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Second Letter I assumed, Sir, in my preceding Letter that I had in fact committed the errors against the faith of which I am accused, and I caused it to be seen that because these errors are not at all harmful to society they were not punishable before human justice. God has reserved for himself his own defense and the punishments of faults that oVend only him. It is a sacrilege for some men to make themselves into the avengers of the divinity, as if it needed their protection. Magistrates, Kings have no authority over souls, and as long as one is faithful to the Laws of society in this world, it is not at all up to them to meddle with what will happen to one in the other, where they have no inspectorship. If this principle were lost from sight, Laws made for the happiness of the human race would soon be its torment, and under their terrible inquisition, men, judged by their faith more than by their deeds, would all be at the mercy of whoever would want to oppress them. If the Laws do not have any authority over the sentiments of men in what pertains uniquely to Religion, they do not have any either over writings in which these sentiments are manifested. If the Authors of these Writings are punishable, it is never precisely for having taught error, because neither the Law nor its ministers judge about what is precisely only an error. The Author of the Letters Written from the Country appears to agree with this principle.* Perhaps he would even push it too far by granting that Politics and Philosophy could maintain the liberty of writing everything .** That is not what I wish to examine here. But here is how your Gentlemen and he twist the thing in order to authorize the judgment rendered against my Books and against me. They judge me less as a Christian than as a Citizen; they regard me less as impious toward God than as a rebel against the Laws; in me they see sin less than crime, and heresy less than disobedience. According to them I have attacked the Religion of the State; thus I have incurred the penalty provided by the Law against those who attack it. There, I believe, is the sense of what is intelligible in what they have said to justify their proceeding. 153 * In this regard, he says on page 22, I recognize my maxims well enough in those of the remonstrances ; and on page 29, he regards as incontestable that no one can be prosecuted for his ideas about Religion. ** Page 30. I see in that only three little diYculties. The Wrst, to know what that Religion of the State is; the second, to show how I attacked it; the third, to locate that Law in accordance with which I have been judged. What is the Religion of the State? It is the holy evangelical Reformation. Without contradiction these are very striking words. But what is the holy evangelical Reformation at Geneva today? Would you know, Sir, by any chance? In that case I congratulate you for it. As for me, I do not know. I used to believe I did know it; but I was mistaken as were many others, more learned than I on every other point, and not less ignorant on this one. When the Reformers separated from the Roman Church they accused it of error; and in order to correct that error at its source, they gave to Scripture a diVerent meaning than the one the Church gave it. They were asked by what authority they thus deviated from the accepted doctrine? They said that it was by their own authority, by that of their reason. They said that since the meaning of Bible was intelligible and clear to all men in what concerned salvation, each was a competent judge of doctrine and could interpret the Bible, which was its rule, in accordance with his individual mind; that all would agree this way about the essential things, and that those upon which they could not agree were not at all essential. Thus the individual mind is established as the sole interpreter of Scripture ; thus the authority of the Church is rejected; thus each is put under his own jurisdiction for doctrine. Such are the two fundamental points of the Reform: to acknowledge the Bible as rule of one’s belief, and not to admit any other...

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