Page:New Christianity.pdf/20

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5

Inn. Morality; the most general divine morality ought to become the only morality; it is the consequence of its nature and its origin.

The people of God, that people which received revelations before the coming of Christ, that people which is the most universally spread over the surface of the earth, has always perceived that the Christian doctrine founded by the Fathers of the church was incomplete. It has always proclaimed that a grand epoch will come, to which it has given the name of Messiah's kingdom; an epoch in which religious doctrine shall be presented in all the generality of which it is susceptible; that it will regulate alike the action of the temporal, and that of the spiritual power; and that then all the human race will have but one religion and one organization.

In short, I have a clear conception of the New Christian doctrine, and I shall now proceed to expose it. Then I shall pass in review all the temporal and the spiritual institutions which exist in England, in France, in North and South Germany, in Italy, Spain, and Russia, in North and South America. I shall compare the doctrines of these different institutions with that which directly deduces itself from the fundamental principle of divine morality; and I shall make it plain to all men of good faith and good intentions, that, if all these institutions were directed towards the end of the amelioration of the moral and physical well-being of the poorest class, they would give prosperity to all nations, and all classes of society, with the greatest possible rapidity.

I am an innovator, because I draw conclusions more direct than have ever been drawn before from the fundamental principle of divine morality. You, who, zealous for the public good, are animated by a spirit of conservation, as I am; you confine yourself to the task of preventing men from losing sight of the same principle which I seek to develop. Well, then, let us unite our efforts; I shall expose my ideas, do