The sovereign is not the judge of the truth of doctrine; he may judge for himself, like all other men; but he ought to take cognizance of it in respect to everything which relates to civil order, whether in regard to purport or delivery.
This is the general rule from which magistrates ought never to depart. Nothing in a doctrine merits the attention of the police, except as it interests public order: it is the influence of doctrine upon manners that decides its importance. Doctrines which have a distant connection only with good conduct can never be fundamental. Truths which conduce to render mankind gentle, humane, obedient to the laws and to the government, interest the State, and proceed evidently from God.
SECTION VI.
Superintendence of the Magistracy Over the Administration of the Sacraments.
The administration of the sacraments ought to be submitted to the careful inspection of the magistrates in everything which concerns public order.
It has already been observed that the magistrate ought to watch over the form of the public registry of marriages, baptisms, and deaths, without any regard to the creed of the different inhabitants of the State.
Similar reasons in relation to police and good government—do they not require an exact registry in the hands of the magistracy of all those who make vows, and enter convents in those countries in which convents are permitted?
In the sacrament of repentance, the minister who refuses or grants absolution is accountable for his judgment only to God; and in the same manner, the penitent is accountable to God alone, whether he consummates it all, or does so well or ill.
No pastor, himself a sinner, ought to have the right of publicly refusing, on his own private authority, the eucharist to another sinner. The sinless Jesus Christ refused not the communion to Judas.
Extreme unction and the viaticum, if demanded or requested by the sick, should be governed by the same, rule. The simple right of the minister is to exhort the sick person, and it is the duty of the magistrate to take care that the pastor abuse not circumstances, in order to persecute the invalid.