Switzerland is one of the countries in which is enjoyed the greatest liberty of opinion. Is Switzerland a land of indifference? Was not the comparative firmness of its citizens' convictions remarked during the conflicts of the last century? Do not the United States bear in large characters upon their banner this inscription: liberty of conscience? America is not distinguished as a country without religion; on the contrary, it is blamed for the excursiveness of its faith, for the multiplicity and sometimes for the extravagance of its sects. Was it a sceptic that taught the inhabitants of the New World to respect religious convictions? Assuredly not! William Penn was shut up in the Tower of London for the crime of free thought. Set free from prison, he crossed the ocean. While intolerance was reigning still on both shores of the Atlantic, he founded in Pennsylvania a place of refuge for all proscribed opinions; and the germ has been fruitful. In vain I pass from old Europe to young America; I look, I observe, and I do not see that liberty is developed in proportion to the scepticism and the incredulity of nations. I seem, on the contrary, to see that there is perhaps most liberty where there is most real faith.
Some may dispute the validity of these conclusions by remarking that the condition of communities is a complex phenomenon depending upon divers causes. Let us simplify the question. Is it not, it will be said, the literary representatives of the spirit of doubt who have demanded and founded toleration? Is it not.... But it is not necessary for my supposed questioner to go on. If he is a Frenchman, he will name Voltaire. No doubt, freedom of opinion has been claimed by sceptics. They have served a good cause; let us know how to rejoice in the fact, and not to be unmindful of what there may have been in their work of noble impulses and generous inspirations. Let us remark however that every proscribed opinion puts forth a natural claim to the liberty of which it is deprived. But it is one thing to claim for one's-self a liberty one would gladly make use of to oppress others, and it is another thing to demand liberty seriously and for all. There was, as I am glad to believe, a certain natural generosity in the motives which led Voltaire to consecrate to noble causes a pen so often sold to evil. Still it is impossible not to suspect that if that apostle of toleration had had a principality under his own sway, the fact of thinking differently from the master would very soon have figured among the number of delinquencies.
The patriarch of Ferney wrote in favor of toleration; some friends of religious indifference have pleaded the cause of liberty of conscience: the fact is certain. But other writers, animated by a living faith, have also demanded liberty for all: the fact is not less certain. Some years ago, at nearly the same epoch, the Père Lacordaire and our own Alexander Vinet consecrated to this noble cause, the former the attractive brilliancy of his eloquence, the latter all the fineness of his delicate analyses. The friends of Lacordaire are gathering up the vibrations of that striking utterance which proclaimed: "Liberty slays not God."[33] Let us gather up also the good words, which, uttered on the borders of our lake, have gained entrance far and near into many hearts. I should like to take such and such a Parisian journalist, bring him into our midst, and get him to acquaint himself thoroughly with the results of our experience; I should like to conduct him to the cemetery of Clarens, place him by the tomb of Vinet, and tell him what that man was.—If, as he returned to his home, my journalist did not leave behind him at the French frontier, as contraband merchandise, all that he would have seen and learnt in our country, he would perhaps understand that the surest road by which to arrive at respect for the consciences of others is not indifference, but firmness of faith, in humility of heart, and largeness of thought. All the writers who have devoted their pen to the defence of the rights of the human soul have not therefore been sceptics. Without continuing this discussion of proper names, let us settle what is here the true place of writers. Before there are men who demand liberty and digest the theory of it, there must be other men who take it, and who suffer for having taken it. If liberty is consolidated with speech and pen, it is founded with tears and blood; and the sceptical apostles of toleration conveniently usurp the place of the martyrs of conviction. "What we want," rightly observes a revolutionary writer, "is free men, rather than liberators of humanity."[34]
In fact, liberty comes to us above all from those who have suffered for it. Its living springs are in the spirit of faith, and not, as they teach us, in the spirit of indifference. It is easy to understand, that where no one believes, the liberty to believe would not be claimed by any one.
Let us now endeavor to penetrate below facts, in order to bring back the discussion to sure principles. Let us ask what, in regard to liberty of conscience, are the natural consequences of faith, and the natural consequences of scepticism.
Faith does appear, at first sight, a source of intolerance. The man who believes, reckons himself in possession of the right in regard to truth, and to God; he has nothing to respect in error. Thus it is that belief naturally engenders persecution. This reasoning is specious, all the more as it is supported by numerous and terrible examples; but let us look at things more closely. Place yourselves face to face with any one of your convictions, no matter which; I hope there is no one of you so unfortunate as not to have any. Suppose that it were desired to impose upon you by force even the conviction which you have. Suppose that an officer of police came to say to you, pronouncing at the same time the words which best expressed your own thoughts: "you are commanded so to believe." What would happen? If you had never had a doubt of your faith, you would be tempted to doubt it, the moment any human power presumed to impose it upon you. The feeling of oppression would produce in your conscience a strong inclination to revolt. Let us analyze this feeling. You feel that it is words, not convictions, which are imposed by force; you feel that declarations extorted by fear from lying lips are an outrage to truth. You feel, in a word, that your belief is the right of God over you, and not the right of your neighbor. Men respect God's right over the souls of their fellow-men, in proportion as they are intelligent in their own faith. The fanaticism which would impose words by force is not an ardent but a blind faith. In order to bring it back into the paths of liberty, it is enough to restore to it its sight.
The establishment of the Christian religion furnishes a great example in support of our thesis. The Christians, when persecuted by the empire, had never allowed themselves to reply to the violence of power by the violence of rebellion. There came, however, and soon enough, a time when they were sufficiently numerous to defend themselves, and had withal the consciousness of their strength; but they had no will to conquer the world, except by the arms of martyrdom, and heroism, and obedience. This was not the case during a few years only, it is the history of three centuries, an ever-memorable page of human annals, in which all ages will be able to learn what are the true weapons of truth. Christendom, too often forgetful of its origin, has in later times allowed the fury of persecution to cloak itself under a pretended regard for sacred interests; but the remedy has proceeded from the very evil. The Christian conscience has protested, in the name of the Gospel, against the crimes of which the Gospel was the pretext, and the passions of men the cause. "We must bewail the misery and error of our time," already St. Hilary was exclaiming, in the fourth century. "Men are thinking that God has need of the protection of men.... The Church is uttering threats of banishment and imprisonment, and desiring to compel belief by force,—the Church, which itself acquired strength in exile and in prisons!"
True faith, then, possesses a principle by which it protests against abuses which it is sought to cloak under its name, and this protest comes at last to make itself heard. Faith suppressed, the passions will remain, for in order to be a saint, it is not enough to be a sceptic. The passions will look for other pretexts. Will not the spirit of doubt offer them such pretexts?
It seems at first sight that doubt must promote toleration, since it does not allow any importance to be attached to opinions. This is a specious conclusion, similar to that which placed in belief the source of intolerant passions. Let us once more reflect a little. The first effect of doubt is certainly to dispose the mind to leave a free course to all opinions; but disdain is not the way to respect, and only respect can give solid bases to the spirit of liberty. Believers are in the eyes of the sceptic weak-minded persons, whom he treats at first with a gentle and patronizing compassion. But these weak minds grow obstinate; the sceptic perceives that they do not bend before his superiority, and dare perhaps to consider themselves as his equals. Then irritation arises, and, beneath the velvet paw, one feels the piercing of the claw. The sceptic has in fact a dogma; he has but one, but one he has after all—the negation of truth. The faith of others is a protest against that single dogma on which he has concentrated all the powers of his conviction. He is passionately in earnest for this negation; he feels himself the representative of an idea, of which he must secure the triumph. Now come such surmisings as these: "Here are men who think themselves the depositaries of truth! These pretended believers—may they not be hypocrites?" Place men so disposed in positions of power; let them be the masters of society; what will follow? Beliefs are a cause of disturbances: what seemed at first an innocent weakness, takes then the character of a dangerous madness. For the politician, the temptation to extirpate this madness is not far off. "What if we were to get rid of this troublesome source of agitation! If we declared that the conscience of individuals belongs to the sovereign, what repose we should have in the State! If we proclaimed the true modern dogma, namely, that there is no dogma; if silencing, in short, fanatics who are behind their age, we decreed that every belief is a crime and every manifestation of faith a revolt, what quiet in society!" The incline is slippery, and what shall hold back the sceptic who is descending it?
Faith carries with it the remedy for fanaticism, but where shall be found the remedy for the fanaticism of doubt? In the claims of God? God is but a word, or a worthless hypothesis. In respect for the convictions of others? All conviction is but weakness and folly. All this, be well assured, gives much matter for reflection. When I hear some men who call themselves liberal, tracing the ideal of the society which they desire, the bare imagination of their triumph frightens me, for I can understand that that society would enjoy the liberty of the Roman empire, and the toleration of the Cæsars.