“ Eighteenth-century Italy looked on religion with apathetic indifference, and Liguori convinced himself that only the gentlest and most lenient treatment could win back the alienated laity; hence he was always willing to excuse errors on the side of laxity as due to an excess of zeal in winning over penitents. Severity, on the other hand, seemed to him not only inexpedient, but positively wrong. By making religion hard it made it odious, and thus prepared the way for unbelief. Like all casuists, he took for granted that morality was a recondite science, beyond the reach of all but the learned. ”

“ In Liguori’s time there were four ways of answering the question. Strict moralists—called rigorists, or “tutiorists”—maintained that the austerer opinion ought always to be followed; dancing on Sundays was certainly wrong, if any good authorities had declared it to be so. Probabiliorists maintained that the more general opinion ought to prevail, irrespectively of whether it was the stricter or the laxer; dancing on Sunday was perfectly lawful, if the majority of casuists approved it. ”

“ Probabilists argued that any opinion might be followed, if it could show good authority on its side, even if there was still better authority against it; dancing on Sunday must be innocent, if it could show a fair sprinkling of eminent names in its favour. ”