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"Cruelty is a specific kind of human behaviour and has a clearly cultural dimension. It is often the result of passions and drives, accompanied by the breaking of taboos and a crossing of boundaries that cultures have raised to prevent the moral regression of mankind. Cruelty is also a "rational" way to acquire and stabilize political power. Both the atrocities themselves and the accusations of cruelty are instruments of power. The political efficiency of cruelty depends on the fear and awe, which it produces. Seneca regarded cruelty as the main attribute of tyranny. Through its imagery (like the bull of Phalaris) it breaks possible resistance and establishes despotism permanently. In the Middle Ages and Early Modern Times cruelty was considered a necessary evil in order to realize superior positive goals. So did the inquisitors, and so did Machiavelli who regarded cruelty not only as a means to the acquisition and preservation of power. The prince should also use cruelty to unify Italy and to build a stable and peaceful political order. Later, the understanding that cruelties are necessary to achieve good ends did not fall into oblivion, in spite of all criticism of Machiavelli's thought. In totalitarianism the aim of cruelty was not primarily the infliction of pain, but the abolition of individualism and the enforcement of the belief in a general law, which rules mankind. This could be either the law of history like during the French Revolution and in socialist states, or the 'natural law' of social Darwinism in the National Socialist and Fascist regimes. After the breakdown of totalitarianism and the triumph of liberal democracy the question arises, if cruelties are necessary components of all politics. Although we can still find cruel policies in liberal democracies (see Guantanamo Bay), at the same time the struggle against cruelty is vital in these systems and explains the dominance of the discourse on human rights." (author's abstract)

A discussion of selected clandestine philosophical works, including William Lyons's The Infallibility, Dignity and Excellence of Humane Judgment; Being a New Art of Reasoning and Discovering Truth (1719), which was widely circulated in manuscript form in a French translation. As a merciless attack on the articles of the Symbol of St. Athanase, Lyons argued against Catholicism, Calvinism, & Trinitarianism, & proposed a reasonable, demystified Christianity. Because the French text intimates Lyons's indebtedness to John Locke's philosophy, it is considered a prime example of problematic cultural transfer. Clandestine works translated into French of latitudinarian English theologians Francis Hare, Arthur Ashley Sykes, & Thomas Chubb are also reviewed. It is noted that the expatriate contextualized understanding of these works served to support the works of French contemporaries such as Pierre Bayle. In the appendix, the clandestine French translation of Arthur Ashley Sykes's L'Innocence de l'erreur soutenue et justifiee dans une lettre a M. XXX ([The Innocence of the Error Sustained and Justified in a Letter to Mr. XXX] 1714) is reprinted. Arguing that a just God could never smite involuntary faults, Sykes distinguishes strongly between failings of intelligence & failings of the will. He also asserts the incomprehensibility & difficulty of the Scriptures; indicates the heterodoxy of various Christian denominations; & ironically supports the Anglican Church as the one true ecumenism. 1 Appendix. J. Sadler