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How and Why lam a Unitarian.
A LECTURE
BY
J. FREDERICK SMITH,
Minister of
the
1 1
u
Elder Yard Chapel,
Chesterfield,
(Late of the Baptist Chapel, George-Street, Hull,')
Delivered
in the
Bowlalley-Lane Chapel, Hull,
On Sunday Evening, April 12th, 1874.
.....
'.
------- J--------
,
I
HULL:
Sold by J. S. Harrison, Bookseller, 48, Eowgate ;
And at the Chapel Vestry.
CHESTERFIELD :
Sold by J. Toplis, “ Courier” Office, High-Street.
1874
Jj’rice Sixpence.
I
�J
�How and Why I am a Unitarian.
A question very analogous to that we have to consider
to-night is, How and Why am I a Christian ? The two
questions are alike in several respects. It is exceedingly
rare that any number of thoughtful persons agree in their
definition of what Christianity is. The name Christian is
an old historic name of very wide and very various signifi
cance. It can be borne by religious people of very dis
similar, or even of opposite,' theological and moral ten
dencies.
It follows from the compass of the name
Christian, that men call themselves Christians for reasons
as various as the senses in which they appropriate the
name. Those amongst them who are not charitably dis
posed, deny to the larger number of their would-be brothers
the right to use the distinction. The charitable con
fess amongst themselves that no definition of Christianity, t
and no classification of the only valid reasons for professing
•it ought to be attempted. Our reasons for being Christians
are very personal as well as our definition of what con
stitutes a Christian. It is not surprising, therefore, to find
that not a few minds prefer greatly to answer the question,
How and Why am I a Christian ? not directly and ex
plicitly, but indirectly and implicitly. They prefer not to
define Christianity or to formulate the reasons of their ad
�4
herence to it: a reply to the question more congenial to
their ideas and feelings would be found by an examination
of some of the living elements of Christianity and of their
own spiritual necessities. They would thus avoid much un
profitable and repulsive historical and dogmatic discussion,
while at the same time they would probably come much
nearer the real heart and true import of the question.
The question proposed by my lecture, How and Why
I am a Unitarian ? appears to me to be in precisely the
same case. We most of us know many senses in which we
are not Unitarians. Some people are Unitarians because
the Bible they think teaches Unitarianism : but certainly I
should be a Unitarian if the Bible had been an earlier
edition of Calvin’s Institutes. Some people are Unitarians
because they hold that the doctrine of the Divine Unity is
the doctrine of the standing or falling church ; yet I am of
those who were I a Manichean or Zoroastrian on this head,
should still class myself with the bearers of the Unitarian
name. Like the word Christian, it is a historic name with
no precise dogmatic import, but on the contrary of a wide
popular meaning, including amongst its bearers men of very
unlike, often of opposite, feelings and views on very im
portant topics. I will ask you, therefore, to permit me to
deal indirectly and implicitly with the question before us
rather than by the method of strict definition and formal
proof. This method will, I believe, enable us to come upon
what are to many amongst us the really valid reasons for
belonging to churches which are commonly described as
Unitarian.
The substance of the answer to the question before us
which I have to return to-night is this : As a religious man
I stand in great need of certain assistance from religious
association ; this assistance is refused by the churches which
are founded upon authority, but is at least to some extent
�5
supplied by the Unitarian or Free Churches which acknow
ledge no higher authority than the individual reason and
conscience.
A man’s religion is that which he most sacredly loves
and seeks: his profoundest desires, his best and most in
vincible tendencies, the deepest springs of his best feelings,
constitute his religion. Now, some amongst us cannot
overcome, and dare not now attempt to overcome, the deep
desire to come into the right relation and attitude towards
all that is not ourselves—God, Man, Nature ; to use and
cultivate fully all that is ourselves—the powers' of our
nature ; and to fulfil the duties that arise from our consti
tution and our relation to things beyond ourselves. The
religious association that will help us to attain this attitude
towards what is without and to use and perfect what is
within, is an association that feeds and sustains our religious
life : it will be our church, even if it renders but imperfect
help.' On the other hand, the association that throws itself
in the way of our deep longing in these respects comes into
collision with our religion, retards and hinders what we count
the highest and holiest attainment.
Let me explain a little more fully the nature of this
deep religious necessity.
Our acquaintance with Nature is at present com
paratively slight; but it is sufficient to call forth admira
tion, wonder, and gladness, mingled with fear and reserve.
Our attitude towards her must be one of reverent enquiry ;
at present we cannot look upon all her ways with satis
faction. At times we could almost worship her, but not
infrequently we are tempted to curse her. Now and here
she is a loving mother to her children ; but then and there
she is a cruel step-mother. We know her at present as a
being half-divine and half-demonic. Our attitude towards
her is a mixture of confidence and dread, while we wait to
�6
know more. The church that condemns this attitude by
authority, in some form or other, not showing us why we
ought to abandon it, cannot help us. We know that we
must respect Nature and study her assiduously ; and we ask
for aid to maintain, in the face of strong temptation to the
contrary, this attitude of respect and enquiry, until fuller
knowledge may exhaust the revelation and sanction a
new at-titude.
Our knowledge of 'Man shares the imperfection of our
knowledge of Nature. Great questions upon which ancient
churches had formal and final dogmas have of late been re
opened, and many of them answered anew, and in the very
teeth of the received authoritative answers. I refer to such
enquiries as those into the origin of man, the unity of man
kind, the mental, moral, and religious endowments of the
various races of mankind, the history of religious and of
moral ideas. The attitude we feel bound to take up in re
ference to Man with such questions as these still open, is
one of profound interest mingled with reserve and eager
enquiry. Not only shall we feel unable to attach any value
to an authoritative dictum as to man’s history and nature,
but we shall feel compelled to reject any one-sided theory
which will not consider all the facts known, and any final
dogma which will not acknowledge that we are at present
but just commencing an acquaintance with the facts. How
could a church assist us in one of the profoundest instincts
of our hearts—to study mankind, if she opposed that study,
either by laying down a theory which rendered it un
necessary, or by condemning some of the established con
clusions of science?
Just as our present knowledge of Nature and of Man
is deficient, so our faith in God waits for completion and
greater strength. At present our faith is sufficient to produce
adoration and trust, but it stands in great need of accessions
,
�7
both to its fulness and vigour. Our theology is our most
precious treasure, but its jewels are yet uncut and its gold
is u,ncoined. We feel rich in possession of it, and would
die rather than resign it, yet we cannot define it. ' Our
attitude towards God is that of profound reverence and
trust, which does not preclude but rather commands earnest
enquiry. How could that church assist us religiously that
requires the acceptance of final views of the nature and
character of God ?
Let us now turn for a moment to those duties that
arise from the possession of personal endowments and the
relation we sustain to God and Nature and each other.
Xhey give rise to great religious necessities which the true
church ought to satisfy to some degree.
As men we are endowed with powers of thought and
feeling, and the means of using them for ourselves and
others have been put within our reach. These are all
talents that must be employed and not left to lie idle.
If we take the intellect, we may observe that one of
the deepest rooted and most ineradicable sins of our nature
is love of ease, which shows itself especially in our dislike
of hard and continuous thinking. Another sin is often
associated with this of intellectual idleness: it is the sin of
indulging ourselves in pleasant theories and beliefs: a fatal
facility in acquiring and tenacity in holding notions that
make u's happy, with the corresponding slowness to receive
any idea that is unpleasant. These two sins together are
the evil genius of the intellect: they are the fruitful source
of moral and mental ruin in innumerable cases. And the
man who is at all alive to the strength of the temptation
that will assail him from this quarter earnestly seeks help
from those who are stronger and more faithful to the God
who gave them reason than he himself is. He seeks a
church that will drive him to think when thought is
�8
wearisome and when it leads to painful results. His
church must be no bulwark of authority for the faint
hearted who are afraid of thought, no retreat for the weary
who are tired of thought, and least of all a. castle of in
dolence for the idle who will not think.
The culture of our emotions is not of less importance
than the culture of our intellects. Our emotions branch
off into several directions. They are directed towards our
fellow creatures who can appreciate and return them,
towards objects of beauty and grandeur, or towards what
is right and noble in conduct. Now, whether they take the
form of affection, or conscience, or taste, they are in all
cases great endowments capable of wide and fruitful cul
ture. All three forms are essential parts of our nature,
neither of them can remain in neglect without serious in
jury to our character and manhood. Whenever one of them
has been allowed to usurp the place of the rest, individuals,
and society have greatly suffered. Conscience must not
frown down the love of beauty; the love of beauty must
not proceed to sacrifice the sanctity and chastity of affec
tion ; nor may affection disregard the rights of conscience
and pleasures of taste. They are all instincts and powers
which the reverent man will fear to slight; they all deliver
a revelation of higher things when their language is under
stood ; their development is the growth of the individual
and the wealth of society. But it is hard to keep the
balance between such closely allied powers quite true ; and
here, as everywhere, the root-evil of idleness bears poisonous
fruit. Who will help us to train and cultivate our emotions
with wisdom and due care ? The church that will recognise
some of them only, that will condemn others, and destroy
the harmony between them by over-estimating more, is not
the church we need. Within ourselves there is enough of this
unwisdom : we seek those who will help us to get rid of it.
�9
'
These powers of intellect and feeling have been put
v into the hands of creatures who can use them for their own
and other’s good. We have endowments, and we must
apply them. This application of them is attended with
great difficulty. It is a difficult matter to know what is
good for ourselves and others ; and when we know, it is
difficult to do. All about us we see men pursuing wrong
courses of action. Much of the benevolent conduct of men
* is weak, twisted, whimsical; it lacks rationality and thorough
usefulness. Still more is our conduct when directed to our
own interests devoid of reasonableness and adaptation : we
are ignorant of what we really want; we are led by impulse
or by custom : our manners and habits, our pursuits add
occupations, our acquaintance and friends, are largely deter
mined by accident and whim. We call aloud to the wise
and strong for help to assist us in attaining right, rational,
and noble conduct. Our church must be composed of souls
that have at least some help to render in this our need.
We now turn from a brief review of some of the
necessities which a church must satisfy to some extent if it
can be a church to us, to enquire which of the churches
around us meets our wants. Now, there is one vital dis
tinction which will divide the whole of the churches around
us into two separate classes, and leave us free to disregard
i the well nigh innumerable minor distinctions amongst them.
This distinction is that of authority or private judgment ;
and it gives us two groups of churches ; on the one hand,
the Roman Catholic and Orthodox Protestant Churches,
and, on the other, the Undogmatic Free Churches. Roman
Catholic and Orthodox Protestants are alike in this, that
they fall back as their last resource upon some authority
outside the individual reason and conscience, either upon a
church or a book. The Undogrqatic Free Churches, whether
called Unitarian,, Free Christian, Theistic, or by no name at
�IO
all, agree in this, that higher than any authority without is
the living, personal judge within. Neglecting the less
fundamental differences that distinguish them, this common
characteristic of Rome and the Reformed Churches justifies
us in classifying them all together so far as regards the
requirements we put upon our church.
All these churches of authority at some stage or other
obstruct enquiry and growth by the introduction of some
authoritative and final doctrine or model : here it may be
a creed, there a book ; here a canonised saint, there a re
ligious founder; but the difference of form makes no
essential difference in the reality: an authoritative dogma
limits enquiry, and an authoritative life limits personal and
social development. The holiest necessity of our nature is
to enquire in all directions until our intellect is satisfied ;
to cultivate and train all our faculties and emotions without
restraint until they find their true rest in perfection and full
activity ; and to pursue any course of conduct whatsoever
that our reason and conscience may command. But these
churches meet us at some critical point of our intellectual
enquiries with dogmas and theories which have ultimately
no other claim to be received than the supposed infallibility
of their propouriders. So far from assisting us to maintain
perfect loyalty to reason and intelligence, and aiding us to
overcome thebesetting sins of idleness and selfish wilfulness
in thinking, they either forbid the exercise of the intellect
upon all subjects, or they concede its unavoidable demands
suspiciously and grudgingly. Not less do they impose
restraints upon the full and free development of human
nature. Their ideal of humanity was conceived in an un
cultivated and decrepid age : it lacks essential elements of
a full, rounded manhood ; many excresences and deformities
cling to it. Their ideal of society is equally imperfect, their
kingdom of heaven becoming every age less adapted for re-
�II
velation upon the earth. Through all history the social
and political instincts of the best citizen have met with ob
structiveness rather than assistance from these churches.
They have assiduously cultivated some of the virtues of
the good citizen, such as submission to authority, content
ment under suffering, but upon other and still more essential
virtues, such as independence, resistance to injustice, love
of enquiry, they have put their bann. And some of the
vices that have weakened society, such as improvidence,
uncharitableness, untruthfulness, have been sometimes in
directly fostered at others. openly sanctioned as divine.
This authoritative and final model of manhood and society
is commonly imposed by these churches either as the in
fallible teaching or the perfect model of life granted to men
at the commencement of our era.
Having an ideal of man and society that descends
from the remote past when both men and society were in
important respects unlike what they now are,, it can hardly
be expected of these churches that they should be able
either to wisely direct or morally strengthen the conduct of
the individual-^vho is seeking counsel and support. They
do not really know what in our day is the one thing need
ful ; nor if they knew would their theory of human nature
permit them to supply the real strength and motive that
are required. The lives that have been formed, and the
conduct that has been directed by them, have not been of
' the type that we can to-day pronounce exemplary. The
lives of priests and ecclesiastics may be taken as indicative
of the real nature and tendency of ecclesiastical character
and aims. These lives are devoted enough, but the devo
tion is to wrong objects, and is not distinguished for its
sanity and fair, strong manliness. The course of conduct
and prevailing characteristics of the chosen saints of all
these churches have been deformed more or less by inhuman
�12
other-worldliness, and want of clear intellectual sanity and
vigour. The lives of St. Augustine, St. Francis of Assisi,
Luther, Calvin, John Wesley, cannot be considered as model
and complete lives by those who know how great Heathen
have lived and what Shakespeare and Goethe have taught.
They are the lives of saints protesting against nature rather
than conforming to her highest requirements. The work
they accomplished needed to be done, but their fitness to
do it rendered them unfit to become models of human
character. Their time was out of joint, and they were
born to set it right: but their ability to do this made them
more unfit than a Hamlet to represent human nature
generally. Without doubt in a sick and despairing age,
their course of conduct and character had great charms for
the hopeless; yet we have more and stronger faith than to
believe that the wants of a diseased period of human life
are the normal wants of mankind, or that the regimen of
sick men should be adopted as the law of their lives by
those who are whole. Memento mori is for some few a
needful sermon, but the greater and more general need of
men is to hear the admonition, Memento vivere !
An enquirer for a church who brings with him such
demands as we have been considering, will not, therefore,
find his church in this first class of authoritative com
munities. He will find that they have determined for him
another attitude towards nature, man, and God, than that
which he holds to be the only true and reverent one ; that
they have laid their bann upon conduct and pursuits which
are to him essential parts of his religion ; that they present i
commands for his obedience and examples for his imitation
which he must deem to lack authority, and to be either
useless or injurious. Turning his face from Catholicism
and Orthodox Protestantism, he will come to the few Free
Undogmatic Churches that are around him, with the hope
�13
of finding there help amidst his struggles after a higher life.
Not that amongst the millions who belong nominally to
these churches of authority, there are not thousands who
are seeking just what he seeks : this he is happy to believe,
and thankful to know personally some of them. It is the
legitimate and prevailing tendency and influence of the
churches only which he must pronounce opposed tawhat
he thinks is best and holiest.
The Undogmatic Free Churches to which we now turn,
have this characteristic in common, that they acknowledge
no external authority as entitled to command the opinions
or the conduct of others. They propose to no one any
final and unalterable views of nature, man, and God; they
set up no absolute 'ideal of manhood, which all men every
where, and in all ages, are tp acknowledge as divine. They
do not map out with unalterable lines the course of any
man’s pilgrimage to heaven.
They know nothing of
eternal plans and schemes of salvation. They rather hold
that the beginning of salvation and holiness is in the
individual’s 'practical recognition of the responsibility that
is laid upon him to think for himself, to shape his own con
duct, and to cultivate any power God has given him. On
this point they all speak with fervour and give no uncertain
sound ; but on the great mass of philosophical and theolo
gical dogmas their opinion is divided and uncertain. They
urge upon men by precept and personal influence that their
holiest duty is to think, and to think earnestly and man
fully ; to make the best use they can of any faculty they
possess, training it to its highest perfection ; and to live
a life as far removed from an ignoble and selfish worldliness
as from the pursuit of irrational and useless projects.
On minor points these churches differ greatly amongst
themselves. They have no common name. They are
called Unitarian, Free'Christian, Theistic; and some of
�14
them have no name at all. In most cases the name is not
a dogmatic description, but merely a .convenient and
customary appellation.. This, I take it, is the case with
the name Unitarian. Our chapels are called Unitarian
Chapels, and our ministers Unitarian Ministers, not be
cause we care particularly whether Trinitarian arithmetic is
correct or incorrect. We found our separation from ortho
dox Christianity upon a principle and not upon a dogma,
that principle being independence of external authority.
Again, these churches have no organisation which
unites them into one ecclesiastical body. They are the
most purely congregational of all congregational churches.
There is not even a common association that unites them
all. This leaves each separate congregation absolutely free
to pursue its own line of thought, and to develope its own
type of character, and follow its own tendencies to action.
They differ in still more important respects. The
position which they assign to the Bible amongst books, and
to Jesus Christ amongst men, are very various. While
they agree in ascribing superiority to the Bible and to Jesus
only to the extent to which their reason is convinced, the
measure of this superiority is of a very varying scale.
Some would rank the Bible above all literatures, while
others put but a low value upon some of its books, and
would not place any of them highest in human literature.
So, too, with respect to Jesus. His character and work are
very variously estimated. To not a few He is a son of
God as no other man has been, while there are others
who consider Him as but one amongst other greatest
religious leaders.
'
Not less undogmatic are these churches with respect
to theology proper, or the doctrine of God. They have no
formulated statement of their faith on this great article.
Each enquirer is left free to form his own ideas of God.
�i5
If his tendencies are towards a pure theism, he will find
fellow believers ; if he shrinks from ascribing human attri
butes to the Infinite, he will find that he is by no means
alone. And whether his religious associates agree with
him in his theology or not, they will urge him to be true to
his own light and proclivities.
Based upon this great principle of free unfettered en
quiry, these churches also leave their members free to cul
tivate their own powers as they deem wise, and to put forth
their energies in whatever direction and to whatever pur
pose they think useful.
The influences of these free
societies may feed the springs of character and activity,
but they do not force the streams to flow in any prescribed
channels. Special ecclesiastical work is not cut out for their
members as the only or chief work of God. They do not
recognise the distinction between the church and the con
gregation, and they dare not call any human avocation or
pursuit unholy and profane. They wish to enable men to
do with all the might of religious fervour whatsoever their
hands find to do. All days are holy days, all work is
worship, all earnest effort is prayer and praise, every
service of our kind is a consecrated ministry, every legiti
mate act of nature is an act of grace. Thus members of
these congregations are left as free'to act for themselves as
to think for themselves; they may form their own ideal of
manhood as well as their own theology; they may choose
any spot on God’s earth as their field of labour, and cul
tivate it with what means and in what manner they think
best. Their religious associates do not command them
what to do, but simply to do what they do well.
Based upon this great principle of individual freedom
and responsibility, and possessing this practical breadth
and divergency of ideas and aims, these churches appear
to me to present religious association in a form which may
�be made really and truly helpful. A small number of souls
possessed with the deep religious desire to stand right with
God, nature, their fellow creatures, and themselves, will not
be hindered by the constitution of such free associations ;
and the one religious bond that binds them together supplies
the positive force which will make them mutually helpful.
The mere fact of association upon such a basis gives im
mense strength to each member of it. The moment I know
that those with whom I meet are possessed with the same
sacred open-minded desire as myself to stand right with
themselves and God, my own desire has acquired a vast
accession of strength and support. The connexion with a
society of men who are seeking the good and the true sus
tains us amidst the temptations of life. And these societies
not only admit but seek out earnest and fearless preachers
of whatever truth has been laid upon their hearts as genuine
and of worth. If a man has anything to say, and can say
it plainly, he will be not only patiently but gladly heard.
Thus the simple but powerful elements of all* helpful
association are. to be found in these churches : they have
the sympathy of the like-minded and the animating and
enlightening word of the speaker. These elements were
the only essential conditions of that little church in
Galilee, of another later at Mecca, and of one earlier than
either on the banks of the Ganges. While the churches of
Buddha, Jesus, and Mohammed, were simple associations of
like-minded men with a speaker at their head, they were
living sources of strength and inspiration to their members ;
when they had hardened into ecclesiastical organisations,
they became the source of bondage and weakness. Their
simplicity was their strength. So is it with these Free
Congregations. They have no organisation beyond the
simplest arrangement for securing a chapel and the few
services connected with it. The whole influence for good.
�17
of the association is to come from the simple source of
personal communion and alliance ‘in devotional acts and
holy desires, and the exhortation of a brother man.
It seems to me that these societies contain constitu
tionally neither too much nor too little to render the assis
tance which we have seen to be requisite. Of course I know
well that many of them fall miserably short of what they
ought to be. Some of them are untrue to the name they bear
and the very principles upon which they are founded. But
the fault lies in the particular exceptions themselves, not in
the principles upon which they were established ; and the
generality of them are, I believe, in fact, as well as in name,
vehicles of vast moral and religious assistance to those who
are connected with them. And, what is of great importance,
these churches are so constituted, that they are capable of
adaptation to new needs and of indefinite improvement.
They can be made whatever the members who compose
them desire to make them. Everything about them is flexi
ble and expansive. Their past history has been one of steady
but continuous change and progress. They have gone on
to find out gradually the depth and compass of their great
fundamental principle of personal freedom and responsi
bility ; they have gone on gradually to widen their con
ceptions of man’s true attitude towards the great facts and
mysteries around him ; they have gone on gradually to
learn that in conduct sanctity is allied to sanity, that human
righteousness is a sweet and noble reasonableness, that one
mission of. the Messiah was to cast out the legions of *
irrational and whimsical demons that twisted the minds
and perplexed the imaginations of religious people.
Here or nowhere, it appears to me, we have the •
lost church restored. In the middle ages men fabled
that God’s church had been lost-—sunk into the depths
of the sea, vanished from the worldly eye within the gloom
�i8
of impenetrable forests. The spiritual ear could indeed be
surprised by the long lost sounds of holy hymns and chants
coming up from mid ocean or stealing from the depths of
holy woods ; but to the outward worldly eye, the sacred
edifice was lost. Personally, I must confess, that that fable
has long been truth to me. The outward church of God
has been lost. But for the inward ear of the spiritual man
there is still audible here and there, far away from ecclesias
tical splendour and carnality, the sweet, tones of bell and
organ and choir, telling us that still the house of God is
with us, that wherever two or three are gathered together
in His name, He is in the midst of them to bless them.
Only He cannot be with any of us unless we are true to
ourselves and the light He has given us!
KIRK, PRINTER, CHAPEL-LANE, HULL.
���
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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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How and why I am a Unitarian: a lecture
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Smith, J. Frederick
Description
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Place of publication: [s.l.]
Collation: 16 p. ; 22 cm.
Notes: From the library of Dr Moncure Conway. Inscription on front page: With J.F.S.s kind regards. Delivered in the Bowlalley Lane Chapel, Hull, on Sunday evening, April 12th, 1874. Printed by Kirk, Hull. Bookseller's J.S. Harrison Hull; J. Toplis, Chesterfield.
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[s.n.]
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1904
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G5373
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Unitarianism
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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 (How and why I am a Unitarian: a lecture), 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
Conway Tracts
Unitarianism
-
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eabd9980da9580f4765e78388c43c264
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V. 4
Notices of Books.
5vm>-
277
Church of England, and accepts the Articles, the Creeds
(even the Athanasian) and the Prayer Book, in a sense
•which is quite satisfactory to his own mind. The fact is
an interesting example of the possible pliability of a vigo
rous and an honest intellect, but hardly a contribution to
the scientific knowledge and clearness of thought of by
standers. Mr. Hutton may very well plead that we ought
not to look for completeness of exposition in a volume of
essays which are avowedly occasional; and we admit, with
the utmost frankness, the justice of his plea. But we cannot
help thinking that it belongs to the genius of this school
of Broad-church thinkers to lay great stress on a few preg
nant ideas, and to decline the task of bringing them into
mutual order and proportion. Only if it be so, they must
be content to look at their form of belief as only a phase of
transition, it may be of very temporary duration, towards a
clearer and more scientific, if not a deeper and a simpler,
faith.
There is much in the form of Mr. Conway’s “Earthward
Pilgrimage,”* and also in its wealth of allusion and its tone
of earnest scepticism, which reminds one of Mr. Carlyle’s
Sartor Resartus. At all events, we imagine that Mr. Carlyle
is a writer with whom Mr. Conway would very willingly be
associated, and from whom he has probably drawn a portion
of his inspiration. The conception of the book is that of
honest revolt against the religious attitude depicted by Bun
yan in his Pilgrim’s Progress. The author affects to place
himself in the position of that celebrated Pilgrim, and de
scribes the weariness that at length came upon him after
sitting on a purple cloud with a golden trumpet, and the
eagerness with which he sought to exchange the region of
idle worship for the so-called City of Destraction with its
earnest work. The Interpreter by whom he is accompanied
gives an unsparing exposure of Christian doctrine as ordi
narily taught in England ; and the succeeding chapters are
continued in the same key. In the chapter called An Old
Shrine, the author takes as his text the inauguration of the
Archbishop of Canterbury. He went to the ancient city “ to
witness the consecration of a plain old Scotch gentleman to
* The Earthward Pilgrimage.
Camden Hotten. 1870.
By Moncure D. Conway.
U2
London- Tohn
n
S% CAp^-VVW
�Notices of Books.
278
the task of presiding over the work of maintaining in Great
Britain the worship of a dead Jew.” “ The Thirty-nine Arti
cles shall mean many things, but one thing definitely shall
they mean: thirty-nine pieces of money to him who shall
betray Reason for them.” In a chapter called Contrivance,
he criticises as vain and needless the effort made by the
Rev. James Martineau and others to preserve to Theism
“ the great religious heart and history of Christendom.” He
affirms,
“•— that every religious form or rite was once real, every watch
word of conservatism was once the watchword of radicalism, all
things old were once new. The Litany, idly repeated by happyhearted youth, who. yesterday were at croquet and cricket, was
the outburst of stricken hearts amid convulsions of nature, war,
plague, and famine : uttered now, it is the mummy of a revival,
set up where a real one is impossible. The first silent Quaker
meeting was accidental; the emotion of that hour is vainly sought
for by the formal imitations of its silence. And so the rantings,
shoutings, love-feasts, communions, baptisms, are attempts to
recover the ecstasies of shining moments by copying the super
ficial incidents that attended them,—attempts as absurd as the
famous fidelity with which the Chinese manufacturers imitated
the tea-set they were required to replace, even to the extent of
preserving all the cracks and flaws of the originals.”—“That
which calls itself conservatism adheres to forms that must become
fossil, whereas any true conservatism must rescue the essence by
transferring it to forms which have their life yet to live.”*
' In the chapter on Voltaire, it is rather a one-sided com
parison, to say the least, to place him in the same class
with “the greatest freethinker who ever trod the earth,
whose death-cry was, ‘ My God, my God, why hast thou
forsaken me?’ A terrible freethinker’s end! Yes, every
drop of his blood w’as paid for free thought! ”f In a
chapter called The Rejected Stone, commencing with a
striking report of theological discussions under the railway
arches at St. Pancras, he says :
“What convictions have we corresponding to those which
sculptured the Phidian Jove or the Milonian Venus, or painted
the great Italian pictures, or built St. Peter's dome? None.
Then for the present no real Art. The one thing we really believe
< in is Scepticism : this is the inspiration of our Science, of our
Pp. 102, 103.
+ Pp. 253, 254.
�279
Notices of Books.
clamour foiwnore education, of our democracy ; they are all the
utterances of the clear and vigorous Misgiving which distinguishes
this age.”*
>.
It may comfort some readers to find that the author is
not, at all events, an infallible prophet, for in the chapter
called the Pilgrim’s Last Reflections, he remarks, though
his book was published only last year :
“ Already it seems doubtful if the West can see another Wel
lington or another Napoleon I. It requires warlike ages to pro
duce such men; and such ages require peoples capable of being
thoroughly drilled and massed.”!
We must find room for the following passage from the
conclusion:
“ There is a story of the Holy Grail which the Laureate has
passed by, but which we may remember. In the days when men
wandered through the world seeking that cup, made of a single
precious stone, holding the real blood of Christ, a Knight left
England to search for the same in distant lands. As he passed
from his door, a poor sufferer cried to him for help. Absorbed
in his grand hope, the Knight heeded him not, but went on. He
wandered to the Holy Land, fought in many wars, endured much,
• but found not the precious cup and at last, disappointed and
dejected, he returned home. As he neared his own house, the
same poor sufferer cried to him for help. ‘ What dost thou re
quire V asked the Knight. The aged man said, ‘ Lo, I am perish
ing with thirst.’ The Knight dismounted and hastened to fetch
a cup of water. He held the half-clad sufferer in his arms, raised
his head, and proffered the water to his parched lips. Even as
he did so the cup sparkled into a gem, and the Knight saw in
his hand the Holy Grail, flushed with the true blood of Christ.
And you, my brothers, may wander far, and traverse many realms
of philosophy and theology, to find the truth which represents
the true life-blood of the noblest soul; but you shall find it only
when and where you love and serve as he did. If you can but
give to the fainting soul at your door a cup of water from the
wells of truth, it shall flash back on you the radiance of God.’ |
/
f
Even from the very fragmentary description of the book
which we have been able to give, it will be perceived that
it is strong meat for men of full age, rather than milk for
babes. There is, we think, a good deal of paradox, arising
Pp. 335, 336.
+ P. 397.
Pp. 405, 406.
�280
Notices of Books.
from the violence of the writer’s reaction from what he
regards as antiquated creeds and superstitions ; but the book
is full of suggestive thoughts, poetically and pointedly ex
pressed ; and though to a thoughtful and judicious reader
he may sometimes seem extravagant, one-sided and unfair
in his statements and representations, the general impres
sion left by the whole is that it is the earnest and healthy
scepticism of a man of real genius. A vigorous mind will
be none the worse for the rough handling of many approved
maxims and professions of faith. At the same time, there
is something to be said in favour of that religious attitude
which the author sets out with condemning. However
needful and noble a duty it may be in this present world
to contend with evil in its various forms of suffering and
sin, the very repose and refreshment which we habitually
seek among congenial minds in our domestic and social
circles, direct our aspirations to a future sphere where suf
fering and sin will be unknown. We can conceive of work
and progress without the necessity of painful strife with
evil. Moreover, we cannot help feeling doubtful how far the
general realization of the author’s views and tone of thought
would really tend to the formation of that generous devotion
to holy duty which we are accustomed to reverence as the
ideal of a Christian character, and which the author himself
admires and commends. Certainly it is most strikingly
exemplified by many of those whom he regards as held in
bondage to superstitious creeds. We cannot help fearing
that the ultimate result of the emancipation for which he
contends would be an Epicurean, rather than a spiritual,
condition of mind. Mr. Conway adopts as the motto of his
title-page a maxim from Confucius : “ Respect the gods, but
keep them at a distance.” Surely that soul has attained to
a higher and holier region of thought and life, which habi
tually rejoices to feel, with Jesus, “I am not alone, for my
Father is with-me.”
A careful inquiry into the theology of the New Testa
ment must be valuable to every candid mind, whether it
agrees or not with the conclusions arrived at. Such a work
is the translation of Dr. Van Oosterzee’s Handbook Defin*
* The Theology of the New Testament. A Handbook for Students. By
the Rev. J. J. Van Oosterzee, D.D. Translated from the Dutch, by Maurice
J. Evans, B.A. London : Hodder and Stoughton.
�
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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>
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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 Earthward Pilgrimage
Description
An account of the resource
Place of publication: [London]
Collation: 277-280 p. ; 23 cm.
Notes: From the library of Dr Moncure Conway. A review, by an unknown reviewer, of Moncure Conway's work 'The Earthward Pilgrimage' from 'The Bookseller'. Date unknown.
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G5606
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Book reviews
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[Unknown]
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[n.d.]
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[s.n.]
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<img src="http://i.creativecommons.org/p/mark/1.0/88x31.png" alt="Public Domain Mark" /><br /><span>This work (The Earthward Pilgrimage), identified by </span><span><a href="https://conwayhallcollections.omeka.net/items/show/www.conwayhall.org.uk">Humanist Library and Archives</a></span><span>, is free of known copyright restrictions.</span>
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Text
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English
Book Reviews
Conway Tracts
Moncure Conway
Unitarianism
-
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PDF Text
Text
1874.] Relation of Unitarians to the Church Universal.
61
RELATION OF UNITARIANS TO THE CHURCH UNIr.
VERSAL *
I am afraid that the tendency of our very freedom of thought,
of our position, as the advance guard of the advance in the inquiry
of the church, throws us Unitarians into danger of narrowness.
In the first place we have been told so long that we are not in the
*
church, that our young folks mighfl be excused if they said that
the Church of Christ probably knew whether we were in it or not,
that they were very well satisfied with the position in which they
found themselves, and that if other people wanted to go on without
us, they were welcome to do so. ’ But that is only a petty, not to
say childish way, of treating a great relation. For the Broad
Church may include all narrow churches ^though a narrow church
of course cannot include the broad. We hold to all that the
Catholic Church holds which does it any good, and we hold to a
great deal more. We hold to all that gives to the Presbyterian
churches their power, and we hold to a great deal more. We have
no difficulty in acceding to all that is generous and hearty in the
ritual of the Episcopal churches, and when they are ready to
listen, we will teach them a great deal more. Our position with
regard to the religion of the world, is not what I may almost call
the pettifogging place, of those wh^are trying to pick out a few
words of creed which they can make everybody agree to; it is — quite
on the other hand — the position of those who know how to intro
duce Religion into all life, and how to find it everywhere. In the
cathedral of the Greek Church, or in the Meeting-house of the
Quaker, we are sure to find it; and there or here we ought to find
ourselves at home.
The danger is, that when a narrow Evangelicism says to us,
“ We have nothing to do with you,” we should say spitefully,
“ Nobody asked you, we are getting on very well alone.” The
Christian answer is the only true answer. Let who will say
to us, “We have nothing to do with you,” our answer is only the
* This article is the substance of the latter part of Mr. Hale’s speech
at the First Church, Boston, Feb. 15, 1874.
�62
Relation of Unitarians to the Church Universal. [Mar.
more earnest, “ We have a great deal to do with you.” We are
in the church because we are God’s children, redeemed by His
Son. Nobody can gainsay that. We could not get out of it, if
we would ; and we would not, if we could.
A narrow bigot tells you sometimes, that Dr. Channing or Dr.
Lowell was almost good enough to be called a Christian. You
are tempted to say, in reply, that Dr. Stanley and Mr. Beecher
and Bishop Simpson are almost as sensible as if they were Uni
tarians. Failing that extreme measure of good sense, you are
tempted to pass by the literature of a people whose creed is not
your creed,—to be indifferent to their worship, though you should
find no worship else,— you are not afraid to let them know that your
contempt for them is quite equal to theirs for you ; and, as I said,
to say, “ If you excommunicate us from your communion, we will
put you out of our thought and our society.” When I was in
college one of our number came into Park Street Church on the
occasion of a protracted revival meeting, to see what was done
there. In the regular course of the meeting a minister came into
the pew where the young man sat, and leaning down, kindly asked
him what was the state of his soul, and if he were in any anxiety
about it. Startled and confused, without answering a question so
tender and so central, he said, “ Oh, I am a Unitarian.” The
natural implication would have been that Unitarians had no souls,
nor any wish to save them; and I am afraid that was the view
his kind friend carried away. But what he meant was, that
because he was a Unitarian he thought his soul was secure;
at all events, that it could not be saved by the processes he saw
there. That answer, if he had made it, would have been
legitimate and kind. But the other answer was to exclude
himself from the tender care of the Church Universal, a
care showing itself in a clumsy way, if you please, but none the less
genuine. I am afraid that story illustrates a sort of intellectual
conceit which has sometimes prevailed among us, a conceit which
is as unchristian as it is unmanly. I remember the protest made
against it by an accomplished and pure Christian woman, who said
in a bitter epigram, that the Unitarians were willing to admit her
into heaven as a fool, as if that were any kinder than to damn her
to hell as a sinner.
�9
1874.] Relation of Unitarians to the Church Universal.
I
63
Now all such intellectual conceit, and the notion that our little
sect here in New England is to stand by itself, are just as petty
as is any bigotry of Hard-Shell Baptists or Old-School Presby
terians. It is the church universal which is to win the victory over
disease, and sin, and the fear of death. It is the church universal,
the whole family of God, which is to make this world God’s home,
and part of His own kingdom. N(||separation, no bigotry, no ex
clusion, and no conceit will help that emjjfire forward. No, and the
great triumphs of to-day are the triumphs, of whatever form,
which make one out of many. The Evangelical Alliance, socalled, was, in its fashion, feeling for it. Every Christian Union,
whether it be a newspaper or a society, is a step towards it.
Every genuine and generous book which fordfes its way outside the
old dogmatic fortresses and circulates and is read among all the
children of God, is a help that way.
The Roman Church, on the other hand, attempted to make
such unity in the poor old fashion of uniformity. That failed.
That was like all other efforts to force freemen. Of course it failed.
Unity is not in unity of organization, but in unity of the spirit.
A fire insurance report in London says that the couplings of the
hose of the different engine companies of that city were of three
or four different gauges and threads, so that you could never rely on
screwing two lengths of hose together in an emergency.
The same writer said that from one end of America to the other,
there was not a length of hose whi^. Wtdd not be screwed into
. another length if occasion came.
I
I do not vouch for the fact. Perhaps it cannot be authenticated.
But let it serve as a parable, which might be true, of the way in
which different meetings, churches, societies, fraternises, unions,
associations of whatever name and whatevei?»order, would combine
if they had the unity of the spirit, in their work for a common cause
against any common misfortune. It does not require any chief
engineer to order them. It only requires mutual sympathy and
respect to make all their several parts work in accord as one.
All this was forced home on my attention as I passed from city
to city in Europe in my summer journey. It is hard to bear the
conceit and self-gratulation of the average American traveller in
other lands. It is a very dangerous habit which he falls into, if
�64
Relation of Unitarians to the Church Universal.
[Mar.
he goes to a church, as if it were only a show, and supposes that,
of course, he is the religious superior of the people who worship
there. I know it is very hard to extenuate the absurdities which are
absurd, or to apologize for the short-comings of other rituals. But
if one goes to a cathedral, one must do his best to make the best
of what he finds. And one always has to ask himself whether he
did the best he could to find other ritual more simple, or worship
more sincere. I have heard a hundred Americans say that the
Roman Catholic service in the Madeleine in Paris was operatic,
and not devotional, for one who told me that he had searched for and
found the hearty company of the French Liberal Protestants, who
were worshipping with M. Coquerel in the obscure Hall of St.
Andr& in Cite d’Antin. Now I have certainly nd quarrel with
the man who joins in the worship at the Madeleine. Only this I
have to say, that if it did not suit him, I do not know why he
went to such a service again and again, instead of finding a place
of worship and religious companionship in which he should be at
home.
This time is the last time of all for the Liberal Religionists of
the world to draw aside from Fellowship with the Church Uni
versal. Grant that in the past, the closely organized sects, those
with hard shells, and hard creeds, have looked askance at us, as
very doubtful allies. In these days, when they find their old
foundations shaken, and antagonists for whom they are not pre
pared, they are fain to rest behind the defences of the very allies
whom but just now they spurned. To take the instance of which
I spoke just now, the intelligent traveller in a-ny city of Europe
may, if he choose, find the Gospel of Liberty, Christianity in its
freedom, illustrated and enforced in churches which are more and
more recognized as the outworks of the church against Atheism
and Nothingism. The Freest Religionist ought not ask for bolder
or more inspiring words than he will hear from Stopford Brooke or
from Stanley in London ; from Coquerel in Paris ; from Father
Hyacinthe of the Liberal Catholics, or from any of the Unitarian
pulpits in Geneva; from Reville and his companions, and from hum
dreds of broad churches in the low countries ; from the pulpits of
the men who are building the German Protestant Association
through all the north of Germany; from Friedrich and the Old
Catholic leaders there and in the South of Germany; ar, if one is
�1874.] Relation of Unitarians to the Church Universal.
» 65
to mention names, from Bracciforti in Milan, from Lange at Zurich,
or, farther east, from our own brothers, the Unitarians of Hungary.
Let a traveller only feel that he is not alone in God’s world and
must not try to be alone, that worship is not complete when it is
the worship of a cell or of a cloister, but must be sometimes united
worship, or what the Latin calls com-munion, — and he will find
that the Church of Freedom in our day has planted the banner of
Faith and Hope and Love in every land.
I suppose this New England habit may be natural enough, or
easily accounted for. Our fathers were driven here, —from lands
which were not too kind to them. No thanks to the Church of
Rome that they came! No thanks to the Anglican Church 1
They came to a wilderness which was very rugged — and they
made it blossom like the rose. No thanks to anybody for their
success in doing so, — but to themselves ! And now that it does
blossom like the rose, — now that they have surrounded them
selves, I do not say, merely, with every oomfort of outward life —
but with every help as well for the nobler culture and the spiritual
longings of men, — now that in the desert that Kedar did inhabit,
these churches have grown to rival the noblest of the old architec
ture, — so that the choicest work of the kilns of Munich and of
London admits the light of heaven for our devotions, that the walls
of these places of our meeting blaze with the glories of Byzantium
and of Italy, — it is not so unnatural that men should say, “ We
were exiled from them, — and we are willing to stay in our exile,
we will let them alone, — with a masterly inactivity.” “ If they
can do without us, we can do without them.”
But this is, after all, as if the hand should say to the foot, “ I
have no need of thee,” or the foot to the hand, “ I have no need
of thee.” The hand is tempted to say so. The foot is tempted to
say so. But the moment either does say so, and acts on its dec
laration, it cuts off at the same time its vital connection with the
head. And when the hand is cut off from the head, — it is lost!
None the less are our churches exposed to this temptation.
They have wrought out, — thanks to their own zeal and to the
ihartyrdom of the fathers,— what, I have no question, is the most
perfect statement of Christian doctrine which has yet been given
to men. Not in vain has the Holy Spirit for nineteen centuries
9
�66 <
Relations of Unitarians to the Church Universal.
[Mar.
led generation after generation into all truth. And they are will
ing to apply this doctrine, — if only they may apply it at their
own fireside. “ We will open the eyes of our own blind, and the
ears of the deaf who live next door to us, and are there any poor
in these streets, we will gladly preach good tidings to them. That
is our place. For the rest of the world, do not ask us to carry
them our religion ! ” I could name to you more than one man in
our own pulpit who is willing to say this. Why, it is only to-day
that my eye rested on what is substantially this statement, in the
printed words of one of our own prophets. He is a prophet who
disproves the old adage. He is not without honor, even in his own
country and in his own home. I sit at his feet and am proud to
say so. I listen to almost every word he speaks with joy and ex
ultation. But not with joy nor w’ith exultation did I find him say
ing, that the work of the Unitarian Church was to leaven, but “ not
to conquer.” “ Not to conquer.” When I read those words I
felt neither joy nor exultation. No ! I remembered what I had
read of that duty in an older book ; and never has the lesson left
me. I have been sometimes enveloped in clouds and murky dark
ness. But with the memories and promises of that older book, and
with the present encouragement of the Living Spirit, it has seemed
to me, sometimes, that I also have seen the clouds rolled back
for a moment and the smoke dispersed, and clear against the
heavens, I could see the form of one who rode upon a White
Horse, whose name was the “ Word of God.” Upon his person
he bore the title, “ King of Kings and Lord of Lords.” I have
not observed in history that his victories were won when his fol
lowers sat comfortably in their homes. The language of the
Revelation seems well chosen, — which says that they were armies
which followed him, mounted on white horses also ; not to enter
into their rest, but to follow the “ Word of God,” even if the
“Word of God” made war. I do not believe that they are
meant to make war as the leaven makes it in the dough. I believe
they are to go forth “ Conquering and to conquer.”
In those armies the Unitarian Church is enlisted ; knowing no
leader but “ the Word of God.” It is so sure of that Leader that
it knows that its mission is to go forth “ conquering and to con
quer.”
Edward E. Hale.
�
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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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2018
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Relation of Unitarians to the church universal
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Hale, Edward Everett
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Place of Publication: Boston
Collation: 61-66 p. ; 25 cm.
Notes: From the library of Dr Moncure Conway. For content of complete issue see: https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=wu.8906965 (accessed 11/2017). From the Unitarian Review and Religious Magazine. Vol. 1 (March 1874). "This article is the substance of the latter part of Mr Hale's speech at the First Church, Boston, Feb. 15, 1874". [Footnote].
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Unitarianism
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Conway Tracts
Unitarianism
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UNIVERSAL RELIGION.
A
SERMON,
DELIVERED IN THE UNITARIAN CHAPEL, PRESTON,
FEBRUARY 20th, 1876.
BY
F.
W.
WALTERS.
PUBLISHED BY REQUEST.
PRESTON:
THE GUARDIAN PRINTING WORKS, FISHERGATE.
1876.
��UNIVERSAL RELIGION
A SERMON,
DELIVERED IN THE UNITARIAN CHAPEL, PRESTON,
FEBRUARY 20th, 1876.
BY
F. W. WALTERS.
PUBLISHED BY REQUEST.
PRESTON:
THE GUARDIAN PRINTING WORKS, FISHERGATE.
1876.
�I am indebted for most of the quotations in this Sermon
to a Lecture by a member of the “Free Religious Association”
of America.
The Lecture is not published in England, and
I have therefore complied with the request of a venerable
member of my Congregation to publish a Sermon which he
believes will serve the cause of religious truth.
added some passages omitted in the delivery.
I have
�UNIVERSAL RELIGION.
“Other sheep I have, which are not of this fold.”—John x., 16.
Nothing more deeply impresses us with the sense of the essential
unity of Man than the universality of the religious consciousness.
However profoundly men differ from one another in other
respects, you almost invariably find that, under one form or another,
they possess some ideas answering to the words, Religion, God,
Duty, and Immortality.
It was once considered essential to Christian faith to denounce all
other religions of the world as false, as great delusions invented by
wicked men under temptation from the Devil. Through all history, it
was supposed, the Spirit of truth had been confined to one narrow
channel, and all beyond had been given up to falsehood. The Old and
New Testaments were the only inspired scriptures; Judaism and
Christianity were the only true religions. But of late years we have
learnt better. We have come to look upon the whole development of
human life as the gradual unfolding of One Divine Spirit; we have
learnt that there can be no monopoly of God, but that to every age
and nation there have come higher Voices, whose message is enshrined
in old traditions and ancient books.
When I call myself a Christian, I do not deny the validity of
other forms of the religious consciousness ; but I merely express the
genesis of my religious faith,—namely, that it can be traced along that
line of spiritual movement inaugurated by Jesus of Nazareth. When
I call myself an Englishman, I merely state my ancestry and nation
ality ; I do not cut myself off from the Brotherhood of men throughout
the world. Christianity, as we desire to understand it, is One Family
in a great Community of Religions ; and we shall better understand
and appreciate our own faith when we see in it one form of a religious
Consciousness common to the whole race of men.
Missionaries have told us so many tales of the idolatries of the
ignorant and vulgar classes, among whom they chiefly labour, that it
�I
is very difficult to realise the spiritual elements of the great Religions
of the East. Who would like a foreigner to judge of Christianity by
the materialistic worship of the Church of Rome, or the irrational and
immoral doctrines of Mr. Moody? Judging Christianity by such
samples, would not the foreigner return home to say that Christianity
was either the Worship of Bread and Wine, or else Belief in a cruel
Deity who could only be appeased by Human Sacrifice ? Just as
Christianity has spiritual elements which are frequently hidden beneath
gross outward forms, so every ethnic religion is nobler than the
superstitious forms of worship into which it is frequently degraded.
An Englishman in India was one day watching the sacred images
carried in pomp to be cast into the Ganges ; and he said to a venerable
Brahman standing near, “Behold your gods ; made with hands ; thrown
into a river 1” “ What are they, sir ?” replied the Brahman, “ Only
dolls 1 That is well enough for the ignorant, but not for the wise.’’
Then he went on to quote from an ancient Hindu Scripture
“ The
world lay in darkness, as asleep. Then He who exists for Himself,
the most High, the Almighty, manifested Himself and dispelled the
gloom. He whose nature is beyond our reach, whose being escapes
our senses, who is invisible and eternal,—He, the all-pervading Spirit,
whom the mind cannot grasp,—even He shone forth.”
Indeed, it would not be difficult to prove that all the great
Religions of the world involve the doctrine of the Unity of God. Just
as behind the Christian Unity of Persons there is held to be One
Primal Divine Nature, so the philosophers of India have always pro
claimed an Essential U nity behind the multitudinous deities worshipped
by the common people. Rammohun Roy said,—“ If Christians affirm
God to be One, though in three Persons, they ought in conscience to
refrain from accusing Hindus of Polytheism ; for every Hindu, we
daily observe, confesses the Unity of the Godhead, even while making
it consist of millions of substances assuming offices according to the
various forms of Divine Providence.” In thus speaking of the Unity
of God, we must always remember that we do not use the word in the
vulgar arithmetical sense. It would be as reasonable to speak of God
as a Thousand or a Million as to say He is One in this sense. An
Infinite Being must include within His nature all numbers, not only
Unity but likewise Multiplicity. In the highest region of thought we
lose sight of number and quantity, and deal only with being and
quality. - I confess, I see much greater breadth of religious thought in
�5
the Eastern theology, which teaches that God has repeatedly become
incarnate, and may be worshipped under a thousand different forms,
than in that Western faith which monopolises God to one man, and.
admits only a triune expression of the Divine nature. When we speak
of the Unity of God, we use the word in the sense of Consistency and.
Order, as opposed to Contradiction and Caprice. The more we
know of the Universe, the more we are assured it is governed by
unchanging Law; and the more we know of History, the more are we
assured that Freedom and Will are within the sphere of an over-rulingProvidence. And these conceptions of Law and Providence guide our
minds to the sublime generalisation of the unity of God.
The most ancient collection of Hindu hymns, the Rig Veda, says,
“They call God Indra, Mithra, Varuna, Agni; that which is One the
wise call in divers manners.”
A later Hindu poem, the Bhagavat Gita, speaks of God as “the
Supreme Universal Spirit, the Eternal Person, divine, before all gods,
omnipresent, Creator and Lord of all that exists, God of gods, Lord of
the Universe.”
Amid the polytheistic mythology of Greece and Rome, the faith
of the Unity of God was held by such theists as Socrates and Cicero,
we are told that Xenophanes, casting his eyes upward to the heavens,
declared, “ The One is Godand that he taught that “ there is One
Supreme God among beings divine and human . . He governs all
things by power of reason.”
Listen to the sublime Theism of the “ heathen” Plutarch:—•
“ There are not different gods for different nations. As there is one
and the same sun, moon, sky, earth, sea, for all men, though they call
them by different names ; so the One Spirit which governs the universe,
the Universal Providence, receives among different nations different
names.” And again,—“We say to God, ‘Thou art:’ giving Him
thus His true name, the name which belongs alone to Him. For what
truly is ? That which is Eternal, which has never had beginning by
birth, never will have end by death,—that to which time brings no
change. It would be wrong to say of Him who is, that he was or will
be, for these words express changes and vicissitudes. But God is : He
is, not after the fashion of things measured by time, but in an im
movable and unchanging Eternity. By a single Now He fills the
For-ever. For Deity is not many, but that which is, must be One.” And
yet we have been accustomed to regard Plutarch as a benighted heathen'
�6
And still further. We often speak of Christianity as the religion
which is specially distinguished by the doctrine of the Fatherhood of
God. Listen to this Hindu hymn, written 1,500 years before Christ:—
May our Father, Heaven, be favourable to us. May that Eternal
One protect us evermore. We have no other friend, no other Father.
The Father of Heaven, who is the Father of men.” Horace calls God
“Father and Guardian of the human race.” Senecawrites,—“He,
the glorious Parent, tries the good man and prepares him for Himself.”
Listen to the confident faith of Epictetus, and tell me whether Jesus
ever spoke a more comforting doctrine :—“ If what philosophers say of
the kinship between God and man be true, why should not a man call
himself a citizen of the universe ? why not a son of God ? Shall not
having God for our Maker, Father, and Guardian free us from griefs
and alarms ? No human being is an orphan ; there is a Father who
incessantly cares for all.”
All religions likewise teach that union with God is to be attained
through the moral being.
The history of Religion is the history of the attempt to bring God
and the Soul into atonement, to reach harmony between the Infinite
and Finite, the Universal and Individual, the Social and Personal, the
Spiritual and Natural. So intense is the longing to see this union
realised between the Ideal and the Real, that most religions have
crystallised around some Model Man, the Type of Perfection, in whom
the Human and Divine were one, who was the great example to which
all men must seek to rise. But that which Theology declares was
miraculously realised in a unique Person, Spiritual Religion seeks to
realise by natural development in humanity. Humanity is the ever
living Christ, who is to be perfected through suffering, strengthened
by temptation, glorified by death, and at last made one with God.
This union of God and man is to be attained through the moral
life. All great Religions proclaim Salvation by life and Atonement
through obedience. “ If thou wilt enter into life, keep the command
ments”—that is the doctrine of every great religious teacher. “ This
is nay religion,” said a Siamese nobleman to a Christian missionary,
“ to be so little tied to the world that I can leave it without regret;
to keep my heart sound ; to live doing no injustice to any, but deeds
of compassion to all.” Here is a passage from a Hindu Scripture :—
“ God is most pleased with him who does good to others, who never
utters calumny or falsehood, who never covets another’s wife or
�7
another’s goods, who does not smite or kill, who desires always the
■welfare of all creatures and of his own soul, whose pure heart taketh
no pleasure in the imperfections of love and hatred. The man who
conforms to the duties enjoined in the Scripture is he who best worships
God : there is no other way.”
We have been told that Moses gave the Ten Commandments by
special inspiration ; yet Buddhism has these five moral rules :—“ Thou,
shalt not kill. Thou shalt not steal. Thou shalt not commit adultery,
nor any impurity. Thou shalt not lie. Thou shalt not intoxicate
thyself with drink.”
Cicero, likewise, has this noble commendation of the moral law:—
“ The true law is everywhere spread abroad, it is constant, eternal. It
calls us to duty by its commandments; it turns us away from wrong
doing by its prohibitions. We can take nothing from it, change
nothing, abrogate nothing. Neither the Senate nor the People have
the right to free us from it. It is not one thing at Rome, another
thing at Athens; one thing to-day, to morrow another. But, eternal
and immutable, the same law embraces all times and all nations.
There is one Being who can teach it and impose it upon all: that is
God.” “ God is just,” says Plato, “ and there is nothing that resembles
Him more than the just man.” We admire the words of Jesus,—“Be
ye therefore perfect, even as your Father in heaven is perfectyet
Zeno used almost the same words,—“ Men ought to seek after perfec
tion, for God is perfect.” We speak of the Golden Rule of Jesus; yet
Confucius said,—“ What you do not wish. done to yourself, do not do
to others.” Thales, the first Greek philosopher, taught,—“ That which
thou blamest in another do not thyself to thy neighbour.” Let me
read to you two passages describing the Good Man. The first is from
Epictetus.—“ The good man must fence himself with virtuous shame.
He must purify his soul. He must know that he is a messenger sent
from God to men to teach them of good and evil. He must tell them
the truth without fear. He must consult the Divinity, and attempt
nothing without God. He will needs be smitten, yet he must love
those who smite him, as being the Father, the Brother of all. When
he rebukes he will do it as a Father, as a Brother, as the minister of
the Father of all. He must have such patience as to seem insensible
and like a stone to the vulgar. Instead of arms and guards, conscience
will be his strength. For he knows that he has watched and toiled for
mankind, that he has slept pure and waked purer, and that he has
�8
regulated all his thoughts as the minister of Heaven.” The second
passage is from Marcus Aurelius.—“ The good man is as a priest and
minister of the gods; devoted to that Divinity which hath its dwelling
within him; by virtue of which the man is incontaminable by any
pleasure, invulnerable to every grief, inviolable to every injury,
insensible to every malice ; a fighter in the noblest fight, dyed deep
with justice, accepting with all his soul that which the Providence of
the Universe appoints him. He remembers also that every rational
being is his kinsman, and that to care for all men is in accordance
with the nature of man.”
Still further, we find the doctrine of Immortality, in different
forms, to be universal as the religious consciousness. Christian
theologians frequently teach us that apart from the resurrection of the
body of Jesus there is no proof of the immortality of the soul. Paul,
in his Rabbinical arguments about the resurrection, in the 15th chap
ter of 1st Corinthians, tells us that, apart from the resuscitation of the
wounded flesh and blood of Jesus, all religious faith and all hope of
immortality are destroyed ; that we are of all men most miserable, and
that our best wisdom is to live a sensual life,—“ Let us eat and drink,
for to-morrow we die.” I believe that many persons who have gained
a rational religious faith still find great difficulty in yielding up belief
in the miracle of the resurrection of Jesus, because it has always been,
associated in their minds with the doctrine of the immortality of the
soul. Such Christians, who can only believe a spiritual doctrine on
the ground of a physical wonder, might learn a lesson from the
“ heathen” Socrates. Listen to the words which Plato reports him to
have spoken on the day of his death.—“ Can the soul, then, which is
invisible, and which goes to another place like itself, excellent, pure,
and invisible, to the presence of a good and wise God (whither, if God
will, my soul must shortly go), can this soul of ours, I ask, being such
and of such a nature, when separated from the body, be immediately
dispersed and destroyed ? Far from it! The soul departs to that
which resembles itself, the invisible, the divine, immortal, and wise.
And on its arrival there it is its lot to be happy, free from error, ignor
ance, fears, wild passions, and all the other evils to which human
nature is subject.”
And again, after elaborate arguments, he says,—“ To affirm posi
tively, indeed, that these things are exactly as I have described them,
does not become a man of sense. That, however, this, or something
�9
of the kind, takes place with respect to our souls and their habitations,
—since the soul is certainly immortal,—this appears to me
most fitting to be believed, and worthy the hazard of one who trusts in
its reality ; for the hazard is noble and the hope is great.”
Plutarch has this noble utterance
Those who have lived in
justice and piety fear nothing after death. They look for a divine
felicity. As they who run a race are not crowned till they have con
quered, so good men believe that the reward of virtue is not given
them till after death. Eager to flee away from the body and from the
world to a glorious and blessed abode, they free their thoughts as
much as in them lies from the things that perish. Not by lamentations
and mournful chants ought we to celebrate the funeral of the good
man, but by hymns ; for, in ceasing to be numbered with mortals, he
enters upon the heritage of a diviner life.”
Cicero has this expression of spiritual faith
“ Although you do
not see the soul of man, as you do not see God ; yet, as from His
works you acknowledge 'Him, so from memory, from invention, from
all the beauty of virtue, do thou acknowledge the divine nature of the
soul. It cannot be destroyed.” To travel still further back into
antiquity,—in the Egyptian “ Book of the Dead,” mitten 2,000 years
before Christ, appear the following passages
The Soul lives after
he dies. Every god rejoices with fife ; the Soul rejoices with life as
they rejoice. Let the Soul go ; he passes from the gate, he sees his
Father God ; he makes a way in the darkness to his Father ; he is His
beloved ; he has come to see his Father ; he has pierced the heart of
the Evil Spirit to do the tilings of his Father God; he is the son
beloved of his Father. He has come a prepared spirit. He moves as
the never-resting gods in the heavens. The Soul says :—‘Hail,
Creator, self-created! do not turn away, I am one of thy types on
earth. I join myself with the noble spirits of the wise in Hades. 0
ye lords of truth, I have brought you truth; I have not privily done
evil against any man ; I have not been idle ; I have not made any to
weep ; I have not murdered ; I have not defrauded ; I have not com
mitted adultery: I am pure, I am pure!’ Let the Soul go; he is
without sin, without crime; he lives upon truth; he has made his
delight in doing what men say and the gods wish ; he has given food
to the hungry, drink to the thirsty, clothes to the naked ; his mouth
is pure, his hands are pure, his heart goes to its place in the balance
complete. The Father of the spirit has examined and proved him. He
�has found that the departed fought on earth the battle of the
good gods, as his Father, the Lord of the invisible world, had com
manded him. 0 God, the protector of him who has brought his cry
to Thee, he is Thine, let him have no harm; let him be as one of Thy
flying servants. Thou art he, he is Thou ! Make it well with him in
the world of spirits.”
In the Hindu Vedas we are told that the God of the dead waits,
“ Enthroned in immortal light to welcome the good into His kingdom
of joy, into the homes He has gone to prepare for themreminding
us of the words ascribed to Jesus,—“ In my Father’s house are many
mansions. I go to prepare a place for you.”
By means of the U nion of God and Man through the moral being,
Universal Religion teaches the ultimate good of all creatures. Thus
the doctrine of Immortality is a Blessed Gospel of the final triumph
of Goodness and Truth. It is the hideous dream of Theology that
Sin and Suffering are to be perpetuated for ever in a dreadful Hell.
The Gospel of Development has for ever destroyed that blasphemous
dogma, and opened up to our minds the transcendent possibilities of
the future. Popular Christianity represents Jesus ascending to the
right hand of God, and gathering his redeemed in crowds around his
throne; while he leaves the great majority of men for ever lost in
hopeless misery. In this respect the Saviour of Buddhism far sur
passes the Saviour of Christianity, for he registers a solemn vow “ to
manifest himself to every creature in the universe, and never to arrive
at Buddha-hood till all are delivered from sin into divine rest, receiving
answers to their prayers.”
I make no apology for bringing these numerous extracts to you
this morning. The discovery of them has greatly refreshed my own
mind. There are “ other sheep,” not of the Christian fold. In the
Father’s house there are “ many mansions,” room for all the great
family of mankind. Now we begin to see a deeper meaning in the
words of the creed,—“I believe in the holy Catholic (universal)
Church.” The spiritual Communion to which we belong is larger, both
in Time and Space, than we supposed ; we find its members in every
age and every nation. We must give up the fond hope, which many
have cherished, that some day the world will become Christian. Believe
me, the Religion of the Future will be grander than the Faith held by
any one race ; it will be a Religion based upon that deep Religious
Consciousness common to all men.
�11
We are told that in Japan a very remarkable movement is taking
place. The educated people of that island have given up the popular
doctrines of Buddhism, but find themselves at the same time unable to
accept the Christianity taught by Protestant and Roman Catholic
Missionaries. A Manchester paper, the other day, gave the following
curious information with regard to this religious movement in Japan.
—“A vernacular paper, anxious for a sure foothold somewhere, is
quite unable to close with the Gospel of the missionaries. In the first
place, its pride is hurt by the airs of superiority which some of the
Missionaries assume. They are not content with proclaiming the
principles of Christianity ; they must also give those among whom they
are labouring to understand that they regard Asiatics as ‘ barbarous
and ignorant? But still more fatal to their success are the demands
which they make upon the faith of the people whom they seek to
instruct. The miracles of the Bible are, according to this writer, the
great obstacle to the spread of Christianity in Japan and in the
East generally. ‘ To teach Asiatics such things,’ he says, ‘ who have
been for many generations steeped in then’ own superstitions, only
tends to make them cling all the closer to their own beliefs, and, far
from attracting them to it, only drives them further away from
Christianity, for we have a mass of traditions of supernatural deeds in
our own mythology? He has heard of the Unitarians—a sect
‘ disliked by all the others ;’ and, if all he has been told about them be
true, he has ‘ little doubt that there are many Japanese of the middle
class’ who would embrace the religion they teach.”
Now, such facts as these should make us exceedingly thankful
that we profess a form of Christianity which is in perfect sympathy
with spiritual religion throughout the world. “ There is diversity of
operation, but the same Spirit.” Though we may still think it well
to retain the distinctive name of Christian, yet we are able to look
beyond the bounds of our fold, and realise our union to those “ other
sheep” who are likewise being guided by the same Divine Providence.
The Moslem proverb says,—“ The leaves of God’s book are the
religious persuasions.” There are pages in that book which we have
learnt by heart, there are others we have scarcely looked into ; but
all the pages are sacred, all are the utterances of that great Religious
Sentiment which lies beneath our outward differences, all are the
expressions of that universal Soul that reveals itself in a thousand
forms. As the intercourse of different races becomes more frequent
�12
and intimate, there will arise a deeper sympathy between different
worsliippers ; the sense of the oneness of Human Nature will lead to a
higher conception of the Unity of God ; and the two great doctrines
of Universal Religion -will be,—that One is our Father, and that
All Men are Brethren.
Then shall be fulfilled the intuition of Jesus, expressed in the
words,—“The hour cometh when ye shall neither in this mountain
nor yet at Jerusalem worship the Father. The hour cometh and now
is when the true worshippers shall worship the Father in spirit and in
truth for the Father seeketh such to worship Him. God is a Spirit;
and they that worship Him must worship Him in spirit and in truth.”
TOULMIN, PRINTER, THE GUARDIAN WORKS, PRESTON.
���
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Universal religion. A sermon, delivered in the Unitarian Chapel, Preston, February 20th, 1876
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Walters, F. W.
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Place of publication: Preston
Collation: 12 p. ; 18 cm.
Notes: Printed by Toulmin, Preston. From the library of Dr Moncure Conway.
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The Guardian Printing Works
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1876
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Unitarianism
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Conway Tracts
Unitarianism
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88
“ The Two (Treat Problems
[Mar4
still a need for the service of this denomination as a member of
the Christian body, with a distinct work of its own, we rejoice in
a name, which however confusing it may be if we consult only a
dictionary for its meaning, has clearly enough defined itself in the
intellectual and social and religious struggles of the last half cen
tury, and has gathered about itself memories and associations of
which we have such reason to be glad.
We will only add that this journal will have no official authority
of any kind, and that it is entirely independent of any organiza
tion — and we repeat that we shall rejoice in feeling that we are
working in co-operation with all, who, under whatever name, are
helping to advance the cause of Truth and to promote the interests
of Christian faith.
~
Charles Lowe.
fi
»
“THE
TWO
■
■
■■
•
J•GREAT PROBLEMS OF
CHRISTIANITY.”
UNITARIAN
A short article, with the above heading, appeared in the last
number of the Religious Magazine, and read so much like a
wail from a sad heart that we have been prompted to write a rep]yIn the opening paragraph the writer says, “We believe that
Unitarian Christianity is a universal gospel; that it is for the
masses as well as for the cultured few, capable of stirring men
to greater action, and giving them a more ample religious growth
than previous forms of Christian truth. But, before it can become
the supreme gospel of the race, two problems must be solved.”
Before considering those two problems, I would like to say a word
on this opening paragraph.
That “ Unitarian Christianity is a universal gospel, intended for
the masses as well as for the cultured few,” I devoutly believe ;
understanding by Unitarian Christianity, simply the Christianity
of Christ. That is, so far forth as Christianity can be put into
words, into propositions, into philosophical statements. But are
we not in some danger of forgetting, that the vital part of Chris-
�1874.]
of Unitarian Christianity39
rcianity is not susceptible of statement in words ? It is a spirit of
life. We can make statements concerning this spirit of life ; we
may hold a philosophy about it, and that philosophy may be sus
ceptible of logical explication, but the vital thing which Christian
ity, the Spirit of Life, is, cannot be formulated. Now, our Uni
tarian Philosophy and statements about this vital life-giving spirit,
seem to me to be true, and I believe will prevail so far and so fast
as men shall be able to appreciate logical and philosophical state
ments about anything. But the masses are not now able to ap
preciate. So that acceptance of our statements about Christian
ity may not, for a long time to come, be very general. But (and
here is our salvation as religious teachers) the masses, however
lacking in ability to appreciate our philosophy, have no difficulty
in appreciating the thing about which we philosophize and make
statements. The spirit of divine life, when manifested in us, it
requires little or no philosophical acumen to see and appreciate.
Our present thought concerning the Bal thing which Christian
ity is, and our present statements of our thought, may both be
modified, it would be strange if they were not; but the thing itself
is ever the same, and is not in the Sgclugive keeping of any sect,
or party, or school of thinkers.
But to advance to the next, the thwd belief stated by the writer
in the opening paragraph, namely, -— that Unitarian Christianity
is “ capable of stirring men to greater action, and giving them a
more ample and religious growth than previous forms of Chris
tianity.” I do not believe the first part of this statement, that
Unitarian Christianity is capable of stirring men to greater action
than previous, or many prevailing forms of Christianity, unless we
are to define action to be somlRing quite different from what it
is usually understood to be in this relation. This is almost too
evident to require illustration; yet, at the risk of being prolix and
commonplace, for the sake of simplicity let me offer an example of
“ action,” produced by other forms of belief and teaching, and
which Unitarianism is not competent to produce. Take an audi
ence of evangelical (unconverted) believers, if the expression
may be allowed, under the manipulation of any well-known power
ful revivalist preacher. He evidently believes that all before him
are in danger of eternal burning, and by his earnestness (for in-
/
�40
“ The Two (Treat Problems
[Mar*
deed how can he help being earnest) he moves the multitude ; he
impresses them with a feeling, which soon amounts to a conviction,
that they are in danger, imminent danger; and soon, action, emo
tional, passionate action is apparent. A shout or a sob in one
direction is followed by a sob or a shout in another, until soon
there is shouting and sobbing all round; and speedily the “ anxious
seats” are crowded with those eager to flee from the danger of the
wrath to come. This is action. And so long as these continue
to believe themselves in such danger, the action in one form or an
other will continue. And so long as others are believed to be in.
such danger action will not cease, efforts will be made to save
others. Is Unitarian Christianity capable of stirring men to any
such action ? I believe not. Nor is Christianity, under any name,
capable of it. It is not Christianity that has done it in the case
of the revivalist’s audience. The revivalist, and thousands of others,
may believe it is, but I do not believe it. It is no more Christian
ity in this instance than it was Christianity in the instances of the
Inquisition and the Massacre of St. Bartholmew. I grant that the
form of action was very different; and it may be said one party
was moved by a love of souls and the other was not; yes, but all
claim to be seeking the glory of God, the establishment of the
true religion, the kingdom of heaven. Now, because Unitarianism
cannot stir men up to what is called intense action, shall we enter-'
tain any doubt of its truth, or its worth, or the wisdom of laboring
for its wider prevalence ? Not until it can be shown that action
can take no other form, or that it cannot exist without being very
demonstrative. The value of action is not to be determined by
any such tests. When you put an acorn into the ground, and
alongside of it the seed of a sunflower, both may grow, but the
manifestation of life in the case of each is different. You can al
most see and hear the growth of the sunflower, and in less than a
year it flames out in garish colors to be seen of all men. But the
acorn has no such action. It is hardly noticeable the first year,
and a century is not sufficient to perfect it, while the sunflower,
meanwhile, has had a wide following in kind. Let not the oak
look in contempt at the sunflower, nor the sunflower despise the
oak.
The higher the type of life you propose for man, the slower will
�1874.]
of Unitarian Christianity.”
41
be his growth toward it, and the longer it will take him to reach
it. While if you are satisfied to tell men that they are in danger
of eternal hell if they do not flee from it, it will not take some very
Bong to start, and they will give themselves no rest or peace until
believed to be beyond danger. But the spiritual quality of the
lives which such a system is competent to produce cannot be of a
very high order. I would not be understood as holding that there
are not multitudes of good, saintly, Christian men and women, who
honestly believe in these doctrines and these methods; of course
there are; but .they are so, in spite of their doctrines, and not
because of them. The writer of the article which I am consider
ing would not pretend that these doctrines are any part of Chris
tianity, and he must know, doubtless does know, that as Christlike
men and women as he ever met are men and women of whose
belief the doctrine of eternal damnation forms no part. But I do
not forget that the question is not one simply of personal charac
ter, but of the value of different systems or views of truth ; and I
recur to the question.
I have dwelt thus at length on the opening paragraph of the
article, because I felt that in it lurked the point of the subsequent
inquiries.
The writer proceeds to say, “ Before Unitarian Christianity can
become the supreme gospel of the race two problems must be
solved.” The first of these problems he regard^ as the finding of
“some motive power to outward action equal to the Orthodox doc
trine of eternal punishment.” I should state it differently, and
say, — Before Unitarianism can become the prevailing form of
Christianity, it must manifest some motive power of inward life
superior to that found in connection with all other forms of Chris
tianity. Considered in its most vital relations, it is not a question
of doctrines, or philosophies of doctrines, half so much as many
seem to think. It is a matter of spirit and life. And it is not a
question of more or less noisy demonstration of life, but of sweet
ness and purity.
Unitarianism and Unitarians need the same motive to outward
action that was in Christ. What was that? Was it not Bove —
Love to God and love to man. His love for God kept him at one
with God. His love for man prompted him to give himself to the
�42
“ The Two Great Problems
Mar.]
work of bringing man also at one with God. It was not so much
the sentiment of fear in Christ, concerning man’s threatened
doom, that was the motive to action in him. It was love for that
which is essential manhood in all men, that which has divine pos
sibilities. He did not overlook man’s danger, he never spoke
lightly of sin, but the moving motive in him never seemed so
much fear of the consequences of sin, or hatred of sin itself, as
love for that which man is capable of becoming. To make Uni
tarianism the prevailing gospel we must not be content to say that
it is the best; nor content philosophically to demonstrate its supe
riority in doctrine over all other forms of Christianity. The merest
novice can state, with beautiful simplicity and truth, the mere law
of the gospel, — to love God above all things and thy neighbor as
thyself. Everybody knows that to practically carry this out is
to live a Christian; and we may as well now, as ever, give over all
idea of finding any superior statement of Christianity, and con
fine ourselves to the more important work of keeping alive in our
own hearts the Spirit which prompts
love, and the generation
and keeping alive of that spirit in other hearts, where it may not
be, or where it exists only in possibility, like the oak in the acorn.
In the presence of the spirit of the living Christ, looking out in
tenderness through human eyes; falling on the ear in sweet ca
dences from human tongue; manifesting itself in self-sacrificing
deeds among men ; in presence of the spirit of. life thus set forth,
of what moment is the doctrine of eternal punishment, or any
other doctrine which is not accompanied with this spirit ? And if
this be present, we can well spare the doctrine. And the influence
and the effect of this spirit, although it might not indeed stir men
to shout, and howl, or sob, would it not do what it did of old, draw
all men to it in more or less loving sympathy, and awaken in them
a kindred spirit ?
The second problem, which in the mind of the writer of the
article under consideration must be solved before Unitarianism is
to prevail, “ is, to find a form of truth that shall make God as
near and helpful to the soul as the Orthodox doctrine of the deity
of Jesus.”
A word on this. The human soul will never outgrow its need of
a feeling of nearness to God, nor outgrow its need of help from
�1874.]
of Unitarian Christianity43
him. It is sweet to feel him near, but does it drive him off, or
does it necessarily rob the soul of all consciousness of his near
ness, to believe concerning him as Jesus believed, namely, — that
he is the ever present spirit of love, power, tenderness and sym
pathy ? It is true, as the writer says, that, “ not much is ac
complished when it is proved that Jesus is not God.” But is it
true that, “ When we do this, he ceases to be a central fact, a
leader, a Saviour ? ” Did the sun cease to be a central fact when
it was proved that he did not move round the earth ? Does Plato
cease to be a leader in philosophy, when it is proved he is not
somebody else, and never wrote the Iliad ? And does Jesus
really cease to be all these, “ a central fact, a leader, a Saviour,”
when it is proved he is not God ? He must cease to be such a
central fact as Orthodoxy conceives him to be, of course, but he
remains just as important a fact nevertheless. And of course he
must cease to be such a leader as Orthodoxy conceives him, but he
may remain just as helpful in his leadership still. And as such a
Saviour as Orthodoxy believes man to be in need of, of course he
must cease to be when the reality of eternal hell is disposed of. But
he may be 'all the Saviour that man really needs still. The writer
seems to overlook the fact that Unitarianism does something more
than prove that Jesus is not God. , It affirms that God was in
Christ, and in him for a blessed purpose, a loving purpose, to bring
man into sympathy and fellowship of life with himself. Christ is
to Unitarian thought a u central factf inasmuch as the divine
life, the life of God, becomes a helpful fact in him, and inasmuch as
the fact of Christianity has its visible root in him, although invisibly
it is in God. He is a leader, not alone by virtue of what he has
taught, but more especially by what he was and is in the spiritual
quality of his life. He was not a leader in literature, science or
art, but he was in the divine art of godly living, in the art of set
ting forth the divinely human life.
And we affirm him Saviour, by virtue of his being the divinely
appointed instrument for the generation and keeping alive in us
of the only thing that can save, the spirit of self-sacrificing love.
Unitarianism, as I hold it, does not oblige me to legislate God
out of Jesus, when it teaches me that Jesus was not God. Jesus,
aside from the Spirit of God, which was livingly in him, of course,*
�44
“ The Two Great*Problems.”
s
Mar.]
is no Saviour. It is God in Christ that wo find to be so precious
and so helpful a Saviour.
But here again I am reminded that no mere statement of this can
accomplish much. It is the Saviour presented in our own lives*
that will be the most effective doctrine. To have its fullest and
best effect, the doctrine must be lived, not simply preached.
Dr Sears is quoted as saying “ that Christianity was a new in
flux of divine power,” and the question is asked, “ Is Unitarianism
a new influx of Divine power, or is it only a philosophy made
momentarily popular by a few fervid orators ? ”
In reply I would say, No, Unitarianism is not a new influx of
Divine power, it is a natural evolution of the influx which was new
in Christ. It is new, of course, in the sense that the spirit is living,
and ever new, as well as old. As I understand Unitarianism, it is
not “ only a philosophy,” but Christianity, minus the theology of
the middle ages, and plus the, common sense of the nineteenth cen
tury. It will become, the form of religion of the masses, just as
far and as fast as the masses learn to va’lue spirituality of life and
righteousness of character, above any merely personal reward,
either in the form of worldly profit, or other-worldly immunity
from threatened doom. But its progress is slow, and the average
preacher of it who sighs for a large following must be willing to be
disappointed. The less religion is mixed up with worldly elements
the longer it will take to make it popular. There is great satisfac
tion in the reflection that the divinest preacher of all did not have,
in his own day, a reliable dozen of followers. There were, who
heard him gladly, but they did not very closely, or publicly identify
themselves with him. And there were not three out of the twelve
who did not mix up his religion with a good many worldly policies.
We have no cause for discouragement. It may not be the ani
mus of our movement to build up a great ecclesiasticism, but it
can do better; it can continue to make clear the superiority of
spiritual religion over the religion of form, of dogma or of tradition
alism ; and who doesnot know that one such living religionist is not
worth, in his influence for good, ten thousand terror-stricken ad
herents of some fear-awakeniftg dogmatism.. Let us continue to
“ hold fast the profession of our faith without wavering.”
J. B. Green.
�
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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 Ethical Society
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"The two great problems of Unitarian Christianity"
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Green, J.B.
Description
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Place of publication: [Boston]
Collation: 38-44 p. ; 25 cm.
Notes: From the library of Dr Moncure Conway. A reply to an article of the same title appearing in the Religious Magazine. For content of complete issue see: https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=wu.89069654465;view=1up;seq=7 (accessed 11/2017). From the Unitarian Review and Religious Magazine. Vol. 1 (March 1874).
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[1874]
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G5433
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Unitarianism
Conway Tracts
Unitarianism
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Text
■ THE EXAMINER:
A Monthly Review of Religious and Humane Questions,
and of Literature.
Vol. I. —FEBRUARY, 1871. —No. 3.
Article I.— Unitarian Leaders.
[These sketches were written while watching the pro
ceedings of the recent meeting of the Unitarian National
Conference. Though slight, and hastily set down, they
aim to be just. They refer in part to persons who were not
present in the meeting alluded to.]
REV. DR. BELLOWS
Is well known to the general public. In the Conference
he appeared as the President of the Council of Ten, which
is the executive committee of the organization! His report
in this capacity opened the work of the conference! In
several respects Dr. Bellows stands in a position almost
pontifical. His abundant energy, his large and broad
intelligence in ethical and religious matters, his usual cath
olicity of spirit, the exceptional warmth and vigor of his
fraternal sympathies, and his great gifts as a writer and
preacher, have justly entitled him to a position not accorded
to any other among the leaders of Unitarianism. It is at
the same time to be said, that a somewhat pontifical temper
is thought by many of Dr. Bellows’s brethren to detract
unhappily from his usefulness as unofficial primate of the
denomination, while his long-time habit of giving way to
LIBRARY
South Place Ethical Society
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Congress, in the year 1871, by Edward C. Towne, in the OfT.ce of the
Librarian of Congress, at Washington.
I
�202
Unitarian Leaders.
extreme inspirations, now in the direction of unrestricted
liberty, and now as entirely in the opposite direction, gives
great uneasiness to the less eminent but more consistent
managers of denominational affairs. The more radical
repress with difficulty their dissatisfaction with the conces
sions which Dr. Bellows has made to extreme conservatism.
On the other hand, the more conservative entertain un
feigned disgust at the equal concessions which their primate
has made to radicalism. It cannot be denied by any, how
ever, that in the report made by Dr. Bellows he stood
between the two extreme which divide his brethren, and
*
even stood above them, both in the gentleness and firmness
of his entirely Christian spirit, and in his sincere effort to
state the common ground occupied by the widely separated
elements pf the caflamunion, that of faith in God, whether
through the Christ off God or the Spirit of God, Christian
union justly frecogjiized between all who believe in “the
God behind both Christ and Spirit.”
REV. E. E. HALE,
, The popular preacher and magazinist of Boston, represents
the onljheecognized denominational publication, “ Old and
New,” of which Mr. Hale is the editor. Five thousand
dollars was given by the American Unitarian Association
towards establishing “ Old and New,” and some benevolent
individuals gave the venerable “ Christian Examiner ”
thirty-five hundred dollars to “ go up higher,” and it went,
leaving the field.to Mr. Hale’s enterprise. In the opinion
of some of the more thoughtful and scholarly of the Unita
rian divines, Mr. Hale has not met just expectations.
Not a few—Rev, Dr. Hedge for example—deem “ Old and
New” of little off no account to any serious religious work,
its notes of really religious utterance are so few and feeble.
Some go so far as to energetically stigmatize the publica
tion as unpardonably superficial, a sugared mush of pleasant
words which can be liked once, can be endured a few times,
but cannot be accepted for a moment as the latest literary
�Unitarian Leaders.
203
legacy of Unitarianism to the American people. These
would gladly give a handsome sum to induce “ Old and
New ” to follow the “ Christian Examiner ” “ up higher.”
Even Dr. Bellows, in his calm, judicious report to the Con
ference, did not hesitate to mingle with kindly praise of his
beloved friend’s labors, an earnest intimation that Mr. Hale
had not yet done what he was supposed to be under a pledge
to do, and decided warning that further disappointment on
the part of the denomination would hardly be borne with
patience. It is but just to say for Mr. Hale, that he has
both consulted the market, which makes but a limited
demand for any other than cheap work in popular maga
zines, and his own genius, which is essentially genial rather
than thoughtfull and interested more in strewing pleasure
in the everyday path of common people, than in leading
the march of the saints and thinkers, or heading the fray
of zealous faith.
REV. CHARLES LOWE,
The popular secretary of the American Unitarian Associa
tion, is a remarkable illustration of modest powers used
with a wisdom hardly ever associated with a more striking
and more daring order of genius. Of delicate physical
constitution, of a peculiar sweetness of spirit and gentle
ness of manner, cautious in thought and unambitious in
action, he yet goes so directly to the point of every matter
with which he has to deal, and takes his stand so conscien
tiously and firmly, with such breadth of spirit and such
profound sympathy with all things lovely and of good
report, as to find himself recognized as one at least of the
pillars of the Gate Beautiful of the Urratarian communion,
if not in fact, in himself alone, the most exact contempo
rary expression of the Christian Liberty through which
Channing taught his disciples to seek entrance to the king
dom of God.
JWES FREEMAN CLARKE,
As he likes to be called, without his titles, was the Secretary
�204
Unitarian Leaders.
of the Association, now represented by Mr. Lowe, during
a p^iod ten years ago, when the seeds of present agitation
were being sown; and at that time no one could have more
nobly held up the Unitarian standard of spiritual freedom.
As an earnest friend of Theodore Parker, and a sufferer
from insisting upon Christian recognition of that great
heresiarch, before Unitarianism had begun to build his
monument,—when in fact it was still stoning him,—Mr.
Clarke earned a most honorable fame among the earliest
friends of the progress which has now become intensely
radical, and this he did not in any respect forfeit during
the period of his secretaryship in the American Unitarian
Association. It was, however, always the case that Mr.
Clarke belonged by his most cherished beliefs to orthodox
Unitarianism. Few of Theodore Parker’s critics have
appreciated his theology less than Mr. Clarke, or have
more positively questioned that radical reformer’s success
as a seeker for Christian truth. The recent eminence of
Mr. Clarke,—now Dr. Clarke,—as a preacher and denomi
national writer, has brought his theological conservatism
into particular prominence, and has given the impression
that age is cooling the more liberal sympathies of his
earlier career. It can be pretty confidently said, neverthe
less, that any wanderer from the stricter churches, or any
fugitive from the darker faiths of the modern world, who
may come to the Gate Beautiful alluded to above, will find
himself passing very close to the ever-warm heart of one
of the purest and noblest men now living, James Freeman
Clarke.
REV. F. H. HEDGE, D.D.,
Rarely presses to the front in any assemblage of liberal
Christians, though he should be recognized as the finest
thinker and ablest writer the denomination has had since
Mr. Emerson withdrew to an exclusively literary position.
Like Dr. Clarke, Dr. Hedge is in one direction conserva
tive—that of a strenuous demand for close connection with
the Christianity of the past; yet he is essentially a trans-
�Unitarian Leaders.
20.5
cendentalist by the greatness of his intellect, a calm seer
who looks out with clear eyes over the highest summits of
human thought, and views both discussions and conclusions
in the purest light of unclouded heavenly reason. Not
even Mr. Emerson has more deeply penetrated the mystic
secrets of divine reason, nor more happily separated in the
spectrum of his thought the elements of the uncreated light
which is to all religious minds the essence of revelation.
If any man now living is competent to report to the ear of
this generation the best echoes of eighteen Christian centu
ries, and in fact the utterances of the “still small voice” in
all ages and places of human faith, Dr. Hedge is entitled to
such rank.
REV. C. A. BARTOL, D.D.,
The successor of Dr. Lowell, in that watch-tower of spirit
ual edification, the pulpit of the West Church, Boston, is
one of the beloved and distinguished leaders of Unitarianism, in spite of his life-long determination to abstain from
all sectarian connection. He is a rare example of the spir
itual insight which makes a. successful preacher, the power
to look through forms to sympathies, and touch the deeper
chords of feeling, in the vibration of which the Christian
heart most readily recognizes the visitation of the divine
compassion. Had he so chosen, Dr. Bartol might have cul
tivated, with eminent success, the difficult field of theologi
cal speculation, and he does not, with all his simplicity and
gentleness, lack the robust qualities necessary to the high
controversy of religious opinion. It was his deliberate
choice to entirely devote himself to edification through
pulpit ministry and pastoral labor, and here he stands
second to none among his brethren.
REV. WM. H. FURNESS, D.D.,
Of Philadelphia, is in the same category as Dr. Bartol: he
1 is a Unitarian leader, without ever meddling with the con
duct of denominational affairs. The most genial of natures
is in him matured by thorough and varied culture in litera-
�206
Unitarian Leaders.
ture, art, and social graces, until he justly ranks among the
most charming masters of the interpretation and illustra
tion of Christian grace and truth. It has been the single
study of Dr. Furness, through all his active life, and by
many successive efforts, to reproduce the true likeness of
ideal humanity, as he reads it in the person of Christ. The
consummate art of the painter appears in every stroke of
his work, but, with most readers, it is less easy to be sure
of the historical fidelity of the picture. The latest, and
probably the final attempt of Dr. Furness to interpret the
person and career of Christ to the modern world, will be
found in a new book from his pen, bearing the simple title
“ Jesus,” which has just issued from the press of J. B.
Lippincott & Co.
REV. W. P. TILDEN,
Who conducted the opening service of the Conference, and
gave to that service a tone of profound faith in the broadest
communion,—through the presence of the indwelling
Father, in the children now, as in the Master eighteen cen
turies ago, “ God in us as in him,”—deservedly ranks with
the leaders of the denomination, for his single-hearted fer
vor of faith, and hope, and charity, and his zealous labors
for the promotion of practical Christianity. Originally a
New England ship-carpenter, his largeness of spiritual
nature and irrepressible enthusiasm for humanitarian and
religious work, pointed him out to Rev. Caleb Stetson, one
of the eminent Unitarian leaders of the last generation, as
peculiarly qualified for effective service in the liberal pulpit;
and this anticipation has been fully justified by all the
events of Mr. Tilden’s career. Without attempting to share
the special labors of Unitarian learning and thought, Mr.
Tilden, who is now among the elder men of the body, has
established a just claim to be considered one of the practi
cal apostles of the work and fellowship of Unitarianism.
And in the same category should be set that worthiest of
good men, and most excellent and earnest of fathers in the
church,
�Definitions from Carlyle.
207
REV. SAMUEL J. MAY,
"Whose long life has beautifully exemplified the power of
zealous goodness, and the charm which always attaches to
a character of which simplicity, sincerity, and the fervor of
unmixed kindness are the chief elements. Mr. May was
magna pars of the great anti-slavery conflict, and has lately
embodied in an interesting and valuable volume, his “ Rec
ollections” of that holy war. In ripe old age, he is as
fresh in fervor as if youth still kept the fountain of his life,
and almost promises to stay here indefinitely, unless the
powers up higher repeat in full, as they have in great part,
the experiment of the patriarch who walked with God, and
was not, for God took him.
Article II.—Definitions, from Carlyle, of Religion, of Pa
ganism, and of Christianity.
“ Religion. . m The thing a man does practically believe
(and this is often without asserting it even to himself, much
less to others); the thing a man does practically lay tc
heart, and know for certain, concerning his vital relations
to this mysterious Universe, and his duty and destiny
there.”
“ Recognition of the divineness of nature 1 sincere com
munion of man with the mysterious invisible Powers visi
bly seen at work in the world around him, . . is the essence
of all Pagan mythology, H. . sincerity the great character
istic of it, . . . looking into nature with open eye and soul:
most earnest, honest!childlike, and yet manlike; with a
great-hearted simplicity and depth and freshness, in a true,
loving, admiring, unfearing way. . . . Such recognition of
Nature one finds to be the chief element of Paganism : rec
ognition of man, and his moral Duty, comes to be the chief
element only in purer forms of religion ; . . here indeed is
a great distinction and epoch in Human Beliefs; a great
landmark in the religious development of Mankind. Man
�208
“ Jesus Christ an Inferior Man.”
first puts himself in relation with Nature and her Powers;
not till a later epoch does he discern that all Power is Moral,
that the grand point is the distinction for him of Good and
Evil, of Thou shalt and Thou shalt not.”
“ Pagan Religion is indeed an Allegory, a symbol of
what men felt and knew about the Universe; and all relig
ions are symbols of that, altering always as that alters.”
“ Christianism; faith in an Invisible, not as real only,
but as the only reality; Time, through every moment of it,
resting on Eternity; Pagan empire of Force displayed by a
nobler supremacy, that of Holiness.”
“ The germ of Christianity, . . is hero-worship, heartfelt
prostrate admiration, submission, burning, boundless, for a
noblest, godlike Form of Man, . . for the great man, with
his free force direct out of God’s own hand, as the indis
pensable saviour of his epoch . . Christianity is the highest
instance of Hero-Worship.”
Article III. — “Jesus Christ an Inferior Man.” — Inde
pendent.
The Independent of November 24 devoted its leading
editorial to the topic, Jesus Christ an Inferior Man. It
placarded this sentiment where it met the eyes of we know
not how many scores of thousands of persons. It rung
the changes upon it until it had repeated the epithet of
contempt twenty-one times, through a column and a half
of feeble rhetoric or feebler snuffle. Appealing to pi pus
fiction, to sacred myth, to goody incident, and goodish
anecdote, and to various historical characters, reputable
and disreputable, it frantically cried shame on the shame
less Examiner for calling Jesus “an inferior man.” The
old pagan, Constantine, and “another emperor, immortal
for infamy,” with that modern master of selfishness, whose
imperial line reached the finale of its infamy at Sedan the
other day, it grouped effectively round Dr. Kane, while the
latter planted a toy cross on “ the northernmost iceberg of
�‘‘ Jesus Christ gin Inferior Man.”
209
the frozen sea,” a “ beautiful, dreary, and perilous cere
mony,” which we, forsooth, could not look on with even
“ a faint pulse of sympathy,” because of our “little criti
cism ” about the “ inferior man 1 ”
This representation of what we were said to have said
about the popular man-image of God has gone the rounds
of the religious press, in editorials and paragraphs, and
probably reached an audience a hundred times as large as
we could reach, or even a thousand times as large, and with
an effect towards breaking down faith in the Christian idol
very much greater than The Examiner, by any circulation
whatever, could have produced. The Independent conspicu
ously posted the intelligence that Jesus Christ had been
thrust ignominiously out of Christianity, had been tumbled
like a heathen idol out of the temple of religion, by a man
who professes Christian faith ! It was very stupid if it
supposed that such an announcement could fail to have a
most disastrous effect upon common faith in Jesus as a
supposed express image of God. For it is not calm argu
ment, nor labored appeal, which have most effect on the
average mind, but sharp, strong assertion, pithy catchwords,
keen epithets,—-just like this which the Independent has
placarded, Jesus Christ an inferior man. Bold to rudeness
or profanity though it be, it is all the more a blow the force
of which cannot be parried. In passing it round, the reli
gious weeklies offer themselves to their enemy as the ass’s
colt offered his back to the Lord Christ.
It is particularly interesting to an iconoclast to see his
work done for him, when the echo of his own word is the
only clear, strong point of the utterance. What do we
care for Kane on an iceberg, or Napoleon arrogantly pre
tending that he knew men, or Constantine guessing or
feigning he saw a cross in the sky, or t’other heathen, con
fessedly “ immortal for infamy,” who, perhaps, did finally
tremble before the “ Galilean,” as many a. wretch certainly
has? Theology is not the science of accidental confessions
of great scamps. Napoleon “knew men,” did he? Knew
�210
“Jesus Christ an Inferior Man.”
the divine side of man, did he? Was just the man to say,
“ I know men, and Jesus Christ was not a man?” Why
not consult the present Napoleon, and get his certificate
that Jesus was not a man ? These “ immortal-for-infamy ”
fellows have such an eye for deity, and can give such sure,
testimony to the godhead of a young Jew of eighteen
centuries since 1 It is really touching, isn’t it, to find how
handsomely they make out their useful certificates that
Jesus was not a man at alf and of course was not“ an inferior
man.”
But here we must say that the words placarded by the
Independent, in the article to which we have alluded, were
never used by The Examiner, nor any words like them.
The expression was copied by the Independent from a con
temptuous sentence of D. A. Wasson, whom we had asked
tor evidence of the “ imperial” greatness of Jesus, and who
eked out the meagreness and feebleness of his reply by sar
casm and sneers, intended to confute us by bringing us into
contempt. He professed to find in what we had said, the
theory that ‘‘Jesus was an inferior man, whom Providence
selected for the express purpose of showing what might be
made of an inferior man,” although in fact we said that
u the child of Joseph and Mary fairly obtained, and must
always hold among men on earth, one of the greatest prov
idential places of human history.” If we also said that his
life was “ simple and humble,” and that he was “ without
any particular greatness of intellect or character,” we said
this in the course of a protest against Mr. Abbot’s attempt
to stand outside a definite relation to him ” as “ the stand
ard bearer of a great movement of mankind.” The words
which Mr. Wasson used were worse than contemptuous,
therefore; they told one of those half truths which are
worse than downright falsehoods. We had not intended to
say this, and should not have done so had not the Indepen
dent given so wide a circulation to Mr. Wasson’s gibe. To
the Independent we beg to say, Beware of second-hand learn
ing, for, from the day that there began to be stories afloat
�Mr. Wasson’s “Medicines.”
211
about the young rabbi of Nazareth, to this present time,
second-hand knowledge has made the current Christianity
a fabric more of fiction than of fact. For instance, Jesus
was not the original author of anything contained in the
Sermon on the Mount. As a distinguished Hebraist of our
time has said, that discourse was perfectly familiar in the
streets of Jerusalem before it was delivered by Jesus; and
both the truths of it and its spirit may be referred to the
truly great Hillel much more justly than to the young
master who was but a pupil and a child, when a rash ambi
tion cost him his life.
Article IV.—Mr. Wasson’s “ Medicines” or IIow to “ See
Jesus.”
In one of the shorter articles of our first issue, we said
that “ it would give us great pleasure to seethe evidence on
which Mr. Wasson pronounces Jesus ‘ an imperial soul,’
and the historical ground for his assumption that the young
Nazarene enthusiast expected ‘ a reign of morals pure and
simple,’ not the reign of an individual, nor of a nation. ”
Mr. Wasson has made a reply to this demand, in the
Liberal Christian. In this reply he first alleges, That we
are in the condition of De Quincey, when he pronounced
Socrates and Plato a pair of charlatans, “ betraying the
extent to which his judgments might be dictated by his
humors,” and presenting a case of “ disease, to be contro
verted with medicines; not with logic and testimony. ”
But what medicines will suffice to prove that Jesus is “ an
imperial soul ?” Is it by calomel or ipecac, by vomit or by
purge, that we may arrive at Mr. Wasson’s view? It is
truly very unkind in our friend to refer us to promiscuous
drugs. We might retire on a dose of blue pill for example,
and wake up Calvinist, as fierce as Fulton, who glories in
having “preached hell in Boston ” to so much purpose ; or’
having distressed our stomach with an emetic, we might
bring ourselves to a condition requiring the small beer and
�212
Mr. Wasson’s “ Medicines ’’
water-gruel Christology of brother Tilton. To proof num
ber one, therefore, alleged by Mr. Wasson, we beg to ask
the particular medicines he would recommend.
In the second place, Mr. Wasson, in reply to our demand
for proof of the “ imperial ” greatness of Jesus, alleges
this: “I see in Jesus an amazing elevation of soul; Mr.
Towne looks on the same picture, and beholds only a daub,
or, at best, a work of little merit. The question, accord
ingly, what Jesus was in character and quality of spirit, is
one which I cannot discuss with him.” Which is, in other
words, “I am right, evidence or no evidence.” Mr. Was
son says, we “ do not entertain the question, which of us
two sees more truly.” But that is exactly the question we
do entertain, and the settlement of which we hoped to
reach, by hearing Mr. Wasson’s evidence, and by contro
verting it with other and weightier proof. We asserted our
belief that Mr. Wasson depended more on imagination than
on historical proof, and here we convict him of it. lie
avows that Jesus is an amazing picture to him, and that we
do not see it as he does, simply because we have not the
eye for it. Very well, but Mr. Wasson’s eye is not histori
cal evidence. He glorified the first disciples, as “ large
popular imaginations,” expressly ascribing their recognition
of Jesus to the largeness and the popular quality of their
imagination. And now he confesses that it is all in his
eye. Medicines and imagination, then, are, so far, what
Mr. Wasson recommends to us, if we would “ see Jesus.”
But Mr. Wasson goes a step further. He names Nicolas
and Colani. He avows that he makes certain “ discrimina
tions,” and we look with care to see what they are. He
rejects the Fourth Gospel. So far, good. The Fourth
Gospel is a theological story, and a poor one at that, though
some of the finest things are preserved in it. Again, he
rejects “ the most extended and explicit of the Messianic
passages in the Synoptical Gospels,” “ upon the showing of
M. Colani.” If he means that he clears Jesus of the charge
of Messianic pretension in a Jewish sense, merely on the
�Or “ How io See Jesus.”
'
213
showing of Colani, he rests, as we feared he did, on the very
narrow basis of insufficient investigation. Not a tithe of
the weight of modern scholarship is on that side. The one
fact most surely proven in regard to Jesus is, that he under
took to be the king of the Jews, and lost his life in conse
quence. To cite. Colani as evidence of the contrary, is to
cite the opinion of a worthy preacher—not the indorsement
of a real scholar; much like quoting Dr. J. F. Clarke.
Mr. Wasson disposes of this point in five lines. He merely
states that Colani has satisfied him. But this is the key of
the controversy, the question whether Jesus entertained a
false Messianic ambition. If Colani has satisfied Mr. Was
son that he did not, either potent drugs or a “ large popular
imagination’'’ must have assisted the effect of Colani’s
superficial and unsatisfactory handling of the subject.
In/the third place, Mr. Wasson feels sure that oral tradi
tion, assuming that the Christ must have put forth claims,
ascribed to him pretension of which he was not guilty.
In fact, however, the evidence still existing, that Jesus put
forth these claims, cannot be set aside by this or any other
imagination of what may or must have been ; while, if Jesus
did undertake and failed, every motive to drop out of sight
the evidence of the abortive undertaking, must have worked
during the years through which the tradition was oral, thus
making it almost certain, that whatever evidence of this
has survived, is to be regarded as peculiarly significant and
weighty. So far, therefore, from throwing out the evidence
that Jesus was a pretender to Messiahship, we ought to
regard it as more strictly historical than anything else in
the record. It is by imagination here, also, not by sound
scholarship, that Mr. Wasson reaches his conclusion.
And, finally, Mr. Wasson thinks it certain, that Jesus
was greater than his immediate followers knew him to be,
and that we must assume, on the one hand, that the best
things reported were not lent him by the disciples, who had
nothing to give, and that other things not so good, were
due to their failure to comprehend. But the fact is, that
�214
Mr. Wasson's “ Medicines.”
the story of Jesus was worked over by oral report, after a
supposed resurrection was thought to have proved him to
have been the Messiah. “Large popular imaginations”
had charge of it, and made what they chose of it. And
the good things of the story (the ethical and spiritual
truths') were current, just as much before. Jesus and apart
from him, as they could be after him. Or if he brought
them together, he did not originate them. Hillel was as
much greater than Jesus as Channing than Chadwick, or
Theodore Parker than Mr. Morse. We intend to speak
exactly. And Hillel’s spirit was, as that of Jesus was not,
fully and invariably that of the best things in the Sermon
on the Mount. He gave to Christianity the Golden RuleHis school of teaching and influence was as much more
important than that of Jesus, as his years, and learning,
and character surpassed those of the young enthusiast
whose dreams interrupted the course of human progress,
from Judaism onward, with eighteen centuries of worship
of a man, and untold inhumanities wrought in the propaga
tion of his pretension. On the one hand then, the belief
that Jesus had been proved the Messiah, moved his disciples
to make the best story they could, and, on the other hand,
they could copy fine truths from current teaching, just as
easily as to repeat them from Jesus, who had but copied
them at the best, so that we are bound to assume, not that
Jesus lost in the story of him, but that he gained in it
immensely, so much so as to be more the creature of it)
than a fact of history. Thus, briefly, do we dispose of Mr.
Wasson’s “ discriminations,” on the basis of which he says
he has made up a critical judgment. We find every one of
these, except the first, unscholarly to a lamentable degree.
But if we had not done this, it would be easy to show
the vice of Mr. Wasson’s conclusion. Por he says that he
proceeds “ to make up a critical judgment,” by “ endeavor
ing first to catch the tune of his mind, his action and char
acter, by meditating upon those sayings of his, and those
incidents of his life which are of such a quality as to carry
�John Brown on the Scaffold.
215
their own credentials.” Imagination, again ! Sayings and
incidents which carry their own credentials ! The Qolden
Rule, for example, or other fine truths, proof of the charac
ter of Jesus, because they are so fine, when, to a certainty
Jesus did not originate either the terms or the tone of the
purest Christian teaching, and did originate the baleful
pretension of his own claim to divine position ! Mr. Was
son must try again. He has not given us a scrap of evi
dence that Jesus was eminently great, either in thought or
in principle. We do not wonder that he began with recom
mending drugs, and then offered the use of his eye, for cer
tainly his “ discriminations” are of no weight whatever, nor
is his “ critical judgment ” entitled to any authority. It
is very well to have read Nicolas, and what there is of
Colani may be looked at with profit, especially if one looks
and passes on, but neither Mr. Wasson nor any other advo
cate of an exploded superstition can afford to be contemptu
ous in a matter of scholarship, on so meagre a support.
We ask Mr. Wasson again for evidence, and hope he will
give us more on the main point than he does when he says,
“I am satisfied on the showing of M. Colani.”
Article V.—John Brown on the Scaffold and Jesus on the
Cross.
Before secession, civil war, and emancipation, had shown
the leader of the Harper’s Ferry enterprise to have been the
providential herald of the greatest overturning of modern
times, there were few persons who would not have been
shocked at the mere suggestion of comparing John Brown
with the most remarkable prophet-judges and prophet
chieftains of familiar Hebrew story. The most plausible
view at first was that he was a crack-brained fanatic, who
might even escape the penalty of his mad crime under the
plea of insanity. It soon became evident, however, that
this madness had more method and character than the
sanity of ordinary men] Two bitterly prejudiced witnesses
said of the hero of Harper’s Ferry :
�216
;
;
,
I
I
I
,
John Brown on the Scaffold
“It is vain to underrate either the man or the conspiracy.
Captain John Brown is as brave and resolute a man as ever
headed an insurrection, and, in a good cause, and with a
sufficient force, would have been a consummate partisan
commander. He has coolness, daring, persistency, the stoic
faith and patience, and a firmness of will and purpose unconquerable. He is the farthest possible remove from the
ordinary ruffian, fanatic, or madman. Certainly it was one
of the best planned and best executed conspiracies that ever
*
failed.
“ They are themselves mistaken who take him to be a
madman. He is a bundle of the best nerves I ever saw,
cut, and thrust, and bleeding, and in bonds. He is a man
of clear head, of courage, fortitude, and simple ingenuousness. He is cool, collected, and indomitable. . . . lie
inspired me with great trust in his integrity, as a man of
truth. . . . Colonel Washington says that he was the cool
est and firmest man he ever saw in defying danger and
death. With one son dead by his side, and another shot
through, he felt the pulse of his dying son with one hand
and held his rifle with the other, and commanded his men
with the utmost composure, encouraging them to be firm,
and to sell their lives as dearly as they could.”f
The opinion of the martyr himself upon the proposal to
put in the plea of insanity on his behalf was unequivocal
and indignant. In addressing the court before his trial he
said : “I look upon it (the plea in question) as a miserable
artifice and pretext of those who ought to take a different
course in regard to me, if they took any at all, and I view
it with contempt more than otherwise. ... I am perfectly
unconscious of insanity, and I reject, as far as I am capable,
any attempts to interfere on my behalf on that score.” To
this we may add the convincing allusion of one of his latest
letters : “I may be very insane, and I am so if insane at all.
But, if that be so, insanity is like a pleasant dream to me.
* C. L. Vallandigliam.
f Henry A. Wise.
�And Jesus on the Cross.
217
I am not in the least degree conscious of my ravings, of my
fears, or of any terrible visions whatever; but fancy my
self entirely composed ; and that my sleep, in particular, is as
sweet as that of a healthy, joyous little infant. I pray G od that
he will grant me a continuance of the same calm but de
lightful dream, until I come to know of those realities which
eyes have not seen, and ears have not heard.” Mary
Brown, who had always been the sharer of her husband’s
plans, said emphatically : “I couldn’t say, if I were called
upon, that my husband was insane—even to save his life;
because he wasn’t.] She declared that if her husband were
. insane he had been consistent in his insanity from the first
moment she knew him.
But more than all else the perfectly grand manifestation
of character, made to the whole world during John Brown’s
forty-two days before the gallows, settled the question of
his mental condition. The conversations, speeches in court
and letters from prison, of John Brown, convict him of any
thing but mental weakness. Beginning with the precious
• fragment of autobiography written for the young son of Mr.
George L. Stearns, the recorded utterances of this uncul
tured man of the people have a fine literary quality which
indicates remarkable purity of intellectual tone. Their
style alone speaks a man of clear head and pure taste. And
x their moral elevation is so complete, the sentiments which
they report are so good and so great, that we are forced to
confess ourselves in presence of a miracle of character.
There seems to us no doubt that John Brown, shepherd,
tanner, wool merchant,farmer, Kansas chieftain, provisional
constitution maker, and Harper’s Ferry commander, must
be classed with the greatest characters of history, because
of his remarkable union of clear vision, pure conscience,
and perfect courage,—the insight of a prophet, the most un
compromising love of right, and absolute intrepidity in
action. In amount of quality he stands with the very few
supreme men of the race, the founders for mankind of civil
ity and religion. And for combination of the grand types
VOL. I.—NO. 3.
2
�218
John Brown on the Scaffold
of character, is it too much to say that, as we see him in
his transfiguration before the scaffold, his figure is nobler
than that of any earlier hero of our race — the wisest,
purest, bravest of mankind ? Standing on this latest stage
of time, instructed, chastened and inspired by a situation
quite beyond any hitherto arranged in history, it was in the
order of Providence that the mount of this martyr should
plant the standard of our march above Calvary, as Calvary
planted it above Sinai. Not that we compare, in respect to
nature, the now deified Christ of Galilee and the’ just now
despised fanatic of Harper’s Ferry. They were equally
common men. We compare only the Jewish figure with
the American figure, the man on the cross with the man
on the scaffold, and say confidently that in John Brown on
his scaffold, Eternal God has lifted the standard of human
advancement higher than it was lifted in the Christ of Cal
vary. Or to put it in other words, and words justified by
that which Jesus himself said, the true Christ-Son of God,
Heaven-anointed soul, which was manifested in Jesus, and
was to be manifested in his humblest disciple, the least of
these his brethren, is manifested to-day in the American
martyr as it was not, and could not be manifested in the
Messiah.
The eindmce is close at hand. At this moment let it suf
fice to present one point of this, the point which is most
important and most conclusive. The world knows the
story of the trial of Jesus—not the trial before Pilate, but
the trial in his own soul. Theological ingenuity has been
exhausted in the attempt to explain this without damage to
the orthodox theory that Jesus was a person of the deity;
but in vain. Give Jesus no more benefit of ingenious
hypothesis and pious prepossession than we give Socrates,
Paul, Giordano Bruno, and John Brown, and we are com
pelled to say that either one had a courage which Jesus did
not possess. Estimate fairly the mental anguish of Savon
arola and of Edward Irving, who died unvisited by the super
natural intervention they had with absolute faith looked
�And Jesus on the Cross.
219
for, the one hung up in chains in the flames after forty-two
days of torture, the other wasted by distressing disease
through days and months of unanswered agonizing prayer,
and it cannot be denied that their trial was far heavier than
that of Jesus. It is idle to ascribe to the Jewish martyr a
superhuman sensibility to evil; for if superhuman at all, he
was superhuman in courage and endurance not less than in
sensibility. If he were not equal to perfect endurance, as
he plainly was not, we but make his weakness the greater
the more we lift him above humanity. The anguish of his
prayer and the wail of the cross, on the lips of a mere child
of Galilee, wrung from the heart of a peasant-Messiah, when
he had really looked for intervention by miracle which did
not come, can be readily explained, without denying the
spiritual elevation of Jesus. We say, then, that in forecast
ing events, and in meeting the turns of fate, he fell short of
the perfection possible to human nature. We recognize
that it was not his mission to do all the things which man
in his most heroic mood can perform, that he represents a
stage in the elevation of our race, by no means our final
attainment. And we confidently compare facts to show
that the American martyr was, in respect to courage under
the heavy blows of fate, superior to the man of Nazareth.
In the garden of Gethsemane we see Jesus “ in distress and
anguish,”—as Mark puts it, “ in great consternation and
anguish,”—and hear him say to his disciples, “ I am in ex
ceeding distress, ready to die.” The bare existence of this
fact is significant; the communication of it, especially to
disciples who could not help himkif they would, marks a
mind utterly shaken out of self-possession. And how con
clusive to the same effect is the prayer, thrice repeated, of
Jesus: He fell upon his face and prayed, saying, “My
Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me. But net
as I will, but as thou wilt.” A second time he prayed, sav
ing, “My Father, if this cup cannot pass from me, but I
must drink it, thy will be done.” Still again he prayed
a third time, saying the same words.
r
�220
John Brown on the Scaffold, Etc.
Setting aside the theory that Jesus was not what he
seemed to be, we have here a man engaged in an almost
desperate effort to meet his fate. The effort of submission
is sincere and grand; it lifts Jesus into the position of a
leader of mankind; considering especially his Jewish limi
tations, how naturally he had looked for supernatural inter
vention, how purely and nobly too he had desired this as
the true coming of God to man, and how really to his eyes
the power of healing the body, with inspiration which
enabled him to instruct and control the mind, had seemed to
him the beginning of miracle, we may'justly see in this
effort, so distinctly conceived and so resolutely attempted, a
manifestation of the very divinity of human nature; but it
is vain to deny that effort is a stage behind attainment. Not
only does the consternation of an experience like that of
Jesus argue a failure to foresee possible duty, but still more
the agonizing effort to accept the situation shows a decided
deficiency of heroic equipment. This deficiency, we repeat,
admits of an explanation, in the case of Jesus, whose em
inence was of purity more than of force, which does not
pluck him from his lofty position of anointed master of the
Christian ages. By the usage of his people Jesus had barely
come of age; he was contemplative rather than executive
in his temperament, more spiritual than practical, and al
most without other education than that of meditation and
prayer. He was in fact an inspired child of Nazareth; more
than that, he had the heart of a pure girl in the breast of a
Galilean peasant. Thus he naturally enough failed to meet
his fate with the serenity of prepared courage, but the ex
planation of the failure does not explain it away. He failed
conspicuously, and as conspicuously John Brown, bringing
back the great example of Socrates, did not fail.
�Theodore Parker’s Antagonism, Etc.
221
Article VI. — Theodore Parker’s Character and Ideas.
■ Chap. III.—His Antagonism with the Religious World.
We come now to the question of Theodore Parker’s
“ antagonism with the religious world.” The reviewer,
whose judgment our discussion starts from, regrets that Mr.
Parker was not “ thrown into intimate relations with Evan
gelical scholars,” and says “ it is singular how rarely he met
such, and how kindly he spoke of them, as of Professors
Stuart, Porter and Woolsey.”
That Theodore Parker found but three or four evangeli
cal scholars who gave him occasion to speak kindly of them,
is doubtless a singular fact, considering the fundamental
principles of Christian religion. Perhaps it is not so sin
gular a fact that Theodore Parker spoke kindly, very kindly,
of these exceptions to the rule. I wish the reviewer had
given a list of the evangelical scholars with whom Mr.
Parker might have had relations of intimate Christian broth
erhood. He mentions Stuart, Woolsey, and Porter, neither
of whom ever pretended to consider Parker a Christian
man and brother. The little intercourse which took place
between Theodore Parker and Stuart, Woolsey, Porter,and
the chief of the New Haven school of theology, Dr. Taylor,
was marked by a manly effort of good will on their part,
and by generous appreciation on his part; but it would be
a great mistake to suppose that these men, the best of their
class, ever felt at liberty to do justice to Theodore Parker.
Their honest principles forbade it. They could suppress, in
his presence, the unbrotherly severity of their judgment
upon him, but they could not offer him Christian brother
hood. And it was not merely that they assumed that he
did not want fellowship. If he had wanted it ever so much,—
and no man has borne the cross of lonely service with a
deeper sense of the value of brotherly fellowship,—they
must in conscience have dropped the mask of generous
courtesy, and shown him all the resolute hardness of their
hearts. Prof. Porter discussed Mr. Parker’s opinions with
�222
Theodore Parker’s Antagonism
charity, and reviewed him with kindness. But even he, so
exceptionally gentle and just, must have resisted, to the last
degree of bitterness even, any attempt to remove the limits
of communion, and make Christian fellowship broad enough
to include the great heretic. President Woolsey could not
fail to act the Christian gentleman in any intercourse with
such a man as Theodore Parker, for by nature and by cul
ture, he is very noble, but even he can feel and show con
tempt for unorthodox struggles in a sincere soul. As to
Dr. N. W. Taylor, who was at once the ablest divine and
the noblest gentleman of all that New Haven circle, I have
heard him tell of his interview with Parker, and how they
crossed broad-swords, and whose head came off. It was in
the spirit of Prof. Park, in the great Boston Council, wnen
he said, “ A man who has studied theology three years, and
has read the Bible in the original languages, and is not a
Calvinist, is not a respectable man.”
I know-what the orthodox spirit in the best men is capa
ble of attempting. I know how the conscience of a solitary
thinker, without help in men or books, may be set upon
and tormented by evangelical surroundings. I have had
said to me, “as a heathen man and a publican”—a hard word
for which there is supposed to be pretty good evangelical
authority. No doubt the souls in whom there is great out
break of new faith and radical thought do sometimes sin
grievously against the pure fitness of things in their demon
strations, but that is not all of their hard case; they not
only become obnoxious in that way, by their own fault, but
they almost invariably become criminals and outlaws, in
the view of the evangelical world, from the hardness and
bitterness of the evangelical spirit. Not only are they dealt
with very harshly for errors which are treated tenderly
where no heresy exists, but they are terribly punished for
that innocent and pure faith which is in them the profound
necessity of a sincere conscience.
It is plain to me that Theodore Parker’s critic does not
consider how infinite is the bitterness of the cup which
�With the Religious World.
K
223
evangelicalism, in all its common forms^ presses to the lips
of one who has stripped himself of precious dogmatic beliefs
to undertake a more daring, more heroic exercise of faith
in God and labor of love than the current Christianity per
mits. Therefore I beg to assure him, upon abundant expe
rience, that a man confessing heresy heartily, must have a
face of brass to presume on “ intimate relations with evan
gelical scholars,” except as a relic of very close youthful
friendship. And if he had the shining qualities of an arch
angel on earth, and withal bore his cross honestly in the
world, doing with his might the work given him to do, he
could not but seem, to evangelical scholars of strict convic
tion, of “ no form nor comeliness—no beauty that they
should desire him.” No worse men than President Wool
sey have thought the dungeon and the fagot needful in the
discipline of demonstrative departure from orthodoxy. The
spirit of the age has, indeed, reduced marvelously the tem
per of orthodox defence of the faith, but the time has hardly
come, certainly had not come in the day of Mr. Parker’s
encounter with the religious world, when liberality could
be consistently practiced by evangelical scholars.
It is, I trust, one result of the appearance of Mr. Parker,
to disclose to some of the wiser defenders of correct tradi
tional faith, the necessity of adjusting their position once
more, to conform more closely to the demand of the Chris
tian spirit. Possibly the day is not far off when the scholars
our critic wishes Mr. Parker might have met, will be
able to accept, within evangelical limits, absolute liberality.
That is to say, holding firmly to the evangelical doctrine of
redemption, its necessity, plan, and operation, they will
relax the severity of their dogmatic convictions upon minor
points, so far as to make character the ground of human
fellowship, and to leave to God alone, the searcher of hearts,
all judgment as to the amount and style of creed necessary
to start either a soul on the road to heaven, or a teacher of
Truth on the way of the knowledge of God. It is easy for
me to think of liberality thus carried to perfection, within
�224
Theodore Parker's Antagonism
evangelical limits. Let our vain decisions as to the times
and seasons of God’s grace and power, be wholly set aside.
Say, if we must, that God hath appointed this way and no
other, the literal gospel of Christ, but leave the administra
tion of this way to Him with whom a thousand years are as
one day.
There is no Biblical evidence to compel acceptance of the
dogma of limited probation. Insist on the possibility of
the worst with the evil and the disobedient, but with the
honest, earnest and faithful seeker for Truth and lover of
God, insist as strongly on the certainty of the best. Go
down to deep below deep, in the experience of true men,
until you find for them a saving tie to God’s administration
of true redemption, rather than suffer our human judgment
to pronounce that there is little or no hope for an honest
soul misguided by an erring intellect. The possibility of
final loss may be, indeed, urged, and the whole terror of
absolute peril brought to bear, to persuade to deeper hon
esty, more serious inquiry, and more humble crying unto
the spirit of Truth, b,ut let it be in love, in hope, in firm
faith, so that the Christian spirit may bind all in one, and
the Holy Spirit, if it may possibly be, bind all to that mercy
seat before which we are all one in absolute need.
It is possible for this to be. It only requires to believe,
as humanity and divinity, even within the strictest evangeli
cal limits, require, that for those who seek there is no closing
of the chances, no limit of opportunity, no inadequacy of
eternal divine providence. Grant that the path is beset
with perils; grant that the abyss of final loss may receive
us at the next step; but say this of all, because of sins
and unworthiness of a moral sort; never say it with a lim
itation to the case of “ that publican,” who is such only by
reason of intellectual error. I heard the New Haven Dr.
Taylor say, very near the close of his life, that he knew he
might fail of heaven. Let this be the form in wlfich we
doubt as to human chances of acceptance with God. Let
this humility penetrate and bind in one all who feel the
�'With the Religious World.
225
burden of moral evil. Then it will be easy to feel that the
grace which is extended to sinners, will not need to be fur
ther extended to embrace all who try to come unto the God
and Saviour of squIs, whatever may be the fault, or, as our
critic says, the “vice” of their conception and confession
of the things of God.
It would be a noble enterprise if eminent evangelical
scholars would unite in, we will say, an Academy of Chris
tian Studies, the aim and use of which should be to vindi
cate the principle of liberality, to throw the shield of Chris
tian charity and Christian encouragement over all honest
and capable pursuits of divine Truth. In two ways espe
cially would this improve exceedingly the position of the
evangelical school. It would provide Christian discipline
for radicalism; and it would show to the world that evan
gelical faith is not afraid of inquiry. Radicalism is forced
to exaggerate the individualism of its method, because the
hand of every man is against it. Give it a place, its due
place, in the school of Christian studies, and at once its
temper must become more moderate, and its demonstra
tions less dangerous to the order of the religious world.
Had Mr. Parker been treated in this way from the begin
ning, there is every reason to believe that his mind would
have acted, upon questions of dogma, with none of that vol
canic energy which made him seem to the evangelical world
a tremendous engine of destruction! And instead of
becoming the leader and hero, not only of elect believers in
whom the spirit and the life had wrought profound convic
tion, but of the throng of deniers in whom serious convic
tion was less developed, he would have stood forth the
exponent of the modern tendency of the Christian faith.
I anticipate the reply to this, that at his best Mr. Parker
would have been an enemy. But I think the assumption of
this reply a mistake. Grant that the best of Mr? Parker’s
belief was erroneous. I go back of his dogmatic convic
tions, then, to his moral and spiritual tendencies, and un
hesitatingly affirm the necessity of accepting these as suffi
�226
Theodore Parker’s Antagonism, Etc.
cient, under the ample providence of the power and grace
of God, for cordial Christian fellowship. Let Professor
Park and President Woolsey have said to Mr. Parker,
“ Brother, we differ with you entirely in doctrinal method
and convictions, but in allegiance to the law of love and to
the spirit of Truth and of Holiness we agree; the soul, and
the soul’s union with God in moral loyalty and spiritual
yearning and devotion, are the foundation,—the Christian
foundation ; in that we meet, alike putting on the new man;
now let us reason together, and labor in one spirit of love
to God and love to man, with good hope in the eternal
providence of God with us, until we all come in the unity
of the faith unto a perfect man,”—let this have been said,
and realized in the attitude of the evangelical school, and
the modern world would have lost its great heresiarch, the
Christian world, so-called, would have gained a great apos
tle of natural religion.
Mr. Parker’s great work in Boston, and in America, had
never been undertaken if even his own sect, the Unitarian,
had had the liberality it ought to have had. In his letter to
his first parish, upon leaving them for Boston, to which he
was called solely to vindicate freedom of religious teaching,
Mr. Parker said:
“ If my brethren of the Christian ministry had stood by
me, nay, if they had not themselves refused the usual min
isterial fellowship with me, then I should have been spared
this painful separation, and my life might have flowed on
in the channel we have both wished for it.”—Life, vol. I,
p. 26L
In a letter to Rev. Mr. Niles, written the year before his
removal to Boston, Mr. Parker states what no one can rea
sonably doubt, that he had no choice but to accept individ
ualism or abdicate his own manhood. He says:
“I must of course have committed errors in reasoning
and in conclusion. I hoped once that philosophical men
would point out both; then I would confess my mistake
and start anew. But they have only raised a storm about
my head; and in a general way a man wraps his cloak
�A Letter of Theodore Parker.
227
about him in a storm and holds on the tighter.”—Life, vol.
Z, p. JfhO.
Now I ask, is it not evident that a divine design, work
ing through the robust nature of this Socratic Samson of
truth and righteousness, wrought deliberately and wisely
the rough antagonism of Theodore Parker to the popular
churches, in order to convict them, one and all, of want of
the Christian spirit, and to utter, in tones that should ring
round the world, the demand of that spirit, in this new
time, for a liberality in religion adequate to sustain, with
all honest believers and teachers, a true Christian fellow
ship ? Theodore Parker, nailing the new theses of human
ity on the doors of recognized Christian communion,
though he made the very walls of the temple tremble to their
foundation, was no lawless destructive, no mad troubler
of communion, but the providential sign of a new reforma
tion in Christendom, the Luther of emancipated faith, the
angel of a new resurrection of that holy spirit which was
the truth in .Tesus, and has been the truth in the Christian
ages, and shall be, in redeemed humanity, sole author and
authority of pure and undefiled religion.
Article VII.—A Letter of Theodore Parker.
Rev. John T. Sargent, who was intimately associated
with Theodore Parker, writes to us as follows :
I welcome your articles just opening in The Examiner
on Theodore Parker. It may interest you to know that I
have large files of letters from him, which have a value so
far as they might illustrate your main topics, bis “ charac
ter and ideas.” Most of them, it is true, are of that pri
vate and social character not intended for the public, 'and
were occasioned by that peculiar relation into which I was
thrown in consequence of my exchange of pulpits with him,
when such an expression of fellowship was looked upon
with distrust, even by the so called “ Liberal” Unitarians.
But there are others so expressive of his well known sympa-
�228
A Leiter of Theodore Parker.
thics for all the great interests of humanity, that portions of
them at least ought to be seen. Take, for instance, the
following extracts which I copy from one under date of
September 18th, 1859, when he was abroad in Montreux,
Canton de Vaud, Switzerland :
“It is Sunday, to-day, and my thoughts turn homeward
with even a stronger flight than on any other days of the
week, so I shall write a little to one of my dear old friends
— ‘ a friend indeed,’ also a brother in the same ministry.
It is the day when the services at the Music Hall are to
begin again I believe, but where I shall no more stand; for
I sent in my letter of resignation some days ago, as duty
and necessity compelled. But my affection will always go
with the dear old friends who gather there, and on Sundays,
when the Music Hall is open, I always come as a silent
minister to look at the congregation, and have ‘ sweet com
munion together,’ though we no longer ‘walk to the house
of God in company.’ It is a tender bond which gets thus
knit by years of spiritual communion :—I think not to be
broken in this life. But here, as you know, Sunday is quite
different from what it is in New England; devoted more
to gaiety and to social festivity of a harmless character.
But to-day is the Annual Fast all over Switzerland, and the
land is as still as with us in the most quiet town in New
England. I like these Swiss people. They are industrious,
thrifty and economical to an extraordinary degree,—intelli
gent, and happy. I sometimes think them the happiest
people in Europe, perhaps happier than even we in Massa
chusetts, for they are not so devoured by either pecuniary
or political ambition. * * * What a condition the
Unitarians are in just now I They put Huntington in the
place of Dr. Henry Ware, and he turns out to be orthodox,—
and, as I understand, won’t go into the Unitarian pulpit of
Brooklyn, N. Y., but officiates in the great orthodox
Plymouth church hard by. Then brother Bellows comes
out with his ‘ Broad (T) church,’ and, while talking of the
‘ Suspense of Faith,’ represents the little sect in no very
�A Letter of Theodore Parker.
229
pleasant light. Meantime, The Examiner—(certainly the
ablest journal in America,) reports to the denomination
the most revolutionary theologic opinions, and this, too,
with manifest approbation thereof. Witness the half-dozen
articles within so many years, by Frothingham, Jr., some
of Alger’s, that of Scherb’s on the Devil, and the three on
India, China, and Asiatic Religions, by an orthodox mis
sionary, now living in Middletown, Conn.; a noble fellow
too. What is to become of us ? To me it is pretty clear
the Progressive party will continue to go ahead in a circu
itous course, for Progress is never in a straight line. No
progressive party will go back describing a line with analo
gous curves.
“ It is beautiful to see the gradual development of religion
in the world, especially among su h a people as our own,
where the government puts no yoke on men’s shoulders.
Little by little they shake off the old traditionary fetters,
get rid of their false ideas of man and God, and come to
clear, beautiful views and forms of religion. No where in
the world is this progress so rapid as in America, because,
in our Northern States, the whole mass of the people is
educated and capable of appreciating the best thoughts of
the highest minds. Of course, foolish things will be done,
and foolish words spoken, but on the whole the good work
goes on, not slowly and yet surely. I am glad the Catho
lics have the same rights as the Protestants;—if they had
not I should contend for the Catholics as I now do for the
negroes. But I think that, after Slavery, Catholicism is
the worst and most dangerous institution in America; and
I deplore the growth of its churches. I know the power of
an embodied class of men with unity of sentiment, unity of
idea, and unity of aim, and when the aim, the idea, and
the sentiment are what we see and know, and the men are
governed by such rules, I think there is danger. Still, it is
to be met, not by Bigotry and Persecution, but by Wisdom
and Philanthropy. I don’t believe Catholicism thrives very
well even in a Republic, but it loves the soil a despot sticks
�230 '
A Letter of Theodore Parlier.
his bayonet into. Since Louis Napoleon has been on the
throne of France, the worst class of Catholic priests have
come more and more into power ; that miserable order, the
Capauchins, has been revived and spreads rapidly. More
than 300 new Convents have been established since the
‘ Coup d’ Etat,’ and are filled with more than 30,000 devo
tees already. But in liberally governed Switzerland, Cathol
icism does not increase, but falls back little by little. No
Jesuits are allowed to actin the land. In a few generations
we shall overcome the ignorance, stupidity, and superstition
of the Irish Catholics in America, at least in the North, but
before that is done, we shall have a deal of trouble. Soon
Boston will be a Catholic city if the custom continues of
business men living in the country; and we know what use
a few demagogues can make of the Catholic voters. It
only requires that another capitalist offer the Bishop $1,500
or so if he will tell his subjects to vote against a special
person or a special measure. All the Catholics may be
expected to be on the side of Slavery, Fillibustering, and
Intemperance. I mean, all in a body; this Romanism will
lead them to support Slavery;—the Irishmen to encourage
Fillibustering and Drunkenness. But good comes out of
evil. I think the Irish Catholics with their descendants,
could not so soon be emancipated in any country as in our
own dear blessed land. So, we need not complain, but only
fall to and do our duty,—clean, educate and emancipate the
‘gintieman from Corrk.’
“ How goes it with the ‘ Poor ?’ and with the ‘ Boston
Provident Association,’ with which you are officially con
nected ? All well, I hope. I am not quite sorry the ‘ Reform
School’ at Westboro is burnt down. The immediate loss
to the State is, to be sure, a great one, but the ultimate loss
would have been far more, for it was a school for crime,
and must graduate villains. I wonder men don’t see that
they can never safely depart from the natural order which
God has appointed. Boys are born in families ; they grow
up in families, a few in each household, mixed with girls
�The Index on Christianity Again.
231
and with their elders. How unnatural to put 500 or 600
boys into a great barn and keep them there till they are one
and twenty years of age, and then expect them to turn out
well and become natural men, after such unnatural treat
ment ! At the beginning, Dr. Howe, really one of the
most enlightened philanthropists I ever met in America or
Europe, proposed a ‘ Central Bureau,’ with a house of tem
porary deposit for boys, and that an agent should place them
in families throughout the country. A quarter of the
money thus spent, would have done a deal of good. I
wonder if you have ever been up to the ‘ Industrial School
for Girls,’ at Lancaster. To me this is one of the most
interesting institutions in the good old State. If I were
Governor of Massachusetts, I think I shouldn’t often dine
with the 1 Lancers,’ or the 1 Tigers,’ or even the ‘Ancients
and Honorables,’ but I should know exactly the condition
of every jail, and ‘ House of Correction,’ in the State, and
of all the institutions for preventing crime and ignorance.
If Horace Mann had been Governor, I think he would have
done so. Here in Europe my life is dull, and would be
intolerable were it not introductory to renewed work on
earth or another existence in Heaven. I am necessarily
idle here, or busy only with trifles which seem only a stren
uous idleness. Such is the state of my voice that I aril
constrained to silence, and so fail to profit by the admirable
opportunity of intercourse with French, German, and Rus
sian people who now fill up the house. I do not complain
of this, but think myself fortunate to be free from pain.”
Article VIII.—'The Index on Christianity Again.
In the Index of January 7th, Mr. Abbot prints a “ synop
sis of Free Religion,” which commences with a criticism of
“ Christianity as a System,” some of the points of which
surprise us more than anything Mr. Abbot has previously
said. What, for example, is he thinking about when he
says, “ Regarded as to its universal element, Christianity is
�232
The Index on Christianity Again.
a beautiful but imperfect presentation of natural morality ?”
His own opinion may separate morality from faith in God,
and make the former only the universal element of religion,
• but no Christianity that ever was, has separated these two
universal elements, or thought of presenting religion, in its
general aspect, as other than the two-fold passion of the soul
of man, towards man and duty on the one hand, and
towards God and heaven on the other.
But this is not the worst of what we deem our friend’s
misrepresentation of “ Christianity as a System.” Having,
as we have seen, made Christianity to consist, as to its uni
versal element, in a “ presentation of natural morality,” he
then states that, “ Regarded as to its special element, Chris
tianity is a great completed system of faith and life,” and
that “ the chief features of this system are the doctrines of
the Fall of Adam, the Total Depravity of the human race,
the Everlasting Punishment of the wicked, and Salvation
by Christ alone,” and that “ it is the worst enemy of liberty,
science, and civilization, because it is organized Despair of
Man.” He then goes on to define “Free Religion as a
System,” and finds it to be “ organized Faith in Man.”
Between the two there exists, he asserts, “ an absolute con
flict of principles, aims, and methods.” He declares that
“ the one ruled the world in the Dark Ages of the past,”
and that “ the other will rule the world in the Light Ages
of the future,” while “ their battle-ground is the Twilight
Age of the present.”
To us this is scandalously unfair. It is no more true that
Christianity is despair of man than it is that free religion is
faith in man. But granting Mr. Abbot his definition of
free religion,—which to us, and to the majority at least of
free religionists, leaves out the religion of Free Religion,—
it is an amazing disregard of the simplest and plainest facts
which permits the statement just quoted, of the sum and
substance of Christianity. Christianity is not organized
despair, but the contrary. One of the means generally
adopted by Christian propagandists to rouse men to “ come
�The Index on Christianity Again.
233
to Christ,” is the preaching of despair, but our friend
knows perfectly well that this is a means only, employed by
teachers of a religion whose chief word is hope, and that
this means is not employed except to induce mankind to
accept the “ hope” which Christianity teaches as her great
lesson. Christianity has never been preached as simple
despair of man, and Mr. Abbot owes it to his honorable
devotion to truth to withdraw the conspicuous assertion that
it consists in so dark and dreadful a thing. “ The worst
enemy of liberty, science, and civilization !” It connot be
said with a particle of justice. Of 79sei«7o-Christianity, the
darker human side of historical Christianity, Mr. Abbot can
speak as harshly as he chooses, without provoking our chal
lenge, but of “ the great completed system of faith and life,”
which, in his own words, Christianity is, he ought never, it
seems to us, to speak as he now speaks in his “Synopsis of
Free Religion.”
We beg him to tell us why he omits from his view of
Christianity as a “ great completed system of faith and life”
everything which constitutes it, in the general opinion of
mankind, except the four dogmas named by him as its
“ chief features.” And in particular, why does he remove
from their universally admitted place, as features of Chris
tianity chief above all others, the two supreme Christian
tenets that God is and that he is Our Father, and that
man is the offspring of God and all men members one of
another in human brotherhood? Even the false side of
historical Christianity contains other chief features than the
four doctrines named by Mr. Abbot, such, for example, as
the doctrines of a special revelation of redemption made
through the Bible, and of the Godhead of Jesus as the agent
of this redemption, and of the administration of this re
demption' by special divine influences, and these doctrines,
however false they may be, cannot be summed up in despair
of man, but intend rather great hope for man; and in all
fair judgment they stand above the darker dogmas of Fall,
Depravity, Punishment, and Limitation of redemption, and
vol.
i.—no. 3.
3
�234
The Index on Christianity Again.
are more entitled than these to give distinctive character to
Christianity, as Mr. Emerson recognizes when he sums up
Christianity in “ faith in the infinitude of man.”
The deplorable fact is that Mr. Abbot, in this instance,
defines Christianity by the darker half of its darker side,
not only leaving out of sight its great and glorious prin
ciples of God’s Fatherhood and man’s brotherhood, its two
supreme rules of love to God and love to man, which make
its bright side, but also leaving out entirely .the more
humane and hopeful of its false dogmas. There would be
nothing at all of Free Religion if it were defined thus by
the worst aspects of its worse side. Nothing that ever was
on earth can bear judgment so grossly unjust. The con
trasts drawn by Mr. Abbot are not legitimate. The past
has not been given up to “ the worst enemy of liberty,
science, and civilization,” nor will the future be ruled by
“the best friend of progress of every kind.” There has
been a vast deal of human freedom in religion before now,
and there will be a vast deal of bondage to authority in the
religion of the future. Not all men have been deceived in
the past, and not all escape delusion now. We heartily
approve vigorous, positive assertion of convictions, but we
must regard some of our friend Abbot’s dogmatizing as not
one whit more respectful towards human freedom than the
least warranted assertions of the popular creeds, inasmuch
as it is not based in evident truth, but in very serious neglect
and disregard of true facts, and does not stop a moment to
consider that its assumptions are generally denied, but lays
down the law of individual opinion precisely as if it were
the law of divine authority. We trust we speak with mod
eration, and with due respect for our friend’s eminence as a
religious teacher, but really we know of nothing in the
movements of religion at the present time more to be
regretted, than Mr. Abbot’s attempt to prove that Christi
anity is all blank despair, and Free Religion all pure faith.
Neither one nor the other is true.
�Why does Mr. Abbot Object, Etc.
235
Article X.— Why Does Mr. Abbot Object to Mr. Sen’s Faith
in God?
We could hardly name two more genuine religious believ
ers and teachers than Keshub Chunder Sen, the Indian
reformer and prophet, and our friend Abbot, at Toledo, the
editor of The Index. The latter has as deep, as pure, as
earnest faith in God as can be anywhere found. Such
sentences as the following are gems of spiritual truth:
“ My whole religion centres in the fact of this perennial,
this unutterable revelation of Eternal Being in the soul of
man;”—“Life is lifted into heaven, in proportion as we
repose in this embrace of the All-Encompassing Soul;”—
“ It is the conception of Nature as the living self-manifes
tation of God, that keeps trie fires of faith still burning in
the inward temple of the soul;” “Pure Religion is itself
the presence of the Infinite Spirit, making itself felt in the
soul of man;”—“The great task of Free Religion is to
prove the ability of each soul to draw its nutriment from its
native soil, dispensing with mediation, and coming into
primary relations with the All-Permeating Deity;’-—“ That
which calls out all high and pure affection is the divine
element, the God in man ;”—“ The lofty and tender senti
ment, the divine sympathy in eternal things, which marks
the completest unity of allied natures, is rooted in the con
sciousness of God;”—“That consciousness of the One
Divine which makes possible to us our loftiest intercourse
with congenial minds, lies also at the root of the sentiment
of the universal brotherhood of man ;”—“ The same repose
in the universal life of God which enables two friends to
enjoy the pure delight of spiritual fellowship, enables, nay,
compels them, to recognize the fundamental unity of their
race, and to cherish that inner consciousness of it which is
the true love of man ;”—“ In the love of God we become
friends to each other, and, in a large sense, friends of man
kind as well; and in this broadening out of the private into
the public, of the individual into the universal, friendship
�236
Why does Mr. Abbot Object to
achieves its highest perfection, and crowns, itself with wor
ship of the Divine.”
To every word of this Mr. Sen would say a hearty amen,
and it would seem as if the two men, being so agreed,
i could walk together in the closest brotherhood. The dis
position of the pious and eloquent leader of the Brahmo
Somaj, of India, was expressed quite recently in a letter to
the Free Religious Association, printed in The Index of
November 24. In that letter Mr. Sen said, “I am sure
that in the fulness of time all the great nations in the East
and in the West will unite and form a vast Theistic Brother
hood, and I am sure that America will occupy a prominent
place in that grand confederation. Let us then no longer
keep aloof from each other, but co-work with unity of heart,
that we may supply each other’s deficiencies, strengthen
each other’s hands, and with mutual aid build up the house
of God. Please take this subject into consideration, and
let me know if you have any suggestions to make whereby
a closer union may be brought about between the Brahmo
Somaj and the Free Religious Association,—between India
and America,—and a definite system of mutual intercourse
and co-operation may be established between our brethren
here and those in the New World. Such union is desirable,
and daily we feel the need of it more and more. Let us
sincerely pray and earnestly labor in order that it may be
realized under God’s blessing in due time.”
To this brotherly word of one who “ crowns friendship
with worship of the Divine,” Mr. Abbot called attention in
the following editorial, printed in the same number of The
Index, under the head, “ A Vital Difference.”
“ An interresting letter, addressed to Mr. Potter by
Keshub Chunder Sen, of India, will be found in the
‘ Department of the Free Religious Association ? This
native reformer, whose late visit to England attracted so
much attention, is desirous of ‘mutual intercourse and
co-operation ’ between the Association and the Brahmo
Somaj. While most cordially reciprocating his brotherly
�Mr. Sen's Faith in G-od?
237
sentiments, we feel constrained to point out an important
difference in their bases of organization. The Brahmo
Somaj, as its name implies, has a Theistic creed as its bond
of union ; the F. R. A. has its bond of union in the simple
principle of Freedom, in Fellowship. Theism, as a creed, is,
in our judgment, little, better than Tritheism. . . . The
friendliest and most brotherly relations should subsist
between the F. R. A. and the Brahmo Somaj; but we must
keep clearly before the public the all-important distinction
between creeded and creedless organization, and forbear, out
of sentiment or sentimentality, to swamp Free Religion in
a ‘ mush of concessions.’ ”
Imagine Mr. Sen receiving the Index, with his letter
printed in the department officially occupied by the Free
Religious Association, and finding that the same number
contained an editorial, warning the public against equal
recognition of him, as a swamping of Free Religion in a
mush of concessions I And that simply because he and
his companions have earnest faith in God!
It is mere words when Mr. Abbot objects to a creed.
No man living has more distinctly laid down, insisted on,
and fought for a creed, than Mr. Abbot. He made a creed
in fifty articles a year ago, and he has just made another
in thirty-two articles, which he calls a “ Synopsis of Free
Religion.” As long as he believes anything, which he
can state in articles, he will have a creed. As long as
*
he devises systems of assertions, and lays them down
nakedly and without qualification, he will have a creed of
the most positive character. We do not object to our
friend’s annual experiment of a downright creed, a set of
positive articles, bold and bald assertions, putting forward
* Creed.—“A definite summary of what is believed; a brief exposition of
important points, as in religion, science, politics, etc.; especially a summary
of Christian belief; a religious symbol.”
“ Symbol.—(Theol.) An abstract or compendium of faith or doctrine; the
creed, or a summary of the articles of religion.”—Webster.
Where does Mr. Abbot get the word “creeded?”
�238
Why does Mr. Abbot Object to
his individual opinion as absolute truth. It is one very
proper way of working on the human mind. But for a
man, who has made two creeds within thirteen months, to
object to Mr. Sen’s equal standing, because the former
believes in God, will not answer.
It happens that Mr. Abbot thinks religion possible with
out faith in God, while Mr. Sen finds the deepest truth of
religion in filial trust in God, and that the latter thinks
quite well of Christianity while the former does not think
well of it at all. But Mr. Abbot’s opinions here are just as
much part of a creed as Mr. Sen’s. Indeed the former
holds his notions on the subject far more rigidly, and asserts
them far more dogmatically than the latter holds and asserts
his views. We do not blame or bewail our friend’s dogma
tism ; let him drive ahead with all his might; but it is
absurd for him to accuse Mr. Sen of having a creed in regard
to God. We could not name a position recently taken in
the religious world which more emphatically merits what
ever stigma should attach to the most positive of creeds,
than our good friend’s position about God and Christianity
as neither of them essential to religion.
And this position not merely has the form and tone of a
creed, or articles of a creed, but it has the tenor, to us, of a
very bad creed. It is a sad enough thing to “ stand squarely
outside of Christianity,” because it involves so general a
refusal of good fellowship, but of thinking of religion with
express exclusion of faith in God, and trying to organize
the law and gospel, the rule and consolation of faith, with
out including the sentiment of the “ Our Father,” is to us
the most terrible of mistakes, not because we have any
aversion to honest atheism, or any wish to put a brand upon
candid infidelity (so called), but for the simple reason that,
in general, faith in God Our Father is the central and fruit
ful principle of blessed religion, and he who dissuades men,
or deters them, or debars them, as Mr. Abbot is doing, from
the exercise of unquestioning filial trust in the Divine Pater
�Mr. Sen’s Faith in God ?
239
nity, is doing the average soul more harm than all other
religious teaching can do him good.
We have given our friend’s new creed, in the Index of
January 7, a respectful study, and see how he arrives at
“ E PLURIBUS UNUM ”
as “ the great watchword of the ages/’ but to us, and we
think to mankind generally, “E PluHus Unum” will not
displace “ Our Father,fl nor any sense of what we are, in
onrselves, and to one another, take the place of the Con
sciousness of God, and the consolation derived from remem
bering HIM in whom we live, Mdflmove, and have our
being. To keep a lively sense of the being, and goodness,
and perfect power of the alone supreme and blessed God,
is not to swamp religion in a mush of concessions. Mr.
Sen’s wish for a Theistic Brottflrhood of all the great
nations, merited sympathy and respect from Mr. Abbot,
and these only. It was no more legitimate to object to it
than it would be to require the mass of childifln to limit
their interest in home pleasuBs to such as orphan asylums
can offer. And in the name of all that is sacred and consol
ing to the heart of man, we beg MiflAbbot to abate the
rigor with which he insists upomkccommodatwg religion to
atheism and to materialism. We will deal respectfully and
fraternally with these honest restrictions of human hope
and faith, but we cannot see wl®any man who has faith in
God and the blessed world of spirit should think it neces
sary to hide that faith, and to base a creed upon suspense of
natural happy trust. In general the atheists, materialists,
and professed “infidels,” are exceedingly positive in their
views, as well as frank and outspokenly Let them be so.
But on the other hand, let those who have firm faith in a
Living Soul of all things, and in Eternal blessed Life, stand
as frankly and firmly for their trust and their thought. If
Mr. Abbot does not care toflhus stand for his best thought
and faith, let him at least cease to insist upon suspense of
faith in our brotherly Bllowship, since the demand is wholly
�240
The Old and the New Christianity.
unreasonable and extremely hurtful. A “ Theistic Brother
hood” does not imply the exclusion of anybody, and not to
show what faith we have in God is to do great hurt to our fel
lows, as well as to be unfaithful to our own vision.
Article XI.— The Old and the New Christianity (Concluded).
Translated from the French of N. Vacherot.
*
After the first ecumenical councils, dogma having
received its constitution almost complete, it would seem
that its history must be finished, and it only remained to
pursue that of organization and church discipline. How
ever, the history of dogma still continues, if not for estab
lishing, at least for the teaching of doctrines. The great
theologians whose discussions prepared the way for the
council of Nicoea, had, with all their subtle distinctions,
preserved, with their Platonic learning, the consciousness
of the highest religious verities. It was rather the teaching
of John which inspired them than that of Paul: but it was
still the vivifying breath of Christian thought. When that
thought fell upon the barbarism of the middle ages, it
found no method of exposition or instruction other than
the philosophy of Aristotle. We know what this became
in the hands of his interpreters of the Sorbonne and of the
universities of the middle ages. The name Schoolman
tells the whole story of distinctions, divisions and ver
bal discussions. If doctors, such as St. Anselm and St.
Thomas, were able to maintain Christian thought in its high
import, it was because both had a spirit sufficiently high
and sufficiently deep to comprehend whatever in the genius
of Plato and Aristotle is most like that thought. Yet we
may question if the extremely Aristotelian philosophy of
St. Thomas would have been to the liking of Paul, of John,
and of the fathers of the church. We will not speak of
* In the last line of Art. VI. (p. 181), of last number, strike out the word
“not,” and read “ could easily accommodate itself.”
�The Old and the New Christianity.
241
Christ himself, who never let slip an occasion to show his
antipathy to every kind of scholasticism. If he would not
have driven from his church the respectable doctors of the
Sorbonne, as he did the traffickers of the temple, we may
believe that the author of the Sermon on the Mount would
not have set foot in schools of this sort, where the spirit of
his teaching was scarcely better kept than the letter.
There is surely a great difference between the teaching
of the gospels and epistles and scholastic theology ; but per
haps a still greater between the primitive church and the
Catholic church governed by the court of Rome. While
reading the historians of Christianity, and particularly M.
Renan, we naturally picture to ourselves those happy and
charming little Christian societies, with such free manners,
such active faith, such simple practice, in comparisonOth
the strong and minute discipline, the mute and passive obe
dience, which characterize the government of our great
Catholic societies of the middle ages. The truth is that the
rising Christianity had no more an organized church than it
had a fixed set of doctrines. It is subject to the same law
as all things which are of this world, or exist in it: it was
obliged to be formed before developing, and to be developed
before organizing. The blessed anarchy of the first Chris
tian societies may be envied by liberal believers as the ideal
of religious societies in the largest acceptation of the word;
but at that time this religious condition was rather the
effect of a provisional historic necessity, than of a welldetermined theory upon the free action of the religious
conscience. As soon as Christian society had attained some
little degree of development and multiplied the number of
its churches, it experienced the need of a more exact disci
pline and of some kind of central government. When
Christianity became under Constantine the religion of the
empire, the bishops were already exercising an actual
authority over the consciences of the faithful. It is to be
observed that the councils, save that at Jerusalem, which
was little more than a name, began to assemble from this
�242
The Old and the New Christianity.
time, under the more or less imperious patronage of the
Ceesars of Byzantium—a circumstance very perilous to thb
independence of the church. Religious monarchy was a
necessity of the times. If it had not had as a head a pope
at Rome, it would have had one in the emperors at Con
stantinople. We see this clearly later in the examples of
the Eastern and of the Russian church, the one being sub
ject to the Caesars of the Lower Empire, the other to the
czars of Moscow and St. Petersburg. All the emperors of
Constantinople, from Constantine down, set about dogma
tising. He allows himself to condemn Arius, although
later he embraced his doctrines ; and in what terms does he
condemn him? “ Constantine, the conqueror, the great,
the august, to the bishops and people of Judea: Arius
must be branded with infamy.” There is nothing more
curious than his letter to the two great opponents in the
Council of Nicoea. “ I know what your dispute is. You,
patriarch, question your priests in regard to what each
thinks about some test of the law or other trifling question.
You, priest, proclaim what you never ought to have
thoughtjor rather what you should have been silent
upon. The inquiry and response are equally useless:
All that is well enough to pass the time or exercise
the ingenuity, but should never reach the ears of the
common people. Pardon each other then the impru
dence of the question and the unsuitableness of the
reply.” Does not this suggest a Romish priest shutting the
mouth of two complaining parties ? His son, Constantins,
speaks even more freely : “ What part of the universe
are you,” writes he to Liberius,. bishop of Rome, “ you
who alone take the part of an unprincipled wretch (Atha
nasius), and break the peace of the world and of the
empire ?”
The establishment of the discipline and organization of
the church were the work of the councils presided over by
the popes, while the government of Christendom was the
peculiar function of papacy. The adversaries of that insti
�The Old and the New Christianity.
243
tution have seen in it only the advent of a monarchial gov
ernment succeeding a sort of democratic and republican
organization of the primitive church. They have not suffi
ciently comprehended that it was also a necessary and
urgent guarantee of the independence of the Christian
church, which, to triumph more easily and quickly over
paganism, had placed itself under the hand of imperial
despotism. If religious liberty of conscience was to suffer
later from the autocracy of the court of Rome, inspired
more by traditional policy and diplomacy than by the
thoughts and feelings of the true religion of Christ, the lib
erty of the church was then and always that of an establish
ment which, in raising the bishop of Rome above all the
others and giving to him for a see the ancient capital of the
known world, freed the management of spiritual affairs from
the yoke of political powers, whatever they might be, mon
archical, aristocratic or democratic. However, the trans
formation of the Christian church was complete. If any
one wishes to judge what ground has been gone over from
primitive Christianity down to present Catholicism, let him
compare the council of Jerusalem with the council of 1869,
where, they say, is at length to be proclaimed the dogma of
the personal infallibility of the sovereign pontiff in the per
son of Pius IX, and consequently the principle of absolute
monarchy applied to the government of a spiritual society
is to be fully realized: an admirable completion to the edi
fice, of which the founder could hardly have dreamed, nor
indeed his first apostles !
Such, in substance, is the history of Christianity from its
advent down to the middle ages. It is very difficult to see
only the word, the hand and the spirit of God in the devel
opment of an institution where error, darkness, superstition,
and persecution have too large a part to prevent traces of
human infirmity being manifest even in dogma. But, in
whatever manner one explains this history, whether he
only considers human causes according to the philosophic
method, or brings in supernatural causes according to the
�244
The, Old and the New Christianity.
theological method, it is a constant fact that Christianity
has obeyed, in its development on the theatre of time and
space, the law of all human institutions, that it has passed,
in doctrine and government, through all the phases of
things which spring up, grow, become organized and defi
nitely established. After having followed it in the move
ment of expansion which takes it continually farther from
its origin, it remains for us to follow it in the movement of
return, which is constantly bringing it back under the
influence of modern times.
HI.
We are about the middle of the fifteenth century, after
the taking of Constantinople. The Roman church no longer
finds in its peculiar world either heresy or resistance. Doc
trine has been for a long time fixed. The teaching of
doctrine is regulated in its least details in accordance with
the scholastic method. Discipline itself is organized and
regulated in its most minute prescriptions. The Catholic
communion resembles an immense army .which moves or
stops, fights or rests, on the orders of its commanders.
Woe to him who speaks, thinks or prays other than as the
formulary directs. Silence even is suspected among those
of whom the church expects a complete confession or a pro
fession of faith. Nothing is more imposing than this silent,
absolute, infallible, government of consciences, where the
word of command as soon as uttered by the mouth of one
man is reechoed in the most remote parts of the Christian
world, without a single voice being able to protest. And
as if that discipline were not sufficient, the court of Rome
has its indefatigable police of the inquisition, to seek out
and denounce the crimes of heresy and sorcery to pitiless
judges, who condemned to the stake thousands of victims.
Suddenly the star of the renaissance rises upon this world,
and driving away the last traces of the darkness of the mid
dle ages, floods with light the dawn of modern societies.
Before the arts and sciences of antiquity, Gothic art and
�The Old and the New Christianity.
245
scholastic science fall into disrepute. And it 19 not the
learned and lettered world alone which receives, admires,
yea, gazes with unbounded delight upon these marvelous
works of classic accuracy, of material grace, of strong
thought, of exquisite taste, of incomparable language,
whose secret the human mind seemed to have lost; it is
also the religious world, it is especially the court of Rome
and its foremost Italian dignitaries.
We cannot positively say that the renaissance caused the
reform. Protestantism, we must not forgetlwas born of a
simple administrative question, the granting of indulgences :
confining itself to a change of discipline, it kept the doc
trines almost without alteration. The great reform which
it accomplished was, to free the religious conscience from
the tutelage which weighed so heavily upon it, and which
left it no initiative, either of thought or of sentiment,
before the word of God interpreted and formally uttered by
the authority of the church. Now every thing was there,
at least in principle. What matter that the new religion
did not touch the credo, if all doctrine was henceforth
wholly subject to a free interpretation of the Scriptures by
the reason and conscience of believers ? Doubtless, as there
is no church without authority, the reformed church had,
also on its part, a council and creed in the Augsburg con
fession; but the principle of individual initiative had been
so affirmed before the contrary principle of official author
ity, that no effort of Protestant orthodoxy, if this expression
may be applied to the reformation, could arrest its course,
even in the lifetime of the great reformers. The door was
open to liberty in matters of faith. The future was to show
that no necessity of discipline could close it: but for the
moment, if we only consider its doctrinal bearing, the
reform was confined to a very slight simplification of
dogma. The worship of saints, worship of the Virgin,
adoration of relics, in fine, the most serious of all, the
eucharist, were the principal objects of reform in what con
cerned dogma, purely so called. Luther was not only a fer
�246
I
The Old and the New Christianity.
vent Christian, he was a consummate theologian, who
would not hear to any one’s touching the holy ark of doc
trine. He was more convinced than Leo X. and the gay
wits of his court of the justice of eternal punishment, of
the efficacy of grace, of the predestination of the elect and
the damned, of the existence and puissance of the devil, of
the wily power of sorcerers, of the real presence of Jesus
Christ in the host. The boldest thing the reform did in
the way of doctrine, was the substitution of consubstantiation
for transubstantiation in the sacrament of the eucharist,
attempting thus to reconcile the preservation of the mate
rial substance with the presence of the divine person. The
court of Rome did not take fire, as Calvin did, on the ques
tion of heresies, and if it still allowed heretics, like Bruno
and Vanini, to be burned by the tribunals of the inexora
ble inquisition, we cannot think it was done with as much
zeal as Calvin manifested in the trial of Michse’. Servetus. In
religious matters, it no longer showed much wrath or en
thusiasm; its passion was elsewhere.
The leading thought of the reform was quite other than
that ofencroaching upon dogma. The spirit which gave
rise to it was too Christian to touch any thing but the
organization of the church. The religious faith of the
people whom the voice of Luther had won over, demanded
nothing more. The natural sciences were not yet born,
and philosophy was still given over to scholastic disputes,
or engaged in the subtle commentaries of the: learned upon
the books of antiquity. Christian dogma, such as the Old
and New Testament had made it,—Alexandrian theology
and scholastic theology,—had not yet been positively contra
dicted, either by the revelations of the natural and the his
toric sciences, or by the interior revelations of the modern
conscience. Beside, in emancipating the conscience, the
reformation reanimated and strengthened Christian thought,
stifled by scholasticism or enervated by the renaissance.
The faith of the new believers went back to the doctrines of
Paul, which the wholly practical sense of the Roman church
�The Old and the New Christianity.
247
had modified, and even to the Old Testament theology.
Luther and Calvin took up again with a vigor and a harsh
ness which the Catholic church seemed to have forgotten,
the doctrines of necessity, of omnipotent grace, of the stern
justice of a powerful God, mild toward the just, terrible to
his enemies.
But when light had begun to be thrown upon philosophy
by the progress of the material sciences, upon conscience
by the progress of moral science, the spirit of reform in the
Christian world was obliged to attack dogma itself, and it
cut off from it as useless every thing which hindered it
from accommodating itself to modern science and con
science. How could they indeed preserve that barbarous
theology of the Old Testament, which confounds in its''
cruel justice, the Bible says in its vengeance, children with
fathers, the innocent with the guilty ? How keep that psy
chology and those moral principles of Paul which make of
sin a question of species and not of individuals, and which
take away from man all the merit of his works by attribut
ing it to God ? How take literally the miracles and other
facts of Biblical history before the scientific revelation of
the immutable laws of nature? And was it not becoming
very difficult to preserve that mysterious theology of the
Nicsean creed when already all high metaphysical specula
tion was falling into discredit ? Was it possible to this
heavy ship of scholastic Christianity to sail in the new
waters of a sea as strong as the modern world, if a way
was not found of lightening its weight and simplifying its
means of locomotion ? The new Christianity was then
obliged to abandon all the cosmogony and a considerable
part of the theology of the old Bible, the fundamental dog
mas of Paul s teaching, and, at last, the great mysteries of
the divine nature, which it found, if not in opposition, at
least useless to a healthy religious life. Let us render jus
tice to the clear and resolute spirit of the eighteenth cen
tury. It attempted little subtilizing or equivocating with
texts : it loyally made the sacrifice of every part of Chris-
�248
The Old and the New Christianity.
tian dogma which was found in contradiction with experi
ence, history, reason, conscience, preserving scarcely any
thing of it except that which constitutes its truth and
worth. When Kant, Lessing, and later, Schleiermacher,
and all that great school of German theology speak
of Christianity, it is almost always in that sense. Their
Christianity is that which sustains, fortifies, purifies and
consoles the soul, much rather than that which engages the
intellect in the mysterious depths of its metaphysics, or
fetters the will in the bonds of its discipline. In that, this
school has largely opened the way to the Christianity which
later was to push forward the reform movement to the
entire suppression of dogma, by preserving only morality,
and morality, too, reduced to the ideal of the life and the
teaching of Christ. Such seems also to have been the
spirit, if not the explicit teaching of the generous part of
the French clergy who embraced the principles and hopes
of the revolution. It was by attaching themselves to the
moral and purely evangelical side of doctrine, that priests
like Faucher and Gregory wished to reconcile Christianity
with the principle^ of reason, of liberty, of justice, of fra
ternity, which that revolution had inscribed upon its pro
gramme. In this sense, it is just to say that the eighteenth
century remained Christian while ceasing to be Catholic,
and that over that part of society which was won by philoso
phy, religion still preserved a certain sway.
This work of simplification which was already bringing
back dogma to its source, was arrested, at the opening of
the nineteenth century, by a wholly opposite movement,
whose aim, on the contrary, was the complete reinstatement
of Christian thought in modern science and philosophy.
The eclecticism of that epoch exerted itself everywhere, in
England, and in France, as well as in Germany, to show,
by an ingenious method of interpretations and explanations,
that all science and all philosophy were at least in germ in
Christianity; all was, to rightly interpret the texts. So
Genesis was harmonized with the geology of certain Eng-
�The Old and the New Christianity.
249
lish savang, the Kicene creed had a place in the metaphysics
of Schelling and Hegel, and the hard doctrines of Saint
Paul themselves, found their explanation and fortification
in the mystic philosophy of certain contemporary schools.
The learned world was quite astonished to learn that there
was a Christian astronomy, geology and history, just as
there was a theology and a morality with this name. Indeed
all the sciences took a peculiar aspect from the new point of
view in which the eclectics of those times placed themselves.
This method had at first great success, thanks to the genius
of the men and the disposition of the times; but this suc
cess could be only ephemeral, because such a manner of
procedure was contrary to the true spirit of the nineteenth
century, a critical spirit, if any ever were so. Besides, the
method was not new: it has a well known name in the
philosophic and religious history of the human mind. Neoplatism had attempted it for paganism with an ardor, a per
severance, a brilliancy, a positive failure, which we need not
recall. For a century like ours, so severe in its methods, so
well informed in natural and historical facts, this kind of
speculation was not science, it was something which savored
now of mystic dreaming, now of political compromise, or
again of Alexandrian exegesis.
This eclecticism was a pure accident, in spite of all the
appearances of reality ! The law which governs the mod
ern history of Christianity, soon resumed its sway I the
progress of purification and simplification grew more and
more pronounced; criticism breathed upon these scaffoldings
so laboriously and sometimes so artistically constructed.
Sober science would no longer lendlitself to that which it
must regard as a play of wits, if not the illusion of a liberal
faith desiring to be of its century at the same time as of its
church. The spirit of reform which fashions the ChrisWn
societies of to-day no longer loses its time and its genius in
reconciling contradictions or confounding differences. With
a firm and bold hand, the doctors which itlnspires separate,
in Christianity, morality from dogma; that is, in their
VOL. I.—NO. 3.
4
�250
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The Old and the New Christianity.
understanding, the true from the actual, the essential from
the accidental, the eternal and immutable from the tempo
rary and variable. To the history of the past, they refer
all the details of dogma properly so called, from Paulinian
and Alexandrian theology to scholastic theology, keeping
only what in their eyes constitutes the basis, the essence,
the very spirit of Christianity, the mild and lofty teaching
of Jesus. And yet, as it is difficult not to find in that teach
ing, so pure and perfect, some indications which recall the
narrow genius of the people to whom the Christ belongs,
the doctors of liberal Christianity refer their religion to the
ideal rather than to the evangelical reality, and, without
denying the latter, preserve of the legend only the figure of
a Christ truly divine, in that he has no longer anything in
common with the sufferings of humanity. Suppose that
Christ really was the man of whom the gospels tell us, the
school, or, if you please, the church of which we speak,
does not make of this an essential point of its religion. The
ideal suffices for it, and, not finding a richer and higher one
in the modern conscience, it proposes it to the faith of the
present, to the faith of the future, as the ideal itself of the
human conscience.
Jfo one has better defined this Christianity than Mr. F.
Pecaut, one of its most noble and most serious doctors.
“ It is not,” he says, “ that we attach to this name of Chris
tians a superstitious value or a sort of magic virtue ; but,
whether we will it or not, our moral and religious ideal is
in its essential features the same as the ideal of Jesus, and
we are his posterity. . . . The ineffaceable glory of the
gospel, its immortal attraction, is always its being the good
news, the news of grace, of the spirit of life which assures
us of the love of God, and frees us from the servitude of
remorse and evil. That is a revelation appealed to by the
human soul, and consequently written on its inmost tablets:
the seers attempt to read it in themselves, and from age to
age they are learning among various peoples to decipher the
name of the Father, until Jesus, by pronouncing it loudly,
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251
makes the old earth, weary of long efforts, leap with exceed,
ing j°y« Hence, as from a generous spring, escape in rivu
lets of living water the best sentiments which are henceforth
to render fruitful Christian civilization, humility, confi
dence, unwavering hope, innate dignity, devotion towards
even the wicked. Does any one to-day conceive of a relig
ious idea superior to that ? Who would wish to repudiate
it? who would dare to deprive his brothers of it, and to
deprive himself of it ? It is the very depth of ourselves
so humane, so natural, but so deep and so uncomfortable
for the profane eye to read, that men in their exuberant
delight have believed it supernatural and superhuman.”
This is why the liberal Christian takes his place in the
school of Jesus: not of Jesus the Messiah, the eternal
Word, the second person of the Trinity, but of Jesus, the
Son of man, the gentle and humble-hearted master who
gives repose to the soul, the master whom love of the
Father and tenderness for the least of his brothers raised to
such a moral height that he felt himself the beloved son of
whom the heavenly Father had no secrets in pure, good
and holy things. Such is the true, the eternal Jesus, he
who founded religion upon conscience and opened to
humanity the gates of the celestial city. Is it the spirit of
God which speaks by that mouth, or the spirit of Satan, as
the Roman Church has it? If Christian sentiment is not
there, where then is it ? If this is not the language of the
true children of God, where shall we find it ? As to us,
whom people accuse, it is true, of having a somewhat large
measure in this sort of things, we believe that there are
many ways of being Christian. One may be so according
to the spirit or according to the letter. He may be so with
Jesus, with Paul, with John, with the Alexandrian theo
logians, with the doctors in the Sorbonne, with all tradition,
as the Catholic Ghurch directs. Does it not seem that to
be Christian with Christ alone, receiving inspiration only
from his spirit and his example, is to be it in the best, the most
Christian manner? If any one says that it is only chosen
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The Old and the New Christianity.
souls essentially religious for whom such an inspiration can
suffice for living in Christianity, and that, as 1o the rest, all
the formality of dogma and traditional discipline is neces
sary, we do not deny it. Upon this ground, many ways of
looking at the matter may be reconciled. What appears to
us harsh and almost odious, is the intolerance of the friends
of the letter towards the friends of the spirit, so that it is pos
sible to say that in drawing near the hearth of every relig
ious faith, the soul of Christ, in order to receive more and
more warmth, life and purification, we get farther away
from the religion of Christ.
Like doctrine, like church: absolute liberty under the
law, or rather under the spirit of Christ. Where there is
no longer dogma, to speak strictly, there can no longer be
discipline and government. Every believer is his own
priest, as his true Bible is his own conscience enlightened
by the light of the gospel ideal. In fact, it is not a church,
but a society of the believers who instruct, guide and help
each other; it is indeed the communion of brothers of the
free spirit in the most modern acceptation of the phrase.
From whatever source the spirit breathes, it is always wel
come; they receive it and become penetrated with it with
out demanding of those inspired any other title to the confi
dence of all than the excellence of their nature or the supe
riority of their wisdom. As to the Scriptures, for this new
church, every grand or fine book is a bible; it is sufficient
if it answers to what is most pure and holy in the conscience
of each one. It is indeed always the soul of Christ which
makes the religious life of the new Christians; but between
it and them there is no intermediate agent, no traditional
teaching, no authority which imposes its decisions. It is
not enough to say, no more pope; no more councils, they
say, no more synods, no more creeds, even if agreed upon
by all. It is the reign of that divine anarchy of which the
primitive church had been only a very feeble image, and
wThich is the ideal itse f of every truly spiritual communion.
�The Old and the New Christianity.
253
IV.
We see what Christianity becomes by simplification after
simplification, from the reformation down to our time, just
as we saw what it become by complication after complica
tion, from its advent to the reformation. This double spec
tacle gives rise to quite difibrent reflexions, according as one
contemplates it as an orthodox Christian, a liberal Chris
tian, or a historian. Where the orthodox Christian finds
only subject for admiration in the ancient period of the his
tory of that religion, and for regret in the second period,
where the liberal Christian, on the contrary, has only regrets
for the one and hopes for the other, the philosophical histo
rian undertakes to comprehend and explain whatever is
necessary in the double movement, in a sense contrary to
religious thought. With the orthodox Christian, he accepts
the entire dogma, no longer as one single and same revela
tion of which all the parts are equally in conformity to the
ideal itself of Christianity, but as a succession of doctrines
corresponding each to a historical fatality of its existence.
Leaving to the liberal believer the ideal point of view, and
himself, in his quality of historian, holding to the point of
view of actual fact, he finds that Christianity, in respect to
the condition of the society it was to conquer, could do it
only by accommodating itself to the instincts, needs, habits
and necessities of human nature, at any particular moment
of its history. Thus he comprehends how, to become a relig
ion in the positive sense of the word, it was necessary that
Christianity pass from the morality of Jesus to the theology
of Paul; how, to become the religion of the most metaphys
ical and most mystical part of ancient society, it was neces
sary for it to pass from the teaching of Paul to the high the
ology of the gospel of John and of the Nicene Creed. So,
at length, he comprehends that, to become the religion of
the middle ages, it has been obliged to descend from these
speculative heights to the practical necessities of a disci
pline as minute as rigorous. Like all the institutions whose
development history shows, Christianity did not have the
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The Old and the New Christianity.
choice of means in extending, establishing and preserving
itself. Whatever were its origin and its peculiar genius, it
had no more freedom of conduct than any other human
institution. It could not escape the law which regulates the
development of everything in time and space; the ideal is
realized only on conditions which do not always permit it
to maintain the purity of its principle or of its origin. Thus
the philosophic historian finds himself in harmony with the
orthodox Christian upon the legitimacy of the dogmas and
institutions with which primitive Christianity enriched
itself or complicated itself, as one may choose to call it.
But he is in harmony with the liberal Christian in quite a
different way. Here it is no more historical necessity that
he has in view, it is the light itself of the idea which makes
him know where he is in the quite opposite religious move
ment which has been in progress since the end of the
middle ages down to our time. The necessity, if this word
may be employed, of the progress which is elevating the
religion of Christ, fallen in the darkness and barbarity of
the middle ages, is no longer an exterior and material law
of reality ; it is an interior and wholly spiritual law of the
idea, which, finding a nature better and better prepared,
whether in individuals or in societies of modern times,
develops itself more and more freely, realizes itself more
and more completely, in proportion as-it feels itself better
sustained by the state of civilization which corresponds to
its expansion. Consequently, without sharing the regrets
of the liberal Christian in all that concerns the past, the
philosophic historian comprehends and judges as a continual
progress, in the literal sense of the word, the work of puri
fication and simplification which is going on in Christian
souls and churches since the renaissance, which restores
liberty to religious faith by the reformation of Luther, and
which is freeing the teaching of Christ from either the subtilties of the Alexandrian creed, or the severity of Paulinian
dogma, to show it to the modern world in all the purity of
its light and in all the power of its worth. If he cannot be
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255
hostile or even indifferent to the history of dogmas and
institutions which have served in the establishment of
Christianity, how much more will he be in sympathy with
the history of the struggles maintained aud efforts attempted
in order to free it from the fett'ers that weigh upon it to-day,
and to bring it back to this high ideal of every truly Chris
tian conscience, which, in certain quarters, is confounded
with the ideal itself of the modern conscience !
What will be the future of liberal Christianity in the pres
ent societies ? If the question were only concerning some
particular reform, attempted by certain men, at some given
time, in view of creating a certain church, all foresight
would be rash. What have become of all the reforms so
ardently preached by the reverend Catholics of our country
who wished to shake off the yoke of Roman discipline or of
scholastic theology ? We know the fruitless efforts
attempted with this intent by Lamennais, Buchez, BordasDumoulin, and Huet. What will become of the movement
of which the apostles of liberal Protestantism have consti
tuted themselves the promoters ? It seems as if everything
concurs for the success of such an enterprise, the devotion
of the men, the favor of circumstances, the essentially popu
lar simplicity of the teaching. Is not this the religion of
those simple in heart and spirit, as Jesus taught it to the
people of Galilee ? In it, appeal is not made to theology,
to metaphysics, to erudition, or to criticism ; it is made only
to conscience, which alone must respond. In perceiving
and loving, all the new Christianity lies; feeling the inner
truths, the heart truths, that is, the beautiful, the just and
the good, and loving them in the person of Christ.
We are not of those whom the passion for pure philos
ophy would render indifferent to such a progress of the
religious life. It is a beautiful idea to make the name of
Christ-the symbol of human conscience, and to surround
the popular teaching of morality with the aureole of such a
tradition. We shall not make so soon a philosophic human
ity. If we could produce such a religious humanity, does
�TC-
256
The Old and the New Christianity.
it not seem as if philosophy might patiently await the day
of its complete triumph, if it is ever to come? What a
dream is that of the liberal Christians ! Christianity appears
to them like the tree which was to cover the world and can
yet do so. This tree, planted at Golgotha for the punish
ment of Jesus, watered with his blood, enveloped with the
divine benediction as with a vivifying atmosphere, left to
natural growth and grace from above, would have first
touched the heavens, and soon embraced the .world in the
universal expansion of its branches. The strong and
learned culture of a Paul, a John, of the Alexandrian fathers
and the scholastic doctors, makes of it the sturdy tree which
history gives us for contemplation, with roots taking deep
hold of the soil, a short and massive trunk, boughs clasped
and interlacing, a rough bark, an-d foliage so thick as to
intercept the rays of light. And as, with such a constitu
tion, the sap could not rise, it was obliged to betake itself
to the ends'of the branches, instead of concentrating itself at
the heart of the tree, to force it to its highest development.
And then, after the brilliant Alexandrian vegetation, after
the solid scholastic organization, either from lack of cir
culation or from a wrong direction of the sap, the tree
grows weak and bends under the weight of the branches
which pull it earthward; it covers the world of the middle
ages with a thick shadow under which everything grows
benumbed or sleeps. What did the reformation have to do
towards righting the tree and making it resume its growth
towards heaven ? To recall the sap to the trunk by lop
ping the dead branches and those too low. It is this work
begun by the first reformers, which liberal Christianity con
tinues, by disengaging the tree more and more from every
thing which prevents it from shooting heavenward. Thus
will it become the tree of life under which the religious
faith of humanity will find again the air, light and fragrance
which strengthen without intoxicating, which calm without
stupifying.
Will the dream become a reality? Only God and his
�The Old and the New Christianity.
257
prophets know; but there is one thing which three centu
ries of progress teach us with certainty; it is that the relig
ious world is on the way to the ideal dreamed of by its
freest children. Because some see it still in large majority
attached to dogma and its most minute details, they con
clude that it has not changed and will'not change, that the
orthodoxy of Rome, of Augsburg or of Geneva, holds it con
strained by its narrow formulas. It is an error. To any
one who looks into the matter closelySt is manifest that the
spirit is gaining light more and more in the Christian con
sciences of our times through the letter which so long
pressed it down. If any one wishes to judge of the im
portance of the religious movement which is going on in
the midst of modern societies, he must not form his opinion
from the bold enterprises which suddeily burst forth and
come to nothing; he must follow the slow and sure evolu
tion taking place in the souls in appearance the most in
bondage to the letter. Everything has kept its position,
everything appears equally firm in Christian dogma as
authority imposes it on its believers; but there is only one
place, even in the Catholiq world, where one does not see
that it has its dead and its living partsk that these latter
alone constitute its worth and can assure its future. Alas
for him, especially in these times, who forgets that the let
ter kills and the spirit gives life! It seems that the true
genius of the new times equally escapes the conservatives
who cling to the past and the men who would revolution
ize the future, to see the illusion of the former and the dis
couragements in store for the latter. Our age has, at the
same time, a liking for tradition and for progress. It
remains faithful to the one by'keeping the letter; it serves
the other by being inspired with the spirit. It is plain that
it is more and more out of conceit with and mistrusts theat
rical strokes and the sudden changes of scene called revolu
tions in the history of human societies. Evolution is what
it would appear is to be the preferred form of modern pro
gress. We do not know what the future reserves for the
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The Old and the New Christianity.
religious world. We see indeed liberal Christianity
redouble its efforts and extend its conquests ; we see it in
America, with Channing, Parker and their disciples, draw
crowds and found new churches; we see it in Europe radi
ate in all the great centres of religious life, at Paris, at
Strasburg, at Geneva, the city of Calvin, at London, at
Berlin, at Florence. We should not be surprised, neverthe
less, if this movement did not descend from the high and
free society of the sons of the spirit into the depths of the
religious world, and if the immense majority of Catholic
or Protestant Christians kept the formulas of orthodoxy,
while gaining light from science and becoming penetrated
by the sentiments of modern conscience.
It would be rash in us to pry into the Catholic and
Christian consciences of our times, and pretend to see into
them more clearly than the believers themselves; but it
seems to us that their faith is no longer all of one kind as
in the past. The faith of our fathers in the middle ages,
and even in the first centuries of modern times, embraced
all its articles of dogma in one single affirmation, invincible
and absolute; nothing in it then either wounded the con
science or revolted against reason. To-day there is taking
place, asfit were without its knowledge, a distinction, if not
a separation, in the depth of the religious conscience.
Everything is accepted which the authority of the church
imposes; but people make really two parts of the subject
matter of tradition, one comprehending everything which
no longer answers to the reason, science, or conscience of
ourBime; the other, one whose eternal and universal truth
will never be behind the progress of modern civilization.
Surely no one can call himself Catholic if he does not sin
cerely profess a belief in eternal punishment, in the resur
rection of the body, in original sin, in the mystery of a God
three in one, and even in many other dogmas of less
importance; but how many believers attach to these things
true faith, the faith of the feeling? They believe in them
because it is the law of the church; but the heart of the
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259
Christian is elsewhere, it is in those ideas of purity, of
justice, of fraternity, of love, which the evangelical teaching
breathes, and which the believer finds in the newest inspi
rations of the modern conscience. This is, if not the only
faith., at least the living one of the religious souls of our
time; the other is only a traditional faith which people
affirm, and will perhaps always affirm, but which they do
not feel alive in their hearts.
Such are those revolutions, which are no more understood
at Rome to-diy than they were in the time of Luther, which
indeed cannot be understood there, because Rome is the
seat of Romanism, rather than of Christianity. The saying
is from the duke of Orleans, and has a yet wider applica
tion than he who let it escape in a moment of discourage
ment intended.
“ Ta regere imperio populos, Romane, memento.” The
verse of the poet is still true. Christian Rome has always
left theology to the doctors of the universities and of the
religious orders, keeping for herself the science of canonical
law and the art of governing. Unfortunately for her,
neither that deep science nor that consummate art are suffi
cient to direct the Christian world in present circumstances.
It is with the religious democracy as with political democ
racy; in order to live they both want more and more
freedom and light, less and less discipline and government.
At the very moment when civilized society aspires to
govern itself, the Romish church reaches the most absolute
formula of personal government. One need not be a pro
phet to predict that such a regime will no more be the law
of the religious than of the political societies of the future.
The spiri-t of liberal Christianity will prevail over the
wholly political genius of Roman Catholicism, not by a
schism, which is not created in a time of so little zeal for
questions of dogma, but by a slow and continued trans
formation of the religious conscience, tending more and
more to conformity with the moral conscience of modern
society. When Protestants like M. de Pressense, when
�I
i
■I
J
I
260
I
The Old and the New Christianity.
Catholics like MM. Dupanloup and Gratry, come to take
for their own church the name even of liberal Chris
tianity, which -is the symbol of the boldest reforms of the
day, we feel that the court of Rome cannot stop the course
of religious thought. In freedom and by freedom was the
great battle of Christianity fought and won in its heroic
age, even in spite of oppression and persecution from with
out. I know no other means of reconquering the world
to-day.” (De Pressense, Hist, des Trois Siecles de l’Eg. Ch.)
Rome is not of this opinion. There are indeed many
degrees in liberal Christianity; the liberty of the Catholics
cannot have such a career as that of Protestants; but Rome,
which understands discipline, comprehends them all in that
universal malady called the spirit of the age, not perceiving
that the true danger which threatens its church to-day, is
the lethargic sleep of a passive and servile faith. It is said
that it is not the freethinkers that cause it the most discom
fort at this time; we readily believe it, and so much the
more as it has never had a taste either for the mystic the
ology or for the scholastic science of these barbarians of the
AVest, for the Germans or the Gauls of any times, which
seem to it to continually wish to go up to the assault of the
Capitol. When Italian finesse does not smile at it, it is
uneasy about it, knowing by a long experience how much
the erudition of the former and the eloqence of the latter
interfere with or trouble her in the manceuvers of her skill
ful diplomacy. They are as children to that great mistress
in the art of governing, but terrible children whose too
violent love for the church of Christ has more than once
agitated and shaken the church of Rome. Such is its mistrust
ot discussion, that, from the advent of modern times, it has
not felt the need of rallying around it the highest lights and
the best forces it found in its own bosom, and that, for its
great combat against the modern spirit, it has counted on
the Inquisition, on the Jesuits, on the favor of princes, on
the adroitness and patience of its diplomacy, on everything,
in short, except the councils. Trusting only to her own
�The Story of a Damned Soul.
261
wisdom, for more than three centuries Rome has governed
and administered her empire without their co-operation,
and now that she has just assembled one, it is to have a
dogma proclaimed which henceforth strikes the institution
with impotence. Then, hearing no longer those disagree
able contradictions which are to have their last echo in the
present assembly, she will be able to live or to sleep in
peace, like the bird which hides its head under its wing at
the approach of the enemy. The fact is, Rome does not
like noisy outbursts, even from the writers and orators
which defend its cause. What it likes, is neither the great
heart of a Lamennais, nor the generous soul of a Lacordaire,
nor the noble and liberal spirit of a Montalembert, nor the
broad and high preaching of a Father Hyacinthe, nor the
fiery polemics of a Gratry, nor the calm dialectics of a
Maret, nor the beautiful and strong eloquence of a Dupanloup, nor, above all, the somewhat worldly wisdom of a
Darboy, nor even the acrimonious temper and satirical spirit
of a Veuillot; it is mute obedience among all its subjects,
without any distinction of character or talent. But, if the
great satisfaction of being mistress of her own house costs
her the dominion of the Catholic world, Rome will have
met the fate of all powers which do not comprehend that
henceforth in liberty alone is the security of all authority.
E. Vacherot.
Article XI.—The Story of'a Damned Soul.
The Examiner and Chronicle, the leading Baptist journal
of the country, calls us to account for the interpretation
put by us upon a passage of Bickersteth’s “Yesterday,
To-day, and Forever,” which we took to refer to Theodore
Parker. Our critic is quite right. The “ Theodore ” of
Mr. Bickersteth’s epic is a Roman youth, the son of a
Christian mother, who, for the love of a pagan girl, goes
over to his father’s paganism, and is soon after killed in
battle, and as particularly and painfully damned, as if the
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The Story of a Damned Soul.
existence of God Almighty depended on it. We confess
to having misinterpreted Mr. Bickersteth, and now propose
to make amends by giving him, and our critic above named,
the benefit, first, of our explanation and apology, and second,
of a reproduction of the story of Theodore’s eternal dam
nation.
The intense anxiety of orthodoxy to get Theodore Parker
fast and sure in hell, was so great, even before Mr. Parker’s
death, as to break out in a prayer-meeting devoted to the
purpose of stirring up Jehovah to give instant attention to
the business. The recollection of this, suggested to us that
Mr. Bickersteth, whose whole work shows him entirely
capable of such a thing, had taken occasion to give assurance
that orthodox desires had been attended to. We had read
his horrible poem all the way from the account of creation
to the end, and could neither recall, nor discover upon
examination, any clue to the meaning of the “ Theodore ”
passage. We had missed the story of Theodore by not
reading one of the preliminary books, in which it comes in
as an episode, where Oriel tells how his first experience of
escorting a soul to hell was in the case of a youth by the
name of “ Theodore,” a youth of “ noble birth,” and “ high
and generous bearing,” whom he had “ fondly loved,” and
whom, nevertheless, he “ bore to his own place in yonder
realms of wrath.” We retract, therefore, the charge that
Mr. Bickersteth particularly and personally damned a
mighty enemy of orthodoxy. It was a generous youth, son
of a pagan father, and drawn, by fond human love of a
pagan girl, to depart from the faith his mother had educated
him in, whom the magnanimous singer of hell and damna
tion singled out for particular horrible mention. We
guessed wrong. Mr. Bickersteth did not strike at a great
heresiarch, to warn daring heretics; he struck at the
unconverted son of a pious mother, to warn a Mrs. Stowe,
and whoever thinks God may be pitiful to Christian mothers,
that inexorable hell cannot be so escaped, in any instance
whatever. We particularly beg pardon of the Examiner
�The Story of a Damned Soul.
263
and Chronicle for robbing its client of a portion of his elab
orately fiendish devotion to orthodoxy. It occurred to us,
when we found the poet saying, “Thus passed the centu
ries,” and then mentioning a name as having startled him,
because it was “ so familiar,” that he must refer to one of
his contemporaries, and we had no doubt that the intense
anxiety of the orthodox world to make sure of Theodore
Parker’s defeat on earth and damnation in hell, had found
convenient, disguised expression in Mr. Bickersteth’s vision.
Our secondary inference, that the mother was damned
with the son, is fully justified by the context of the passage.
“ Theodore is represented as stealing a hurried glance
“ upon a form
us,” with the thought, “ could it be his
mother ?” The Examiner and Chronicle says of our mistake
about the passage, “ All this comes of mistaking below us
(below Oriel and the poet-seer) for below him.” But in fact
the poem had described the damnation of the rebel angels
e
o
as going on below Oriel and the seer, so that
“ As their cry of piercing misery
“ From out that yawning gulf went up to heaven,
Standing upon its rugged edge, we gazed,
Intently and long, down after them;”
and immediately upon this, the lost of earth had been sum
moned to take their turn, whereupon Oriel, says the poet,
“ Spake,
“ With tears, of that which passed beneath, our feet”
The very next local allusion is the “ below us,” which tells
where Theodore saw his mother; and if “below us” is not
equivalent to “ beneath our feet,” which referred, two pages
before, to the damned, we do not understand plain language.
However, going back some seven thousand lines, to the
actual story of Theodore, it becomes plain that the poet
intended to show us how the son was damned to everlasting
hell, but the mother to everlasting heaven, and “ no breath
of useless prayer escaped his lips,” or her’s either. Will
�264
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the Examiner and Chronicle face the honest fact here, and
permit its readers to see that its poet’s lesson, in the dam
nation of Theodore, is blacker, a thousand fold, than the
one we mistakenly pointed out? Meanwhile we invite our
readers, who can stomach as blasphemous heathenism as
superstition ever fathered, to trace with us, in Mr. Bicker
steth’s sulphurous pages, the story of a pious mother’s
son particularly damned, for a sign to maternal love that
for the impenitent dead there is possible no other doom
than “ Gehenna’s burning, sulphurous waves.”
The angel attendant of the seer who tells the vast story
of Mr. Bickersteth’s poem, is called Oriel. He points out
to the seer the road to hell, and is asked whether he has
ever been there.
“ Oriel replied, with calm, unfaltering lip,
And with his words his countenance benign
Grew more and more severely beautiful;
The. beauty of triumphant holiness,
The calm, severity of burning love.”
Is not this exquisitely satanic in conception ? Oriel had
been to hell “ thrice,” and the recollection brings to his
countenance the calm severity of love, “burning to. the
lowest hell,” as the full phrase is. The occasion which
particularly comes to his mind was this :
“ The first
Of disembodied human souls I bore
To his own place in yonder realms of wrath,
Was one I fondly loved, of noble birth,
Of high and generous bearing.”
He was “ born of Christian mother,” the wife of a Roman
consul, who himself kept the old faith of his pagan fathers.
5
“ An aged priest baptized him Theodore,
God's <71/% his mother whispered. And thenceforth
She poured upon him, him her only child,
The priceless treasures of a mother’s heart.”
�The Story of a Damned Soul.
1
265
Oriel was his guardian angel, and relates that the boy’s
home,
9
“ Unlike
The moated fortress of a faithful house,
Was ever open to the spirits malign.”
That is to say, the father not being a saint, devils had con
stant access to the young Theodore! Nevertheless, if the
“ severely beautiful ” Oriel tells the truth, “ not an arrow
reached him.” Innate depravity alone was his ruin, says
the explicitely theological angel. And yet he seems to
ascribe to the father a malign influence;—
11 The mother teaching prayers the father mocked!
And yet her spell was earliest on her child,
And strongest. And the fearless Theodore
Was called by other men, and called himself,
A Christian. Love, emotion, gratitude,
All that was tenderest in a tender heart,
All most heroic in a hero’s soul,
Pleaded on Christ’s behalf.”
Theodore was trained to arms, and joined the army of
Constantine, in the struggle against Maxentius,
“ When it chanced,
In sack of a beleagured city, he saved
A Grecian maiden and her sire from death;
Her name Irene, his Iconocles;
Among the princes he a prince, of all
Fair women she the fairest of her race,
Not only for her symmetry of form,
But for the music and the love which breathed
In every motion and in every word.”
Theodore loved her, but his suit was met with the answer,
from Irene’s father,
“ Never shall my child be his
Who kneels before a malefactor’s cross,”
vol. i.—no. 3.
5
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The Story of a Damned Soul.
A determination approved by Irene, who was pagan enough
to abhor the idea of worshipping an undoubted man. The
odore struggled hard,“ now cleaving to his mother’s faith,’’
and “now driven from his anchorage.” “God’s Spirit
strove with him,” and unsuccessfully, says the accurately
Calvanistic Oriel, although he—Oriel —was good enough
to “ ward the powers of darkness off,” while “ the awful
fight was foughten, ’ and give God a fair chance with the
young man. The poet is determined to clearly reveal the
inability of the Heavenly Father (and the human mother)
to save this fine youth, even when Oriel vigilantly and
successfully warded off hellish fraud and violence.” The
bad heart of the youth brought him to this decision:
“ 11 cannot leave that spirit
Angelic in a human form enshrined.
She must be mine forever. Life were death
Without her.’ And straight entering, where she leaned
Upon her father, as white jasmine leans
On a dark pine, slowly, resolutely,
As measuring every word with fate, he said,
‘ Irene, if the choice be endless woe,
For thy sake I renounce my mother’s faith:
I cannot, will not leave thee. I am thine.’ ”
That night the three escaped to the army of Maxentius;
a “soldier’s spousal” was celebrated; and the morning
brought the fatal battle. Mr. Oriel relates, with calm
severity of damning love, that Theodore rose, a desperate,
maddened, hell-inspired blasphemer, “in his eye a wild,
disastrous fire,” and “ the tempest raging in his heart, and
went
Impetuously into the thickest fight,
And prodigies of valor wrought that day,
Felling beneath his fratricidal blade
Whole ranks, his comrades and his brethren, late
Brethren in faith and arms.”
We suspect Mr. Oriel here of being an arrant liar, and
�The Story of a Damned Soul.
267
wonder that the poet-seer did not bid him go “ squat like a
toad ” at the ear of Rev. J. D. Fulton, with this part of his
tale. But we will hear from him Theodore’s end:
£< An unknown arrow, not unfledged with prayer,
Transpierced his eye and brain. Sudden he fell;
One short, sharp cry; one strong, convulsive throe,
And in a moment his unhappy spirit
Was from its quivering tabernacle loosed.”
The first cry of the disembodied soul, says Oriel, was,—
“ Mother, where art thou, mother ? where am I ?”
a cry which Oriel answered by seizing his “ fondly loved ”
charge, with a stern announcement of orders from Almighty
Power to convey him to hell. Theodore was “ submissive,”
without “ lamentations,” and without “ proud reluctances
and vain despite,” as Oriel led him hellward. But as they
advanced on the dreadfully darkening way, and “the hope
less captive gazed a long, last gaze” upon sun and stars,
“ A groan brake from him, and he sobbed aloud—
4 My mother, oh 1 my mother, from thy love
I learned to love those silent orbs of light,
God’s watchers thou didst call them, as they peered,
Evening by evening, on my infant sleep,
And mingled with my every boyish dream:
Are they now shining on thy misery ?
Who, now that I am gone, will wipe thine eyes ?
Who, mother, bind thy bruised and broken heart ?’ ”
Oriel now states to Theodors that his mother, will think
he was slain a Christian and has gone to heaven, whereat
the doomed young man expresses feelings of which Oriel
says,
44 Never will this heart forget
The impress of the look he cast on me.
He had not wept before; but now a tear
Hung on his trembling lids, through which he looked
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The Story of a Damned Soul.
Such gratitude as utter hopelessness
May render, .... a look which said
‘ I thank thee as the damned alone can thank;
Lost as I am, hell will not be such hell,
The while my mother thinks of me in heaven.’ ”
At last “ the iron gates of hell ” are reached, after a march
of interminable horror, through a desolate ravine, in the
palpable darkness of which the radiance of Oriel’s form, as
we can readily believe, was but “ a faint and feeble torch.”
The “ adamantine doors ” receive their victim and his
escort; Oriel conducts Theodore to a barren mountain, and
“ God looked upon him,” with his “ dreadful eye,”— not
with its full hell power, but “ half eclipsed,” yet with such
severely loving effect that to the doomed man,
“ The very air he breathed
Seemed to his sense one universal flame
Of wrath, . . . H . . and a low wail
Ere long brake from those miserable lips—
‘ 0 God, and is this hell ? and must this last
Forever ? would I never had been born I
Why was I born ! I did not choose my birth.
0 Thou, who did’st create me, uncreate,
I pray Thee. By Thine own omnipotence
Quench Thou this feeble spark of life in me.
0 God destroy me. Grant this latest boon
Thy wretched, ruined child will ever ask,
And suffer me to be no more at all.’ ”
To this “ aimless, bootless prayer,” the quite contented
Oriel replies,
“ Thou cravest what Omnipotence can do,”
but wont do, because “ Omniscient Love decrees ” damna
tion,
“ And therefore vainly dost thou now invoke
Almighty Power to thwart All-Seeing Love.”
�✓
The Story of a Damned Soul.
269
Even the “free service” of God, “justice interdicts,”
that being “heaven’s perennial joy.” “ Hades knows no
other law ” than “ passive submission ” to damnation,
“And here there is no sentinel but Glod;
His Eye alone is jailer; and His Hand
The only executioner of wrath.”
With this pungent doctrine of Moloch, Oriel proposes to
leave Theodore, while he catches a glimpse, “permitted
him by God,” of Paradise, and is moved thereby to indulge
“ idle phantasies of hope,” which Oriel, mindful of Calvinistic problems, turns back to extinguish, “ in mere pity.”
Convinced thus that there is no hope for himself, Theodore
cries out,
,
'
“ But is there not a hope
For one I briefly, passionately loved ?
*******
Tell her, in mercy tell her where I am,
What suffering—what must suffer evermore :
It may be she will turn and live. And if,
Whene’er my mother’s pilgrimage is passed,
And she, entering the gates of bliss, shall search
Through every field of yonder Paradise,
To find her only son, and search in vain,
If then thou wilt but try and comfort her—■
What way I know not, but thou know’st—and should
Her restless eye intuitively glance
Towards this valley, instantly divert
Its gaze else wither, thou wilt have done all
I ask for, and far more than I deserve.”
To which the insensate, pitiless, damnation-contriving
Oriel replies,
“Thy prayers to thine own bosom must return.”
*******
“ I leave thee in thy just Creator’s hands.”
Fifteen centuries now passed, and Oriel received orders
�The Story of a Damned Soul.
270
from the Almighty to join an embassy sent forth to
“ traverse hell in all its length and breadth,” and announce
the near approach of the judgment day. Of this Oriel
says,
“First to that mountain valley, where I left
Lost Theodore, I bent my course. 0 God !
The solemn change which fifteen centuries
In hell had written on his fearful brow.”
The further description, and the elaborate speeches ex
changed, represent Theodore as entirely converted to high
Calvinism, and quite convinced that hell-fire,—the “ veilless
blaze” of the “Dreadful Eye,” which is to come after
the judgment, will be after all the greatest possible boon,
“repressing with flame the fertility ” of “ the ineradicable
germs of sin,” though never able to extinguish them. And
to this extraordinary exposition of the divine imbecility, or
indisposition, to eradicate sin, the judicious angel gave
Theodore no opportunity to reply, but sped on his way to
advise the hellions of the speedy Second Advent of the
Messiah, making expository remarks, as he went, vindicative
of hell in general, and of particular hell for the generous
youth to whom he had been guardian angel.
To follow the story we must turn now to the ninth book
of the poem, which is called “ The Bridal of the Lamb.”
Here we hear Messiah say,
“ Now is the day of vengeance in my heart,
And now the year of my redeemed is come; ”
and we behold
“ Messiah seated on a snow-white horse
Of fiery brightness, as the Lord of hosts,
Apparelled in a vesture dipped in blood.”
In due time the Last Judgment is at. hand, and the hosts
of darkness gather in one final conspiracy,
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271
“ When from the frowning heavens again that sound,
Which shook the first fell council of the damned,
More terrible than thunder, vibrated
Through every heart Jehovaffls awful laugh / ”
And now
“ Messiah spake again, His voice
Resounding from the jasper walls of heaven
To hell’s profoundest caves.
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
and' Death and Hell,
With dreadful throes and agonizing groans,
Disgorged their dead, the lost of every age,
In myriads, small and great confusedly.”
These are all brought back to earth to resume their
bodies, which were to be “ made fit to endure the terrors
of the wrath to come.” Then the book of life is read, and
the redeemed deceived to the right hand of the Judge.
The rebel angels are damned in order, ending with the
Arch-fiend, whose head Messiah crushes with “ his burning
heel.”
“ And for a space no sound was heard. But then
It seemed the crystal anpyr^m clave
Beneath them, and the horrid vacuum sucked
The devil and his armies down . . .
To bottomless perdition.”
After this the lost of mankind are summoned, and among
them is specially observed Theodore. Then
“ The Judge arising from his throne,
Bent on the countless multitudes convict
His vision of eternaBwrath, and spake
In tones which more than thousand thunders shook
The crumbling citadel of every heart,—
‘ Depart from Me, ye cursed, into fire,
For the devil and his hosts prepared,
Fire everlasting, fire unquenchable;
Myself have said it: let it be : Amen.’
*
*
*
*
Again the floor
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The Story of a Damned Soul.
Of solid crystal where the damned stood
Opened its mouth, immeasurable leagues;
And with a cry whose piercing echoes yet
Beat through the void of shoreless space, the lost
Helplessly, hopelessly, resistlessly,
Adown the inevitable fissure sank,
As sank before the ruined hosts of hell,
Still down, still ever down, from deep to deep,
Into the outer darkness, till at last
The fiery gulf received them, and they plunged
Beneath Gehenna’s burning sulphurous waves
In the abyss of ever-during woe.
"
“ All shook except the Throne of Judgment. * *
The Hand that held the scales of destiny
Swerved not a hair’s breadth: and the Voice which spake
Those utterances quailed not, faltered not.
But when the fiery gulf was shut, and all
Looked with one instinct on the judgment-seat,
To read his countenance who sate thereon,
He was in tears—the Judge was weeping—tears
Of grief and pity inexpressible.
And in full sympathy of grief the springs
Gushed forth within us; and the angels wept:
Till stooping from the throne with His own hand
He wiped the tears from every eye, and said,
1 My Father’s will be done: His will is mine;
And mine is yours: but mercy is his delight,
And judgment is his strange and dreadful work.
Now it is done forever. Come with me
Ye blessed children of my Father, come;
And in the many mansions of His love
Enjoy the beams of His unclouded smil<£f
So saying, as once from Olivet, he rose
Majestically toward the heaven of heavens
In the serenity of perfect peace:
And we arose^with him.
But what of those
Who from the place of final judgment hurled,
Had each his portion in the lake of fire ?
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273
No Lethe rolled its dark oblivious waves,
As some have feigned, betwixt that world of woe
And ours of bliss. But rather, as of old
Foreshadowed in the prescient oracles,
The smoke of their great torment rose to heaven
In presence of the holy seraphim,
And in the presence of the Lamb of God,
For ever and for ever. At the first
Nothing was heard ascending from the deep
Save wailings and unutterable groans,
Wrung from them by o’ermastering agony;
But as His Eye, who is consuming fire,
Unintermittingly abode on them,—
Silence assumed her adamantine throne.”
The One-Eyed Dread having thus attended to his ene
mies, snivelled a pretence of grief to accommodate a passage
in the New Testament, and got his red-hot look so fixed on
the damned that they burned horribly without useless wail
or groan, there roll away “ages of a measureless eternity,”
and at last the voice of “ hell’s dethroned monarch ” breaks
the silence with an elaborate confession of the dogmas and
arguments of Calvinism, ending with
“ Lost, lost: our doom is irreversible:
Power, justice, mercy, love have sealed us here;
Glory to God who sitteth on the throne,
And to the Lamb for ever and for ever.”
<
The voice was hushed a moment; then a deep
Low murmur, like a hoarse resounding surge,
Rose from the universal lake of fire:
No tongue was mute, no damned spirit but swelled
That multitudinous tide of awful praise,
‘ Glory to God who sitteth on the throne,
And to the Lamb, for ever and for ever.’ ”
H
The reader who has not made himself familiar with the
severities of damning love may imagine that the One-Eyed
�274
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The Story of a Damned Soul.
Horror called a Lamb took off now his eye of consuming
fire, and'permitted the hellions to cool a trifle. Not he, if
he knew the catechism. On the contrary, he held on the
hotter, as the only sure thing for his glory, and the devil is
made to say pensively and submissively, at the Lamb’s hellhot look,
“ I see far off the glory of thy kingdom
Basking in peace, uninterrupted peace:
But were I free, and were my comrades free,
Sin mightier than myself and them would drag
Our armies to perplex those fields with war.
Only thus fettered can we safely gaze;
Thus only to the prisoners of despair
Can Mercy, which is infinite, vouchsafe
Far glimpses of the beauty of holiness.
Woe, woe, immedicable woe for those
Whose hopeless ruin is their only hope,
And hell their solitary resting-place,”—
/
which makes it plain that if the Fount of Hell, the Lamb’s
Dreadful Eye, should cool ever so little, to all eternity, it
would be very bad for the damned, whose only hope is in
sizzling patierroly under the merciful vengeance of the
Moloch Eye.
There is bug one more point to be made, that of the
advantage to the saints of having the damned always in
view, the happiness a redeemed mother, for example, will
feel from gazing occasionally on her Theodore—her God’s
gift—smoking in the frying-pan of the Lamb’s “ infinite
mercy,” and kept from unconverted pranks of human love
by the “ immedicable woe ” of “ hopeless ruin.” In his
closing pages Mr. Bickersteth labors to make this evident.
He seems to be of opinion that the saints would be too
happy in heaven, or on the redeemed and restored earth,
but for interesting reminiscences of damnation and occa
sional contemplation of the woes of the lost.
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The Story of a Damned Soul.
“ Haply such perfectness of earthly bliss,
And such far vistas of celestial light,
Had overcharged their hearts. But not in vain
The awful chronicles of time. And oft
When dazzled with the glory and the glow
That streamed from Zion’s everlasting hills,
Messiah or his ministers would tell
Rapt auditors how Satan fell from bliss,
The story of a ruined Paradise,
The foughten fight, the victory achieved,
But only with the endless banishment
Of damned spirits innumerable and men
From heaven and heavenly favor, which is life.
Nor seldom he, who strengthened human sight,
As with angelic telescope, to read
The wonders of the highest firmament,
Would bid them gaze into the awful Deep
Couching beneath; and there they saw the lost
- ...
For ever bound under his dreadful Eye,
Who is eternal and consuming fire,
There in the outer darkness.
*
*
*
That which men witnessed of the damned in hell,
By unction of the Spirit at God’s command,
Was in our gaze at will, whene’er the smoke
In mighty volumes rising from the Deep,
Blown devious by God’s breath athwart the void,
Dispersed. Nor turned we always from the sight; (
Should not the children share their Father’s thoughts ?
Should not the Wife her husband’s counsels learn?
*
*
*
*
*
*
And in the cloudless joys of heaven and earth
Haply this sight and knowledge were, to us
The needful undertones of sympathy
With Him.”
So ends the tale. The mother of our Roman youth is
with the redeemed; her husband and only child in hell. To
keep her from a surfeit of happiness the Lamb gossips with
her about the fall and damnation of spirits and men;
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Prospects and Purposes.
strengthens her vision so that she can distinctly see what
is going on in hell; and so brings her into sympathy with
the effects of his red-hot Dreadful Eye. Who says Amen
to this heathenism ?
The Examiner and Chronicle.
Mr. Beecher's Christian Union.
The Chicago Advance.
The Independent.
The Congregationalist and Recorder.
The Watchman and deflector, etc., etc.
Article XI.—Prospects and Purposes.
We believe we may now say, with confidence, that the
permanence of The Examiner is fully assured. We have
had to make a month’s delay, to consider difficulties and
provide resources, and for this reason, date our third issue
February, instead of January. Our enterprise is a difficult
one, but we lack neither faith nor courage, and we find
willing and strong friends. The Examiner will not die.
It is gaining noble support, and much ampler than we
expected.
Our position in a field already occupied by The Rad
ical and The Index, has a two-fold explanation. We
undertook to interpret religion and kindred themes, under
the Christian name, which The Index rejects, and with the
purpose of earnestly and definitely controverting the pseudo
Christianity of existing sects, much more than The Radical
has chosen to do this. Our views of the error and mischief
of Jesuism, either as orthodox theology or as liberal heroworship, are much more distinct and decisive than those of
contemporary liberalism. Neither The Radical nor The
Index seem to us to have illustrated full emancipation from
the current sentimentalism and unscholarly prepossession,
which have made Jesus more than a common man, and
better, for help and comfort, than the natural dependence of
�Prospects and Purposes.
277
man, the God and Father of all souls. We propose to
have the exact truth of history told about this young Jew
ish aspirant to earthly Messiahship, and the plain truth of
theology taught in regard to the absolute insignificance of
him, or any other man, where the question is of the eternal
life, the destiny and the blessedness, of the creatures of
GOD. It is time to cry Great Pan is dead, and perempto
rily to remand Jesus, the God-man, Lord and Saviour, mas
ter and hero, to his proper humble place, as in himself a
quite common and erring man, and in his providential posi
tion a standard-bearer for similar quite common and erring
men, of faith in God’s presence, without mediator or mes
senger, with every soul of man.
On the other hand we desire to resist, with all the force
of what we deem just thought and sound learning, the
theory of The Index that Christianity is to be separated from,
and that the new movement of faith is to disavow the pre
vious steps of our common humanity. Not only is there
vast power to be kept in the just weight of what has been
best in Christianity, but the connection is one absolutely
essential to the consolation, by religious teaching, of the
suffering millions. We had rather a thousand fold silence
our private opinions, and study and practice the simpler,
more universal, and always most heavenly truths of practi
cal Christianity, as a lay member, a novice or penitent, in
the Catholic church, than to join our friend Abbot in his
stupendous misrepresentation of Christianity. Not that we
shrink from any surgery of truth, lor would hesitate a
moment to give Mr. Abbot a place with us in The Exam
iner, for fair consideration of his views, and full defence of
them, but simply because, when all has been said, his con
clusion is, to us, the most unwarranted and lamentable
which an honest thinker and earnest scholar ever arrived
at. We profoundly honor our friend, whose position we thus
criticise; he has on every ground as much right to his opin
ion as we to ours; we cherish no aversion towards him as
a religious teacher, and will gladly stand anywhere with
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Prospects and Purposes.
him, but of what 13 to us the utterly unfit expedient of
seething the kid in his mother’s blood we will unmistaka
bly speak our mind to the end of the chapter. And we
have abundant evidence that in so doing we can render
important service to the emancipation of the public miud
from superstition, and the healthy development of free reli
gion. In general, with many exceptions of course, the
purification of faith results in a free and large comprehen
sion of Christianity, not in rejection of the connection or
the name. With Mr. Abbot’s organ (much more than with
Mr. Abbot himself), it results in a singular stringency ot
speculative doubt and reserve, which flatly forbids us to be
Christian, and hardly permits us to cherish a comfortable
thought of God. Our special hope and desire, on the contrary, is to cultivate a very great, and fervent, and fruitful
thought of God, and to make clear that this, as it is emphasized in “Our Father,” is the ever-enduring truth of Christiani ty.
The lament, or the complaint, of some of our critics, that
The Examiner is the organ of one man, bespeaks a mi-understanding of our editorial plans. To such as take a
friendly interest in our effort to conduct a monthly review
such as The Examiner is, we need say but a word in explanation of our purpose, which is to editorially bring together
the ample testimonies of literature, and make the greatest
and best minds of this and other times help to fill our pages.
To us literature is the true scripture, and it is a neglected
scripture. Lessons far richer and greater than the current
divinity knows, are scattered through the better writings
of mankind, from the time of Socrates to the present day.
To edit and publish these lessons of neglected inspiration,
to gather and set forth to the public of common readers
these contributions of unrecognized prophets, marking
their force and fairly interpreting their significance, is a
legitimate work.
And in this work we can also have the aid of many of
the best living writers, the leaders of thought and faith and
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science in all parts of the world, whose best selected words
we can properly and acceptably reproduce in our pages.
Two distinguished French writers have already instructed
our readers, and Emerson, Parker, Max Miiller, Mr. Abbot,
and others have been heard in the numbers already issued.
We shall make this feature of our plan more distinct as we
go on, and have no doubt that our readers will be satisfied
of the wisdom of our aim. And in addition to this, we
*
shall secure, as our plans develop, the very best aid which
contemporary thought and learning, at home or abroad, can
furnish, in the form of original contributions prepared
expressly for The Examiner, English, French, German,
and other voices, as well as American, speaking through a
publication in the heart of our new world, to the audience
of earnest inquirers which we are gathering.
It is not too much, we trust, to ask our friends to work
earnestly for us now, with the full expectation of permanent
and complete success. To give more time for this, and to
enable us to put our regular publication-day back to the
middle of the month, we shall bring out our next number
for April, and have it ready March 15. This will make ©ur
first year of the publication (12 numbers) end with the
current year.
* There is variety enough, and richness enough, in the current expres
sion of the human race to give us more than we can possibly use. Our
work will be, as near as possible, to gather out of this unrolling scrip
ture of mankind the fact, thought, principle, life, which are the voice
of man and the voice of God in the world to-day; sometimes citing
exact words of contemporary utterances, as in our translated article,
and the numerous extracts scattered through other articles; sometimes
reporting the substance of a new or fresh page of revelation; and
sometimes entering upon a critical examination of the book, the man,
the life which merits attention.
�280
Wanted, a Moralist for Dr. Clarke’s Statesman.
Article XIII.— Wanted, a Moralist for Dr. J. F. Clarke’s
Statesman.
The title under which Dr. J. F. Clarke discoursed of
political matters, in a recent number of Old and New—
“Wanted, a Statesman,”—assumed enough in itself to
warrant us in looking for superior wisdom in the essay,
whether it dealt only with the failure of our politics, or also
went on to lay down a policy of its own. To our great
surprisel we found, under this title, some remarks as
ill-considered as'the worst parts of Dr. Clarke’s theological
treatises, not the sound wisdom of a cautious thinker, nor
even the correct views of a careful observer; but crude
observations of a deplorably careless sentimentalist, such as
we so commonly find in second-rate sermons. Take, for
example, Dr. Clarke’s solution of the Alabama question,
gravely proposed by him in an exposition of what he con
siders the statesmanship wanted by us :—
“ Great Britain either did right or did wrong. Leave it
to herself to decide which. Let Gen. Grant request our
minister to request the British Government to decide that
question, and inform it beforehand that we are ready to
accept its conclusion. If Great Britain, through her govern
ment, says that she did right, we will accept that solution,
and drop the subject; only in that case, we shall, of course,
have the right to do the same. Whenever she has a rebel
lion in her empire, or is engaged in a foreign war, we shall
have a right to do to Great Britain exactly what she did to
us. We shall take just as much pains as she did, and no
more, to keep pirates from going out of our ports, to prey
upon her commerce. If she likes this programme, let her
say so.”
This may be astute statesmanship, to leave to Great
Britain to say whether those who lost by the rebel cruisers
fitted out in British ports have any just claim upon her, and
also to leave to her prejudiced decision to settle the future
law of the matter, but at least we may deny the morality,
in case Great Britain refuses what we are sure is justice, of
�'Wanted, a Moralist for Dr. Clarke’s Statesman.
281
determining to imitate such refusal of justice the first
chance we have. As a sentimentalist, Dr. Clarke might
have said, “ If Great Britain thinks she did right, let us sayno more about it, and when our chance comes, we will
shame her neglect and treachery by scrupulous justice and
fidelity.” He would then lie open only to the charge of
unjustly sacrificing the claims of our citizens, and of yield
ing needlessly a grave point of law, merely for a burst of
sentiment. But when he advises that we yield now, and
make it up in hard hits by and by, he proposes the policy of
the cowardly savage, a statesmanship which would soon
carry the world back to the settlement of all questions by
stealthy blows of the strong hand and the wily craft of
aboriginal passion.
We introduced in our last issue, on p. 184, a barbarism,
anti Christum, etc^intending to indicate by a note that we
used it as a barbarism. Our meaning was, that if the Uni
tarians were to forget their culture and take a position in
the spirit of the expression in question, it would be better
than to dawdle disreputably about Zion waiting for the
Lord to come and claim the contents of the Unitarian
napkin.
VOL. I.—NO. 3.
6
�BOOKS'.
Plutarch's Morals—A Bible of Greek “ Grace and Truth.’'*
—What mean these five goodly octavos, with their more
than twenty-five hundred pages of the writings of a pagan
of the last half of the first Christian century? They are
published under auspices the very best which America
could afford. No house in the country, or indeed anywhere,
would be less likely than Little, Brown & Co., Boston,
whose imprint these volumes bear, to make either a com
mercial or a literary mistake, in a matter so serious as this
evidently is. So, also, the name of Prof. Goodwin argues
not less certainly that so large and difficult a task was not
attempted except for most weighty reasons. And when we
learn that the revision carried through by him has been
beset at every step with unusual perplexities, yet has been
accomplished with the utmost pains, and is evidently a
signal success, we conclude, unhesitatingly, that Plutarch’s
Morals must have merits rarely found in the productions of
any age. To confirm this conclusion, if confirmation were
needed, what witness more competent than Mr. Emerson ?
lie is the acknowledged master of the best school of
American literature, and the man of all men now living
to pass judgment on, and to authenticate to the thoughtful
and working world of to-day, any studies, ancient or
modern, in the important field of ethical science and prac
tical wisdom. If, therefore, he gives unstinted praise, we
need not wait to turn over these twenty-five hundred pages
to be convinced that something rich and rare is set before us.
* Translated from the Greek, by several hands. Corrected and revised by
William W. Goodwin, Ph.D., Professor of Greek Literature in Harvard
University. With an Introduction by Ralph Waldo Emerson. 5 vols., 8vo.,
$15. Little, Brown & Co., Boston.
�Plutarch’s Morals.
2E3
As a matter of fact, however, we had known for some
years that a certain old translation of Plutarch’s Morals,—
an extensive collection of essays by the author of the famous
“Lives,”—was esteemed by Mr. Emerson, both from the
Greek wit and wisdom garnered in it, and for the singular
vigor, freshness, and breadth of its English style, one of
the most precious bibles of mankind. We had had the use
of a copy of this translation — it is a very rare book — and
had made a selection of its richest texts; and from Mr.
Emerson himself we had learned, some time since, of the
plan for its revision and reproducEon, and of the hope
which he cherished that it would introduce to the studious
and earnest believers and workers of our day “some good
paganism.”
The labors of some forty or fifty English university men
produced the version now re-presentedftnd made it, in Mr.
Emerson’s judgment, “a monument of the English language
at a period of singular vigor and freedom of style.” Still, the
old book was “ careless and vicious in parts,” as a transla
tion, and sadly needed the improvement which ProflGoodwin’s accomplished hand has given it. And happily,Ehe
thorough revision which has made the translation faithful
to the Greek original, has proved throughout a vindication
of Plutarch, a restoratibn of clear and accurate statements
where the old version gave something absurd and unintel
ligible.
Plutarch belonged to the generation second after that of
Jesus. He was just coming to manhood when Paul ceased
from apostolic labors. The essays which are called his
“ Morals,” were written at the moment when Christian
teaching was fairly in the world, but before it had made
any appreciable impression upon paganism. If they contain
lessons of rare and gracious wTisdom, these lessons show
what paganism was capable of at the very hour when
Christianity, as popularly interpreted, claims to have found
the light of ethical and religious teaching Blean gone out.
�284
Plutarch's Morals.
The “ Lives” and the “ Morals” of Plutarch, taken together,
form a large body of history and instruction, of chronicle,
character and catechism, retold and retaught, newly narrated
and freshly expounded and enforced, at just the moment
when our popular Christianity pretends that the world of
ancient life and faith was without form and void, and dark
ness brooded over a chaos which waited the creating breath
of Divine interference through Christ. As Mr. Emerson
says, “ Plutarch occupies a unique place in literature, as an
encyclopaedia of Greek and Roman antiquity.” He is a
kind of bible of ancient faith and practice, an evangelist of
the best, in ideas and in examples, which the old pagan
world had to offer. It is worth while, therefore, to know
what his gospel is, and to compareBits truths and errors
with the truths and errors of the system which has so long
put all other systems aside, with the claim that they all
failed of grace and truth, and that it alone had the word of
lifeH
Mr. Emerson says of the “ Morals,” the sermons of
Plutarch, “ I know not where to find a book — to borrow a
phrase of Ben Jonson’s—1 so rammed with life.’ ” Plutarch
in general he pronounces “ a chief example of the illumina
tion of the intellect by the force of morals.” Other
points of the explanation and vindication of the Greek
essayist by the American, appear in the following sentences,
which we cull from the Introduction to the edition of the
“ Morals ” now before us :
“ Whatever is eminent in fact, or in fiction, in opinion,
in character, in institutions, in science — natural, moral, or
metaphysical, or in memorable sayings, drew his attention
and came to his pen with more or less fullness of record.”
—(The reason of Plutarch’s vast popularity is his humanity.
Nothing touches man but he feels it to be his. He has
preserved for us a multitude of precious sentences, in prose
or verse, of authors whose books are lost; and these
embalmed fragments, through his loving selection alone,
have come to be proverbs of later mankind.”—“Now and
then there are hints of superior science. You may cull
�Plutarch’s Morals.
285
from his record of barbarous guesses of shepherds and
travelers statements that are predictions of facts established
in modern science.”—“ His extreme interest in every trait
of character, and his broad humanity, lead him constantly to
Morals, to the study of the Beautiful and Good. Hence
his love of heroes, his rule of life, and his clear convictions
of the high destiny of the soul. La Harpe said ‘ that Plutarch
is the genius the most naturally moral that ever exist
ed.’ ”—“Plutarch is genial, with an endless interest in all
human and divine things.” — “ Plutarch thought ‘ truth
to be the greatest good that man can receive, and the good
liest blessing that God can give.’ ”—“ His faith in the
immortality of the soul is another measure of his deep
humanity. He believes that the doctrine of the divine
Providence, and that of the immortality of the soul, rest on
one and the same basis.”—“lean easily believe that an
anxious soul may find in Plutarch’s chapter called ‘Pleasure
not attainable by Epicurus,’ and his ‘Letter to his Wife
Tiihoxena,’ a more sweet and reassuring argument on the
immortality than in the Phaedo of Plato; for Plutarch
always addresses the question on the human side, and not
on the metaphysical; as Walter Scott took hold of boys
and young men, in England and America, and through
them of their fathers. His grand perceptions of duty lead
him to his stern delight in heroism; a stoic resistance to
low indulgence; to a fight with fortune; a regard for truth ;
his love of Sparta and of heroes like Aristides, Phocion,
and Cato.”—“But this stoic, in his fight with fortune,with
vices, effeminacy and indolence, is gentle as a woman when
other strings are touched. He is the most amiable of men.
He has a tenderness almost to tears, when he writes on
‘Friendship,’ on ‘Benefitsflon ‘The Training of Children,’
and on ‘The Love of Brothers.’ All his judgments are
noble. He thought, with Epicurus, that it is more delight
ful to do than to receive a kindness. . . . His excessive and
fanciful humanity reminds one of Charles Lamb, whiist it
much exceeds him. . . . His delight in magnanimity and
self-sacrifice has made his books, like Homer’s Iliad, a bible
for heroes.”
We cannot here go at length into proof from Plutarch’s
own pages, of the existence in him of a veritable revelation,
worthy to be compared, in many great and noble respects,
with anything ever indited for the instruction of mankind.
�286
Plutarch’s Morals.
In brief, we declare our unhesitating judgment that
Plutarch, pagan chronicler and moralist though he be, is as
well worth earnest and reverent study as that Bible which
has been so long thrust upon us as the only and the infallible
rule of divine truth. In our opinion, the revelation which
is contained in Socrates, Plato, Philo Judaeus, Plutarch, and
the other representatives or inheritors of Greek wisdom, is
much richer than that which we have accepted from the
Hebrews and Hebrew-Christian mind. As the words Christ
and Christianity are Greek, so the best part of our truest
Christianity is from Greek teaching rather than Hebrew,
and far the largest, and deepest, and purest fountain of
divine truth, is in the scriptures which commence with
Socrates and Plato, and which have their fourth gospel in
the “Morals” of Plutarch, as they have their Acts of the
Apostles in his “ Lives.”
’ It may seem a rude judgment in the face of current
Christian opinion, but we cannot help it. We feel no call
to respect the crass ignorance and gross superstition which
still make accredited Christian judgment, in the matter of
divine revelation, a baseless prepossession, no more just
than Hindoo, Chinese, or Mohammedan prepossession. If
the world of Christendom had spent as much pains in the
free study of Greek chronicle and exposition as have been
given to the law and gospel derived from Jewish sources,
we have no doubt that the average enlightenment and ele
vation of mankind would be very much greater than at
present. The simpler and more superstitious books have
commanded attention, and the world meanwhile has lost
fifteen hundred years, and only now begins to walk with
the best masters of paganism. It did not surprise us when
Mr. Emerson said to us, speaking of Plutarch, “ We want
some good paganism.” The study of divinity will take a step
as important as any ‘ revival of learning ’ that ever was,
when Greek Socrates shall displace Hebrew Samuel, Plato
Paul, and Plutarch John and Matthew’, aud study shall seek
�Plutarch's Morals.
287
for great thoughts, humane principles,, and manly examples
rather than waste itself on the®uperstition that one young
Jew and certain Jewish books shut up both God and God’s
truth in themselves, and that the first and last labor of
investigation is to vindicate this pretension. We will un
hesitatingly compare Plutarch alone with the whole Bible,
not to show that he avoids error, but to prove that he more
fully and more profoundly grasps essential truth, and that
on the grand points of ethical and theological teaching he
is infinitely wiser than the popular Christian interpretation
of so-called holy writ. We shall make it our duty to bring
forward proof of this from time to time, as our space and
plans will permit. In conclusion now we merely cite a few
specimens taken from the first pages of Vol. I. of the
“ Morals.”
0S'<3hr,a'tes, ^t^as be’perceived "anyfierceness of spifiT
h
*s
to rise within him towards any of his friends, setting him
self like a promontory to break the waves, would speak with
A lower voice, bear a smiling PowntenancS,, and look with a more
*
yentie'eye $ andtehusl by bending thexother way and moving
contrary to the passion, he kept himself from falling or
being worst®d^S|
“Observing that many have begun their change to virtue
more from being pardoned than being punished, I became per
suaded of this: that reason was fitter to govern with than
anger,” JI
“Good temper doth remedy some things, put an orna
ment upon others, ^udgweete^^thermiU
“ If every one would al way s rep eat th e question of Plato
to himself, But am not I perhaps sum aone
and
turn his reason from abroad to loofei into himself, and put
restraint upon his reprehension of others, he would not make
so much use of his hatred of evil in reproving other men, seeing
himsaH:
in need fgrgat. indulgonc^^jg
“ J^rnTve affl vnlwest, 1
Jimpedoelelp.as a
divine thing, ‘ To fast from evil.’ ” — From Concerning the
Cure of
�288
The Invitation Heeded.
“Atheism, which is a false persuasion that there are no
blessed and incorruptible beings, . . is very lamentable and
sad. For to be blind or to see amiss in matters of this con
sequence cannot but be a fatal unhappiness to the mind, it
being then deplved of the fairest and brightest of its many
eyes, the knowledge of God.”
“ Atheism hath no hand at all in causing superstition ;
bull superstition not only gave atheism its first birth, but
serves it ever since by giving it its best apology for existing,
whgh, although it be neither a good nor a fair one, is yet
the most specious and colorable.”
“There is certainly no infirmiB belonging to us that
contains such a multipllity of errors and fond"passions, or
that consists of such incongruous and incoherent opinions,
as this of superstition dotl3f It behooves us, therefore
to
*
do our utmost to escape it; but withal, we must see we do it
safely and prudmtly, and not rashly and inconsiderately, as
people run from the incursions of robbers or from fire, and
fall into bewildered and untrodden paths, full of pits and
precipices. For so some, while they would avoid supersti
tion,Rea® over the golden mean of true piety into the harsh
and coarse extreme of atheism.”—From Of Superstition or
Indiscreet Devotion.
The Invitation Heeded—Reasons for a Return to Catholic
Unity.—By James Kent Stone.
*
The activity of the Catholic Publication Society has been
for some time one of the signs of theKimes. It represents
an earnest school of American Catholics, whose gifts and
graceJcannot be denied. We have a shelf of the books
which have come from this school within a few years, which
we highly prize as one of the genuine fruits of contempo
rary religious activity, although much which these volumes
contain must be winowed out as mere chaff of tradition. In
our judgment the new school of Catholicism is much more
humane, sensible and religious in its literature, both books
and tracts, than the Protestant orthodoxy ^represented by
* The Catholic Publication Society, New York, 1870.
�The Invitation Heeded.
289
the Tract Societies and Publication Houses which flood the
country with cheap superstition; superstition, too, which is
absurd and cruel.
This school finds a new recruit, and a valuable one, in
the author of The Invitation Heeded. Dr. Stone appears to
great advantage in his deeply sincere, earnest and able argu
ment and appeal, which he does not confidently urge with
out having profoundly felt. We can lend a hearty sympa
thy to the deep, spiritual tones of such a man’s plea, and
challenge for him the respectful attention of his religious
contemporaries, although the opinion within the limits of
which he now attempts religion has no more practical value,
weight, or interest to us than any other hallucination of
misguided sentiment] Dr. Stone treats first of the Church
considered in certain historical aspects, such as the attitude
of the world towards it, its perpetuity, its guardianship of
morals, the failure of its great foe Protestanism, its relation
to civilization, and its asserted complicity with persecution.
In the second part of his work he deals with the Church as
a Divine Creation, under the heads of incarnation and in
spiration, infallibility, scripture, antiquity, and the signs of
the true church. The third, and concluding part, considers
the Church as an organization, or the relations of the Pri
macy to Christianity; to prophecy, to antiquity, to unity, to
authority, and to infallibility. Into the merits of the argu
ment we cannot here enter, but we can assure our readers
that they can see in these pages just how pious and earnest
men are obeying certain sentiments taught them by Chris
tianity, by going over to Romanism. And we think no
man engaged with religion can sympathetically follow Dr.
Stone’s plea through to the end without being wiser and
better for noting the aspects of experience which it discloses.
Pew readers accustomed to the assumptions of faith which
are dictated by sound reason will have ary difficulty in see
ing where Dr. Stone’s illusion is, or how it is that his logic
has constrained him to join himself to the largest historical
�290
Mommsen’s Rome.
result of the primitive Christian movement. If we did not
believe in the universality of inspiration and incarnation,
and had to assume that the creature can return to the Crea
tor only through creature mediation by Christ and the
church, we should make haste to follow Dr. Stone. As it is,
we bid him good speed into the Roman fold, but propose,
ourselves, to stay outside and take the chance of their being
God enough for all creation. We have a shrewdy guess that
the supply of Divine grace is not materially lessened, much
less exhausted, by what the Primacy has shut up in Roman
limits.
Mommsen’s History of Rome, the American edition of
which, published by Charles Scribner & Co., New York, is
now completed by the appearance of the fourth volume,
merits recognition by both critics and readers, as without
exception the finest existing account of the course of events
from the origin of Rome, and the earliest political life of
Italy, to the time when Caesar put an end to the Roman
Republic!in the year 46 B. C. The scholar finds in the fruits
of Mommsen’s labors much more than learned study in this
field has ever before achieved; fuller discovery of facts,
more just appreciation of causes, more faithful and more
complete reproduction of real features of Roman life, and
a method and style of the highest and noblest art. But
none the less does the mere reader, who wishes to be carried
along by a trustworthy and attractive recital, find in Momm
sen a guide whom it is a profound pleasure to follow. The
secret of this two-fold success of the work is in the author’s
union of learning and masterly intelligence with simplicity,
earnestness and vigor.
It is one of the most satisfactory peculiarities of study, as
the best scholars undertake it, that it demands real facts and
actual truths, and counts no cost great which adds to veri- .
tableBcnMledge. We are able now to come at a great deal
of historical truth, where heretofore we have had to put up
with traditions W’hich were in large part misrepresentations
�Froude’s England.
291
of fact, even when they were not pure inventions of igno
rance, or fictions of imagination. We rejoice in this new
fidelity of study to truth, both for its results in such resto
ration of the picture of humanity as we have an illustration
of in Mommsen’s Rome, and for what must come from the
inevitable application of it to the history of religion, which
has been with Christians a mass of misrepresentation in the
case of all other religions than their ownland for their own
a tissue of fiction and false tradition, persisted in with a
bravery of unveracity fcr which the whole history of man
kind besides affords no parallel. Dr.Mommsen tells the
story of conquering Rome down to a period very near the
era of Christianity. He is expected to go on with the nar
rative through the period of the empire, and mil thus give
us important aid in comprehending the world into which
Christian teaching penetrated. At present, however, the
work is complete. The English translation was made from
the fourth German edition, and the reprint is in Scribner’s
excellent library style, four handsome volumesBwith com
plete index, and sold at the very low price of $2 a volume.
Scribner’s edition is decidedly preferable to the English.
Froude’s History of England has extended to twelve vol
umes, covering the events from the Fall of Wolsey to the
Defeat of the Spanish Armada, and is now brought to a
close, because the author deems that he has already tres
passed too much upon the patience of his readers, and
because, although he has not reached the end of the reign
of Elizabeth, where he at first proposed to stop, he has gone
far enough to accomplish his main purpose, which was “to
describe the transition from the Catholic England with
which the century opened, the England of a dominant
Church and monasteries and pilgrimages, into the England
of progressive intelligence.”
It is not our purpose to attempt even a brief criticism of
the work which Mr. Froude thus brings to a close. Its
�292
Eroude’s England.
fascination as one of the grand stories of the world, told
with singular eloquence, need not be celebrated here. But
one remark in particular we wish to make, in justification
of the unstinted praise which we deem it but right to
bestow upon Mr. Froude’s work. It is not yet time to write
the final history of an epoch so closely connected with our
own as that in which “ the England of progressive intelli
gence” had its birth. Dr. Mommsen can write of Rome,
and Mr. Lea can write of early and mediaeval Christian
pretension, with the confidence of judicial decision, because
the one and the other have been sufficiently investigated to
be thoroughly known, and readily comprehended and
judged. The turns and problems of Roman historv are
simple, as soon as they are seen in the light of actual facts,
and even Christianity, as it took outward form in an organ
ized church, only needed to be fairly seen as it was to be
conclusively judged as the most woful defeat of the Chris
tian spirit, and most heinous outrage upon human rights.
If Christians generally do not admit this, it is only because
their prejudice loves ignorance rather than knowledge,
and deliberately excludes the light, that in complete dark
ness it may continue a pretension which every candid
scholar in Christendom knows to have no warrant whatever,
nor even the shadow of an honest excuse. But no such
judicial certainty is possible in the case which comes before
us in Mr. Froude’s volumes. We are hearing the pleas of
great advocates, and must continue so to do for a long time
to come. Mr. Froude is an advocate worthy of the field
into which he has entered, in thoroughness of learned
study, in penetration and vigor of thought, in profound and
glowing sympathies, and in earnest eloquence. The course
of his great story commands our deepest interest at every
step, and if we cannot feel on all points that historv utters
through him her conclusive word, we nevertheless are con
scious that no such plea in her court has been made before,
touching this matter of the transition from Catholic England
to the England of progressive intelligence, and that very
�The Library of Wonders.
293
much which Mr. Froude so eloquently urges will appear in
the final verdict of the tribunal of coming time. The story
is a long one, but we can hardly wish that there were less.
In fact we hope that Mr. Froude may yet carry out his
original purpose, and go on to the end of Elizabeth’s reign.
The twelve volumes which now complete the work are
brought out in three styles by its American publishers,
Charles Scribner & Co.; a large paper edition at $5 a
volume, a library edition at $3 a volume, and a capital
popular edition at $1.25 a volume.
The Illustrated Library of Wonders, a translation of which
is in course of publication by Charles Scribner & Co., was
immediately successful on its first appearance in Paris, and
seems hardly less popular in America. Eighteen volumes
of Scribner’s edition are already out, and eleven more are
to appear shortly. One of the last published volumes,
however, Lighthouses and Lightships, is chiefly an English
work, and the entire series has been edited by English
hands. These volumes, in their proper place, as stories of
science told for the entertainment and instruction of un
learned and uncritical readers, fully deserve the welcome
they have received, and one much wider still which we
cannot doubt they will‘obtain. They are just the sort of
books which are needed in the popular library and on the
household book-shelf, attractive with their numerous illus
trations, entertaining and readable in matter and style, and
full of information, suggestion, and intellectual stimulus.
The titles of the volumes already published are, Thunder
and Lightning; Wonders of Optics; Wonders of Heat;
Intelligence of Animals; Great Hunts; Egypt 3,300 Years
Ago; Wonders of Pompeii; The Sun; The Sublime in
Nature; Wonders of Glassmaking; Wonders of Italian
Art; Wonders of the Human Body; Wonders of Architec
ture; The Bottom of the Ocean; Winders of Acoustics;
Lighthouses and Lightships; Wonderful Balloon Ascents;
and Wonders of Bodily Strength and Skill. Price per
vol., in scarlet cloth, gilt backs, and printed on very nice
paper, $1.50.
�264
The Geology and Physical Geography of Brazil.
The Geology and Physical Geography of Brazil, by Ch.
Fred. Hartt, which Fields, Osgood & Co. have just published,
forms an elegant octavo of above 600 pages, enriched with
73 illustrations and a large and valuable map, and completed
by an excellent index (price $5). In form, therefore, it is
worthy of the place which its author and publishers propose
for it, as one volume of the “ Scientific Results of a Journey
in Brazil, by Louis Agassiz and his travelling companions.”
It seems to us still more worthy of its ,place among the
fruits of the “Thayer Expedition” to Brazil, in the scien
tific excellence, and in the great interest, of its matter. It
was at first the intention of Prof. Hartt to make the work
embr|pe merely the results of his explorations as geologist
of the expedition under Prof. Agassiz, together with those
of a second journey made by himself, independently; but,
happily for the public, the studies incidental to the prepa
ration of the matter for the press, led to a considerable
expansion of this plan, and we now have a general work
which incorporates with the results of recent investigation
all that is most valuable in previous works on the geology
and Physi°al geography of Brazil. We note with special
satisfactions also, the strong terms in which Prof. Hartt
announces his indebtedness to the people of Brazil, and his
“ sincerest wish in acknowledgment of so much kindness
to be to some humble degree instrumental in removing
false Jmpressions so current about Brazil, and to make the
tesourcegof the empire better known in America.”
It would be of no avail to attempt, in a brief notice, to
give a just idea of the store of facts about Brazil which
this rich volume contains. Prof. Hartt takes us from prov
ince to province, over the great field of his explorations,
along the extensive coasts, up rivers and through forests,
over plains and mountains, until he has shown us the whole
face of the land, has pointed out to us its striking features
and its most remarkable objects of interest, when we feel
almost as if we had ourselves probed the soils, hammered
the rocks, inspected the corals, brought to light the treasures
■
�Margaret, a Tale of the Real, Etc.
295
of caves, threaded the forests, and otherwise gathered the
elements of a complete sketch of that great region which
Brazil is. Not only will students of science receive this
volume with particular satisfaction, but whoever is practi
cally interested in the resources of South America, and its
opportunities for enterprise, will find in it a trustworthy
guide to an extensive knowledge of important facts, while
to all who acknc wledge the duty of acquainting themselves
with the great regions of. the earth as. the seats of human
life, it will render a great and grateful service.
Margaret, A Tale of the Real and the Ideal, Blight and Bloom, by
Sylvester Judd, is a New England classic, a true picture out of the
quaint, sweet, homely life which a gentle parson such as Sylvester
Judd was loved to move in and portray. Time but adds to its value.
If it were not a picture which the press can multiply, it would speedily
become a work of price, as one of the choicest remaining illustrations
of manners and men of the genuine New England which is passing
rapidly away. Happily a new edition can reproduce for a new gene
(
*
ration of readers every line of Judd’s masterpiece, as undoubtedly
future editions will transmit the wise and beautiful tale to future gen
erations interested to study, and able to take delight in, the by-gone
New England. Mr. Judd was one of the earlier apostles of sweetness
and light, a very true and pure soul emancipated by graces of charac
ter and clearness of intelligence from the old dark creed of the Puri
tans. He became-a saintly teacher of charity, justice, and faith, as he
found these impersonated in him to whom he looked, without worship,
but with reverence, as his guide, friend, and Master, and the helpful
and friendly Master of all the sons® of men. One aim of hi® tale was
to bring back to his readers the simple, natural humanity of the ideal
Christ, which was to him the actual leader of life, and so to give to
whoever could accept it a gentle,Hiving guide and Reacher in place of
the half awful, half absurd Jesus of Puritan theology. In this aspect
the book is twenty-fold more available now than it was when Mr. Judd
first gave it to the world, twenty years ago, because the popular con^i
ception of the Christ has come round very largely to the view which is
so admirably illustrated in Margaret# But Mr. Judd was more an
artist than a theologian, and made a capital tale of real life rathe© <
*
than a religions treatise. He will be increasingly honored and loved
�296
Immortality.
by all readers who know how precious a thing is a true, simple'
impressive picture of wholesome realities, as they were seen by him,
and were portrayed with photographic accuracy. The present edition
is in a very neat volume from the pre'-s of Roberts Brothers, Boston.
Price $1.50. We shall take a future occasion for criticising Mr.
Judd’s view of the ideal, “ self-wrought,” perfection of Jesus, which
we deem as far from radical truth lying before it as it is in advance of
the Puritan idea which it had displaced. Meanwhile we can promise
our readers a rich repast in Mr. Judd’s beautiful pages, and trust
many of them will place Margaret among their choicest books.
Immortality. Four Sermons preached before the University of Cam
bridge. Being the Hulsean Lectures for 1868. By J. J. Perowne, B. D.
Published by A. D. F. Randolph, New York. These lectures, which
only profess to be “ a fragmentary contribution to the literature of
a great subject,” may be profitably consulted as an able recent
evangelical attempt to prove that life and immortality are revealed
through the Christ of orthodoxy alone. The first discusses the theories
of materialism, of pantheism, and of spiritism. The second treats of
Egyptian, Greek, and Oriental faith, and failure of faith, in immor
tality. In the third we are shown the hope of the Jew, which is
found on a cursory examination to be “ no advance whatever upon the
pagan system,” yet is finally thought to have been “ brighter and
truer than that of the wisest of the heathen,” because so clearly
implied in the doctrine of a near relation of the soul to God. In the
concluding chapter, the hope of the Christian is set forth as resting
on two facts, the resurrection of Christ, and the inner life of the Spirit.
The general fairness, sincerity and thoughtfulness of the work are
worthy of praise. It opens a great subject, the critical examination
of which, as handled by Mr. Perowne, we shall return to at a suitable
future time.
If our readers are acquainted with the little books entitled Arne,
and The Happy Boy, they will eagerly accept a third from the same
source, a little volume of stories of Norwegian and Danish origin, with
the title The Flying Mail, Old Olaf, and Railroad and Churchyard,
published in very tasteful style by Sever and Francis, Boston. Arne,
and The Happy Boy, which the same publishers introduced to us in
an English translation, were delightful specimens of the current
fiction of Norway, stories by Bjornstjerne Bjornson, a simple, pure,
and touching painter of human life and passion in the land of the
northmen. They were a real addition to our treasures, at once works
of real art, and transcripts of pure nature, from a field in which nature,
human and other, possesses an unique interest. In the little volume
before us the third of the stories is by Bjornsen. The first is by
Goldschmidt, a Danish writer famous in his own country, and the
second by Mrs. Thoresen, a countrywoman of Bjornson. They all
have the same fine flavor of simple nature, and make together a
charming little book.
�
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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 Ethical Society
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The Examiner: a monthly review of religious and humane questions, and of literature. Vol. 1, February,1871, no. 3
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Place of publication: [Winnetka, IL.]
Collation: [201]-296 p. ; 25 cm.
Notes: From the library of Dr Moncure Conway. Contents include: Unitarian leaders -- Theodore Parker's character and ideas.
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1870
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<img src="http://i.creativecommons.org/p/mark/1.0/88x31.png" alt="Public Domain Mark" /><br /><span>This work (The Examiner: a monthly review of religious and humane questions, and of literature. Vol. 1, February,1871, no. 3</span><span>), identified by </span><span><a href="https://conwayhallcollections.omeka.net/items/show/www.conwayhall.org.uk">Humanist Library and Archives</a></span><span>, is free of known copyright restrictions.</span>
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English
Religion
Unitarianism
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f
��MEMORIALS
OF THE
OF THE
First Congregational Church
OF
CINCINNATI, OHIO,
JANUARY 21st, 1880.
PRINTED FOR
THE
UNITY
CLUB.
��D
* OTe^
^IDWDU£TORY
The Fiftieth Anniversary of the First Congregational
Church of Cincinnati was observed by a special service of com
memoration in the church building, corner Plum and Eighth
streets. The altar had been beautifully decorated with green
garlands and flowers. A large company was in the pews and
participated in the printed order of service. The historical
review, communications, and letters read are included in this
memorial volume. At the conclusion of the very interest
ing and impressive exercises, the congregation repaired to the
parlors below, where a collation had been spread by the ladies
of the society, the older members occupying a table together
at the upper end of the room. The walls and tables were
decorated with evergreens and flowers. There was also
exhibited a collection of portraits of former ministers and mem
bers of the church, which included an excellent pencil sketch
of the first church edifice of the society on the corner of
Fourth and Race streets (since demolished), drawn by Mrs.
Ephraim Peabody in 1832, and kindly loaned by her for this
occasion. Brief addresses were made during the evening by
the pastor, who presided over the feast; by John Kebler,
Esq., who made tender reference to various deceased mem
bers of the church, and spoke enthusiastically of its prospects
for the future ; by Capt. Robert Hosea on “The Unitarian
Outlook”; by Judge Manning F. Force, who paid a warm
tribute to the laborsand sacrifices of the women of the church ;
Hon. Alphonso Taft, who affirmed that a free and rational
religion was a necessity for a free state; by Mr. Edward
Goepper, on behalf of the younger members of the society;
Rev. T. M. Johnson, who extended a greeting from the Universalist connection; Michael Tempest, Esq., Dr. Seth Salt
marsh, and other friends. At a late hour the meeting broke
up with the hearty singing of “Auld Lang Sync. "
�1880.
1830.
^ordcr*of*cxcr<ji$c$^
I.
II.
HI.
Organ Voluntary,
by
Theodore Stanwood, Esq.
Rev. C. W. Wendte.
Prayer by the Pastor,
Hymn,
by
Rev. A. A. Livermore.
1.
A Holy air is breathing round,
A fragrance from above ;
Be every soul from sense unbound,
Be every spirit love.
2.
O God, unite us heart to heart,
In sympathy divine,
That we be never drawn apart,
And love not thee'nor thine.
3.
But by the cross of Jesus taught,
And all thy gracious word,
Be nearer to each other brought,
And nearer to the Lord.
IV. A Historical Review of The First Congregational Church,
by
V.
VI.
Reading
of
John D. Caldwell, Esq.
Communications from former Pastors and Members.
Hymn,................................................... by Rev. Jas. H. Perkins.
1.
It is a beautiful belief,
When ended our career,
That it will be our ministry,
To watch o’er others here.
2.
To lend a moral to the flower:
Breathe wisdom on the wind ;
To hold commune, al night’s pure noon,
With the imprisoned mind ;
'
�5
3.
To bid the mourners cease to mourn.
The trembling be forgiven;
To bear away from ills of clay
The infant, to its heaven.
4.
Oh! when delight was found in life,
And joy in every breath,
I cannot tell how terrible
The mystery of death.
5.
But now the past is bright to me,
And all the future clear;
For ’tis my faith that after death
I still shall linger here.
VII. Religious Poems written by Rev. John Pierpont, D.D.,
Rev. C. G. Fenner,
VIII.
IX.
.
read by
and
Miss Clara E. Nourse.
Congratulatory Letters.
Original Hymn—Tune, “Fair Harvard.”
1. They are gone, the first laborers, earnest in toil
Who tilled for the Master the field;
Through their furrows we tread as we cast o’er the soil
The seed that rich harvests shall yield.
Refrain.
•
Rejoicing, not weeping, we fare through the land,
And scatter our handful of seed :
Of each earnest effort, of each ready hand,
The Lord of the Harvest hath need.
z
2.
We sow as we go what we stay not to reap,
“God giveth the increase” alone.
Will His harvest ungarnered be, e’en though we sleep
When the ripe golden grain shall be grown ?
Refrain.—Rejoicing, etc.
3.
The night cometh swiftly—then work while we may
At this task we are trusted to do:
With light hearts at sunset we’ll lay it away
If our toil has been faithful and true.
Refrain.—Rejoicing, etc.
Alice Williams Brotherton.
X.
The Benediction.
A Social Re-Union and Collation in the Church Parlors immediately after
the conclusion of the Exercises.
�6
->-Li$T+OF+çommiTTees^
On Invitations.
Edward P. Cranch,
Robert Hosea,
Ai.phonso Taft,
John W. Hartwell,
John Kebler,
George H. Hivl,
John K. Coolidge,
Rowland Ellis,
Manning F. Force,
Fayette Smith,
Richard B. Field,
Michael Tempest,
John D. Caldwell,
Charles W. Wendte.
On Exercises.
The Pastor,
Mrs. George Hoadly,
Miss Sallie Ellis,
W. H. Venable,
On Social Re-Union.
Mrs. Anne Ryland,
Mrs. H. C. Whitman,
Mrs. Caleb Allen,
Mrs. Josiah Bridge,
Mrs. William H. Sampson,
Mrs. Jeremiah Peters,
Mrs. Theodore Stanwood,
Mrs. Elihu Green,
Mrs. Seth Evans,
Mrs. Mary Russell,
Mrs. Chas. Truesdale,
Mrs. A. O. Tyler,
Mrs. E. G. Leonard,
Mrs. J. O. Eaton.
On Decorations.
Wm. Bellows.
�RISTCWAL SK6TCR
OF THE
FIRST CONGREGATIONAL CHURCH
OF CINCINNATI.
�THE FIRST CONGREGATIONAL CHURCH,
N. E. Cor. Plum and Eighth Sts.
�T513CORKZAL SKCCCB
OF
THE FIRST CONGREGATIONAL CHURCH OF CINCINNATI
Bv JOHN D. CALDWELL.
‘Aready it is history—
We may tell what, our fathers did.’
Three generations have arisen in Cincinnati since the organization here of the First Congregational Church. But a
few survivors of that pioneer band remain to unite with us in
the felicitations which the attainment of its Semi-Centennial
evokes. It is from their reminiscences and the somewhat
scanty memorials contained in the written records of the
^society, that the following brief account of its destinies for
half a century has been prepared. One of the founders of
the First Congregational Church in Cincinnati, Hon. Wm.
Greene, late Lieut. Governor of Rhode Island, who was, in a
peculiar sen^e, the Father of the Church, and who is—thank
Heaven—still spared to add his testimony and congratulations
to our festival of commemoration, writes us:
“ The first decisive step in the Unitarian movement in Cincinnati, more
than half century ago, was the assembling at the City Council Chamberpot a
large number of citizens in favor of the establishment of a Unitarian Society
in Cincinnati. This meeting was held in response to an invitation published
in the Cincinnati Gazette, at the instance of several gentlemen who were
prominently favourable to the object. At the meeting thus assembled, a conv
mittee was appointed to take the necessary steps for the procurement of a charter.
This was obtained at the next subsequent meeting of the Legislature of Ohio,
and bore the date of January 21 st, 1830. The corporators and first trustees
named in said charter were Elisha Brigham, Jesse Smith, Nathan Guilford,
George Carlisle and Wm. Greene.
“For some time previous to their action at the Council Chamber, those
favourable to and interested in the undertaking had been kindly favoured with
�IO
professional visits by distinguished Unitarian clergymen from New England.
This kindly interest was long continued after the establishment of the church.
I cannot speak too strongly of the great value and constantly encouraging in
fluence of the generous services of our Eastern Brethren.”
Among these Eastern brethren, thus gratefully referred to,
were the Rev. Charles Briggs, of Lexington, Mass., the agent
of the American Unitarian Association, and the Rev. John
Pierpont, D.D., both of whom were deeply interested in the
New West as a field for missionary operations in behalf of
Liberal Christian principles. Mr. Pierpont, at that time pasitor of the Hollis Street Church, in Boston, made a report to
the Association in June, 1828, of his.five weeks’ stay in Cin
cinnati, in which he says, “You ask me what judgment I
formed of that city. I shall tell you as briefly as possible.
It is one of the most flourishing and rapidly increasing cities
of our country. The material for building up a Unitarian
Society in this place I believe to be abundant and of good
quality. The most enlightened among the different sects are
fast becoming at odds with the exclusive and horrible systems
of Calvin and his would-be followers. And if a Unitarian
Church could be built and a pastor settled, there is all good
*
reason to believe that the society woûld soon be, to say the
least, as numerous and respectable as any in the city.
In every place there seemed to be a growing dissatisfaction
with the religious sentiments generally preached. The people
. .. are getting tired of hearing changes rung on *he sublime
t
mysteries of the Westminster Catechism. They want some
thing more simple and practical ; something whose tendency
is bodi to enlighten the understanding and to purify the heart,
and we believe that the doctrines of Unitarianism, which are
those of pure Christianity, are every way calculated to supply
this want and to effect those all important purposes for which
they were designed by the Author and Finisher of our Faith. ”
Mr. Pierpont spoke wisely and truly. At Cincinnati
clustered a cultured few of New England blood, who were the
active movers in initiating Common Schools and educational
institutions in the city and State, and were notably efficient
also in benevolent enterprises. It is not invidious to mention
�I I
here the names of Nathan Guilford, Micajah J. Williams,
Charles Stetson, Timothy Flint, George Carlisle, John C.
Vaughan, William Goodman, James H. Perkins and William
Greene, early members of the Unitarian Church, who were
eminently devoted to such works of culture and philanthropy.
Carrying this spirit of enlightenment and good will into the
realm of religious thought and feeling they speedily became
dissatisfied with the popular theology and preaching of their
day, and for a time met on Sundays at each other’s houses for
conversation and discussion of ethical and religious topics.
These private gatherings led in turn to public meetings at the
City Hall and elsewhere, and finally resulted, as Mr. Greene
has concisely stated, in the organization of the First Congre
gational Church and its subsequent incorporation. During a
part of the year 1830, the Rev. Charles Briggs, who had been
sent out by the American Unitarian Association, officiated as
pastor to the young society, which was‘ under obligations to
thè Universalist and New Church or Swedenborgian societies
for the use of their rooms for its public worship. In the
meantime, a lot of land had been purchased, at a liberal rate,
»¿from Elisha Brigham, on the south-west corner of Race and
Fourth streets, and on the 23d of May, 1830, the society,
with thankfulness and joy, dedicated its newly built temple to
the worship of the One God. The sermon for the occasion
was preached by the Rev. Bernard Whitman, of Waltham,
Mass. An ode had been written by Rev. John Pierpont (see
appendix), and an original hymn by Timothy Flint, Esq.
The young society flourished abundantly. In September,
1830, the Rev. E. B. Hall (later stationed at Providence, R,
I.), became its first regular pastor. Concerning his vigorous
and hopeful ministry, but few memorials are found in the
church records, but his son contributes a genial word to our
Semi-Centennial festival, which will be found in the pages fol
lowing. Mr. Hall also formulated a declaration of principles
which held its own in the church for some years, and was
signed by a number of the members.
On the 20th of May, 1832, the Rev. Ephraim Peabody, a
man of singular purity and loveableness of character, a scholar
�12
and a poet, was installed as minister. Rev. James Walker,
D.D., preached the sermon, and Rev. Francis Parkman, of
Boston, gave the Charge and the Address to the People. In
the course of his discourse Mr. Walker said: *‘I believe that
Unitarianism will prevail in the West. Not that I expect its
spread here or elsewhere will depend wholly or chiefly on the
abilities or exertions of Unitarians themselves. Its spread,
like that of the truth generally, must depend on the progress
of civilization, the diffusion of useful knowledge among the
people, and the general assertion and application of the great
principles of religious liberty and free inquiry.”
The original hymns sung on this occasion, and which were
doubtless written by Mr. Peabody himself, are preserved in
the appendix. Among the activities in which the newly-set
tled minister was engaged was the publication, in 1835 and
following, of “The Western Messenger,” a monthly which
contained valuable contributions, especially those from the pen
of James H. Perkins. Soon, however, this fresh tie was sev
ered by the ill health of Mr. Peabody, and the beloved pastor
was transferred to another field. The tender word his son
gives in another place in this memorial volume, fitly describes
the sentiment still felt towards his gracious memory by all
who came within the circle of his influence. For some time
coming the church had to content itself with pulpit supplies
mainly from the East. Among others, the veteran Rev.
Aaron Bancroft; father of the historian, preached here in
1836. For some six and nine months respectively, the Revs.
C. A. Bartol and Samuel Osgood ministered to the shepherd
less flock. Revs. James Freeman Clarke, Wm. Silsbee and
Christopher P. Cranch (now the poet-painter of Cambridge),
preached before the society during a part of 1837, until, in
August of that year, Rev. B. Huntoon was settled as pastor.
But it was only to resign his post again in the year 1838,
when the Rev. Henry W. Bellows, of New York, filled the
pulpit for six weeks and was succeeded by others. In March,
1839, a call was extended to Rev. Wm. H. Channing, who
had preached with great acceptance during the previous win
ter, and on May 10th his ordination took place; the sermon
�i3
being preached by Rev. F. A. Farley, of Providence, R. L,
the Charge and Address given by Rev. W. G. Eliot, of St.
Louis, and the Right Hand of Fellowship by Rev. J. Free
man Clarke, of Louisville. The hymns were written by James
H. Perkins, and are reprinted in the appendix. Of Mr. Chan
ning’s bénéficient ministry hè has sent a too modest account,
which is given in its proper place. His resignation in Febru
ary, 1844, from conscientious motives, though honorable to
himself, was a severe blow to the society. For some time
after the pulpit was occupied by James H. Perkins, a mem
ber of the society, and a man of brilliant gifts and lofty char
acter. The Rev. C. J. Fenner, a talented and poetic mind,
returning from a southern trip, was invited to the pastorate,
and, although in very precarious health, accccpted the call,
serving the society faithfully from June to November, 1846,
when he relapsed, and a few months later died. In 1847 we
find Mr. Perkins again occupying the pulpit of the society,
this time as its regular pastor, a position he held with the
unbroken respect and love of his people until his too early
death in December, 1849. During his ministry the society
became noted for it$ benevolent activities, and rendered good
service in the many noble causes of which he was the inspirer,
and for which his previous experience as a minister
among the poor had so admirably qualified him. Thus, on
the first of January, 1848, a meeting of citizens was held, at
his call, in the City Council Chamber, and the Cincinnati Re
lief Union inaugurated, of which noble charity he was the first
president and efficient manager. He may also be considered
the father of the House of Refuge for children (in which
enterprise he was greatly aided by the labors of a good
woman, Mrs. R. B. Field, a member of the Unitarian Church),
as well as of other good institutions. His last sermon was an
appeal for the poor, and although eminent as a lawyer, editor,
teacher, essayist, poet, lecturer and preacher, it is this sanc
tified labor for the unfortunate and destitute that best keeps
his memory green among his parishioners and fellow-towns
men in Cincinnati to-day.
In 1850, Rev. A. A. Livermore accepted the pastorate
�T4
and began a useful and beneficent work among us. Thank
God, he is yet spared to gladden us from time to time with
his apostolic presence. Under Mr. Livermore the society was
thoroughly organized for efficient service and made liberal
donations of time, labor and money to good causes. The
various city charities and missionary enterprises of the denom
ination were recipients of its bounty. In 1852 the Western
Unitarian Conference was „organized at Cincinnati. Mr. Liv
ermore felt constrained, however, in 1856, to resign his charge
on account of ill health, and the society chose as his successor
in November of the same year, the Rev. Moncure D. Conway,,
of Washington, D. C. Mr. Conway’s ministry began most
auspiciously. His vigorous, fearless style of preaching, the
literary finish and freshness of his discourses attracted a large
following. In 1859, however, the increasing radicalism of
his utterances from the pulpit sorely troubled some of his par
ishioners of more conservative opinion, and a difference arose,
which, although causing a deal of unpleasant feeling at the
time and for long years after, there is no occasion to dwell
upon here, since it has been quite, if not entirely, out
lived on both sides, and a cordial unity of feeling restored.
The immediate result of this difference of opinion in the
church was the withdrawal of a minority of its members, who
soon after organized a second Unitarian society under the
name of the Church of the Redeemer.
The new congregation purchased from the Second Universalist Society the edifice on the south-west corner of Mound
and Sixth streets (since demolished). Disappointed in their
efforts to secure as pastor the Rev. Thos. Starr King, which
at first seemed likely to be successful, their pulpit was filled
for some time by various Unitarian notables, among whom
were Revs. Dr. H. W. Bellows, Dr. A. P. Peabody, Dr.
Oliver Stearns, Dr. Wm. -G. Eliot, Dr. Thomas Hill, J. H.
Heywood and Horace Mann, Esq. In January, 1863, the Rev.
A. D. Mayo was settled over the society and remained in Cincin,nati for ten years, a hard-working pastor, a gifted preacher, and
rendering great services to the community as a member of the
Public School Board. In 1872 he accepted a call to Spring
�i5
field, Mass., and was succeeded on January 5th, 1873, by Rew
‘Charles Noyes, whose ministry was marked by great fidelity to
his trust, while his catholicity of spirit and geniality of nature
did much to bring about a better understanding between the
two branches of Unitarianism in Cincinnati, and prepared the
way for the coming re-union.
Returning from this necessary digression to the history of
the parent church, we find Mr. Conway continuing his ser
vices as pastor until his resignation in November, 1862, to
accept a charge elsewhere. A call wa% extended to Rev. C.
G. Ames,-who occupied the pulpit during the greater portion
of the year 1863. In February, 1864, the church building
was sold, and the site is now covered by a huge block of
stores. An excellent representation of this simple, but his
toric, structure, in which R. W. Emerson, Theodore Parker,
Orville Dewey and so many other eminent men first uttered
their radical thought in our city, is given as a frontispiece to
this volume. It has been prepared from a pencil sketch made
in 1832 by Mrs. Ephraim Peabody, and kindly loaned by her
for this purpose. The society now migrated to Library Hall
on Vine street. As Mr. Ames was not able to remain per
manently with them, a number of preachers distinguished for
their progressive and radical views, as well as for their pulpit
ability, ministered for longer or shorter periods to the church.
Among them were Revs. Sidney H. Morse, David A. Was
son, Edward C. Towne and H. W. Brown. On the 19th of
September, 1865, the trustees were authorized to purchase
the lot and dwelling on the north-east corner of Plum and
Eighth streets, the site of the present church. January 26th,
1866, a call was extended to Rev. Thomas Vickers, then
studying at Heidelberg, Germany. Pending his acceptance,
the pulpit was occupied by A. Bronson Alcott, Revs. Samuel
Johnson, John Weiss, D. A. Wasson, Robert Collyer and
others. On the 6th of January, 1867, Rev. Mr. Vickers
preached his first sermon and began his pastoral relation.
Services were held for some years thereafter in Hopkins Hall,
on the south-west corner of Elm and West Fourth streets, but
it was now determined to erect a suitable house of worship,
�16
and on the 6th of November, 1870, the present building, on
the corner of Plum and Eighth streets, was dedicated, Rev.
Robert Collyer, of Chicago, preaching the sermon, and the
dedicatory prayer being from the lips of Rabbi Dr. Max Lilienthal. Mr. Vickers remained with the society until he
accepted the post of Public Librarian of the city, and on
Easter Sunday, April 5th, 1874, preached his farewell ser
mon. A man of scholarship and radical opinion, he also took
a prominent part in civil affairs, leading the opposition to the
retention of the Bible in the Public Schools, and conducting
a controversy with the Catholic Archbishop of this diocese
with signal ability and success. For some months during the
year 1874 the pulpit was filled by Revs. A. W. Stevens and
J. S. Thomson, after which services were, in a measure, sus
pended.
In the meantime, the pulpit of the Church of the Redeemer
had also become vacant, Rev. Charles Noyes having resigned.
With considerable differences of theological opinion, there yet
existed a very kindly feeling and pleasant social relations
between the members of the two societies. Both flocks
were pastorless, both burdened with a heavy indebted
ness. Under these circumstances their consolidation into
one society seemed in every way advisable, and was a
subject of discussion. In November, 1875, Rev. C. W.
Wendte, of Chicago, having received a call from the Church
of the Redeemer, and an informal invitation also from the
First Congregational Society, the opportunity for the union
seemed to have arrived. At his suggestion, which was
cordially seconded by Mess. John Kebler, Robert Hosea,
M. F. Force, Seth Evans and J. W. Harper, trustees of the
Church of the Redeemer, and Alphonso Taft, Thomas Vick
ers, Wm. Wiswell, John D. Caldwell and John F. Dair, trus
tees of the parent society, several consultations were held to
consider the consolidation of the two churches, and on
the 29th of December, 1875, a plan of union was unan
imously adopted by the two corporations under the original
name, “The First Congregational Church of Cincinnati.”
Trustees were chosen equally from each of the societies, and
�17
Rev. C. W. Wendte was called as pastor, preaching his first
sermon before the re united flock in the Church of the Re
deemer on the 9th of January, 1876, following. By a happy
coincidence, Rev. M. D. Conway, being in Cincinnati on a
visit, had occupied the pulpit for one Sunday by invitation of
the Church of the Redeemer, and expressed his felicitations at
the re-union. The formal installation of Mr. Wendte took
place on the 19th of January, 1876. Rev. Robert Collyer, of
Chicago, preached the sermon, Rew J. H. Heywood, of Louis
ville, Ky., offered the prayer, Rev. Chas. Ames, of Bos
ton, gave the Right Hand of Fellowship, and Rev. Thomas
Vickers the Address to the People. For two years or more
the society continued to worship in the Mound street temple,
but this edifice having been disposed of, the church on the
corner of Plum and Eighth streets was refitted and refurnished,
and on Easter Sunday, April 13th, 1879, was re-dedicated
with appropriate services in the presence of a crowded con
gregation.
The re-united society has already reaped the goodly fruits
of its forbearance and catholicity. During the past year,
1879, two-thirds of its indebtedness has been paid off, and
extensive repairs made in its church edifice, a new organ
purchased, and liberal contributions made toward good causes.
Notwithstanding considerable difference of opinion on points
of theology, there is a remarkable unity of religious spirit in
the membership. It is not claiming too much to say that the
latter day of the First Congregational Church of Cincinnati
is worthy of that brave beginning and notable history of
which we have given this fragmentary account, and of which
the communications and letters that follow in this volume are
the commentary and elucidation. May we be worthy of our
trust, and another half century find this church still a power
unto salvation to its members and the larger community.
3
�Congregational Unitarian Ctynrcl),
cusroinsrisr^LTT.
CHAS. W. WENDTE, Minister.
1 S'T'S-SO.
Regular Sunday Morning Services
I
Special Sunday Evening Services
at ii o’clock.
|
at
o’clock.
Sunday School at 9^ o’clock a. m.
TRUSTEES.
Fayette Smith,
Theodore Stanwood,
M. E. Ingalls,
Zeph. Brown.
Michael Tempest,
John D. Caldwell,
4-CRG+UnirWLllB-F
A society for self-culture, social entertainment and helpfulness, holds its meet
ings at the church parlors, North-east corner Plum aud Eighth
streets, on alternate Wednesday evenings, at 8 o’clock.
*
OFFICERS AND COMMITTEES FOR 1879-80.
Edward Goepper, President,
W. H. Taft, 1st Vice-President,
J. B. Stanwood, 2d Vice-President,
Stephen Wilder, Secretary,
W. H. Williamson, Treasurer,
Miss Annie Sampson,
\
j
f
Executive
/committee.
\
/
^CBe+LADieS’+AID+ASSOPIACIOD^
Mrs. Henry C. Whitman,
.
•
.
.
Mrs. Mary Russell,
.....
Miss Lizzie Allen,
.....
President.
Vice-President.
Secretary and Treasurer.
Meets every Wednesday afternoon, at 3 o’clock, in’ the vestry of the church.
All ladies attending services at this church are invited to join this society.
*CR6+mmiODARY*$O(UeCY*
Manning F.. Force,
.....
Alphonso Taft and George Thornton,
.
Miss Sallif. Ellis, ......
President.
Vice-Presidents.
Secretary and Treasurer.
�(jommunitfÄTions
FROM FORMER
Pastors and Early Members of the Society
��FROM REV. WM. H. CHANNING.
Accept my hearty thanks for your welcome to the SemiCentennial Festival of the “First Congregational (Unitarian)
Church of Cincinnati.” It would be a high gratification to
be one of. your guests on so encouraging an occasion. For,
although it has never been my happiness to re-visit the
“Queen City” since the resignation of my ministry in 1841,
yet all associations with Cincinnati are brightly beautiful, and
their freshness will never fade. But, as it will be out of my
power to be present in person, let me avail myself of your
invitation—as one of the Early Ministers of your Society—to
speak a few words of Good Cheer through the medium of
this note.
And in beginning my pastoral leisure, the memory can
not but move me, that nearly forty years have swept by since
the publication of a “Farewell Letter” to your congregation
explaining the motive for withdrawing my ministry, and ex
pressing deep regret that a sense of honour had compelled
me to loose so dear a tie. That printed “Letter” now lies
open before me, and it would please me to learn that copies
of it are still kept among your elder members and in the
archives of your Society. For that “Confession of Faith”
was written in heart’s blood—to use the common symbol of
emotion—and the purest life of my spirit was infused through
its pages; so truly, indeed, did it express convictions, which
have been growing ever more vivid, that it i^my hope, ere
closing, to re affirm them in a slightly altered form.
But how few of the Elders to whom that “Farewell” was
addressed, survive among you. Other generations have entered
into their labors, to garner rich harvests from fields which their
toils reclaimed, and to pluck ripe clusters from vineyards which
their hands planted. Your people and you are co-heirs in a
�22
domain bequeathed by a noble band of pioneers. And to
some representatives among these prime missionaries of Lib
eral Christianity, it would gladden me, if time allowed, to pay
a transient tribute.
First, however, let me bear a brief testimony of personal
regard to the two friends whose advice brought me to Cincin
nati—one a predecessor, the other my immediate successor in
the ministry - of your congregation—Ephraim Peabody and
*
James H. Perkins. Both were highly endowed, most earnest
and widely useful men, and their images yet remain undimmed
in the records of your Society. Ephraim Peabody was, at
that time, a poet in character and conduct, even more than in
his fervid eloquence and literary compositions. He fold thrown
his ardent sympathies into the heroic life of ’ the vigorous
West, and his imagination was all aglow with visions of the
giant young commonwealths, which, with hands interlinked,
and shoulder to shoulder, were bearing triumphantly onward
Christian civilization beyond the broad prairies and across the
Rocky Mountains to the shores of the Pacific. Most justly
did it appear to him t’hat the generous form of religion called
“Liberal Christian” was the very inspiration fitted to purify,
enlarge and elevate this conquering host of Pilgrims of Hope.
And most lucidly did he expound the Affirmative Doctrine
and Practical Principles of this large type of Christian Faith
and Life, till he not only won the loving reverence of his own
people, but also of the Orthodox Communions, who honoured
his cheerful humanity and lofty trust, while rejecting what
they deemed his heresies. He confided to me, afterwards,
that, according to his own estimate, his tone of thought at
this era was too ideal, and his style of address too strictly intel
lectual. But this self-criticism sprang from his own modes.ty.
For, though aeach year of spiritual struggle, doubtless, served
to refine his religious character, yet from the first shone forth
the devout enthusiasm, luminous wisdom and hallowed serenity
which overspead with softened lustre his sunset years.
Of my cousin, James Perkins, who from childhood was
like a twin brother, as we were of the same age and bred in
close intimacy, it would be delightful to write at length, but
�2$
your ciders, and, let me hope, some of your younger mem
bers, have probably read the Memoir which it was my privi
lege to prepare after his lamented departure; and to that let
me refer as the truest portrait in my power to paint of his
genius and virtues. Like Ephraim Peabody, James Ferkins’
soul was kindled with anticipations of the magnificent future
opening before the people of the West, and being, like Pea
body, also a fervent Liberal Christian, he was pre-eminently
qualified to spread a quickening influence through the city and
State of his adoption. Already distinguished as a sagacious
and well-read lawyer, an effective speaker and a brilliant his
torical and critical essayist, many friends were expecting a
high career for him as a statesman. But, though ambitious
to bear a patriot’s part in enlightening the minds and mould
ing the wills of the young around him, his fine-toned con
science and scrupulous sense of personal dignity repelled him
from the sphere of partisan politics. And at the time of my
arrival in Cincinnati he had made arrangements to settle him
self on the soil as a nursery gardener in the neighborhood of
the city. It is one of my happiest Western remembrances,
that very much through my urgent encouragement, my cousin
was diverted from pursuits, which, however honourable, would
have too much have absorbed his rare intellectual and moral
powers, and was impelled to consecrate them to the ministry
among the poor, for which he became so tenderly loved and
trusted. It was his admirable usefulness in these disinterested
services that led your congregation so unanimously to elect
him as my successor. And then it was that he first became
conscious of his wonderful gift as a pulpit orator. As a lec
turer before literary societies and in platform addresses, indeed,
he had often held large audiences spell-bound by the charm
of his clear, terse, energetic and commanding speech. But
it was only when under the sway of religious emotion, he
sought to reveal to tried and tempted, struggling, yet aspiring,
fellow beings, the Spiritual Laws of which he had caught a
glimpse, that he disclosed that penetrating reason, soaring
imagination, wide-embracing mercy and awe-struck reverence
which lay hid, even from the eye of friends, beneath his
�24
stoical reserve. They, whoever listened to one of these effu
sions, will bear witness with me that there were seasons when
the poet in James Perkins wore the prophet’s robe.
From these slight notices of two esteemed associates, my
impulse is to make mention, next, of the crowd of affection
ately remembered friends, whose images throng round me as
the happy years of ministerial intercourse are recalled. But
discriminating sketches of the chief of these even would carry
me too far, while to omit any would be ungrateful. No
doubt, Brother Wendte, you and our fellow-ministers as
sembled at your festival, would echo my words in regard to
your own Societies, when I say that my old congregation in
the “Unitarian Church of Cincinnati,” appear, on looking
back, like a company of the “Elect,” so unaffectedly devout
were they, so free-thoughted to receive the newest truth, so
closely knit together iri kindly fellowship, and so ready for
good works.
Turning then, though reluctlantly, from the persons and
families who re-appear in that Palingenesia of memory, which
is the pledge of immortal Re union, let me note a few of the
specially bright remembrances of our Congregational Life.
And first rises the recollection of our well ordered Sunday
School. How radiantly from the past shine forth the expect
ant faces of the Bible Class which each Sunday morning con
versed with me and one another on the lesson for the day;
and of the eagerly attentive congregation of little ones who
listened so responsively to my familiar talks. Those refresh
ing half hours of communion with the young come back to
me like a breath of Spring over an orchard in bloom. Your
seed plot of blossoming Trees of Life thrives richly, let us
trust.
Next seem tore-gather our weekly Conferences for study
ing the solution of Theological problems, discussing the prin
ciples of Christian Ethics, and planning methods for applying
these to the needs of the community. Your Committees, it
gratifies me to observe, are admirably organized and doubtless
they are efficient workers. But, believe me, the essays, de
bates and consultations of your predecessors, in our time,
�would not have been unworthy of the notice of this genera
tion, accomplished as it is, for the depth of philosophic thought,
fervent religious feeling, frank sincerity of criticism, openmindedness to the last result of scientific inquiry, earnestness
in reform, and undaunted hopefulness which characterized
them. In a word, our Conference was a company of fellow
seekers after truth and righteousness, wherein every honest
conviction was hospitably welcomed, and whence intolerance
alone was expelled as intolerable.
My next cheerful memory is that the brotherly kindness
kept alive by. our conference and social meetings prompted
a successful effort to clear off an accumulated load of debt
which had long burdened the energies of the Congregation.
The sacrifices, gladly borne, and the genuine sympathies thus
awakened, not only revived the religious life of the society
within, but attracted members from other communions and
newly-come strangers to join us, until, with well filled pews,
we felt that exhilarating consciousness of vigorous growth
which is- the sure sign of spiritual health in a society.
Indeed, we were bound together in perfect harmony, ex
cept in regard to the two practical reforms of Temperance and
Anti-Slavery. As to the first of these, a passing reference
alone is needed. For, although not a few in those days re
garded my principle of Total Abstinence as ascetic to the
verge of fanaticism, yet no attempt was made to check my
most earnest advocacy of the Temperance Cause. But in re
gard to Anti-Slavery, any one who will recall the temper of
Public Opinion as to the constitutional relations between the
Free States and the Slave States all along the Ohio Valley at
that critical period, will readily comprehend how difficult Was
the position of a minister in Cincinnati who uncompromisingly
avowed himself an Abolitionist. It gave proof of the remark
able liberality of the “First Congregational Church,” and of
the genuine friendship between them and their preacher, that
no remonstrance was made against the emphatic declaration
from the pulpit, that the law of Christian Brotherhood com
manded “Immediate PLmancipation. ” But when their pastor
proceeded to read announcements of Anti-Slavery Meetings—
4
�26
when, claiming his right as a pew-holder, he voted in a small
minority that the use of the church should be granted for Anti
Slavery lectures —when, in company with Rev. Wm. H. Bris
bane, from South Carolina, and Rev. Mr. Blanchard, of the Or
thodox Congregationalists, he addressed crowded assemblies,
and finally, when, with the far-famed Editor of the “Philanthro
pist,” Dr. Bailey, he took a stand-on the platform beside
Salmon P. Chase, when that great-hearted Statesman devoted
his whole political influence to the cause of Liberty for all
men—the indignation of not a few waxed warm. And the
crisis came when, amidst the impassioned excitements of the
Presidential Election, when nearly all of my best friends voted
for General Harrison, my ballot was cast for James G. Bir
ney. Then, for a few days, it did look probable that, for the
sake of peace, it might be wise to resign my post. But before
the week was out it was candidly recognized that my course
as a Citizen had been guided by the conscience of a Christian
Freeman, and my hold on the confidence of the society grew
firmer than ever. My chief reason, indeed, for re-awakeriing
these long buried trials is, first, to encourage your young
people to follow the Flag of Duty at all risks, and next, to
place distinctly on record this Fact in the history of the ‘ ‘First
Congregational Unitarian Church of Cincinnati,” that a score
of years before the era of our Nation’s redemption from the
crime and curse of Slavery, its pulpit stood before Ohio as
the representative of impartial Equity, Mercy and Brotherly
Kindness, and as the advocate of Universal P'reedom within
the United States.
And now it may well be asked, “How could you bear to
break a fraternal bond which such trials had only served to
seal?” My answer will be found in the “Farewell Letter”
already referred to. From its’pages it may be learned, how,
under the lead of Transcendental Philosophy then prevalent
in New England, and the ultra-rationalistic criticism imported
from Germany nearly forty years ago, I had become what is
now called a “Theist,” and how, having assumed aground
widely different from that held by the Unitarian denomination
which had ordained me, and from that avowed by myself,
�when the “First Congregational Unitarian Church” had en
trusted their pulpit to my charge, I felt it to be right to resign
my ministry, and with “a sad heart, though a clear con
science,” to bid my Cincinnati friends “Farewell.” But, from
the “Confession of Faith” contained in that “Letter,” it will
also appear how prolonged studies, conference with wise
scholars, calm thought and devout aspiration had brought me
up into a purer, spiritual atmosphere, and into a bright Faith
in Jesus as the Son of Man, transfigured into the Son of
God, which was like the dawn of a new day. Half a life
time has rolled by since that turning point in my ascending
path. And now, at the age of three score and ten, thanks to
“The Father of Lights,” I re-affirm the main doctrine of that
“Credo” with all my heart, and mind, and soul, and strength.
So nearly, indeed, does that Declaration embody my present
convictions in regard to the Character and Life of the Beloved
Son, his Central Relation to the Heavenly Father and to Hu
manity, and his Providential Function in evolving the destiny
of our Race, that I should rejoice to reprint it, with a few
modifications, and place it in the hands of every member of
your society. The chief difference between the views declared
in that “Letter, and to which exhaustive study of Comparative
Religion, Philosophy and History have enabled me to attain,
is that now from serener heights, with vision commanding a
wider horizon, and as in noon-day splendour, I behold
realities which in my early progress were discerned from
afar, half-veiled in morning clouds beneath the flush of sunrise.
[Note by the Editor of the Memorial Volume.—Mr. Channing con
cludes his admirable letter with a philosophic and brilliant exposition of Spir
itual Christianity as the one, universal, world-redeeming religion of humanity.
It is impossible, from want of space, to include in this pamphlet the balance of
his communication, which, however, appeared in the Christian Register for
February 21st, 1880. We have room only for its closing sentences.]
* * *
And now, Brethern and Sisters, Co-citizens
of our Freed and United Republic, could you but behold the
unequaled privileges and possibilities of our people as they
appear to an exile, who follows with longing eyes the descending
sun as he sinks to shed noon-tide on the lands of the west,
�28
you would rejoice and take courage. Receive, then, my Ben
ediction across the seas. Be worthy of your heritage of hope.
There is coming, swiftly coming, to repeat my refrain, a New
Era of Christendom, the celestial signs of which will be the
Revival of Real Christian Life. Henceforth, the United
Christian Church Universal can be content with nothing less
than Living Communion with the Father, through the Son,
in the Spirit of Holy, Heavenly Human Love. Consecrate
your whole being to receive this influx of the Real God with
us. Give your best energies heartily up to the currents of
Charity pulsating through our communities. But clearly
comprehend that this blessed Beneficence, beautiful as it is,
serves but as a John the Baptist to proclaim the advent of the
Real Christ. Does there not flow through you, like a cleansing
fire, the consciousness that the Son of Man, in His Perfect
Manhood, made glorious as Son of God by the Father’s In
dwelling Presence was the Adam of a New-born Race? That
one Transfigured Man was the ideal prophecy and pledge of
a Transfigured Humanity! Brethern, Sisters! Co-sovereign
children of God! Our Nation of United Freemen may be, if
only wise enough to will it, the elect People to realize that
Divine Ideal, and so fulfill the “desire of all Nations" by or
ganizing in every township of our Christian Commonwealth
perfect Societies as Heavens on Earth.
With Christmas and New Year’s Greeting,
Yours, in Good Hope,
William Henry Channing.
Harrogate, England, December ioth, 1879.
�29
FROM REV. CYRUS A. BARTOL, D.D.
I am so over-pressed with cares, I can but send to your
church God-speed for the future, with congratulations for the
past.
I had a happy six months’ work in the dear old temple
on the corner, hard by where Lyman Beecher preached, and
where he was tried for heresy by the Presbytery.
My heart has lost none of its warmth for the friends of
nearly forty-four years ago, but runs deep and steady as the
Ohio River, and never to be frozen as that was, so that I crossed
into Covington, Kentucky, on the ice. But I bear in mind,
too, the flowers I picked with beloved companions—one of
whom at least, ever precious to my heart, still lives—on the
the 1st day of January, 1836.
There is something in a memory—there is a hope in it.
A great and good one may there be in your commemoration,
prays,
Your cordial friend,
C. A. Bartol.
Boston, January ist, 1880.
FROM REV. SAMUEL OSGOOD, D.D.
Your Committee on Invitations have kindly remembered
me in your arrangements for your Church Semi-Centennial,
and it would be to me a most interesting festival could I be
present. Great would be the satisfaction of meeting the few
members of the congregation whom I remember and who
remember me/ Equally great would be the surprise at noting
the new faces in the assembly, and the marvellous growth of
your noble city, and all its good institutions, and beautiful arts.
I have a very humble claim to a place on your list of
preachers, for I occupied your pulpit from May 1st, 1836, till
the end of November, and again from February 5th, 1837, to
the middle of March. I did what I could in the pulpit, the
�Sunday School, and in parish work, but I was conscious of
being too green in experience and too crude in culture to meet
the demands of so important a post. There was great kind
ness on the part of many of the people, whilst I was aware
that the need of a popular preacher who could build them up
at once by mingled wisdom and eloquence, was not met by
the raw youth who went West from the Cambridge Divinity
School.
I am sorry to find so few names that are familiar to me
on your list of representative parishioners. E. P. Cranch,
Rowland Ellis, Ryland, Hartwell and Fayette Smith are all
that I am sure of recalling, but there may be others. * *
Mrs. Charles Stetson, to whom, with her husband, I owed so
much for their great kindness, I saw a few days ago in the
repose of death in All Souls’ Church—the same delicacy and
peace in her features as in her hospitable home forty-four
years ago. So the years pass.
God’s blessing be with your church and with you all.
Your friend,
Sam’l Osgood.
New York, January 19th, 1880.
FROM REV. A. A. LIVERMORE.
I thank the committee of the First Congregational Church
of Cincinnati for its kind invitation to attend the Semi-Cen
tennial Re-union of the church on the 21st inst. My duties
here, however, will necessarily prevent me from enjoying that
very great pleasure. But I am glad to send my word of
greeting, and to respond, with all my heart, to your invitation.
It will be thirty years—one whole generation, as time is
reckoned—on the 15th of next May, when my dear wife and
I, having descended the Ohio from Pittsburg, in the Keystone
State, Capt. Stone, landed in Cincinnati and were welcomed
by brother Kebler and wife to their ever hospitable home.
�3i
We were both wholly strangers to the West, as it was then
called. I had b6en settled in a quiet £Jew England town,
Keene, New Hampshire, for thirteen years arid a half. But
chronic bronchitis required a change of climate, and a spon
taneous call from your society brought us to the Queen
City. It was a great change for us, greater than we knew
then. Eloquent and devoted pastors had preceded me, among
whom were the apostolic Peabody, the enthusiastic Channing,
and the philanthropic Perkins. The fermentation of many
new opinions was going on here, both in politics and religion
Different national elements entered into the composition of
society. It was the eventful era of the Anti-Slavery discus
sion, of the rise of Spiritualism, of radical and free religious
opinions, and. of the first mutterings of the thunder cloud
which soon broke forth in civil war.
Th'e old church, at the corner of Race and Fourth, now
occupied by a splendid dry goods store, was a dear place to
our hearts. Home is home, however homely, and that was
our religious home. It was ancient and dingy, but it was
clothed over, within and without, with hallowed associations.
There noble men had lifted up their voices—Emerson, Walk
er, Bellows, Dewey, Parker, Gannett, Hosmer, Mann, and
others of the great liberal household. Th'e only sketch of
■the building, I believe, in existence, is one made by Mrs.
Ephraim Peabody, and now in her possession. I wish I had
it to send you.
The first summer was a cholera season, less fatal than 1849,
but sweeping off thousands. I attended five furierals of those
who died of this disease—Mr. Pollard, Mr. Bates and child,
Mrs. Dr. Price, and Mrs. Lemaire. But we and our people
staid in the city all through the hot weather, and had three
services every Sunday—Sunday school at nine o’clock and
preaching in the forenoon and evening. Unitarians were stal
wart in those days, and minded not wind or weather. And I
am glad to see that of the Committee of Invitation, on your
card sent me, twelve are active still, who belonged to the
society in my day. Happy men, who, after dwelling in tent
and tabernacle, and the wanderings in the wilderness, have
�32
lived to enter the promised land, and even-to behold this fair
temple on Mount Zion.
We did what we could in those days of transition and crisis.
We kept the fire lighted on the altar. We drew as near
Christ and His Father—and our Father—as we could, feeling
that for a working principle and every day religion, lofty prin
ciples and ideals, plus these mighty personalities, were better
for us than the grandest truths, if they were merely abstract
and unsymbolized. In 1852 we organized here the Western
Conference, which has flourished since and become a power
in the land. We reached out a helping hand to Antioch Col
lege and over to Meadville Theological School, when those
institutions were getting under way. We did something in
the book business and circulated several hundred volumes of
Channing’s works and memoirs, and other liberal books in this
community and through the West. More or less of us
worked for the anti-slavery cause, and united in those charm
ing re-unions at the annual spring time in the hospitable
Ernst mansion at Spring Garden, where we met such historic
characters as Garrison, Mrs. Stowe, May, Phillips, Adin
Ballou, and others. The Ladies’ Art Association, the Relief
Union for charity, and the Kossuth frenzy came in for a
share of attention and work. Hearts that are dust now,
spirits that burn pure in heaven now, kindled then with sacred
fire for the cause of God and man. If the fuel of the fire
was not always free from earthliness and grossness, the fire
itself flamed pure to heaven, transforming all to its own
celestial essence.
So we worked, and so dreamed, as the years rolled by. It
was a sweet and happy society, that old Cincinnati brother
hood and sisterhood. There was the old Book Club Sociable.
There was the great hospitable Stetson mansion , and other
hospitable mansions. There were lectures from Parker and
Emerson and Mann. There was Madame D’Arusmont, whose,
funeral I afterward attended, insisting on woman’s rights and
wrongs. There were many eccentrics in Western society at
that time, and the race is not yet wholly extinct, but they
added interest and piquancy to what otherwise might have
proved tame and prosaic.
�33
But at last the work grew heavy. Illness of a sad type
invaded the household. There must be another change, and
on July 6, 1856, I performed the last service as the pastor of
your church, after a ministry here of six years and two
months, and removed to Yellow Springs, O., and the same
fall to New York to take charge of the Christian Inquirer, and
the parish at Yonkers for seven years, and thence removed to
Meadville, in 1863, where my duties are still in the Theolog
ical School.
It was a rupture of many tender and endeared ties to break
away from Cincinnati; but short ministries have been the
customary rule there. I received always from your church
and society the most kindly consideration and generous treat
ment, and not a word or act, so far as I know, ever broke the
charm of a perfect friendship. And whenever, from time to
time, I have visited Cincinnati, I have always met friends
and only friends, and have been made glad with the old love
and the ancient friendly greeting. I wish I could say this
face to face, but as that cannot be done, the next best thing
is to write it.
And now that a great blow has fallen upon me that stuns
me to the earth, I find a sweet, sad pleasure in recalling those
past days, when we, who are now parted, labored together
here and had such blessed communion in duties, anxieties and
trials as must fall to the lot of all who are engaged in the
ministry of Christ.
And now, to bring these desultory reminiscences to a close,
may your re-union be a happy and encouraging one ; gain
say it who will, the work which this church has done in your
city and in the larger community of the State and the Ohio
Valley has not been in vain. It has sowed many a good seed
and reaped many a golden harvest. Noble men and sainted
women have been in your household of faith. The record is
on high and it is one we need not be ashamed of. In how
many things we might have done better is not the thought
for this evening of commemoration, but it- is fervent gratitude
to God that His grace has enabled us to do as we have and as
much as -we have. So we will thank God and take courage.
5
�May your history for the next fifty years round out the
century with still better service to God and man and still
nobler achievements than any you have yet seen or realized.
Your position is a glorious one—to act on the heart and cen
ter of a great and growing nation. Let the heart and soul of
every young man and every young woman of this church, or
at this re-union, catch the fire of a holy resolution to unite to
do something worthy and substantial to help on the Christian
culture and civilization of the great coming nation that is here
to exceed all the other nations of the earth. But to give
solidity and incisiveness to this resolution they need to re
member that only on these eternal paths of righteousness can our
beloved America hold her way in safety, and not go down, as
so many kingdoms and empires before her have done, in irre
trievable ruin. * * * All earthly interests, all worldly
ambitions are but as the small dust of the balance compared
with the eternal truths and the heavenly aims of which your
church stands as the representative, and which will still rise
and shine bright as ever when a thousand ages are past.
Peace and love be with you all!
Ever, most affectionately,
Your old pastor and constant friend and brother,
A. A. Livermore.
Meadville, January 17, 1880.
FROM REV. MONCURE D. CONWAY.
Hearty thanks for your good kind letter and your remen?brance of me in connection with the Semi-Centennial of the
First Congregational Church of Cincinnati. But it astonishes
me! I never had a notion that the church was such a young
thing. I thought it belonged to the pre-historic bronze age
of Cincinnati, or at least sprang up along with the first
catawba vine planted by Nicholas Longworth. I knew it was
very much evolved when I went to it, and, some may add,
�35
considerably involved when I left it. At any rate, I am sure
its present prosperity is an example of the survival of the
fittest. When I come to think of it, there is a good long
stretch of years since the first Sunday I entered the pulpit at
the corner of Fourth and Race streets. I have on my wall
now a photograph of that pulpit with an evergreen arch in
front of it and large lilies each side. Dear Mr. Hoffner sent
them. If my memory does not deceive me, it was on the
occasion of the minister’s marriage, a ceremony in which I
participated. How well I remember the old days!
Now and then, when I meet the eminent London composer
and conductor, Danreuther, I wonder if he recalls my end of
the old church as vividly as I do his thin, small form at the
other end, struggling with the organ keys, which he mastered,
and the pedals which almost mastered him. There were some
happy years at the old corner. No misunderstandings, or
differences which followed them, and no changes since have
ever made me forget any of the brave, earnest, and able men
and women who used to gather with me there, most of whom
I am glad to hear of standing by you now. Goethe says:
“All things would be done so nice,
Could we only do them twice,”
and I sometimes think that if I had my life and ministry at
Cincinnati to live over again, with as many gray hairs as I
have now, I should be able to make it a pleasanter page in
the history of the First Congregational Church. * * * *
I have seen by the papers that your minister has been sug
gesting to the chimneys how they may burn their own smoke,
and trust that the Orthodox steeples will learn the same les
son. The smoke of their torment ought not to ascend up for
ever and ever. I hope that beautiful Cincinnati will become
clean of both coal and dogmatic soot, and as fair as the Queen
of the West should be. My heart will be with you at the
banquet of your year of jubilee, and I shall think of it as a
golden wedding, the fiftieth anniversary of a union of faithful
hearts, based on a profounder union of reason and religion in
earnest minds. May you still be present when the diamond
�5
*
3
wedding arrives to lay on the society’s brow the crown of a
higher success, shining with brilliants yet to be won from the
mines of truth and freedom 1 And, if I may be allowed to
change the similitude, may our children and our children’s
children remember this Semi-Centennial festival as but a vig
orous leaf on a flourishing stem when they gather around the
century blossom whose glory will surely crown our cause.
Across sea and land I pledge the old First Congregational
with the bumper of a full heart.
Ever yours faithfully,
Moncure D. Conway.
London, Christmas-time., 1879.
FROM REV. C. G. AMES.
* * * I was prevented by a sudden call out of the city
and to the sick chamber of one very dear to me from answer
ing your kind note of invitation. The impulse was strong to
send you a telegram merely to say, “The communion of the
Holy Ghost be with you all,” but I had a little fear that by
the time it got to your meeting it would sound canting. But
it is just what I want to say to the dear folks and to you, my
friend and fellow servant.
Charles G. Ames.
Philadelphia, Penn., January 24, 1880.
FROM REV. A. D. MAYO.
My Dear Friends:
When I read your kind invitation to be present at the
anniversary of the First Congregational Church, I was sorry
that in spite of telegraphs and telephones a thousand miles
�37
are not yet as one mile, that I might be with you. It is true
I was never settled over your church, but was pastor of our
dear buried Church of the Redeemer. But in the Christian
faith, in which I rejoice, there is no death or burial, but what
seems to be the going out of one good thing is only the birth
of another. Whatever of the true church of love to God
and man was formed in those eventful years in the breasts of
the men and women and children who used to assemble in
that plain tabernacle at the corner of Sixth and Mound
streets, still abides, and has passed over into the new congre
gation, which gathers about the new minister and approves
itself by its work.
#
<<
^4
^4
^4
jj;
My best wishes are with you, however. I have not forgot
ten one of my old parishioners and I wish I could become
acquainted with all your parish I have not seen.
I have never wavered from my conviction, always expressed
while in Cincinnati, that your city is one of the few strategic
points for Christian work in America. In no American city
are the elements of our nationality so evenly mated and so in
want of a final moulding into a true American type. No
where does the community suffer so much from the violence,
on the one hand, of an intolerant conservatism, and on the
other, from an implacable antipathy to all forms of organized
Christianity. So far the Protestant church in Cincinnati
seems to have failed to reconcile these warring elements and
lead this new metropolis as it should be led in the highway
of public purity and private and social morality. The present
condition of your city is the reproach of the Protestant church
that for a hundred years has stood at the sources of its spirit
ual and moral life. Whether from a theology too scholastic and
impractical, or a want of spiritual tact to seize upon decisive
moments in the life of the city, or from want of courage to
face the insolent Romanism and blatant Atheism that have
filled your streets with a strange clamor of discordant voices,
or from all these combined, the Protestant church of Cincinnati
has not yet come up to the full measure of her responsibility.
I believe nothing but a truly Liberal Christianity can save
�óur American cities, East and West, from a more dangerous
than Roman or Asiatic corruption. Much as I rejoice over
your growth in wealth, in social refinement, in music and art,
*
and highly as I esteem your admirable system of free educa
tion, I have no faith that any or all of these can make of Cin
cinnati the city any truly wise and virtuous citizen desires her
to become. Religion always was and always wilt be the root
of every great and beneficent community, as of every great
and beneficent life. And the religion that seems to me given
by God especially for the healing of a distracted nation is that
absolute, universal faith in a God of infinite love ; a humanity
cradled, trained and disciplined in God’s love. This religion
I find set forth best in the words and person of Jesus of NazHFCtll
I hope there are plenty of men and women in your congre
gation who believe this and that you are working in that faith.
That your counsels may prevail, and your broad and beautiful
hope for man may be realized, in the life of the present church,,
is the fervent prayer of,
Your friend,
A. D. Mayo.
Springfield, Mas&, January 18th, 1880.
FROM REV. CHARLEIS NOYES.
We rejoice with you that the Semi-Centennial comes to find
Unitarian Christians of Cincinnati of one mind and one heart,
one spirit and one purpose, and that the favorable auspices for
their future are the result of their mutual toils and sacrifices.
You are to be congratulated that the debt which was so heavy
an incubus has been so nearly paid, and that young and old,
forgetting the things that are behind, are looking forward with
so much confidence and courage to the things that are before.
May pure religion and undefiled lead you from victory to vic
tory ! Let us hope you may solve the question, so difficult of
i
�39
practical solution, how to bring the many elements of liberal
.strength that are now with you, but in a certain indefinite and
hazy sympathy, to join their forces with yours in an aggressive
warfare against sin, and keeping each to absolute individual
liberty, work together, each with each, and all together with
'God. Could this result be reached, no building in your goodly
city could hold the thousands who are to-day theoretically with
you, but, for various reasons, have not put their hands with
you to the plough of reform.
Shall it continue ever to be true that Unitarian laborers are
few, or that they stand all the day idle ? The divine voice
should be heard all along the line. Skirmishing enough has been
done; the nature of the ground and the position of the enemy
is known. The battle should begin in faith in our principles
strong to move mountains, and victories manifest in works
■ought to be the result
Remember me to all the friends gathered together on the
21 st for council and rejoicing. One body may they ever be,
■“joined together and compacted by that which every joint
supplieth.”
Truly your friend,
Charles NoyesClinton Mass., January i6th, 1880.
FROM HON. WILLIAM GREENE.
The valued favor of your committee is duly received. I beg
to thank you and all my old friends of the First Congregational
Church that I am so kindly remembered. I would most gladly
accept your invitation to join you in your proposed Semi-Cen
tennial celebration did my advanced years admit of it. All
that I can say is that my heart is as warmly interested in your
church as ever, that I rejoice in the present prosperous con
dition of an organization of which I still consider myself a
�40
member, and that you have my cordial best wishes for its con
tinued success and usefulness. Appended you will find a
short statement, as desired by you, of the first steps taken
toward the formation of a Liberal church in Cincinnati.
Very truly yours,
W. Greene.
East Greenwich, R. I., January 15th, 1880.
FROM JOHN ROGERS, ESQ.
I thank you for your kind invitation to be present at the
celebration of the half-century anniversary of the First Con
gregational Church in Cincinnati, on the 21 st inst., which I
would gladly accept, and be present, did circumstances favor.
Be assured, I still feel much interest in the little church under
whose “droppings” I was said to live, (my house being next
door) and where I listened to Whitman, and Clarke, and Hall,
and Peabody, so many years ago.
But half a century!—what changes does it make? How
few, probably, are left of those I remember among the wor
shipers of 1830 to 1835. I should be a stranger there and feel
the awkwardness of one, should I come to your meeting. In
spirit, however, I will be there, and assuring you of my sym
pathy, and rejoicing in the prosperity of the old church,
I am very truly yours,
John Rogers.
Boston, January 17, 1880.
�4i
FROM MRS. ANNE RYLAND.
I received your note of invitation, a few days ago, to the
Semi-Centennial celebration of the church, and should have
answered it sooner had I not hoped that my health would
have permitted me to join your circle in that happy hour, but
as that cannot be, allow me to send you my most sincere
sympathy and congratulations on this occasion, with wishes
that the church and all its members may continue to increase
in prosperity and well-doing.
Being the oldest participant, in this city, in its first organ
ization, and a regular attendant till ill health and weakness
prevented, I have watched its growth with the greatest inter
est and love as each year has rolled round, and can hardly
realize that fifty of them have passed. As I cannot be with
you in bodily presence, rest assured that my heart is there, as
warm towards you, as sincere as ever. That your meeting
may be one of joy and happiness to all is the earnest prayer of,
Yours truly,
Anne Ryland.
Cincinnati, January 21, 1880.
FROM EDW. P. CRANCH, ESQ.
I am prevented by indisposition from attending the jubilee
at the church this evening. I wanted to come, for I was a
nursling of the church myself, and was married in it. Pea
body, Channing, Perkins, Silsbee, Osgood, Bulfinch, Eliot
and I were young men together, friends and companions, and
I owe it to them and the charm of their society, that as a
youth I was kept away from many things. But as for me, I
do but count one out of thousands who have to thank God
for the splendid influence of such men and many others like
them. My grandfather, my father and myself have been, in
our time, which covers about a century and a half, avowed
6
�42
and active Unitarians; and, looking back simply to my own
humble experience, I can form a pretty correct judgment of
what must have been the experience of thousands of Amer
ican youth who have been, during that long period, and are
still, cast loose in the whirling current of life, and who have
found in the companionship of some Unitarian pastor, per
haps as young and untried as themselves (some spiritual
friend, perhaps, like James H. Perkins or Ephraim Peabody),
that which removed their deepest doubts and kept alive in
them a spark of honest religious conviction. I do not hes
itate to say, from what I know, that the influence of the
Unitarian clergy upon the minds of young men of education
has been an important factor in the progress of civilization
during the last hundred years.
When our little congregation first came together it was
predicted by our orthodox friends that it would not hold
together for ten years, but our fiftieth anniversary finds it
flourishing, and healthy and influential, and it has become a
necessity to our city. As an old member, I delight to add
my heartfelt congratulations, and to express my belief that
there is in its present organization the germ of still greater
things.
Very sincerely yours,
Edw. P. Cranch.
Cincinnati, January 21, 1880.
�(JOHGRÄTULÄTORY LETTERS.
��FROM REV. JAMES FREEMAN CLARKE, D.D.
I heartily wish I could be with you at your celebration of
the fiftieth anniversary of the foundation of your society. I
did not know that when I first saw it in 1833, it was only an
infant three years old. It seemed already hardened into the
sinew of manhood. The society to which I went at Louisville
was founded in the same year, but was not so strong. The
Cincinnati church, at that time, had Ephraim Peabody for its
minister, who was surrounded by a noble body of men and
women—among whom how well I remember Mr. and Mrs.
Chas. Stetson, Mr. and Mrs. William Greene, Timothy Walk
er, the Pomeroys, James H. Perkins, and a multitude of other
bright men and women, of whom the greater part have fallen
asleep. What brilliant meetings were held at the houses of
Mr. Foote, Mr. Stetson and Mr. Greene, which stood side by
side on a lofty terrace overlooking the city, the river, and the
hills of Kentucky! There met the famous “Semi-Colon,”
where so many witty men and bright women made a focus of
literature in the midst of the business life of the young city !
There are some still left among you who can remember and
describe those meetings. There, too, originated our famous
monthly, “The Western Messenger,” edited by Peabody, Per
kins, Cranch, Gallagher and others—until our dear brother
Peabody was obliged to go away from impaired health. The
spirit of the Unitarian Society in those days was full of life.
How glad I was, once or twice a year, to come to Cincinnati
and have the satisfaction of meeting all these generous and
noble souls. And, though years and distance have separated
us, I have never forgotten your society nor lost my interest in
its welfare. I have sorrowed with it in its trial's and rejoiced
in its prosperity. My good wishes and prayers will be with
you on your anniversary, and my congratulations on the
present prospects which open before you. May the next
fifty years see fifty more societies around you, and you the
�46
Mother-Church of the valley, the most active and useful of
all. The church in Pittsburgh was, I think, older, but I fear
that its work has, for the present, ceased ; and the Meadville
(Penn.) Church, founded in 1825, can hardly be considered as
in the Ohio Valley.
When I went down the Ohio, for the first time, in 1833,
the Unitarian churches west of the Alleghanies were only
five—being those in Meadville, Pittsburgh, Buffalo, Cincinnati
and Louisville. There was then no society in St. Louis nor
in Chicago. Now the number of the churches given in the
Year Book is 57, of which 47 have settled preachers. And yet,
during all this time, we have been told that Unitarianism was
“dying out!” Let us hope that it it may long continue to
die out in the same way.
Very sincerely yours,
James Freeman Clarke.
Jamaica Plain, Mass., January 17, 1880.
FROM REV. H. W. BELLOWS, D.D.
Your letter, announcing the coming celebration of the
fiftieth anniversary of the Unitarian Society in Cincinnati,
arouses a multitude of pleasant memories in my mind. In
my early life the Cincinnati church was the very out-post of
our cause, and a sort of a Mecca for Western bound folk who
left the East and never felt at home until they had made the
acquaintance of the delightful little circle that gathered about
that “live coal” that had been taken from the Eastern altar to
kindle the flame of our Unitarian culture and piety in what
was then a wilderness. A venerable uncle of mine—who
died, ninety-six years old, some ten years ago—told me that he
saw Cincinnati when it was a village of 3,000 people, and
when the first experiment to conquer the Ohio by steam
power was being tried at the river’s shore. Even in my recol
�47
lection it was a town of gardens, with outlooks from many
places quite inland to the Kentucky shores and hills. Coal
smoke had not then enveloped it. But, besides its charms as
a beautiful rural town of irregular and varied surface, and all
beflowered with shrubs, it had then a circle of choice spirits
—hospitable, touched with a culture then rare, in music, and
art, and literature—hungry for the sight of faces that came
from the East, which was then “the home" of all Western
hearts. You have, doubtless, fifty times the number of liter
ary and public spirited persons of the same type now—but
“familiarity breeds contempt.” People do not go through a
wilderness now to get to Cincinnati, nor come upon its little
circle as upon a spring in a dry land, an oasis in the desert, as
they did then. Nor was that little circle one that can be copied
or repeated. It had the mingled charm of exile, of pioneer
life, of rarity in tastes, of domestic familiarity, and of a relig
ious bond. These things no longer enter into any life in
America since railroads and telegraphs have put an omnipres
ence, or home-i-ness, everywhere, into all persons at all points.
It meant something to find yourself in Cincinnati after a week’s
travel over the Alleghanies, an upset in the stage, and two
days on a sandbar in the Ohio! And then, to get a welcome
into that charmed circle, small but so kind, intelligent and
hospitable, of which your church was the one center, was one
of the most delightful of surprises, and the most memorable
of experiences. I recollect thinking the dozen families I knew,
all eminently cultivated, and humane and progressive, were
only a sample of the population. Really, they were the
cream, and I found it out by noticing that they rose to the
top every time. At intervals of a year or two, I visited the
place, and always the some clot. There are advantages in not
having too many people to admire. You have the time to ad
mire the few, and appreciatively and at leisure.
I arrived in Cincinnati the first time in the year 1834. My
principal recollection is that I was traveling at twenty years of
age, and had spent more money than I ought, in the cities then
new to me—New York, Philadelphia, Baltimore, and Washing
ton—in which I had lingered. A few years later, 1838, I re
�48
member that I arrived at Cincinnati in early May, I think, just
in time to hear Rev. Mr. Huntoon preach his farewell sermon
on Sunday morning. I was asked to preach in the evening
and I filled the vacant pulpit for six weeks. They were among
the most delightful weeks of my life, for I was the guest of
Mr. and Mrs. Chas. Stetson, whose house was then almost
the public hotel of the Unitarian stragglers, in black coats or
black gowns, who wandered into the city. Childless them
selves, they became father and mother to all, with or without
a claim, who needed furtherance or shelter. How delightful
that hill, vheie the Stetsons, the Footes, the Greenes so long
lived side by side in a sort of garden! I shall never be young
again in this world, and so I shall never bring the sauce of
youth to the viands that society spreads before me. And who
can tell whether the sauce or the fish makes the feast? And
so I cannot tell how much my recollections of the Cincinnati
circle owe to the period of life they recall.
I knew very little of the man of genius and lofty humanity,
whose memory is still precious among you, James H. Perkins.
But of your saintly minister, Ephraim Peabody, I am not
likely to forget much, now that his daughter cultivates his
memory at my own hearth! He preached my ordination ser
mon in New York. His portrait looks down upon me as I
wiitc. What a charm of countenance, of speech, of charactei and piesence he had ! The wisdom of this world was never
more completely blended with the wisdom that.is from on high.
He was a wondrous judge of character, and his slow, delayed
and sententious wisdom usually ended with a snap like the
sound of a whip. He had a genius for morals and religion.
He looked, and he was, saintly. His memory is cherished
by his old flock in New Bedford, in King’s Chapel, Boston,
and by the \ ery few who remain who knew him in Cincinnati
and in Meadville, still earlier scenes of his fascinating and
always elevating influence.
My v ife s kinsman, Rev. A. A. Eivermore, I have known
foi nearly fifty years, and always to love and honor. Thank
God, he still remains to receive the respect and love of all the
people who were ever blessed with his transparent purity' of
�49
heart and his calm wisdom of head in Keene, in Cincinnati,
and in Meadville. I rejoice to hear such excellent and en
couraging accounts of the parish health and prospects. Your
church has never wanted hard-working ministers, or devoted
people in the pews. Rev. Mr. Mayo will always be remem
bered for,the unflagging zeal he brought to every one of his
various spheres of ministry. If I should name the good men
and women who have adorned and blessed your church—and
whose connection with the parish is as old as my first knowledge
of it—I should be afraid of injuring the modesty of those I
recall, and wounding the pride of those I should be sure to for
get and omit. . In such a case silence is golden. But when I
speak of noble men and lovely and faithful women in your
church whom I have known these------ ? years—I mean—well,
they know and I know—and that is enough—and I won’t say
I mean—and I really mean everybody who honestly thinks
he is meant or that she is thus delicately referred to !
How I wish I could be with you, but I can't! A great
company of our ministers will be in spirit with you, for how
many have enjoyed your hearty semi-Southern hospitality!
Commend me to any old friends who Will care to hear that I
still remember them, and believe me,
Very affectionately and fraternally yours,
Henry W. Bellows.
New York, January i, 1880.
FROM REV. GEO. W. HOSMER, D.D.
With all my heart I rejoice with you.
I remember the
establishment of the society. It was the spring-time of our
hope for the spread of Liberal Christianity in the West. We
were looking for great things, and we young theological stu
dents were girding ourselves to go into the fields ripe for the
■harvest.
7
�50
At that time Dr. Walker was in Cincinnati, and some man
who had heard him once was invited to go and hear him again.
“No,’ said he, “why, I will not be a Unitarian, and if I hear
that man again I shall .be obliged to be one.”
Five years from the beginning of the society I was in Cin
cinnati, the beautiful, terraced garden city, as it then was—
and how the names and faces of the dear old friends come up
to me now; Ephraim Peabody, my classmate, the pastor, so
wise and loving, the Stetsons, the Greenes—but I must not
write all their names, nor attempt to tell what a charming,
earnest, happy society it was; so young, bright and hopeful.
There were many remarkable persons among them. I have
known much of the Unitarians of Cincinnati from that day to
this, and the memories are bright spots in my life. While at
Antioch College, Cincinnati was one of my homes, and those
good friends there—God bless them!—were always ready to
give help and cheer out of their generous hearts and pleasant
homes. Your society has been very rich in fine characters
and noble lives. What a line of ministers, the living and the
dead! Perkins and Peabody, so unlike, but in each what con
secrated genius,—prophet and saint. Your society has much
to think of and to rejoice in. I am glad you arc all one again
and can rejoice together, and as your second half-century is
knocking at your door, in one mind and heart may you wel
come it, and with reverent, prayerful aspiration try to make
even a better half-century than the last has been.
With earnest congratulation and God-speed, I am with you.
Geo. W. Hosmer.
Salem, January 19, 1880.
FROM REV. WM. SIESBEE.
In the spring of 1837 I first turned my steps Westward.
I he circlet of hills which graced the Queen City was green
then and no pervading smoke soiled her fair robes. The
�51
society was the most charming, take it all in all, that I had
ever known. And the dear church sent out an influence to
gladden and elevate the whole place. It is enough to recall
the memory of one who ministered to them, now long since
passed away, in that remarkable man and preacher, James H.
Perkins, whom I should in vain attempt to describe to those
who never heard him. I cannot refrain from adding my
hearty congratulations to your church on its present bright
prospects. I have great confidence that you will prove not
unworthy of the founders. Such, at least, is the earnest
prayer of,
Your sincere friend,
Wm. Silsbee.
Trenton, N. Y., January 19, 1880.
FROM REV. ROBERT COLLYER.
Your circular came at breakfast this morning, and I make
haste to send congratulations and good wishes to the golden
wedding to be celebrated by your church on Wednesday. It
is an event of the most genuine interest in the history of our
faith in the West. Only our church in Louisville runs back
to 1830, and if you are not twins—also as twins have never
been the good fortune of our Unitarian household, so far as I
know—your happy advent in January of that year will make
you the oldest church of our order in the West. I wish I
could be with you to witness your joy, to hear the story of
the day of small things and see the nobler promise with mine
own eyes, and to wish for you the great career you are sure
to carve out by God’s blessing and your own faithful striving
in the Athens of the West. In France, they say there is a rose
rooted down in sacred ground, they can trace backward for 400
years, abloom still, with no sign of decay about it, but every
year roses foaming over the old walls, covering them with
beauty and making the whole neighborhood fragrant.
�52
So may it be with the fair rose the fathers and mothers
planted in Cincinnati. May the centuries endow it with an
enduring beauty and fragrance from God, is the prayer of,
Your ever loving brother,
Robert Collyer.
New York, January 19, 1880.
FROM REV. E. H. HALL.
I have been delaying my answer to your note, trying to
delude myself into the idea that I might accept your very
cordial and attractive invitation. Unfortunately, I must de
cline, as it is impossible tor me to leave home at this season,
for so long a time ; but, nothing could have given me greater
pleasure than to have celebrated with you an anniversary that
has almost as great an interest for me as for you.
As I left Cincinnati at the early age. of two months, I can
not retain many personal recollections of the town or parish
in those days; but I remember well my father’s continued
affection for the little church which he helped to found, and I
can imagine the vivid interest he would have taken, if he were
still living, in your, commemoration. In a letter, which lies
on my table, written by him to Rev. E. S. Gannett, and dated
Cincinnati, February 21st, 1831, he speaks in the strongest
language, of the importance and promise of thè new move
ment, and of his regret at abandoning it, as his health com
pelled him to do. “A more important, place-than this,” he
says, there is not,-1 believe, in the land. This is often said
of many places, by those who live in them ; but I do think
it may be said pre-eminently of this. This society and its
pastor are to give the character of Unitarianism in the whole
wide and growing West.”
I congratulate you that during the half century which has
passed since these words were written, thè Liberal cause has
been bravely maintained in Cincinnati, and that you can cele-
�53
brate your anniversary with such' bright and cheering pros
pects before you.
With many regrets that I can not be with you, and with
sincerest good-wishes for the future, I am,
Yours, with great regard.
Edward H. Hall.
W orcester, Mass., January 7, 1880.
FROM REV. FRANCIS G. PEABODY.
I am too late to use your very kind hospitality offered to
my father’s son at your Love Feast. Thank you none the
less for thinking of it, and may you begin to-morrow another
long term of prosperity and power.
When I was in Cincinnati, a few years ago, I was much
struck by the lesson which the reminiscences of my father
contained. All who had known him spoke of him to me;
but when I recalled this series of conversations, I discovered
that not one had said a word of his preaching, so absorbed
were they all in the memory of his character and personal
holiness.
This was wl'at was left after forty years, and it was a living
force still; the sermons, which seemed to him, no doubt, his
central work, were dead long ago.
I suppose human nature and needs are much the same still.
Faithfully yours,
Francis G. Peabody.
• Santa Barbara, California, January 20, 1880
�54
FROM REV. HENRY W. FOOTE.
* * * To one who is looking forward to keeping the
two hundredth anniversary of his church before long, your
Semi-Centennial seems to cover but a brief span; but it has
been long enough to give a goodly show of souls who have
made a record for your church in Cincinnati whereof it may
be proud. King’s Chapel shares with you one of the holiest
and purest memories that either church can have in all their
history. As the successor of Ephraim Peabody here, I send
this belated greeting to his successor in his early parish. May
his spirit, purpose and reward be ours.
Truly your friend,
Henry W. Foote.
Boston, January 23, 1880.
FROM H. P. KIDDER, ESQ.,
President of the American Unitarian Association.
* * * Let mc congratulate you and your society on
your present prosperous condition, adding the hope that it
may never be less.
Yours most truly,
H. P. Kidder.
Boston, January 17, 1880.
�appgiídix.
�F
,1
•I
là
�in memoRiAm
MRS. CHARLES STETSON.
This beloved and venerated woman—so long the centre of hospitality to
Unitarian visitors in Cincinnati—died on the evening of January 6, 1880, in
New York, where for ten years past she had resided. She had been declining
for two or three years, but her death was very sudden, as she had been at the
family tea-table at 6 p. M., and died of a paralytic stroke before 9 P. M. Being
at or about eighty, her departure may be regarded as not untimely, and her
state of health did not make life sufficiently desirable to allow her friends any
other regrets than those awakened by the memory of her useful and benevolent
life, and the thought that her gentle face and lovely smile can no more be
seen! She has gone to a great reward, if heaven gives the heartiest welcome
to those who have rendered the law of kindness most honor and obedience
here on earth.
To those who never experienced the charm of the Stetson home—open
for nearly half a century with almost boundless hospitality to all homeless vis
itors with the shadow of a claim on the attention of Mr. Charles Stetson and
his wife—it is difficult to tell the emotions awakened in the hearts of the few
who survive among the hundreds who once knew the loving kindness and care
and delicacy of that noble pair, as they hear that the last of them has
gone heavenward! Rich, childless, unpretending, public-spirited, simple in
personal tastes, refined and cultivated, lovers of music and the arts, fond of
good people and admirers of genius and worth, the Stetsons made their
beautiful and generous home the centre of a copious, yet simple hospitality,
which has rarely been exceeded, either in sum or quality, by any house
known to the somewhat wide experience of the writer. One in feeling and
action, agreeing in a curious fondness for promoting the comfort and pleasure
of those neglected by others, they made it the main business of their lives to
do good as they had opportunity, and to do it, not at arms length, but by per
sonal service. Their house was always full of guests; they welcomed our
Unitarian clergy, artists, philanthropists, strangers from abroad, and rising
aspirants at home, besides doing their full part towards the general society of
Cincinnati. Their horses and carriages were always carrying round others to
see the beautiful country about their city ; and to many Eastern folk the Stet
sons’ home was the largest part of Cincinnati.
�58
How many of our ministers, young forty years ago, must be thrilled with
tender gratitude as they hear of Mrs. Stetson’s departure, and recall the thought
fulness, heartiness, and simplicity of her hospitality to them, when they were
unknown and without any claim except that of their profession and their soli
tude ! We should, perhaps, never have had a Unitarian society in Cincinnati
but for their interest, liberality and hospitality to our ministers. At any rate,
the fiftieth anniversary of our church there, celebrated on the coming 21st of
January, will date back to a time when the Stetsons were better known in
connection with our cause than any household in the West.
Mr. Stetson died about five years ago. He was very unfortunate during the
last decade of his life, and earned his living, after a long career of prosperity,
by the performance of a clerk’s duties in the New York Custom House. But
his sweetness, his wit, his love of children, his pride of character, his charm
of sympathy, his childlikeness of heart never left him ; and he bore his crush
ing misfortunes with manly courage, broken and infirm as his body was, and
wounded and sick as his heart must have been.
Mrs. Stetson, just gone, was a woman who united a sort of Quaker sim
plicity of face and costume with a decided originality of thought and a very
marked individuality. Strength and self-respect were beautifully blent with
modesty, genuineness and unworldliness of nature. She lived in the world and
enjoyed and used it, but she never allowed it to use her. She had not a particle
of cant or sanctimoniousness about her, but she was spiritually-minded in the
truest sense, and religious to the core. Free, and without dogmatic fetters,
she was Christian in spirit and faith. For a woman who had so little love of
change, and so little intellectual ambition, she was singularly courageous and
independent in her opinions. Though childless, she carried an atmosphere
of universal motherliness about her, and a purity and sympathetic ardor that
mixed affection and simplicity with insight and freshness of judgment. She
loved many and much, and was greatly beloved by many who must associate
the happiest years of life with her image.
The beloved sister, who shared her home and became at last the watchful
guardian of her decline, is worthy of the respect and honor she now inherits
as the sole survivor of all the memories of the Stetson household. May every
consolation wait upon her loneliness, and faith and patience attend her remain
ing days!
H. W. B.
�59
5Ymn ujRiTTen for trg dcdioatiod
OF THE
JANUARY 18TH, 1880.
By W. H. Venable.
Our Father, we would consecrate
This organ to Thy righteous name ;
The conscious reeds expectant wait,
Thy solemn praises to proclaim.
Oft may these sacred keys prolong
Devotion’s calm, celestial mood ;
Oft lead the glad thanksgiving song,
And melt the soul to gratitude.
Long may returning Sabbaths greet
Our choral joy in things divine,
Prelusive to the doctrines sweet,
Of him who taught in Palestine.
Yea, let the organ’s solemn breath
Resound Thy praises, Holy One !
Thy grace surviveth sin and death,
Forevermore thy will be done.
The venerable Western poet, Wm. D. Gallagher, whose name is identified
with the early history of the society, also sent to the festival a poem, entitled
“In Exaltis,” whose length, unfortunately, precludes the insertion here of
more than the following fragment:
“And I cried out, O man to the House of Prayer,
Made with hands—go up, for Thy God is there ;
And, in the days of thy beautiful youth,
Bow down, and worship in spirit and truth ;
In the mightier years of thy ripening age,
There still against Sin in the battle engage;
But say not of him who goes out and stands
In that grand old Temple noi made with hands,
And hungers and thirsts, and worships and waits,
And for righteousness strives and supplicates.
1'hat he errs: for Christ and his Cross are there,
And God’s angels come to him unaware.”
�6o
ODE FOR TFjG DCDICATIOD
TO THE
O UNTIE
ALMIC3-HTY
GOD,
COMPOSED FOR THE OCCASION,
By Rev. John Pierpont, of Boston.
I.
To Gon, to God alone,
This temple have we reared ;
To God, who holds a throne
Unshaken and unshared.
Sole King of Heaven
Who’st heard our prayers
And blessed our cares,
To thee ’tis given.
II-
< > thou, whose bounty fills
This plain so rich and wide,
And makes its guardian hills
Rejoice on every side,
With shady tree
And growing grain,
This decent fane
We give to thee.
III.
Thou, who hast ever stooped
To load our land with good,
Whose hand this vale hath scooped,
And rolleth down its flood
To the far sea—
This home we raise,
And now, with praise,
Devote to thee.
IV.
To all, O God of love,
Dost thou thy footsteps show—
The white and blue above,
The green and gold below,
The grove, the breeze,
The morning’s beam,
The star, the stream,—
They’re seen in these.
V.
Where now, in goodly show,
Thy domes of art are piled.
Thy paths, not long ago,
Dropped fatness on a wild.
O let us see
Thy goings here
Where now we rear
A house for thee.
VI.
Nursed by the blessed dew,
And light of Bethlehem’s star,
A vine on Calvary grew
And cast its shade afar.
A storm went by—
One blooming bough
Torn off, buds now
Beneath our sky.
�61
VII.
O let no drought or blight,
This plant of thine come nigh ;
But may the dew, all night,
Upon its branches lie ;
Till towards this vine
All flesh shall press,
And taste and bless
Its fruit and wine.
VIII.
Because, O Lord ! thy grace
Hath visited the West,
And given our hearts a place
Of worship and of rest;
Old age and youth,
The weak, the strong,
Shall praise in song
Thy grace and truth.
May 23rd, 1830.
IX.
The grace and truth that came
By thine Anointed Son,
H ere let such lips proclaim
As fire hath fallen upon
From out the high
And holy place
Where dwells in grace
Thy Deity.
X,
To thee, to thee alone,
This temple have we reared,To thee—before whose throne
Unshaken and unshared,
Sole King of Heaven,
With thanks we bow-^
This temple now
For praise is given.
�62
ORIGIRAL BYIRRS
WRITTEN FOR THE
Ordination
of
As Pastor of
the
Rev. Ephraim Peabody
First Congregational Church,
IN CINCINNATI, MAY 2Oth, 1832.
I.
Oh ! Thou before whose glorious brow,
With veiling wings Archangels bow, •
May our deep, trembling prayer
To mercy’s ear accepted rise,
Through the rich music of the skies,
And blend harmonious there.
Thou wert not in the earthquake’s crash,
Nor in the bannered lightning’s flash
That flamed o’er mount and grove ;
But in the low, soft breath that stirr’d
The conscious leaves, Thy voice was heard
In mercy and in love.
Lord! let that sweet and holy strain
Breathe through this dedicated fane,
Thy bessing here descend,
While praise and incense heavenward roll,
Fill with thy glory every soul,
Our Father and our friend!
May he whose pastoral hand shall guide
This flock where living waters glide,
Here, angel-strengthened be;
With unpolluted lips impart
Immortal truths, and lift each heart
Adoring unto Thee.
�63
II.
That voice which bade the dead arise,
And gave back vision to the blind.
Is hushed but when he sought the skies,
Our master left his word behind.
’Twas not to bid the ocean roll,—
’Twas not to bid the hill be riven;
No,—’twas to lift the fainting soul,
And lead the erring mind to heaven.
To heave a mountain from the heart,—
To bid those inner springs be stirred :
Lord, to thy servant here impart
The more than wisdom of that word.
Dwell, Father, ’round this earthly Fane.
And when its feeble walls decay,
Be with us as we meet again,
Within thy halls of endless day.
Note.— These hymns were presumably written by Mr. Peabody.
�64
ORIGIDAL RYmnS
WRITTEN BY JAS. H. PERKINS FOR THE
Ordination
of
William H. Channing,
AS
Pastor of the First Congregational Society,
CIXTCIXTXT-a.T’T.
IML AY
IO, 1839.
I.
Almighty God ! with hearts of flesh,
Into thy presence we have come,
To breathe our filial vows afresh,
And make thy house once more our home.
We know that thou art ever nigh ;
We know that thou art with us here;
That every action meets thine e.ye,
And every secret thought thine ear.
But grant us God, this truth to feel,
As well as know ; grant us the grace,
Somewhat as Adam knew thee, still
To know and see thee, face to face.
Here, while we breathe again our vows,
Appointing one to minister
In holy things within this house,
Grant us to feel that thou art here.
�65
II.
The storm-shaken winter
Has passed from earth’s bosom,
And spring to our borders,
Brings back bird and blossom—
Through all her sweet life-strings,
Through all her glad voices,
In daylight and darkness,
Old Nature rejoices.
And we have known winter,
The dark storm hath swept us ;
But God, our preserver,
Hath graciously kept us ;
The winter is passing,
The spring bursts around us,
And he has with new bands
Of brotherhood bound us.
To thank him, our Father,
As brethren we come here ;
Our hopes and our wishes—
Henceforth be their home here !
Almighty Redeemer,
We ask not to fear thee,—
But, like our Great Teacher,
To know, love, revere thee.
�CONTENTS.
PAGE.
Introductory Note,
-------
3
Order of Exercises,
......
4
.......
6
List
of
Committees,
Historical Sketch
Communications
of the
Congratulatory Letters,
9
First Congregational Church, -
from former
Pastors and Members,
-•
-
21
45
------
Appendix, ---------
55
« In Memoriam, Mrs. Charles Stetson,
b Hymns
for
Various Oc casions, -
-
-
-
-
*
T( ;
�
Dublin Core
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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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Memorials of the celebration of the First Congregational Church of Cincinnati, Ohio, January 21st, 1880
Creator
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First Congregational Church of Cincinnati
Description
An account of the resource
Place of publication: [Cincinnati]
Collation: 65 p. : ill. ; 23 cm.
Notes: From the library of Dr Moncure Conway. Printed for the Unity Club. Contents listed on back page. Includes a letter from Moncure Conway p. 34-26 dated 'Christmas-time, 1879'. Appendix I: In Memoriam, Mrs Charles Stetson. II. Hymns for Various Occasions.
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[s.n.]
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[1880?]
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G5615
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Unitarianism
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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 (Memorials of the celebration of the First Congregational Church of Cincinnati, Ohio, January 21st, 1880), 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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Church history
Conway Tracts
First Unitarian Church
Memorials
Unitarianism
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Text
Literary Notices.
LITERARY NOTICES.
The Earthward Pilgrimage. By Moncure D. Conway. London: John
Camden Hotten. 1870.
Mr. Conway in this book has accomplished a rare feat of intellectual dar
ing in a country where acts of such positive religious non-conformity have
to be paid for, even by such men as John Stuart Mill, with a seat in Parlia
ment. Indeed, the sincerity, the plainness of speech, and fearlessness as to
all consequences, which mark each line of this book, cannot sufficiently be
commended, as manifested amid a people whose mental health is mortally
injured by the cancer of cant. The practical value of the work is, moreover,
enhanced by the popular method in which the subject is treated, which will
probably insure it a wide circle of miscellaneous readers.
The introductory chapter is a very clever parody of Bunyan’s allegory.
The pilgrim has, according to immemorial prescription, journeyed to the
domain of the prince of other-worldliness ; where, after having overcome the
well-known difficulties, he finds himself comfortably settled on a purple cloud,
blowing a golden trumpet: —
“ For a time this was pleasant enough. The purple cloud acted as a screen
against many disagreeable objects. The dens of misery and vice, the hard
problems of thought, the blank misgivings of the wanderers amid worlds
unrealized, were all shut out from view; and though I was expected, as a
matter of course, to say I was a miserable sinner, it was with the distinct
understanding that I was all the more our Prince’s darling for saying so.”
This existence, however, becomes somewhat stale. He is also struck by
some new facts about him. He notices that the wayfarers who now enter
the celestial city in crowds, so far from being worn out from their painful
journey, have a sleek and fat appearance. He converses with some of them,
and learns “ that the celestial railway had been opened, and that this had led
to a tide of immigration. The pilgrim could now travel in a first-class car
riage, and his pack be checked through. A pilgrim has since made the
world familiar with this result of the enterprise of Mr. Smooth-it-away.
His account, however, is, as I have learned, not entirely accurate; for in
stance, the Slough of Despond was not filled up by volumes of French
and German philosophy, but by enormous editions of an English work,
showing the safest way of investing in both worlds. Moreover, it is but just
to say that the engineering feat by which the Hill Difficulty was tunneled is
due to Prof. Moonshine, whose works, showing that the six days of creation
mean six geoligical periods, and that miracles are 'due to the accelerated
workings of natural law, also furnished the patent key by which many pil
grims are enabled to pass with ease through Doubting Castle.” The dan
gers and difficulties now, on the contrary, beset the travelers who would
�Literary Notices.
r-
T57
journey from, not to, the Celestial City; 'and our pilgrim, therefore, prepares
to bend his steps in the direction of the city of Destruction, to which he
must go through the tedious paths of study, ideality, and devotion.
Thus by a glittering thread of fun are we lured on to face the grave prob
lems of the present. The pilgrim lifts the mask from the apparently flour
ishing creed and beholds a death’s head grinning behind. Wherever you
touch what looks like a solid body, the seeming substance, as though you
handled a mummy,'crumbles into dust. There in Canterbury Cathedral an
archbishop is consecrated to the music of the very chant, probably, which
was sung by Augustine and his monks as they marched from the sea-shore
to Canterbury. But now what a mere farce it is, not influenced by nor
influencing the stirring realities around it! Here in St. Albans the ritualists
believe that with the revival of mediaeval candles and vestments they can
also rekindle the old fervent faith that has for ever passed'out of them.
Wherever we turn we may see in fact, what the poet has revealed by the
searing lightnings of lyric wrath, how —
Mouldering now, and hoar with moss,
Between us and the sunlight swings
The phantom of a Christless cross,
Shadowing the sheltered heads of kings.
1
But Mr. Conway does not rest contented with exposing the purely forced
existence of the Christian religion in this country, which, by a capital
stroke of fancy, he likens to the fauna or flora of the tropics, only flourishing
in an English park by the help of an artificial habitat. In his effort to act
as a dissolvent on petrified dogmas he seeks to deprive Christianity of part
of its prestige by demonstrating how its roots have derived their nourish
ment from the buried remains of Hindu, Greek, Scandinavian mythologies.
So far from being a direct and abrupt revelation, it is an organic religious
development which has absorbed into its life the spiritual and ethical sap of
bygone faiths. Thus the cross, that most characteristic symbol of what is
deepest in Christianity, casts its shadow far back on the first glimmer of reli
gious thought. Christmas, believed to be hallowed by the birth of Jesus of
Nazareth, has sacred associations and holly and mistletoe entwined round it
by a gray pagan past, now buried sphyhx-like beneath the accumulated sands
of centuries.. The evil spirits haunting the hill and river sides of mediaeval
Europe were but the transformed shapes of gods and goddesses now luring
the ill-starred wanderer on to eternal perdition. Even the pitiless ugliness
of those images that leer in stone from portal and crypt of the Gothic dome
are but gracious Nix and Elf pressed into the service of Hell.
The author, however, does not confine his onslaught to the religious petri
factions of thought. Secular forms of prejudice rouse his indignation no
less. The Madonna is the starting-point which leads him to the Woman’s
Suffrage. He contends that/ woman’s influence on politics would be of
incalculable benefit, and aptly remarks : “ She is inharmonious with every
�158
Literary Notices.
remnant of barbarism, with all that is passing away — with war, with husf>
ing mobs ; but how stands she related with the society for which good men
are striving ? ”
From Moses to Shelley seems also a wide leap, yet the author boldly
takes it, and asserts that wherever a right and true man stands there is
Mount Sinai. Shelley, of course, offers the best possible occasion to casti
gate that spirit of narrow bigotry which was so rampant in school, univer4
sity, church, and state, and is still sufficiently thriving to convert the English
Sunday to a period of monotonous gloom and lethargy. We cannot here
refrain from pointing out the remarkable influence exerted by Shelley over
different classes of minds. Whereas Mr. Morley, for example, in fiis excel
lent article on Byron, speaks of the “ abstract humanitarianism ” of Shelley,
Mr. Conway, on the other hand, selects him as the most typical figure of the
' revolutionary poet. The fact is that his genius transcends either of these
estimates. So far from having less fellow-feeling for the sufferings of hu
manity than Byron, he was so tortured that he might well say, —
“ I am but as a nerve o’er which do creep
The else unfelt oppressions of the earth.”
i
But he had imbued himself too deeply with the inmost spirit of nature not
to feel the unity of life at all moments of it, and that is a temper of mind
incompatible with the aggressive rebellion which moans and thunders
through Byron’s verse. Shelley, however, brings not “the first streak of
the day of Humanity,” as Mr. Conway says : his soul rather projects the
rays of its genius into an incalculably remote future where the transposed
paradise of Dante and Milton lure on the lagging feet of mankind with the
divine magic of ideal beauty.
From Shelley the transition to Mary Wollstonecraft is natural enough.
This truly brave-hearted woman, the first to agitate the question of the sub
jection of women in that large, liberal spirit more characteristic of the close
of the last century than of our age, should never be named without rever
ence-as having inaugurated the movements whose influence is but now posi
tively manifest. Her name inextricably connected with the protest against
our present marriage laws, she herself an example of the persecution dealt
inexorably by society against any one who dares attack its cherished strong
holds, leads Mr. Conway on to treat of some of the drawbacks and injurious
consequences of that institution. That such but too truly exist no one who
unites perfect sincerity with clearsightedess will deny. Sensuality, hypoc
risy, and moral corruption, are but too often the direct result of a union
which was doubtless intended to act as a safeguard against much misery and
vice. But it is not so much a liberation from without as from within that
must be effected ere there can be any hope of a beneficial renovation in the
relations between the sexes. Else probably confusion, misery, and a thou
sand-fold increase of degradation, would be the result of a change. An
effective re-adjustment of the laws relating to marriage can only be hoped
. i
�Literary Notices.
159
for when the entire position of the female sex will have undergone a radical
transformation through the changes which are even now taking place,
■woman, who has hitherto found hpr most sacred place in the marriage tie,
will never wantonly loosen it; but with her delicate perceptions of moral rectitude, she will also, sooner or later, come to the conclusion that her appar
ently fair domain flourishes at present over bottomless morasses of human
(putrescence; and, if she has but once thought the thought to the end, she
will not stay her feet for any moral cowardice as to the possible effects of
change. There can be no doubt then that this question, like many others,
should, from time to time, be theoretically aired. Though the accumulated
dust which will be set flying in all directions by that process may prove
rather trying to weak lungs and sore eyes, there is no doubt that the act is a
salutary one, and the more disagreeable it is the more should the author be
thanked for taking the office into his own hands.
From a literary point of view we cannot award the same unqualified praise
to “ The Earthward Pilgrimage,” which most unreservedly we give to its
moral qualities. We find in it a certain crudity of material and a diffuse
ness of expression which often seems to grope around its object rather than
hit straight at the heart of it. In one word, the matter collected by vast
and varied reading has not exactly been fused in the heat of the writer’s
own mind, and hence to emerge a re-shapen whole. The parts might, like
ore which has particles of its original bed still clinging to it, be tracked back
to various layers of thought.
But this, we fancy, is less a characteristic of Mr. Conway’s method than of
the American literary process generally. It seems as if the boundlessness
and wealth of the world possessed such an irresistible charm for this young,
impetuous nation, that its writers rush headlong to the four quarters of the
globe to gather in their multitudinous facts, while scarcely allowing them
selves sufficient time to let the accumulated seeds germinate afresh in the
soil of their own minds. What their literature chiefly lacks (with some re
markable exceptions of course) is that distinguishing flavor which imparts
to a product of the intellect somewhat of the quality of good wine, where the
peculiar earthy qualities which nourished it now linger on the palate, trans
muted into an ethereal bloom of taste.
It would, however, be ungracious and hypercritical to dismiss a book,
which will doubtless do more effectual work than many more labored pro
ductions, with any words of dissent or dispraise. What is urgently required
in England is precisely work of a kind that shall leaven the thought of the
great mass of readers. In Germany and France the modern era of free
thought has long ago been victoriously ushered in by such master minds as
Lessing and Voltaire. In England, on the other hand (though at one time
in the van of both these nations as regards philosophical speculation of the
boldest kind), the fact of the body of the people being steeped in Puritanism
necessitates that the work shall be done over again in a more popular form.
The surest way of accomplishing this is by propelling the shafts aimed at
�160
Literary Notices.
superannuated myths and dogmas on the light breath of persiflage. The
chapters in which Mr. Conway has succeeded in raising a hearty laugh at
the cost of the venerable anachronisms that stili flourish amongst us are, in
our opinion, the most useful as well as the most brilliant ones of his book.
Mathilde Blind.
Song-Tide, and other Poems. By Philip Bourke Marston.
erts Brothers. 1871.
Boston : Rob
Mr. Marston, who here prints his first volume of poems, is a son of the
editor of “ The London Atheneum,” and has been afflicted with blindness
from an early age. As we read, however, we are disposed to imagine that
he would resent our saying he has been afflicted; for the day shines in these
verses, the color of roses and the sky are revealed as by sight, the forms of
women, the outlines of landscapes, are clearly defined. This objective life
is a rather surprising element to observe here. But the poems chiefly deal
with the moods of love, absence, anticipation, the joys of music, the sub
jective life of passion. Sometimes the page is a little too Swinburnish.
Where ? asks instantly the reader who dotes upon being referred to an
indelicacy, and likes a critic whose deprecation points a passage clearly
with page and line.
There are fifty or more sonnets, which seem to us the best, though not,
perhaps, the most highly colored and attractive portion of the volume. They
show a refined and gentle taste, and a musical ear. And their simplicity is
a good omen for Mr. Marston, for when he reaches a more mature expres
sion, and busies himself with subjects of a longer breath, he will be fore
armed against the new tendency to verbal dexterities and conflagrations of
style.
„ J. W.
Little Men. By Louisa M. Alcott. Boston: Roberts Brothers. 1871.
A delightful book for the young — and the oldest grow young as they turn
its pages. Miss. Alcott deserves and receives, we know, the heartfelt thanks
of all little men and women the world over where her books have found
their way. The publishers’ report shows that everybody who read “ Little
Women ” is reading “ Little Men,” and they will not regret it, we are sure.
�
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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 Earthward Pilgrimage
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Blind, Mathilde
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Place of Publication: [s.l.]
Collation: 156-160 p. ; 23 cm.
Notes: A review from an unknown journal, possibly The Radical, 1871 or 1872, of Moncure Conway's work 'The Earthward Pilgrimage'. From the library of Dr Moncure Conway.
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[s.n.]
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[1871-2?]
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Book reviews
Book Reviews
Conway Tracts
Moncure Conway
Unitarianism
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Text
THE VOCATION
OF
UNITARIAN CHRISTIANS.
♦,
A
SERMON
«■
PREACHED BEFORE THE
atth
$nnxgn ffiniimmx ^zzatrattxm,
AT THE
ANNUAL MEETING IN ESSEX-STREET CHAPEL, STRAND,
JUNE 7, 1876.
SK;
•'*' ' '
0 J1’1 ' ' -
‘
BY
THOMAS ELFORD POYNTING,
.
OF MONTON.
PUBLISHED AT THE REQUEST OF THE COMMITTEE.
LONDON:
UNITARIAN ASSOCIATION ROOMS, 37, Norfolk Street, Strand.
1876.
�*** The British and Foreign Unitarian Association, in accordance
with its First Rule, gives publicity to works calculated “ to promote
Unitarian Christianity by the diffusion of Biblical, theological, and
literary knowledge, on topics connected with it,” but does not hold
itself responsible for every statement, opinion, or expression of the
writers.
�THE VOCATION OF UNITARIAN CHRISTIANS.
Ephesians iv. 1:
“ I [therefore the prisoner of the Lord] beseech you that ye walk worthy
of the vocation wherewith ye are called.”
We meet together to-day with one common purpose in
our hearts—that of promoting religion—promoting it in
the form in which it commends itself to us in greatest
loveliness and power, that of Unitarian Christianity. By
uniting for this common purpose we show that we recognize
in Unitarian Christianity something which is common to
us all. We are not united only as men who agree to
differ, hut much more as men who can afford to differ,
because they feel how largely they agree. And then it is
not we alone who are here to-day that have much in com
mon : though we are not authorized to make the Associa
tion meeting here representative of our whole religious
community, we cannot forget that there is that community,
and that what is common to us is common to a large body
of Unitarian Christians with us, and that thoughts which
may quicken our hearts to-day may awaken a responsive
throb through our whole Unitarian people.
And let it not be taken as a narrowness of spirit that
I now confine my vision within the field of Unitarian
Christianity. We have all of us sympathies extending
a
2
�4
far beyond the limits of that field, acknowledging every
man that “ feareth God and worketh righteousness ” as a
fellow-member in the same great universal Church; but to
day we meet as Unitarian Christians, and so it is to us as
Unitarian Christians that I am called to speak. My work,
I take it, is if possible to reach and interpret our common
religious consciousness ; for in that common consciousness
must be revealed our common vocation ; what its deepest
convictions, reverences, aspirations, call us to do; what the
extent of our sympathy with each other will enable us to
co-operate in doing.
Of course, in this endeavour to reach and interpret our
common religious consciousness, I can only fall back upon
myself, and try to find and express what I feel to be the
deepest things in ■which I have experienced communion
with brother Unitarian Christians. I feel assured, then,
that though I find myself differing from them, now upon
this, and now upon that point of theological belief, there
is also a large common element of belief and life in which
I and they are heartily one. I feel that the very word,
“ body,” by which we usually name our religious commu
nity, is suggestive of its organic unity. We are a body
consisting of members greatly differing indeed from one
another, as hand differs from foot, as eye from ear, and yet
animated by one common life, fed by one common blood;
and so our common Unitarian Christianity is not some
thing crystallized into one hard, fixed form for evermore.
It is the Life of this body, the life of a growing organism,
ever changing by orderly development; and therefore to
attempt to define it for ever by what it is or has been
at any particular stage of its growth, is like attempting
to define the life of the man for all his days by what it
has been at any particular epoch—to make, for example,
�5
the mental life of the child, with its childish thoughts and
feelings, the measure for the mental life of youth, or that
of the youth the measure for the man. God’s truth is
indeed one, but our knowledge of it “ grows from more to
more.” We shall understand the organic unity and deve
lopment of our body by looking at the history of one of
its members. Take, then, a congregation, now Unitarian,
descended in unbroken succession from Puritan forefathers.
We look back and see that congregation at its secession
and settlement Calvinistic after the the type of Baxter.
By and by, perhaps, we find it passing through something
like an Arminian phase, more after the type of Doddridge.
Then we find the influence of men like Clarke and Whiston inducing a change to Arianism. Dr. Priestley and
his school lead the congregation by and by to Unitarianism
of one school; and then, later on, men like Channing, John
James Tayler, and Martineau, aid in a gradual development
towards Unitarianism of another school. Attempts have
been made from time to time through all this evolution to
fix and crystallize the life in the type of one particular
epoch; but the strength of the life itself, following its own
law of development, has always made the effort vain. And
so it happens that though we to-day have doctrines, we
have no true dogmas; i.e. no doctrines decreed—ieZoyp.t.va
—by any authority to bind us down, to arrest or impede our
growth. We have not had, because we would not have,
any General Council to mark off a catholic orthodox faith—
to be held—from heterodox opinions, to be rejected. We
have permitted no Westminster Assembly and no Convo
cation with Parliament to draw up for us a Westminster
Confession or Thirty-nine Articles to be believed for ever
more. I could not then, if 1 would, this evening, estimate
the common element in our Unitarian Christianity by
�6
pointing to any authoritative standard, and so telling you
what it is by defining what it ought to be: for no such
standard exists. Unitarian Christianity is a living thing,
and if we would know it, we must study it in its life. Nor
will it do to appeal to etymology to discover what the
words “Unitarian Christianity” must mean. Etymology
may teach us what words once meant, what according to
their derivation they ought to mean; but to find what
they do mean, you must learn by observation what are the
thoughts which they actually cover in the minds of those
who use them in the “living present.” The words Unita
rian Christianity have undoubtedly extended their meaning
beyond the old etymological sense of “Unitarian,” and
beyond what Christendom at large considers the true sense
of “ Christianity,” and now signify in common parlance
among us the whole religious life and opinions of the
people who call themselves Unitarian Christians, and are
nearly synonymous with “Liberal Christianity.” I appeal
then to no external authority. I appeal simply to your
own consciousness, and ask, what do you feel to be common
to yourselves and fellow-Unitarians in the Unitarian Chris
tianity which you hold and desire to promote ?
At the same time I gratefully own that our living Uni
tarian Christianity has its roots in the past, with which it
must preserve an organic connection to be healthy and
true. There is a religious consciousness broader than ours
running through the life of our Unitarian forefathers,
through the long life of Christendom, through the life re
corded in the Scriptures, through the life of humanity;
and we must compare what is common in our conscious
ness with what is common in that larger consciousness.
Returning to ourselves, there are several elements which
are, I think, unquestionably common to us. There is, first,
�7
our religious life itself, considered in its simplest form;
second, our claim to mental freedom; third, our reverence
for Jesus Christ; fourth, our endeavour after a.spiritual
and rational theology; fifth, our Antitrinitarianism or Unitarianism proper.
Now I notice these separately for the convenience of
treatment, though I know of course that they do not exist
as separate elements. They run into one another, and are
blended in our minds into one living whole. First of all,
there can be no question that among sincere Unitarian
Christians there is a universal consensus in holding, or
aspiring to hold, religion, in its simple essence of a life of
love for goodness, opening into love for God and love for
man. I say love for goodness, because it seems to me there
is often at least a rudimentary stage of religion, in which,
like a precious flower in the bud, it has not yet developed
into the expanded blossom of love to God and love to man.
There is a stage when the mind has only awakened to
moral consciousness, has become sensible of a highei’ and
lower within itself, and of an obligation to surrender itself
to the higher and suppress the lower, whilst it sees, per
haps, the manifestation of this self-surrender to the higher
in the character of the dear mother, or the Christ, or other
venerated persons. Its religion is then simply a vague
love of goodness within and without, as yet not clearly
discerning the elements of which full goodness is composed.
By and by, as knowledge enlarges, these are disclosed, and
the love of goodness opens into the love for the perfect
goodness in God, and the love which seeks to promote the
goodness as well as the happiness of man. Now, though
the religion after which we aspire is the developed form,
we must be patient if we find minds, that sympathize with
us in many things, still in the rudimentary stage. Many
�8
in the present day, through some defect of nature, some
perversity of education, or the blighting influence of some
false philosophy, seem, as in the case of John Stuart Mill,
to have the development of religion arrested, at least on
the side of the love to God. But I would not deny the
name of religion even to this rudimentary stage, and I
think it is not for us Unitarians to quench the smoking
flax by casting any word of scorn upon it, but to believe
rather that it contains the elements which may by and by
be fanned into the noblest, fullest flame. We all, then,
have the rudimentary form, and without losing that, we
have, or seek to have, the developed form of love to God
and love to man into which it grows. In our prayers on
the Sunday, which are, I hope, some expression of our life
in the week, the soul flows forth in adoring, wondering,
self-dedicating love to the Bather Spirit. It seeks to break
loose from the entanglements of earth and sense, and deli
ver itself up to live for a season in His immediate presence,
to forget its own littleness in His greatness, its deformities
in His beauty, its sin in His righteousness, its sorrows in
His love, its short life below in the hope of sharing His
eternity above. In these our prayers the soul flows out
also in love to man, and so, in longing for those human
virtues which can alone promote man’s welfare, and which
coming from love make it, as Paul has said, the fulfilling
of the law. That human love flows out too in yearning to
have all the burdens of sin and woe lifted from human
hearts, to see the light of the knowledge of God lighting
up the dark places of the earth, to see the dawn of the
heavenly kingdom brighten year by year. In all this, and
in seeking the life which flows from it, we are perfectly
one.
Hext to this common element of simple essential religion,
�9
I may perhaps put our claim to mental liberty. This, I
take it, is an element perfectly common to all Unitarian
Christians. And it is in our view invested also with a
religious character; for our claim to mental liberty is, if I
understand it, only a claim to be free from the usurped
authority of man in order to give ourselves to the rightful
authority of God. Our claim to liberty of mind is, I think,
always, consciously or unconsciously, accompanied by a
claim to trust the mind, which is a claim to trust God who
speaks through the mind. For I think we generally recog
nize Reason and Conscience, the oracles of the mind, as
oracles through which God directly or indirectly speaks
within us; and so in breaking from all the dogmatic bonds
of men, we are only like the child who breaks from the
arms of strangers to run and throw itself into the arms of
the mother. Our assertion of the right of liberty is no
self-assertion. We ask not to think as we will, but as God
wills—not as we please, but as God pleases. Believing the
ultimate laws of our reason, as well as those of our con
science, to be the guidance of the great hand of God, in
giving up all self-will and prejudice to be led by them we
are giving ourselves in a truly religious spirit to Him, to
“ walk with Him as dear children.” This same spirit of
freedom and trust of mind carries us necessarily on to rever
ence for science, and for all the knowledge which trusted
reason and conscience have brought us. Since God leads
our souls, the ever-widening truths in this His universe to
which He is leading us are also His revelations, and bring
us nearer to Him by disclosing the secrets of His thought
and the methods of His action. We are assuredly one in
our claim to mental liberty.
3rdly. We are one in deep, tender reverence for him
whose name we bear, the great Master, Jesus Christ. For
�10
give me if I speak of this common element in this wide
and indefinite way. I wish to stand this evening on the
firm ground of our agreements, and you know that it is in
connection with our reverence for Christ that our greatest
disagreements appear. It must he so. There is a field of
critical and philosophical thought surrounding the person
and life of Christ, on which, claiming to use our liberty
and trust to our own souls, we can scarcely fail to differ.
Accordingly, we do differ in our critical estimate of the re
corded facts of the Master’s life ; we differ in the philo
sophy by which we interpret these facts, by which we
conceive of his nature, and assign him his place in God’s
providential thought and the world’s history. Yet, amid
all our diversities, there is certainly among all who claim
to be Unitarian Christians a common reverence for Christ;
a reverence for him as the spiritual rock from which has
historically flowed the fountain which has become the
stream of our Christian life; a reverence for him as the
impersonation of our religion in its universal aspect of
love for Goodness, love for God, and love for Man. I
would go further, and say that Christ is to many of us
an impersonation of our religion also in its reverence and
claim for liberty, and in all that reverence for science and
intellectual development which flows therefrom. For Jesus
seems to us, breaking away in that his age of mental slavery
from the bonds of tradition in which he was brought up,
and trusting himself to the simple universal teachings of
God—Jesus seems to us the noblest hero of mental liberty
that the world’s history presents. But whether all Uni
tarians agree with this or not, they will agree that they
escape from the region of “ dry abstract truths without a
way to the human heart,” in which Mr. Gladstone seems
to imagine that we always dwell, by seeing the universal
�11
part of their religion reflected in a person, the revered,
beloved person of Jesus Christ. Thus their religion be
comes living, warm, human. Their conceptions of goodness,
God, man, become tinted with colours from his life and
character. Goodness is that which they see embodied in
him; God is loved as seen imaged in him; man is honoured
and seen to be worthy of their love because man’s nature is
revealed in him. It is by living in him and with him,
loving goodness, God and man with him, that they learn to
live. It is by dying with him in his death, surrendering
ourselves as living sacrifices to the Father, that they receive
the atonement, the reconciliation to God. Such reverence
as this is, I think, truly common. I know that many
among us cannot be satisfied with this. They want all to
go with them into the critical and philosophical theories
which they hold regarding Christ; and I speak of no par
ticular school among us; I speak of all schools alike. It
is, I have no doubt, a cause of sorrow with all of us that
we cannot take our fellow-worshippers with us into what
seems to us the larger, holier truth. And yet, dear
brethren, it is a great thing to be one, as we are, in our
reverence for this “ author and finisher of our faith.” We
do all in this reverence practically call him Lord, Master;
we do all sit together at his feet as loving disciples; we do
all confess his authority over us; for what is that authority
but the authority of our own religion impersonated in
him, the authority of our own souls, which find them
selves reflected in him? All parties among us profess to
regard with reverence the spirit of the teachings of Dr.
Channing. Now that whole spirit seems to me embodied
in one significant passage in his discourse on Love to
Christ: “ What is it that constitutes Christ’s claim to love
and respect? What is it that is to be loved in Christ?
�12
\
Why are we to hold Christ dear? I answer, there is but
one ground for virtuous affection in the universe, but one
object worthy of cherished and enduring love in heaven or
on earth, and that is moral goodness. I know no exception
to this principle. I can conceive of no being who can have
any claim to affection but what rests on his character,
meaning by this the spirit and principle which constitute
his mind and from which he acts.” Let us take to our
souls this great thought of Channing, and whatever we may
think of the imperfection of our brother’s theories, let us
be content for him to share with us our Master’s name, if
only he shares with us some of the disciple’s reverence.
Let us be content to say with the Apostle, “ Grace be with
all those who love the Lord Jesus Christ in sincerity.”
A fourth element of Unitarian Christianity common to
us all is the endeavour after a spiritual and rational, or,
as it has been called, scientific theology. This head will
be thought by some to be included under the head of
mental liberty. But as many may not immediately see
how the endeavour after a spiritual and rational theology
follows from the exercise of our liberty, I have thought
better to give it an especial consideration. I would say,
then, that this endeavour after a spiritual and rational
theology follows both from our religion and our liberty.
Birst, our religion needs a theology to feed it, then our
liberty requires that such theology should be spiritual and
rational, by which I mean a theology brought, by the
exercise upon it of our mental liberty, into accordance
with the spiritual judgments of our conscience and the
rational judgments of our reason. First, our religion
needs a theology. The life of religion will ever need to
be fed by the food of thought regarding things divine.
That life can no more exist without that thought, than the
�13
life of this bodily frame can exist without material food.
To speak contemptuously of theology because it is not
religion, is like speaking contemptuously of bread because
it is not the life of which it is the staff. We must there
fore have a theology with our religion; but then, secondly,
in accordance with our first principle of claim to mental
freedom in order to trust the oracles within, we must have
that theology spiritual and rational. Yet, in forming this
theology, whilst we are guided by the same common prin
ciples of inquiry, we naturally come to very various con
clusions of doctrine. This is not wonderful if we consider
to what errors we are liable in interpreting the voices of
conscience and reason; how apt we are to mistake our
own prejudices for their decisions; and what different
amounts of knowledge we bring to them as data for their
judgments. And yet, great as are our differences, I sus
pect that there is on the whole more substantial agreement
among us than would be found in any other religious body;
and I believe this agreement will become larger and larger
as sound education advances. I believe all this because
we begin with the same great principle of free thought,
W'hich really means carrying our beliefs for arbitration to
the same tribunals of the soul. Our experience, then, not
withstanding our divergences, coincides with our instinct,
and encourages us to go on in the path of free and reverent
thought, assured that it is the right path, and that if we
press boldly forward we shall only go from truth to truth,
from light to light. Yes, we must go on; and we shall
make our theology more spiritual and more rational as we
turn the light of God within us on the ways of His provi
dence in the past, on the laws in which He works in uni
verse and in soul in the present. Yes, we must go on; and
�14
science and philosophy and scholarship shall be tributaries
to the stream of our theology—a theology which shall feed
our piety by ever larger revelations of the grandeur and
loveliness of God, and shall feed our philanthropy by ever
larger disclosures of possibilities for man. We must go
on, fearless in our trust in truth. We must go on with
Science ; and if now she seems to be for a season shutting
up the mind in the prison-house, and binding it with the
chains of materialism, we must still only try to understand
more deeply her meaning, and by and by we shall find
her changing into the delivering angel, coming with a
great light to open the prison doors and make the chains
fall off. We must go on with Philosophy; and if now,
leading the mind up her mountain heights, she seems
to have brought it into the region of cloud, where it is
blinded with the mists of the unknowableness or the im
personality of God, we must still cling to her and ask her
to go forward, and by and by she will lead us above the
mists into God’s open light, and beneath His clear, ever
lasting heavens again.
The fifth element common to all Unitarian Christians
is their protest against Trinitarian error, that is, their
Antitrinitarianism, or Unitarianism proper. Of course this
is a part of our spiritual and rational theology; but it
is our spiritual and rational theology in its belligerent—
its polemic—attitude. If there were no Trinitarian errors
in Christendom around us, we should never dream of an
Antitrinitarian attitude or Antitrinitarian name. We are
like colonists who have had to build their city in pre
sence of hostile forces. But for these, they might have
arranged it simply in accordance with their own needs
and their own conceptions of symmetry and beauty. But
�15
Low they have been obliged to build upon the heights, and
surround their city with a wall strengthened by many a
tower and mounted with many a threatening gun.
We, but for the presence of the great host of Trinitarian
errors, might have built our city of theology, placed the
palaces and all the pleasant places of its noblest thoughts
as we needed or desired them for ourselves; but now we
have been obliged to erect our wall and towers, and point
our guns of Unitarian protest against these errors. And
our •whole city of theological belief has been called after
our Unitarian, that is, Antitrinitarian, fortifications, much
as many an English city, like Chester and Manchester,
anciently received its name—as Castra—from the bulwarks
that partly or wholly surrounded it. It is certainly a mis
fortune that our faith should be named from its least per
manent and least essential characteristic. For as we find
many a city named once after its fortifications, now, in
these days of peace, with its ramparts levelled and even all
traces of them lost, so let us hope it may be hereafter
with our Antitrinitarian protest. Trinitarianism may pass
away, and then we shall build our theology for our own
internal needs and not for external protest, and there will
be no more reason for calling ourselves Unitarians, that is,
Antitrinitarians, than for calling ourselves Anti-Gnostics
or Anti-Ebionites, or Anti- any other dead and forgotten
sect.
That time, however, has not yet come. Our protest we
must still continue to make ; and if we cannot change our
name, we must continue boldly to wear it; only taking
care, however, that as long as it is the name for our reli
gious community, and as long as we have no other name
to cover the whole religious life and opinions of that com
munity, we jealously watch that it does not stand for any
1
�16
thing less than this—that it does not narrow our souls
down to the narrowness of its proper signification, and
make us think of our religion as only sectarian and
polemic. There are good and noble Unitarians who re
joice in being fighters. Their place is on the wall and by
the guns, and their delight is in the shout of war. Well,
they are fine fellows and valuable helpers. We could not
do without them. But still we must not let them make
Unitarian Christianity mean only our Antitrinitarian for
tifications, ignoring the great city itself of positive doc
trines and life that lies behind. In thinking of ourselves
as Unitarians, we must not think of ourselves as soldiers
only of the walls, but as citizens also of the great city of
our theology.
And now if I have, however inadequately, yet to some
extent truly, interpreted our common Unitarian conscious
ness—if these things, simple religion, claim to mental liberty
reverence for Christ, endeavour after a spiritual and rational
theology, Unitarian protest against Trinitarian errors, are the
things which lie nearest to our hearts, the things in which
we are one body in Christ, things which will bear judging,
too, by the universal consciousness—then, I think, I have
shown the revelation of a very great and very solemn voca
tion. These things make our vocation. They are God’s
indications in our souls of what He is calling us in common
to do. He is calling us in drawing these common breath
ings of a holy music from our souls. These, rising, make
one grand Unitarian anthem, which, if we can but hear and
interpret, will make us a people knit together by a grand
sympathy in a grand faith, standing shoulder to shoulder
in a grand and glorious work.
Brethren, it is plain that we are called to live and give
a religion seeing itself in Christ, and also associated with
�17
liberty, which means associated with knowledge; a religion
which shall be the fulness of all the deepest reverence of
the soul with all the freest, largest, truest thought of the
mind. Ours is the work, suggested by the poet, to
“Let knowledge grow from more to more,
But more of reverence in us dwell,
That mind and soul, according well,
May make one music as before.”
Ours is the work to live such a religion and give it to the
world—to live it first, or we cannot give it. We seek to
commend the lamp of our theology to the masses. It is
of little use for us to display the framework, and show
how reasonable and simple and yet beautiful it is. We
must show men a bright flame of religion burning in it.
Our vocation in general may be summed up in one word—
it is to combine religion with freedom, that is with a free
theology. It is, then, to show the world, what others
besides Mr. Gladstone seem to doubt, that there can be
religion with freedom; that there can be a Church with
an earnest religious life—our Church now, and therefore a
grand Catholic Church hereafter—founded, not on dogmas
or traditions, but on common affections and common trusts
in the oracles in the human soul. Ah ! can we come up
to this vocation ? Can we walk worthy of it ? It is not
easy to come up to it; we must not flatter ourselves that
we have come up to it. Sometimes we are very near it,
but we oft fall back again. To unite liberty and religion,
to lay the foundations of the Catholic Church, of the
City of God, not in the perishable materials of common
dogmas, but in the eternal precious stones of common
spiritual trusts,—this, as you know, is one of the hardest
things in the world; for either religion is apt to shackle
liberty, or liberty to blight religion. In no other church
B
�18
as yet has it been, possible to harmonize the two. And we
have undertaken the difficult task. Ah! shall the result
only be to show that the task must be sorrowfully given
up as impracticable still ? It is difficult to hold religion
and yet not give up liberty. The result of liberty, as we
have seen, is difference of theological opinion, and this
difference it is hard for the religious mind to bear.
When my brother, dwelling with me in the same religious
home, claiming to be of the same household of faith, wear
ing, and perhaps I may think dishonouring, the same
family name, nourished too by the mother’s milk of the
same religious life,—when he turns round upon me and
denies as baneful error what I revere as precious truth,
denounces as poisonous superstition what I feel to be the
very daily bread of my life,—he hurts me, and must hurt
me because he throws slight on things with which my
reverence is deeply interwoven. He tends to take away
from me and from others what seems to me most needful
to the religious life. And so I know, on the other hand,
that if I deny what my brother holds dear and sacred, I
cause similar pain to him. Now, brethren, the question
for us is, Can we learn loyally and patiently to bear this
pain without losing our religious earnestness, on the one
hand, or letting that pain repel us from our brother or
make us seek to check his liberty, on the other ? Here
is the difficulty which ever opposes the strength of our
organization. It is here that comes in the, fatal disso
ciating force that tends to make our body a mere rope of
sand. Ah! can we watch and overcome this repellant
force ? We can do so only by a great-souled loyalty to
our principles, only by a wise and manful government of
ourselves. When our brother exercises his liberty accord
ing to his right, can we abstain from pleading our pain as
�19
a bar to that liberty, as a cause for his silence ? Can we
so master our pain as that it shall not become a dissocia
ting force to separate between our brother and ourselves—
make us eager to thrust him from our religious home or
deny him the use of the family name? If we cannot
come up to this loyalty, if we cannot exercise this govern
ment of self, then we cannot come up to our vocation.
Our theory of combining liberty with religion is but a fine
theory still; we do our part to. show that in practice it
remains a hopeless thing.
We shall be helped to bear the pain of difference by
keeping in mind that if God does mean us to be free, free
to believe that which to our own minds appears to be the
truth, then even to believe amiss, if we have come to
believe by exercising faithful inquiry, cannot be regarded
by Him with any moral disapproval. And surely what
God does not blame, we have no right to shrink from as if
it were a sin. And if God looks upon our varieties of
belief with all-patient eye, we may be sure that He cannot
think any one form of belief, however correct, to be all
essential to our religious life. Experience tells us that
this is true ; for though the religious life is nourished
by theological belief, as the bodily life is nourished by
food, happily vitality may be supported by very different
foods; and as no land with its particular material diet can
boast that it alone nourishes strong and beautiful bodies,
so no church, no sect, no school with its particular theo
logical diet, can boast that it alone nourishes strong and
beautiful souls. There is no doubt that souls which
have a noble theology to live from enjoy a great advantage,
yet somehow it happens that the advantage is not always
used; and there are those who are like the three children
in the story of Daniel, and draw more nourishment for
�20
their strength and. beauty from a theology as of poor pulse
and water, than others draw from one which is like the
king’s rich meat.
Again, we may help ourselves to bear this pain of differ
ence from our opinion by just looking at our opinion and
asking what there is in it that should make us, as it were,
fall down and worship it as if it were infallible and divine.
Let each of us imagine the body of our theological
opinions written down on a private scroll which we carry
in our bosom. ISTow let each one take out the scroll and
read it over, and ask himself if he can honestly say that
every one of the opinions there written down has been
come to in the sincere desire to find the very truth. Can
he honestly affirm that he has gone with each opinion
right into the inner court of judgment, and submitted it
to the judges, Conscience and Beason, there ? Ah ! must
he not confess, on the contrary, how often, rather, he has
allowed himself to be detained by the crowd of his own
prejudices, inclinations and passions in the outer court,
and has allowed his opinion to be the mere echo of the
voices of that meaner crowd 1 Or even if any one can feel
sure that he has gone with any opinion to the ultimate
judges of truth and right, can he also feel sure that he
provided himself with all the knowledge he could gain in
order to form the case to lay before the judges for their
judgment ? When the decision to be formed was a critical
one, has he gone to criticism ? or when it was a philoso
phical one, has he gone to philosophy ? or if a scientific
one, has he gone to science for the information needed ?
Can he say that he has not often judged of the truth of
an opinion, not by evidence for or against it, but by a bias
suggested by its supposed practical tendency ? I do not
know, brethren, how it may be with you, but for myself I
�21
could not dare to be sure that with any single opinion tlaat
I hold I had -been thus perfectly truthful.
Let .each of us look on this scroll of his opinions, and
ask himself if this is what he can venture to hold up as if
it were a sacred standard of unquestionable truth, if this
is what he dares to call the truth, condemning his brother
as a dangerous heretic because he differs from it.
And observe, brethren, I am saying this again to no
school among us in particular, but to all schools alike; for
this self-delusion that our opinion, however formed, is the
truth, belongs to all schools—alas 1 to all human nature.
We see then this difficulty of really so holding religion
as not to give up liberty. Can we try more to overcome
it and come up to our vocation, which sets us to make the
union of the two ?
But now, once more, if it is difficult to hold religion
without giving up liberty, it is still more difficult to hold
liberty and yet in no way give up religion. This is our
vocation still. Let us remember our conception of religion.
It is holy .emotion working out holy life. Religion, ob
serve, is emotion at its source. It is love, and surely love
is .emotion—-love for goodness, love for God, love for man.
Now it is .clear that this emotion, this love, must be fed
by some belief regarding its objects. He, for example,
who does .not believe in goodness cannot love goodness.
He who does not believe in fGod, and in His lovableness
too, cannot love God. .Now it is fhe result of freedom—
that ;is, pf free thought—to interfere very much with the
beliefs ;by which the religious emotions need to be fed,
and .so to make religion difficult, or even to dry.it up alto
gether. The beliefs by which our religion is nourished
have been compared this .evening to bread, the bread of
c
�22
life. Let us take the other familiar figure and compare
them to water—the water of life. Consider the theolo
gical beliefs belonging to different churches as springs
flowing at different levels, some down on the very plain,
some higher up on mountain sides, and some among the
very mountain heights. Now it is the result of free thought
to detach and turn away the mind from all the springs
of lower and more popular religious beliefs, leaving none
possible to their use but very high ones, flowing from the
mountain heights where Conscience and Reason reign. Go
into many of the churches around us, where evangelists of
the type of Mr. Moody, or Ritualists or Romanists of other
types, appeal to multitudes and seem to awaken tides of
religious emotion, and ask how it is all done. You will
find that the secret is, that the preachers lead their hearers
to thoughts, to springs of theological belief, on a low level.
The people can more easily get to them, and do get to
them and drink freely, and go away, I have no doubt,
refreshed and strengthened to live a better life. A preacher
with us, were he the mightiest prophet, has no such advan
tage. He addresses men who have left these lower springs,
who look upon them with aversion as turbid and poisoned
waters. He must point Unitarian hearers to the only
springs their free thought has left them, far up among the
mountain heights. He must point them to such truths as
the eternal beauty and sanctity of goodness, the Fatherhood
and eternal goodness and immanence of God, the divine
childhood as well as human brotherhood of man, the reve
lation of our true nature and life, and relation to God and
hope of immortality in Jesus Christ. And these he very
high; and simple as it seems to apprehend them, it is very,
very difficult to reach them so as to believe them with all
�23
the heart and soul. It is difficult intellectually, and it is
difficult morally. It is difficult intellectually. The thoughts
which our theology presents, if simple thoughts, are still
great thoughts, thoughts which cannot be realized without
some mental effort. The mind must give itself up to them
—will, understanding, imagination—in order to grasp
them •, and multitudes come to their religion in an indolent
frame of mind, as to a subject that needs no thought.
Alas 1 no mind, as long as it abandons itself to this indo
lent mood, will ever climb to the springs of our Unitarian
belief. There are many who, through the exercise of their
free thought, get far away above the springs of the popular
faith, and yet fail to reach the higher springs, and very
much, I cannot help thinking, because they will not exert
the mental effort and perseverance necessary to climb to
them. When in their newly-found liberty they first break
away from the popular superstitions, they seem to go on
joyously for a time, mounting higher and higher in the
freer air. But by and by they get into the region of mists,
the mists of doubt, and their zeal for truth begins to slacken.
They seem to lose all power of pushing forward, and, as if
doomed by some fatality, they go round and round in that
same region of mist, never emerging above it. We may
be assured that the exercise of free thought will always
leave some of these dwellers in the mist among us. These
will be generally somewhat dead and cold themselves,
through the absence of any intensity of religious conviction,
and so they will be like icebergs, chilling the whole moral
air around them. Ah! my friends, who of us does not feel
how depressing it is to live in a church with those who
have no strength of religious conviction, and how their
apathy makes us almost ashamed to have any intensity of
religious conviction ourselves !
�24
For these dwellers in the mist, and for all of us, there
needs the exercise of a greater intellectual bravery and
faithfulness in religion.
But, alas! there is the still greater moral difficulty in
getting up to the lofty springs of our faith. Even those of
us who never seem to doubt, still do not drink habitually
from the higher springs, just because they are too high
morally for us to reach. Religion is Love; and we shall not
love, not deliver ourselves to our love, as long as we are
not prepared to do what that love demands. The rich
man in the Gospel would have given himself to his love
for Jesus, to follow with Peter, James and John, but that
love demanded a sacrifice too great for him to make, and
he went sorrowful away. Now there is this difficulty in
the way of our giving ourselves up to believe our theology
with all our hearts, that the high love to which it appeals
requires self-sacrifice which we are not often prepared to
make. Ah! there lies our greatest difficulty. Our theology
is as yet too high for our moral strength; we do not, and
we cannot, without more heroism, come up to it. Now I
do not wish to indulge in any morbid self-depreciation,
but I wish also to discourage any unwarranted self-satisfac
tion. There is, no doubt, much religious life among us; but
if we can be satisfied with this, we must have a very inade
quate conception of the ideal which our theology presents.
Let us put away for ever those foolish pleas by which we
try to hide from ourselves a poverty and coldness in our
religious life of which we are truly conscious. Let us no
longer say, Oh, we have abundant religious life, only through
our taste and culture we are an undemonstrative people,
and do not show it. My friends, I look into my own
heart, and see how hollow such excuses are. Ah! do I
not know by my own experience that there is a deficiency
�25
in the religious life simply because of the great difficulty
in coming up to the high springs of faith? Do 1 not know
too surely that my heart is stubbornly hard and dry? Do
I not know that I do not, except in rarest moments, get
up to my belief in God, and experience that love of God
of which the Master speaks, “ with all the heart, with all
the soul, with all the mind, and with all the strength”?
And do I not know that it is because the thought of God
which my theology presents is too high for me; it does not
touch me, because I do not strain towards it; I do not
surrender myself to it, alas! because the weight of earthly
sin and habit keeps me back? Ah! how can I delight to
go up and believe in God, think of Him in all His perfect
goodness, allow that thought to fill my soul, unless I am
prepared to surrender myself to the Eternal Goodness, to
be and to do what it demands ?
And so, again, with regard to that love for my neigh
bour as myself, that enthusiasm of humanity which I see
in Jesus. Do I not know how little I really feel it, and
simply because the belief in man, and what I can do for
him, and the kingdom of God I can help to bring in, is
too high for me, I cannot through my selfishness come up
to it ? Do I not know that if I really go up to it, giving
myself up to this Christ-like love for man, I must be pre
pared to go forth and sacrifice time and ease and inclina
tion and means to carry it out; and my dull nature replies,
“I cannot do it,” and I dare not go and drink of the water
which might inspire me to do what I am not prepared
to do?
Brethren, am I alone in this sorrowful experience? Do
not many hearts respond to the confession that our reli
gious life has not yet come up to our theology, and that
we have not yet overcome the great difficulty of holding
�26
religion in union with liberty? Can we resolve to make a
greater effort to come up to our vocation? We must, if we
are ever to become that power in the world of which we
dream. We have found a grand and glorious theology up
among the eternal heights. But when we go forth to com
mend that theology to the world, and assure them how
pure and good its waters are, men’s hearts virtually say to
us, “ Yes, your theology seems very reasonable, very beau
tiful, but how about your religion? Do these springs
which you say are so pure and wholesome, then, feed your
souls with a religious life larger and deeper than is felt
among churches fed by lower and impurer streams? Let
us look into your churches. How does your theology
work? You profess, for example, to hold the thought of
God as a Father lovely with all holiness and goodness and
fatherly compassion. You remove from His face, as you
say, all the clouds of unrighteous wrath with which ortho
dox error has darkened it. Well, then, does your thought
of God in all its loftiness and purity act upon you and
awaken in you a warmer, deeper, devouter love than is felt
by your orthodox fellow-christians ?
“You profess to honour Christ, not, with Christendom in
general, because he is God as well as man, but because he
is the highest example of moral loveliness which history
presents. Does, then, that moral loveliness in Christ
awaken in your souls a love greater or more operative on
the moral life than the love excited towards him by what
you call an idolatrous mistake?
“ Once more, you profess to love man, not as Christians
in general love him, but simply as a brother and as a child
of God. You yearn over the ignorant and the sinful, not
as seeing them lying under a dreadful doom to eternal woe,
but. simply as lying in degradation and moral ruin, far from
�27'
pod and tlieir own true life, and you would raise them and
restore them to themselves and God. Again, does this
thought of man really kindle in your hearts the enthusiasm
of humanity? Does it really make you take upon you the
sins and sorrows of your fellow-men, and bear them as
your own? Does that love send you out in missions and
other instrumentalities to fight more zealously than others
against the great evils of society—ignorance, drunkenness,
pauperism, vice and crime? Is your church life—being
inspired by such lofty truths—more ardent than that of
others ? United by such grand common hopes, aspirations,
emotions, do you feel bound to one another, hallowed, as
it were, to one another?” Ah! what shall we say to ques
tions like these? Simply that they make us feel how much
we have to do to walk worthy of our calling; they make
us feel that we have not already attained, are not already
perfect, but must still follow after, counting not ourselves
to have apprehended, but, “ forgetting those things which
are behind and reaching forth unto those things which are
before,” must “press toward the mark for the prize of the
high calling—calling of God in Christ Jesus.” Amen.
C. Green & Son, Printers, 178, Strand.
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Title
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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
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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
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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
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The vocation of Unitarian Christians, a sermon preached before the British and Foreign Unitarian Association at the annual meeting in Essex-Street Chapel, Strand, June 7, 1876
Creator
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Poynting, Thomas Elford
Description
An account of the resource
Place of publication: London
Collation: 27 p. ; 18 cm.
Notes: From the library of Dr Moncure Conway. Printed by C. Green and Son, Strand; published at the request of the Committee.
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Unitarian Association Rooms
Date
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1876
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G5354
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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 vocation of Unitarian Christians, a sermon preached before the British and Foreign Unitarian Association at the annual meeting in Essex-Street Chapel, Strand, June 7, 1876), 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
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Text
Language
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English
Subject
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Unitarianism
Conway Tracts
Unitarianism
-
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311a91f4f5fc47c9561049f9b91ec013
PDF Text
Text
SHALL WE NOT GO FORWARD?
A DISCOURSE
DELIVERED IN
THE UNITARIAN CHAPEL, BRIDGEWATER.
BY
WILLIAM
CHATTERTON COUPLAND, B.A., B.Sc.
LONDON:
TRÜBNER AND CO., 60, PATERNOSTER ROW.
1 8 6 5.
�“ Behold,
the former things are come to pass, and new things do
I DECLARE : BEFORE THEY SPRING FORTH I TELL YOU OF THEM.”
�A DISCOURSE.
I
it a privilege to live in this age, when
temporal and spiritual empires which have done
good service in their time, but now cumber the
earth, totter towards their grave; when ancient
systems of thought which have outlasted the cen
turies, refusing to adapt their garb to the altered
circumstances of the time, are fading peacefully
away; when old Jerusalems are melting into the
mist of memory; and new temples rising out of the
deep. A few years ago many must have thought
that all was over with this terrestrial sphere; all
the great men were dead and buried, the highest
minds were given up to restoring and criticising the
works of their predecessors, building “ the tombs of
the prophets” and garnishing “ the sepulchres of the
righteous;” for the world had entered on its dotage,
but a few hours more and the archangel would sound
his trumpet, and Past and Present would cease to be.
But the world was mistaken, and that not for the
first time in its biography. Amidst' all that slum
count
�4
berous period a few lamps were burning brightly,
and 11 while their companions slept” some “were
toiling upward in the night,” sowing new seed and
planting fresh trees, which are even now beginning
to sprout, and yet shall grow into stout trunks and
leafy branches.
The Head-Master of Rugby School declares at
Whitehall that the beginning, as the end, of the
Bible is poetry, not fact; and the Dean of West
minster, not without a merry twinkle one may
fancy, preaches in the venerable Abbey from the
text of Ezekiel, “The hand of the Lord was upon
me, and carried me out in the spirit of the Lord, and
set me down in the midst of the valley, which was
full of bones, and caused me to pass by them round
about; and behold, there were very many in the
open valley, and lo, they were very dry. And he
said unto me, Son of man, can these bones live?
And I answered, 0 Lord God, thou knowest.”
Dean Stanley knows very well that the bones are
very dry, and is doubtful whether even a divine
breath can re-enliven them. But yet, somehow or
other, people do like the dry bones; and there is
something to be said for them ; for is not a bone a
relic ? and whatever has once been holy surely never
can lose its virtue ? To hang up a prophet’s bone
over your mantle-piece, for instance, what an in
fusion of spiritual vigour would not that afford ?
Why, your room would be a shrine of divinity,
�5
whither a thirsting and weary people might crowd
to inhale inspiration for the loftiest battles of lifeI
So the Catholic Church lives by its bones, and he
must be a bold man who denies the Catholic Church
to be still living. The Protestant Church yet not
less thrives upon its bones, though unfortunately the
vessel in which it holds them is so very fragile that
it is in constant danger of spilling them.
But Ezekiel was doubtful as Stanley whether the
bones could ever live again. It is the essential dis
tinction of the prophet to have no faith in dry bones ;
for I define a prophet to be the living voice of a nation.
He is that organ raised up by God to keep alive a
spirit of hope in the age. Lose your prophet, or kill
him, and you destroy the heart of your nation. That
was the function of the Hebrew prophets through
out the long period of the reign of the kings, and
the Babylonian exile. From Elijah to Malachi it
was the never-sleeping prophet who kept the
Hebrew nation breathing; and when Judaism cruci
fied its last prophet, it sounded its own knell. Is
not that the word which our great English seer,
Thomas Carlyle, has been thundering in our ears,
that the great prophetic man, the hero, is the
desideratum of every age—a man who shall be
shackled by no routine of predecessors, who shall
start the world afresh on its journey, and point its
eyes to the future,—the man who shall dare to
think and do, as if no one had ever thought and
�6
done before; a new creation; no puny dependent
child who ever leans on his grandsire’s arm ? And
Thomas Carlyle has not spoken in vain; I fancy all
the life which this English generation possesses
comes from Carlyle. The burning torch was taken
up by Emerson, and from Emerson passed to Parker,
and kindled an undying flame on the other side of
the Atlantic. So in France, Ernest Renan has lately
revivified the theologic dry bones by publishing
that glowing life of Jesus which has electrified this
time—a work full of errors, doubtless, but which
must be measured by its life-breathing spirit.
Strauss is far sounder, but Strauss gives no life.
The English Unitarians have never been very wake
ful, they have nursed their dry bones from the
beginning; but the Church of England is now
warming a little, and if it were not for its narcotic
of a prayer-book, and that sleep-giving ritual, would
soon wake up into a living life. Politics are
slumberous enough, but when our present leaders
die, having served their term, we may expect a
regeneration there.
I hope great things when
Gladstone is prime minister. He will shake the
dry bones, or I am much mistaken.
We live, therefore, in a favoured age, but I do
not think we make the most of it; nor can we,
until we unreservedly place ourselves in the pro
phetic rank. We must discard all traditions, set no
store by precedent, work out anew for ourselves.
�7
So we go through the routine of all the sects, though
we have no affinity with them. We are not a more
liberal branch of the Church of England, or the
Congregationalists, or the Methodists, but we are a
new Church, whose rock is human nature, and
whose temple is the personal soul. In affirming
this, we by no means cut our connection with the
past—that were impossible : as surely as we are the
descendants of our parents, are we the offspring of
the past; the organic bond no power in earth or
heaven can sever; but we must not look to our sires
to show us the way our feet should tread in the
future. All our sires can teach us is what they
have experienced, but their experience only corre
lates their circumstances; but our circumstances
have never pre-existed, therefore our experiences
have to be shaped anew by ourselves. Popes and
Bibles were indispensable and valuable under the
then conditions of society; but now those conditions
are changed, Popes and Bibles rather hinder than
help us. It is only the Absolute which endures.
And when we say Popes and Bibles have done their
work, we by no means intend to affirm there is
nothing valuable even for us in Popes and Bibles.
The essential truth in the Papal function is, that
every organism must have a head; thus a “minister”
is a Pope—but the idea of a Pope is something more
than that, viz., that one man has the authority and
power to make declarations, which others have only
�8
implicitly to receive, possessing no right to test or
question. That the “ Bible ” is a collection of facts,
truths, ethics, and religious sentiment, is indis
putable ; but that is not what Protestantism means
by a “Bible.” Protestantism means thereby a docu
ment containing a set of divine commands, necessary
for all time, and a set of beliefs which it is abso
lutely incumbent upon us to believe, whether our
reasons say “ aye”, or “no.” Protestantism repudi
ates all homage to a Catholic Pope, and we repudiate
all homage to a Protestant Bible • but neither Pro
testantism surrenders its episcopal establishment,
nor do we refuse to work up into our thought and
life all the good things we find in Jewish-Christian
literature.
It is curious how reliant man yet is. We like to
follow our fathers’ steps as long as we can, and I
verily believe would hold our mothers’ dresses to
this day if we might. Man is naturally a timid
animal. But great deeds were never achieved by
fearful men. What enabled Napoleon to accom
plish his main victories was that he had no fear.
But the many are easily panic-stricken. A sentence
of excommunication uttered amidst blue lights and
ghostly intonations will scare many hearts; and to
fling “infidel” in a man’s face is as effective as to
stab him in the side. Fear is the real “ dweller of
the threshold,” and we must conquer fear before
we can make a step in advance. “Yes, but if we
�9
turn over a new leaf, what will Mr. and Mrs.------?
say?” Are you afraid of the opinion of Mr. and
Mrs.------ ? Then you will never leave the Valley
of Destruction and set out on the way towards the
Eternal City.
Thus, I would have our Sunday
services utterly remodelled myself, permit a greater
elasticity in the arrangement, abolish the stereotyped
monotony of hymn, prayer, biblical chapter, hymn,
prayer, sermon, etc. time after time. I would have
absolute liberty here as in the thought; but do I not
know that if I were to advocate such a change I should
bring down on my devoted head all the tumultuous
shriekings and anathemas of a hundred congrega
tions and the religious newspapers. I suppose
there would be a rain-shower of 11 Iconoclast” and
“Atheist,” “Desecrator of the Pulpit,” and what
not!
But this is only applying on a small scale what
occurs on the large. The world has to fight against
that base tendency in its nature to stand still and
be contented. Contentment is false. You ought
not to be contented: everything is imperfect, and
will be so for many a long day,—I had almost said
for ever. And as the infant when it can run alone
puts off its long clothes, and the child when it be
comes a man exchanges the school-boy jacket for the
coat; so, as the world becomes maturer, must it
leave on one side the apparel of its youth, and take
to itself better-fitting raiment. And if any one
�10
blames this procedure as iconoclastic and revolu
tionary, he is only blaming the baby for growing to
be a boy, and the boy for maturing into a man.
“But,” say some, “what a harassing time you are
making for us ! Are we never to have any rest and
peace, but always to be reforming ?” No, I answer,
you are never to have rest and peace in the sense of
being permitted to sleep half your time, and turn
your tramp-mill the other half, but you are to move
on as Time moves, imperceptibly but surely; and
as it does not harass you to change your skin through
every seven years, and to pass through the stages
of birth, marriage, and death ; so, if you are liberal
at the very core, you will naturally doff the out
grown garments and array yourselves in the bright
robes of the Present. One sees therefore I have
little sympathy with our Conservative gentlemen.
I abhor Conservatism; it is to stop short at animal
existence, it being the great characteristic of brute
as differentiated from man. But of course there is
always the response, “but the time is not ripe.’’
And when, pray, in your wisdom, will the time be
ripe? When will the time be ripe to say, “We
have no need of Popes,” and “ a Bible is a hindrance
to human life” ? Who does not see that each
generation puts up the same plea, and will put it
up as long as the world lasts; but it is evident that
if the plea had never been disregarded, we should
have had no Christianism, no Protestantism, and no
�13
and social imperfection. When we have such a
“Church” as that, I think the nations will flock
thereto as to the prophetic 11 Hill of the Lord,” and
malice and uncharitableness will die away. In such
a community the spirit of God must be permitted to
blow where it listeth; yes, even though it be doubted
to be a spirit of God at all, and through every story
of earth and heaven shall the human mind press,
proving and questioning. In such a society, nought
shall be secular and nought be sacred, the triumphal
march holy as the hymn, and the silent meditation
grateful as a prayer. Chiefest of all, shall the
thoughts of great men of all time and every clime
be spread before a hungering people, and whoever in
India or Arabia, England or Syria, have stood closest
to the skies shall be esteemed venerable, and be
listened to as a heavenly seer.
You smile perchance at this dream, but is it to
be ever a dream ? and must the world wait another
millennial cycle till the thought become a deed?
Who knows ? I think we should not wait long if
some amongst us were more earnest. When the
idea does become an act, it needs no very prophetic
eye to scan the consequences.
Instead of the
ghastly hymn which makes our flesh creep, or the
lugubrious psalm which compels us to think our
selves in a funeral vault instead of a sun-lit hall; I
imagine a melody of inspiration, and a multitude
with beaming faces and joyous hearts, shining like
�14
the teachers of righteousness transplanted to the
skies, feeling at last one with man, and all the
universe.
The tendency of man to seek his paradise in the
past is of old standing—a dream more oriental, how
ever, than western; a thought, too, which could
only be very vivid where trust in an immortal
future was weak. Besides, the problem of evil
seemed to necessitate such a conception: there must
have been a time when sin was not, when man
stood still a erect as a sunbeam,’’ and as yet no
lawless passion had darkened the fair face of nature.
Although we may not have advanced much beyond
those early theories in solving that great problem,
still we have no longer any doubt at which end to
place the true Paradise. Seeing by the light of
Darwin and Lyell, no naturalist may place his
Eden-garden at the dawn of human history. How
ever fair nature might then have been, man could
not have been very lovely. I have never hesitated
to avow the conviction that the only conceivable
explanation of man’s creation lies in regarding him
as the progressive child of the highest Catarhine
primates; I cannot conceive for a moment of any
other origin, corroborated as it is, too, by his whole
physical structure. But, even if that be not con
ceded, evidence is slowly accumulating of the
barbaric beginnings of human history, and our Eden
vanishes more and more into the mist. The growth
�15
of man has been upward from the commencement—
incredibly slow, but ever to a better from a worse.
After much toil we are come at length to a highlyimproved link in the chain, but we have by no
means entered upon Paradise. Our Paradise still
lies before us, the El Dorado of our hopes lies far
beyond the furthest mountain-peaks, and probably
each pilgrim, as he attains a new height, will descry
yet stretching beyond glorious snow-clad summits.
The end is far distant, the way is long, but the sky
is not dark. That consolation we have to sustain
us. The sun is still shining overhead, and will
shine; the birds will still sing gladdening hymns;
and though humanity will reel many times back
ward and forward with passionate folly and mad
ness, beyond the blood-stained battle-field, and the
fierce strifes of parties, lies the chosen country, the
milk-and-honey-flowing Land of Promise. This is
our faith, firm and rooted. But if this be our belief,
does it not shape our duties ? does it not summon
us away from the tombs to the busy throbs of instant
life; from laudation of departed saints, to live out our
lives, and leave our footprints on the temporal sands?
Does it not tell us how futile it were to grow up
under the shadow of any by-gone heroic or holy
soul, there being as great souls now, and greater
probably to come ? The Eden of Adam, naturally
fair as it is deemed; the Eden of Moses, morally
fair as it appears; the Eden of Jesus, radiantly
�16
beautiful as it unquestionably was,—are but Edens
whose memory will never utterly perish, but which
by no means exhaust all natural and divine creation.
We do not add to our capabilities, we only quench
our own powers, by breathing in the atmosphere of
a foreign community. I do not stand one inch
taller for walking always at the heels of some by
gone chief. A superinduced righteousness is no
righteousness worth having; and to put on “the
garment of Christ,” I must put off the “garment” of
personality. I do not want to walk thus masqueraded.
Truly none will be so foolish as to refuse assistance;
the entire human race is mutually dependent for
much, but we only seek the disciple’s stool to receive
suggestions which we must work forward in our own
way. A man forfeits his personality when he be.
comes an echo. And the more intimately we know
any great man the less shall we be disposed to call
him “master.” We see that he can be no autocrat
of our soul. And what is true of a man or series of
men is true of countries and ages. Palestine is
no norm for England, nor St. Paul for Western
Republicans. Paul may have fancied he laid down
the law for all time, but only impersonal minds will
credit him.
What, then, is the moral of this argument ?
That we are to speak our speech, think our
thought, do our deeds, as being our own speech,
thoughts, and deeds, and without ceaselessly affirm
�17
ing it is somebody else’s thoughts, speech, and deeds
that we are to think, speak, and do. They may be
Christian, they may be Brahminic, they may be
Confucian, they may be Hellenic, or what not; that
is not our concern: are they true, right to us ?
Are they the best realization we can give to the
floating ideals of our minds ? That is all we have
to ask, and all that we need be concerned in the
world’s knowing. Before the bar of inner con
sciousness each man must be brought to trial, his
own consciousness and not another’s.
Drop then the skirts of by-gone prophets, and
become yourselves prophets. Be in your generation
the kindling fuel which shall keep alive the dull
embers of earthly love, hope, and truthfulness. Men
walk as in a strange stupor; they know not the joy
they might possess were they only content to trust
themselves to the swaying waters. Have no Fear;
exorcise that phantom, the direst that ever infested
the human heart. Why should we fear? The
stars will not fall from the skies and crush us; the
old destroyer of earnest pilgrims has no longer any
teeth to devour, and can only mock. Let her mock;
her heaven, her hell, does not invite nor terrify us.
The Diabolus of the legends may go about still
“ like a roaring lion,” but his fangs are powerless.
The only Devil, and an ugly one sometimes he is,
who has any power, is Public Opinion, and he who
is not prepared to brave public opinion may as well
�18
at once withdraw from our communion; he has no
part with us, nor have we aught to do with him;
he has yet to learn the first lesson in the alphabet
of Right.
Nor turn your gaze too regretfully towards the
fair cities of the plain which duty orders you to
quit. Bright they were, I know; beautiful those
fretted arches, and venerable those long-used rites.
Many a good man knelt upon this pavement, and
pious lips kissed that book. Yet, beautiful as it all
was, to us it is but a memory; it speaks no longer
our faith, it rolls no longer our anthem; our eyes
gleam on another world, and the past is a corpse no
more to be awakened. “Must I leave thee, Para
dise?” Yes, for even “Paradise” does not endure
for ever; nay, it will be no Paradise to a new
world, who sees with other eyes, and beats with
other throbs. The vows which no longer bind we
do not snap, and it is a puerile thing to mourn when
the destiny is inevitable. Vain is it to put back
the dial. Pleasant it was, doubtless, to sail on that
shining water, glorious to be the sharer of a mar
tyr’s agony; the Olive Mount is ever sacred, and
storied Nazareth fair with verdant glades.
But
well-nigh nineteen hundred years stand between us
and that halcyon time; the sun has gone down
upon that fairy land, and has arisen upon a world
whose aims, thoughts, and aspirations were then
undreamed. Awake, 0 monk! from that childish
�19
trance; here is thy work-day world, here thy Olive
mountain, and Golgotha hath still its counterpart.
Nor, had we trod that fairy-land, should we pro
bably have found it so fairy-like as we imagine.
Gazed at through the mists of time all scenes look
brighter than they actually were; our minds tinge
them with colours which they may never have
possessed, mingling with the actual ideal beauties
flung from the absolute, and lighting with a glory
what then was human, but what we fain would have
divine. Fair and best; yes, if, once for all, the
superhuman flood of light suffused the earth, and
never reappeared. But it is not so: I can see
already a future grander than was ever hoped, which
shall dwarf the splendour of any single age, and
inaugurate a Paradise on earth. There is a Gospel
for us as there was a Gospel for the Jewish-Roman
world; a Gospel, too, born of hours of prophetic
vision, and nights of solemn wonder; a Gospel
which also tells of a kingdom of heaven, or, may
be, kingdom of earth; and which, if we have only
faith, shall not disappoint us.
“ Not where long past ages sleep
Seek we Eden’s golden trees ;
In the future, folded deep,
Are its mystic harmonies.
“ Eden with its angels bold,
Trees, and flowers, and cooling sea,
No less ancient story told,
Than a glowing prophecy,
�20
“ In tlie spirit’s perfect air,
In the passions tame and kind,
Innocence from selfish care,
The true Eden shall we find.
“ It is coming, it shall come.
To the patient and the striving ;
To the quiet heart at home,
Thinking, wise, and faithful living.
“ When all error is worked out
From the heart and from the life,
When the sensuous is laid low
By the spirit’s holy strife.
“ When tlie soul to sin hath died.
True, and beautiful, and sound :
Then all earth is sanctified,
Up springs Paradise around.
“ Then shall come the Eden days,
Guardian watch from seraph eyes,
Angels on the slanting rays,
Voices from the opening skies.
“From that spirit-land afar,
All disturbing force shall floc.
Sth nor toil, nor hope shall mar
Its immortal unity.”
STEPHEN AUSTIN, PRINTER, HERTFORD.
�
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
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Original Format
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Pamphlet
Dublin Core
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Title
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Shall we not go forward?: a discourse delivered in the Unitarian Chapel, Bridgewater
Creator
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Coupland, William Chatterton
Description
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Place of publication: London
Collation: 20 p. ; 22 cm.
Notes: From the library of Dr Moncure Conway. Printed by Stephen Austin, Hertford.
Publisher
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Trubner and Co.
Date
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1865
Identifier
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G5263
Subject
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Unitarianism
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 (Shall we not go forward?: a discourse delivered in the Unitarian Chapel, Bridgewater), 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
Conway Tracts
Unitarianism