Some such reflections as these it is probable that Erasmus made when he observed, in one of his letters to Melancthon, that Plato, dreaming of a philosophical commonwealth, saw the impossibility of governing the multitude without deceiving them.  “Let not Christians lie,” says this great divine:  “but let it not be thought neither that every truth ought to be thrown out to the vulgar.” ("Non expedit omnem veritatem prodere vulgo.”) Scaevola and Varro were more explicit than Erasmus, and more reasonable than Plato.  They held not only that many truths were to be concealed from the vulgar, but that it was expedient the vulgar should believe many things that were false.  They distinguished at the same time, very rightly, between the regard due to religions already established, and the conduct to be held in the establishment of them.  The Greek assumed that men could not be governed by truth, and erected on this principle a fabulous theology.  The Romans were not of the same opinion.  Varro declared expressly that if he had been to frame a new institution, he would have framed it “ex naturae potius formula.”  But they both thought that things evidently false might deserve an outward respect when they are interwoven into a system of government.  This outward respect every good citizen will show them in such a case, and they can claim no more in any.  He will not propagate these errors, but he will be cautious how he propagates even truth in opposition to them.

There has been much noise made about free-thinking; and men have been animated in the contest by a spirit that becomes neither the character of divines nor that of good citizens, by an arbitrary tyrannical spirit under the mask of religious zeal, and by a presumptuous factious spirit under that of liberty.  If the first could prevail, they would establish implicit belief and blind obedience, and an Inquisition to maintain this abject servitude.  To assert antipodes might become once more as heretical as Arianism or Pelagianism; and men might be dragged to the jails of some Holy Office, like Galilei, for saying they had seen what in fact they had seen, and what every one else that pleased might see.  If the second could prevail, they would destroy at once the general influence of religion by shaking the foundations of it which education had laid.  These are wide extremes.  Is there no middle path in which a reasonable man and a good citizen may direct his steps?  I think there is.

Every one has an undoubted right to think freely—­nay, it is the duty of every one to do so as far as he has the necessary means and opportunities.  This duty, too, is in no case so incumbent on him as in those that regard what I call the first philosophy.  They who have neither means nor opportunities of this sort must submit their opinions to authority; and to what authority can they resign themselves so properly and so safely as to that of the laws and constitution of their country?  In general, nothing