Our author then proceeds to quote from the works of many writers, who maintain that the punishment of heretics is no part of the civil magistrate’s duty; from Erasmus, who declares that God, the Great Father of the human family, will not have heretics, even hæresiarchs, put to death, but tolerated in view of their possible amendment. ‘When I think how reprehensible are heresy and schism,’ says the great scholar, ‘I am scarce disposed to condemn the laws against them; but when I call to mind the gentleness wherewith Christ led his disciples, I shrink from the instances I see of men sent to prison and the stake on the ground of their disagreement with scholastic dogmas.’ From Aug. Eleutherius, who opines that ‘they are not always truly heretics whom the vulgar so designate.’ From Lactantius, who says ‘Force and violence are out of place in matters of faith; for religion cannot be forced on mankind; words not stripes are here the proper instruments of persuasion.’ From Augustin, who goes so far as to say that ‘for the sake of peace even dogs are to be tolerated in the Church. The Catholic servants of God are not to stain themselves with the blood of their enemies, but to be examples of patience and forbearance. It is no business of theirs to gather the tares for burning before the harvest is ready; they who err are men, and it is man’s part to bear with the erring; the tares do no real harm to the wheat; and if the erring be not cured here, they do not escape punishment hereafter.’ There is much besides from others, which we spare the reader; but we have to show that clemency for theological divergence was no novelty in the age of Calvin; and no one will imagine for a moment that he had forgotten what he had written himself, or was ignorant of a word that had ever been said on the subject by others.