the question of whether the state was permitted to determine the religion of its subjects. Since the dissertation itself has not survived, we can only extrapolate from Poetry and Truth, where Goethe gives a twofold answer. He argues that the state may establish the mandatory public rituals of the religious communities for their respective clergy and laity but that it ought not attempt to control what each individual thinks, feels, or meditates in private. He thus grants the state dominion over external, but not internal, religious life. Subjective religiosity should remain free. He owed that
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