915

Probability.—­They have some true principles; but they misuse them.  Now, the abuse of truth ought to be as much punished as the introduction of falsehood.

As if there were two hells, one for sins against love, the other for those against justice!

916

Probability.[376]—­The earnestness of the saints in seeking the truth was useless, if the probable is trustworthy.  The fear of the saints who have always followed the surest way (Saint Theresa having always followed her confessor).

917

Take away probability, and you can no longer please the world; give probability, and you can no longer displease it.

918

These are the effects of the sins of the peoples and of the Jesuits.  The great have wished to be flattered.  The Jesuits have wished to be loved by the great.  They have all been worthy to be abandoned to the spirit of lying, the one party to deceive, the others to be deceived.  They have been avaricious, ambitious, voluptuous. Coacervabunt tibi magistros.[377] Worthy disciples of such masters, they have sought flatterers, and have found them.

919

If they do not renounce their doctrine of probability, their good maxims are as little holy as the bad, for they are founded on human authority; and thus, if they are more just, they will be more reasonable, but not more holy.  They take after the wild stem on which they are grafted.

If what I say does not serve to enlighten you, it will be of use to the people.

If these[378] are silent, the stones will speak.

Silence is the greatest persecution; the saints were never silent.  It is true that a call is necessary; but it is not from the decrees of the Council that we must learn whether we are called, it is from the necessity of speaking.  Now, after Rome has spoken, and we think that she has condemned the truth, and that they have written it, and after the books which have said the contrary are censured; we must cry out so much the louder, the more unjustly we are censured, and the more violently they would stifle speech, until there come a Pope who hears both parties, and who consults antiquity to do justice.  So the good Popes will find the Church still in outcry.

The Inquisition and the Society[379] are the two scourges of the truth.

Why do you not accuse them of Arianism?  For, though they have said that Jesus Christ is God, perhaps they mean by it not the natural interpretation, but as it is said, Dii estis.

If my Letters are condemned at Rome, that which I condemn in them is condemned in heaven. Ad tuum, Domine Jesu, tribunal appello.

You yourselves are corruptible.

I feared that I had written ill, seeing myself condemned; but the example of so many pious writings makes me believe the contrary.  It is no longer allowable to write well, so corrupt or ignorant is the Inquisition!