the Old
Testament England and the Suppression of Heresy The Calvinists and
the Suppression of Heresy Cruelty of the Criminal Code in the Middle
Ages The Spirit of the Age Explains the Cruelty of the Inquisition
Defects in the Procedure Abuses of Antecedent Imprisonment and
Torture Heretics who were also Criminals Heresy Punished as Such
Should the Death Penalty Be Inflicted upon Heretics? The
Responsibility of the Church Abuses of the Penalties of Confiscation
and Exile The Penitential Character of Imprisonment The Syllabus and
the Coercive Power of the Church

THE INQUISITION

CHAPTER 1
FIRST PERIOD
I-IV CENTURY
THE EPOCH OF THE PERSECUTIONS

ST. PAUL was the first to pronounce a sentence of condemnation upon
heretics. In his Epistle to Timothy, he writes: "Of whom is Hymeneus
and Alexander, whom I have delivered up to Satan, that they may learn
not to blaspheme."[1] The Apostle is evidently influenced in his
action by the Gospel. The one-time Pharisee no longer dreams of
punishing the guilty with the severity of the Mosaic Law. The death
penalty of stoning, which apostates merited under the old
dispensation,[2] has been changed into a purely spiritual penalty:
excommunication.

[1] 1) Tim. i. 20. Cf . Tit. iii. 10-11. "A man that is a heretic,
after the first and second admonition, avoid, knowing that he, that
is such an one, is subverted, and sinneth, being condemned by his own
judgment."

[2] Deut. xiii. 6-9) ; xvii. 1-6.

During the first three centuries, as long as the era of persecution
lasted, the early Christians never thought of using any force save
the force of argument to win back their dissident brethren. This is
the meaning of that obscure passage in the _Adversus Gnosticos_ of
Tertullian, in which he speaks of "driving heretics (i.e., by
argument), to their duty, instead of trying to win them, for
obstinacy must be conquered, not coaxed."[1] In this work he is
trying to convince the Gnostics of their errors from various passages
in the Old Testament. But he never invokes the death penalty against
them. On the contrary, he declares that no practical Christian can be
an executioner or jailer. He even goes so far as to deny the right of
any disciple of Christ to serve in the army, at least as an officer,
"because the duty of a military commander comprises the right to sit
in judgment upon a man's life, to condemn, to put in chains, to
imprison and to torture."[2]

[1] _Adversus Gnosticos S