It was themselves they hoodwinked--by the arguments they themselves conceived--and although it is undeniable that they practised a deception which must provoke the scorn of every thoughtful man, yet it must be remembered that this deception was the self-deception that lies in wait for every fanatic, whatever the subject of his fanaticism. By staring too long and too intently at one object, that object itself becomes blurred and indistinct. “_Ecclesia abhorret a sanguine._” That was the principle that governed them. Conceive it! The tenet that a Christian must not be guilty of shedding blood or causing the death of a fellow-creature has been touched upon more than once in these pages. It has been seen how in the very dawn of Christianity the Christian’s refusal to bear arms in the service of the State gave rise to friction with the Roman authorities, and, being construed into insubordination, was one of the causes of the persecutions to which Christians were subjected in the first and second centuries. As time went on, under stress of the necessities of this world, the Christian was forced to abandon that fine and loftily humanitarian ideal. Soon he had not only abandoned it under pressure of expediency, but he had forgotten it altogether; so that he donned the cross of the crusader, and went forth sword in hand, exultantly, to shed the blood of the infidel in the name of that tender Founder Whose disciple had brought to Rome the great Message of Forbearance. But however much it might be accounted justifiable and even necessary for the Christian layman to wield the sword, the priest still continued under the prohibition to shed blood or compass the death of any man. And if a priest lay under such an injunction, so must a tribunal that was controlled by priests. Therefore it follows that not only was it admittedly illicit for the inquisitor to pass a capital sentence, to send a man to his death, but even to be in any way a party to such an act. This was the letter of the law, and, happen what might, that letter must suffer no violence. Nor did it. When the accused was found guilty of heresy, when he was impenitent, or relapsed, the inquisitor was careful that the sentence he passed contained no single word that could render him responsible for the delinquent’s death. Far from it. The inquisitors earnestly implored the secular justiciaries to whom they abandoned him not to do him any hurt whatever. But consider the actual formula of the sentence as prescribed by Eymeric. It concluded thus: “The Church of God can do no more for you, since you have already abused its goodness.... Therefore we cast you out from the Church, and we abandon you to the secular justice, beseeching it none the less, and earnestly, so to moderate its sentence that it may deal with you without shedding your blood or putting you in danger of death.”[125] * * * * *