Religious dissensions again threaten disorders in Switzerland. Some parties profess
to have discovered in the towns of the re- public an extensive organization for subverting the political and religious systems of Europe. The doctrines imputed to this reti- culation of " clubs " are as atrocious as they are revolutionary ; implying not freedom but anarchy, not resistance to tyranny but a multiplication of tyranny—the sacredness of revenge, political assassination, and such barbarisms. We distrust, however, these imputations at second-hand : they look like' a common trick of antagonists in controversy—the putting certain constructions and inferences upon the doctrines they oppose, and then substitu- ting those constructive interpretations for the avowed doctrines ; having done which, it is an easy lapse from truth to pervert or coin words as the declarations of the impugned. It is easy too, and common, to distribute epithets that are odious, such as "An- archist" or "Atheist." We must therefore have some more dis- tinct and trustworthy evidence, before we can believe that there is an extensive organization of educated Swiss, Germans, and French, established to disgrace the advocates of human progress by a pedantic imitation of Thuggee or Ribandism.
