Liberalism in a Nutshell
Political liberalism abolished the inequality of masters and servants: it made people masterless, anarchic. The master was now removed from the individual, the "egoist," to become a ghost -- the law or the State. Social liberalism abolishes the inequality of possession, of the poor and rich, and makes people possessionless or propertyless. Property is withdrawn from the individual and surrendered to ghostly society. Humane liberalism makes people godless, atheistic. Therefore the individual's God, "My God," must be put an end to. Now masterlessness is indeed at the same time freedom from service, possessionlessness at the same time freedom from care, and godlessness at the same time freedom from prejudice: for with the master the servant falls away; with possession, the care about it; with the firmly-rooted God, prejudice. But, since the master rises again as State, the servants appears again as subject; since possession becomes the property of society, care is begotten anew as labor; and, since God as Man becomes a prejudice, there arises a new faith, faith in humanity or liberty. For the individual's God the God of all, viz., "Man," is now exalted; "for it is the highest thing in us all to be man." But, as nobody can become entirely what the idea "man" imports, Man remains to the individual a lofty other world, an unattained supreme being, a God. But at the same time this is the "true God," because he is fully adequate to us -- to wit, our own "self"; we ourselves, but separated from us and lifted above us.
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