A STEP BACKWARD IN ROME 



Religion was the only hope of the proletariat. 

 It offered the only possibility of organization 

 which the ruling class would not suppress, nay, 

 which it would promote for the same reasons that 

 rulers have ever had for preserving religion, viz., 

 because it is an excellent means of dividing the 

 working classes and of strengthening belief in 

 authority. 



It was but logical, therefore, that this new re- 

 ligion should first appear in Palestine, and that it 

 should try to justify itself from the ancient rec- 

 ords, which had once been the common heritage 

 of all members of the twelve tribes. The car- 

 penter of Nazareth and his followers had but to 

 step into the shoes of the ancient tribal prophets 

 in order to get a hearing among the workers. 

 The very arguments that once served in the 

 mouths of the old prophets against the usurpation 

 of the tribal chiefs, or kings, sounded familiar in 

 the mouths of the new prophets when used 

 against the rulers of Christ's time. 



So the new paganism tried to drive out the 

 devil by the help of Satan. Christianity entered 

 history as the first conscious attempt of an inter- 

 national proletariat to hide its revolutionary aims 

 under the cloak of a religion adapted to its mental 

 requirements. 



