"We pursue the same end,--progressive improvement, association, transformation of the corrupted medium in which we are now living, the overthrow of all idolatries, shams, lies, and conventionalities. We both want man to be, not the poor, passive, cowardly, phantasmagoric unreality of the actual time, thinking in one way and acting in another; bending to power which he hates and despises; carrying empty popish or Thirty-nine Article formulas on his brow, and none within; but a fragment of the living truth, a real individual being linked to collective humanity,--the bold seeker of things to come; the gentle, mild, loving, yet firm, uncompromising, inexorable apostle of all that is just and heroic,--the Priest, the Poet, and the Prophet." Mazzini saw in the conception of God the great "Indicator" of duty, and that the one figure, "the most deeply inspired of God, men have seen on the earth was Jesus." Mazzini's impassioned protest against unbelief was itself a form of unbelief. He believed only in one God, not in three. If Jesus was inspired of God, he was not God, or he would have been self-inspired. But, apart from this repellent heresy, if Theism and Christianism are essential to those who would serve humanity, all propaganda of freedom must be delayed until converts are made to this new faith. The question will be put, Has independent morality ever been seen in action? Voltaire, at the peril of his liberty and life, rescued a friendless family from the fire and the wheel the priests had prepared for them. Paine inspired the independence of America, and Lloyd Garrison gave liberty to the slaves whose bondage the clergy defended. The Christianity of three nations produced no three men in their day who did anything comparable to the achievement of these three sceptics, who wrought this splendid good, not only without Christianity, but in opposition to it. Save for Christian obstruction, they had accomplished still greater good without the peril they had to brave. None of the earlier critics of Secularism, as has been said (and not many in the later years), realised that it was addressed, not to Christians, but to those who rejected Christianity, or who were indifferent to it, and were outside it. Christians cannot do anything to inspire _them_ with ethical principles, since they do not believe in morality unless based on their supernatural tenets. They have to convert men to Theism, to miracles, prophecy, inspiration of the Scriptures, the Trinity, and other soul-wearying doctrines, before they can inculcate morality they can trust. We do not rush in where they fear to tread. Secularism moves where they do not tread at all. CHAPTER XVI. ETHICAL CERTITUDE "You can tell more about a man's character by trading horses with him once than you can by hearing him talk for a year in prayer meeting." --American Maxim.