THE STRUGGLE FOR THE CHILD.
If the truth of what has been said above be admitted, it follows that
civilization has two fundamental aspects. On the one side there is the
environment, made up--so far as civilized humanity is concerned--of the
ideas, the beliefs, the customs, and the stored up knowledge of
preceding generations, and on the other side we have an organism which
in virtue of its education responds to the environmental stimuli in a
given manner. Between the man of to-day and the man of an earlier
generation the vital distinction is not that the present day one is, as
an organism, better, that he has keener sight, or stronger muscles, or a
brain of greater capacity, but that he has a truer perception of things,
and in virtue of his enlarged knowledge is able to mould natural forces,
including the impulses of his own nature, in a more desirable manner.
And he can do this because, as I have already said, he inherits what
previous generations have acquired, and so reaps the benefits of what
they have done.
We may illustrate this in a very simple manner. One of the most striking
differences between the man of to-day and the man of the past is the
attitude of the two in relation to natural phenomena. To the people of
not so many generations ago an eclipse was a very serious thing, fraught
with the promise of disaster to mankind. The appearance of a comet was
no less ominous. John Knox saw in comets an indication of the wrath of
heaven, and in all countries the Churches fought with all their might
against the growth of the scientific view. Away back in antiquity we
meet with the same view. There is, for example, the classic case of the
Greek general Nikias, who, when about to extricate his army from a
dangerous position before Syracuse, was told that an eclipse of the sun
indicated that the gods wished him to stay where he was for three times
nine days. Nikias obeyed the oracles with the result that his army was
captured. Now it is certain that no general to-day would act in that
manner, and if he did it is equally certain that he would be
court-martialled. Equally clear is it that comets and eclipses have
ceased to infect the modern mind with terror, and are now only objects
of study to the learned, and of curiosity to the unlearned. But the
difference here is entirely one of knowledge. Our ancestors reacted to
the appearance of a comet or an eclipse in a particular manner because
their knowledge of these things was of a certain kind. It was not at all
a case of feeling, or of degree of feeling, or of having a better brain,
but simply a matter of reacting to an environmental influence in terms
of an understanding of certain things. Had we the same conception of
these things that our ancestors had we should react in the same manner.
We act differently because our understanding of things is different. We
may put it briefly that the kind of reaction which we make to the things
around us is mainly determined by our knowledge concerning their nature.
There is one other fact that brings into prominence the importance of
the kind of reaction which we make to environmental stimuli. Put
briefly, we may say that an important distinction between the animal and
man is that the animal passes its existence in a comparatively simple
environment where the experiences are few in kind and often repeated,
whereas with man the environment is very complex, the experiences are
varied in character, and may be only repeated after long intervals. The
consequence is that in order to get through life an animal needs a few
simple instincts which automatically respond to frequently repeated
experiences, while on the other hand there must be with man opportunity
for the kind of response which goes under the name of intelligent
action. It is this which gives us the reason, or the explanation, why of
all animals the human being is born the most helpless, and why he
remains helpless for a longer period than does any other. The prolonged
infancy is the opportunity given to the human being to acquire the
benefits of education and so to reap the full advantage of that social
heritage which, as we have shown, raises him so far above the level of
past generations. Or we may express the matter with the late Professor
Fiske, who was the first, I think, to dwell at length upon this
phenomenon, that the distinction between man and the animal world is
that in the one case we have developed instincts with small capacity for
education, in the other few instincts with great capacity for education.
It is often said that the Churches have failed to pay attention to
education, or have not taken it seriously. That is quite wrong. It may,
indeed, be said that they have never failed to attend to education, and
have always taken it seriously--with disastrous results to education and
to social life. Ever since the birth of the modern movement for
education the Church has fought hard to maintain its control of schools,
and there is every reason why this should be so. Survival in the animal
world may be secured in two ways. On the one side we may have a
continuance of a special sort of environment to which a given structure
is properly adapted; on the other there may be a modification of the
animal to meet the demands of a changing environment.
Applying this principle to the question of the Churches and education
the moral is clear. The human environment changes more than that of any
other animal. The mere amassing of experience and its expression in the
form of new institutions or in the modification of already existing
ones, is enough to effect a change in the environment of successive
generations. The Christian Church, or for the matter of that, any form
of religion, has before it two possible courses. Either it must maintain
an environment that is as little as possible unchanged, or it must
modify its body of teaching to meet the changed surroundings. As a mere
matter of fact both processes go on side by side, but consciously the
Churches have usually followed the course of trying to maintain an
unchanged environment. This is the real significance of the attempt of
the more orthodox to boycott new, or heretical literature, or lectures,
or to produce a "religious atmosphere" round the child. It is an attempt
to create an environment to which the child's mind will respond in a
manner that is favourable to the claims and teachings of the Christian
Church. The Church dare not openly and plainly throw overboard its body
of doctrines to meet the needs of the modern mind; and the only thing
remaining is to keep the modern mind as backward as possible in order
that it may rest content with a teaching that is reminiscent of a past
stage of civilization.
In this connection it is interesting to note that the struggle for the
child is essentially a modern phrase. So long as the teaching of
religion is in, at least, a working harmony with current knowledge and
the general body of the social forces the question of religious
instruction does not emerge. Life itself--social life that is--to a very
considerable extent enforces religious teaching. At all events it does
not violently contradict it. But as, owing to the accumulation of
knowledge, views of the world and of man develop that are not in harmony
with accepted religious teaching, the Churches are forced to attempt the
maintenance of an environment of a special religious kind to which their
teaching is adapted. Hence the growing prominence of the division of
secular and sacred as things that have to do with religion and things
that have not. Hence, too, the importance to the Churches of acquiring
power over the child's mind before it is brought completely under the
influence of an environment in which orthodox teachings can only present
themselves as a gross anachronism.
Thus, one may say with absolute confidence that if in a modern
environment a child was left free with regard to modern influences there
is nothing that would lead to an acceptance of religion. Our ancestors
grew up familiar with the idea of the miraculous and the supernatural
generally because there was nothing in the existing knowledge of the
world that contradicted it. But what part is there in the general
education of the child in modern society that would lead to that end? So
far as it is taught anything about the world it learns to regard it in
terms of causation and of positive knowledge. It finds itself surrounded
with machinery, and inventions, and with a thousand and one mechanical
and other inventions which do not in the very remotest degree suggest
the supernatural. In other words, the response of a modern child in a
modern environment is of a strictly non-religious kind. Left alone it
would no more become religious in the sense of believing in the
religious teachings of any of the Churches than it would pass through
life looking for miracles or accepting fairy tales as sober statements
of historic fact. It would no more express itself in terms of religion
than it would describe an eclipse in the language of our ancestors of
five hundred years ago.
In self defence the Churches are thus bound to make a fight for the
possession of the child. They cannot wait, because that means allowing
the child to grow to maturity and then dealing with it when it is able
to examine religion with some regard to its historic evolution, and with
a due appreciation of the hopelessly unscientific character of the
conception of the supernatural. They must, so far as they can, protect
the growing child from the influence of all those environmental forces
that make for the disintegration of religious beliefs. The only way in
which the Churches can at all make sure of a supply of recruits is by
impressing them before they are old enough to resist. As the Germany of
the Kaiser is said to have militarized the nation by commencing with the
schools, so the Churches hope to keep the nations religious by
commencing with the children. Apart from these considerations there is
no reason why religion could not wait, as other subjects wait, till the
child is old enough to understand and appreciate it. But with the
Churches it is literally the child or nothing.
From the point of view of citizenship the retention of religion in State
schools is a manifest injustice. If ever religious instruction could be
justified in any circumstances it is when the religion taught represents
at least the professed beliefs of the whole of the people. But that is
clearly not the case to-day. Only a section of the people can be called,
even formally, Christian. Large numbers are quite opposed to
Christianity, and large numbers deliberately reject all religion. How,
then, can the State undertake the teaching of a religion without at the
same time rousing resentment in and inflicting an injustice on a large
number of its members? It cannot be done, and the crowning absurdity is
that the State acknowledges the non-essential character of religion by
permitting all who will to go without. In secular subjects it permits no
such option. It says that all children shall receive certain tuition in
certain subjects for a given period. It makes instruction in these
subjects compulsory on the definite and intelligible ground that the
education given is necessary to the intelligent discharge of the duties
of citizenship. It does not do that in the case of religion, and it dare
not do that. No government to-day would have the impudence to say that
discharge of the duties of citizenship is dependent upon acceptance of
the Athanasian Creed, or upon the belief in the Bible, or in an after
life. And not being able to say this it is driven to the absurd position
of, on the one hand saying to the people, that religion shall be taught
in the State schools, and on the other, if one doesn't care to have it
he may leave it alone without suffering the slightest disqualification.
Indeed, it is impossible for instruction in religion to be genuinely
called education at all. If I may be allowed to repeat what I have said
elsewhere on this subject, one may well ask:--
What is it that the genuine educationalist aims at? The imparting
of knowledge is, of course, essential. But, in the main, education
consists in a wholesome training of mind and body, in forming
habits of cleanliness, truthfulness, honesty, kindness, the
development of a sense of duty and of justice. Can it be said in
truth that what is called religious instruction does these things,
or that instruction in them is actually inseparable from religion?
Does the creation of a religious "atmosphere," the telling of
stories of God or Jesus or angels or devils--I omit hell--have any
influence in the direction of cultivating a sound mind in a sound
body? Will anyone contend that the child has even a passing
understanding of subjects over which all adults are more or less
mystified? To confuse is not to instruct, to mystify is not to
enlighten, the repetition of meaningless phrases can leave behind
no healthy residuum in the mind. It is the development of capacity
along right lines that is important, not the mere cramming of
verbal formulae. Above all, it is the function of the true teacher
to make his pupil independent of him. The aim of the priest is to
keep one eternally dependent upon his ministrations. The final and
fatal criticism upon religious instruction is that it is not
education at all.
It may be argued that a policy of creating sentiments in favour of
certain things not wholly understood by the child is followed in
connection with matters other than religion. We do not wait until a
child is old enough to appreciate the intellectual justification of
ethics to train it in morals. And in many directions we seek to
develop some tendencies and to suppress others in accordance with
an accepted standard. All this may be admitted as quite true, but
it may be said in reply that these are things for which an adequate
reason _can_ be given, and we are sure of the child's approbation
when it is old enough to appreciate what has been done. But in the
case of religion the situation is altogether different. We are here
forcing upon the child as true, as of the same admitted value as
ordinary ethical teaching, certain religious doctrines about which
adults themselves dispute with the greatest acrimony. And there is
clearly a wide and vital distinction between cultivating in a child
sentiments the validity of which may at any time be demonstrated,
or teachings upon the truth of which practically all adults are
agreed, and impressing upon it teachings which all agree may be
false. We are exploiting the child in the interests of a Church.
Parents are allowing themselves to be made the catspaws of priests;
and it is not the least formidable of the counts against the
Church's influence that it converts into active enemies of children
those who should stand as their chief protectors. It is religion
which makes it true that "a _child's_ foes shall be those of his
own household."[14]
[14] _Religion and the Child_, Pioneer Press.
Where the claim to force religion upon the child breaks down on such
grounds as those outlined above it is quite certain that it cannot be
made good upon any other ground. Historically, it is also clear that we
do not find that conduct was better in those ages when the Christian
religion was held most unquestioningly, but rather the reverse. The
moralization of the world has, as a matter of historic fact, kept pace
with the secularizing of life. This is true both as regards theory and
fact. The application of scientific methods to ethical problems has
taught us more of the nature of morality in the short space of three or
four generations than Christian teaching did in a thousand years. And it
is not with an expansion of the power and influence of religion that
conduct has undergone an improvement, but with the bringing of people
together in terms of secular relationships and reducing their religious
beliefs to the level of speculative ideas which men may hold or reject
as they think fit, so long as they do not allow them to influence their
relations to one another.
On all grounds it is urgent that the child should be rescued from the
clutches of the priest. It is unfair to the child to so take advantage
of its trust, its innocence, and its ignorance, and to force upon it as
true teachings that which we must all admit may be false, and which, in
a growing number of cases, the child when it grows up either rejects
absolutely or considerably modifies. It is unjust to the principle upon
which the modern State rests, because it is teaching the speculative
beliefs of a few with money raised from the taxation of all. The whole
tendency of life in the modern State is in the direction of
secularization--confining the duties and activities of the State to
those actions which have their meaning and application to this life.
Every argument that is valid against the State forcing religion upon the
adult is valid also against the State forcing religion upon the child.
And, on the other hand, it is really absurd to say that religion must be
forced upon the child, but we are outraging the rights of the individual
and perpetuating an intolerable wrong if we force it upon the adult.
Surely the dawning and developing individuality of the child has claims
on the community that are not less urgent than those of the adult.
Finally, the resolve to rescue the child from the clutches of the priest
is in the interest of civilization itself. All human experience shows
that a civilization that is under the control of a priesthood is doomed.
From the days of ancient Egypt there is no exception to this rule. And
sooner or later a people, if they are to progress, are compelled to
attempt to limit the control of the priest over life. The whole of the
struggle of the Reformation was fundamentally for the control of the
secular power--whether life should or should not be under the control of
the Church. In that contest, over a large part of Europe, the Roman
Church lost. But the victory was only a very partial one. It was never
complete. The old priest was driven out, but the new Presbyter remained,
and he was but the old tyrant in another form. Ever since then the fight
has gone on, and ever since, the Protestant minister, equally with the
Catholic priest, has striven for the control of education and so to
dominate the mind of the rising generation. The fight for the liberation
of the child is thus a fight for the control or the directing of
civilization. It is a question of whether we are to permit the priest to
hold the future to ransom by permitting this control of the child, or
whether we are to leave religious beliefs, as we leave other beliefs of
a speculative character, to such a time as the child is old enough to
understand them. It is a fight for the future of civilization.