It was to be
wished that these horrible maxims had never found their way out of
hell; and that the devil, who is their original author, had never
discovered men sufficiently devoted to his will to publish them
among Christians.
From all that I have hitherto said, it is easy to judge what a
contrariety there is betwixt the licentiousness of your opinions and
the severity of civil laws, not even excepting those of Heathens.
How much more apparent must the contrast be with ecclesiastical
laws, which must be incomparably more holy than any other, since it is
the Church alone that knows and possesses the true holiness!
Accordingly, this chaste spouse of the Son of God, who, in imitation
of her heavenly husband, can shed her own blood for others, but
never the blood of others for herself, entertains a horror at the
crime of murder altogether singular, and proportioned to the
peculiar illumination which God has vouchsafed to bestow upon her. She
views man, not simply as man, but as the image of the God whom she
adores. She feels for every one of the race a holy respect, which
imparts to him, in her eyes, a venerable character, as redeemed by
an infinite price, to be made the temple of the living God. And
therefore she considers the death of a man, slain without the
authority of his Maker, not as murder only, but as sacrilege, by which
she is deprived of one of her members; for, whether he be a believer
or an unbeliever, she uniformly looks upon him, if not as one, at
least as capable of becoming one, of her own children.
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