24.5. 5. That the Catholic Religion is most agreeable to a Monarchy, and
the Protestant to a Republic.
When a religion is introduced and fixed in
a state, it is commonly such as is most suitable to the plan of
government there established; for those who receive it, and those who
are the cause of its being received, have scarcely any other idea of
policy than that of the state in which they were born.
When the Christian religion, two centuries ago, became unhappily
divided into Catholic and Protestant, the people of the north embraced
the Protestant, and those of the south adhered still to the Catholic.
The reason is plain: the people of the north have, and will for ever
have, a spirit of liberty and independence, which the people of the
south have not; and therefore a religion which has no visible head is
more agreeable to the independence of the climate than that which has
one.
In the countries themselves where the Protestant religion became
established, the revolutions were made pursuant to the several plans of
political government. Luther having great princes on his side would
never have been able to make them relish an ecclesiastical authority
that had no exterior pre-eminence; while Calvin, having to do with
people who lived under republican governments, or with obscure citizens
in monarchies, might very well avoid establishing dignities and
preferments.
Each of these two religions was believed to be perfect; the
Calvinist judging his most conformable to what Christ had said, and the
Lutheran to what the Apostles had practised.
