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though it may occasionally be found in the poets, and in 

 those prose-writers who exercise an inordinate curiosity 

 in the selection of their terms. But besides being used 

 to denote insulting and opprobrious speech in general, 

 it was used to denote speech of that- kind of a peculiar 

 nature, namely when the object against which it was di- 

 rected was a person esteemed sacred, but especially when 

 against God. The word was used by the LXX to represent 

 the 77p of the original Hebrew, when translating the pas- 

 sage of the Jewish law which we find in Leviticus xxiv. 

 10-16 ; this is the first authentic account of the act of blas- 

 phemy being noticed as a crime and marked by a legislator 

 for punishment : ' And the son of an Israelitish woman, 

 whose father was an Egyptian, went out among the children 

 of Israel, and this son of the Israelitish woman and a man 

 of Israel strove together in the camp: and the Israelitish 

 woman's son blasphemed the name of the Lord, and cursed. 

 And they brought him unto Moses, and they put him in 

 ward, that the mind of the Lord might be showed them. 

 And the Lord spake unto Moses saying, Bring forth him 

 that hath cursed without the camp, and let all that heard 

 him lay their hands upon his head, and let all the congre- 

 gation stone him. And thou shall speak unto the children 

 of Israel saying, Whosoever curseth his God shall bear his 

 sin, and he that blasphemeth the name of the Lord he shall 

 surely be put to death, and all the congregation shall cer- 

 tainly stone him ; as well the stranger, as he that is born 

 in the land, when he blasphemeth the name of the Lord, 

 shall be put to death.' It is said that the Hebrew com- 

 mentators on the law have some difficulty in defining ex- 

 actly what is to be considered as included within the scope 

 of the term ' blaspheme' in this passage. But it seems from 

 the text to be evidently that loud and vehement reproach, 

 the result of violent and uncontrolled passion, which not 

 unfrequently is vented not only against a fellow mortal 

 who offends, but at the same time against the majesty and 

 sovereignty of God. 



Common sense, applying itself to the text which we have 

 quoted, would at once declare that this, and this only, con- 

 stituted the crime against which, in the Mosaic code the 

 punishment of death was denounced. But among the later 

 Jews, other things were brought within the compass of this 

 law : and it was laid hold of as a means of opposing the in- 

 fluence of the teaching of Jesus Christ, and of giving the 

 form of law to the persecution of himself and his followers. 

 Thus to speak evilly or reproachfully of sacred things or 

 places was construed into blasphemy. The charge against 

 Stephen was that he ' ceased not to speak blasphemous 

 words against this holy place and the law' (Acts vi. 13) ; and 

 he was punished by stoning, the peculiar mode of putting to 

 death prescribed, as we have seen, by the Jewish law for 

 blasphemy. Our Lord himself was put to death as one 

 convicted of this crime. ' Again the high priest asked and 

 said unto him, Art thou the Christ, the son of the blessed ? 

 And Jesus said, I am ; and ye shall see the Son of Man 

 sitting on the right hand of power, and coming in the clouds 

 of heaven. Then the high priest rent his clothes and said, 

 What need we any further witnesses? Ye have heard the 

 blasphemy : what think ye ? And they all condemned him 

 to be guilty of death.' (Mark xiv. 61-64.) It was manifest 

 that there was here nothing of violence or passion, nothing 

 of any evil intention essential to constitute such a crime, 

 nothing, indeed, but the declaration of that divine mission 

 on which he had come into the world, and of which his 

 miracles had been the indisputable signs. 



There are some instances of the use of the term in the 

 New Testament, in which it is not easy to say whether the 

 word is used in its ordinary sense of hurtful, injurious, and 

 insulting speech, or in the restricted, and what may be 

 called the forensic sense. Thus when it is said of Christ 

 or his apostles that they were blasphemed, it is doubtful 

 whether the writers intended to speak of the act as one of 

 more than ordinary reviling, or to charge the parties with 

 being guilty of the' offence of speaking insultingly and re- 

 proachfully to persons invested with a character of more 

 than ordinary sacredness : and even in the celebrated pas- 

 gage about the blasphemy against the Holy Ghost, it appears 

 most probable from the context that blasphemy is there 

 used in the sense of ordinary reviling, though the object 

 against which it was directed gave to such reviling the 

 character of unusual atrocity. 



Among the canonists, the definition of blasphemy is 

 made to include the denying God, or the asserting anything 



to be God which is not God, anything, indeed, in the 

 words of the Summa Angelica, voce ' Blasfemia,' which 

 implies 'quandam derogationem excellentis bonitatis ali- 

 cujus et praicipue divinee ;' and this extended application of 

 the term has been received in most Christian countries, 

 and punishments more or less severe have been denounced 

 against the crime. 



In our own country, by the common law, open blasphemy 

 was punishable by fine and imprisonment, or other infamous 

 corporal punishment. The kind of blasphemy which was 

 ;hus cognizable is described by Blackstone to be ' denying 

 the being or providence of God, contumelious reproaches of 

 our Saviour Christ, profane scoffing at the Holy Scripture, 

 or exposing it to contempt and ridicule.' (Commentaries, 

 3. iv. c. iv.) All these heads, except the first, seem to 

 spring immediately from the root-sense of the word blas- 

 phemy, as they are that hurtful and insulting speech 

 which the word denotes. And we suspect that whenever the 

 common law was called into operation to punish persons 

 guilty of the first of these forms of blasphemy, it was only 

 when the denial was accompanied with opprobrious words 

 or gestures, which seem to be essential to complete the true 

 crime of blasphemy. Errors in opinion, even on points 

 which are of the very essence and being of religion, were re- 

 ferred in England in early times to the ecclesiastics, as falling 

 under the denomination of heretical opinions [see HERESY], 

 to be dealt with by them as other heresies were. There is 

 nothing in the statute book under the word blasphemy till 

 we come to the reign of King William III. In that reign 

 an act was passed, the title of which is ' An Act for the more 

 effectual suppressing of blasphemy and profaneness.' We 

 believe that the statute-book of no other nation can show 

 such an extension and comprehension as is given in this 

 statute to the word blasphemy, unless, indeed, two statutes of 

 the Scottish parliament, which were passed not long before. 

 The primitive and real meaning of blasphemy, and we may 

 add of profaneness also, was entirely lost sight of, and the 

 act was directed to the restraint of all free investigation of 

 positions respecting things esteemed sacred. The more 

 proper title would have been, ' An Act to prevent the inves- 

 tigation of the grounds of belief in Divine revelation, and 

 the nature of the things revealed;' for that such is its ob- 

 ject is apparent throughout the whole of it : ' Whereas many 

 persons have of late years openly avowed and published 

 many blasphemous and infamous opinions contrary to the 

 doctrines and principles of the Christian religion, greatly 

 tending to the dishonour of Almighty God, and may prove 

 destructive to the peace and welfare of this kingdom 

 wherefore for the more effectual suppressing of the said 

 detestable crimes, be it enacted, that if any person or per- 

 sons having been educated in, or at any time having made 

 profession of the Christian religion within this realm, shall, 

 by writing, printing, teaching, or advised speaking, deny 

 any one of the persons of the Holy Trinity to be God, or 

 shall assert or maintain that there are more gods than one, 

 or shall deny the Christian religion to be true, or the Holy 

 Scriptures of the Old and New Testament to be of divine 

 authority,' &c. These are the whole of the offences com- 

 prised in this act. The penalties are severe : disqualifica- 

 tions; incapacity to act as executor or guardian, or to receive 

 legacies ; three years imprisonment. (Stat. 9 Will. III. c. 35.) 

 The writings alluded to in the preamble were not, in any 

 proper sense of the term, blasphemous. They were, for the 

 most part, we believe universally, the work of sober-minded 

 and well-disposed men, who, however erring they might be, 

 were yet in the pursuit of truth, and seeking it in a direction 

 in which it is especially of importance to mankind to find 

 it. To prevent such inquiries by laws such as these is most 

 unwise and injurious. There can be no solid conviction 

 where there can be no inquiry. In a statu where laws like 

 this are acted on (happily, in this country, it is become a 

 dead letter), Christianity can never have the seat she ought 

 to have, not only in the affections, hut in the rational and 

 sober convictions of mankind. What we mean however at 

 present to urge is, that the title of blasphemy in this sta,- 

 tute is a palpable misnomer. The delivery either from the 

 pulpit or the press of the results of reflection and inquiry 

 applied to the divine authority of the Holy Scriptures, or 

 of any particular book included within that term, to the 

 claim of Christianity to be a divine institution, or to the 

 claim of the doctrine of the Trinity to be received as part 

 and parcel of Christianity, can never be regarded as in itself 

 blasphemy or profaneness, however in particular instances it 



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