|
John
Adams Letter to Thomas Jefferson
Quincy,
January 23, 1825
MY
DEAR SIR,--We think ourselves possessed, or at least we
boast that we are so, of liberty of conscience on all subjects
and of the right of free inquiry and private judgment in
all cases, and yet how far are we from these exalted privileges
in fact. There exists, I believe, throughout the whole Christian
world, a law which makes it blasphemy to deny, or to doubt
the divine inspiration of all the books of the Old and New
Testaments, from Genesis to Revelations. In most countries
of Europe it is punished by fire at the stake, or the rack,
or the wheel. In England itself, it is punished by boring
through the tongue with a red-hot poker. In America it is
not much better; even in our Massachusetts, which, I believe,
upon the whole, is as temperate and moderate in religious
zeal as most of the States, a law was made in the latter
end of the last century, repealing the cruel punishments
of the former laws, but substituting fine and imprisonment
upon all those blasphemies upon any book of the Old Testament
or New. Now, what free inquiry, when a writer must surely
encounter the risk of fine or imprisonment for adducing
any arguments for investigation into the divine authority
of those books? Who would run the risk of translating Volney's
Recherches Nouvelles? Who would run the risk of translating
Dapin's? But I cannot enlarge upon this subject, though
I have it much at heart. I think such laws a great embarrassment,
great obstructions to the improvement of the human mind.
Books that cannot bear examination, certainly ought not
to be established as divine inspiration by penal laws. It
is true, few persons appear desirous to put such laws in
execution, and it is also true that some few persons are
hardy enough to venture to depart from them; but as long
as they continue in force as laws, the human mind must make
an awkward and clumsy progress in its investigations. I
wish they were repealed. The substance and essence of Christianity,
as I understand it, is eternal and unchangeable, and will
bear examination forever; but it has been mixed with extraneous
ingredients, which, I think, will not bear examination,
and they ought to be separated. Adieu.
Source:
VII The Writings of Thomas Jefferson: Being His Autobiography,
Correspondence, Reports, Messages, Addresses, and Other
Writings, Official and Private 396-97 (H. A. Washington
ed., 1984).
|
