Imágenes de páginas
PDF
EPUB

cisely the whole English Bible during a seminary course in a half-hour per day, if more time could not be afforded. Better still, we think, if both the theological and sociological meanings were developed together in brief chapel expositions covering the entire Bible in a student's course. 16. For example, the writer found the following sociological passages in a single evening: Gen. i: 27, ii: 21-24; iii: 3; iv: 17, last clause, xviii: 18-33; Exod. i: 8-16, V: I-9, xvi: 22-31, xviii: 13-27, Xx: 1-17; xxi. I-II. (Note that although slavery, like divorce, could not be abolished in Old Testament times, it was restrained to an extent never found elsewhere. All Bible countries have since abolished it and no others.) Exod. xxi 27, 29, xxii: 21-27, xxiii: 6-12, xxxi: 1-5; Lev. vi: 1-5, xix: 9-18, 30-37, xxv: 8-55; Deut. xxii: 8, XXV: 1-3, 13-16, xxviii: 1-19; Psalms lxxii, c; Isaiah xi: 10; Dan. vii: 13, 14; Matt. v: 43-47, vi: 10, vii : 12, xv: 1-6, xviii: 21, 22, xix: 16-24; xx: 20-28, xxi: 5, xxii: 15-22. (This passage, often quoted by those who would have Christians avoid politics, is a distinct command to Christians to perform their political as well as devotional duties. We are to render to government the duties due to government and to God the duties due to God.) Matt. xxiii: 23, xxv: 31-46; Luke x: 25-37. (Who is it that I feel toward as Jews felt toward Samaritans ? What class or race? They are the "neighbors" I am here taught to help.) Acts iv: 32, ix: 36-41, x: 9-16, 34, 35, xvii: 26; James i : 27, ii: 5-9, 14-17, v: 1-6; 1 John iv: 20, 21; Rev. xxi: 1-5.-Professor R. T. Ely's book on Social Aspects of Christianity is largely made up of sociological expositions of Bible texts. See also Bible Index at close of this book.

[ocr errors]

17. The skeptic's sneer that the Bible is chiefly about another world is the opposite of truth. "Nearly everything in the words of Christ,' says Professor Ely, applies to the present life."-Social Aspects of Christianity, 55.

[ocr errors]

18. Christ's great word was "the kingdom of God." Of all the words of his that have come down to us this is by far the commonest. One hundred times it occurs in the Gospels.-Professor Henry Drummond, Christianity Practically Applied, 1: 468. The kingdom of heaven is the entire social organism in its ideal perfection. . Every department of human life-the families, the schools, amusements, art, business, politics, industry, national policies, international relations-will be governed by the Christian law and controlled by Christian influences. When we are bidden to seek first the kingdom of God [Matt, vi : 33] we are bidden to set our hearts on this great consummation; to keep this always before us as the object of our endeavors; to be satisfied with nothing less than this. . . When the Son of man cometh shall he find faith on the earth? Verily, he would find on the earth to-day a great multitude of those who bear His name, but who do not believe that the world could be governed by his law.-Rev. Dr. Washington Gladden, The Church and the Kingdom, pp. 11–12, 8, 34.

19. Matt. vi: 10.

20. Genesis is found to be the most original literary source for the study of social origins.-Professor Graham Taylor, D. D., Christianity Practically Applied, 1: 411.

[ocr errors]

21. Rev. xxi.

22. While there is much genuine philanthropy outside of Christianity charity, as we know it, gets its chief religious authority and

incentive from him who gave as the summary of all the law and prophets the coordinate commands to love God and to love our neighbor. -A. G. Warner, American Charities, 7. An impartial observer would describe the most distinctive virtue referred to in the New Testament as love, charity, or philanthropy.-Lecky, History of European Morals, 2: 130. When Paul said (1 Cor. xiii), Faith, hope, love, these three; but the greatest of these is love, it was not love to God, but love to man, to which he referred. Lecky, skeptic though he was, has this to say of the influence of Christ's love to man (History of European Morals): "It was reserved for Christianity to present to the world an ideal character that, through all the ages of eighteen centuries, has inspired the hearts of men with an impassioned love; has shown itself capable of acting on all ages, nations, temperaments, and conditions; has been not only the highest pattern of virtue, but the strongest incentive to its practise, and has exercised so deep an influence that it may be truly said that the simple record of three short years of active life has done more to regenerate and soften mankind than all the disquisitions of philosophers and all the exhortations of moralists. This has indeed been the well-spring of all that is best and purest in Christian life."

23. I have no evidence in history that a mere man would have exalted man as Christ did.. the most convincing proof of divinity.-Ely, Social Aspects of Christianity, 59. Professor Ely calls Christ "the Altruist of altruists."-Christianity Practically Applied, 1: 440.

This minute and scrupulous care for human life and human virtue in the humblest forms, in the slave, the gladiator, the savage, the infant, was indeed wholly foreign to the genius of Paganism. It was produced by the Christian doctrine of the inestimable value of each immortal soul.-W. E. H. Lecky (rationalist), quoted, Brace's Dangerous Classes of New York, 13-14.

24. It was from Judea that there arose the most persistent protests against inequality, and the most ardent aspirations after justice that have ever raised humanity out of the actual into the ideal. We feel the effect still. It is thence has come that leaven of revolution that still moves

the world.-Émile De Laveleye, Socialism of To-day, p. 16. D'Israeli declared that there were only two living powers in Europe, the Church and the Revolution.

The best features of the common law, and especially those which regard the family and social relations; which compel the parent to support the child, the husband to support the wife; which make the marriage tie permanent, and forbid polygamy, if not derived from, have at least been improved and strengthened by the prevailing religion and the teachings of its sacred book.-Hon. T. M. Cooley, quoted, Christianity Practically Applied, 1: 175. See Kidd's Social Evolution, 168.

25. Only now, when the welfare of nations, rather than of rulers, is becoming the dominant idea, are historians beginning to occupy themselves with the phenomena of social progress. The only history that is of practical value is what may be called Descriptive Sociology.

materials for a Comparative Sociology and for the subsequent determination of the ultimate laws to which social phenomena conform.-Herbert Spencer, Sociology. Human history is the terrestrial laboratory of God. To have here on this ball of earth a kingdom of God made out of the human race is the purpose of God.-President Geo. A. Gates, Christianity Practically Applied, I: 472.

26. On the social affection of early Christians for each other, see Lecky's History of European Morals, 1: 409; also Kidd's Social Evolution, 123-24, 149; also Ulhorn's Christian Charity in the Ancient Church. Professor Ely notes that the social significance of the Lord's Supper is fraternity, the invitation being to those who are in love and charity with their neighbors."

27. It has been aptly said that in this day of class churches we must have "not only an apostle to the Gentiles, but also an apostle to the genteels."

28. On sociological merits of the Middle Ages, see Ulhorn's Mediæval Christian Charities; also Kidd's Social Evolution, 153: Warner's American Charities, 10, 216 footnote; Lecky's History of European Morals, 2: 95. See also Guizot's History of Civilization. Had not the Christian Church existed when the Roman Empire went to pieces, Europe, destitute of any bond of association, might have fallen into a condition not inuch above that of the North American Indians, or only received civilization with an Asiatic impress from the conquering simitars of the invading hordes [of Mohammedans]. . . Though Christianity became distorted and alloyed though pagan ideas [were taken] into her creed; yet her essential idea of the equality of men was never wholly destroyed.-Henry George, Progress and Poverty, 366, 374. The glory of the medieval Church is the resistance which it offered to tyranny of every kind. The typical bishop of those times is always upholding a righteous cause against kings and emperors, or exhorting masters to let their slaves go free, or giving sanctuary to harassed fugitives.-Fitzjames Stephen, quoted in Gladden's Working People and their Employers, 32.

[ocr errors]

29. See Lecture V.; also in Appendix, Part II., Chronological Data of Progress and Readings, arranged by centuries.

30. On Roman justice, see Kidd's Social Evolution, 135f. 31. Heauton: Act 3, Sc. v.

32. See chapter on "The Condition of Neglected Children before Christianity," in The Dangerous Classes of New York, by Charles Loring Brace. Also similar facts in his Gesta Christi, and in Lecky's History of European Morals, vol. 2, ch. iv.

33. See on defects of Plato's Republic, free love, slavery, etc., Rev. Hugh Price Hughes, Philanthropy of God, 20-21; Behrends' Socialism and Christianity, II. Those sayings of Epictetus, "Nothing is more becoming to him who governs than to despise no man ... but to preside over all with equal care," and "It is wicked to withdraw from being useful to the needy, and cowardly to give way to the worthless," are worthy of praise, considering their age, but did not mean, when first spoken, all they suggest to Christian ears to-day. The English word good has no precise Greek or Latin equivalent; it is a higher term, invested with a distinguishing spiritual capacity in expression.-Dr. D. H. Wheeler, Chautauquan, 20: 523.

[ocr errors]

44

34. Benjamin Kidd (Social Evolution, 134), concurring with George Henry Lewes, says: Morality never, among the Greeks, embraced any conception of humanity." The Christian religion," says Professor Sidgwick, in his History of Ethics, "identified piety with pity." See also Ely's Social Aspects of Christianity, 56–62.

35. The political history of the centuries so far may be summed up in a single sentence: It is the story of the political and social enfran

chisement of the masses of the people.-Benjamin Kidd, Social Evolution, 139.

36. The history of Western civilization is simply the natural history of the Christian religion.—Benjamin Kidd, Nineteenth Century, March, 1895.

37. The Reformation was only a partial success, because there was not enough love in it.-Rev. Hugh Price Hughes, Philanthropy of God, 24. Bunyan's Pilgrim had only one thought. His work by day, his dream by night, was escape. He took little part in the things of the world through which he passed.-Professor Henry Drummond, Christianity Practically Applied, 1 : 467.

38. It may be noticed how much farther the development of the humanitarian feelings has progressed in those parts of our civilization most affected by the movement of the sixteenth century, and more particularly among Anglo-Saxon peoples. That great wave of altruistic feeling, which caused the crusade against slavery to attain such remarkable development among these peoples, has progressed onward, carrying on its crest the multitude of philanthropic and humanitarian undertakings which are so characteristic a feature of all English-speaking communities, and such little understood movements as anti-vivisection, vegetarianism, the enfranchisement of woman, the prevention of cruelty to animals, and the abolition of the State regulation of vice.-Benjamin Kidd, Social Evolution, 299. As to the less altruistic Roman Catholic nations, see 301-3. 39. See Ballot on Reforms in Appendix.

40. At every point . . . increase in temporal good waits upon spiritual advance.-President E. B. Andrews, Wealth and Moral Laws, 49. For every advance in religious belief we can point to a corresponding social advance in the history of humanity, while the only result you can show as a consequence of your doctrine of indifference in matters of religion is anarchy.-Joseph Mazzini, Duties of Man, 25. See Eighteenth Century data in Appendix.

41. See Mackenzie's History of the Nineteenth Century; also Nineteenth Century data in Appendix.

42. In Russia alone the open impurity of medieval courts yet survives. The mistress of the Czar, said the Union Signal in 1895, is a recognized official of the court, whose income is met from the revenues of the state, whose appearance at the theater is recognized by a rising audience, and whose photograph is displayed in the shop windows of St. Petersburg beside that of the imperial family. This record, duplicated in every court of Europe in the eighteenth century, by its loneliness to-day marks the progress of other European nations, who should shame the Czar into the nineteenth century.

43. For statistics of divorce, see Lecture II; for those of crime, Lecture V; or see "Divorce" and "Crime" in alphabetical index at close of this book. The consumption of intoxicating liquors in the United States has increased from 3 22 gallons per capita in 1860 to 18.04 gallons per capita in 1893.-The Voice, November 8, 1894. Same paper, August 16, 1894, gave per capita increase from 1878 to 1893 as The period named in the lecture, 1867 to 1895, would be between the two preceding figures, about as given. Another black three might be added, as the prohibitory States are only about one-third as many as in the previous third of the century-instead of fifteen, only Maine, New Hampshire, Vermont, Kansas, and North Dakota. The enemies of

2.2.

prohibition in 1894 enacted a sort of anarchistic hotch-potch in Iowa, which retained the prohibitory law, but made a certain number of peti tioners for a saloon " a bar to prosecution." In South Dakota, antiprohibitionists, in 1895, secured resubmission, and the law will be lost unless the people vote more wisely on the direct issue than in selecting the legislature. In North Dakota, resubmission passed the so-called "upper house" in 1895, but failed in the other branch. It failed also at about the same time in Kansas, Maine, and New Hampshire, but it was a bad omen that enemies of prohibition were able to bring the question to a vote. In the same year a bill to provide adequate penalties for violations of the prohibitory law failed even in Maine. In Massachusetts, Ohio, and Minnesota the liquor question was at the front, in the form of local option, with little if any gain for temperance in the total result. Indiana was almost the only State in which temperance people secured favorable legislation that year.

44. The religious people of Christ's time did nothing with their religion except to attend to its observances. Even the priest, after he had been to the temple, thought his work was done. When he met the wounded man he passed by on the other side.-Professor Henry Drummond, Christianity Practically Applied, 1: 467. Rev. Charles F. Dole, in City Government and the Churches, Pamphlet No. 2, National Municipal League (514 Walnut Street, Philadelphia), raises the question, "How far are the people in the churches Christians?" He notes that at first the energies of Christianity were absorbed in making men humane; then in making them personally honest and truthful and pure; but he urges that now Christianity should advance to the work of making its votaries Christians, socially, in business and politics.-Christians have not loved their neighbors. They have hired somebody else to love them. They have left it to the women. Sociology has rightly been said to be one-half of religion; theology is the other half. If, then, ministers instruct their hearers about the nature of God, should they not instruct them equally about the nature of society.-Professor J. R. Commons, Social Reform and the Church, 12, 19, 20. I should say that half of the time of a theological student should be devoted [as half the commandments in Christ's summary] to social science [love to man]. Let the reader take any hymn-book . . . and seek for the hymns expressive of burning, all-consuming altruism.-Ely, Social Aspects of Christianity, 17, 27.

It has taken the Christian Church centuries even to approximate the position of Christ with reference to the social nature of religion. . . We may still go into many a prayer meeting and listen to prayer after prayer, and address after address, and hear not one word which would indicate that the speaker recognized the existence of anyone else in all the universe outside of himself and Almighty God.-Professor R. T. Ely, Socialism, etc., 232. With us, when a church finds itself in a difficult neighborhood, it skips. In the first ages of the Church the Christians used to run after the heathen; now they run away from them... Speaking now for my own town only [New York], there is nothing in any large way that deserves to be called contact between our churched sanctification and our unhoused depravity. The leaven is in the attic and the meal down cellar. The meal remains meal, and the desiccated yeast cakes coddle each other. . . The pothouse politician cares more for his [the immigrant's] vote than the Church cares either

« AnteriorContinuar »