Assuredly, the Bible talks no
trash about the rights of man; but it insists on the equality of
duties, on the liberty to bring about that righteousness which is
somewhat different from struggling for "rights"; on the fraternity of
taking thought for one's neighbour as for one's self.
So far as such equality, liberty, and fraternity are included under
the democratic principles which assume the same names, the Bible is
the most democratic book in the world. As such it began, through the
heretical sects, to undermine the clerico-political despotism of the
middle ages, almost as soon as it was formed, in the eleventh century;
Pope and King had as much as they could do to put down the Albigenses
and the Waldenses in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries; the
Lollards and the Hussites gave them still more trouble in the
fourteenth and fifteenth; from the sixteenth century onward, the
Protestant sects have favoured political freedom in proportion to the
degree in which they have refused to acknowledge any ultimate
authority save that of the Bible.
But the enormous influence which has thus been exerted by the Jewish
and Christian Scriptures has had no necessary connection with
cosmogonies, demonologies, and miraculous interferences. Their
strength lies in their appeals, not to the reason, but to the ethical
sense. I do not say that even the highest biblical ideal is exclusive
of others or needs no supplement.
Pages:
66
67
68
69
70
71
72
73
74
75
76
77
78
79
80
81
82
83
84
85
86
87
88
89
90