Excerpt from The State There seems no choice of themes at this time. One overmastering thought constrains us, and letters must be subordinate in the scholar's mind to that whose idea is essential to the completeness of all let ters and philosophy and religion itself: For God himself, in a very terrible way, is educating us up to the doctrine and appreciation of that noblest form and fruit of society, - the state. Whatever it was' needful to think and do for individual development, now plainly, since by great exigencies we are forced to act, is it reverential to think in the direction of the whole. Indeed, the Divine method proceeds in large part by unities, and doubtless one significance of this moment in our history is a recoil from indi vidualism and a vindication of social unity. We are obeying a. Mighty conservative instinct to preserve and confirm the State. Better, certainly, is it to pray for it, and die for it, - but it is A150 well to think it out, and enunciate it in high places. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.