The inquisition in Spain does not proceed from the religion originally professed, but from this mule-animal, engendered between the church and the state.
Thomas Paine: “The inquisition in Spain does not proceed from the religion originally professed, but from this mule-animal, engendered…”
Editor's note · Context
In "Rights of Man," this sentence attributes the atrocities of the Spanish Inquisition not to religion itself, but to the union of church and state.
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Reason and discussion, persuasion and conviction, become the weapons in the contest, and it is only when those are attempted to be suppressed that recourse is had to violence.
But as religion is very improperly made a political machine, and the reality of it is thereby destroyed, I will conclude this work with stating in what light religion appears to me.
As to what are called national religions, we may, with as much propriety, talk of national Gods.
I have no idea, considering the reforms which are now passing and spreading throughout Europe, that England will permit herself to be the last; and where the occasion and the opportunity quietly offer, it is better than to wait for a…