Genius is almost universally persecuted.

religious, and that the Deist do not by his arguments shock my vanity.

By endeavouring to instruct we humiliate. Let in the light upon a nest of young owls, and they cry out against the injury you have done them. Men of mediocrity are young owls: when you present them with strong and brilliant ideas, they exclaim against them as false, dangerous, and deserving of punishment (60).

Under what prince, and in what country, can a man be great with impunity? In England, and under the reign of a Trajan or a Frederic; under every other form of government, and every other sovereign, the reward of talents is persecution. Strong and great ideas are almost every where proscribed. The authors most generally read, are those that render common ideas in a new and striking manner; they are praised because they are not worthy of praise; because they do not contradict any one. Contradiction is intolerable to all, but especially to the great. To what degree did it not excite the wrath of Charles V. against the Lutherans? That prince, they say, repented of having persecuted them; it may be so: but at what time was it? When after having abdicated the empire he lived in retreat. He then said to himself, I have thirty watches on my table, and no two of them mark precisely the same time *: how could I imagine then,

* A servant carelessly entered his cell and threw down the ta

that

Intolerance of mankind in general.

that in matters of religion I could make all men think alike? What was my folly and my pride! Would to heaven that Charles had made this reflection sooner; he would have been more just, more tolerant, and more virtuous. What seeds of war he would have destroyed! how much human blood would he have spared!

No prince, not even any private man, assigns bounds to his power. It is not enough to reign over our fellow-citizens, and command their ideas, we would even command their tastes. M. Rousseau loves not French music; in this he agrees with all the other nations of Europe. When he published this opinion, a thousand voices were raised against him: he deserved to rot in a dungeon. They solicited a lettre de cachet, but the minister was luckily too prudent to grant it, and expose the French nation to ridicule.

There are no crimes to which human intolerance does not lead. To pretend in this matter to correct man, is to desire that he should prefer others to himself; that is, to desire him to change his nature. A wise man never desires impossibilities; his aim is to disarm and not destroy intolerance. But what shall restrain it? A reciprocal fear. When two men of

ble with the thirty watches; Charles laughed, and said to the servant, you are more lucky than I, for you have found the way to make them all go together.

Means of suppressing intolerance.

equal force differ in opinion, neither of them insults the other? for men rarely attack those whom they think they cannot injure with impunity.

Why do military men dispute with so much politeness? for fear of a duel. Whence arises the same politeness among men of letters? From the fear of ridicule no man likes to be confounded with the pedants of a college. Now from those two instances we may judge what the still more efficacious fear of the law would produce among citizens.

Severe laws would suppress intolerance as well as robbery. If while I have the free use of my tastes and opinions, the law forbids me to insult those of others my intolerance then checked by the edicts of the magistrate, will not extend to acts of violence; but if through imprudence the government free me from the fear of a duel, ridicule, and the law, my intolerance unrestrained will again render me savage and inhuman. The atrocious ferocity with which different religious sects persecute each other, is a proof of what is here asserted.

CHAP.

Of religious intolerance..

CHAP. XVIII.

OF RELIGIOUS INTOLERANCE.

THIS HIS is the most dangerous of all intolerance; its motive is the love of power, religion its pretence. What is it they would punish in a heretic or unbeliever ? The audacity of the man who would think for himself; who would believe his own reason before that of the priests, and thereby declare himself their equal. The pretence of avenging Heaven is nothing but that of his offended pride. Priests of almost all religions are the same.

In the sight of the mufti, as in that of a bonze, an infidel is an impious wretch that ought to be destroyed by fire from heaven; a man so destructive to society as to deserve to be burnt alive.

In the eyes of a wise man however, this same infidel is a man who does not believe the tale of mother Goose for what is there wanting to make that tale a religion? A number of people to maintain its veracity.

Whence comes it that men covered with the rags of penitence and the mask of charity have been at all times the most atrocious? How can it be possible that

Ingenious parable of a celebrated painter.

light of toleration has not yet broken forth? What! must honest men hate and persecute each other without remorse for disputes about a word, frequently about the choice of errors, and because they are distinguished by the different name of Lutherans, Calvinists, Catholics, Mahometans, &c.

When in a convocation the monk anathematises the dervise, can he be ignorant that in the sight of the dervise the truly impious, the real infidel, is the Christian, pope, or monk who does not believe in Mahomet? Can each sect, eternally condemned to stupidity, approve in itself what it detests in others?

Let them sometimes recollect the ingenious parable of a celebrated painter. Transported in a dream to the gates of heaven, says he, the first object that struck me was a venerable old man; by his keys, his bald head, and his long beard, I knew him to be St. Peter. The apostle sat on the threshold of the celestial gates; a crowd of people advanced towards him; the first who presented himself was a papist; I have, said he, all my life been a religious man, and yet honest enough. Go in, replies the saint, and place yourself upon the bench for catholics. The next was a protestant, who gave a like account of himself; the saint said in the like manner, place yourself among the reformed. Then came merchants of Bagdat, Bassora, &c. these were all musulmans who had been constantly virtuous; St. Peter made them sit down among the musulmans. At last came an infidel; What is thy

sect?