occasions; and (however inveterate may have become the abuse of the name of the HOLY ONE in this respect, still) to exert all their authority in limiting the administration of oaths to cases only of necessity. In the next place, the full current of Christian antiquity, through its simplest, and purest, and best times, runs direct and strong against the multiplication of even judicial oaths. I do not mean, that the first Christians absolutely refused on all occasions to testify to the truth by an oath (I maintain the contrary); but they required the necessity of the case to be proved. They appear to have adopted practically, the rule prescribed by Hierocles, "Never to swear, except in cases of great importance and necessity; when the magnitude of the question at issue should call for some extraordinary interference; and when no other means appeared of securing the ends of justice*.” The early teachers of the Gospel-faith employed their pens and tongues, on all occasions, against the growth of so pernicious a practice, as that of multiplying oaths unnecessarily †. * Hierocles on the Golden verses of Pythagoras. See Tertul. de Idol. c. 23, 11 et 17. 66 'Præscribit Christus non esse jurandum." "Taceo de perjurio quando ne jurare quidem liceat." Tertullian lived in the second century. His works have been lately very ably examined, and employed in illustration of the ecclesiastical history of the second and third centuries, by the present Bishop of Lincoln, who refers to Gregory Nazianzen, who lived in the fourth century, and who, (as we are told by his biographer, Gregory the Presbyter,) observed to the day of his death, his resolution never to swear, has left us a spirited poem, written expressly against the custom of swearing. In one of his images, he compares the habit to a stone rolling down a steep with increasing velocity, till at last it reaches the brow of a precipice, and then, with one bound, dashes itself into the gulf below, and that gulf is PERJURY*. "Fly from every oath," he says. "How then shall we be believed?" "By our word, and by a life which makes our word worthy of credit.” Augustin appears to have caught the true spirit of our Lord's precept, and to have taken a wise and liberal, and at the same time a pious view of the whole subject." Avoid an oath as much as ever you can; it is better not to swear, even to the truth. By the practice of swearing, perjury is often incurred, and is always approached. It does not follow, that because the Apostle, a man most firm in the truth, has called God to witness in his the two passages in this note, as his authority for saying, that "Tertullian seems to have considered an oath as in no case allowable." A doubt, however, may be fairly entertained whether Tertullian is there pronouncing against all oaths, or solely against the particular heathen oath which Christians were then in the habit of taking to satisfy their heathen creditors. * Ορκου τί χεῖρον; Οὐδὲν ὡς οὑμὸς λόγος. than an oath ?-Nothing as I maintain. -What is worse Epistles, therefore, swearing should be a light and trifling thing, a sort of amusement to us. We shall act more safely, if we never voluntarily swear; not because to testify the truth upon oath is sinful, but because to swear falsely is a most grievous sin, and this guilt is more easily incurred where oaths are frequent." He sums up his whole doctrine in these three pregnant sentences:-"False swearing is fatal,-true swearing is dangerous,―swearing not at all is safe*." And with what reluctance the Christian Church admitted her members to take an oath, is made more evident from the fact that, through a long period of her existence, she could never be brought to sanction her clergy in doing so. Bishops and priests were expressly forbidden to take any corporal oath, and were enjoined, instead, to say every thing in sincerity and truth. This was not always observed, though Heineccius traces the oath by proxy to the religious scruples of ecclesiastics to swear in their own persons. Nor will I inquire, whether the custom in Pagan Rome, which exempted the Flamen Dialis, the Priest of Jupiter, from all compulsion to take an oath, or rather which prohibited him from swearing at all, had any indirect tendency towards the establishment of this rule in the Christian Church. The mere adoption of it proves her judgment to be *In Jac. v. + See Du Cange, De Juram. See Part III., Sect. H. against the consistency of oaths with that highest purity of evangelical excellence with which she desired her ministers of the altar to be clothed. To the present day in Spain, and I believe in some other countries, priests are not allowed to swear on the Gospels; their only form of solemn affirmation is, "This I declare on the word of a priest *.' Certainly, before the French Revolution†, the custom of exempting Ecclesiastics from the necessity of taking a corporal oath, prevailed in France, and through the greater part of the Continent. For a fuller account of the opinions of the early fathers of the Christian Church, I would refer the reader to Suicer‡. Among others, Chrysostom, Theodoret, Epiphanius, Basil, and Theophylact§, seem all to have considered our Lord's words as peremptorily forbidding all oaths. At the close of his article "On an Oath," Suicer quotes the arguments of Balsamon in his comment on Basil, in *This custom, however, was by no means universally adopted, at least not through all times. Bassano, in his Theorico-Praxis, tells us, "it was declared that the testimony, even of a Cardinal, could not be taken, except on oath, of which not even the Pope could dispense with the necessity." Répertoire de Jurisp., par M. Merlin.-" Serment." § It may, however, admit of a doubt whether the strong expressions to be found in the works of some of these Fathers, were not chiefly employed in reference to the Heathen oaths, by which many professed Christians bound themselves in those early times, as well as in later ages. which he maintains, that not lawful solemn oaths in a cause of justice, but rash, and false, and common, and unnecessary oaths, were forbidden. He tells us, to regard that prohibition in the same light with the command, "Sell all thy goods and give to the poor," which must be understood in a limited sense, and as inculcating the spirit of charity, rather than insisting upon an universal obedience to the letter of the precept. For, he argues, if all were to sell, who would there be to buy? He confesses, nevertheless, that were all men perfect Christians, there would be no room for oaths at all. Such also, seem to have been the sentiments of Cyril of Alexandria, who strongly urges, that if an oath is ever taken, it is absolutely necessary that it be sworn in the name of God only, and of no creature whatever. Augustin's words on St. James are very remarkable. After reprobating unnecessary swearing, he adds, "We do not assert that we never swear. I myself swear, but only when compelled by urgent necessity. And then, after weighing the matter well, I say with great fear, Before God,' God is witness,' or Christ knows that so it is in my mind."" He confesses at the same time, that this itself springs from evil;— from the fault, however, not of him who swears, but of the person who will not believe without an oath. Though it may seem to be anticipating what * Lib. vi. De Adoratione. |