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Xiterat^ (Butbe AND RATIONALIST REVIEW .

[ESTABLISHED 188S.]

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No. 40. (Nkw Series.)

OCTOBER i, 1899.

Monthly ; T wopence.

C o n t e n t s

Dreyfus and Political Moralists. By J. McCabe 14INCF.NSE AND L ights. By Lector . , J T he C laim of the S aihiatarian. By o. Dawson

Baker . . . , ,

, ._

T he S ea-gull and the S alvationists. By F 1

Gould . . . . .

1 . 148

T he American “ Hampton” . .

x x

A Guide to S pinoza How we Think A T reasury of Heiirew L egend . ’ ' , - 0 Wagnerian Madnesses. By w. j . Shaxby . . 1 -Q T he Late Colonel I ngersoli. . . Random J ottings . . . ’ ' T he F atal Rainbow.—v i . . . ’ ' S igns and Warnings . . , ’ 1-4 Rationalism in the Magazines . . 1-S hort Notices and Correspondence . 1-7

2>re\>fus anfc political Moralists. One of the greatest disadvantages that has followed upon the adoption of ethical interests by the Christian Church has been the occasional perversion of ethical truth in view of the political exigencies of the ecclesiastical organization. History was once read through rose-coloured spectacles. The Church could do no wrong. Cyril’s responsibility for the murder of Hypatia, the Spanish prelates’ responsibility for the Inquisition, every ecclesiastical outrage on charity and justice, was covered with the mantle of a high religious urpose. Even so late as the middle of this century ecclesiastical historians were ready to defend every act that geared in the annals of the Church, just as Biblical scholars were prepared to defend the truth of every line that was found between the covers of the Old Testament. The swift progress in freedom of thought in these latter days has driven that attitude to country parsonages and Sundayschools. We now look back on the long drama of Christian history with impartial gaze, and we find that the cause of justice, which Christianity professed to take from the gutter of the “ pagan ” world, has been traversed time after time in the political interest of the Church.

After the work of Hume, and Gibbon, and Lecky, and Harrison — to say nothing of innumerable anti-Papal excavators in the annals of the Vatican—the reflection seems a trite one. It is revived by a consideration of the attitude of the Church in France during the agitation over Captain Dreyfus. It is not necessary to discuss the proofs of the Church’s actual complicity in the recent gross violation of justice. Lay aside every “ indiscreet ” utterance ol prominent ecclesiastics, the ugly fact remains that the Influence which the Church still wields in France was not mployed in the averting of a moral catastrophe. I f there is one sphere in which French ecclesiastical influence counts for anything, it is among the military officers, most of whom have passed through ecclesiastical schools and still profess aiiegiance to Rome. Daily and weekly journalism has made us completely familiar with the vicissitudes of the affaire. \Ve may safely take it as our starting-point that a national crime—the verdict and its reception—has been committed, and that the silence, at least, of the Church has made it an acconipl'ce of that crime.

It is equally clear, though not so generally understood, that the French Church has acted in its own political interests, and that the Vatican has permitted its complicity in the political interest of the international Church of Rome. Many circumstances have caused grave anxiety to French prelates during the expiring century. The decrease of ecclesiastical influence, now so notorious even in neighbouring countries, has manifested itself in many ways. Firstly, there is the well-known decrease in attendance at church, especially of the male population. 1 have attended High Mass at the Madeleine, and seen only one man to every hundred women. The circum­ stance is constantly noted by English travellers, but its true significance is not often appreciated—weekly attendance at Mass is an obligatory test of fidelity in the Church of Rome. Then there is the political success of anti-clerical statesmen—of Gambetta and Jules Ferry; the spread of Socialism, and of disrespect and contempt for all traditional authority, among the working class; the rapid acceptance of Positivism and of Eclecticism, even of Materialism, among the cultured; the very disquieting fact of the capture of the schools by the secular party. Finally, the stationary condition of the population tells the discerning pastor that the ostensibly faithful matrons of France are in reality little influenced by ecclesiastical rule; every Catholic knows that the Church lias forbidden the use of contraceptives under “ the pain of mortal sin ’’— i.e., of practical excommunication.

That is the condition of things which the Church of France has to contemplate at the close of the nineteenth century. There seems little solid ground for hope of a renewal of its purely religious influence. The modern imagination is not so susceptible to the fire of the preacher as it once was. Even if a Savanarola or a Jacobo della Marchia did arise among the modern French clergy (and if he succeeded in escaping their jealousy and indisposition towards piety of the olden type), his words would excite more interest and humour than response in a modern French congregation. Rationalist criticism of every branch of theological apologetics has done its work too effectually for activity of the Savanarola type. I f the Church is to regain any large measure of its former influence, it must work towards it through political power. The political power which it abused in its too sanguine mood after the founding of the Third Republic must be regained. It must have control of the schools and Universities, literature and journalism; it must have freedom to deal with Jews, Freethinkers, and Protestant missionaries in the nonargumentative style of traditional ecclesiasticism ; it must have chiefs who give an example of submission, and set a royal fashion of church-going; it must be free to flout its rites and ceremonies under the eyes of all Frenchmen, willing and unwilling. Under Republican rule it does not expect to regain that power ; even the superstitious Felix Faure dared not endow it with any element of political ascendancy. But the Royalist pretenders and the military pretenders have promised it a vague deliverance from Republican coercion. It sees in the advancement of their plans some hope of a return to the condition of things in the seventies, when a man who chose to die without its ministrations had to be buried like a dog in the early morning. That is the secret of the attitude of the French Church in the Dreyfus trial.

Now, so grave a distortion of the ethical function of the Church is only made possible through the arbitrary character of the Christian code of morals. Justice is one of a series of laws which it has pleased the supreme lawgiver to enact of his own sweet will. Even if it be admitted to have a singularly intimate connection with the present welfare of