by Nesta H. Webster
Christian Book Club of America
PREFACE
It is a matter of some regret to me that I have been so far
unable to continue the series of studies on the French Revolution of
which The Chevalier de Boufflers and The French
Revolution, a Study in Democracy formed the first two volumes.
But the state of the world at the end of the Great War seemed to
demand an enquiry into the present phase of the revolutionary
movement, hence my attempt to follow its course up to modern times
in World Revolution. And now before returning to that first
cataclysm I have felt impelled to devote one more book to the
Revolution as a whole by going this time further back into the past
and attempting to trace its origins from the first century of the
Christian era. For it is only by taking a general survey of the
movement that it is possible to understand the causes of any
particular phase of its existence. The French Revolution did not
arise merely out of conditions or ideas peculiar to the eighteenth
century, nor the Bolshevist Revolution out of political and social
conditions in Russia or the teaching of Karl Marx. Both these
explosions were produced by forces which, making use of popular
suffering and discontent, had long been gathering strength for an
onslaught not only on Christianity, but on all social and moral
order.