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Victorian Blogging
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A collection of digitised nineteenth-century pamphlets from Conway Hall Library & Archives. This includes the Conway Tracts, Moncure Conway's personal pamphlet library; the Morris Tracts, donated to the library by Miss Morris in 1904; the National Secular Society's pamphlet library and others. The Conway Tracts were bound with additional ephemera, such as lecture programmes and handwritten notes.<br /><br />Please note that these digitised pamphlets have been edited to maximise the accuracy of the OCR, ensuring they are text searchable. If you would like to view un-edited, full-colour versions of any of our pamphlets, please email librarian@conwayhall.org.uk.<br /><br /><span><img src="http://www.heritagefund.org.uk/sites/default/files/media/attachments/TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" width="238" height="91" alt="TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" /></span>
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Conway Hall Library & Archives
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2018
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Conway Hall Ethical Society
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The birth, life, and death of the devil: an argument, in which the beginning & extinction of evil in Biblically demonstrated and the popular personal devil proved to be a pagan myth
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Antipas, F. D. [1843-1919]
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Place of publication: London
Collation: 32 p. : ill. (engravings) ; 19 cm.
Notes: Includes correspondence raised by the lecture. Annotations in ink. Two new publications from the publisher listed on numbered pages at the end.
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Martin & Co.
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[188-?]
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G5125
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Christianity
Devil
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<a href="http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/mark/1.0/"><img src="http://i.creativecommons.org/p/mark/1.0/88x31.png" alt="Public Domain Mark" /></a><span> </span><br /><span>This work (The birth, life, and death of the devil: an argument, in which the beginning & extinction of evil in Biblically demonstrated and the popular personal devil proved to be a pagan myth), identified by </span><a href="https://conwayhallcollections.omeka.net/items/show/www.conwayhall.org.uk"><span>Humanist Library and Archives</span></a><span>, is free of known copyright restrictions.</span>
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English
Devil-Christianity
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NADONALSECULARSOCIETy
THE
POLITICAL STATUS
OF
WOMEN.
BY
AITNIE
[third
EESANT.
edition.]
LONDON:
FEEETHOUGHT
PUBLISHING COMPANY,
28, STONECUTTER STREET, E.C.
PRICE TWOPENCE.
�LONDON:
PRINTED BY ANNIE BESANT AND CHARLES BRADLAUGH,
28, STONECUTTER STREET, E.C.
�POLITICAL STATUS OF WOMEN.
Various arguments are advanced by the opponents of
woman suffrage, which require to be met by those who
maintain that the political status of women should be the
same as the political status of men. Of these the prin
cipal—apart from party arguments, such as those which re
gard the momentary strengthening of Tory, Whig, or
¿Radical, by the female vote—are as follows :—
Why should the political incompetency of women receive
so much attention when more pressing wrongs require a
remedy ?
Women are naturally unfit for the proper exercise of the
franchise.
They are indifferent about the matter.
They are sufficiently represented as it is.
Political power would withdraw them from their proper
sphere, and would be a source of domestic annoyance.
It can scarcely be necessary for me to clear my way by
proving to you that there are such things as rights. “ Every
great truth,” it has been said, “ must travel through three
stages of public opinion : men will say of it, first, that it is
not true; secondly, that it is contrary to religion; lastly,
that every one knew it already.” The “rights of man”
have battled through these first two stages, and have reached
the third; they have been denounced as a lie, subversive of all
government; they have been anathematised as a heresy, to
be abhorred of all faithful Christians.; but now every one
has always known that men have rights, it is a perfect
truism.. These rights do not rest on the charter of a higher
authority; they are not privileges held at the favour of a
superior; they have their root in the nature of man ; they
are his by “ divine ’’—that is to say, by natural—right.
Kings, presidents, governments, draw their authority from
the will of the people; the people draw their authority
from themselves.
�4
!
POLITICAL STATUS OF WOMEN.
It is quite a new light to the general public that women
have any rights at all; duties ? ay, plenty of them, with
sharp penalties for their non-fulfilment. Wrongs? ay,
plenty of them, too—wrongs which will not be borne much
longer. Privileges ? yes, if we will take them as privileges,
and own that we hold them at the will of our masters; but
rights ? The assertion was at first met with laughter that
was only not indignant, because it was too contemptuous.
Our truth is as yet in its infancy—first, it is not true;
secondly, it is contrary to religion. The matter is taken
a little more seriously now ; men begin to fancy that these
absurd women are really in earnest, and they condescend
to use a little argument, and to administer a little “soothingsyrup ” to these fractious children. Gentle remonstrance
takes the place of laughter, and thus we arrive at my first
head—surely there are more pressing female wrongs toattend to than the question of political incapacity.
It is perfectly true that the want of representation in
Parliament is not, in itself, a grave injury. In itself, I say,
it is of secondary importance; its gravity consists in what
it involves. You do not value money for its own sake—
those little yellow counters are not intrinsically beautiful,,
nor are they in themselves worth toil, and trouble, and
danger; but you value them for what they represent; and
thus we value a vote, as means to an end. In a free
country, a vote means power. When a man is a voter,
his wishes must be taken into consideration; he counts asone in an election—his opinion influences the return.
When the working-classes wished to alter laws which
pressed hardly on them, they agitated for Parliamentary
reform. What folly 1 what waste of time 1 what throwing
away of strength and energy! how unpractical! Why agitate
for an extension of the franchise, when so many social
burdens required to be lightened ? Why? Because they
knew that when they won the franchise they could trust to
themselves to remedy these social anomalies—when they
had votes, they could make these questions the test of the
fitness or unfitness of a candidate for Parliament. Non
voters, they could only ask for reform; voters, they could
command it. And this is the answer of women to those
who urge on them that they should turn their attention to
practical matters, and leave off this agitation about the
franchise. We shall do nothing so foolish. True, certain
laws press hardly on us; but we are not going now to
�POLITICAL STATUS OF WOMEN.
S
agitate for the repeal of these laws one by one. We might
agitate for a very long time before we gained attention.
We prefer going to the root of the matter at once. We
will win the right of representation in Parliament, and
when we have won that, these laws will be altered. Ten
years after women become voters, there will be some
erasures in the Statute Book. There will no longer be a
law that women, on marriage, become paupers, unless steps
are taken beforehand to prevent it; marriage will. have
ceased to bring with it these disabilities. There will no
longer be a law which gives to the father despotic authority
over the fate of the child ; which enables the father to take
the child from the mother’s arms, and give it into the charge of
some other woman; which makes even the dead father
■able to withhold the child from the living mother. _ There
will be no longer be a law which sanctions the consignment
of thousands of women to misery and despair, jn order
that men’s lives may be made more safely luxurious, and
their homes, when they choose to make them, kept more
pure. The laws whose action is more and more driving
women (in the large towns especially) to prefer unlegalised
marriages to the bonds of legal matrimony, will have
vanished, to the purifying of society and the increased
happiness of both men and women. The possession of a
vote, by giving women a share in the power of the State, will
Also make them more respected. Hitherto, law, declaring
women to be weak, has carefully put all advantages into
the hands of those who are already the powerful. Instead
of guarding and strengthening the feeble, it has bound them
hand and foot, and laid them helpless at the feet of the
strong. To him that hath, it has indeed been given ; and
from her that hath not, has been taken away even the
,protection she might have had.
“ Women are naturally unfit for the proper exercise of
the franchise.” It has been remarked, more than once,
that, in this contest about the voting of women, men and
women have exchanged their characteristics. Women appeal
to reason, men to.instincts; women rely on logic, men on
.assumptions; women are swayed by facts, men . by pre
judices. To all our arguments, to all our reasoning, men
answer, “ It is unfeminine—it is contrary to nature.’’ If
we press them, How and why? we are only met with a
re-assertion of the maxim. I am afraid that we women
.sadly lack the power of seeing differences. It is unfeminine
�6
POLITICAL STATUS OF WOMEN.
to be a doctor, but feminine to be a nurse. It is unfeminine
to mix drugs, but feminine to administer them. It is un
feminine to study political economy, but feminine to train
the future Statesmen. It is unfeminine to study sanitary
laws, but feminine to regulate the atmosphere of the nursery,
whose wholesomeness depends on those laws. It is un
feminine to mingle with men at the polling-booth, but
feminine to.labour among them in the field and the factories.
In a word, it is unfeminine to know how to do a thing, and
to do.it comprehendingly, wisely, and well j it is feminine to
do things of whose laws and principles we know absolutely
nothing, and to do them ignorantly, foolishly, and badly.
We do not see things in this light.. I suppose it is because
we, as women, have “ the poetical power of seeing re
semblances,” but lack the “ philosophical power of seeing
differences.” We must, however, analyse this natural in
feriority of women; it is shown, we are told, in their mental
weakness, their susceptibility to influence, their unbusiness
like habits. If this natural mental inferiority of woman
be a fact, one cannot but wonder how nature has managed
to make so many mistakes. Mary Somerville, Mrs. Lewis
(better known as George Eliot), Frances Power Cobbe,
Harriet Martineau, were made, I suppose when nature
was asleep. They certainly show no signs of the properlyconstituted feminine intellect. But, allowing that these
women are inferior in mental power to the uneducated
artisan and petty farmer, may I ask why that should be a
political disqualification? I never remember hearing it
urged that the franchise should only be conferred on men
of genius, or of great intellectual attainments. Even the
idea of an educational franchise was sneered at, low as was
the proposed standard of education. When a law is made
which restricts the franchise to those who rise above a
certain mental level, the talk about mental inferiority will
become reasonable and pertinent; but, when that law is.
passed, I fear that nature will not be found to have been
sufficiently careful of the male interest to have placed all
men above the level, and all women below it. Suscepti
bility to influence is an argument that also goes too far. I
am afraid that many people’s opinions are but rarely
“ opinions ” at all. They are simply their neighbours*
thoughts covered over with a film of personal prejudice.
It is, however, a new idea in England that a class liable to.
be unduly influenced should be disfranchised ; the Ballot.
�POLITICAL STATUS OF WOMEN.
7
Act lately passed was, I always understood, specially
designed to protect the weak from the pressure of the
strong. Oliver Cromwell said that it was unjust to deprive
any one of a natural right on the plea that, were it given, it
would be abused. Not so; “when he hath abused it,
judge.” Business incapacity may, or may not, exist on the
part of women; it is difficult to judge what power a person
may have when he is never permitted to exercise it. Tie
' up a man’s hands, and then sneer that he has no aptitude
for writing; or chain his feet, and show his natural inca
pacity for walking. John Stuart Mill has remarked : “ The
ladies of reigning families are the only women who are
allowed the same range of interests and freedom of develop
ment as men, and it is precisely in their case that there is
not found to be any inferiority. Exactly where and in pro
portion as woman’s capacities for government have been
tried, in that proportion have they been found adequate.”
In France, at the present day, the women rule business
matters more than do the men, and the business capacity
of French-women is a matter of notoriety. Lastly, I would
urge on those who believe in women’s natural inferiority,
why, in the name of common sense, are you so terribly
afraid of putting your theory to the proof? Open to women
the learned professions; unlock the gates which bar her
out from your mental strifes ; give her no favour, no special
advantages; let her race you on even terms. She must fail,
if nature be against her; she must be beaten, if nature has
incapacitated her for the struggle. Why do you fear to let
her challenge you, if she is weighted not only with the
transmitted effects of long centuries of inferiority, but is
also bound with nature’s iron chain ? Try. If you are so
sure about nature’s verdict, do not fear her arbitration ; but
if you shrink from our rivalry, we must believe that you feel
our equality, and, to cover your own doubts of your supe
riority, you prattle about our feebleness.
“Women are indifferent about the possession of the
franchise.” If this is altogether true, it is very odd that
there should be so much agitation going on upon the sub
ject. But I am quite willing to grant that the mass of
women are indifferent about the matter. Alas ! it has
always been so. Those who stand up to champion an
oppressed class do not look for gratitude from those for
whom they labour. It is the bitterest curse of oppression
that it crushes out in the breast of the oppressed the very
�8
POLITICAL STATUS OF WOMEN.
wish to be free. . A man once spent long years in the
Bastille; shut up m his youth, old age found him still in
his dungeon. The people assailed the prison, and, among
others, this prisoner was set free; but the sunshine was
agony to the eyes long accustomed to the darkness, and the
fresh stir of life was as thunder to the ears accustomed to
the silence of the dungeon; the prisoner pleaded to be
kept a prisoner still. Was his action a proof that freedom
is not fair ? The slaves, after generations of bondage, were
willing to remain slaves where their masters were kind and
good. Is this a proof that liberty is not the birthright of
a man ? And this rule holds good in all, and not only in
the extreme, cases I have cited. Habit, custom, make hard
things easy. If a woman is educated to regard man as her
natural lord, she will do so. If the man to whom her lot
falls is kind to her, she will be contented; if he is unkind,
she will be unhappy; but, unless she be an exceptional
character, she will not think of resistance. But women are
now beginning to think of resistance j a deep, low, murmur
ing is going on, suppressed as yet, but daily growing in
intensity; and such a murmur has always been the herald
of revolt. Further, do men think of what they are doing
when they taunt the present agitators with the indifference
shown by women? They are, in effect, telling us that, if
we are m earnest in this matter, we must force it on their
attention 5 we must agitate till every home in England rings
with the subject; we must agitate till mass meetings in
every town compel them to hear us; we must agitate till
every woman has our arguments at her fingers’ ends. Ah !
you are not wise to throw in our teeth the indifference of
women. You are stinging us into a determination that this
indifference shall not last j you are nerving us to a struggle
which will be fiercer than you dream ; you are forcing us
into an agitation which will convulse the' State. You dare
to make indifference a plea for injustice ? Very well; then
the indifference shall soon be a thing of the past. ’ You
have as yet the frivolous, the childish, the thoughtless, on
your side 5 but the cream of womanhood is against you.
We will educate women to reason and to think, and then
the mass will only want a leader.
“ Women are sufficiently represented as it is.” By whom ?
oy those whose interests lie in keeping them in subjection. So
the masters told the workmen : “ We represent you; we take
care of your interests.” The workmen answered : “ We
�POLITICAL STATUS OF WOMEN.
9
prefer to represent ourselves : we like to have our interests
guarded by our own hands.” And such is our answer to
-our “ representatives.” We don’t agree with some of your
views; we don’t like some of your laws ; we object to some
-of your theories for us. You do not really represent us at
all; what you represent is your own interests, which, in
many cases, touch ours. The laws you pass are passed in the
interests of men, and not of women; and naturally so, for you
are made legislators by men, and not by women. There are
few cases where men are really the representatives of women.
John Stuart Mill—now dead, alas!—noblest and most candid
•of philosophers and Statesmen; Professor Fawcett, a future
leader; Jacob Bright, our steadfast friend: these, and a
few others, might fairly be called representatives of women
in Parliament. Outside the House, too, we have a few
gallant champions, pre-eminent among whom is Moncure
Conway, whose voice is always raised on the side of freedom
and justice. But what we demand is the right to choose
our own representatives, so that our voice may have its
share in making the laws which we are bound to obey. We
share the duty of supporting the State, and we claim the
right of helping to guide it. Taxation and representation
run side by side, and if you will not allow us to be repre
sented, you have no right to tax us. I may suggest here, in
reference to the contest about married women having votes,
that this point is altogether foreign to the discussion. The
right to a vote and the qualification for a vote, are two dis
tinct things, and come under different laws. The one is
settled by Act of Parliament, the other by the revising
barrister. A blunder was lately made by putting into a Bill
a special disqualification of married women. Such a clause
is absurdly out of place. We are contending to remove
from a whole sex a legal disability; the details come later,
and must be arranged when the principle is secured. A
man has the right to vote because he is a man; but he must
possess certain qualifications before he can exercise his
right. Let womanhood, as such, cease to be a disqualifi
cation; that is the main point. Let the discussion on
qualifications follow. Further, if it be urged that women
are represented by their husbands, what are we to say about
those who have none? In 1861, fifteen years ago, there
were three and a half millions of women in England work
ing for their livelihood—two and a half millions of these
were unmarried, and were, therefore, unrepresented. Is
�10
POLITICAL STATUS OF WOMEN.
there no pathos in these figures ? Two and a half millions
struggling honestly to live, but mute to tell of their wants
or their wrongs. Mute, I say, for not one in a thousand hasthe power of the pen. And this is not the worst. Oh,
friends ! below these, pressed down there by the terrible
struggle for existence, there is a lower depth yet, tenanted
by thousands of whom it is not here my province to speak,
thousands, from whom a bitter wail goes up, to which men’s
ears are deaf. Surely, women need representation—surely,
there are grievances and wrongs of women which can only
be done away by those whom women send to Parliament as
their representatives. It is natural that men should not
desire that many of these laws should be altered. In the
first place, it is impossible they should understand how
hardly they press on women; only those who wear it, says
the proverb, “ know where the shoe pinches.” And, in the
second place, the holders of a monopoly generally object
to have their monopoly interfered with. They can’t imagine
what in the world these outsiders want pressing in upon
their social domains. The nobleman cannot understand
why the peasant should object to the Game Laws; it is so
unreasonable of him. The farmer cannot make out why
the labourer should not attend quietly to his hedging and
ditching, instead of making all this fuss about a union.
The capitalist cannot see the sense of the artisan banding
himself with his brethren, instead of going on with his
duty, and working hard. Men can’t conceive why women
do not attend to their household duties instead of fussing
about Parliament. Unfortunately, each of these tiresome
classes cares very little whether those to whom they are
opposed can or cannot understand why they agitate. We
may be told continually that we are sufficiently repre
sented ; we say that we do not think so, but that we mean
to be.
“ Political power would withdraw women from their
proper sphere, and would be a source of domestic annoyance.”
Their proper sphere—/.<?., the home. This allegation is
a very odd one. Men are lawyers, doctors, merchants;
every hour of the day is pledged, engrossing speculations
stretch the brain, deep questions absorb the mind, great
ideas swell in the intellect. Yet men vote. If occupation
be a fatal disqualification, let us pass a law that only idle
people shall have votes. You will withdraw workers from
their various spheres of work, if you allow them to take an
�POLITICAL STATUS OF WOMEN.
II
interest in politics. For heaven’s sake, do not go and take
the merchant from the desk, the doctor from the hospital,
the lawyer from the court; you will disorganise society—you will withdraw the workers. Do you say it is not so—
that the delivery of a vote takes up a very short time at
considerable intervals ? that a man must have some leisure,,
and may very well expend it, if he please, in studying
politics ? that a change of thought is very good for the
weary brain? that the alteration of employment is a
positive and most valuable relaxation? You are quite
right; outside interests are healthy, and prevent private
affairs from becoming morbidly engrossing. The study of
large problems checks the natural tendency to be absorbed
in narrower questions. A man is stronger, healthier,
nobler, when, in working hard in trade or in profession for
his home, he does not forget he is a citizen of a mighty
nation. I can think of few things more likely to do women
real good than anything which would urge them to extend
their interests beyond the narrow circle of their homes..
Why, men complain that women are bigoted, narrow
minded, prejudiced, impracticable. Wider interests would
do much to remedy these defects. If you want your wife
to be your toy, or your drudge, you do perhaps wisely in
shutting up her ideas within the four walls of your house
but if you want one who will stand at your side through
life, in evil report as well as in good, a strong, large-hearted
woman, fit to be your comfort in trouble, your counsellor in
difficulty, your support in danger, worthy to be the mother
of your children, the wise guardian and trainer of your sons
and your daughters, then seek to widen women’s intellects,
and to enlarge their hearts, by sharing with them your
grander plans of life, your deeper thoughts, your keener
hopes. Do not keep your brains and intellects for the
strife of politics and the conflicts for success, and give to
your homes and to your wives nothing but your condes
cending carelessness and your thoughtless love. Further, do
you look on women as your natural enemies, and suppose they
are on the look out for every chance of running away from
their homes and their children ? It says very little for you
if you hope only to keep women’s hearts by chaining their
minds, or limiting thezr range of action. What is it really
worth, this compelled submission—this enforced devotion?
Do you acknowledge that you make home-life so dull, sowearisome, that you dare not throw open the cage-door,
�12
POLITICAL STATUS OF WOMEN.
lest the captive should escape ? Do you confess that your
service is so hard a one that she you call your friend
is only longing to be free? You do yourselves an injustice,
friends; you shame your own characters—you discredit
your homes. A happy home, the centre of hopes and
fears, the cherished resting-place from life's troubles, the
sure haven from life’s conflicts, the paradise brightened
by children’s prattle and children’s laughter—this home is
not a place where women must be chained down lest they
should run away. Admitting, however, for argument’s
sake, the absurd idea that women would neglect their
homes if they possessed the franchise, may I ask by what
right men restrict women’s action to the home? I can under
stand that, in Eastern lands, where the husband rules his wives
with despotic authority, and woman is but the plaything
■and the slave of man, woman’s sphere A the home, for the
very simple reason that she cannot get outside it. So, in
this sense, in the Zoological Gardens, is the den the sphere
of the lion, and the cage of the eagle. Shut any living
creature up, and its prison becomes its sphere. But if the
prisoner becomes restless—if nature beats strongly at the
captive’s heart—if he yearns for the free air and the golden
sunshine, you may, indeed, keep him in the sphere you
have built for him; but he will break his heart, and will
die in your hands. Many women now, educated more
highly than they used to be—women with strong brains
and loving hearts—are being driven into bitterness and
into angry opposition, because their ambition is thwarted
at every step, and their eager longings for a fuller life are
.forced back and crushed. A tree will grow, however you
may try to stunt it. You may disfigure it, you may force it
into awkward shapes, but grow it will. One would fain
hope that it is in thoughtlessness and in ignorance that
men try to push women back. Surely they do not appre
ciate the injury they are doing, both to themselves and to
women, if they turn their homes into prison-houses, and
the little children into incumbrances. In the strong, true,
woman there is a tender motherhood which weaker natures
cannot reach ; but if these women are to be told that
‘domestic cares only are to fill their brains, and the prattle
of children to be the only satisfaction of their intellect, you
run a terrible risk of making them break free from home
and child. Allow them to grow freely, to develop as nature
bids them, and they will find room for home-cares in their
�POLITICAL STATUS OF WOMEN.
13
minds, and the warmest nestling-place in their bosom will
be the haven of the little child. But if you check, and
fret, and carp at them, you will not succeed in keeping,
them back, but you will succeed in souring them, and in
making them hard and bitter. Oh, for the sake of English
home life—for the sake of the tender ties of motherhood—
for the sake of the common happiness, do not turn into
bitter opponents the women who are still anxious to be
your friends and your fellow-workers. This is no imaginary
danger; it is a thunder-cloud brooding over many English
homes. I can scarcely believe that men and women would
be so unreasonable as to make the power of voting into a
domestic annoyance. Of course, if a married couple want
to quarrel, there are sure to be plenty of differences of
opinion between them which will give them the proper
opportunity. But why should political disagreement be
specially fatal to domestic peace ? Theology is now a
fruitful source of disagreement. If the husband is the free
thinker, he does not suffer, because he does not allow his
wife to worry him too far ; but if the free-thinking is on the
side of the wife, matters are apt to become uncomfortable.
There is only one way to remedy this difficulty. Let the
husband feel, as the wife now does, that between two
grown-up people control of one by the other is an absurdity.
Bitterness arises now from disagreement, because the wife
who forms her opinion for herself is regarded as a rebel to
lawful authority. Remove the authority, which is a tyranny,
and people will readily “ agree to differ.” There will pos
sibly be a little more care before marriage about the opinions
of the lady wooed than there is now, when the man fancies
that he can mould the docile girl into what shape he
pleases, and the future happiness of both is marred if the
woman happens to be made of bright steel, instead of
plastic clay. In any case, Parliament is scarcely bound tp
treat one half of England with injustice, lest the other half
should find its authority curtailed.
One by one I have faced the only arguments against the
extension of the franchise to women with which I am ac
quainted. You yourselves must judge how far these argu
ments are valid, and on which side right and justice rest. I
would add that I feel sure that, when the matter is fairly
placed before them, most men will sympathise with, and
assist our cause. Some noble and brave men have come
forward to join our ranks already, and speak boldly for
�r4
POLITICAL STATUS OF WOMEN.
woman’s cause, and work faithfully for its triumph. The
mass of men only need to study our claims in order to
accept them. They have been reared to regard themselves
as our natural superiors; small blame to them that they
take the upper seats. Kind and gentle as many of them
•are, working hard for wife and children, thinking much of
women and loving them well, it cannot be expected that
they should readily understand that their relations to the
weaker sex are founded on an injustice. But if they want
to see how false is their idea of peace, and how misled
they are when they think women’s position satisfactory, let
them go out and see what the laws are where the power they
give is wielded by brutality and tyranny. Let them try to
imagine what women suffer who are too weak and timid to
resist the strength under whose remorseless exercise they
writhe in vain , let them try to appreciate the sharper agony
of those whose bolder hearts and stronger natures defy their
tyrants, and break, at. whatever cost, their chains. Laws
must be tested by their working ; these laws which make
the woman the helpless servant of man are not enforced in
happy homes; but they exist, and elsewhere they are
used.
Injustice is never good ; it is never even safe. There is
a higher life before us, a nobler ideal of marriage union, a
fairer development of individual natures, a surer hope of
wider happiness. Liberty for every human being, equality
before the law for all in public and in private, fraternity of
men and women in peaceful friendship, these are the promise
of the dawning day. Co-workers in every noble labour, co
partners in every righteous project, co-soldiers in every just
cause, men and women in the time to come shall labour,
think, and struggle side by side. The man shall bring his
greater strength and more sustained determination, the
woman her quicker judgment and purer heart, till man shall
grow tenderer, and woman stronger, man more pure, and
woman more brave and free. Till at last, generations
hence, the race shall develop into a strength and a beauty
at present unimagined, and men and women shall walk this
fair earth hand-in-hand, diverse, yet truly one, set each to
each—
“As perfect music unto noble words.3
�BOOKS BY ANNIE BESANT.
The Freethinker’s Text-Book.—Part II. By Annie Besant.—
“On Christianity.” Section I.— “ Christianity: its Evidences
Unreliable.” Section II.—“Its Origin Pagan.” Section III.—“Its
Morality Fallible.” Section IV.—“Condemned by its History.”
Bound in cloth, 3s. 6d.
History of the Great French Revolution.—By Annie Besant.
Cloth, 2s. 6d.
My Path to Atheism.—Collected Essays of Annie Besant.—The
Deity of Jesus—Inspiration—Atonement—Eternal Punishment_ Prayer—Revealed Religion—and the Existence of God, all examined
and rejected ; together with some Essays on the Book of Common
Prayer. Cloth, lettered, 4s.
Marriage: as it was, as it is, and as it should be. By
Annie Besant. In limp cloth, Is.
The Jesus 'of the Gospels and The Influence of Chris
tianity.—Verbatim Report of Two Nights’ Debate between the
Rev. A. Hatchard and Annie Besant, at the Hall of Science,
London. Is.
To be obtained of the Freethought Publishing Company,
28, Stonecutter Street, E.C.
�PAMPHLETS BY ANNIE BESANT.
The True Basis of Morality. A Plea for Utility as the Standard
of Morality...
...
...
...
...
q
Auguste Comte. Biography of the great French Thinker, with
Sketches of his Philosophy, his Religion, and his Sociology.
Being a short and convenient resumé of Positivism for the
general reader
...
...
...
...
.. q
Giordano Bruno, the Freethought Martyr of the Sixteenth
Century. His Life and Works
...
...
... 0
The Political Status of Women. A Plea for Women’s Rights ... 0
Civil and Religious Liberty, with some Hints taken from the
French Revolution ...
...
...
...
... q
The Gospel of Atheism ...
...
...
...
.. q
Is the Bible Indictable ? ...
...
...
...
... q
England, India, and Afghanistan ...
...
...
... q
The Story of Afghanistan
...
...
...
... 0
The preceding two pamphlets bound together in limp cloth, Is.
The Law of Population : Its consequences, and its Rearing upon
Human Conduct and Morals. Fortieth thousand
... 0
An additional twenty-five thousand of this have also been
printed in America, and translations have been issued and
widely sold in Holland, Italy, and France.
Liberty, Equality, and Fraternity...
...
...
.. 0
Landlords, Tenant Farmers, and Labourers
...
... 0
The God Idea in the Revolution ...
...
...
... 1
The Gospel of Christianity and the Gospel of Freethought
... 0
English Marseillaise, with Music ...
...
...
... 0
English Republicanism ...
...
...
...
... q
Essays, bound in one volume, cloth
...
...
... 3
Christian Progress
...
...
...
...
... q
The English Land System
...
...
...
... 0
Ethics of Punishment
...
...
...
...
... ()
Large Portrait of Mrs. Besant, fit for framing, 2s. 6d.
A splendidly executed Steel Engraving of Mrs. Besant, price 2d.
London : Fkeethought Publishing Company, 28, Stonecutter
Street, E.C.
d..
2
6
1
2
3
2
2
3
2
&
1
1
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2
1
1
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1
1
�
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Victorian Blogging
Description
An account of the resource
A collection of digitised nineteenth-century pamphlets from Conway Hall Library & Archives. This includes the Conway Tracts, Moncure Conway's personal pamphlet library; the Morris Tracts, donated to the library by Miss Morris in 1904; the National Secular Society's pamphlet library and others. The Conway Tracts were bound with additional ephemera, such as lecture programmes and handwritten notes.<br /><br />Please note that these digitised pamphlets have been edited to maximise the accuracy of the OCR, ensuring they are text searchable. If you would like to view un-edited, full-colour versions of any of our pamphlets, please email librarian@conwayhall.org.uk.<br /><br /><span><img src="http://www.heritagefund.org.uk/sites/default/files/media/attachments/TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" width="238" height="91" alt="TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" /></span>
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Conway Hall Library & Archives
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2018
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
Conway Hall Ethical Society
Text
A resource consisting primarily of words for reading. Examples include books, letters, dissertations, poems, newspapers, articles, archives of mailing lists. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre Text.
Original Format
The type of object, such as painting, sculpture, paper, photo, and additional data
Pamphlet
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
The political status of women
Description
An account of the resource
Edition: 3rd ed.
Place of publication: London
Collation: 14 p. ; 18 cm.
Notes: Books and pamphlets by Annie Besant advertised on and inside back cover. Part of the NSS pamphlet collection.
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Besant, Annie Wood [1847-1933]
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
Freethought Publishing Company
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
[188-?]
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
N069
Subject
The topic of the resource
Women's rights
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
<a href="http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/mark/1.0/"><img src="http://i.creativecommons.org/p/mark/1.0/88x31.png" alt="Public Domain Mark" /></a><span> </span><br /><span>This work (The political status of women), identified by </span><a href="https://conwayhallcollections.omeka.net/items/show/www.conwayhall.org.uk"><span>Humanist Library and Archives</span></a><span>, is free of known copyright restrictions.</span>
Format
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application/pdf
Type
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Text
Language
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English
NSS
Women-Suffrage
Women's Rights
-
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PDF Text
Text
qsJ 0
LIBERTY, EQUALITY,
FRATERNITY.
BY
ANNIE
be s a n t.
THIRD EDITION.
'• ’A
t-
*
LONDON:
FREETHOUGHT PUBLISHING COMPANY,
28, Stonecutter Street, F C.
PRICE ONE PENNY
�LONDON;
PRINTED BT ANNIE BESANT AND CHARLES BRADLAUGH,
28, STONECUTTER STREET, E.C.
�LIBERTY, EQUALITY, FRATERNITY.
Freedom, Justice, Brotherhood : such, in other words,
is the legend which is inscribed on the Republican banner,
which is the motto on the Republican shield. With these
words gleaming on her brow, Republican France fought and
conquered; with this war-cry ringing from her lips, Repub
lican France unsheathed the sword which struck at the
tyrants+of the people, and at “the priests of an evil faith.”
Alas ! that France, maddened by oppression, and by most
cruel outrage, blinded with furious hate and passionate
indignation, conscious that she was strong enough to defy
her gaolers, allowed herself to be betrayed by the emissaries
of monarchs, and permitted some of her citizens to be bribed
by English coin, until the golden letters were tarnished with
blood, and their brightness shone lurid through a mist of
terror. And yet France—glorious in spite of her madness
and of the despair of her anguished fear—France clung fast
to the grandest thought ever struck out of the human soul:
men are free; men are equal; men are brothers. The
shame of the Revolution we fling back on her tyrants ; on
the kings who had made France their playground, and had
rioted while the people were starving; on the nobles who,
evil courtiers, fluttered round an evil monarch, and wrung
from the peasants’ food the money for their feasting, and
took from the poor man’s home its brightest ornaments, the
honour of his wife, and the purity of his daughter ; on the
Church, whose priests were corrupt, and whose Bishops were
the worst of a bad court, foul with the double foulness of a
hypocrisy which knelt to God in order the better to rob
Man. On these be the disgrace of the Reign of Terror,
of the massacres of September. These men had taught the
people that Liberty meant the power to grasp at everything
which gratified the whim of the moment; that Equality
meant that, when possible, those above should be dragged
down to a lower level; that Fraternity meant that brother
should slay the brother and betray the sister. Little wonder
�4
LIBERTY, EQUALITY, FRATERNITY.
that the evil seed bore evil fruit, and that Republican France
did not shake off at once the ingrained habits of France
Monarchical. Yet at the worst she did not torture her
victims, as the Monarchy had tortured Damiens; or commit
them to long-drawn agony, as the Monarchy did with its
Irttres de cachet; the massacres of September were scarce so
bloody as the massacre of St. Bartholomew, or the guillotine
so devouring as the dragonnades of Louis. True, the
B epublic shed the blood of nobles, while the Monarchy
shed only the blood of the people ; there is the secret of the execrations that arise against the Revolution, and of the
hatred which blackens it and defames. In spite of her
faults and her errors, the Republic held fast to the thought
embodied in her motto ; she was based on principles that
were pure and strong; her creed was noble, even though
muttered by lips that were red with blood. And to-iday we
repeat it, we Republicans, enthusiasts, dreamers, as men
call us, we proclaim that the words are true, that the thought
is perfect; we own as the ideal we worship, “ Liberty,
Equality, Fraternity.”
It is well, however, that we should attach to each word of
our motto a clear and distinct meaning, so that we may
never be led away into making an indefensible statement,
or be betrayed into a foolish and untenable position. What
is Liberty ? Not, as some seem to fancy, the power to
impose upon others a political constitution of which they do
not approve, or a form of Government which they do not
desire. Not the fact that our own opinion is uppermost, and
our own ideas triumphant. Not the discovery that we have
grown strong enough to bend the wills of others to our will,
and to make the world as we would wish to see it. Liberty
means that every individual is left perfectly free to follow
his own will, to pursue his own objects in his own fashion,
with no limit whatsoever imposed upon him by others ; this
complete freedom being bounded only by the equally com
plete freedom of every one of his neighbours. Nothing less
than this is liberty; nothing more than this is possible. This
liberty is the birthright of every man and of every woman.
The right to life comes with the fact o. birth; and life
implies something more than mere existence ; it implies the
right to exercise every physical and every mental faculty, to
grow, to develop, to become perfect. No one has a right
to maim another’s body; all admit this ; and yet men claim
a right to maim the faculties of another, to break his mental
�LIBERTY, EQUALITY, FRATERNITY.
5
-arms, and to stunt his mental growth. No man can exercise
his faculties to the fullest extent unless he has complete
freedom to do so ; but no man has a greater right to com
plete freedom than his fellow; and, therefore, we are
■driven to the conclusion that every individual has a right to
complete freedom of action, but that he has no right to infringe
on the complete freedom of any one else. Liberty, then,
implies the right to live the fullest and happiest life of which
the individual is capable by the constitution with which he
is born into the world ; it implies the right to property, to
■all which the individual has acquired for himself by his own
skill and his own power, provided that, in acquiring it, he
has not trespassed on his neighbours either by force or by
fraud; it implies the right to make what contracts or arrange
ments he pleases with other individuals, provided, again, that
the contract contains nothing which trenches on the rights
of other parties. The free man is king of himself, but he is
ruler of none other; self-respecting, he must respect the
rights of others; jealous of his own liberty, he must be
equally jealous of the liberty of every one else; stern
defender of his own dignity, he must equally sternly repress
any personal inclination, or any inclination of the many, to
injure the same dignity which is in each individual alike.
There is no picture of a nation possible to imagine which
is sublimer than this: a nation of men and women, each
free to develop into that beautiful variety which is one of the
marvels and the glories of Nature, each a law to himself,
•each the defender of the liberty of each, strong and digni
fied as only free citizens can be, with the strength which
grows from self-confidence and from confidence in others,
with the dignity which is born of the knowledge that he who
lives on the highest level he can reach, deserves the respect
of his own heart, and wins the respect of all who surround
him.
Equality is a word which is used as carelessly and as lightly
as Liberty, and with as little thought of its only possible
meaning. Equal in natural endowments, equal in possibili
ties of achievement, equal in physical and in mental strength,
equal in moral virility, men are not; in this sense they are
not born equal, in this sense they never can be equal; this
■equality is nowhere found in Nature, for throughout her
mighty realms there is an endless variety, a marvellous
interweaving of higher and lower elements, but never a
dead level of equality, wherein none is afore or after other,
�6
LIBERTY, EQUALITY, FRATERNITY.
none is greater or less than another. As a simple matter
of fact, does any one pretend that men can be born equal
in power and in possibilities? Take the children of
drunken and unhealthy parents, born with enfeebled nerves,
with stunted limbs, with dwarfed brain and diseased blood ;
take the child of hardy, sound, and temperate parents, with
strong round limbs, and well-strung muscles, and all the
bright vitality of young new life thrilling and bounding
within him ; are the two babes born equal ? Could they
be equal under any possible system of government? Let
them be born, if you will, where waves the flag of a true
Republic, and let no factitious superiority raise the one
over the other; let each have a fair chance, and let neither
be unjustly weighted; but Nature, before birth, has handi
capped the one, and there is no equality between them. It
may be pleaded that where equality was recognised and taught,
there drunkenness and criminality would have fewer victims,
and that then our poor little ones, foredoomed to misery and
vice, would be one of the horrors of the past, no longer tobe found in England. Take it that so it would be, as to a
great extent it would be, although no glory of governmental
purity and nobility can raise men without the will of men to
raise themselves; take it so, because the ideal Republic
is not possible until the men and women who are the Re
public have grown into true manhood and true womanhood,
and have left behind the weaknesses of childhood; yet,
even then, no absolute equality will be found ; some brains
will be larger than others, and some bodies stronger than
others ; never will man be as the work of a craftsman,
turned out by the dozen from the same mould. What, then,
does Equality mean, when we place it in our Trinity of
Hope and of Love? Is it only an empty word without
meaning, with the false jingle of which we seek to deceive,
babbling a falsehood which can never be a truth ? Not
so; Equality has a meaning which makes it worthy of its
high place, mid-way between the Freedom and the Brother
hood of Man. Equality is Justice; absolute Justice to all
alike; Justice which denies to none the right which is his;
Justice which gives to none a right which is not his. Equality
means that in rights, all men are equal; that before the law,
all men are equal; that in law-given opportunities, all men
are equal; that in advantages bestowed, all men are equal.
It means that in life’s race none shall start in artificial
advance of another; that, although strength, and agility,.
�LIBERTY, EQUALITY, FRATERNITY.
7
and endurance must tell in the race itself, yet the racers
shall be placed equal at the starting-post; that the supe
riority must be in the runner, and not gained by an advan
tage in the position from which he begins the race. Equality
implies also that men shall really be born more equal than
they are at present, because from our present inequalities,
from our swollen wealth on the one side and from our
ghastly poverty on the other, we actually labour to increase
the slighter inequalities which Nature would produce, and
we literally breed an inferior race with which to fill our
workhouses and our gaols. Where equality of right is
recognised, we shall gradually decrease inequalities of
Nature, and we shall raise the race itself to a higher level,
until, in the march upwards, until, in the developments of
a more glorious Humanity, the poorest and the lowest in
those happier times will be the superiors of the noblest and
the proudest of our heroes of to-day.
There remains Fraternity : Fraternity, without which no
Liberty is possible, except the fierce liberty of the beast of
prey, living alone and in enmity with all; Fraternity, with
out which no Equality can exist, unless it be an equality of
barbarism, where each lives by himself and through himself,
and owes nought to his fellow. For Fraternity none need
plead in theory, although we trample it under our feet in
our daily practice; all acknowledge the beauty of brotherly
love, and all would gladly extend its sway; many are care
less of Liberty, and few seek for Equality, but all would
raise an altar to Fraternity, where the smiling goddess might
sit, garlanded in flowers, with the child Love in her arms,
with the moon Peace at her feet, and clothed with the sun
of Joy. And brotherhood may be cultured among us, yet
more easily than Freedom and Justice ; it is the hand which
shall pluck the others, it is the magic wand which shall
create them. Fraternity binds us together, each to each ;
fraternity is the strong cord which shall give to one the
power of the whole. Liberty and Equality can only be
won by combined effort, and combination is only possible as
brotherhood is recognised and felt. This principle can be
acted upon and spread by each of us : in our homes, in
our lives, we can show its beauty ; by the genial word and
the helpful act; by the mere cordial clasp of the hand, which
recognises the brotherhood of the labourer as reverently as
fliat of the noble ; by the steady refusal to deny the right of
e lowest and most degraded, and the constant readiness
�8
liberty, equality, fraternity.
to own the brotherhood and sisterhood of those whom theworld makes outcasts ; by crushing down jealousy and by
following true greatness loyally; by working hand-in-hand
with others to further every noble cause; by joyful self
sacrifice for the common good, and glad free labour for thebenefit of all, we may so spread the principle of Fraternity
in our ranks that, by the force of unity among us, we may
stand all-powerful for attack, and may wrest Liberty from
the grasp of oppressors, and erect the statue of Equality on
the ruins of privilege and favouritism. Liberty, Equality,
Fraternity: it is our motto, our cry, our badge. As the
Christian wears the cross, and the Mahommedan is known
by the crescent, so might Republicans be known by this
symbol of their creed ; engraven on the ring, on the locket,
on the ornament, it might speak with silent eloquence of
the hope which we struggle to realise, of the faith in which
we work, of the aspirations by which we live; and, dead,
it might hallow our tombs, as the sacred ideal to which we
strove to conform our lives, and as the promise of the dawn
of a gladder to-morrow, which shall be won for those who
come after us by our labour or by our deaths.
�
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Victorian Blogging
Description
An account of the resource
A collection of digitised nineteenth-century pamphlets from Conway Hall Library & Archives. This includes the Conway Tracts, Moncure Conway's personal pamphlet library; the Morris Tracts, donated to the library by Miss Morris in 1904; the National Secular Society's pamphlet library and others. The Conway Tracts were bound with additional ephemera, such as lecture programmes and handwritten notes.<br /><br />Please note that these digitised pamphlets have been edited to maximise the accuracy of the OCR, ensuring they are text searchable. If you would like to view un-edited, full-colour versions of any of our pamphlets, please email librarian@conwayhall.org.uk.<br /><br /><span><img src="http://www.heritagefund.org.uk/sites/default/files/media/attachments/TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" width="238" height="91" alt="TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" /></span>
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Conway Hall Library & Archives
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2018
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
Conway Hall Ethical Society
Text
A resource consisting primarily of words for reading. Examples include books, letters, dissertations, poems, newspapers, articles, archives of mailing lists. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre Text.
Original Format
The type of object, such as painting, sculpture, paper, photo, and additional data
Pamphlet
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Liberty, equality, fraternity
Description
An account of the resource
Edition: 3rd ed.
Place of publication: London
Collation: 8 p. ; 18 cm.
Notes: Printed by Annie Besant and Charles Bradlaugh. Part of the NSS pamphlet collection.
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Besant, Annie Wood [1847-1933]
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
Freethought Publishing Company
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
[188-?]
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
N068
Subject
The topic of the resource
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NATIONAL SECULAR SOCIETY
THE TRUTH OF HISTORY.
BY
Colonel
R. Gk
Ingersoll.
'England, printed the following:
__
“ CONVERSION OF THE ARCH ATHEIST.
“ Mr. Isaac Loveland, of Shoreham, desires ns to insert the
■following:
through Mr. Hine’s grand mission work, the other side of the Atlantic.
The colonel’s cousin, the Rev. Mr. Ingersoll, wrote to Mr. Hine soon
after he began lecturing in America, informing him that his lectures
had made a great impression on the colonel and other Atheists. 1
noted it at the time in the Messenger. Bradlaugh will yet be converted;
his brother has been, and has joined a British Israel Identity Associa
tion. This is progress, and shows what an energetic, determined man
(dike Mr. Hine) who is earnest in his faith can do.
“ ‘ Very faithfully yours,
H. Hodson RuGG.
How can we account for an article like that ? . Who made
up this story ? Who had the impudence to publish it ?
As a matter of fact, I never saw Mr. Hine, never heard of
him until this extract was received by me in the month of
December. I never read a word about the “ Identity of Lost
Israel with the British Nation.’’ It is a question in which I
never had, and never expect to hav®, the slightest possible
-interest.
�2
man, in whose vd^ca/bFfo8^’0^ V^^hat tbe Englishpane, the Norman,the Het thl SenfbI°Od °+f?he Saxof, the
descendant of nbrZm
Scot, and the Celt, is the
language does ntt be^ ’the
dacok” The
Hebrew, and yet it is claimed hv +L°^St reser?lblan®« to the
be used bj
what w^SSeXiI’T“*d about'a living man,
opposed the Church p P
oncerning the dead who have
opponents of^uperstition
Clrcill,ated about all the
falsehoods of hisPtime will firJdihV1’ attacks the popular
telling other lies Noth!™ d thatake defends itself by
multiply itself, nothing can lay ZuF hatch n°thing ean 80
as a good, healthy, religious lie 7
d h * h as many
be^eta^
sedulity Of the
obligation to believe^vo^v-n • ’ •
^eel under a kind of
against any form of what fhev^ 1U ^avor
their religion, op
The old falsXod^iii 7^uP-eaSe- cal1 “ Infidelity.”
Diderot, and hundreds of nth ° taire’ Paine, Hume, Julian,
They are answered th^ J u 8 gr°w green every spring,
slightest foundation • but thev emon,straiied to be without the
dots die there reems to L n
• And when one
that in each instance althono-h^t^ of pa3sa^ian operation, so
to undergo, if’ nSsarv
die8’the cMd
child, and sometimes two’
operation, leaving another
°f t™gueS
to
part of the stock in trade tn ° J36 {¥se’ and these lies are a
No Church can afford to th™ Vnluable assets> of superstition
that these stories are false nn^ dsProPer.ty away. To admit
has been busy1lyi^gfo^r hundred^ of vdm1^
°hurch
admit that the word of‘the Chord ‘ 7TS’ Td li; 18 also to
as evidence of aZy fact.
not’ and cannot be taken
of^heVew YoiT
a
£ontl’°Versy with the editor
now supposed to be in k’’
^8V' ?reneus Prime (who is
Infidels in hell) as tn w^+u11 emx,°^1Ilg
bliss of seeing
religious opinions 1 offerT/10mas Paine recanted his
for the benefit of a^hfrity if th?°Slt ® tkousand dollars
substantiate the charee
P
reverend doctor would
NewYorkO&Xer toflfot VaTp Feca^d. I forced the
compelled that -nn-ner
au Paine did not recant, and
blaspheming Infidel.”
837 ka^ “Thomas Paine died a
�3
A few months afterward an English paper was sent to me
—a religions paper—and in that papei’ was a statement to the
effect that the editor of the New York Observer had claimed
that Paine recanted; that I had offered to give a thousand
dollars to any charity that Mr. Prime might select, if he would
establish the fact that Paine did recant; and that so over
whelming was the testimony brought forward by Mr. Prime
that I admitted that Paine did recant, and paid the thousand
dollars.
This is anothei* instance of what might be called the truth
of history.
I wrote to the editor of that paper, telling the exact facts,
and offering him advertising rates to publish the denial, and
in addition stated that if he would send me a copy of his
paper with the denial, I would send him twenty-five dollars
for his trouble. I received no reply, and the lie is in all pro
bability still on its travels, going from Sunday-school to
Sunday-school, from pulpit to pulpit, from hypocrite to savage
—that is to say, from missionary to Hottentot—without the
slightest evidence of fatigue—fresh and strong, and in its
cheeks the roses and lilies of perfect health.
Some person, expecting to add another gem to his crown of
glory, put in circulation the story that one of my daughters
had joined the Presbyterian church—a story without the
slightest foundation—and although denied a hundred times, it
is still being printed and circulated for the edification of the
faithful. Every-few days I receive some letter of inquiry as
to this charge, and I have industriously denied it foi years,
but up to the present time it shows no signs of death—not
even of weakness.
Another religious gentleman put in print the chargethat
my son, having been raised in the atmosphere of Infidelity,
had become insane and died in an asylum. Notwithstanding
the fact that I never had a son? the story still goes right on,
and is repeated day after day without the semblance of a blush’
Now, if all this is done while I am alive and well, and while
I have all the facilities of our century for spreading the
denials, what will be done after my lips are closed ?
The mendacity of superstition is almost enough to make a
man believe in the supernatural.
And so I might go on for a hundred columns. Billions of
falsehoods have been told, and there are trillions yet to com 6
The doctrines of Malthus have nothing to do with this
particular kind of reproduction.
And there are also many other falsehoods which the
Church has told, the which if they should be written every
one, I suppose that even the world itself could not contain the
books that should be written,
�This Tract can be obtained for
gratuitous distribution from :
R. FORDER,
28 Stonecutter St,
Farringdon Rd, E.C.
PRICE 1/- PER 100, POST FREE 1/3.
ALL COL
INGERSOLL’S” LECTURES KEPT
IN STOCK.
CATAL OUGE ONE PENNY STAMP.
THE
‘National Reformer’
WEEKLY
2zd.
The FREETHINKER
WEEKLY lzo.
PRINTED AND PUBLISHED BY R, BORDER, 28 STONECUTTER STREET, E.C.
�
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Victorian Blogging
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An account of the resource
A collection of digitised nineteenth-century pamphlets from Conway Hall Library & Archives. This includes the Conway Tracts, Moncure Conway's personal pamphlet library; the Morris Tracts, donated to the library by Miss Morris in 1904; the National Secular Society's pamphlet library and others. The Conway Tracts were bound with additional ephemera, such as lecture programmes and handwritten notes.<br /><br />Please note that these digitised pamphlets have been edited to maximise the accuracy of the OCR, ensuring they are text searchable. If you would like to view un-edited, full-colour versions of any of our pamphlets, please email librarian@conwayhall.org.uk.<br /><br /><span><img src="http://www.heritagefund.org.uk/sites/default/files/media/attachments/TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" width="238" height="91" alt="TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" /></span>
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Conway Hall Library & Archives
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2018
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Conway Hall Ethical Society
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Title
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The truth of history
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Ingersoll, Robert Green [1833-1899]
Description
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Place of publication: [London]
Collation: 3 p. ; 18 cm.
Notes: "From Truth Seeker, 1887"--Stein, who does not list this ed. Tentative date of publication from KVK. Part of the NSS pamphlet collection.
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[R. Forder]
Date
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[188-?]
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N406
Subject
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Christianity
Jesus Christ
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Text
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English
Christianity
Jesus Christ-Historicity
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ß
2
WH5
NATIONAL SECULAR SOCIETY
THE MODERN DEFENCE
OF CHRISTIANITY:
A
CHANGE
OF ’ FRONT.
BY CHARLES WATTS.
Christian advocates frequently adduce, as a proof of the
Divine origin of Christianity, what they term “ the con
tinuity of the Christian Church.” If by this phrase is
meant that for nearly two thousand years Associations
have existed called “ Christian,” it is unnecessary to take
exception to the allegation. In what way, however, can
the existence of such Organisations prove that Chris
tianity is aught else but the outcome of the human
mind ? To make the argument sound from a Christian
standpoint, it would not be sufficient to prove the con
tinuity of the Church; the continuity of its teachings
must also be demonstrated. Christian exponents have
not hitherto done this. The fact is that what is called
Christianity has at different times appeared in various
forms, according to the general conditions of the period.
First, it is said there was “primitive Christianity,” which,
we are told, meant worshipping God and endeavouring
to emulate Christ irrespective of creeds and dogmas.
By and bye this form of Christianity gave way to the
age of ceremonies, the worshipping of images, and the
introduction of formularies which supplanted the “ pri
mitive purity ” of the new faith. In course of time the
ceremonies were changed and the formularies altered to
suit the miraculous period and the doctrine of implicit
belief, which, in their turn, had to give way to “rational
Christianity ” and emotional adoration for Christ.
During this variety of changes diversified, indeed, have
been the doctrines professed, such as the divinity of the
Virgin Mary, purgatory, infant damnation, the person
ality of the Devil, hell and its material fire, verbal inspi
ration of the Bible, predestination, special providence,
etc. The general lines of departure from pre-existing ✓
�2
THE MODERN DEFENCE OF CHRISTIANI1Y.
forms are associated with the rise and formation of the
Latin, the Greek, and the Reformed or Protestant
Churches, followed by the establishment of Nonconfor
mity and Unitarianism. Even the views supposed to
have been held of the nature and attributes of God—of the
birth, mission, and death of Christ—have not escaped
the law of change and modification which has always
governed the Church. The only “ continuity ” in the
history of the Christian Church has really been its name
and its determined opposition to and persecution of those
outside its pale.
A similar change has taken place in modern days in
the mode of advocating and defending orthodox Chris
tianity. The controversies once prevalent as to images,
saints, the Pope, the Trinity, prayer, miracles, prophecy,
and verbal inspiration, are seldom heard of now. The
line of defence adopted by Paley, Watson, Wardlaw,
Butler, and Pearson is in many respects superseded by
the policy of Colenso, Dr. Irons, Professor Jowett, and
the late Dean Alford.
It may here be asked, Where is primitive Christianity
to be found to-day ? and where can be discovered the
consistent successors of the old Christian defenders ?
The Moravians and the Peculiar People are the two
sects which practically endorse, more than any others,
the earlier views of the teachings of the New Testament.
But these believers are comparatively so few in number
that they cannot be said to represent the modern Chris
tian Church. Where at the present time can clergymen
or ministers be found who will defend in debate with a
Freethought advocate such questions as the character of
the Christian Deity, as given in the Old Testament; the
existence of the Devil; the Trinity; that the Bible is the
very word of the very God ; and the doctrine of endless
torments ? These subjects are preached upon from the
pulpit by gentlemen who dare not discuss them on the
platform.
Even the so-called Christian Evidence
Society, with all its wealth and boasted influence,
refuses to put forward one man to defend Christianity
in public debate. Why is this? One would suppose,
if the Christian faith were built upon a rock, no Scepti
cism could prevail against it. If Christian advocates
really thought their religion invulnerable, why should
�THE MODERN DEFENCE OF CHRISTIANITY.
3
they hesitate to submit it to criticism ? The fact is,
Orthodoxy will not stand the thought-test of the nine
teenth century; the old mode of expounding its claims
and defending its positions has proved inadequate to
meet the reasoning requirements of the present time.
The rapid progress of general education and scientific
knowledge has compelled Christian exponents to change
their front.
In former times the Bible, “ every word and every
letter,” according to the old-fashioned theory of the
Dean of Chichester, was thrown into the teeth of Coper
nicus, Kepler, Galileo, and other investigators and dis
coverers of natural truths. Now, however, Christians
proclaim : “ Oh ! the Bible was not intended to teach
physical science.” So much the worse, then, for the
Bible. No sane person will deny that science has been
the greatest benefactor to the world. To it are we in
debted for the marvellous improvements so manifest in
the present century. If the Bible is “God’s word,”
containing rules for man’s guidance, it should teach that
which is undoubtedly the guiding principle of his life.
We readily grant that the Bible does not teach science,
although its defenders once claimed that it did. It pro
fesses to do so, however, and much of its space is
devoted to such scientific questions as the origin of man,
disease and death, and the solar system ; only upon all
these subjects the Bible writers evidently wrote nothing
that we can now accept as scientifically accurate. Is it
not strange that Christian instructors did not recognise
this fact until the nineteenth century ? Why did they
continue to inculcate a theory of creation which was
thoroughly erroneous, and which is now rejected by every
scholar whose intellect is not prostrated before the shrine
of blind belief?
A noteworthy feature of the modern defence of Chris
tianity is that it attempts, not really to defend, but to
explain away, the plain teachings of the Bible. For
example, Christian apologists now maintain that a very
long world-period, a geological and biological era, elapsed
between the time spoken of in the first and second verses
of Genesis. If this wise discovery had any foundation,
how is it that we can discern no reference to it in the
book? Why is it that the writer of the first chapter of
�4
the MODERN DEFENCE OF CHRISTIANITY.
Genesis said not a syllable about previously existing
forms of life ? God, who is said to be omniscient, must
have foreseen the geological discoveries of later times,
and that those discoveries would conflict with his inspired
revelation. Why, therefore, did he not have a clause
introduced that would have reconciled the Bible with
modern science ?
Another example of the Christian method of “ explain
ing away ” may be seen in their mode of defending the
Bible account of the Deluge. We are now told that this
was only a partial cataclysm or inundation. Strange to
say, however, while adopting this change of front the
theologians are illogical enough to attempt to prove that
every race of men has its traditions of a deluge. How
can these two directly antagonistic theories be consis
tently held? If the Deluge had been partial, no wise man
would urge a general tradition, which, from the orthodox
standpoint, would seem to show that it was universal.
But it is not to be marvelled at that we find numerous
traditions of a great devastation caused by water. In
most countries inundations, floods, abnormally-high
tides, periodically occur. These fasten themselves in
delibly upon the imagination of the terrified people, and
are sure to be transmitted from father to son for thou
sands of years.
There can be no doubt that the Bible teaches the
universality of its Flood, and that, great as the difficulty
is to believe its statements thereon, the difficulty is not
lessened by introducing the explaining-away theory of a
partial Flood. (For facts in support of these two alle
gations the reader is referred to my pamphlet on “ The
Bible and Science.”)
Failing to reconcile the Bible with science, Christians
seek to depreciate science by calling its doctrines “specu
lative theories.” It is quite true that some portion of
the theory of scientific men is allowed to be speculative—
i.e., it is not yet demonstrated; but the scientific facts
already established are sufficient to prove—(a) that the
earth could not have been created within six days ;
(b) that the beginning—if beginning there could be in
an infinite chain of nature-action—must have been
countless ages ago, before ever the Jews were thought
of; (c) that the Bible story of the Deluge is a self-
�THE MODERN DEFENCE OF CHRISTIANITY.
5
evident absurdity; (d) that the Fall, Atonement,
universal relapse into sin, and the consequent necessity
for a redemption, are _opposed to history, justice, and
humanity, and cannot, therefore, be defended by reason
and experience
Christian advocates are just now very ready to answer
in the affirmative the old philosophical puzzle of “ Is
there a first cause ?” Supposing they could prove their
affirmation, it would effect nothing in their favour unless
they could also show that this “ first cause ” is identical
with the Deity of the Book of Genesis and with Jesus
Christ. The “ first cause ” argument is one of Theism,
not merely Christianity, whose “first cause” Christian
advocates of the present generation decline to defend.
Christian apologists, finding it difficult, in this critical
age, to defend successfully any one doctrine of orthodoxy
against the attacks of Rationalists, fall back for refuge
upon the assertion that the “ Christian evidences are
cumulative.” They urge that the Christian faith must
be judged as a whole—a complete system. To this we
answer, that if the “ evidences ” are cumulative, so also
are our objections to them. What are the alleged
“ cumulative evidences ” as set forth in the Bible ? Prac
tically, they are these. God having the power to make
man perfect, formed him out of such inferior materials,
and organised him so badly that his weakness was mani
fested at the first test to which he was subjected. The
result was that he fell, and although God is supposed to
be omnipotent, he did not improve the work of his own
hand, but, by a cold-water process, actually destroyed
the whole of mankind, one family excepted. By and
by the human race again multiplied; but wickedness
and misfortune still marked their fallen condition. There
fore, God then decided to send his son, who was of the
same age as himself, to correct the errors of the original
creation, with the injunction that those who did not
believe in the Son should perish everlastingly. Notwith
standing that this belief was necessary to salvation, no
provision was made to impart a universal knowledge of
this plan of redemption. The consequence is that at the
present time, after it has existed nearly two thousand
years, only about one-third of mankind know anything
about it; and among those the first portion do not un
�6
THE MODERN DEFENCE OF CHRISTIANITY.
derstand it, the second portion find its application per
sonally impracticable, and the third portion reject it
altogether.
Thus the weakness, cruelty, and total
failure of this orthodox scheme are so apparent that the
“cumulative” objections to it are so numerous and
powerful as to destroy the force of any supposed
“ cumulative evidence.”
Another feature of the modern defence of Christianity
is to be seen in the attempt to prove that morality and
progress have always been identified with some form of
supernatural religion. Hence it is said that a society
that did not reverence and worship God after the manner
of either the Mosaic or Christian dispensation would
sooner or later revert into semi-brutality.
Let us apply the test of history to this position. First,
then, we notice the morality and culture of the Jews of
the Exodus. Led by Moses, under God’s guidance, we
yet find them manifesting the lowest possible moral
qualities, the most utter forgetfulness of virtue, the
least self-reliance and energy. They resort to falsehood,
theft, and murder, and ultimately, without any rational
ground for so doing, forsake their God and worship a
golden calf. Where at this period do we find their
works of art, their philosophers, and their advanced in
stitutions ?
Under the succeeding “ dispensation ” what do we
behold ? The Christian Church overturning old litera
ture, opposing the extension of knowledge, destroying
teachers, banishing learning, and doing its best to ex
tinguish the light of reason. From the reign of the first
Christian monarch to the partial renunciation of the
then “ national ” faith in the sixteenth century, the state
of society earned for that period the name of the Dark
Ages.
We are told by modern Christians that God’s revela
tion was a continuous development; first an illumination
to Adam and Eve, then to Abraham, then to Mioses,
and then by Jesus Christ to the world. A mere glance
at the Bible and history will show the folly of such a
position. How many of the earth’s population were the
better for Adam’s revelation ? We have the decided
answer to this in the story of the destruction of the race
by the Flood. How many were improved through
�THE MODERN DEFENCE OF CHRISTIANITY.
7
Abraham’s call ? But few indeed outside his own family,
and even within that circle the revelation failed to in
spire the members with either truth, honour, or honesty.
How many benefited from Moses’ dispensation? Simply
the Jewish people—a mere handful of the human race.
Lastly, how many have received the alleged advantages
of the revelation of Jesus? After nearly nineteen cen
turies have passed since he came, how stands the case?
Let the following figures, representing the number of the
adherents of the various religions of the world, serve as
an emphatic reply :—Parsees, 150,000 ; Sikhs, 1,200,000;
Jews, 7,000,000; Greek Catholics, 75,000,000; Roman
Catholics, 152,000,000; other Christians, 100,000,000;
Hindoos, 160,000,000; Mohammedans, 155,000,000;
Buddhists, 500,000,000. It must here be understood
that 327 millions of nominal Christians include Atheists,
Secularists, Deists, and Rationalists. Deduct all these
from the sum total of professing Christians, together
with the indifferent class, and how few, indeed, compara
tively speaking, bow to the name of Jesus !
In many instances the modern mode of defending
orthodoxy is a system of casuistry. It does not openly
contradict science and criticism, but it will base an argu
ment upon incidental coincidences. Thus recent re
searches in the East have shown that the Bible contains
the real names of Assyrian and Chaldean monarchs.
Hence the inferences are at once drawn that because a
King called Sennacherib once really lived, therefore,
says the Christian Evidentialist, Isaiah and God turned
back the time of day. Because there was once really a
King of Egypt named Shishak, therefore Samson killed
a thousand men with the jawbone of an ass, Elisha
made iron float on water, and Joshua stopped the earth’s
motion.
Truly the times are altered since Watson, in reply to
Paine, endeavoured to represent the Christian religion
as the perfection of rationalism. All along the line the
contending forces have changed their very nature. Now,
the Christian defence is nothing more than an endeavour
to depreciate the logical inferences deducible from all
scientific investigation. As proof of this, reference need
only be made to the labours of Colenso and of the
German Rationalists. The principal object of certain
�THE MODERN ¿{DEFENCE OF CHRISTIANITY.
theologians now appears to be, not what they can refute,
but how much they can retain by explaining away
and by pruning down. The moral of this is easily
drawn. Of all systems orthodoxy is dying the most easy
but certain death. Other systems, like Paganism, have
had to be extirpated by the sword, or have been pro
scribed by the State; but Christian orthodoxy is declin
ing from its own inherent weakness—its inability to with
stand the test of modern thought. Of course, it is not
here meant that the whole of Christianity will disappear.
It will be its errors, its creeds, and its dogmas that will
fade before man’s cultured intellect; but its truths, like
all verities, will remain and become allied with systems
more practicable, and with principles more in accordance
with the requirements of an advanced civilisation.
Weekly, price Twopence,
THE
SECULAR
REVIEW.
A JOURNAL OF DAILY LIFE.
EDITED
BY
CHARLES
WATTS.
The REVIEW contains Articles weekly upon Social, Political,
and Theological subjects, and advocates Positive Secularism.
Among its contributors are—
G. J. HOLYOAKE
H. V. MAYER
J. P. ADAMS
CHARLES C. CATTELL
H. G. ATKINSON
FRANCIS NEALE
G. W. FOOTE
Dr. TRAVIS
W. MACCALL
Can be ordered through any Bookseller, or obtained direct from
the Office—84 Fleet Street, London
Printed and Published by Watts & Co., 84, Fleet Street, Ltnd*>n.
Price One Penny.
�
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The modern defence of Christianity : a change of front
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NATIONAL SECULAR SOCIETY
THE
FLAGELLANTS
'
AND
THE
COVENANTERS
(New Edition).
BY
SALADIN.
Author of “God and His Book,” etc.
London :
W. Stewart & Co., 41, Farringdon Street, E.C.
�THE FLAGELLANTS.
From the era of its half-mythical Galilean down
wards, Christianity has laid incontestable claims to
be considered the Religion of Misery. A radical
doctrine of the faith is that this world is only a
Babelmandeb, or Gate of Tears to the “ glory that
shall yet be revealed.” The teaching’s recorded of
Christ have all the jaundiced acerbity of the Essenes.
The son of Mary was an ascetic, or nothing. Ac
cording to him, the end of the world was close at
hand. Its concerns and aims were despicable, and
the best that could be done was to regard its plea
sures as pernicious seductions and lay up “ treasures
in heaven,” as it would avail a man nothing should
he ** gain the whole world and lose his own soul.”
Strictly compatible with the teachings of Christ
were the doctrines of Cardinal Damiani, when he
wrote a panegyric upon the efficacy of self-inflicted
suffering, and those of the celebrated Dominic, when
he introduced penitential hymns, to be chanted to
a tune to which the self-inflicted lash kept time.
Hair shirts, protracted periods of fasting, and the
like, had long been m vogue as means to propitiate
an angry heaven ; but Dominic affirmed that twenty
recitations of the Psalms, accompanied by selfinflicted scourging, was equal to a hundred years,
of ordinary penitence.
Dominic flourished towards the middle of the
eleventh century ; but it was not till about two
centuries later (1260) that the seed of asceticism
he had sown sprang up to be a great and popular
tree of self-torture. It was in an age of gloom
and suffering and wickedness that, at Pergugia,
in Italy, a monk named Regnier, with wild and
bitter eloquence, preached Flagellation as the anti
dote that would restore an afflicted people to the
�The Flagellants.
3
favour of an angry God. Like Peter the Hermit
in the first Crusade, like Luther at the Reformation,
or Bernhardt of the Millenarian insanity, this
Regnier had rightly interpreted the spirit of the
times. He put in his sickle, and the corn was
already ripe for the harvest. The wars of Guelph
and Ghibelline, famine, pestilence, rapine, murder,
and misery had, after a thousand years of Chris
tianity, made Italy and the most of Europe feel
that life was, indeed, not worth living, but only
a horrid and mysterious burden, which was taken
up involuntarily, and which left those who bore it
such cravens that they had not the courage to lay
it down.
And so another violent epidemic of Lose you-r
Reason to Save your Soul fell upon Christendom
like a rinderpest. The memory and inspiration of
the Man of Sorrows was again to lay the load of
a great sorrow upon the shoulders of the world.
Once more, as, under the preaching of Bernhardt
and Peter the Hermit, rowdy and rascal, swash
buckler and sword-player, blackguard and blackleg,
worked themselves into a frenzy concerning one
Jesus, whose name has always been a spell-word
with miscreants from the time of the Christian cut
throats mentioned by Tacitus down to Booth’s latest
prize, the “ blood-washed soul ” of ’Arry Juggins
the burglar.
Two by two the holy ones of the whip-lash
marched through the gaping multitudes on the
crowded streets. Their heads wTere covered with
sackcloth ; their remaining article of attire was a
bandage round the loins, which rendered them a
little decent for God’s sake. Their backs and breasts
were entirely nude. The back bore a huge cross,
daubed upon J&B skin with red paint ; and another
cross was smeared upon the naked breast. On
through the town, and through the wilderness, in
long and narrow file, like the march of the ducks
from the dub to the dung-hill, marched those nasty
saints of God. The hand of each sacred fanatic
bore a heaw and horrible whip, the thongs tipped
with iron ; and, with this whip, every pious madman
lashed his own bare back till the thongs were clotted
and gory, and long lines of blood running down
�4
The Flagellants.
from the scapula to the pelvis defaced the red cross
which had been painted on the skin.
To what shall we liken the men of that genera
tion? To a crazy dog, refusing its food and chew
ing off its own hind legs to please its master. But
the analogy is imperfect, and the man flogging his
own back to please his Jesus is more irrational than
the dog chewing off his own hind legs to please his
master ; for the dog is positively sure he has a
master ; but the ablest Christian that has ever writ
ten has not been able to establish that his Jesus
really ever existed. The only record of him is in
four so-called “ Gospels,” written by nobodv knows
who, nobody knows where, and nobody knows when,,
and the statements of which are contradicted by
each other and are utterly unsupported by history.
A pretty source, indeed, from which to derive a
Jesus in whose honour you can flog your back 1
But backs always will be flogged, and noses ever
will be held close to the grindstone, till he with
the back and he with the nose takes the trouble to
cultivate his brain, and dares to confront, eagleeyed, the authorities that would make him a chattel
and a poor mad cats-paw in the hands of priest
and tyrant.
Jehovah has ever liked singing and dancing and
capers to his glory and honour. David, the “ man
according to God’s own heart,” danced naked be
fore deity and certain young girls ; and another
worthy sang to God’s glory with acceptance because
Jael had hammered a nail into her guest’s head
while he slept. So the Flagellants, besides tickling
their own backs with whips, deemed it would be
well to tickle Jehovah’s ears with music. Accord
ingly they sang while they flogged. If vou think
flogging your back is conducive to making you
rival the efforts of Sims Reeves, just try the ex
periment. Flog your back while you sing, and you
will find-that many a quaver flies off into a scream,
and that many a crotchet is dead-born. But the
Lord had just to content himself with such music
as- was obtainable under the circumstances. Cer
tain fragments of the hymns which the Flagellants
sang have been preserved. Here are brief speci
mens
�The Flagellants.
5
“Through love of man the Saviour came,
Through love of man he died ;
He suffered want, reproach, and shame,
Was scourged and crucified.
Oh, think, then, on thy Saviour’s pain,
And lash the sinner, lash again ! ” *
The following are a few lines from the metrical
rendering' into English of “ The Ancient Song of
the Flagellants ” :—
“Tears from our sorrowing eyes we weep,
Therefore so firm our faith we keep
With all our hearts, with all our senses :
Christ bore his cross for our offences.
Ply well the scourge, for Jesu’s sake,
And God, through Christ, your sin will take.
For love cf God abandon sin—
To mend your vicious lives begin ;
So shall we his mercy win.” t
Thirty-three days and a-half was the shortest term
in which a Flagellant must macerate and lacerate
himself ; and these thirty-three and a-half days were
meant to be mystically symbolical of the thirty-three
years and a-half which the third part of God, and
yet equal to the "whole of God, had lived on earth
4‘saving souls” and making three-legged stools,
lhe devotees fell down on their dirty knees in the
dirty streets, and, setting up their naked, putrid,
and horrible backs, prayed to Jah and Jesus and
Mary to have mercy on their souls, before having
taken the trouble to find out whether they had souls
or not. Jah and Jesus and Mary had, however,
something else to do than attend to kneeling lunatics
with voices like cross-cut saws and backs like half
cooked beef-steaks. But the cities, then as now,
had plenty of fools, and certain of them rushed out
at their doors or leapt from their windows for God’s
sake to join the ranks of those who lashed their
hurdies with thongs and prayed with their knees
in the gutter. When all Christendom had managed
to lash its back to its own satisfaction, it threw
down the whip, got up from its knees, and took
to swearing and sinning in the usual way.
But, some fifty years afterwards, Christendom
again took it into its head that its back would be
* Preserved by L’Evesque : quoted by Lingard.
t Dr. He:ker.
�6
The Flagelleiits.
all the better for a flogging. So, in 1296, the saints,
particularly those of Strasburg, Spires, and Frank
fort, took unto themselves whips, and began busi
ness in earnest. The Jews had good broad backs,
which they were impious enough never to whip,
and this mightily offended the Christian Flagellants.
The Jews did not see their way to whip their own
backs, so, in the most obliging manner, the Chris
tians offered to whip them for them. The Jews
preferred to look after their commercial enterprises
to tearing away with a scourge at their own dorsal
rafters ; and, for this deadly sin, they were foully
massacred. The wretches who did not scourge their
backs had scourged the third of deity and crucified
him. Down with them to Tophet! One Jew,
goaded to desperation by Christian persecution and
outrage, set fire to the Town Hall and the Cathedral
of Frankfort, and they were reduced to ashes. Down
with the seed of Iscariot and Barabbas ! The holy
ones flung away their whips, and, seizing sword,
hatchet, and knife, devoted some hours of horror
to the slaughter of man, woman, and child of the
seed of Israel. The God of Jacob looked on ; but,
apparently, did not see his way to interfere. In
Frankfort, of all the sons and daughters of Salem
whose ancestors had sung to the Lord by the streams
of Babel, none remained alive, except a small rem
nant that, bursting through the carnage, had
escaped into Bohemia. Christ had “ redeemed ”
these Christians (they were well worth it) by a
bloody sacrifice upon Calvary, and, out of com
pliment—like Catherine Medici in her sanguinous
bath—they set him in blood to the chin. Every
tree must be judged by its fruit. I hereby defy the
history of all the other faiths to produce a tree like
the Christian one, which, from the deepest root to
the topmost twig, is dyed with human gore.
After the Frankfort tragedy of 1296, Flagellantism
did not rear its head conspicuously till the year 1348.
To students of history the mention of this date re
calls the deepest and widest grave that was ever
dug to receive the slag and refuse of morality. The
“ Black Death ” took into her hands the besom
of destruction, and swept into the sepulchre twentyfive millions of human beings ! Europe fell upon
�The Flagellants.
7
her knees, and from Dirt appealed to Deity. But
the appeal was in vain. In every Christian city
there was a plethora of disgusting sewage and un
speakable stench. Cleanliness is, proverbially, next
to godliness ; but the citizens of mediaeval Europe
were so godly that they forgot to be cleanly. Out
side Mohammedan Constantinople there was not a
bath on the entire European continent, from the
Straits of Behring to the Straits of Messina. Pious
Ignorance and theological Intolerance sat to the
eyes in filth, which it would give my readers the
jaundice to describe ; and mankind perished as do
clouds of locusts when overtaken by a gale at sea,
or as perish at the end of autumn tens of thousands
of hives of bees, when imprisoned amid the fumes
I
of burning brimstone.
“ God in heaven, Mary and all the Saints, what
is the matter now? ” gasped Christendom, as, with
pale lips and phrenized eye, she, in whole cityfuls,
-staggered into the grave. Nothing practical, as
connected with this wretched “Vale of Tears,’’
suggested itself to the follower of Jesus. He was
beyond and above attending to the carnal conditions
of this despicable earth, and from the midst of his
priests and relics and shrines and miracles his whole
hope was in heaven, and his only court of appeal
his “ Maker and Redeemer.’’ But neither Maker
nor Redeemer could be induced to interfere ; and
graves were dug till there were none left to dig
them, and corpses were borne out of the streets
and houses till there were none left to bear them.
There were only the voice of prayer, the cry of pain,
and the rattle of the death-cart ; and in certain dis
tricts even these sounds died away. In the houses
the dead were left with the dead. There lay a dis
used cart and a skeleton horse. Grass and weeds
flourished in the streets where a busy traffic had
— rolled its tides, and there the wind waved ghastly
shreds of human apparel, still adhering to more
ghastly relics of human beings. There was high
carnival for maggot and fly, and dogs and swine
tugged and snarled among the entrails of those who
bad trusted in Jesus and neglected their dust-bins.
The New Testament was looked to as the anti
dote to the bane ; and, whatever may be its merits,
�8
' -
The Flagellants.
it is a poor manual of hygiene. Scrubbing is never
mentioned, and there is no reference to washing,
except to the washing of “ souls,” whatever they
may be, in blood. There is, moreover, allusion to
the washing- of a certain party’s feet with tears,
and then drying them with maiden’s hair ; but this
is a sentimental and not an efficacious lavation. It
is not on record that Mary or Tabitha, or anyone
else, ever washed the shirt or tunica which was
worn under the seamless garment of Jesus, and I
question if it was ever washed or changed from
the day on which he left the carpenter’s bench till
the day that, with his life, he expiated his sedition
and folly. Through all the horror of the Black
Death we hear of no wholesome and honest wash
ing with water ; but there certainly was a washing
of the streets with blood. It was surmised that
tlris visitation of the wrath of Heaven was instigated
by the sinfulness of the Christians in allowing the
Jews to live ; for it was the Jews who had crucified
the Lord ; and yet, according to the Christian theory,
if the Lord had not been crucified, the world would
inevitably have been lost. The Black Death was
accompanied with another merciless massacre of the
Jews. It was also accompanied by another pitiless
flogging of backs. So fanatically wild did this selfinflicted back-flogging become that many held that
the rite of Flagellation should, in the Christian
Church, supersede the rite of Baptism. Many liter
ally flogged away the flesh off their bones, and yet
the plague did not abate ; and the sky and the earth
were pregnant with supernatural terrors. A pillar
of fire hung over the pope’s palace at Avignon ;
a red ball of fire in the heavens blazed over Paris,
and Greece and Italy were shaken with an earth
quake. And the Christians flogged and prayed, and
prayed and flogged, and sang and slew, and slew
and sang, and still the plague went on.
Flageliantism was not without its serio-comic as
pect. I cannot say whether it copied from the game
of Leap-the-Frog, or whether Leap-the-Frog has
copied from it. In Leap-the-Frog each boy vaults
over his neighbour’s bended back, and then bends
his own, and so on the process goes till each has
vaulted over the back of all. The Flagellants lay
!
/
|
�The Flagellants.
9
in rows, and one ran along the row scourging
furiously as he went with a leathern scourge tipped
with iron, and then he lay down ; and so on and
so on, till each had flogged the naked backs of all.
In lying in the rows to be flogged, however, those
who wished to do penance for certain crimes had
to observe certain recognized postures indicative of
these crimes. If the crime was perjury, till it was
his turn to get up and flog, the penitent lay on his
side, holding up three fingers ; if it was adultery,
he lay flat with his face on the ground ; and so on,
different postures of the body were fixed upon to
indicate different crimes. The Flagellants, too, were
not without their grotesque impostures in the shape
of pious forgeries. At one of their assemblies they
actually read a letter which had been sent to them
direct from heaven, and in which Jesus Christ was
good enough to give them his favourable opinion of
the efficacy of flagellation. The “ Blessed Virgin ”
had, with maternal affection, given her son some
assistance in the composition of this celestial missive.
Unlike the Millenarian mania, the Flagellant craze
•extended even to England. In 1351 a deputation
of 120 continental Flagellants visited London ; but
insular stolidity did not see its way to carry its piety
to the extent of lacerating its own flesh with
scourges. Even on the continent the irenzy began
to exhaust itself. The leaders betook themselves to
desperate resources to buttress up a falling cause.
They set themselves to the task of restoring life
to a dead child, and performed the “ miracle ” so
clumsily that the performance hastened their dis
solution instead of giving them a new lease of in
fluence. In the hey-day of their fanaticism neither
king nor pontiff saw it prudent to interlere with
the Flagellants ; but when the tide turned against
them, king and pontiff turned against them too. . A
bitter persecution set in, and Flagellantism, like
most other isms, was called upon to furnish its roll
•of martyrs, and it heroically enough responded to
the' call. Its dying spasm—and it was a vigorous
and terrible one—was in 1414, and some time later
it finally expired in the dungeons and amid the
fagots of the Holy Inquisition. Mankind, in the
mass, continue to be fools ; but, in the last four
�10
2 he Couenanteis.
centuries, there has been some small advance to
wards sanity, and it is now somewhat difficult toget anyone to flog his own back for the love of God.
W. S. R.
THE COVENANTERS.
MONDAY, October 27th, 1884.
The House met at tour o’clock.
QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS.
Answering Mr. Buchanan, the Marquis of Hartington said hehad communicated with Loid Wolseley as to the employment of a
greater number of Presbyterian chaplains with the Scottish regi
ments under his charge, adding that one at present at Alexandria
would be available, if his services were required.
Alas, that the world has not yet dispensed with'
the services of Presbyterian Beetles of god and gun I
I myself ran such a narrow escape of being a Scotch.
Beetle that this project of employing the ScarabceusScotorum in Egypt brings up to my memory sundry
of the bloodthirsty insects’ previous ravages scrolled,
over history’s panoramic canvas, and that in pig
ments of blackness and fire.
There, with hign cheek-bones and scowling browsr
with black gowns and Geneva bands, file past thedour and grim fanatics who barred the path of
Charles I., and of Laud, Juxon, and Wren. There
go they who, lor twenty-eight years, through steel!
and blood and heather, set their backs against thewall of Fate, and practically swore to lead Scotland
to Hell, rather than to Rome.
History has a pretty feasible hint that the shower
of clasp-Bibles that, on July 23rd, 1637, rained so>
murderously round the head of Dean Hanna, in
St. Giles’s Church, were flung by Scottish ministers,,
dressed in female gowns and mutches, and that
their pulpit-trained voices initiated the popular yell
of “Anti-Christ! Anti-Christ! A Pope! A Pope!
A Bellv-god ! Stone him ! ” It was the fanatical"
and hard-headed Presbyterian Beetles who, by their
wild biblically-phrased warnings, roused the Scottish
�The Covenanters.
11
peers to a vivid apprehension that, if Charles and’
Laud succeeded, the estates which had been con
fiscated from the Church at the Reformation would7
be .wrenched from the nobles and restored to Rome.
This was a potent argument ; for, whatever might
be the territorial lord’s desire for a place in the
kingdom of heaven, he would fight and sing psalms
for twenty years rather than lose a single acre of
his lands in the kingdom of Scotland. And thus
there was almost instantly arrayed ag-ainst the
Government a black phalanx of ninety Beetles,
walled round by John, Earl of Rothes ; John, Earl
of Cassilis ; Alexander, Earl of Eglington ; James,
Earl of Biome ; William, Earl of Lothian ; John,
Earl of Wemyss ; and John, Earl of Loudon ; Lord
Lindesay, Lord Yester, Lord Balmerino, Lord
Cranston, and large numbers of the gentry and
lesser nobility. These, of course, led with them
the psalm-singing yokels of their estates, primed
up by the Beetles to a perfect phrenzy of religious
fanaticism, which could not fail to be exceedingly
profitable to their lords and masters. There is no
patriotism in denying that Scotland’s desperate
struggle in the seventeenth century was carried out
bv the immoral instrumentality of Beetle and nobleprimed bumbkins, howling from Jeremiah and cant
ing from Ezekiel, grimly frantic with suffering and
fanaticism, who, singing psalms, mutilated the slain,
and dashed their texts and swords at the same time
through .the bodies of the dragoons of the Govern
ment. Scotland did all this drunk with divinity,
and I should respect her quite as much if she had
done it all drunk with whisky. And yet I should’
like to see the land in the whole world that can
afford to scoff at her. Man, up to this time, has
been a small and nasty animal at the best, and what
are magniloquently called his noblest motives will
not bear anything like rigid analysis. You are
kinder to mankind when you expect too little of
them, than when you expect too much. And it will.'
puzzle your ingenuity to expect less than you will
get.
1 The passage in Genesis, anent God’s making all
things very good, would have stood better on its
legs, if it had read, 4 God made all thing's verv good
�12
The Covenanters.
save man, and him he made mad.” It is teleology
alone that makes man madder than his “ earth-born
companions and fellow-mortals. ” Well might Burnsapostrophise the mouse :—
“ Still thou art blest, compared wi’ me :
The Present only toucheth thee ;
But, ah ! I backward cast my e’e
On prospects drear ;
And, forward though I canna see,
I guess and fear,”
It is all very well for writers of the school of Dr.
Lewins to abjure, teleology absolutely. It rises
superior to abjuration. The speculatively religious
instinct is strong in normal man, and I, for one,
rejoice, rather than lament that it is so. It is not
the religious instinct that has stultified and cursed
the race, but the diversion of that instinct into
baleful channels by interested sacerdotal and civil
chicane. Man has too little religion, rather than
too much ; but he has certainly too much theology
rather than too little.
"
fc' ’
But, back to the Black-Beetles of the Presbyterian
corner of the vineyard of the Lord. So well did
the interested leaven of religious sedition work, that
in June, 1638, the Hig’h Commissioner swaggered
up to Holyrood escorted by 20,000 men, most of
them mounted. There were present, moreover, 700
Beetles, the most sour and grim kind that ever
banged a bible for the love of God. Many of them
had buff coats under their Geneva cloaks, and,
according, to Burnet, many wore in their belts
swords, pistols, and daggers, that, for the love of
heaven, they might redden the earth with blood.
Madly Beetle-bitten, the peasantry flew to arms ;
every Beetle-box in the country breathed of fire and
slaughter ; the crackle of musketry was in every
sermon, the roar of cannon in every prayer ; the
sword-blade was sharpened on the pulpit, and the
kirk became a recruiting-ground for the battlefield.
We have now cast down the walls of Jericho ;
let him who rebuildeth them beware of the curse
of Hiel and Bethelite, ” was the refrain of a Tyrteeaa
sermon by Henderson, of Leuchars. Beetles Musfiet,
Row, Cant, Dickson, and a mighty host of mur
derous piety, took up the cry. It was thundered
■from hundreds of pulpits. The heather was, indeed,
�The Covenanters.
U
on fire. The Beetle struck the Bible with his fist
in the emphasis of bloodthirsty rhetoric, and his
voice found a terrible echo in the ring of the
armourer’s anvil, as the hammer clashed and clanged
upon the red-hot iron that was being fashioned into
bit and stirrup, helmet and sword-blade.
The Lords of the Covenant prepared for war..
Wheresoever the carcase of prey is, there shall the
eagles of militarism be gathered together. Hereto
fore Scotland had proved too stale and pacific to be
a fitting arena for the restless energies of her gentle
men of the sword and swashbuckling fire-eaters,
and they had accordingly poured in thousands from
the banks of the Forth, the Dee, and the Clyde to
the banks of the Elbe, the Oder, and the Danube,
to follow Gustavus Adolphus for gold and glory,
and write their names imperishablv in their blood
in the annals of the Thirty Years’ War, in which
the stubborn valour of the Scottish Legion filled
all Europe with their renown. The Beetles had now
wrung the coin out of the pockets of their frugal
countrymen at home, and their fighting countrymen
abroad rushed back to offer their steel blades and
their blood for the merks of the peasant and the
burgher. The world had no better soldiers than the
Scoto-Swedish officers of Gustavus, among the most
distinguished of whom were Sir Alexander Leslie,
Sir Alexander Hamilton, Sir James Livingstone,
Monroe, Baillie, and other heroes of Prague and
Fleura, and numerous battlefields in Polish Prussia,
Brandenberg, Westphalia, and Silesia. The Beetle,
the ancestor of him now wanted in Egypt, had done
it with a veng-eance. Every -fourth man in Scotland
was to consider himself a soldier. The sword of
the Lord and of Gideon ! The land was as busy as
a beehive declaiming sermons, whining prayers,
drawling psalms, and getting ready arms and muni
tions—bodv armour for the cavalry, buff-coats and
morions for pikemen, and muskets with rests for
the musketeers. A cannon foundry was, moreover,
established at the Potter Row, Edinburgh, under
the direction of Sir Alexander Hamilton, formerly
master of the cannon foundries of Gustavus
Adolphus at Urbowe, in Sweden. And all Beetledom was up on end, and raving to Jehovah to hurl
�14
*
The Covenanters.
• down the curse of Meroz upon those who failed
to gird up their loins and go forth to help the Lord
.against the mighty.
The old legend-book of Judah was clasped to the
very heart of Scotland. Its bloodiest and most ter
rible texts were interwoven with the common par
lance of mundane affairs, and preached from with
a wild and volcanic vehemence. “ And I will feed
them that oppress thee with their own flesh ; and
they shall be drunken with their own blood, as with
sweet wine: and all flesh shall know that I, the
Lord, am thy Saviour and thy Redeemer, the mighty
one of Jacob.” ‘‘The Lord hath a sacrifice in
Bozrah, and a great slaughter in the land of
Idumea.” “ Cursed be he who keepeth back his
sword from blood.” “ Thus saith the Lord God cf
Israel : Put every man his sword by his side, and
go in and out, from gate to gate, throughout the
camp, and slay every man his brother, and every
man his companion, and every man his neighbour.”
These were the sort of bases of Beetle-spun
harangues that scared the pee-wheet and the plover
-of the hills and moors. “ Now go and smite Amalek,
and utterly destroy all that they have, and spare
them not ; but slay both man and woman, infant
and suckling, ox and sheep, camel and ass. And
Saul gathered the people together, and numbered
them in Telaim, two hundred thousand footmen,
and ten thousand men of Judah. And the Lord sent
thee on a journey, and said : Go and utterly destroy
the sinners, the Amalekites, and fight against them
until they be consumed,” was the fearful text from
which a certain Beetle of Hell preached, and incited
the Covenanters to, after the Battle of Philiphaugh,
enclose the defeated musketeers of Montrose in the
-courtyard of Newark Castle, and pour in volley
after volley of shot upon the defenceless and un
resisting mass, till not a man remained standing ;
and the gunpowder smoke cleared away and left the
court covered with blood and brains like the floor
of a slaughter-house, and the air rent with the
shrieks of those to whom Death had not yet come
in mercy to end their agony. After this holy
massacre, 1,000 corpses were interred in a spot
which to this day bears the shuddering- name of
�The Covenanters.
15
'The Slain Man's Lea. And so much did the
Presbyterian Beetles insist upon the curses that
-would overtake those who spared the A malekites,
the enemies of God, and so terribly did they em
phasise “ man and woman, infant and suckling,”
that the swords of the Covenant ripped open the
■bodies of the women with child, and transfixed the
unborn babe with the blade reeking with the blood
-of its mangled mother, that the Scripture might
*
be fulfilled.
So much for the antecedents of the Presbyterian
Beetles Mr. Buchanan inquires about so kindly, and
in regard to whom the Marquis of Hartington replies
that there is a spare one to be had at Alexandria.
Even now, it would seem, Scottish soldiers do not
feel they can slaughter properly for the Lord unless
they are under the beetlefications of an Ephraim
MacBriar or a Gabriel Kettledrummle !
How long, O Lord, how long, will it be accounted
glorious to drill a bayonet through a diaphragm,
and valorous to lodge a leaden pellet in the medulla
•oblongata? No religion whatever can be true whose
God is the God of Battles, and whose priests officiate
in the sanctification of slaughter. O that there were
.a righteous heaven, and that man’s objective Para•dise was correlative with man’s subjective desire I
Then would I call to this heaven to witness that
the torn banners and emblazoned rags of war are
hung up as trophies in the Christian churches and
^cathedrals—the relics and memorials of wounds and
misery and hate and death in the temples of “ the
Prince of Peace ” ! I have sat in a certain cathedral
and listened to the Gospel of goodwill to all man
kind, although, at the entrance, I had to pass dusty,
torn, and ghastly relics of some of the bloodiest
-engagements in India and the Peninsula. I yearn
for the religion that will account State murder and
■private murder alike unhallowed, and which will find
no room in its fanes for bannered rags in memorial
of burning towns, slaughtered men, shrieking
widows, and breadless orphans, more than for the
gory knives which were wielded by the miscreants
and murderers whose infamy is perpetuated in the
'Chamber of Horrors at Madame Tussaud’s.
*
W. S. R.
Gordon of Ruthven.
�NEW EDITION.
'
•
380 pp, cloth, gold lettered. Price 3s.; post free, 3s. 3d;
GOD-AND HIS BOOK.
By SALADIN.
Ix Two Volumes Complete.
New Edition. Crown 8vo, cloth, gilt lettered.
Vol. I., 260 pp. Price 2s. 6d. ; post free, 2s. gd.
Vol. II., 268 pp. Price 2s. 6d. 5 post free, 2s. 9d.
WOMAN :
Her Glory, Her Shame, and Her God.
By SALADIN.
Large Crown Svo, cloth, gold lettered, 265 pp.
Piice 3-.; post free, 3s. 3d.
THE
BOOK OF “AT RANDOM.”
By SALADIN.
Catalogue of Recent Works by Saladin free on application.
London: Il. Stewart & Co, $r, Farringdon St, E.C.
�
Dublin Core
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Title
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Victorian Blogging
Description
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A collection of digitised nineteenth-century pamphlets from Conway Hall Library & Archives. This includes the Conway Tracts, Moncure Conway's personal pamphlet library; the Morris Tracts, donated to the library by Miss Morris in 1904; the National Secular Society's pamphlet library and others. The Conway Tracts were bound with additional ephemera, such as lecture programmes and handwritten notes.<br /><br />Please note that these digitised pamphlets have been edited to maximise the accuracy of the OCR, ensuring they are text searchable. If you would like to view un-edited, full-colour versions of any of our pamphlets, please email librarian@conwayhall.org.uk.<br /><br /><span><img src="http://www.heritagefund.org.uk/sites/default/files/media/attachments/TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" width="238" height="91" alt="TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" /></span>
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Conway Hall Library & Archives
Date
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2018
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Conway Hall Ethical Society
Text
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Pamphlet
Dublin Core
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Title
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The Flagellants and the Covenanters
Creator
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Ross, William Stewart [1844-1906]
Description
An account of the resource
Place of publication: London
Collation: 15 p. ; 18 cm.
Notes: The Flagellants (p.[2]-10).--The Covenanters (p.10-15). The Covenanters is a new edition. Publisher's advertisements on back cover Part of the NSS pamphlet collection.
Publisher
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W. Stewart & Co.
Date
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[188-?]
Identifier
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N587
Subject
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Religious practice
Protestantism
Rights
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<a href="http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/mark/1.0/"><img src="http://i.creativecommons.org/p/mark/1.0/88x31.png" alt="Public Domain Mark" /></a><span> </span><br /><span>This work (The Flagellants and the Covenanters), identified by </span><a href="https://conwayhallcollections.omeka.net/items/show/www.conwayhall.org.uk"><span>Humanist Library and Archives</span></a><span>, is free of known copyright restrictions.</span>
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application/pdf
Type
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Text
Language
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English
Covenanters
Flagellants
Flagellation
NSS