s, then this
teaching would be right, and Christ was bound to give a perfect
morality. That is to say, if people were different to what they are,
this teaching of Christ would not be injurious because--it would be
unneeded! If there were no robbers, and no assaulters, and no borrowers,
then the morality of the Sermon on the Mount would be most harmless.
High praise, truly, for a legislator that his laws would not be
injurious when they were no longer needed. Christ should have remembered
that the "law is made for sinners," and that such a law as he gives here
is a direct encouragement to sin.

We can scarcely wonder that, inculcating a course of conduct which must
inevitably lead to poverty, Christ should hold up a state of poverty as
desirable. We read in Matthew v. 3, "Blessed are the poor _in spirit_"
and it is contended that it is poverty only of spirit which Christ
blesses; if so, he blesses the source of much wretchedness, for
poor-spirited people get trampled down, and are a misery to themselves
and a burden to those about them. If, however, we turn to Luke vi. 20,
we find the declaration: "Blessed are ye poor," addressed directly to
his Apostles, who were anything but poor in spirit (Luke ix. 46, and
xxii. 24); and we find it, further, joined with the announcement,
"blessed are ye that hunger now," and followed by the curses: "Woe unto
you that are rich ... woe unto you that are full." If "hunger" means
"hunger after righteousness," the antithesis "full" must also mean "full
of righteousness," a state on which Christ would surely not pronounce a
woe. Mr. Bradlaugh well draws out the various thoughts in these most
unfortunate sayings: "Is poverty of spirit the chief amongst virtues,
that Jesus gives it the prime place in his teaching? Is poverty of
spirit a virtue at all? Surely not. Manliness of spirit, honesty of
spirit, fulness of rightful purpose, these are virtues; but poverty of
spirit is a crime. When men are poor in spirit, then do the proud and
haughty in spirit oppress and trample upon them, but when men are true
in spirit and determined (as true men should be) to resist and prevent
evil, wrong, and injustice whenever they can, then is there greater
opportunity for happiness here, and no lesser fitness for the enjoyment
of future happiness, in some may be heaven, hereafter. Are you poor in
spirit, and are you smitten; in such case what did Jesus teach? 'Unto
him that smiteth thee on the one cheek offer