effort. They have at once the strength and the weakness of the standing
army system, they produce a body of officials keen to carry out their
objects and careless of other issues, and they release individuals
from the duty of serving the need they have recognised. That the
sensational method of rousing the charitable activities has resulted
in organisation rather than in association may be seen by reference
to the Charities Register, with its long record of new societies and
institutions. That it also inspires with party spirit the associations
which it forms is more difficult of proof. Strong statements which are
necessary to advertisement can hardly, though, be fair statements, and
loud statements can rarely be exhaustively accurate. Where there is in
the beginning neither fairness of feeling nor accuracy of thought there
will be afterwards a repetition of the old theological hatred.
‘Ye know not what spirit ye are of,’ said Christ to His disciples, who,
ignorant of His purpose, would have used force in His service against
the Samaritans. The same party spirit still sometimes inspires those
who hold grand beliefs and support great causes, the height and depth
and breadth of which they have had neither time nor will to measure;
and such a spirit degrades their character. It is not a gain to a man
to be a Christian or a Liberal if by so doing he becomes certain that
there is no right nor truth on the side of a Mohammedan or of a Tory.
He has not, that is, risen to the height of his character: rather, as
Mr. Coleridge says, ‘He who begins by loving Christianity better than
the truth will proceed by loving his own sect or Church better than
Christianity, and end in loving himself better than all.’ A teetotaller
will not add so much to society by his temperance as he will take away
from society if his character becomes proud or narrow.
Party spirit--the spirit, that is, which is roused and limited by
some hasty view of truth or right--is likely to make men unjust and
cruel, and so a method of reform which produces this spirit cannot be
approved. In the name of the grandest causes, missionaries were in old
times cruel, and philanthropists are in modern times unjust.
Lastly, (3) those who have claimed for sensationalism the parentage of
some law have been met by the paradox that laws and institutions rarely
exist till they have ceased to be wanted. In England public opinion
condemns cruelty to animals, and so a society has been created. In
Egypt, where the need is greater, but where there is no public opinion
to condemn the cruelty, there is no society. Certain it is, at any
rate, that the statute-book is cumbered with laws passed in a moment of
moral excitement which remain without influence because they have never
represented the true level of public opinion.
Where arguments are so urged for and against sensationalism it may be
useful if, out of thirteen years’ experience of East London life,
I shortly collect what seem to be some of the effects on character
developed during this period.
The first effect which is manifest is the great increase of humanity
in the richer classes. This is shown not only by talk, by drawing-room
meetings, and by newspaper articles, but by actual service among the
poor. The number of those who go about East London to do good is
largely increased. The increase is, though, I believe, greatest among
those philanthropists who aim to apply principles rather than to
provide relief. There have always been people of good-will ready to
give and to teach; there is now an increase in their numbers, but the
marked increase is among those who, following Mrs. Nassau Senior, work
registry offices, on the principle that friends are the best avenues
by which young girls can find places; or, following Miss Octavia Hill,
become rent collectors, on the principle that the relation of landlord
and tenant may be made conducive to the best good; or, following
Miss Nightingale, take up the work of nursing, on the principle that
the service of the sick is the highest service; or, following the
founders of the Charity Organisation Society, examine into the causes
of poverty, on the principle that it is better to prevent than to cure
evil; or, following Miss Miranda Hill, give their talents to making
beauty common, on the principle that rich and poor have equal powers of
enjoying what is good; or, following Edmund Denison, come to live in
East London and do the duties of citizens, on the principle that only
they who share the neighbourhood really share the life of the poor.
In all these cases the increase began more than thirteen years ago,
and it must be allowed that the development of humanity which they
represent is not of that form which can as a rule be traced to the use
of sensationalism.
Another effect I notice as generally present is increase of impatience.
The richer classes seeing things that have been hidden, and ignorant
that any improvement has been going on, have taken up with ready-made
schemes. Irritated that the poor should find obstacles to relief in
times of sickness, they, in their hurry, give the pauper a vote, but
leave him to get his relief under degrading conditions. Angry that
children should be hungry, but too anxious to consider other things
than hunger, they start an inadequate system of penny dinners which
keeps starvation alive. Stirred by the news of uninhabitable houses,
and insanitary areas, and brutal offences, they pass stringent laws and
take no steps to see that the laws are administered. Affected by the
thought that the majority of the people have neither pleasure-ground,
nor space for play, nor water for cleanliness, they raise a chorus of
abuse against London government, but do not deny themselves every day
the bottle of wine or the useless luxury which would give to Kilburn a
park or to East London a People’s Palace. Hearing that the masses are
irreligious, means are supported without regard as to what must be the
influence on thoughtful men of associating religion with things which
are not true, nor honourable, nor lovely, nor of good report.
On all sides among persons of good-will there seems to be the belief
that things done _for_ people are more effective than things done
_with_ people. There is an absence of the patience--the passionate
patience--which is content to examine, to serve, to wait, and even to
fail, so long as what is done shall be well done.
The same impatience which takes this shape among the richer classes is,
I think, to be seen among the poorer classes in a growing animosity
against the rich for being rich. Strong words and angry threats have
become common. All suffering and much sin are laid at the doors of the
rich, and speakers are approved who say that if by any means property
could be more equally shared, more happiness and virtue would follow.
Schemes, therefore, which offer such means are welcomed almost without
inquiry. Artisans, roused by what they hear of the state in which their
poorer neighbours live, misled often by what they see, do not inquire
into causes of sin and sorrow. Scamps and idlers come forward with
cries which get popular support, and the mass of the poor now cherish
such a jealous disposition that, were they suddenly to inherit the
place of the richer classes, they would inherit their vices also and
make a state of society in no way better than the present.
There may be such a thing as a noble impatience, but the impatience
which has lately been added to character of both rich and poor is not
such as to make observers sanguine of the social reform which it may
accomplish. The old saying is still true, ‘He that believeth shall not
make haste.’
The other effect on character which has become manifest is one at which
I have already hinted. It is a growing disposition among all classes to
trust in ‘societies,’ whose rules become the authority of the workers
and whose extension becomes the aim of their work. Men give all their
energies to get recruits for their ‘army,’ recognition for their
clubs, and more room for their operations. ‘Societies’ seem thus to
be very fountains of strength, and the only method of action. Bishops
aim to strengthen the Church by speaking of it as a ‘society,’ and
individual ministers try to keep their parishes distinct with a name,
an organisation, and an aim which are independent of other parishes.
The lovers of emigration have for the same reason grouped themselves in
no less than fourteen societies, and it has seemed that even to give
music to the people has required the creation of three large societies.
A ‘society’ has indeed taken in many minds the place of a priest, its
authority has given the impetus and the aim to action, but it has
tended to make those whom it rules weak and bigoted. I see, therefore,
in the members of these societies much energy, but less of the spirit
which is willing to break old bonds and to go on, if need be, in the
loneliness of originality, trusting in God. I see much self-devotion,
but more also of the spirit of competition, more of the self-assertion
which yields nothing for the sake of co-operation.
If now I had to sum up what seems to me to be the effect on character
of the method of striving and crying, I should say that the possible
increase of humanity is balanced by increase of impatience, by
sacrifice of originality, and by narrowness. Whether there is loss or
gain it is impossible to say, but it will be useful, considering the
end in view, to see how the most may be made of the gain and the least
of the loss.
The end to be aimed at is one to be stated in the language either of
Isaiah or of the modern politician. We all look for a time when there
shall be no more hunger nor thirst, when love will share the strength
of the few among the many, and when God shall take away tears from
every eye. Or, putting the same end in other words, we all look for a
time when the conditions of existence shall be such that it will be
possible for every man and woman not only to live decently, but also
to enjoy the fulness of life which comes from friendships and from
knowledge.
For such an end all are concerned to work. Comparing the things that
are with the things that ought to be, some may strive and cry, others
may work silently, but none can be careless.
None can approve a condition of society where the mass of the people
remain ignorant even of the language through which come thought,
comfort, and inspiration. Let it be remembered that now the majority
are, as it were, deaf and dumb, for the mass of the nation cannot ask
for what their higher nature needs, and cannot hear the Word of God
without which man is not able to live. None can approve a condition
of society where, while one is starving, another is drunken; where in
one part of a town a man works without pleasure to end his days in the
workhouse, while in the other part of the town a man idles his days
away and is always ‘as one that is served.’ None can look on and think
that it always must be that the hardest workers shall not earn enough
to secure themselves by cleanliness and by knowledge against those
temptations which enter by dirt and ignorance, while many have wealth
which makes it almost impossible for them to enter the kingdom of God.
A time must come when men shall hunger no more, nor thirst any more,
when there shall be no tears which love cannot wipe away, and no pain
which knowledge cannot remove. For this end everyone who knows ‘the
mission of man’ must by some means work.
That all may avoid the loss and secure the gain which belongs to their
various methods, it seems to me that they would be wise to remember two
things--(1) that national organisations deserve support rather than
party organisations, and (2) that the only test of real progress is to
be found in the development of character.
A national organisation is not only more effective on account of its
strength and extent, but also on account of its freedom from party
spirit. Its members are bound to sit down by the side of those who
differ from themselves, and are thus bound to take a wider view of
their work. They are all under the control of the same body which
controls the nation, and they thus serve only one master. A public
library, for instance, which is worked by the municipality will be more
useful than one worked by a society or a company. The books will not
be chosen to promulgate the doctrines of a sect so much as to extend
knowledge, and its management will not be so arranged as to please any
large subscriber so much as to please the people. Instead, therefore,
of starting societies, it would be wise for social reformers to throw
their strength into national organisations.
The Board of Guardians might thus be made efficient in giving relief.
From its funds and with the help of its organisation a much more
perfect scheme of emigration could be worked than by private societies
whose funds are limited and whose inquiries are incomplete. The
workhouse might provide such a system of industrial training as would
fit the inmates on their discharge both to take and to enjoy labour.
It is as much by others’ neglect as by their own fault that so many
strong men and women drift to the relieving officer, unable to earn
a living because they have never been taught to work. The poor-law
infirmary, too, properly organised under doctors and nurses and visited
by ladies, might be the school of purity and the home of discipline in
which the fallen might be helped to find strength. The pauper schools
in which, by the service of devoted officers, education could be
perfected might do better work than the schools and orphanages which
depend on voluntary offerings and often aim at narrow issues. The
Guardians, moreover, having the power over out-relief, have in their
hands a great instrument for good or evil. Rightly used, the power
gives to many who are weak a new strength, as they realise that refusal
implies respect, and that a system of relief which encourages one to
bluster and another to cringe cannot be good.
The School Board might, in the same way, be made to cover the aims of
the educationalists. As managers of individual schools these reformers
could bring themselves into close connection with teachers and
children. They could show the teachers what is implied in knowledge,
introduce books of wider views, and they could visit the children’s
homes, arrange for their holidays, and see to their pleasures. Much
more important is it that the schools under the nation’s control should
be good than that special schools should be started to achieve certain
results. In connection, too, with the Board it is possible to have
night classes, which should be in reality classes in higher education,
and means both of promoting friendship and gaining knowledge.
Then there are the municipal bodies, the Vestries and Boards of Works,
who largely control the conditions which people of goodwill strive
to improve. It rests with these bodies to build habitable houses and
to see that those built are habitable, and they are responsible for
the lighting and cleaning of the streets. It is in their power to
open libraries and reading-rooms, to make for every neighbourhood a
common drawing-room, to build baths so that cleanliness is no longer
impossible, and perhaps even to supply music in open spaces. It is by
their will, or rather by their want of will, that the houses exist in
which the young are tempted to their ruin, and it only needs their
energy to work a reform at which purity societies vainly strive.
Lastly, there is the national organisation which is the greatest of
all, the Church, the society of societies, the body whose object it is
to carry out the aim of all societies, to be the centre of charitable
effort, to spread among high and low the knowledge of the Highest,
to enforce on all the supremacy of duty over pleasure, and to tell
everywhere the Gospel which is joy and peace. If the Church fulfilled
its object, there would be no need of societies or of sects. If the
Church fails, it is because it is allowed to remain under the control
of a clerical body; its charity tends thus to become limited, its ideas
of duty are affected by its organisation, and it preaches not what is
taught by the Holy Spirit, who is ‘the Giver of life’ now as in the
past, but it teaches only what its governing body remembers of the past
teaching of that Spirit. All this would be changed if the people were
put in the place of this clerical body. The Church would then be the
expression of the national will to do good, to distribute the best and
to please God.
Because the national organisations are so vast, and because association
with them is the most adequate check on the growth of party spirit, it
is by their means that the best work can be done. The cost involved
may at times be great. It may be hard to endure the slow movement of a
public body while the majority of that body is being educated; it may
be bitter work for the ardent Christian to endure the officialism of a
public institution; it may seem wrong that profane hands should mould
the Church organisation; but the cost is well endured. The national
organisations do exist, and will exist, if not for good, then for evil.
They are vast, a part of the life of the nation, and the cost which is
paid for association with them is often the cost of the self-assertion
which, if it sometimes is the cause of success, is also the cause of
shame.
Further, at this moment when many methods of social reform offer
themselves, it seems to me that all would be wise to remember that the
only test of progress is in the development of character. Institutions,
societies, laws, count for nothing unless they tend to make people
stronger to choose the good and refuse the evil. Redistribution of
wealth would be of little service if in the process many became
dishonest. A revolution would be no progress which put one selfish
class in the place of another. The test, then, which all must apply
to what they are doing is its effect on character, and this test
rigorously applied will make safe all methods both new and old. When it
is applied there will be a strange shifting of epithets. Things called
‘great’ will seem to be small, and efforts passed by in contempt will
be seen to be greatest.
The man in East London who, judged by this test, stands among the
highest is, I think, one who, belonging to no society, committed to
no scheme of reform, has worked out plan after plan till all have
been lost in greater plans. Years before the evils lately advertised
were known, he had discovered them, and had begun to apply remedies
unthought of by the impatient. He has won no name, made no appeal,
started no institution, and founded no society, but by him characters
have been formed which are the strength of homes in which force is
daily gathering for right. The women, too, whose work has borne best
fruit are those who, having the enthusiasm of humanity, have had
patience to wait while they work. After ten years such women now
see families who have been raised from squalor to comfort, and are
surrounded by girls to whom their friendship has given the best armour
against temptation.
That work of these has been great because it has strengthened
character, and there are other fields in which like work may be done.
Conditions have a large influence on character, and the hardships of
life may be as prejudicial to the growth of character as the luxuries.
They, therefore, who work to get good houses and good schools, who
provide means of intercourse and high teaching, who increase the
comforts of the poor, may also claim to be strengthening character.
One I know who by patient service on boards has greatly changed some
of the conditions under which 70,000 people have to live. He has
never advertised his methods nor collected money for his system; he
has simply given up pleasure and holidays to be regular at meetings;
he has at the meetings, by patience and good temper, won the ear of
his fellows, while by his inquiries into details and by his thorough
mastery of his subject he has won their respect. A change has thus been
made on account of which many have more energy, many more comfort, and
many more hope.
One other I can remember who, even more unknown and unnoticed, came
to live in East London. He gathered a few neighbours together, and
gradually in talk opened to them a new pleasure for idle hours. They
found such delight in seeing and hearing new things that they told
others, and now there are many spending their evenings in ways that
increase knowledge, who do so because one man aimed at providing means
of intercourse and high teaching.
Those whose aim it is to reform the material conditions in which life
is spent may, as well as those who teach, claim to be strengthening
character, but the admission of their claims must depend on the way
in which they have worked. They themselves can alone tell how far in
pursuit of their aims they have forgotten the effect of their means
upon character, and how those means are now represented by people whose
growth they have helped or hindered. Teachers are not above reformers,
and reformers are not above teachers. The people must be taught, and
conditions must be changed. It is for those who teach as well as for
those who try to change conditions to judge themselves by the effect
their methods have on character. If striving and crying they have
avoided impatience and allowed time for the growth of originality, if
working silently they have indeed done something else than find faults
in others’ methods, they may be said to have secured the good and
avoided the loss.
SAMUEL A. BARNETT.
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XII.
_PRACTICABLE SOCIALISM._[1]
[1] Reprinted, by permission, from the _Nineteenth Century_ of April
1883.
Some time ago I met in a tramcar a well-known American clergyman. ‘Ah!’
said he, ‘ten years’ work in New York as a minister at large made me a
Christian socialist.’ The remark illustrates my own experience.
Ten years ago my wife and I came to live in East London. The study of
political economy and some familiarity with the condition of the poor
had shown us the harm of doles given in the shape either of charity
or of out-relief. We found that gifts so given did not make the poor
any richer, but served rather to perpetuate poverty. We came therefore
to East London determined to war against a system of relief which,
ignorantly cherished by the poor, meant ruin to their possibilities of
living an independent and satisfying life. The work of some devoted
men on the Board of Guardians, helped by the members of the Charity
Organisation Society, has enabled us to see the victory won.
In this Whitechapel Union there is no out-relief, and ‘charity’ is
given only to those who, by their forethought or their self-sacrifice,
awaken those feelings of respect and gratitude which find a natural
expression in giving and receiving presents. The result has not
disappointed our hope. The poor have learnt to help themselves, and
have found self-help a stronger bond by which to keep the home together
than the dole of the relieving officer or of the district visitor. The
rates have been saved 6,000_l._ a year, and that sum remains in the
pockets of ratepayers to be spent as wages for work, and by the new
system of relief the poor are not only more independent but distinctly
richer. The old system of relief has been conquered, and the result we
desired has been won. What is that result? With what a state of things
does the new system leave us face to face?