[1] _Adversus Gnosticos Scorpiace_, cap. ii, Migne, P.L., vol. 11, col. 125.
[2] _De Idololatria_, cap. xvii, P.L., vol. i, col. 687.
If a Christian has no right to use physical force, even in the name of the State, he is all the more bound not to use it against his dissenting brethren in the name of the Gospel, which is a law of gentleness. Tertullian was a Montanist when he wrote this. But although he wrote most bitterly against the Gnostics whom he detested, he always protested against the use of brute force in the matter of religion. "It is a fundamental human right," he says, "a privilege of nature, that every man should worship according to his convictions. It is assuredly no part of religion to compel religion. It must be embraced freely, and not forced."[1] These words prove that Tertullian was a strong advocate of absolute toleration.
[1] _Liber ad Scapulam_, cap. ii, P.L., vol. i, col. 699
Origen likewise never granted Christians the right to punish those who denied the Gospel. In answering Celsus, who had brought forward certain texts of the Old Testament that decreed the death penalty for apostasy, he says: "If we must refer briefly to the difference between the law given to the Jews of old by Moses, and the law laid down by Christ for Christians, we would state that it is impossible to harmonize the legislation of Moses, taken literally, with the calling of the Gentiles.... For Christians cannot slay their enemies, or condemn, as Moses commanded, the contemners of the law to be put to death by burning or stoning."[1]
[1] _Contra Celsum_, lib. vii, cap. xxvi.
St. Cyprian also repudiates in the name of the Gospel the laws of the Old Testament on this point. He writes as follows: "God commanded that those who did not obey his priests or hearken to his judges,[1] appointed for the time, should be slain. Then indeed they were slain with the sword, while the circumcision of the flesh was yet in force; but now that circumcision has begun to be of the spirit among God's faithful servants, the proud and contumacious are slain with the sword of the spirit by being cast out of the Church."[2]
[2] Ep. lxii, _ad Pomponium_, n. 4, P.L., vol. iii. col. 371. Cf. _De unitate Ecclesiæ_, n. 17 seq.; _ibid.,_ col. 513 seq.