think as they please about it. Under Zenobia, all had liberty to
believe as they would. And there was under her the reign of universal
peace and good-will. Here, on the other hand, it has been the practice
of the state to interfere, and say what the citizens shall believe and
whom they shall worship, and what and whom they shall not. How should it
be otherwise than that troubles should spring up, under legislation so
absurd and so wicked? Would it not be a certain way to introduce
confusion, if the state--or Aurelian--should prescribe our food and
drink? or our dress? And if confusion did arise, and bitter opposition,
you could not justly say it was owing to the existence of certain kinds
of food, or of clothes which people fancied, but to their being
interfered with. Let them alone, and they will please themselves and be
at peace.'

'Yes,' said Livia, 'that may be. But the common people are in no way fit
judges in such things, and it seems to me if either party must give way,
it were better the people did. The government has the power and they
will use it.'

'In so indifferent a matter as food or dress,' rejoined the sister, 'if
a government were so foolish as to make prohibitory and whimsical laws,
it were better to yield than contend. But in an affair so different from
that as one's religion, one could not act in the same way. I may dress
in one kind of stuff as well as another; it is quite a possible thing:
but is it not plainly impossible, if I think one kind of stuff is of an
exquisite fineness and color, for me to believe and say at the same
time, that its texture is coarse and its hue dull? The mind cannot
believe according to any other laws than those of its own constitution.
Is it not then the height of wickedness to set out to make people
believe and act one way in religion? The history of the world has shown
that, in spite of men's wickedness, there is nothing on earth they value
as they do their religion. They will die rather than change or renounce
it. Men are the same now. To require that any portion of the people
shall renounce their religion is to require them to part with that which
they value most--more than life itself--and is it not in effect
pronouncing against them a sentence of destruction? Some indeed will
relinquish it rather than die; and some will play the hypocrite for a
season, intending to return to a profession of it in more peaceful
times: but most, and the best, will die before they w