Belief passed into dogma; the mind of man was put in fetters as well as his body; the Church built one prison and the State another. . . . All this was closely connected with the idea of the potentate God which Church and State, in consequence of their political alliance, had restored, against the martyr protest of Jesus Christ.
But how should man be treated? Here it is that Dr. Jacks makes a most valuable suggestion:
Treat man, after the mind of Christ, as a being whose first need is for Light, and whose second need is for government, and you will find that as his need for light is progressively satisfied, his need for government will progressively diminish.
Is it not a significant fact that while the churches are complaining of emptiness, the schools, the colleges, the universities, are packed to overflowing?
Dr. Jacks has asked quite recently a Frenchman, a Swede, a Dutchman, an American, a Chinaman, and a Japanese, "What is the leading interest in your country? What do your people really believe in?" The answer in each case was, "Education."
When he varied his question, and asked, "What have you learnt from the war?" the answer came, "We have learnt our need of education."
Some would prefer them to have said: "We have learnt our need of Christianity." But is it not the same thing? In grasping the vast potentialities of the human spirit, and that is what this hunger for education means, have they not grasped an essential characteristic of the Christian religion and placed themselves at its very growing point?
Education is Light, and Light is from God.
Dr. Jacks believes that a movement has begun which, "if it develops according to promise, will grow into the most impassioned enterprise so far undertaken by man."
The struggle for light, with its wide fellowships and high enthusiasms, will displace the struggle for power, with its mean passions, its monstrous illusions, and its contemptible ideals.