[105] . . . . . because I believe that it is under the direction
of a superior impulse, because, Providence being unable to act in
the social order except through the intervention of men’s interests
and men’s wills, it is impossible that the natural resulting force
of these interests, the common tendency of these wills, should
be towards ultimate evil; for then we must conclude that it is
not only man, or the human race, which proceeds onward towards
error; but that God himself, being powerless or malevolent, urges
on to evil His abortive creation. We believe, then, in liberty,
because we believe in universal harmony, because we believe in God.
Proclaiming in the name of faith, and formulating in the name of
science, the Divine laws of the moral movement, living and pliant
as these laws are, we spurn the narrow, sinister, unbending, and
unalterable institutions which the blind leaders of the ignorant
would substitute for this admirable mechanism. It would be absurd in
the atheist to say, ‹laissez faire le hasard!›—seek not to control
chance, or blind destiny. But, as believers, we have a right to say,
seek not to control the order and justice of God—seek not to control
the free action of the sovereign and infallible mover of all, or of
that machinery of transmission which we call the human initiative.
Liberty thus understood is no longer the anarchical deification of
individualism. What we adore is above and beyond man who struggles;
it is God who leads him.
We acknowledge, indeed, that man may err; yes, by the whole interval
which separates a truth realized and established from one which
is merely guessed at or suspected. But since man’s nature is to
seek, his destiny is to find. Truth, be it observed, has harmonious
relations, necessary affinities, not only with the constitution of
the understanding and the instincts of the heart, but also with the
whole physical and moral conditions of our existence; so that even
when we fail to grasp it as ‹absolute truth›, even when it fails to
recommend itself to our innate sympathies as ‹just›, or to our ideal
aspirations as ‹beautiful›, it, nevertheless, at length contrives
to find acceptance in its practical and unobjectionable aspect as
‹useful›.
Liberty, we know, may lead to evil. But evil has itself its
mission. Assuredly God has not thrown it across our path as a
stumbling-block. He has placed it, as it were, on each side of that
path as a warning,—as a means of keeping us in the right road, or
bringing us back to it.
Man’s will and inclinations, like inert molecules, have their law
of gravitation. But, whilst things inanimate obey blindly their
pre-existent and inevitable tendencies, in the case of beings
indued with free will, the force of attraction and repulsion does
not precede action; it springs from the voluntary determination
which it seems to be waiting for, it is developed by the very act
itself, and it reacts for or against the agent, by a progressive
exertion of co-operation or resistance, which we term recompense
or chastisement, pleasure or pain. If the direction of the will
coincides with that of the general laws, if the act is ‹good›,
happiness is the result. If it takes an opposite direction, if
it is ‹bad›, something opposes or repels it; error gives rise to
suffering, which is its remedy and its end. Thus, Evil is constantly
opposed by Evil, and Good as constantly gives rise to Good. And
we venture to say that, when seen from a higher point of view,
the errors of free will are limited to certain oscillations, of
a determinate extent, around a superior and necessary orbit; all
persistent resistance, which would force this limit, tending only to
destroy itself, without at all succeeding in disturbing the order of
the sphere in which it moves.
This reactive force of co-operation or repulsion, which, by means
of recompense and suffering, governs the orbit, at once voluntary
and necessary, of the human race, this ‹law of gravitation of free
beings› (of which Evil is only a necessary part) is distinguished by
the terms Responsibility and Solidarity; the one brings back upon
the individual; the other reflects and sends back on the social body
the good or bad consequences of the act; the one applies to man as
a solitary and self-governing individual; the other envelops him
in an inevitable community of good and evil as a partial element,
a dependent member, of a collective and imperishable being—man.
‹Responsibility› is the sanction of individual liberty, the
foundation of the ‹rights› of man. ‹Solidarity› is the evidence of
his social subordination, and his principle of duty. . . .
[‹A leaf of Bastiat’s MS. being awanting, I hope to be pardoned
for thus endeavouring to continue the idea of this religious
introduction.›]—R. F.
[106] Religion (‹religare›, to bind), that which connects the
present life with the future, the living with the dead, time with
eternity, the finite with the infinite, man with God.
[107] May we not say that Divine Justice, which is so
incomprehensible when we consider the lot of individuals, becomes
striking when we reflect on the destinies of nations? Each man’s
life is a drama which is begun on one theatre and completed on
another. But the same thing cannot be said of the life of nations.
That instructive tragedy begins and ends upon earth. This is the
reason why history becomes a holy lesson; it is the justice of
Providence.—«De Custine’s» ‹La Russie›.
[108] Allusion to Socialist Utopias of the day.—«Translator.»
[109] “As to the doctrine of necessity, no one believes it. If
a man should give me arguments that I do not see, though I could
not answer them, should I believe that I do not see? . . . . All
theory is against the freedom of the will; all experience for
it. . . . . I ‹know› that I am free, and there’s an end on’t.” (‹Dr
Johnson.›)—«Translator.»
[110] “Cursed is the ground for thy sake; in sorrow shalt thou eat
of it all the days of thy life: Thorns also and thistles shall it
bring forth to thee. . . . In the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat
bread, until thou return unto the ground; for out of it wast thou
taken: for dust thou art, and unto dust shalt thou return.”—‹Gen.›
iii. 17, 18, 19.
[111] The interesting developments which the author intended to
present here by way of illustrations, and of which he indicated
beforehand the character, he unfortunately did not live to write.
The reader may supply the want by referring to chapter xvi. of this
work, and likewise to chapters vii. and xi. of Bastiat’s pamphlet,
‹Ce qu’on voit et Ce qu’on ne voit pas›.—«Note of the Editor.»
[112] “For when the Gentiles, which have not the law, do by nature
the things contained in the law, these, having not the law, are a
law unto themselves; which show the work of the law written in their
hearts, their conscience also bearing witness, and their thoughts
the meanwhile accusing or else excusing one another.”—‹Romans› ii.
14, 15. See also ‹Bishop Butler’s 3d Sermon, on Human Nature›:
“Nothing,” says he, “can be more evident than that, ‹exclusive of
revelation›, man cannot be considered as a creature left by his
Maker to act at random, and live at large up to the extent of his
natural power, as passion, humour, wilfulness, happen to carry him;
which is the condition brute creatures are in. But that, ‹from his
make, constitution, or nature, he is in the strictest and most
proper sense a law to himself›. He hath the rule of right within.
What is wanting is only that he honestly attend to it.”—«Butler’s»
‹Works›, vol. ii. p. 65.—«Translator.»
[113] The conclusion of this chapter is little more than
a series of notes thrown together, without transitions or
developments.—«Editor.»