LETTER IV.

Testimony of History to the Influence of Calvinism.

SIR,

You stated in your Sermon, that the positions you had taken could easily be illustrated and confirmed by tracing the history of American Unitarianism. You were desired to trace this history, and compare it with a similar historical view of Presbyterianism, and let the world see by a fair parallel in what respects Unitarians have fallen so immensely behind their brethren in morals and piety, as to be ranked among Mohammedans and Jews, and not to deserve the name of Christians.

With this most reasonable request you did not think it expedient to comply. "I do not intend," you observe," to follow this gentleman far, in the comparison, which he so zealously and confidently urges, between Presbyterians and Unitarians, on the score of purity of morals." That is, you decline to make the comparison by which alone the accuracy of your very serious charges can be tested. The question is, whether Unitarians are less moral as a sect, than other sects. This question must be decided, if decided at all, by facts and a comparison. You have answered it in the affirmative, but without proof. Those, who come under your censure, do not approve

the tribunal before which they have been arraigned, and, as they recognize no Inquisition, they think it a duty, and claim the privilege to protest against your decision. They believe you to have gone on false premises, and would have you review your ground, and at all events give the public a detail of the facts and reasons, by which you felt yourself bound to reveal to the world the moral disability, the practical irreligion, and licentious habits of Unitarians.

Nothing more was asked, than what you had said might easily be done, namely, to let the voice of history speak in your behalf. Turn to actual events, and not to speculative theories, to the moral condition and progress of society, and not to an imaginary tendency of opinions. Examine the history of Unitarianism with minuteness and severity; trace its advancement through every channel; bring to the light of open day the secret mischiefs, which it has been working; let the lineaments of immorality with which you aver it to be so odiously disfigured, be exhibited in their boldest relief; in short, give a true picture, as highly wrought as you please, and then place it by the side of a similar sketch of Presbyterianism, and I venture to affirm, that no Unitarian will desire to have his cause presented in a more favourable light, or wish the public to possess a better confutation of your charges. Such an examination is the only possible mode in which a charge of practical immorality can be substantiated.

You not only appeal to the records of past times as a witness against Unitarians, but call on them to

bear testimony to the good effects of Calvinism. You express yourself in the following language. "Now I appeal to all impartial readers, who have the least knowledge of ecclesiastical history, whether those who have embraced the general system of christian doctrine, designated by the name of Calvinism, have not been in all ages distinguished as the stricter sorť of professing christians? Have they not always been reproached by the laxer classes as 'austere,' 'puritanical,' and enemies of even many innocent indulgencies?" An appeal so formal and confident cannot be met with more fairness, I presume, than by bringing distinctly before us some of the prominent particulars to which it refers. A small number must suffice, but they shall be such as have marked the strong features of Calvinism.

Let us begin with the founder of this system. What does history report respecting the influence of his principles on his own mind, temper, and character? Has there ever been a more violent or unrighteous persecutor than Calvin? What page of history is stained with darker blots, than those which narrate some of the events of his life? Look at his violent abuse and cruel persecutions of his friend Castalio, a man of great learning, moderation, and piety, against whom he uttered the grossest language, and procured a decree of banishment for no other reason, than that he had the independence to assert and maintain opinions, which differed from his own. The unfortunate, though less worthy, Bolsec shared a similar fate. Every one, indeed, who presumed to doubt his infal

libility, whether friend or foe, was made to feel the effects of his turbulent passions. But the darkest

and deepest stigma on his character, was his treatment of Servetus, and it is one, which his ardent admirers have laboured with total want of success to remove, or even to diminish. Servetus had for many years been his confidential friend and correspondent. He could not subscribe the creed of Calvin, and as Calvin could not convince him by argument and persuasion, he resorted to stronger means. He accused him of heresy, procured his imprisonment, commenced against him a criminal process, and was thus the original and chief cause of his sentence of death, and his murder at the stake. He afterwards declared his warmest approbation of this event in letters to his friends, and expressed himself in the most intemperate language. Even in his commentaries on the Bible, he calls Servetus a "profligate fellow, a knave, and an obscene dog.

*The rage of Calvin seems first to have been excited on account of certain questions in theology, which Servetus had proposed to him, but which Calvin did not answer to his satisfaction. Calvin could not bear opposition, and Servetus was not to be convinced without a reason. One of the unworthy acts of Calvin in procuring his condemnation, was the producing of a manuscript at his trial, which Servetus had sent to him long before for his examination and judgment, but which had never been printed.

To show the spirit with which he meditated and prosecuted this business, it is enough to quote what he said in a letter, which Bolsec and Grotius saw in the original, "that if this heretic should fall into his hands, he would order it so, that it should cost him his life." And after the unholy act was done, he boasted of "having exterminated Michael Servetus the Spaniard."

The authority for these facts, and others equally disgraceful, may be seen in a very circumstantial and interesting account of the life, writings, and death of Servetus, contained in the Monthly Repository, vol. i. and v. See also the Cambridge General Repository, vol. iii.; Wright's History of Persecutions, p. 345; Mosheim, vol. iv. p. 433, 488.

name.

Such was the character of him, who first matured and embodied the doctrines, which now go under his Do these historical facts argue much in favour of the moral tendency of the principles you defend? Calvin was the more inexcusable, as he had himself deserted the church of Rome, and professed to be an advocate for free inquiry. It is certainly unfortunate for your appeal to history, that few names have descended to posterity, bearing feebler testimony of the persons to whom they belonged having been under the purifying influence of religious principles, than that of Calvin.

The commotions in Holland, which preceded and followed the Synod of Dort, and which brought the virtuous and inflexible patriot, Oldenbarneveldt, to the block, and consigned the illustrious Grotius to perpetual imprisonment, were excited by the Calvinists. The spirit of intolerance, which arose to so fervent a heat in Calvin, raged at this period with scarcely less violence in his followers. The Arminians had struck out of their creed the doctrine of absolute decrees, because they could neither find it in the Scriptures, nor believe it. This was the offence that kindled a flame of persecution in the Calvinists, which lasted for years, drove many of the Arminians into exile, immured others in prisons, silenced their preachers, suppressed their religious assemblies, and inflicted universally every species of severity. Even at the Synod of Dort, which was pretended to be summoned for the purpose of a mutual conference, the Arminians were treated as heretics,