In the first paper of this series, reference was made to the Principles of Unity and Individuality as dominating over distinctive epochs of the world's progress; and certain characteristics of each epoch were pointed out which may be briefly recapitulated. Up to a period of time which is commonly said to commence with the publication of Lord Bacon's Novum Organum, the preponderating tendency in all the affairs of Society—in Government, in Religion, in Thought, in Practical Activities—was convergent and toward Consolidation, Centralization, Order, or, in one word, Unity; with a minor reference only to Freedom, Independence, or Individuality. A change then took place, and the Tendency to Unity began to yield, as the major or chief tendency in society, to the opposite or divergent drift toward Disunity or Individuality, which gradually came to be pre-eminently active. The Spirit of Disintegration which thus arose, has exhibited and is still exhibiting itself in Religious affairs, by the destruction of the integrality of the Church, and its division into numerous sects; and in the State, by the Democratic principle of popular rule, as opposed to the Monarchical theory of the supremacy of one.

We have now arrived, in the course of our development as a race, at the culminating point of the second Stage of Progress—the Era of Individuality. The predominant tendency of our time in things Religious, Governmental, Intellectual, and Practical, is toward the utter rejection of all clogs upon the personal freedom of Man or Woman. This is seen by the neglect into which institutions of all kinds tend to fall, and the disrespect in which they are held; in the movements for the abolition of Slavery and Serfdom; in the recognition of the people's right of rule, even in Monarchical countries; more radically in the Woman's Rights Crusade, and in the absolute rejection, by the School of Reformers known as Individualists, of all governmental authority other than that voluntarily accepted, as an infringement of the individual's inherent right of self-sovereignty.

This Spirit of Individuality, this desire to throw off all trammels, and to live in the atmosphere of one's own personality, exhibits itself in a marked degree in the literature of our day. It is the animating spirit of John Stuart Mill's work 'On Liberty'—a work which, as the writer has elsewhere shown, was substantially borrowed, although without any openly avowed acknowledgment of indebtedness, from an American publication. It is this spirit which has inspired some of the most remarkable of Herbert Spencer's Essays; and is distinctively apparent in the Fourth one of the Propositions which Mr. Buckle affirms to be 'the basis of the history of civilization;' and in the general tenor of Prof. Draper's Intellectual Development of Europe.

The gist of this doctrine of Individuality, as it is now largely prevalent in respect to the institutions of the Church and the State, and which is squarely affirmed in the proposition above mentioned, is this: Men and Women do not wish nor do they need a Spiritual Society to teach them what to believe, nor a Political Society to teach them what to do. If they are simply left alone, they will thrive well enough. An Ecclesiastical Organization is not only useless, but positively injurious; it is a decided hinderance to the progress of humanity; and the same is true of a Civil Organization, except in so far as it serves the purpose of protection to person and property.

It is intended to show in this article the erroneousness of this doctrine; to point out that Religious and Political Institutions have, in the past, been great aids to human advancement; that they are still so; and will be in the future. In this manner we shall meet the arguments of those who regard such institutions as having always been unnecessary and a hinderance; and of those who, while considering them as essential in the past, believe that they are now becoming obsolete, are detrimental to the cause of human progress, and in the future to be wholly dispensed with.

Mankind in its entirety resembles a pyramid. At the base are the ignorant and superstitious nations of the earth, comprising the great majority of its inhabitants. A step higher includes the next greatest number of nations, in which the people are less ignorant and less degraded, but still very low as respects organization and culture. So, as we rise in the scale of national development, the lines of inclusion continually narrow, until we reach the apex, occupied by the most advanced nation or nations.

That which is true of nations is so of classes and of individuals composing classes. Every community has its natural aristocracy, its superior men and women. These constitute the top of the pyramid of Society; and comprise those in whom intellectual powers, moral purposes, and practical capacities are most highly developed and combined. Below them comes the somewhat larger body of persons who are less endowed in respect to the qualities just enumerated. Below these comes, in turn, the still greater congregation who are still less gifted; and so on, the number increasing as the range of general capacity decreases, until we reach the layer which embodies the great mass of Society; who, though measurably affectionate, well-intentioned, and docile, are ignorant, superstitious, and simple minded, wanting in any large degree of high moral purpose, and constantly prone to the development of the vicious and depraved passions incident to this lower stratum of life.

It is evident that to meet the needs of these widely different grades of individuals, widely different manners, customs, and institutions are indispensable. Culture, delicacy, and intelligence have their own attractions, which are wholly diverse from those of crudeness, coarseness, and simplicity. The surroundings which would bring happiness to the lover of art or the man of large mental endowment, would render miserable the peasant who still lacked the development to appreciate the elegancies of refinement; while the tidy cottage and plain comforts which might constitute the paradise of the humble and illiterate rustic, would be utterly inadequate to the requirements of larger and more highly organized natures.

The Constitution and Structure of Society should be of such a nature, therefore, for the purposes of human growth and happiness, as to allow the needs and wants of every one of its members to be adequately supplied. As yet there has been no such arrangement of our social organization. In nations governed by Monarchical or Aristocratic rule, the institutions of the country are made to satisfy the demands of the privileged classes; with scarcely any reference to the wants of the masses. In Democratic communities, the opposite method is adopted; and the character of their public organizations and of their public opinion—the latter always the most despotic of institutions—is determined by the average notions of the middle class, which ordinarily furnishes the bulk of the voters; with little consideration to the desires of the higher or the necessities of the lower orders.

The institutions of any people, civil or religious, are, therefore, representative, in the main, of the state of development of the dominant and controlling class in the community. In a Monarchical or Aristocratic nation it is the upper portion of the body politic whose condition is chiefly indicated. In this case, the manners, customs, laws, etc., of the country are in advance of the great body of the people, who have yet to grow up to them. In Democratic states, the manners, customs, laws, etc., conform to the stage of advancement which the majority of the people have reached. They are thus above the level of the lower classes, who are not sufficiently developed to participate in their full benefits; and below the capacity of the superior ranks, who, though fitted for the right use and enjoyment of more liberal and higher social adaptations, are nevertheless obliged to cramp their natures and dwarf their activities to the measure of the capacities of the more numerous circle of citizens.

Three classes have thus far been named as the personnel of any Society. There is, however, a body of individuals which, although made up of persons from the three classes above indicated, constitute, in a peculiar sense, a distinct order. This includes the Philosophers, Poets, Scientists—the Thinkers of all kinds—who are in advance of the best institutions of either Monarchical or Democratic countries; who see farther into the future than even the great bulk of men of intelligence and high development; who especially understand the transient nature and inadequate provisions of existing societies, and feel the need of better conditions for intellectual, social, and moral growth.

It is from this body of men that the incentives to progress chiefly spring. They behold the errors which encumber old systems—they are, indeed, too apt to conceive them as wholly composed of errors. To them, the common and current beliefs appear to be simply superstitious. It irks them that humanity should wallow in its ignorance and blindness. They chafe and fret against the organizations which embody and foster what they are firmly convinced is all false. The Church is, in their eyes, only a vast agglomeration of priests, some of them self-deceived through ignorance; most of them not so, but deliberately bolstering up an obsolete faith for place, profit, and power. The State, both as existing in the past and now, is likewise, in their understanding, a tremendous engine of tyranny, keeping the light of knowledge from the masses; withholding liberty; and hindering the prosperity of mankind.

That there is much truth in such opinions, too much by far, is not to be denied. That Society needs regeneration in all departments of its life—political, religious, industrial, and social—is plainly apparent. But there is an essential omission in the kind of reform which is spontaneously taking place at this time, and which is lauded by Mill, Buckle, Spencer, Draper, and the advanced Thinkers of the day generally, as the true direction in which change should be made; an omission which will bring Society to disastrous revolution, even, it may be, to fatal overthrow, unless supplied.

The tendency of modern reform in reference to the institutions of Church and State—and these, in the sense in which they are here used, include all other institutions—is, as has been said, to do away with the former altogether, and to restrict the latter to the sole functions of protection of person and property. Reformatory ideas come, it has also been said, from that small circle of men and women in Society, who are in advance of the general development of the age even as represented in the superior class—meaning by this, the class which, in the average estimate, occupies the highest position; as, for instance, the Aristocracy in England, and the Wealthy Families of America.

Human Society, in all its Institutions, has been, thus far in the history of the world, a thing of spontaneous, instinctual, or automatic growth. There has never been and is not to-day, so far as is publicly known, any Science of Social Organization; any System of Laws or Principles embodying the true mode of Social Construction. There has not been, in other words, any discovery of the right Principles upon which the affairs of mankind should be conducted in reference to their mutual relationships; and hence, there is no real knowledge, but only conjecture, of what are the right relations. Might has always been the accepted Right and the only Standard of Right in the regulation of Society. The opinions of the Ruling Power give tone to human thought and action. While Kings and Oligarchies were in the ascendency, the Standard of Right—the King's or the Oligarchs' will—were based on his or their ideas of right. Later, when the People secured the conduct of their own affairs, the voice of the Majority became the voice of God, as expressed in the popular motto: Vox populi, vox Dei.

Having then no Standard of true Social Organization, it is natural, though short sighted, that the reformatory party—perceiving the insufficiencies and drawbacks of our present Societary Arrangements, feeling that they have no need of the Governmental and Religious institutions of the day, that these are, indeed, rather hindrances than aids to their progress—should think that the people of the whole world, of the civilized nations, or of one civilized nation, at least, were in like state of preparation, and that those Institutions could be safely and advantageously dispensed with. There could scarcely be a greater mistake. There are but comparatively few individuals in the world who are so highly developed in their intellectual and moral capacities, and in practical ability also, as to be competent to be a law unto themselves in the general conduct of life. The great mass of mankind, even in the most advanced communities, need still the guiding hand of a wisely constituted and really paternal Government, and the religious admonitions of a true priesthood. The greatest danger with which Society is threatened in modern times, arises from the lack of these essential concomitants of any high civilization. The degradation, squalor, ignorance, and brutality of the lowest classes; the irreverence, disrespect, dishonesty, and moral blindness of the middle orders; and the apathy, heartlessness, unscrupulousness, selfishness, cupidity, and irreligion of the upper stratum of Society, are alike due to the absence of a rightly organized State, which should command the allegiance, and of a rightly constituted Church, which should absorb the devotion, of the whole community.

The Constitution of Society must be moulded with reference to the character of the individuals in it. Of these, some are sagacious, executive, intelligent, benevolent, sympathetic, philanthropic, self-reliant; possessed of all the qualities, in fine, which inspire respect and confidence in their fellow men, and cause them to be recognized as leaders. Others are timid, ignorant, feeble-minded, credulous, prone to lean upon others, hero worshippers; people whose natural bent it is to follow some one in whom they put faith. The sentiment of loyalty is inherent in the human breast, and will find an object whereon to fasten. At one time it is an Alexander; then a Washington, a Napoleon, or a Wellington; at another, a Clay, a Webster, or a Grant. There are ranks and orders in Society as there are ranks and orders among individuals. And as the inherent rank of an individual is, as a general rule, recognized and accorded, no matter what may be the social constitution of the land in which he lives, so it is with classes. Theoretically, all individuals and orders are equal in the United States. But the Law of Nature is stronger than the laws of man; and the men and women of superior endowment in moral power, intellectual force, or practical ability, receive the voluntary homage of those who feel themselves to be inferior.

In considering the nature of the Institutions which Society needs, we have simply to consider by what mode we may best provide for the normal tendencies which ever have been and ever will be active in man. It is not in our power to change these tendencies, nor to prevent their play. But we may so order our social polity as to assist their natural drift, or to obstruct it. In the one case, the affairs of the community are conducted with harmony, and with the least possible friction. In the other, they are discordant, and are forced to reach their proximately proper adjustment through antagonism and struggle. It is the difference between the ship which flies swiftly to her destined port with favoring winds, fair skies, and peaceful seas, and one which struggles wearily to her harbor through adverse gales and stormy waves, battered, broken, and tempest tossed. The great mass of the people have always looked to the more highly developed of their race for practical guidance in the secular concerns of life, and for spiritual guidance in religious things. That they have done so, and that the Church and the State have been large factors in the sum of human progress, we shall presently see. We shall also see brought out more distinctly and clearly the fact, that the dominant classes in Society, whether the form of Government be a Monarchy, an Oligarchy, or a Democracy, are, in the main, and except, perhaps, in transitional epochs, the classes who possess, in reality, superior capacities of the quality the age most requires in its leaders.

In the earliest ages of the world, when brute force was regarded as the highest attribute of greatness, the men of might, the renowned warriors, the Nimrods and the Agamemnons, occupied the highest pinnacle of Society, and received homage from their fellows as supreme men. Of their age they were the supreme men. To our enlightened epoch, the fighting heroes of the past are but brutal bullies a little above the level of the animals whose powers and habits they so sedulously emulated. But if we plant ourselves in thought back in that savage era, if we reflect that its habits and instincts were almost wholly physical, that the chief controlling powers of the time were the arm of might and superstition, and if we ponder a moment upon the force of will, the dauntless courage, the inexorable rigor, the terrible energy, the ceaseless activity, and the gigantic personal strength which must have combined in a single man to have enabled him to rule so turbulent and so animal a people; we shall be apt to understand that the only being who could, in that age, stand first among his fellows, must have been the superior brute of all.

If we consider still further the ferocious natures of the men of that time, we shall perceive the necessity which existed for a strong Government, regulating all the affairs of Society, and administered by the most severe and savage chieftain; one who could hold all others in subjection by the terror of his might, preserve a semblance at least of order in the community, and protect his subjects from outside wrong.

But what could hold him in subjection—an irresponsible despot, without human sympathy, without any awakened sense of moral responsibility, capricious, self-willed, ambitious, lustful, vindictive, without self-control, and possessing absolute power over the lives and property of his subjects? Nothing but the dread of an offended God or gods. And, as a consolidated despotism, wielded by brute force, was the best form of Government possible in this age; so a worship based chiefly upon the incitements and terrors of retributive law—the holding out of inducements of reward for the good, and of determents of direful punishment for the wicked, in a future world—was the best religion for which the time was prepared.

Tracing the history of the world down to later times, we shall find the same state of things in society at large, until a period which it is difficult to fix, but which, we may say, did not fairly begin until the beginning or the middle of the eighteenth century. Down to that time, physical force was the dominant element among the nations. The great warriors were still the prominent men upon the stage of action, though many of the brutal characteristics of the earlier ages had disappeared. The people were still ignorant, credulous, childlike, and looked to the Feudal Aristocracy for direction and support—an Aristocracy founded on superiority of warlike talent; thus fitly representing the leading spirit of the age, and the proper guardians of the people in this warlike time. The Catholic Church, and, at a later period, the Protestant sects, held the upper classes from oppressing the lower, and taught the latter to respect and defer to the former. The Feudal Lords were thus the Social providence and protection of the poor and weak, thinking and acting for them in things beyond their range of capacity; while these, in turn, performed the agricultural and other labors to which they were competent. Each class occupied its appropriate position and fulfilled its legitimate calling. The superior orders held the superior situations; and were recognized for what they really were, leaders and guides. The masses of the community were faithful and obedient as followers. The Church inspired each with a feeling of devotion to duty, protected the subject and controlled the ruler. In its function of a Governmental arrangement, the Feudal System was admirably adapted to the necessities of the time. In its religious capacity, the Catholic Church was the bulwark of Social order during the Middle Ages.

About the period of time mentioned above, the warlike spirit which had theretofore pervaded the world and controlled its destinies, began to yield before the enlightenment of civilization. Commercial, industrial, and intellectual pursuits commenced to assume the leading position among the interests of Society. At the same time physical force and hereditary blood began to give way, as tokens of superior character, to intellectual greatness and executive commercial ability. The struggle which then commenced between the Aristocracy of Birth and the Aristocracy of Genius in all its forms, mental or practical, is still pending in the Old World. In America it has declared itself in favor of the latter. The only Noblemen here recognized are those of Nature's make—those who bear in their organizations and culture the stamp of superiority. These are, in the main, quickly recognized and acknowledged; whether they exhibit their genius in the field of Literature, Science, Invention, Government, Religion, Art—or in the thousand Commercial and Industrial Enterprises which are characteristic of this era, and especially of this country.

With the breaking up of the Feudal System and the advent of modern commercial activities, a great change took place in the organization of Society. Under this system a community was, as has been indicated, made up in such a manner that the whole body formed, so to speak, one family, having mutual interests; each individual performing those functions—for the benefit of the whole—for which he was, as a general rule, best fitted. The most warlike, sagacious, executive—those, in short, who were best capacitated for leaders and protectors, being at the head, and looking after the welfare of the whole; while others occupied such stations and rendered such services as their qualifications made them adequate to, in subordination to these leaders. Thus the interests of community were linked immediately together. They formed a grand CoÖperative Association, in which each member recognized his obligations to the whole body of associates, and to every individual associate, and measurably fulfilled those obligations as they were understood at that day. The poor were not left to fall into starvation and misery for the want of work; there were no paupers; and the rich and powerful classes did not neglect the affairs of the indigent and weak as those who had no claim upon them. On the contrary, they felt that mankind were the children of one Father, and their brethren. They felt that their superior powers devolved upon them accompanying responsibilities; that because they were comparatively far seeing and strong, they were bound by all the nobler sentiments of manhood to watch over and guide the short sighted and the feeble. Under the inspiration of the Catholic Church—a Church whose persistent efforts were ever devoted in a marked degree to the amelioration of the physical no less than the spiritual conditions of humanity, a Church which strove in the darkest hours of its history and always to stand between the helpless and suffering and their oppressors—they accepted this office and fulfilled its functions. To the beat of their understanding—with the light they then had, considering the times in which they lived, and the state of the world's progress—they executed well and faithfully the duties which pertained to it. Far better, indeed, as we shall presently see, than the opulent and powerful perform the same duties in our day.

With the commencement of more peaceful times and the gradual civilization of Society, the necessity of personal protection which had, in great measure, given rise to the Feudal System, passed away. Civil law acquired the protective power which had formerly resided in the arm of physical force. Travel became safe. The accumulations of industry were less liable to be wrenched from their legitimate owner by the hand of the robber. There was a rapid opening up of intelligence among the masses. Individual energy was stimulated. Commerce received a wonderful impetus. The bounds of personal freedom were enlarged. Men felt no longer the necessity of association for the sake of safety. They felt, moreover, the restless surging of new-born powers within them; and longed to give them exercise. So the old forms of community life were slowly broken up. Individuals embarked in various enterprises; now no longer consociated with others in mutual coÖperation, but for their individual benefit. Thus competitive industry gradually supplanted the old method of coÖperative or associated industry, as seen in its crude and imperfect form, and the inauguration of the false and selfish system which still prevails began.

There could be but one result to a mode of commercial and industrial traffic and a system of labor and wages which pits the various classes of Society together in a strife for the wealth of the world, the fundamental principle of which strife is, that it is perfectly right to take advantage of the necessities of our neighbors in order to obtain their means for our own enrichment.

For this was the principle which instinctively sprang up in the world as the basis of business, and which has never been changed. Traffic originated in the necessities of life, and was extended by the desire to obtain wealth. Each individual perceived some want in his neighbor, and forthwith proceeded to supply this want, charging just as much for the thing supplied as the desire for the article or his need of it would force the person supplied to pay; without reference to the equitable price, estimated with respect to the labor bestowed in supplying the want. This principle of trade, originating in the most complete selfishness, and, viewed from any high moral point, both unjust and dishonest, has always been and is to-day the fundamental principle of our Political Economy. That 'a thing is worth what it will bring,' is a basic axiom of all trade. The only price which is recognized in commerce is the market price; which is, again, what a commodity will bring. What a commodity will bring is what the necessities of mankind will make them pay. Thus is exhibited the curious spectacle of the existence of a Religion which inculcates good will and love to our neighbor as the foundation of all true civilization and virtue, coexisting side by side with a Commercial System, a relic, like slavery, of ancient barbarism, which forces all men to traffic with each other on the principle that our neighbor is an object of legitimate prey.

Of course, in a System of Competitive Industry thus carried on, the wealth of the world would fall into the hands of those of superior powers; while the feeble, the stolid, and the ignorant would be left poor and helpless. And, as the different classes of the community would be no longer directly associated with each other in their labors and interests, but would be, on the contrary, competitors—and as the fact that there had been free competition would be held by all classes to absolve them from any responsibility as to each other's welfare—it would inevitably result that the weaker orders should fall into indigence, degradation, wretchedness, starvation, and premature death.

Such has been the case. With the advent of Competitive Industry in Europe and America—to confine ourselves to these countries—with the disintegration of the Social System in which the different classes were associated in mutually dependent and coÖperative efforts; with the abrogation, on the part of the superior body of citizens, of all responsibility for, and direct interest in, the affairs and comfort of the lower orders, has come Pauperism, Social Instability, and a degree of misery and depravity among the poorest of the masses, never before known in the history of the world, all things being taken into consideration. It is a well-known saying of Political Economists, that the rich are daily growing richer, and the poor poorer. It might be added with truth: and more degraded and dangerous.

The effects of this method of Competitive Industry upon the higher classes have been scarcely less injurious, though in a different direction. It has bred an intense selfishness and an apathy in respect to the sufferings of others which no lover of his race can contemplate without emotions of anguish. Not only is the idea of any effort for the permanent relief of the poorer classes, for taking them under special care and making their welfare the business of Society, not entertained by any large number of persons; but those who do feel keenly the necessity of such a step, and whose sympathies are aroused by the sufferings of the masses around them, are too deeply imbued with the ease-loving spirit of the age, too much wedded to their own comfort, to take any active measures for the realization of their desires, or to forego their momentary interests to secure them.

The rich heap up riches by the iniquitous trade-system which drifts the earnings of the laborers into their net, and are dead to the call of those whom they are, unconsciously in most cases, defrauding. Nay! they even struggle to wring from them the largest possible amount of work for the smallest possible pay! Day by day they grow more exacting as they grow wealthier; day by day the laboring orders sink into more harassing and hopeless conditions. Had the functions of Government in our own country and in England been those only of protection to persons and property; had not the general and local authorities in some degree assisted the oppressed toilers; had not the Church by her admonitions and pleadings kept some sparks of feeling alive in the breast of the people of this money-getting age, and stimulated somewhat their benevolence, the laboring classes of England and America would long since have sunk to utter destitution. Nor would this have been all. For when the mass of the people reach such a point; when they are driven to despair, as they are now fast being driven, and would long ago have been driven but for the circumstances stated, then comes the terrible reaction, the frightful revolution, the upheaval of all order, anarchy, and—who shall tell what else? The Riot of July is still ringing its solemn warning—all unheeded—in the ears of this people. Society has yet and speedily to lift the masses out of their ignorance, poverty, squalor, and accompanying brutality, or to sink awfully beneath their maddened retaliation.

In thus criticizing the Industrial Polity of modern times as, in the respects indicated, inferior to that of the Feudal System, the writer does not wish to be understood as affirming any more than is really said. The idea which it is desired to express is this: that the plan upon which this system was founded—the mutual interdependence of classes and their reciprocally coÖperative labor—was far superior to the method of Competitive Industry now in vogue; and the true type—when rightly carried out, without the drawbacks and the evils of the Feudal System—of Social organization. That there are compensations in our modern mode, and that, on the whole, Society advances in adopting it, is true. But it will take a further step in advance when it reverts to that plan on the footing above indicated; when it adopts the plan without the evils which in an ignorant and undeveloped age necessarily accompanied it.

It has not been forgotten that the Church has arrayed itself, to no small extent, against the advent of new knowledge; that the State has suppressed the enlarging tendencies of individual liberty; and that both have been, in this way and in other ways, as Mr. Buckle and Professor Draper have clearly shown, clogs upon the hurrying wheels of the nations. It is precisely because they have been and are still so, that they served and do serve the cause of progress.

It has been previously stated that new truths come from the body of advanced Thinkers, who constitute a fourth and comparatively small class in the community. The discoverer of a new truth sees the immense advantages which would accrue to Society from a knowledge of it, and is eager for its immediate promulgation and acceptance; and, if it be of a practical nature, for its incorporation into the working principles of the Social polity. This may be true. But there is another verity of equal importance, which ordinarily he does not take into consideration, namely: that the great mass of the people who form Society are not prepared for the change which he contemplates. They comprehend and act more slowly than the Thinkers. The novelty must be brought home to their understandings gradually, and assimilated. Old forms of thought, old associations, encrusted prejudices, the deep-seated opinions of years must be modified before the new will find a lodgment in their convictions.

It is well that the Thinker should urge with impetuous and ardent zeal his side of the case; that he should insist upon the immediate adjustment of thought or activity in accordance with advanced right. It is true that he will not instantly succeed. It is equally true that, with human nature and Society as they now are, he would destroy all order if he did. Men can live only in that portion of truth which they are competent to appreciate. Place the Indian in the heated city, and make him conform to the usages of city life, he pines and dies. If it were possible to take away from the ignorant and child-minded races of the earth or portions of community their superstitious faith, and substitute the higher truths of a more spiritual interpretation, yet would they not subserve their religious purposes. So, when the new verity is held up to view, to the great mass who cannot understand it, it is no truth, but a lie. They oppose it. Thus the discovery becomes known. Discussion excites new thought. The Thinkers array themselves upon one side, urging forward; the State and the Church, representing the body of Society, take the other, standing sturdily still, or hesitating, doubting either the validity of the alleged truth or its uses. Between the clash of contending opinions the new ideas take shape in the awakened minds which are prepared for them. These come shortly to be the majority. The State and the Church gradually and imperceptibly modify their methods or their creeds; and so, safely and without disaster, humanity takes a step in advance.

It would be better, indeed, if this slow process were not necessary. When the whole scope of Fundamental Truths is apprehended; when a Science of the Universe is known; when truth is no longer fragmentary; and when there is mutual confidence and coÖperation among the different classes of community, it will not be necessary. But until then, any attempt to force an instantaneous acceptance of new truths or an immediate inauguration of new methods upon the mass of the people will only serve, if successful, to overthrow order in Society, and introduce Social anarchy in its stead. From such an attempt came the chaos of the French Revolution;—from an endeavor to inaugurate ideas essentially correct among a people noway ready to comprehend them rightly. The Conservative Element is as essential to the well-being of society as the Progressive. To eliminate either is to destroy its balanced action; and to give it over to stagnation on the one hand, or to frenzy on the other. The Thinkers of the past have done, and those of the present are doing, good work for humanity, on the Progressive side. The Church and the State of the past have done, the Church and the State of the present are doing, good work for humanity, on the Conservative side. Through the instrumentality of the Thinkers, the Church, and the State, the world has been brought slowly, steadily, and safely along the path of progress, now gaining in one way, and now in another; at times abandoning one line of advance, only to go ahead upon a different one; yet always moving onward, and standing to-day, in spite of its seeming retrogressions, at the highest point of development which it has ever touched.

The Church and the State of the future will be the subject of subsequent consideration.