sent a Spanish presbyter into Pales- ibid.p.86. tine to accuse Pelagius, who was favored by the bishop of Jerusalem.—And he it was, who, at the head of the African bishops, inflamed the Gauls, Britons, and Africans, by their councils, and the emperors, by their edicts and penal laws, to demolish the Pelagians. 47. The Donatists had expressly remonstrated against appeals to the civil power in cases of religion. The implacable Austin (says Robinson,) had spent Ecel. Re'almost half a century in banishing, butchering and searches, driving all dissenters into corners, and there he stood, crowing to hail the return of day." But the Donatist's recovered their former liberty and tranquility by the protection they received from the Vandals, who invaded Africa; but as the Vandal king p. 104. IV. CHAP dom was brought to a period in the year 534; hence, "Orthodoxy and persecution once more overwhelmEccl. Re- 'ed that ill-fated country Africa. Councils, canons, searches, edicts and all imaginable instruments of oppression 6 came rolling in like a tide." p.110,111 bid. P. 112. ibid. 48. "One name given to the Donatists was Mon'tenses, because in the caves of the mountains, in 'times of oppression, they held their religious assem"blies. About the beginning of the seventh century, 'pope Gregory wrote to two African bishops to exert 'themselves to suppress them. Marked out thus for vengeance they disappeared-and the presumption is (says Robinson,) that they went among the Pagans for a liberty which the pretended followers of Jesus 'refused to grant them." 49. Robinson says of Gregory, who sent Augustin p. 165 the monk to preach his catholic gospel in Britain, "In spite of his title, ST. GREGORY THE GREAT, the blood of more than two thousand British Christians, whom he a foreigner, had the impudence to 'condemn, and the brutality to cause to be butchered, cries to heaven against him, and his accom.. plice Augustin the monk." It appears that St. Gregory had studied the great African oracle-Thou shalt not revile the gods, that is, says Gregory, the priests. ibid. p. 113. Eccl. His 50. Arabs, and others called infidels, never per'secuted till the orthodox taught them. It is allow'ed by all, that the infernal cruelties of pretendedly 'orthodox, both in the eastern and western empires, had rendered the name of Christianity hateful.” 51. "The Saracens persecuted nobody. Jews and Christians of all parties lived happy among them." Of course, those infernal cruelties, together with "the Jory, vol. i p. 157. 'bitter dissentions and cruel animosities that reigned " among the Christian sects"-dissentions that filled a great part of the east with carnage and assassinations, may be ranked among the causes that contributed to the rapid progress of the more mild and rational religion of Mahomet. |