Superstition In All Ages (1732) Part 14

CXLVIII.--HOW FATAL IT IS TO PERSUADE KINGS THAT THEY HAVE ONLY G.o.d TO FEAR IF THEY INJURE THE PEOPLE.

Negligent, ambitious, and perverse princes are the real causes of public adversities, of useless and unjust wars continually depopulating the earth, of greedy and despotic governments, destroying the benefactions of nature for men. The rapacity of the courts discourages agriculture, blots out industry, causes famine, contagion, misery; Heaven is neither cruel nor favorable to the wishes of the people; it is their haughty chiefs, who always have a heart of bra.s.s.

It is a notion destructive to wholesome politics and to the morals of princes, to persuade them that G.o.d alone is to be feared by them, when they injure their subjects or when they neglect to render them happy.

Sovereigns! It is not the G.o.ds, but your people whom you offend when you do evil. It is to these people, and by retroaction, to yourselves, that you do harm when you govern unjustly.

Nothing is more common in history than to see religious tyrants; nothing more rare than to find equitable, vigilant, enlightened princes. A monarch can be pious, very strict in fulfilling servilely the duties of his religion, very submissive to his priests, liberal in their behalf, and at the same time dest.i.tute of all the virtues and talents necessary for governing. Religion for the princes is but an instrument intended to keep the people more firmly under the yoke. According to the beautiful principles of religious morality, a tyrant who, during a long reign, will have done nothing but oppress his subjects, rob them of the fruits of their labor, sacrifice them without pity to his insatiable ambition; a conqueror who will have usurped the provinces of others, who will have slaughtered whole nations, who will have been all his life a real scourge of the human race, imagines that his conscience can be tranquillized, if, in order to expiate so many crimes, he will have wept at the feet of a priest, who will have the cowardly complaisance to console and rea.s.sure a brigand, whom the most frightful despair would punish too little for the evil which he has done upon earth.

CLXIX.--A RELIGIOUS KING IS A SCOURGE TO HIS KINGDOM.

A sincerely religious sovereign is generally a very dangerous chief for a State; credulity always indicates a narrow mind; devotion generally absorbs the attention which the prince ought to give to the ruling of his people. Docile to the suggestions of his priests, he constantly becomes the toy of their caprices, the abettor of their quarrels, the instrument and the accomplice of their follies, to which he attaches the greatest importance. Among the most fatal gifts which religion has bestowed upon the world, we must consider above all, these devoted and zealous monarchs, who, with the idea of working for the salvation of their subjects, have made it their sacred duty to torment, to persecute, to destroy those whose conscience made them think otherwise than they do. A religious bigot at the head of an empire, is one of the greatest scourges which Heaven in its fury could have sent upon earth. One fanatical or deceitful priest who has the ear of a credulous and powerful prince, suffices to put a State into disorder and the universe into combustion.

In almost all countries, priests and devout persons are charged with forming the mind and the heart of the young princes destined to govern the nations. What enlightenment can teachers of this stamp give? Filled themselves with prejudices, they will hold up to their pupil superst.i.tion as the most important and the most sacred thing, its chimerical duties as the most holy obligations, intolerance, and the spirit of persecution, as the true foundations of his future authority; they will try to make him a chief of party, a turbulent fanatic, and a tyrant; they will suppress at an early period his reason; they will premonish him against it; they will prevent truth from reaching him; they will prejudice him against true talents, and prepossess him in favor of despicable talents; finally they will make of him an imbecile devotee, who will have no idea of justice or of injustice, of true glory or of true greatness, and who will be devoid of the intelligence and virtue necessary to the government of a great kingdom. Here, in brief, is the plan of education for a child destined to make, one day, the happiness or the misery of several millions of men.

CL.--THE SHIELD OF RELIGION IS FOR TYRANNY, A WEAK RAMPART AGAINST THE DESPAIR OF THE PEOPLE. A DESPOT IS A MADMAN, WHO INJURES HIMSELF AND SLEEPS UPON THE EDGE OF A PRECIPICE.

Priests in all times have shown themselves supporters of despotism, and the enemies of public liberty. Their profession requires vile and submissive slaves, who never have the audacity to reason. In an absolute government, their great object is to secure control of the mind of a weak and stupid prince, in order to make themselves masters of the people. Instead of leading the people to salvation, priests have always led them to servitude.

For the sake of the supernatural t.i.tles which religion has forged for the most wicked princes, the latter have generally united with the priests, who, sure of governing by controlling the opinion of the sovereign himself, have charge of tying the hands of the people and of keeping them under their yoke. But it is vain that the tyrant, protected by the shield of religion, flatters himself with being sheltered from all the blows of fate. Opinion is a weak rampart against the despair of the people. Besides, the priest is the friend of the tyrant only so long as he finds his profit by the tyranny; he preaches sedition and demolishes the idol which he has made, when he considers it no longer in conformity with the interests of Heaven, which he speaks of as he pleases, and which never speaks but in behalf of his interests. No doubt it will be said, that the sovereigns, knowing all the advantages which religion procures for them, are truly interested in upholding it with all their strength. If religious opinions are useful to tyrants, it is evident that they are useless to those who govern according to the laws of reason and of equity. Is there any advantage in exercising tyranny?

Does not tyranny deprive princes of true power, the love of the people, in which is safety? Should not every rational prince perceive that the despot is but an insane man who injures himself? Will not every enlightened prince beware of his flatterers, whose object is to put him to sleep at the edge of the precipice to which they lead him?

CLI.--RELIGION FAVORS THE ERRORS OF PRINCES, BY DELIVERING THEM FROM FEAR AND REMORSE.

If the sacerdotal flatteries succeed in perverting princes and changing them into tyrants, the latter on their side necessarily corrupt the great men and the people. Under an unjust master, without goodness, without virtue, who knows no law but his caprice, a nation must become necessarily depraved. Will this master wish to have honest, enlightened, and virtuous men near him? No! he needs flatterers in those who approach him, imitators, slaves, base and servile minds, who give themselves up to his taste; his court will spread the contagion of vice to the inferior cla.s.ses. By degrees all will be necessarily corrupted, in a State whose chief is corrupt himself. It was said a long time ago that the princes seem ordained to do all they do themselves. Religion, far from being a restraint upon the sovereigns, ent.i.tles them, without fear and without remorse, to the errors which are as fatal to themselves as to the nations which they govern. Men are never deceived with impunity. Tell a prince that he is a G.o.d, and very soon he will believe that he owes nothing to anybody. As long as he is feared, he will not care much for love; he will recognize no rights, no relations with his subjects, nor obligations in their behalf. Tell this prince that he is responsible for his actions to G.o.d alone, and very soon he will act as if he was responsible to n.o.body.

CLII.--WHAT IS AN ENLIGHTENED SOVEREIGN?

An enlightened sovereign is he who understands his true interests; he knows they are united to those of his nation; he knows that a prince can be neither great, nor powerful, nor beloved, nor respected, so long as he will command but miserable slaves; he knows that equity, benevolence, and vigilance will give him more real rights over men than fabulous t.i.tles which claim to come from Heaven. He will feel that religion is useful but to the priests; that it is useless to society, which is often troubled by it; that it must be limited to prevent it from doing injury; finally, he will understand that, in order to reign with glory, he must make good laws, possess virtues, and not base his power on impositions and chimeras.

CLIII.--THE DOMINANT Pa.s.sIONS AND CRIMES OF PRIESTCRAFT. WITH THE a.s.sISTANCE OF ITS PRETENDED G.o.d AND OF RELIGION, IT a.s.sERTS ITS Pa.s.sIONS AND COMMITS ITS CRIMES.

The ministers of religion have taken great care to make of their G.o.d a terrible, capricious, and changeable tyrant; it was necessary for them that He should be thus in order that He might lend Himself to their various interests. A G.o.d who would be just and good, without a mixture of caprice and perversity; a G.o.d who would constantly have the qualities of an honest man or of a compliant sovereign, would not suit His ministers. It is necessary to the priests that we tremble before their G.o.d, in order that we have recourse to them to obtain the means to be quieted. No man is a hero to his valet de chambre. It is not surprising that a G.o.d clothed by His priests in such a way as to cause others to fear Him, should rarely impose upon those priests themselves, or exert but little influence upon their conduct. Consequently we see them behave themselves in a uniform way in every land; everywhere they devour nations, debase souls, discourage industry, and sow discord under the pretext of the glory of their G.o.d. Ambition and avarice were at all times the dominating pa.s.sions of the priesthood; everywhere the priest places himself above the sovereign and the laws; everywhere we see him occupied but with the interests of his pride, his cupidity, his despotic and vindictive mood; everywhere he subst.i.tutes expiations, sacrifices, ceremonies, and mysterious practices; in a word, inventions lucrative to himself for useful and social virtues. The mind is confounded and reason interdicted with the view of ridiculous practices and pitiable means which the ministers of the G.o.ds invented in every country to purify souls and render Heaven favorable to nations. Here, they practice circ.u.mcision upon a child to procure it Divine benevolence; there, they pour water upon his head to wash away the crimes which he could not yet have committed; in other places he is told to plunge himself into a river whose waters have the power to wash away all his impurities; in other places certain food is forbidden to him, whose use would not fail to excite celestial indignation; in other countries they order the sinful man to come periodically for the confession of his faults to a priest, who is often a greater sinner than he.

CLIV.--CHARLATANRY OF THE PRIESTS.

What would we say of a crowd of quacks, who every day would exhibit in a public place, selling their remedies and recommending them as infallible, while we should find them afflicted with the same infirmities which they pretend to cure? Would we have much confidence in the recipes of these charlatans, who would bawl out: "Take our remedies, their effects are infallible--they cure everybody except us?" What would we think to see these same charlatans pa.s.s their lives in complaining that their remedies never produce any effect upon the patients who take them? Finally, what idea would we form of the foolishness of the common man who, in spite of this confession, would continue to pay very high for remedies which will not be beneficial to him? The priests resemble alchemists, who boldly a.s.sert that they have the secret of making gold, while they scarcely have clothing enough to cover their nudity.

The ministers of religion incessantly declaim against the corruption of the age, and complain loudly of the little success of their teachings, at the same time they a.s.sure us that religion is the universal remedy, the true panacea for all human evils. These priests are sick themselves; however, men continue to frequent their stands and to have faith in their Divine antidotes, which, according to their own confession, cure n.o.body!

CLV.--COUNTLESS CALAMITIES ARE PRODUCED BY RELIGION, WHICH HAS TAINTED MORALITY AND DISTURBED ALL JUST IDEAS AND ALL SOUND DOCTRINES.

Religion, especially among modern people, in taking possession of morality, totally obscured its principles; it has rendered men unsocial from a sense of duty; it has forced them to be inhuman toward all those who did not think as they did. Theological disputes, equally unintelligible for the parties already irritated against each other, have unsettled empires, caused revolutions, ruined sovereigns, devastated the whole of Europe; these despicable quarrels could not be extinguished even in rivers of blood. After the extinction of Paganism the people established a religious principle of going into a frenzy, every time that an opinion was brought forth which their priests considered contrary to the holy doctrine. The votaries of a religion which preaches externally but charity, harmony, and peace, have shown themselves more ferocious than cannibals or savages every time that their instructors have excited them to the destruction of their brethren. There is no crime which men have not committed in the idea of pleasing the Deity or of appeasing His wrath. The idea of a terrible G.o.d who was represented as a despot, must necessarily have rendered His subjects wicked. Fear makes but slaves, and slaves are cowardly, low, cruel, and think they have a right to do anything when it is the question of gaining the good-will or of escaping the punishments of the master whom they fear. Liberty of thought can alone give to men humanity and grandeur of soul. The notion of a tyrant G.o.d can create but abject, angry, quarrelsome, intolerant slaves. Every religion which supposes a G.o.d easily irritated, jealous, vindictive, punctilious about His rights or His t.i.tle, a G.o.d small enough to be offended at opinions which we have of Him, a G.o.d unjust enough to exact uniform ideas in regard to Him, such a religion becomes necessarily turbulent, unsocial, sanguinary; the worshipers of such a G.o.d never believe they can, without crime, dispense with hating and even destroying all those whom they designate as adversaries of this G.o.d; they would believe themselves traitors to the cause of their celestial Monarch, if they should live on good terms with rebellious fellow-citizens. To love what G.o.d hates, would it not be exposing one's self to His implacable hatred? Infamous persecutors, and you, religious cannibals! will you never feel the folly and injustice of your intolerant disposition? Do you not see that man is no more the master of his religious opinions, of his credulity or incredulity, than of the language which he learns in childhood, and which he can not change? To tell men to think as you do, is it not asking a foreigner to express his thoughts in your language? To punish a man for his erroneous opinions, is it not punishing him for having been educated differently from yourself? If I am incredulous, is it possible for me to banish from my mind the reasons which have unsettled my faith?

If G.o.d allows men the freedom to d.a.m.n themselves, is it your business?

Are you wiser and more prudent than this G.o.d whose rights you wish to avenge?

CLVI.--EVERY RELIGION IS INTOLERANT, AND CONSEQUENTLY DESTRUCTIVE OF BENEFICENCE.

There is no religious person who, according to his temperament, does not hate, despise, or pity the adherents of a sect different from his own.

The dominant religion (which is never but that of the sovereign and the armies) always makes its superiority felt in a very cruel and injurious manner toward the weaker sects. There does not exist yet upon earth a true tolerance; everywhere a jealous G.o.d is worshiped, and each nation believes itself His friend to the exclusion of all others.

Every nation boasts itself of worshiping the true G.o.d, the universal G.o.d, the Sovereign of Nature; but when we come to examine this Monarch of the world, we perceive that each organization, each sect, each religious party, makes of this powerful G.o.d but an inferior sovereign, whose cares and kindness extend themselves but over a small number of His subjects who pretend to have the exclusive advantage of His favors, and that He does not trouble Himself about the others.

The founders of religions, and the priests who maintain them, have intended to separate the nations which they indoctrinated, from other nations; they desired to separate their own flock by distinctive features; they gave to their votaries G.o.ds inimical to other G.o.ds as well as the forms of worship, dogmas, ceremonies, separately; they persuaded them especially that the religions of others were unG.o.dly and abominable. By this infamous contrivance, these ambitious impostors took exclusive possession of the minds of their votaries, rendered them unsocial, and made them consider as outcasts all those who had not the same ideas and form of worship as their own. This is the way religion succeeded in closing the heart, and in banishing from it that affection which man ought to have for his fellow-being. Sociability, tolerance, humanity, these first virtues of all morality are totally in compatible with religious prejudices.

CLVII.--ABUSE OF A STATE RELIGION.

Every national religion has a tendency to make man vain, unsocial, and wicked; the first step toward humanity is to permit each one to follow peacefully the worship and the opinions which suit him. But such a conduct can not please the ministers of religion, who wish to have the right to tyrannize over even the thoughts of men. Blind and bigoted princes, you hate, you persecute, you devote heretics to torture, because you are persuaded that these unfortunate ones displease G.o.d. But do you not claim that your G.o.d is full of kindness? How can you hope to please Him by such barbarous actions which He can not help disapproving of? Besides, who told you that their opinions displease your G.o.d? Your priests told you! But who guarantees that your priests are not deceived themselves or that they do not wish to deceive you? It is these same priests! Princes! it is upon the perilous word of your priests that you commit the most atrocious and the most unheard-of crimes, with the idea of pleasing the Deity!

CLVIII.--RELIGION GIVES LICENSE TO THE FEROCITY OF THE PEOPLE BY

LEGITIMIZING IT, AND AUTHORIZES CRIME BY TEACHING THAT IT CAN BE USEFUL TO THE DESIGNS OF G.o.d.

"Never," says Pascal, "do we do evil so thoroughly and so willingly as when we do it through a false principle of conscience." Nothing is more dangerous than a religion which licenses the ferocity of the people, and justifies in their eyes the blackest crimes; it puts no limits to their wickedness as soon as they believe it authorized by their G.o.d, whose interests, as they are told, can justify all their actions. If there is a question of religion, immediately the most civilized nations become true savages, and believe everything is permitted to them. The more cruel they are, the more agreeable they suppose themselves to be to their G.o.d, whose cause they imagine can not be sustained by too much zeal. All religions of the world have authorized countless crimes. The Jews, excited by the promises of their G.o.d, arrogated to themselves the right of exterminating whole nations; the Romans, whose faith was founded upon the oracles of their G.o.ds, became real brigands, and conquered and ravaged the world; the Arabians, encouraged by their Divine preceptor, carried the sword and the flame among Christians and idolaters. The Christians, under pretext of spreading their holy religion, covered the two hemispheres a hundred times with blood. In all events favorable to their own interests, which they always call the cause of G.o.d, the priests show us the finger of G.o.d. According to these principles, religious bigots have the luck of seeing the finger of G.o.d in revolts, in revolutions, ma.s.sacres, regicides, prost.i.tutions, infamies, and, if these things contribute to the advantage of religion, we can say, then, that G.o.d uses all sorts of means to secure His ends.

Is there anything better calculated to annihilate every idea of morality in the minds of men, than to make them understand that their G.o.d, who is so powerful and so perfect, is often compelled to use crime to accomplish His designs?