:

to what is purity of doctrine, and how far purity of life has been exhibited; but of the fact of persecution, there can scarcely ever exist a doubt. We mean not to mix up with this question, what are called "religious wars,"-the Hussite war, or the tumults of the Anabaptists. We speak merely of patient suffering for conscience-sake and this, with scarcely any exception, will be found to be a token of the presence of Christ's Church. Satan does not rouse persecutions against his own servants. "If Satan were divided against himself, how should his kingdom stand?" "If ye were of the world, the world would love its own: but because ye are not of the world, but I have chosen you out of the world, THEREFORE the world hateth you." With this view, and adopting this as a safe clue in our search, we shall begin our enquiry by seeking, in every age, for THE PERSECUTED.

Far different, however, is this from the line of argument adopted of late by an active and erudite body of writers, who have warmly taken up Bossuet's theory; and are earnestly contending for a view which must ultimately lead, if generally adopted, to the renewal of Romish ascendancy. Mr. Maitland, Mr. Palmer, Dr. Todd, the writers of Tracts for the Times, and a host of their disciples, are all united in contending,-1. That Christ must always have had a visible Church upon earth: 2. That the Waldenses being a modern sect, and the Albigenses and Paulicians, heretics, there could be no other visible Church of Christ from the Nicene era till the end of the twelfth century, than the Romish ;-whence it follows, inevitably, that if we admit the Romish Church to have been the abiding-place of the Holy Spirit through all the dark and dismal times of Theodora and Marozia, Dunstan and Hildebrand, it would be idle to question her title to the same rank in later and comparatively purer days. The next step in the argument is, that if Rome be a Church of Christ,-and the principal Church,-and purer now than in former days,--we ought to be in communion with her. Which last conclusion conducts us safely back into her embraces; for the greater will surely absorb the less; not the less, the greater.

This being the line of reasoning adopted, after Bossuet, by all those who, while they still cleave to our Church with traitorous intent, are chiefly desirous of leading her back to Rome,-it becomes abundantly obvious, how important, how essential, in fact, to the integrity of their argument, is the exclusion of all those bodies of Christians who preserved the light of Divine truth through all the gloom of the middle ages, from the pale of Christ's Church. Hence the resolute, the persecuting vehemence, with which the Maitlands and Todds contend for the heretical turpitude

of the Paulicians, Albigenses, &c. One might have hoped that christian charity would rather have rejoiced to believe that these poor persecuted ones were really followers of the Crucified. But whatever sentiment of this kind might exist in Tractarian bosoms in ordinary cases, their controversial acumen suffices to shew them at a glance, that the guilt of the Paulicians, &c. is absolutely necessary to their argument. That these persecuted ones should be admitted to be orthodox Christians, would lay Bossuet's theory in the dust. Hence the whole scholarship of the Tractarian school is put in requisition to establish the fact, that the Paulicians, Albigenses, &c. were Manichees and greatly are we indebted to these writers for their efforts; for those efforts have most satisfactorily shewn, that the charge rests on insufficient grounds; and that there is solid foundation for the belief, that it was in, and among, and by, these persecuted communities, that the light of Divine truth was, amidst constant perils, always and finally preserved. Before we go into the evidence at length, there are two or three points which we wish to premise, as guide-marks which should be always kept in view.

1. Remembering that the expectation held out to us in holy writ, is, that an usurping and apostate Church should persecute and wear out the saints of the Most High, during the 1260 years, we must constantly expect to find those saints, so persecuted, stigmatized as "heretics.' Not only does the experience of our own Church warrant this conclusion (for Ridley and Cranmer, Wickliff and Jewell, are all, to this hour, excommunicated and accursed heretics in the eyes of the Apostate Church ;) but it would be quite irrational to expect any other state of things.

In all ages, the Romish Church has burned, and tortured, and destroyed all the saints of God that fell into her power. But did she do this on the ground that they were in some slight error, or had trivially misconducted themselves? Of course not. In necessary consistency, she has always declared those whom she thus put to cruel deaths to be in mortal sin; to be in foul and damnable heresy; to be in contumacious rebellion against her lawful authority. Except by grave and fearful charges of this kind, how should she ever have justified her conduct, even in the eyes of worldly men? Hence, it is quite certain, and may be instantly conceded, that all the Romish writers agree in speaking of our own Reformers as "obstinate heretics;" that they describe Wickliffe, Huss, and Jerome in the same terms; and that every individual, and every body of Christians, from the Lollards, upwards, to the Albigenses, Paterines, Cathari, and Paulicians, who have refused

submission to their yoke, have been alike described as sunk in "filthy and abominable heresies." All this we freely admit. But what kind of an argument can be built upon such a fact as this? When the Pope sends an army of Crusaders to ravage with fire and sword the country of the Albigenses, we may conclude, even without being so informed, that he does so because it pleases him to call them "heretics." But surely his mere bestowal of this title on them, no more proves them to be maintainers of false doctrine, than does his wholesale infliction of fire and sword, prove them to be worthy of death.

2. Another circumstance which ought always to be borne in mind is this, That while, on the one hand, the faithful witnesses for God were sure to be branded with the charge of heresy by the Apostate church; they were equally sure to be troubled with seducers and tempters, sent among them by the Evil One. Thus was it from the beginning, and our Lord most explicitly warned his disciples that wherever the Devil perceived the good seed to be sown, there he would be sure immediately to sow tares; so that both should spring up together. And so was it found, in the experience of all the Apostles. All of their number, who have left us any record of their ministry,-St. Paul, St. John, St. Peter, St. James, St. Jude,-with one voice complain of "evil men and seducers," who had arisen within the Church.

Hence we should ever remember that the adversary, whether Papal or Infidel, will never lack occasion of cavil, in pointing to these "spots in our feasts of charity,"-to the "ungodly men who have crept in among us," and whose offences and heresies will constantly be laid to the charge of those real disciples of Christ, who hate the sin, and mourn over the sinner.

With the most sedulous enmity has the Adversary followed every movement of the Reformation, anxiously scattering his tares," wherever the good seed was sown the most plentifully. Thus Luther was perplexed by the crimes of Muncer; Calvin, by the heresies of Servetus; Cranmer, by like offenders in our own land. From these inroads, advantage could not fail to flow to the enemy; for if the heretic remained unmolested, he quickly led away numbers of those whom Popery had left in the grossest ignorance; while if, on the other hand, he was punished, a justification seemed to be thus established, for all the cruelties of the Romish persecutors.

3. A third remark which seems needful, is this, that allowance ought always to be made, for the natural deterioration of all things human. However pure and spiritual a Church may seem to become, under a Calvin, or a Melancthon, or a Parker, we may

always calculate with a lamentable certainty, that if we return to the history of that church after an interval of seventy or a hundred years, we shall find a fearful declension. So was it in Germany, and in Geneva, and in England. Hence we ought not to feel the least surprise, if a church commencing with a pure and spiritual reform, like the Paulicians, or the Hussites, shall be found, some fifty or a hundred years after, sunk into a mere political sect or faction, and fighting for civil liberty, where their forefathers only prayed and suffered for Divine truth.

As a general result of these three cautions, we shall briefly conclude, that in searching for the true Church of Christ, amid the gloom of the 1260 years, it would be irrational to reject any community, or body of Christians, either because Rome had denominated them "heretics,"-or because some evil men had appeared among them, or because, after a lapse of years, they became in a measure corrupted, and perhaps sunk into torpor, or dwindled into a mere political faction. Neither of these three circumstances, supposing them clearly established, would amount to a proof, that in the outset, there might not be a pure and spiritual branch of Christ's church among them.

We proceed, then, now to commence our enquiry; and the period at which it must naturally begin, is that of the seventh century. Many different calculations and estimates have been given to the world, as to the date of the establishment of the Apostasy in power. The 1260 years reign of the Roman little horn, may be dated from its first incipient budding, and then it would terminate with Luther: or, it might be made to commence from the first infliction of capital punishment for alleged "heresy," and then it would end with the massacre of St. Bartholomew: or it might date from Justinian's decree; and then it would close with the French revolution: or, lastly, it might be held to begin with Phocas's acknowledgment of the pope as universal bishop; or with the rise of the ten Gothic kingdoms, and then it would close about 1866. Without offering any opinion on these points, we may safely assert, that, in the middle of the seventh century, the Apostasy was visibly exalted and endowed with power: that now the Man of Sin had taken his seat, and that to look to the Romish Church as the dwelling-place of the Holy Spirit, would be to set common sense at defiance. At this period, then,-at about A.D. 650,-we are compelled to seek for a true church of Christ elsewhere. It is admitted that there never was to be a time when a Church of Christ could not be found upon earth. Now, however, we can no longer attempt to maintain the character of Rome, or of its rival Constantinople, as such a church.

We must, therefore, enquire whether a purer and more scriptural community is not at this period to be found. And the question is no sooner asked than it is answered. Exactly at that period, namely, about the year A.D. 653, a fresh effusion of divine grace seems to have been poured out, and the Paulician church sprang up; destined to exist in the east for about three or four centuries, and then, in its dispersion, to carry the light of divine truth into almost every part of the west; giving rise to the Cathari, the Paterines, and probably the Albigenses.

The safest and best way of exhibiting the rise of the Paulicians, will be by simply copying the sketch given by Peter of Sicily, an ecclesiastic, sent by the emperor Basil to negotiate an exchange of prisoners with them, about the year 870. He learnt, during his residence among them, some details of their early history. There is no other witness, of any class, whose knowledge of them could equal that of Peter. Paulician writers extant there are none. We must of necessity, therefore, receive the character of the community from the pens of their enemies. Peter was an active agent and partisan of the Church against which they had rebelled, and he therefore hated them with a polemical hatred. He was also the servant of the emperors who had slain the Paulicians by tens of thousands; and he must of course describe them as wretches deserving only fire and sword. Remembering that this is the sort of author whom we are about to quote, let us take his narrative, as we find it translated by Mr. Maitland:

"There was in the reign of Constantine (or Constans) the grandson of Heraclius, not far from Samosata, a certain native of Armenia called Constantine, dwelling in the village of Mananalis, which the Manichees inhabit to this day. This person received into his house, and treated as his guest for some days, a certain captive deacon, who (as is certainly known) was returning into his own country out of Syria; and chanced to go through Mananalis. The deacon, therefore, that he might as it were repay his host for this kindness, presented Constantine with two books which he had brought with him out of Syria; namely the Gospel and the Epistles of Paul. But he, who for a long time had observed that his wicked and impure heresy was an object of hatred and horror to all persons on account of the impious sayings and filthy crimes, which are contained in the Manichean writings, conceived the idea as a matter of religion carefully to renovate (renovare) and to spread more widely abroad, that pest. The Devil, as it is but just to suppose, instigating him, not to touch from that time forward any book but those of the Gospel and the Apostle; having, forsooth, this design, that by their help he might conceal all the stain of the evil; as those who administer poisoned cups smear and cover them with honey. And indeed, since, as I have already said, he had become acquainted through the Manichean books with all the arts of every impiety, he by the help of Satan presently attained so far that, by falsely interpreting the meanings of the Gospel and the Apostle, he could easily wrest them to his purpose as he would, and according to his pleasure. He therefore (as has been said) entirely cast aside the writings of the Manicheans, and was chiefly induced to do so because he saw that on account of them many were put to the sword.”—(Letter to Mill. pp. 77—79.)

This, as we have said, is the principal, and indeed, almost only