CHAPTER I.: religion.

1. All enterprises to be undertaken should be for the honor of God and the general good of the country.

2. The fear of God facilitates every enterprise undertaken by governments.

3. Wherever there is religion, there every good may be presupposed; and where it is lacking, there all evil may be presupposed.

4. As the observance of Divine worship is the cause of the greatness of states, so the disregard of Divine worship is the cause of their ruin.

5. The non-observance of religion and of laws are vices that are the more detestable as they are caused by those who govern.

6. It is impossible that he who governs should himself be respected by those who disregard the Deity.

7. In well-constituted governments the citizens fear more to break their oaths than the laws; because they esteem the power of God more than that of men.

8. Governments that wish to maintain themselves incorrupt must above all else maintain religious ceremonies uncorrupted, and hold them always in the highest veneration.

9. If in all the governments of the Christian republic religion were maintained as it was instituted by its Divine Founder, the state and the Christian republics would be much more united and happy than what they are now.

10. To show little reverence to God, and still less to the Church, is not the act of a free man, but of one that is dissolute, and more inclined to evil than to good.

11. The disregard of all devotion and of all religion brings with it many troubles and infinite disorders.

12. St. Francis and St. Dominic, by their poverty and the example of the life of Christ, brought back the Christian religion into the minds of men, and restored it to its original principles.

13. The Christian religion, having shown us the truth and the true way, should be interpreted according to virtue, and not according to idleness.

14. It is not proper that men should pass their holidays in idleness and in places of pleasure.

15. Amongst all the qualities that distinguish a citizen in his country is his being above all other men liberal and munificent, especially in the construction of public edifices, such as churches, monasteries, and retreats for the poor, for the infirm, and for pilgrims.

16. The good citizen, although constantly spending money in the building of churches and in charities, yet complains that he has never been able to spend so much in honor of God but what he finds himself His debtor on his books.

17. It is proper to thank God, when in his infinite goodness he deigns to accord to a state or to a citizen some mark of approval, which the one has merited by its greatness, and the other by his rare virtues and wisdom.