Besides, it seems to me that reform becomes atheistic the moment it is
organized. For it aims, really, at that which conservatism represents. The
merit of the reformer is his sincerity, not his busy effort to emancipate
the slaves or to raise the drunkards. And the deeper his sincerity the
more deeply grounded seems to him the order he holds to be so corrupt. God
always weighs down the Devil. Therefore the church is not a collection of
puzzling priests and deceived people, but the representative, now as much
as ever, of the religious sentiment. A pious man needs no new church or
ritual. The Catholic is not too formal nor the Quaker too plain. If he
complains of these, and build another temple and construct a new service,
it is not the satisfaction which piety would have. Luther's protest was
that of the intellect against the supremacy of sentiment. So was
Unitarianism, and now we do not seek in the Boston churches for the
profound pietists. Does not our present experience show that as fast as we
are emancipated from morality and the dominance of the intellect, we
revert to the older rituals, if we need any. And if we have no need, the
piety can so fully inform them, that we seek no other. The transcendental
is a spiritual movement. It is the effort to regain the lost equilibrium
between the intellect and the soul, between morals and piety. Therefore,
put of its ranks come Catholics and Calvinists and mystics, and those who
continue the reform movement commenced by Luther; and, proceeding at
intervals down the stream of history, are the Rationalists. There is
indeed a latent movement, badly represented by these reforms, and that is
the constant perception of the supremacy of the Individual. But the
stronger the feet become the more delicate may be the movements. The more
strictly individual I am, the more certainly I am bound to all others. I
can reach other men only through myself. So far as you have need of
association you are injured by it.