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THE  SOCIALISM  OF  TO-DAY.

Already  in  1863,  at  the  Munich  Congress  of  Catholic
savants,  the  illustrious  theologian  Dœllinger  maintained  that
Catholic  associations  should  grapple  with  the  social  question.
Soon  afterwards,  an  eminent  prelate,  the  Bishop  of  Mayence,
Monseigneur  Ketteier,  published  a  book  upon  the  same  subject,
which  made  a  great  stir,  and  which  was  entitled  Die  Arbeiterfrage ­
  und  das  Kristenthum  (“  The  Labour  Question  and
Christianity”).  He  showed  that,  upon  certain  points.  Socialism ­
  and  Christianity  were  in  accord.  In  reality  the  idea  was
not  altogether  new.  In  the  Middle  Ages,  the  Jacquerie  in
France,  and  the  revolted  peasantry  of  the  sixteenth  century  in
Germany,  invoked  the  Gospel.  The  men  of  the  French  Revolution, ­
  who  dreamed  of  something  more  than  the  establishment
of  liberty  and  civil  equality,  did  the  same  ;  and,  in  his  cynical
language,  Camille  Desmoulins  called  Jesus  the  first  of  the
sans-culottes.  After  1848  French  Socialists  frequently  cited
the  Christian  Fathers  in  support  of  their  doctrines;  and  a
Communist,  Villegardelle,  who  was  not  wanting  in  intelligence,
compiled  a  whole  volume  of  extracts  from  their  writings  to
prove  that  private  property  should  be  unhesitatingly  abolished.*
In  1852,  twelve  years  before  the  Bishop  of  Mayence,
François  Huet,  a  Catholic  philosopher  of  rare  merit,  issued  a
volume.  Le  Règne  Social  du  Christianisme,  where  may  be  found
explained,  with  greater  clearness,  method,  and  science,  those
ideas  which  are  to-day  promulgated  by  the  Catholic  Socialists.
It  is  beyond  question  the  best  book  upon  the  subject  which
has  yet  appeared.
When  the  Gospel  is  appealed  to  in  favour  of  Communism
or  Socialism,  this  is  at  once  right  and  wrong.  If  it  be  intended
that  Christianity  enjoins  any  particular  social  or  political  organization, ­
  this  is  a  mistake.  What  Christ  preached  was  a
change  of  heart,  internal  reformation.  He  did  not  dream  of
modifying  surrounding  institutions  ;  they  were  about  to  disa])-pear
  in  a  cosmical  revolution  of  which  the  Evangelists  have  left
us  a  terrible  picture.  It  was  “  in  another  world  and  under
*  Histoire  des  idées  sociales  avant  la  Revolution,  bv  F.  Villegardelle.
See  also,  for  the  same  period  and  style  of  thought,  VEvangile  devant  le
siècle,  by  Simon  Granger.