Page:Readings in European History Vol 2.djvu/419

 The Eve of the French Revolution 381 Officials, laborers, and priests should all alike pay the taxes All should of the state, since they all alike belong to the state. pay taxes. There should be but one standard of weights and measures Uniformity, and one system of law. Let the punishment of criminals be useful. A man when hanged is good for nothing : a man condemned to hard labor continues to serve his country and furnish a living lesson. Every law should be clear, uniform, and precise. To inter- pret law is almost always to corrupt it. Nothing should be regarded as infamous except vice. The taxes should never be otherwise than proportional to the resources of him who pays. Voltaire's mingling of jest and earnest is generally apparent in his discussion of theological matters. Like Erasmus, he felt that the fine distinctions made by the divines often obscured the main issue. Under "grace" he writes as follows : grace. Ye sacred counselors of modern Rome, ye illustrious and 387. Vol- infallible theologians, no one has more respect than I for your opinions. But were Paulus ^Emilius, Scipio, Cato, Cicero, Caesar, Titus, Trajan, or Marcus Aurelius to return to that Rome upon which they formerly cast some little glory, you will admit that they would be somewhat startled at your decisions respecting grace. What would they say if they should hear of St. Thomas' grace of health and of Cajetan's medicinal grace ; of external and internal, free, sanctifying, actual, habitual, and cooperating grace ; of effec- tual grace which is sometimes without effect ; of sufficing grace which is often insufficient ; of versatile and congruous grace? Would they, in good faith, understand these any better than you and I do? How completely at a loss would these poor people be without your exalted instruction. I seem to hear them say: "Reverend fathers, what stupendous genius is yours! We have been accustomed to think — absurdly enough, as it appears — that the Eternal Being never follows special