soon became the characteristic vice of the ecclesiastical order. Innumerable contrivances were resorted to for the purpose of extorting money from the superstitious fears of the people. Hardly rescued from the rites of idolatry, and still imbued with its spirit, the minds of the early converts were easily filled with an extravagant veneration for the priesthood. The efficacy of expiatory gifts became as much an article of faith in the new, as in the old religion. They, who during their lives indulged their appetites without reserve, were anxious at their death to secure pardon and safety, by bestowing their riches on the Church. This disposition was eagerly encouraged by the clergy, and proceeded to so great abuses, as to require very soon the restraining hand of the Roman government. Exactions for baptism, for burial, for masses to secure the repose of the buried, for relics, for indulgences, became common every where. In addition to voluntary donations, tythes were demanded and universally paid. If the violence and barbarism of the age had not in some degree counteracted the effects of superstition, the whole soil of Christendom must have become the property of the Church. In addition to this excessive wealth, the Church rapidly acquired extensive jurisdiction and influence in civil and political affairs. Almost all suits were brought before the ecclesiastical courts. As ministers, counsellors, confessors, they governed the consciences of kings and emperors. In a few centuries after the union of Church and State, the successors of the fishermen of Galilee decided upon the rival claims of princes, and bestowed sceptres at their pleasure. This The natural and inevitable consequence of the wealth and power of the Church, was to invite into its high offices the avaricious and ambitious spirits of all countries. They rushed into the ranks of the clergy, not to save souls, but to secure the spoils of the people by the readiest means. again reacted upon the character of the Church, to desecrate still farther its holy ministry. Bishops became armed warriors, and headed their followers in rapine or war;-monsters of sensuality and vice made their lairs in the possessions of the Church; and nothing but the provident care of its head has preserved it from the farther effects of the fostering patronage of the State. The lessons of avarice and ambition were not the only fruits of the protection and aid bestowed by the civil government on the Church. It was initiated and trained in persecution and cruelty also. In the ages immediately succeeding the Apostles, we hear of no war of Christian upon Christian, no persecution of one society or community of Christians by another, for opinions' sake. Differences, and even dissensions, it is true, there must have been. Even among the Apostles there arose variations of opinion, and warmth of discussion, but unexasperated by those stimulants to malice and uncharitableness which the State supplies, they were subdued or moderated by the kindly influences of Christian love. But when Constantine professed himself a convert to the faith, and threw a fold of the imperial purple round the Church, then began the bitter and ferocious feuds which have continued to disgrace the Christian religion to the present day. The Roman emperor became supreme head of the Christian Church. Accustomed to dispose of the lives and fortunes of the millions subject to his rule, he could feel no hesitation in regulating their opinions. To differ from the doctrine which he regarded as true, was no longer an offence against heaven or the Church only, it was a contempt of the imperial majesty. The indignation of the ruler, and the punishment of the delinquent, awaited all departures from the rule of faith established by imperial sagacity and piety. The logic of the owner of forty legions was enforced by the usual cogent considerations, and they who were insensible to its power, were deemed worthy of exile or death. The Church, patronized by the emperor, was taught to consider all departures from her doctrine as punishable, not only by the expulsion of the offending party, but by temporal punishment, to be administered by the secular arm. The ambitious or avaricious adventurers who sought in its ministry indulgence for their lust of power or wealth, regarded every religious scruple or doubt as an attack on their influence or revenue, and readily co-operated with the intolerance of the civil government. Secular considerations added fierceness to religious disputes, and cruel and blood-thirsty persecution became the argument for settling Christian diversities of opinion. The deplorable consequences of the spirit thus caught by the Church from the State, may be seen in almost every page of ecclesiastical history. The heart mourns over the horrible tale of wrong and outrage which meets us every where. The most atrocious crimes, assassinations, burnings, massa cres of men, women and children, killing, not by speedy means of extermination only, but by tortures the most various, the most exquisite, that the malignity of infernal spirits could dictate to human ingenuity, all these have been perpetrated by men professing to be followers of Jesus Christ, and teachers of his religion. The horrible excesses of ferocity, and the hatred springing from secular influences and motives, have been ascribed to the religion of universal benevolence and good will,-the religion which teaches, as its sum and substance, love to God and love to man,-not to our friends only, but to our enemies,-not to those alone who do good to us, but to those from whom we receive scorn and injury, the religion which inculcates gentleness, meekness, humility, long suffering, charity, and active and unwearied benevolence to all mankind. The persecutor professes, indeed, to be actuated by the love of heaven. Apologies are made for his crimes, upon the plea that he is influenced by a sincere, although a mistaken, zeal for the glory of God. He is represented as being governed by love even, for the victim of his cruelty. He strives to rescue the soul of the sufferer, at the expense of his tortured and perishing body; he kills to save; he murders the physical, to preserve the spiritual part of the sufferer. Admirable reasoning, indeed, and worthy of that potentate, whom Milton designates among the infernal spirits as the homicide, "Moloch, horrid king, besmeared with blood Their children's cries unheard, that pass'd thro' fire To his grim idol.” The modern, like the ancient worshippers of the homicidal spirit, presume also to place their temple "right against the temple of God," and raise "Within his sanctuary itself their shrines They erect altars to the fiend of cruelty within the very Church of Christ. The subtlety that led astray "the wisest heart of Solomon," has been even more successful with the professor of Christianity; and the blood of human sacrifice offered up to the Genius of religious murder in modern times, has exceeded that which was shed by the older Syrian wor shippers of the grim idol. The victims of persecution in a single nation of Christian Europe, are said to be more in number than all the martyrs made by Heathen cruelty since the days of the Apostles,-with greatly less excuse, too, for the Christian persecutors; the Pagan violator of the rights of conscience may plead ignorance in his defence, the professed Christian sins against the light of revealed truth. Which has the best right to be considered the worshipper of the true God, may well be doubted. The increasing intelligence and civilization of Christendom, have mitigated the fury of persecuting zeal, and there is no nation in Europe, where burning or torturing would now be regarded as legitimate means for regulating religious belief. The spirit, however, is not altogether laid. A few years only have elapsed, since the Irish Catholic was restored to his civil and political rights. He is still taxed for the support of a Church to which he does not belong. In many parts of Europe, the Protestant is either openly oppressed or secretly harrassed in the exercise of his religious rights; and at this moment, the valleys of the ancient and simple Vaudois are suffering under the combined tyranny of priest and king. Neither Catholic or Protestant can resist the seductions of the demon of persecution, when corrupted by an union with secular power. The cruelties of religious persecution, then, so alien to the character of Christ and his religion, are the genuine offspring of this union between Church and State; and it may be confidently asserted, that every Church in connexion with the civil government will, in a greater or less degree, betray an arrogant spirit, sometimes exhibiting itself in open attacks on the rights of conscience, and always indicating towards dissenters and sectarians a contempt or aversion inconsistent with the charities of Christian love. The disputes or differences between Christian societies, which time or reflection and a sense of duty would gradually allay, are exasperated into outrage by the facilities afforded by the State to the dominant Church, for the indulgence of bigotry and intolerance. The secular arm becomes the instrument of theological hate, and the violence of the disputant is tempted to indulgence, by being furnished with the means of inflicting punishment on his opponent. For the union of Church and State, then, there is no warrant of scripture, no pretence of necessity, no ground of utili ty or expediency; on the contrary, from this corrupting and polluting connexion, the Church derives the spirit of avarice, ambition and cruelty,-nor can we hope to see Christianity restored to the simplicity, beauty and power which it possessed in the time of the Apostles, until, as then, it stands alone, independent and unencumbered with the favors of secular power. If the religious movements in Scotland, England, and elsewhere, produce this result, so essential to the triumphant progress of Christian Truth, we may well rejoice in them as preparing the way for the Exodus, not of the Church of Scotland only, but of Christianity itself. ART. VIII. The Mysteries of Paris. A Novel. By EuGENE SUE. Translated from the French by CHARLES H. TOUNE, Esq. New-York: Harper & Brothers. 1843. We have read this book of "Mysteries," and found in it a meaning that already has aroused and given direction to our thoughts. We have heard numerous judgments passed upon it. At first, concluding from the general impression that the book was a bad one, we were doubtful about the expediency of giving it a reading. Our doubts gave way upon witnessing the deep interest which the readers of the work seemed to feel in its perusal. Whatever could awaken so much thought, appeared to us worth attention, and we began to distrust the popular judgment; and since the reading, we acknowledge some different conclusions from those which we have generally heard from others. Society must be its own guardian, and we rejoice to see how sensitive it is, and how jealously it guards over the moral life of its members. It requires healthy means of support, in order to cherish a vigorous growth of virtue. Let no poison of evil mingle, with the genius that tempts the social appetite. In fiction, the danger is peculiarly great that a brilliant imagination will gloss over the hideousness of vice and clothe moral deformity in the garments of moral beauty. There is danger of hiding sin behind attractive pleasure. And in no other department of literature has sin been made to wear so winning a smile, as in the works of imagination. |