386 Readings i}i European History Danger of intolerance. happiness of the just, the punishment of the wicked, the sacredness of the social contract and the law, — these are the positive dogmas. As to the negative dogmas, I limit them to one, — intoler- ance : it enters into the religions which we have excluded. Those who make a distinction between civil intolerance and theological intolerance deceive themselves, to my mind. These two intolerances are inseparable. It is impossible to live in peace with people whom one believes to be damned ; to love them is to hate God, who punishes them ; they must be redeemed or else tortured. Wherever theological intol- erance is admitted, it must have some civil effects; and as soon as it has them the sovereign is no more a sovereign, even in temporal matters. From that time priests are the true masters ; kings are but their officers. VI. TURGOT AND NECKER 390. Tur- got's letter to the king upon assum- ing office (August, 1774)- Turgot, immediately after learning from Louis XVI that he had been appointed comptroller general, wrote the following touching letter to that inefficient young mon- arch, who was so ready to desert him a few months later. COMPIEGNE, August 24, 1 774. kjire ' Having just come from the private interview with which your Majesty has honored me, still full of the anxiety pro- duced by the immensity of the duties now imposed upon me, agitated by all the feelings excited by the touching kind- ness with which you have encouraged me, I hasten to con- vey to you my respectful gratitude and the devotion of my whole life. Your Majesty has been good enough to permit me to place on record the engagement you have taken upon you to sus- tain me in the execution of those plans of economy which are at all times, and to-day more than ever, an indispensable
