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how far they were entitled to either of these opprobrious epithets. And, first, with respect to the imputation of heresy, the following extract from Venema's Ecclesiastical History will serve to set this matter in a tolerably clear light:

"The chief articles of their heresy," he tells us, "were the following:-1. That the holy Scriptures are the only source of faith and religion, without regard to the authority of the Fathers and of tradition; and although they principally used the New Testament, yet, as Usher proves from Reinier and others, they regarded the Old also as canonical Scripture. From their greater use of the New Testament, however, their adversaries took occasion to charge them with despising the Old. 2. They held the entire faith, according to all the articles of the Apostles' Creed. 3. They rejected all the external rites of the dominant church (the church of Rome), except baptism and the Lord's Supper; such as [the sanctity of] temples, vestures, images, crosses, the religious worship of the holy relics, and the remaining (five) sacraments: these they considered as inventions of Satan and the flesh, and full of superstition. 4. They rejected purgatory, with masses and prayers for the dead, acknowledging only two terminations of the present state-heaven and hell. 5. They admitted no indulgences, nor confessions of sin, with any of their consequences, except mutual confessions of the faithful for instruction and consolation. 6. They held the sacraments of baptism and the eucharist only as signs, denying the corporeal presence of Christ in the eucharist; as we find in the book of this sect concerning Antichrist, and as Ebrard of Bethunia, accuses them in his book against heresies. 7. They held only three ecclesiastical orders,―bishops, priests or presbyters, and deacons,—and that the remainder were human figments: that monasticism, or monkery, was a putrid carcass, and vows the invention of men; and that the marriage of the clergy was lawful and necessary. 8. Finally, they asserted the Roman church to be the Whore of Babylon; and denied obedience to the pope or bishops, and that the pope had any (scriptural) authority over other churches, or the power of either the civil or ecclesiastical sword."

The quotation now made from this eminent foreign professor, will enable you to form a tolerably correct judgment, how far the

charge of heresy is fairly imputable to these various classes of dissenters from the church of Rome; and though it exhibits the judgment of only an individual, and that individual a Protestant divine, I shall presently submit to you quotations from the writings of several eminent men among the Catholics themselves, which will amply corroborate and confirm what Venema has said of them, and leave no doubt upon your minds of its correctness. All that I request of you, at present, is to keep in mind, that nothing is laid to their charge on the score of unsoundness in the faith, or defectiveness in moral conduct; on the contrary, they are said to have held fast "the form of sound words”—“ the faith once delivered to the saints,”—and were generally blameless in life and conversation. Their heresy, therefore, consisted in refusing to receive the traditions of men as a part of the religion of Christ, and in bearing a testimony against the innovations, usurpations, corruptions, and abominations of the apostate church of Rome. And if this be heresy, which of us can plead exemption from it?

But another infamous imputation laid to their charge, not indeed of all, but only some of them, is, that they were Mani

chæans.

In labouring to fix this stigma on these dissenters, the Romish party have been more successful than in the former case, for they have succeeded in persuading many protestants that they were actually infected with that odious system. It will, however, be proper in this place to explain what the principles held by the Manichæans were, before I proceed to inquire to what extent, if indeed at all, these dissenters are justly chargeable with maintaining them.

The sect of the Manichæans derived its origin from a person of the name of Manes, or, in Latin, Manichæus. He was a Persian by nation, educated among the Magi, and was one of their number before he embraced Christianity, about the end of the third century, A. D. 277. His doctrine was a motley mixture of the tenets of Christianity with the ancient philosophy of the Persians, in which he had been instructed during his youth. The following is Dr. Mosheim's account of the Manichæan system.* "There are two principles from which all things proceed,-the

Eccles. Hist. vol. i. Cent. iii. ch. v.

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one a most pure and subtle matter called LIGHT, the other a gross and corrupt substance called DARKNESS. The Being who presides over light is called God; he that rules the land of darkness bears the name of Hyle, or Demon. The ruler of the light is supremely happy, and consequently benevolent and good: the prince of darkness is unhappy in himself, and, desiring to render others partakers of his misery, is evil and malignant. These two beings have produced an immense multitude of creatures resembling themselves, whom they have distributed through their respective provinces. He held, that Christ is that glorious intelligence whom the Persians called Mithras-a splendid substance endowed with life, and having his residence in the sun: the Holy Ghost, a luminous and animated body, diffused throughout every part of the atmosphere which surrounds this terrestrial globe. He held, that the God of the Jews was the prince of darkness,— affirmed that the Old Testament was not the word of God, but of the prince of darkness, and rejected as spurious the four Gospels, and indeed most of the canonical Scriptures: he also maintained the transmigration of souls,* &c. &c. So much for the

In the Manichæan system, as above explained, there was little, if any thing, that can be considered new, except the foolish attempt to mingle the simple doctrines of the Gospel with what was held by heathen philosophers long before Manes was born. The Gnostics, the Cerdonians, the Marcionites, and several other sectaries, had introduced this wicked doctrine before Manes occasioned any contest about it; yet they were by no means its inventors, but found it in the writings of the heathen philosophers. Plutarch gives an account of the antiquity and general prevalence of this doctrine, not merely as an historian, but as one who strenuously adhered to it himself, (see his Isis et Osiris, p. 369, Franc. 1599,) and he refers to Heraclitus and Euripides, as maintaining it. The English reader will find an interesting account of this matter in the New and General Biographical Dictionary, ART. MANES, in which there is an extract from Plutarch, which furnishes a full and explicit account of the doctrine of the two principles with which Manes laboured to incorporate the doctrines of the Gospel. In the same article, he will find some useful information relating to the spread of this absurd and horrid doctrine, in Italy, Africa, and the Lesser Asia, with the efforts made by the popes of Rome, and emperors of Constantinople, to extirpate the heresy. I can only find room for the concluding sentence of the article, which I quote with satisfaction:-"It was said that the Albigenses were Manichees, but this is generally believed to be a falsehood, and nothing but a calumny fostered upon that much-injured people, to justify the unheard-of cruelties and persecutions which were exercised against them." This I believe to be true; and am further of opinion, that it is equally true of the Paulicians, for reasons which will presently appear.

Manichæan system, which may in truth be denominated a heresy, in the scriptural sense of that term, as subverting the fundamental doctrines of the Gospel. Our business now is to inquire how far the various sects of dissenters from the Romish church which sprang up during the twelfth century, are justly chargeable with having imbibed that pernicious heresy. But here it may be proper to state, in limine, that our inquiry must not be supposed to be directed to every individual who might think proper to assume the name, or a connexion with any of these classes of dissenters, whether Catharists, Paterines, Paulicians, Albigenses, or any other sect. Such a supposition is totally out of the question. There is no denomination of Christians, either now or in any preceding age of the church, that would hold itself answerable for the principles, opinions, or conduct of all who might chuse to pass under their name. Even the Romish party itself would demur to this, and protest against the rule as unreasonable, uncandid, unjust. It will be sufficient for my present purpose to ascertain what were the avowed and recognized tenets of the general body of these dissenters, in reference to the Manichæan heresy, without descending to minute particulars or fractional parts; and upon the principle now laid down, I apprehend we shall not find it very difficult to repel the accusation of the church of Rome, that any of these sects were Manichæans.

In investigating this matter it will not be necessary, I presume, to scrutinize the sentiments of every particular class or sect: there are certain land-marks to be traced in the writings of both papists and protestants which will serve to guide us through this intricate subject, without wandering into bye ways and devious paths, in which the ablest and most learned of our writers on ecclesiastical affairs have lost their way, and greatly perplexed themselves. To illustrate what has now been remarked, I will lay before you an extract of some length from a cotemporary writer of our own country, of well-merited celebrity: I refer to Mr. Henry Hallam, who, in his History of the Middle Ages, in discussing this particular subject, thus proceeds :-" Many ages elapsed, during which no remarkable instance occurs of a popular deviation from the prescribed line of belief; and pious catholics console themselves by reflecting that their forefathers, in those

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times of ignorance, slept at least the sleep of orthodoxy, and that their darkness was interrupted by no false lights of human reasoning. But from the twelfth century this can no longer be their boast. An inundation of heresy broke in that age upon the church, which no persecution was able thoroughly to repress, till it finally overspread half the surface of Europe. Of this religious innovation we must seek the commencement in a different part of the globe. The Manichæans afford an eminent example of that durable attachment to a traditional creed which so many ancient sects, especially in the east, have cherished through the vicissitudes of ages, in spite of persecution and contempt. Their plausible and widely-extended system had been, in early times, connected with the name of Christianity, however incompatible with its doctrines and its history. After a pretty long obscurity, the Manichæan theory revived, with some modification, in the western parts of Armenia, and was propagated, in the eighth and ninth centuries, by a sect denominated PAULICIANS. Their tenets are not to be collected with absolute certainty from the mouths of their adversaries, and no apology of their own survives. There seems, however, to be sufficient evidence that the Paulicians, though professing to acknowledge, and even to study the apostolic writings, ascribed the creation of the world to an evil deity, whom they supposed also to be the author of the Jewish law, and consequently rejected all the Old Testament. Believing, with the ancient Gnostics, that our Saviour was clothed on earth with an impassive celestial body, they denied the reality of his death and resurrection.* These errors exposed them to a long and cruel persecution, during which a colony of exiles was planted by one of the Greek emperors in Bulgaria. From this settlement they silently promulgated their Manichæan creed over the western regions of Christendom. A large part of the commerce of those countries with Constantinople, was carried on for several centuries by the channel of the Danube. This opened an immediate intercourse with the Paulicians, who may be traced up that river, through Hungary and Bavaria, or sometimes taking the route of Lombardy, into Switzerland and France. In the

* These, the reader will recollect, were the principles of the Manichæans; and of the Paulicians holding them, our author says, there is "sufficient evidence!" VOL. II.

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