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Chapter XXVIII: An Examination of what may be answer’d to the foregoing Chapter. - Pierre Bayle, A Philosophical Commentary on These Words of the Gospel, Luke 14.23, ‘Compel Them to Come In, That My House May Be Full’ [1686]

Edition used:

A Philosophical Commentary on These Words of the Gospel, Luke 14.23, ‘Compel Them to Come In, That My House May Be Full’, edited, with an Introduction by John Kilcullen and Chandran Kukathas (Indianapolis: Liberty Fund, 2005).

About Liberty Fund:

Liberty Fund, Inc. is a private, educational foundation established to encourage the study of the ideal of a society of free and responsible individuals.


Chapter XXVIII

An Examination of what may be answer’d to the foregoing Chapter.

First Answer. This way of Compelling wou’d scandalize the Publick.

I don’t suppose they’l answer me simply, that these Actions are evil; for this were saying nothing, since they maintain that pillaging the Houses of Hereticks, condemning ’em to Death or to the Gallys, of very wicked, as they are in themselves, become good Actions by being destin’d to the compelling Men in. We must say the same of every other Crime, if some particular Circumstance bar it not. Let’s see whether the Answer alledg’d in the Title be of this kind.<740>

I say not: For if the Publick can bear the Din and Roaring of a Rabble of Dragoons, who live at discretion on the Hereticks, who turn every thing topsy-turvy, thresh their Landlord, toss him in a blanket, beat Drums at his ears to keep him from sleeping; if the Publick can bear the sight of a world of People of both Sexes drag’d to Torture and Death, as during the Crusade against the Albigenses under the Auspices of St. Dominick, and during the Government of the Duke D’Alva in the Low Countrys,300 and upon several other occasions: if it can be pleas’d with seeing those burnt alive, who are condemn’d by the Inquisition, when it performs what it calls Autos de Fe with so much pomp; ’twou’d soon be reconcil’d to this other kind of Punishment. The Novelty might shock a little at first; but the Scandal wou’d soon be remov’d, by shewing the good effect which these Threats, executed now and then only on the more Obstinate, might produce.

Second Answer. Sodomy is essentially sinful, whereas Murder is sometimes warrantable.

To show the Invalidity of this Exception, I shall only consider Murder not in a general manner, but restrain’d to a certain Murder actually sinful; as that, for example, of a Citizen of Paris, a perfectly honest Man, a good Subject, a good Commonwealths-man, a good Catholick; but who shou’d believe, contrary to the Opinion of the King and Court, and all the Scholars of the Kindom, that the French Tongue in the days of Francis I was purer and more elegant<741> than that which is spoken now-a-days. I say, that shou’d the King order him to be hang’d purely for this reason, he’d be guilty of a crying Murder; and that this Murder is of an essentially sinful nature, it being impossible that any Murder thus circumstantiated and qualify’d shou’d be warrantable. Let’s leave this Person just the same in all other respects, only make him of a Catholick, as he was, a Hugonot; such as Anne du Bourg:301 We’l suppose the King orders him to be hang’d for this reason alone, that he is not a Catholick; the Convertists maintain that this is not a sinful, but a good Action. Consequently the same individual Murder, which might be essentially evil if it had not bin committed for the advantage of Religion, ceases to be a Sin when committed for the destroying of a Sect. In like manner then the unnatural sex Act, which were wicked if it had not bin design’d to bring over those in Error to the true Church, shall become a good Action when proceeding from this Motive.

Third Answer. Kings have not the same power over Pudicity, as over Life.

And why then wou’d the Romans order, that Virgins sentenc’d to death shou’d be first deflower’d by the common Hangman, as was actually executed on the Daughter of*Sejanus? However it be (for as I don’t set up for much<742> Reading, I can’t tell whether this Question has bin treated by the Canonists, and I leave the discussing it to any one that has a mind to shew himself) I think it strange, that Men who give Sovereigns a Right over Conscience, shou’d not allow ’em the same Power over the Parts of Shame as they have over the Tongue, the Hand, the Head, the Life of a Subject; for they may order the Hand to be cut off, the Tongue tore out, the Head sever’d from the Body, and the Life to be taken away by any other means. I see no reason why, if they can order the Hangman to tear a Virgin’s Tongue from the root, cut off her Arm or Nose, pluck out her Eyes, they mayn’t as well command him to deflower her; if they think this kind of Punishment, which wou’d be no Sin in her provided she did not consent but yielded to superior Force, likely to turn to a better account than any other Mark of Infamy.

Fourth Answer. They who executed this Command, wou’d commit a great Sin on account of the pleasure they might take in it.

But if this reason holds, the Dragoons shou’d not be allow’d to live at discretion on the Hereticks; for undoubtedly they take a deal of pleasure in getting drunk with their Wine, in domineering, in vilifying ’em, in squeezing out of ’em day after day all the Pence they have left.<743>

[300. ]Dominic founded in 1215 the Order of Preachers to convert the Albigenses, against whom Pope Innocent III had launched a crusade; Dominicans were active members of the Inquisition. The Duke of Alva was sent in 1557 by King Philip II of Spain to punish the rebellion of the Protestant heretics in the Netherlands; see above, p. 168.

[301. ]See above, p. 160, note 69.

[* ]Tradunt temporis ejus Auctores, quia Triumvirali supplicio affici virginem inauditum habebatur, a Carnifice laqueum juxta compressam. Tac. Ann. l. 5. [Tacitus, Annales, V.9: “It is recorded by authors of the period that, as it was an unheard-of thing for capital punishment to be inflicted on a virgin, she was violated by the executioner with the halter beside her.” Translated J. Jackson, Loeb Classical Library, pp. 150–51.]