How many a poor Jew or Moor in Spain and Portugal has been burned alive for
no other reason than
_Pour n'avoir point quitte la foi de leurs ancetres._
No, no; no sect or religion was ever so persecuting as the Catholic
Christians! The Polytheists of all times, both ancient and modern, were
tolerant to all religions and so far from striving to make proselytes,
often adopted the ceremonies of other worships in addition to their own;
witness the Egyptians, Greeks and Romans of old, and the Hindoos and
Chinese of the present day. The Jews, ferocious and prejudiced as they
were, never persecuted other nations on the ground of religion, and if they
held these nations in abhorrence as idolaters, and considered themselves
alone as the holy people, the people of God (Yahoudi), they never dreamed
of making converts. The Mussulmans tho' they hold it as a sacred precept of
their religion to endeavour to make converts to Islam, do not use violent
means and only compel those of a different faith to pay a higher tribute.
At any rate, they never have or do put people to death merely for the
difference of religious opinions. Such were the reflections I made on
walking about the Arena of this colossal edifice so worthy of the _popolo
Re_.
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