Yours, &c., &c.,
A. Panizzi.
“B. M., Nov. 29th, 1855.
“My dear Haywood,
And so you are not afraid of the influence of the Church because Scepticism and Infidelity prevail? It is because they prevail that I fear the Concordat. If the Protestants were animated by religious fanaticism, as they were some centuries ago, they would resist and prefer martyrdom to submitting to Rome; but Philosophy, and Scepticism, and Infidelity, and all that, are all negative qualities. They do not give strength and courage.
Do you think all the Sceptics and Infidels in the world would fight like the Waldenses, the Hussites, and the Germans under the King of Sweden?
Moreover, the number of Infidels and Sceptics is limited to the upper classes generally. What hold can they have on the ignorant masses, who have only in view the gallows in this world and hell in the next?
There were Infidels and Sceptics enough in Spain and Italy in the sixteenth century, and the united tyranny of the temporal and spiritual power kept Italy obedient to Rome.
It was towards the end of the reign of Louis XIV. that the French Protestants were obliged to submit.