legium, or Society of Preachers, should select persons to fill vacancies, and to the congregation was left only a veto, which was regarded more as a nominal than a real prerogative. Whatever may have been the influence of Calvinism on society, Calvin himself was unfavorable to democracy. It is remarkable that almost at the beginning of his earliest writing, the Commentary on Seneca, there is an expression of contempt for the populace. His experiences at Geneva, and especially the dangers to which his civil as well as ecclesiastical system would be liable if it were at the disposal of a popular assembly, confirmed his inclination to an aristocratic or oligarchic constitution.

Calvin had begun, after his return, with moderation, with no manifestation of vindictiveness, and without undertaking to remove the other preachers who had been appointed by the opposite party in his absence. But symptoms of disaffection were not long in appearing. The more the new system was developed in its characteristic features, the more loud grew the opposition. Let us glance at the parties in this long continued conflict. Against Calvin were the Libertines, as they were styled. They consisted of two different classes. There were the fanatical Antinomians, an offshoot from the sect of the Free Spirit, who combined pantheistic theology with a lax morality, in which the marriage relation was practically subverted and a theory allied to the modern “free love" was more or less openly avowed and practiced. Their number was sufficient to form a dangerous faction, and it appears to be proved that among them were persons in affluent circumstances and possessed of much influence. United with the "Spirituels," as this class of Libertines was termed, were the Patriots, as they styled themselves; those who were for maintaining the democratic constitution, and jealous of the Frenchmen and

1 For his opinion of "the people," see Kampschulte, i. 419.

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other foreigners who had migrated in large numbers to Geneva, and to whom the supporters of Calvin were for giving the rights of citizens. The licentious free-thinkers, the native Genevese of democratic proclivities and opposed to the granting of political power to the immigrants, and the multitude who chafed under the new restraints put upon them, gradually combined against the new system and the man who was its principal author. On the other side were those who preferred the order, independence, morality, and temporal prosperity which were the fruit of the new order of things, and, in the existing circumstances, were inseparable from it, and especially all who thoroughly accepted the Protestant system of doctrine as expounded by Calvin. In the ranks of this party, which maintained its ascendency, though not without perilous struggles, were the numerous foreigners, who had been, for the most part, driven from their homes by persecution, and had been drawn to Geneva by the presence of Calvin and by the religious system established there. On a single occasion not less than three hundred of these were naturalized. That wide-spread disaffection should exist, was inevitable. The attempt was made to extend over a city of twenty thousand inhabitants, wonted to freedom and little fond of restraint, the strict discipline of a Calvinistic church. Not only profaneness and drunkenness, but recreations which had been considered innocent, and divergent theological doctrines, if the effort was. made to disseminate them, were severely punished. In 1568, under the stern code which was established under the auspices of Calvin, a child was beheaded for striking its father and mother. A child sixteen years old for attempting to strike its mother, was sentenced to death, but, on account of its youth, the sentence was commuted, and having been publicly whipped, with a cord about its neck, it was banished from the city. In 1565 a woman was chastised with rods for singing secular songs to the melody

of the Psalms. In 1579 a cultivated gentleman was imprisoned for twenty-four hours because he was found reading Poggio, and having been compelled to burn the book, he was expelled from the city. Dancing, and the manufacture or use of cards, and of nine-pins, brought down upon the delinquent the vengeance of the laws. Even those who looked upon a dance were not exempt from punishment. The prevalence of gambling and the indecent occurrences at balls furnished the ground for these stringent enactments. To give the names of Catholic saints to children was a penal offense. In criminal processes, torture was freely used, according to the custom of the times, to elicit testimony and confession; and death by fire was the penalty of heresy. It is no wonder that the prisons became filled and the executioner was kept busy.1

The suppression of outspoken religious dissent by force was an inevitable result of the principles on which the Genevan state was established. The Reformers can never be fairly judged unless it is kept in mind that they were strangers to the limited idea of the proper function of the state, which has come into vogue in more recent times. The ancient religions were all state religions. It was a universal conception that a nation, like a family, must profess but one faith, and practice the same religious rites. The toleration of the ancients, which has been lauded by modern sceptical writers, was only such as polytheism requires. The worship of a nation was sacred within its territory, and among its own people. But to introduce foreign rites, or make proselytes of Roman citizens, was contrary to Roman law, and was severely punished. This policy was conformed to the general feeling of antiquity. The early Christian fathers, as Tertullian and Cyprian, speak against coercion in matters of religion. After the downfall of heathenism, the suc1 Kampschulte (i. 426, 428) gives statistics.

2 The passages are given in Limborch, Historia Inquisitionis, 1. ii.

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cessors of Constantine enforced conformity to the religion of the Empire; and Constantine himself did the same within the pale of the Christian Church, as is seen in the Arian controversy. There was persecution both on the orthodox and on the Arian side. Severe laws were enacted against the Manichæans and Donatists. Augustine, who in his earlier writings had opposed the use of force for the spread of truth, or the extirpation of error, altered his views in the Donatist controversy. He would not have capital punishment inflicted, but would confine the penalties of heresy to imprisonment or banishment, the confiscation of goods and civil disabilities. Theodosius has the unenviable distinction of incorporating the theory of persecution in an elaborate code, which threatened death to heretics; and in his reign the term Inquisitors of the faith first appears. The feeling of the necessity of uniformity in religious belief and worship, and of the obligation of rulers to punish and to exterminate infidelity and heresy within their dominions, was universal in the Middle Ages. Innocent III. enforced this obligation upon princes under the threat of excommunication, and of the forfeiture of their crowns and dominions. In 1208 he established the Inquisition. It is true that the Church kept up the custom of asking the magistrate to spare the life of the condemned heretic; but it was an empty formality. The Church inculcated the lawfulness of the severest punishments in such cases. Leo X., in his Bull against Luther, in 1520, explicitly condemns the proposition: "Hæreticos comburere est contra voluntatem Spiritus." No historical student needs to be told what an incalculable amount of evil has been wrought by Catholics and by Protestants, from a mistaken belief in the perpetual validity of the Mosaic civil legislation, and from a con

1 For the history of persecution, see Limborch, 1. iii; Gibbon, ch. xxvii.; the art. "Hæresie" in Herzog, Real-Encycl. d. Theol.; Lecky, History of Rationalism in Europe, ch. iv. (ii.).

founding of the spirit of the old dispensation with that of the new-an overlooking of the progressive character of Divine Revelation. The Reformers held that offenses against the first table of the law, not less than the second, fall under the jurisdiction of the magistrate. To protect and foster pure religion, and to put down false religion, was that part of his office to which he was most sacredly bound. Occasional utterances, it is true, which seem harbingers of a better day, fell from the lips of Protestant leaders. Zwingle was not disposed to persecution. Luther said, in reference to the prohibition of his version of the New Testament: "Over the souls of men, God can and will have no one rule, save Himself alone;" and in his book against the Anabaptists, he says: "It is not right that they should so shockingly murder, burn, and cruelly slay such wretched people; they should let every one believe what he will; with the Scripture and God's Word, they should check and withstand them; with fire they will accomplish little. The executioners on this plan would be the most learned doctors." But these

noble words rather express the dictates of Luther's humane impulses than definite principles by which he would consistently abide. It is often charged upon the Protestants themselves as a flagrant inconsistency that whilst they were persecuted themselves, they were willing, and sometimes eager, to persecute others. So far is Calvin from being impressed with this incongruity, that he writes: "Seeing that the defenders of the Papacy are so bitter and bold in behalf of their superstitions, that in their atrocious fury they shed the blood of the innocent, it should shame Christian magistrates that in the protection of certain truth, they are entirely destitute of spirit.”2 The repressive measures of Catholic rulers were an example for Protestant rulers to emulate! There were voices occasionally raised in favor of toleration. The case of 2 Bonnet, letter cccxxv.

1 Walch, x. 461, 374.