light or piety in a petty prince, to the paucity or intireness of his territories: but that an beathen, and king of one hundred and feven and twenty provinces, should, throughout his vaft dominions, not fear, but practife toleration with good fuccefs, has fomething

admirable in it.

If we please to remember the tranquillity and fuccess of those heathen Roman emperors, that allowed indulgence; that Auguftus fent hecatombs to Jerufalem, and the wisest honoured the Jews, and at least spared the divers fects of Chriftians, it will certainly oblige us to think, that princes, whofe religion is nearer of kin to those of the Diffenters of our times, may not unreasonably hope for quiet from a difcreet toleration, especially when there is nothing peculiar in Christianity to render princes unfafe in fuch an indulgence. The admirable prudence of the emperor Jovianus, in a quite contrary method to thofe of the reigns of his predeceffors, fettled the moft imbroiled time of the Chriftian world, almoft to a miracle; for though he found the heats of the Arians and Orthodox carried to a barbarous height, (to fay nothing of the Novatians, and other diffenting interefts) the emperor efteeming those calamities the effect of coercing conformity to the prince's or ftate's religion, and that this courfe did not only wafte Chriftians, but expofe Chriftians to -the fcorn of Heathens, and fo fcandalize those whom they should convert, he refolutely declared, That he • would have none molested for the different exercise of their religious worship: Which (and that in a trice, for he reigned but feven months) calmed the impetuous storms of diffention, and reduced the empire, before agitated with the most uncharitable contests, to a wonderful fecurity and peace: thus a kindly amity, brought a civil unity to the state; which endeavours for a forced unity never did to the church, but had formerly filled the government with incomparable miferies, as well as the church with incharity: and which is fad, I must needs fay, that those leaders of the church that should have been the teachers and examples of

peace,

peace, in fo fingular a juncture of the church's ferment, did, more than any, blow the trumpet, and kindle the fire, of divifion. So dangerous is it to Juperfine upon the text, and then impofe it, upon penalty, for faith.

Valentinian the emperor,' we are told by Socrates Scholafticus, was was a great honourer of those that • favoured his own faith; but fo, as he molested not the Arians at all.' And Marcellinus farther adds to his honour, That he was much renowned for his moderate carriage during his reign; infomuch, that amongst fundry fects of religion, he troubled no 'man for his confcience, impofing neither this nor that to be observed; much lefs, with menacing edicts and injunctions, did he compel others, his fubjects, to bow the neck, or conform to that which bimfelf worshipped, but left fuch points as clear and untouched as he found them.'

Gratianus, and Theodofius the Great, indulged divers forts of Chriftians; but the Novatians of all the difsenters were preferred: which was fo far from infecuring, that it preserved, the tranquillity of the empire. Nor till the time of Celeftine, bishop of Rome, were the Novatians difturbed; and the perfecution of them, and the affumption of the fecular power, began much at the fame time. But the Novatians at Conftantinople were not dealt withal; for the Greek bishops continued to permit them the quiet enjoyment of their diffenting affemblies; as Socrates tells us, in his fifth and feventh books of the Ecclefiaftical Story.

I fhall defcend nearer our own times; for notwithstanding no age has been more furiously moved, than that which Jovianus found, and therefore the experiment of indulgence was never better made; yet to speak more in view of this time of day, we find our contemporaries, of remoter judgments in religion, under no manner of difficulty in this point. The grand feignior, great mogul, czars of Mufcovia, king of Perfia, the great monarchs of the east, have long allowed and profpered with a toleration; and who

does

does not know that this gave great Tamerlane his mighty victories? In these western countries we fee the fame thing.

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Cardinal d'Offat, in his 92d Letter to Villeroy, secretary to Henry the Fourth of France, gives us doctrine and example for the subject in hand; Befides,' fays he, that neceffity has no law, be it in what case it will; our Lord Jefus Chrift inftructs us by his gofpel,' "To let the tares alone, left removing them may endanger the wheat:" that other catholick princes have allowed it without rebuke: that particularly the duke of Savoy, who (as great a zealot as he would be thought for the Catholick religion) tolerates the hereticks in three of his provinces, namely, Angroyne, Lucerne, and Perone: that the king of • Poland does as much, not only in Swedeland, but in • Poland itself: that all the princes of the Austrian < family, that are celebrated as pillars of the catholick church, do the like, not only in the towns of the empire, but in their proper territories, as in Austria itself, from whence they take the name of their honour; in Hungary, Bohemia, Moravia, Lufatia, Stirria, Carniolia and Croatia the like: that Charles the fifth, father of the king of Spain, was the perfon that taught the king of France, and other princes, how to yield to fuch emergencies: that his fon, the pre⚫ fent king of Spain, who is esteemed Arch-Catholick, and that is, as the Atlas of the catholick church, • tolerates notwithstanding, at this day, in his king• doms of Valentia and Granada, the Moors themfelves in their Mahometifm, and has offered to those of Zealand, Holland, and other hereticks of the low countries, the free exercife of their pretended religion, fo that they will but acknowledge and obey • him in civil matters.' It was of those letters of this extraordinary man, (for fo he was, whether we regard him in his ecclefiaftical dignity, or his greater christian and civil prudence) that the great lord Falkland faid, A minister of state fhould no more be without Cardinal d'Offa's letters, than a parfon

' without his bible.' And indeed, if we look into France, we shall find the indulgence of those Proteftants hath been a flourishing to that kingdom, as their arms a fuccour to their king. It is true, that fince they helped the minifters of his greatness to fuccefs, that haughty monarch has changed his measures, and refolves their conformity to his own religion, or their ruin but no man can give another reafon for it, than that he thinks it for his turn to please that part of his own church, which are the prefent neceffary and unwearied inftruments of his abfolute glory. But let us fee the end of this conduct; it will require more time to approve the experiment.

As it was the royal faying of Stephen, king of Poland, That he was a king of men, and not of confcience; a commander of bodies, and not of fouls ;' fo we fee a toleration has been practifed in that country of a long time, with no ill fuccefs to the ftate; the cities of Cracovia, Racovia, and many other towns of note, almost wholly diffenting from the common religion of the kingdom, which is Roman Catholick, as the others are Socinian and Calvinist, mighty oppofite to that, as well as to themselves.

The king of Denmark, in his large town of Altona, but about a mile from Hamburg, and therefore called fo, that is, All-to-near, is a pregnant proof to our point. For though his feat be fo remote from that place, another ftrong and infinuating ftate fo near, yet under his indulgence of divers perfuafions, they enjoy their peace, and he that fecurity, that he is not upon better terms in any of his more immediate and uniform dominions. I leave it to the thinking reader, if it be not much owing to this freedom, and if a contrary course were not the way for him to furnish his neighbours with means to depopulate that place, or make it uneafy and chargeable to him to keep?

If we look into other parts of Germany, where we find a ftout and warlike people, fierce for the thing they opine, or believe, we shall find the prince palatine of the Rhine has been fafe, and more potent by his indulgence;

indulgence; witnefs his improvements at Manheim: and as (believe me) he acted the prince to his people in other things, fo in this to the empire; for he made bold with the conftitution of it, in the latitude he gave his fubjects in this affair.

The elector of Brandenburgh is himself a Calvinift, his people' moftly Lutheran; yet in part of his dominions, the Roman Catholicks enjoy their churches quietly.

The duke of Newburg, and a ftrict Roman Catholick, brother-in-law to the present emperor, in his province of Juliers, has not only at Dewfburg, Mulheim, and other places, but in Duffeldorp itself, where the court refides, Lutheran and Calvinift, as well as Roman Catholick affemblies.

The elector of Saxony, by religion a Lutheran, in his city of Budiffin, has both Lutherans and Roman Catholicks in the fame church, parted only by a grate.

In Augsburg, they have two chief magiftrates, as their duumvirate; one must always be a Roman Catholick, and the other a Lutheran.

The bishop of Ofnabrug is himself a Lutheran; and in the town of his title, the Roman Catholicks, as well as Lutherans, have their churches: and, which is more, the next bishop must be a Catholick too; for, like the buckets in the well, they take turns: one way, to be fure, fo that one be but in the right.

From hence we will go to Sultzbach, a fmall territory, but has a great prince, I mean in his own extraordinary qualities; for, among other things, we fhall find him act the moderator among his people. By profeffion he is a Roman Catholick, but has fimultaneum religionis exercitium; not only Lutherans and Roman Catholicks enjoy their different worships, but alternatively in one and the fame place, the fame day; fo balancing his affection by his wifdom, that there appears neither partiality in him, nor envy in them, though of fuch oppofite perfuafions.

I will end these foreign inftances with a prince and bishop all in one, and he a Roman Catholick too, VOL. IV. Y

and