enjoined as a duty, and recommended as meritorious. No good nature of their own, no obligation, arising from amiable dispositions in others, no sanctity of oaths, no sense of honour, no awe of the Divine Being, are to restrain them from any thing that is likely to promote the temporal advantage of their church. This is known. to all who are acquainted with the 4th Council of the Lateran, and the Council of Constance. a It is there solemnly decreed, that faith is not to be kept with heretics; and that all whom the pope condemns as such, are to be delivered up to the secular arm, and burnt without mercy. But how absurd is this principle! how criminal is this practice! The pretence is to promote religion: but what do they mean by religion? What, but to repeat a creed, to subscribe a confession, or to perform a ceremony. Is this religion? No, surely; religion is something better than this; it consists in doing justly, loving mercy, and walking humbly with God; in visiting the fatherless and widows in their affliction, and keeping ourselves unspotted from the world; in a divine nature, and a divine life. It is a reasonable and voluntary service, flowing from the full conviction of the mind, and the approving sentiments of the inward man. And what can violence do towards producing this inward conviction? Can fines take away error, and banishment drive men nearer to truth? Can dungeons illuminate the

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a The author has chiefly followed the authorities "faithfully drawn out of the allowed writings of the Church of Rome," as collected and arranged by the Rev. John Wesley, who, speaking of his Roman Catechism, says, I am very confident that the quotations throughout are true, having again and again examined them; and I have been as careful as I could not to mistake the sense of them, that I might rightly understand and truly represent the doctrine which I profess to censure; for without a faithful and important examination of an error, there can be no solid confutation of it."-Preface.

mind, and shackles free it from prejudice? Can racking the limbs rectify the judgment, and burning the flesh purify the conscience? As reasonably might a man expect to beat down a wall by an argument, or to set a broken bone by a fine harangue, as to remove the errors of the mind by threats, or convince the understanding by tortures. Besides, persecution tramples on the rights of conscience, invades the prerogative of God, destroys the liberties of man, and spreads devastation and ruin as far as its influence reaches.

The doctrine of propagating religion by external force, has often been put in practice, not only to the laying some negative discouragements and hardships on men, but to the subversion of all their most important privileges and rights, to the violation of all the order and peace of the public, to the committing the most horrid outrages and cruelties, and the turning whole countries into fields of blood. For instance the barbarous cruelties of the Spaniards, in the West Indies only, would fill a volume. One of their own writers, Don Casas, bishop of Chiapa, who was an eye-witness, thus writes concerning them: "The Spaniards have ruined ten kingdoms in America, larger than all Spain, by the commission of all sorts of barbarities and unheard-of cruelties. They have driven away or killed all the inhabitants, so that these kingdoms are desolate to this day, and reduced to the most desolate condition, though this was formerly the best peopled country in the world. In the island of Hispaniola there were about three millions of inhabitants, but they are now reduced, by the ravages of the Spaniards, to less than three hundred. Cuba, a large and populous island, is entirely a desert without inhabitants, and nothing but ruin to be seen in it. Within the space of forty years, they have unjustly put

to death above twelve millions of people, counting men, women, and children. They fell on them with the rage and fierceness of wolves and tigers, when pinched with hunger; while the poor victims seemed to be inspired by the Almighty with the meekness and gentleness of lambs. And in one place they set up a gibbet, and hanged thirteen of these miserable people, as they, with horrid blasphemy, expressed it, in honour of Christ and his apostles." Thus did they sport with human blood, and the miseries of mankind; and thus abused and profaned the sacred name of the holy Jesus! They have delighted in blood and slaughter, and, if they repent not, the glorified Head of the church has predicted, they "shall have blood to drink, for they are worthy."

Observe, concerning their murderous conduct, they so acted, "as they, with horrid blasphemy, expressed it, in honour of Christ and his apostles!" Here let us remark, that such a spirit, is as cruel and destructive in its operations, as highly displeasing to Christ, and unbecoming persons professing the Christian religion. We have no warrant from Christ to have recourse to methods hurtful to men, for promoting his honour in the world. It is, indeed, the duty of Christians to be zealously affected in his service, to vindicate his religion, to bear their testimony against every thing injurious to his name, truth, and interest; and, concerning these, he has given them rules as to the method of proceeding; and, as he has done so, it is a contradiction to the very name of a disciple of Christ to act without his authority, or to imagine that any plans we may propose should be equally agreeable to him.

We have a striking proof of the temper and spirit of Christ in his conduct towards the Samaritans. The Jews considered the Samaritans as apostates, heretics,

and corrupters of their religion; and 30 when they would load any one with infamy, they called him a Samaritan, as they did our blessed Lord. This rancorous spirit in the Jews, had a tendency to kindle the same in the Samaritans, who sufficiently evinced it in peremptorily refusing him the liberty to pass through their town, and afford him any refreshment, because they understood he believed, that Jerusalem, and not Gerizim, was the right place of worship-which was the grand controversy between them. This ill usage of our Lord, two of his disciples, James and John, warmly resented; this inhuman treatment of so excellent a person, so inflamed their spirits, that they wanted nothing but his consent to inflict a most severe and exemplary punishment on the vile persons who had dared to use him so basely; and therefore solicited leave to consume them by fire from heaven," Lord, wilt thou that we command fire to come down from heaven, and consume them, as Elias did ?" But notwithstanding the zeal which the disciples manifested in this motion, for the honour of their divine Master; and notwithstanding they endeavoured to justify it by the authority and example of Elijah, our Lord was so far from approving it, that he rejected it with holy indignation and abhorrence. He turned quickly, and rebuked them, saying, “Ye know not what manner of spirit ye are of; for the Son of man is not come to destroy men's lives, but to save them." As if our Saviour had said, Ye do not consider what a vile and unchristian spirit now actuates you, which dictates so much inhumanity and cruelty, and how impossible it is for me to comply with your proposal; since it is utterly irreconcileable with the end of my appearing in the world, which is not to do the least harm to mankind, but, on the contrary, to do them all possible good, not only to

promote their everlasting happiness in another world, but to consult their present welfare and comfort—to establish human society in peace and good order, and to contribute to the security and true enjoyment of life. This, every one will perceive to be our Saviour's meaning, who considers, that he here speaks of his coming to save men's lives, in opposition to that destruction which his disciples intended to bring on those Samaritans, which was to have its effect in this present world.

To suppose that a cruel, fiery, destructive spirit, against any of the human family, is necessary to maintain the honour of Christ and his religion, is attended with the greatest absurdities imaginable. If any have but a small degree of the knowledge of Christianity, it can be nothing but wilful perverseness and blindness, if they see not the repugnancy of all fire and flame, rage, and cruelty, to its design and tendency. And on such a supposition, how preposterous is the thought, that such a method of acting should be necessary to secure the honour of Christ, and extend the progress of the Gospel! -is it not a downright contradiction and inconsistency? We cannot more effectually dishonour Christ, than by acting in a spirit directly contrary to what is exhibited by his true disciples, and enjoined in his holy word.

The supposition that cruelty and destruction are necessary to maintain the honour of Christ, and the dissemination of his truth, is highly profane, and a kind of blasphemy. To pretend the honour of Christ, as a justification of treating others with ferocity and death, is to make the meek and holy Jesus the patron of wrath, hatred, fury, and violence, which are essentially vicious, and can never be consecrated by any authority, or any pretended purpose or intention. To say, that the end