Jesus, at the same time that he announced an unparalleled subversion in human affairs, proclaimed the principles upon which society has reposed for eighteen hundred years.
[Footnote 1: The millenarian sects of England present the same contrast, I mean the belief in the near end of the world, notwithstanding much good sense in the conduct of life, and an extraordinary understanding of commercial affairs and industry.] That which in fact distinguishes Jesus from the agitators of his time, and from those of all ages, is his perfect idealism.

Jesus, in some respects, was an anarchist, for he had no idea of civil government.
That government seemed to him purely and simply an abuse.

He spoke of it in vague terms, and as a man of the people who had no idea of politics.

Every magistrate appeared to him a natural enemy of the people of God; he prepared his disciples for contests with the civil powers, without thinking for a moment that there was anything in this to be ashamed of.[1] But he never shows any desire to put himself in the place of the rich and the powerful.

He wishes to annihilate riches and power, but not to appropriate them.