Rousseau_contrat-social

of sacrilege, and not the conquest of unbelievers.
44. It should be noted that the clergy find their bond of union not so
much in formal assemblies, as in the communion of Churches. Communion
and excommunication are the social compact of the clergy, a compact
which will always make them masters of peoples and kings. All priests
who communicate together are fellow-citizens, even if they come from
opposite ends of the earth. This invention is a masterpiece of
statesmanship: there is nothing like it among pagan priests; who have
therefore never formed a clerical corporate body.
45. See, for instance, in a letter from Grotius to his brother (April
11, 1643), what that learned man found to praise and to blame in the De
Cive. It is true that, with a bent for indulgence, he seems to pardon
the writer the good for the sake of the bad; but all men are not so
forgiving.
46. "In the republic," says the Marquis d’Argenson, "each man is
perfectly free in what does not harm others." This is the invariable
limitation, which it is impossible to define more exactly. I have not
been able to deny myself the pleasure of occasionally quoting from this
manuscript, though it is unknown to the public, in order to do honour to
the memory of a good and illustrious man, who had kept even in the
Ministry the heart of a good citizen, and views on the government of his
country that were sane and right.
47. Cæsar, pleading for Catiline, tried to establish the dogma that the
soul is mortal: Cato and Cicero, in refutation, did not waste time in
philosophising. They were content to show that Cæsar spoke like a bad
citizen, and brought forward a doctrine that would have a bad effect on
the State. This, in fact, and not a problem of theology, was what the
Roman senate had to judge.
48. Marriage, for instance, being a civil contract, has civil effects
without which society cannot even subsist. Suppose a body of clergy
should claim the sole right of permitting this act, a right which every
intolerant religion must of necessity claim, is it not clear that in
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