Christians have burnt each other, quite persuaded
That all the Apostles would have done as they did.

Byron is satirizing religious persecution carried out in the name of Christian orthodoxy. The couplet points to the moral contradiction of Christians executing fellow Christians—historically through heresy trials and burnings—while claiming apostolic sanction for such violence. The phrase “quite persuaded” underscores self-righteous certainty: persecutors imagine their actions are not only justified but would have been endorsed by the earliest Christian leaders. The sting lies in the implied gap between the Gospel’s ethic and later institutional coercion, a recurring Byronic theme in which piety becomes a pretext for cruelty and power.