Part 12 (1/2)
[Footnote 3: John vi 15]
The revolution he wished to effect was always a els and the last trumpet for its execution It was upon men and by the aid of men themselves that he wished to act A visionary who had no other idea than the proximent, would not have had this care for the aiven utterance to the finest ueness no doubt tinged his ideas, and it was rather a noble feeling than a fixed design, that urged hih in a very different dodom of the Spirit, which he founded; and if Jesus, from the bosom of his Father, sees his work bear fruit in the world, he may indeed say with truth, ”This is what I have desired” That which Jesus founded, that which will re for the i realized by humanity, is the doctrine of the liberty of the soul Greece had already had beautiful ideas on this subject[1] Various stoics had learned how to be free even under a tyrant But in general the ancient world had regarded liberty as attached to certain political foriton, Brutus and Cassius The true Christian enjoys more real freedom; here below he is an exile; what overnor of this earth, which is not his home? Liberty for him is truth[2] Jesus did not know history sufficiently to understand that such a doctrine came most opportunely at the moment when republican liberty ended, and when the small municipal constitutions of antiquity were absorbed in the unity of the Roood sense, and the truly prophetic instinct which he had of his uided him with marvelous certainty By the sentence, ”Render unto Caesar the things which are Caesar's, and to God the things which are God's,” he created soe for souls in the midst of the empire of brute force assuredly, such a doctrine had its dangers To establish as a principle that we itimacy of a power by the inscription on its coins, to proclaim that the perfect man pays tribute with scorn and without question, was to destroy republicanism in the ancient form, and to favor all tyranny Christianity, in this sense, has contributed much to weaken the sense of duty of the citizen, and to deliver the world into the absolute power of existing circu an i three hundred years was able to dispense with politics, Christianity a it had done to civic virtues The power of the state was lis of earth; the mind was freed, or at least the terrible rod of Roman omnipotence was broken forever
[Footnote 1: See Stobaeus, _Florilegiu]
[Footnote 2: John viii 32, and following]
The man who is especially preoccupied with the duties of public life, does not readily forgive those who attach little importance to his party quarrels He especially blames those who subordinate political to social questions, and profess a sort of indifference for the forht, for exclusive power is prejudicial to the good governress have ”parties” been able to effect in the generalhis heavenly kingdo against Tiberius, or in regretting Germanicus, ould have become of the world? As an austere republican, or zealous patriot, he would not have arrested the great current of the affairs of his age, but in declaring that politics are insignificant, he has revealed to the world this truth, that one's country is not everything, and that the her than, the citizen
Our principles of positive science are offended by the drearamme of Jesus We know the history of the earth; cosmical revolutions of the kind which Jesus expected are only produced by geological or astronos has never yet been deinators, they ed by the prejudices in which they have shared Colu from very erroneous ideas; Newton believed his foolish explanation of the Apocalypse to be as true as his system of the world Shall we place an ordinary man of our time above a Francis d'assisi, a St Bernard, a Joan of Arc, or a Luther, because he is free from errors which these last have professed? Should we measure men by the correctness of their ideas of physics, and by the e which they possess of the true system of the world? Let us understand better the position of Jesus and that which hteenth century, and a certain kind of Protestantism, have accustomed us to consider the founder of the Christian faith only as a greatood e intellectual state in which it was originated
There are even persons who regret that the French Revolution departed ht about by wise and moderate men Let us not impose our petty and commonplace ideas on these extraordinary movements so far above our every-day life Let us continue to adospel”--let us suppress in our religious teachings the chimera which was its soul; but do not let us believe that with the simple ideas of happiness, or of individual morality, we stir the world The idea of Jesus was much more profound; it was the most revolutionary idea ever formed in a human brain; it should be taken in its totality, and not with those timid suppressions which deprive it of precisely that which has rendered it efficacious for the regeneration of humanity
The ideal is ever a Utopia When ish nowadays to represent the Christ of the e of the new tihteen hundred and thirty years ago We suppose the conditions of the real world quite other than what they are; we represent a ro, a liberty to oppressed nations We forget that this iinia and that of Congo ed, our social complications restored to a chimerical simplicity, and the political stratifications of Europe displaced fros”[1] desired by Jesus was not more difficult This new earth, this new heaven, this new Jerusales new!”[2] are the common characteristics of reformers The contrast of the ideal with the sad reality, always produces in ainst uniard as folly, till the day arrives in which they triumph, and in which those who have opposed thenize their reasonableness
[Footnote 1: _Acts_ iii 21]
[Footnote 2: _Rev_ xxi 1, 2, 5]
That there may have been a contradiction between the belief in the approaching end of the world and the general moral system of Jesus, conceived in prospect of a perous to that which now exists, no one will attempt to deny[1] It was exactly this contradiction that insured the success of his work
The ; thepowerful The ave the impulse, the moralist insured the future Hence Christianity united the two conditions of great success in this world, a revolutionary starting-point, and the possibility of continuous life Everything which is intended to succeed ought to respond to these tants; for the world seeks both to change and to last Jesus, at the same time that he announced an unparalleled subversion in human affairs, proclaihteen hundred years
[Footnote 1: The land present the same contrast, Iood sense in the conduct of life, and an extraordinary understanding of commercial affairs and industry]
That which in fact distinguishes Jesus froes, is his perfect idealism Jesus, in soovernovernment seeue terms, and as a istrate appeared to him a natural enemy of the people of God; he prepared his disciples for contests with the civil powers, without thinking for ain this to be ashamed of[1] But he never shows any desire to put himself in the place of the rich and the powerful He wishes to annihilate riches and power, but not to appropriate them He predicts persecution and all kinds of punishht of ar all-powerful by suffering and resignation, and of triu over force by purity of heart, is indeed an idea peculiar to Jesus Jesus is not a spiritualist, for to hi tended to a palpable realization; he had not the least notion of a soul separated fro only to hi expression of that which does not appear
[Footnote 1: Matt x 17, 18; Luke xii 11]
[Footnote 2: Matt v 10, and following; x entirely; Luke vi 22, and following; John xv 18, and following; xvi 2, and following, 20, 33; xvii 14]
To whom should we turn, to whodom of God? The hly esteeht of God[1] The founders of the kingdom of God are the simple Not the rich, not the learned, not priests; but woreat characteristic of the Messiah is, that ”the poor have the gospel preached to theentle nature of Jesus here resureat social revolution, in which rank will be overturned, in which all authority in this world will be humiliated, was his dream The world will not believe him; the world will kill him But his disciples will not be of the world[4] They will be a little flock of the humble and the simple, ill conquer by their very humility The idea which has made ”Christian” the antithesis of ”worldly,” has its full justification in the thoughts of the master[5]
[Footnote 1: Luke xvi 15]
[Footnote 2: Matt v 3, 10, xviii 3, xix 14, 23, 24, xxi 31, xxii
2, and following; Mark x 14, 15, 23-25; Luke iv 18, and following; vi 20, xviii 16, 17, 24, 25]
[Footnote 3: Matt xi 5]
[Footnote 4: John xv 19, xvii 14, 16]
[Footnote 5: See especially chapter xvii of St John, expressing, if not a real discourse delivered by Jesus, at least a sentiment which was very deeply rooted in his disciples, and which certainly came from him]
CHAPTER VIII