sentatives of that mystic Being, the State, without which it is supposed that men are unable to exist.
The vicious circle has been completed; submission to Power has weakened, and partly destroyed, the religious feeling in men; and the weakening and cessation of religious consciousness has subjected them to human power.
The sin of Power began like this: The oppressors said to the oppressed, "Fulfil what we demand of you; if you disobey, we will kill you. But if you submit to us, we will introduce order and will protect you from other oppressors."
And the oppressed, in order to live their accustomed lives, and not to have to fight these and other oppressors, seem to have answered: "Very well, we will submit to you; introduce whatever order you choose, we will uphold it; only let us live quietly, supporting ourselves and our families."
The oppressors did not recognise their sin, being carried away by the attractions and advantages of Power. The oppressed thought it no sin to submit to the oppressors, for it seemed better to submit than to fight. But there was sin in this submission; and as great a sin as that of those who used violence. Had the oppressed endured all the hardships, taxations and cruelties without acknowledging the authority of the oppressors to be lawful, and without promising to obey it, they would not have sinned. But in the promise to submit to power lay a sin (ἁμαρτία, error, sin) equal to that of the wielders of power.
In promising to submit to a force-using power, and in recognizing it as lawful, there lay a double sin. First, that in trying to free themselves from the sin of fighting, those who submitted condoned that sin in those to whom they submitted; and secondly, that they renounced their true freedom (i.e., submission to the will of God) by promising always to obey the power. Such a promise (including as it does the admission of the possibility of disobedience to God in case the demands of established power should clash with the laws of God), a promise to obey the power of man, was a rejection of the will of God; for the
