Page:The Ancient City- A Study on the Religion, Laws, and Institutions of Greece and Rome.djvu/533

 CHAP, III. CHRISTIANITY. 52T tions; what was only the consolation of a few, it made the common good of humanity. If, now, we lecollect what has been said above on- the omnipotence of the states among the ancients, — if we bear in mind how far the city, in the name of its sacred character and of religion, which was inherent in it, exercised an absolute empire, — we shall see that this new principle was the source whence individual lib- erty flowed. The mind once freed, the greatest difficulty was over- come, and liberty was compatible with social order. Sentiments and manners, as well as i)olitics, were then- changed. The idea which men had of the duties of the citizen were modified. The first duty no longer consisted in giving one's time, one's strength, one's life to the state. Politics and war were no longer the whole of man ; all the virtues were no longer comprised in patriotism, for the soul no longer had a country. Man felt that he had other obligations besides that of living and dying for the city. Christianity distinguished the private from the public virtues. By giving less honor to the latter, it elevated the former; it placed God, the family, the hnman individual above country, the neigh- bor above the city. Law was also changed in its nature. Amont; all ancient nations law had been subject to, and had le- ceived all its rules from, religion. Among the Persians, the Hindus, the Jews, the Greeks, the Italians, and the Gauls, the law had been contained in the sacred books or in religious traditions, and thus every religion had made laws after its own image, Christianity is the first religion that did not claim to be the source of law. It occupied itself with the duties of men, not with their interests. Men saw it regulate neither the laws of t