“How so?” cried the monk. “Are you a Jansenist?”
“I have another reason for it,” I replied. “You must know I am in the habit of writing from time to time, to a friend of mine in the country, all that I can learn of the maxims of your doctors. Now, although I do no more than simply report and faithfully quote their own words, yet I am apprehensive lest my letter should fall into the hands of some stray genius, who may take into his head that I have done you injury, and may draw some mischievous conclusion from your premises.”
“Away!” cried the monk; “no fear of danger from that quarter, I’ll give you my word for it. Know that what our fathers have themselves printed, with the approbation of our superiors, it cannot be wrong to read nor dangerous to publish.”
I write you, therefore, on the faith of this worthy father’s word of honor. But, in the mean time, I must stop for want of paper—not of passages; for I have got as many more in reserve, and good ones too, as would require volumes to contain them.—I am, &c.[[172]]
LETTER VIII.[[173]]
CORRUPT MAXIMS OF THE CASUISTS RELATING TO JUDGES—USURERS—THE CONTRACT MOHATRA—BANKRUPTS—RESTITUTION—DIVERS RIDICULOUS NOTIONS OF THESE SAME CASUISTS.
Paris, May 28, 1656.
Sir,—You did not suppose that anybody would have the curiosity to know who we were; but it seems there are people who are trying to make it out, though they are not very happy in their conjectures. Some take me for a doctor of the Sorbonne; others ascribe my letters to four or five persons, who, like me, are neither priests nor Churchmen. All these false surmises convince me that I have succeeded pretty well in my object, which was to conceal myself from all but yourself and the worthy monk, who still continues to bear with my visits, while I still contrive, though with considerable difficulty, to bear with his conversations. I am obliged, however, to restrain myself; for were he to discover how much I am shocked at his communications, he would discontinue them, and thus put it out of my power to fulfil the promise I gave you, of making you acquainted with their morality. You ought to think a great deal of the violence which I thus do to my own feelings. It is no easy matter, I can assure you, to stand still and see the whole system of Christian ethics undermined by such a set of monstrous principles, without daring to put in a word of flat contradiction against them. But after having borne so much for your satisfaction, I am resolved I shall burst out for my own satisfaction in the end, when his stock of information has been exhausted. Meanwhile, I shall repress my feelings as much as I possibly can; for I find that the more I hold my tongue, he is the more communicative. The last time I saw him, he told me so many things, that I shall have some difficulty in repeating them all. On the point of restitution you will find they have some most convenient principles. For, however the good monk palliates his maxims, those which I am about to lay before you really go to sanction corrupt judges, usurers, bankrupts, thieves, prostitutes and sorcerers—all of whom are most liberally absolved from the obligation of restoring their ill-gotten gains. It was thus the monk resumed the conversation:—
“At the commencement of our interviews, I engaged to explain to you the maxims of our authors for all ranks and classes; and you have already seen those that relate to beneficiaries, to priests, to monks, to domestics, and to gentlemen. Let us now take a cursory glance of the remaining, and begin with the judges.
“Now I am going to tell you one of the most important and advantageous maxims which our fathers have laid down in their favor. Its author is the learned Castro Palao, one of our four-and-twenty elders. His words are: ‘May a judge, in a question of right and wrong, pronounce according to a probable opinion, in preference to the more probable opinion? He may, even though it should be contrary to his own judgment—imo contra propriam opinionem.’”