sponse, the poet left the table really angry. It was not he who dictated consciously. But he counted for something, for much, possibly for everything. Is, then, our spirit able to exteriorize itself, act outside of us? Once more, we are here on the threshold of an unknown world.

The third hypothesis, of invisible living beings in our midst, is equally defensible. But if so it must be confessed that in that region there are very inferior beings. Their manifestations are to the last degree banal. They have taught us absolutely nothing. Moreover, there is always a sort of reflection of the psychic condition of the experi

menters.

To sum up, and begging the reader to excuse the length of this article, I believe we can go a little further than M. Schiaparelli, and affirm the undoubted existence of unknown forces capable of moving matter and of counteracting the action of gravity. It is a combination, difficult to analyze, of physical and psychic forces. But such facts, however extravagant they may appear, deserve to enter the domain of scientific investigation. It is even probable that they may powerfully contribute towards the elucidation of the problem for us supreme of the nature of the human soul. Unquestionably we have not yet the data necessary to define these forces; but for this one can hardly throw the blame on those who study them.

CAMILLE FLAMMARION.

THE INFLUENCE OF HEBREW THOUGHT IN THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE SOCIAL DEMOCRATIC IDEA IN NEW ENGLAND.

WH

BY CHARLES S. ALLEN.

HEN in the Declaration of Independence the fathers of the Republic enunciated the democratic creed that all men are socially equal, the doctrine fell upon sympathetic ears. The ground was already prepared for the sentiment to take root. The publication was not premature. These social conditions were not the work of a day or a year, but the culmination of a century and a half of growth on American soil.

The idea of the native dignity of man, which no accident of birth or social position could dethrone, developed more rapidly in the New than in the Old World. It was this divergence between the social philosophy of the colony and the parent country that made political separation more easily accomplished. The issue of taxation alone did not cause the rupture. Each had long been conscious that there was a difference in their theories of social as well as political institutions. In solving these questions, the child had progressed faster than the parent. The revenue acts and other grievances were the immediate cause of the Revolution, but there had previously existed a feeling that the two commonwealths had drifted apart, and were not in sympathy with each other. In the American commonwealth a new conception of the relation between the individual and the state had been evolved. Individualism was emerging. It had not escaped the attention of England that the social institution of an aristocracy had not taken root in New England. Nor was the cause unknown. It was plain that the social democratic idea was so deeply planted that aristocracy could gain no foothold. It had been proposed to found an order of nobility in the Massachusetts colony, and invest it with titles, but the suggestion met with no approval among the citizens.

Lord North, prime minister in 1766, had observed the development of this social democratic idea, so prevalent in the New England colonies, and had bitterly denounced it. His remarks came to the ears of the colonists and were commented on in the newspapers. The application was understood. The Earl of Hillsborough, Secretary for the Colonies, said in public debate in 1770, that the future policy of every administration must be to repress the "republican spirit" so prevalent in the colonies. The privileged classes of the home government could but view with disfavor the rapid growth of a powerful colony where such doctrines existed. It was a

menace.

It is probable that English statesmen would not have regarded with such jealousy the political liberties of New England had they found its citizens in full sympathy with the social institutions of the home country, and the aristocratic principle firmly established. Self-government would not have been so obnoxious to them if the pernicious doctrine of social equality had not sprung up. The definite formulation of this idea in the Declaration of Independence revealed the breach between them that had long existed. It was only a public recognition of a doctrine that already had been privately accepted.

The forces that were to produce this divergence between the social theories of England and her colonists were at work when the Puritans landed. After they came, local causes coöperated to swell the current and accelerate its speed. The founders of New England were the flower of the Puritan movement. They were men who lived and thought "Man doth not live by bread alone"

Their conception of
Measured by the

on an elevated plane. was their creed. They believed that the higher life was worth the sacrifice of material comfort. it was an austere and religious life. standard of the nineteenth century, it seems narrow. But remembering that the child of the seventeenth century must be judged by the ideas of his age, the New England Puritan will always command our admiration because he resolutely stood for the doctrine that man has a higher destiny than to eat, drink, and waste his days in attendance upon the

His culture was That it is man's

monotonous round of trivial social affairs. not broad. He was ruled by one idea. duty to develop all the faculties of his mind, and widen his horizon, he did not fully appreciate. He did grasp the fundamental idea that true satisfaction comes only with unconditional surrender of the lower to the higher instincts. He started on the upward round. The light he had, he followed. A hostile government prevented him from attaining his religious ideal, and he gladly left his comfortable home, to brave the perils and hardships of the wilderness, that he might have the approbation of his own conscience.

Characters grounded upon the conviction that the ideals of inspired minds shall be wrought into daily life and conduct are a potent force in society. The institutions of custom cannot exact slavish obedience from such. They work revolutions, peaceful or violent. Social precedents do not hold and control them. Men who are intent on the higher problems of life naturally attach less value to customs established by those who live on the lower conventional plane. Thus the philosopher and the religious zealot tend toward the social democratic idea. They know that the lack of furniture or a pedigree cannot degrade a truly noble mind. Further than that, the conclusion is forced upon them that no social restrictions should impede the immediate recognition of individual merit.

The New England Puritan was thus in the mental condition in which it was easy to revise and re-form his theories of the social institutions of aristocracy and the underlying principle of special privileges and inequality. Having lifted himself out of the rut of conventional life, it was natural that he should apply the new standard to all things that affected him, and readjust his opinions. But his ancestors had been moulded for ages in the school of feudalism, and his inherited social theories could not be transformed in a moment. Custom and habit are not so easily overthrown.

The Protestant revolution, allying religion with political reform, stimulating national life, fostering education, bringing the Bible and religious instruction into every home, was

a movement that operated to break up class distinctions and lay the foundation for a social democracy.

It has been well said too, that the Calvinist creed, which invested the moral government of the Almighty with such power and grandeur, tended to lessen the reverence for earthly kings and lords. It was a return to the conception of the great Hebrew prophets of the eighth century before Christ, to whom the administration of Jehovah seemed so immediate and direct that it overshadowed the petty dynasties of princes and potentates, whose thrones were hardly secure from day to day.

Physical separation also made it easier to throw off social precedents. The necessity of joint action in the founding and defence of the colony assisted to create a feeling of brotherhood. Each felt his dependence upon the other. The free play of local self-government and of economical forces exerted an influence.

But while these aided in the development of the social democratic idea, it is obvious that the social theories so clearly presented in the Bible, especially in the Old Testament, must have had a powerful effect. Here was a definite system formulated in a book that was their daily guide in civil and religious matters. In this were laid down the rights of the rich and poor, weak and strong, prince and subject. The Puritan must have perceived that the Hebrew prophet's idea of the privileges of classes was radically different from that upon which feudalism was founded.

A glance through the local history of the New England colonies suffices to prove that the civil as well as the religious theories of the Bible were incorporated into their institutions. It was the determination of the leaders of the colonies, who moulded its thought, to make the Bible the absolute rule of life. They sought to reproduce the type of society pictured therein. The influence of Hebrew thought appears on every page.

When the New Haven colonists assembled in 1636 to effect a political organization, the proposition was definitively formulated, that the Bible should be not only their

I Fiske's "Beginnings of New England," p. 58.