an the poor. A Christian may consistently say, "I respect
that man's rank, although he takes bribes." But a Christian cannot say,
as all modern men are saying at lunch and breakfast, "a man of that rank
would not take bribes." For it is a part of Christian dogma that any man
in any rank may take bribes. It is a part of Christian dogma; it also
happens by a curious coincidence that it is a part of obvious human
history. When people say that a man "in that position" would be
incorruptible, there is no need to bring Christianity into the
discussion. Was Lord Bacon a bootblack? Was the Duke of Marlborough a
crossing sweeper? In the best Utopia, I must be prepared for the moral
fall of _any_ man in _any_ position at _any_ moment; especially for my
fall from my position at this moment.

Much vague and sentimental journalism has been poured out to the effect
that Christianity is akin to democracy, and most of it is scarcely
strong or clear enough to refute the fact that the two things have often
quarrelled. The real ground upon which Christianity and democracy are
one is very much deeper. The one specially and peculiarly un-Christian
idea is the idea of Carlyle--the idea that the man should rule who feels
that he can rule. Whatever else is Christian, this is heathen. If our
faith comments on government at all, its comment must be this--that the
man should rule who does _not_ think that he can rule. Carlyle's hero
may say, "I will be king"; but the Christian saint must say, "Nolo
episcopari." If the great paradox of Christianity means anything, it
means this--that we must take the crown in our hands, and go hunting in
dry places and dark corners of the earth until we find the one man who
feels himself unfit to wear it. Carlyle was quite wrong; we have not got
to crown the exceptional man who knows he can rule. Rather we must crown
the much more exceptional man who knows he can't.

Now, this is one of the two or three vital defences of working
democracy. The mere machinery of voting is not democracy, though at
present it is not easy to effect any simpler democratic method. But even
the machinery of voting is profoundly Christian in this practical
sense--that it is an attempt to get at the opinion of those who would be
too modest to offer it. It is a mystical adventure; it is specially
trusting those who do not trust themselves. That enigma is strictly
peculiar to Christendom. There is nothing really humble about the
abnegation