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subject, the rest are not safe. Laws cannot make precise classification or exact enumeration of all opinions. Thus it is that such a power is necessarily arbitrary and, most of the time, will be converted into a reason for persecution. These are not unfounded suspicions. Look back at the barbarian centuries and it will be seen that the universities, the parliaments, the chancelleries, and the kings were determined to place proscriptions on the learned who were making physical discoveries and attacking the doctrines of Aristotle. Pedro Ramos Tritemio, Galileo, and innumerable others suffered what would not be believable if it were not made obvious to us beyond any doubt. And what was the fruit of such methods? Did the governments succeed in what they were attempting? Not in the least. Converts increased day by day, perhaps because of that very persecution.
In effect, if one wants to give credence to a doctrine, nothing else is needed but to forbid it. Men naturally suppose, and in this they do not deceive themselves, that a doctrine cannot be fought by reason when it is attacked by force. Strong spirits and courageous souls hold fast to forbidden doctrines, more for show than from conviction, because the spirit of novelty and making themselves the object of public excitement, attracting the attention of everyone, is so lively a passion, and as a final consequence an inappropriate remark that might have remained buried in the corner of a house degenerates into heresy that possibly undermines the supports of the social edifice because of the importance persecution bestows on it.
But does not discrediting the laws make them contemptible and inspire men to transgress them, depriving the laws of their stature? And is this not the outcome of the frank criticism that is made of them? When the laws have been dictated with calm and care, when they are the outcome of a free discussion, and when the spirit of partisanship and the fears that it instills in legislators have not contributed to their preparation, making the general interest subordinate to the private interest for reasons external to them, the fear of such outcomes is very remote; but to prevent it, governments must be very alert and not lose sight of public opinion, favoring it in everything. This is formed only by free discussion, which cannot be maintained when the government or some faction is granted the power of the press and condemns, with no sense of shame, those who either impugn the dogmas of the sect or throw light on its abuses of authority. On the contrary, when one proceeds without
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prejudice and in good faith, when one listens attentively and impartially, everything that is said or written in support of or against the laws is certainly on the road to being right. We never tire of repeating it: freedom of opinions regarding doctrine has never been disastrous for any people; but all the events of modern history prove with the greatest certainty the dangers and risks that nations have run when one faction has managed to take possession of the press, has dominated the government, and, availing itself of it, has silenced by terror those who could educate it.
But governments do not take warning despite such repeated examples. Always fixed in the present moment, they disregard the future. Their principal error consists in believing they can do anything, and it is enough to hint at its will for it to be promptly and faithfully obeyed. Perhaps they turn on themselves when there is no longer any remedy, when they have been discredited and have precipitated the nation into an abyss of evils. We conclude our reflections, then, recommending to the trustees of power that they be convinced that when they make crimes of opinions, they run the risk of punishing talents and virtues, of losing the idea, and of making famous the memory of their victims.
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| 4 | Discourse on the Means Ambition Uses to Destroy Liberty * |
Nothing is more important for a nation that has adopted the republican system, having just emerged from a despotic regime and having won its liberty by the force of arms, than to reduce the real or apparent reasons that might allow a great mass of authority and power to accumulate in the hands of a single man, giving him prestige and ascendency over all other citizens. The downfall of popular institutions has almost always originated in measures imprudently prescribed to preserve them, not because this preservation was not seriously and effectively attempted, but rather because the natural and consistent consequences of causes requisite to the downfall cannot be altered by the will of whoever sets them in motion.
The misfortune of republics consists now, and has always consisted, in the very limited moral and physical force entrusted to the depositaries of power. This necessity that naturally comes along with the system has, as with all human institutions, its advantages and disadvantages. These should be weighed faithfully before their adoption because, once accepted, it is necessary to consider the whole before making a change that, no matter how superficial it may be or may be imagined to be, opens the door to the total change of the system and is a shock that, although superficial, if repeated, slowly undermines the foundations of the social structure until it collapses. What is more attractive than being as far as possible from the control of authority and submitting one’s own person and actions as little as possible to the vigilance and decrees of the agents of power? And in what system, if not the republican, is more space enjoyed and greater breadth given to such privileges? In none, certainly.
Well then, this inestimable good is in greater danger of being lost
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than in any other type of government if free men are not very much on the alert to anticipate every kind of aspiration that tends, if only for a few moments, to reduce their liberty and to augment with these losses the power of the one who begins by directing them and will unfailingly end by dominating them.
The love of power, innate in man and always progressive in government, is much more terrible in republics than monarchies. The one who is sure he will always rule exerts himself little to increase his authority; but the one who sees, even from afar, the end of his greatness if the immense body of the nation and irresistible force of true public opinion do not curb him, always works indefatigably to occupy the highest office if he believes it within reach, or to prolong indefinitely its duration and expand its limits if he has managed to gain it.
The means one can put into play to arrive at this end are infinite, but among the most commonplace are making oneself popular to promote one’s rise, presenting oneself as necessary so as to maintain oneself in the post, and suggesting, so as to destroy the Constitution, the impossibility or ineffectiveness of the fundamental laws.
Among a new people who because of their inexperience have never known liberty, demagogues have an immense field on which to exercise their intrigues, giving free rein to their ambition. Look for popular passions and, once found, flatter them immoderately; proclaim principles, exaggerating them to a degree that makes them odious; and arouse suspicion of all those who have not advanced this far and profess or propound principles of moderation. Here is the means of making oneself popular in a nation made up of men who, for the first time, tread the difficult and always dangerous path of liberty.
What has been done in England, in France, in Spain, and, finally, in all the former Spanish colonies, now independent nations of America? Consider carefully the first period of their revolutions. Follow, keeping in view all the steps of those who afterward have been their masters, and it will be seen, without exception, that they have owed to no other means the popularity that served as stepping-stones to the summit of power.
In fact, people who have lived under an oppressive regime do not believe themselves free when they shake off the chains that held them yoked to the cart of the despot. Rather, they want to break all the ties that unite them with authority and even the necessary dependence that
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brings with it inequality of classes, an inequality owing not to laws but to the various physical and moral faculties with which nature has endowed each man. Because of this they listen with enthusiasm and elevate to all the public offices those who preach that chimerical equality of fortunes, pleasures, and ability to be anything,