That church can have no right to be tolerated by the magistrate, which is constituted upon such a bottom, that all those who enter into it, do thereby ipso facto deliver themselves up to the protection and service of another prince. For by this means the magistrate would give way to the settling of a foreign jurisdiction in his own country, and suffer his own people to be listed, as it were, for soldiers against his own government.
Nor does the frivolous and fallacious distinction between the court and the church afford any remedy to this inconvenience; especially when both the one and the other are equally subject to the absolute authority of the same person; who has not only power to persuade the members of his church to whatsoever he lists, either as purely religious, or as in order thereunto; but can also enjoin it them on pain of eternal fire.
It is ridiculous for any one to profess himself to be a mahometan only in religion, but in every thing else a faithful subject to a christian magistrate, whilst at the same time he acknowledges himself bound to yield blind obedience to the mufti of Constantinople; who himself is entirely obedient to the Ottoman emperor, and frames the feigned oracles of that religion according to his pleasure.
All of us, every single man, woman, and child on the face of the Earth were born with the same unalienable rights; to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. And, if the governments of the world can't get that through their thick skulls, then, regime change will be necessary.
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Friday, August 06, 2010
John Locke, The Works, vol. 5 Four Letters concerning Toleration - 1685
From Andrew Bostom:
This is an interesting topic. For this same reason the founders were against toleration of Catholics as well, because of dual allegiance problems.
ReplyDeleteCatholics no longer have the sovereign allegiance to the Pope (it is a spiritual one only), so Catholicism is no longer an issue.
Islam on the other hand, has all manner of bearded potentates ordering followers to lop off heads and to subvert the modern societies they have infested.
Sometimes Catholics do still pull the bullshit that their Cardinals are citizens of the Vatican and not of whatever country they are located in.
ReplyDeleteBut, you are correct. In general Catholics do not at all demonstrate that kind of crazy attitude.
I have seen Protestants pray to the "Christian flag".