Criminal law Quote by Simon Baker

“Now all these [heretics] are of much later date than the bishops to whom the apostles committed the Churches; which”

— The Church Fathers

“The moderns say we must not punish heretics. My only doubt is whether we have the right to punish anybody else.”

— G.K. Chesterton

It was even possible for the most venerated patriarchs of the Church, like St. Augustine and St. Thomas Aquinas, to conclude that heretics should…

— Sam Harris

Heretics are not to be disputed with, but to be condemned unheard, and whilst they perish by fire, the faithful ought to pursue the…

— Martin Luther

“heretics can validly administer all the other Sacraments, with the sole exception of Penance, 30 which cannot, barring cases of urgent necessity, be validly…

— Joseph Pohle

Heretics were most often bitterly persecuted for the their least deviation from accepted belief. It was precisely their obstinacy about trifles that irritated the…

— Lev Shestov

“Prosecution is not an original feature in any religion; but it is always the strongly-marked feature of all law-religious, or religions established by law.…

— Thomas Paine

“Believing, as they now did, that the heavenly powers took part in human affairs, they became so much absorbed in the cultivation of religion…

— Livy

Heretics have been hated from the beginning of recorded time; they have been ostracized, exiled, tortured, maimed, and butchered; but it has generally proved…

— Learned Hand

Wherefore if forgers of money and other evil-doers are forthwith condemned to death by the secular authority, much more reason is there for heretics,…

— St Thomas Aquinas

Never forget that if you leave your law to judges and your religion to bishops, you will presently find yourself without either law or…

— George Bernard Shaw

But this inestimable privilege was soon violated: with the knowledge of truth the emperor imbibed the maxims of persecution; and the sects which dissented…

— Edward Gibbon