God, when one believes in Him as you and I do, imposes then on man a
duty towards the society of which he makes a part. You admit it, do
you not?
Then follow, and analyze with me this society. Of whom, and how, is it
composed?
It is composed, at the same time, of strong and weak, conquerors and
conquered, victors and vanquished, oppressors and oppressed, masters
and slaves, nobles and serfs, of citizens and bondmen or subjects
disinherited and enslaved, considered as living furniture, as tools
and laughing-stocks to their fellow-men, as were the Blacks in our
colonies before the Republic.
Thanks to the increase of general reason, to the light of philosophy,
to the inspiration of Christianity, to the progress of the idea of
justice, of charity, and of fraternity, in laws, manners, and
religion, society in America, in Europe, and in France, especially
since the Revolution, has broken down all these barriers, all these
denominations of caste, all these injurious distinctions among men.
Society is composed only of various conditions, professions,
functions, and ways of life, among those who form what we call a
Nation; of proprietors of the soil, and proprietors of houses; of
investments, of handicrafts, of merchants, of manufacturers, of
farmers; of day-laborers becoming farmers, manufacturers, merchants,
or possessors of houses or capital, in their turn; of the rich, of
those in easy circumstances, of the poor, of workmen with their
hands, workmen with their minds; of day-laborers, of those in need, of
a small number of men enjoying considerable acquired or inherited
wealth, of others of a smaller fortune painfully increased and
improved, of others with property only sufficient for their needs;
there are some, finally, without any personal possession but their
hands, and gleaning for themselves and for their families, in the
workshop, or the field, and at the threshold of the homes of others on
the earth, the asylum, the wages, the bread, the instruction, the
tools, the daily pay, all those means of existence which they have
neither inherited, saved, nor acquired. These last are what have been
improperly called _the People_. This name is extended now; it embraces
really all the People; but still it is used as the name of the
indigent and suffering part of the People.
It is more especially of this class that I intend to speak, in saying
to you, "To love the People, it is necessary to believe in God."