[ CHAPTER 1 ] - ( CHRISTIAN LEADERS OF THE 18TH CENTURY ) - { PT. 3 }

[ CHAPTER  1 ] - ( CHRISTIAN LEADERS OF THE 18TH CENTURY ) - { PT.  3 } - A few simple facts will be enough to make this clear. I am not going to speak of our political condition. Our standing among the nations of the earth was comparatively poor, weak, and low. Our voice among the nations of now. The foundation of our empire in India had hardly been laid. Our Australian possessions were a part of the world only just discovered, but not colonized. To be a Dissenter, a Non-conformist, one who followed God outside of the state church, was to be regarded as only one degree better than being seditious and a rebel. Corrupt and filthy towns abounded. Bribery among all classes was open, shameless, and common. That was England politically a hundred years ago. I also am not going to speak of our condition from a financial and economic point of view. Our vast cotton, silk, and linen manufacturing had hardly begun to exist. Our enormous mineral treasures of Coal and iron had been barely touched. We had no steamboats, no locomotive engines, no railways, no gas, no penny postal system, no scientific farming, no solid roads, no free trade, no sanitary arrangements, and no police deserving of the name.   

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