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It is obviously impossible to apply to the political ideology of the Polish Brethren criteria that were not developed until the eighteenth century. They were not striving for the political freedom of the citizen in the sphere of the State, nor for the influence of the will of serfs on the course of State affairs. On the contrary, they themselves withdrew from these affairs, seeking no honours or offices. They asked of the state only that its laws and institutions should not violate the requirements of their religion; asked of it, above all, freedom of conscience, for all confessions as well as for themselves. Even when they were being persecuted in violation of the law, they did not raise the standard of rebellion. They complained, tried to persuade, protested, and finally, in the face of the harshest violence, when forbidden to confess their religion, they left their native land and went into banishment, misery and exile. They placed the cause of God and of conscience above any worldly goods and affections.

The Polish Brethren represented not only great intellectual but also great moral values. They gave profound consideration to the commandments of Christ and tried in all sincerity to conform their lives to them. The moral level of their ecclesias aroused the enthusiasm of impartial observers. In spite of the fact that they were hated and passionately opposed by all the confessions, we find no complaints against their morals whether collective or individual.

The Polish Brethren did not live to see the time in which their ideas, principles, and methods of thought began to exert an influence on the intellectual life of' the world. They died out while dispersed as exiles, grieving that their own nation had rejected them, although to them its spiritual and moral elevation was of the greatest importance.

Only after centuries of oblivion have students of the Polish past discovered them. But the consciousness is precious to us that in the remote past such an unusual flower grew up on Polish soil, that the nation produced within itself a group of such moral elevation, such critical spirit, and such gravity of life.147