18th Century Dominican Cardinal (Vincenzo Gotti): Protestants Cannot Be Martyrs

Cardinal Vincenzo Lodovico Gotti (1664–1742) was a Dominican theologian, prior, provincial, and inquisitor of Milan under Clement XI.  He wrote an apologetic work on the Church against the Swiss Calvinist Giacomo Picenino.

Cardinal Vincenzo Lodovico Gotti, O.P., Vera ecclesia Christi signis, ac dogmatibus demonstrata, 1748, Chap. 3 (#6), pp. 78-81: “Protestants neither have martyrs nor can have them... I likewise most gladly yield to you your martyrs of France, who died not for Christ but for the faith of Calvin. Nor would I say more about them, except that you dare even to compare them with the ancient martyrs and to treat the cause of both as one and the same. Our ancient martyrs died for the unity of the Church; yours died for schism against that unity. What common cause, then, is there?... The Calvinists and the other sectarians did not suffer for justice, because they did not die in the faith. Nor in charity: if they had possessed it, they would not have torn apart the body of Christ, which is the Church.  Therefore they are not martyrs.”