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Page 6
(18) But if, in despotic statecraft, the supreme and essential mystery be to
hoodwink the subjects, and to mask the fear, which keeps them clown, with
the specious garb of religion, so that men may fight as bravely for slavery
as for safety, and count it not shame but highest honour to risk their blood
and their lives for the vainglory of a tyrant; yet in a free state no more
mischievous expedient could be planned or attempted. (19) Wholly repugnant
to the general freedom are such devices as enthralling men's minds with
prejudices, forcing their judgment, or employing any of the weapons of
quasi-religious sedition; indeed, such seditions only spring up, when law
enters the domain of speculative thought, and opinions are put on trial and
condemned on the same footing as crimes, while those who defend and follow
them are sacrificed, not to public safety, but to their opponents'
hatred and cruelty. (20) If deeds only could be made the grounds of
criminal charges, and words were always allowed to pass free, such seditions
would be divested of every semblance of justification, and would be
separated from mere controversies by a hard and fast line.
(20) Now, seeing that we have the rare happiness of living in a republic,
where everyone's judgment is free and unshackled, where each may worship God
as his conscience dictates, and where freedom is esteemed before all things
dear and precious, I have believed that I should be undertaking no
ungrateful or unprofitable task, in demonstrating that not only can
such freedom be granted without prejudice to the public peace, but also,
that without such freedom, piety cannot flourish nor the public peace be
secure.
(21) Such is the chief conclusion I seek to establish in this treatise; but,
in order to reach it, I must first point out the misconceptions which, like
scars of our former bondage, still disfigure our notion of religion, and
must expose the false views about the civil authority which many have most
impudently advocated, endeavouring to turn the mind of the people, still
prone to heathen superstition, away from its legitimate rulers, and so bring
us again into slavery. (22) As to the order of my treatise I will speak
presently, but first I will recount the causes which led me to write.
(23) I have often wondered, that persons who make a boast of professing the
Christian religion, namely, love, joy, peace, temperance, and charity to all
men, should quarrel with such rancorous animosity, and display daily towards
one another such bitter hatred, that this, rather than the virtues they
claim, is the readiest criterion of their faith. (24) Matters have long
since come to such a pass, that one can only pronounce a man Christian,
Turk, Jew, or Heathen, by his general appearance and attire, by his
frequenting this or that place of worship, or employing the phraseology of a
particular sect - as for manner of life, it is in all cases the same. (25)
Inquiry into the cause of this anomaly leads me unhesitatingly to ascribe it
to the fact, that the ministries of the Church are regarded by the masses
merely as dignities, her offices as posts of emolument - in short, popular
religion may be summed up as respect for ecclesiastics. (26) The spread of
this misconception inflamed every worthless fellow with an intense desire to
enter holy orders, and thus the love of diffusing God's religion degenerated
into sordid avarice and ambition. (27) Every church became a theatre, where
orators, instead of church teachers, harangued, caring not to instruct the
people, but striving to attract admiration, to bring opponents to public
scorn, and to preach only novelties and paradoxes, such as would tickle
the ears of their congregation. (28) This state of things necessarily
stirred up an amount of controversy, envy, and hatred, which no lapse of
time could appease; so that we can scarcely wonder that of the old religion
nothing survives but its outward forms (even these, in the mouth of the
multitude, seem rather adulation than adoration of the Deity), and that
faith has become a mere compound of credulity and prejudices - aye,
prejudices too, which degrade man from rational being to beast, which
completely stifle the power of judgment between true and false, which seem,
in fact, carefully fostered for the purpose of extinguishing the last spark
of reason! (29) Piety, great God! and religion are become a tissue of
ridiculous mysteries; men, who flatly despise reason, who reject and turn
away from understanding as naturally corrupt, these, I say, these of all
men, are thought, 0 lie most horrible! to possess light from on High. (30)
Verily, if they had but one spark of light from on High, they would not
insolently rave, but would learn to worship God more wisely, and would be as
marked among their fellows for mercy as they now are for malice; if they
were concerned for their opponents' souls, instead of for their own
reputations, they would no longer fiercely persecute, but rather be filled
with pity and compassion.
(31) Furthermore, if any Divine light were in them, it would appear from
their doctrine. (32) I grant that they are never tired of professing their
wonder at the profound mysteries of Holy Writ; still I cannot discover that
they teach anything but speculations of Platonists and Aristotelians, to
which (in order to save their credit for Christianity) they have made Holy
Writ conform; not content to rave with the Greeks themselves, they want to
make the prophets rave also; showing conclusively, that never even in sleep
have they caught a glimpse of Scripture's Divine nature. (33) The very
vehemence of their admiration for the mysteries plainly attests, that
their belief in the Bible is a formal assent rather than a living faith: and
the fact is made still more apparent by their laying down beforehand, as a
foundation for the study and true interpretation of Scripture, the principle
that it is in every passage true and divine. (34) Such a doctrine should be
reached only after strict scrutiny and thorough comprehension of the Sacred
Books (which would teach it much better, for they stand in need no human
factions), and not be set up on the threshold, as it were, of inquiry.
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