And there is a religious and political
materialism which spoils all that it touches, liberty, equality,
individuality. So that there are two ways of understanding democracy....
What is threatened to-day is moral liberty, conscience, respect for the
soul, the very nobility of man. To defend the soul, its interests, its
rights, its dignity, is the most pressing duty for whoever sees the
danger. What the writer, the teacher, the pastor, the philosopher, has
to do, is to defend humanity in man. Man! the true man, the ideal man!
Such should be their motto, their rallying cry. War to all that debases,
diminishes, hinders, and degrades him; protection for all that
fortifies, ennobles, and raises him. The test of every religious,
political, or educational system, is the man which it forms. If a system
injures the intelligence it is bad. If it injures the character it is
vicious. If it injures the conscience it is criminal.
August 12, 1852. (Lancy.)--Each sphere of being tends toward a higher
sphere, and has already revelations and presentiments of it. The ideal
under all its forms is the anticipation and the prophetic vision of that
existence, higher than his own, toward which every being perpetually
aspires. And this higher and more dignified existence is more inward in
character, that is to say, more spiritual.
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