Civil Religion and Political Witch Hunts: Three Explanations

a purely civil profession of faith, the articles of which are for the sovereign to establish, not exactly as religious dogmas but as sentiments of sociability without which it is impossible to be a good citizen or a faithful subject.... The sovereign can banish from the State anyone who does not believe them.., not for being impious but for being unsociable; for being incapable of sincerely loving the laws, justice, and of giving his life, if need be, for his duty. If someone who has publicly acknowledged these same dogmas behaves as though he does not believe them, he should be punished with death. He has committed the greatest of crimes: he lied before the laws.'