datis militum gladiis et draconum praesentibus
signis, et tubarum vocibus cogeretur." Monument. p. 304.]

[Footnote 159: The Histoire des Camisards, in 3 vols. 12mo.
Villefranche, 1760 may be recommended as accurate and impartial. It
requires some attention to discover the religion of the author.]

Such disorders are the natural effects of religious tyranny, but the
rage of the Donatists was inflamed by a frenzy of a very extraordinary
kind; and which, if it really prevailed among them in so extravagant a
degree, cannot surely be paralleled in any country or in any age. Many
of these fanatics were possessed with the horror of life, and the desire
of martyrdom; and they deemed it of little moment by what means, or
by what hands, they perished, if their conduct was sanctified by the
intention of devoting themselves to the glory of the true faith, and
the hope of eternal happiness. [160] Sometimes they rudely disturbed
the festivals, and profaned the temples of Paganism, with the design of
exciting the most zealous of the idolaters to revenge the insulted
honor of their gods. They sometimes forced their way into the courts
of justice, and compelled the affrighted judge to give orders for their
immediate execution. They frequently stopped travellers on the public
highways, and obliged them to inflict the stroke of martyrdom, by the
promise of a reward, if they consented, and by the threat of instant
death, if they refused to grant so very singular a favor. When they were
disappointed of every other resource, they announced the day on
which, in the presence of their friends and brethren, they should east
themselves headlong from some lofty rock; and many precipices were
shown, which had acquired fame by the number of religious suicides.
In the actions of these desperate enthusiasts, who were admired by one
party as the martyrs of God, and abhorred by the other as the victims of
Satan, an impartial philosopher may discover the influence and the last
abuse of that inflexible spirit which was originally derived from the
character and principles of the Jewish nation.

[Footnote 160: The Donatist suicides alleged in their justification the
example of Razias, which is related in the 14th chapter of the second
book of the Maccabees.]

The simple narrative of the intestine divisions, which distracted the
peace, and dishonored the triumph, of the church, will confirm the
remark of a Pagan historian, and justify the complaint of a