encourage
the greater individuality. All forms and reforms, remarks Machiavelli,
in one of his notes to Livy, have been brought about by the exertions of
one man.[251-1] Religious reforms, especially, never have originated in
majorities. The reformatory decrees of the Council of Trent are due to
Martin Luther.

Either ideal, raised to its maximum, not only fails to satisfy the
religious sentiment, but puts upon it a forced meaning, and is therefore
not what this sentiment asks. This may be illustrated by comparing two
remarkable works, which, by a singular coincidence, were published in
the same year, and which better than any others present these ideals
pushed to their extreme. It is characteristic of them that neither
professes to treat of religion, but of politics. The one is entitled,
"_An Attempt to define the limits of Government_," and is by Wilhelm von
Humboldt; the other is the better known work of Auguste Comte, his
"_System of Positive Polity_."[252-1]

The first lays down the principle that the highest end of man is the
utmost symmetrical education of his own powers in their individual
peculiarities. To accomplish this, he must enjoy the largest freedom of
thought and action consistent with the recognition of the same right in
others. In regard to religion, the state should have nothing to do with
aiding it, but should protect the individual in his opposition to any
authoritative form of it. As a wholly personal and subjective matter,
social relations do not concern it. In fine, the aim of both government
and education should be the development of an individualism in which an
enlightened intellect controls and directs all the powers toward an
exalted self-cultivation.

Comte reverses this picture. His fundamental principle is to subordinate
the sum total of our existence to our social relations; real life is to
live in others; not the individual but humanity is the only worthy
object of effort. Social polity therefore includes the whole of
development; the intellect should have no other end but to subserve the
needs of the race, and always be second to the altruistic sentiments.
Love toward others should absorb self-love. "_Il est encore meilleur
d'aimer que d'etre aime._"

Such is the contrast between the ideal of the individual as exhibited by
the Religion of Culture, and the ideal of the commonwealth as portrayed
in the Religion of Humanity.

The whole duty of man, says the one school, is to live f