Note 30 — PART I
Reading edition
If he sees all around him thieving and enjoying their plunder with impunity, what wonder is it that he should thieve also? If his tribunals of all descriptions afford him no redress, or place that redress beyond his reach, what resource has he but private revenge?30 If he cannot enjoy the fruits of his labour in peace, why should he work? If he is ignorant, why has he not been instructed? There exist scarcely any schools to teach him his duties: the few that do exist teach him Latin! prayers! theology! jurisprudence! and some little reading and writing;31 but he is only taught to read the lives of the saints, and the legends of the church, whose gloomy, fanatical doctrines and sanguinary histories have not a little contributed to make him at times revengeful and intolerant. Does he prevaricate and flatter? It is because he dare not speak the truth, and because a long system of oppression has broken his spirit.