Page:Readings in European History Vol 2.djvu/423

 The Eve of the FrencJi Revolution 385 Should the depository of this [political] power abuse it, he regards this abuse as the rod with which God punishes his children. People would have scruples about driving out the usurper : it would be necessary to disturb the public repose, to use violence, to shed blood ; all this accords ill with the gentleness of the Christian, and, after all, what mat- ters it whether one is a slave or free in this vale of misery ? The essential thing is to go to paradise, and resignation is but one more means to accomplish it. Should some foreign war supervene, the citizens march to combat without difficulty. None among them think of flying ; they do their duty, but without passion for victory; they know better how to die than to win. Whether they are victors or vanquished, what matters it? Does not Providence know better than they what they need? . . . But I am in error in speaking of a Christian republic ; each of these words excludes the other. Christianity preaches only servitude and dependence. Its spirit is too favorable to tyranny not to be taken advantage of by it. Christians are made to be slaves : they know it and do not care ; this short life has too little value in their eyes. . . . There is, however, a profession of faith purely civil, of which it is the sovereign's [i.e. the people's] duty to decide upon the articles, not precisely as dogmas of religion, but as sentiments of sociality without which it is impossible to be a good citizen or a faithful subject. Without being able to oblige any one to believe them, the sovereign can banish from the state whoever does not believe them ; the sovereign should banish him, not as impious, but as unsocial, as incapable of loving law and justice sincerely, and of sacrificing at need his life to his duty. If any one, having publicly acknowledged these dogmas, conducts himself as if he did not acknowledge them, he should be punished with death ; he has committed the greatest of crimes, — he has lied before the law. The dogmas of civil religion should be simple, few in number, announced with precision, without explanation or commentary. The existence of a powerful, intelligent, benevo- lent, prescient, and provident Divinity, the life to come, the