But how much soever the persecuting spirit hath prevailed amongst those who have called themselves Christians, yet certainly it is a great mistake to confine it wholly to them. We have instances of persons, who were left to the light of nature and reason, and never suspected of being perverted by any revelation, murdering and destroying each other on the account of religion; and of some judicially condemned to death for differing from the orthodox, _i. e._ the established idolatry of their country. And I doubt not, but that if we had as full and particular an account of the transactions of the different religious sects and parties amongst the Heathens, as we have of those amongst Christians, we should find a great many more instances of this kind, than it is easy or possible now to produce. However, there are some very remarkable ones, which I shall not wholly omit. THE HISTORY OF PERSECUTION. ======== BOOK I. OF PERSECUTION AMONGST THE HEATHENS UPON ACCOUNT OF RELIGION. [Illustration] SECT. I. _Abraham persecuted._ There is a passage in the book of Judith[1] which intimates to us, that the ancestors of the Jews themselves were persecuted upon account of their religion. Achior, captain of the sons of Ammon, gives Holofernes this account of the origin of that nation. “This people are descended of the Chaldeans; and they sojourned heretofore in Mesopotamia, because they would not follow the gods of their fathers, which were in the land of Chaldea; for they left the way of their ancestors, and worshipped the God of heaven, the God whom they knew. So they cast them out from the face of their gods, and they fled into Mesopotamia, and sojourned there many days.” St. Austin[2] and Marsham[3] both take notice of this tradition; which is farther confirmed by all the oriental historians, who, as the learned Dr. Hyde[4] tells us, unanimously affirm, that Abraham suffered many persecutions upon the account of his opposition to the idolatry of his country; and that he was particularly imprisoned for it by Nimrod in Ur. Some of the eastern writers also tell us, that he was thrown into the fire, but that he was miraculously preserved from being consumed in it by God. This tradition also the Jews believed, and is particularly mentioned by Jonathan[5] in his Targum upon Gen. xi. 28. “Nimrod threw Abraham into a furnace of fire, because he would not worship his idol; but the fire had no power to burn him.” So early doth persecution seem to have begun against the worshippers of the true God. ----- Footnote 1: Cap. 5. v. 6, &c. Footnote 2: De civit. Dei, l. 16. c. 13. Footnote 3: Marsh. Cron. § 5..fn- Footnote 4: De Relig. Pers. c. 2. Footnote 5: Hotting. Smeg. Orient. p. 290, &c. ----- [Illustration]