Ancient and Modern Celebrated Freethinkers: Reprinted From an English Work, Entitled "Half-Hours With The Freethinkers."Bradlaugh, Charles
Religion
Ancient and Modern Celebrated Freethinkers: Reprinted From an English Work, Entitled "Half-Hours With The Freethinkers."
Bradlaugh, Charles
Rationalists -- Biography
that difference was to be reconciled was past the skill of the wisest to
unravel. England had liberal institutions, and a people with part of the
substance, and many of the forms of Liberalism, along with a degree of
education which kept them in comparative ignorance, yet did not offer
any obstacles to raising themselves in the social sphere. Before France
could compete with England, she had to rid herself of the feudal system,
and obtain a Magna Charta. She was above four centuries behind-hand
here. She had to win her spurs through revolutions, like those of
Cromwell's and that of 1688, and the still greater ones of Parliament.
The Freethinkers of England prepared the Whig revolution of William, by
advocating the only scheme which was at the time practicable, for of the
two--the Protestant and the Catholic religion--the former is far more
conducive to the liberties of a people than the latter, and at the time,
and we may also say, nearer the present, the people were not prepared
for any organic change. This being the case, it is not to be wondered
at that the French Revolution was a failure as a constructive effort;
it was a success as a grand outbreak of power; showing politicians where
(in the future) to rely for success. The men who undertook to bring
about this Revolution are not to be censured for its non-success. They
wished to copy English institutions, and adapt them to those of the
French; for this purpose, the Continental League was formed, each member
of which pledged himself to uproot, as far as lay in his power,
the Catholic Church in France. A secret name was given to
it--_L'Infame_--and an organized attack was speedily commenced. The
men at the head of the movement, besides Voltaire and Frederick, were
D'Alembert, Diderot, Grim, St. Lambert, Condillac, Helvetius, Jordan,
Lalande, Montesquieu, and a host of others of less note. Con-dorcet,
being secretary of the Academy, corresponded with, and directed the
movements of all, in the absence of his chief. Every new book was
criticised--refutations were published to the leading theological works
of the age; but by far the roost effective progress was made by the
means of poems, essays, romances, epigrams, and scientific papers. The
songs of France at this era were written by the philosophers; and this
spirit was diffused among the people. In a country so volatile and
excitable as the French, it is difficult to estimate too highly the
power of a ballad warfare. The morality of Abbots and Nuns were sung in
strains as rhapsodical, and couplets as voluptuous as the vagaries of
the Songs of Solomon.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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