Part 3 (1/2)

II.

The province of Positivism is not speculation upon the origin, but study of the laws of Nature--its policy is to destroy error by superseding it.

Auguste Comte quotes, as a cardinal maxim of scientific progress, the words ”nothing is destroyed until it is replaced,” a proverbial form of a wise saying of M. Necker that in political progress ”nothing is destroyed for which we do not find a subst.i.tute.” Negations, useful in their place, are iconoclastic--not constructive. Unless subst.i.tution succeeds destruction--there can be no sustained progress. The Secularist is known by setting up and maintaining affirmative propositions. He replaces negations by affirmations, and subst.i.tutes demonstration for denunciation. He a.s.serts truths of Nature and humanity, and reverses the position of the priest who appears as the sceptic, the denier, the disbeliever in Nature and humanity. Statesmen, not otherwise eager for improvement, will regard affirmative proposals. Lord Palmerston could say--”Show me a good and I will realize it--not an abuse to correct.”

III.

”All science,” says M. Comte, ”has prevision for its end, an axiom which separates science from erudition, which relates to events of the past without any regard to the future. No acc.u.mulation of facts can effect prevision until the facts are made the basis of reasonings. A knowledge of phenomena leads to prevision, and prevision to action;” or, in other words, when we can foresee what will happen under given circ.u.mstances, we can provide against it. It by no means follows that every Secularist will be scientific, but to discern the value of science, to appreciate and promote it, may be possible to most. Science requires high qualities of accurate observation, close attention, careful experiment, caution, patience, labour. Its value to mankind is inestimable. One physician will do more to alleviate human suffering than ten priests. One physical discovery will do more to advance civilization than a generation of prayer-makers. ”To get acquaintance with the usual course of Nature (which Science alone can teach us), is a kind of knowledge which pays very good interest.”*

* Athenaeum, No. 1,637, March 12, 1850.

The value of this knowledge becomes more apparent the longer we live.

There may be a general superintending Providence--there may be a Special Providence, but the first does not interfere in human affairs, and the interpositions of the second are no longer to be counted upon. The age of Prayer for temporal deliverance has confessedly pa.s.sed away.

But without disputing these points, it is clear that the only help _available_ to man, the sole dependence upon which he can _calculate_, is that of Science. Nothing can be more impotent than the fate of that man who seeks social elevation by mere Faith. All human affairs are a process, and he alone who acts upon this knowledge can hope to control results. Loyola foresaw the necessity of men acting for human purposes, as though there were no G.o.d. ”Let us pray,” said he, ”as if we had no help in ourselves; _let us labour as if there was no help for us in heaven_.” Society is a blunder, not a science, until it ensures good sense and competence for the many. Why this process is tardy, is that creedists get credit for hoping and meaning well. Creedists of good intent, who make no improvement and attempt none, are very much in the way of human betterance. The spiritualist regards the world theoretically as a gross element, which he is rather to struggle against than to work with. This makes human service a mortification instead of pure pa.s.sion. We would not deify the world, that is, set up the sensualism of the body, as spiritualism is set up as the sensualism of the soul. Secularism seeks the material purity of the present life, which is at once the _means_ and _end_ of Secular endeavour. The most reliable means of progress is the _improvement of material condition_, and ”purity” implies ”improvement,” for there can be no improvement without it. The aim of all improvement is higher purity. All power, art, civilization and progress are summed up in the result--purer life.

Strength, intellect, love are measured by it. Duty, study, temperance, patience are but ministers to this. ”There is that,” says Ruskin, ”to be seen in every street and lane of every city, that to be found and felt in every human heart and countenance, that to be loved in every road-side weed and moss-grown wall, which, in the hands of faithful men, may convey emotions of glory and sublimity continual and exalted.”

IV.

It is necessary to point out that Sincerity does not imply infallibility. ”There is a truth, which could it be stamped on every human mind, would exterminate all bigotry and persecution. I mean the truth, that worth of character and true integrity, and, consequently, G.o.d's acceptance, are not necessarily connected with any particular set of opinions.”* If you admit that Mark and Paul were honest, most Christians take that to be an admission of the truth of all related under their names. Yet if a man in defending his opinions, affirm his own sincerity, Christians quickly see that is no proof of their truth, and proceed to disprove them. Sincerity may account for a man holding his opinions, but it does not account for the opinions themselves.

Nothing is more common than uninformed, misinformed, mistaken, or self-deluded honesty. But sincere error, though dangerous enough, has not the attribute of crime about it--personal intention of mischief.

”Because human nature is frail and fallible, the ground of our acceptance with G.o.d, under the Gospel, is _sincerity_. A sincere desire to know and do the will of G.o.d, is the only condition of obtaining the Christian salvation. Every honest man will be saved.”** But Sincerity, if the reader recurs to our definition of it, includes a short intellectual and moral education with respect to it. Those worthy of the high descriptive ”sincere,” are those who have thought, inquired, examined, are in earnest, have a sense of duty with regard to their conviction, which is only satisfied by acting upon it. These processes may not bring a man to the truth, but they bring him near to it. The chances of error are reduced hereby as far as human care can reduce them. Secularism holds that the Protestant right of private judgment includes the moral innocency of that judgment, when conscientiously formed, whether for or against received opinion; that though _all sincere opinion is not equally true, nor equally useful, it is yet equally without sin_; that it is not sameness of belief but sincerity of belief which justifies conduct, whether regard be had to the esteem of men or the approval of G.o.d. Sincerity, we repeat, is not infallibility.

The conscientious are often as mischievous as the false, but he who acts according to the best of his belief is free from criminal intention.

The sincerity commended by the fortuitous, insipid, apathetic, inherited consent, which so often pa.s.ses for honesty, because too indolent or too cowardly to inquire, and too stupid to doubt. The man who holds merely ready-made opinions is not to be placed on the same level with him whose convictions are derived from experience. True sincerity is an educated and earnest sentiment. Secularist is an active sentiment seeking the truth and acting upon it.

* Dr. Price.

** John Foster's Tracts on Heresy,

V.

In the formation and judgment of opinions we must take into account the consequences to mankind involved in their adoption. But when an opinion seems true in itself and beneficial to society, the consequences in the way of inconvenience to ourselves is not sufficient reason for refusing to act upon it. If a particular time of enforcing it seem to be one when it will be disregarded, or misunderstood, or put back, and the sacrifice of ourselves on its behalf produce no adequate advantage to society, it may be lawful to seek a better opportunity. We must, however, take care that this view of the matter is not made a pretext of cowardice or evasion of duty. And in no case is it justifiable to belie conscience or profess a belief the contrary of that which we believe to be true. There may in extreme cases be neutrality with regard to truth, but in no case should there be complicity in falsehood. So much with respect to this life. With respect to Deity or another life, we may in all cases rely upon this, that in truth alone is safety. With G.o.d, conscience can have no penal consequences. Conscience is the voice of honesty, and honesty, with all its errors, a G.o.d of Truth will regard. ”We have,” says Blanco White, ”no revealed rule which will ascertain, with moral certainty, which doctrines are right and which are wrong--that is, as they are known to G.o.d.”--”Salvation, therefore, cannot depend on orthodoxy; it cannot consist in abstract doctrines, about which men of equal abilities, virtue, and sincerity are, and always have been, divided.”--”No error on abstract doctrines can be heresy, in the sense of a wrong belief which endangers the soul.” ”The Father of the Universe accommodates not His judgments to the wretched wranglings of pedantic theologians, but every one who seeks truth, _whether he findeth it or not_, and worketh righteousness, will be accepted of Him.”*

* Bishop Watson's Theological Tracts. Introductory.

Thomas Carlyle was the first English writer, having the ear of the public, who declared in England that ”sincere _doubt_ is as much ent.i.tled to respect as sincere _belief_.”

VI.

Going to a distant town to mitigate some calamity there, will ill.u.s.trate the principle of action prescribed by Secularism. One man will go on this errand from pure sympathy with the unfortunate; this is goodness.

Another goes because his priest bids him; this is obedience. Another goes because the twenty-fifth chapter of Matthew tells him that all such persons will pa.s.s to the right hand of the Father; this is calculation.

Another goes because he believes G.o.d commands him; this is piety.

Another goes because he believes that the neglect of suffering will not answer; this is utilitarianism. But another goes on the errand of mercy, because it is an errand of mercy, because it is an immediate service to humanity; and he goes to attempt material amelioration rather than spiritual consolation; this is Secularism, which teaches that goodness is sanct.i.ty, that Nature is guidance, that reason is authority, that service is duty, and that Materialism is help.

VII.