Posted on 07/25/2010 1:37:12 PM PDT by betty boop
TWO REVOLUTIONS, TWO VIEWS OF MAN
By Jean F. Drew
As every American schoolchild has been taught, in Western history there were two great sociopolitical revolutions that took place near the end of the eighteenth century: The American Revolution of 1775; and the French, of 1789. Children are taught that both revolutions were fought because of human rights in some way; thus bloody warfare possibly could be justified, condoned so long as the blood and treasure were shed to protect the “rights of man.” The American schoolchild is assured that the American and French revolutions were both devoted to the expansion of human rights and thus were equally noble revolutions. Moreover, it is widely believed that the French Revolution was an evolution from the American one.
Rather than simply accept these ideas uncritically, comparison and contrast of the two revolutions can shed some light on what turns out to be their stark differences — as to inceptions, ostensible goals, foundational ideology, and respective outcomes.
Inceptions
There is a famous Pythagorean maxim (c. sixth century B.C.): “The beginning is the half of the whole.” That is to say, inception events have a way of profoundly influencing the course of events that follow from them; and so their analysis can give insight into the character of their development in time, and even of the motivations they configure. Less obviously, an inception event is itself the culmination of a train of social, political, and cultural development that finally “erupts,” or takes evident shape, as a concrete beginning, or precipitating event of what follows. At that point, a situation of no return has been reached: “The fat is in the fire.” There is no turning back….
And so, let us take a look at the beginnings of two revolutions:
The American:
“In London George III and his cabinet, their confidence bolstered by their huge majority in Parliament, moved toward a confrontation with the Americans. On February 2, 1775, [Prime Minister Frederick, Lord] North introduced a motion to declare the province of Massachusetts in a state of rebellion and asked the King to take steps to support the sovereignty of England. The opposition, led by Edmund Burke, decried this move as a declaration of war. But the measure passed by a majority of three to one. George III was immensely pleased….”
The King decided to send some 1,000 reinforcements to Boston, far short of the number that Governor General Thomas Gage had wanted.
“…The King and his ministers still refused to believe Gage’s assessment of the odds he faced…. Colonel James Grant — who had served in America, at one point in the same army with George Washington [in the French and Indian Wars] — declared he was certain the Americans ‘would never dare to face an English army.’… In this spirit the King … ordered Lord Dartmouth to draft a letter telling Gage that it was time to act.”
Gage promptly acted. Thanks to his spies, he knew that the Colonials were accumulating military stores at Concord, including large quantities of gunpowder. So Gage decided that a swift march on Concord to seize the powder as well as the fourteen cannon said to be in the town “would have a crippling, even demoralizing impact on the Provincial Congress’s plans to form an Army of Observation to pen the British inside Boston.”
From this decision ensued, on April 19, 1775, the opening shot — “the shot heard ’round the world” — of the American Revolutionary War, at North Bridge, Concord, Massachusetts at about 8 o’clock in the morning.
Although the Colonials already knew the British were coming to Concord and Lexington sooner or later, and for what purpose, and that the incursion would come by a night march (rare in that day) — the Americans proved early to be remarkably effective spies — what they did not know was the specific date, or whether the British forces would be moving by land — over Boston Neck — or by sea — in longboats across the Back Bay. Hence the famous signal of “one if by land, two if by sea” posted at the Old North Church, wherein observers were keeping an eye on British troop movements.
It turned out to be “two”: The British forces, under the command of Lieutenant Colonel Francis Smith, were subsequently debarked at Cambridge across the Charles River, from longboats attached to H.M.S. Somerset then standing guard over the Boston Harbor ferryway. This was a force of some 700 men composed of light infantrymen and “fearsome” grenadiers. From thence the body proceeded overland, on a much shorter march than would have been the case had they approached Concord via Boston Neck. The route from Cambridge to Concord led straight through the heart of the neighboring town of Lexington.
As soon as the news came that the British were moving, Paul Revere set upon his famous midnight ride “on a fast mare,” traveling west at high speed to warn the people of Concord and the surrounding towns that the British were coming. Samuel Prescott and William Dawes likewise fanned out on horseback, spreading the alert to all within earshot.
The folks at Concord, having thus been warned, working feverishly overnight, managed to remove all the military stores to safe locations. The locals felt confident they could handle the threat: After all, the town had 600 drilled and trained Minutemen on spot, and there were some 6,000 other Minutemen and Militia — a body composed of all able-bodied men between the ages of 15 and 60 — within fairly easy reach of Concord town who were already pledged to come to her aid in the event of the outbreak of actual hostilities.
The people of Concord evidently figured a show of force would suffice to deter the British officers from doing anything rash. But really what they were relying on was their expectation — based on their understanding of the so-far prevailing rules of engagement, frequently tested — that British troops would never open fire on their fellow citizens — i.e., the Colonials themselves, who were British subjects also — unless they were fired upon first. And the Americans did not intend to fire first.
In this assessment of the situation on the ground, they were sadly mistaken. In the approach to Concord, the Brits had provoked a bloody engagement at Lexington Green in which “the British light infantry unquestionably fired the first volleys, killing eight men and wounding ten.” Then the British forces continued their march into Concord, to secure the bridges of the town: The British commander Smith had detached four squadrons to visit a prominent local farm to see whether contraband might be stashed there; and feared his troops could not safely return if the North Bridge were under the control of the Colonials. In defense of the bridge, the Brits again fired first. For a moment, the Americans could not believe this was happening. “‘Goddamn it,’ one man shouted, ‘They are firing ball!’” Then their commander, Major Buttrick, “whirled and shouted, ‘Fire fellow soldiers, for God’s sake fire.’” The Americans sustained six casualties at North Bridge, all fatal. On the British side, “Two privates were killed and a sergeant, four privates and four officers were wounded.”
Then the Brits cut their losses and in disorderly retreat high-tailed it back to the security of their barracks in Boston — empty-handed. Their mission was a failure: They had not found, let alone confiscated, any military stores.
But the American Revolutionary War was officially ON….
* * * * * * *
The French:
“History will record, that on the morning of the 6th of October 1789, the king and queen of France, after a day of confusion, alarm, dismay, and slaughter, lay down, under the pledged security of public faith, to indulge nature in a few hours of respite, and troubled melancholy repose. From this sleep the queen was first startled by the voice of the sentinel at her door, who cried out to her, to save herself by flight — that this was the last proof of fidelity he could give — that they were upon him, and he was dead. Instantly he was cut down. A band of cruel ruffians and assassins, reeking with his blood, rushed into the chamber of the queen, and pierced with an hundred strokes of bayonets and poniards the bed, from whence this persecuted woman had just time to fly almost half naked, and through ways unknown to the murderers had escaped to seek refuge at the feet of a king and husband, not secure of his own life for a moment.
“This king … and this queen, and their infant children (who once would have been the pride and hope of a great and generous people) were then forced to abandon the sanctuary of the most splendid palace in the world, which they left swimming in blood, polluted by massacre, and strewed with scattered limbs and mutilated carcasses. Thence they were conducted into the capital of their kingdom. Two had been selected from the unprovoked, unresisted, promiscuous slaughter which was made of the gentlemen of birth and family who composed the king’s bodyguard. These two gentlemen, with all the parade of an execution of justice, were cruelly and publicly dragged to the block, and beheaded…. Their heads were stuck upon spears, and led the procession; whilst the royal captives who followed in the train were slowly moved along, amidst the horrid yells, and shrilling screams, and frantic dances, and infamous contumelies, and all the unutterable abominations of the furies of hell…. After they had been made to taste, drop by drop, more than the bitterness of death, in the slow torture of a journey of twelve miles protracted to six hours, they were, under a guard composed of those very soldiers who had thus conducted them through this famous triumph, lodged in one of the old palaces of Paris, now converted into a Bastile for kings….”
And thus, the French Revolutionary War was officially ON….
On the question of origins — beginnings, inceptions, precipitating events — it would appear that the American and French Revolutions do not seem to resemble one another very much. It’s difficult to draw a common understanding of what human rights might be on the basis of such disparate evidence.
On the one hand, it’s possible to see that perhaps human rights had something to do with the defense of Concord: People coming together to protect and defend their lives, liberty, and property against the tyranny of George III, who then was most corruptly usurping the ancient “rights of Englishmen” not only in America, but also back in the home isles — as the Colonials were very well aware.
People today do not appreciate how close was the tie with the “mother country” at the time, through the printed word: In that day, the London presses were offloading their publications directly onto American ships bound for Boston, New York, Philadelphia, and Charleston, as soon as the ink was dry. It was from the London press that the Colonials learned of the usurpations of individual liberty that good King George was perpetrating at home, not to mention in their own backyard. They wanted no part of it.
On the other hand, it’s difficult to see what human right is implicated in the inception event of the French Revolution — unless it be the right to commit regicide. Or maybe the right to agitate and deploy mobs as instruments of social and political change….
In the end, “Citizen Louis Capet,” formerly known as King Louis XVI of France, was tried and convicted of treason by the National Convention and was guillotined on 21 January 1793 — the only French king in history to fall victim to regicide. His queen, Marie Antoinette, was also tried and convicted of treason: She was executed by guillotine on 16 October 1793, nine months after her husband.
Ostensible Goals
It seems clear that the Americans were not seeking to kill the king, or to overthrow the traditions of the British constitutional monarchy. Rather, they were seeking a complete, formal separation from it — because they were motivated by the conviction that their historic liberties were being systematically violated by George III.
By 1775, the Americans already had a tradition of local or self-government going back some 150 years. When the king sent in his governors, who ruled autocratically as directed by himself and his council, the Americans were outraged. The maxim “no taxation without representation” was but one expression of their revulsion for what they perceived as the wholesale destruction of the historic liberties of British subjects in America. The Sons of Liberty at Boston, notably including Samuel Adams, Paul Revere, and John Hancock, eloquently argued for total separation from the British Crown — not the most popular idea at first. But the events at Lexington Green and Concord Bridge caused many to reappraise their position on this matter. In the end, complete separation was the idea that prevailed, and which was finally achieved….
So what was this notion of liberty that had the Americans so exercised? John Trenchard and Robert Gordon, writing in Cato’s Letters — serially published in The London Journal in 1721 and after, which was avidly read in America at the time — describe human liberty as follows:
All men are born free; Liberty is a Gift which they receive from God; nor can they alienate the same by Consent, though possibly they may forfeit it by crimes....
Liberty is the power which every man has over his own Actions, and the Right to enjoy the Fruit of his Labor, Art, and Industry, as far as by it he hurts not the Society, or any Member of it, by taking from any Member, or by hindering him from enjoying what he himself enjoys.
The fruits of a Man’s honest Industry are the just rewards of it, ascertained to him by natural and eternal Equity, as is his Title to use them in the Manner which he thinks fit: And thus, with the above Limitations, every Man is sole Lord and Arbiter of his own private Actions and Property....
These were the ideas that had earlier inspired the Glorious Revolution of 1688, of which the great British philosopher and political activist, John Locke (1632–1704) — a thinker enormously respected in America — was the intellectual father. Above all, Locke’s ideas constitute a theory of the individual human being. This is the same theory that inspired the American Revolution of 1775: “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. That to secure these rights, governments are instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed….” Indeed, it appears the author of the Declaration of Independence (July 4, 1776) was strongly resonating to Locke’s essential political ideas in these passages.
Edmund Burke (1729–1797) — the great Anglo-Irish statesman, political theorist, and philosopher (who as already noted was sympathetic to the American cause) — also articulated the historic rights of Englishmen, and of all free peoples universally, as follows:
“…If civil society be made for the advantage of man, all the advantages for which it is made become his right. It is an institution of beneficence; the law itself is only beneficence acting by a rule. Men have a right to live by that rule; they have a right to justice; as between their fellows, whether their fellows are in political function or in ordinary occupation. They have a right to the fruits of their industry; and to the means of making their industry fruitful. They have a right to the acquisitions of their parents; to the nourishment and improvement of their offspring; to instruction in life, and to consolation in death. Whatever each man can separately do, without trespassing on others, he has a right to do for himself; and he has a right to a fair portion of all which society, with all its combinations of skill and force, can do in his favor. But as to the share of power, authority and direction which each individual ought to have in the management of the state, that I must deny to be amongst the direct original rights of man in civil society; for I have in my contemplation the civil social man, and no other. It is a thing to be settled by convention.
“If civil society be the offspring of convention, that convention must be its law. That convention must limit and modify all the descriptions of constitution which are formed under it. Every sort of legislative, judicial, or executory power are its creatures. They can have no being in any other state of things; and how can a man claim, under the conventions of civil society, rights which do not so much as suppose its existence?”
This last point draws attention to Burke’s understanding that the foundational rights of man declared by the French philosophes — Liberté, Egalité, Fraternité — are purely abstract rights indicating no sign of understanding of, or connection with, the actual development and maintenance of a just civil society. In other words, the philosophes envisioned man abstractly, or to put it another way, as abstracted from both nature and society as if this abstract man stands as a total end in himself, as sacrosanct, beyond any demand of society which nature assigns to him as inescapable part and participant of it. It seems the philosophes first reduce the human being to an abstraction — by taking him entirely out of the context of historical experience and traditional understandings of natural law going back millennia. Then, with man having been so abstracted, from there it is easy to dissolve him into an abstract mass: The individual is no longer the natural or even “legal” bearer of rights; rather, the legal bearer of rights is now the mass, the “group”— mankind at large or however else defined.
There is a further consideration regarding the original American founding that we should remember today: The British colony at Massachusetts was not established by means of military power — which is the usual way that states of whatever description acquire new territories. Instead, the Massachusetts Bay Colony was established by religious refugees: They were dissenters from the Church of England, the established church of which the reigning king was titular head.
Beginning with Henry VIII and extending to all his successors, the king of England entirely combined in his own person both the fundamental secular and spiritual authority of British society. But, when religious pilgrims on November 11, 1620, at Provincetown, Massachusetts, ratified what has been described as the first written constitution in human history, the Mayflower Compact, they were acting in resonance to a spiritual authority superior to that of the then-reigning king, James I — or of kings in general.
Just by making the voyage to America, the religious refugees were repudiating the authority of the king over their spiritual lives. Once there, the secular authority of the king was of absolutely no help to them. They had to shift for themselves, and basic survival was the highest priority: Almost the majority of the original colony perished during their first New England winter. They were forced to place their reliance entirely on themselves, on each other, and on God. The Mayflower Compact, moreover, made the pilgrim’s primary reliance on God perfectly explicit. Its first five words are: “In the name of God, Amen.”
Hold that thought while we turn to the French experience.
For centuries, the foundation of French society, culture, and politics had been the idea of the Etats General, of which there were three “estates”: the aristocracy, whose head was the King; the Church, whose head was the Pope; and everybody else; i.e., your average, everyday, common, “small” people….
What is known is that when King Louis XVI was decapitated, the social force of the French aristocracy was effectively decapitated with him. Also it is known that in the four-year period between the invasion of the queen’s bedchamber and the execution of the king, some 16,000 French men and women were guillotined at Paris — mainly aristocrats and other well-off people — as “enemies of the State.” Also all Church lands (probably accounting for some twenty percent of the total French real estate) and property were forcibly confiscated by the State, now reposed in a body called the National Assembly, composed by the Third Estate, the “people” of France. Thousands of clergy — bishops, priests, monks, and nuns — were murdered.
In effect the Third Estate utterly destroyed the other two: That’s the French Revolution in a nutshell.
Foundational Ideology
The French Revolution managed to kill off the first two Estates — and with that, evidently hoped to extinguish forever all aristocratic and theological ideas, pretensions, and powers regarding questions of the human condition. Indeed, the general expectation then seemed to be the Third Estate, the people, unchained from past “superstitions” and “repressions,” had at last come into its own sphere, where it could finally define and exercise true human “liberty.”
But the people were not some sort of homogeneous mass. Rather, there is a natural hierarchical order within the Third Estate similar to that found in both the aristocratic and theological estates.
In France at the time, at the top of this natural hierarchy were the people with expertise in manufacturing, commerce, banking, and law. They were the beneficiaries of the rising tide of the Enlightenment, as plentifully nourished from the side of Newtonian science.
In the rank immediately below them were the skilled craftsmen. Below this, relatively unskilled laborers. Then, the “least” of the people, the peasants/serfs who mainly were the impoverished suffering victims of the feudal order then embraced by both the aristocracy and the Church.
Thus within the Third Estate there were marked disparities of wealth, opportunity, education, talent, and ability. Yet the doctrine of Egalité erases all such distinctions: An Einstein and the most ignorant day laborer were considered “equal.” All were “equal” in the National Assembly too. On this basis, the doctrine of Fraternité, of the universal brotherhood of mankind, is blind and silent regarding the problem of: how the victims of the revolution become “non-brothers” in the first place, such that they could be destroyed with impunity by the mob, or condemned as “enemies of the state” by the National Convention and sent to the guillotine. On this basis, the doctrine of Liberté seems little more than a defense of gratuitous, passionate license that is immensely destructive to society.
Burke’s analysis of the situation in France, the condition of the National Assembly, and their combined implications, retains its extraordinary political noteworthiness to defenders of Liberty in our own day:
“It is no wonder therefore, that it is with these ideas of everything in their constitution and government at home, either in church or state, as illegitimate and usurped, or, at best as a vain mockery, they look abroad with an eager and passionate enthusiasm. Whilst they are possessed by these notions, it is vain to talk to them of the practice of their ancestors, the fundamental laws of their country, the fixed form of a constitution, whose merits are confirmed by the solid test of long experience, and an increasing public strength and national prosperity.
“They despise experience as the wisdom of unlettered men; and as for the rest, they have wrought underground a mine that will blow up at one grand explosion all examples of antiquity, all precedents, charters, and acts of parliament. They have ‘the rights of men.’ Against these there can be no prescription; against these no agreement is binding; these admit no temperament [modification], and no compromise: anything withheld from their full demand is so much of fraud and injustice. Against these their rights of men let no government look for security in the length of its continuance, or in the justice and lenity of its administration….”
Burke again reminds us a few pages later on that there is deep danger in relying on abstract rights when it comes to the organization of a just — that is “liberal,” in the sense of liberty, the root idea of classical liberalism — political society:
“The moment you abate anything from the full rights of men, each to govern himself, and suffer any artificial positive limitation upon those rights, from that moment the whole organization of government becomes a consideration of convenience. This it is which makes the constitution of a state, and the due distribution of its powers, a matter of the most delicate and complicated skill. It requires a deep knowledge of human nature and human necessities, and of the things which facilitate or obstruct the various ends which are to be pursued by the mechanism of civil institutions. The state is to have recruits to its strength, and remedies to its distempers. What is the use of discussing a man’s abstract right to food or medicine? The question is upon the method of procuring and administering them. In that deliberation I shall always advise to call in the aid of the farmer and the physician, rather than the professor of metaphysics.”
In Burke’s view — and I daresay in the view of his contemporary American readers — the French Revolution was a
“… usurpation which, in order to subvert ancient institutions, has destroyed ancient principles, will hold power by arts similar to those by which it has acquired it. When the old feudal and chivalrous spirit of Fealty, which by freeing kings from fear, freed both kings and subjects from the precautions of tyranny, shall be extinct in the minds of men, plots and assassinations will be anticipated by preventive murder and preventive confiscation, and that long roll of grim and bloody maxims which form the political code of all power not standing on its own honor and the honor of those who are to obey it. Kings will be tyrants from policy when subjects are rebels from principle.”
“Excuse me … if I have dwelt too long on this atrocious spectacle of the sixth of October 1789, or have given too much scope to the reflections which have arisen in my mind on occasion of the most important of all revolutions, which may be dated from that day, I mean a revolution in sentiments, manners, and moral opinions. As things now stand, with everything respectable destroyed without us, and an attempt to destroy within us every principle of respect, one is almost forced to apologize for harboring the common feelings of men….”
Clearly, Burke understands the French Revolution first and foremost as a “revolution in sentiments, manners, and moral opinions” — that is, it was preeminently a social, not a political revolution. Certainly that was not the case with the American Revolution. Indeed, Bernard Bailyn, eminent professor of Early American History at Harvard, has asked a tantalizing question: Was the American Revolution a revolution, or was it an evolution?
The prevailing American view at the time did not reject the ancient British tradition of natural liberty under natural law; it was rejecting King George as the traducer and usurper of this tradition. They didn’t want a king or a pope; they wanted a system of self-government that had already been in long usage in America. Ultimately they wanted a Constitution exclusively devoted to the defense of human liberty under just and equal laws. Which if history was of any guide meant that the action of the State had to be kept minimal in its scope by well-defined authority.
Most colonial Americans, being heirs of the same ancient, natural-law cultural tradition as Edmund Burke, likely would have agreed with him about this:
“…We are not the converts of Rousseau; we are not the disciples of Voltaire; Helvetius has made no progress amongst us. Atheists are not our preachers; madmen are not our lawgivers. We know that we have made no discoveries; and we think that no discoveries are to be made, in morality; nor many in the great principles of government, nor in the ideas of liberty, which were understood long before we were born, altogether as well as they will be after the grave has heaped its mould on our presumption….”
The allusion to Rousseau here is particularly instructive. Rousseau held that man is born perfectly good: He is born the “noble savage.” But as soon as he is in the world long enough, he becomes subject to a relentless process of corruption that makes him “bad” — because of the “bad institutions” of society, including churches and states, educational systems, economic organizations, and so forth. Man is victimized by society and powerless against it. “Bad institutions” are entirely to blame for human misery.
In short, Rousseau’s doctrine is directly opposed to the natural law doctrine that human beings are responsible (within limits) for whatever happens to them. Natural law theory holds that individual human beings alone have the ability to choose, decide, act; and that they are responsible for the decisions they make. And this implies the objective existence of good and evil. It also requires a universal (divine) spiritual authority to underwrite the foundational truths of the natural and moral worlds, thus to bring them into correspondence in human reason and experience.
In short, the Americans were not disciples of Rousseau…. He stands their theory of man on its very head.
Two Views of Man — Then and Now
The two revolutions have theories of man that are diametrically opposed, based on the idea of what constitutes human liberty, of the source of human rights. What Locke and Burke and the Americans held in common was the belief that human rights are the gifts of God, and are therefore inseparable from human nature itself. In other words, these rights inalienably inhere in concrete individual persons, each and every one, equally.
In contrast, on the French revolutionary view, human rights are the province of an abstraction known as “mankind.” Its doctrine is the Rights of Man — not the equal, inalienable rights of actual men. It sets up scope for the idea of “group rights,” as opposed to the idea of rights divinely vested in the individual person in such a way as to constitute his or her very own human nature. Under the French Revolution, the “metaphysicians” — Burke’s term for intellectual elites — would guide the rest of us in our understanding of such matters. In short, our rights as human beings ineluctably would be what politically powerful elites tell us they are. There is to be no higher standard of truth than that.
In the so-called post-modern world, the revolution that works overtime to kill truth wants to destroy it at its root — at the Logos. Rather than engage in fully free and fair debate, the entire project of the French Revolution seems have been the delegitimation of the idea that there is an “objective” standard by which Reality can be ascertained and judged, the root criterion for the discernment of good and evil in the actual world, by which human beings, acting according to reason and experience, can guide their lives in fruitful ways — or do the opposite. In short, once the concept of good and evil is destroyed, the human being has no firm guide by which to navigate his own personal existence.
Instead of the perennial question of good v. evil, in the post-modern world some “metaphysicians” tell us there is no objective truth at all — which logically follows from the presupposition of the “death” of God which they have, like Rousseau, already achieved in their own minds. The description of human reality thus boils down to a competition of amoral human “narratives,” or skilled opinions; but in the end still opinions. And under the principle of Egalité, one man’s opinion is just like any other man’s, neither good nor bad.
It appears we have among us today “metaphysicians” who desire, in the words of the great Anglo-American poet T. S. Eliot, to contrive and execute “systems so perfect that no one will need to be good.” And then to impose them on humanity. To succeed in this project, first they have to discredit the foundational motivating ideas of the American Revolution….
To speak of the Now: The currently sitting American president seems to be an activist of the French model. He is distinctly a post-modernist thinker, as an analysis of his words vis-à-vis his actions will show. Evidently he has no sympathy for the values, principles, and goals of the American Revolution, and has disparaged the Constitution — to which he freely swore an Oath of fidelity — on grounds that it is a “system of negative liberties” that has outlived its usefulness.
Indeed, it appears that he is doing everything in his power finally to drive a silver stake through the very heart of American liberty — the historic liberty of We the People of the United States of America, and that of our Posterity — for which the Constitution originally was “ordained and established.”
©2010 Jean F. Drew
ENDNOTES
1 Kenneth Sylvan Guthrie, The Pythagorean Sourcebook and Library, David Fideler, ed., Grand Rapids: Phanes Press, 1988, p. 97.
2 Thomas Fleming, Liberty!: The American Revolution, New York: Viking, 1997, p. 104f.
3 Fleming, p. 105.
4 Ibid.
5 Fleming, p. 112.
6 Fleming, p. 118.
7 Ibid.
8 Ibid.
9 Edmund Burke, Reflections on the Revolution in France, New York: The Classics of Liberty Library, 1982, p. 105f. Note: Because this edition is a facsimile of the original publication of 1790, I’ve taken the liberty of modernizing the spelling and punctuation.
10 John Trenchard and Robert Gordon, Cato’s Letters, Vol. 1, Indianapolis: Liberty Fund, Inc., 1995, p. 406ff.
11 Burke, p. 87–88.
12 Burke, p. 85–86.
13 Burke, p. 89–90.
14 Burke, p. 116.
15 Burke, p. 119; emphasis added.
16 Burke, p. 127–128; emphasis added.
Hello Betty. I am afraid I cannot deal with incoherence. I will simply read your attempts at teaching. I learn something every time I do.
Sorry Quix. I thought I was writing to Betty boop.
Yes. By those who were angered by his advocacy of religious freedom and the consequent loss of their sinecure. “They wish it to be believed that he can have no religion who advocates its freedom.”
“Jefferson rewrote the New Testament and rejected Paul. he even declared "I am of a sect by myself, as far as I know."
So, what?
You refuse to admit that he [Jefferson] rejected Paul and that he rejected Jesus as divine. Maybe you do too, but somehow you consider yourself a "Christian."
It’s irrelevant. Jefferson was commissioned to sum up the spirit of the Revolutionary Generation, and did it so well that his words have become as one with that spirit. The topic is “Two Revolutions, Two Views of Man” and Jefferson’s writing perfectly describes one of those views.
“I can appreciate Jesus' morality and Christian values without being a Christian.”
Proving what, with respect to the topic?
“Jesus never said that.” [Jefferson’s advice to his namesake]
Did not Jesus admonish us to keep the commandments? (Matthew 19:17) And so did Jefferson advise his namesake. Further: “Whosoever therefore shall break one of these least commandments, and shall teach men so, he shall be called the least in the kingdom of heaven; but whosoever shall do and teach them, the same shall be called great in the kingdom of heaven.” (Matthew 5:19)
“He [Jefferson] was a deist and deism is not Christianity.”
Jefferson knew Christianity very well, and so thoroughly that he described himself a Christian. Your vehement protests changes not a whit of it.
“Is there any evidence that he [Paine] changed his mind?”
Contrast Paine’s work of 1776 with that of 1794. You don’t see a difference? The Revolutionary Generation saw a difference, and Paine went from one of the most celebrated men in American to dying in disgrace and disdain.
“Blowing smoke. I asked you to show me where in the Document . . .”
Blowing smoke yourself. I’ve explained the Founders’ attitude about it and you cannot seem to bring yourself to accept that. If you can’t agree, then fine, don’t agree. Just don’t insist I repeat myself until you get the answer you want.
“What attack?”
Paine’s Age of Reason is nothing but a relentless attack on Christianity.
“What is your problem?”
I don’t have a problem. What's yours?
And I have provided ample evidence that the Founding Generation were convinced contrarily. Going over the same ground will change nothing.
“Oh so now we are mind reading?”
Who is this “we,” Pilgrim?
“What makes you think I "seem" to think I am infallible?”
You ask, are the Founders infallible? I ask in return, are you infallible? You can’t seem to accept their judgment that The Declaration, which they wrote, was inspired by their Christian belief. You must believe your knowledge at least superior to theirs, if not infallible. Why else would you ask the question?
How pathetic?”
Are you asking me? Or are you making it personal?
“This is not about me but about Jefferson & others.”
You ask, “Is it against the law to interpret them individually?” I ask, Is it against the law to dispute your interpretations. You’re referring to your interpretations. Whom is making it about you, if not you?
“You are making it about me.”
Case building.
“I never accused anyone of blasphemy or "treason" for disagreeing with me.”
That’s right. You accused me of accusing you of treason, if not blasphemy, for having a different opinion of the Fathers. (“You make it sound as if having a different opinion of the Fathers is treason if not blasphemy?”)
“What's the matter? Running out of stuff to write so now we going to make this about me? No, we are not.”
More case building. If it’s not about you then stop talking about you.
“You are telling me to shut up?”
Is that a question? Or, have you an accusation? If an accusation, you have to account for the meaning of the following “He explained” to make the accusation stick. You tell me “Get hold of your emotions and pipe down your presumptuous attitude.” That reads like “shut up!” to me. The same sort of reaction I get from a lot of people who think they are above having to deal with disputation.
“Get lost, troll!”
Isn’t that making it personal? And conclusion jumping (And insulting)?
“Who are you to tell me to shut up?
It’s more like you were telling me to shut up. You’re really working up a lather of indignation now.
“If you have nothing to bring to the table but throw insults and make this personal, then you are on the wrong forum.”
In full case making mode now. Very impressive.
Discuss the issues all you want, but do not make it personal.
Your behavior condemns your own actions. Whenever I mention Adams’ declaration that the Revolutionary Act was fueled by Christian influences, your response is that he (Adams) was no Christian. If not to disqualify his thoughts, then to what end? Don’t insult this forum by saying, “to set the record straight,” because the question remains, to what end if not to disqualify his thoughts.
“Now, as to your ridiculous and unfounded accusation: I do say that Unitarists are not Christians and if he was a Unitarists, someone who denied the divinity of Christ, then he was no Christian. That's not seeking to disqualify Adams' thoughts, just set the record straight.”
Really?! To what end, if not to disqualify what Adams has to say about the Revolutionary Act?
“I think you are mixing apples and oranges."
Prove it.
“If I say that there is nothing biblical in the Declaration that is a fact and you have no reason to disagree with that regardless . . . ”
The Revolutionary Generation disputes your “fact.” That is reason enough for me to disagree.
“Besides, I never said I wasn't able to "find" God (now you are making things up!), but that I don't know what God is!”
If you don’t know what God is, then you certainly haven’t found God. I seem to recall reading you also saying you weren’t able to find God, but it’s a pretty well established fact that human memory is a very unreliable source of information. Thanks for setting the record straight (if you did).
“That still doesn't change the fact that there is nothing explicitly or implicitly Christian or biblical in the text of the Declaration.”
And, your fact does not change the fact that the Revolutionary Generation was certain that The Declaration was explicitly Christian.
“One thing is certain: rejecting a fact simply because I am an agnostic is neither logical nor warranted.”
Mind reading; a practiced much frowned upon. And misrepresentation (your Agnosticism is not the basis of my dispute; I have made clear the reason).
“Mind reading.”
Really?! Someone as obviously schooled in Christianity as yourself, and you’re not aware of two hundred years of persecution of Christianity by Roman Might before Christian meekness persevered over that Roman Might?
“How about reviewing Religion Forum rules?
You’re right. I could stand a review. It’s just that I’ve never even thought to use forum rules against another poster.
“So? What's the point."
As stated.
“To prevail does not mean to extinguish or to eliminate or to eradicate, expunge, annihilate, etc."
Sometimes, perhaps. Sometimes, perhaps not. In this instance Roman Might was intended to enforce an edict. After some two hundred years, Roman Might failed.
RM, it's pretty obvious who started this. You already removed #668. Maybe it's time to remove #703, 704 and 706 as well, and put an end to this flame-baiting. Thank you.
I was reading Summa Theologica this morning and came across this very good explanation that I wanted to pass along to you,dear sister
http://ivww.newadvent.org/summa/1118.htm
Article 3. Whether human souls were created together at the beginning of the world?
Objection 1. It would seem that human souls were created together at the beginning of the world. For it is written (Genesis 2:2): “God rested Him from all His work which He had done.” This would not be true if He created new souls every day. Therefore all souls were created at the same time.
Objection 2. Further, spiritual substances before all others belong to the perfection of the universe. If therefore souls were created with the bodies, every day innumerable spiritual substances would be added to the perfection of the universe: consequently at the beginning the universe would have been imperfect. This is contrary to Genesis 2:2, where it is said that “God ended” all “His work.”
Objection 3. Further, the end of a thing corresponds to its beginning. But the intellectual soul remains, when the body perishes. Therefore it began to exist before the body.
On the contrary, It is said (De Eccl. Dogmat. xiv, xviii) that “the soul is created together with the body.”
I answer that, Some have maintained that it is accidental to the intellectual soul to be united to the body, asserting that the soul is of the same nature as those spiritual substances which are not united to a body. These, therefore, stated that the souls of men were created together with the angels at the beginning. But this statement is false.
Firstly, in the very principle on which it is based. For if it were accidental to the soul to be united to the body, it would follow that man who results from this union is a being by accident; or that the soul is a man, which is false, as proved above (Question 75, Article 4). Moreover, that the human soul is not of the same nature as the angels, is proved from the different mode of understanding, as shown above (55, 2; 85, 1): for man understands through receiving from the senses, and turning to phantasms, as stated above (84, 6,7; 85, 1). For this reason the soul needs to be united to the body, which is necessary to it for the operation of the sensitive part: whereas this cannot be said of an angel.
Secondly, this statement can be proved to be false in itself. For if it is natural to the soul to be united to the body, it is unnatural to it to be without a body, and as long as it is without a body it is deprived of its natural perfection. Now it was not fitting that God should begin His work with things imperfect and unnatural, for He did not make man without a hand or a foot, which are natural parts of a man. Much less, therefore, did He make the soul without a body.
But if someone say that it is not natural to the soul to be united to the body, he must give the reason why it is united to a body. And the reason must be either because the soul so willed, or for some other reason. If because the soul willed it—this seems incongruous.
First, because it would be unreasonable of the soul to wish to be united to the body, if it did not need the body: for if it did need it, it would be natural for it to be united to it, since “nature does not fail in what is necessary.”
Secondly, because there would be no reason why, having been created from the beginning of the world, the soul should, after such a long time, come to wish to be united to the body. For a spiritual substance is above time, and superior to the heavenly revolutions.
Thirdly, because it would seem that this body was united to this soul by chance: since for this union to take place two wills would have to concur—to wit, that of the incoming soul, and that of the begetter. If, however, this union be neither voluntary nor natural on the part of the soul, then it must be the result of some violent cause, and to the soul would have something of a penal and afflicting nature. This is in keeping with the opinion of Origen, who held that souls were embodies in punishment of sin. Since, therefore, all these opinions are unreasonable, we must simply confess that souls were not created before bodies, but are created at the same time as they are infused into them.
Reply to Objection 1. God is said to have rested on the seventh day, not from all work, since we read (John 5:17): “My Father worketh until now”; but from the creation of any new genera and species, which may not have already existed in the first works. For in this sense, the souls which are created now, existed already, as to the likeness of the species, in the first works, which included the creation of Adam’s soul.
Reply to Objection 2. Something can be added every day to the perfection of the universe, as to the number of individuals, but not as to the number of species.
Reply to Objection 3. That the soul remains without the body is due to the corruption of the body, which was a result of sin. Consequently it was not fitting that God should make the soul without the body from the beginning: for as it is written (Wisdom 1:13-16): “God made not death . . . but the wicked with works and words have called it to them.”
“Both. Prevail is less judgmental. But the side that prevails gets its way and says what is right.
And that “side” is always Might. Right?
“Too many Hollywood movies.
Really?! You mean to tell me that Christian Martyrdom is nothing but a PR scheme? Sounds ahistorical to me, but you’ve taken ownership of that claim. Good luck.
“Might is measured by outcome, not sheer force.
Really?! Do you mean to tell me that might is on a sliding scale depending on what your present philosophical needs require?
might 2 noun
great and impressive power or strength, esp. of a nation, large organization, or natural force: a convincing display of military might. (Italics in text)
“Have you heard of him proposing to resist evil to the death?”
Matthew 10:22 would apply here, I think (and 10:28; and 10:38-39). Off the top of my head. Surely, there are others.
“The crispy "critters and broken bodies" is Hollywood;”
All just a Christian PR scheme? I see.
“Yes of course, but in the real world we do have choices (usually)”
Tell that to the guy who doesn’t think he should be forced to pay the income tax (unless he is Charlie Rangel, or some other Democrat apparatchik). Rand dealt with your “choice” proposition with the mugger parable (your money or your life – some choice). Stalin was never an ally in the sense that Great Britain was, so what compromise (if you equate ‘choice’ with ‘compromise’) was required? We did compromise with the USSR, just the same. And paid for it with near fifty years’ of national headaches (just one of many such “compromises” that have plagued us since 1941).
“And how does he [Jefferson] know that?
“We have heard it said,” Jefferson wrote. And apparently he agreed. It is consistent with Jefferson’s character that he would. If you object to Jefferson’s judgment on that issue, take it up with him. Pack for an extended trip.
Jesus never said what Jefferson suggests (except what is line through), to wit: "Adore God. Reverence and cherish your parents. Love your neighbor as yourself, and your country more than yourself."
It’s more like you were telling me to shut up
"More like" I never said anything to that effect. Persecution issues?
Matthew 10:22 would apply here, I think (and 10:28; and 10:38-39
Doesn't say resist evil to the death. Matthew 5:39 however does say "do not oppose evil [or the evil one]." The verses you mention either have no relevance or call for taking on a cross (which is consistent with Petrine Epistles calling the faithful to suffer, by offering themselves in emulation of Christ, bit never to resist).
All just a Christian PR scheme?
Pretty much. The number of Christians was exceedingly small and there were really no organized campaigns by Romans to wipe them off the face of the earth; most of the anti-Christian violence was spontaneous mob lynchings of a sect perceived as effeminate and rumored to be cannibalistic. The rest is mostly Christian myth.
so what compromise (if you equate ‘choice’ with ‘compromise’) was required?
This was an illustration that in the real world compromise with evil is not always abject surrender bur a pragmatic necessity.
line through =lined through
bur=but
Matthew 19:17 - Why callest thou me good? there is none good but one, that is, God: but if thou wilt enter into life, keep the commandments.
Matthew 22:37-40 - Jesus said unto him, Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind. This is the first and great commandment. And the second is like unto it, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself. On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets.
Jefferson invokes the two great commandments “adore God” and “Love your neighbor as yourself,” then adds “and your country more than yourself.” The latter being his own idea. He also advises his namesake to honor his mother and father (“Reverence and cherish your parents”), another of the Commandments. He concludes with “Be just. Be true. Murmur not at the ways of Providence.” invocations of Christ to which no one familiar with Christianity could possibly object unless they be in denial.
”More like” I never said anything to that effect.”
“Get hold of your emotions and pipe down your presumptuous attitude.” Close enough. Less has been known to have started a flame war.
”Persecution issues?”
Now, now. You’re making this very personal, and we’re supposed to be discussing issues.
“The verses you mention either have no relevance or call for taking on a cross”
”And he that taketh not his cross, and followeth after me, is not worthy of me.” (Matthew 10:38). That’s exactly what many early Christians did rather than deny Christ. And many another has endured torture or death rather than deny Christ, which they consider any surrender to evil to be. It continues to this day (see Voice of the Martyrs).
”The number of Christians was exceedingly small”
There is no accurate, specific count of Christian deaths at the hands of the Romans. Historians of the time used such expression as “a great many” or “large numbers.”
”there were really no organized campaigns by Romans to wipe them off the face of the earth”
To the best of my knowledge no one says Roman forays against Christians were continuous and organized. Or that their objective was to wipe Christians of the face of the earth. But, the notion that the number of Christian deaths was exceedingly small is an Atheist/Agnostic myth
“This was an illustration that in the real world compromise with evil is not always abject surrender bur a pragmatic necessity.”
What was an illustration? The cowardly behavior of the League of Nations? The corruption of Western Civilization? The abandonment of Christian values? Some compromise.
My comment was in response to your #632 where you write: " A man, who apparently believed similarly as you, turned on the American people, betrayed their trust by denouncing everything they held sacred, in the mistaken thought that he could sway them to any way of thinking he wished, discovered he could not, and died with their scorn and in disgrace. Would that no better fate should await you, but I defer to the Lord’s will on that issue."
And all this is in response to my statement "Those who deny the divinity of Jesus or the Trinitarian nature of God are not Christians." (#623) For that I am associated with "turning against" the American people, "betraying their trust", even "denouncing" everything [sic] they held sacred, and just might, like the fellow I am likened to, "die in scorn and disgrace," wishing me no better fate? Talk about above and beyond!
And you think that telling someone to turn down such emotional and confrontation attitude is reason enough to start flame wars? Over what? Over the fact that Christianity is founded on the belief that Christ is divine and that those who deny Jesus' divinity are not considered Christians no matter how much they call on his name? Well, it's true! They are not Christians, even if they swear up and down that they are.
Who? What is the date of the oldest copy? Where is corroborating evidence and what does "great many' and "large numbers" mean? The Bible speaks of the slaughter of the innocent children by Herod, yet there is no historical evidence of any such event, even in highly detailed accounts of Herod's life by writers such as Josephus. So, take ancient accounts with a grain of salt because they are usually exaggerated and even outright myths.
Other "evidence," suggests that Christian the Apostles and Apostolic Fathers were targeted, such as St. Paul, St. Irenaeus, St. Polycarp, St. Justin Maryr, etc. It's all legendary. Nero's persecution of Christains in Rome in 65 AD is indistinguishable from the targeting of the Jews, since Christians and Jews were not distinct groups (Christians still attended synagogues in Paul's time) in Rome in 65 AD.
Christian martyrdom in Israel is estimated at mere 2,000. And records of the seven-year pogrom of Christians (303 to 311 AD), incorrectly blamed mostly on Diocletian, is said to have claimed approximately 3,000 lives, a figure one must seriously scrutinize since the laws also targeted Manechaenas as "Christians" and sects. This was the biggest persecution ever. And even then, the clergy rather than the populace were targeted.
So, yes, the myth of some enormous persecution and reign of terror is a Christian myth, among many, an exaggeration that is accepted by most Christians as "fact" without even reviewing the facts. The "persecutions" were a series of laws demanding pagan worship and loyalty to the Caesar the way we expect allegiance to the country. This did not start until the middle of the 3rd century, and ended by the first decade of the 4th, spanning approximately 71 years. (240 - 311 AD).
Christian persecutions mostly affected the eastern side of the empire. Christians, and people thought to be Christians (Gnostics, etc.), in the Gaul and other western regions were pretty much left unaffected.
No doubt, one would expect brave individuals to do so, but their number is unknown and by all accounts was few and far in between. St. Cyprian was the one who argued that eastern Christians who worshiped pagan gods under edicts should not be readmitted into the Church, but he was overruled, indicating that the number of Christians who "failed" by succumbing to the pressure was great enough to be of importance to the Church to issue a general amnesty. In other words, most were pragmatic enough to choose life rather than lose it.
How many people do you think would die today if they had to choose between publicly denouncing their faith and dying? I am sure most people would publicly denounce their faith and continue to believe in secret the way the majority of Spanish Jews did. They converted to Catholicism and lived Catholic lives publicly but worshiped as Jews privately for 300 years before emigrating to Holland. That's how the Jews survived. That's how the Christians survived.
The illustration is that sometimes, in order to survive, in the real world we choose the a lesser evil without abjectly surrendering to evil and that Ayn Rand's "choice" was neither a choice nor applicable to reality.
--o0o--
I think we have pretty much exhausted all there is to be said and can only continue by beating a dead horse. I think relentless inquiry and unemotional approach goes farther in revealing the truths about people and issues. The best thing to do is not to succumb to to the temptation of legends created by idealizing what is not ideal, namely human beings and their works, and that includes what we may hold sacred. That doesn't mean disrespect, just a realization that no one is perfect and no human work is perfect.
Now, now. We’ve both been enjoined to not make it personal, but rather to discuss the issues.
“. . . those who deny Jesus' divinity are not considered Christians no matter how much they call on his name? Well, it's true! They are not Christians, even if they swear up and down that they are.”
Nonetheless, even if that assessment is entirely true, it does not address the fact that the Revolutionary Generation, “Diest” and Christian alike, are unequivocal in their affirmation that the Revolutionary Act was grounded in Christian values. All this frantic hand-waving and dust kicking-up changes not a whit of it.
Tacitus’ Annals, with respect to Nero, speaks of a great multitude torn by dogs, nailed to crosses, or tormented by flames, but I’m sure his historical writings are dismissed as nonsense by the deniers of Christian persecution by Romans. Gibbons speaks with frustration at the lack of specific numbers of Christian deaths at the hands of the Romans (or by their leave), but one would think that the lack of specific numbers of Christian deaths casts as much doubt on “exceedingly small” as it does it does on “large numbers.” Apparently not.
“The "persecutions" were a series of laws demanding pagan worship and loyalty to the Caesar the way we expect allegiance to the country.”
And was not death the penalty for refusal? My point was that in the persecution of Christians, Roman Might did not prevail. I guess the Deniers’ response is that the Romans didn’t really try very hard.
“Christian persecutions mostly affected the eastern side of the empire.”
And this means that since it was in the East, it doesn’t count for much?
If their number is unknown, how can it be thought “all accounts” believe their number to be few and far between?
“ How many people do you think would die today if they had to choose between publicly denouncing their faith and dying?”
I have no idea. I’m very sure those who have no faith would have no trouble denouncing the nonexistent. Others would discover whether or not they possessed faith, or just convention. Truly, we have been put on notice that we may be tested:
“Then shall they deliver you up to be afflicted, and shall kill you: and ye shall be hated of all nations for my name’s sake. And then shall many be offended, and shall betray one another, and shall hate one another. And many false prophets shall rise, and shall deceive many. And because iniquity shall abound, the love of many shall wax cold.”
Sounds so much like today that it is downright spooky. But I am sure that many times in the past it has seemed likewise. Like when Romans were killing Christians.
“The illustration is that sometimes, in order to survive, in the real world we choose the a lesser evil without abjectly surrendering to evil and that Ayn Rand's "choice" was neither a choice nor applicable to reality.”
Well, in the “real world” (albeit in a minor key), we may observe that the NY Republican Party chose to endorse a “lesser evil” RINO (Scozzafava), as a compromise, rather than a Conservative (Hoffman), and when the RINO saw that she could not win against a Conservative, she betrayed her party and threw her support behind a Democrat (Owen), ensuring his win. You can compromise on details, but not on principle. So, in the “real world” and back to the major key, if you chose to compromise with evil, you will surrender your principle to evil. Evil has no interest in details.
Of course Rand’s “choice” was no choice. That was her point. There is no “choice” in a compromise with Evil. Either you resist evil, or you surrender to it. What ever you give up as a compromise, evil will demand more. It never ends until there’s nothing left.
“I think we have pretty much exhausted all there is to be said and can only continue by beating a dead horse.”
OK, stop beating the horse. I can take a hint.
“The best thing to do is not to succumb to the temptation of legends created by idealizing what is not ideal, namely human beings and their works, and that includes what we may hold sacred.”
It’s a material world. Nothing’s sacred, baby.
“That doesn't mean disrespect . . .”
No, no. Of course not.
Yes we have and that's good and proper. I was not making it personal, however; just asking a general question. :)
Sure, they believed them to be Christian values, but I ask again which Christian values? Being endowed with freedom to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness are not Christian, much less specifically Christian values. Creator or "God of Nature" is not a Christian-only concept. Such terminology is curiously absent from Christian thinking preceding the English Enlightenment and the rise of Deism.
Of course, we can only presume, but not claim as historical fact, that's what Tacitus wrote in the 2nd century about the 1st century events—or that any of it is historically accurate, given that the oldest extant copies of Tacitus' Annals (chapters 1-6) were written by Christian scribes in the mid 9th century AD (Codex Mediceus), and the other (Mediceus II), in the early 11th century (chapters 11-16).
If Tacitus were a valuable source of Christian history he surely would have been used more extensively. But this is not the case. Tacitus was all but forgotten until the Renaissance. Between the 5th and the 15th century, there is simply hardly any mention of Tacitus.
It's a matter of reconstructing a circumstantial picture, based on a variety of factors, such as Roman census reports, politics, and sidebar references made by various authors.
First, in Nero's time (60's AD) Christians were indistinguishable from the Jews, especially to Romans. Any persecution of Christians would have automatically involved other Jewish sects congregating in synagogues.
Second, Roman laws that directly affected Christians (and similar sects) do not appear before 240 AD, and all punishment exacted on uncooperative Christians ceases in 311 AD with one period of a few years under Dioclecian's rule as being the "worst" with an estimated 20,000 deaths.
Third, we don't know which Christians were targeted, as there were any, many sects (Christianity was entirely heterodox until the first Nicene Council in 325 AD).
Fourth, there is no evidence that Christians represented anything but an insignificant albeit somewhat unorthodox mystery cult.
Fifth, all indications are that the Christian congregations were not targeted but their leaders, the clergy.
Sixth, rumor mills and oral transmission of "what happened" have a known characteristic for distortion and exaggeration.
Seventh, textual corruption of original manuscripts by Christian scribes is a well-documented phenomenon. I cold go on, but I am sure you get the picture.
Roman might did not seek to convert Christians to pagans but to make them obey Roman law. In that Roman might of course succeeded, either by having some Christians show their obedience or by punishing those who didn't. Those who refused to obey the law were punished. Our society is no different than Rome was in that respect )in principle). The Romans could care less what Christians believed in or whom they called God; they did consider burning incense to Caesar a matter of pledging loyalty to the Roman state, and refusing to do so as a statement of treason.
Roman might did prevail, again, in making Christianity the state religion, because it sought to accomplish that. No matter how you turn it around, it was how the Roman might saw things fit.
No, it simply means that it was not something that affected the whole Empire and shows the extent to which the whole thing is overblown by Christian apologetics.
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