Page:Essays on Catholicism, Liberalism, and Socialism.djvu/238

as if there existed an irremediable disproportion between the weight of this balance and the weakness of man. It would seem as if God, when he gave to man dominion over the sciences, had withheld one alone which he destined to remain under his own sway and jurisdiction—the science of equilibrium.

This is the reason why all those who have attempted to hold the scales in equipoise have been absolutely impotent to effect their object, and are so condemned by history. This also explains why the great problem of the reconciliation of the rights of the state with those of individuals, and of order with liberty, after having been agitated from the commencement of the first associations, still rests without a solution. Man cannot maintain an equilibrium in things without preserving them in their existence; nor can he preserve their existence unless he abstains from touching them. God having established all things upon the foundations on which they firmly rest, any change of his mode of ordaining and placing them necessarily brings with it a loss of equilibrium. The only peoples who have been at the same time respectful and free, the only governments that have united moderation and strength, are those in whose formation the hand of man is not visible, and whose institutions are the result of that slow and progressive growth which characterizes everything that has stability in the domains of time and of history.

This great power, which has been denied to man, not without a deep design, resides in God in a special and exclusive manner. Through this power all that leaves the hand of God leaves it in a perfect state of equilibrium, and all that remains as established by God, maintains its perfect equipoise. Without seeking elsewhere for