466 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



take the place of the old one and dethrone him. We know that 

 the old churchmen saw something divine in the origin and nature 

 of the state ; but then there were in those days relations between 

 the Church and the state that exist no longer. The kings and 

 emperors of the middle ages never dreamed habitually of deify- 

 ing themselves, or of attributing to themselves in their own per- 

 sonalities a divine mission. Even in its highest pretensions and 

 most impudent usurpations the state of the old regime was never 

 ashamed to bow before God, it acknowledged that it held its 

 power from him, and considered itself under obligations to make 

 his laws respected. The Church never saw an adversary or a 

 rival in it ; if it rebelled occasionally against the supremacy of 

 the ecclesiastical power, the Church could always hope to bring 

 it back to docility and obedience. 



But we mistrust the modern state, both as Christians and as 

 citizens. This modern state, monarchical or republican; the 

 bureaucratic state, with a hundred arms reaching everywhere ; 

 the elective state, headless or many-headed, changing, incoherent, 

 capricious, constantly inclined to usurp the functions of the fam- 

 ily, of private societies, of individuals we are afraid to extend 

 its competence beyond bounds. We know it too well to give our- 

 selves up to it. We know by experience how heavy and clumsy 

 its hand is ; how violent, rough, arbitrary, and tyrannical are its 

 processes, and how presumptuous and costly are its methods. The 

 Church itself knows something of its character and proceedings. 

 St. Thomas of Aquinas said the state was the servant of God for 

 good. But is it God whose minister the contemporary state is ? 

 Even when it does not sin by doctrinal presumption, or by anti- 

 religious intolerance, or by usurpation of authority over the 

 family, the state seems to us morally incapable of assuming the 

 high mission which some of the sons of the Church seem to claim 

 for it. It is inspired neither with Christian law nor with the law 

 of God, nor with the ideal justice which such persons prescribe as 

 its guides. Its law and rule are not justice, but electoral inter- 

 ests. Instead of being, as it is invited to be, an impartially serene 

 authority, lifted above all classes and providing equitably for all, 

 the state which we know and whose workings we witness is essen- 

 tially partial. The child of government by party, it is, we might 

 say, partial by derivation. Instead of the traditional balances of 

 justice, it has two weights and two measures in everything. It 

 has none of the qualities of an earthly Providence : not foresight, 

 or intelligence, or equity, or wisdom. It is always ready to en- 

 croach upon a domain which is not its own, and in every direc- 

 tion ; it is careless of the rights of others, and recognizes hardly 

 any but those which it has established ; it assumes to be the only 

 law-maker, and imagines that it creates right. It believes that 



