n between the belief in the
approaching end of the world and the general moral system of Jesus,
conceived in prospect of a permanent state of humanity, nearly
analogous to that which now exists, no one will attempt to deny.[1] It
was exactly this contradiction that insured the success of his work.
The millenarian alone would have done nothing lasting; the moralist
alone would have done nothing powerful. The millenarianism gave the
impulse, the moralist insured the future. Hence Christianity united
the two conditions of great success in this world, a revolutionary
starting-point, and the possibility of continuous life. Everything
which is intended to succeed ought to respond to these two wants; for
the world seeks both to change and to last. Jesus, at the same time
that he announced an unparalleled subversion in human affairs,
proclaimed the principles upon which society has reposed for eighteen
hundred years.

[Footnote 1: The millenarian sects of England present the same
contrast, I mean the belief in the near end of the world,
notwithstanding much good sense in the conduct of life, and an
extraordinary understanding of commercial affairs and industry.]

That which in fact distinguishes Jesus from the agitators of his time,
and from those of all ages, is his perfect idealism. Jesus, in some
respects, was an anarchist, for he had no idea of civil government.
That government seemed to him purely and simply an abuse. He spoke of
it in vague terms, and as a man of the people who had no idea of
politics. Every magistrate appeared to him a natural enemy of the
people of God; he prepared his disciples for contests with the civil
powers, without thinking for a moment that there was anything in this
to be ashamed of.[1] But he never shows any desire to put himself in
the place of the rich and the powerful. He wishes to annihilate riches
and power, but not to appropriate them. He predicts persecution and
all kinds of punishment to his disciples;[2] but never once does the
thought of armed resistance appear. The idea of being all-powerful by
suffering and resignation, and of triumphing over force by purity of
heart, is indeed an idea peculiar to Jesus. Jesus is not a
spiritualist, for to him everything tended to a palpable realization;
he had not the least notion of a soul separated from the body. But he
is a perfect idealist, matter being only to him the sign of the idea,
and the real, the living expression of that which does