The
doctrine of individual freedom before the state is due to the
Christian religion, which asserts the dignity and worth of every
human soul, the accountability to God of each man for himself,
and lays it down as law for every one that God is to be obeyed
rather than men. The church practically denied the absolutism of
the state, and asserted for every man rights not held from the
state, in converting the empire to Christianity, in defiance of
the state authority, and the imperial edicts punishing with death
the profession of the Christian faith. In this she practically,
as well as theoretically, overthrew state absolutism, and infused
into modern society the doctrine that every individual, even the
lowest and meanest, has rights which the state neither confers
nor can abrogate; and it will only be by extinguishing in modern
society the Christian faith, and obliterating all traces of
Christian civilization, that state absolutism can be revived with
more than a partial and temporary success.
The doctrine of individual liberty may be abused, and so
explained as to deny the rights of society, and to become pure
individualism; but no political system that runs to the opposite
extreme, and absorbs the individual in the state, stands the
least chance of any general or permanent success till
Christianity is extinguished. Yet the assertion of principles
which logically imply state absolutism is not entirely harmless,
even in Christian countries.
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