Humanized Christianity

During the 1840s, Russian literary culture was overtaken by enthusiasm for French Romantic Socialism, mediated through novelists like George Sand.  The extent to which this liberal socialism was a humanistic reduction of Christianity is evident from the creed of V. Belinsky, the arbiter of Russian literary tastes during the period:

“And there will come a time – I fervently believe it – when no one will be burned, no one will be decapitated, when the criminal will plead for death . . . and death will be denied him . . . when there will be no senseless forms and rites, no contracts and stipulations on feeling, no duty and obligation, and we shall not yield to will but to love alone; when there will be no husbands and wives, but lovers and mistresses, and when the mistress comes to the lover saying: ‘I love another,’ the lover will answer: ‘I cannot be happy without you, I shall suffer all my life, but go to him whom you love,’ and will not accept her sacrifice . . . but like God will say to her: I want blessings, not sacrifices . . . . There will be neither rich nor poor, neither kinds nor subjects, there will be brethren, there will be men, and, at the word of the Apostle Paul, Christ will pass his power to the Father, and Father-Reason will hold sway once more, but this time in a new heaven and above a new world.”