第70章

To produce this effect, I have nothing more to do than simply to quote Escobar, in his Practice of Simony according to the Society of Jesus; "Is it simony when two Churchmen become mutually pledged thus: Give me your vote for my election as Provincial, and I shall give you mine for your election as prior? By no means." Or take another: "It is not simony to get possession of a benefice by promising a sum of money, when one has no intention of actually paying the money; for this is merely making a show of simony, and is as far from being real simony as counterfeit gold is from the genuine." By this quirk of conscience, he has contrived means, in the way of adding swindling to simony, for obtaining benefices without simony and without money.But I have no time to dwell longer on the subject, for I must say a word or two in reply to your third accusation, which refers to the subject of bankrupts.Nothing can be more gross than the manner in which you have managed this charge.You rail at me as a libeller in reference to a sentiment of Lessius, which I did not quote myself, but took from a passage in Escobar; and, therefore, though it were true that Lessius does not hold the opinion ascribed to him by Escobar, what can be more unfair than to charge me with the misrepresentation? When I quote Lessius or others of your authors myself, I am quite prepared to answer for it; but, as Escobar has collected the opinions of twenty-four of your writers, I beg to ask if I am bound to guarantee anything beyond the correctness of my citations from his book? Or if I must, in addition, answer for the fidelity of all his quotations of which I may avail myself? This would be hardly reasonable; and yet this is precisely the case in the question before us.I produced in my letter the following passage from Escobar, and you do not object to the fidelity of my translation: "May the bankrupt, with a good conscience, retain as much of his property as is necessary to afford him an honourable maintenance- ne indecore vivat? I answer, with Lessius, that he may- cum Lessio assero posse." You tell me that Lessius does not hold that opinion.But just consider for a moment the predicament in which you involve yourselves.If it turns out that he does hold that opinion, you will be set down as impostors for having asserted the contrary;and if it is proved that he does not hold it, Escobar will be the impostor;so it must now of necessity follow that one or other of the Society will be convicted of imposture.Only think what a scandal! You cannot, it would appear, foresee the consequences of things.You seem to imagine that you have nothing more to do than to cast aspersions upon people, without considering on whom they may recoil.Why did you not acquaint Escobar with your objection before venturing to publish it? He might have given you satisfaction.It is not so very troublesome to get word from Valladolid, where he is living in perfect health, and completing his grand work on Moral Theology, in six volumes, on the first of which I mean to say a few words by-and-by.

They have sent him the first ten letters; you might as easily have sent him your objection, and I am sure he would have soon returned you an answer, for he has doubtless seen in Lessius the passage from which he took the ne indecore vivat.Read him yourselves, fathers, and you will find it word for word, as I have done.Here it is: "The same thing is apparent from the authorities cited, particularly in regard to that property which he acquires after his failure, out of which even the delinquent debtor may retain as much as is necessary for his honourable maintenance, according to his station of life- ut non indecore vivat.Do you ask if this rule applies to goods which he possessed at the time of his failure? Such seems to be the judgement of the doctors." I shall not stop here to show how Lessius, to sanction his maxim, perverts the law that allows bankrupts nothing more than a mere livelihood, and that makes no provision for "honourable maintenance." It is enough to have vindicated Escobar from such an accusation-it is more, indeed, than what I was in duty bound to do.But you, fathers, have not done your duty.It still remains for you to answer the passage of Escobar, whose decisions, by the way, have this advantage, that, being entirely independent of the context and condensed in little articles, they are not liable to your distinctions.I quoted the whole of the passage, in which "bankrupts are permitted to keep their goods, though unjustly acquired, to provide an honourable maintenance for their families"- commenting on which in my letters, I exclaim: "Indeed, father! by what strange kind of charity would you have the ill-gotten property of a bankrupt appropriated to his own use, instead of that of his lawful creditors?" This is the question which must be answered; but it is one that involves you in a sad dilemma, and from which you in vain seek to escape by altering the state of the question, and quoting other passages from Lessius, which have no connection with the subject.I ask you, then: May this maxim of Escobar be followed by bankrupts with a safe conscience, or no? And take care what you say.

If you answer, "No," what becomes of your doctor, and your doctrine of probability? If you say, "Yes," I delate you to the Parliament.In this predicament I must now leave you, fathers; for my limits will not permit me to overtake your next accusation, which respects homicide.This will serve for my next letter, and the rest will follow.In the meanwhile, Ishall make no remarks on the advertisements which you have tagged to the end of each of your charges, filled as they are with scandalous falsehoods.

I mean to answer all these in a separate letter, in which I hope to show the weight due to your calumnies.I am sorry, fathers, that you should have recourse to such desperate resources.The abusive terms which you heap on me will not clear up our disputes, nor will your manifold threats hinder me from defending myself You think you have power and impunity on your side; and I think I have truth and innocence on mine.It is a strange and tedious war when violence attempts to vanquish truth.All the efforts of violence cannot weaken truth, and only serve to give it fresh vigour.

All the lights of truth cannot arrest violence, and only serve to exasperate it.When force meets force, the weaker must succumb to the stronger; when argument is opposed to argument, the solid and the convincing triumphs over the empty and the false; but violence and verity can make no impression on each other.Let none suppose, however, that the two are, therefore, equal to each other; for there is this vast difference between them, that violence has only a certain course to run, limited by the appointment of Heaven, which overrules its effects to the glory of the truth which it assails; whereas verity endures forever and eventually triumphs over its enemies, being eternal and almighty as God himself.