第27章
There are persons who, frightened by this truth, admit half of it, as debtors who offer half to their creditors, and ask respite for the rest." There are," they say, " some events which are necessary, and others which are not." It would be very comic that one part of the world was arranged, and that the other were not; that a part of what happens had to happen, and that another part of what happens did not have to happen.If one looks closely at it, one sees that the doctrine contrary to that of destiny is absurd; but there are many people destined to reason badly, others not to reason at all, others to persecute those who reason.
Some say to you: " Do not believe in fatalism; for then everything appearing inevitable, you will work at nothing, you will wallow in indifference, you will love neither riches, nor honours, nor glory; you will not want to acquire anything, you will believe yourself without merit as without power; no talent will be cultivated, everything will perish through apathy."Be not afraid, gentlemen, we shall ever have passions and prejudices, since it is our destiny to be subjected to prejudices and passions: we shall know that it no more depends on us to have much merit and great talent, than to have a good head of hair and beautiful hands: we shall be convinced that we must not be vain about anything, and yet we shall always have vanity.
I necessarily have the passion for writing this, and you have the passion for condemning me; both of us are equally fools, equally the toys of destiny.
Your nature is to do harm, mine is to love truth, and to make it public in spite of you.
The owl, which feeds on mice in its ruins, said to the nightingale:" Finish singing under your beautiful shady trees, come into my hole, that I may eat you"; and the nightingale answered: " I was born to sing here, and to laugh at you."You ask me what will become of liberty? I do not understand you.I do not know what this liberty is of which you speak; so long have you been disputing about its nature, that assuredly you are not acquainted with it.If you wish, or rather, if you are able to examine peaceably with me what it is, pass to the letter L.Philosophical Dictionary: Devout DEVOUT THE word "devout" signifies "devoted;" and in the strict sense of the term this qualification should belong only to monks and nuns who make vows.
But as in the Gospel there is no more mention of vows than of devout persons, this title does not in fact belong to anyone.Everyone should be equally righteous.A man who styles himself devout resembles a commoner who styles himself a marquis; he arrogates to himself a quality he does not possess.
He thinks himself more worthy than his neighbour.One can forgive such foolishness in women; their frailty and their frivolity render them excusable;the poor creatures pass from a lover to a director in good faith: but one cannot pardon the rogues who direct them, who abuse their ignorance, who establish the throne of their pride on the credulity of the sex.They resolve themselves into a little mystic seraglio composed of seven or eight aged beauties, subdued by the weight of their lack of occupation, and almost always do these persons pay tribute to their new masters.No young woman without a lover, no aged devout woman without a director.Oh! the Orientals are wiser than we are! Never does a pasha say: "We supped yesterday with the Aga of the Janissaries who is my sister's lover, and the vicar of the mosque who is my wife's director."Philosophical Dictionary: The Ecclesiastical Ministry THE ECCLESIASTICAL MINISTRY THE institution of religion exists only to keep mankind in order, and to make men merit the goodness of God by their virtue.Everything in a religion which does not tend towards this goal must be considered foreign or dangerous.
Instruction, exhortation, menaces of pains to come, promises of immortal beatitude, prayers, counsels, spiritual help are the only means ecclesiastics may use to try to make men virtuous here below, and happy for eternity.
All other means are repugnant to the liberty of the reason, to the nature of the soul, to the inalterable rights of the conscience, to the essence of religion and of the ecclesiastical ministry, to all the rights of the sovereign.
Virtue supposes liberty, as the carrying of a burden supposes active force.Under coercion no virtue, and without virtue no religion.Make a slave of me, I shall be no better for it.
The sovereign even has no right to use coercion to lead men to religion, which supposes essentially choice and liberty.My thought is subordinate to authority no more than is sickness or health.In order to disentangle all the contradictions with which books on canon law have been filled, and to fix our ideas on the ecclesiastical ministry, let us investigate amid a thousand equivocations what the Church is.
The Church is the assembly of all the faithful summoned on certain days to pray in common, and at all times to do good actions.
The priests are persons established under the authority of the sovereign to direct these prayers and all religious worship.
A numerous Church could not exist without ecclesiastics; but these ecclesiastics are not the Church.
It is no less evident that if the ecclesiastics, who are part of civil society, had acquired rights which might trouble or destroy society, these rights ought to be suppressed.
It is still more evident that, if God has attached to the Church prerogatives or rights, neither these rights nor these prerogatives should belong exclusively either to the chief of the Church or to the ecclesiastics, because they are not the Church, just as the magistrates are not the sovereign in either a democratic state or in a monarchy.
Finally, it is quite evident that it is our souls which are under the clergy's care, solely for spiritual things.