Justice requested

Reason requires those who are truly pious and philosophical to honor and love truth alone, refusing to follow the opinions of the ancients when they are worthless. For sound reason requires not only that we refuse to follow those who have acted or taught unjustly; the lover of truth must, by every means and even when death is threatened, choose to say and do what is right before preserving his own life. You, then, are everywhere said to be pious and philosophers, guardians of justice and lovers of learning. Whether you really are so will now be shown. We have not come through these writings to flatter you or speak for your favor, but to ask you to make your judgment according to strict and searching reason, without being controlled by prejudice, by a desire to please superstitious people, by irrational impulse, or by a long-established evil rumor, and thus casting a vote against yourselves. For we have concluded that no one can do us any real evil unless we are proved to be workers of wickedness or shown to be evil. You can kill us, but you cannot harm us.