" But I must tell you, moreover, that I was perfectly
correct when I said that Molina estimates the value of the thief's
life at six ducats; and, if you will not take it upon my word, we
shall refer it to an umpire to whom you cannot object. The person whom
I fix upon for this office is your own Father Reginald, who, in his
explanation of the same passage of Molina (l.28, n. 68), declares that
"Molina there determines the sum for which it is not allowable to kill
at three, or four, or five ducats." And thus, fathers, I shall have
Reginald, in addition to Molina, to bear me out.
It will be equally easy for me to refute your fourteenth
Imposture, touching Molina's permission to "kill a thief who offers to
rob us of a crown." This palpable fact is attested by Escobar, who
tells us "that Molina has regularly determined the sum for which it is
lawful to take away life, at one crown." And all you have to lay to my
charge in the fourteenth Imposture is, that I have suppressed the last
words of this passage, namely, "that in this matter every one ought to
study the moderation of a just self-defence." Why do you not
complain that Escobar has also omitted to mention these words? But how
little tact you have about you! You imagine that nobody understands
what you mean by self-defence. Don't we know that it is to employ "a
murderous defence"? You would persuade us that Molina meant to say
that if a person, in defending his crown, finds himself in danger of
his life, he is then at liberty to kill his assailant, in
self-preservation.
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