Must I demonstrate to you so simple a truth? Can you not comprehend,
without explanation of mine, that a nation, where each citizen thinks
only of his own private well-being here below, and sacrifices
constantly the general good to his personal and narrow interest;--where
the powerful man wishes to preserve all the power for himself alone,
without making an equitable and proportional division to the
weak;--where the weak wishes to conquer at any price, that he may
tyrannize in his turn;--where the rich wishes to acquire and
concentrate the greatest possible amount of wealth, to enjoy it alone,
and even without circulating it in work, in wages, in assistance, in
benevolence, in good deeds to his brothers;--where the poor wishes to
dispossess violently and unjustly those who possess more than himself,
instead of recognizing that diversity of chances, of conditions, of
professions, of fortunes, of which human life is composed,--instead of
acquiring prosperity for his family, in his turn and degree, by effort,
by order, by labor, by economy, by the assistance of borrowed capital,
by the law of inheritance, by the free transfer of real estate, by free
entrance into different callings and trades, by free competition in the
money market;--where each class of citizens declares itself an enemy to
every other, and heaps upon each other all manner of evil, instead of
doing all the good in its power, and uniting in the holy harmony of
social unity;--where each individual draws around him, for himself
alone, the common mantle, willing to tear it in pieces for himself,
and thus leave the whole world naked,--do you not understand, I say,
that such a People, having no God but its selfishness, no judge but
interest, no conscience but cupidity, will fall, in a short time, into
complete destruction, and, being incapable of a Republican government,
because it casts aside the government of God himself, will rush
headlong into the government of the brute: the government of the
strongest, the despotism of the sword, the divinity of the
cannon,--that last resort of anarchy, which is at once the remedy and
the death of nations without God!
Now has not this weakening of the sentiment of God in the soul of the
People been, from year to year, from century to century, indeed, I
might say, the most discouraging and threatening symptom, in the eyes
of those who desire the progress of their race, who aspire to the
moral perfection of the human spirit, who hope in Republican
institutions, who love the People, who wish to cultivate their reason,
who desire that the People should understand themselves, respect
themselves, and, finally, by their enlightenment, their
conscientiousness, their moderation and virtue, give the lie to those
who declare them in a state of perpetual infancy, perpetual madness,
or perpetual weakness?
Yes, this is but too true: men have been blotting out God, for a
century past, from the souls of the People, and more especially in
latter years. The masses have been driven to Atheism, they have been
driven on every side and by every hand.
Sometimes, by blasphemies, such as were never heard upon the earth,
until an insult to the Creator became a means of popularity among His
creatures; blasphemies which would have darkened the sun and
extinguished the stars, if God had not commanded His creation to pass
unnoticed the revolt of a blind and foolish insect against Infinity,
and refused Himself to sink to the foolishness of avenging impiety!
Read those lines which I dare not write, those lines where an apostle
of Atheism effaces the name of God from the beautiful creation and
endeavors to substitute his own! * * *