English Secularism Part 10

--Ella Wheeler Wilc.o.x.

LADY HESTER STANHOPE said she knew "Lord Byron must be a bad man, for he was always _intending_ something." Any improvement in the method of life is "intending something," and society ought to be tolerant of those whose badness takes no worse form. The rules Secularism prescribes for human conduct are few, and no intelligent preacher would say they indicate a dangerous form of "badness." They are:

1. Truth in speech.

2. Honesty in transaction.

3. Industry in business.

4. Equity in according the gain among those whose diligence and vigilance help to produce it.

"Though this world be but a bubble, Two things stand like stone-- Kindness in another's trouble, Courage in your own."

Learning and fortune do but illuminate these virtues. They cannot supersede them. The germs of these qualities are in every human heart.

It is only necessary that we cultivate them. Men are like billiard b.a.l.l.s--they would all go into the right pockets in a few generations, if rightly propelled. Yet these principles, simple and unpretending as they are, being founded on considerations apart from modes of orthodox thought, have had a militant career. The Spanish proverb has been in request: "Beware of an ox before, of a mule behind, and of a monk on every side." The monk, tonsured and untonsured, is found in every religion.

In Glasgow I sometimes delivered lectures on the Sunday in a quaint old hall situated up a wynd in Candleriggs. On the Sat.u.r.day night I gave a woman half-a-crown to wash and whiten the stairs leading to the hall, and the pa.s.sage leading to the street and across the causeway, so that the entrance to the hall should be clean and sweet. Sermons were preached in the same hall when the stairs were repulsively dirty. The woman remarked to a neighbor that "Mr. Holyoake's views were wrang, but he seemed to have clean principles." He who believes in the influence of material conditions will do what he can to have them pure, not only where he speaks, but where he frequents and where he resides. The theological reader, who by accident or curiosity looks over these pages, will find much from which he will dissent; but I hope he will be able to regard this book as one of "clean principles," as far as the limited light of the author goes. Accepting the "golden rule" of Huxley--"Give unqualified a.s.sent to no propositions but those the truth of which is so clear and distinct that they cannot be doubted"--causes the Secularist to credit less than his neighbors, and that goes against him; being, as it were, a reproach of their avidity of belief. One reason for writing this book is to explain--to as many of the new generation as may happen to read it--the discrimination of Secularism. Newspapers and the clerical cla.s.s, who ought to be well informed, continually speak of mere free-thinking as Secularism. How this has been caused has already been indicated. Two or three remarkable and conspicuous representatives of free thought, who found iconoclasticism easier, less responsible, and more popular, have given to many erroneous impressions. When Mr. Bradlaugh, Mrs. Besant, and Mr. Foote came into the Secularistic movement, which preceded their day, they gave proof that they understood its principles, which they afterwards disregarded or postponed. I cite their opinions lest the reader should think that this book gives an account of a form of thought not previously known. One wrote:

"From very necessity, Secularism is affirmative and constructive; it is impossible to thoroughly negate any falsehood without making more or less clear the opposing truth."*

* "Secularism: What Is It?" National Secular Society's Tracts--No. 7. By Charles Bradlaugh.

Again:

"Secularism conflicts with theology in this: that the Secularist teaches the improvability of humanity by human means; while the theologian not only denies this, but rather teaches that the Secular effort is blasphemous and unavailing unless preceded and accompanied by reliance on divine aid."*

Mrs. Besant said:

"Still we have won a plot of ground--men's and women's hearts. To them Secularism has a message; to them it brings a rule of conduct; to them it gives a test of morality, and a guide through the difficulties of life. Our morality is tested only--be it noted--by utility in this life and in this world."**

Mr. Foote was not less discerning and usefully explicit, saying:

"Secularism is founded upon the distinction between the things of time and the things of eternity.... The good of others Secularism declares to be the law of morality; and although certain theologies secondarily teach the same doctrine, yet they differ from Secularism in founding it upon the supposed will of G.o.d, thus admitting the possibility of its being set aside in obedience to some other equally or more imperative divine injunction."***

* "Why Are We Secularists?" National Secular Society's Tracts--No. 8. By Charles Bradlaugh.

** "Secular Morality." National Secular Society's Tracts-- No. 3. By Annie Besant.

*** Secularism and Its Misrepresentation, by G. W. Foote, who subsequently succeeded Mr. Bradlaugh as President of the National Secular Society.

For several years the _National Reformer_ bore the subt.i.tle of "Secular Advocate."

We could not expect early concurrence with the policy of preferring ethical to theological questions of theism and unprovable immortality.

We accepted the maxim of Sir Philip Sydney--namely, that "Reason cannot show itself more reasonable than to leave reasoning on things above reason." We are not in the land of the real yet, common sense is not half so romantic to the average man as the transcendental, and an atheistical advocacy got the preference with the impetuous. The Secularistic proposal to consult the instruction of an adversary proved less exciting than his destruction. The patience and resource it implies to work by reason alone are not to the taste of those to whom a kick is easier than a kindness, and less troublesome than explanation. Those who have the refutatory pa.s.sion intense say you must clear the ground before you can build upon it. Granted; nevertheless, the signs of the times show that a good deal of ground has been cleared. The instinct of progress renders the minority, who reflect, more interested in the builder than the undertaker. What would be thought of a general who delayed occupying a country he had conquered until he had extirpated all the inhabitants in it? So, in the kingdom of error, he who will go on breaking images, without setting statues up in their place, will give superst.i.tion a long life. The savage man does not desert his idols because you call them ugly. It is only by slow degrees, and under the influence of better-carved G.o.ds, that his taste is changed and his worship improved. The reader will see that Secularism leaves the mystery of deity to the chartered imagination of man, and does not attempt to close the door of the future, but holds that the desert of another existence belongs only to those who engage in the service of man in this life. Prof. F. W. Newman says: "The conditions of a future life being unknown, there is no imaginable means of benefiting ourselves and others in it, except by aiming after present goodness."*

Men have a right to look beyond this world, but not to overlook it.

Men, if they can, may connect themselves with eternity, but they cannot disconnect themselves from humanity without sacrificing duty. The purport of Secularism is not far from the tenor of the famous sermon by the Rev. James Caird, of which the Queen said:

"He explained in the most simple manner what real religion is--not a thing to drive us from the world, not a perpetual moping over 'good'

books; but being and doing good."**

* Prof. P. W. Newman, who is always clear beyond all scholars, and candid beyond all theologians, has published a Palinode retracting former conclusions he had published, and admitting the uncertainty of the evidence in favor of after- existence.

** The Queen on the Rev. J. Caird's sermon, Leaves from the Journal of Our Life in the Highlands.

This end we reach not by a theological, but by a Secular, path.

CHAPTER XXII. SELF-EXTENDING PRINCIPLES

"Prodigious actions may as well be done By weaver's issue as by prince's son."

--Dryden.

SO FAR as Secularism is reasonable, it must be self-extending among all who think. Adherents of that cla.s.s are slowly acquired. Accessions begin in criticism, though that, as we have seen, is apt to stop there. In all movements the most critical persons are the least suggestive of improvements. Constructiveness only excites enthusiasm in fertile minds. After the Cowper Street Discussion with the Rev. Brewin Grant in 1853, see Chapter X, page 50, societies, halls, and newspapers adopted the Secular name. In 1863 appeared the _Christian Reasoner_, edited by the Rev. Dr. Rylance, a really reasoning clergyman, whom I afterwards had the pleasure to know in New York. His publication was intended to be a subst.i.tute for the _Reasoner_, which I had then edited for seventeen years. But when the _Reasoner_ commenced, in 1846, Christian believing was far more thought of than Christian reasoning. One line in Dr.

Rylance's _Christian Reasoner_ was remarkable, which charged us with "forgetfulness of the necessary incompleteness of Re-velation."

So far from forgetting it, it was one of the grounds on which Secularism was founded. However, it is to the credit of Dr. Rylance that he should have preceded, by thirty years, the Bishop of Worcester in discerning the shortcomings of Revelation, as cited in Chapter XIX, page 101.

In 1869 we obtained the first Act of Secular affirmation, which Mr. J.

S. Mill said was mainly due to my exertions, and to my example of never taking an oath. In obtaining the Act, I had no help from Mr. Bradlaugh, he being an ostentatious oath-taker at that time. It was owing to Mr.

G. W. Hastings (then, or afterwards, M. P.), the founder of the Social Science a.s.sociation, that the Affirmation clause was added to the Act of 1869. One of the objects we avowed was "to procure a law of affirmation for persons who objected to take the oath."*

Another of our aims was stated to be: "To convert churches and chapels into temples of instruction for the people.... to solicit priests to be teachers of useful knowledge."** We strove to promote these ends by holding in honor all who gave effect to such human precepts as were contained in Christianity. This fairness and justice has led many to suppose that I accepted the theological as well as the ethical pa.s.sages in the Scriptures. But how can a Christian preacher be inclined to risk the suspicion of the narrower-minded members of his congregation, if no one gives him credit for doing right when he does it?

* Secularism the Practical Philosophy of the People, p. 13; 1854. Fifteen years before the first Act was pa.s.sed.

** Secularism the Practical Philosophy of the People, by G.

J. Holyoake, p. 12; 1854.

With our limited means and newness of doctrine, we could not hope to rival an opulent hierarchy and occupy its temples; but we knew that the truth, if we had it, and could diffuse it in a reasonable manner, would make its way and gradually change the convictions of a theological caste. The very nature of Free-thought makes it impossible for a long time yet, that we should have many wealthy or well-placed supporters.

Where the platform is open to every subject likely to be of public service--subjects suppressed everywhere else, and open to the discussion of the wise or foolish present who may arise to speak, outrages of good taste will occur. Persons who forget that abuse does not destroy use, and that freedom is more precious than propriety, cease to support a free-speaking Society. The advocacy of slave emanc.i.p.ation was once an outrage in America. It is now regarded as the glory of the nation. In an eloquent pa.s.sage it has been pointed out what society owes to the unfriended efforts of those who established and have maintained the right of free speech.

"Theology of the old stamp, so far from encouraging us to love nature, teaches us that it is under a curse. It teaches us to look upon the animal creation with shuddering disgust; upon the whole race of man, outside our narrow sect, as delivered over to the Devil; and upon the laws of nature at large as a temporary mechanism, in which we have been caught, but from which we are to antic.i.p.ate a joyful deliverance. It is science, not theology, which has changed all this; it is the atheists, infidels, and rationalists, as they are kindly called, who have taught us to take fresh interest in our poor fellow denizens of the world, and not to despise them because Almighty Benevolence could not be expected to admit them to Heaven. To the same teaching we owe the recognition of the n.o.ble aspirations embodied in every form of religion, and the destruction of the ancient monopoly of divine influences."*

* Leslie Stephens's Freetkinking and Plain Speaking.

Those who, in storm and stress, bring truth into the world may not be able to complete its triumph, but it makes its own way, and finally conquers the understanding of mankind.

Priestley, without fortune, with only the slender income of a Unitarian minister, created and kept up a chemical laboratory. There alone he discovered oxygen. Few regarded him, few applauded him; only a few Parisian philosophers thanked him. He had no disciples to spread his new truth. He was not even tolerated in the town which he endowed with the fame of his priceless discovery. His house was burnt by a Church-and-King mob; his instruments, books, and ma.n.u.scripts destroyed; and he had to seek his fortune in a foreign land.

Yet what has come out of his discovery? It has become part of the civilisation of the world, and mankind owe more to him than they yet understand.

When a young man, he forsook the Calvinism in which he was reared. "I came," he said, "to embrace what is called heterodox views on every question."* He cared for this world as well as for another, and hence was distrusted by all "true believers." Though he had "spiritual hopes,"

he agreed that he should be called a materialist.