Authority

Abstract

The next main section, numbered “Chapitre troisiême”, is headed L’Authorité. The numbering of the sub-headings continues through de Vallone’s treatment of Scripture. However, as the following and last major chapter, entitled De la Religion, is numbered “Chapitre cinquieme”, it is better to treat Scripture as a major section in itself. The chapter on authority has a good deal to say about reason. It questions the claims of individual religious sects and is very similar to the Deistic works of the eighteenth century. But there is a difference. De Vallone has his own idea of what is meant by reason, and, unlike most of his contemporaries, both Deist and Christian, he gives a definition of the word, a definition which, as has been said, is very similar to that which is to be found in his Profession de Foi.