A handbook of Freethought

by Unknown

THE PURITANS INTOLERANT.

Capital Laws of Connecticut, Established by the General Court, December 1, 1642.

1. If any man after legal conviction shall have or worship any other God but the Lord God, he shall be put to death. ([Deut. 13 : 6]; [17 : 2, 3], and [Ex. 22 : 20].)

2. If any man or woman be a witch (that is, hath or consulteth with a familiar spirit) they shall be put to death. ([Ex. 20 : 18]; [Lev. 20 : 27]; [Deut. 18 : 10, 11].)

3. If any person shall blaspheme the name of God, the Father, Son or Holy Ghost, with direct, express, presumptuous, or high-handed blasphemy, or shall curse God in the like manner, he shall be put to death. ([Lev. 24 : 15, 16].)

4. If any person shall commit any wilful murder, which is manslaughter committed upon malice, hatred, or cruelty, not in a man’s necessary and just defense nor by mere casualty against his will, he shall be put to death. ([Ex. 21 : 12, 13, 14]; [Numb. 35 : 30, 31].)

5. If any person shall slay another through guile, either by poisoning, or other such devilish practice, he shall be put to death. ([Ex. 21 : 14].)

6. If any man or woman shall lie with a beast or brute creature, by carnal copulation, they shall surely be put to death, and the beast shall be slain and buried. ([Lev. 20 : 15, 16].)

7. If any man lie with mankind as he lieth with a woman, both of them have committed abomination, they both shall surely be put to death. ([Lev. 20 : 13].)

8. If any person committeth adultery with a married or espoused wife, the adulterer and the adulteress shall surely be put to death. ([Lev. 20 : 10]; [18 : 20]; [Deut. 22 : 23, 24].)

9. If any man shall forcibly and without consent ravish a maid or woman, that is lawfully married or contracted, he shall be put to death. ([Deut. 22 : 25].)

10. If any man shall steal a man or mankind, he shall be put to death. ([Ex. 21 : 16].)

11. If any man rise up by false witnesses, wittingly and of purpose to take away any man’s life he shall be put to death. ([Deut. 19 : 16, 18, 19].)

12. If any man shall conspire or attempt any invasion, insurrection, or rebellion against the commonwealth, he shall be put to death.

“All these are copied from the capital laws of Massachusetts, established (with her Body of Liberties) December, 1641,—except the ninth (against rape of a married or betrothed woman), which was enacted by Massachusetts in June, 1642. One of the Massachusetts laws punished manslaughter with death, was not adopted by Connecticut, and only the first clause of the Massachusetts law against conspiracy, rebellion, etc. was taken.” (“Blue Laws, True and False,” by Trumbull.)

“December 1642, two additional capital laws were added to the statute of Connecticut.” (Ibid. p. 59.)

13. If any child or children about 16 years old and of sufficient understanding, shall curse or smite their natural father or mother, he, or they shall be put to death, unless it can be sufficiently testified that the parents have been unchristianly negligent in the education of such children or so provoke them by extreme and cruel correction that they have been forced thereunto, to preserve themselves from death or maiming. ([Ex. 21 : 17, 15]; [Lev. 20 : 9].)

14. If a man have a stubborn and rebellious son of sufficient years and understanding, namely, 16 years of age, which will not obey the voice of his father or mother, and that when they have chastened him, will not hearken to them, then may his father and mother, being his natural parents, lay hold on him, and bring him to the magistrates assembled in court and testify unto them that their son is stubborn and rebellious and will not obey their voice and chastisement, but lives in sundry notorious crimes, such a son shall be put to death. ([Deut. 21 : 20, 21].)

“Persuade men that when ascribing to the Deity justice and mercy, they are speaking of qualities generally distinct from those which exist among mankind—qualities which we are altogether unable to conceive, and which may be compatible with acts which men would term grossly unjust and unmerciful; tell them that guilt may be entirely unconnected with a personal act that millions of infants may be called into existence for a moment to be precipitated into a place of torment, that vast nations may live and die, and then be rased again to endure never-ending punishment, because they did not believe in a religion of which they never heard, or because a crime was committed thousands of years before they were in existence; convince them that all this is part of a transcendentally perfect and righteous scheme, and there is no imaginable abyss to which such a doctrine would not lead.” (Lecky’s “Rationalism in Europe,” vol. 1, p. 384.)

Lecky proceeds to show that men who believe in salvation by the church will always persecute dissenters, and all history attests the truth of his remarks. Catholics persecuted Protestants; Protestants persecuted Puritans; and Puritans, in there turn, persecuted other dissenters. Nor did the work stop here; though limited in their power, yet these dissenters even to-day find ways by which they can persecute dissenters from them without resort to physical means. There was not, two centuries ago, a single sect that did not uphold persecution.