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diff --git a/41559-8.txt b/41559-8.txt deleted file mode 100644 index 18eb74d..0000000 --- a/41559-8.txt +++ /dev/null @@ -1,3496 +0,0 @@ - THE NEW CHRISTIANITY - - - - -This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with almost -no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it -under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included with this -eBook or online at http://www.gutenberg.org/license. - - - -Title: The New Christianity - or, The Religion of the New Age -Author: Salem Goldworth Bland -Release Date: December 04, 2012 [EBook #41559] -Language: English -Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 - - -*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE NEW CHRISTIANITY *** - - - - -Produced by Al Haines. - - - - -[Illustration: Cover] - - - - The New Christianity - - or - - The Religion of the New Age - - - By - Salem Goldworth Bland - - - - - MCCLELLAND & STEWART - PUBLISHERS :: TORONTO - - - - - COPYRIGHT, CANADA, 1920 - BY MCCLELLAND & STEWART, LIMITED, TORONTO - - - - PRINTED IN CANADA - - - - - TO THE CANADIAN SOLDIERS, - SPEARHEAD OF THE - ARMY OF LIBERTY IN FRANCE, - SPEARHEAD OF THE - ARMY OF BROTHERHOOD IN CANADA - - - - - PREFACE - - -This little book is only a sketch. Some suggestions of the kind that is -too exclusively regarded as practical, I hope, may be found in it. On -the whole, its aim is, as from Mt. Nebo, to give a vision of the -Promised Land. It does not attempt to minutely describe the roads -leading thither. But then, probably, it is not given to any one as yet -to map out very precisely the journey before us, for we "have not passed -this way heretofore." It is my hope that these ideas which have -gradually grown clear to me may help to increase the number of those who -are willing fearlessly and resolutely to set out to find a way that may, -after all, not prove so hard to find as it has sometimes seemed. The -possible reproach of idealism is one to which Christianity itself lies -too open to be feared. - -I have tried to write impersonally. May I, then, here gratify myself by -confessing how dear to me and how strong is the faith that my -convictions and my hopes are shared by multitudes of my -fellow-Canadians? I have lived in many parts of Canada. I have tried to -understand the Canadian temper. Canada, I believe, has not yet found -herself. The strain of the war has revealed her -weaknesses,--thoughtlessness, irresponsibility, divisive prejudice, -worst of all, selfishness, sometimes in the extreme. But it has -revealed, too, high devotion, quiet, unostentatious self-sacrifice, rare -energy and resourcefulness. - -There is in every nation a Jekyll and a Hyde, but not in every nation -to-day is the struggle between the two so keen or the possibilities of -its settlement so dramatic. The turn that our church life, our business -life, our public life, may take in the next few years--which, indeed, I -think, it is already taking--may be decisive and glorious. Canada has -the faults of youth but also its energy, its courage, and its idealism. -I believe it is possible that she may be the first to find the new -social order and the new Christianity, and so become a pathfinder for -the nations. - -This preface would be incomplete if I did not express my great -indebtedness to my friends, Professor W. G. Smith of the University of -Toronto, who gave me valuable criticisms and suggestions, and Miss Ruth -E. Spence, B.A., who kindly assisted me in reading the proofs. - - -SALEM GOLDWORTH BLAND. -Toronto, - _March_, 1920. - - - - - TABLE OF CONTENTS - - -INTRODUCTION - -PART I. THE NEW SOCIAL ORDER - CHAP. 1. THE OVERFLOW OF DEMOCRACY - CHAP. 2. THE OVERFLOW OF BROTHERHOOD - -PART II. THE NEW CHRISTIANITY - CHAP. 1. A LABOR CHRISTIANITY - CHAP. 2. AN AMERICAN CHRISTIANITY - CHAP. 3. THE GREAT CHRISTIANITY - -CONCLUSION - - - - - INTRODUCTION - - THE WORLD-WELTER - - - - INTRODUCTION - - -The Western nations to-day are like storm-tossed sailors who, after a -desperate voyage, have reached land only to find it heaving with -earthquakes. In almost every country involved in the great struggle, -the war without has been succeeded by a war within. - -Of this turmoil, industrial or political as it may be, two things can be -said. One is, that no Western people is likely to escape it, and -certainly not the peoples of this Continent. The other is, that even in -its most confused and explosive forms it is a divine movement. Mistaken, -sordid, violent, even cruel forms it may assume. Strange agencies it -may utilize. None the less no student of history, no one, at least, who -has any faith in the divine government of the world, can doubt that -these great sweeping movements owe their power and prevalence to the -good in them, not to the evil that is always mingled, to us at least, so -perplexingly and distressingly with the good. - -If this be so, no clearer duty can press upon all who wish to fight for -God and not against Him than to try to discern the good factors that are -at work and the direction in which they are moving. This duty is the -more urgent since no one can tell when the clamor and the dust may make -it very hard to discern either. - -In Canada, particularly, is this duty of careful analysis especially -pressing. In no Western country, probably, has there been less -experience of internal turmoil, less anticipation of it, or less -preparedness against it. The attitude of Canada to life hitherto might -almost be described as the attitude of a healthy, well-cared-for boy of -fifteen, full of energy, full of ambition, with plenty of fight in him -but still more good nature, whose only problems are the problems of the -campus and of pocket money. - -And yet it is conceivable that in no Western country may the turmoil of -the next few years take a more acute form than in Canada. The -youthfulness of the Dominion, the recency and frailty of the ties that -bind the scattered provinces, the deep divisions of race and language -and religion which criss-cross Canada in every direction, the high -percentage of the new Canadians that have come, and recently, from the -countries with which Canada has been at war, the large numbers of men -who have now returned from overseas and who for different reasons, some -of them unpreventable, are naturally and inevitably finding it difficult -to discover their places in the tasks of peace--these conditions bring -it about that Canada is not only not safeguarded, but is peculiarly full -of inflammable material. - -It is true that Canada in population is only one of the small nations, -but it would seem as if none of the greater nations, since ramshackle -Austria-Hungary fell to pieces, faces so severe an internal strain. - -But, after all, nations never find their soul except through hard tasks. -God educates peoples as He educates individuals, by putting them in -tight places. This little book is written in the faith that the task of -finding the right solution of Canadian national problems is so high and -hard that only the deepest and truest soul of the Canadian people can -achieve it, but, also, in the faith that Canadians, by the blessing of -God, will be found equal to the task; and the chief purpose of what -follows will be to show what are the good and beneficial elements in the -turmoil, and how, with the least of strife and confusion, all who have -other than selfish aims may co-operate in the divine movement. - -There can be little fruitful constructive effort without hope, and, -perhaps, we shall find, when we try to analyze the situation, that it -has even more of hope in it than menace. - -The aim of the following discussion is, as the title suggests, twofold: - -First, to show that in the unrest and confusion of the civilized nations -two principles, above all others, are at work; that these two principles -are both of them right beyond question; and that the disturbance and -alarm so widely felt are both due to the fact that these principles are -finding their way into regions from which they have hitherto been -largely excluded--to show, in short, that the whole commotion of the -world, in the last analysis, is chiefly due to the overflow of the two -great Christian principles of democracy and brotherhood. - -Second, to point out the only kind of Christianity which is adequate to -meet the situation, or in other words, to describe the Christianity -which, we may hope, is taking form. - - - - - PART I. - - THE NEW SOCIAL ORDER - - - - CHAPTER I. - - THE OVERFLOW OF DEMOCRACY - - -The history of the last nine hundred years in one, at least, of its most -vital aspects is the history of the development of democracy. Perhaps in -no other way can one so accurately discuss and estimate the progress -achieved through this almost millennial period than in noting the -successive conquests made by that great principle. - -The first conquest was in the field of education. Modern democracy -began with the rise of universities in the eleventh and twelfth -centuries. Education had been the monopoly of the clergy, not, indeed, -through any such design on the part of the clergy, but through the -ignorance of the Northern races which had overrun Southern Europe and -almost extinguished its culture, and through the unsettled and harassed -condition of Europe which had delayed the growth of a new culture. It -was only the clergy who felt that education was necessary. - -It is one of the many inestimable services that the monasteries have -rendered the modern world, that they preserved from destruction some of -the precious flotsam and jetsam of that Greco-Roman literature which had -for the most part been submerged, and that in these quiet retreats there -grew up the schools which were to lay the foundations of yet nobler -literatures. - -Eventually, when a measure of peace came at last to the lands so long in -distress and turmoil, the irrepressible impulses of the human soul for -knowledge asserted themselves. The youth of Europe, eager to know, -flocked in increasing numbers to the teachers who began to be famous, -and the university took its rise. - -Education placed in the hands of the people the key to other doors. As -a natural consequence, democracy found its way into the jealously -guarded realm of religion. After innumerable abortive, but glorious and -not wasted, struggles for the right of the individual to find his own -religion and dispense with ecclesiastical guides and directors, Northern -Europe established the principle of democracy in religion in the great -revolt known as the Protestant Reformation. That uprising was a very -complex movement. Many motives mingled in it, but of these the desire -for a purer faith was, probably, on the whole not so influential as the -democratic passion for intellectual and religious freedom. - -Concurrent with the overflow of democracy into the realm of religion was -its overflow into politics. The evolution of political democracy is the -distinctive glory of England. It is her contribution to world -civilization as that of the Hebrew was monotheism, that of the Greek -culture, and that of the Roman organization and law. - -The barons, primarily in their own interest, wrested the Great Charter -from a King who more recklessly and oppressively than his predecessors -played the despot. In the provision of Magna Charta that the King -should levy no more taxes without consent of the taxed was found the -necessity of the coming together, first of the barons and the spiritual -lords, later of the knights of the shire, and finally of the burghers of -the towns--separate assemblies which soon coalesced and by their -unification formed the English Parliament. English constitutional -history from the reign of Henry III. to the Revolution of 1688 is the -history of the gradual supersession of the crown by Parliament, and of -the ascendancy of the elective House of Commons over the hereditary -House of Peers. The eighteenth century witnessed the development of -Cabinet government; the nineteenth completed the great fabric of -political democracy in those Franchise Acts which admitted to -participation in the government-- - -In 1832, the propertied classes of the manufacturing towns; - -In 1867, the artisan; - -In 1884, the farm labourers; - -In 1918, the women. - -With these must be mentioned the Act of 1911 which constitutionally and -decisively established the ascendancy of the popular House over the -Peers. - -England broke the trail which all other peoples that have accepted -democracy have followed. The mobile and logical intelligence of France, -slower through historical conditions to snap the feudal bonds, when it -was at last aroused, at one bound outstripped England. Not content to -limit, it swept away both monarchy and the House of Peers. A still more -striking illustration of how the last may be first may yet be yielded by -that great half-European, half-Asiatic people, so long, apparently, -impenetrable to democracy, but now in the obscure throes of a revolution -which despite its initial disorders and excesses, may, it is perhaps -possible to hope, give to Russia the high honour of being the first -nation to achieve the last conquest of democracy--its triumph in the -economic realm. For it would seem impossible to doubt that that final -triumph of democracy can be long delayed. Autocracy and aristocracy -overthrown in politics cannot stand in economics. - -He who will trace a river like the Mississippi from its source, and find -it growing in hundreds of miles from a stream that may be waded to a -great river a mile in width and a hundred feet in depth, does not need -to actually follow the river to its mouth to be assured that it must -reach the sea. Such a river cannot be diverted or dammed. Obstructions -will only serve to make its current more violent. - -This, then, would seem to be clear, that by an action as cosmic and -irresistible as the movement of a great river, democracy is invading the -industrial world. The time has passed for all temporary and makeshift -expedients. A kindly spirit in the employer, improved hygienic -conditions, rest rooms, better pay and shorter hours, will not secure -equilibrium, though the spirit of good-will they tend to evoke may make -further struggle less bitter. Profit-sharing furnishes no permanent -resting place. It is merely a camping place on the journey. In the -papers of Feb. 12, 1919, appeared a significant despatch from London of -the same date, describing the acute labor situation. - -"The labor situation reaches a crisis to-day in conferences between the -government and three great unions, representing nearly 1,500,000 -workers, the result of whose demands is awaited with keen interest by -the entire labor world. - -"The unions are the Miners' Federation of Great Britain, membership -800,000; National Union of Railway-men, membership 400,000; and the -National Transport Workers' Federation, membership 250,000. The unions -are acting together, and it is believed they have agreed on joint action -if dissatisfied with the result of the conferences. - -"The railwaymen's demands include a 48-hour week and control of railways -by representatives of the managements and workers. This latter clause is -considered a step toward nationalization, but an alternative has been -prepared in the form of a commission of labor delegates and boards of -directors. - -"William Adamson, leader of the Labor party in the House of Commons, -speaking on the industrial situation, said that it was almost as -menacing and dangerous as the war itself. He said that the principal -Labor amendment to the reply to the address from the throne would relate -to the causes of industrial unrest. - -"'I hope,' he continued, 'that no attempts will be made to disappoint -the legitimate expectations of the working people. All sections of the -people should understand that we have reached the stage when we have -laid the cards upon the table and when the working classes will refuse -longer to be treated as cogs in a machine or for mere profit-making -purposes.'" - -In short, nothing will now satisfy the workers but a share in the -control. The most hopeful scheme of harmony would seem to be some such -arrangement as the Whitley scheme which has been officially endorsed by -the British Government. The essential features of the Whitley scheme -are the organization of all the workers in any industrial area, the -organization of all the employers, the creation of joint committees -representative of both groups to fix wages and determine conditions of -labor. And this is not the end but the beginning. The end, at least of -this phase of industrial evolution, would appear to promise to be the -disappearance of the capitalistic control of industry. So far as -industries are not owned and managed by the community, they will be -owned and managed by the workers that carry them on. The revolution -will be accomplished when the men of inventive and organizing and -directive ability recognize that their place is with the workers and not -with the owners. Capitalistic control must pass away. It has, no doubt, -played a necessary and useful part in the social evolution. It has -shown courage and enterprise. But it has been, on the whole, rapacious -and heartless, and its sense of moral responsibility has been often -rudimentary. When the managers on whom it depends desert to the side of -the workers, it will be patent how little capacity or service is in -capitalism, and how little it deserved the immense gains it wrung from -exploited labor and skill. - -The process may be harder and slower than even the most sober-minded -would estimate, or it may be much easier and quicker; but the process -has begun, and there can be but one end. Feudalistic industry must -follow feudalistic land holding. Feudalistic landlordism went because -the feudal lords were enormously overpaid in proportion to their -services. When organizing and directive ability breaks the artificial -bond that has associated it with capital, it will be seen how slight is -the service capital has rendered and how enormously it has been -overpaid. - -Management is, of course, entitled to its wages, and under present -conditions those wages must be relatively high, for managing ability is -not abundant. What might be called the wages of capital have been -unjustly high and are destined to fall until no man can afford to be a -mere capitalist. To gain a livelihood he will be obliged to develop -some productive function. - -So long as industry must be maintained on a capitalistic basis, those -furnishing the capital are entitled to a fair return on their -investment, but the fashion of this capitalistic age passeth away. The -control of money and credit is destined to gradually become a function -of government. - -A check must be placed on the fatal fashion money has of breeding money. -Wages of labor, wages of invention, wages of superintendence, are just; -profits of capital must grow less and less to the vanishing point. The -bitter conflict between capital and labor over the division of the -profits will never be settled. It probably never can be settled. It -will cease to be. Capital will cease to be a factor; only labor in the -broadly inclusive sense of the term will remain. - -The onward march of democracy, then, cannot be staid. It ought not. -Democracy is nothing but the social expression of the fundamental -Christian doctrine of the worth of the human soul. Democracies had -found their way into human life before the revelation of the worth of -the human soul in the redemptive work of Jesus Christ, but at their -best, as in ancient Greece, they were restricted. Even that most -glorious of all non-Christian democracies and, in some respects, most -glorious as yet of all democracies non-Christian and Christian, the -democracy of Athens, rested on a slave basis and excluded the man not -possessing Athenian citizenship. But it was at least a noble -anticipation, a sublime, if inconsistent, partial, and evanescent -reaching-out after the democracy which Christianity can never be content -till it has achieved, a democracy of religion, of culture, of politics, -and of industry. The inherent dignity of every human soul must be -recognized in every sphere of life. Heirs of God, joint-heirs with -Christ--how is it possible to reconcile such august titles with -servitude or subjection? A share in the control of church, community, -industry is the Divine right of every normal man and woman. - - - - - CHAPTER II. - - THE OVERFLOW OF BROTHERHOOD - - -The Church of Jesus Christ should not be alarmed at the inundating -progress of democracy. She, of all institutions, should not oppose it. -It is her child. But even democracy, with its majestic vindication of -the worth and dignity of the humblest and least-endowed human soul, is -not so distinctively and gloriously the offspring of Christianity as is -the principle of brotherhood. The movement towards brotherhood, the -great master-passion of our day, is just the overflow of Christianity -from the conventionally religious into the economic realm. One might -rest the divine claim of Christianity on this irrepressible impulse to -overflow. - -The ancient heathen faiths, with a few possible exceptions, did not seek -to overflow. They asked only a strictly delimited area, definite times, -definite places, definite gifts, definite ceremonial, observances and -regulations. Outside that circumscribed area, life might go on as it -would. - -Even some forms of Christianity have shown little disposition to -overflow. There has long been and still is a type of Christianity which -fixes its eye on heaven and abandons earth. It is indifferent and -acquiescent in regard to the affairs of this life, with no surge of -passion for their purification and ennoblement. - -This attitude has found expression in a hymn of John Wesley's which was -once sung in its entirety but which, where it still lingers in our -present collections, survives in a repeatedly and severely abridged -form. - - How happy is the pilgrim's lot! - How free from every anxious thought, - From worldly hope and fear! - Confined to neither court nor cell, - His soul disdains on earth to dwell, - He only sojourns here. - - His happiness in part is mine, - Already saved from self-design, - From every creature-love; - Blest with the scorn of finite good, - My soul is lightened of its load, - And seeks the things above. - - The things eternal I pursue, - A happiness beyond the view - Of those that basely pant - For things by nature felt and seen; - Their honors, wealth and pleasures mean - I neither have nor want. - - I have no babes to hold me here, - But children more securely near - For mine I humbly claim; - Better than daughters or than sons, - Temples divine, of living stones - Inscribed with Jesus' name. - - No foot of land do I possess, - No cottage in this wilderness, - A poor, wayfaring man; - I lodge awhile in tents below, - Or gladly wander to and fro - Till I my Canaan gain. - - Nothing on earth I call my own: - A stranger to the world unknown, - I all their goods despise; - I trample on their whole delight, - And seek a country out of sight, - A country in the skies. - - There is my house and portion fair, - My treasure and my heart are there, - And my abiding home; - For me the elder brethren stay, - And angels beckon me away, - And Jesus bids me come. - - I come,--thy servant, Lord, replies-- - I come to meet Thee in the skies, - And claim my heavenly rest! - Now let the pilgrims' journey end, - Now, O my Saviour, Brother, Friend, - Receive me to thy breast. - - -As expressed in this hymn and still more in that spiritual classic, the -"_De Contemptu Mundi_" of Bernard of Cluny, such a piety is not without -its pathos and beauty and lofty idealism, but it is not Christianity. - -It is only the pale bloodless spectre of Christianity. Christianity is -a torrent. It is a fire. It is a passion for brotherhood, a raging -hatred of everything which denies or forbids brotherhood. It was a -brotherhood at the first. Twisted, bent, repressed for nearly twice a -thousand years, it will be a brotherhood at the last. - -Does Christianity mean Socialism? It means infinitely more than -Socialism. It means Socialism plus a deeper, diviner brotherhood than -even Socialism seeks. It abhors inequality. It always has abhorred -inequality. It seems almost inexplicable that the censors in these days -of panicky attempts at suppression of incendiary ideas have not put -under the ban such words as these: - -"My soul doth magnify the Lord, - -And my spirit hath rejoiced in God my Saviour. - - * * * * * - -He hath showed strength with his arm: - -He hath scattered the proud in the imagination of their heart. - -He hath put down princes from their thrones, and hath exalted them of -low degree. - -The hungry He hath filled with good things: - -And the rich He hath sent empty away."--Luke 1:46-53. - -or these: - -"Let the brother of low degree rejoice in that he is exalted; - -But the rich in that he is made low; because, as the flower of the grass -he shall pass away. - -For the sun is no sooner risen with a burning heat but it withereth the -grass, and the flower thereof falleth, and the grace of the fashion of -it perisheth: so also shall the rich man fade away in his ways."--James -1:9-ll. - -"Nothing is hid," was the word of Jesus, "that shall not be made -manifest, nor anything secret that shall not be known and come to -light." Many things have been hidden in that extraordinary amalgam that -we call historical Christianity. St. Paul hid in it his peculiar -idiosyncratic contempt of marriage and lack of reverence for women, and -these elements worked out in the millennial denial of woman's rights and -the abnormalities and tragedies of asceticism. St. Paul, again, and the -unknown authors of the letter to the Hebrews and the fourth Gospel hid -in primitive Christianity the Greek passion for metaphysics, and there -emerged that perverse exaltation of dogma and orthodoxy which has, more -than any other thing, withered the heart of the Church, smothered its -fresh spontaneous life, kindled the infernal fires of heresy-trials and -autos-da-fé. But Jesus hid something in historic Christianity, too, -something deeper, diviner, mightier than any foreign ingredients added -by other hands. Those commingling elements the Christianity of Jesus -probably had to take up, test, and eventually reject. The only way, -perhaps, in which the real meaning of Christianity could be discovered -by men was in contrast with the innumerable and heterogeneous -adulterations of it. We come to truth, it has been profoundly said, by -the exhaustion of error. Humanity cannot apparently be sure of the -right road till it knows all the wrong roads as well. So it would -certainly have seemed to be with historic Christianity. - -But deepest and most vital of all the elements that have found their way -into historic Christianity is what Christ hid there,--the equality of -brotherhood. That hidden element, too, must find its way to the light. -Early repressed, driven in, well nigh smothered, it has, nevertheless, -never been extinguished, for it is the secret force, the most deeply -vital essence of Christianity. As Bernard Shaw has said, it is not true -that Christianity has been tried and found wanting; it has been found -difficult and has never been tried. But in the profound words of -Martineau, "In the history of systems an inexorable logic rids them of -their halfness and hesitancies and drives them straight to their -appointed goal." Not always by a straight road but by a sure one. - -Nothing is more certain than that the human intellect must refuse -eventually to acquiesce in that strange, illogical, and inconsistent -jumble we call our Christian civilization. Something drives it -irresistibly to consistency. The Christianity of Jesus means nothing if -it does not mean brotherhood. Brotherhood means nothing if it does not -mean a passion for equality. The story is told that when the Duke of -Wellington, who, like so many other great soldiers of other times and of -our own, was a devout man, was kneeling to receive the Communion in the -village Church near his estate, a humble neighbour found himself, to his -consternation, kneeling close beside the great Duke. He was rising at -once to move away when the Duke put out his hand and detained him, -saying, "We are all equal here." It was a fine spirit that the Duke -showed for the time and in a country such as England was then. But it -holds in it explosives of which probably the Duke did not dream. Equal -at the table of their Common Lord! Then equal everywhere! Equality -everywhere or equality nowhere! The soul of every man who has seen the -divine beauty of equality must forever war against all limitations and -impairments of it. Even human logic can not permanently tolerate such a -fundamental incompatibility and irrationality as religious equality and -social inequality sleeping in the same bed. Religious equality has -already worked itself out in political equality. Even in aristocratic -England the last vestige of political inequality has disappeared. The -accepted formula is now--one man, one vote. It may be a harder problem -to work out, but economic equality will be worked out to the same -conclusion--one man, one share of all the conditions of human dignity -and well being. - -The keen satire of Charles Kingsley in _Alton Locke_ will not always be -justified. - -"Faix, an' ain't we all brothers?" asked Kelly. - -"Ay, and no," said Sandy, with an expression which would have been a -smile, but for its depths of bitter earnestness; "brethren in Christ, my -laddie." - -"An' ain't that all over the same?" - -"Ask the preachers. Gin they meant brothers, they'd say brothers, be -sure; but because they don't mean brothers at a', they say -brethren--ye'll mind, brethren--to soun' antiquate, an' professional, -an' perfunctory-like, for fear it should be ower real, an' practical, -an' startling, an' a' that; and then jist limit it down wi' a 'in -Christ,' for fear o' owre wide applications, and a' that. But - - For a' that, and a' that, - It's comin' yet, for a' that, - When man an' man, the warld owre, - Shall brothers be, for a' that-- - -An' na brithren any mair at a'!" - -Social inequality between human beings can never be a permanent -relation. Ordinarily between normal human beings it is a hateful and -demoralizing relation. It is twice cursed. It curses him who is down -and him who is up. - -It powerfully tends to make the one who is down and knows he is down, -subservient, a truckler, a fawner. If a man is wise enough and strong -enough to withstand the influence, the probability is that the very -effort at resistance, unless he is very wise and very strong, will -develop an unlovely and ungracious spirit of defiance, sometimes of -hostility. In any case, human nature generally sours under it. - -It is, perhaps, even worse in its effects on the one who is up. At the -best he becomes condescending, affable, gracious, -patronizing--intolerable attitudes every one. At the worst he becomes -arrogant and insolent. Always he tends to become suspicious and -cynical. He learns to distrust the forced respectfulness and -obligingness everywhere shown to himself, and so comes to distrust -courtesy and good-will in general. - -H. G. Wells in his _The Future in America_ inserts a picture of "one of -the most impressive of these very rich Americans." "My friend beheld -him, gross and heavy, seated in an easy chair in the centre of his -private car, among men who stared and came and went. He clutched a long -cigar with a great clumsy hand. He turned on you a queer, coarse, -disconcerting bottle nose with a little hard, blue, wary, hostile eye -that watched out from the roots of it. He said nothing. He attempted -no civility, he looked pride and insults--you ceased to respect -yourself.... 'It was Roman,' my friend said. 'There has been nothing -like it since the days of that republic. No living king would dare to -do it. And these other Americans! These people walked up to him and -talked to him--they tried to flatter him and get him to listen to -projects. Abjectly. And you knew, he _grunted_. He didn't talk back. -It was beneath him. He just grunted at them!" - -Just as clear as the incompatibility of Christianity with social -inequality is its incompatibility with business competition. - -Competition for a livelihood, competition for bread and butter, is the -denial of brotherhood. It is the antithesis of the Golden Rule. It is -not the doing unto other men as we would that they should do to us. It -is obedience to David Harum's parody of the Golden Rule, "Do unto the -other fellow as he wants to do to you, and do it fust." The essential -condition of competition is that always there shall be at least two men -after the one contract, two men after the one job, two men after the -custom, the patronage, the _clientèle_ only sufficient for one. As a -consequence, wherever competition exists, the success of one man always -involves the failure of another. The man who gets the position knows -that another man is suffering. The merchant who captures the trade -knows that another must fail. The rule for success, as given by a -highly successful business man of America, was, "So conduct your -business that your competitor will have to shut up shop." The method is -essentially disorderly and wasteful. Worse than that, it is inhuman. - -It is difficult, indeed, to imagine how a more inhuman method of -business could be devised short of methods which no man who had not -ceased to be human would tolerate. Inhuman and dehumanizing. How deeply -dehumanizing is seen in the effort of Christian men to justify it--the -supreme illustration in our day of the morally blinding power of the -accustomed, the familiar, and, above all, the profitable, which has made -Christian men defenders of competition, of war, of the drink traffic, of -the opium traffic, and of slavery. - -Business competition to-day is, conceivably, as great an evil as ever -intemperance was. Its working is more subtle, more wide-spread, more -deeply destructive. - -It hardens men. It dries up their natural and almost inextinguishable -kindliness. It demoralizes them. It almost compels them to resort to -crooked methods. It subjects them to temptations sometimes virtually -irresistible. It presents them with the alternatives of failure and -starvation for themselves and their loved ones or the doing of -something, not right indeed, but which plenty of others do and which -seems imperative. The honorable man has to compete with the -dishonorable. The Hydrostatic Paradox of controversy, the Autocrat of -the Breakfast Table has told us, lies in this, that as water in two -connected tubes, however different their calibre, stands at the same -level in both, so if a wise man and a fool engage in controversy, they -tend to equality. The more demoralizing Hydrostatic Paradox of business -competition is its deadly tendency to bring the honorable man down to -the level of the dishonorable. - -It is not always demoralizing. There are men strong enough to maintain -their integrity, even sometimes at great risk. But the strain of it, -the feverishness of it, the narrowing influences of it, still fewer men -escape. - -Under the shade and fallen needles of the pine forest, no other -vegetation can grow. Under the absorption, the exhaustion, of the fierce -business competition of America, little else than business shrewdness, -business insight, business knowledge can grow. A thousand seeds of -culture, art, music, philanthrophy, religion, human fellowship, home -happiness die permanently or fail to germinate at all in the American -business man. The struggle, like a remorseless machine, seizes him as a -young man and works its way with him till it flings him off at the other -end of the process, a failure with a dreary old age of dependence and -uncertainty, or a successful man broken in health at fifty, to spend the -rest of his days in search of health, or with the leisure and the means -to develop the old tastes but the tastes themselves atrophied by long -and enforced neglect. - -In the name of the brotherhood of Christianity, in the name of the -richness and variety of the human soul, the Church must declare a -truceless war upon this sterilizing and dehumanizing competition and -upon the source of it, an economic order based on profit-seeking. - -With profits not merely as an inducement but as the absolutely essential -condition, the _sine qua non_ not merely of success but of a livelihood, -competition, even desperate competition, is inevitable. There is not -usually the direct personal clash, the bloody or deadly combat, though -these may be, but it is a life and death struggle none the less. In -business competition, men are fighting with halters around their necks. -They are fighting as wolves fight who know that the beaten one will be -devoured by the pack. - -How unfair and how futile under such conditions to heap reproaches upon -the men who make what are called excessive profits! The risks are -great. Should not a man make provision for them when he can? When, -too, a man is immersed from boyhood in an atmosphere of profit-seeking, -when in the talk around the meal-table and the conversation of his -father with other men he gathers that profits are the measure of -success, when in business he finds the whole energy and ingenuity and -influence of men concentrated on profits, and men largely estimated by -the amount of their profits, what capacity will be left after twenty -years of such a life to distinguish between legitimate and excessive -profits? - -A profit-seeking system will always breed profiteers. It cannot be -cleansed or sweetened or ennobled. There is only one way to -Christianize it, and that is, to abolish it. That is, it may well be -believed, the distinctive task of the age that is now beginning, as the -abolition of the liquor-traffic was of the age that is closing, and the -abolition of slavery of a still earlier age. - -This whole present industrial and commercial world, ingenious, mighty, -majestic, barbaric, disorderly, brutal, must be lifted from its basis of -selfish, competitive profit-seeking and placed squarely on a basis of -co-operative production for human needs. - -How this tremendous transformation will be eventually accomplished, -probably no one of this generation can foresee. All we can see is some -initial steps. - -A hint, it may be, is given in the well-recognized tendency of competing -industries to escape competition by specialization. Thus they become -co-operative. The same tendency to co-operative specialization is at -work among professional men. Medical men specialize ever more narrowly. -Lawyers elect to become authorities in a very narrow field. - -Another principle of transformation may be found in the union of -competing businesses under government regulation as to prices. Such -combinations, while often disadvantageous to the public unless -governmentally regulated, at least attest the increasing recoil from -competition. - -The main line of development, however, it seems altogether probable, -will be the extension of public ownership, municipal, state or -provincial, and national. - -There is no diviner movement at work in the modern world. It is -emancipating, educative, redemptive, regenerating. "Whatever says _I_ -and _mine_," says one of the wisest and most Christ-like of Medieval -Mystics, "is Anti-Christ." The converse is equally true. "Whatever says -_we_ and _ours_ is Christian." Public ownership, more extensively and -powerfully than any other human agency, teaches men to say we and ours. -It teaches them to think socially. - -To discredit and attack the principle of public ownership is to -discredit and attack Christianity. It would seem to be the special sin -against the Holy Ghost of our age. He who doubts the practicability of -public ownership is really doubting human nature and Christianity and -God. - -What we are facing to-day is the issue between learning to do things -together and a struggle between competing individuals, competing -classes, and competing nations, so frantic and ferocious that in it our -civilization may go down. - -In these two chapters there has been the effort to set forth two at -least of the dominating principles of the new social order. They are -both embodied in a significant report adopted by the General Conference -of the Methodist Church of Canada, October, 1918, in the city of -Hamilton, Ontario. This report presented by a Committee on the Church -in Relation to War and Patriotism was adopted, after a long and deeply -earnest debate, in a reduced but still large Conference, with but four -dissentient votes. It has awakened unusual interest as perhaps the -boldest and most outspoken deliverance on the social question which any -great Christian body up to that time had made. - - - REPORT NO. 3 - - II. CHURCH LEADERSHIP IN THE NATION - -"Your Committee has had its attention directed to the work of the Church -in the problems of reconstruction by some pregnant passages in the -address of the General Superintendent, and by a Memorial from the -Alberta Conference. - -"Even before the war it was widely foreseen that great social changes -were imminent in the western world. This gigantic convulsion has -precipitated the nations into the melting pot. Such an era summons the -prophetic gifts of the Church, first, to the task of interpretation--to -discern amid the turmoil and confusion the hand of God, and secondly, to -the task of inspiration--to breathe into the hearts of men the faith, -the courage, the patience, the brotherliness, by which alone the happy -harbor can be won. And no Church is under a deeper obligation to assist -in this two-fold task than our own. Methodism was born in a revolt -against sin and social extravagancies and corruption. It was content -with no aim lower than 'to spread scriptural holiness through the land.' -Insisting on personal regeneration and all the implications therein, it -transformed the face of England and saved that land from the excesses of -a French revolution. To it the ideal of the Christian life was simply -love made perfect. Without seeking at this time to commit the Church to -a definite programme of economic policy, we would present for the -consideration of our people the following statement which reflects our -point of view: - -"1. The present economic system stands revealed as one of the roots of -the war. The insane pride of Germany, her passion for world-domination -found an occasion in the demand for colonies as markets and sources of -raw materials--the imperative need of competing groups of industries -carried on for profits. - -"2. The war has made more clearly manifest the moral perils inherent in -the system of production for profits. Condemnation of special -individuals seems often unjust and always futile. The system, rather -than the individual, calls for change. - -"3. The war is the coronation of democracy. No profounder -interpretation of the issue has been made than the great phrase of -President Wilson's, that the Allies are fighting to 'make the world safe -for democracy.' It is clearly impossible for the champions of democracy -to set limits to its recognition. The last century democratized -politics; the twentieth century has found that political democracy means -little without economic democracy. The democratic control of industry -is just and inevitable. - -"4. Under the shock and strain of this tremendous struggle, accepted -commercial and industrial methods based on individualism and competition -have gone down like mud walls in a flood. National organization, -national control, extraordinary approximations to national equality, -have been found essential to efficiency. - -"Despite the derangements and the sorrow of the war, the Motherland has -raised large masses of her people from the edge of starvation to a -higher plane of physical well-being and, in consequence, was never so -healthy, never so brotherly, nor ever actuated by so high a purpose, or -possessed by such exaltation of spirit as to-day--and the secret is that -all are fighting or working, and all are sacrificing. - -"It is not conceivable that, when Germany ceases to be a menace, these -dearly bought discoveries will be forgotten. Relapse would mean -recurrence, the renewal of the agony. - -"The conclusion seems irresistible. The war is a sterner teacher than -Jesus and uses far other methods, but it teaches the same lesson. The -social development which it has so unexpectedly accelerated has the same -goal as Christianity. That common goal is a nation of comrade workers, -such as now at the trenches fights so gloriously--a nation of comrade -fighters. - -"With the earthquake shocks of the war thundering so tremendous a -re-affirmation to the principles of Jesus, it would be the most -inexcusable dereliction of duty on the part of the Church not to -re-state her programme in modern terms and re-define her -divinely-appointed goal. - -"The triumph of democracy, the demand of the educated workers for human -conditions of life, the deep condemnation this war has passed on the -competitive struggle, the revelation of the superior efficiency of -national organization and co-operation, combine with the unfulfilled, -the often forgotten, but the undying ethics of Jesus, to demand nothing -less than a transference of the whole economic life from a basis of -competition and profits to one of co-operation and service. - -"We recognize the magnificent effort of many great employers to make -their industrial organization a means of uplift and betterment to all -who participate, but the human spirit instinctively resents even the -most benevolent forms of government while self-government is denied. -The noblest humanitarian aims of employers, too, are often thwarted by -the very conditions under which their business must be carried on. - -"That another system is practicable is shown by the recent statement of -the British Prime Minister, that every industry save one in Britain has -been made to serve the national interest by the elimination of the -incentive of private profit. That the present organization, based on -production and service for profits, can be superseded by a system of -production and service for human needs, is no longer a dream. - -"We, therefore, look to our national government--and the factor is a -vital one--to enlist in the service of the nation those great leaders -and corporations which have shown magnificent capacity in the organizing -of life and resources for the profit of shareholders. Surely the same -capacity can find nobler and more deeply satisfying activity in the -service of the whole people rather than in the service of any particular -group. - -"The British Government Commission has outlined a policy which, while -accepting as a present fact the separation of capital and labor, -definitely denies the right of sole control to the former and, insisting -on the full organization of workers and employers, vests the government -of every industry in a joint board of employers and workers, which board -shall determine the working conditions of that industry. - -"This policy has been officially adopted by the British Government, and -nothing less can be regarded as tolerable even now in Canada. - -"But we do not believe this separation of labor and capital can be -permanent. Its transcendence, whether through co-operation or public -ownership, seems to be the only constructive and radical reform. - -"This is the policy set forth by the great Labor organizations and must -not be rejected because it presupposes, as Jesus did, that the normal -human spirit will respond more readily to the call to service than to -the lure of private gain. - -"The acceptance of this report, it cannot be too clearly recognized, -commits this Church, as far as this representative body can commit it, -to nothing less than a complete social reconstruction. When it shall be -fully accomplished, and through what measures and processes, depend on -the thinking and the good-will of men and, above all, on the guiding -hand of God. But we think it is clear that nothing less than the goal -we have outlined will satisfy the aroused moral consciousness of Canada -or retain for the Churches any leadership in the testing period that is -upon them. And in such an heroic task as this, our citizen armies will -find it possible to preserve, under the conditions of peace, the high -idealism with which they have fought for democracy in France. - -"Recognizing the greatness and complexity of the task before the -Christian people of Canada, and the imperative necessity of united -action by the Churches, we recommend that the suggestion of the memorial -from the Alberta Conference be adopted, and that this General Conference -invite the other Churches of Canada to a National Convention for the -consideration of the problems of reconstruction. - -"Further, in order that our Church may give the most intelligent support -to the movement, we recommend that our Ministers and people should -acquaint themselves with such important documents as the Report of the -United States Commission on Industrial Relations, the Inter-Allied Labor -Party's Memorandum on War Aims, the British Labor Party's Programme of -the new social order, and the British Governmental Commission Reports on -Industrial Relations. - -"Your Committee outlines this programme in the profound conviction that -it can be carried out only by men quickened and inspired by the spirit -of Christ, and that for that Divine Spirit, working in the hearts of -men, nothing that is good is too high or too hard." - - - - - PART II. - - THE NEW CHRISTIANITY - - - - CHAPTER I. - - A LABOR CHRISTIANITY - - -A new social order is not more imperatively demanded than a new -Christianity. Nothing less than this will suffice, nor will anything -less be brought into being, in this crisis of transition. For while -there are unchanging elements in Christianity, there are, it is equally -certain, aspects that are constantly changing. - -The devotion to the Lord Jesus Christ, which is the central and -determinative principle of Christianity, is the least variable element; -the institutions and dogmas by which that devotion is expressed and -seeks to act upon the world, are the most variable. - -Institutional Christianity is even more variable than dogmatic -Christianity. It has varied greatly, is still changing, and its history -shows that it is subject to the same influences as fashion the changing -social order. This illuminating principle helps us to understand the -past and to forecast the future of the Church. - -During the last twelve hundred years or more, the Christian Church and -the social order in Western lands have developed on parallel lines. -Each has passed through two great phases and is now entering on a third. - -I. The aristocratic or feudalistic phase, A.D. 700-1500. - -The three centuries (roughly reckoning) from, let us say, A.D. 400 to -A.D. 700 were, probably, the darkest in the history of -civilization--darker even than the struggle of the last five years. -They were the centuries of a struggle not so colossal in its apparatus -of destruction, but seeming, even more than this struggle in its darkest -hours, to threaten the extinction of civilization. - -The Northern barbarians that had been pressing against the defences of -the Roman Empire, as the yellow tides of the North Sea against the dykes -of Holland, from the time of the inroads of the Cimbri and Teutons in -the last decade of the second century before Christ, at last found -entrance A.D. 378 when the Visigoths, who had been permitted to cross -the Danube to find an asylum from the Huns, defeated the Roman armies -and slew the Emperor in the great battle of Adrianople. From that year, -with varying intervals of quiet, armies, or rather hordes, of men from -the inexhaustible forests of Germany and Scandinavia, from the steppes -of Russia and Central Asia, swept over lands for centuries accustomed to -peace and weakened by bureaucratic despotism, inequitable and crippling -systems of taxation, and, most debilitating of all, the essentially -demoralizing influence of slavery. The mighty legions that had so long -kept the frontiers inviolate vanished like a dream. The superb Roman -roads and bridges fell into ruins. Fertile fields relapsed into -wilderness. Towns decayed. Laws were forgotten. Cultivated languages -with great literatures were replaced by barbarous jargons. - -It was as when a country-side is devoured by a flood, and trees are -uprooted, houses and barns dissolved or swept away. - -Only one institution of the old Greco-Roman world withstood the waves, -uprose above the yeasty flood in indestructible sovereignty--the Roman -Catholic Church. - -Out of the welter of overrunning barbarism--no law, no government, no -protection except by superior force--the feudal system arose. The deep -instinct for order and peace asserted itself. The strong man found a -following. His tribe or clan, if he were a chieftain, his neighborhood, -in any case, gave him service and maintenance, and he on his part gave -the fullest measure of protection he was able to furnish. He became the -feudal lord of a district. Through those stormy centuries that -followed, when the savage people fought each other, and western Europe -as it slowly struggled into order again was assailed by the Viking -pirates on the North and West, by Hun-like Magyars on the East, and by -the Saracens on the South, the feudal system was the only method by -which over large areas any measure of security could be achieved. The -strong man with his fighting force lived in his castle, and huddled -under its walls lived the tillers of the soil, whom he at once in -varying ratio protected and oppressed. - -Some kind of relationship established itself among these feudal lords. -One who by conquest or marriage had secured possession of specially -large territories might out of these allot subordinate holdings to -faithful followers, or by the same methods establish an overlordship -over other lords. Eventually the deep and irrepressible instinct for -unity and order lifted one of these families to the kingship of a group -of feudal districts. - -The feudal system was a varying system, the theory of which was never -fully carried out, a system that had different origins in different -countries and underwent different developments. The chief characteristic -of it, as far as this reference to it is concerned, was its aristocratic -character. Those men only counted who had enough land to support -themselves and a body of fighting men. Whatever authority there was lay -in their hands. The men who tilled the soil and practised the rude -handicrafts of the age and carried on such beginnings of commerce as -were possible, could find such imperfect security as there was only in -accepting the despotic rule of one of these lords, knight or baron or -count or duke as it might be, or more happily for them, in some -respects, a bishop or monastery abbot. All sovereignty was in the mailed -hands of these men or in those of the king, who in most of the countries -slowly but surely established his control over his turbulent and -recalcitrant feudatories. - -It was the lowest form of order, the smallest degree of security, that -feudalism provided. Legalized anarchy it has been happily called. But -the measure of order and security it secured was probably all that was -possible under such conditions, conditions under which an aristocratic -system was the best system and, probably, the only and the inevitable -one. Whatever judgment one may pass on the inadequacy and -unserviceableness of aristocratic and monarchical forms of Government -to-day, it ought never to be forgotten that we owe the beginnings of -modern civilization to aristocracy, and its farther development to that -outgrowth of aristocracy, monarchical government. Democracy in such a -stage of civilization would have meant nothing but anarchy. - -As under such semi-savage conditions no other kind of social -organization could possibly arise than an aristocratic, so no other kind -of ecclesiastical organization could meet the religious needs than an -aristocratic. A democratically organized church could not have -fulfilled the mission of the Church, could not, indeed, have existed. -With great hordes of half-savage people precipitating themselves upon -the Empire and almost extinguishing the ancient civilization, the only -kind of Church that could grapple with the problem--the most formidable -and appalling that civilization and Christianity ever had to face--was a -Church organized on thoroughly aristocratic principles. Such a Church -had been providentially prepared in the Roman Empire before its -downfall. It has been already remarked that the one institution of the -old shattered and submerged Greco-Roman civilization which survived the -barbarian deluge was the Roman Catholic Church. We owe that Church, -which has laid mankind to the end of time under unforgettable -obligations, to the conditions which surrounded primitive Christianity -and to the organizing, governing genius of the Latin mind. - -Primitive Christianity, the devotion to the supreme Jew, Jesus Christ, -we owe to the Hebrew mind. Transplanted among the Greeks, the simple, -ethical, comparatively untheological and unorganized faith developed its -latent philosophical implications. The Greeks gave it a creed. -Transplanted simultaneously among the Latins, it was given an -organization by that race whose superb and unexampled genius for -government had made it mistress of all the countries around the -Mediterranean. - -The turmoil of erratic speculation within the infant churches with their -motley converts gathered in from all kinds of religious and philosophic -cults, and the ferocious persecutions from time to time launched at the -helpless followers of the Christ, with their terrific temptations to -apostasy or dangerous compromise, developed an aristocrat form of -government. War and danger always call for the strong command. -Christianity, threatened by erratic thinking and divisive controversy -within and by deadliest attacks on the constancy of its people from -without, found its salvation, as far as human agency was concerned, in -the episcopacy, in large powers intrusted to the man who in the judgment -of the individual Church was the wisest and ablest leader. The rule of -the bishop was as natural and inevitable under such conditions as the -rule of the captain on the ship at sea, the rule of the commanding -officer in a fighting unit, the authority of the man recognized as -leader in an unorganized group of farmers fighting a prairie fire. It -is not wonderful that the bishops came to be regarded with veneration -and their office as essential to the Christian Church. The episcopal -office has earned the regard which it has enjoyed. The more fully one -understands the historical conditions under which the belief in the -indispensableness of episcopal organization grew up, the more reasonable -one finds such a belief even if one is unable to admit its validity. - -The same Roman genius for government which gave the principle of -episcopacy its great place in the Church gave the Church also the -papacy, and by a development as natural and, probably, as inevitable. -The same necessity in troublous and dangerous times for large powers of -command being held by the ablest man in the individual congregation or, -later, in the group of Churches which came to be known as the diocese, -developed the over-bishop, or archbishop, or metropolitan, or patriarch, -as over-bishops were variously known, and over these again the supreme -bishop, the bishop of bishops, the bishop of the great capital, Rome, -who came at last to monopolize the title of Papa, or Pope, which -originally had been given to every bishop. - -The Papacy corresponds to the united command of the allied armies on the -western front, which so swiftly and irresistibly transformed the war in -that decisive area, and which will make illustrious till the Great War -is forgotten the names of the great war-minister, Lloyd George, who so -wisely and magnanimously brought it about, and the great general, -Marshal Foch, who so magnificently justified it. - -The Roman Catholic Church is the sublimest achievement of the organizing -powers of mankind, and the unifying element in it, the capstone of that -mighty structure, the key stone of the arch, is the Papacy. The Roman -Catholic Church, or, as it might appropriately be designated, the Papal -Church, is a greater construction than even the Roman Empire, of which -it is the spiritual counterpart--vaster, more enduring, more -firmly-knit, and infinitely more beneficent. The Pope corresponded to -the Emperor; the bishops, to the provincial governors; the invincible -legions which carried the Roman eagles into the swamps of Germany and -the mountains of Caledonia, were surpassed in their daring and the -tenacity of their conquests by their spiritual counterpart, the -missionary monks. - -It was this organization which had been providentially prepared for the -anarchic and desolating period of the barbarian invasions, as Noah's ark -for the Deluge, and not only as a shelter for the precious salvage of -the submerged Greco-Roman civilization, but as a spiritual army which -should conquer the conquerors, and on the debris of the greatest -landslide of history fashion new gardens and habitations. - -Latin Christianity, then, represents a distinctively aristocratic type -of Christianity, the priest dominating the congregation and not -controlled by them, the bishop dominating the priest, the Pope at the -summit responsible to none but God. Such fashioning that great Church -had received at the hands of men wise to give the Church such -organization as the conditions demanded. It was this Church which the -barbarian onset could neither shatter nor overpower. It was this Church -which met the barbarians with a force and a sovereignty beyond their -own. It asserted its moral and intellectual superiority. It overawed -the men who, with the passions of men, had often the heart and still -oftener the brain of the child. It put these turbulent warriors to -school and struck to their hearts the fear of God and of the devil and -of the Church. - -No Church but an aristocratic one could have dominated such a situation. -The very qualities which the modern man most resents in the Roman -Catholic Church--its authority, its dogmatism, its spiritual powers of -intimidation--were the qualities which enabled it to evangelize the vast -heathen and barbarian masses. As in the state so in the Church, the -centuries from the fall of the Roman Empire to the Protestant -Reformation were centuries which called, though, it must be recognized, -with lessening emphasis and with sporadic but multiplying exceptions, -for the aristocratic principle. Feudalism and Roman Catholicism were -the only possible systems. - -II. The _bourgeois_ or plutocratic or capitalistic phase, A.D. -1500-1914. - -Gradually, however, there arose in the aristocratically organized middle -age a new power. This was the trading and manufacturing classes. As -soon as the feudal nobility gave any measure of security, and much more -extensively when kings grew strong enough to stretch the royal power -over their turbulent feudatories, the irrepressible trading instinct -asserted itself. English wool found its way to Flanders, French wine to -England, the silks and spices and gems of the East to Europe. Busy and -wealthy cities sprang up in districts favorable for manufacture and -along the great trade routes between East and West. Kings, eager to -assert their sovereignty over the anarchic barons, allied themselves -with this new burgher class, which was on its part glad to support a -power that promised it deliverance from such very imperfect and costly -protectors as the feudal lords had shown themselves to be. - -The Crusades, especially, stimulated trade and in the nearly two -centuries (A.D. 1096-1270) during which the crusading spirit was active, -the most notable feature of the social evolution of Europe was the rise -of the towns. - -The rise of the towns meant the liberation of the people. No buildings -in Europe have more sacred associations than the old city halls of the -medieval cities of the Low Countries, France, and Germany. They were -the birth place of modern freedom. - -Trade loves freedom and abhors all restrictions except such as are -sometimes short-sightedly imposed by itself. The towns, wearied of the -exactions of their castellated tyrants, won their freedom by purchase or -by fighting, or co-operated with the king in reducing the barons to some -measure of good behavior. - -During the last five hundred years, and especially since the Industrial -Revolution effected by the use of machinery, the merchant and -manufacturing classes have been steadily climbing into power. They have -superseded or absorbed the pre-existing aristocracy. The old families -have died out or been transformed by a profitable and strengthening -admixture of rich plebeians. The bulk of even such an imposing -aristocracy as that of Britain is composed of creations of the last two -or three generations, and these so largely from the ranks of wealthy -brewers that there is truth as well as wit in the saying that the -British peerage is the British beerage. The sale of titles at the price -of large contributions to political funds is admitted and defended. -Even in Great Britain, with its impressive array of ancient names, -aristrocracy has been largely converted into plutocracy. - -In a constitutionally democratic nation like the United States there is -no other aristocracy. - -Now, if Church and State undergo a parallel development and re-act in -the same way to conditions governing them both alike, what we might -expect to find would be that, with the growing ascendancy in the social -structure of the trading and manufacturing class (or to use a single -term, though unfortunately one with a flavor of resentment about it, -_bourgeoisie_), there would be a parallel ascendancy of the same class -in the Church. - -This is exactly what we do find. The aristocratic form of Christianity, -which fitted into the feudalistic age, which was called for by the -social conditions of that age, which was, indeed, probably, the only -kind of Christianity that could have existed in that age, did not suit -the freedom-loving, self-reliant, self-asserting, ambitious burghers. -They resented the control which the clergy exercised over them, alike -when it was well-meant and when it was selfish and tyrannical. -Especially they resented the enormous sums which were extracted from -them by the fees and taxes of priests, bishops, and the Papal Court at -Rome. They resented, too, the Church's prohibition of interest. This -condemnation, based on the Mosaic prohibition of interest, had not been -found so unfair or vexatious prior to the sixteenth century when money -was borrowed mainly for unproductive consumption, as for example, for -war and for extravagance. Now when, in the great commercial development -of that century, money was being borrowed for business with the -prospect, almost the certainty, of profit, and interest became merely -the sharing of profits, the Church's refusal of absolution to those -guilty of taking interest was a serious factor in the growing hostility -between the cities and the Church. - -The Church, moreover, favoured sumptuary laws,--the minute regulation of -purchases and prices. As this well-meant legislation tended to restrict -trade, it was disliked by the traders. - -The immense capital locked up in vast ecclesiastical buildings and -estates was naturally, also, the object of envy. Clerical immunities -from municipal taxation, and episcopal jurisdiction over otherwise free -towns added to the general irritation. - -It might possibly have been foreseen that, sooner or later, a revolt -would come and a new sort of Church would take form. That revolt came -under Luther. Many motives conspired in it. With Luther himself and -many of his followers the motive was a genuinely religious one. It was -a revolt against the legalistic interpretation of Christianity and -against the moral failure of the Roman Catholic Church. But with the -mass of the city people, who were the main support of Luther, the motive -was mainly a passion for freedom and only subordinately and sporadically -a passion for a purer faith or a holier life. - -In the new Church that was fashioned in varying forms in the northern -races where the revolt was most general and thorough-going, one feature -naturally predominated--the ascendancy of the _bourgeoisie_. That -Church, or rather group of Churches which by seeming accident, but, -perhaps, by that deeper philosophy which moves even through the seeming -accidents of history, came to be known as the protesting or Protestant -Church, was the Church which suited a predominately middle class society -as Roman Catholicism suited a feudal society.[#] Protestantism, in a -word, is _bourgeois_ Christianity. It is the Christianity of the -middle, or trading, classes. It was born where these classes were -strongest--in Germany, Holland, Switzerland, England, France. It has -exalted the middle classes and the middle classes have exalted it. It -has been with them in their struggle and has shared their triumph. It -sanctions their ethical standards, falls in with their tastes, -emphasizes their virtues, is indulgent toward their faults, condemns -their aversions. - - -[#] "The 'true inwardness' of the change of which the Protestant -Reformation represented the ideological side, meant the transformation -of society from a basis mainly corporative and co-operative to one -individualistic in its essential character. The whole polity of the -middle ages, industrial, social, political, ecclesiastical, was based on -the principle of the group or the community--ranging in hierarchical -order from the trade-guild to the town-corporation; from the town -corporation through the feudal orders to the imperial throne itself; -from the single monastery to the order as a whole; and from the order as -a whole to the complete hierarchy of the Church as represented by the -papal chair. The principle of this social organization was now breaking -down. The modern and _bourgeois_ conception of the autonomy of the -individual in all spheres of life was beginning to affirm -itself."--Belfort Bax: The Peasants' War, p. 19. - - -It would almost seem that it was a consciousness of its specific class -limitations which led the new movement promptly and decisively to turn -away from the claims of the lowest class, though the distinct refusal of -German Protestantism to champion the cause of the oppressed peasants in -1524 may be credited to the imperfect sympathies of Luther and his -jealousy for the reputation of the new movement. Luther was a peasant's -son, but his attitude to other peasants was one almost of contempt, -mingled later with fear.[#] - - -[#] "The wise man saith: food, a burden, and a rod for the ass; to a -peasant belongs oat straw. They hear not the word and are mad; then -must they hear the rod and the gun and they get their due. Let us pray -for them that they obey; otherwise there need be no pity for them. Let -only the bullets whistle around them. Otherwise they are a hundred fold -more evil."--Letter to Rühel. De Wette. Vol. II., p. 619. - - -Luther's glorification of the liberty of a Christian man, his stirring -appeals to the German nobility to shake off the rapacious tyranny of -Rome found response in other hearts than those he was addressing. His -impassioned words, like hot coals kindling a fire whereever they fell, -helped to bring to a head the discomfort which had been growing among -the peasants. This was due, in part, to the increased cost of living, a -fifty per cent. advance, it has been estimated, from 1400 to 1415, for -which the increased output of silver from the mines in the Tyrol and -elsewhere was chiefly responsible. But the chief cause was the -increased exactions of the German princes, sustained in their oppressive -claims by the growing recognition of the Roman law, which found no place -for the peasants except as slaves. Eventually, in 1524 the peasants -drew up twelve demands which they submitted to Luther with an appeal for -his support. Luther found the demands mainly just and urged the princes -to make concessions, but strongly condemned any effort, in case the -reforms were not granted, to secure them by violence. The demands were -refused and the peasants rose. They were successful at the outset, as -most of the professional soldiers of the princes were in Italy with the -Emperor, Charles V., then at war with the Pope. On their return, these -trained forces scattered the undisciplined bodies of peasants, already -demoralized by wine and plunder and lack of leadership. The princes -took a ferocious revenge. It is estimated that from one hundred to one -hundred and fifty thousand peasants were slaughtered; many more were -blinded and maimed. - -Luther, angered and terrified by the uprising, had urged the princes on -to the slaughter in words that are an ineffaceable blot on his memory. - -"First, they [the peasants] have sworn to their true and gracious [!] -rulers to be submissive and obedient, in accord with God's command -(Matt. 22:21), 'Render unto Caesar the things that are Caesar's,' and -(Rom. 13:1), 'Let every soul be subject to the higher powers.' But -since they have deliberately and with outrage abandoned obedience, and -in addition have opposed their lords, they have thereby forfeited body -and soul, as perfidious, perjured, mendacious, disobedient rascals and -villains are wont to do." - -[Later, Luther approved and justified the revolt of the Protestant -princes against the Emperor to whom they had sworn obedience--so early -had Protestantism one standard for the lowly and another for the high.] - - * * * * * - -"It is right and lawful to slay at the first opportunity a rebellious -person, known as such, already under God and the Emperor's ban. [Luther -himself was certainly under the latter ban and, in the judgment of Roman -Catholics, under the former.] For of a public rebel, every man is both -judge and executioner. - -"Therefore, whosoever can should smite, strangle, and stab, secretly or -publicly, and should remember that there is nothing more poisonous, -pernicious, and devilish than a rebellious man [much more devilish in -Luther's judgment than an oppressive prince!] Just as when one must -slay a mad dog; fight him not and he will fight you, and a whole country -with you. - - * * * * * - -"If the civil government thinks proper to smite and punish those -peasants without previous consideration of right or fairness, I do not -condemn such action, though it is not in harmony with the Gospel, for it -has good right to do this. - - * * * * * - -"Therefore let him [a prince or lord] not sleep, nor shew mercy and -compassion. Nay, this is the time of sword and wrath, not the time of -mercy. - - * * * * * - -"Such wonderful times are these that a prince can more easily win heaven -by shedding blood than others with prayers." - -He even makes the extraordinary statement, "In 1525 the elector John of -Saxony asked me whether he should grant the peasants their twelve -articles. I told him, not one," (Michelet, p. 448)--revealing a -callousness which can only be characterized as brutal.[#] - - -[#] "The Lutheran Reformation, from its inception in 1517 down to the -Peasants' war of 1525, at once absorbed, and was absorbed by, all the -revolutionary elements of the time. Up to the last-mentioned date it -gathered revolutionary force year by year. But this was the -turning-point. With the crushing of the Peasants' revolt and the -decisively anti-popular attitude taken up by Luther, the religious -movement associated with him ceased any longer to have a revolutionary -character. It henceforth became definitely subservient to the new -interests of the wealthy and privileged classes, and as such completely -severed itself from the more extreme popular reforming sects."--Bax; -Peasants' War, pp. 28, 29. - - -Luther completed the severance of the new faith from the proletariat -when he deliberately handed over his new Church to the control of the -princes. In his complete distrust of the common people, it seemed to -him that there was no other authority that could replace that of the -bishops. So, despite the remonstrances of Melanchthon, a more -oppressive tyranny was imposed on the Lutheran Church in Germany than -had been exercised by the bishops, and the foundation was laid for that -estrangement of the proletariat from the Church which has had such fatal -results on both proletariat and Church in our time. On Luther rests the -responsibility of converting the German Church into a branch of an -autocratic government, as such distrusted and detested by the laborer in -the country and the worker in the town, and of thus bringing about a -condition of things which has earned for Protestant Prussia the reproach -of being the least religious country of Europe. - -Protestantism, then, by its very origin is Christianity shaped to suit -the trading and manufacturing class. Now, what are the characteristics -of members of this class? They are keenly but, in general, -superficially intelligent, alert, watchful, ambitious, pushful, -courageous, energetic, industrious, self-reliant, independent, -freedom-loving, intensely individualistic. They are honorable according -to the standards of their class, often generous when the business -struggle is not involved, but in the struggle itself they tend, almost -of necessity, to become hard and selfish. Their great aim has been to -"get on," to make money, to rise to as high a social position as -possible, amid the vast opportunities of modern business to win and -retain great power. - -Protestantism fits a people of such characteristics like a glove. It -exalts the rich man. It consults him and honors him, puts him forward on -every possible occasion, suitable or scarcely suitable. Knowing his -sensitiveness, it deals with him tactfully and deferentially. - -It emphasizes the virtues conducive to business success,--industry, -thrift, sobriety, self-control, honesty, at least as far as the law -commands or as far as dishonesty would be plainly imprudent. - -It disapproves the sins that hinder success or impair -respectability,--such as indolence, profanity, intemperance, -licentiousness, and all overt transgressions of the law. - -What would be the sensations of an audience to which a millionaire -manufacturer or broker or promoter was unfolding the secret of his -success, if he were to say, "I owe my success and any distinction I have -been able to achieve to my honest effort to carry out the Sermon on the -Mount!" - -For good and for evil, at the outset doubtless more for good than for -evil, now more for evil than for good, Protestantism is intensely -individualistic. - -Christianity has its individualistic aspect. Protestantism has -emphasized this. Christianity has also its social aspect. -Protestantism has largely ignored this. - -Above all, Protestantism has lacked humility and pity. Naturally so. -They are the two virtues least called for in the business struggle, the -two virtues, indeed, most liable to prove embarrassing. - -Here is where, probably, Protestantism most sharply differs from -Primitive Christianity and from the Christianity which was in the mind -of Jesus. - -Protestantism is a fighting faith. It trains men to be self-reliant and -hard. Fair play is its substitute for brotherliness, and it often finds -it difficult to get as high as that. - -The divine note of love is faint. Protestantism has never caught the -passion for brotherhood. So it is not strange that, where the reviving -spirit of brotherhood, which is the divinest movement in modern life, is -strongest, there is the least drawing to Protestantism. - -It is in the proletariat to-day that the sense of brotherhood is -keenest. It is the proletariat which is the increasing despair of the -Protestant Churches. Perhaps it is not too bold a generalization that, -on this Continent at least,--it does not seem so widely true in -England--the working man who is most interested in the Church is least -interested in labor organizations. He is the ambitious, individualistic -workingman who is bent on emerging from his class. He is least -class-conscious. He hopes to become affiliated with the master class. - -The workingman who is most class-conscious, whose heart is set on the -betterment of his class, is usually very slightly affiliated with the -Church, if at all, and that affiliation is due, generally, to the appeal -the Church and Sunday School make to his wife and children. Very -frequently his attitude to the Church is one, not of indifference, but -of resentment and distrust. He feels, though perhaps subconsciously, -that the prevailing temper of the Church is one of self-advancement. -The leading men in the Church are mostly those who have been most -successful in strenuous self-advancement. Any man whose heart has been -stirred with the passion for the common good is liable to be -disappointed in seeking in the Church for the encouragement and sympathy -that he craves. - -Neither the Protestant nor the Roman Catholic Churches can claim to have -inspired the Labor movement. At best it can only be said that, when the -movement had struggled through the early days of conflict and -persecution, the Churches reached out hesitatingly and half-heartedly a -hand of fellowship in a spirit, partly of genuine desire to make amends -for past dereliction, partly of condescension, and partly of fear. - -But during the severity of Labor's early struggle, Protestantism, except -in isolated and unofficial representatives, gave no assistance, not even -its blessing, to what was the most profoundly Christian movement of the -nineteenth century. - -When it did not frankly sympathize with the masters in their -difficulties with their unreasonable and discontented employees, it -maintained a cautious neutrality. The first step to right relations -between the Churches and Labor would be a frank confession that they -failed to give Labor their help when Labor deserved and needed it most. - -But perhaps this sympathetic attitude to Labor was too much to expect of -a form of Christianity which had such an origin and such associations as -Protestantism. Like the form of Christianity which it largely displaced -in the freedom-loving northern races of Europe and America, it has -rendered great services. Like that again, it was, perhaps, the only -sort of Christianity possible under the conditions under which it took -its form. It has helped to train an energetic, daring, self-reliant, -and relatively honorable people. It has been the Christianity of a -_bourgeois_ epoch, and with the passing of that epoch it, too, will pass -away or undergo a profound metamorphosis. It is a very different sort of -Christianity that will meet the religious needs of the new epoch that -the world is entering. - - III. The Labor phase, A.D. 1914-- - -We have seen how the trading and manufacturing towns pushed their way up -during the later period of the medieval age and eventually overthrew -aristocracy in state and Church, substituting a social and political -order and a Church dominated by the business class. Similarly, since the -middle of the last century, a new force has been pushing up in the -_bourgeois_ regime, destined, it now seems clear, to effect a similar -transformation. This is organized Labor. - -The most significant feature in the social development of the last -hundred years has been the patient, persistent, oft-defeated, yet -insuppressible struggle of the proletariat of the western world for -human rights. The dead weight of the bygone ages was upon it. When had -the men and the women who did the rough and necessary work of the world, -smoothed the highways, dug the drains, built the houses and the bridges, -carried the burdens over the mountains and across the seas, tilled the -fields and cared for the herds and the flocks--when had they been other -than the despised, ill-paid, ill-housed servants of the classes who -through their fighting-power or their money-power could command the -services of the toilers? What right had they to overturn the ancient -order, an order which history recognized and the Church was willing to -consecrate? Against the established order, against religious sanctions, -against the combined authority of wealth and rank, against the -legislative and military powers of governments, the workers had to carry -on their new, uncharted, and desperate struggle unaided and alone. The -Universities from their academic heights looked down on it with calm -scientific interest. If any feeling was stirred, it was oftener -contempt than pity. Even the Church of Christ was, with a few -illustrious exceptions, unfriendly or timidly neutral. Nevertheless, in -spite of calamitous setbacks, the movement made way against the public -opinion of the dominant classes, against hostile legislation, against -anarchic injunctions, against police and soldiers, and to-day Labor is -the mightiest organized force in the world. - -It is enthroned despotically in Petrograd and Moscow above the shattered -ruins of the most imposing monarchy of the modern world. It is the -strongest element in that welter of confusion and uncertainty to which -the most powerful and compactly organized nation of modern times has -been reduced by its insane ambition, the indignation of mankind, and the -justice of God. - -Labor is the uncrowned king of Great Britain. Wisely led, there seems -no reasonable aim it cannot realize. - -In the United States in the Summer of 1916, in a straight issue between -Labor and one of the most powerful capitalistic groups, the President -and Congress of the United States wisely and justly capitulated to -Labor. - -The futility of trying to "smash the Labor unions" or to arrest the -progress of the Labor movement is now sufficiently clear. As well try -to smash a forty mile wide Alaskan glacier or arrest its onward march to -the sea. Old precedents have lost their authority, old calculations and -presuppositions fail or mislead. It is a new age the world is entering. -As the determining factor in the social structure of Europe from 800 -A.D. to 1500 was feudalism, and from A.D. 1500 to 1900 capitalism, so -from 1900 onwards to the dawn, it may be, of still vaster changes as yet -undescried, the dominant factor will be organized Labor. - -If Labor, then, is to be the dominating factor in the age just opening, -it becomes a question of deepest interest to discover the principles of -the Labor movement. - -A full answer to this question would be lengthy and might have elements -of uncertainty, but the essential outstanding principles of the Labor -movement are neither doubtful nor difficult to determine. They are -three: - -1. Every man and every woman a worker. - -The Labor movement has no place except for workers. Its essential -demand is that every man and woman shall, during the normal working -years, make a just contribution to the welfare of the social organism. -It is determined that there shall be no place in society for idlers or -exploiters. It is the deadly enemy of parasitism in all its Protean -forms. - -2. The right of every worker to a living wage. - -This is nothing other than the assertion, in the only form that makes it -more than iridescent froth, of the great Christian principle of the -worth of the soul. It is a very modest and restricted assertion of that -great principle, but it is a more substantial and significant assertion -than has been made anywhere else. The Christian doctrine of the -infinite worth of the human soul becomes claptrap where this principle -is not admitted. - -3. Union. - -The Labor movement is based on the solidarity of the workers. It abhors -competition. It represents the triumph of the we-consciousness over the -I-consciousness. It organizes in unions. There have been few things in -history that had more of the morally sublime in them than the way in -which the individual has been called upon by the Labor movement to risk, -not his comfort merely or his advancement, but his livelihood, in -defence of some one whom he would never know but with whom he was linked -in the sacred cause of Labor. - -And these principles of the Labor movement are at the same time the -characteristics of the corresponding Christianity of the new age. For, -as we found an aristocratic type of Christianity in the aristocratic -medieval period, the social conditions demanding the aristocratic -organization in Church and State and permitting no other, and as, in the -age which succeeded the feudal, a freedom-loving, competitive, -individualistic class imposed its character on the social and the -ecclesiastical organization, so institutional Christianity will undergo -a third transformation and, in a society dominated by Labor -organizations, will become democratic and brotherly. - -Protestantism must pass away. It is too rootedly individualistic, too -sectarian, to be the prevailing religion of a collectivist age. It is -passing away before our eyes. Everywhere it reveals the marks of decay -or of transformation. It must change or die. - -Not to Protestantism, not to Roman Catholicism, belongs the age now -dawning, but to a new Christianity which will, indeed, have affinities -with them both but still more deeply with the Christianity of Jesus. - -This Christianity, indeed, is already here. Like its Master when He -came, it is in the world and the world knows it not. It is still -immature, undeveloped, unconscious even of its own nature and destiny. -It will receive large and valuable contributions from both the great -historic forms of Christianity, not improbably from the Eastern, or -Greek Christianity, as well. But in promise and potency the coming -Christianity is more fully and truly here in the Labor movement than in -any of the great historic organizations. Perhaps a more accurate -statement would be, that the Labor movement needs less radical change -than the great Church organizations to become the fitting and efficient -Christianity for the new age. - -It needs, in the main, but two great changes. - -1. It must broaden. - -It must open its doors, as the British and Canadian Labor Parties are -now doing, to include all kinds of productive work, of hand or brain. -It must make room for all who contribute to the feeding, clothing, -housing, educating, delighting of the children of men. It must include -the inventor, the research scientist, the manager, as well as the manual -worker; the men who grow things or who distribute them as well as those -who make them; the professional class, who, on their part, must cease to -regard themselves as other than men and women of labor. Labor must -become, in short, the category to which all belong who really earn their -living and do not seek to "make" more than they earn. - -2. Labor must recognize the Christianness of its own principles. - -I do not say Labor must become Christian. It is profoundly and vitally -Christian in its insistence on the right of the humblest man or woman to -human conditions of life, in its corresponding denial of the right of -any human being to live on the labor of others without rendering his own -equivalent of service, in its devotion to the fundamental Christian -principle of brotherhood. - -The Draft Report on Reconstruction, for example, prepared near the close -of 1917 for the Labor party of Britain, is not only the ablest and most -comprehensive programme of social reconstruction so far drawn up, but in -its aims and methods and spirit it is profoundly Christian, a thousand -times more Christian than the ordinary ecclesiastical pronouncement, -though the name of Christ does not occur in it. The need is not so much -that Labor become Christian, as that it become clearly conscious that it -is Christian and can realize itself and win its triumph only on -Christian lines. - -It is not strange, after all, that among working men should arise the -Church which is to give the truest interpretation of Christianity. The -Lord Jesus was Himself a working man and brought up in a working man's -home; His chief friends and chosen apostles were mostly working men. -How can He be fully understood except through a working man's -consciousness? The high, the served, the rich, the mere scholars, as -such, are not fitted to understand Christianity. Individuals of -exceptional character and insight may escape the limitations of their -environment and education, but in any large community interpretation the -working man's consciousness would seem to be essential. And, on any -large scale, Christianity has never found such an expression as the -Labor movement promises to give it--so essentially and predominately -democratic and brotherly. - -Labor and Christianity, then, are bound up together. Together they -stand or fall. They come into their kingdom together or not at all. It -is the supreme mission of the prophetic spirit at this fateful hour to -interpret Labor to itself, that it may not in this hour of consummation -miss the path. To turn away from Christianity now would be for Labor to -turn away from the throne. But it will not. Mankind is in the grasp of -divine currents too strong to be resisted. - - - - - CHAPTER II. - - AN AMERICAN CHRISTIANITY - - -It will help us, perhaps, to understand still more clearly the religious -revolution which is going on to-day concurrently with the social -revolution if we survey the evolution of Christianity from another -standpoint,--the racial. In the preceding chapter the effort has been to -show that Christianity in its organization and even in its spirit has -been profoundly affected by its social environment and has changed as -that has changed. The most superficial study of the history of -Christianity reveals, moreover, that Christianity has been, also, deeply -affected by the characteristics of each race among which it has made its -home. - -1. Jewish Christianity. - -The earliest form of Christianity was that which sprang up in Jerusalem -immediately after the Resurrection and the ingathering at Pentecost. It -was the Christianity of the apostles and of the first disciples. -Perhaps it might be called a Christianized Judaism rather than a Jewish -Christianity, for it was the old Judaism unchanged except by the -acceptance of Jesus of Nazareth as the fulfilment of the national hope. -The apostles remained good Jews, even stricter than before in their -discharge of the duties of the old faith, and commanding through their -strictness the respect of the Jews, James the brother of Jesus, in -particular, being held in high esteem for his devoutness. - -The chief characteristic of Jewish Christianity, it might almost be -said, was its lack of almost all the features which have since been -counted essential to a Church. - -The ancient Jew, as has often been noted, markedly resembled the modern -Englishman in many things, notably in an indifference to theological or -philosophical speculation and in a strong sense of the value of the -ethical and practical. These earliest Jewish Christians, accordingly, -did not seek to analyze and systematize their faith. They did not seek -to draw out its philosophical implications. They were interested in the -construction neither of a creed nor of a theological system. They were -content to hold their faith in Jesus as a vital loyalty and a great -hope. Jesus was to them the long desired Messiah who would redeem -Israel and establish the Kingdom of God upon the earth. That glorious -consummation would take place when He returned, as they confidently -expected He would, in the immediate future. Meanwhile, the door into -the Kingdom of God stood open to all Jews who would accept Jesus as the -Christ, and to such Gentiles as were willing to receive circumcision and -identify themselves with Israel. - -Overshadowed with the imminence of the Parousia, this Jewish Church of -the first years had no interest in a reflective interpretation of its -faith or in the elaboration of its organization. The apostles preached; -alms were distributed to those of the disciples who were in need. No -programme was drawn up for the future; no propaganda among the Gentiles -was even dreamed of. The whole attitude was one of almost passive -expectancy that clung to the ancient capital, the holy city, where the -long-expected Hope of Israel would shortly, descending from the heavens, -establish His throne. - -Jewish Christianity had only the rudiments of a creed, only the simplest -organization, and the most unelaborated and democratic form of worship. -It was a seed with the germinating impulse unawakened, a bark launched -and rigged but that had no thought of venturing out of the harbour. - -This simple, undeveloped, undogmatic, unorganized, and Judaistic -character of primitive Jewish Christianity is strikingly displayed in -the early chapters of the book of the Acts and in the Epistle of James, -which on most, at any rate, of the different hypotheses as to date and -authorship is, at least, a witness to early Jewish Christianity.[#] - - -[#] A later form of Jewish Christianity, the obscure Ebionitism of the -second century, does not fall within the limits of this sketch. It was, -probably, not so much a development of Christianity as a perversion of -it. - - -2. Greek Christianity. - -But the expansive forces residing in this undeveloped Christianity could -not long remain inactive. - -An important element in the population of Jerusalem in the time of our -Lord was the Hellenist. This name was applied to the Jews who for -various reasons, mainly for trade, had made their home in the commercial -cities of the Levant. Here they had learned to speak the prevailing -language of the countries around the Eastern Mediterranean, Greek, and -had been, to a varying extent, intellectually broadened and quickened by -contact with the Greek world. Large numbers of them returned to -Jerusalem for educational purposes or to gratify their devout feelings, -but they were regarded by the Palestinean Jews with something -approaching contempt for their willingness to live away from the sacred -soil of Palestine. - -It was in the Hellenist mind, thus stimulated and developed by the Greek -spirit, that the first development of Christianity occurred. To the -Hellenist Stephen, the first thinker, the first controversialist, and -the first martyr of Christianity, belongs the honor of first discovering -the universal principle of Christianity, and his interpretation of -Christianity brought about his own death and kindled a persecution which -scattered the Christians of Jerusalem up and down the Syrian coast of -the Mediterranean. - -To some of these fugitive Hellenist Christians, partakers of the thought -of the martyred Stephen, belongs the not less lofty honor of being the -first to overleap the jealously guarded barriers of Judaism and to open -the door of Christianity to the Gentiles. "They therefore that were -scattered abroad upon the persecution that arose about Stephen travelled -as far as Phoenicia and Cyprus and Antioch, speaking the word to none -save only to Jews. But there were some of them, men of Cyprus and -Cyrene [and therefore Hellenists] who, when they were come to Antioch, -spake unto the Greeks also, preaching the Lord Jesus." Acts 11:19-20. - -It is to be noted that it was, probably, this influx of Greeks into the -Church hitherto composed only of Jews which made necessary a new name -applicable to the composite body, and so it came about that "the -disciples were called Christians first at Antioch." - -A Church, in part Jewish but, probably, in still larger part Gentile, -thus sprang up in Antioch, which became the mother city of Gentile, or -world-wide, Christianity. From this centre the greatest of all -Hellenist Jews, Saul of Tarsus, fired by that very universalism which -had at first aroused the hatred of his bitter Jewish particularism, -carried Christianity westward through Asia Minor, Greece, Italy and, -possibly, even to Spain. - -Thus transplanted from the deeply and exclusively religious and ethical -Hebrew mind to the predominantly speculative mind of the Greek, -Christianity began to undergo an immediate transformation. The Greek -mind, probably never equalled for its curiosity, its acuteness, its -subtlety, could never be content to ask, what? It must also ask, why, -and how? To it we owe science, philosophy, all our ordered thinking. -Christianity, as a mere affection felt for Jesus Christ or purely as a -code of conduct, could not satisfy the Greek mind. The Greek mind, at -first contemptuous of it as a mere vulgar superstition, fascinated at -length by its rational monotheism, its lofty ethics, and, above all by -the charm of its central figure, flung itself with ardor on the task of -adapting this naive and untutored but fascinating religion to its own -tastes and habits of thought. - -A place was found for the Jewish Messiah in the philosophical world of -the Greeks as the Logos, or Reason, of God, a familiar philosophical -conception. Plato and Zeno were made His forerunners. The principles -of His teaching were dissected out of the traditions of His ministry and -organized into a coherent body of doctrine. The acutest minds of Greek -Christianity disengaged the great problems which were involved in the -worship paid to Christ and, after centuries of speculation and of strife -(not always intellectual only), achieved those great solutions which, -whether in every respect permanently satisfactory or not, must forever -be recognized as among the sublimest constructions of the philosophic -intellect,--the creeds of Nicaea and Chalcedon. - -For good and for ill the simple, almost creedless Christianity of the -Sermon on the Mount and of the Epistle of James had become through Paul, -the author of the Fourth Gospel, the still more mysterious author of the -Epistle to the Hebrews, and countless Greek dialecticians and -theologians, the elaborately and authoritatively dogmatic system which -has, almost till to-day, treated unorthodox opinion as the deadliest of -sins. - -The undue emphasis on the intellectual element in Christianity, the -tyrannical control of human thought we to-day must deplore, but he who -repudiates Greek Christianity must also deny that Christianity had any -mission to the Greek mind, and that men have any right to think out -their religious beliefs and adjust them to the rest of their thinking. - -3. Latin Christianity. - -Latin Christianity cannot altogether be classed as a later stage than -Greek Christianity. It was to a large extent a concurrent development. -As far as its theological features were concerned, it was little more -than the uncritical acceptance of dogmas worked out by the Greeks. But, -eventually, the distinctive gifts of the Latin race asserted themselves -and those races which had built up the Roman Empire, or as subjects of -it had become embued with its spirit, applied their organizing genius to -the Christian Church and moulded the Church of the West into a replica -of the Empire, and in such closely-knit fashion that, when under its own -inherent weaknesses and through the irruption of the northern -barbarians, that mightiest of all organizations of antiquity collapsed, -the Church that came eventually and fittingly to know itself as Roman -took its place and proved itself an even mightier organization, subduing -restless and fierce peoples on which Imperial Rome had never been able -to impose her yoke. - -The Latin mind, then, with its reverence for order and law, its genius -for government, its detestation of lawless individualism, discerned the -possibilities of the Christian Church as an organization, and out of the -simple piety of Jesus and the reasoned theology of the Greeks fashioned -the mightiest instrument of discipline and order the world has ever -seen. - -Here, again, there may be a protest. This Latinization, or -imperialization, of Christianity may be indignantly termed a perversion -rather than a development. This only need be said in reply, that it -would be difficult for anyone who has studied, without prejudice, the -period between the overthrow of the Western Empire and the Protestant -Reformation to deny the providential character of Latin Christianity. -No other form of Christianity has as yet rendered so great a service to -the race. It is questionable whether any other form of Christianity, -even if it had been in existence, could at that stage have rendered so -great a service. It was precisely those features in the attitude of the -Roman Catholic Church towards her people which are most uncongenial to -the Protestant temper which were the disciplinary agencies needed by the -lawless, seething Europe of the Dark Ages to qualify it for the personal -liberty the vindication of which has been the faith and service of -Protestantism. - -4. Teutonic Christianity. - -The Greek mind moulded Christianity into a reasoned and systematized -theology; the Latin, into an organization closely knit and marvellously -efficient for the end to which Latin Christianity was largely and, -perhaps, inevitably content to aim,--external control. Now, at least, we -can see how inevitable it was that a third development of Christianity -should take place after it had been transplanted among the Teutonic -peoples. That development was slower in taking place than either the -Greek or Latin forms. Those northern races which, until their -conversion to Christianity, had stood almost completely outside the -circle of ancient civilization, coming under the spell of a powerful -religion and a civilization, even in its decay, majestic, were brought -so thoroughly under the yoke that for centuries they were content to be -ruled by a spiritual imperialism enthroned at Rome. - -But that authority never ceased to be regarded by the northern races as -a foreign one. The Teutonic peoples whose home lay outside the limits of -the old Roman Empire were never Latinized in spirit. When they attained -intellectual maturity and sought the free development of their own -nature, they shook off the authority of Rome and brought to light those -free and individualistic and spiritual germs in Christianity which, -hitherto, in the luxuriant and stately growth of Greco-Roman Catholicism -had remained almost dormant. - -The Protestant Reformation, as has been noted, was a complex movement. -It involved many factors. But fundamentally it was the outcome of the -determination, not always clearly conscious, of the Teutonic peoples to -discover a Christianity which should be consonant with that passion for -freedom and that high sense of personal dignity which from the beginning -had characterized the men of the Teutonic stock. - -It is an interesting illustration of this that the movement of reform, -or, rather, of revolt, which swept like a prairie fire over all Teutonic -Europe that had never been permanently subdued by the Empire, flickered -and died as soon as it crossed what had been the boundary of the old -Empire, and that that boundary is still the dividing line between those -countries of Western Europe which are preponderatingly Protestant and -those which are preponderatingly Roman Catholic. The Roman Church held -only what the Roman Empire had won. Only where the old Teutonic love of -liberty had been subdued by centuries of the masterful and, on the -whole, beneficent rule of old Rome did it cease to feel the spiritual -rule of the new Rome alien and irksome. - -Another illustration of how essentially Teutonic is the spirit of -Protestantism is in the slight influence Protestantism has had on the -Celtic peoples islanded in the Teutonic populations. Celtic Brittany is -the most fervidly Catholic part of France to-day. Celtic Ireland -remains solidly and deeply Catholic. Celtic Scotland, despite -overwhelming Protestant influences, is still largely Catholic. Celtic -Wales has become wholly Protestant, but it has seized and developed the -least prominent and least Protestant of all the elements embraced in -Protestantism,--the emotional and the mystical. - -The rule of Rome under the Emperors and under the Popes had been the -rule of the machine--a superb machine, ingeniously contrived for what -were conceived as the best ends, and operated with indomitable -pertinacity and boundless devotion, but still a machine; and Protestant, -or Teutonic, Christianity, in the last analysis, was the overthrow of -the machine. To the Teutonic race belongs the honor of being the first -on a racial scale to establish a religion without ceremonial or a -priesthood or any privileged class whatever. Hebrew prophetism with its -magnificent protest against ritual, and its culmination in the -democratic simplicity of Jesus, now for the first time found recognition -on a national scale. - -Teutonic Christianity is the exaltation of the individual. It was born -of individualism and glorifies individualism. It affirms the right and -duty of individual judgment, the supremacy of the individual conscience, -the privilege of the individual access to God. It finds the authority -and proof of the Christian religion in its consonance with, and its -satisfaction of, the capacities and needs of the individual soul. - -The distance between the spirit of Latin and that of Teutonic -Christianity, and, also, it should be noted, the distance between the -twelfth century and the sixteenth may be seen in the two appeals of -Abelard and Luther. Peter Abelard, a great and pathetic and only a -little less than a heroic figure, was a Protestant, and in the best -sense of the term, a free thinker, three hundred years before the -Renaissance and four hundred years before Luther. Accused of heresy by -the saintly but censorious and bigoted Bernard, and brought to trial -before a tribunal carefully packed by his relentless and unscrupulous -adversary, Abelard, despairing of a fair hearing, refused to defend -himself and appealed to the Pope. Another monk charged with heresy four -hundred years later, inferior to Abelard in clearness and energy of -thought but of more heroic moral fibre, before the most august -assemblage Europe could gather, closed his defence with the undying -words, "It is not safe for a man to do aught against his conscience. -Here I stand. I can do no other. God help me, Amen." - -Abelard appeals to the Pope, Luther to his conscience. That is the -supreme contrast between Latin and Teutonic Christianity. - - 5. American Christianity. - -Since the revolt of the Teutonic peoples, the most remarkable phenomenon -of Christian history has been the growth of a branch of Teutonic -Christianity under the novel political and social conditions of the new -world. - -This has been a transplantation of Christianity quite as significant as -any of its transplantations in the past, and the new soil has produced -just as unmistakably new a growth. - -Doubtless none of the great phases of Christianity in the past knew -themselves to be new. Neither Greek nor Latin Christianity was conscious -of any departure from primitive Christianity. Indeed, to this day, in -their conception of the history of the Church, they persist in -impressing their own type on that primitive and undeveloped type. - -Teutonic Christianity took centuries to come to clear consciousness of -itself and of its irreconcilability with Latin Christianity. It is not -wonderful, therefore, that hitherto, as far as I am aware, American -Christianity has been, if at all, very dimly and imperfectly conscious -of the difference between its spirit and that of the Teutonic -Christianity of the old world. - -American Christianity has not yet arrived. It is only on the way. It -has not yet found itself. It is not yet conscious of its own -individuality, not yet self-reliant, independent. It is a youth, but a -youth rapidly approaching manhood. Perhaps the characteristics that are -unfolding themselves can be most clearly brought out by an attempt to -show wherein it resembles, and wherein it differs from, each of the four -great phases of Christianity which have just been under consideration. - -_a_. American Christianity compared with Jewish. - -Compared with Jewish Christianity, American Christianity resembles the -latter in its simplicity of creed, its emphasis on the practical and -ethical, and (to a distinct and growing degree) in its brotherliness and -democratic equality. - -But its creedal simplicity is not the same as that of the primitive -Jewish Church. That Church was wise in the brevity and simplicity of -its creed, but it did not know its own wisdom. American Christianity is -wise and knows its wisdom. It will not, like the Jewish Church, allow -itself to be seduced into interminable theological controversies and -into the superstition of orthodoxy. Seventeen hundred years of bitter -wrangling and bloody conflict and cruel persecutions have taught it -something. It has a short and a simple creed, not because it knows so -little, but because it knows so much. - -It differs, again, in its extensive and manifold organization, in the -variety and elaborateness of its forms of worship, and, most markedly of -all, in its attitude toward the present life. Primitive Jewish -Christianity had no interest in the present social order. Intoxicated -with apocalyptic visions, it stood on tiptoe awaiting with outstretched -arms the return of the Saviour and the overthrow of this whole order by -supernatural power. Its primary interest was eschatological. Its -deepest feeling was expressed by St. Paul when he relegated all social -relations and arrangements to the region of unimportance. "But this, I -say, brethren, the time has been cut short, that henceforth both those -that have wives may be as though they had none; and those that weep, as -though they wept not; and those that rejoice, as though they rejoiced -not; and those that buy, as though they possessed not; and those that -use the world, as not using it to the full: for the fashion of this -world is passing away." Cor. 7:29-31. - -In this respect American Christianity is at the opposite pole. It does -not look for the end of the world. It has largely ceased to believe in -such a future and, where it still professes the apocalyptic faith, for -the most part, it allows that faith little or no influence in actual -life. American Christianity believes in the progressive and aggressive -amelioration of things. It believes in this life and its glorious -possibilities. It is bent on attaining them as no other sort of -Christianity ever was before. It is steeped in optimism. It believes -that the leaven of Christianity possesses the power to leaven all the -relations and institutions of civilization. It believes that the -fulfilment of our Lord's prayer, that God's Kingdom may come and His -will be done on earth as it is in heaven, rests with the Church. Its -real and, to an ever-increasing extent, its conscious and avowed faith -is expressed by Dr. Henry Burton in the fine hymn: - - There's a light upon the mountains and the day is at the spring, - When our eyes shall see the beauty and the glory of the King: - Weary was our heart with waiting, and the night-watch seemed so - long, - But His triumph-day is breaking and we hail it with a song. - - In the fading of the starlight we may see the coming morn; - And the lights of men are paling in the splendours of the dawn: - For the eastern skies are glowing as with light of hidden fire, - And the hearts of men are stirring with the throbs of deep - desire. - - He is breaking down the barriers, He is casting up the way; - He is calling for His angels to build up the gates of day: - But His angels here are human, not the shining hosts above; - For the drum-beats of His army are the heart-beats of our love. - - -_b_. American Christianity compared with Greek. - -Of all the great historic forms of Christianity, it is the Greek from -which American Christianity might seem, at first sight, farthest -removed. The punctilious orthodoxy of the former, its bitter doctrinal -polemic are utterly abhorrent to American Christianity. American -Christianity is more and more indifferent to theological agreement, more -and more tolerant of wide doctrinal differences. And it has little -interest in the great historic creeds. - -Yet it is not so far away from the Greek spirit after all. It is -inquisitive and speculative and as interested as the Gnostics in great -sweeping theories of the universe. America is of all Christendom, past -and present, the most tolerant country, yet it is, at the same time, a -hotbed of religious speculation, even of religious vagaries. But, at -last, there has been born a kind of Christianity which can think and let -think, which is interested in thinking, but does not believe that -opinions determine a man's character here or his destiny beyond. - -It should not be overlooked in comparing Greek and American Christianity -that American Christianity in its most thoughtful form would have felt a -great sympathy with the bold and free and comprehensive thought of the -great Alexandrians, Clement and Origen. It is the later and narrower and -bigoted Greek Christianity, which fittingly chose for itself the -designation, the Orthodox Church, that I have been contrasting with -American Christianity. - -_c_. American Christianity compared with Latin. - -The comparison of American and Latin Christianity is much more complex. - -No two kinds of Christianity could well be more sharply opposed than -these two in regard to the exalted claims of the clergy in the Latin -Church. American Christianity is deeply and intensely democratic. -Sacerdotalism in any form it instinctively rejects. The very idea of -priest is passing out of its thought. The preacher it can appreciate. -The competent ecclesiastical manager has its respect. The religious -leader and pastor it can thoroughly understand and cordially recognize -where genuine. But that any class of men should occupy a mediating -position between God and man or possess a monopoly of any spiritual -gifts is foreign to the American consciousness. "Kings and priests unto -God and the Father." Those who are taught from childhood that they are -kings are quite as conscious that they are also priests. The essential -democracy of primitive Christianity has never established itself in any -land before. This is the gift--and a great one--of American democracy to -the Church. - -What has been said of sacerdotalism holds true, to a still greater -degree, of that thin, shadowy form of sacerdotalism, clericalism. The -way in which the garb and badges of clericalism are disappearing in -America is symbolical of the disappearance of the idea. - -Latin Christianity, as we have seen, on account of the conditions of its -origin and early history intensely autocratic, has always given a very -humble place to the laity. Obedience and money were all that was -required of them. The High Church theory, indeed, of the Roman Catholic -Church and of the so-called High Church section of the Church of England -is not a High Church theory at all. It is a High Clerical theory. The -Church has been virtually identified with the clergy. Against the -over-weening claims of Boniface VIII., Philip of France protested that -"Holy Church, the spouse of Christ, is made up not of clergy only but of -laymen." But that is not the working theory of Latin Christianity. A -quaint medieval preacher suppressed what he thought was an undue -bumptiousness on the part of his people by a sermon from the text Job -1:14, "The oxen were plowing and the asses feeding beside them," which, -he showed his too forward hearers, clearly indicated the functions of -the clergy, who were typified by the oxen, while the duty of the laymen -was set forth by the feeding asses. - -Luther's flight to the monastery when he became alarmed about his -salvation was partly prompted by a picture which made a profound -impression on him as a boy and haunted him for years. It was "an -altar-piece in a Church, the picture of a ship in which was no layman, -not even a King or a Prince; in it were the Pope with his Cardinals and -Bishops, and the Holy Ghost hovered over them, directing their course, -while priests and monks managed the oars and the sails, and thus they -went sailing heavenwards. The laymen were swimming in the water beside -the ship; some were drowning, others were holding on by ropes which the -monks and priests cast out to them to aid them. No layman was in the -ship and no priest was in the water." (Cambridge Mod. Hist. II., -109-110.) - -American Christianity is bent on an ever larger place for the laity in -the Church and an ever-growing activity. The Y.M.C.A. and Y.W.C.A., the -Young People's Society of Christian Endeavor and the Epworth League, the -Laymen's Missionary Movement, the Men and Religion Movement, all -illustrate the increasingly practical and lay aspect of American -Christianity. - -The Papacy, too, is another feature of Latin Christianity peculiarly out -of harmony with characteristic American thought. The remoteness of the -United States from the cradle of that institution, the hostility with -which Washington inspired the young republic in regard to entangling -alliances with European nations, its intensely American and democratic -consciousness, all conspire to make the idea of a foreign ruler -uncongenial to the American mind. The national consciousness of the -United States is as exacting as religion. Its first commandment is, -Thou shalt have no other country and no other ruler than the United -States. - -The authority of the Pope in the United States is maintained by being -carefully withheld from all danger of challenge. The American Catholic -is not conscious of any restraint in the tie that binds him to Rome -because the rope is always paid out as freely as his movements require. - -Again, it would seem that the Roman Catholic exaltation of the -contemplative life over the active can never be accepted by American -Christianity. There are no Catholics to whom the monastic life makes so -faint an appeal as the Catholics of the United States. Perhaps a -stronger admixture of the spirit of Mary might be beneficial, but -American Christianity is emphatically a child of Martha. - -On the other hand, however, there is much in Latin Christianity that -appeals strongly to the American. His extraordinary genius for -organization, in which he probably surpasses even the modern German -whose great organizing capabilities have less of individual initiative, -and the ancient Roman with whom, again, it was the characteristic of a -class rather than of a people, dispose him to appreciate the great -organizing skill that has always been shown by the Roman Catholic -Church. - -Further, the catholicity of that Church, its wonderful power to -assimilate and build up within itself all races and languages and -classes, cannot but appeal to a people engaged in solving a parallel -problem. Modern American Christianity, moreover, is more and more -unsectarian, even anti-sectarian. It does not glory in division and -isolation. There is in it a growing passion for unity, a growing -yearning for a strong, commanding, national type of Christianity that is -much more akin to the imperialism of the great Popes, like Gregory VII. -and Innocent III., than to the parochialism and sectarianism that have -generally and naturally been associated with Protestantism. American -Christianity is fast losing all interest in denominationalism. All this -is bringing it nearer to the temper of Latin Christianity. - -_d_. American Christianity compared with Teutonic. - -It may seem absurd to try to compare Protestantism and American -Christianity, since the American Christianity that is here being -discussed is mainly the Protestantism of America. But it is not -exclusively the Protestantism of America. The Roman Catholicism of the -United States shows, though less markedly, the same traits. And within -the Protestant Churches of America another kind of Christianity is -growing up as the butterfly develops within the chrysalis. And, -moreover, it is not wholly within the organized Protestantism of America -that the new Christianity is developing. There is an unknown but vast -amount of the new American Christianity outside the organized Churches -of America. A part of this was once in the organized Churches but has -lost interest in their spirit and aims. A part of it has never been -attracted by the organized Churches. Another great--probably the -greatest--element in the coming American Christianity is the Labor -movement which, as it has been suggested, needs only to be broadened and -more consciously spiritualized to be identical with the coming true and -indigenous Church of America. It is, indeed, a grave question whether -the coming American Christianity will gradually capture and transform -the present Churches or whether, as in the Protestant Reformation, the -new wine will have to be poured into new bottles, and a new Church arise -distinct from, and even in conflict with, the present Churches. - -One thing, at least, is clear. - -Protestantism in its present form will not survive. The very name is -inadequate. It is not self-explanatory. It can only be understood by -reference to another and earlier Church. It is negative. It has no -positive or vital content. It carries with it the unhappiness and -partialness of division. It is essentially and incurably sectarian. -The more extensive and comprehensive the body becomes, the less -intelligible becomes the name. If Protestantism should become really -catholic, that is, universal, the name would become a complete misnomer. - -American Christianity, so far as it still calls itself Protestant, only -continues to bear the name through unthinking habit. As soon as it -reflects upon the name, it must disown it. American Christianity is too -essentially catholic and comprehensive, too little concerned with the -past, too impatient of the old outworn disputes, to be content with a -name that must always convey a flavor of division and controversy. - -Protestantism, sectarian in its nature as in its name, is inadequate to -express the genius of American Christianity. The dominating principle -of Protestantism has been individualism, and the dominant note of -American Christianity is fraternity. America is the chosen home of -fraternal societies. It is Rudyard Kipling, I think, who has said that -of the famous revolutionary motto, Liberty, Equality, Fraternity, the -Frenchman cares only for equality, the Englishman is resolute for -liberty and despises both equality and fraternity, while the American -who knows neither liberty nor equality will forgive a man for anything -if only he is a good fellow. The American loves a "good mixer." A -shrewd French observer nearly twenty years ago in "La Réligion dans la -Société aux Etats-Unis" caught the spirit of this nascent American -Christianity. - -He found it, first, a social religion, and, as such, concerning itself -more with society than with individuals; secondly, a positive religion, -in its interest in what is human rather than in what is supernatural. -It stands chiefly, he thought, for the idea of morality. It encourages -a strong recognition of the fact that good people, without professing -the same faith, are governed by the same rules of conduct, and that, if -dogma divides, morality unites. - -"The Americans," he said, "make fraternity, the actual form of which is -social solidarity, the essence of Christianity. The moral unity for -which they strive under the name of Christian unity is only the -co-operation of all for the increased establishment of fraternity and -solidarity. High above sects whose diversity seems a matter of -indifference to them, they organize a religion which pervades society -throughout its length and breadth, and tends towards being only a social -spirit touched by the evangelical feeling. - - * * * * * - -"This moral unity is indeed a religious unity and a Christian unity; -this positivism is a Christian positivism. American humanism has -received from Christianity all the traditional, sentimental, and -poetical elements which distinguish a religion from a philosophy. -American positivism is only a Christianity which has evolved.... The -American religion may be called a Christian positivism or a positive -Christianity. It has received from the past the traditional and the -evangelical spirit. Traditional, it preserves the names and the forms -of the Churches even when it changes their customs; it develops them -from the interior. Evangelical, it keeps the figure of Jesus Christ -before all, even when it does not recognize his divinity. - - * * * * * - -"Therefore it is not Protestantism.... The title of Christianity is the -only one broad enough to designate it; yet this must be taken in its -evangelical sense.... The American religion is living and fruitful -because it is national." - -To discern a distinct American Christianity in 1902 showed much more -insight than its recognition indicates to-day. American Christianity -has developed greatly since then and is now developing still more -rapidly under the forcing conditions of the war and the great -reconstruction. The work of reconstruction will not have been carried -very far before the incongruity of this new type of Christianity with -the hard, individualistic, militant spirit of Teutonic Christianity will -become apparent to all. - -When American Christianity comes to full and clear self-consciousness, -when it, so to speak, finds itself, it will be found to have a very -simple and brief and intelligible creed. Not a shallow creed, however, -but a deep and vital one. It will put, probably, no other question to -candidates for membership than the Apostolic Church put, Dost thou -believe in the Lord Jesus Christ? - -Its emphasis will be where Jesus placed it, not on opinions, but on -spirit, the spirit of brotherhood. - -Democratic it will, therefore, be as well, for democracy is bound up -with brotherhood. - -Finally, with a little creed it will have a big programme. It will live -to establish the Kingdom of God on the earth. Its helpful, healing, -redeeming, Christ-like activities will be infinite in the Christian and -in the heathen lands. - -And as pre-eminently practical, clericalism will die out of it. -Preachers, teachers, missionaries there will be, but the gulf that has -divided these from the laity will be closed. Sacerdotalism, even in its -most attenuated and vestigial forms, will disappear. - -Throughout this chapter, it is, perhaps, hardly necessary to add, the -word, American, is used in its proper continental sense. By American -Christianity is meant the new and distinct type of Christianity which is -developing in the Protestant churches of the United States and Canada -and also, though less markedly, in the Roman Catholic. Politically -distinct as these countries are likely to remain, socially and -religiously they cannot escape the influences of neighborhood. - -In some respects, as has been noted, the United States, on account of -its republican constitution, its political rupture with the old world, -and its more strongly developed self-consciousness, has been more -favorable than Canada to the growth of that new form of Christianity, -yet signs are not wanting, especially in that western section in which -the coming Canada seems to be most clearly discernible, that the younger -and smaller and so, perhaps, the more mobile country may outstrip her -older and greater neighbor in the formation, out of, at least, the -Protestant denominations, of a national Christianity, simple, yet free -and varied, practical, democratic, brotherly, in a word, truly catholic. -Institutions which have outlived their usefulness usually retain an -appearance of strength until the hour of collapse. Denominationalism in -Canada is still a stately tree, but the heart is dust. - - - - - CHAPTER III. - - THE GREAT CHRISTIANITY - - -But American Christianity is not final Christianity, nor even the -highest and richest form of Christianity in sight, unless it blossom -into a yet richer and more varied loveliness than it at present gives -promise of. Of all actual forms of Christianity it seems to have the -fairest promise, but it will probably prove to be only a tributary, -though a great one, of a still mightier river. - -Is it possible for us at this stage to discern at least the outline of -the Great Christianity that is to be? - -Certainly, every great historic form of Christianity has been tried by -history and found wanting. As much of primitive Jewish Christianity as -refused to merge in the large Catholic Christianity of the Greco-Roman -world dried up into an unfruitful, bigoted, and eccentric heresy and -perished. - -Greek Christianity emphasized doctrine and tore itself by doctrinal -disputes into a shattered, helpless welter of vituperative sects, -powerless to spread the Gospel, powerless to withstand the -Mohammedan,--the shame and tragedy of Christian history. - -Latin Christianity emphasized the organization and became the enemy of -freedom and progress which, with few exceptions, every Roman Catholic -people has had to fight and dethrone to escape intellectual and moral -decay and death. - -Teutonic Christianity has emphasized freedom and the rights of the -individual. Like Islam, it has been a fighting faith. And judgment has -fallen on it in its loss of unity, its bitter and wasteful sectarian -wrangles, and the ferocious strife between labor and capital, the -outcome of which may be one of the great tragedies of history. - - -[#] It is, perhaps, scarcely necessary to remark that Protestantism is -here being compared, not with Roman Catholicism, but with ideal -Christianity. Roman Catholicism, too, has been a fighting faith, and in -the appalling century and a half of religious wars that set in with the -Protestant Reformation it was the older faith that first resorted to -force. [Transcriber's note: there was no reference to this footnote in -the source book.] - - -Protestantism has taught her people to fight for their rights and now is -helpless before the selfish conflict of her own children that have -learned too well her spirit. - -In the great industrial conflict now reaching its height, one may safely -prophesy Protestantism will perish--or be transformed. - -She has taught her children to think; she has taught them to cherish -freedom; she has not taught them to love. - -Since by far the most of any readers this little book may be fortunate -enough to find will be Protestant, it may be fitting and useful to point -out more specifically the defects of Protestantism than the defects of -other forms of Christianity among whose adherents, probably, the writer -can scarcely hope to find many readers. - -The Protestant Reformation, so far as it was not a struggle for liberty, -national and intellectual and religious, was a doctrinal reformation. -There was not much more of the spirit of Jesus, His gentleness, -meekness, love, on one side than on the other. Erasmus understood -Christianity on the whole better than Luther. Sir Thomas More was more -Christian than John Calvin. - -The Protestant Reformation was in its successful forms marked by little -sympathy with the poor and the oppressed. It declined to recognize any -duties to the serf except that of giving him the Gospel. Luther washed -his hands of the peasants and calmly abandoned them to the savage -vengeance of the princes when they refused to be satisfied with the -liberty of Gospel preaching. - -Protestantism has been, except in a few despised sects, militant, -dogmatic, self-reliant, in a word, masculine. The gentler feminine -characteristics of Christianity it has very slightly recognized. - -When we think of the genius of Protestantism, we think of a humble monk, -in the majesty of a conscientious conviction defying the two most -powerful rulers of Europe, the Pope and the Emperor; we think of the -indomitable sea-beggars of Holland and the heroic defence of Leyden; of -the white-plumed Henry of Navarre and the battles of the League; of the -splendidly audacious execution of Charles I., of Jenny Geddes' stool, -the solemn League and Covenant and the bloody field of Drumclog; of the -soldiers of Gustavus Adolphus, the Lion of the North, singing Luther's -great hymn, _Ein'feste Burg ist unser Gott_, as they moved on to the -glorious but dear-bought victory of Lützen; we think of the massacre of -Drogheda and the undying defence of Derry; and of that typical -Protestant and superb fighter, the rugged, dour, and unconquerable -Ulster man whose unrelenting opposition and deep-rooted passion for -domination have been so great an obstacle to Irish peace and the unity -of the English-speaking world. Protestantism has had a great and a -beneficent and a heroic history, but it has reproduced only imperfectly -the Christianity of Jesus. - -Meekness and long-suffering were outstanding characteristics of Jesus -and of His early followers; they have rarely been outstanding -characteristics of Protestantism. Perhaps Protestantism has been of -necessity a man of war from its youth. Yet primitive Christianity -encountered fiercer persecution and did not take the sword. -Protestantism did not suffer long before she grasped the sword. She -has, on the whole, followed Christ's precepts of non-resistance never -when she had a fighting chance. - -Primitive Christianity by patience and love conquered and Christianized -the Roman Empire in three hundred years. Protestantism in more than -three hundred years has gained not a foot beyond the territory won in -the first rush of evangelical enthusiasm, and has lost territories she -at first held. It is the demonstration of the futility of a fighting -Christianity. Nowhere has the interaction of the two religions been -associated with more fighting than in Ireland, and nowhere has -Protestantism as an evangelical missionary force been more of a failure. - -Gentleness, patience, humility have not been the strong points of -Protestantism. She has been proud, vigorous, masterful, impatient of -control, and to her have been given the kingdoms of the world. But not -to her has been given the Kingdom Jesus promised to the meek. - -In short, in Protestantism there is much of Christianity but there is -also much simply of the old Teutonic spirit. Protestantism is not pure -or primitive or ultimate Christianity. It is Teutonic Christianity, no -more fitted to prevail than Greek or Latin Christianity. It is the -faith of the fighter, the wrestler, the individualist. - -Perhaps no community calling itself Christian suggests so remotely the -tender name Jesus gave His disciples, "my sheep." Who, looking on a -prosperous Protestant congregation in town or country, with shrewdness, -vigilance, self-reliance written on almost every face, would think of -saying, "Fear not, little flock"? Freedom is what Protestantism has -demanded and fought for, freedom to think for herself and take her own -course and fight her own battles, every kind of freedom but one, the -only freedom that need not be fought for, that can never be fought -for,--freedom to love and to serve. - -Protestantism in its original form is passing away; it has run its -course; its day is nearing its close. Where it has not caught the -vision of the new and the Great Christianity, its churches are being -deserted, its preachers are being seized with stammering lips and -despondent heart,[#] Its spirit cannot solve the problems of the new -age. It must become meek and lowly in heart. It must learn to love. -Rich man and poor man must stand in its churches as they stand in the -sight of God. Like medieval Christianity, it calls for a new -Reformation--not a new creed but a new heart, the heart of a little -child, humble, self-distrustful, not quick to resent, or even to see a -slight, eager to love, delighting to serve. - - -[#] These words are written with reverent recognition of the innumerable -forms of ministry to the bodies and souls of men that are being carried -on by devoted men and women in the Protestant Churches, but, also, with -the full conviction that these are slight and partial compared with the -outburst of devotion and service which will be aroused when the vision -of the new Christianity seizes great masses of men and women as the -passion for freedom seized Germany in the years 1517 to 1524 or France -in 1789. - -Never were the young men and women of Protestant lands so ready for a -great task, but that task must be broadly Christian and broadly human. -It must be a spiritual task but of a spirituality interwoven -inextricably with politics, business, and sport. - - -Luther cannot help us here with his callousness to the wrongs and -miseries of the peasants, nor Knox with his harshness and his militancy, -nor Calvin with his hatred of those whom he thought God's enemies, nor -the Puritans nor the Covenanters with their bigotry and their blow for -blow and curse for curse. - -Another deep lack is in Protestantism. In Isaiah's vision of the -seraphim above the throne of God, "each one had six wings; with twain he -covered his face, and with twain he covered his feet, and with twain he -did fly." Two wings for service and four for worship! A Roman Catholic, -meeting a friend who had become a Protestant, asked him how he liked his -new faith. "I like it well," answered the other, "but one thing I miss, -and that is the spirit of adoration." - -How strange to us in Roman Catholic pictures are the faces of the saints -upturned in adoration to the Mother and the holy Child! Protestantism -does not produce faces like those. Shrewd, intelligent, alert, at best -reliable, frank, kindly, they often are; humble, not often; reverent, -adoring, still more rarely. Yet Goethe has said, "The highest thing in -life is the thrill of awe." And Carlyle, too, "Thought without -reverence is barren and poisonous." - -Protestantism tends to be shallow, with the thinness and hardness and -tinniness of mere intellectualism. It needs to tap great fountains of -tenderness, humility, adoration, to be deepened, mellowed, enriched. Of -the two ultra types of worship--the bright church, comfortable with -plush cushions and glittering with brass work, where the people sit with -wide-open eyes and curiously watch the preacher while he prays, and -where the preacher with conscious cleverness clears up all the mysteries -of life and _coloratura_ quartettes display their technique (an ultra -type, confessedly, and not common, but actual), and the dim church with -the drooping Christ on the cross and pictured saints gazing in adoration -and the congregation on their knees before the divine Presence in the -Sacrament, one may be a convinced Protestant and yet believe the latter -form of worship the more fruitful of the two. - -American Protestantism needs new inspiration. So far as the past can -yield this, it would seem that it should look particularly to three -great leaders and saints--St. Francis of Assisi, St. John of England (to -use W. T. Stead's deserved designation of John Wesley), and General -Booth. - -Perhaps the most winsome and Christ-like figure that Roman Catholicism -presents, the loveliest flower in her rich garden of sainthood, is the -poverty-loving, utterly lowly and loving, care-free and joyous Francis -of Assisi, and perhaps, too, it may be said that no Christian character -better deserves the study of Protestants. St. Francis is not an ideal -figure; he lacks the balance and sanity of Jesus. Yet, perhaps, of all -who have passionately set themselves to reproduce the life of Jesus, St. -Francis in his utter humility, his complete unworldliness, and his -overflowing tenderness can best bring home to Protestantism its hardness -and shrewdness, its worldly-wisdom and its self-complacency. What a -far-distant world is the world of the man who renounced all possessions, -went about to preach and serve in coarsest, meagrest garb, who despised -money and loved poverty, whose sympathies went out to birds and fishes, -to Brother Fire and Sister Water, who could captivate robbers and even, -it was believed, wild creatures of the woods, and at whose coming the -Umbrian cities rang their bells and poured out with branches and flags -to greet the mean little man with the shabby grey gown and the rapt, -pale, worn face. - -Let it be granted Protestant countries are more wealthy than Roman -Catholic, more progressive, more successful in trade and manufacture, -St. Francis gives us a glimpse into the simplicity and childlikeness, -humility and romance, that may sometimes find a Roman Catholic -atmosphere more genial than a Protestant. - -Associated with the Franciscan order of tonsured monks and cloistered -nuns, there grew up a great society of men and women taking a middle -path between the world and the cloister--plainer in dress, abstaining -from the dance and the theatre, eschewing all quarrels, praying and -fasting more regularly, practising a more systematic beneficence than -ordinary Christians. And it is noteworthy that, in 1882 on the seven -hundredth anniversary of the birth of Francis, Pope Leo XIII. in an -encyclical declared that the institution of these Franciscan Tertiaries -was alone fitted to save humanity from the social and political dangers -which threatened it. - -Wesley and Francis are not far removed. The Saint of Epworth was almost -as ardent a devotee of poverty as the Saint of Assisi. If he did not -absolutely strip himself, he gave away immensely more. He, too, had a -passion for the souls of men, all of St. Francis' pity for the poor, and -he won a wealth of reverence and love. He was a far wiser man, living -in a more rational age. But he was not only extraordinarily competent. -He knew, too, his own competence. There is a wildflower grace of the -childlike in St. Francis that we miss in the far more intelligent and -commanding figure of Wesley. - -Primitive Methodism had much of the enthusiasm and devotion and -joyousness of the Franciscan brotherhood. Francis' friars and Wesley's -helpers had a common unworldliness, joyousness, and passion for the -souls of men. But even as the Franciscan movement diverged from the -ideals of St. Francis, so Methodism soon developed on lines of its own. -It has preserved much of the evangelical fervor and the practical -helpfulness of its original inspiration. Considered in its direct and -indirect effects, its union of evangelicalism, mysticism, and practical -kindliness, there has been no other Christian movement which has -combined such a measure of purity with such vastness of influence. In -genuine Christian influence it has surpassed even the Reformation. -Modern Christianity (and there is a distinguishable modern Christianity) -is of all forms that Christianity has assumed the nearest to the -Christianity of Jesus, and in its fashioning the Methodist Revival has -been the chief agency. Yet Methodism has not realized the ideals of its -human founder. It did not perpetuate his unworldliness. It failed, as -R. W. Dale pointed out, to the great loss of Christendom, to develop the -ethical implications of his great doctrine of perfect love. It -cherished his memory and his organization, but it refused to inherit his -dread and hatred of riches. Its very thrift and industry and morality -have been its undoing. It became, in great measure, like Protestantism -in general, a _bourgeois_ religion, eminently suited for people who want -to get on in the world. Its chief abhorrence has never been of social -inequality and injustice but of the wasteful frivolities and vices, -dancing, card-playing, theatre-going, and, pre-eminently, intemperance. -The Report already cited shows, however, a new spirit at work in the -Methodism of Canada, a spirit in which Wesley would rejoice, and it is -not in Canadian Methodism only that it is at work. - -A still closer resemblance obtains between the Franciscan order and the -Salvation Army than between the former and Methodism. No two movements, -perhaps, so widely apart in time and methods are so closely akin. -Poverty, humility, obedience, love are the dominant features of them -both. - -Francis is a more winsome figure than General Booth but incomparably -less intelligent and efficient. Francis awakened a great religious -revival but probably wrought little improvement on the face of -Europe--on its ferocity, chronic warfare, sensuality, oppression of the -poor. The Salvation Army has redeemed countless victims of poverty and -vice. It has probably proved itself the most effective agency in all -history for the salvation of the down and out. - -The Order and the Army have the same limitations. - -1. Both are too exclusively inward and individualistic. They do not -deal adequately with conditions and causes, the Franciscan movement not -at all, the Salvation Army very timidly. The weakest element in the -latter is its willingness to accept gifts from even those who have made -their wealth out of the degradation of men and women, and its seeming -reluctance to engage in any drastic social reforms which might dry up -such bounty. It is content with ambulance work, and even the most -devoted and heroic ambulance work will never stop the war. - -2. Both, too, are sectional; fitted only for the few, the enthusiasts. -Each has cared for the saint; neither has made provision for the -ordinary man. Christian perfection, in the thought of Francis and of -General Booth, is for the man who withdraws from the ordinary work of -the world, turns away from its culture, crucifies a thousand human -instincts, breaks all the strings of the human lute but one. Both -movements organized by these great saints are eccentric, abnormal. -Neither is workable on a catholic, or universal, scale. Both -sectionalize the holy life. - -What is needed to-day is another leader, a leader for the ordinary man. -The ordinary man is neither saint nor fanatic, neither preacher nor -monk; he would be bored to death if he had to sing or pray or meditate -all day; his joy is in building bridges and planning railways and -ripping up the matted prairie sod with gasoline engines; he likes his -wife and children and does not feel called upon to become a missionary -to China or Central Africa. The need is for the leader who can show -this ordinary man how to bring the truest love and the deepest piety -into the ordinary, commonplace, work-a-day life, revealing the glory of -God, not alone as gilding the cold snows of Alpine peaks or bathing the -distant desert with unearthly beauty, but transfiguring the city street, -the cozy home, the quiet fields where lovers walk at even. - -Francis, Wesley, Booth--the time has come for each section of the -Christian Church to remember that "all things are hers: whether Paul or -Apollos or Cephas." We Protestants may think the Roman Catholic Church -less likely to appropriate our saints than we theirs. This judgment of -ours may be right or wrong, but we have no right to pass it until we -ourselves have recognized the limitations of Protestantism and set -ourselves heartily to appropriate the great elements of the Christian -life that are the distinctive glories of Latin Christianity. -Protestantism, too, has its own peculiar glories. Neither great -division of Christendom is adequate to meet the religious needs of -to-day. The hour has struck for the great Christianity. - -The future belongs neither to Roman Catholicism nor to Protestantism. -Roman Catholicism is too aristocratic and distrustful of freedom. The -modern man will no more go back to medieval Christianity than to -medieval feudalism. There is a drift from Protestantism to-day, but the -drift from Roman Catholicism has been far greater. To fulfil its -destiny, Roman Catholicism must accept freedom of thought; magnificently -democratic as it has been from the beginning in some respects--the chair -of St. Peter being accessible to the humblest peasant's son--it must -accept a deeper and wider democracy. - -Protestantism, on the other hand, must become heart-broken over its -divisions, religious and social. It must become more brotherly, more -lowly, more worshipful, in a word, more childlike. - -It is unthinkable that either of these great forms of Christianity will -pass away. They will change. They are already changing, and each, as -it changes, moves toward the other. - -Thought and life move through conflict to unity. -Thesis--antithesis--synthesis--that is the great law. The great and, -perhaps, inevitable stage of antithesis that has divided Christendom for -four centuries is drawing to a close. Latin Christianity needed -Protestantism. It was the Protestant Reformation that inspired the -counter-reformation. Roman Catholicism owes to Luther and Calvin a -purer faith and a new lease of life. To-day the noblest and most -energetic types of Roman Catholicism are found in Protestant lands, and -the service of Protestantism to Roman Catholicism is not yet finished. - -Just as certainly, Protestantism needs Roman Catholicism. Some -exposition of this has already been attempted. It is hard to see how -any one who believes Roman Catholicism to be a tissue of errors can -account for its extraordinary tenacity of life. Why should God preserve -it unless because its mission is not yet accomplished? - -Far apart and deeply antagonistic these two great forms of Christianity -may seem, but, after all, it is an inescapable law on this earth that -two people who try to get as far away from each other as possible must -meet at last; and hatred is nearer love than is indifference. Human -nature wearies of antagonism, and the longer it lasts the warmer the -welcome for its passing. - -Like denominationalism, this four hundred year old antagonism seems a -mighty tree but, like denominationalism, it is hollow within. Some day -the great winds of God will arise, and when they begin to blow, this -tree, too, will fall. - -The thirteenth century was one of the great centuries of Christian -history. In it feudalism reached its height, and chivalry its fullest -flower. In it Gothic architecture and medieval philosophy reared their -noblest monuments. It was the century of the greatest of medieval, or, -perhaps, of distinctively Christian, poets, Dante, the greatest of -Christian theologians, Aquinas, the greatest of Popes, Innocent III., -the two most winsome of saints, St. Francis and St. Louis of France. In -all its greatness, the thirteenth century is distinctively Roman -Catholic. The nineteenth century, also, is another of the less than -half a dozen of the greatest of Christian centuries, and it is -distinctively a Protestant century. Its great achievements in -geographical and astronomical discovery, scientific investigation, -increase of human comfort and wealth, and above all its unparalleled -extension of liberty--bear all of them the Protestant stamp. - -These two centuries have thus established beyond dispute the right of -those two great historic forms of Christianity to the lasting reverence -and gratitude of mankind. - -Roman Catholicism has cherished the divine principle of unity. At great -cost it has preserved unity. It has not been equally careful of the -divine principle of liberty. - -Protestantism has gloriously fought and suffered and died for liberty. -It has never highly valued unity. It has even gloried in division. But -unity is a diviner thing than even liberty. Liberty is precious only as -the indispensable condition and pre-requisite of true unity. - -It is a lovely and thrilling hope that the twentieth century may prove -to be the century of the Great Christianity, the Christianity which will -extinguish neither Latin nor Teutonic Christianity but comprehend and -blend them, the simple, yet free and varied, democratic, passionate -Christianity of all who love the Lord Jesus Christ and seek His Kingdom -on the earth, the Christianity which was the first and will be the last. - -This, at least, can be said, that the unparalleled problems of social -and political reconstruction facing the world to-day can be rightly -solved only by a great religious devotion, and it is difficult to see -how that devotion can be secured except by a unification of the great -Churches of Christendom and their common baptism into the spirit of -primitive Christianity. - -And let no one say the Great Christianity is only a beautiful dream. - -Already, in that forever holy strip of land where towns were reduced to -heaps of dust and trees to splintered trunks, where earth was gashed and -torn as men never gashed and tore the kindly bosom of mother earth -before, and where beautiful human bodies were mutilated and destroyed -with a fury unknown in history, there the Great Christianity has -disclosed itself. There at the mouth of hell unfolded the sweetest -flowers that ever bloomed on earth. There in the brotherhood of the -trenches became visible the Great Christianity. There Anglicans, -Baptists, Congregationalists, Methodists, Presbyterians, Salvationists, -and every other kind of Protestants, aye, and Roman Catholics, kneeled -together to commemorate the suffering and love of their Common Redeemer, -the Soldier-King. - -"Father," wrote a Manitoba boy to his father from the trenches, in the -spring of 1917, "we have a religion here but, father, it is not the same -as yours. You don't like the Catholics or the Church of England, but, -father, we love everybody here. We are all one. And, father," the boy -went on, "when we come back, our religion is going to blow yours -sky-high." - -A prophecy not as yet fulfilled but not, perhaps, beyond fulfillment. -Certain it is that our soldier boys will never crowd into our churches -as they crowded to the colors till those churches are the home of a -Christianity that has the breadth and the brotherliness and something, -at least, of the heroism of the Christianity of the trenches. - -But something more must be said about the Great Christianity. - -It may be that Latin Christianity and Teutonic combined do not represent -the full splendor and power of Christianity, and that the drastic social -changes which must be carried out in the next quarter of a century, or -even in a briefer period, call for the re-inforcement of another race -and another sort of Christianity. - -The distinctive Greek Christianity of the first five or six centuries -made its contribution and passed away with the vanishing of the original -and pure Hellenic race. But there is a Greek Christianity which has -found a new lease of life and a new home in that race which has largely -replaced the Greek in his own home and has diffused itself over most of -eastern Europe, the Slavonic. There is a great Christianity which is -still called Greek, but which is rather Slavonic Christianity, and which -might more narrowly and specifically be called Russian Christianity, -after that people who constitute the largest section of Greek -Christianity and promise to be the most influential. - -It may well be that the Great Christianity which the world so -desperately needs will be neither Latin nor Teutonic Christianity nor -both in combination, but a blend of Latin and Teutonic and American and -Russian Christianity, and it does not seem unlikely that the -contribution of the last of the four may be the most precious and vital -of them all. Perhaps in the part Russia is destined to play in the next -fifty years will be found the most striking example in all history of -how it is God's way to choose the foolish things of the world that He -may put to shame them that are wise; and the weak things of the world -that He may put to shame the things that are strong; and the base things -of the world and the things that are despised that He may bring to -nought the things that are. - -The Slav has been the Cinderella of the European sisterhood. Perhaps we -might say, the ugly duckling. From a military point of view he has been -no match for the Teuton. In the long struggle of the last thousand -years between the Teuton and the Slav, the Teuton has nearly always -showed himself the stronger. For centuries he has ruled over the Slav. -In the industrial arts, in all that pertains to the utilization of -natural resources for the material well-being of men, in agriculture and -mining and manufacturing and trading, the Slav has been immeasurably -more backward. - -Mastered and oppressed by the Teuton on the West, subjugated for -centuries by the Tartar on the East, the Slav has remained until -yesterday a people forgotten and despised, shrouded in poverty, -ignorance, mystery. And now out of that twilight he has stepped, -ignorant, fanatical, and in his ignorance or superstition capable of -ferocity, yet essentially the most child-like, the most religious, the -most brotherly, the most idealistic of European peoples. What other -people call their country, what the Russian calls his--_holy_ Russia? - -The peoples of the West, especially the Teutonic or the Anglo-Saxon, are -weak where they are strong. It is their practicalness that has given -them their high place; it is their practicalness which keeps them from -the highest. It is hard for them to believe in a Holy City. If they do -believe in it, they do not care to seek it till they are sure of a -practicable road. But the Slav instinctively believes in a Holy City, -and only needs to be told where it is to be found to set out forthwith -over rivers, bogs, and rugged mountain ranges. - -And it is just these things the Western world needs in this crisis--the -spirit of the little child, the spirit of brotherhood, the sense of the -pre-eminence of religion, the idealism that will risk everything for a -dream. - -The first movements of the awakened Russian may be unsteady. His new -found freedom may act on him with intoxicating, almost deranging power. -But they know little of the real Russian soul who dread the liberation -of that long-prisoned soul and its free play on the Western world. - -In the material ground-work of our civilization, its farming, its -mining, its building of steamships, of railroads, of modern cities, the -Teutonic races have taken the lead. They have builded the house. Now, -it may be, when the finer problems arise of living in the home in -harmony and helpfulness and in a high and holy spirit, it is the Slav -who, in his turn, will take the lead. The Greek, the Italian, the -Frank, the Spaniard, the Anglo-Saxon have successively held the premier -place. The day of the Slav may now be dawning. - -Nor yet is our forecast of the Great Christianity complete. It may be -that there awaits us, though in a more distant future, a still more -striking illustration of how God chooses for honor the despised things -of the world. Of all races the most despised, the most oppressed, has -been the African, and that not for generations or centuries but for -millenniums. Europe, Asia, and America have all made Africa their -servant. The dark Continent stands pre-eminent in suffering and in -service. But it is in suffering and in service that He, too, the Coming -King, has been pre-eminent. One reason why Africa has been the hunting -ground of the slaver from immemorial times is because in the African -nature immemorially and inextinguishably is the readiness to serve. All -other races love to rule; some of them, like the Latin and the Teutonic, -have been intensely proud, greedy of power, and averse from service. -The African race is the one race which has by nature the spirit of Him -who came not to be ministered unto but to minister. The African race, -too, is of all races the most child-like, the most care-free, the one -most ready to delight in simple things and the things of to-day. The -white races, in comparison, are old, vigilant, suspicious, anxious, -care-worn. There is no question which, in these respects, is nearest the -ideal of Jesus. The greedy, ambitious spirit of the Western nations, -never contented, their delight in to-day always poisoned by the fear or -the fascination of to-morrow, is far from the spirit of Jesus. It may -be that the white man will yet have to sit at the feet of the black, and -that, when Christ is glorified, it will be that race that has, beyond -all other races, trodden Christ's path of suffering and service which, -beyond all others, will be glorified with Him. - -The re-action of the uncounted millions of Asia on Christianity--the -contributions of the ancient and deeply experienced brown and yellow -races to that religion in which alone they can find their fullest -development--is another fascinating subject for enquiry and speculation; -but these influences, potent and inescapable as they promise to be, fall -outside the limits of the period considered by this book. - - - - - CONCLUSION - - -The task before Western civilization to-day, it is probable, is the -greatest civilization has ever faced. It is a complete reconstruction -that is demanded. It must be accomplished with speed. All the Western -nations are involved. There have been other reconstructions as drastic, -but either they have been permitted a much longer period of development, -or they have been confined to much smaller areas. - -The struggle will not be over religious opinions, or political theories, -though both are involved. It will be over what touch men ordinarily -much more deeply, their livelihood and their profits, and the war has -seemed to show that men will sacrifice their lives more readily than -their profits. It will be a struggle no class can escape. - -The readjustments would be difficult enough in themselves if men engaged -in them in the calmest and kindliest spirit. But many who will be -foremost in the task of reconstruction bring to the problems the -bitterness and distrust engendered by centuries of cruel wrong. - -Nothing but Christianity can carry the Western peoples through this -unparallelled crisis. But it must be Christianity in its purity and its -fulness, not a Christianity wasting its energy on doctrinal controversy, -broken by denominational divisions, or absorbed in taking care of its -machinery. It must, in short, be a Christianity neither -intellectualized nor sectarianized nor institutionalized. - -It must be a Christianity, born as at the first in the hearts of the -common people, simple, democratic, brotherly; like a tree, its top in -the sky but its roots deep in common earth; treating institutions, even -the most venerable, as the mere temporary contrivances that they are; -with the faith of Jesus in the human heart and in the ultimate triumph -of love, and a willingness, like His, to find a throne in a cross. - - - - - Warwick Bro's & Rutter, Limited, - Printers and Bookbinders, Toronto, Canada. - - - - - - -*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE NEW CHRISTIANITY *** - - - - -A Word from Project Gutenberg - - -We will update this book if we find any errors. - -This book can be found under: http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/41559 - -Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no one -owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation (and -you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without permission -and without paying copyright royalties. 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