Part 5 (1/2)
But now let us turn to the teaching of the actual Political Economist, in his present fas.h.i.+onable shape. I will take a very favourable instance of him: he shall be represented by a gentleman of high character, whose religious views are sufficiently guaranteed to us by his being the special choice, in this department of science, of a University removed more than any other Protestant body of the day from sordid or unchristian principles on the subject of money-making. I say, if there be a place where Political Economy would be kept in order, and would not be suffered to leave the high road and ride across the pastures and the gardens dedicated to other studies, it is the University of Oxford. And if a man could anywhere be found who would have too much good taste to offend the religious feeling of the place, or to say any thing which he would himself allow to be inconsistent with Revelation, I conceive it is the person whose temperate and well-considered composition, as it would be generally accounted, I am going to offer to your notice. Nor did it occasion any excitement whatever on the part of the academical or the religious public, as did the instances which I have hitherto been adducing. I am representing then the science of Political Economy, in its independent or unbridled action, to great advantage, when I select, as its specimen, the Inaugural Lecture upon it, delivered in the University in question, by its first Professor.
Yet with all these circ.u.mstances in its favour, you will soon see, Gentlemen, into what extravagance, for so I must call it, a grave lawyer is led in praise of his chosen science, merely from the circ.u.mstance that he has fixed his mind upon it, till he has forgotten there are subjects of thought higher and more heavenly than it. You will find beyond mistake, that it is his object to recommend the science of wealth, by claiming for it an _ethical_ quality, viz., by extolling it as the road to virtue and happiness, whatever Scripture and holy men may say to the contrary.
He begins by predicting of Political Economy, that in the course of a very few years, ”it will rank in public estimation among the first of _moral_ sciences in interest and in utility.” Then he explains most lucidly its objects and duties, considered as ”the science which teaches in what wealth consists, by what agents it is produced, and according to what laws it is distributed, and what are the inst.i.tutions and customs by which production may be facilitated and distribution regulated, so as to give the largest possible amount of wealth to each individual.” And he dwells upon the interest which attaches to the inquiry, ”whether England has run her full career of wealth and improvement, but stands safe where she is, or whether to remain stationary is impossible.” After this he notices a certain objection, which I shall set before you in his own words, as they will furnish me with the ill.u.s.tration I propose.
This objection, he says, is, that, ”as the pursuit of wealth is one of the humblest of human occupations, far inferior to the pursuit of virtue, or of knowledge, or even of reputation, and as the possession of wealth is not necessarily joined,-perhaps it will be said, is not conducive,-to happiness, a science, of which the only subject is wealth, cannot claim to rank as the first, or nearly the first, of moral sciences.”(9) Certainly, to an enthusiast in behalf of any science whatever, the temptation is great to meet an objection urged against its dignity and worth; however, from the very form of it, such an objection cannot receive a satisfactory answer by means of the science itself. It is an objection external to the science, and reminds us of the truth of Lord Bacon's remark, ”No perfect discovery can be made upon a flat or a level; neither is it possible to discover the more remote and deeper parts of any science, if you stand upon the level of the science, and ascend not to a higher science.”(10) The objection that Political Economy is inferior to the science of virtue, or does not conduce to happiness, is an ethical or theological objection; the question of its ”rank” belongs to that Architectonic Science or Philosophy, whatever it be, which is itself the arbiter of all truth, and which disposes of the claims and arranges the places of all the departments of knowledge which man is able to master. I say, when an opponent of a particular science a.s.serts that it does not conduce to happiness, and much more when its champion contends in reply that it certainly does conduce to virtue, as this author proceeds to contend, the obvious question which occurs to one to ask is, what does Religion, what does Revelation, say on the point? Political Economy must not be allowed to give judgment in its own favour, but must come before a higher tribunal. The objection is an appeal to the Theologian; however, the Professor does not so view the matter; he does not consider it a question for Philosophy; nor indeed on the other hand a question for Political Economy; not a question for Science at all; but for Private Judgment,-so he answers it himself, and as follows:
12.
”My answer,” he says, ”is, first, that the pursuit of wealth, that is, the endeavour to acc.u.mulate the means of future subsistence and enjoyment, is, to the ma.s.s of mankind, the great source of _moral_ improvement.” Now observe, Gentlemen, how exactly this bears out what I have been saying. It is just so far true, as to be able to instil what is false, far as the author was from any such design. I grant, then, that, ordinarily, beggary is not the means of moral improvement; and that the orderly habits which attend upon the hot pursuit of gain, not only may effect an external decency, but may at least shelter the soul from the temptations of vice.
Moreover, these habits of good order guarantee regularity in a family or household, and thus are accidentally the means of good; moreover, they lead to the education of its younger branches, and they thus accidentally provide the rising generation with a virtue or a truth which the present has not: but without going into these considerations, further than to allow them generally, and under circ.u.mstances, let us rather contemplate what the author's direct a.s.sertion is. He says, ”the endeavour to _acc.u.mulate_,” the words should be weighed, and for what? ”for _enjoyment_;”-”to acc.u.mulate the means of future subsistence and enjoyment, is, to the ma.s.s of mankind, _the great_ source,” not merely _a_ source, but _the great_ source, and of what? of social and political progress?-such an answer would have been more within the limits of his art,-no, but of something individual and personal, ”of _moral improvement_.” The soul, in the case of ”the ma.s.s of mankind,” improves in moral excellence from this more than any thing else, viz., from heaping up the means of enjoying this world in time to come! I really should on every account be sorry, Gentlemen, to exaggerate, but indeed one is taken by surprise, one is startled, on meeting with so very categorical a contradiction of our Lord, St. Paul, St. Chrysostom, St. Leo, and all Saints.
”No inst.i.tution,” he continues, ”could be more beneficial to the morals of the lower orders, that is, to at least nine-tenths of the whole body of any people, than one which should increase their power and their wish to acc.u.mulate; none more mischievous than one which should diminish their motives and means to save.” No inst.i.tution more beneficial than one which should increase the _wish to acc.u.mulate_! then Christianity is not one of such beneficial inst.i.tutions, for it expressly says, ”_Lay not up to_ yourselves _treasures_ on earth ... for where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also;”-no inst.i.tution more mischievous than one which should diminish the _motives to save_! then Christianity is one of such mischiefs, for the inspired text proceeds, ”Lay up to yourselves treasures _in heaven, where_ neither the rust nor the moth doth consume, and where thieves do not dig through, nor steal.”
But it is not enough that morals and happiness are made to depend on gain and acc.u.mulation; the practice of Religion is ascribed to these causes also, and in the following way. Wealth depends upon the pursuit of wealth; education depends upon wealth; knowledge depends on education; and Religion depends on knowledge; therefore Religion depends on the pursuit of wealth. He says, after speaking of a poor and savage people, ”Such a population must be grossly ignorant. The desire of knowledge is one of the last results of refinement; it requires in general to have been implanted in the mind during childhood; and it is absurd to suppose that persons thus situated would have the power or the will to devote much to the education of their children. A further consequence is the _absence of all real religion_; for the religion of the grossly ignorant, if they have any, scarcely ever amounts to more than a debasing superst.i.tion.”(11) The pursuit of gain then is the basis of virtue, religion, happiness; though it is all the while, as a Christian knows, the ”root of all evils,” and the ”poor on the contrary are blessed, for theirs is the kingdom of G.o.d.”
As to the argument contained in the logical _Sorites_ which I have been drawing out, I antic.i.p.ated just now what I should say to it in reply. I repeat, doubtless ”beggary,” as the wise man says, is not desirable; doubtless, if men will not work, they should not eat; there is doubtless a sense in which it may be said that mere social or political virtue tends to moral and religious excellence; but the sense needs to be defined and the statement to be kept within bounds. This is the very point on which I am all along insisting. I am not denying, I am granting, I am a.s.suming, that there is reason and truth in the ”leading ideas,” as they are called, and ”large views” of scientific men; I only say that, though they speak truth, they do not speak the whole truth; that they speak a narrow truth, and think it a broad truth; that their deductions must be compared with other truths, which are acknowledged to be truths, in order to verify, complete, and correct them. They say what is true, _exceptis excipiendis_; what is true, but requires guarding; true, but must not be ridden too hard, or made what is called a _hobby_; true, but not the measure of all things; true, but if thus inordinately, extravagantly, ruinously carried out, in spite of other sciences, in spite of Theology, sure to become but a great bubble, and to burst.
13.
I am getting to the end of this Discourse, before I have noticed one tenth part of the instances with which I might ill.u.s.trate the subject of it.
Else I should have wished especially to have dwelt upon the not unfrequent perversion which occurs of antiquarian and historical research, to the prejudice of Theology. It is undeniable that the records of former ages are of primary importance in determining Catholic doctrine; it is undeniable also that there is a silence or a contrariety abstractedly conceivable in those records, as to an alleged portion of that doctrine, which would be sufficient to invalidate its claims on our acceptance; but it is quite as undeniable that the existing doc.u.mentary testimony to Catholicism and Christianity may be so unduly valued as to be made the absolute measure of Revelation, as if no part of theological teaching were true which cannot bring its express text, as it is called, from Scripture, and authorities from the Fathers or profane writers,-whereas there are numberless facts in past times which we cannot deny, for they are indisputable, though history is silent about them. I suppose, on this score, we ought to deny that the round towers of this country had any origin, because history does not disclose it; or that any individual came from Adam who cannot produce the table of his ancestry. Yet Gibbon argues against the darkness at the Pa.s.sion, from the accident that it is not mentioned by Pagan historians:-as well might he argue against the existence of Christianity itself in the first century, because Seneca, Pliny, Plutarch, the Jewish Mishna, and other authorities are silent about it. Protestants argue in a parallel way against Transubstantiation, and Arians against our Lord's Divinity, viz., on the ground that extant writings of certain Fathers do not witness those doctrines to their satisfaction:-as well might they say that Christianity was not spread by the Twelve Apostles, because we know so little of their labours. The evidence of History, I say, is invaluable in its place; but, if it a.s.sumes to be the sole means of gaining Religious Truth, it goes beyond its place.
We are putting it to a larger office than it can undertake, if we countenance the usurpation; and we are turning a true guide and blessing into a source of inexplicable difficulty and interminable doubt.
And so of other sciences: just as Comparative Anatomy, Political Economy, the Philosophy of History, and the Science of Antiquities may be and are turned against Religion, by being taken by themselves, as I have been showing, so a like mistake may befall any other. Grammar, for instance, at first sight does not appear to admit of a perversion; yet Horne Tooke made it the vehicle of his peculiar scepticism. Law would seem to have enough to do with its own clients, and their affairs; and yet Mr. Bentham made a treatise on Judicial Proofs a covert attack upon the miracles of Revelation. And in like manner Physiology may deny moral evil and human responsibility; Geology may deny Moses; and Logic may deny the Holy Trinity;(12) and other sciences, now rising into notice, are or will be victims of a similar abuse.
14.
And now to sum up what I have been saying in a few words. My object, it is plain, has been-not to show that Secular Science in its various departments may take up a position hostile to Theology;-this is rather the basis of the objection with which I opened this Discourse;-but to point out the cause of an hostility to which all parties will bear witness. I have been insisting then on this, that the hostility in question, when it occurs, is coincident with an evident deflection or exorbitance of Science from its proper course; and that this exorbitance is sure to take place, almost from the necessity of the case, if Theology be not present to defend its own boundaries and to hinder the encroachment. The human mind cannot keep from speculating and systematizing; and if Theology is not allowed to occupy its own territory, adjacent sciences, nay, sciences which are quite foreign to Theology, will take possession of it. And this occupation is proved to be a usurpation by this circ.u.mstance, that these foreign sciences will a.s.sume certain principles as true, and act upon them, which they neither have authority to lay down themselves, nor appeal to any other higher science to lay down for them. For example, it is a mere unwarranted a.s.sumption if the Antiquarian says, ”Nothing has ever taken place but is to be found in historical doc.u.ments;” or if the Philosophic Historian says, ”There is nothing in Judaism different from other political inst.i.tutions;” or if the Anatomist, ”There is no soul beyond the brain;” or if the Political Economist, ”Easy circ.u.mstances make men virtuous.” These are enunciations, not of Science, but of Private Judgment; and it is Private Judgment that infects every science which it touches with a hostility to Theology, a hostility which properly attaches to no science in itself whatever.
If then, Gentlemen, I now resist such a course of acting as unphilosophical, what is this but to do as men of Science do when the interests of their own respective pursuits are at stake? If they certainly would resist the divine who determined the orbit of Jupiter by the Pentateuch, why am I to be accused of cowardice or illiberality, because I will not tolerate their attempt in turn to theologize by means of astronomy? And if experimentalists would be sure to cry out, did I attempt to install the Thomist philosophy in the schools of astronomy and medicine, why may not I, when Divine Science is ostracized, and La Place, or Buffon, or Humboldt, sits down in its chair, why may not I fairly protest against their exclusiveness, and demand the emanc.i.p.ation of Theology?
15.
And now I consider I have said enough in proof of the first point, which I undertook to maintain, viz., the claim of Theology to be represented among the Chairs of a University. I have shown, I think, that exclusiveness really attaches, not to those who support that claim, but to those who dispute it. I have argued in its behalf, first, from the consideration that, whereas it is the very profession of a University to teach all sciences, on this account it cannot exclude Theology without being untrue to its profession. Next, I have said that, all sciences being connected together, and having bearings one on another, it is impossible to teach them all thoroughly, unless they all are taken into account, and Theology among them. Moreover, I have insisted on the important influence, which Theology in matter of fact does and must exercise over a great variety of sciences, completing and correcting them; so that, granting it to be a real science occupied upon truth, it cannot be omitted without great prejudice to the teaching of the rest. And lastly, I have urged that, supposing Theology be not taught, its province will not simply be neglected, but will be actually usurped by other sciences, which will teach, without warrant, conclusions of their own in a subject-matter which needs its own proper principles for its due formation and disposition.
Abstract statements are always unsatisfactory; these, as I have already observed, could be ill.u.s.trated at far greater length than the time allotted to me for the purpose has allowed. Let me hope that I have said enough upon the subject to suggest thoughts, which those who take an interest in it may pursue for themselves.