THE JEWS.

:

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dotal power was in the hands of military chiefs and yet, she contributed her share towards the formation of an independent spiritual power. It happened through her finding the impossibility of keeping together portions of her empire so various and remote by any temporal centralization, however stringent; and, again, by her military activity passing from the offensive to the defensive state, and parting off, for want of central aim, into independent principalities, requiring the advent of the spiritual power to unite them in a common bond. We shall see that this was the real origin of the feudality of the Middle Ages. A third way was that a universal morality became necessary, to unite the nations which were brought forcibly together while urged to mutual hatred by their respective forms of polytheism; and the need was met and satisfied by the communication of those higher and more general views and feelings which the conquering nobles had acquired by exercise and proof. In this way it appears that the political movement had as much share as the philosophical in causing that spiritual organization which distinguished the Middle Ages, and which owed its attribute of generality to the one movement, and that of morality to the other.

The Jews.

As nothing was fortuitous in this great revolution, but, on the contrary, every leading feature might be anticipated after due consideration of the conditions I have indicated, it may be interesting to observe what Roman province must be the scene of the great result of the dualism just described. It must be a portion of the empire which was especially prepared for monotheism, and for the habitual existence of an independent spiritual power. It must have an intense and obstinate nationality, which would make it suffer under isolation, and find a way out of it, without surrendering its peculiar faith, and indeed being disposed to propagate it. These conditions point to the little Jewish theocracy, derived in an accessory way from the Egyptian, and perhaps also the Chaldean theocracy, whence it probably emanated by a kind of exceptional colonization of the sacerdotal caste, the superior orders of which, become monotheists by their own intellectual progress, were led to institute, as a refuge or an

experiment, a monotheistic colony, in which monotheism preserved a difficult but avowed existence,—at least, after the separation of the ten tribes. Before the annexation to Rome, this anomalous people was only the more isolated by its faith, through the pride of superiority which enhanced, in their case, the superstition of exclusive nationality proper to all theocracies. This peculiarity was beneficial to the great movement, by furnishing the first direct instruments of the universal regeneration.

This view seems to present itself naturally; but it is not essential to our analysis. If the Jews had not made a beginning, some other nation would have offered the requisite organs; and those organs would have guided the advance in precisely the same direction, only transferring to some books, now probably lost, the sacred character which is still attributed to others.

The slowness of this immense revolution is easily accounted for, if we only consider how all the social powers of the polytheistic régime were concentrated, so that it was necessary to change everything almost at once. The theocratic elements of the Roman system were once more in the first rank; for the five or six centuries which intervened between the emperors and the kings may be considered as a vast military episode in the long period proper to ancient theocracies; and the sacerdotal character, which had, for that interval, been effaced by the military, reappeared when conquest ceased. With the re-establishment of the theocratic régime, now much weakened, the conservative instinct proper to it revived, notwithstanding the instability of the rulers after the humiliation of the senatorial caste. This confusion between the temporal and spiritual power, which was the very spirit of the system, explains why even the wisest and most generous of the Roman emperors could no more understand than a Chinese emperor could now, the voluntary renunciation of polytheism, which they regarded, and feared to sanction, as a demolition of their whole government, till the gradual conversion of the population to Christian monotheism introduced a new political influence, permitting first, and then requiring, the conversion of the leaders. That conversion terminated the preparatory progression, and opened

III.

CLOSE OF POLYTHEISM.

81

the new system by a decisive symptom of the real, independent power of the new spiritual authority which was to be its great moving force.

Such is my view of ancient polytheism as a whole, contemplated in its intellectual and social aspects, and examined as to its tendency to produce the new theological phase of the Middle Ages; which, again, after performing higher social functions than its predecessor, is making way for the advent of the positive philosophy. In the examination of monotheism, to which I shall now proceed, I shall be obliged, as hitherto, to content myself with proposing my series of historical views, in illustration of my theory of human development; leaving it to the reader to supply the mass of historical proof which it would be incompatible with the nature and limits of my work for me to set before him.

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AGE OF

CHAPTER IX.

MONOTHEISM.-MODIFICATION

OF THE THEO

LOGICAL AND MILITARY SYSTEM.

WHEN Rome had united the civilized world under her

sway, the time was come for Monotheism to assume and complete the work of preparation for a new and higher social life. The intellectual decline of the theological philosophy was about to begin: but it had not yet attained its full social value: and this action, inverse to that of the polytheistic régime, is the reason why we should consider its social qualities,-beginning with the political,--before examining its mental attributes. I begin with the political, because, though the predominant action of monotheism is moral, its moral efficacy itself has always depended on its political existence. My task will be shortened by a new facility, which will attend us from this point onwards, -that of attending to one form only of the theological régime. Hitherto, we have had to separate the abstract qualities of the system examined from the various

Catholicism the form.

modes in which they were realized. Now, we have to attend only to the Roman Catholic form of monotheism, because, while Mahommedanism, the Greek faith, and every form of monotheism, presents a remarkable general conformity with all the rest, it is the Roman Catholic form which has fulfilled the functions of the régime in Western Europe: and it must therefore be the single object of our examination. I prefer the term Catholicism to that of Christianity, not only because it is more distinctive, but because it is more universal, from involving no name of any individual founder, but comprehending the monotheistic principle without sectarian limitation. Every one knows what a Catholic is; but the wisest man will not undertake to say what a Christian is, now that the title belongs to all the thousand varieties which separate the primitive Lutheran from the pure deist.

As the chief attribute of the political system of monotheism is the introduction of a spiritual power independent of the temporal, we must first examine this great social creation, passing on afterwards to the temporal organization.

The uniformity of belief proper to monotheism, and enforced by it, admits of the establishment of a single theological system among peoples too important and too diverse to be long kept together under one temporal government: whence such a consistence and dignity must accrue to the sacerdotal class as affords a ground for political indepen dence. The preparation of the conditions, beginning from the concurrence of the Roman power with the Greek philosophy, was very slow. The Greek philosophy, it is true, contemplated the establishment of a spiritual power; but it did not contemplate the separation of the temporal power from it: hence it merely indicated, as every Utopia does, the social need of the age, and prophesied its satisfaction and it remained for Catholicism to take to itself whatever was true and practicable in all other schemes, dismissing what was foolish or hurtful. How this was done we shall see as we proceed.

Principle of political rule.

Though intelligence must always exert a powerful influence in human affairs, and though a certain convergence of opinion is necessary to all association, and therefore to all government, such supremacy of intellect in political government as the Greek philosophers desired can never be more than a dream. The intellectual life is feebler than the affective in our organism, as I have repeatedly said; and mental superiority is too little understood and appreciated by the majority of society to obtain an immediate and practical ascendancy. The mass of mankind, being destined to action, sympathize most with organizations of moderate intelligence and eminent activity. The general gratitude also waits upon services which satisfy the sum of human wants, among which those of the intellect are very far from holding the most conspicuous place. The most vivid interest and the most unqualified gratitude are excited by practical success, military or industrial, though such achievement requires far less intellectual power than almost any theoretical labours, even of a kind very inferior to