 Book 4. CHAPTER IV. THE ROMAN COMMISSION We have no very trustworthy records of the early times of Rome. There is even great probability that most of the things which have been handed down are fables, and in general the most instructive part of the annals of nations, which is the history of their institution, is the most defective. Experience every day teaches us from what causes spring the revolutions of empires, but as nations are no longer in process of formation we have scarcely anything but conjectures to explain how they have been formed. The customs which are found established at least testify that these customs had a beginning. Of the traditions that go back to these origins, those which the greatest authorities countenance, and which the strongest reasons confirm, ought to pass as the most undoubted. These are the principles which I have tried to follow in inquiring how the freest and most powerful nation in the world exercised its supreme power. After the foundation of Rome, the growing republic, that is, the army of the founder, composed of albans, sebines, and foreigners, was divided into three classes, which from this division took the name of tribes. Each of these tribes was divided into ten curiae, and each curiae into decuriae, at the head of which were placed curians and decurians. Besides this, a body of one hundred horsemen or knights called a centuriae was drawn from each tribe, once we see that these divisions, not very necessary in a town, were at first only military. But it seems that an instinct of greatness induced the little town of Rome from the first to adopt a polity suitable to the capital of the world. From this first division an inconvenience soon resulted. The tribe of the albans and that of the sebines, remaining always in the same condition, while that of the foreigners increased continually through perpetual accessions, the last soon outnumbered the two others. The remedy which Servius found for this dangerous abuse was to change the mode of division, and for the division by races, which he'd abolished, to substitute another derived from the districts of the city occupied by each tribe. Instead of three tribes be made four, each of which occupied one of the hills of Rome and bore its name. Thus in remedying the existing inequality he also prevented it for the future, and in order that this might be a division not only of localities, but of men, he prohibited the inhabitants of one quarter from removing into another, which prevented the races from being mingled. He also doubled the three old centuriae of Calvary and added twelve others to them, but still under the old names, a simple and judicious means by which he affected a distinction between the body of knights and that of the people, without making the latter murmur. To these four urban tribes Servius added fifteen others, called rural tribes, because they were formed of inhabitants of the country, divided into so many cantons. Afterward as many new ones were formed, and the Roman people were at length divided into thirty-five tribes, a number which remained fixed until the close of the Republic. From this distinction between the urban and the rural tribes resulted in effect worthy of notice, because there is no other instance of it, and because Rome owed to it both the preservation of her manners and the growth of her empire. It might be supposed that the urban tribes soon irrigated to themselves the power and the honors, and were ready to disparage the rural tribes. It was quite the reverse. We know the taste of the old Romans for a country life. This taste they derived from their wise founder, who united with liberty, rural and military works, and relegated, so to speak, to the towns, arts, trades, intrigue, wealth, and slavery. Thus every imminent man that Rome had, being a dweller in the fields and a tiller of the soil, it was customary to seek in the country only for the defenders of the Republic. Thus every imminent man that Rome had, being a dweller in the fields and a tiller of the soil, it was customary to seek in the country only for the defenders of the Republic. This condition, being that of the worthiest patricians, was honored by everyone. The simple and laborious life of villagers was preferred to the lax and indolent life of the burgesses of Rome, and many who would have been only captured proletarians in the city became as laborers in the fields, respected citizens. It is not without reason, said Vero, that our high-minded ancestors established in the village the nursery of those hardy and valiant men who defended them in time of war, and sustained them in time of peace. Plenty says positively that the rural tribes were honored because of the men that composed them, while the worthless, whom it was desired to disgrace, were transferred as a mark of ignominy into the urban tribes. The Sabine, Apius Claudius, having come to settle in Rome, was there loaded with honors and enrolled in a rural tribe, which afterward took the name of his family. Lastly, all the freedmen entered the urban tribes, never the rural, and during the whole of the Republic there is not a single example of any of these freedmen attaining a magistracy, although they had become citizens. This maxim was excellent, but was pushed so far that it linked the change and certainly an abuse in government resulted from it. First the censors, after having long irrigated the right of transferring citizens arbitrarily from one tribe to another, allowed the majority to be enrolled in whichever they pleased, a permission which certainly was in no way advantageous, and took away one of the greatest resources of the censorship. Further, since the great and powerful all enrolled themselves in the rural tribes, while the freedmen who had become citizens remained with the populace in the urban ones, the tribes in general had no longer any district or territory, but all were so endermingled that it was impossible to distinguish the members of each except by the registers, so that the idea of the word tribe passed us from the real to the personal, or rather became almost a chimera. Moreover, it came about that the urban tribes, being close at hand, were often the most powerful in the commissia, and sold the state to those who stooped to buy the votes of the mob of which they were composed. With regard to the curiae, the founder having formed ten in each tribe, the whole Roman people, at that time enclosed in the walls of the city, consisted of thirty curiae, each of which had its temples, its gods, its officers, its priests, and its festivals called Compitalia, resembling the Paganalia which the rural tribes had afterward. In the new division of Sirius, the number thirty being incapable of equal distribution into four tribes, he was unwilling to touch them, and the curiae, being independent of the tribes, became another division of the inhabitants of Rome. But there was no question of curiae either in the rural tribes or in the people composing them, because the tribes having become a purely civil institution, and another mode of living troops having been introduced, the military divisions of Romulus were found superfluous. Thus, although every citizen was enrolled in a tribe, it was far from being the case that each was enrolled in a curiae. Sirius made yet a third division, which had no relation to the two proceeding, but became by its effects the most important of all. He distributed the whole Roman people into six classes, which he distinguished not by the place of residence, nor by the men, but by property, so that the first classes were filled with rich men, the last with poor men, and the intermediate ones with those who enjoyed a moderate fortune. These six classes were subdivided into one hundred and ninety-three other bodies called centuriae, and these bodies were so distributed that the first class alone comprised more than a half, and the last formed only one. It thus happened that the class least numerous in men had most centuriae, and that the last entire class was counted as only one subdivision, although it alone contained more than a half of the inhabitants of Rome. In order that the people might not so clearly discern the consequences of this last form, Sirius affected to give it a military aspect. He introduced in the second class two centuriae of armorers, and two of makers of instruments of war in the fourth. In each class, except the last, he distinguished the young and the old, that is to say, those who were obliged to bear arms, and those who were exempted by law on account of age, a distinction which, more than that of property, gave rise to the necessity of frequently repeating the census or enumeration. Finally he required that the assembly should be held in the campus marshes, and that all who were qualified for service by age should gather there with their arms. The reason why he did not follow in the last class the same division in the seniors and juniors is that the honor of bearing arms for the country was not granted to the populace of which it was composed. It was necessary to have homes in order to obtain the right of defending them, and out of those innumerable troops of beggars with which the armies of kings nowadays glitter. There is perhaps not one, but would have been driven with scorn from a Roman cohort when soldiers were defenders of liberty. Yet again there was in the last class a distinction between the proletarii and those who were called capite censi. The former, not altogether destitute, at least applied citizens to the state, sometimes even soldiers in pressing need. As for those who had nothing at all and could only be counted by heads, they were regarded as altogether unimportant, and Marius was the first who condescended to enroll them. Without deciding here whether this third enumeration was good or bad in itself, I think I may affirm that nothing but the simple manners of the early Romans, their disinterestedness, their taste for agriculture, their contempt for commerce, and for the ardent pursuit of gain, could have rendered it practicable. In what modern nation would rapacious greed, restlessness of spirit, intrigue, continual changes of residence, and the perpetual revolutions of fortune have allowed such an institution to endure for twenty years without the whole state being subverted. It is indeed necessary to observe carefully that morality and the censorship, more powerful than this institution, corrected its imperfections in Rome, and that many a rich man was relegated to the class of the poor for making too much display of his wealth. From all this we may easily understand why mention is scarcely ever made of more than five classes, although there were really six. The sixth, which furnished neither soldiers to the army nor voters to the campus marshals, and which was almost useless in the republic, rarely counted as anything. Such were the different divisions of the Roman people. Let us see now what effect they produced in the assemblies. These assemblies, lawfully convened, were called commissia. They were usually held in the Forum of Rome or in the campus marshals, and were distinguished as commissia curiata, commissia sin-tiriata, and commissia tributa, in accordance with that one of the three forms by which they were regulated. The commissia curiata were founded by Romulus, the commissia sin-tiriata by Servius, and the commissia tributa by the tribunes of the people. No law received sanction, no magistrate was elected, except in the commissia. And as there was no citizen who was not enrolled in a curia, in a sin-tiriata, or in a tribe, it follows that no citizen was excluded from the right of voting, and that the Roman people were truly sovereign, de jure, and de facto. In order that the commissia might be lawfully assembled, and that what was done in them might have the force of law, three conditions were necessary. The first, that the body or magistrate which convoked them should be invested with the necessary authority for that purpose. The second, that the assembly should be held on one of the days permitted by law. The third, that the auguries should be favorable. The reason for the first regulation need not be explained. The second is a matter of police. Thus it was not permitted to hold the commissia on feast days and market days, when the country people, coming to Roman business, had no leisure to pass the day in the place of assembly. By the third, the Senate kept in check a proud and turbulent people, and seasonably tempered the ardor of seditious tribunes, but the latter found more than one means of freeing themselves from this constraint. Laws in the election of chiefs were not the only points submitted for the decision of the commissia. The Roman people having usurped the most important functions of government, the fate of Europe may be said to have been determined in their assemblies. This variety of subjects gave scope for the different forms which these assemblies took according to the matters which had to be decided. To judge of these different forms, it is sufficient to compare them, Romulus, in instituting the curiae, desired to restrain the Senate by means of the people, and the people by means of the Senate, while ruling equally overall. He therefore gave the people by this form all the authority of numbers in order to balance that of power and wealth which he left to the patricians. But according to the spirit of a monarchy, he left still more advantage to the patricians through the influence of their clients in securing a plurality of votes. This admirable institution of patrons and clients was a masterpiece of policy and humanity, without which the patrician order so opposed to the spirit of a republic could not have subsisted. Rome alone has had the honor of giving to the world such a fine institution, from which there never resulted any abuse, and which notwithstanding has never been followed. Since the form of the assembly of the curiae subsisted under the kings, down to Servius, and since the reign of the last Tarkin is not considered legitimate, the royal laws were on this account generally distinguished by the names of legis curiate. Under the republic the assembly of the curiae, all was limited to the four urban tribes, and containing only the Roman populace, did not correspond either with the Senate, which was at the head of the patricians, or with the tribunes, who, although plebeians, were at the head of the middle class citizens. It therefore fell into disrepute, and its degradation was such that its 30 assembled lictors did what the comitia curiata ought to have done. The comitia sin curiata was so favorable to the aristocracy, that we do not at first see why the Senate did not always prevail in the comitia which bore that name, and by which the consuls, censors, and other curule magistrates were elected. Indeed, of the 193's centurie, which formed the six classes of the whole Roman people, the first class comprising 98, and the votes being counted only by the centurie, this first class alone outnumbered in votes all the others. When all these centurie were in agreement, the recording of votes was even discontinued, what the minority had decided passed for a decision of the multitude, and we may say that in the comitia sin curiata affairs were regulated rather by the majority of crowns, ecu, than of votes. But this excessive power was moderated in two ways. First, the tribunes usually, and a great number of plebeians always, being in the class of the rich, balance the influence of the patricians in this first class. The second means consisted in this, that instead of making the centurie vote according to their order, which would have caused the first class to begin always, one of them was drawn by lot and proceeded alone to the election, after which all the centurie, being summoned on another day according to their rank, renewed the election and usually confirmed it. Thus the power of example was taken away from rank to be given to lot, according to the principle of democracy. From this practice resulted yet another advantage. The citizens from the country had time between the two elections to gain information about the merits of the candidate provisionally chosen and so record their votes with knowledge of the case. But under the pretense of dispatch this practice came to be abolished and the two elections took place on the same day. The comitia tributa were properly the council of the Roman people. They were convoked only by the tribunes, in them the tribunes were elected and passed their plebiscita. Not only had the senate no status in them, it had not even a right to attend, and being compelled to obey laws on which they could not vote, the senators were, in this respect, less free than the meanest citizens. This injustice was altogether impolitic and alone suffice to invalidate the decrees of a body to which all the citizens were not admitted. If all the patricians had taken part in these comitia according to the rights which they had as citizens, having become in that case simple individuals, they would have scarcely influenced a form in which votes were counted by the head and in which the meanest proletarian had as much power as the chief of the senate. We see then, that besides the order which resulted from these different divisions for the collection of the votes of so great a people, these divisions were not reduced to forms and material in themselves, but that each had results corresponding with the purposes for which it was chosen. Without entering upon this in greater detail, it follows from the preceding explanations that the comitia tributa were more favorable to popular government and the comitia sin tirata to aristocracy. With regard to the comitia curiata, in which the Roman populace alone formed the majority, as they served only to favor tyranny and evil designs, they deserved to fall into discredit, the seditious themselves refraining from a means which would too plainly reveal their projects. It is certain that the full majesty of the Roman people was found only in the comitia sin tirata, which were alone complete, seeing that the rural tribes were absent from the comitia curiata and the senate and the patricians from the comitia tributa. The mode of collecting the votes among the early Romans was as simple as their manners, although still less simple than in Sparta. Each gave his vote with a loud voice and a recording officer duly registered it. A majority of votes in each tribe determined the suffrage of the tribe. A majority of votes among the tribes determined the suffrage of the people, and so with the curia sin tirata. This was a good practice so long as probity prevailed among the citizens, and everyone was ashamed to record his vote publicly for an unjust measure or an unworthy man. When the people were corrupted and the votes were bought, it was expedient that they should be given secretly in order to restrain purchasers by distrust and give naves an opportunity of not being traders. I know that Cicero blames this change and tributes to it in part the fall of the republic, but although I feel the weight which Cicero's authority ought to have in this matter, I cannot adopt his opinion. On the contrary, I think that through not making sufficient changes of this kind the downfall of the state was hastened as the regimen of healthy persons is unfit for invalids, so we should not desire to govern or corrupt people by the laws which suit a good nation. Nothing supports this maxim better than the duration of the Republic of Venice, only the semblance of which now exists solely because its laws are suitable to none but worthless men. Tablets therefore were distributed to the citizens by means of which each could vote without his decision being known. New formalities were also established for the collection of tablets, the counting of votes, the comparison of numbers, etc., but this did not prevent suspicions as to the fidelity of the officer's charge with these duties. At length edicts were framed the multitude of which proves their uselessness. Toward the closing years they were often compelled to resort to extraordinary expedience in order to supply the defects of the laws. Sometimes prodigies were feigned, but this method, which might impose on the people, did not impose on those who govern them. Sometimes an assembly was hastily summoned before the candidates had had time to canvas. Sometimes a whole sitting was consumed in talking when it was seen that the people having been won over were ready to pass a bad resolution. But it last ambition evaded everything, and it seems incredible that in the midst of so many abuses this great nation, by favor of its ancient institutions, did not cease to elect magistrates, to pass laws, to judge causes, and to dispatch public and private affairs with almost as much facility as the Senate itself could have done. End of Chapter 4 Fourth Book Chapter 5 of The Social Contract This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org Recording by Daniel Watkins The Social Contract by Jean-Jacques Rousseau Fourth Book Chapter 5 The Tribunship When an exact relation cannot be established among the constituent parts of the state, or when indestructible causes are incessantly changing their relations, a special magistracy is instituted which is not incorporated with the others, but which replaces each term in its true relation, forming a connection or middle term either between the prince and the people, or between the prince and the sovereign, or if necessary between both at once. This body, which I shall call the Tribunship, is the guardian of the laws and of the legislative power. It sometimes serves to protect the sovereign against the government, as the tribunes of the people did in Rome, sometimes to support the government against the people, as the Council of Ten now does in Venice, and sometimes to maintain an equilibrium among all parts, as the Ephors did in Sparta. The Tribunship is not a constituent part of the state, and should have no share in the legislative or in the executive power, but it is in this very circumstance that its own power is greatest, for while unable to do anything, it can prevent everything. It is more sacred and more venerated as defender of the laws than the prince that executes them and the sovereign that enacts them. This was very clearly seen in Rome when those proud patricians, who always despised the people as a whole, were forced to bow before a simple officer of the people, who had neither auspices nor jurisdiction. The Tribunship, wisely moderated, is the strongest support of a good constitution, but if its power be ever so little in excess, it overthrows everything. Weakness is not natural to it, and provided it has some power, it is never less than it should be. It degenerates into tyranny when it usurps the executive power, of which it is only the moderator, and when it wishes to make the laws which it should only defend. The enormous power of the Ephors, which was without danger so long as Sparta preserved her morality, accelerated the corruption when it had begun. The blood of Aegis, slain by these tyrants, was avenged by his successor, but the crime and the punishment of the Ephors are like hasten the fall of the Republic, and after clear menace, Sparta was no longer of any account. Rome, again, perished in the same way, and the excessive power of the Tribunes, usurped by degrees, served at last with the aid of laws framed on behalf of liberty, as a shield for the emperors who destroyed her. As for the Council of Ten in Venice, it is a tribunal of blood horrible both to the patricians and to the people, and, far from resolutely defending the laws, it has only served since their degradation for striking secret blows which men dare not remark. The Tribune ship, like the government, is weakened by the multiplication of its members. When the Tribunes of the Roman people, at first two in number, and afterward five, wished to double this number, the Senate allowed them to do so, being quite sure of controlling some by means of others, which did not fail to happen. The best means of preventing the usurpations of such a formidable body, a means of which no government has hitherto availed itself, would be not to make this body permanent, but to fix intervals during which it should remain suspended. These intervals, which should not be long enough to allow abuses time to become established, can be fixed by law in such a manner that it may be easy to shorten them in case of need by means of extraordinary commissions. This method appears to me free from objection, because, as I have said, the Tribune ship, forming no part of the Constitution, can be removed without detriment, and it seems to me efficacious, because a magistrate newly established does not start with the power that his predecessor had, but with that which the law gives him. End of chapter five. Fourth book, chapter six of the social contract. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information, or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Recording by Daniel Watkins. The social contract by Jean-Jacques Rousseau. Fourth book, chapter six. The dictatorship. The inflexibility of the laws, which prevents them from being adapted to emergencies, may in certain cases render them pernicious, and thereby cause the ruin of the state in a time of crisis. The order and tardiness of the forms require a space of time, which circumstances sometimes do not allow. A thousand cases may arise for which the legislator has not provided, and to perceive that everything cannot be foreseen is a very needful kind of foresight. We must therefore not desire to establish political institutions so firmly as to take away the power of suspending their effects. Even Sparta allowed her laws to sleep. But only the greatest dangers can outweigh that of changing the public order, and the sacred power of the laws should never be interfered with except when the safety of the country is at stake. In these rare and obvious cases, the public security is provided for by a special act, which entrusts the care of it to the most worthy man. This commission can be conferred in two ways, according to the nature of the danger. If an increase in the activity of the government suffices to remedy this evil, we may concentrate it in one or two of its members. In that case it is not the authority of the laws which has changed, but only the form of their administration. But if the danger is such that the formal process of law is an obstacle to our security, a supreme head is nominated, who may silence all the laws and suspend for a moment the sovereign authority. In such a case the general will is not doubtful, and it is clear that the primary intention of the people is that the state should not perish. In this way the suspension of the legislative power does not involve its abolition. The magistrate who silences it can make it speak. He dominates it without having power to represent it. He can do everything but make laws. The first method was employed by the Roman senate when it charged the consuls by a consecrated formula to provide for the safety of the republic. The second was adopted when one of the two consuls nominated a dictator, a usage of which Alba had furnished the president to Rome. At the beginning of the republic they very often had recourse to the dictatorship because the state had not yet a sufficiently firm foundation to be able to maintain itself by the vigor of its constitution alone. Public morality rendering superfluous at that time many precautions that would have been necessary at another time. There was no fear either that a dictator would abuse his authority or that he would attempt to retain it beyond the term. On the contrary it seemed that so great power must be a burden to him who was invested with it, such haste did he make to divest himself of it, as if to take the place of the laws were an office too arduous and too dangerous. Therefore it is the danger not its abuse but of its degradation that makes me blame the indiscreet use of this supreme magistracy in early times. For while it was freely used at elections, at dedications and in purely formal matters, there was reason to fear that it would become less formidable in case of need and that the people would grow accustomed to regard as an empty title that which was only employed in empty ceremonies. Toward the close of the republic the Romans having become more circumspect used the dictatorship sparingly with as little reason as they had formally been prodigal of it. It was easy to see that their fear was ill founded that the weakness of the capital then constituted its security against the magistrates whom it had within it, that a dictator could in certain cases defend the public liberty without ever being able to assail it, and that the chains of Rome would not be forged in Rome itself but in her armies. The slight resistance which Marius made against Silla and Pompey against Caesar showed clearly what might be looked for from the authority within against the force without. This error caused them to commit great mistakes, such for example was that of not appointing a dictator in the Catalan affair. For as it was only a question of the interior of the city, or at most of some province of Italy, a dictator with the unlimited authority that the laws gave him would have easily broken up the conspiracy which was suppressed only by a combination of happy accidents such as human prudence could not have foreseen. Instead of that the senate was content to entrust all its power to the consuls, once it happened that Cicero, in order to act effectively, was constrained to exceed his authority in a material point, and that although the first transports of joy caused his conduct to be approved, he was afterward justly called to account for the blood of citizens, shed contrary to the laws, a reproach which could not have been brought against the dictator. But the consuls' eloquence won over everybody, and he himself, although a Roman, preferred his own glory to his country's good, and sought not so much the most certain and legitimate means of saving the state as the way to secure the whole credit of this affair. Therefore he was justly honoured as the liberator of Rome, and justly punished as a violator of the laws. However brilliant his recall may have been, it was certainly a pardon. Moreover, in whatever way this important commission may be conferred, it is important to fix its duration at a very short term which can never be prolonged. In the crises which cause it to be established, the state is soon destroyed or saved, and the urgent need having passed away, the dictatorship becomes tyrannical or useless. In Rome, the dictator's held office for six months only, and the majority abdicated before the end of this term. Had the term been longer, they would perhaps have been tempted to prolong it still further, as the dissenters did their term of one year. The dictator only had time to provide for the necessity which had led to his election. He had no time to think of other projects. End of Chapter 6 Fourth Book Chapter 7 of The Social Contract This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org Recording by Daniel Watkins The Social Contract by Jean-Jacques Rousseau Fourth Book Chapter 7 The Censorship Just as the declaration of the general will is made by the law, the declaration of public opinion is made by the censorship. Public opinion is a kind of law of which the censor is minister, and which he only applies to particular cases in the manner of the prince. The censorial tribunal, then, far from being the arbiter of the opinion of the people, only declares it, and so soon as it departs from this position, its decisions are fruitless and ineffectual. It is useless to distinguish the character of a nation from the objects of its esteem. For all these things depend on the same principle, and are necessarily intermixed. In all the nations of the world it is not nature, but opinion which decides the choice of their pleasures. Reform men's opinions and their manners will be purified of themselves. People always like what is becoming or what they judge to be so, but it is in this judgment that they make mistakes. The question, then, is to guide their judgment. He who judges of manners, judges of honor, and he who judges of honor takes his law from opinion. The opinions of a nation spring from its constitution. Although the law does not regulate morality, it is legislation that gives it birth, and when legislation becomes impaired, morality degenerates. But then the judgment of the censors will not do what the power of the laws has failed to do. It follows from this that the censorship may be useful to preserve morality, never to restore it. Institutes censors while the laws are vigorous, so soon as they have lost their power, all is over. Nothing that is lawful has any force when the law sees to have any. The censorship supports morality by preventing opinions from being corrupted, by preserving their integrity through wise applications, sometimes even by fixing them when they are still uncertain. The use of seconds in jewels carried to a mad extreme in the Kingdom of France was abolished by these simple words in an edict of the King, as for those who have the cowardice to appoint seconds. This judgment, anticipating that of the public, immediately decided it. But when the same edicts wanted to declare that it was also cowardice to fight a jewel, which is very true, but contrary to common opinion, the public ridiculed this decision, on which its judgment was already formed. I have said elsewhere that his public opinion is not subject to constraint, there should be no vestige of this in the tribunal established to represent it. We cannot admire too much the art with which this force, wholly lost among the moderns, was set in operation among the Romans, and still better among the Lacedaemonians. A man of bad character, having brought forward a good measure in the Council of Sparta, the Ethos, without regarding him, caused the same measure to be proposed by a virtuous citizen. What an honour for the one, what a stigma for the other, without praise or blame being given to either. Certain drunkards from Samos defiled the tribunal of the Ethos. On the morrow a public edict granted permission to the Samians to be filthy. A real punishment would have been less severe than such impunity. When Sparta pronounced what was, or was not honourable, Greece made no appeal from her decisions. End of Chapter 7 Book 4 Chapter 8 of the Social Contract This is a Librivox recording. All Librivox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit Librivox.org The Social Contract by Jean-Jacques Rousseau Book 4 Chapter 8 Civil Religion Man had at first no kings except the gods and no government but a theocracy. They reasoned like Caligula and at that time they reasoned rightly. A long period is needed to change men's sentiments and ideas in order that they may resolve to take a fellow man as a master and flatter themselves that all will be well. From the single circumstance that a god was placed at the head of every political society it followed that there were as many gods as nations. Two nations foreign to each other and almost all was hostile could not long acknowledge the same master. Two armies engaged in battle with each other could not obey the same leader. Thus from national divisions resulted polytheism and from this theological and civil intolerance which are by nature the same as will be shown here after. The fancy of the Greeks that they recognize their own gods among barbarous nations arose from there regarding themselves as the natural sovereigns of those nations. But in our days that is a very ridiculous kind of erudition which turns on the identity of the gods of different nations as if Malak, Saturn and Kronos could be the same god. As if the ball of the Phoenicians, the Zeus of the Greeks and the Jupiter of the Latins could be the same as if there could be anything in common among imaginary beings bearing different names. But if it is asked why under paganism when every state had its worship and its gods there were no wars of religion I answered that it was for the same reason that each state having its peculiar form of worship as well as its own government did not distinguish its gods from its laws. Political warfare was also religious. The departments of the gods were, so to speak, fixed by the limits of the nations. The god of one nation had no right over other nations. The gods of the pagans were not jealous gods. They shared among them the empire of the world. Even Moses and the Hebrew nation sometimes countenanced this idea by speaking of the god of Israel. It is true that they regarded as not the gods of the Canaanites, prescribed nations devoted to destruction whose country they were to occupy, but see how they spoke of the divinities of the neighboring nations whom they were forbidden to attack? The possession of what belongs to Chamos, your god, said Jephthah to the Ammonites. Is it not lawfully your due? By the same title we possess the lands which our conquering god has acquired. In this, it seems to me, there was a well-recognized parody between the rites of Chamos and those of the god of Israel. But when the Jews subjected to the kings of Babylon and afterward to the kings of Syria, obstinately refused to acknowledge any other god than their own, this refusal being regarded as a rebellion against the conqueror, drew upon them the persecutions which we read of in their history, and of which no other instance appears before Christianity. Every religion, then, being exclusively attached to the laws of the state which prescribed it, there was no other way of converting a nation than to subdue it, and no other missionaries than conquerors, and the obligation to change their form of worship being the law imposed on the vanquished, it was necessary to begin by conquering before speaking of conversions. Far from men fighting for the gods, it was, as in Homer, the gods who fought for men, each sued for victory from his own god and paid for it with new altars. The Romans, before attacking a place, summoned its gods to abandon it, and when they left to the Tarantines their exasperated gods, it was because they then regarded these gods as subjected to their own, and forced to pay them homage. They left the vanquished their gods as they left them their laws. A crown for the capitalized Jupiter was often the only tribute that they imposed. At last the Romans having extended their worship in their laws with their empire, and having themselves often adopted those of the vanquished, the nations of this vast empire, since the right of citizenship was granted to all, found insensibly that they had multitudes of gods and religions almost the same everywhere. And this is why paganism was at length known in the world as only a single religion. It was in these circumstances that Jesus came to establish on earth a spiritual kingdom which, separating the religious from the political system, destroyed the unity of the state, and caused the intestine divisions which have never ceased to agitate Christian nations. Now this new idea of a kingdom in the other world having never been able to enter the mind of the pagans they always regarded Christians as actual rebels who, under cover of a hypocritical submission only sought an opportunity to make themselves independent and supreme and to usurp by cunning the authority which in their weakness they pretend to respect. This was the cause of persecutions. What the pagans had feared came to pass. Then everything changed its aspect. The humble Christians altered their tone and soon this pretended kingdom of the other world became under a visible chief the most violent despotism in this world. As however there have always been a prince and civil laws a perpetual conflict of jurisdiction has resulted from this double power which has rendered any good polity impossible in Christian states and no one has ever succeeded in understanding whether he was bound to obey the ruler or the priest. Many nations however even in Europe or on its outskirts wish to preserve or to re-establish the ancient system but without success the spirit of Christianity prevailed over everything the sacred worship always retained or regained its independence of the sovereign and without any necessary connection with the body of the state. Muhammad had very sound views he thoroughly unified his political system and so long as his form of government subsisted under his successors the Caliphs the government was quite undivided and in that respect good but the Arabs having become flourishing learned polished effeminate and indolent were subjugated by the barbarians and then the division between the two powers began again although it may be less apparent among the Muhammadans than among the Christians the division nevertheless exists especially in the sect of Ali and there are states such as Persia in which it is still seen among us the kings of England have established themselves as heads of the church and the Tsars have done the same but by means of this title they have made themselves its ministers rather than its rulers they've acquired not so much the right of changing it as the power of maintaining it they are not its legislators but only its princes wherever the clergy form a corporation they are masters and legislators in their own country there are then two powers two sovereigns in England and in Russia just as elsewhere of all Christian authors the philosopher Hobbes is the only one who has clearly seen the evil and its remedy and who has dared to propose a reunion of the heads of the eagle and the complete restoration of political unity without which no state or government will ever be well constituted but he ought to have seen that the domineering spirit of Christianity was incompatible with his system and that the interest of the priest would always be stronger than that of the state it is not so much what is horrible and false in his political theory as what is just and true that has rendered it odious I believe that by developing historical facts from this point of view the opposite opinions of Bale and Warburton might easily be refuted the former of these maintains that no religion is useful to the body politic the latter on the other hand asserts that Christianity is its strongest support to the first it might be proved that no state was ever founded without religion serving as its basis and to the second that the Christian law is more injurious than useful to affirm constitution of the state in order to succeed in making myself understood I need only give a little more precision to the exceedingly vague ideas about religion in its relation to my subject religion considered with reference to society which is either general or particular may also be divided into two kinds vis the religion of the man and that of the citizen the first without temples without altars without rights limited to the purely internal worship of the supreme god and to the internal duties of morality is the pure and simple religion of the gospel the true theism and what may be called the natural divine law the other inscribed in a single country gives to it its gods its peculiar and tutelary patrons it has its dogmas its rights its external worship prescribed by the laws outside the single nation which observes it everything is for it infidel foreign and barbarous it extends the duties and rights of men only as far as its altars such were all the religions of early nations to which may be given the name of the divine law civil or positive there is a third and more extravagant kind of religion which giving to men two sets of laws two chiefs two countries imposes on them contradictory duties and prevents them from being at once devout men and citizens such is the religion of the llamas such is that of the japanese such is roman christianity this may be called the religion of the priest the results from it a kind of mixed and unsocial law which has no name considered politically these three kinds of religion all have their defects the third is so evidently bad that it would be a waste of time to stop and prove this whatever destroys social unity is good for nothing all institutions which put a man in contradiction with himself are worthless the second is good so far as it combines divine worship with love for the laws and by making their country the object of the citizen's adoration teaches them that to serve the state is to serve the guardian deity it is a kind of theocracy in which there ought to be no pontiff but the prince no other priest than the magistrates then to die for one's country is to suffer martyrdom to violate the laws is to be impious and to subject a guilty man to public execration is to devote him to the wrath of the gods sasser esto but it is evil in so far as being based on error and falsehood it deceives men renders them credulous and superstitious and obscures the true worship of the deity with vain ceremonial it is evil again when becoming exclusive and tyrannical it makes a nation sanguinary and intolerant so that it thirsts after nothing but murder and massacre and believes that it is performing a holy action and killing whosoever does not acknowledge its gods this puts such a nation in a natural state of war with all others which is very prejudicial to its own safety there remains then the religion of man or christianity not that of today but that of the gospel which is quite different by this holy sublime and pure religion men children of the same god all recognize one another as brethren and the social bond which unites them is not dissolved even at death but this religion having no particular relation with the body politic leaves to the laws only the force that they derive from themselves without adding to them any other and thereby one of the great bonds of the particular society remains ineffective what is more far from attaching the hearts of citizens to the state it detaches them from it and from all earthly things i know of nothing more contrary to the social spirit we are told that a nation of true christians would form the most perfect society conceivable in this supposition i see only one great difficulty that a society of true christians would be no longer a society of men i say even that this supposed society with all its perfection would be neither the strongest nor the most durable by virtue of its perfection it would lack cohesion its perfection indeed would be its destroying vice each man would perform his duty the people would be obedient to the laws the chief men would be just and moderate and the magistrates upright and incorruptible the soldiers would despise death there would be neither vanity nor luxury all this is very good but let us look further christianity is an entirely spiritual religion concerned solely with heavenly things the christian's country is not of this world he does his duty it is true but he does it with a profound indifference as to the good or ill success of his endeavors provided that he has nothing to reproach himself with that matters little to him whether all goes well or ill here below if the state is flourishing he scarcely dares to enjoy the public felicity he fears to take a pride in the glory of his country if the state declines he blesses the hand of god which lies heavy on his people in order that the society might be peaceable and harmony maintained it would be necessary for all citizens without exception to be equally good christians but if unfortunately there happens to be in it a single ambitious man a single hypocrite a cateleen or a cromwell for example such a man will certainly obtain an advantage over his pious compatriots christian charity does not suffer men readily to think ill of their neighbors as soon as a man is found by cunning the art of imposing on them and securing to himself a share in the public authority he is invested with dignity god wills that he should be reverenced soon he exercises dominion god wills that he should be obeyed the depository of this power abuses it this is the rod with which god punishes his children they would have scruples about driving out the usurper it would be necessary to disturb the public peace to employ violence to shed blood all this ill-accords with the meekness of the christian and after all does it matter whether they are free or enslaved in this veil of woes the essential thing is to reach paradise and resignation is but one means the more toward that some foreign war comes on the citizens march to battle without anxiety none of them think of flight they do their duty but without an ardent desire for victory they know better how to die than to conquer what matters it whether they are the victors or the vanquished does not providence know better than they what is needful for them conceive what an advantage a bold impetuous enthusiastic enemy can derive from this stoical indifference set against them those noble peoples who are consumed with a burning love of glory and of country suppose your christian republic opposed to sparta or rome the pious christians will be beaten crushed destroyed before they have time to collect themselves or they will owe their safety only to the contempt which the enemy may conceive for them to my mind that was a noble oath of the soldiers of phobias they did not swear to die or to conquer they swore to return as conquerors and kept their oath never would christians have done such a thing they would have believed that they were tempting god but i am mistaken in speaking of a christian republic each of these two words excludes the other christianity preaches only servitude and dependence its spirit is too favorable to tyranny for the latter not to profit by it always true christians are made to be slaves they know it and are hardly aroused by it this short life has too little value in their eyes christian troops are excellent we are told i deny it let them show me any that are such for my part i know of no christian troops the crusades will be cited without disputing the valor of the crusaders i shall observe that far from being christians they were soldiers of the priest citizens of the church they fought for their spiritual country which the church had somehow rendered temporal properly regarded this brings us back to paganism as the gospel does not establish a national religion any sacred war is impossible among christians under the pagan emperor's christian soldiers were brave all christian authors affirm it and i believe it there was a rivalry of honor against the pagan troops as soon as the emperors became christians this rivalry no longer subsisted and when the cross had driven out the eagle all the roman valor disappeared but setting aside political considerations let us return to the subject of right and determine principles on this important point the right which the social pact gives to the sovereign over its subjects does not as i have said pass the limits of public utility subjects then owe no account of their opinions to the sovereign except so far as those opinions are of moment to the community now it is very important for the state that every citizen should have a religion which may make him delight in his duties but the dogmas of this religion concern neither the state nor its members except so far as they affect morality and the duties which he who professes it is bound to perform toward others each may have in addition such opinions as he pleases without its being the business of the sovereign to know them for as he has no jurisdiction in the other world the destiny of his subjects in the life to come whatever it may be is not his affair provided they are good citizens in this life there is however a purely civil profession of faith the articles of which it is the duty of the sovereign to determine not exactly as dogmas of religion but as sentiments of sociability without which it is impossible to be a good citizen or a faithful subject without having power to compel anyone to believe them the sovereign may banish from the state whoever does not believe them it may banish him not as impious but as unsociable as incapable of sincerely loving law and justice and of sacrificing at need his life to his duty but if anyone after publicly acknowledging these dogmas behaves like an unbeliever in them he should be punished with death he's committed the greatest of crimes he has lied before the laws the dogmas of civil religion ought to be simple few in number stated with precision and without explanations or commentaries the existence of the deity powerful wise beneficent prescient and bountiful the life to come the happiness of the just the punishment of the wicked the sanctity of the social contract and of the laws these are the positive dogmas as for the negative dogmas I limit them to one only that is intolerance it belongs to the creeds which we have excluded those who distinguish civil intolerance from theological intolerance are in my opinion mistaken these two kinds of intolerance are inseparable it is impossible to live at peace with people whom we believe to be damned to love them would be to hate god who punishes them it is absolutely necessary to reclaim them or to punish them wherever theological intolerance is allowed it cannot but have some effect in civil life and as soon as it has any the sovereign is no longer sovereign even in secular affairs from that time the priests are the real masters the kings are only their officers now that there is and can be no longer any exclusive national religion we should tolerate all those which tolerate others so far as their dogmas have nothing contrary to the duties of a citizen but whosoever dares to say outside the church no salvation ought to be driven from the state unless the state be the church and the prince be the pontiff such a dogma is proper only in a theocratic government in any other it is pernicious the reason for which Henry the fourth is said to have embraced the romish religion ought to have made any honorable man renounce it especially any prince who knew how to reason end of chapter eight fourth book chapter nine of the social contract this is a LibriVox recording all LibriVox recordings are in the public domain for more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org recording by Daniel Watkins the social contract by Jean-Jacques Rousseau fourth book chapter nine conclusion after laying down the principles of political right and attempting to establish the state on its foundations it would remain to strengthen it in its external relations which would comprise the law of nations commerce the right of war and conquests public rights alliances negotiations treaties etc but all this forms a new subject too vast for my limited scope I ought always to have confined myself to a narrower sphere end of chapter nine end of fourth book end of the social contract by Jean-Jacques Rousseau