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THEOLOGY AND THE
SOCIAL CONSCIOUSNESS
A STUDY OF THE RELATIONS OF THE
SOCIAL CONSCIOUSNESS TO THEOLOGY
BY
HENRY CHURCHILL KING
PROFESSOR OF THEOLOGY AND PHILOSOPHY
IN OBERLIN COLLEGE
_SECOND EDITION_
HODDER & STOUGHTON
NEW YORK
GEORGE H. DORAN COMPANY
COPYRIGHT, 1902
BY THE MACMILLAN COMPANY
Set up and electrotyped September, 1902
Reprinted February, 1904;
July, 1907; August, 1910; April, 1912.
To the Members of the
Harvard Summer School of Theology
OF THE YEAR 1901
IN RECOGNITION OF THEIR INTEREST IN THE LECTURES
THAT FORMED THE BASIS OF THIS BOOK
PREFACE
There is no attempt in this book to present a complete system of
theology, though much of such a system is passed in review, but only
to study a special phase of theological thinking. The precise theme of
the book is the relations of the social consciousness to theology.
This is the subject upon which the writer was asked to lecture at the
Harvard Summer School of Theology of 1901; and the book has grown out
of the lectures there given. In preparing the book for the press,
however, the lecture form has been entirely abandoned, and
considerable material added.
The importance of the theme seems to justify a somewhat thorough-going
treatment. If one believes at all in the presence of God in
history--and the Christian can have no doubt here--he must be
profoundly interested in such a phenomenon as the steady growth of the
social consciousness. Hardly any inner characteristic of our time has
a stronger historical justification than that consciousness; and it
has carried the reason and conscience of the men of this generation in
rare degree. Having its own comparatively independent development, and
yet making an ethical demand that is thoroughly Christian, it
furnishes an almost ideal standpoint from which to review our
theological statements, and, at the same time, a valuable test of
their really Christian quality.
In attempting, then, a careful study of the relations of the social
consciousness to theology, this book aims, first, definitely to get at
the real meaning of the social consciousness as the theologian must
view it, and so to bring clearly into mind the unconscious assumptions
of the social consciousness itself; and then to trace out the
influence of the social consciousness upon the conception of religion,
and upon theological doctrine. The larger portion of the book is
naturally given to the influence upon theological doctrine; and to
make the discussion here as pointed as possible, the different
elements of the social consciousness are considered separately.
It should be noted, however, that the question raised is not the
historical one, How, as a matter of fact, has the social consciousness
modified the conception of religion or the statement of theological
doctrine? but the theoretical one, How should the social consciousness
naturally affect religion and doctrine? In this sense, the result
might be called, in President Hyde's phrase, a "social theology"; but,
as I believe that the social consciousness is at bottom only a true
sense of the fully personal, I prefer myself to think of the present
book as only carrying out in more detail the contention of my
_Reconstruction in Theology_--that theology should aim at a
restatement of doctrine in strictly personal terms. So conceived, in
spite of its casual origin, this book follows very naturally upon the
previous book. Some of the same topics necessarily recur here; and
references to the _Reconstruction_ have been freely made, in order to
avoid all unnecessary repetition.
That this social sense of the fully personal has finally a real and
definite contribution to make to theology, I cannot doubt. I can only
hope that the present discussion may be found at least suggestive,
particularly in the analysis of the social consciousness, and in the
treatment of mysticism and of the ethical in religion, as well as in
the consideration of the special influence of the elements of the
social consciousness upon the restatement of doctrine. Of the
doctrinal applications, the application to the problem of redemption
may be considered, perhaps, of most significance.
HENRY CHURCHILL KING.
OBERLIN COLLEGE, June, 1902.
CONTENTS
INTRODUCTION
PAGE
THE THEME 1
THE REAL MEANING OF THE SOCIAL CONSCIOUSNESS
FOR THEOLOGY
INTRODUCTION
THE POINT OF VIEW OF THE THEOLOGIAN 5
CHAPTER I
THE DEFINITION OF THE SOCIAL CONSCIOUSNESS 9
I. The Sense of the Like-Mindedness of Men 9
II. The Sense of the Mutual Influence of Men 11
1. Contributing Lines of Thought 11
2. The Threefold Form of the Conviction 13
III. The Sense of the Value and Sacredness of the Person 16
IV. The Sense of Obligation 18
V. The Sense of Love 20
CHAPTER II
THE INADEQUACY OF THE ANALOGY OF THE ORGANISM AS AN
EXPRESSION OF THE SOCIAL CONSCIOUSNESS 23
I. The Value of the Analogy 23
II. The Inevitable Inadequacy of the Analogy 24
1. It Comes from the Sub-personal World 24
2. Access to Reality, Only Through Ourselves 24
3. Mistaken Passion for Construing Everything 25
III. The Analogy Tested by the Definition of the Social
Consciousness 27
CHAPTER III
THE NECESSITY OF THE FACTS OF WHICH THE SOCIAL CONSCIOUSNESS
IS THE REFLECTION, IF IDEAL INTERESTS ARE TO BE SUPREME 29
I. The Question 29
II. Otherwise, No Moral World at all 30
1. The Prerequisites of a Moral World 30
(1) A Sphere of Law 30
(2) Ethical Freedom 30
(3) Some Power of Accomplishment 31
(4) Members One of Another 32
2. The Ideal World Requires, thus, the Facts of the
Social Consciousness 32
CHAPTER IV
THE ULTIMATE EXPLANATION AND GROUND OF THE SOCIAL
CONSCIOUSNESS 35
I. How can it be, Metaphysically, that we do Influence
One Another? 35
1. Not Due to the Physical Fact of Race-Connection 36
2. We are not to Over-Emphasize the Principle of Heredity 37
3. Not Due to a Mystical Solidarity 39
4. Grounded in the Immanence of God 40
II. What is Required for the Final Positive Justification of
the Social Consciousness, as Ethical? 44
1. Must be Grounded in the Supporting Will of God 44
2. God's Sharing in our Life 48
3. The Consequent Transfiguration of the Social
Consciousness 49
THE INFLUENCE OF THE SOCIAL CONSCIOUSNESS
UPON THE CONCEPTION OF RELIGION
INTRODUCTION 53
CHAPTER V
THE OPPOSITION OF THE SOCIAL CONSCIOUSNESS TO THE FALSELY
MYSTICAL 55
I. What is the Falsely Mystical? 55
1. Nash's Definition 55
2. Herrmann's Definition 56
II. The Objections of the Social Consciousness to the Falsely
Mystical 57
1. Unethical 58
2. Does not Give a Really Personal God 58
3. Belittles the Personal in Man 59
4. Leaves the Historically, Concretely Christian 62
CHAPTER VI
THE EMPHASIS OF THE SOCIAL CONSCIOUSNESS UPON THE PERSONAL
RELATION IN RELIGION, AND SO UPON THE TRULY MYSTICAL 66
I. The Social Consciousness Tends Positively to Emphasize
the Personal Relation in Religion 66
1. Emphasizes Everywhere the Personal 66
2. Requires the Laws of a Deepening Friendship in
Religion 67
3. Requires the Ideal Conditions of the Richest Life
in Religion 68
II. The Social Consciousness thus Keeps the Truly Mystical 70
1. The Justifiable and Unjustifiable Elements
in Mysticism 71
(1) Emotion, the Test 71
(2) Subjective Tendency 72
(3) Underestimating the Historical 72
(4) Tendency toward Vagueness 73
(5) Tendency toward Pantheism 73
(6) Tendency to Extravagant Symbolism 76
2. The Protest in Favor of the Whole Man 78
3. The Self-Controlled Recognition of Emotion 82
CHAPTER VII
THE THOROUGH ETHICIZING OF RELIGION 86
I. The Pressure of the Problem 86
II. The Statement of the Problem 87
III. The Answer 89
1. Involved in Relation to Christ 89
2. The Divine Will Felt in the Ethical Command 90
3. Involved in the Nature of God's Gifts 91
4. Communion with God, Through Harmony with His
Ethical Will 92
5. The Vision of God for the Pure in Heart 92
6. Sharing the Life of God 93
7. Christ, as Satisfying Our Highest Claims on Life 94
8. The Vision of the Riches of the Life of Christ,
Ethically Conditioned 96
9. The Moral Law, as a Revelation of the Love of God 98
CHAPTER VIII
THE EMPHASIS OF THE SOCIAL CONSCIOUSNESS UPON THE
HISTORICALLY CHRISTIAN 102
I. The Social Consciousness Needs Historical Justification 102
II. Christianity's Response to this Need 103
THE INFLUENCE OF THE SOCIAL CONSCIOUSNESS
UPON THEOLOGICAL DOCTRINE
CHAPTER IX
GENERAL RESULTS 105
I. The Conception of Theology in Personal Terms 106
II. The Fatherhood of God, as the Determining Principle
in Theology 109
III. Christ's Own Social Emphases 111
IV. The Reflection in Theology of the Changes in the Conception
of Religion 113
CHAPTER X
THE INFLUENCE OF THE DEEPENING SENSE OF THE LIKE-MINDEDNESS
OF MEN UPON THEOLOGY 115
I. No Prime Favorites with God 116
II. The Great Universal Qualities and Interests, the Most
Valuable 117
III. Essential Likeness Under very Diverse Forms 121
IV. As Applied to the Question of Immortality 124
V. Consequent Larger Sympathy with Men, Faith in Men,
and Hope for Men 127
VI. Judgment According to Light, and the Moral Reality of
the Future Life 132
CHAPTER XI
THE INFLUENCE OF THE DEEPENING SENSE OF THE MUTUAL
INFLUENCE OF MEN UPON THEOLOGY 136
I. The Real Unity of the Race 136
II. Deepening the Sense of Sin 139
III. Mutual Influence for Good in the Attainment of Character 145
1. Application to the Problem of Redemption 147
2. The Consequent Ethical and Spiritual Meaning of
Substitution and Propitiation 150
IV. Mutual Influence for Good in our Personal Relation to God 160
1. In Coming into the Kingdom 160
2. In Fellowship within the Kingdom 162
3. In Intercessory Prayer 164
V. Mutual Influence for Good in Confessions of Faith 167
1. Complete Uniformity of Belief and Statement Impossible 169
2. Complete Uniformity of Belief and Statement Undesirable 171
VI. The Consequent Importance of the Doctrine of the Church 177
CHAPTER XII
THE INFLUENCE OF THE DEEPENING SENSE OF THE VALUE AND
SACREDNESS OF THE PERSON UPON THEOLOGY 179
I. The Recognition of the Personal in Man 180
1. Man's Personal Separateness from God 180
2. Emphasis upon Man's Moral Initiative 181
3. Man, a Child of God 183
II. The Recognition of the Personal in Christ 184
1. Christ, a Personal Revelation of God 184
2. Emphasizing the Moral and Spiritual in Asserting
the Supremacy of Christ 185
3. The Moral and Spiritual Grounds of the Supremacy
of Christ 188
(1) The Greatest in the Greatest Sphere 188
(2) The Sinless and Impenitent One 192
(3) Consciously Rises to the Highest Ideal 194
(4) Realizes the Character of God 195
(5) Consciously Able to Redeem All Men 196
(6) Complete Normality under this Transcendent
God-Consciousness and Sense of Mission 197
(7) The Only Person Who can call out Absolute Trust 198
(8) The One, in Whom God Certainly Finds Us 199
(9) The Ideal Realized 200
4. Christ's Double Uniqueness 201
5. The Increasing Sense of Our Kinship with Christ,
and of His Reality 205
III. The Recognition of the Personal in God. 207
1. The Steady Carrying Through of the Completely Personal
in the Conception of God. Guarding the Conception 208
2. God is Always the Completely Personal God 212
(1) Consequent Relation of God to "Eternal Truths" 212
(2) Eternal Creation 214
(3) The Unity and Unchangeableness of God 216
(4) The Limitations of the Conception of Immanence 217
3. Deepening the Thought of the Fatherhood of God 218
(1) History, no Mere Natural Process 218
(2) God, the Great Servant 219
(3) No Divine Arbitrariness 220
(4) The Passibility of God 221
4. As to the Doctrine of a Social Trinity 222
5. Preëminent Reverence for Personality, Characterizing
all God's Relations with Men 226
(1) Reflected in Christ 226
(2) In Creation 230
(3) In Providence 232
(4) In Our Personal Religious Life 233
(5) In the Judgment 237
(6) In the Future Life 240
THEOLOGY AND THE SOCIAL CONSCIOUSNESS
INTRODUCTION
_THE THEME_
No theologian can be excused to-day from a careful study of the
relations of theology and the social consciousness. Whether this study
becomes a formal investigation or not, the social consciousness is so
deep and significant a phenomenon in the ethical life of our time,
that it cannot be ignored by the theologian who means to bring his
message to men really home. This book is written in the conviction
that, while men are thus moved as never before by a deep sense of
mutual influence and obligation, they have also as deep and genuine an
interest as ever in the really greatest questions of religion and
theology. Interests so significant and so akin cannot long remain
isolated in the mind. They are certain soon profoundly to influence
each other. And this mutual influence of theology and the social
consciousness form the theme of this book.
Two questions are naturally involved in this theme. First: Has
theology given any help, or has it any help to give, to the social
consciousness?--the question of the first division of the book.
Second: Has the social consciousness made any contribution, or has it
any contribution to make, to theology?--the question of the second and
third divisions. That is to say: On the one hand, Have the great facts
which theology studies any help to give to the man who faces the
problem of social progress--of the steady elevation of the race? On
the other hand, Has the great fact of the immensely quickened social
consciousness of our time, with all that it means, any help to give to
the theologian in his attempt to bring the great Christian truths
really home to men, to make them more real, more rational, more vital?
Or again: On the one hand, do theological doctrines--the most adequate
statements we can make of the great Christian truths--best explain and
best ground the social consciousness, so as best to bring our entire
thought in this sphere of the social into unity? Is the Christian
truth so great that it not only includes all that is true in this new
social consciousness--is fully able to take it up into itself and to
make it feel at home there--but also, so great that it alone can give
the social consciousness its fullest meaning, alone enable it to
understand itself, and alone furnish it adequate motive and power? Is
the social consciousness, in truth, only a disguised statement of
Christian convictions, and does it really require the Christian
religion and its thoughtful expression to complete itself? Must the
social consciousness say, when it comes to full self-knowledge,--I am
myself an unmeaning and unjustified by-product, if there is not a God
in the full Christian sense? and, so saying, confirm again the great
Christian truths? This is the question of the first division.
On the other hand, since the task of any given theologian is
necessarily temporary, and since any marked modification of the
consciousness of men will inevitably demand some restatement of
theological doctrine, the question here becomes--To what changed
points of view in religion and theology, to what restatements of
doctrine, and so to what truer appreciation of Christian truth, does
the new social consciousness naturally lead? How do the affirmations
of the social consciousness, as the outcome of a careful, inductive
study of the social evolution of the race, affect our theological
statements? This is the question of the second and third divisions of
the book.
Our discussion must of course assume and build on the conclusions of
sociology, and of New Testament theology, especially the conclusions
concerning the social teaching of Jesus.
THE REAL MEANING OF THE SOCIAL CONSCIOUSNESS FOR THEOLOGY
INTRODUCTION
_THE POINT OF VIEW OF THE THEOLOGIAN_
First, then, what is the real meaning of the social consciousness, as
the theologian must view it? The answer to this question involves a
preliminary one: What is the point of view of the theologian in any
investigation? One can only give his own answer.
First of all, the theologian, as such, is an _interpreter_, not a
tracer of causal connections. He builds everywhere upon the scientific
investigator, and takes from him the statement of facts and processes.
With these he has primarily nothing to do. With reference to the
social consciousness, therefore, he does not attempt to do over again
the work of the sociologist; he asks only, What does the social
consciousness, in the light of the whole of life and thought, mean;
not, How did it come about?
The theologian, too, is a _believer in the supremacy of spiritual
interests_; this is his central contention. He affirms strenuously,
with the scientific worker, the place and value of the mechanical; but
he is certain that the mechanical can understand itself even, only as
it is seen to be simple means, and thus clearly subordinate in
significance. His problem is, therefore, everywhere, that of ideal
interpretation, not of mechanical explanation. But, while he has
nothing to do with the scientific tracing of immediate causal
connections, he recognizes causality itself as requiring an ultimate
explanation, that cannot be mechanically given. The theologian must be
in this, then, an _ideal_ interpreter, and an inquirer after the
_ultimate_ cause.
The theologian assumes, moreover, the legitimacy and value of the fact
of _religion_; for theology is simply the thoughtful, comprehensive,
and unified expression of what religion means to us. The meaning of
the social consciousness to the theologian involves, therefore, at
once the question of its relation to religious conviction.
The point of view of the Christian theologian involves, besides, the
_reality of the personal God_ in personal relation to persons.
Theology is in earnest in its thought of God, and knows that God is
everywhere to be taken into account; that, if there is a God at all,
he is not to be exiled into some corner of his universe, but is
intimately concerned in all, is at the very heart of all; and that,
therefore, it is not a matter of merely curious interest or of
subsidiary inquiry, whether we are to look at our questions with God
in mind.
Finally, the Christian theologian tries everywhere to make his point
of view _the point of view of Christ_. The theology, upon which he
ultimately stakes his all, is Christ's theology. He knows that there
is much concerning which he cannot refuse to think, but upon which
Christ has not expressed himself either explicitly or by clear
inference; but in all this unavoidable supplementary thinking he aims
to be absolutely loyal to the spirit of Christ.
From this point of view of the Christian theologian, now, what does
the social consciousness mean? The answer may be given under four
heads: (1) the definition of the social consciousness; (2) the
inadequacy of the analogy of the organism, as an expression of the
social consciousness; (3) the necessity of the facts, of which the
social consciousness is the reflection, if ideal interests are to be
supreme; (4) the ultimate explanation and ground of the social
consciousness.
These four topics form the subjects of the four chapters of the first
division of our inquiry.
CHAPTER I
_THE DEFINITION OF THE SOCIAL CONSCIOUSNESS_
The simplest and probably the most accurate single expression we can
give to the social consciousness, is to say that it is a growing sense
of the real brotherhood of men. But five elements seem plainly
involved in this, and may be profitably separated in our thought, if
that is to be clear and definite:--a deepening sense (1) of the
likeness or like-mindedness of men, (2) of their mutual influence, (3)
of the value and sacredness of the person, (4) of mutual obligation,
and (5) of love.
I. THE SENSE OF THE LIKE-MINDEDNESS OF MEN[1]
If a society is "a group of like-minded individuals," if the
"all-essential" requisites for coöperation are "like-mindedness and
consciousness of kind," as Giddings tells us, then certainly a prime
element in the social consciousness is likeness and the sense of it--a
growing sense of the mental and moral resemblance and "potential
resemblance" of all men, and of all classes of men, though not
equality of powers.
"Equality of need" among men, too,[2] to which sociology comes as one
of its surest conclusions, implies a common capacity, even if in
varying degrees, to enter into the most fundamental interests of life,
and so points unmistakably to the essential likeness of men in the
most important things.
So, too, sociology's unquestioning assertion that both smaller and
larger groups of men constantly tend toward unity, assumes potential
resemblance.
And the uniform experience and prescription of social workers, that
_really_ knowing "how the other half lives" brings increasing
sympathy, also affirm the fundamental likeness of men. Every
painstaking investigation of a social question comes out at some point
or other with a fresh discovery of a previously hidden, underlying
resemblance between classes of men.
From the careful, inductive study of social evolution, too, the men of
our day see, as no other generation has seen, that the great force
always and everywhere at work in that evolution has been likeness and
the consciousness of it.
For all these reasons, this generation believes, as men never believed
before, in the essential like-mindedness of men; and this deepening
sense of the like-mindedness of men is certainly one element in the
modern social consciousness.
II. THE SENSE OF THE MUTUAL INFLUENCE OF MEN
A second element in the social consciousness, and, perhaps, that which
has most of all characterized it through the larger period of its
growth, is the strong sense of the mutual influence of men--that we
are all "members one of another."
1. _Contributing Lines of Thought._--It is worth seeing how firmly
planted the idea is. Several lines of thought have united to induce
men to emphasize--perhaps even to over-emphasize--this way of thinking
of society. The influence of natural science, in the first place, has
been inevitably in this direction. Its root idea of the universality
of law forces upon one the thought of a world which is a _coherent_
whole, a unity with universal forces in it, in which every part is
inextricably connected with every other. So, too, the acceptance of
the theory of evolution has led science to regard the whole history of
the physical universe as an organic growth.
Psychology, also, with its present-day emphasis, in Baldwin and Royce,
upon the constant presence and fundamental character of _imitation_,
and its insistence upon the still more fundamental impulsiveness of
consciousness which Dewey believes underlies imitation,[3] is really
proclaiming exactly this element of the social consciousness. And the
whole assertion by the later psychology of the unity of man--mind and
body, and of the complex intertwining of all the functions of the
mind, is in closest harmony with a similar view of society.
Philosophy, too, is exerting all along a half-unconscious pressure
toward the thought of the organic unity of society. That philosophy
may exist at all, it must start from the assumption of a universe, a
real unity of truth, and its problem is to find a _discerned_ unity.
It knows no unrelated being, and, consequently, whether it
theoretically accepts the formulation or not, it must admit that, as a
matter of fact, to be is to be in relations. It asserts as a universal
fact, what natural science and psychology both affirm in their own
respective spheres, the concrete relatedness of all. It cannot well
deny the same thought when applied to society. Its repeated attempts,
moreover, to conceive all as a developing unity, and the profound
influence of the analogy of the organism upon its history, both
further sustain the organic view of society.
Christianity, as well, has been a powerful factor in this direction
from the beginning, for it really first gave the Idea of Humanity.[4]
2. _The Threefold Form of the Conviction._--Sustained, now, by all
these movements in natural science, psychology, philosophy, and
Christianity, this thought of the mutual influence of men has taken
three forms: that mutual influence is inevitable, isolation
impossible; that mutual influence is desirable, isolation to be
shunned; that mutual influence is indispensable, isolation blighting.
(1) This second element in the social consciousness has meant, then,
in the first place, a growing sense of the inevitableness of the
mutual influence of all men, and of all classes of men; that we are
all parts of one whole, each part unavoidably affected by every other;
that we are bound up in one bundle of life with all men, and cannot
live an isolated life if we would; that we do influence one another
whether we will or not, and tend unconsciously to draw others to our
level and are ourselves drawn toward theirs; that we joy and suffer
together whether we will or not, and grow or deteriorate together.
(2) But the mutual influence of men means more than this: not only
that we do inevitably affect one another in living out our own life,
but a growing sense of the fact that we are obviously not intended to
come to our best in independence of one another; that we are made on
so large a plan that we cannot come to our best alone; that we are
evidently made for personal relations, and that, therefore, largeness
of life for ourselves depends on our entering into the life of others.
(3) But even more than this is true. It is not only that entering into
the life of others is a help in my life, it is _the_ great help, the
one great means, the indispensable, the essential condition of all
largeness of life; it is the very meaning of life,--life itself. We
are to find our life only in losing our life. Life is the fulfilment
of relations. When we try to run away from the variety and complexity
of these relations, we are running away from life itself. The
indispensableness of these relations to others is assumed, also, in
the assertion by the sociologist of an evolution toward a society, at
once more and more complex, and more and more perfect.
But if I grow in the growth of another, the other grows in my growth.
If the only thing of value that I can finally give is myself, the
value of that gift depends upon the largeness and richness of the self
given. For love's own sake, therefore, I must grow, must strive to
bring to its highest perfection that work which is given me to do. A
person is a social being called to contribute to the whole, in the
line of his own best possibilities. One's largest ministry to others
is to be rendered, then, through sacred regard for one's own calling,
considered as exactly his place of largest service. Or, to put it the
other way: I can come to my best only in work so great and in
associations so large that I may lose myself in them in perfect
objectivity.
The mutual influence of men, therefore, is unavoidable, is desirable,
is indispensable; isolation impossible, hindering, blighting. This is
the true solidarity of the race, in which there is no fiction, no
hiding in the inconceivable, and no pretense.
III. THE SENSE OF THE VALUE AND SACREDNESS OF THE PERSON
The third element in the social consciousness, the sense of the value
and sacredness of the person, follows naturally from the sense of
like-mindedness and of mutual influence, but needs distinct and
emphatic statement.
It is less easily separable than the other elements named, and,
indeed, may be made to include all the others, and does, in a way,
carry all with it. Thus broadly conceived, it has seemed to the writer
that--with the return to the historical Christ--it might well be
called the most notable moral characteristic of our time.[5] But,
though less easily and definitely discriminated, one who knows deeply
the modern social consciousness would surely feel that the very heart
of it had been omitted, if this growing sense of the value and
sacredness of the person did not come to strong expression. Reverence
for personality--the steadily deepening sense that every person has a
value not to be measured in anything else, and is in himself sacred to
God and man--this it is which marks unmistakably every step in the
progress of the individual and of the race. Without it, whatever the
other marks of civilization, you have only tyranny and slavery; with
it, though every trace of luxury and scientific invention be lacking,
you have the perfection of human relations.
This sense of the value and sacredness of the person not only
characterizes increasingly the whole social and moral evolution of the
race, but it is to be seen in the clearly conscious demand for
equality of rights, and, especially--to take a single example--in the
growing recognition that the child is an individual with his own
rights; that he has a personality of his own of a sanctity inviolable
by the parent; that there are clear bounds beyond which no one may go
without personal outrage. The recognition by psychology of respect for
personality as one of the three or four most fundamental
conditions--if not the most essential of all--of happiness, of
character, and of influence, is explicit confirmation of the truth of
this element of the social consciousness.
IV. THE SENSE OF OBLIGATION
But the elements of the social consciousness already named lead
directly to a growing sense of obligation. Every man carries in
himself his only possible standard of measurement of all else. A
growing sense of the likeness of other men to himself quickens at
once, therefore, the sense of obligation, and leads naturally to the
Golden Rule. Recognition of mutual influence, too, inevitably carries
with it a deeper sense of obligation; for, if we do affect others
constantly, then we are manifestly under obligation not only to do
direct service to others, but so to order our own lives as to help,
not to hinder, others. The sense of the value and sacredness of the
person plainly looks to the same deepening of obligation.
As an element of the social consciousness, the sense of obligation
means for a given individual, a growing sense of responsibility for
all; and for society at large an increase in the number of those who
feel the obligation to serve.
The growth in each of these directions cannot be questioned. There is
no privileged class, in whose own consciences there is not being
recognized more and more the right of the claim that they must justify
themselves by service which shall be as unique as their privilege. In
consequence, the conception of the governing classes is steadily
changing, for both the governed and the governing, to some recognition
of Christ's principle, that he who would be first must be servant of
all. The sharp insistence of the sociologist that "organization must
be for the organized" expresses the same thought. One must add
sociology's double assertion, that society is really advancing toward
its goal, and yet that a chief condition of the progress of society is
unselfish leadership.[6] This can only mean that there is,
increasingly, unselfish leadership, more and more of conscious,
willing coöperation on the part of men in forwarding the social
evolution.
None of us can return to the older attitude of comparative
indifference, nor can we honestly defend it. We do have obligations
and we own them; we are judging ourselves increasingly by Christ's
test of ministering love.
V. THE SENSE OF LOVE
And the social consciousness ends necessarily in love, in the broader,
ethical meaning of that word. We shall never feel that the social
consciousness is complete, short of real love. All the other elements
of the social consciousness lead to love and are included in it. Even
the sociologist must bring in as necessary results of the
consciousness of kind--sympathy, affection, and desire for the
recognition of others;[7] and he finds these always more or less
distinctly at work among men.
These further considerations from the study of evolution confirm this
result: that man is preëminently the social animal;[8] that with man
we have clearly reached the stage of persons and of personal
relations;[9] that the very existence and development of man required
love at every step;[10] and that the chief moral significance of man's
prolonged infancy is probably to be found in the necessary calling out
of love.[11]
So, too, it has become constantly more and more clear that our
obligation, what we owe to others, is ourselves; and the giving of the
self is love. It seems to be thrust home upon social workers
everywhere that there is no solution of any social problem without a
personal self-giving in some way on the part of some; that there is no
cheaper way than this very costly one of love, of the giving of
ourselves--whether in the family, or in charity, or in criminology.
The point, already noted, that the progress of society depends on
leaders who will serve with unselfish devotion, is only another
emphasis upon love as an indispensable element of the social
consciousness.
And the social goal--equality, brotherhood, liberty, when these terms
are given any adequate ethical content--is absolutely unthinkable in
any really vital sense without love.
Any attempted definition of love, moreover, resolves at once into what
we mean by the social consciousness. If we define love as the giving
of self, this is exactly what, with growing clearness and insistence,
the social consciousness demands. If with Herrmann we call love, "joy
in personal life"--joy, that is, in the revelation of personal life,
this can only come in that trustful, reverent, self-surrendering
association to which the social consciousness exhorts. If with Edwards
we call love, willing the highest and completest good of all, we reach
the same result. Or if with Christ in the Beatitudes, or with Paul in
the thirteenth of I Corinthians, we study the characteristics of love,
we shall hardly doubt that a complete social consciousness must have
these marks of love.
These elements, then, make up the social consciousness: the sense of
like-mindedness, of mutual influence, of the value and sacredness of
the person, of obligation, and of love; and all these, with their
implied demands, only point to what a person must be if he is to be
fully personal.
With this definition in mind, we may now ask, whether the analogy of
the organism can adequately express the social consciousness.
[1] Cf. Giddings, _Elements of Sociology_, pp. 6, 10, 65, 66, 77.
[2] Cf. Giddings, _Op. cit._, p. 324.
[3] See _The New World_, Sept., 1898, p. 516.
[4] Cf. Lotze, _The Microcosmus_, Vol. II, p. 211.
[5] See King, _Reconstruction in Theology_, Chap. IX, pp, 169 ff.
[6] See Giddings, _Op. cit._, pp. 302, 320-322.
[7] Cf. Giddings, _Op. cit._, pp. 65, 66.
[8] Cf. Giddings, _Op. cit._, p. 241.
[9] See King, _Reconstruction in Theology_, pp. 92-96.
[10] Cf. Drummond, _The Ascent of Man_, pp. 272 ff.
[11] Cf. John Fiske, _The Destiny of Man_, p. 74; Drummond, _Op.
cit._, p. 279 ff.