Notwithstanding these contradictions, the book of Ezekiel was not the less admitted into the number of those inspired writers: It is true, that according to St. Jerome, the synagogue did not permit the reading of it till after thirteen years of age; but that was for fear their youth should make a bad use of the too lively description, in the sixteenth and twenty-third chapters, of the whoredoms of Aholah and Aholibah. But when the immortality of the soul came to be a received doctrine,[61] which was probably about the beginning of the Babylonish captivity, the sect of Sadducees still continued to believe that there were no rewards or punishments after death, and that the faculties of the soul perished with us in like manner as those of the body. They also denied the existence of angels. In a word, they differed much more from the other Jews than the Protestants do from the Catholics; nevertheless, they lived in peaceable communion with their brethren; and some of their sect were admitted to the high-priesthood. The Pharisees held fatality or predestination,[62] and believed in the Metempsychosis;[63] the Essenians thought that the souls of the just went into some happy islands,[64] and those of the wicked into a kind of Tartarus, or hell. They offered no sacrifices, and assembled together in particular synagogues of their own. In a word, if we examine closely into the Jewish economy, we shall be surprised to find the most extensive toleration prevailing amidst the most shocking barbarities. This is indeed a contradiction, but almost all people have been governed by contradictions. Happy are those whose manners are mild, while their laws are bloody! Let us now see whether Christ established sanguinary laws, whether He enjoined non-toleration, instituted the horrors of the inquisition, or the butchery of an _auto da fé_. There are, unless I am much mistaken, very few passages in the New Testament from which the spirit of persecution can have inferred that tyranny and constraint in religious matters are permitted: one is the parable wherein the kingdom of heaven is likened unto a certain king who made a marriage for his son, and sent forth his servants to invite guests to the wedding, saying, “Tell them which were bidden, my oxen and my fatlings are killed, and all things are ready; come unto the marriage.”[65] But those who were bidden made light of the invitation, one going to his farm and another to his business, and the rest of them took the king’s servants and slew them. Upon which he sent forth his armies and destroyed those murderers and burnt up their city. After this he sent out into the highways to invite all that could be found to come to the marriage; but one of the guests happening to sit down to table without a wedding garment, the king ordered him to be bound hand and foot and cast into outer darkness.