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error; for truth is able to maintain itself by sober argument, and can derive no advantage from the persecution of its opposers; on the contrary it is always disgraced and injured when the unholy weapons of the bigot and the persecutor are forced into its service. Thus on the supposition that the persecuted are in error persecution is irrational; but when it is remembered how often the victims of persecution have been on the side of truth, how seldom, if ever, truth has been with the persecutor, and that there can be no infallible certainty on either side, as all are liable to err, persecution must appear a mixture of insanity and brutality.

SECTION V.

Persecution is altogether antichristian.

Christianity gives not the least countenance to persecution in any form. It is altogether an antichristian practice, because directly contrary to the spirit and example of Jesus Christ: he was meek and lowly, mild and gentle, kind and compassionate towards all men: he would not suffer those to be persecuted who refused to receive him he had many persecutors, but he

ever rendered them good for evil, praying for them even when dying on the cross: nothing that gives the least countenance to persecution can be discovered in any part of his spirit or conduct; it is in direct opposition to the example he hath left us. It is an antichristian practice, because directly opposite to the spirit and precepts of the gospel: the spirit of the gospel is a spirit of love: the New Testament requires us to love all men, even our enemies, and it is impossible we should persecute and destroy those we love: it enjoins us to be gentle towards all men, in meekness instructing those who oppose themselves: it prohibits persecu tion by commanding us not to render evil for evil to any man, but contrariwise blessing. It is an antichristian practice, because its tendency is to extinguish the genuine spirit of christianity, destroy the liberty wherewith Christ hath made us free, and bring us under a most grievous yoke of bondage, and because it violates the command of Christ, that those who profess his name should love one another as he hath loved them, and it is contrary to the example of the holy apostles and first christians. The persecutor resembles the unbelieving Saul of Tarsus, when breathing out threatenings and slaughter against the disciples of Jesus;

not Paul the faithful servant of Christ, and the apostle of the Gentiles. Every part of genuine. christianity has a tendency to life; but persecution makes havock with the church of God and scatters around firebrands and death. No two things can be more opposite than genuine christianity and the spirit and practice of persecusion. Persecution is the worst part of antichristianism. The symbolical mother of harlots is said, in the Apocalypse, to be drunken with the blood of the saints and martyrs, and every persecutor is a partaker with her and shares in her intoxication; consequently must expect to be a partaker of her plagues: as he beats his fellow servants he must expect his portion with the unbelievers. The spirit of persecution is the spirit of antichrist, as it shows a dereliction of the mind that was in Christ, a destitution of the temper of the gospel, and subverts its genuine influences. The practice of persecution is a leading characteristic of the antichristian church: the persecutor has not the mark of God's children, but that of his enemies. It is impossible to defend persecution without defending what is irrational and antichristian. Popery is no further destroyed than the practice of persecution is laid aside, and its spirit eradicated. Whatever particular system

men adopt, so far as they are persecutors they are antichristians.

SFCTION VI.

For christians to persecute each other is highly injurious to the church, and baneful to christianity.

The plea for persecution has often been that it is necessary to preserve uniformity, and prevent a contrariety in doctrine, and schisms in the church. It has never yet, however, been proved that uniformity, were it attainable, is necessary to the union, peace, and edification of christians; nor that a diversity of opinions ever did any harm, when not associated with bigotry and a persecuting spirit. But however necessary uniformity may be thought, ages of experience teach that it is not to be obtained by persecution. In the most persecuting times there have still been many nonconformists, and much diversity of sentiment. Persecution, so far from healing the wounds of the church has made them much deeper. It cannot fail to be highly injurious, because it destroys peace and union among those who differ, rends in pieces the church, and instead of preventing schisms

produces them. It corrupts the minds of christians, by inspiring animosity, hatred, and wrath, corroding the best feelings of the heart, producing ferocity of manners, and turning what should be the temple of God and the habitation of every virtue, into a scene of carnage and misery. It is baneful to christianity, because it interrupts the progress of christian knowledge, by preventing free enquiry, and is incompatible with its genuine spirit and practice; and because it greatly scandalizes the gospel, and fills the mouths of unbelievers with arguments against divine revelation. It deforms the most excellent of all institutions, and counteracts the influence of christianity in the world. Persecutors are the greatest troublers of the church, the fire of their unholy zeal tends to consume it, and the greatest enemies to the success of the gospel, their ferocious and cruel temper and conduct cannot fail to disgrace it.

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