Page:The Collected Works of Theodore Parker Sermons Prayers volume 2.djvu/116

100 Yet still religion is a great power amongst men, spite of these disadvantages. It was never so great before; for in the progressive development of mankind the higher faculties acquire continually a greater and greater influence. If Christianity means what was true and good in the teaching and character of Jesus, then there was never so much of it in the world. Spite of the defalcation and opposition of the churches there is a continual growth in all those four forms of piety. Under the direction of able men all those fragments of religion are made ready in their several places. In the department of mind, see how much has been done in this last hundred years; man has nearly doubled the intellectual property of the seventeenth century. The early history of mankind is better understood now than by the nations who lived it. What discoveries of science in all that relates to the heavens, to the earth and its inhabitants, mineral, vegetable, animal, human! In the philosophy of man, how much has been done to understand his nature and his history ! In practical affairs, see what wonders have been wrought in a hundred years; look at England, France, Germany, and America, and see the power of the scientific head over the world of matter, the human power gained by better political organization of the tribes of men.

In the department of conscience, see what a love of justice developes itself in all Christendom; see the results of this for the last hundred years ; in the reform of laws, of constitutions, in the great political, social, and domestic revolutions of our time. Men have clearer ideas of justice; they would have a church without a bishop, a State without a king, society without a lord, and a family without a slave. From this troublesome conscience comes the uneasiness of the Christian world. A revolution is a nation's act of penitence, of resolution, and of prayer,—its agony and bloody sweat. See what a love of freedom there is shaking the institutions of the aged world. Tyrannies totter before the invisible hand of Justice, which, to the terror of the oppressors, writes, "Weighed, and found wanting." So the despot trembles for his guilty throne; the slave-driver begins to fear the God of the man he has kidnapped and enthralled. See the attempts making by the people to break down monopolies, to promote freedom