Page:The Great Encyclical Letters of Pope Leo XIII.djvu/158



152 HUMAN LIBERTY.

is absurd to suppose that nature has accorded indifferently to truth and falsehood, to justice and injustice. Men have a right freely and prudently to propagate through- out the State what things soever are true and honorable, so that as many as possible may possess them; but lying opinions, than which no mental plague is greater, and vices which corrupt the heart and moral life, should be diligently repressed by public authority, lest they insidi- ously work the ruin of the State. The excesses of an unbridled intellect, which unfailingly end in the oppres- sion of the untutored multitude, are no less rightly con- trolled by the authority of the law than are the injuries inflicted by violence upon the weak. And this all the more surely, because by far the greater part of the com- munity is either absolutely unable, or able only with great difficulty, to escape from illusions and deceitful subtleties, especially such as flatter the passions. If unbridled license of speech and of writing be granted to all, nothing will remain sacred and inviolate; even the highest and truest mandates of nature, justly held to be the common and noblest heritage of the human race, will not be spared. Thus, truth being gradually obscured by darkness, per- nicious and manifold error, as too often happens, will easily prevail. Thus, too, license will gain what liberty loses; for liberty will ever be more free and secure, in proportion as license is kept in fuller restraint. In regard, however, to all matters of opinion which God leaves to man's free discussion, full liberty of thought and of speech is naturally within the right of every one ; for such liberty never leads men to suppress the truth, but often to dis- cover it and make it known.

A like judgment must be passed upon what is called liberty of teaching. There can be no doubt that truth alone should imbue the minds of men; for in it are found the well-being, the end, and the perfection of every intelli- gent nature; and therefore nothing but truth should be taught both to the ignorant and to the educated, so