THE HUMANIST'S RELIGION
In the preceding pages we have no doubt often hurt--but we have hurt to
heal. The good surgeon probes deeply in order that he may not have the
operation to perform again. Even a minute amount of diseased tissues
left behind can prevent the return of vigorous and creative health.
Thus what may seem to the anxious patient unnecessary cruelty may be
the greatest kindness. A sentimental compromise is never welcomed by
the mature judgment of the brave man. And in this day when so many
have willingly given their lives for the sake of a human ideal, is it
just and right to flinch in the spiritual warfare which confronts our
generation? We are seeking nothing less than a renaissance in which
men's energies will be wisely and loyally directed to what is greatly
human and humanly great. In such a service we must will to be hard on
ourselves and on others.
In the past, religion has only too often been formal and negative and
world-fleeing. It has said nay to life rather than yea. Past religion
rested upon man's sense of his own helplessness in a world which he did
not understand. By the very instinct of self-preservation, he created
supernatural powers which were to be on his side in the grim and
unequal struggle in which he was engaged. But this subterfuge by which
he thought to conquer had its treacherous effects, for it turned man
{212} from comprehending and mastering his world. He became but a
pilgrim here, intent on heavenly joys and splendors, which threw this
world into darkness. What these joys and splendors were he hardly
knew: yet he hugged the thought of them to his heart and despised
things merely human. And if, as often became the case, the world grew
upon him, his conscience was torn and tormented. He was a man divided
against himself, unable to throw himself whole-heartedly into any
enterprise.
But the humanist's religion is the religion of one who says yea to life
here and now, of one who is self-reliant and fearless, intelligent and
creative. It is the religion of the will to power, of one who is hard
on himself and yet joyous in himself. It is the religion of courage
and purpose and transforming energy. Its motto is, "What hath not man
wrought?" Its goal is the mastery of things that they may become
servants and instrumentalities to man's spiritual comradeship.
Whatever mixture of magic, fear, ritual and adoration religion may have
been in man's early days, it is now, and henceforth must be, that which
concerns man's nobilities, his discovery of, and loyalty to, the
pervasive values of life. The religious man will now be he who seeks
out causes to be loyal to, social mistakes to correct, wounds to heal,
achievements to further. He will be constructive, fearless, loyal,
sensitive to the good wherever found, a believer in mankind, a fighter
for things worth while.
When old ideas become enfeebled, they clog the spiritual system.
Conventionality, routine and sentimentalism take the place of the fresh
vigor which always accompanies profound conviction. A gospel cannot be
{213} a heritage enjoyed: it must be a portion earned. And to-day,
especially, there is pressing need for a brave criticism of past
standards, succeeded by an act of intelligent will which presses
fearlessly on to a reformulation and reaffirmation of values. Because
the old religions did not have this power to exalt significant human
ideals, relevant to the changing crisis of the times, the nations
drifted into the materialism of commercialism and militarism. And a
religion insistent upon a rational and wise interpretation of the ways
of life will, alone, be able to rescue them. Watchwords by themselves,
if they remain vague generalities untranslatable into new directions of
effort, will fail. What is necessary is a new goal, or else a
pragmatic development of past dreams into programs which awaken loyalty
and hope. But the center of gravity and endeavor of such a religion
will lie within society. It will be, to all intents and purposes, a
humanist's religion. It will save men's souls by making them worth
saving. For it, salvation will be no magical hocus-pocus external to
the reach and timbre of man's personality: it will be his loyal and
intelligent union with those values and possibilities of life which
have come within his ken. To convert will be to educate and redirect
the energies of the soul. And society will need conversion as
pressingly as scattered individuals in slums and tenements. Does it
to-day stress the most important things? The State has been the
servant of things as they are, not of things as they might be. A
humanist's religion can admit no cunning division into the things which
are God's and the things which are Caesar's. Human values are as
jealous as the Yahweh of Moses. To sin against them is to die
spiritually.
{214}
The common opinion that critical work is ever merely negative is a
great error. It is the willing error of a dogmatism which feels itself
insecure. It is the error of a spiritual plane which has settled into
ease and hates to be disturbed. Sooner or later, criticism leads to
something positive, to a new vision and a new goal. All that is needed
is the patience which is founded upon faith and is willing to try all
things in the firm belief that the truth will prevail. Moreover,
criticism has a positive psychological effect in that it calls
attention to the actual situation and directs attention to the living
problems. It is that spur to the soul which prevents it from going to
sleep. Without it, problems are avoided rather than sought. Who can
deny that this lethargy has been the disheartening temper of the
Christian Church, now when every domain of life cries aloud for
vigorous thought? Surely religion has to do with more than the common
decencies of life, important as they are. Its place is in the van of
the fighting; it has to do with last hopes and glimpsed visions, with
what is to come as well as with what is. Religion at its tensest has
to do with ultimate loyalties. Habit and tradition are helpless in
such matters, which are of things hoped for--upon this earth.
But enough of the critical side. We have said that the coming religion
will say yea to human life. Yet it will not affirm it in a blind and
sentimental way. It will be realistic and striving. All great
religions of the past have recognized the tragic aspects of human life,
its brevity, its littlenesses, its fussy selfishness, its lack of
vision, its suffering; but they have too often been led to despise
humanity by seeing it on the illimitable background of celestial
omnipotences and perfections. {215} Religion as loyalty to human
values will lose no whit of this tragic sense, and yet the palsying
background of supernaturalism will disappear. Some measure of tragedy
will remain; but its morbidity will have been separated out and
courageously rejected. Social groups will fall to with a will to live
largely and widely. They will seek a tingling welfare woven of the
threefold values of truth, beauty and goodness. The saint will not be
the groveling sinner, but the man of mellow wisdom. He will be
immersed in the currents of life and yet master of himself. He will be
at once the servant of concrete and compassable ideals and their
possessor and enjoyer.
The shadow of the Great War will lighten to the coming generation soon
after peace is declared. Then will come the time for the taking of
stock and the revaluation of human endeavor. Man must ask himself more
seriously than ever before what things are worth while, and thereupon
bend his political and economic instrumentalities to their furtherance.
And here the religion of human values must be the leader. Does
democracy yet accord with such a religion? Or is it still too timid,
negative, thin and uninstructed? America, for example, has a soul; but
it is a soul which needs discipline, instruction, contemplation. The
religion of human possibilities needs prophets who will grip men's
souls with their description of a society in which righteousness,
wisdom and beauty will reign together. It is hard to say what thought
such a society calls up before us. Yet does it not mean that, more
than now and increasingly, selfish luxury will be scorned, property
subordinated to welfare, economic fear lessened to the utmost,
knowledge unenviously exalted, and art called {216} into service?
Loyalty to such an ideal will surely constitute the heart of the
humanist's religion.
The ideals of a religion can never be easy. The prophets were stern
critics and hard taskmasters; Jesus knew that his true followers would
find their way no primrose path; the Mediaeval saints were hard on
themselves and their disciples. We can generalize this history for the
future.
And yet a larger measure of joy and human satisfaction will play around
religion in the future than has been the case in the past. Because of
its supernaturalisms and distortions, religious demands have often been
morbid and full of unnecessary friction. Religion has sought to thwart
and repress human nature rather than to guide and express. But a
religion of human loyalty can be kindly as well as exigent,
mirth-loving as well as stern.
As never before, spiritual values sing to us from life. They sing to
us of the patient love of the parent for the child, of the conquest of
nature by trained intellect, of the quiet labor of the skilled workman,
of the steady loyalties of every-day life, of the willing cooperation
of citizens, of the sweetness of music, of plans for greater social
justice, and of a world made free from war. Spiritual values are
everywhere around us inviting our service. He who asks where they are
is like a man who asks for water when a spring is bubbling beneath his
feet. And yet we have been so blinded by the old ascetic
supernaturalisms that we are slow to realize that these simple human
things are nobly spiritual. So long as there are things worth while,
there will be spiritual values. Is not this positive enough? Need he
who has an inalienable treasure fear robbery?
{217}
To put the situation bluntly, religion must be separated from the
other-worldly pull of the traditional theologies and be sanely grounded
in the outlook of modern knowledge. There is no need for a rabid
anti-theism. The truth is, rather, that mankind is outgrowing theism
in a gentle and steady way until it ceases to have any clear meaning.
This is a hard saying and requires justification. In part, I have
given the justification in the preceding pages; in part, I have given
it elsewhere.[1] But the drift among thinking people is unmistakable.
With the imminent solution of the mind-body problem, the last bulwark
of the old supernaturalism will have fallen. Man will be forced to
acknowledge that he is an earth-child whose drama has meaning only upon
her bosom. It is my firm conviction that the clear realization of this
fact will startle men into insights and demands of far-reaching import.
May it not remove a dead-weight of inhibitions which has kept the human
spirit under bonds to past attitudes and methods? There will no longer
be a divided interest and an uncertain horizon. To many it will come
like a plunge in cold water: but may not such a plunge do them good by
waking them from their dogmatic slumbers?
The interpretation of the physical world of which man is a part must be
left to the cooperative work of {218} science and philosophy. These
will give to us tested and critical knowledge of the processes which go
on around us, of the drift of the stars in the world-spaces, of the
spiral movements of nebular matter, of the evolution of the elements,
of the integration of organic forms, of the development of historic
life. The universe is: it is meaningless to ask whence it came, for it
always was, and time is but a term for the changes which go on within
it.
But, having explored the universe by telescope and microscope, and
having thus come to some understanding of his world, man must return
again to his own pressing problems and possibilities, to his need to
interpret his own good, to his desire to further and maintain those
interests and activities in which he finds self-expression. His own
life, as a realm of affection and action, must rightly be for him the
significant center of the universe. These urgencies, interests,
possibilities, satisfactions, loyalties are inalienably human and
valid. He can no more ignore them than he can his hunger for food and
his thirst for water. Nothing can rob him of the values which he has
created, nor can any one take from him the burden of courageous
endeavor. He is the master of his own destiny and the prompter in his
own drama. In his tenser moments, the physical spaces around his
planet will but contain
"The endless, silly merriment of stars."
As religion learns to relinquish theology and accept the modern view of
the world, the spirituality which it has fostered will mate with
reason. Reason by itself is not enough; feeling by itself is not
enough. What the world awaits is the sane and kindly ministry of a
{219} concrete reason to the goods of human life. Thinking and
experimentation must be instrumental to the progressive betterment of
life. This idea is not new. Many have grasped it before in whole or
in part; but the setting has not always been simple enough. Comte
meant just such a humanism in his religion of humanity, but he was
unable to cut himself loose from his associations with organized
Christianity. There is no adequate motive for the retention of the
ritualism and worship of Comtism, nor is there any good reason for the
deification of humanity. Humanity is not an entity, nor is it a sort
of supreme personality which may be worshiped. Religion will mean the
valuing of experiences and activities, the striving for their
realization, the loyalty to their call. Taken in this way, religion
will agree with and commend the purpose expressed by Huxley: "To
promote the increase of natural knowledge and to forward the
application of scientific methods of investigation to all the problems
of life to the best of my ability, in the conviction which has grown
with my growth, and strengthened with my strength, that there is no
alleviation for the sufferings of mankind except veracity of thought
and action, and the resolute facing of the world as it is, when the
garment of make-believe by which pious hands have hidden its uglier
features is stripped off." This outlook has been called the marriage
of naturalism with philanthropy; it is better to speak of it as the
marriage of naturalism with humanism. It is the belief that a rational
spirituality is possible, natural to man, and, above all things,
desirable.
But if men find their salvation in love for, and loyalty to, values of
various kinds, the practical question {220} becomes that of the
furtherance and support of these values. What are some of the social
conditions of a noble life? Surely education, opportunity and free
association. It is no longer granted to trust the coming of a
supernatural grace which will illuminate life. Such subjective
illumination is only too apt to reflect the temperament of the
individual and to lack that training and breadth of interest which only
education and opportunity for a varied experience can give. Many of
the values which we prize most highly to-day need the soil of culture
and of a complex civilization before they will flourish. To distribute
them widely is the dearest hope of a democracy which looks beyond the
merely political aspects of social institutions. But such a
distribution is a goal which has conditions which must be mastered by
the bending of a keen social intelligence into the service of a genuine
desire for the extension of well-used leisure. I mean that the task of
modern democracy is the securing of economic well-being and a fair
degree of leisure for the mass of the citizens in order that they may
have the time, the energy, and the opportunity to develop themselves
and to put themselves cooperatively into touch with the pleasant and
creative side of life. But I have already touched upon these problems
of social method and aim in another volume.[2]
It is time that I discussed a question which, I have no doubt, has been
hovering in the background of many a reader's mind. Is it justifiable
to retain the term religion when its ancient setting has been so
completely discarded? I have myself asked this question many a {221}
time. For many years, I felt that it would be better to give up the
word entirely as indissolubly bound up with those ideas and beliefs
which the modern trained mind is outgrowing. But I could not hide from
myself the fact that the consciousness of the time was beginning to
employ it in a freer and more constructive way. It had sensed the
element of devotion and loyalty which religion had, in spite of its
many shortcomings, nourished. How common the phrase is that a man has
made a religion of some interest! The socialist is said to make a
religion of socialism, the social reformer of his work of constructive
philanthropy, the artist of his art. We mean that he has thrown
himself whole-heartedly into some one of these fields. And,
positively, this means that he has found that concrete and living
salvation which ideal effort always brings to a man. He is filled with
the spirit of consuming loyalty to what he values. He has left the
mere conventionalities, the run of use-and-wont behind and has exalted
himself with a living purpose which illuminates and concentrates his
being. I think that this spirit and attitude is coming to be called
religious, no matter to what objects it attaches itself. Have we not
here a mark of identity which justifies the retention of the age-old
word? Morality is too cold a word in the ears of most men. Besides,
moral values are only a part of the immense throng of appreciations to
which man responds. There is need of a comprehensive term, able to
take in all those interests and activities which give life its variety
and glory. Is there a better term than religion?
But there must be no mistake about the new setting of the term; no
casuistic ambiguity must be encouraged. We must be firm in our
negations of the old as {222} well as constructive in our affirmation
of the new. I have tried to show that the belief in superhuman spirits
arose in primitive times when man knew little about the world in which
he found himself. Investigators in the history of religion trace the
steps from polydemonism to polytheism and thence to henotheism and
monotheism. Along with this evolution, which reflected changes in
social organization, went a corresponding moral transformation of these
divine beings. Yet the setting of the outlook was largely the same as
in earlier days. Social relations were supposed to control the
universe as a whole. Nature recognized her master in God much as the
subjects of a king greeted him as their lord. His was the might,
majesty, dominion and glory. There is a pathetic incident related of
Carlyle which has meaning in this connection. Mr. Froude told Carlyle,
not long before the latter's death, that he could believe only in a God
who did something. With a cry of pain, Carlyle answered, "He does
nothing." How can we harmonize this cry with his earlier faith in an
Everlasting Will and a Providential Government of the world? It is
impossible to do so. Romantic spiritualism must give way to a
humanistic naturalism which sees clearly the place of man in the world.
Morality, science and art are man's creation and distinctive
possession. What he needs is a stable, law-abiding environment within
which to work. He has this, and has gained some mastery of it. The
further necessary step is mastery of himself and of those huge
institutions which have grown up and now threaten to make him circle
within their orbits. Man has battles still to fight.
The religion of the future will increasingly be concerned with two
things, virtues and values. The Greek {223} virtues have been made
tenderer by the Christian virtues and more steadfast by that training
of the will and character which we associate with puritanism. The
experience of the ages has deepened and broadened man, made him less
hasty in judgment, more aware of his limitations, more realistic, more
efficient. At the same time, it has added that touch of pathos which
spiritualizes the beauty of life. We believe, also, that it has
nourished that sentiment of tenderness for the homely fate of the
average man that will some day find expression in a fuller democracy
than has as yet dawned upon the earth.
But, above all, religion must be catholic in its count of values.
Wherever there is loyal endeavor, it will acknowledge the presence of
the spiritual. It will reverence the philosopher who has found
salvation in the solution of complex intellectual problems, the
scientist who has given himself to the whole-hearted study of nature,
the missionary who has devoted himself to the spread of an elevating
conception of life, the kindly physician who has sought to alleviate
human suffering, the social reformer who has spent his life in
agitating for a saner social polity, the artist who has had a vision of
beauty and has labored to express it in such a way that all men could
share it, the man and woman who have met the tasks of every day with
courage and charity. And it will seek to bring these values to closer
acquaintance with each other than has hitherto been the case. The
guidance of a kindly and clear-eyed reason will not be regarded with
suspicion, for this human faith will have nothing to fear, because
having no tottering creed to sustain. What a relief it will be to have
the narrow sectarianism, the cruel bigotry, the obscurantism of {224}
supernaturalism purged from religion! These unlovely features of man's
spiritual life had their rootage in the distrust of human nature and of
human reason, in a certain slavishness of soul continuous with the
distant days of man's ignorance and fear. They will lessen and pass
away as knowledge increases, as liberty becomes concrete and
significant, as a more spiritual courage grows among the mass of men.
And, in my opinion, there is nothing more calculated to hasten the
growth of this buoyancy and moral courage than a larger measure of
social justice in the common affairs of life.
And, in this mission of adjustment and service between the various
values of life, reason will have a co-equal as a helper. Surely, art
will come more and more to its own in the life which is opening up
before us! Man's soul will crave gracious surroundings, the harmony of
well-constructed dwellings, the restfulness of dawn and flowers, the
elevation of noble buildings. Ugliness and squalor will be repugnant
to him, for he will know their spiritual cost. But man will not only
seek healthy and beautiful surroundings, he will also be desirous to
interpret all phases of his life to himself. And in this effort at
interpretation he will succeed ever more fully in seeing the various
sides of his life as parts of a whole. Art will set itself the task of
giving significance and depth to nature, to industry, to the home, to
public life, to science. And, as art begins to perform this mission of
interpretation, it will cease to be thought of as a mere decoration,
the plaything of the rich. It will be conceived as the means for the
expression of those various loyalties which will ennoble and
spiritualize life. As the human race grows healthier {225} and happier
it will employ to the full that gift of all gifts it has in its
possession, the capacity to clothe things with gracious forms and give
its deepest feelings a human voice. Art will be the high-priest of the
religion of loyalty to the values of life.
To those accustomed to the old mythological setting of religion with
its glance away from human life as a whole, this prophecy will but
confirm their conviction of the revolutionary character of the thesis
which this book has sought to champion. But I feel certain that, if
they will permit themselves a dispassionate study of the facts, they
will, sooner or later, be forced to acknowledge the inevitableness of
the conclusion. If religion is to survive, it must be human and
social. It is they who insist upon a supernatural foundation and
object who are its enemies. Man's life is spiritual in its own right.
So long as he shall dream of beauty and goodness and truth his life
will not lack religion.
[1] Those who are interested in a constructive philosophical position
which meets the results of modern science may be referred to my two
books, _Critical Realism_ and _The Essentials of Philosophy_. I have
there shown that the mind-body dualism has been due to a false way of
approach. Psychology gives knowledge about the functional capacities
of the nervous system additional to that given by the physical science,
and in no way conflicting with it, and consciousness is in the brain.
[2] See especially _The Next Step in Democracy_, ch. 5.
THE END
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{227}
INDEX
Agency, impersonal, 117 f.; limits of personal, 121 f.
Agnosticism, and theodicy, 154 f.
Albigenses, 162
Arminianism, 161
Asceticism, 156; protestant, 202
Attis, 23
Attis mysteries, 24
Balder, 21
Biblical criticism, 66
Bibliolatry, 204
Brain, discussion of, 136
Buddhism, 138
Calvinism, 164
Cathars, 162
Christianity, origins of, 58 f.; historical approach to, 60 f.; setting
of, 68 f.; democratic movements in, 73; in transition, 95 f.; naivete
of doctrines, 101 f.
Christian mythology, 28
Church, organization of, 92, 187
Copernican theory, 100 f.
Creation, stories of, 30 f.
Criticism, higher, 128, 131 f.
Demons, Jesus's belief in, 127
Devil, a personal, 155
Dionysus, 18
Dogmatism, tendency to, 65
Dreams, influence of, 143
Ethics, and early religion, 170 f.; in the Middle Ages, 173 f.;
heteronomous, 175 f.; modern, 177 f.; 184 f.
Evil, for primitive man, 153; and Satan, 156; created by God, 158; as
illusion, 164 f.; disappearance of problem of, 165
Evolution, and myth, 41 f.; biological, 104 f.
Faith cures, 132
Gnosticism, 87 f.
God, for Christianity, 115 f.; ideas of, 159 f.
Great War, 2, 11
Hades, 140
Hell, 177
Humanism, 192
Humanitarianism, 5
Immortality, arguments for, 146 f.; and early peoples, 139 f.; and
Christianity, 142; philosophical aspect of, 148 f.
Incarnation, 90
Infallibility, 204
Insanity, 146 f.
James, Wm., 145
Jesus, 75, 79 f.; death of, 82; as Messiah, 85; become God, 91; and the
Hebrew prophets, 158 f.
Job, 154.
Kant, Immanuel, 147 f.
Kempis, Thomas a, 180
Koran, 62
Lang, Andrew, 17
Laws, universal, 118
Lyell, scientific canon of, 132
Magic, 44 f.
Magicians, 50
Manicheism, 162
McGiffert, quoted, 7
Mill, John Stuart, 163
Miracles, 123 f.; of Jesus, 127 f; evidence for, 130 f.; and their
logic, 133
Mithraism, 23, 69.
Monastic orders, 194
Monotheism, ethical, 91, 115; Christian, 111 f.; of Isaiah, 158 f.
Morality, 173
Mythology, 14 f.
Myths, and morality, 24 f.; surrendering of, 108
Name, influence of, 51 f.
Naturalism, 2
Newman, Cardinal, 187
Original sin, 157
Osiris, 23
Paul, 70, 73
Pauline Christianity, 86 f.
Philo, 90
Prometheus, 17
Prophets, Hebrew, 171 f.
Protestantism, beginnings of, 93; aspects of, 199 f.; sects of, 205
Providence, 144 f.
Reformation, 205
Reinach, 17
Religion, new perspective in, 6, 10; of the Hebrews, 27; and magic, 53
f.; in early times, 170; social side of, 190
Ritual, 19 f.; and Christianity, 23
Robinson, quoted, 200
Roman Empire, 189, 192
Sacraments, 192
Salvation, 8 f.; and immortality, 141 f., 201
Satan, 155
Savior, 157
Science, 62 f.
Secular life, growth of, 195 f.
Sheol, 18, 140 f.
Skepticism, 110
Social democracy, 5
Spiritual, the, 11, 196
Spiritual courage, 2
Spiritualism, 11
St. Augustine, 159, 162
St. Francis, 73.
Strauss, 64
Synoptic gospels, 77 f.
Theology, and ethics, 164
Totemism, 15 f.
Tradition, harm of, 10
Tyndall, 135
Unitarian movement, 206
Universe, new view of, 3 f.
Wells, H. G., 162, 184 f.
Yahweh, 26 f.
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"Broad, profound scholarship, close relationship with progressive
sentiment all over the land, and unusual powers of keen analysis and
graphic statement are forceful elements in 'The New Horizon of State
and Church.'"--_Philadelphia North American_.
The Christian Man, the Church and the War
BY ROBERT E. SPEER
Dr. Speer here discusses the essentials of a problem which has
exercised Christian men since the beginning of the war. He deals with
it sanely and in a manner that will be considered distinctly helpful.
The Assurance of Immortality
BY HARRY EMERSON FOSDICK
"Will be welcomed by those who need to be shown how much it means to
this world to believe that this life is but part of a vast
forever."--_Boston Transcript_.
The Church and the Man
BY DONALD HANKEY
"Filled with the wise sincerity of a religious conviction that cares
little for creed and miracle, that finds the whole _vade mecum_ of life
in the simple facts of Christ's active work among men."--_Boston
Transcript_.
Are You Human?
BY WILLIAM DEWITT HYDE
"Like a stinging fresh breeze laden with the very salt of life and
vigor.... Every man ought to get and digest this book."--_Pacific
Churchman_.
The Best Man I Know
BY WILLIAM DEWITT HYDE
"All the virtues and the graces that make for fine quality of life are
included. They are presented with a vigor that is like the sting of
salt winds, bracing and wholesome."--_Christian Register_.
It's All in the Day's Work
BY HENRY CHURCHILL KING
"Good bracing counsel ... a book for all who wish to acquit themselves
well in the battle of life."--_The Dial_.
THE MACMILLAN COMPANY
Publishers -- 64-66 Fifth Avenue -- New York
End of Project Gutenberg's The Next Step in Religion, by Roy Wood Sellars