DURING the nineteenth century the authority of preachers and pastors has
diminished plainly; and this is largely due to a fact of which Emerson
spoke thus: "We should not forgive the clergy for taking on every issue
the immoral side." This was true in England, where the great reforms
were achieved for the benefit of the masses, and against the interest of
the class to which most clergymen belonged. The American pastor seldom
differed from his parishioners, unless he was more philanthropic. He
was usually in favour of the agitation against drunkenness; and he had
a right to say that the disunionism of Phillips and Garrison, together
with their systematically repelling sympathy in the South, went far to
offset their claim for his support. It was difficult, during many years,
to see what ought to be done in the North. When a practical issue was
made by the attack on Kansas, the clergy took the side of freedom almost
unanimously in New England, and quite generally in rural districts
throughout the free States. The indifference of the ministers to
abolitionism, before 1854, was partly due, however, to their almost
universal opposition to a kindred reform, which they might easily have
helped.
I. It was before Garrison began his agitation that Frances Wright
denounced the clergy for hindering the intellectual emancipation of her
sex; and her first ally was not _The Liberator_, but _The Investigatory_
though both began almost simultaneously. She pleaded powerfully for the
rights of slaves, as well as of married women, before large audiences
in the middle States as early as 1836, when these reforms were also
advocated by Mrs. Ernestine L. Rose, a liberal Jewess. These ladies
spoke to men as well as women; and so next summer did Miss Angelina
Grimke, whose zeal against slavery had lost her her home in South
Carolina. Her first public lecture was in Massachusetts; and the
Congregationalist ministers of that State promptly issued a declaration
that they had a right to say who should speak to their parishioners, and
that the New Testament forbade any woman to become a "public reformer."
Their action called out the spirited poem in which Whittier said:
"What marvel if the people learn
To claim the right of free opinion?
What marvel if at times they spurn
The ancient yoke of your dominion?"
Garrison now came out in favour of "the rights of women," and thus
lost much of the support which he was receiving from the country clergy
generally in New England. The final breach was in May, 1840, at the
meeting of the National Association of Abolitionists in New York City.
There came Garrison with more than five hundred followers from New
England. They gained by a close vote a place on the business committee
for that noble woman, Abby Kelley. Ministers and church members seceded
and started a new anti-slavery society, which carried away most of the
members and even the officers of the old one. The quarrel was embittered
by the vote of censure, passed at this meeting upon those abolitionists
who had dared to nominate a candidate of their own for the presidency
without leave from Mr. Garrison; but the chief trouble came from the
prejudice which, that same summer, caused most of the members of the
World's Anti-Slavery Convention in London, to refuse places to Harriet
Martineau and other ladies as delegates. This exclusion was favoured
by all the eight clergymen who spoke, and by no other speakers so
earnestly. Among the rejected delegates were Mrs. Lucretia Mott and
Mrs. Elizabeth Cady Stanton; and they resolved, that night, to hold a
convention for the benefit of their sex in America.
The volume of essays which Emerson published in 1844 praised "the new
chivalry in behalf of woman's rights"; and the other Transcendentalists
in America came, one after another, to the same position. Mrs. Stanton
and Mrs. Mott called their convention in that year of revolutions, 1848,
on July 19th. The place was the Methodist church at Seneca Falls, in
central New York. The reformers found the door locked against them;
and a little boy had to climb in at the window. The Declaration of
Independence, adopted on July 4, 1776, furnished a model for a protest
against the exclusion of girls from high schools and colleges, the
closing of almost every remunerative employment against the sex, and the
laws forbidding a married woman to own any property, whether earned or
inherited by her, even her own clothing. This declaration was adopted
unanimously; but a demand for the suffrage had only a small majority.
Not a single minister is known to have been present; but there were two
at a second convention, that August, in Rochester, where the Unitarian
church was full of men and women.
There were more than twenty-five thousand ministers in the United
States; but only three are mentioned among the members of the national
convention, held at Worcester, Massachusetts, in October, 1850, by
delegates from eleven States. As Phillips was returning from this
meeting, Theodore Parker said to him, "Wendell, why do you make a fool
of yourself?" The great preacher came out a few years later in behalf of
the rights of women; but it was long before a single religious newspaper
caught up with _The Investigator_.
How the clergy generally felt was shown in 1851, at Akron, in northern
Ohio. There Episcopalian, Presbyterian, Baptist, Methodist, and
Universalist ministers appealed to the Bible in justification of the
subjugation of women. There was no reply until they began to boast of
the intellectual superiority of their own sex. Then an illiterate old
woman who had been a slave arose and said: "What 's dat got to do with
women's rights, or niggers' rights either? If my cup won't hold but a
pint, and yourn holds a quart, would n't ye be mean not to let me have
my little half-measure full?" The convention was with her; but the Bible
argument was not to be disposed of easily. The general tone of both
Testaments is in harmony with the familiar texts attributed to Paul and
Peter. These latter passages were written, in all probability, when
the position of women was changing for the better throughout the Roman
Empire: and the original words, asserting the authority of husbands, are
the same as are used in regard to the power of masters over slaves. Such
language had all the more weight, because the ministers had been brought
up as members of the ruling sex. They may have also been biassed by the
fact that their profession depends, more than any other, for success
upon the unpaid services in many ways of devoted women. Emancipation was
by no means likely to promote work for the Church. There was an audience
of two thousand at Syracuse, in 1852, when what was called the "Bloomer
Convention," on account of the short dresses worn by some members,
took up a resolution, declaring that the Bible recognises the rights of
women. Mrs. Rose said that the reform had merits enough of its own,
and needed no justification by any book. A letter was read from Mrs.
Stanton, saying that "among the clergy we find our most violent enemies,
those most opposed to any change in woman's position." The accuracy
of this statement was readily admitted, after a reverend gentleman
had denounced the infidelity of the movement, in a speech described
as "indecent" and "coarsely offensive" in the New York Herald; and the
resolution was lost.
The lady who offered it was ordained soon after for the
Congregationalist ministry; but she was obliged to confess, at the
Woman's Rights' Convention, in 1853, that "the Church has so far cast
me off, that to a great extent I have been obliged to go to just such
infidels as those around me for aid to preach my Christian views." It
was at this meeting that a doctor of divinity, and pastor of a prominent
society, denounced the reform so violently that Mr. Garrison called him
a blackguard and a rowdy, with the result of having his nose pulled
by the champion of the Church militant. There were many such unseemly
manifestations of clerical wrath. The _History of Woman Suffrage_, which
was edited by Mrs. Stanton and other leading reformers, said, in 1881:
"The deadliest opponents to the recognition of the equal rights of women
have ever been among the orthodox clergy." The Unitarians were more
friendly; but I do not think that the reform was openly favoured, even
as late as 1860, by one clergyman in a thousand out of the whole number
in the United States. The proportion was even smaller in Europe.
Even as late as 1878, it was resolved by the Woman Suffrage Convention
at Rochester, N. Y., "that as the first duty of every individual is
self-development, the lessons of self-sacrifice and obedience taught
woman by the Christian Church have been fatal, not only to her own vital
interests but through her to those of the race." Influences were already
at work, however, which have made the relations of platform and pulpit
comparatively friendly in this respect.
The women of the North showed their patriotism, during the great war,
by establishing and managing the Sanitary Commission, the Freedman's
Bureau, and the Woman's Loyal National League. Important elections
were carried in 1862 by the eloquence of Anna E. Dickinson, for the
Republican party; and it has often since had similar help. The success
of the Women's Christian Temperance Union and other partly philanthropic
and partly religious organisations, has proved the ability of women to
think and act independently. Many of their demands have been granted,
one by one; and public opinion has changed so much in their favour, that
they ceased long ago to encounter any general hostility from the clergy
in the Northern States.
Even there, however, women still find it much too difficult for them
to enter a peculiarly easy, honourable, and lucrative profession. Their
elocutionary powers are shown on the stage as well as the platform.
Their capacity for writing sermons is plain to every one familiar with
recent literature. Their ability to preach is recognised cordially in
the Salvation Army, as well as by Spiritualists, Quakers, Unitarians,
and Universalists. Much of the pastoral work is done by women, in actual
fact; and more ought to be. The Sunday-school, choir, social gathering,
and other important auxiliaries to the pulpit are almost entirely in
female hands. Women enjoy practically the monopoly of those kinds of
church work for which there is no pay; and their exclusion from the kind
which is paid highly, in the largest and wealthiest denominations, looks
too much like a preference of clergymen to look after the interest of
their own sex. The most orthodox churches are the most exclusive;
and the same forces which are driving bigotry out of the pulpits are
bringing women in.
This reform is one of many in which a much more advanced position has
been taken by New England and the far West than by the South; and the
American Transcendentalists led public opinion in the section where most
of them lived. In Great Britain the struggle has been carried on in the
interest of the middle and lower classes, and under much opposition from
the class to which most admirers of philosophy belonged. No wonder that
one of the keenest critics of Transcendentalism was prominent among the
champions in England of the oppressed sex. John Stuart Mill declared,
in his widely circulated book on _The Subjection of Women_, that "nobody
ever arrived at a general rule of duty by intuition." He held that the
legal subjection of wives to husbands bore more resemblance, as far as
the laws were concerned, to slavery, than did any other relationship
existing in Great Britain in 1869. He did not argue from any theory
of natural rights, but pointed out the advantage to society of women's
developing their capacities freely. He also insisted on the duty
of government not to restrict the liberty of any woman, except when
necessary to prevent her diminishing that of her neighbours. This last
proposition will be examined in the next chapter. The fact that Mill's
great work for freedom was done through the press, and not on the
platform, makes it unnecessary to say more about him in this place.
II. Clergymen, like Transcendentalists, in England were generally
conservative, or reactionary; and the friends of reform were much more
irreligious than in America. Their appeal against the authority of
Church and Bible was not to intuition but to science; and they were
aided by Lyell's demonstration, in 1830, that geology had superseded
Genesis. Working-men were warned in lectures, tracts, and newspapers
against immorality in the Old Testament; and even the New was said
to discourage resistance to oppression and efforts to promote health,
comfort, and knowledge.
The most popular of these champions against superstition and tyranny
was Bradlaugh. He began to lecture in 1850, when only seventeen, and
continued for forty years to speak and write diligently. His atheism
obliged him to undergo poverty for many years, and much hardship. He
charged no fee for lecturing, went willingly to the smallest and poorest
places, and was satisfied with whatever was brought in by selling
tickets, often for only twopence each. He once travelled six hundred
miles in forty-eight hours, to deliver four lectures which did not repay
his expenses. Many a hall which he had engaged was closed against him;
and he was thus obliged to speak in the open air one rainy Sunday, when
he had two thousand hearers. At such times his voice pealed out like a
trumpet; his information was always accurate; opposition quickened the
flow of ideas; and he had perfect command of the people's English. His
great physical strength was often needed to defend him against violence,
sometimes instigated by the clergy. He had much to say against the Old
Testament; but no struggle for political liberty, whether at home or
abroad, failed to receive his support; and he was especially active for
that great extension of suffrage which took place in 1867. His knowledge
that women would vote against him did not prevent his advocating their
right to the ballot; but it was in the name of "the great mass of the
English people" that he was an early supporter of the cause of Union and
Liberty against the slave-holders who seceded.
In 1866 he became president of the National Society of Secularists, who
believe only in "the religion of the present life." Most of the members
were agnostics; and one of Bradlaugh's many debates was with Holyoake,
the founder of secularism, on the question whether that term ought to be
used instead of atheism. The society was so well organised that only
a telegram from the managers was needed to call out a public meeting
anywhere in England. Among Bradlaugh's hearers in America in 1873 were
Emerson, Sumner, Garrison, Phillips, and O. B. Frothingham. He won soon
after a powerful ally in a clergyman's wife, who had been driven from
her home by her husband because she would not partake of the communion.
Mrs. Besant began to lecture in 1874, and with views like Bradlaugh's;
but her chief interest was in woman suffrage. Both held strict views
about the obligation of marriage; and their relations were blameless.
Bradlaugh's place in history is mainly as a champion of the right of
atheists to sit in Parliament. He was elected by the shoemakers of
Northampton in 1880, when oaths of allegiance were exacted in the
House of Commons. Quakers, however, could affirm; and he asked the
same privilege. As this was refused, he offered to take the oath, and
declared that the essential part would be "binding upon my honour and
conscience." This, too, was forbidden; but there was much discussion,
not only in Parliament but throughout England, as to his right to
affirm. His friends held two hundred public meetings in a single week,
and sent in petitions with two hundred thousand signatures during twelve
months. The liberal newspapers were on his side; but the Methodist and
Episcopalian pulpits resounded with denials of the right of atheists
to enter Parliament on any terms. Among the expounders of this view
in leading periodicals were Cardinal Manning and other prominent
ecclesiastics. They had the support of the Archbishop of Canterbury,
as well as of many petitions from Sunday-schools. Public opinion showed
itself so plainly that Brad-laugh was finally allowed by a close vote to
make affirmation and take his seat. He was soon forced to leave it by an
adverse decision of the judges, but was promptly re-elected.
Again he offered in vain to take the oath. After several months
of litigation, and many appeals to audiences which he made almost
unanimous, he gave notice that he should try to take his seat on August
3, 1881, unless prevented by force. It took fourteen men to keep him
out; and he was dragged down-stairs with such violence that he fainted
away. His clothes were badly torn; and the struggle brought on an
alarming attack of erysipelas. A great multitude had followed him to
Westminster Hall, and there would have been a dangerous riot, if it had
not been for the entreaties of Mrs. Besant, who spoke at Bradlaugh's
request. His next move was to take the oath without having it properly
administered. He was expelled in consequence, but re-elected at once.
Thus the contest went on, until the Speaker decided that every member
had a right to take the oath which could not be set aside. Bradlaugh was
admitted accordingly, on January 13, 1886; and two years later he
brought about the passage of a bill by which unbelievers were enabled to
enter Parliament by making affirmation. The Irish members had tried to
keep him out; but this did not prevent his advocating home rule for
Ireland, and also for India. From first to last he fought fearlessly and
steadily for freedom of speech and of the press. His beauty of character
increased his influence. Mrs. Besant is right in saying: "That men and
women are now able to speak as openly as they do, that a broader spirit
is visible in the churches, that heresy is no longer regarded as morally
disgraceful--these things are very largely due to the active and
militant propaganda carried on under the leadership of Charles
Bradlaugh."
III. Similar ideas to his have been presented ever since 1870 to immense
audiences, composed mostly of young men, in Chicago, New York, Boston,
and other American cities, by Robert G. Ingersoll. Burning hatred of
all tyranny and cruelty often makes him denounce the Bible with a
pathos like Rousseau's or a brilliancy like Voltaire's. He was decidedly
original when he asked why Jesus, if he knew how Christianity would
develop, did not say that his followers ought not to persecute one
another. In protesting against subordinating reason to faith, Ingersoll
says: "Ought the sailor to throw away his compass and depend entirely
on the fog?" Among other characteristic passages are these: "Banish
me from Eden when you will, but first let me eat of the tree of
knowledge!"... "Religion has not civilised man: man has civilised
religion."... "Miracles are told simply to be believed, not to be
understood."
Ingersoll is not merely a destroyer but an earnest pleader for what he
calls the gospel of cheerfulness and good health, "the gospel of water
and soap," the gospels of education, liberty, justice, and humanity. He
regards "marriage as the holiest institution among men"; but holds that
"the woman is the equal of the man. She has all the rights I have and
one more; and that is the right to be protected." He believes fully "in
the democracy of the family," and "in allowing the children to think for
themselves." He is not so much interested as Bradlaugh was in political
reform and social progress, but has often taken the conservative side;
and his speaking in public has been more like an occasional recreation
than a life-work. Some of his lectures have had an immense circulation
as pamphlets; and his Biblical articles in the _North American Review_
attracted much notice. He is never at his best, however, without an
audience before him; and he sometimes writes too rapidly to be strictly
accurate.
IV. A better parallel to Bradlaugh is furnished by Mr. B. F. Underwood,
who was only eighteen when he began to lecture in Rhode Island. The
great revival of 1857 was in full blast; and he showed its evils with
an energy which called down much denunciation from the pulpit. He
spoke from the first as an evolutionist, though Darwin had not yet
demonstrated the fact. To and fro through the Connecticut valley went
the young iconoclast, speaking wherever he could find hearers, asking
only for repayment of expenses, and sometimes failing to receive even
that. His work was interrupted by the war, in which he took an active
and honourable part. When peace was restored, he studied thoroughly the
_Origin of Species_ and the _Descent of Man_; and he began in 1868 to
give course after course of lectures on Darwinism in New England, New
York, and Pennsylvania. The new view had been nine years before the
public, but had received little or no support from any clergyman in the
United States, or any journal except _The Investigator_.
For thirty years Mr. Underwood has been busily propagating evolutionism
on the platform, as well as in print. No other American has done so
much to make the system popular, or has reproduced Herbert Spencer's
statements with such fidelity. He has taken especial pains to prove that
"evolution disposes of the theory that the idea of God is innate," as
well as of the once mighty argument from design. He has said a great
deal about the Bible and Christianity, but in a more constructive spirit
than either Bradlaugh or Ingersoll. He has discredited old books by
unfolding new truth. Among his favourite subjects have been: "What Free
Thought Gives us in Place of the Creeds," "The Positive Side of Modern
Liberal Thought," "If you Take away Religion, what will you Give in its
Place?" "The Influence of Civilisation on Christianity." He has always
shown himself in favour of the interests of working-men, and also of
women's rights and other branches of political reform. During the twelve
years ending in 1881, he lectured five or six times a week for at least
nine months out of twelve, often travelling from Canada to Arkansas and
Oregon. Occasionally he spoke every night for a month; but he has seldom
lectured in summer, except when on the Pacific coast.
His lectures in Oregon in 1871 on evolution awoke much opposition in the
pulpits. Two years afterwards he held a debate in that State against a
clergyman who was president of a college, and who denounced evolution
as in conflict with "the Word of God." Such views were then prevalent in
that city; but in 1888 it was found by Mr. Underwood to have become the
seat of the State University, where the new system was taught regularly.
Underwood, like Bradlaugh, has always challenged discussion, and he has
held over a hundred public debates. The first was in 1867; and some have
occupied twenty evenings. Most of his opponents have been clergymen;
and a hundred and fifty of the profession were in the audience at one
contest in Illinois in 1870. How much public opinion differs in various
States of the Union is shown by the fact that nine years later the doors
of a hall which had been engaged for him in Pennsylvania were closed
against him, merely because he was "an infidel." His friends broke in
without his consent; and he was fined $70. The first lecture which he
tried to give in Canada was prevented by similar dishonesty.
Another hall was hired for the next night at great expense; but much
interruption was made by clergymen; and when suit was brought for
damages through breach of contract, the courts decided that bargains
with unbelievers were not binding in Canada.
Both Bradlaugh and Underwood have usually spoken _extempore_, but both
have been busy journalists. The American agitator wrote as early as 1856
for both _The Liberator_ and _The Investigator_. His connection with the
latter paper lasted until the time when a serious difference of opinion
arose between those aggressive unbelievers who called themselves
"freethinkers," or even "infidels," and those moderate liberals who
belong to the Free Religious Association, and formerly supported _The
Index_. This journal came in 1881 under the management of Mr. Underwood.
His colleague, Rev. W. J. Potter, was nominally his equal in authority;
but I know, from personal acquaintance with both gentlemen, that the
real editor from first to last was Mr. Underwood. It was mainly due to
him that much attention was given, both in the columns of the journal
and in the meetings of the association, to efforts for secularising the
State. He was in charge of _The Index_ until it stopped at the end
of 1886. In 1882 he held a discussion in Boston with the president of
Williams College, and Professor Gray, the great botanist, on the
relations between evolution and "evangelical religion." About four
hundred orthodox clergymen were present. In 1897 Mr. Underwood was still
in his original occupation. Early that year he lectured in Illinois,
Indiana, Michigan, Ohio, New York, Connecticut, Rhode Island,
Massachusetts, and Canada. He now believes, like Emerson, in "a higher
origin for events than the will I call mine."
V. The difference of opinion among liberals, just referred to, grew
out of the agitation for a free Sunday, which had been begun by Frances
Wright in 1828. A call for "an anti-Sabbath convention" in Boston was
issued by some Transcendentalists in 1848, when men had recently been
imprisoned in Massachusetts for getting in hay, and in Pennsylvania
for selling anti-slavery books. Churches were closed on Sunday against
lecturers for any reform, however popular; and even the most innocent
amusement was prohibited by public opinion. Only a moderate protest had
any chance of a hearing; but Garrison and the other managers insisted in
the call that "the first day of the week is no holier than any other,"
and refused to allow anyone who did not believe this to speak. Very
little was said about what the Sunday laws really were; but most of the
time was occupied with arguments that the Sabbath was only for the Jews,
and that keeping Sunday is not a religious duty. This last assertion
called out an earnest remonstrance from Theodore Parker; but his
resolutions were voted down. The Garrisonians insisted, as usual, that
the big end of the wedge ought to go in first; and their convention was
a failure. Twenty-eight years went by without any protest of importance
against Sunday laws in America.
Meantime the Free Religious Association was organised in Boston by
Unitarian clergymen who were indignant at the recent introduction into
their denomination of a doctrinal condition of fellowship. The first
public meeting, on May 30, 1867, called out an immense audience. Emerson
was one of the speakers; and he held his place among the vice-presidents
as long as he lived. A similar position was offered to Lucretia Mott,
but she declined on the platform. Her reason was that practical work
was subordinated to theological speculation by the announcement in
the constitution that the association was organised "to promote the
interests of pure religion, to encourage the scientific study of
theology, and to increase fellowship in the Spirit." These phrases were
altered afterwards; but the association has always been, in the words
of one of its leading members "a voice without a hand." Free religious
conventions have regularly increased the confusion of tongues in that
yearly Boston Babel called "Anniversary Week"; and there have been
many similar gatherings in various cities; but not one in four of these
meetings has given much attention to any practical subject, like the use
of the Bible in the public schools. A vigorous discussion of the Sunday
laws of Massachusetts took place in 1876, under peculiar circumstances
to be described in the next section; but there was no other until 1887.
_The Index_ started in 1870; but it was largely occupied with vague
speculations about theology; and its discontinuance in 1886 left the
association without any organ of frequent communication among its
members, or even an office for business. Dr. Adler, who became president
in 1878, tried to awaken an interest in unsectarian education, and
especially in ethical culture; but he resigned on account of lack of
support; and the Ethical Culture societies were started outside of the
association. Comparatively few of its members took any interest in the
petitions presented by its direction to the Massachusetts Legislature in
1884 and 1885, asking for taxation of churches, protection of witnesses
from molestation on account of unbelief, and rescue of the Sunday law
from giving sanctuary to fraud. The president acknowledged in 1892 that
there had been a "general debility for practical work." There seems to
have been a lack of energy among the managers; and some of the members
were too anxious to preserve their individuality, while others had too
much regard for ecclesiastical interests. The Parliament of Religions
next year, however, showed what good the association had done by
insisting continually on fellowship in religion, and keeping its
platform open to Jews, Hindoos, and unbelievers, as well as to
Christians of every sect.
VI. Prominent among the founders of the Free Religious Association
was Francis E. Abbot, who lost his place soon after as pastor of an
independent society, because the Supreme Court of New Hampshire decided,
on the request of some Unitarians for an injunction against him, that
his opinions were "subversive of the fundamental principles of
Christianity. He was the first editor of _The Index_; and there appeared
in April, 1872, his statement of what are generally recognised as
"THE DEMANDS OF LIBERALISM
"1. We demand that churches and other ecclesiastical property shall no
longer be exempt from just taxation.
"2. We demand that the employment of chaplains in Congress, in State
legislatures, in the navy and militia, and in prisons, asylums, and all
other institutions supported by public money, shall be discontinued.
"3. We demand that all public appropriations for educational and
charitable institutions of a sectarian character shall cease.
"4. We demand that all religious services now sustained by the
Government shall be abolished; and especially that the use of the Bible
in the public schools, whether ostensibly as a text-book or avowedly as
a book of religious worship, shall be prohibited.
"5. We demand that the appointment, by the President of the United
States, or by the Governors of the various States, of all religious
festivals and fasts shall wholly cease.
"6. We demand that the judicial oath in the courts and in all other
departments of the Government shall be abolished, and that simple
affirmation under the pains and penalties of perjury shall be
established in its stead.
"7. We demand that all laws directly or indirectly enforcing the
observance of Sunday as the Sabbath shall be repealed.
"8. We demand that all laws looking to the enforcement of "Christian"
morality shall be abrogated, and that all laws shall be conformed to the
requirements of natural morality, equal rights, and impartial liberty.
"9. We demand that not only in the Constitutions of the United States,
and of the several States, but also in the practical administration of
the same, no privilege or advantage shall be conceded to Christianity
or any other special religion; that our entire political system shall
be founded and administered on a purely secular basis; and that whatever
changes shall prove necessary to this end shall be consistently,
unflinchingly, and promptly made."
He knew how unlikely it was that the Association would agitate for
anything; and in January, 1873, he published a call for organisation
of liberal leagues, in order to obtain the freedom already asked. Such
leagues were soon formed in most of the States, as well as in Germany
and Canada. Among the members were Phillips, Garrison, Lucretia Mott,
Higginson, and other famous abolitionists, Karl Heinzen and other
radical Germans, several Rabbis and editors of Jewish papers,
Inger-soll, Underwood, the editor of _The Investigatory_ and other
active agitators, several wealthy men of business, Collyer, Savage,
and other Unitarian clergymen. Hundreds of newspapers supported
the movement; and eight hundred members had been enrolled before a
convention of the National Liberal League met in Philadelphia, on
the first four days of July, 1876. The managers of the International
Exhibition in that city had already decided that it should be closed on
Sunday, in violation of the rights, and against the wishes, of the Jews,
unbelievers, and many other citizens. The Free Religious Association had
been requested in vain, at a recent meeting, to remonstrate against this
iniquity. The League passed a strong vote of censure without opposition,
and appointed a committee to present a protest which had been circulated
during the convention. Resolutions were also passed asserting the right
of all Americans to enjoy on Sunday the public libraries, museums,
parks, and similar institutions "for the support of which they are
taxed," and demanding "that all religious exercises should be prohibited
in the public schools."
It was under the influence of this example that the Free Religious
Association held a special convention on November 15, 1876, to protest
against the Sunday laws of Massachusetts. A Jewish Rabbi complained that
more than two thousand Hebrew children in Boston were prevented from
keeping holy the day set apart for rest and worship in Exodus and
Deuteronomy, and many of them actually obliged by their teachers to
break the Sabbath. This was the effect of the law commanding them to go
to school on Saturday, which is that "seventh day" whose observance
is required by the fourth commandment. Other speakers declared that
no legislation was needed to ensure Sunday's remaining a day of rest.
Mention was made of the fact that "any game, sport, play, or public
diversion," not specially licensed, on Saturday evening, made all
persons present liable to be fined. This was already a dead letter; and
the theatres had announced with perfect safety twenty years before, in
their playbills, "We defy the law." A few months after this convention,
its influence was shown in the opening of the Art Museum free of charge
to the people of Boston, Sunday afternoons.
Thus the Association began to co-operate with the National League; and
the latter soon had the support of more than sixty local organisations.
The movement for establishing "Equal Rights in Religion" was uniting
Liberal Christians, Jews, independent theists, Spiritualists,
materialists, evolutionists, agnostics, and atheists. All were willing
to call themselves "Freethinkers" and work together as they have never
done since 1877. Then the League felt itself strong enough to call
for "taxation of church property," "secularisation of public schools,"
"abrogation of Sabbatarian laws," and also for woman suffrage, as well
as compulsory education throughout the United States. Steps were taken
towards nominating Ingersoll on this platform for President of the
Republic.
These plans had to be abandoned; the agitation subsided; and the harmony
between lovers of liberty from various standpoints was lost. A fatal
difference of opinion was manifest in 1878, in regard to those Acts of
Congress called "the Comstock laws."
These statutes forbade sending obscene literature through the mails;
and there had been more than a hundred recent convictions. Some of the
prosecutions were said to have been prompted by religious bigotry; and
there seems to have been unjustifiable examination of mail matter.
The most important question was whether the laws ought to be enforced
against newspapers and pamphlets about free love and marital tyranny,
which were not meant to be indecent but really were so occasionally. A
publisher in Massachusetts was sentenced in June, 1878, to two years
of imprisonment for trying to mail such a pamphlet; but he was soon
released. More severe punishment has been inflicted recently for similar
offences. The majority of people in America and England favoured the
exclusion by law of indecent literature from circulation; and this
course has been considered necessary on account of the known frailty of
human nature. The members of the Free Religious Association were willing
to have the Comstock laws changed, but not repealed; and they voted,
early in 1878, to take no part in what threatened to be an unfortunate
controversy. The League, however, was divided on the question whether
these laws ought to be amended or repealed. Abbot, Underwood, and other
prominent members declared that literature ought to be excluded from
the mails or admitted according as it was intentionally and essentially
indecent, or only accidentally so. Thus Ingersoll said: "We want all
nastiness suppressed for ever; but we also want the mails open to all
decent people." Other members held that the Comstock laws ought to be
repealed entirely, and no restriction put on the circulation of any
literature except by public opinion. This must be admitted to agree with
the principle that each one ought to have all the liberty consistent
with the equal liberty of everyone else; but this application of the
theory cannot be considered politic in agitating for religious freedom.
The _Investigator, Truthseeker_, and other aggressive papers, however,
called for complete repeal; and a petition with this object received
seventy thousand signatures.
The National League had voted, in 1876, that legislation against obscene
publications was absolutely necessary, but that the existing laws needed
amendment. The question whether this position should be maintained,
was announced as the principal business to be settled in the convention
which met at Syracuse on October 26, 1878. Mr. Abbot, the president, and
other prominent officers declared that they should not be candidates
for re-election if the position assumed two years before was not kept.
Scarcely had the convention met, when its management passed into the
hands of the friends of repeal. They allowed Judge Hurlbut, formerly
on the bench in the Supreme Court of the State, to argue in favour of
closing the mails against publications "manifestly designed or mainly
tending to corrupt the morals of the young." Much respect was due to the
author of a book which declared, in 1850, that married women had a right
to vote and hold property, as well as that the State "cannot rightfully
compel any man to keep Sunday as a religious institution; nor can it
compel him to cease from labour or recreation on that day; since it
cannot be shown that the ordinary exercise of the human faculties on
that day is in any way an infringement upon the rights of mankind." On
Sunday morning, October 27th, it was agreed that the question of repeal
or reform should be postponed until the next annual convention; but
the decision was made a foregone conclusion that afternoon, when
three-fifths of the members voted not to re-elect Mr. Abbot and other
champions of reform. The defeated candidates left the convention at
once, as did Mr. Underwood and many other members, Judge Hurlbut taking
the lead. A new league was organised by the seceders; but it was not a
success.
The movement for amending, but not repealing, the Comstock laws was
given up; and most of those who had favoured it took sides with those
who had refused to agitate. There was little interest in "The Demands
of Liberalism" thenceforth among the Liberal Christians, Reformed Jews,
Transcendentalists, and evolutionists. These and other moderate liberals
refuse to call themselves "Freethinkers"; and they make little attempt
at collective and distinctive action. The Free Religious Association did
nothing towards secularising the laws of Massachusetts between 1876
and 1884. The agitation which began in the latter year ended on May
27, 1887, when the Sunday laws were discussed at Boston in a large
and enthusiastic convention. The Legislature had just passed a bill
to legalise Saturday evening amusements, as well as boating, sailing,
driving, use of telegraph, and sale of milk, bread, newspapers, and
medicines on Sunday; the signature of the Governor had not yet been
given; but it was agreed that these changes must be made, and for the
reason that the old restrictions could not be enforced. Judge Putnam, of
the State District Court, told the convention that "the Sunday law,
so called, has not in a long, long time been enforced," except by
"a prosecution here and there"; and that if it were to be enforced
strictly, the prosecutions would occupy nearly all the week. He opposed
any restraint on "entertainments not of an immoral tendency." Mr.
Garrison, son of the famous abolitionist, declared that Sunday ought to
be "the holiday of the week." Captain Adams, of Montreal, said: "This
is not a mere question how much men may do or enjoy on Sunday: it is
a question of human liberty, a question whether ecclesiastical
tyranny shall still put its yoke on our necks." The tone was bold, but
thoroughly practical from first to last.
An earnest protest against closing the Chicago Exposition on the
people's day of leisure was made by the F. R. A., in May, 1893; and
an important victory in behalf of religious liberty was won in 1898 in
Massachusetts. The Sunday laws of this State have been so improved as to
permit what are called "charity concerts," and are not made up entirely
of ecclesiastical music, to be given for the pecuniary benefit of
charitable and religious societies on Sunday evenings. The Legislature
which met early in 1898 was asked by representatives of the Monday
Conference of Unitarian Ministers, the Women's Christian Temperance
Union, and several other religious organisations to alter the law so as
to prevent any but "sacred music" from being heard on the only evening
when many people in Boston can go to concerts. The officers of the F. R.
A. made a formal request to be heard by a committee of the Legislature
through counsel, who proved that the "charity concerts" were really
unobjectionable, and that the opposition to them was due entirely to
zeal for an ancient text forbidding Hebrews to labour on Saturday in
Palestine.
The injustice of stretching this prohibition so far as to try to stop
concerts on Sunday evenings in America was pointed out by
representatives, not only of the F. R. A., but also of the International
Religious Liberty Association, which has been formed to protect
Christians who have kept the Sabbath on the original day set apart in
Exodus and Deuteronomy, from being punished for not prolonging their
rest from honest labour over an additional day, first selected by an
emperor whose decrees are not worthy of reverence. This association has
offices in Chicago, New York City, Toronto, London, Basel, and other
cities; and its principles are ably advocated in a weekly paper entitled
the _American Sentinel_. Representatives of this organisation assisted
those of the F. R. A. in forcing the "charity concerts" question to be
decided on its own merits, independent of ancient texts. The members of
the legislative committee made a unanimous report against suppressing
these harmless amusements; and their opinion was sustained by their
colleagues. This victory was duly celebrated at the annual convention of
the F. R. A., in Boston, on May 27, 1898. Among the speakers that
afternoon was the secretary of the I.R.L. A., who said: "If any nation
under heaven has the right to confiscate one-seventh of my time, and
tell how I shall and how I shall not use that, then the whole principle
of inherent rights is denied, and it now is simply a matter of policy
whether it shall not confiscate two-sevenths, three-sevenths,
or seven-sevenths, and take away all my liberty."
Since 1878, the agitation for religious equality has been carried on
mainly by materialistic atheists and agnostics, with some assistance
from Spiritualists. These aggressive liberals continue to call
themselves to Liberty in the Nineteenth Century.
"Freethinkers," and to support the _Investigatory Truthseeker_, and
other papers which have much to say against Sunday laws, religious use
of the Bible in public schools, and exemption of churches from taxation.
They often reprint "The Demands of Liberalism"; and one of these
requests has been so amended in Canada as to ask for the repeal of "all
laws directly or indirectly enforcing the observance of Sunday or the
Sabbath." The attack on the Comstock laws has subsided; and no
reference was made to them in 1897 in the call for a convention of the
organisation which took the place of the whole system of national and
local leagues in 1885. The name then chosen was "The American Secular
Union." The words, "and Freethought Federation" were added in 1895,
when two kindred associations were consolidated. It was under strong and
constant pressure from these aggressive liberals that the great museums
of art and natural history in New York were thrown open on Sundays to
longing crowds. One of the petitions was signed by representatives of a
hundred and twelve labour organisations. The trustees of the Art Museum
were induced to open it in the summer of 1891 by the contribution of
$3000, which had been collected by some young ladies for meeting extra
expenses. Thirty-eight thousand people took advantage, in August, 1892,
of their first opportunity to visit the Museum of Natural History on
their one day of leisure; and these visitors were remarkable for good
behaviour. There has been a similar experience in the Boston Art Museum
ever since the Sunday opening in 1877.
VII. An exciting contest took place at Chicago in 1893. More than fifty
nations were co-operating with the people of every one of the United
States in commemorating the discovery of America. Disreputable
politicians had persuaded Congress to pass a bill, by which closing the
Exposition on Sundays was made a condition of receiving aid from the
National Treasury. The people of Chicago had given three times as much,
however, as Congress; and there was much dissatisfaction among those
citizens who had bought stock in the enterprise. The grounds had been
kept open to visitors for some months, Sunday after Sunday, until the
buildings were formally thrown open on May 1st; and the receipts had
been liberal enough to prove that continuance of this course would be
greatly to the advantage of these shareholders, while Sunday closing
might result in heavy loss. During the first three Sundays of May the
gates were kept shut by order of the Board of National Commissioners,
made up of members from every State. Their action and that of Congress
had been sanctioned by petitions bearing millions of signatures; but
it is a significant fact that the alleged signers in Pennsylvania were
three times as many as the entire population of the State. Many people
had been counted again and again as members of different organisations;
and this fraud was committed in other parts of the country. No attempt
to find out what the people really wished was made except in Texas;
and there the majority was in favour of opening the gates. Sabbatarians
acknowledged publicly that they got little support from the secular
press; and much opposition was made to them by some of the great
dailies, as well as by the organs of aggressive liberalism.
Sunday after Sunday in May the gates were surrounded by immense crowds
who waited there vainly, hour after hour. Many of them could evidently
not come on other days; and the number was so large that the local
directors, who had been elected by the shareholders, voted on May 16th
for opening both gates and doors. This action was warmly approved by
the leading citizens of Chicago at a public meeting; but Sabbatarians
demanded that visitors be kept out by Federal bayonets. The National
Commissioners, however, permitted the entrance of a hundred and fifty
thousand people on the last Sunday of May. On Monday, the 29th, a judge
of Hebrew race, in a State court, pronounced the contract with Congress
null and void, because the money had not been fully paid. He decided,
accordingly, that there was no excuse for violating the Illinois law,
which guaranteed the right of the citizens to visit on Sunday the park
where the Exposition was held. This ensured the admission of visitors
on June 4th, and for twenty of the remaining twenty-one Sundays. The
Government buildings and many others, however, were closed; numerous
exhibits, for instance, one of Bibles, were shrouded in white; machinery
was not allowed to run; there were no cheap conveyances about the
ground; and there was little opportunity to get food or drink. No wonder
that the Sunday attendance was comparatively small; but there were one
hundred and forty thousand paying visitors on October 22d and 29th.
This was a victory of the press rather than the platform. There has been
no successor to the original Liberty League, and no rival to the Sunday
Society. The latter was organised in 1875 in England, where there has
been constant agitation since 1853 for opening the British Museum,
Crystal Palace, and other public institutions to their owners on Sunday.
Dean Stanley was president of this society; and among its members have
been Herbert Spencer, Huxley, Tyndall, Charles Reade, Lecky, Miss Cobbe,
Mrs. Craik, and many prominent clergymen. The real issue was stated
clearly at one of the public meetings by Tyndall as follows: "We only
ask a part of the Sunday for intellectual improvement." The justice
of this request has been so far admitted that on May 24, 1896, all the
national museums and galleries in London were opened for the first time
on Sunday. Among these educational institutions from which the
owners are no longer shut out are the National Gallery and the South
Kensington, British, and Natural History Museums. Many libraries and
museums in other parts of England were opened some years earlier.
VIII. Nowhere has the platform done so much to regenerate the pulpit as
in Chicago. Religious history has been largely a record of strife. There
was little brotherly feeling between clergymen of different sects in
America before 1860; but they were often brought into co-operation by
the great war. Even Unitarians were shocked to hear Emerson speak with
reverence of Zoroaster in 1838; but he won only applause in 1869 when he
spoke of the charm of finding "identities in all the religions of men."
This was at a convention of the Free Religious Association, which has
pleaded from the first for "fellowship in religion," and often made this
real upon its platform. The secretary, Mr. Potter, said in 1872,
that some of his hearers would live to see "a peace convention" "of
representatives from all the great religions of the globe." Chicago
was so peculiarly cosmopolitan that the local managers of the Columbian
Exposition were glad to have products of the various intellectual
activities of mankind exhibited freely. Ample provision was made for
conventions in behalf of education and reform; but what was to be done
for religion?
An orthodox citizen of Chicago, Mr. Charles Carroll Bonney, took counsel
in 1891 with Rev. J. LI. Jones, a Unitarian, who has been preaching for
twenty years the essential oneness of all religions. Rabbis, bishops,
and doctors of divinity were consulted also; and thus was formed the
committee which invited "the leading representatives of the great
historic religions of the world for the first time in history," to meet
in friendly conference and show what they "hold and teach in common,"
as well as "the important distinctive truths" claimed for each religion.
Thus the Columbian Exposition offered an opportunity "to promote and
deepen the spirit of human brotherhood among religious men of diverse
faiths," "to inquire what light each religion has afforded or may
afford to the other religions of the world," and, finally, "to bring
the nations of the earth into a more friendly fellowship in the hope
of securing a permanent international peace." Thus was announced the
"Parliament of Religions." All the members were to meet as equals; and
there was to be neither controversy nor domination. The Archbishop of
Canterbury and some leading Protestants in America protested against
abandoning the exclusive claims made for Christianity; and similar
objections were offered by the Sultan of Turkey. The Jews, Buddhists,
and other believers in the ancient religions welcomed the invitation, as
did the dignitaries of the Greek Church, and also the Protestants on
the continent of Europe, and many members of every Christian sect in the
United States. The Catholic archbishops of America appointed a delegate;
and many Methodist and Episcopalian bishops agreed to attend the
Parliament.
The sessions were held in the permanent building erected in the centre
of Chicago to accommodate the intellectual portion of the Exposition.
Four thousand people assembled on Monday, September 11, 1893, to see a
Roman Catholic cardinal mount the platform at 10 A.M., in company with
the Shinto high-priest, an archbishop of the Greek Church, a Hindoo
monk, a Confucian mandarin, and a long array of Buddhists and Taoists
from the far East. All these dignitaries wore gorgeous robes of
various colours. With them were a Parsee girl, a Theosophist, a Moslem
magistrate from India, a Catholic archbishop from New Zealand, a Russian
and an African prince, a negro bishop, several Episcopalian prelates,
Rabbis, and Jewesses, missionaries returned from many lands, doctors of
divinity of various Protestant sects, and the lady managers of the great
Fair. A prominent Presbyterian pastor took the chair, and cordial
declarations of the brotherhood of religions were made by Catholic
archbishops, the Shinto high-priest, a Buddhist delegate, and the
Confucian sent by the Emperor of China. Full hearing was given in
subsequent sessions to advocates of the Jain religion, which is perhaps
the oldest, as well as of the Parsee, Jewish, Moslem, Taoist, and Vedic
faiths, besides a score of the leading Christian denominations. The
Parliament lasted seventeen days; and the audiences were so large that
most of the essays were repeated in overflow meetings. There were also
some forty congresses held in smaller halls for speakers who could not
find room on the great platforms. One of these meetings was held by
Jewesses, of whom nineteen spoke. Some of them were also heard from the
platform of the Parliament; as were many clergy women.
Mr. Underwood presided at the Congress of Evolutionists. There was also
a convention of the Free Religionists, in connection with the Parliament
which they had made possible; but "The Freethought Federation" could get
no chance to meet in the great building, or even to sell pamphlets. Mr.
Bonney had proposed a union of all religions against irreligion; and
this would have been in harmony with the policy adopted by many States
of the American Union. Their Sunday laws and similar statutes show a
purpose of encouraging all the popular sects alike, with little regard
for the rights of citizens outside of these favoured associations. Most
of the speakers in the Parliament, especially the Buddhists, were so
zealous for the brotherhood of man, that they protested against any
discrimination on account of theology. The great audiences gave most
applause to the broadest declarations; and the few utterances of
Protestant bigotry were plainly out of place. The general tendency of
the Parliament was strongly in favour of recognising the equal rights
of all mankind, without regard to belief or unbelief. All legislation
inconsistent with this principle will be swept away, sooner or later,
by that great wave of public opinion which broke forth during the
Parliament of Religions. There the golden age of religion began, and war
must give place to peace.