It was in their full power to do so, but probably none of them would have desired that private soldiers who had no legal choice in the matter should have followed their example and become deserters from the ranks. There are, however, extreme cases in which the violation of the military oath and disobedience to military discipline are justified. More than once in French history an usurper or his agent has ordered soldiers to coerce or fire upon the representatives of the nation. In such cases it has been said 'the conscience of the soldier is the liberty of the people,' and the refusal of private soldiers to obey a plainly illegal order will be generally though not universally applauded. In all such cases, however, there is much obscurity and inconsistency of judgment. The rule that the moral responsibility falls exclusively on the person who gives the order, and that the private has no voice or responsibility, will even here be maintained by some. Ought a private soldier to have refused to take part in such an execution as that of the Duc d'Enghien, or in the _Coup d'État_ of Napoleon III.? Ought he to refuse to fire on a mob if he doubts the legality of the order of his superior officer? In such cases there is sometimes a direct conflict between the civil and the military law, and there have been instances in which a soldier might be punishable before the first for acts which were absolutely enforced by the second.[30] Perhaps the strongest case of justifiable disobedience that can be alleged is when a soldier is ordered to do something which involves apostasy from his faith, though even here it would be difficult to show, in the light of pure reason, that this is a graver thing than to kill innocent men in an unrighteous cause. In the Early Church there were some soldier martyrs who suffered death because they believed it inconsistent with their faith to bear arms, or because they were asked to do some acts which savoured of idolatry. The story of the Thebæan legion which was said to have been martyred under Diocletian rests on no trustworthy authority, but it illustrates the feeling of the Church on the subject. Josephus tells how Jewish soldiers refused in spite of all punishments to bring earth with the other soldiers for the reparation of the Temple of Belus at Babylon. Conflicts between military duty and religious duty must have not unfrequently arisen during the religious wars of the sixteenth century, and in our own century and in our own army there have been instances of soldiers refusing through religious motives to escort or protect idolatrous processions in India, or to present arms in Catholic countries when the Host was passing. Quaker opinions about war are absolutely inconsistent with the compulsory service which prevails in nearly all European countries, and religious scruples about conscription have been among the motives that have brought the Russian Raskolniks into collision with the civil power.