{"collection":"scripture-revelation","full_text_available":true,"graph_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/api/page/gutenberg_77050/graph","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/page/gutenberg_77050","id":"gutenberg_77050","license":"Public Domain (US)","rights_basis":"gutenberg_metadata_copyright_false","source":"gutenberg","source_url":"https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/77050","summary":null,"tags":["Category: Philosophy & Ethics","Category: Religion/Spirituality","Category: Sociology","Christian civilization","Christianity","Philosophy and religion"],"text":"DOES CIVILIZATION\n                             NEED RELIGION?\n\n                    _A Study in the Social Resources\n                       and Limitations of Religion\n                             in Modern Life_\n\n\n                                   BY\n                            REINHOLD NIEBUHR\n\n\n                                NEW YORK\n                          THE MACMILLAN COMPANY\n                                  1927\n                          _All rights reserved_\n\n\n                            Copyright, 1927,\n                        By THE MACMILLAN COMPANY.\n\n                        Set up and electrotyped.\n                        Published December, 1927.\n\n\n                  SET UP BY BROWN BROTHERS, LINOTYPERS\n              _Printed in the United States of America by_\n                  THE FERRIS PRINTING COMPANY, NEW YORK\n\n\n\n\n                       TO THE MEMORY OF MY FATHER\n\n                     WHO TAUGHT ME THAT THE CRITICAL\n                      FACULTY CAN BE UNITED WITH A\n                             REVERENT SPIRIT\n\n                                  _and_\n\n                              TO MY MOTHER\n\n                     WHO FOR TWELVE YEARS HAS SHARED\n                          WITH ME THE WORK OF A\n                           CHRISTIAN PASTORATE\n\n\n\n\n                                CONTENTS\n\n\n       CHAPTER                                                  PAGE\n\n    I. The State of Religion in Modern Society                     1\n\n   II. Nature and Civilization as Foes of Personality             19\n\n  III. The Social Resources of Religion                           35\n\n   IV. The Social Conservatism of Modern Religion                 63\n\n    V. Religion and Life: Conflict and Compromise                 79\n\n   VI. Social Complexity and Ethical Impotence                   124\n\n  VII. Transcending and Transforming the World                   165\n\n VIII. A Philosophical Basis for an Ethical Religion             190\n\n   IX. Conclusion                                                220\n\n\n\n\n                    DOES CIVILIZATION NEED RELIGION?\n\n\n\n\n                    DOES CIVILIZATION NEED RELIGION?\n\n\n\n\n                               CHAPTER I\n\n                THE STATE OF RELIGION IN MODERN SOCIETY\n\n\nReligion is not in a robust state of health in modern civilization.\nVast multitudes, particularly in industrial and urban centers, live\nwithout seeking its sanctions for their actions and die without\nclaiming its comforts in their extremities. While its influence is\nstill considerable among agrarians and the middle classes of the city,\nan ever-increasing number of the privileged classes are indifferent to\nits values. Spiritual and moral forces have always been in a perennial\nstate of decay in those circles of society in which physical ease and\ncultural advantages combine to make intellectual scruples more pressing\nthan moral ones. But modern scientific education has greatly multiplied\nthe intellectual difficulties of religion and the increasing opulence\nof Western life has rendered its moral problems more perplexing.\nIndustrial workers, in as far as they are socially self-conscious,\nare almost universally inimical to religion, and their opposition\nrepresents a type of anti-religious sentiment which is entirely new in\nhistory.\n\nSince the dawn of the modern era the tides of faith have ebbed and\nflowed so that it is not easy to chart their general course; but it\nis difficult to escape the conclusion that each new tide has barely\nexceeded the mark left by a previous ebb. The stream of religious life\nhas been deepened at times, as in the Protestant Reformation, but the\nimpartial observer will note that it has been narrowed as well. A\npsychology of defeat, of which both fundamentalism and modernism are\nsymptoms, has gripped the forces of religion. Extreme orthodoxy betrays\nby its very frenzy that the poison of scepticism has entered the soul\nof the church; for men insist most vehemently upon their certainties\nwhen their hold upon them has been shaken. Frantic orthodoxy is a\nmethod for obscuring doubt. Liberalism tries vainly to give each new\nstrategic retreat the semblance of a victorious engagement. To retreat\nfrom untenable positions is no doubt a necessary step in preparation\nfor new advances; but this necessary strategy has not been accompanied\nby the kind of spiritual vigor which would promise ultimate victory.\nThe general tendencies toward the secularization of life have been\nconsistent enough to prompt its foes to predict religion\u2019s ultimate\nextinction as a major interest of mankind and to tempt even friendly\nobservers to regard its future with grave apprehension. There are\nindeed many forms of religion which are clearly vestigial remnants of\nanother day with other interests. They have no vital influence upon\nthe life of modern man, and their continued existence only proves that\nhistory, like nature, is slow to destroy what it has found useless, and\neven slower to inter what it has destroyed. Scattered among the living\nforms of each civilization are the whitened bones of what was once\nflesh and blood.\n\nThe sickness of faith in our day may be the senility which precedes\ndeath; on the other hand, it may be a specific malady which time\nand thought can cure. If history is slow to destroy what has become\nuseless, it may be as patient and persistent in reviving what is\nuseful but seems dead. Five hundred years are but a short span in\nhistory, and a constant tendency over such a period may lead to\npremature conclusions. If religion contains indispensable resources\nfor the life of man, its revival waits only upon the elimination of\nthose maladjustments which have hindered it from making its resources\navailable for the citizen of the modern era. Whatever may be said of\nspecific religions and religious forms, it is difficult to imagine\nman without religion; for religion is the champion of personality in\na seemingly impersonal world. It prompts man to organize his various\nimpulses, inherited and acquired, into a moral unity; it persuades\nhim, when its vitality is unimpaired, to regard his fellows with an\nappreciation commensurate with his own self-respect; and it finally\ndiscovers and creates a universe in which the human spirit is\nguaranteed security against the forces of nature which always seem to\nreduce it to a mere effervescence unable to outlast the collocation of\nforces which produced it. The plight of religion in our own day is due\nto the fact that it has been more than ordinarily pressed by foes on\nthe two lines on which it defends the dignity and value of personality.\nThe sciences have greatly complicated the problem of maintaining the\nplausibility of the personalization of the universe by which religion\nguarantees the worth of human personality; and science applied to the\nworld\u2019s work has created a type of society in which human personality\nis easily debased. The pure sciences have revealed a world of nature\nmuch more impersonal and, seemingly, much less amenable to a divine\nwill and to human needs than had been traditionally assumed; and the\napplied sciences have created an impersonal civilization in which human\nrelations are so complex, its groups and units so large, its processes\nso impersonal, the production of things so important, and ethical\naction so difficult, that personality is both dwarfed and outraged in\nit.\n\nPersonality is that type of reality which is self-conscious and\nself-determining. The concept of personality is valid only in a\nuniverse in which creative freedom is developed and maintained in\nindividual life as well as in the universe. Religion therefore needs\nthe support of both metaphysics and ethics. It tries to prompt man to\nethical action by the sublime assumption that the universe is itself\nethical in its ultimate nature whatever data to the contrary the\nimmediate and obvious scene may reveal; and through the cultivation\nof the ethical life in man it seeks to make such a personalization\nof the universe both necessary and plausible. It teaches men to find\nGod by loving their brothers, and to love their brothers because\nthey have found God. It inspires a mystical reverence for human\npersonality, prompted by the discovery and creation of a universe in\nwhich personality is the supreme power and value; and it persuades men\nto discover personal values in the universe because they have first\ncome upon clues to the transcendent value of personality in the lives\nof their fellows. Its ethics is dependent upon its metaphysics and its\nmetaphysics is rooted in its ethics. Religion is thus obviously placed\nin a desperate plight when its metaphysics and its ethics are imperiled\nat the same time. It must face and do battle with two hosts of enemies,\nthose who do not believe in men because they do not believe in God, and\nthose who do not believe in God because modern civilization has robbed\nthem of their faith in the moral integrity of men.\n\nSince it is difficult to fight on two fronts at the same time,\nthe forces of religion have been forced to choose one of the two\nfronts for their major defensive effort. Perhaps it was inevitable\nthat they should choose the easier task. It is easier to challenge\nthe idea of an impersonal universe than to change the fact of an\nimpersonal civilization. That is what the modern church has done and\nis doing. It is spending all its energy in discounting the excessive\nclaims of a deterministic science. It has exhausted its ingenuity\nin retreating from the untenable positions of an orthodoxy which\noverstated the freedom and the virtue in the physical universe and\ntherefore aggravated the very determinism by which it was defeated.\nOutraged truth has a way of avenging itself. The idea of a capricious\nGod working his will in the universe without the restraint of law or\nthe hindrance of any circumstance helped to create the concept of a\nmechanistic world in which all freedom is an illusion and therefore all\nmorality a sham. Thus the strategic retreats of religion in the field\nof metaphysics have been the necessary prelude to any new religious\nadvance. Religion may in fact be forced to make some concessions\nwhich even modern liberalism seems still unwilling to make. Modern\nreligionists, particularly popular apologists are inclined to add the\nword creative to the word evolution, and assume that their problem is\nsolved. The modern church has very generally borrowed its apologetic\nstrategy from John Fiske and Henry Drummond, and has tried to\nvisualize a God who differed from older conception only in this\u2014that\nhe took more time to gain his ends than had once been assumed. The\nimportant fact which has escaped many modern defenders of the faith is\nthat the patience of the creative will is a necessary characteristic\nrather than a self-imposed restraint. There is a stubborn inertia in\nevery type of reality which offers resistance to each new step in\ncreation, so that an emerging type of reality is always in some sense\na compromise between the creative will and the established facts of\nthe concrete world. Whether we view the inorganic world, organic life\nor the world of personal and moral values, each new type of reality\nrepresents in some sense a defeat of God as well as a revelation of\nhim. Religious apologetics will probably be forced to concede this fact\nmore generously than has been its wont before it can bring religious\naffirmations into harmony with scientific facts. Modern liberalism is\nsteeped in a religious optimism which is true to the facts of neither\nthe world of nature nor the world of history. The ultimate worth of\nhuman personality in the universe may not be guaranteed as immediately\nnor as obviously as liberal religion seems inclined to assume. Liberal\nreligion may be forced to discard its metaphysical and theological\nmonisms, which have been its support even more than orthodoxy\u2019s, and\nconcede that freedom and creativity in both man and the cosmic order\nare more seriously circumscribed than religion had assumed. But after\nthat concession is made it is not likely that the idea of freedom, and\nthe dignity of personality which is associated with it, will ever be\ncompletely discredited, whatever may be the deterministic obsessions of\nmodern science. The various sciences can momentarily afford to indulge\nin their various determinisms because the prestige of metaphysics as\na co\u00f6rdinator of the sciences has been destroyed for the time being.\nEach science is therefore able to disavow the authority of metaphysics\nand work upon the basis of its own metaphysical assumptions, which\nare usually unreflective and generally deterministic. But the bulk\nof new knowledge which has momentarily destroyed the authority of\nany unifying perspective must in time be mastered by philosophical\nthought; and absolute determinism is bound to be discredited in such a\ndevelopment.[1]\n\nThere can be no question but that the development of the physical\nsciences has permanently increased the difficulty of justifying the\npersonalization of the universe upon which all religious affirmations\nare based. Every new form of reality is so closely linked to every\npreceding form out of which it emerges that it is not easy to discern\nthe place where free creativity functions. Yet no total view of reality\ncan ever be permanently mechanistic, for new types of reality do emerge\nand science is able to explain only the process and not the cause of\ntheir emergence.\n\nImportant, then, as the metaphysical problem of religion is, it is\nnot the only problem which it faces. Though it is a real task to\nreinterpret religious truth in the light of modern science, it is by\nno means a hopeless one; and though it is necessary, it is not the\nonly necessary task. In the light of modern philosophical inquiries it\nis justifiable to assume that the most needed hypotheses of religion\nare metaphysically defensible. In the present situation of religion\nin civilization, it is more necessary to inquire if and how the\npeculiar attitudes and the unique life which proceeds from a religious\ninterpretation of the universe may be made to serve the needs of men in\nmodern civilization. The fact is that more men in our modern era are\nirreligious because religion has failed to make civilization ethical\nthan because it has failed to maintain its intellectual respectability.\nFor every person who disavows religion because some ancient and\nunrevised dogma outrages his intelligence, several become irreligious\nbecause the social impotence of religion outrages their conscience.\nReligion never lacks moral fruits so long as it has any vitality. It\nhas been placed in such a sorry plight in fulfilling its ethical task\nin modern civilization because the mechanization of society has made\nan ethical life for the individual at once more necessary and more\ndifficult, and failure more obvious, than in any previous civilization.\nIf we are not less ethical than our fathers, our happiness is certainly\nmore dependent than that of our fathers upon the ethical character of\nour society. Rapid means of commerce and communication have brought\nus into terms of intimacy with all the world without increasing the\nspiritual dynamic and ethical intelligence which makes such close\ncontact sufferable. We have multiplied the tools of destruction which a\nconfused conscience may wield and have thus armed the world of nature\nwhich lives in the soul of man by the same science by which we imagined\nourselves to have conquered nature. We have developed so complex a\nsociety that it cannot be made ethical by moral goodwill alone, if\nmoral purpose is not astutely guided. Lacking social intelligence,\nmodern civilization has thus robbed man of confidence in his own\nand his neighbor\u2019s moral integrity even when ethical motives were\nnot totally lacking. Civilization with its impersonal and mechanized\nrelationships tends on the one hand to make society less ethical,\nand on the other to reveal its immoralities more vividly than in any\nprevious age. Religion has a relation to both cause and effect to the\nmoral life. Both its friends and its foes are inclined to judge it\nby its moral fruits, regarding it as primarily the root, fancied or\nreal, of morality. Yet morality is as much the root as the fruit of\nreligion; for religious sentiment develops out of moral experience\nand religious convictions are the logic by which moral life justifies\nitself. In a civilization in which the dominant motives and basic\nrelationships are unethical, religion is therefore doubly affected.\nThe immoralities which bring the reproach of impotence upon it are\nalso the reason for the impotence. Thus modern civilization creates\na temper of scorn for a religion which fails to challenge recognized\nsocial iniquities, and at the same time it destroys the vitality\nwhich religion needs to issue such a challenge. The defection of the\nindustrial workers from religious life and institutions, one of the\nmost significant phenomena of our time, has this double significance.\nThe industrial worker is indifferent to religion, partly because he\nis enmeshed in relations which are so impersonal and fundamentally so\nunethical that his religious sense atrophies in him. On the other hand\nhe is hostile to religion because he observes the ethical impotence of\nthe religion of the privileged classes, particularly in its failure to\neffect improvement in economic and social attitudes. The industrial\nworker raises a general characteristic of modern urban man to a unique\ndegree. His own experiences help him to see the moral limitations of\nmodern civilization more clearly than do the more privileged classes;\nbut what is true of him is generally true of all members of a complex\nsociety in which human relations are impersonal and complicated. If\nreligion is senescent in modern civilization, its social impotence is\nas responsible for its decline as is its metaphysical maladjustment.\n\nThe restoration of its vitality must wait upon the adjustment of\nits tenets and the reorganization of its life to meet the problems\nwhich both the pure and the applied sciences, which both the\ndepersonalization of the universe and the depersonalization of\ncivilization, have created. The metaphysical problem of religion cannot\nbe depreciated. In the long run religion must be able to impress the\nmind of modern man with the essential plausibility and scientific\nrespectability of its fundamental affirmations. But the scientific\nrespectability of religious affirmations will not avail if the life\nwhich issues from them will not help to solve man\u2019s urgent social\nproblems. If modern churches continue to prefer their intellectual\nto their ethical problems, they will merely succeed in maintaining a\nvestige of religion in those classes which are not sensitive enough to\nfeel and not unfortunate enough to suffer from the moral limitations\nof modern society. An unethical civilization will inevitably destroy\nthe vitality of the religion of the victims and the sincerity and\nmoral prestige of the religion of the beneficiaries of its unethical\ninequalities.\n\nThe future of religion and the future of civilization are thus hung\nin the same balance. Both as a means to a moral end and as an end in\nitself, for which the moral life is the means, the future of religion\nis involved in the ethical reconstruction of modern society. Social\nand economic problems are not the only problems which fret the mind\nand engage the interest of modern men. But they are proportionately\nmore important in an advanced than in a primitive society. Modern men\nface no problem that is greater than that of their aggregate existence.\nHow can they live in some kind of decent harmony with their fellow men\nwhen the size and intricacy of their social machinery tends continually\nto aggravate the vices which make human life inhuman? How shall they\ngain mastery over the instruments by which they have mastered nature\nso that these will not become the means of projecting nature\u2019s vices\ninto human history? How shall they bring the life of great social and\npolitical groups under the dominion of conscience and moral law? These\nare the problems upon which hangs the future of civilization. Such\nsocial problems are fundamentally ethical and the intimate relation\nbetween religion and morality bring them inevitably into the province\nof religion. Can it help to solve them? Will their solution give\nreligious idealism new vitality? Is the present social impotence of\nreligion due to innate defects? Or is it due to specific and historical\nlimitations which the years may change at least as quickly as they\nproduced them? To such questions we must address ourselves.\n\n\n\n\n                               CHAPTER II\n\n             NATURE AND CIVILIZATION AS FOES OF PERSONALITY\n\n\nIt would be extravagant to claim that the possibility of making the\nresources of religion available for the solution of social problems\nof modern civilization is absolutely determining for its future.\nReligion would continue to maintain itself in modern society even if it\nproduced only the scarcest socio-ethical fruits. The problem of living\ntogether is not the only problem which men face, and civilization is\nnot the only foe with which personality contends. At least two other\nfundamental problems engage the interest of every normal individual,\nthat of developing the multifarious forces of his personality into some\nkind of harmony and unity and that of asserting the dignity and worth\nof human personality in defiance of nature\u2019s indifference and contempt.\nIf religion can render the human spirit a tolerably effective service\nin the solution of these two problems, its aid will not be scorned\nthough it fail him in his social problem. It will not maintain itself\nwith equal vitality in all strata of society, but it will continue some\nkind of existence in all of them, and a fairly vigorous life in those\nclasses in which social problems are least urgent.\n\nPsychiatry and the psychological sciences are encroaching upon one\nservice to the perplexed spirit of man which was once an almost\nexclusive province of religion. They are offering him aid in the task\nof integrating the heterogeneous forces, with which ages of human\nand prehuman history have endowed him, into the unity of dependable\ncharacter; and there are those who think that this service will obviate\nhis need for religion in this field. Undoubtedly it will be to the\nadvantage of any moral or religious discipline of the individual\nlife to avail itself of a more precise knowledge of the intricacies\nof human personality; yet only the most mechanistic and naturalistic\nethical theorist would maintain that the knowledge of self is the\nonly prerequisite of self-mastery, and that the eternal conflict\nbetween the higher will and the immediate desires, about which the\nreligious of every age have testified, may be composed by nothing more\nthan a better understanding of the devious ways of human intelligence\nand emotion. The psychological sciences have undoubtedly saved men\nfrom some morbid fears and repressions, but the most modern school\nof psychological mechanists and determinists seems more anxious to\ndestroy restraints which are the product of ages of moral experience\nthan to correct the defects which reveal themselves inevitably on the\nfringe of every moral discipline. The reason mechanistic psychiatry and\npsycho-analysis run easily into a justification of license is because\nthey labor under the illusion that the higher self (they would scorn\nthat term) is able to put all internal forces in their proper place, if\nonly it knows their previous history and actual direction. Under such\nan illusion the clamant desires of man\u2019s physical life are bound to\nbe closer to the center of character than any moral discipline would\nallow. Modern determinism is too naturalistic to see or to be willing\nto regard human personality as the incarnation of moral and spiritual\nvalues which did not have their origin in any immediate necessity and\nwhich no individual will maintain if his resolution is not strengthened\nby something more than his momentary and obvious experience. This is\nnot to say that moral discipline in individual life can be maintained\nby religion alone. A humanistic ethical idealism, which makes the\nexperience of the race the guide and inspiration of individual\nconduct, will not fail to aid men toward some higher integration of\npersonality, though it will seldom go beyond the Greek ideal of a\nbalanced life which knows how to escape sublime enthusiasms as well as\ncrass excesses. The value of religion in composing the conflict with\nwhich the inner life of man is torn is that it identifies man\u2019s highest\nvalues, about which he would center his life, with realities in the\nuniverse itself, and teaches him how to bring his momentary impulses\nunder the dominion of his will by subjecting his will to the guidance\nof an absolute will. \u201cMake me a captive, Lord, and then I shall be\nfree,\u201d has ever been the prayer of religious people. \u201cHe who loses his\nlife for my sake shall find it,\u201d said Jesus. In such paradoxes the\ntruth is revealed that the highest peace comes to men where their life\nis centered not in what is best in them but in that beyond them which\nis better than their best.\n\nObviously this function of religion in the life of the individual\nhas its social implications; but it is not to be assumed that the\nintegration of personality automatically solves man\u2019s social problem.\nThat assumption, which religion invariably makes, is one of its very\ndefects in dealing with the social problem. A unified personality may\nstill be anti-social in its dominant desires and the very self-respect\nwhich issues from its higher integration may become the screen for its\nunsocial attitudes.\n\nJust as important as the problem of bringing peace to the warring\nfactions within the soul of man is the task of giving human personality\na sense of worth in the face of nature\u2019s indifference and contempt;\nand of adjusting man\u2019s highest values to nature\u2019s sublimer moods. The\nsignificance of the religious inclinations of country people lies just\nhere. The peasant is religious because man\u2019s relation to the natural\nworld about him is still the agrarian\u2019s great interest. His ethical\nlife is simple and develops in those primary or family relationships in\nwhich problems are comparatively few and a disturbance of the religious\ntemper by unethical social facts rather infrequent. He is close enough\nto nature to be prompted to awe and reverence by her beauties and\nsublimities, to gratitude by her vast and perennial benevolences,\nand to fear by her occasional cruel caprices. He expresses his awe\nin worship, his gratitude in the spring and harvest festivals, which\nare traditional in all religions, and when her momentary atrocities\novertake him he appeals from nature\u2019s God to the God who is above\nnature and seeks the intervention of a supernatural ally in behalf of\nhuman personality. In a sense the religion of peasants remains the\nconstant spring of religious sentiment in every class of society, which\nothers may corrupt or refine but never quite destroy. Urban men suffer\nfrom an atrophy of the religious sense because they lose, as they are\ndivorced from the soil, some of the reverence to which a view of the\nserene majesties of nature prompts and some of the fear occasioned by\nher elemental passions. Yet the most sophisticated and emancipated\ncity dweller cannot finally escape the problem of the relation of the\nhuman spirit to the natural world in which it is at once child and\nrebel. Even the refinements and artificialities of urban life will not\nsave man from facing nature\u2019s last and most implacable servant\u2014death,\nnor free him of the necessity of making some kind of appeal against\nthe obvious victory which nature claims at the grave. The fight of\npersonality against nature is religion\u2019s first battle, and that is one\nreason why there is always a possibility that other struggles will\nbe neglected for it. Traditional religion fails in its social tasks\npartly because men have suffered longer from the sins of nature than\nfrom the sins of man; and religious forms and traditions are therefore\nbetter adjusted to offer them comfort for these distresses than for\nany other from which they suffer. Religion is not yet fully oriented\nto the new perils to personality which are developed in civilization.\nBut it may fail to meet these and yet not be totally discredited; for\nthe new perils have not supplanted the old ones. At its best religion\nis both a sublimation and a qualification of the will to live. Defeated\nby nature the human spirit rises above nature through religious faith,\ndiscovering and creating a universe in which divine personality is\nthe supreme power and human personality a cherished, protected and\ndeathless reality. But this religious sublimation of the will to live\nmust be balanced by a qualification of that will to live by which\nmen are persuaded to sacrifice themselves for each other, that they\nmay save themselves from each other and realize their highest self.\nLove is a natural fruit of religion but not an inevitable one. A high\nappreciation of personality ought to issue in a reverence for all\npersonalities and in a qualification of the tendency to self-assertion\nfor the sake of other personalities. But left to itself religion easily\nbecomes a force which sublimates but does not qualify man\u2019s desire for\nsurvival; in which case it may still function in simple societies but\nwill be less useful in those which are highly complex and in which the\nproblem of human relationships has become very important.\n\nNext to the faith of agrarian classes the greatest stronghold of\nreligion is in the life of the middle classes of the city. This\nphenomenon is due to several causes. Ideals of self-mastery and\npersonal rectitude are always strongest in those classes in which\nphysical resources are not so abundant as to tempt to sensual excesses\nand not so scant as to lead to an obsession with life\u2019s externalities.\nFor that reason the resources of religion for the solution of personal\nmoral problems are particularly coveted by the middle classes. On the\nother hand the middle classes are also religious because they are\ncomparatively unconscious of their responsibility for society\u2019s sins\nand comparatively untouched by the evil consequences of an unethical\ncivilization. They may therefore indulge in a religion which creates\nmoral respectability, and reinforces self-respect, even though it does\nnot force them to share their sense of worth with all their fellows.\nThere is for this reason an element of hypocrisy in all middle-class\nreligion of which it never becomes clearly conscious but which helps to\ncreate the corroding cynicism from which the lower classes of modern\nsociety suffer.\n\nSince ideals of personal righteousness flourish in the genteel\npoverty of the countryside at least as well as in urban middle class\nconditions, the religion of peasants and the city\u2019s middle classes have\ntwo characteristics in common: their preoccupation with problems of\nthe individual life and their concern for the adjustment of the soul\nto nature\u2019s realities. But while they share these elements the two\ntypes of religion are by no means identical. The simple expedient of\nclaiming divine and supernatural intervention in the soul\u2019s specific\ncases of distress does not appeal to the sophisticated intelligence of\ncity people, particularly since higher learning has become so general\nand science has become the burden of this learning. They are anxious to\ncorrect the intellectual inadequacies of traditional religion; and if\nthey are conscious of any moral defects in it, they have the easy faith\nthat these will be eliminated with a proper adjustment of religious\naffirmations to the world of scientific fact.\n\nThe conflict between orthodoxy and liberalism, between fundamentalism\nand modernism, is essentially a conflict between city and countryside.\nThough the Protestant Reformation was used by the rising cities\nto assert the needs of the inner life against a too artificially\nelaborated institutional religion and to express an ethic of\nindividualism against the traditional loyalties of the peasants\nrather than to make a readjustment of religion to the growing demands\nof intellectual life, the humanistic revival which preceded the\nReformation was clearly determined by this latter interest and it\ncontributed to the dissolution of the medieval religious structure.\nIn the recent theological controversies within Protestantism, between\nConservatism and Liberalism, the religious na\u00efvete of the agrarian and\nthe intellectual sophistication of the city are more obvious influences\nin the conflict.\n\nThe revision of ancient affirmations of faith in the light of modern\nlearning was of course necessary from the point of view of the general\nneeds of the age, and not required merely to satisfy the intellectual\nscruples of a particular class in society which has a preponderant\ninfluence in the Protestant church. It might be better to say therefore\nthat the commercial middle classes appropriated as much as they\nprompted the revision of Protestant theology and religion.\n\nBy doing this they have indeed created a religion capable of\nmaintaining itself in urban civilization, but it develops little\npower for the ethical reconstruction of industrial society. The same\nreligionists who pride themselves upon the reasonableness of their\nfaith generally use their very modern and revised religion to sanctify\na very unmodern and unrevised ethical orthodoxy, an individualistic\northodoxy which makes much of self-realization and comparatively little\nof the social needs of modern life.\n\nThe kind of liberal religion which thrives among the privileged\nclasses of the city gives them some guarantee of the worth of their\npersonalities against the threats of a seemingly impersonal universe\nwhich science has revealed, but it does not help to make them aware\nof the perils to personality in society itself. The final test of any\nreligion must be its ability to prompt ethical action upon the basis\nof reverence for personality. To create a world view which justifies a\nhigh appreciation of personality and fails to develop an ethic which\nguarantees the worth of personality in society, is the great hypocrisy.\nIt is the hypocrisy which is corrupting almost all modern religion.\nIn a sense hypocrisy is the inevitable by-product of every religion.\nMen are never as good as their ideals and never as conscious as the\nimpartial observer of their divergence from them. Every religious\nperson commits the error of solipsism in some form or other, the\nsin of claiming for himself what he will not grant to his brothers.\nThe religion of modern men, particularly of the privileged classes,\nseems to be more than ordinarily insincere, partly because the social\nsimplicity of another age obscured this inevitable hypocrisy and partly\nbecause the privilege of the religious classes is so great and its\nunethical basis in modern society, particularly from the perspective of\nthe lowly, so patent and so destructive, that it is no longer possible\nto veil the immoral implications of a self-centered religion.\n\nThe question which we really face, therefore, is whether religion is\nconstitutionally but a sublimation of man\u2019s will to live or whether\nit can really qualify the will of the individual and restrain his\nexpansive desires for the sake of society. If it is only the former,\nit will continue to be the peculiar possession either of those who\nhave no urgent social problems or of those who are the beneficiaries\nand not the victims of social maladjustments. If religion is not\nnow functioning in the solution of social and ethical problems, its\nimpotence in this field may be due to constitutional weaknesses which\nmay be corrected, once they are understood, or it may be due to certain\nspecific historical influences of the past centuries of Western life\nwhich further experience will change and qualify. If religion has\nresources for the solution of social and ethical problems which have\nnot been made available for the uses of society, it is the duty of\nmodern teachers of religion and of all who still have confidence\nin its social efficacy or who benefit by its comforts to work for\nthe elimination of its social limitations, whether they seem to be\nincidental and casual or basic and constitutional. Even constitutional\nlimitations in the social task need not discredit religion as a social\nforce; for a valuable resource may be closely related to a social\nlimitation and a way may be discovered to detach the one from the\nother. Men always tend to be either uncritical devotees or merciless\ncritics of the various values which emerge in human life. This is\nparticularly true in regard to the values of religion, the limitations\nof which are always aggravated by its unreflective champions and\nmade the occasion of sweeping abuse by its critics. Religious people\nhave assumed too easily that a religious life must issue not only in\nprivate rectitude but in perfect social attitudes. This overestimate\nof its social usefulness easily creates a reaction of criticism which\ndenies that there is any useful counsel in religion for the problems of\nsociety or any dynamic necessary for their solution.\n\n\n\n\n                              CHAPTER III\n\n                    THE SOCIAL RESOURCES OF RELIGION\n\n\nThe task of analyzing and isolating the ethical limitations and the\nsocial deficiencies of religion is to no purpose if there is not in\nreligion itself, at its best, some resources which civilization and\nsociety need for the solution of their problems. Some critics of\nreligion discount it entirely as a social force, or at least as a force\nof social progress. Bertrand Russell\u2019s prejudices on this subject\nare too violent to make his testimony against religion particularly\nweighty. Yet he speaks for a large number of ethically sensitive\nindividuals who share his critical attitude, if not his vehemence,\nwhen he declares: \u201cSince the thirteenth century the church has\nconsistently encouraged men\u2019s blood lust and avarice and discouraged\nevery approach to human and kindly feeling.... Emancipation from the\nchurches is still an essential condition of improvement, particularly\nin America where the churches have more influence than in Europe....\nOf all requisites for the regeneration of society the decay of religion\nseems to me to have the best chance of being realized.\u201d[2] The number\nof people among the middle and higher classes who would subscribe to\nsuch a denunciation of organized religion is probably not very large.\nBut there are very many who ignore the church as a force for social\namelioration; and in the class of industrial workers a temper against\nthe church exceeding even Mr. Russell\u2019s violence is very general.\n\nWhatever may be the facts in regard to contemporary religion and to\nother specific types of organized religious life, it is relevant to ask\nwhether religion as such, freed from its specific limitations, contains\nindispensable resources for the ethical reconstruction of society.\n\nThe first resource which would seem to be of social value is the social\nimagination which religion, at its best, develops upon the basis of\nits high evaluation of personality. A spiritual interpretation of the\nuniverse may not issue automatically in a high appreciation of human\npersonality, but religion is never quite able to deny this ethical\nimplication of its faith, and in occasional moments of high insight\nit revels in it. It persuades men to regard their fellows as their\nbrothers because they are all children of God. It insists, in other\nwords, that temporal circumstance and obvious differences are dwarfed\nbefore the spiritual affinities which men have through their common\nrelation to a divine creator. Thus Jesus could deal sympathetically\nwith the harlot of the street, the publican at the gate, the Samaritan\nwoman at the well and the blinded fanatics and their dupes who\ncrucified him. The apostle Paul, though he did not always understand\nthe genius of his master, was nevertheless able to apprehend this\ncentral dogma at the heart of religion and declare: \u201cIn Christ there\nis neither Jew nor Greek, neither bond nor free.\u201d Celsus, the critic\nof the Christian church in the first century, derides the church for\nits failure to distinguish between outcasts and respectable citizens.\nThe fervor and consistency with which the church has espoused the ideal\nof the equal worth of all personalities has not always equaled that\nof the early church; many compromises with the brute facts of history\nhave been made; yet the church has never been able to betray this faith\naltogether. The missionary enterprise with all its weaknesses is still\na revelation of this power in religion. Oceans are bridged and varying\ncircumstances of race and environment are ignored in order that the\nsoul inspired by God may claim kinship with other souls of every race\nand every clime.\n\nThe physical characteristics and outward circumstances in which men\ndiffer are sometimes not so great as they seem to the superficial\nobserver; wherefore education may do as much as religion to cultivate\nand discover those profounder unities which made all men brothers.\nThere are hatreds which are due merely to misunderstanding. They\nspring from the parochialism of the average mind, which knows no\nbetter than to regard with contempt what differs from the standards\nand values to which it has become habituated. Education and culture\nmay emancipate men from such hatreds. Other misunderstandings which\nare caused by a superficial analysis of men\u2019s action may be dissipated\nby a profounder appreciation of the complex life of every individual\nout of which each action emerges. Yet understanding alone does not\nsolve all the problems of living together. We do not hate only those\nwhom we do not know or understand. Sometimes we hate those most whom\nwe know best. Love does not flow inevitably out of intimacy. Intimacy\nmay merely accentuate previous attitudes, whether they be benevolent or\nmalevolent. Anthropologists are easily obsessed with the inequalities\nwhich men reveal in their natural state, and the very abundance of\ntheir knowledge prompts them to an ethically enervating determinism\nwhen they attempt to gauge the potentialities of so-called primitive\npeoples. The modern psychologists are more inclined to accept the\ndogma of the total depravity of man than the ancient theologians were,\nand they prove thereby that a profound knowledge of human nature need\nnot incline men to regard human beings with reverence and affection.\nMr. H. L. Mencken may not speak for the scientists, but he is somewhat\ntypical of the cynicism which follows in the wake of intellectualism.\nHis estimate of human beings is: \u201cMan is a sick fly taking a dizzy ride\non a gigantic flywheel.... He is lazy, improvident, unclean.... Life\nis a combat between jackals and jackasses.\u201d Love is always slightly\nirrational and requires an irrational urge for its support. It is at\nleast as irrational as hatred and the same intelligence which mitigates\nthe one may enervate the other. A highly sophisticated intelligence is\ngenerally unable to survey the human scene with any higher attitude\nthan that of pity for human beings, and pity is a form of contempt\nunder a thin disguise of sympathy.\n\nThe facts of human nature are sufficiently complex to validate\nalmost any hypothesis which may be projected into them. Therefore\nthe assumptions upon which we essay our social contacts are all\nimportant. One reason why the social sciences can never attain the\nscientific prestige of the physical sciences to which they aspire is\nthat the importance of hypotheses increases with the complexity and\nvariability of the data into which they are projected. Every assumption\nis an hypothesis, and human nature is so complex that it justifies\nalmost every assumption and prejudice with which either a scientific\ninvestigation or an ordinary human contact is initiated. A vital\nreligion not only prompts men to venture the assumption that human\nbeings are essentially trustworthy and lovable, but it endows them with\nthe courage and inclination to maintain their hypothesis when immediate\nfacts contradict it until fuller facts are brought in to verify it.\nMere sentiment is easily defeated by life\u2019s disappointing realities.\nAnatole France observed that if one started with the supposition that\nmen are naturally good and virtuous, one inevitably ends by wishing to\nkill them all. Human nature is neither lovable nor trustworthy in its\nundisciplined state and a sentimental overestimate of its virtue may\nwell result in the reaction to which Anatole France alludes. Yet its\nundeveloped resources are always greater than either a superficial or\ncritical intelligence is able to fathom. There must be an element of\nfaith in love if it is to be creative. \u201cLove,\u201d said Paul, \u201cbelieves all\nthings\u201d; and it may be added that it saves its faith from absurdity\nby creating some of the evidence which justifies its assumptions. It\n\u201chopes till hope creates from its own wreck the thing it contemplates.\u201d\nNothing less than a religious appreciation of personality, supported\nby a spiritual interpretation of the universe itself in terms of\nmoral goodwill, will make love robust enough to overcome momentary\ndisappointments and gain its final victory. The injunction of Jesus\nto his disciples to forgive not seven times, but seventy times seven,\nrepresents the natural social strategy of a robust and vital religious\nidealism, which subdues evil by its unswerving confidence in the good.\n\nWhile it is true that religion does not issue automatically in an\nattitude of reverence and goodwill toward all human personalities, it\nnevertheless remains a fact that a religious world view does incline\nmen to regard their fellow men from a perspective which obscures\ndifferences and imperfections and reveals affinities and potential\nvirtue. Even if intelligence became imaginative enough to discover\nthe affinities, it could not be courageous enough to challenge the\nevil in men in the name of their better selves. The art of forgiveness\ncan be learned only in the school of religion. And it is an art\nwhich men must learn increasingly as a complex society makes human\nassociations more and more intimate. Whatever improvement a growing\nsocial science may establish in the technique of social intercourse,\nmen will never escape the necessity of overcoming the evil, which they\ninflict upon each other, by creative patience and courageous trust. A\nhigher intelligence may mitigate our fears and an exacter justice may\nrestrain the inclination to wreak vengeance upon the wrongdoer; but\nonly the stubborn forces of religion will turn fear into trust and\nhatred into love. Sometimes mutual fear and hatred reduce themselves to\nsuch an absurdity (as in the late World War) that even a superficial\nintelligence can recognize it; but their absurdity does not become\npatent until they have issued in mutual annihilation. Even then the\nperson with an ordinary commonsense view of life can do no better than\nto substitute partial trust for fear and partial understanding for\nhatred. So one war breeds the next. All men are potentially at once our\nfoes and our friends. An unreflective social life assumes that they\nare enemies and helps to make them so. A higher social intelligence\nestablishes a nicely balanced compromise between trust and mistrust so\nthat the one cannot be very creative and the other not too destructive.\nOnly the foolishness of faith knows how to assume the brotherhood of\nman and to create it by the help of the assumption. A religious ideal\nis always a little absurd because it insists on the truth of what\nought to be true but is only partly true; it is however the ultimate\nwisdom, because reality slowly approaches the ideals which are implicit\nin its life. A merely realistic analysis of any given set of facts is\ntherefore as dangerous as it is helpful. The creative and redemptive\nforce is a faith which defies the real in the name of the ideal, and\nsubdues it.\n\nLove is, in short, a religious attitude. There are circumstances in\nwhich it may prosper without the inspiration of religion. In the family\nrelation and in other intimate circles proximity and consanguinity\nmay prompt men to regard human beings as essentially good, and direct\nexperience validate their faith. That is why Jesus discounted love in\nthe family as a religious achievement. \u201cIf ye love those who love you,\nwhat thanks have ye?\u201d In the secondary relations, which are no longer\nsecondary in the matter of importance to human welfare, the matter\nis not so simple. In these only a sublime assumption will persuade\nmen to embark upon the adventure of brotherhood, and only a robust\nand constantly replenished faith will inure them against inevitable\ndisappointments. The religious interpretation of the world is\nessentially an insistence that the ideal is real and that the real can\nbe understood only in the light of the ideal. Since the family relation\nis the most ethical relation men know, religious faith interprets all\nlife in terms of that relation. In view of many of the facts of history\nwhich seem to reveal the world of man as but a projection of the world\nof nature in which animal fights with animal and herd with herd, this\nkind of interpretation is superficially too absurd to persuade a highly\nsophisticated intelligence. It is the truth which is withheld from the\nwise and revealed to babes. Yet it is the truth without which men will\nnot be able to build a peaceful society. It is the truth which even the\nphysical facts of a highly complex civilization, in which space and\ntime are being annihilated, are conspiring to make true. The races and\ngroups of mankind are obviously not living as a family; but they ought\nto. And as the necessity becomes more urgent the truth of the ideal\nbecomes more real.\n\nIt would be foolish to insist that goodwill alone will create\nconscience and that to detect the ethical core at the heart of man\u2019s\nbeing is all that is required to make him ethical. It is a task to\npersuade human beings to trust their fellows; but is equally important\nto prompt their fellows to trustworthy action. If human nature is left\nunchallenged and undeveloped, it hardly qualifies the brute struggle\nfor survival sufficiently to validate any religion or ethic of trust.\nMen\u2019s actions are not as free as we have imagined. The social, economic\nand psychological sciences have restricted the concept of freedom in\nthe soul of man as the physical sciences have restricted it in the\nuniverse. Man is not only less free than he had once imagined, but he\nis not as free as he once was. If science has discredited the idea of\nfreedom, civilization has circumscribed the fact. It is easier for man\nto act as an ethical individual in a comparatively simple social group,\nsuch as the family, than in a very large and complex social group when\neven the most robust ethical purpose must meet the resistance and\nthe corruption of the primitive and untamed desires of the group. If\nman is capable of sacrificing immediate advantages for ultimate ones\nand his own advantages for the sake of society, this capacity is an\nachievement which he gains only after much effort and preserves from\ncorruption only at the price of eternal vigilance. The first requisite\nof an ethical life in modern civilization is a realization of the\ndifficulties which face the human conscience in maintaining itself\nagainst the pressure of immediate desires to which the whole emotional\nlife of man is wedded. It is not easy to sacrifice meat for beauty,\npleasure for some seemingly ephemeral value, self-interest for the sake\nof the family, the interest of the family for the sake of society, the\ninterest of our generation for the society of to-morrow. Yet only by\nsuch sacrifices can man prove the reality and potency of his creative\nwill. If such sacrifices are not actually made, all so-called morality\nbecomes in fact a device for obscuring the bestiality of man without\novercoming it.\n\nThe fact that, in spite of the pressure of the struggle for survival,\nman has created a kingdom of values in which truth, beauty and goodness\nhave been made real, is proof that he is more free and more moral than\nthe modern cynic is willing to concede. But his kingdom of values is\nnever as uncorrupted as he imagines. The task therefore of binding\nmen to spiritual values, and of prompting them to sacrifice immediate\npleasures and physical satisfactions for them, is difficult almost to\nthe point of desperation. Religion makes its contribution to it by\ngiving man the assurance that the world of values really has a relevant\nplace in the universe and that values are permanent and will be\nconserved. He is challenged to sacrifice in a universe in which love is\na basic law. He is asked to prefer personal values to property values\nin a world in which personality is the highest reality. He is prompted\nto exercise his conscience under the scrutiny and with the sympathy of\na higher conscience. Religion in its purest form does not guarantee\nman an immediate reward for every ethical achievement; indeed it may\noffer him no reward at all except the reward which inheres in the act\nitself. But it does give him the final satisfaction of guaranteeing\nthe reality of a universe which is not blind to the values for which\nhe must pay such a high price, and which is not indifferent or hostile\nto his struggle. It asks him to respect human personality because the\nuniverse itself, in spite of some obvious evidence to the contrary,\nknows how to conserve personality; and to create values in a world in\nwhich values are not an effervescence but a reality. Religion is in\nshort the courageous logic which makes the ethical struggle consistent\nwith world facts. In its most vital form religion validates its sublime\nassumptions in immediate experience and gives man an unshakable\ncertainty. It thus becomes the dynamic of moral action as well as the\nlogic which makes the action reasonable.\n\nThe force of its faith operates not only to preserve moral vigor but to\nsensitize moral judgments. The God of religious devotion is not only\nrevealed in the moral values of the universe outside of man, but he is\nrevealed in the aspirations of man which are beyond his achievements.\nGod insures not only the preservation of values but their perfection.\nAll moral achievement is qualified by the relativities of time and\ncircumstance. The worship of a holy God saves the soul from taking\npremature satisfaction in its partial achievement. It subjects every\nmoral value to comparison with a more perfect moral ideal. Of course\nthe absolute perfection of God is itself conditioned by the imperfect\nhuman insight which conceives it. A cruel age may picture God more\ncruel than itself, and to a generation lusting for power God may be\nthe supreme tyrant. Thus religion may become the sanctification of\nhuman imperfections. Yet in its highest form religion does inculcate\na wholesome spirit of humility which gives the soul no peace in any\nvirtue while higher virtue is attainable.\n\nThe force of religion in moral action and the necessity of religious\nassurance for the highest type of social life may be gauged by\nan analysis of possible alternatives to a social life which is\noriented by a religious world view. There are two real alternatives\nto such a life. The one is based upon an ethical but unreligious\nworld view, and the other scorns both ethics and religion in its\nabsolute determinism. An ethical life which claims no support from\nreligion may on occasion develop a very high type of social idealism,\nparticularly since it escapes the ethical defects of religion even\nwhile it sacrifices religious resources. Stoicism is in many respects\nsuperior to pantheistic religions; for there are moral advantages in\nunderestimating rather than overestimating the virtue of the universe.\nIt is better to create a sense of tension between the conscience of\nman and a morally indifferent nature than to obscure the moral defects\nof nature by a deification of the natural order. But if men disavow\nall faith in a power not their own which makes for righteousness,\nthey cannot finally save themselves from either arrogance or despair.\nReligion may destroy man\u2019s self-reliance by an undue sense of humility,\nbut even that limitation is no more destructive of moral values\nthan a self-reliance which prompts the human spirit to strut for a\nwhile on this narrow world in the consciousness of unique virtue\nbefore capitulating to a world which is too blind to know what it has\ndestroyed. Thomas Huxley thought he would as soon worship \u201ca wilderness\nof monkeys\u201d as to give himself to the worship of humanity after the\nfashion of Comte. To insist too strenuously upon the uniqueness of\nhuman life in the cosmic order must inevitably issue in the pride\nwhich such a worship implies. Since the Renaissance there has been a\nmarked decay of the spirit of humility in Western civilization which\nis closely associated with the secularization of its ethical idealism.\nThe difference between the pride of secular idealism and the humility\nimplicit in genuine religion may be gauged, as Professor Irving Babbitt\nsuggests, by comparing Confucius with Buddha and Marcus Aurelius with\nJesus. Pascal thought the stoics were guilty of \u201cdiabolical pride.\u201d The\njudgment may be too severe, but it must be confessed that a purely\nsecular idealism has difficulty in escaping a morally destructive\narrogance from which true religion is saved because it subjects all\nvalues and achievements to measurement, with its absolutes as the\ncriteria. \u201cWhy callest thou me good?\u201d said Jesus: \u201cno one is good save\nGod.\u201d In the religion of Jesus the perfection of God is consistently\ndefined as an absolute love by comparison with which all altruistic\nachievements fall short. \u201cI say unto you, love your enemies; bless\nthem that curse you; do good to them that despitefully use you and\npersecute you; that ye may be children of your Father in heaven; for he\nmaketh his sun to rise on the evil and the good and sendeth rain upon\nthe just and on the unjust. For if ye love them which love you, what\nreward have ye? Do not even the publicans the same?... Be ye therefore\nperfect even as your Father in heaven is perfect.\u201d[3] Here the value\nof an absolute standard to save from undue pride in partial ethical\nachievements is particularly apparent. Prudential morality can hardly\ngo beyond the encouragement of altruism within the social group, i.e.\nloving those \u201cwhich love you.\u201d That is precisely what Stoicism did.\nIt is just this pride in partial achievement which complicates the\nmoral problem of modern life; for our ethical difficulties are created\nby the very tendency of reasonable ethics to make life within groups\nmoral and never to aspire to the moral redemption of inter-group\nrelations. Humility is therefore a spiritual grace which has value\nnot only for its own sake but for its influence upon social problems.\nTraditional religions, which live off of original inspirations and\nexperiences without recreating them, easily fall into a pride of their\nown, the pride which comes from identifying the absolute standards of\ntheir inspired source with their partial achievements and inevitable\ncompromises. But religion in its purest and most unspoiled form is\nalways productive of a spirit of humility which regards every moral\nachievement as but a vantage point from which new ventures of faith and\nlife are to be initiated toward the alluring perfection which is in God.\n\nAn ethical idealism unsupported by religion is almost as certain to\nissue in final despair as in unjustified pride. A few choice spirits\nare sometimes able to imagine themselves in rebellion against the\nuniverse without finally succumbing to a temper of sullenness; but the\ndreadful logic of insisting upon conscience in a conscienceless world\ninevitably leaves its mark upon the multitude. Oswald Spengler, in his\nmorphology of civilizations,[4] presents \u201creligion without God\u201d as the\nunvarying symptom of a dying civilization, too sophisticated to believe\nin the cosmic worth of its moral values but not quite ready to abandon\nthem. The enervating effect of a moral idealism which has sacrificed\nits hopes with its illusions always becomes apparent in the long run,\nbut frequently it reveals itself quite immediately in the very lives of\nits most robust champions.\n\nMr. Russell may think that the \u201cfirm foundation of unyielding despair\u201d\nis an adequate basis for an ethical life, but his own growing\nbitterness betrays how such a philosophy corrupts moral idealism\nwith a sense of frustration. The idealist is put into the position of\nsacrificing everything for values which have no guaranteed reality\nin the cosmic order. Even his faith in mankind is finally destroyed;\nfor however precious personal values may seem in a given moment, his\nphilosophy denies him the right to attribute any lasting worth to them.\nTrue religion gives man a sense of both humility and security before\nthe holiness which is at once the source and the goal of his virtue;\nand thus it saves him at the same time from premature complacency and\nultimate despair. The choice between irreligious and religious idealism\nis the choice between pride which issues in despondency and humility\nwhich becomes the basis of self-respect. There is an irrational element\nin either alternative; but the irreligious idealist is in error when he\nimagines that he has chosen the more reasonable alternative; his choice\nis no more reasonable and morally much less potent.\n\nThe absolute determinists who have as little confidence in the moral\nintegrity of human nature as in any moral meaning in cosmic facts\nare more consistent than the Stoics, but they are involved in worse\nabsurdities. Their cynicism robs them of both an adequate motive and an\nadequate method for social reconstruction. Discounting moral idealism\neven while they exhibit it in their social passion, they ostensibly\ndesire social reconstruction only in the interest of the class to which\nthey belong. But their personal interests are not frequently identical\nwith those of the oppressed classes and they are moved as much by\nsympathy for the plight of the victims of our present society as by any\nselfish considerations. They profess to be prompted by the reflection\nthat individual action has become useless in a capitalistic age and\nthat it is possible to advance the interests of an individual only by\nmaking common cause with other individuals in a similar predicament.\nMeanwhile there is hardly an economic determinist, even among those\nwho are actually members of the class of the oppressed, who could not\ngain higher advantages for himself by disassociating himself from his\nclass than by making common cause with it. This is certainly true of\nthose who are intelligent enough to evolve or elaborate the theory of\nabsolute determinism.\n\nAbsolute determinism, when developed consistently, must disavow all\nother methods of social reconstruction but that of ruthless conflict.\nIf nothing qualifies the self-interest of men, a conflict of interests\nbecomes inevitable. This defect in method is even more important than\nthe defect in its motive. A ruthless struggle can result in an ordered\nsociety only if the victors are able to annihilate their foes. But even\nin that event the interests of the members of any class engaged in a\nsocial or political struggle will cease to be identical as soon as its\nfoes are eliminated. Thus a new and equally ruthless struggle must\nresult between the comparatively strong and comparatively weak, the\ncomparatively privileged and the comparatively underprivileged victors.\nUltimately men cannot escape the necessity of building a stable society\nby the mutual compromise and the mutual sacrifice of conflicting\nrights. The determinists have made an important contribution to the\nmodern social problem by revealing the brutal nature of much of man\u2019s\nsocial life. Even if the human conscience could be sensitized to a\nmuch greater degree than now seems probable, it will not be possible\nto eliminate conflict between various social and economic groups.[5]\nGood men do not easily realize how selfish they are if someone does\nnot resist their selfishness; and they are not inclined to abridge\ntheir power if someone does not challenge their right to hold it.\nReligious and moral idealism cannot be expected to eliminate, but it\ncan be expected to mitigate social warfare. The conscience of man\nmust finally be the force which builds a new society; and a man with\na conscience must be the end for which such a society is built. If\nthere is no virtue in man which lifts him above the brute struggle for\nsurvival, there is no value in him to justify the effort of building\na new and more perfect society\u2014and he is not the stuff out of which\nsuch a society can be built. It is difficult to escape the conclusion\nthat the reverence for personality which is implicit in religion is\nnecessary to establish an adequate motive and an adequate method\nof social reconstruction. Reverence for personality qualifies the\nindividual\u2019s will to power so that his life can be integrated with\nother lives with a minimum of conflict; and it saves society from\nsacrificing the individual to the needs of the group. In the religion\nof Jesus both a social and an individualistic emphasis issues from a\nspiritual appreciation of human personality. The individual is given a\nplace and prestige which he never before possessed in society. Western\ncivilization owes much to the high evaluation of the individual which\nJesus introduced into the thought of the world. On the other hand this\nemphasis is saved from mere individualism by an ethic which helps\nthe individual to realize his highest self by sacrificing personal\nadvantages for social values.\n\nThe contribution of religion to the task of an ethical reconstruction\nof society is its reverence for human personality and its aid in\ncreating the type of personality which deserves reverence. Men cannot\ncreate a society if they do not believe in each other. They cannot\nbelieve in each other if they cannot see the potential in the real\nfacts of human nature. And they cannot have the faith which discovers\npotentialities if they cannot interpret human nature in the light of a\nuniverse which is perfecting and not destroying personal values.\n\n\n\n\n                               CHAPTER IV\n\n               THE SOCIAL CONSERVATISM OF MODERN RELIGION\n\n\nThe charge against religion most frequently made by critics who are\ninterested in social reconstruction is that it is a conservative\nforce which impedes social progress. If it has resources which are\nindispensable for the life of society, social idealists will not\nappreciate them if its contemporary forms are invariably aligned\nwith the social forces most intent upon preserving the status quo.\nContemporary liberal Christianity refutes the charge of social\nconservatism by appealing to the social radicalism of Jesus which it\nalleges to have appropriated. By this appeal liberal Christianity\nexhibits one of the very tendencies of religion which subjects it\nto the criticism of social liberals. Religion is easily tempted to\nmake devotion to the ideal a substitute for its realization and to\nbecome oblivious to the inevitable compromise between its ideal and\nthe brute facts of life. The absolute nature of the ethics of Jesus\nand the perfect harmony between his religion and his ethics may be\nthe guarantee of the perennial spiritual and ethical renewal of the\nChristian religion; but it is also occasion for the self-deception of\nmany professed disciples. Many streams of thought have contributed to\nthe current of modern liberal Christianity and it contains alluvial\ndeposits from all Western civilizations. Yet it imagines that it\nrepresents a simple return to radical and dynamic ethics of the\nreligion of Jesus. By this deception it easily becomes the fa\u00e7ade\nbehind which the brutal facts of modern industrial civilization may be\nobscured rather than a force by which they might be eliminated. The\nProtestant Reformation suffered from the same deception. It thought of\nitself as a return to the original ideal when it was, as a matter of\nfact, a new type of compromise.\n\nCatholicism was a compound of early Christianity and the thought and\nlife of Gr\u00e6co-Roman civilization. The medieval church was a kind of\nghostly aftermath of the Roman empire and the popes were inspired by\nthe genius of C\u00e6sar as much as by the spirit of Christ. The north\nEuropean peoples first accepted this latinized Christianity, partly\nbecause they were attracted by those universal elements in it which\nhave made their appeal to all peoples, and particularly those of\nthe Western world, and partly because it was for them the symbol\nof the ordered civilization of Rome which they first envied, then\ndestroyed, and finally tried to rebuild. In time they reacted against\nthe ecclesiastical, international and feudal solidarities of this\nwhole politico-religious world, prompted no doubt by the untamed\nspirit of liberty which characterized the northern peoples and which\nresented the tyranny by which the middle ages achieved their high\nmeasure of social cohesion. Thus Protestantism became the handmaiden\nof a budding nationalism which was impatient of the restraints of\nan international papacy, as it has since been impatient of every\nother type of international control. In time it also came to be the\npeculiar spiritual possession of those classes among the northern\npeoples who developed modern commerce and industry. The affinity\nbetween its sanctification of the principle of liberty and the\nnecessary individualism of classes which were intent upon destroying\nthe traditional restraints of the ancient world for the sake of giving\nunhampered play to a growing commercial and industrial life, has been\nso perfect that it is hardly possible to decide which of the two is\ncause and which effect. Max Weber[6] has made an interesting analysis\nof commercial and industrial superiority of Protestant nations. It\nmay be that the aptitude for commercial and industrial pursuits and\nan inclination to the Protestant form of the Christian faith are\nconcomitant characteristics of north European peoples rather than\ncasually related phenomena. Yet they have become so intimately related\nin history that the most typical commercial classes and nations are\nmost generally Protestant, and most uniquely Protestant. In England\nthe nonconformist sects are almost identical with the commercial\nmiddle classes, while the established church with its semi-Catholic\ngenius has spiritual affinities both with the old Tories and the\nnew world of the industrial worker. In Germany there is a similar\nalignment with Catholic and agrarian Bavaria on the one hand and\nthe highly industrialized and Protestant Prussia on the other. The\ncontrast between Protestant and industrial Ulster and Catholic and\nagrarian south Ireland is equally significant. Everywhere in Western\ncivilization, and nowhere more than in America, Protestantism with its\nindividualism became a kind of spiritual sanctification of the peculiar\ninterests and prejudices of the races and classes which dominate the\nindustrial and commercial expansion of Western civilization.\n\nSince liberal Christianity is the product of an adjustment of the main\ntenets of orthodox Protestantism to the sophistication of the cities\nand the growing intelligence of the privileged and therefore educated\nclasses, its whole moral atmosphere is much more determined by the\nspecial interests of these classes than it is willing to admit. The\nauthority of Jesus, to which it appeals, has indeed been given a new\nemphasis, but this has been done because liberal Christianity valued\nthe theological simplicity rather than the moral austerity of his\ngospel. In the same way many liberal Jews have appealed from the law\nto the prophets, not because they had a great passion for the ethical\nrigors of an Amos or Isaiah but because they found obedience to the\nminute exactions of the law too onerous in a sophisticated age. Jesus\nis valuable to the modern Christian because he offers an escape from\nthe theological absurdities of the ancient creeds; meanwhile his\nethical and religious idealism will not leave the lives of those who\nprofess to follow him unaffected. In time it may become the instrument\nof the regeneration of Western society; but this will not be possible\nif the liberal church does not overcome its self-deception and realizes\nthat its religious and moral life is a composite into which have\nentered the imperialism of Rome, the sophistication of the Greeks, the\nfierce tribalism and individualism of the Nordics and the prudential\nethics of an industrial civilization.\n\nReligion can be healthy and vital only if a certain tension is\nmaintained between it and the civilization in which it functions. In\ntime this tension is inevitably resolved into some kind of compromise.\nThe tendency of religion to become a conservative social force is\npartly derived from its ambition to defend the resultant compromise in\nthe name of its original ideal. Thus all partial values, determined\nby geographic, economic, social and political forces, are given a\npseudo-absolute character by the religious elements which entered\ninto the compromise; and their defects are sufficiently obscured and\nsanctified to make them comparatively impregnable to the attacks\nof the critics of the status quo. The Russian moujik was more than\nordinarily docile under the tyranny of the czars and more than\nordinarily patient with the imperfections of his society, because his\nobedience was claimed not by Russia but by \u201choly Russia,\u201d the historic\nincarnation of his religion. In the same way the medieval church\nbecame organically involved with feudalism and forced the critics of\nfeudal society to undermine its influence before they could hope to\nchange the feudal social order. Orthodox Protestantism is intimately\nrelated to this day with Nordicism, with the racial arrogance of north\nEuropean peoples. The Ku Klux Klan, which thrives in the hinterlands\nof America, maintains its influence over simple minds by screening\nracial prejudice against Slavic, Latin and Semitic peoples behind\na devotion to the spiritual treasures of Protestantism and their\ndefense against the fancied peril of allegedly inferior religions. In\nIreland the racial pride of Ulstermen expresses itself in a passionate\nespousal of the Presbyterian religion and a contemptuous attitude\ntoward the Catholicism of the Irish. In modern prewar Germany there\nwas a curious partnership between \u201cThron und Altar,\u201d the interests\nof the nationalist German state, as integrated by the Prussian royal\nhouse, with the interests of Protestantism. To this day the fanatic\nmonarchists of Germany are also Protestant extremists who imagine that\nthe monarchy was undermined by religiously motivated conspiracies of\nJews and Catholics. Incidentally the Lutheran type of Protestantism\nwhich flourishes in Germany has always been less intimately aligned\nwith the commercial classes than the Calvinistic sects of other Western\nnations. While the German socialists include the Lutheran church among\nthe forces of reaction with which they must contend, the church\u2019s real\nstrength is among the peasants and junkers, who are also the strongest\nsupport of monarchist opinion and who abhor the democratic liberalism\nof commercial and industrial Germany as much as they despise socialist\nradicalism; and they imagine both to be inspired by Semitic designs\nupon their national integrity. The real inspiration of this liberalism\nwith its emphasis on international conciliation and co\u00f6peration is\nborn out of the economic and political necessities of an industrial\nand commercial state which cannot afford to indulge in the fanatic\nnationalism to which peasants and agrarian aristocrats are prone.\n\nLiberal Christianity as it has developed in the urban centers of the\nWestern world grew out of the intellectual and religious needs of\nthe privileged classes and bears the marks of its social environment\njust as much as the other types of religion which have preceded it\nand with which it is historically related. It is in the same danger\nof becoming a spiritual sublimation of the peculiar interests and\nprejudices of these classes while it imagines itself the bearer\nof an unconditioned message to its day. It has preserved the same\nindividualistic ethics which has characterized orthodox Protestantism\nand which is so dear to the hearts of the commercial classes, and so\nunequal to the moral problems of a complex civilization in which the\nneeds of interdependence outweigh the values of personal liberty. The\nsupposed devotion of the privileged classes to a religion in which the\nsacrifice rather than the stubborn preservation of individual rights is\nenjoined and in which the prudential and utilitarian root of morality\nis completely plucked out is one of the incongruities which frequently\noccur when a civilization harks back to the spiritual visions of its\nchildhood in order to obscure the sober and disenchanted practicality\nof its maturity.\n\nIf the modern church is really to become an instrument of social\nredemption, it must learn how to divorce itself from the moral\ntemper of its age even while it tries to accommodate itself to the\nintellectual needs of the generation. The religion of Jesus is free\nof theological absurdities. Its very simplicity saves it from undue\nentanglements with discredited cosmologies. But those who espouse it\nchiefly for this reason easily miss its real genius. Its essential\nassumptions may not outrage the mind, but neither are they readily\naccepted by an age which has sanctified cool and careful, moral\nprudence. Its solemn injunction, \u201cTake no thought for your life,\nwhat ye shall eat or what ye shall drink ... but seek ye first the\nkingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things shall be\nadded unto you,\u201d is strangely anachronistic in a day which worships\nobvious and tangible success and appreciates virtue only as it\ninsures those advantages of health and prosperity which are its\nhighest desiderata. Prudential morality has its own uses. Few men have\neither the imagination or the courage to pursue an ideal if it does\nnot justify itself by some fairly immediate advantage. Society is not\naltogether the loser if men discover that \u201cGodliness is profitable\nunto all things,\u201d and espouse an ideal because they have their eye\nupon the concrete and obvious advantages which flow from it. But a\nprudential morality has its limitations and these will prove less\ndetrimental to society if they are not sanctified by religion. It is\nbetter therefore to seek no other basis for utilitarian ethics than the\nsocial experience from which it is really derived. Honesty will prove\nitself the best policy without the authority of religion. The function\nof religion is to nerve men for an ethical achievement when it promises\nno immediate returns. From the perspective of an impartial observer\nthere is an element of hypocrisy in all prudential morality. The cool\nintelligence which computes selfish advantage which may flow from\nmoral action is not imaginative enough to include all persons who are\naffected by an action and not dynamic enough to balance the drive of\nself-interest which influences it.\n\nIn modern industrial society those who are in position of power and\nprivilege are most inclined to espouse an ethical ideal because it\ntends to stabilize social life and thus insures the perpetuation of\nprivilege. They are also most easily tempted to restrict ethical action\nso that it will prompt to no sacrifices which are not consistent with\na wise self-interest. Since they are also the classes which have, for\nreasons previously discussed, maintained their loyalty to religion,\nthe church can avoid connivance with their prudential morality only by\na continual regeneration of its religious life. Failing to maintain\na distinction between utilitarian ethics and a religiously inspired\nmoral life, the church cannot escape the fate of becoming a useful\nadjunct of the forces of privilege in the social and economic conflict\nin which modern society is engaged. It may be good business to pay\nhigh wages, but social good may demand an increase in the wages of\nworkers beyond the point where economic advantage is derived from an\nenlightened wage policy. It may be wise to share some privileges so\nthat all of them will not be lost, but sensitive ethical insight will\ndetect the selfishness and insincerity in such a course. A religion\nwhich sanctifies such social prudence is ultimately a hindrance to the\nethical reconstruction of modern society. A religion which discovers\nand amends the limitations of prudential morality by the elements of\nits reverence for personality and its quest for the absolute is a\nnecessary factor in social reconstruction.\n\nThe question which faces the modern church is whether it will help\nto hide or to discover the limitations in the ethical orientation of\nmodern life. Its devotion to the gospel of Jesus may serve either\npurpose. The contempt for ethical opportunism implied in the whole\nidealism of Jesus and its scorn for immediate advantages are the\nvery ethical values which the generation needs, but they are also\nthe values which have given the Christian religion its great moral\nauthority and prestige which the church can so easily misuse. If the\nauthority of Jesus prompts men to a courage and imagination which\nescapes the defects of contemporary morality, its influence will be\nredemptive; if it is used merely to hide the defects, the critics of\nthe church will be justified in regarding it as detriment to social\nprogress. The religion which is socially most useful is one which\ncan maintain a stubborn indifference to immediate ends and thus give\nthe ethical life of man that touch of the absolute without which all\nmorality is finally reduced to a decorous but essentially unqualified\nself-assertiveness. The paradox of religion is that it serves the world\nbest when it maintains its high disdain for the world\u2019s values. Its\nsocial usefulness is dependent upon its ability to maintain devotion\nto absolute moral and spiritual values without too much concern for\ntheir practical, even for their social usefulness. The church is in a\nvery favorable position to make a necessary contribution to social\nlife, for it reveres as Lord one whose life incarnates the strategy\nwhich saves morality from insincerity. But its assets easily became\nmoral liabilities when it compounds the pure idealism of Jesus with the\ncalculated practicalities of the age and attempts to give the resultant\ncompromise the prestige of absolute authority.\n\n\n\n\n                               CHAPTER V\n\n               RELIGION AND LIFE: CONFLICT AND COMPROMISE\n\n\nIt is obvious that the ethical potency of religion depends largely\nupon its ability to make its ideals effective in the world and yet\npreserve a measure of detachment from those natural forces which\nexpress themselves in human society and offer such stubborn resistance\nto every spiritual and ethical ideal that no victory has yet been\ngained over them in which the heel of the victor has not been\nbruised. Ideal religion makes reverence for personality the end of\nhuman action. Society has its various secular ends the attainment of\nwhich necessitates the debasement of personality. Religion seeks to\npersuade men to sacrifice immediate advantages for ultimate values;\nthe average man whose influence is dominant in all large social groups\nis not easily persuaded to forego immediate and concrete advantages\nfor values which are too remote and too ephemeral to captivate his\nimagination. There must therefore be a tension between the spiritual\nideal and all historic societies. The significance of Jesus for the\nreligious life of the Western world is due to his attainment and\nincarnation of a spiritual and moral ideal of such absolute and\ntranscendent nature that none of his followers have been able to\ncompromise it by their practical adjustments to the social necessities\nof their day. There is therefore a resource in the avowed loyalty of\nWestern civilization to his ideal which may yet become the basis of its\nredemption. It is the peculiar characteristic of men and societies, and\nan evidence of both their moral and immoral nature, that they reserve\ntheir most unqualified devotion for those ideals and personalities\nwhich they find difficult to realize or emulate. They pay tribute to\nthe ideal even while they are corrupting it and they reward those\nwho have accommodated it to their indifferent capacities with a more\nqualified respect.\n\nIt was probably inevitable that the church should adjust the spiritual\nideal, which to propagate it ostensibly regards as its very raison\nd\u2019\u00eatre, to the practical needs of the various ages and social orders\nwith which it came in contact. But it is necessary that it should be\nshrewd enough to see the compromise involved in every adjustment and\nbe stubborn enough to make a new bid for victory after every partial\ndefeat. On the whole the Catholic church, which Protestants easily\nassume to have been more amenable to the practical demands of an\nunregenerate society than the churches of the Reformation, has really\nbeen much shrewder than these in gauging the hazards to virtue in the\nmost natural social relationships. Some of the moral weaknesses in the\nmodern church may be traced directly to the na\u00efvete of Protestantism in\ndealing with the vagaries of human nature, and in failing to estimate\nthe overt and covert peril to its values in the ordinary ways of men.\n\nMedieval Catholicism had various strategies in preserving and relaxing\nthe tension between the ideal of religion and the practical needs of\nmen and society. It made fewest demands upon the individual. He was\npermitted to indulge almost all the natural appetites and ambitions\nwhich characterize the life of the average man. For him the religion of\nthe church was a magic which guaranteed divine intervention in critical\nmoments and which offered a rather easy short-cut to the prizes of the\nspirit which ought to be won only by virtuous achievement. Yet this\nsame church had an uncompromising attitude toward the various social\ninstitutions which Protestantism has never equaled. It insisted on the\nsacramental nature of the family union with such intransigeance that\nit may fairly be accused of failing to make necessary accommodations\nof its spiritual ideal to the imperfections of human nature. It dealt\nwith economic relations with less severity but enforced ethical ideals\nupon them which must seem unusually exacting to an age which has become\naccustomed to the connivance of Protestantism with laissez-faire\neconomics. The master of the medieval church, Thomas Aquinas, had\nelaborated a theory of the just price for all commercial transactions,\nwhich the church made every effort to apply and which it enforced\nthrough the canonical law. The church did not organize the guilds but\nit blessed them; and their efforts to regulate wages, fix fair profits,\ninsure high quality of merchandise and organize mutual aid among\ntheir members were prompted by a religiously inspired moral idealism.\nWhile it dealt less successfully with the ethical implications of the\nrelations between landowners and peasants, it impressed the owners\nwith a sense of their obligation toward those who were economically\ndependent upon them which to this day gives the landed aristocracy\nof European nations a certain moral superiority over the industrial\noverlords who have been trained in more modern schools of thought. The\nambition of the medieval church to dominate the life of the nations\nis well known but frequently misinterpreted. The contest between the\npapacy and the empire was indeed in some of its aspects no more than\na conflict between two great political organizations lusting for the\npower which easily becomes the sole end of the life of social and\npolitical organisms. Yet there was a measure of ethical idealism in\nthe political aspirations of the popes to which Protestant thought\nhas given scant justice. In the two greatest exponents of the papacy\nas an international political force, Gregory VII and Innocence III,\nparticularly in Gregory, the ethical ideal of a unified Christian\nsociety which knows how to hold the capricious self-will of nations in\ncheck and how to set bounds to their natural lust for power is of no\nsmall moment in the development of papal policy. The very autocracy of\nthe papacy, which the modern world finds so little to its liking, was\nelaborated by Gregory in order to save the church from international\nanarchy and make it an instrument of international unification.\nIncidentally Gregory was neither the first nor the last great statesman\nwho preferred autocracy to anarchy, and the preference is supported by\nmore than one lesson of history. Free co\u00f6peration between individuals\nand groups is a high and rare political and moral achievement, and\nwhere men\u2019s capacities are unequal to it there are occasions when it\nmay be better to sacrifice freedom than to destroy social cohesion. At\nany rate the medieval church revealed both political shrewdness and\nspiritual idealism in its attempt to dominate the life of nations.\nNaturally its efforts did not result in any ideal society. The ambition\nof the C\u00e6sar haunted the life of the popes and in many respects the\nwork of their hands approximated the dominion of an Augustus more\nnearly than the kingdom of God of Christian dreams. The Christian ideal\nof an ethical international society was thus corrupted by imperial\nambition in its very inception, and the historical realities which\nsprang from it diverged even farther from any conceivable ideal. Yet\nthe whole political policy of the medieval church is in marked contrast\nto the easy capitulation of historic Protestantism before the force\nof economic and political groups. If Catholicism\u2019s treatment of the\nmoral problems of the individual represents the relaxation of the\ntension between religion and life, and its social and political policy\nrepresents the compromise which follows inevitably upon the conflict of\nthe ideal with the moral inertia of life, its monasticism represents\nthe strategy of religion when it seeks to maintain an absolute tension\nbetween its ideal and historic reality.\n\nThe various ascetic movements which prospered under the general\n\u00e6gis of the medieval church represent so many different types of\nreligious idealism that no generalization about them will be accurate.\nProtestantism reacted violently from the monastic ideal and therefore\nhas been able to see nothing in monasticism but a selfish flight\nfrom life\u2019s realities. Monasticism may be a retreat from life, but\nat its best it was not a selfish retreat. Its development of the\narts, its emphasis on learning, its vast philanthropies and its\nreligious zeal for those outside of the monastic walls are not selfish\ncharacteristics. It did sometimes degenerate into a very odious type\nof spiritual selfishness and pride; but if we judge it by its typical\nexemplars, we cannot accuse it of a lack of social passion. The\nreligious fervor of Catholic ascetics has been matched by Protestant\nmystics, but their ethical insights have never been excelled. Their\nsuperior moral shrewdness was revealed in their ability to detect\nthe perils to the ethical ideal which are covert in the natural and,\nfrom any obvious perspective, virtuous social relationships. They saw\nthat the family, in itself the most virtuous of human groups, could\neasily become the occasion for disloyalty to high fealties of the\nsoul. \u201cWhoso loveth father or mother more than me is not worthy of\nme,\u201d Jesus had said, and no one in the history of the church seems\nto have understood the problem with which he dealt in those words as\nwell as Catholic ascetics. It must be said that the celibacy of the\nmonasteries was not prompted solely by the desire to avoid conflicting\nloyalties; it sprang partly from a morbid evaluation of the sexual\nrelation. That was probably the weakest and least worthy characteristic\nof medieval asceticism. Its understanding of the perils to the spirit\nin the possessive instinct was perhaps its finest bit of insight. It\nunderstood how easily the privilege and power which spring from the\npossession of property may corrupt the soul with pride and destroy a\nloving relationship between individuals. It therefore insisted upon the\nvow of poverty. In all these problems the insight of asceticism was\nsuperior to its strategy. It saw peril in ordinary human relationships\nwhere most modern Christians are unable to detect them; but it knew of\nno way to overcome the peril except by destroying the relationships\nand building its unique fellowship of the spirit upon the basis of\ncelibacy, poverty and absolute obedience. In asceticism the flowers of\nthe spirit are cut from the roots by which they are supported and life\nis destroyed in the process of its purification. Asceticism creates a\nhigh type of ethical spirituality which cannot be universalized without\ncompletely destroying society; and the virtue which it develops can\nbe maintained only in its own artificial media and therefore lacks\nredemptive force. The great medieval ascetics have always claimed\nJesus as their authority though he was not an ascetic in their sense.\nHe disassociated himself from the asceticism of John the Baptist,\nwho had come \u201cneither eating nor drinking,\u201d and unlike the ascetics\nhe had no morbid fears of natural enjoyments. Protestantism has\ntherefore regarded asceticism as the result of a foolish literalism\nwhich failed to allow for poetic latitude in the words of Jesus.\nNevertheless it must be admitted that both his words and his practice\nhave a closer affinity to medieval asceticism at its best than to\nany modern spiritualized worldliness which tries vainly to unite the\nlargest number of spiritual graces with the greatest possible temporal\nadvantages. Francis of Assisi was surely more like the real Jesus than\nBruce Barton\u2019s modernized caricature of the original. The strategy of\nJesus might be described as a leaning in the direction of asceticism,\nas a hovering upon its brink. He is saved from its morbid temper by\nthe wholesome common sense which leavens all his attitudes. The virtue\nof asceticism lies in its ability to detect the perils to a virtuous\nlife in the necessary and inevitable social relationships in which all\nindividual personality must develop; its limitation is its inclination\nto destroy the relationships in order to overcome the peril. Religious\nidealism, nurtured in the individualism of Protestantism, fails to\nappreciate the virtue of asceticism, while it condemns its limitations\nbecause it fails to realize how fundamentally all individual ethical\nachievements are qualified by the society in which men live. Wherever\nthat fact is fully understood, every honest effort to maintain\nthe purity of the religious ideal will result in strategies which\nwill approximate asceticism at many points and which may excel it\nonly in the ability to avoid its depreciation, occasionally morbid\ndepreciation, of the ordinary functions of life.\n\nProtestantism\u2019s reactions to the problems of preserving a sense of\ntension between religion and life have been a little more varied than\nthose of the medieval church because of the multifarious nature of its\nhistoric forms. But varied as may be the strategies of the various\nchurches, they do not finally differ from the three which Catholicism\nemployed, i.e., capitulation without a struggle, compromise after a\nstruggle, and victory gained through the device of avoiding some of\nthe issues. The marked differences between the medieval and the modern\nchurch lie in the areas of life where the struggle between religion\nand human inertia was attempted, where the compromises were made and\nwhere the victories were won. If Catholicism left the individual to his\nown devices, the churches of the Reformation followed a similar course\nin dealing with the moral problems of all human groups. The state was\ncompletely secularized under Protestant influence. The Reformation was\nin some of its aspects simply a simultaneous revolt of the various new\nnations of Europe against the restraints of the international papacy.\nIn Germany, Scotland and finally in England, the nationalistic motive\nwas a decided force in destroying the prestige of the old religion.\nLutheranism capitulated much more easily to the secular state than\nCalvinism, which tried in fact to maintain the ancient controls upon\npolitical life. But once the Reformation had destroyed the old unity of\nWestern society and the prestige of the organization which maintained\nit, secular nationalism became the universal characteristic of Western\ncivilization. Even Calvinism, which was ambitious to dominate the\npolicy of political states, hardly had the opportunity of affecting\ninternational relations. Its influence barely went beyond domestic\npolicy, and there it was less interested in the morality of the state\nthan in the legal enforcement of individual moral ideals. The greed\nand lust for power of national groups is not a unique characteristic\nof the modern world; but our own era takes the moral autonomy of\nthe nation for granted more generally than did the Middle Ages. The\nProtestant church did not create Machiavellian politics but it was more\nimpotent before unscrupulous nationalism than any other institution of\nthe religious ideal, and its impotence was partly due to its lack of\ninterest in social problems.\n\nThe emancipation of economic relations from all ethical restraint\nwas more or less concomitant with the Reformation movements, but it\nis a question how much it was causally and how much coincidentally\nrelated. Tawney[7] thinks that the growing complexity of commercial\ntransactions invalidated the old canonical laws designed to enforce\nethical standards in business, and thus made the secularization of\neconomics inevitable even before the Reformation. Luther and Calvin\nwere as anxious as the fathers of the medieval church to preserve moral\nstandards in business. But they were no more ingenious than these in\ndevising new and more flexible methods of control when the prohibition\nof usury and the fixation of a just price were swept away by a growing\ncommerce which made money-lending an incident of commercial enterprise\nrather than a philanthropic device, and which engulfed the standards by\nwhich a just price was determined in a sea of economic relativities.\nLuther was completely baffled by the intricacies of the new world and\ncould do little more than try vehemently but futilely to maintain the\nold prohibition against usury and insinuate meanwhile that the recently\ndeveloped system of international banking was in some mysterious way\nrelated to the evil conspiracies of the papacy. Calvinism, true to its\ngenius, was more ambitious in dealing with the problems of commerce; so\nmuch so in fact that Beza\u2019s thunderous denunciations of covetousness\nprompted the Geneva Council to declare that he stirred up class hatred\nagainst the wealthy. Yet it was Calvin who finally destroyed the last\nvestige of medievalism in economics by justifying interest. Though his\naction prompted the charge that \u201cusury was the brat of heresy,\u201d he\nprobably did no more than to recognize the logic inherent in the facts\nof a new economic development. There was no more conscious desire to\nemancipate commercial life from the sanctions of morality and religion\nin Protestantism than in the ancient church; but the preoccupation of\nthe leaders of the Reformation with the problem of the inner life and\nthe general temper of individualism which characterized the Protestant\nchurches undeniably accelerated the processes of secularization. In\ntime Adam Smith rather than Thomas Aquinas became the moral authority\nof the commercial world, and, whatever may have been the futile fury of\nthe early reformers, Protestantism did finally accept the economics of\nlaissez faire and habituated itself to a world in which vast areas or\nlife were withdrawn not only from the influence of religiously inspired\nethical ideals, but from every ethical sanction whatsoever. Thus was\nthe present world created in which \u201cbusiness is business\u201d and \u201cpolitics\nis politics,\u201d i.e., in which the non-moral character of two of the most\nimportant social relationships of mankind is taken for granted.\n\nIf Protestantism made its easy capitulation before the larger social\ngroups of mankind and its premature peace with them, it developed\nits most stubborn resistance to the natural appetites of men in\nits influence upon the individual life. It was precisely in that\narea of life in which the medieval church was least effective that\nProtestantism displayed its highest ambition. At this point it becomes\nimpossible to speak in general terms of Protestantism, for the\nstrategies of Calvinism and Lutheranism in dealing with the problems\nof the inner life differ widely, even more widely than their social\npolicies. The unique characteristics of either are frequently the\ncommon characteristics of Protestantism when viewed from some external\nperspective; but an intimate view may reveal them in the light of very\ndifferent religions. Calvinism is religion\u2019s most energetic effort to\nmaster the ethical life of the individual. In some of its historic\nforms, in Geneva and Scotland and the American colonies for instance,\nits social policy was ambitious enough to compare with that of Pope\nGregory, but its chief interest was not in the social institution as\nsuch. It merely used the political power to reinforce an uncompromising\nethical rigor in the life of the individual. In Calvinism the religion\nof the modern world makes its boldest bid for the ethical mastery of\nlife. Calvinism believed that life could be dominated by the spiritual\nand ethical ideal if the individual could be persuaded to control\nhis appetites and to overcome his natural indolence. A temperate,\nindustrious, thrifty and honest individual was, in its esteem, the\nperfect exemplar of the religious ideal and the stuff out of which a\nnew society could be built. It never faced the problem of the conflict\nbetween the ideal in the soul of the individual and the intractable\nforces in human society because its moral ideals were socially and\neconomically very useful and it could therefore indulge the illusion\nthat economic success, social well-being and obvious happiness are\nthe natural and inevitable fruits of the religious life. Hence it was\na religion admirably suited for the middle classes who rose to power\nin the seventeenth, eighteenth and nineteenth century, for it endowed\nthem with virtues which would insure their success and it doubled their\nzeal by giving religious sanction to their secular enterprises. The\nancient and medieval world had given moral precedence to a life of\nleisure and meditation, whether of aristocrat or philosopher, of monk\nor priest. Calvinism was as contemptuous of luxury and leisure as of\nthe arts and amenities which flourished in them. Its sanctification\nof the common task, of manual toil and of commercial enterprise was\nin itself a valuable contribution to social progress. It was in a way\nthe spiritual foundation upon which the whole structure of modern\ncivilization has been built. It developed a high type of honesty\nwithout which the intricate credit relationships of modern commerce\nwould have been impossible. It encouraged a diligence which was the\ndriving force in establishing the commercial classes in power over a\nmoribund aristocracy. Its religiously inspired habits of continence\nand temperance gave the lower classes a sense of moral dignity and a\nnatural self-respect which they needed in challenging the pride and\ncomplacency of the aristocratic world. These puritan virtues have\nmoreover given the whole north European world and America (which is\nmore puritan than any nation, because here the puritan life flourished\non virgin soil and remained unqualified by the vestiges of medievalism\nwhich remain firmly imbedded in the culture of even the most modern\nEuropean nations) a robust vitality and moral urge which have had no\nsmall part in developing their political hegemony in the modern world.\n\nThe conflict of puritan religion with the world has however resulted in\nthe inevitable compromise between the religious ideal and the world\u2019s\nprimitive urges and desires. Its moral weakness lies in its na\u00efve\nconfidence of victory over the world and its inability to discover\nthe relativities and qualifications which history has wrought upon\nits absolute. If the spiritual idealism of Jesus is the norm for\nChristians, the Calvinists and puritans diverged from it more seriously\nthan they knew in the very conception of their ideal. The love and\nreverence for personality which is the basis of the ethics of Jesus\nis totally lacking in Calvinism. It knows how to create self-respect\nbut lacks the imagination to inculcate a religious respect for others,\nexcept possibly for the respectable. Its confidence in the obvious\nrewards of virtue tempted it to abhor poverty and hold the poor\nin contempt, though they might become the helpful occasion for the\nexercise of that philanthropy without which the idea of Christian\nstewardship could not be realized. While early Calvinism had an heroic\nmood which would have scorned to make a concession to the selfishness\nof man through the sanctification of prudential ethics, its ethical\ntheories did nevertheless lend themselves to easy appropriation by\nmoralists who were intent upon identifying the social good with a\ndecent selfishness. The uncompromising spirituality of the ethics of\nJesus is totally lacking in Calvinism. Its moral theories were in\nfact derived from the Old rather than the New Testament; and there\nis hardly a scintilla of evidence in Calvinistic thought that the\nSermon on the Mount is recorded in the scripture which it accepted as\nrevealed finality. Its very bibliolatry was partly responsible for its\nnon-Christian type of ethics, for through it the casual moral theories\nof the early Hebrews achieved the dignity of absolute truth. Lack\nof historical perspective in the use of the Old Testament further\naggravated this error, for the real worth of the prophets was never\nappreciated and their high type of moral idealism could not serve\nto qualify the less heroic morality of the law and the superficial\nmoralizing of the Wisdom literature. Incidentally it may be observed\nthat bibliolatry is one of the handicaps to moral progress in almost\nall religions. Through it primitive cultures and moral customs which\nhappen to be enshrined in the canon become absolutely authoritative,\nand the weight of their influence is set against new ventures in moral\nlife.\n\nIf Calvinistic and puritan idealism departed from its assumed norm in\nits very conception, the moral realities which issued from it bore even\nless resemblance to the absolute idealism of the ethics of Jesus. Its\nunqualified confidence in the power of individual virtue to overcome\nthe world and change society contributed to the relaxation of moral\nrestraints upon social institutions and the secularization of society\nto which reference has been made. Its sanctification of secular tasks\nled inevitably to a sanctification of secular motives which it did not\ndesire but could not prevent. Men were to serve God by diligence in\ntheir daily toil. But what was the end of industry which endowed it\nwith virtue? The puritan answer was to regard work as an end in itself,\nan emphasis which it learned to make in its reaction to monastic\nand aristocratic idleness. But that answer alone could not suffice.\nInevitably the material gains which were the rewards of industry were\ngiven a special religious sanction. \u201cIf God show you a way in which\nyou may lawfully get more than in another way, without wrong to your\nsoul or to any other, if you refuse this and choose the less gainful,\nyou cross one of the ends of your Calling and refuse to be God\u2019s\nsteward,\u201d said Governor Bradford.[8] The ancient and medieval world\nhad been more or less scornful of the pursuit of wealth and abounded\nin characters among both the nobility and the peasantry who thought\nit beneath their dignity to increase their patrimony. The religious\nsanction of material gain was a new thing in history and undoubtedly\nhelped to fashion the moral temper of modern society in which diligence\nis the great virtue and greed the besetting vice.[9] It is the puritan\nheritage of America which gives a clew to the paradox of our national\nlife. It explains how we can be at the same time the most religious and\nthe most materialistic of all modern nations.\n\nIf puritanism failed to see how easily the virtue of thrift might\nbe transmuted into the vice of avarice, it was even less careful to\nguard the righteous soul against the perils to virtue which inhere\nin the power which wealth supplies. There are few men who can wield\nextraordinary power without making it the tool of their own desires\nand without magnifying their limitations which might pass unnoticed\nin less puissant individuals. Puritanism did indeed have a doctrine\nof stewardship, but it was applied to the privilege which flowed from\neconomic power and not to the possession of power itself. There was\nnever enough imagination in puritanic religion to detect how nature\nin the soul of man, frustrated by a discipline of the senses, comes\ninto its own through the sins of the mind. It knew how to redeem\nhuman life from its vagrant passions, but it did not know how to\ndeal with those dominant desires, the lust for power and the greed\nfor gain, which express themselves more frequently in a disciplined\npersonality than in a chaotic one and which may be more detrimental\nto the welfare of others than the consequences of undisciplined and\nmomentary passions. It was a spiritual discipline admirably suited to\nlift the middle classes to a dominant position in society but hardly\ndesigned to guide them in the use of the power once they had achieved\nit. Even its abhorrence of luxury and prohibition of extravagance is\nfinally softened in a civilization which has profited all too well by\nits virtues and is tempted to destroy them by the very advantages which\nthe virtues supplied. John Wesley, who revived puritan morality after\nit had declined in its original form, saw this problem more clearly\nthan his predecessors, but he had no answer for it except to advocate\nphilanthropic generosity. He writes in his _Journal_: \u201cReligion must\nnecessarily produce both industry and frugality, and these cannot\nbut produce riches. But as riches increase so will pride, anger and\nlove of the world in all its branches.... So although the form of\nreligion remains, the spirit is swiftly vanishing away. Is there no\nway to prevent this\u2014this continual decay of pure religion? We ought\nnot prevent people from being diligent and frugal; we must exhort all\nChristians to gain all they can and save all they can; that is, in\neffect, to grow rich. What way then can we take that our money may not\nsink us in the nethermost hell? There is one way and there is no other\nunder heaven. If those who gain all they can and save all they can\nwill likewise give all they can, then the more they give the more will\nthey grow in grace and the more treasure will they lay in heaven.\u201d[10]\nWesley, of course, could hardly be expected to appreciate that money\nrepresents power even more than privilege in modern society, and that\nphilanthropy may become a method of satisfying the ego and displaying\npower.\n\nMany of the moral and religious limitations of modern civilization\nmay be attributed first to the partial victory and then to the\nself-destruction of puritan religion in modern civilization. In\npuritanism religion made one of its boldest advances upon the world;\nand so confident was it of victory that it prepared no one for the\nmoral relativities which were the inevitable issue of its enterprise.\nIn dealing with the stubborn resistance of the material world it is\nbetter to expect victory than to assume defeat before the battle is\nbegun. Yet an undue confidence may be as dangerous to the enterprise\nas a timorous spirit. The medieval ascetics who regarded all human\nrelationships with a critical spirit, and rather expected the old\nAdam to assert himself in seemingly the most innocent human concerns,\npossessed spiritual insights which were totally lacking in the typical\npuritan. He expected to build a society in which the scripture was\n\u201creally and materially to be fulfilled.\u201d\n\nIt will have been noted that Calvinism and puritanism have been used\nin this discussion as interchangeable terms. The fact is that, while\nthe two terms are not synonymous theologically, the moral temper of\nCalvinism was so potent in the whole non-Lutheran Protestant world that\nall of the various denominations were indoctrinated with its puritan\nspirit. The various sects had their own theological peculiarities, but\nin their puritan spirit they were essentially one. Only the Quakers\ndeparted from it; for George Fox had discovered the ethics of Jesus,\nand the religion of the Friends was ever after to express itself in\nterms relevant to the spirit of the Sermon on the Mount. Denominations\nsuch as the Baptists and Methodists who evangelized Western America\ngave a rebirth to the puritan spirit when it suffered decay in its more\nnative haunts. Their history is additional evidence for the thesis\nthat puritanism is a religious sublimation of the life of the middle\nclasses. For when the heroic spirit of puritanism declined in those\nclasses which it had lifted to power, it was reborn in the lower middle\nclasses of England and the Western pioneers of America. Methodism\nis theologically as unrelated to Calvinism as can be imagined. Its\ntheological presuppositions are really more congenial to a dynamic\npuritanism than those of Calvinism; for the moral vigor of Calvinism\nwas logically incompatible with its deterministic faith. Denominations\nsuch as the Baptists and Methodists with their strong emphasis on\nregeneration as the basis of church membership aggravated one weakness\nof Protestantism, for all of their spiritual vigor. Their tests of what\nconstituted regeneration were drawn from religious experience rather\nthan from its moral fruits; yet they were bound to assume that a marked\nmoral contrast existed between the saved and the unsaved. Thus they\naccentuated what Professor A. Whitehead has defined as the Protestant\noversimplification of ethics, i.e., a tendency to judge men, in spite\nof the intricacy of their inner life and the complexity of their\nsocial relations, as being either good or bad. This is simply another\naspect of Protestant individualism, but it is an aspect which emerges\nmore clearly in the free churches which have renounced all ambition\nto have a membership coextensive with the citizenship of the state\nthan in those churches in which some vestige of the state-church idea\nstill remains. The superior spiritual vigor of churches which make\na religious experience the prerequisite of fellowship in the church\nmay well be conceded; but that does not change the fact that ethical\nvalues in a complex civilization are frequently imperiled by the\noversimplification of moral issues, which is the inevitable by-product\nof simple religious tests. Men are neither totally good nor totally bad\nwhen they live in a society which may corrupt the virtuous intention of\nthe most robust idealist, or when their own inner life is so complex\nthat moral purpose may express itself in one of its areas and be\nbetrayed in another. There is a moral simplicity in Protestantism which\nis closely related to its individualism and which is particularly\nunfortunate, since it is the characteristic of a religion which orients\nthe ethical life of peoples who have tremendous responsibilities in the\ncomplex life of Western civilization.\n\nCalvinism has frequently been referred to as Protestant asceticism.[11]\nIts robust moral energies are indeed commensurate with the strict\nethical discipline of medieval monasticism, but with this difference:\nthat one is developed within the world and the other outside of the\nworld of ordinary human relations. But it is precisely this difference\nwhich makes Lutheranism more closely related to asceticism than\nCalvinism; for Lutheranism is the Protestant way of despairing of\nthe world and of claiming victory for the religious ideal without\nengaging the world in combat. Both are founded upon an ethical\ndualism. The medieval ascetic flees from the world into the monastery\nand there attempts realization of his religious ideal; the Lutheran\nquietist flees from the world into the asylum of his inner life\nwhere he comes into the emotional possession of the ideal without\nrisking its refinements in the world of cruel realities. The one has\na dualism which divides the monastic from ordinary men; the other\ndraws the line within the soul of each individual and expects him to\nrealize in his religious experience what he cannot reveal in ordinary\nhuman relations. If Calvinism is _Weltfreundlich_, Lutheranism like\nasceticism is _Weltfeindlich_. It has little hope that a kingdom of God\nwill be established upon earth, except perhaps through supernatural\nintervention. It places all its emphasis upon the sentiment of Jesus:\n\u201cThe kingdom of God is within you.\u201d It must be admitted that Jesus\u2019\nconception of the kingdom of God is probably as much related to\nquietistic religion as to puritan morality, though ascetic religion\nseems closer to him than either. The modern church has dismissed the\neschatological element in Jesus\u2019 teachings as the Semitic shell in\nwhich Jesus developed his conception of the kingdom of God as a social\nideal; but it was more probably his way of expressing doubt that his\nideal could ever be realized in history except by a miracle of God.\nYet the apocalyptic element in the gospel was qualified by the idea\nof the kingdom to be realized by evolutionary process. The kingdom\nof God was also \u201clike unto a mustard seed.\u201d Jesus in short was both\npessimistic and optimistic in regard to the spiritual potentialities of\nhuman society, and in his paradoxical rather than consistent position\nhe was able to maintain the tension between religion and life in a way\nwhich has escaped both parties in the churches of the Reformation. Of\nthis more will be said later. The attitude of Lutheran piety toward the\nworld has the merit and the limitation characteristic of all pessimism.\nIt sharpens the ideal but despairs of its realization. Lutheran\ndoctrine was fashioned out of the religious experiences of a tumultuous\nsoul seeking peace and failing to find it in any of the institutions\nwhich were meant to incarnate the religious ideal or in any of the\nobservance which were intended to express it. The institution shocked\nhim by their imperfections, and the observances and rituals had\nundergone the inevitable process which reduces a necessary symbolism\nto a kind of magic in which the symbol achieves potencies originally\nascribed only to the ineffable truth or reality for which it stands.\nFrom all historic relativities of the institutions and superficialities\nof religious rites Luther reacted and discovered his absolute in the\nreligious experience in which the soul appropriates the grace of God.\nIn that mystic communion all natural imperfections of the human spirit\nare transcended and the soul is lifted out of the relativities of time\nand circumstance. It is easy to see how inevitable is this emphasis in\nthe history of religion but also how perilous it may become to moral\nvalues. It is inevitable because every sensitive conscience suffers at\ntimes from a realization that \u201cour reach is beyond our grasp,\u201d that\nmoral capacities are not equal to the goals set by imagination and\nhope. The apostle Paul, whose religious experience closely paralleled\nthose of Luther and whose theology therefore became authoritative for\nhim, complained: \u201c... the good that I would, I do not; but the evil\nwhich I would not, that I do.... For I delight in the law of God after\nthe inward man. But I see another law in my members, warring against\nthe law in my mind and bringing me into captivity to the law of sin\nthat is in my members. O wretched man that I am. Who shall deliver\nme from the body of this death? I thank God through Jesus Christ our\nLord.\u201d[12] That is a classic statement of the dualism in life which\nevery religion is tempted to overcome by transcending it. Lutheranism\nwas in fact but a revival of Pauline Christianity and it was Pauline\nChristianity which had built the Christian church. In it the tension\nbetween religion and life which is maintained in the religious idealism\nof Jesus is relaxed and the sensitive soul is given the assurance that\na merciful God will know how to complete what is so incomplete and\nhow to perfect our manifest imperfections. Thus the same Jesus who in\nthe gospels is a bold adventurer of the spirit who challenges his\ndisciples to be perfect as their Father in heaven is perfect becomes in\nthe epistles the symbol of the divine grace which knows how to accept\nour intentions for our achievements. It may be unfair to speak of a\nconflict between the religion of Jesus and the religion of Paul; for it\nwas a heavenly Father and not a jealous judge who was central in the\nthought of Jesus, and his emphasis upon forgiveness shocked the strict\nmoralists of his day. But if there is no conflict at this point, there\nis a marked change in emphasis. In the one the appropriation of divine\ngrace is a necessary part of the moral adventure; in the other it is\nseparated from the moral enterprise and easily becomes a substitute\nfor it. Paul had indeed disavowed all antinomian tendencies in his\ndoctrine of grace. \u201cWhat shall we then say? Shall we continue to sin\nthat grace may abound? God forbid. How shall we that are dead to sin,\nlive any longer therein?\u201d Obviously the mystical experience in both\nthe Pauline and the Lutheran religion was not unrelated to the life of\nmoral purpose and was not consciously used to obviate the necessity\nfor moral enterprise. But what is to prevent men from making a\npremature appropriation of the peace it guarantees, before and without\ndeserving it? In that lies a peril to morality in almost all religion\nwhich Pauline and Lutheran theology did not create but which it may\naccentuate. It is well to remember that some of the greatest perils to\nmorality in the life of religion arise out of its most cherished and\nnecessary characteristics. Religion is at once the necessary partner\nand the potential foe of moral life.\n\nThe quietistic tendencies of religion, particularly as elaborated by\nPauline and Lutheran theology, are less dangerous in a simple society\nthan in a complex one. Ethical attitudes in simple social relations\nflow almost automatically out of a religious experience, even though\nthe conscious interpretation of the experience is scornful of the\n\u201crighteousness of works.\u201d But in the secondary and more complex\nsocial relationships the moral urge which issues out of the religious\nexperience is easily frustrated by the intricacies and relativities\nof historic realities and institutions. How shall the soul preserve\nthe sense of the absolute which it has gained in the religious\nexperience from contamination by the sins which are covert in all\nsocial relations? It is in the varying answers of quietistic religion\nto that question that its ethical limitations are vividly revealed.\nOne answer is to avoid conflict with political and social institutions\non the score that they are divinely ordained. \u201cLet every soul be\nsubject unto the higher powers. For there is no power but of God; the\npowers that be are ordained of God,\u201d said the apostle Paul. When it is\nremembered that the reference is to the government of the Roman empire,\nthe social conservatism implicit in this logic is obvious. It was this\nattitude of Paul which made it easy for Luther to bring his church\ninto such intimate union with the various governments of Germany and\nto maintain an attitude bordering on subservience toward the German\nprinces. The political conservatism of Lutheranism has since been its\nunvarying characteristic and has had its marked effects upon history,\nin no period more so than in that of the World War. State churches of\nany kind easily become the tools of the secular state, but Lutheran\nstate churches have usually been more compliant tools than the Anglican\nchurch, for instance, which has never quite renounced the old Catholic\nambitions of partnership with the state.\n\nAnother method of which quietistic religion avails itself in dealing\nwith the world is to assume that its ideal will somehow achieve\nautomatic realization in the intricacies of economic and social life.\nThis method is hardly consistent with its pessimism, but it satisfies\nthe desire for practical results which is bound to assert itself in\neven the most supra-moral religion. Thus Luther declares:[13] \u201cThere\ncan be no better instructions in ... all transactions in temporal\ngoods than that every man who is to deal with his neighbor present to\nhimself these commandments: \u2018What you would that others should do\nunto you, do ye also to them,\u2019 and \u2018Love thy neighbor as thyself.\u2019 If\nthese were followed out, then everything would arrange and instruct\nitself; all things would quietly and simply be set to rights, for\neveryone\u2019s heart and conscience would guide him.\u201d It is a conceit of\nreligious people, by no means confined to Lutherans, that a vigorous\nstatement of the ideal ought to result in its realization. No one can\nestimate how often the pulpit has insisted in these latter days that\nwar could be abolished if only the nations \u201cwould live according to\nthe law of Christ.\u201d This characteristic frequently gives the church\u2019s\npronouncements a curious air of futility; for ideals are neither\nchallenged nor applied if they are not finally embodied in concrete\nproposals for specific situations. It is in such situations that the\nideal meets its real test and runs the peril of corruption. Frequently\nthe tendency of religion to be content with the statement of abstract\nprinciples is due to a want of intellectual vigor which results easily\nfrom religion\u2019s mistrust of reason.\n\nA method of dealing with the world which is more consistent with the\nessential dualism of quietistic religion is its effort to give some\nrealization to the ideal by means of subjective religious emotion which\ntranscends the imperfections of society without attempting to change\nthem. Thus the ideal of brotherhood is to be realized by a religious\nappreciation of all men as brothers, however much economic and social\nfacts may give the lie to the ideal. This was the apostle Paul\u2019s\nmethod of dealing with slavery and Luther emulated it in his attitude\ntoward the peasant\u2019s revolt. Nothing gives a more illuminating clue\nto the conservative implications of this type of religion than this\nincident in the Reformation. The peasants, suffering in a state of\nsemi-slavery, saw in Luther\u2019s statement of the gospel principles of\nfreedom, and in the religious ideal of the equal worth of all souls,\nimplicit in Christian teaching, a justification for their revolt\nagainst the intolerable conditions of serfdom. They declared: \u201cIt has\nbeen custom hitherto for men to hold us as their own property, which\nis pitiable enough considering that Christ has delivered and redeemed\nus all, the lowly as well as the great, by the shedding of his precious\nblood. Accordingly it is consistent with scripture that we should be\nfree and should wish to be so. We therefore take it for granted that\nyou will release us from serfdom as true Christians, unless it should\nbe shown from the gospels that we are serfs.\u201d[14] Luther violently\ndisavowed this practical application of his gospel. \u201cThis article\nwould make all men equal and so change the spiritual kingdom of Christ\ninto an external worldly one. Impossible. An earthly kingdom cannot\nexist without inequality of persons. Some must be free, others serfs,\nsome rulers, others subjects. As St. Paul says, \u2018In Christ there is\nneither bond nor free.\u2019\u201d The violence of Luther\u2019s reaction in this\ninstance was partly due to considerations of expediency; for he feared\nto lose caste with the princes by having the Reformation identified\nwith radical political movements; yet it is fairly faithful to his\ngeneral conceptions of the nature and function of religion. Obviously\nthe dualism of Protestantism which separates the religious experience\nof the individual from the social realities in which alone personality\ncan achieve significance has defects which are more perilous to social\nvalues than the ethical dualism of medieval monasticism. If the ideal\nis to be withdrawn from life to save it from corruption, it is better\nthat it be realized in some social medium, however artificial, than\nthat it be suspended in the thin air of religious sentiment and be\nrealized only in subjective experience.\n\nAn analysis of the various strategies of religion in establishing\ncontact with the historic situations and social realities in which it\nmust function reveals, in short, that it can pursue no course which\nis altogether free of peril to its moral values. Capitulation without\nconflict reduces religion to magic and secularizes life. A stubborn\nconflict with the intractable forces of nature and history results in\nsome kind of compromise. Neither papal internationalism nor puritan\nplutocracy are what the idealists who were responsible for them really\ndesired. And what they really desired fell short of their pretended\ngoals. Withdrawal from the world is equally dangerous. For it may\nlead either to the morbid artificialities of asceticism or to the\nsentimental subjectivism of quietistic religion. There are values in\neach of the various strategies as well as perils. Perhaps those who\nare too critical of their limitations can never create their values.\nReligion must create its values in na\u00efve faith and subject their\nlimitations to a critical intelligence. Of the various strategies\nasceticism is probably nearest to the real genius of religion and most\nadequate for the moral needs of our day. If a world is completely\nastray the higher perspective from which it may be convicted of sin and\nthe greater dynamic which may function redemptively in its life both\ndepend upon some kind of detachment of religion from life.\n\n\n\n\n                               CHAPTER VI\n\n                SOCIAL COMPLEXITY AND ETHICAL IMPOTENCE\n\n\nWhile there is good reason to regret the individualism of Protestantism\nin a civilization which has increased the intimacy of all human\nrelations and made social and economic interdependence a basic fact,\nyet it alone cannot be held responsible for the unethical nature\nof modern society. This is attributable as much to the greater\ndifficulties which the human conscience faces in modern life as to any\nweakness in the moral and religious idealism by which it is informed. A\nmuch more adequate type of religious idealism might have been unequal\nto the task of preserving ethical values in modern life.\n\nThe gradual secularization of economics through the growing complexity\nof commercial relations has been a previous interest of our study. When\nit became inconvenient and difficult to make simple moral standards,\nexpressed in prohibitions of usury and maintenance of a \u201cjust price,\u201d\nfit the new intricacies of international commerce and industrial\nproduction, we have seen how men turned naturally and inevitably to the\nconsoling reflection that \u201cin the providence of God life is so arranged\nthat each man seeking his own shall serve the common weal.\u201d The\ndoctrine of laissez faire was in other words as much an admission of\ndefeat on the part of the moral forces of society as it was a conscious\neffort toward secularization. Other factors beside a growing complexity\nof social life helped however to secularize modern society. Modern\ncommerce and industry tend to increase the extent of co\u00f6perative effort\nwhile they diminish personal contacts. World commerce and large-scale\nproduction make human beings interdependent without offering them\nthe opportunity of entering upon personal associations. There is a\nnatural sympathy in the soul which saves men from actions which are\nvery obviously detrimental to their fellows. But if they are unable to\nsurvey the consequences of their actions or to gauge the reactions to\ntheir attitudes in the lives of others, their temptation to unethical\nconduct is materially increased. The master of a manufacturing unit\nin the old handcraft period of industry thus found it much easier to\nmaintain moral relations to his workers than a modern, frequently\nabsentee, owner of a large factory. If in addition ownership becomes\ncollective, with the resulting division of responsibility, while the\nnumber of workers increases until individuals lose their significance\nin the mass, the problem of making industrial relations ethical is\nfurther complicated. Ethical conduct is, in its last analysis, based\nupon reverence for personality; and personality fails to make its\nappeal to the conscience when considered in the mass and when regarded\nat too long range. In such circumstances a degree of intelligence and\nimagination, which mankind has not yet achieved, is required to gauge\nthe effect of industrial and commercial policy upon the individuals who\nare involved in it. The unethical nature of modern civilization with\nits destruction of confidence in the moral integrity of human nature\nand with its deterministic obsessions is largely due to its mechanical\nperfections which have increased the extent of social co\u00f6peration while\nthey have decreased personal contacts.\n\nThe same means of commerce and communication which have increased\nthe size of industrial groups and extended the range of commercial\ntransactions have also enlarged the political units and increased\ninterdependence between them. We are living in a world in which a\nfinancial depression in America results in a panic upon the silk\nexchange of Tokio; in which a boycott upon cotton goods initiated by\na Gandhi in India throws thousands of cotton spinners in Manchester\ninto unemployment; and in which Western industrialism may exploit\nChinese labor in the seaports of China without one beneficiary of this\nindustrialism out of a million being able to make a mental picture\nof the social consequences of the commercial policies from which he\nbenefits. The difficulty of these long-range relationships is further\ncomplicated by the fact that the participants are separated not only\nby great distances but by the barriers of race and nationality. All\nsocial decencies in the past have developed within the bounds of the\ngroup, and men have not yet learned to treat individuals in other\ngroups with confidence, respect and honesty. Attitudes of tenderness,\nsympathy and affection have been confined very largely to the family\ngroup. From this intimate group they were finally sluiced out to\neffect social relations in larger groups, but they have not changed\ninter-group relations. Civilization has increased the size of groups in\nwhich human relations have an ethical basis, but it has not moralized\nthe action of the group nor taught individuals in one social group\nto treat individuals in other groups with the respect and confidence\nwhich a wholesome social life requires. The connotation of contempt\nwhich the Jews placed in the word \u201cgentile\u201d and the Greeks in the word\n\u201cbarbarian\u201d may be matched in the terminology of practically every\npeople. When groups are geographically separated, as in the case of\npolitical states, fear and misunderstanding are multiplied by the\nignorance which results from a lack of contacts. But contacts alone\ndo not remove them; for the relations of political, social and racial\ngroups within the boundaries of the same state are only slightly\nmore ethical, as for instance the relation between white and colored\npeople in the United States or of the Scotch and Irish in Ulster.\nHuman imagination and intelligence have not been equal to the task of\nextending ethical attitudes beyond the boundaries of the group.\n\nThe ethical problem of group relations is made still more difficult\nby the expansive desires and unethical attitudes which develop\nnaturally within the group as a corporate entity. That is, groups as\nsuch find it even more difficult to maintain moral attitudes toward\nother groups than do the individuals within it toward individuals in\nother racial or political unities. All human groups tend to be more\npredatory than the individuals which compose them. The most tender\nemotions may characterize the relations of members of a family to\neach other; but the family as such is easily tempted to gain its\nadvantages at the expense of other families. The tendency of family\nloyalty to accentuate covetousness has been frequently noted by social\nobservers who have seen the family instinct as the very basis of the\nsanctity which civilization has given private property. Religious\norganizations are not free of the imperial ambitions which come\nnaturally to social groups of every kind. One fruitful cause of the\ndilution of religious idealism is the desire of religious groups to\ngain power and prestige among larger numbers. They therefore soften\nthe rigor of their ideal that it may captivate the morally mediocre\nmajority. Both employers and employees frequently find agreement in\nspecific cases of conflict difficult because the policies of both are\ndetermined by considerations of loyalty to their respective groups.\nOf all human groups the political state is probably most inclined to\nunethical conduct. It was a dictum of George Washington\u2019s that a nation\nwas not to be trusted beyond its interests, and history supports the\njustice of his observation. After shrewdly observing the statesmen of\nEngland equivocate on the attitude of their nation toward the southern\nrebellion until they could determine their policy by considerations\nof expediency, Henry Adams came to the melancholy conclusion that\nmasses of men were always moved by interest and never by conscience\nand that morality is a private and a costly luxury.[15] One reason\nwhy the relations of nations to each other are still characterized\nby primitive fears and excessive caution is because their actions\nhave not, as a matter of fact, been morally dependable. The problem\nof making nations and other groups conform to ethical standards of\nany kind is particularly difficult because the ethical attitude of\nthe individual toward his group easily obscures the unethical nature\nof the group\u2019s desires. The patriot identifies his tender emotions\ntoward his nation with the attitude of the nation itself until he\nbecomes incapable of a critical appraisal of its policy; or he frankly\ncondones the selfishness of the nation because he recognizes no ethical\nvalues beyond those implicit in group loyalty. The father of a family\nmay feel moral pride in essentially selfish pursuits because he means\nto secure advantages by them not for himself but for his family.\nLoyalty to \u201cthe firm\u201d may give the business man a consciousness of\nvirtue even though it forces him to connive in predatory practices\nof his concern. The class-conscious worker may be willing to disrupt\nsociety in the interest of his class because all his moral needs are\nsatisfied by his devotion to what he regards as the most significant\nsocial group. While this ethical paradox of patriotism is obviously\nnot confined to political groups, the nation is most seriously tempted\nto unethical conduct because it is not a voluntary association, its\ngroup is conveniently isolated from others and loyalty to it is least\nqualified by other conflicting loyalties. It may be set down as a truth\nof almost axiomatic finality, that groups tend to be unethical in\nproportion to the degree of unqualified loyalty which they are able\nto claim or exact of their members. In this connection it may be noted\nthat democracy has increased rather than diminished the imperialism\nof nations, for it has given patriotism a higher moral sanction and\nthus reduced the moral scruples which might qualify the loyalty of\ntheir citizens. The arrogance of nations and their insistence on moral\nautonomy has developed simultaneously with the extension of democracy.\nIt is this ethical paradox of patriotism which invalidates the\ncontention that the root of all imperialism is the imperialism of the\nindividual. It is true of course that group loyalty may become a device\nfor delegating our vices to the group and imagining ourselves virtuous.\nSome types of political arrogance and race prejudice are obviously\nmethods of compensating individuals for their lack of opportunity\nto bully their immediate neighbors. Yet on the whole the unethical\ncharacter of group action is determined as much by the partial virtues\nas by the vices of individuals.\n\nThe problem of bringing groups under some kind of ethical control is\nnot new in history. It has become unusually difficult in the modern\nworld not only because of the consolidation of the authority of the\nstate but also because rapid means of communication have increased the\nsize of social, political and economic units and made relations between\nthem more intricate. The larger the unit the more unqualified seems\nto be the moral sanction which loyalty to it may claim. To an average\ncitizen, immersed in his parochial interests, the nation appears in the\nlight of a universal community in contrast to the smaller and voluntary\ncommunities within the nation. Yet this same nation is one of many\nhuman groups, most of which betray imperial desires reminiscent of Rome\nbut which aspire in vain after the universal dominion which gave Roman\nimperialism a measure of moral worth. Treitschke, whose philosophy of\nhistory was the object of so much opprobrium during the World War that\nits faithfulness to the general prejudices of Western life would hardly\nbe surmised, presented the nation as the ultimate community because\nall smaller societies are too petty to deserve and all larger ones too\nvague and abstract to claim the unqualified allegiance of men.\n\nThe intricacies and propinquities of an industrial civilization tend at\nsome points to increase the imperial desires of nations and at others\nto make their ordinary lusts more deadly. The feud between Germany\nand France is a very ancient one, but the need of French industry\nfor German coal and of German industry for French iron explains some\naspects of their present difficulties which are not derived from\nancient animosities. Modern industry needs a unified world and, lacking\nit, each nation is inclined to seek the completion of its industrial\nestablishment by the forcible appropriation of territory, rich in\nneeded resources. The economic imperialism of industrially advanced\nnations is a product of the high productivity of modern industry which\nproduces more than one national unit can consume and which needs\nmore raw materials than the same nation can produce. Covetous eyes\nare consequently turned upon undeveloped portions of the globe, rich\nin raw materials and hungry for the products of modern industry. In\none sense the European war was incubated in Africa. Rapid means of\ncommunication also extend the reach of the grasping nations. China is\nattempting to throw off the shackles of a Western imperialism which\ncould never have gained the position it holds on Chinese soil but for\nthe new contiguity which has destroyed the boundaries between East and\nWest. Moreover, the intricacies of international commerce and finance\noffer opportunities for a new kind of economic imperialism which hardly\nneeds, though it does not always avoid, the use of political force.\nThe economic forces of one nation simply penetrate the economic life\nof another and, if there is a great disparity in economic power, the\nweaker nation is brought under the dominion of the stronger without\nthe citizens of either being aware of the process by which this has\nbeen accomplished. This is the type of imperialism which America\nis most fitted and inclined to develop. In South America political\npressure does accompany economic penetration, but in Europe American\npower increases under a policy of political isolation. The isolationism\nof America, which has become a firmly established foreign policy\nsince the war, is prompted partly by the sense of power which America\nfeels as the richest nation of the world, and partly by a political\ninfantilism which tempts us both to pharisaism and to fear when dealing\nwith the supposedly more astute political bargainers of Europe. The\nrelation of America to the rest of the world is a perfect example of\nthe moral peril in the new intricacies of modern civilization. The\ncitizen of the state is as ignorant of the actual character of his\nnation\u2019s relation to other nations as of other peoples\u2019 reactions to\nthe real policy of his own government. Probably not one American in a\nthousand is able to comprehend a single reason why Europe should fear\nor hate America and not more than one in a hundred is actually aware\nof the existence of such hatreds and fears. There is therefore an\nunconscious hypocrisy in the moral pretensions of the citizens of every\nnation, a more or less conscious hypocrisy in the attitudes of the\ngovernments which do not share but yet exploit the political ignorance\nof the people, and an inevitable reaction of cynicism on the part of\nthose who know the real facts and suffer from the moral limitations\nof the nation\u2019s policy. Group relations, particularly those which are\nintricate, are thus persistently unethical because part of the modern\nworld is too ignorant to make them ethical and the other part is so\nworldly-wise that it has lost confidence in the possibility of ethical\nrelations. Frequently hypocrisy and cynicism are united in the same\nperson who knows how to discount the moral pretensions of other groups\nbut lacks the perspective from which he might arrive at a critical\nevaluation of the real character of his own group. This curious\ncombination of insincerity and cynicism is obvious in the relation of\nboth economic and national groups, but it is particularly noticeable\nin international difficulties. In the struggle between economic\ngroups there is a growing inclination to make no moral pretensions\non either side. Sometimes the group in power makes them but in that\ncase its insincerity is usually conscious rather than ignorant. In\ninternational affairs the same patriots who ignorantly persecute every\nperson who seeks to qualify national loyalty or to make a dispassionate\nappraisal of national policies frequently sink into moral despair and\ndisillusionment when history unfolds the inevitable consequences of the\nanarchy of conflicting national lusts.\n\nThe task of making complex group relations ethical belongs primarily\nto religion and education because statecraft cannot rise above the\nuniversal limitations of human imagination and intelligence. A\nrobust ethical idealism, an extraordinary spiritual insight and a\nhigh degree of intelligence are equally necessary for such a social\ntask. The difficulties of the problem are enhanced by the fact that\nthe religious imagination and astute intelligence which are equally\nnecessary for its solution are incompatible with each other. Religion\nis naturally jealous of any partner in a redemptive enterprise; and\nthe same intelligence which is needed to guide moral purpose in a\ncomplex situation easily lames the moral will and dulls the spiritual\ninsight. It is possible that this difficulty may permanently destroy\nevery vestige of morality in the group relations of modern society.\nThe necessary partnership and the inevitable conflict between the\nreligio-moral and the rational forces is obvious in both the political\nand the economic problems of the present age.\n\nThe unqualified authority and the boundless lusts of a modern state\nneed first of all to be brought under the scrutiny of clear minds who\nunderstand the implications and can gauge the consequences of its\npretensions. Patriotism is a form of altruism and as such represents\nthe victory of ultra-rational sanctions over the selfish inclinations\nof individuals which seem quite reasonable to the average man. The\nemotional attitude and ethical achievement in patriotism endows the\npatriot with a kind of madness and pride which make him as scornful\nof more rational types of altruism as of the prudent and cautious\nselfishness with which he has his primary conflict. It is because\npatriotism represents a victory of an ethical ideal that religion\nso easily becomes its uncritical partner. When many hearts are cold\nanything that warms them will seem religious to the undiscriminating\nchampion of religious values. The defects of patriotic altruism are\nthus left to the correction of rationalistic idealists who know how\nto discover the absurdities into which an uncritical devotion to\npartial values may issue and how to envisage the larger community\nof mankind of which the nation is a part. During the last war moral\nidealists of rationalistic persuasion, such as Bertrand Russell, Romain\nRolland, Henri Barbusse and Bernard Shaw, were more detached in their\nperspective and freer of war hysterias than any religious leaders of\nequal standing. To envisage the larger community of mankind which\nlacks the physical symbols of the state and to dispel the parochial\nprejudices which are harbored in mediocre minds and which make hatred\nof others the inevitable commitant of love for one\u2019s own is clearly a\ntask to which a discriminating intelligence must contribute.\n\nHowever the problem of group relations, as has been previously noted,\nis created not only by the parochialism of individuals but by the lust\nand greed of the group itself. The task of persuading the group to\nsacrifice some of its advantages for the sake of the whole of human\nsociety is so difficult that it almost leads to despair. If it will\never be accomplished religio-moral forces, whatever their present\nimpotence, must come to the aid of reason. Prudence alone may prompt\nnations to a measure of self-sacrificing action, since unqualified\nself-assertion must lead to mutual destruction. But prudential morality\nreveals the same defects in inter-group relations which we have noted\nin simpler social problems. Its ends are always too immediate and its\nperspective is too narrow. Moral action which lacks some reference to\nan absolute standard and some ultra-rational dynamic inevitably falls\nshort even of satisfying the social necessities. The prudence of\nnations in the present state of international relations tends to prompt\na few, usually neighboring nations, to compose their differences, but\nfor the sake and at the price of sharpening the conflict with some\nother alliance of states. The net result of such an enterprise is\nsimply to enlarge the unit of conflict once more without abolishing\nwarfare. The manner in which the triple entente and the triple\nalliance, both formed with high moral pretensions, helped to make the\nWorld War inevitable is a matter of history. More recently there are\nindications that France and Germany will compose their differences \u201cfor\nthe sake of Europe.\u201d Such a reconciliation will hasten the unification\nof Europe but will also help to raise the specter of intercontinental\nwars with continental units of conflict. The unification of Asia\nupon a basis of common resentment against Western imperialism is an\nalmost unavoidable development in international affairs. All these\ncontinental alliances are logical enough from any immediate perspective\nbut dangerous from the perspective of the welfare of the whole race.\nThere is no indication that prudential statecraft has the resources\nto prevent America from inciting the whole of Europe against our\neconomic overlordship of that continent. The increasing feeling aroused\nby the problem of debt liquidations is symptomatic of the natural\nresentment which must inevitably issue out of a relation of economic\ninterdependence between a very wealthy and a poor continent. For the\nsettlement of this issue no policy will be wise except one which will\nappear very foolish to the wise statesmen. A prudent statecraft has\nmade the anxiety of a wealthy creditor the dominant note in American\ninternational policy, and envy and fear the chief characteristics in\nthe attitudes of the peoples who must deal with us.\n\nSocial intelligence does of course produce a finer fruit than the type\nof prudence which characterizes the international policy of modern\nstates. There is a whole class of social idealists who understand the\neconomic basis of most international difficulties and who would bring\npeace to the warring classes and nations by an economic reorganization\nof modern society. Since modern industrialism and capitalism have\nmaterially complicated the ancient feuds between races and classes, it\nis evident that no amount of moral and spiritual goodwill can produce\nan ordered and stable international society if the economic roots of\nwar are not clearly discerned and finally eliminated. However the\nsame intelligence which is capable of such discernment easily drifts\ninto a cynicism which discounts all moral and personal factors in\nsocial reconstruction and places its hope entirely in a new social\nstrategy. Loyalty to the class is substituted for loyalty to the\nstate, and class conflict is expected to issue in a lasting peace\nfor both classes and nations. Economic determinists show a superior\ndiscernment in recognizing that in a civilization which is forced to\norganize its economic life across national boundaries the conflict of\ninterest between classes does become more significant than the conflict\nbetween states, particularly since the latter conflict is due either to\neconomic or to fantastic and imaginary causes. But their very realism\nbetrays them into a cynicism which finally issues in the most romantic\nand unrealistic dreams. They imagine that social peace will result\nfrom the victory of one class over all other classes. They have not\ntaken into account that modern capitalism produces a formidable middle\nclass the interests of which are not identical with the proletarians.\nMoral and spiritual considerations may conceivably prompt this class\nto make common cause with the workers in the attainment of ethical\nsocial ends, but it will never be annihilated even by the most ruthless\nclass conflict nor will it be persuaded by the logic of economic facts\nthat its interests are altogether identical with those of the workers.\nEven if one class were able to eliminate all other classes, which is\nhardly probable, it would require some social grace and moral dynamic\nto preserve harmony between the various national groups by which this\nvast mass would be organized and into which it would disintegrate. Even\nwithin one national unit any economic class will dissolve into various\ngroups, according to varying and sometimes conflicting interests, as\nsoon as its foes are eliminated. The Russian communists were not long\nable to preserve their absolute solidarity after their revolution was\nfirmly established. The dominant group soon learned that no amount of\nruthlessness was able to prevent the gradual formation of a minority\ngroup under Trotzky and Zinoviev. Significantly, the conflict of\ninterest between peasants and industrial workers is the real basis of\nthis schism within communist ranks.\n\nIn Europe the qualification of patriotism by class loyalties has in\nsome instances led to a mitigation of national animosities, but it has\nnot destroyed them. On the contrary it has added new hatreds to the\nold and created a society which is divided not only by vertical but\nalso by horizontal divisions. The Marxian idea of the unification of\nthe world upon the basis of the common interests of the proletarian\nclass must be relegated to the category of millennial dreams. It is\nbased upon an illusion little better than that of nationalism. The\nnationalists seek to escape the moral problem by delegating the vices\nof the individual to the group and the Marxians fantastically endow\nthe group with virtues which it does not possess. Religious and moral\nidealism, preaching goodwill and peace without taking the brutal\nrealities of the modern economic conflict into consideration, is little\nbetter, and probably less serviceable than a cynical realism which is\nblind to everything but the secular facts revealed in modern economic\nlife. The moral futility of such idealism is one of the very roots of\nsuch a cynicism. Yet, finally, the problem of social reconstruction\ncannot be solved without the resources of religious insight and moral\ngoodwill. The economic reorganization of society will not be effected\nwithout conflict between those who possess the privileges and those who\nsuffer from the inequalities of modern industrialism. Neither can it be\neffected without the mutual sacrifice of rights, the mutual forgiveness\nof sins and a mutual trust going beyond the deserts of any party to\nthe controversy. In England, where economic theory and practice has\nnever been as completely divorced from religious idealism as on the\nContinent, a gradual transfer political power and social privilege to\nthe ranks of the workers is being made with much less peril of a social\nconvulsion than in any nation of the Continent. Both the possessors of\nprivilege and those who challenge the possession are stubborn in the\ndefense of their advantages and in the championship of their rights;\nbut at least a measure of influence upon the struggle is exercised by\nspiritual and moral considerations which Continental critics of England\nidentify with the British capacity for compromise but which probably\nhas deeper and more spiritual roots. Meanwhile religious idealism in\nAmerica is almost completely corrupted by sentimentality and betrayed\ninto social futility because the momentary unification of American\nsociety upon the basis of the interests of the middle classes absolves\nthe religious conscience from facing the moral challenge in the social\nand economic facts of modern society.\n\nEconomic determinists are not alone in sharing with an ordinary\nprudential statecraft in the effort to organize the life of groups\nby means of the resources of intelligence. The hopes of the more\nconventional yet socially intelligent people for a new world are\ninvolved in the idea of a society or league of nations. Since an\ninchoate international society created by the new intimacy in which\nnations live exists in spite of international anarchy, it is reasonable\nto attempt the creation of more adequate forms and machinery for the\ncrystallization and expression of its collective will, the conciliation\nof disputes among its members and the closer integration of its life.\nMoral and spiritual forces are sometimes frustrated merely by the\nlack of adequate machinery for the application of generally accepted\nprinciples to specific situations. There is therefore great need for an\nintelligent statesmanship which will give the soul of an international\nsociety a body, and incarnate its aspirations in the instruments of\npolitical order.\n\nFrom another point of view, however, international society does not yet\nexist and needs to be created; and the means for its creation are not\nlaws but attitudes, not organization but a type of life. Politically\nminded people easily suffer from the illusion that laws create\nmorality, that organization creates society. Societies are not created\nby political mechanism but by attitudes of mutual respect and trust.\nWhere these exist social relations are established and traditions\nformed. These in turn are gradually codified and given definition and\nprecision by legal enactments. No one now takes the theory seriously\nthat human society was created by a conscious mutual contract between\nindividuals who suddenly realized that they could save themselves in\nno other way from mutual self-destruction. Society is older than human\nhistory and exists wherever individuals establish relations of mutual\nreverence and trust. The family is usually the beginning of society\nbecause here nature aids the imagination and consanguinity creates an\natmosphere of mutual trust. The family is enlarged by the fortunes\nand the needs of war, the resulting clans may amalgamate into larger\nunits through intermarriage of leaders or through other exigencies,\nand the emerging national or racial group is formed by similar forces.\nThe love and trust which unite a society are no more rational than the\nhatred and mistrust which divide one society from another. People do\nnot regard each other as morally dependable because reason persuades or\nexperience prompts them to such an attitude. The attitude is determined\nby natural and instinctive or by ideal and religious forces and, once\nit is assumed, is inevitably verified; for in an atmosphere of mutual\ntrust human action finally becomes trustworthy and morally dependable.\nIn so far as national and racial groups live in a state of mutual fear\nand hold life outside of the group in contempt rather than in reverence\nthere is no international society nor can political machinery create\nit. Only in rare instances are new social traditions created by legal\nenactments. Political forms and legal measures are usually belated\nrecognitions of previously established social facts and necessities.\nThe problem of group relations in modern society is as difficult as it\nis because natural causes have operated to make the social units larger\nand larger while no ideal forces have been strong enough to prompt the\ngroup to enter into ethical relations with other groups. If a higher\ndegree of imagination than now seems probable does not inform the life\nof modern nations only, one further step is possible\u2014the consolidation\nof continents. In such an eventuality the present League of Nations\ncould easily become the instrument of pan-Europeanism in conflict with\nother Continents. A society of nations is impossible, in short, without\nthose ultra-rational attitudes which either instinct or religion must\ncreate and which in the case of this final venture is beyond the\nresources of natural instincts\u2014except in the event of a threat from\nsome other planetary community.\n\nIf the creation of an international society is a task to which\nmoral and spiritual resources must contribute, its maintenance and\ndevelopment are no less dependent upon the co\u00f6peration of spiritual\ninsight with political prudence. Even at best human nature is so\nimperfect and relations between groups as well as individuals so\nfruitful in misunderstandings that it is impossible to maintain the\nmutual trust and confidence which are the basis of society without\nthe spiritual achievement of mutual repentance and forgiveness. In\nthe relation between groups the ability to detect flaws in one\u2019s own\nand extenuating circumstances in the actions and attitudes of others\nis at once more necessary and more difficult than in intra-group\nrelations. It is more difficult because the intricacy and long range\nof the relations, and the inevitable hypocrisy in the pretensions of\ngovernments, easily obscure the limitations of one and the virtues\nand good intentions of the other party of the relationship. It is\nmore necessary because the frictions which fret the relations of\nnational and other groups are much more generally due to mutual guilt\nthan those of individual relations. They develop in a narrow world\nand in a society of but few members in which a suspected peril may\nlead to a gesture of defense, the defensive measure be regarded as\noffensive and in turn prompt an actual attack which will be justified\nin turn as a defensive measure. Thus fears produce hatreds, hatreds\nexpress themselves in ugly grimaces and someone finally strikes the\nfirst blow. The World War resulted from a spontaneous combustion of\nfears and hatreds, and the partial mobilizations, full mobilizations\nand final declarations of war are so intimately related to each\nother that impartial historians find it increasingly difficult and\nirrelevant to decide who was responsible for the actual hostilities.\nThe obvious fact is that every generation of every European state for\nseveral centuries had gathered fuel for flames of war. Yet each group\ndeclared its absolute innocence and heaped abuse upon the foe. Years\nafter the conflict only a small minority in each of the participating\nnations has had the imagination to see or the grace to confess the\nshare of its nation in the mutual guilt. Meanwhile ancient feuds are\nperpetuated because the hypocrisy of the victors is written into\nsolemn treaties and produces a resentment among the vanquished which\nmakes them incapable of any higher sincerity. Issues between nations\nare so involved that only expert knowledge is able to ascertain the\nreal facts, but the very intricacies of the problems involved make\nit possible to use the facts for the validation of almost any thesis\nwhich national pride may dictate. The real task of persuading groups\nto encourage forgiveness by repentance and repentance by forgiveness,\nand thus to overcome rather than perpetuate evil, is a spiritual\nand a moral one and cannot be accomplished in a completely secular\natmosphere. There is little evidence to justify the hope that spiritual\nand moral forces, as they are now oriented, are prepared to aid in such\na task. But their responsibility is obvious; social intelligence may\nbe a partner in the process of conciliation but intelligence cannot\nbear the burden alone when a disposition to humility and a capacity for\nmercy is lacking.\n\nUrging the necessity of religious attitudes between social and\npolitical groups may seem to be a counsel of perfection when it is\nremembered that intra-group relations, except in the circle of the\nfamily and in small religious fellowships, have never been able to\nprofit by their aid. Society in general has usually contented itself\nwith the expedient of composing social friction and arbitrating dispute\nby apportioning the relative guilt and innocence of the disputants\nthrough a presumably impartial judicatory which enforces its decisions\nupon the belligerents, however irreconcilable or obstreperous they\nmay be. But the fact is that such a method is both easier and more\neffective in a society composed of individuals than in a society\nof groups. In an ordinary national society the impartiality of the\ncourt is guaranteed by a society of thousands and even millions of\nindividuals who are supposed not to be biased in favor of one or the\nother litigants; and the parties to a controversy are therefore more\ninclined to accept the verdict of a court. Furthermore the society\nwhich supports the judicial tribunal is so powerful compared to\nwhatever political or physical strength the litigants possess that\nit is able to enforce the awards of the latter however recalcitrant\nthe disputants may be. But the society of nations is too small,\njudged by the number of its member nations, to function with absolute\nimpartiality in any major dispute. Judicial action is therefore\nimmediately less effective. It is to be noted that courts are less\nserviceable instruments of social conciliation even within nations\nwhen they deal with large economic and social groups such as unions\nand trusts or when the issue involves basic economic problems; and the\nreason for this is that the parties to a litigation represent so large\na part of the total community that the unbiased character of the court\nis not as readily assumed and ought not be taken for granted. Tradition\nand social custom usually bias the court in favor of one or the other\nlitigants, generally the one most firmly established in the traditional\norganization of the society. In the case of nations it is obvious that\nfor some time to come an international court must confine itself mainly\nto petty disputes among powerful nations and to the real disputes\nof the petty nations, from whose perspective the large nations may\nrepresent an impartial international society.[16] Even at best no\nformal conciliation can heal wounds such as were made by the World War\nif nations cannot develop the capacity for repentance and mercy and\nlearn how to restrain both the proud and the vindictive passions which\nare the natural products of unreflective social life.\n\nThough morally dependable action develops most readily in an atmosphere\nof mutual trust, it is not to be assumed that either nations or\nindividuals always justify trust by trustworthy action. Faith does not\nproduce conscience automatically. Much of the pacifism now cultivated\nby socially effective religious forces has the defect that it fails\nto gauge the stubborn resistance to ideal forces in the predatory\nnature of national groups. It is difficult to develop moral attitudes\nsufficiently honest not only to give the bearer of trust the prestige\nof sincerity but to make the object of trust worthy of its faith. Trust\nunited with selfishness results in moral futility; and when it is\nbased upon illusion and fails to take account of the imperfect social\nattitudes which it must overcome, it issues in mere sentimentality. It\nis significant that the idea of the outlawry of war should be espoused\nparticularly in America and find little favor in other nations; for\nhere extraordinary power is united with remarkable political na\u00efvete,\nso that American idealists find it difficult to appreciate the\nunsatisfied hungers of other nations or their resentful reaction to our\nown satiety. If nations cannot be moved to make some sacrifices for\nthe sake of the ideal and to qualify their expansive desires by moral\npurpose, all efforts to create an international society must finally\nprove vain. It may be that the secular ambitions of nations are so\nfirmly established in social custom and their unethical attitudes so\ngenerally sanctioned by the popular mind that nothing will avail to\ngive their actions even a touch of ethical character. It is difficult\nenough to subdue and discipline the immediate and anarchic desires\nwhich struggle for expression in the soul of the individual; but when\nthey express themselves in the life of groups and are veiled in seeming\nsanctities even while they achieve new and more diabolical forms they\ncan be subdued only by the most astute intelligence united with a high\nmoral passion. Modern civilization lacks both this intelligence and\nthis moral passion and is in the peril of losing what it has of the\nlatter as it develops the former. Moral idealism which fails to gauge\nthe measure of resistance which its ideals must meet in the confused\nrealities of life or to fashion adequate weapons for its conflict\ndegenerates into mere sentimentality. But a social intelligence which\nis overwhelmed by the discouraging realities and despairs of the\nattainment of any ideal sinks into a morally enervating cynicism. Moral\nleadership in Western society is divided to-day between sentimentalists\nand cynics who combine to render the prospect of an ethical\nregeneration of modern life well-nigh hopeless. If men are really to be\nredeemed from the sins of greed and mutual fears and hatreds by which\nthey make their common life intolerable they need a faith which is not\nheld too cheaply but which is held nevertheless in defiance of every\ndiscouragement. The same intelligence which the complexities of modern\nlife demand and create easily prompts not only to the cynicism which\ndeclares that \u201call men are liars\u201d but to a moral ennui which cries,\n\u201cVanity, vanity, all is vanity.\u201d\n\nBenjamin Kidd who understood the need for ultra-rational sanctions in\nsocial life better than most sociologists put the problem of modern\nsociety in these words: \u201cThe great problem with which every progressive\nsociety stands confronted is: How to retain the highest operative\nultra-rational sanctions for those onerous conditions of life which are\nessential to its life, and at one and the same time to allow freest\nplay to those intellectual forces which, while tending to come into\nconflict with such sanctions, contribute nevertheless to raise to the\nhighest degree of social efficiency the whole of its members.\u201d[17]\n\nTo develop the wisdom of serpents while they retain the guilelessness\nof doves is the task which faces the religio-moral forces if they\nwould aid in the moral regeneration of society. It may be that such\na task is too difficult for the resources of this or any generation\nof the immediate future and that painful experience must first prove\nother strategies inadequate. Meanwhile even the possibility of\nfuture usefulness of religion demands the largest possible measure\nof immediate detachment from the unethical characteristics of modern\nsociety. If religion cannot transform society, it must find its social\nfunction in criticizing present realities from some ideal perspective\nand in presenting the ideal without corruption, so that it may sharpen\nthe conscience and strengthen the faith of each generation.\n\n\n\n\n                              CHAPTER VII\n\n                TRANSCENDING AND TRANSFORMING THE WORLD\n\n\nThe tendency of modern religion to make itself at home in the world and\nto enter into intimate relations with civilization is not due solely to\nthe puritan confidence of victory over life. It is partly due to the\ninfluences of a sentimental and optimistic evaluation of human nature\nwhich came to the modern church through Rousseau and romanticism. It\nis also a product of the evolutionary optimism which has characterized\nreligious thought since ethicists and religionists have learnt to\novercome the melancholy conclusions implicit in the Darwinian theory\nand to see the bright side of evolution. Traditional religion is\nother-worldly. The modern church prides itself on its bright and happy\nworldliness. It is more interested in transforming the natural and\nsocial environment of personality than in persuading the soul to\ntranscend all circumstances and find its happiness in inner peace. The\nmodern church regards this mundane interest as its social passion.\nBut it is also the mark of its slavery to society. Whenever religion\nfeels completely at home in the world, it is the salt which has lost\nits savor. If it sacrifices the strategy of renouncing the world, it\nhas no strategy by which it may convict the world of sin. A movement\nwhich detaches religion from life to give it perspective and power over\nlife must on the other hand run the risk of centering the interests\nof men on other than social problems. Religion thus faces a dilemma\nwhich is not easily solved. A religion of social amelioration easily\nbecomes a beautiful romance which obscures the unlovely realities of\nlife. A religion of detachment from the world may persuade the soul\nto find both happiness and virtue in defiance of physical and social\ncircumstances and thus to regard all social problems as irrelevant to\nits main purpose. This dilemma is not due to any specific or historic\nweaknesses in types of religion but arises out of the nature and\nconstitution of religion as such.\n\nReligion in its unspoiled form is always other-worldly and\ndisenchanted. Puritanism, romanticism and evolutionary optimism are\nreally but reflections and refractions of the general temper of Western\nlife, which has slowly gained the ascendancy over the religious\nspirit. It is a temper of friendliness to, or at least fearlessness\nbefore the world. In puritanism the tension between religion and life\nis maintained, but the soul is persuaded that it can bring the whole\nof life under the dominion of conscience. In romanticism there is a\nfrank identification of human virtue with a sentimentally idealized\nnatural world. Religious and ethical thought which has come under the\ninfluence of evolutionary optimism maintains a sense of tension between\nthe soul and the natural world in rare instances; more frequently it\nregards human history as but the last chapter in the beautiful story\nof progress which all life has unfolded and which time and patience\nwill inevitably bring to a happy issue. The foundation for the Western\nstrategy of life was laid by the Greeks who, overcoming the awe and\nreverence with which the Oriental brooded over nature\u2019s mysteries,\nthrust impious hands into her secrets and made shrewd guesses about\nher varied phenomena. The Greeks learned to make only slight practical\napplication of their knowledge, and the rise of Christianity eclipsed\ntheir scientific temper. It came into its own again at the close of the\nMiddle Ages and at the dawn of the modern era. The fact that science\ndeveloped in the West rather than the East is due to this attitude\ntoward the natural world. The Orient is not less curious than the\nOccident, but it directs its mind to other problems. While it cradles\nphilosophies and religions the West gives birth to science.\n\nSince the dawn of the industrial era scientific knowledge is used\nincreasingly for the purpose of transforming the natural circumstance\nof human life. Nature is not transcended but transformed in the\ninterest of human happiness. Comforts are multiplied; power is\nincreased; time and distance are destroyed; hours of toil are reduced;\nnatural environment is changed; disease is eliminated and death\npostponed; the hostilities of nature are overcome and her benevolence\nmultiplied for the sake of human welfare. Our birth may be \u201cbut a\nsleep and a forgetting\u201d but our life is undeniably lived in natural\nconditions which profoundly affect not only physical well-being but\ncultural and spiritual character. It is evident therefore that there\nis profound wisdom in the scientific strategy which transforms the\nnatural world in the interest of the human spirit. Not only is the\nWestern world firmly committed to it, but there are indications that\nthe Orient will adopt it in spite of the opposition of religious\nleaders such as Gandhi. Whatever perils to the spiritual life may lurk\nin the preoccupation of the soul with its physical circumstances, it\nis clear that human personality may be served by improving the natural\nenvironment which conditions it. Wealth may lead to sensual excess but\nit is also the basis of culture. Leisure may be secured by reducing\nphysical wants to a minimum, but there are cultural advantages in a\nleisure which does not preclude the satisfaction of all reasonable\ndesires. Comforts may lead men to become obsessed with their external\ncircumstances, but they also reduce irrelevant distractions to life\u2019s\nmain purpose. Physical health is not a necessary but a convenient\ncondition for moral and spiritual enterprise.\n\nIn spite of these advantages religion, except in a few contemporary\nforms, has always been either hostile or indifferent to the business\nof transforming nature in the interest of personal values. It has\ncounseled the soul to seek its happiness not in changing but in\nbecoming independent of circumstances. In Buddhism the highest\nhappiness is sought by throttling all desires. Jesus was more careful\nto distinguish between the will to live and its physical expressions.\nBut he was critical of all physical desires and satisfactions. He had\nthe Orient\u2019s profound indifference to the \u201cbusiness of earth.\u201d If\nour ears were not so habituated to his words that they fail to catch\ntheir real significance, a modern congregation would be shocked by\nthe admonition: \u201cTake no thought for your life, what ye shall eat or\nwhat ye shall drink; nor yet for your body, what ye shall put on. Is\nnot life more than meat and the body more than raiment?\u201d \u201cLay not up\nfor yourselves treasures upon earth where moth and rust doth corrupt\nand where thieves break through and steal, for where your treasure\nis, there will your heart be also.\u201d \u201cFear not them which kill the\nbody but are not able to kill the soul; but rather fear him which is\nable to destroy both soul and body in hell.\u201d The modern Christian is\ninclined to destroy the force of the profound other-worldliness of such\nsentiments by reflecting that they represent an Oriental cast which is\nincidental and not essential to the gospel of Jesus. They are Oriental\nno doubt, but precisely because they are religious; and to regard them\nas incidental is to miss the whole meaning of the gospel. Though the\nWest is unable to accept them, it pays an unconscious tribute to the\ntruth involved in them. For the absolute moral values incarnated in the\npersonality of Jesus, which the West still reveres, are organically\nrelated to this other-worldliness.\n\nWhatever the limitations of this emphasis, it is evident that religion\ncannot escape it. Concerned with the soul\u2019s inner peace and perfect\nvirtue it is forced to lift it above the corruptions and irrelevancies\nof temporal conditions. The whole course of modern history is ample\njustification for Jesus\u2019 warning: Where your treasure is, there will\nyour heart be also. The instruments of personality\u2019s victory over\nnature have become the chains for a new kind of thraldom. Western\ncivilization is enslaved to its machines and the things which the\nmachines produce. Spiritual forces are emancipated from the forces of\nnature only to become the victims of a mechanized civilization. It is\na Pyrrhic victory. America, which has developed the Western strategy\nwith greater consistency than any other nation, is at once the envy and\nthe scorn of the world. The scorn may be a device for hiding the envy,\nbut there is moral justification for reproach. What the world regards\nas our vulgarity is more than the awkwardness of youth; it is an undue\npreoccupation with life\u2019s instrumentality and an obsession of the soul\nwith the concrete world.\n\nThe Orient may be more cruel than the West, but our superior tenderness\nis matched by our more expansive avarice. Having determined that\nlife consists in things a man possesses, the West sacrifices both\ninner peace and social harmony in the mad scramble for the power and\nprivilege which the conquests of nature has supplied. Neither the\nimperialism of nations nor the monstrous avarice of economic groups\nis confined to Western life, but covetousness and greed have been\nmanifestly increased by the temper and strategy of the Occident. The\nBiblical analysis which discovers covetousness as the root of conflict\nis applicable to our own day: \u201cYe lust and have not; ye kill and\ndesire to have, and cannot obtain; ye fight and war, yet ye have not\nbecause ye ask amiss.... Know ye not that the friendship of this world\nis enmity with God?\u201d[18] However necessary it may be to make a more\nequitable distribution of the physical blessings of life, religion\u2019s\ntrue function is to develop an attitude of indifference toward the\nvery goods for the possession of which men contend so frantically.\nWhen Jesus rebuked the young man who desired his aid in correcting the\ninequitable division of an inheritance, his unwillingness to assume\na judicial function was manifestly dictated by the thought that the\nwhole inheritance ought to have been a matter of indifference to the\nyoung man. It is easy to see that such an attitude may lend itself to\nabuse and be used to perpetuate inequalities. If advocated by religious\ngroups which have profited by economic inequalities, it becomes the\ntool of hypocrisy. Yet it is an emphasis which religion cannot disavow.\nIt is basic to its whole world view.\n\nThe peril to happiness as well as to virtue in reliance upon the\nexternal fortunes of life justifies the counsel of religion that\nhappiness must be founded on internal rather than external resources.\nThe conquest of nature is really but a relative victory of personality\nover circumstance. Though the caprice of nature\u2019s forces has been\nchecked, fortune remains fickle. If men cannot learn \u201chow to be\nabased and how to abound,\u201d there is no guarantee of happiness for\nthem. Poverty may be a curse, but voluntarily chosen or consented to\nwithout sullenness it may become the way of the soul\u2019s emancipation.\nThe elimination of disease is a boon to mankind, but there is little\nlikelihood that science will be able to overcome all ills to which the\nhuman flesh is heir. No scientific advance will obviate the necessity\nfor the discovery of faith that \u201cGod\u2019s strength is made perfect in\nweakness,\u201d that the infirmities of the flesh may become the occasion\nfor the cultivation of spiritual graces. Even at best science cannot\ndestroy nature\u2019s final irrelevancy\u2014death. There can therefore be\nno real victory over nature except by the strategy of transcending\nher fortunes. The more hostages taken from her the greater will be\nthe disappointment in the hour of her final victory. It is man\u2019s\nsublime and tragic fate that he must find happiness in the search for\ninfinitude amidst the flux of time and he can therefore never accept\nthe portion of mortality for himself with equanimity. Hence his final\ncomfort must come from the counsel of religion which teaches him how he\nmay identify himself with the eternal values of his devotion, so that\n\u201cthough the outward man perish yet the inward man is renewed day by\nday.\u201d[19]\n\nThe temper of Western civilization has made the modern church quite\nashamed of the other-worldly character of traditional religion, and\nintent upon discarding it as much as possible. Everything is done\nto impress the generation with the mundane interests of religious\nidealism and to secularize religion itself so that it may survive\nin a secular age as a kind of harmless adornment of the moral life.\nYet its service to both human happiness and virtue are involved in\nits other-worldliness. It is through that element that it gains the\npower to raise morality above the utilitarian plane and to give human\nhappiness a firmer foundation than fickle fortune. If men can find no\nbasis for happiness except in their adjustment to external realities,\nthey will not suffer pain to realize a kingdom of righteousness. If\nthey are taught to identify physical well-being with their cherished\npeace, they will not venture farther than such actions as a cool\nprudence prompts. The cross was inspired by devotion to a \u201ckingdom\nwhich is not of this world\u201d; but the cross was also the method by which\nthat kingdom was changed from an ethereal to a concrete reality. It\nis the absolute ideal which has no basis in concrete reality which\nmoves men to defy the limitations of the concrete and overcome them. A\nreligion which is perfectly at home in the world has no counsel for it\nwhich the world could not gain by an easier method.\n\nYet the reaction of modern religion to traditional other-worldliness is\nnatural enough and, in a way, necessary. While religion cannot afford\nto discard its other-worldliness, the moral and social limitations\nwhich issue from it are obvious enough. We have previously observed\nthe tendency of types of religion to withdraw the ideal from life\nand to imagine that it has magic potencies over life\u2019s realities,\nor that subjective devotion to it may absolve them of the duty of\nrealizing it in history. All these defects are due to vagaries\nwhich are not inevitable characteristics of religious life. But\nthe social limitations which result from the religious strategy of\ntranscending the fortunes of life are constitutional and central. They\ntherefore offer a very serious problem. If the soul is lifted above\ncircumstances, it easily loses interest in changing them to better\nadvantage. If its happiness is made independent of fortune, there\nis less purpose in making fortune secure. If personality discovers\nits highest satisfactions in defying environmental factors, it may\nbecome indifferent to the necessary projects of creating a more\nfavorable environment for personal values. Human personality is an\nhistoric product, determined by specific forces of natural and social\nenvironment, and though it may attain its highest glory by transcending\nall circumstances, it will fall short if it adopts that strategy at\nthe beginning and not at the end of its efforts. The Orient, which\nproduces more saints than the Occident, pays for them by the abject\nmisery of its multitudes. Its highest moral achievements are really\ndetermined by a cruel law of survival. Only personalities of great\nspiritual resource can overcome the general physical conditions of its\nlife which submerge the mass in hopeless poverty.\n\nSome credit for the advantages of Western life must be given to the\nmoral superiority of Christianity over Buddhism, which represents the\nquintessence of the Oriental spirit. Christianity is a life-affirming\nand Buddhism a life-denying faith. The one does not destroy but\nrefines the energy of life. The other destroys energy in the process\nof refinement. The Orient is pantheistic; and by deifying all of\nlife, offers no avenue of escape from its imperfections except by\nannihilation of life itself. There is a difference between fleeing to\nGod from life\u2019s unbearable realities and identifying these with the\ndivine will. At its worst the strategy of the Orient is a fatalistic\nacceptance of life\u2019s circumstances; at its best it is a stifling of\nall desires so that the soul may be free of the world. Yet there is\na social peril even in the more wholesome strategy of Christianity\nwhich affirms life but divorces it from its physical necessities. This\nlimitation is felt particularly when the conditions which invite change\nare social rather than natural. Nature is inexorable and it is well to\nlearn that only they are able to escape her furies who also know how\nto renounce her delights. But the world which man has created retains\nits cruelties only by the sufferance of man. Anything which will\nincline men to assume an attitude of indifference toward projects of\nsocial reform and amelioration is therefore a potential peril to social\nprogress. When Jesus rebuked the young man for his anxiety about an\nequitable division of his inheritance, he took a high spiritual ground\nwhich easily lends itself to abuse in the disillusioning realities\nof economic and social life. What if a sublime renunciation does not\nsoften the hearts of those who hold more than their just share of the\ninheritance? And what if the welfare of others besides that of the\nmoral idealist is involved in the renunciation? Shall the Biblical\ninjunction to servants that they be obedient to their masters \u201cnot only\nto the good and gentle but also to the froward\u201d apply to political\ntyrannies? Obviously an attitude which represents a high spiritual\nachievement in the individual instance has its limitations when raised\nto a general social policy. Social radicals who have been confronted\nwith the conservatism of religion have parodied the other-worldly\ntemper at the heart of this characteristic in the words: \u201cBye and\nbye, there\u2019ll be pie in the sky.\u201d The sneer in this parody hardly\ndoes justice to religious other-worldliness. The emphasis is not so\nmuch upon a future life as distinguished from the present existence\nas upon a type of life which can afford to regard \u201cpie\u201d with disdain\nwhether in this or any other world. Nevertheless, even the highest type\nof other-worldliness may become the cause of indifference to social\nconditions. The very sensitiveness of religion which persuades it to\nregard human society in the same category with the world of nature as\n\u201cthe world\u201d may result in the completer secularization of society and\nits abandonment to the unchecked forces of nature.\n\nThere is no easy formula for avoiding this social peril in the strategy\nof religion. The elimination of pantheism is a material aid in its\nsolution. The superior energy of the West may be due to a tentative\ndualism in its religion which has been qualified from time to time\nby pantheistic and monistic thought but never completely destroyed.\nYet even the dualism of Christianity does not save it altogether\nfrom positions which offer peril to social and moral values. Even an\nobserver who is entirely sympathetic to religion must come to the\nconclusion that the West owes many of its advantages to the fact that\nreligion has had no easy time in Western life, and that in the past\ncenturies not only scientific thought but scientific life-strategy has\nchallenged religion at every turn. Some of the excellencies of Western\nlife are clearly the fruits of our science rather than our religion.\nOf course, these advantages have been bought at a price. The empirical\ninstincts of science drive it to deny the continuities in reality and\nto see everything only in its momentary and immediate situation. The\nmodern behavioristic destruction of the concept of personality is\ntherefore one of the natural results of scientific thought betrayed\ninto absurdity by its own consistency. But a consistent religion is\ngenerally equally absurd. Regarding all reality, and personality\nin particular, _sub specie \u00e6ternitatis_, it fails to see how truly\npersonality is the product of specific social and natural forces and\nneglects to change the material environment in the interest of human\nwelfare. Human personality can be understood neither in terms of its\nenvironment alone nor in absolute terms which leave the material world\nin which it develops out of account. The final victory of personality\nmust be gained by transcending concrete situations and material\ncircumstances; but it is a hollow victory if circumstances are not\npreviously used and amended to improve personal values. The soul is\nat once the victim and the master of the material world. It gains\nits highest triumph by renouncing the world, but the renunciation is\npremature if a futile and yet not futile effort is not made to make the\nnatural world conform to the needs of human character.\n\nWhile the Western world has much to learn from the East in its strategy\nof life, there is no gain in substituting one strategy for the other;\nfor they are both defective. The plight of the West is due to the\ncomplete bankruptcy of religious forces and the unchallenged dominion\nof science; just as the plight of the East is due to the unchallenged\nsway of religion. Applied science has created a civilization which may\nbe as destructive of personality for the meagerly endowed multitudes\nas the natural poverty of Asia. But Western civilization may at least\nboast of developing a middle class which enjoys physical and spiritual\nadvantages which no considerable class of the Orient possesses. Neither\nthe West nor the East has arrived at a perfect basis for happiness. The\nOriental soul is like a bird, freed of its cage, but with no wings to\nfly. The Occidental soul has wings but is so fascinated by its gilded\ncage that it does not care to fly.\n\nThe conclusion which emerges from such reflections will shock orthodox\nreligionists. It is that the values of religion are conditioned and not\nabsolute and that they attain their highest usefulness not when they\nsubdue all other values but when they are in perpetual conflict with\nthem, or it may be truer to say when they are co\u00f6rdinated with them.\nWestern life gained an advantage over the East by centuries of conflict\nbetween the religious and scientific strategy of life. It is losing the\nadvantage by an excessive devotion to concrete interests and by the\ncapitulation of religion. The supreme tragedy of history would be the\nnot improbable armed conflict between West and East, with the Orient\nin a frenzy of resentment against the greed of the Occident and the\nOccident in a natural fear of the low living standards of Asia. Part of\nthe truth would be on either side and the conflict could result only\nin exaggerating the limitations of the partial truth which each side\nholds.\n\nMeanwhile there is the possibility of co\u00f6rdinating the values of East\nand West, of science and religion. Let the East learn to live in\ntime and the West to view its temporalities with indifference. The\nco\u00f6rdination is not easy because men are not inclined to be at once\ncritical and appreciative of the values with which they must deal.\nThey always tend to increase the limitations of certain values by an\nuncritical devotion, or to destroy the values in mad resentment against\ntheir limitations. Since man is a citizen of two worlds, he cannot\nafford to renounce his citizenship in either. He must work out his\ndestiny both as a child of nature and as a servant of the absolute.\n\nThe prospects for an exchange of values between the East and the West\nare not particularly bright. The Orient is indeed being \u201cAmericanized,\u201d\nbut partly through the policy of Western imperialism exploiting the\nlow living standards of Asia to the advantage of Western industry.\nThere is no powerful movement in the West to dissuade it from its\ncomplete trust in physical power as the method of self-realization, and\nin physical comfort as the way to happiness. Modern religion has not\nbeen totally ineffective in qualifying racial arrogance and parochial\nprejudices. But it has had practically no effect upon the instincts of\navarice which dominate Western life. The religious groups which are\nstill ambitious to defy civilization in the name of their faith have\na theology which cannot gain the respect of the thoughtful leaders of\nmodern life; and the sins of which they convict modern society are not\nits real sins. The intellectually emancipated religious groups are too\nthoroughly acclimatized to the atmosphere of Western life to have any\nsensitiveness for its imperfections.\n\nThe greatest hope lies in the missionary enterprise, which through its\nvery effort toward the universalization of the Christian faith has\na tendency to strip it of its Occidental accretions, so that it may\nbecome intrinsically worthy of its world expansion. The missionary\nenterprise may thereby contribute as much toward the spiritualization\nof Western life as toward the regeneration of the East. Its very\ncontact with the East gives it a perspective on the limitations of\nWestern life which churches at home do not possess. There is, of\ncourse, the possibility that Western imperialism will so thoroughly\ndiscredit the missionary enterprise before it can function in this\nway that it will lose its whole prestige in the Eastern world. In\nthat case Japan will probably continue to unify and occidentalize\nAsia in the hope of fighting fire with fire. A small minority of\nthoughtful missionaries are making a desperate effort to disassociate\nthe missionary enterprise from the politics of Western imperialism in\nthe Orient. Considering the difficulty of their task, they have made\ncommendable progress. Yet if Christianity at home does not become\ndisassociated from and does not qualify the greed of which the Oriental\npolitics of Western nations is but one expression, the heroic efforts\nof the missionaries may be vain. Men of prudence in the Orient may be\nwilling to concede that ideals have validity even if they are outraged\nby those who ostensibly accept them. But the final test of ideals must\ninclude their ability to qualify human action. If Christian idealism\nis to be a force which will help to create a unified world culture,\ncapable of destroying the moral limitations of both the Oriental and\nthe Occidental strategy of life, it must detach itself more completely\nfrom the temper of Western life even while it seeks to influence the\nthought of the East.\n\n\n\n\n                              CHAPTER VIII\n\n             A PHILOSOPHICAL BASIS FOR AN ETHICAL RELIGION\n\n\nThe ethical problem of religion may be more important than the\nmetaphysical one, as previously observed, but it cannot be solved\nwithout a reorientation of the present philosophical basis of religious\nconviction. The Western world has had a slight advantage over the\nEast in the tentative dualism of Christianity, but this advantage\nhas been lost by the inevitable drift toward pantheism in Western\nthought. Pantheistic tendencies are potential perils to moral values\nin practically all religions. By identifying God and the natural world\nthey either persuade men to resign themselves to the inadequacies of\nnature, under the illusion that divine sanctity has rendered them\nimmutable, or they blind the eye to the imperfections of nature and\nthus destroy the moral sensitiveness of religion. The Orient has\nusually derived a morally enervating pessimism from its pantheism,\nwhile the Occident has chosen the other horn of the monistic dilemma\nand fallen into a sentimental optimism. Both alternatives are as untrue\nto the facts as they are inadequate to men\u2019s moral needs.\n\nIn the Western world religious optimism has been gradually destroyed\nby the advance of science which discredited the moral overestimate of\nthe cosmic order, implicit as one of two tendencies in pantheism. The\npractical and tragic realities of its international and industrial life\nhave added to the disillusionment and made men as sceptical of human as\nof cosmic virtue. Thus the cynicism of disillusioned intelligence is\nadded to the despair of an outraged conscience to unite in a pessimism\nwhich questions both the rationality of the universe and the morality\nof man. The despair of the West is even more devastating to moral\nvalues than the pessimism of the East, for the Orient is prompted by\nits religion to a serene resignation while the West spends itself in\nblind fury or sensual excess. When all confidence in moral values is\ndestroyed, the strong express themselves by asserting their power or\nresenting their seeming impotence, while the weak sink into an easy\nindulgence of natural appetites. The real history of Western society\nis being written by Nietzschian and Marxian cynics who have subdued\nevery scruple which might qualify their contest for power. Meanwhile\ntheir conflict is lazily witnessed by vast hordes whose main purpose\nin life is to gratify their senses and who give their sympathy to one\nor the other side according as it offers least hindrance to their\nenjoyments. In such a situation religion is easily relegated to the\nposition of restraining the petty and obscuring the major vices of the\nsmall minority which still profess it. This is particularly true when\noptimism and sentimentality, such as characterize modern religion,\nmake it incapable of a realistic evaluation of the forces which reveal\nthemselves in human society.\n\nAlbert Schweitzer[20] interprets the whole moral bankruptcy of Western\ncivilization as a pessimistic reaction to the extravagant optimism of\nits traditional religions and philosophies. While other factors, such\nas the complexity and the impersonal nature of industrial society,\nhave been contributory factors to the disillusionment of the age, it\nis probably true that men are inclined to expect too little of the\nworld and of man mostly because too much has been claimed for them and\nextravagant hopes have been disappointed. A regeneration of the ethical\nlife of Western society must depend, therefore, upon the revival of a\nreligion in which the Scylla of pantheism and the Charybdis of pure\nnaturalism are avoided. While the Orient has a serenity which will\ncontribute much to the art of living in a unified world civilization,\nthere is no health for our sickness in its religious philosophies.\nIts pantheism cannot be maintained in the scientific atmosphere of\nthe West, and if it could, as it is in rare instances, it would only\npresent us with the impossible choice between the moral ennui of\npessimism and the sentimentality of an unqualified optimism. The\nyouthful exuberance of the Western mind invariably inclines it to\nthe least defensible of these two bad alternatives, the optimistic\none. When the West borrows religion from the East, as for instance\nin theosophy and Christian Science, it is used to support optimistic\nillusions so palpably absurd that they flourish only in those circles\nof society in which life is extremely comfortable and not too\nintelligent.\n\nThe only fruitful alternative to a monism and pantheism which\nidentifies God and the world, the real and the ideal, is a dualism\nwhich maintains some kind of distinction between them and does not\nlose one in the other. Dualistic solutions to the riddles of life\nare not new in the history of religious thought. They are in fact as\nnumerous as pantheistic ones, but their metaphysical limitations have\nusually outweighed their moral advantages and shortened their life. In\nZoroastrianism, the noblest of purely Aryan faiths, Ahirman the spirit\nof evil exists independently of Ormuzd the good spirit. The influence\nof this Persian dualism is seen in both Hebrew and Christian thought.\nThe satanology of the Old Testament is partly derived from it; and\nManich\u00e6ism, through which Augustine passed before he embraced and\nelaborated Catholic orthodoxy, is a compound of Persian and Christian\nreligion. Mythology is filled with efforts to do justice to the\nconflicts which the world reveals as obviously as its unities, as for\ninstance in the myth of Prometheus and Zeus. Even Plato, from whom most\nWestern pantheism has been indirectly derived, held that God\u2019s perfect\ngoodness was thwarted by the intractableness of the materials with\nwhich he worked.\n\nEarly Hebrew religion was na\u00efvely dualistic, and that is one reason\nwhy it has been so potent in the history of religion. God was\nindeed conceived of as omnipotent; that conception was the path\nthat led to monotheism. But the idea of omnipotence was elaborated\ndramatically rather than philosophically. The heavens might declare\nhis glory and the firmament show his handiwork, but he was revealed\nin national history and (according to the conception of the later\nprophets) in personal experience more than in natural phenomena. Even\na very early prophet discovered that the still small voice rather\nthan the earthquake or the fire was the symbol of his presence.\nThe Genesis account of the fall solves the problem of evil upon an\nessentially monistic basis by making human sin responsible for even\nthe inadequacies of nature and attributing everything from weeds to\nmortality to the luckless error of the first man. Neither the goodness\nnor the omnipotence of God is abridged in this na\u00efve but sublime\nconception in which the human conscience assumes responsibility for\nmore than its share of human ills in order to save the reputation of\ndivine virtue. The monism of this account is, however, qualified by the\ninjection of the tempting serpent, an element which is precursory of\nthe belief in the devil, which the Jews inherited from Babylonia and\nPersia and which has fortunately qualified all monistic tendencies in\nJewish and Christian orthodoxy until this day. A profounder instinct\nthan reveals itself to the casual observer persuades fundamentalism\nto defend the reality of the devil with such vehemence. It may be\nmetaphysically inconsistent to have two absolutes, one good and one\nevil, but the conception provides at least for a dramatic portrayal of\nthe conflict which disturbs the harmonies and unities of the universe,\nand therefore, it has a practical and ethical value. The idea of\nattributing personality to evil may be scientifically absurd but it\nrests upon a natural error. When the blind and impersonal forces of\nnature come to life in man they are given the semblance of personality.\n\nProfessor Albert Schweitzer[21] ascribes the moral superiority of\nprophetic Judaism and Christianity over other world religions to the\nna\u00efve dualism of the prophets and Jesus, who emphasized the moral\nrather than the metaphysical attributes of God in such a way as to\ndevelop a practical and morally potent distinction between God and the\nuniverse, between the ideal of religious devotion and the disappointing\nrealities of life. The distinction between Oriental monism and the\npractical dualism of Christianity in its unspoiled form is succinctly\nstated by Professor Alfred Whitehead: \u201cChristianity has always been\na religion seeking a metaphysics in contrast to Buddhism which is a\nmetaphysics generating a religion.... The defect of a metaphysical\nsystem is the very fact that it is a neat little system which thereby\noversimplifies its expression of the world.... In respect to its\ntreatment of evil, Christianity is therefore less clear in its\nmetaphysical idea but more inclusive of the facts.\u201d[22]\n\nIn the early Christian church the na\u00efve dualism of Jesus was given\ndramatic and dynamic force through his deification, so that he became,\nin a sense, the God of the ideal, the symbol of the redemptive force\nin life which is in conflict with evil. Since no clear distinction\nwas made between the spirit of the living Christ and the indwelling\nHoly Ghost, the doctrine of the trinity was, in effect, a symbol of\nan essential dualism. Orthodox Christianity did indeed renounce the\ngnostic heresy which tried to give this implicit dualism explicit\ncharacter by its distinction between the God who was revealed in Jesus\nand the God of creation. And history has justified the wisdom of its\ncourse. The scientific precision necessary to save such theology\nfrom essential polytheism was lacking and Christianity was intent\nupon guarding its monotheism. Yet it preserved enough metaphysical\ninconsistency to retain dualistic tendencies in its monistic orthodoxy.\nIts symbols lacked philosophical precision but they did give vivid\nand dramatic force to the idea of a conflict between evil and the\nredemptive and creative force in life. Thus it could fulfill the two\ngreat functions of religion in prompting men to repent of their sins,\nand in encouraging them to hope for redemption from them. No mechanical\nor magical explanations of the significance of the crucifixion have\never permanently obscured the helpful spiritual symbolism of the\ncross in which the conflict between good and evil is portrayed and\nthe possibility as well as the difficulty of the triumph of the good\nover evil is dramatized. An absolute dualism either between God and\nthe universe or between man and nature, or spirit and matter, or good\nand evil, is neither possible nor necessary. What is important is that\njustice be done to the fact that creative purpose meets resistance in\nthe world and that the ideal which is implicit in every reality is also\nin conflict with it. The reason why na\u00efve religions are \u201cmore inclusive\nof the facts\u201d in portraying this struggle than highly elaborated\ntheologies is that the latter are always prompted by the rational need\nof consistency to obscure some facts for the sake of developing an\nintellectual plausible unity. Religions grow out of real experience in\nwhich tragedy mingles with beauty and man learns that the moral values\nwhich dignify his life are embattled in his own soul and imperiled\nin the world. He is inclined neither to obscure the reality of the\nstruggle nor to sacrifice the hope of victory until too much reflection\npersuades him to believe either that all partial evil is universal good\nor that destiny makes his struggle futile and his defeat inevitable.\nThat is how morality dies with religion when an age has become too\nsophisticated.\n\nNa\u00efve Christianity was unable to maintain itself in the Gr\u00e6co-Roman\nworld without making concessions to its intellectual scruples and\npaying for its conquests by incorporating Hellenic philosophies in its\ntheology. The gospel was diluted with neo-Platonism to make it more\npalatable for a cultured world. The na\u00efvely and dramatically conceived\nomnipotence of God was metaphysically elaborated and inevitably\nbetrayed the church into an essential pantheism, which \u201cturns the\nnatural world, man\u2019s stamping-ground and system of opportunities,\ninto a self-justifying and sacred life, endows the blameless giant\nwith an inhuman soul and worships the monstrous divinity it has\nfabricated.\u201d[23] The process of compounding the simplicities of the\ngospel with the dialectic achievements of Greek philosophy culminated\nin St. Augustine who laid the foundation for Christian orthodoxy and\nmade the simple Christian epic the basis of an elaborate theological\nstructure in which God becomes at the same time the guarantee of the\nreality of the ideal and the actual cause of every concrete reality.\nChristianity has always anathematized pantheism officially, but\nprobably\u2014as Professor Santayana suggests\u2014because it suspected that\nit was a suppressed but not entirely quiescent half of its dogma.\nVital religion has a way of expressing itself outside the limits of\nits rationally fixed concepts and the essential pantheism of orthodox\nChristianity therefore did not destroy the moral vigor of even such\nresolute determinists as Augustine or John Calvin. Yet in the end the\nlogic of a system of ideas becomes the pattern of human action. A\nrigorous determinism as well as an unqualified pantheism destroys moral\nvigor because it either makes the attainment of the ideal too certain\nor idealizes the real beyond all evidence. If reality only thinly\nveils the ideal implicit in it, or if the implicit ideal is certain to\nbecome real in history, there is no occasion for moral adventure and\nno reason for moral enthusiasm. In a sense pantheism is naturalism\nwith an unnatural light upon it. That is why the determinism implied in\npantheism may lead so easily to a reaction of naturalistic determinism.\nThus Karl Marx appropriated Hegel\u2019s determinism and put it to his own\nuse. When the whole wealth of Hegel\u2019s dialectical skill served no\nbetter purpose than to deify the Prussian military state, as a kind\nof ultimate revelation of the counsels of God, it was easy enough to\ndiscredit its optimistic illusions without destroying its determinism.\nThe residual determinism became the basis of a new philosophy of\nhistory in which natural instinct and economic necessity took the\nplace of divine will as man\u2019s inexorable fate. The reaction from Hegel\nto Marx is a perfect symbol of the whole course of Western thought\nin the last hundred years with its change from a supernatural to a\nnaturalistic determinism.\n\nReligion left to itself, even when it elaborates theologies, tries\nto do some justice to the reality of moral conflict even though it\nmay confuse the issue by a faulty definition of divine omnipotence.\nBut its necessary co\u00f6peration with metaphysics drives it inevitably\ninto more and more consistent monisms in which moral enthusiasms are\ndestroyed. The monistic and pantheistic element in Western religion\nwas greatly increased by its intimate collaboration with philosophies\nwhich dealt chiefly with the problem of knowledge. For the solution\nof the epistemological problem the philosophical idealists thought it\nnecessary to posit an all-knowing intelligence. It was this all-knowing\nabsolute which became the support of religion\u2019s faith in God against\nthe attacks of realists and empiricists, though there was little enough\naffinity between the God of any healthy religious theism and the\nimpersonal absolute of monistic philosophers.\n\nWhen religious apologists found it necessary to readjust the age-old\naffirmations of faith to the evolutionary facts revealed by science\nthey usually sank even more deeply into the morass of pantheistic and\nmonistic philosophy. The old and na\u00efve conceptions of a capricious\nomnipotence working its will upon natural phenomena became manifestly\nuntenable and a way had to be found to relate divine purpose to and\ndiscover the area of creativity in the natural and cosmic processes. It\nwas practically inevitable that such a task would be accomplished only\nby an overemphasis on divine immanence and a consequent betrayal of\nreligion into a sentimental optimism. When defenders of religious faith\nwere borrowing from the quiver of their opponents they would have done\nwell to consult Thomas Huxley more and Herbert Spencer less; for Huxley\nwas morally much more realistic than Spencer. Spencerian doctrines lent\nthemselves more easily to the strategy of linking religious theism\nwith the faith of science in the dependability of the universe; but\nthere was something lacking in Spencerian optimism which is very vital\nto religion, a sense of the tragic in life and an awareness of the\nfrustration which moral purpose and creative will must meet in nature\nand in man. The sentimentality of modern religion is of course older\nthan the optimism which it derived from Spencer. Part of it is derived\nfrom Rousseau and the romanticism of the eighteenth century. Here again\nreligion suffered the fate of snatching error while it was borrowing\ntruth from its opponents. Renouncing the idea of total depravity which\nwas central in medieval religion, and in orthodox Protestantism for\nthat matter, it evolved a sentimental overestimate of human virtue\nwhich is no nearer the truth than the medieval conceptions of original\nsin. It is a strange irony in history that to-day irreligion, in\nthe form of deterministic psychology, should elaborate doctrines\nstrangely akin to the derogatory estimates of human resources made by\nmedieval theologians. So modern churches are involved in an optimistic\noverestimate of the virtue of both man and nature at the very time\nwhen science tempts men to despair of discovering moral integrity in\nthe one and moral meaning in the other. Modern religion is, in short,\nnot sufficiently modern. In it eighteenth-century sentimentality and\nnineteenth-century individualism are still claiming victory over the\nethical and religious prejudices of the Middle Ages. Meanwhile life\nhas moved on and the practical needs of modern society demand an ethic\nwhich is not individualistic and a religion which is not unqualifiedly\noptimistic.\n\nThe practical effects of this lack of contact of modern religion\nwith the real temper of modern life may be gauged by comparing the\nobservations of any average denominational journal of religion upon the\nevents of contemporary history with the realistic analyses of secular\njournals. The brutalities of the economic conflict, the disillusioning\nrealities of international relations, the monstrous avarice of nations\nand the arrogance of races, all these sins with which the life of\nmodern society is cursed are treated with an easy complacency by\nreligious observers which contrasts strangely with the frantic anxiety\nof secular idealists. In a recent world conference of the churches\nat Stockholm members of the German delegation objected to what they\nregarded as an identification of the Kingdom of God with the League of\nNations made by a good bishop in the opening sermon. National prejudice\nmay have prompted this criticism but the superior perspective lent by\nbitter experience gave it a measure of justification, and it would be\napplicable to other sermonic interpretations of current history besides\nthose of the bishop.\n\nThe war itself was a disheartening revelation of the moral obfuscation\nof modern religion when dealing with the tragedies of history. The\neasy partnership of religious sentiment with patriotic fervor has been\npreviously ascribed to the natural relation between religion and any\ndevotion to an ethical ideal, however imperfect. There is, however,\nyet another reason for the blindness of religious idealists to the\nhorrors of war. The monistic orientation of modern religion made it\nnecessary for the church to save religious faith by discovering the\nsaving virtues in the great evil. It was therefore unable to view the\nrealities in proper proportion. For a realistic interpretation of the\ngreat tragedy modern society had to depend upon secular idealists who\ndid not feel called upon to save either God\u2019s or man\u2019s reputation.\n\nSentimentality is a poor weapon against cynicism, and idealistic\ndeterminism has no way of defeating determinism of the naturalistic\ntype. Since both the latter represent reactions to the former, they\ncan be overcome only by bringing these into closer conformity with the\nfacts. The freedom and moral integrity of man is not an illusion but\nit is a fact very seriously circumscribed. Transcendent purpose and\ncreative will in the universe may be scientifically validated but do\nnot thereby become the effective cause of every natural phenomenon.\nWhat is needed is a philosophy and a religion which will do justice\nboth to the purpose and to the frustration which purpose meets in the\ninertia of the concrete world, both to the ideal which fashions the\nreal and to the real which defeats the ideal, both to the essential\nharmony and to the inevitable conflict in the cosmos and in the soul.\nIn a sense there is not a single dualism in life; rather there are\nmany of them. In his own life man may experience a conflict between\nhis moral will and the anarchic desires with which nature has endowed\nhim; or he may experience a conflict between his cherished values and\nthe caprices of nature which know nothing of the economy of values in\nhuman life. In the cosmic order the conflict is between creativity and\nthe resistance which frustrates creative purpose. Whether the dualism\nis defined as one of mind and matter, or thought and extension, or\nforce and inertia, or God and the devil, it approximates the real facts\nof life. It may be impossible to do full justice to the two types of\nfacts by any set of symbols or definitions; but life gives the lie to\nany attempt by which one is explained completely in terms of the other.\nThere is no more reason to-day to deny the reality of God than to\nexplain every casual phenomenon in terms of his omnipotent will.\n\nOur interest is in the moral fruits of religious and philosophical\nideas rather than in their perfect consistency, but it may be noted in\npassing that philosophically competent scientists and scientifically\ncompetent philosophers arrive at conclusions to-day which are in\ncloser accord with a na\u00efve theism than with the monism of absolute\nidealism. They do not of course picture a God who is outside of the\nworld and at work upon it as a potter upon his clay; but they do\njustice to both the purpose and the limitation of purpose in the\ncreative process. Professor Hobhouse writes: \u201cThe evolutionary process\ncan best be understood as the effect of a purpose slowly working\nitself out under limiting conditions which it brings successively\nunder control.... This would mean not that reality is spiritual or the\ncreation of an unconditioned mind ... but that there is a spiritual\nelement integral to the structure and movement of reality and that\nevolution is the process by which this principle makes itself master\nof the residual conditions which at first dominate its life and thwart\nits efforts.\u201d[24] It may be a natural overbelief and an inevitable\nanthropomorphism if religion attributes all the characteristics of\npersonality to the purpose, \u201cthe spiritual element integral to the\nstructure and movement of reality.\u201d But if a place for freedom and\npurpose in the cosmic order, however conditioned, is discovered the\nessential affirmation of religious faith is metaphysically verified.\nThe values of personality are related to cosmic facts. Professor Alfred\nWhitehead defines God as that in reality which is not concrete but the\nprinciple of every concrete actuality. He makes the telling observation\nthat while a dynamic view of reality may dispense with God as the prime\nmover it must substitute for Aristotle\u2019s prime mover a principle of\nlimitation and concretion, since the dynamic nature of reality does\nnot account for the various forms in which it is made concrete.[25]\nIn other words the faith of religion in both the transcendence\nand immanence of God is given a new metaphysical validation. His\nunchangeableness is \u201chis self-consistency in relation to all change\u201d;\nbut this does not justify the deterministic conclusion of a \u201ccomplete\nself-consistency of the temporal world.\u201d The reality of God and the\nreality of evil as a positive force are thus both accepted.\n\nThere is, in short, no reason why religion should not hold to its\nfaith in God without either identifying him with or losing him in the\nconcrete world. The moral and spiritual values in which religion is\ninterested have a basis in concrete actuality. They are on the one hand\nnot a mere effervescence on the surface of the concrete, and on the\nother hand they are not the only basis of historical realities. The\npluralism of William James, which has been criticized as scientifically\ninaccurate and metaphysically inconsistent, seems to have both\nscientific and metaphysical virtues. There is good reason to accept at\nleast a qualified dualism not only because it is morally more potent\nthan traditional monisms, but because it is metaphysically acceptable.\nIt is not to be expected that science will ever invest the concept\nof God with the attributes which religious devotion assigns to it.\nBut there is no reason why religious and moral experience should not\nbuild further upon the foundation laid by science. It is manifestly\nnecessary to have some metaphysical basis for religious conviction, for\nthere is no spiritual vigor in the conscious self-deception of purely\nsubjective religions. But it is not necessary to limit religion to\nthe bare concepts which science establishes. It is in fact better for\nreligion to forego perfect metaphysical consistency for the sake of\nmoral potency. In a sense religion is always forced to choose between\nan adequate metaphysics and an adequate ethics. That is not to say that\nthe two interests are incompatible but that they are not identical.\nWhen there is a conflict between them it is better to leave the\nmetaphysical problem with some loose ends than to develop a religion\nwhich is inimical to moral values. The reason why na\u00efve religions have\nfrequently been morally more potent than highly rationalized ones is\nnot because the faith which gave them moral fervor was necessarily\ninconsistent with the facts, but because they based their affirmations\nupon facts and experiences which were inconsistent with each other\nor seemed to be but were equally true and equally necessary for the\nmaintenance of moral and spiritual energy.\n\nThe objection to religious dualism comes not only from those who\nsubordinate all advantages to that of rational consistency but also\nfrom those who believe that it imperils purely religious values. It\nrobs God of omnipotence (so the argument runs) and the universe of\ndependability. It gives no certain guarantee of the triumph of personal\nand spiritual values. It may put a note of challenge in religion,\nbut it also destroys its comforting assurances. The answer to such\na criticism is that the moral virtues of dualism are derived from\nprecisely that characteristic. It is not easy to challenge to conflict\nand to guarantee victory at one and the same time. By dignifying\npersonality religion runs the peril of obscuring the defects of human\nnature; if it makes the triumph of righteousness certain, it may\nincline men to take \u201cmoral holidays.\u201d Too much emphasis upon the\nharmonies of the universe may make evil seem unreal. If men are given\nthe opportunity, they will extract comfort from religion and forget the\nchallenge implied in its faith; which simply means that they will use\nreligion to sublimate rather than to qualify their will to live. They\nwill accept the assurance of faith that the frustrations of the natural\nworld are not permanent, but they will not accept the challenge of\nfaith to overcome the corruptions of nature in their own souls.\n\nThe perennial conflict between priest and prophet is given in the\ndouble function of religion. The priest dispenses comfort and the\nprophet makes the challenge of religion potent. The priest is more\nnumerous than the prophet because human selfishness is as determining\nin religion as in other fields. Though the priest always defeats\nthe prophet in the end, the prophet is avenged because his original\nexperience is the reality which makes the priest\u2019s assurance plausible.\nThere is no way of guaranteeing the reality of God if someone does\nnot make him real in experience, and there is no way of declaring\nthe victory of the ideal if someone does not defeat reality in the\nname of the ideal in history. Religion validates itself in spiritual\nexperience and moral triumph. Speculation and deduction contribute to\nreligious certainty only after experience has laid the foundation for\nfaith. It is not possible to free religion altogether of its priestly\ncorruptions. But anything which will make it more difficult to accept\nthe comforts of faith without accepting its challenges will increase\nthe moral potency of religion and decrease the possibility of its\ncorruption by those who want to use it for the purpose of insuring the\ndignity of human life without paying the price of moral effort for the\nboon.\n\nThere is no reason why the comforting assurances of religion should be\nsacrificed completely. Science is not inimical to the assumption of\nreligion that personal and moral values have a basis in the universe\nitself which insures their permanence and their further refinement.\nThough God works his will against the inertia of the concrete world\nand the waywardness of man, neither science nor history justifies\nthe conclusion that his resources are not ultimately equal to the\ncreative task. The intractableness of the world makes the creative\nand redemptive struggle real but not hopeless. Religion has as much\nright to preach hope as it has to preach repentance. It fails in its\ntask if it does not save men from despair as well as from undue pride\nand complacency. There is nothing in either science or history which\ninvalidates either function of religion. But science unites with\nmoral experience in insisting on the reality and the painfulness of\nthe creative process in man and in nature. If the resistance to moral\npurpose in cosmic history is underestimated, it merely serves to\nincrease that resistance in the life of man by justifying his moral\ninertia. The needs of a dynamic religion are consistent with scientific\nfact, though not always compatible with a completely consistent\nmetaphysics. Science may well combine with religion in persuading man\nthat \u201cif hopes are dupes, fear may be liars,\u201d and that he must \u201cwork\nout his salvation with fear and trembling.\u201d\n\n\n\n\n                               CHAPTER IX\n\n                               CONCLUSION\n\n\nAt the risk of unnecessary repetition it may be well to capitulate the\nmost important conclusions which emerge from our study of religion in\ncontemporary civilization. Religion is dying in modern civilization not\nonly because it has not yet been able to restate its affirmations so\nthat they will be consistent with scientific fact, but also because it\nhas not been able to make its ethical and social resources available\nfor the solution of the moral problems of modern civilization. Its\nrejuvenation therefore waits upon a reorientation of its ethical\ntraditions as well as of its theological conceptions. It is under the\nnecessity of finding some metaphysical basis for its personalization of\nthe universe, but its scientific and philosophical respectability will\nbe of no avail if the moral fruits which issue from its affirmations\nand experiences do not actually qualify the brute struggle of life, so\nlargely determined by natural forces.\n\nReligion is scientifically verified if freedom and purpose are found to\nhave a place in the cosmic processes, and it is ethically justified if\nit helps to create and maintain creative freedom and moral purpose in\nhuman life. The present moral impotence of Protestant Christianity is\npartially derived from the inadequacy of some of its traditions which\nit inherited out of periods of history which had different moral needs\nthan our own day. Its individualism rendered a universal service at the\ndawn of the modern era but survives to-day chiefly as a sanctification\nof the peculiar interests and prejudices of one particular class in\nWestern society. The limitations of its ethical traditions are easily\nobscured not only because all religion easily gives the semblance\nof finality to the relativities of history, but because a religion\nwhich imagines itself devoted to the spirit of Jesus is under the\ntemptation of exploiting the prestige of his absolute ethics without\napproximating his ethical position.\n\nThe moral effectiveness of religion depends upon its ability to detach\nitself from the historical relativities with which its ideals are\ninevitably compounded in the course of history. The avowed loyalty\nof the Christian church to the spirit of Christ may become the basis\nof such a detachment, since there is little in the gospel of Jesus\nwhich conforms to the dominant interests of modern life. But the very\nreverence in which Jesus is held may operate to obscure the essential\ngenius of his life. Religion is therefore under the necessity of\ndeveloping the critical faculty even while it maintains its na\u00efvete\nand reverence. The necessity of co\u00f6peration between the naturally\nincompatible factors of reason and imagination, of intelligence\nand moral dynamic, is really the crux of the religious and moral\nproblem in modern civilization. The complexity of modern life demands\nthat moral purpose be astutely guided; but moral purpose itself is\nrooted in ultra-rational sanctions and may be destroyed by the same\nintelligence which is needed to direct it. Both humility and love,\nthe highest religious virtues, are ultra-rational; yet they cannot\nbe achieved in an intricate social life without a discriminating\nintelligence which knows how to uncover covert sins and to discover\npotential virtues. The incidental limitations which every historic type\nof religion reveals can be dealt with only if the religious devotee\ncan be persuaded to regard the values of his religion critically;\nyet the cultivation of such a critical spirit may easily lead to the\nenervation of the religious spirit itself. If the highest values of\nreligion are themselves conditioned rather than absolute, it must be\npossible to assign them a place in the hierarchy of values, without\nencouraging a complete loss of confidence in them. Such a task is\ndifficult but not impossible. A robust moral idealism will help\nto create a spiritual fervor which will not be easily defeated by\nany superficial intellectualism. If institutions of religion gave\npreference to the ethical rather than the intellectual problem of\nreligious faith, it might be possible to create a religious spirit\nsufficiently vigorous to permit the free play of the critical faculties\nwithout a loss of moral or spiritual dynamic. Obviously civilization\ncannot afford to dispense with either the irrational moral will or\nthe critical intelligence by which it is made effective in complex\nsituations. Men need to subject all partial moral achievements to\ncomparison with the absolute standards of truth, beauty and goodness of\ntheir religious faith, and yet be able to see and willing to concede\nthe relativities in the absolute values of their devotion. They can\nbe saved from a morality of mere utilitarianism only by the religious\nquest for an absolute moral standard; yet they need to be discerning\nenough to see that every ethical achievement, even when inspired by\nreligious motives, is tinged with prudential self-interest. They must\ncontinue to strive after freedom and yet realize that human life and\ncharacter is largely determined by environment. If they seek happiness,\ndivorced from fortune, they nevertheless cannot escape the duty of\nmaking the material world serve human welfare. Their ability to\ndiscover the transcendent values in human personality has value only\nif they maintain faith in human nature after they have discovered its\nimperfections. They must search after the perfect goodness in God and\nyet be prepared to face the cruelties of life without either denying\ntheir reality or being driven to despair by them.\n\nIf it is true that moral sincerity is even more necessary to a vital\nreligion in modern life than intellectual modernity, a strategy must\nbe developed to sever religious idealism from the unethical tendencies\nin modern civilization. Any strategy which will succeed in such an\nenterprise will savor of asceticism. The limitations of historic\nasceticism may teach the present how to avoid inevitable pitfalls\nin the task of detaching religious idealism from the corruptions of\nsociety. An asceticism which flees the world and develops its saints at\nthe price of abandoning industrial civilization even more completely to\nthe natural and anarchic forces which operate in its life, is obviously\nof no use to modern civilization. Yet a type of asceticism is needed,\nif for no other reason, because greed is the dominant motive of Western\ncivilization and nothing less than an ascetic discipline will free\nreligious idealism from its entanglement with the covetousness of\nmodern life. Since Western life is intent upon material advantages,\nno religious idealism can maintain any degree of purity if it does\nnot enter into a conscious conflict with the civilization in which it\nfunctions and succeed in setting some bounds to the expansive desires\nof men and of nations.\n\nThe church as such has sufficient spiritual resources to become the\nrecruiting ground for such a movement of detachment, but it is too\nmuch to hope that it will take the leadership in it. It is too deeply\nenmeshed with the interests and prejudices of contemporary civilization\nto possess the insight and courage which the enterprise requires. Such\na movement of detachment must be, as it has always been, a minority\nmovement. But the minority ought not detach itself from the majority\nso completely that it will sacrifice the possibility of acting as\na leaven in it. There is no force or strategy which can prevent the\ngreat majority from using religion to give human personality dignity\nand self-respect without a serious effort to approximate a moral\nideal which would justify religion\u2019s estimate of human worth. Some\ntypes of religion will continue to obscure the defects in nature and\nhuman nature. They will reassure the perplexed soul by recounting the\nvictories of the past without seeking new triumphs. They will build\nsystems of faith upon past experiences without any effort to validate\nor amend them in fresh experience. Thus rejuvenation and progress must\ncome from the few who understand the fuller implications of the faith\nwhich they share with the multitudes whose eyes are holden and who lack\nthe courage to follow even such visions as may come to them.\n\nA highly spiritual religion cannot be an esoteric possession to which\nthe multitudes may never aspire. It cannot afford to lose confidence\nin the multitudes; yet it must resist the gravitation toward moral\nmediocrity among them. It certainly must avoid the cultivation of\na priestly cult into which the layman cannot be initiated. If the\nmodern movement of detachment is to be effective it must in fact be\na layman\u2019s movement; for it must express itself in rebuilding the\nsocial order rather than in building new religious institutions. Its\nmost effective ministers will be laymen who will lack neither the\ntechnical skill nor the spiritual resource to deal with the practical\nproblems of industry and politics. Religious teachers may help to\ninspire such a movement, but its efficacy will depend upon those who\nare engaged in the world\u2019s work. If the greed of Western civilization\nis to be qualified by religious idealism, it will be accomplished by\nmen who use and direct the machines of modern industry without making\nmechanical efficiency an end in itself and without succumbing to the\nlure of the material rewards which come so easily to those who are\nproficient in the industrial enterprise. A revival of either puritan\nor monastic asceticism will be unequal to the task which faces modern\nreligion. Puritanism sanctified economic power, and monasticism fled\nits responsibilities. The new asceticism must produce spiritualized\ntechnicians who will continue to conquer and exploit nature in the\ninterest of human welfare, but who will regard their task as a social\nservice and scorn to take a larger share of the returns of industry\nthan is justified by reasonable and carefully scrutinized needs. The\nnew asceticism must, in short, be in the world and yet not of the\nworld. It must be truly scientific in gauging the advantage to human\npersonality in the conquest of nature and truly religious in finding\na basis for human happiness beyond the material rewards which this\nconquest returns.\n\nIf Christian idealists are to make religion socially effective they\nwill be forced to detach themselves from the dominant secular desires\nof the nations as well as from the greed of economic groups. The\nsocially minded portion of the church has in fact made some progress in\nthis direction. The lessons of the World War have not been altogether\nfutile, and there is a wholesome mood of repentance in the church\nfor its easy connivance with an unethical nationalism in the past\ncenturies. The church has not yet had an opportunity to prove the\nsincerity of its contrition in this matter, for the moment of crisis\nhas not yet come. In that moment, which will come inevitably, many\nreligiously inspired peace idealists will no doubt bow their knees to\nBaal; but there is real reason to hope that there is a new conscience\nin the church which will resist the claims of an unethical nationalism\nto the utmost. Perhaps the greatest weakness of the religious idealists\nwho have become critical of an unethical nationalism is that they are\nnot sufficiently aware of the intimate and organic relation between\nthe imperialism of nations and the whole tendency of avarice which\ncharacterizes Western life. Too few realize that it is not possible\nto detach oneself from an unethical nationalism if one continues to\nenjoy the material advantages which flow from the nation\u2019s unqualified\ninsistence upon the right to hold its advantages against the world.\nIt may be impossible to arrive at a complete equalization of living\nstandards among all individuals who desire to achieve and express the\nideal of the brotherhood of man. But a religious idealism which does\nnot move in that direction will be convicted of insincerity and moral\nconfusion. Unrepentant political realists may well pour contempt upon\nit and justly accuse those who profess it of profiting from policies\nwhich they ostensibly condemn. Religious idealism is in desperate need\nof a strategy which will express its detachment from the dominant\ndesires and impulses of modern civilization by something more than\ndesultory and usually qualified criticism of unethical political ideals\nand industrial policies.\n\nThe old challenge \u201cbe ye not conformed to this world\u201d must be accepted\nanew in a more heroic fashion than is customary in enlightened\nreligious circles. The policy of building a Kingdom of God by\nregenerating individual lives has become discredited, not because\nmoral character is dispensable to a wholesome social life, but\nbecause the criteria of moral character have been too individualistic\nto serve the needs of modern society. It is important enough that\nmen gain some control over their immediate desires and discipline\ntheir momentary passions. Society is always in need of integrated\npersonalities. But the validity of the religious ideal must finally\nbe judged by its capacity to create not only unified personalities\nbut personalities which know how to restrain their expansive desires\nfor the sake of social peace. Religion intensifies selfishness\nwhen it adds sanctity to a respectable selfish life and creates a\nself-respect which is impervious to emotions of contrition. If the\nreligious ideal is to gain any potency in modern life it must be able\nto convict men of sin and inspire them to a conversion. But the sins\nof which they need most to be convicted are those which are covert\nin the social and economic relations which custom has hallowed;\nand the conversion of life which is most needed is that which will\nexpress itself in terms of the economic and political relationships\nin which men live. Not to be conformed to this world, if it is to\nhave any real meaning in modern life, will mean that the religiously\ninspired soul knows how to defeat the avarice and to overcome the\nindifference to the worth of human personality which inheres in the\nwhole economic and industrial structure of modern society. Practically\nand individually such a detachment from the world will express itself\nin the sacrifice of material advantages for the sake of realizing a\nmore intimate fellowship with the underprivileged, in the careful\nanalysis of industrial policies from the standpoint of their effect\nupon personality, in an unwillingness to profit by social and economic\npractices and policies which are fundamentally unethical and in a\nwillingness to bear some pain for the sake of expressing loyalty to the\ncommunity of mankind as against all lesser and conflicting loyalties.\n\nThe hope of persuading any large number of religious people to\nexpress their spiritual convictions in any such socially tangible\nand revolutionary terms is made rather desperate by the fact that\nthe modern church seems no more inclined to undertake the task of\nspiritual regeneration than the orthodox church. The orthodox church\nstill possesses some of the religious fervor which is required to\ndefy the world, but it is too anti-rational in its theology to gain\nthe respect of the intelligent classes and too individualistic in its\nethics to express religious idealism in socially helpful terms. The\nmodern churches are not acutely conscious of any serious defects in\ncontemporary civilization. If they do recognize limitations in the\nsocial order, they give themselves to the pleasant hope that time\nand natural progress will bring inevitable triumph to every virtuous\nenterprise. They have relegated the eschatological note of the gospel,\nby which Jesus expressed his sense of the tragic, to the limbo of\ntheological antiquities. The possibility of a catastrophe seems never\nto arouse their fears or to give energy to their ambitions. Life,\naccording to their gospel, goes automatically from grace to grace and\nfrom strength to strength.\n\nThough neither the orthodox nor the modern wing of the Christian\nchurch seems capable of initiating a genuine religious revival which\nwill evolve a morality capable of challenging and maintaining itself\nagainst the dominant desires of modern civilization and yet expressing\nitself in terms relevant to civilization\u2019s needs, there are resources\nin the Christian religion which make it the inevitable basis of any\nspiritual regeneration of Western civilization. Christianity, as Dr.\nErnst Troeltsch has observed, is the fate of Western society. Spiritual\nidealisms of other cultures and societies may aid it in reclaiming its\nown highest resources; and any universal religion capable of inspiring\nan ultimately unified world culture may borrow from other religions.\nBut the task of redeeming Western society rests in a peculiar sense\nupon Christianity. It is congenial to the energy and activism of\nWestern peoples and is yet capable of setting bounds to their expansive\ndesires. It has reduced the eternal conflict between self-assertion and\nself-denial to the paradox of self-assertion through self-denial and\nmade the cross the symbol of life\u2019s highest achievement. Its optimism\nis rooted in pessimism and it is therefore able to preach both\nrepentance and hope. It is able to condemn the world without enervating\nlife and to create faith without breeding illusions. Its adoration\nof Jesus sometimes obscures the real genius of his life but cannot\npermanently destroy the fruitfulness of his inspiration. If there is\nany lack of identity between the Jesus of history and the Christ of\nreligious experience, the Jesus of history is nevertheless more capable\nof giving historical reality to the necessary Christ idea than any\ncharacter of history. Intelligence will gradually soften prejudices and\nallay the conflict between Christianity and the Judaism out of which it\nemerged and with which it is organically related so that the religions\nof the prophetic ideal may make common cause. Such a co\u00f6peration will\nprobably never lead to complete fusion because Christianity cannot\nafford to sacrifice the Christ idea and the Jews will continue to\nregard this as a Hellenistic and unacceptable element in the Christian\nreligion. Christianity will not disavow it, for it gives dramatic\nforce and historical concretion to its theism and dualism. The God\nof our devotion is veritably revealed most adequately in the most\nperfect personality we know, as he is potentially revealed in all\npersonal values; and his conflict with the inertia of the concrete and\nhistorical world is expressed most vividly in the cross of Christ.\nWhen dealing with life\u2019s ultimates, symbolism is indispensable, and a\nsymbolism which has a basis in historic incident is most effective. The\nidea of a potent but yet suffering divine ideal which is defeated by\nthe world but gains its victory in the defeat must remain basic in any\nmorally creative world view.\n\nIt is possible of course that the resources of the Christian religion\nwill not be made available in time to save Western civilization from\nmoral bankruptcy. It is possible that life will continue to run its\ncourse of conflict between the unrestrained ambitions and desires of\nindividuals and groups until unqualified self-assertiveness will issue\nin mutual destruction. It is possible that cynicism will continue\nto discount the moral potentialities of human nature while science\ncontinues to give plausibility to a depreciation of the moral factors\nin life by arming the brute in man and making his vices more deadly.\nCivilization may be beyond moral redemption; but if it is to be\nredeemed a religiously inspired moral idealism must aid in the task.\nA purely naturalistic ethics will not only be overcome by a sense\nof frustration and sink into despair, but it will lack the force to\nrestrain the self-will and self-interest of men and of nations. If life\ncannot be centered in something beyond nature, it will not be possible\nto lift men above the brute struggle for survival. Intelligence may\nmitigate its cruelties and prudence may prompt men to eliminate its\nworst inhumanities; but the increased power which the conquest of\nnature supplies merely substitutes unintended cruelties for those which\nhave been consciously abolished. Living on the naturalistic level men\nare bound to contend for life\u2019s physical prizes and to use physical\nforce in the contest with more and more deadly effect.\n\nIt is the virtue of a vital religious idealism that it lifts life\nabove the level of nature and makes the development of an ethical\npersonality the ultimate goal of human existence. Without the vivid\nand realistic other-worldly hopes and fears with which the medieval\nchurch disciplined life and which the modern church cannot restore,\nit may seem that religion possesses no force which could counteract\nthe primitive impulses which move men and nations. But these hopes\nand fears were merely crude ways of expressing the idea that life\nis fundamentally moral and that its destiny transcends the animal\nconflict. Life will continue to develop in the direction of the ideal\nimplicit in it and every organism is impelled to move toward the\ngoal of its own completeness. The ideal implicit in human character\nis that of ethical freedom; and awakened personalities will seek to\nrealize that ideal. They will seek to realize it even at the expense\nof physical sacrifices and pain. They will learn how to find life by\nlosing it. It is the quest for what is not real but is always becoming\nreal, for what is not true but is always becoming true, that makes man\nincurably religious. Modern religion is therefore not without resource\nin contending against the forces of nature. The great difficulty is\nthat the struggle for ethical integrity is so painful that most men are\ntempted to seek some short-cut to it; and organized religion generally\nexpresses the hopes and desires of this easygoing multitude. In the\nmedieval church magic provided the short-cut. In the modern church\nit is provided by a sanctified prudence which teaches men how to be\nunselfish and selfish at the same time, how to gain moral self-respect\nwithout sacrificing too many temporal advantages. The hope of a revival\nof ethical religion and of an ethical reconstruction of society\ntherefore depends, as it did in the past, upon a renunciation of the\nreligious short-cuts which lead to hypocrisy.\n\nIf religious aspiration can be united with perfect moral sincerity a\nfruitful partnership may again be established between religion and\nmorality. The moral struggle will give meaning to the affirmations\nof religion and the religious experience will strengthen the\nmoral purpose. While religion does not issue automatically in\nmoral action and the moral enterprise does not inevitably create\nreligious experience and hope, there is nevertheless a relation of\ninterdependence between religious aspiration and moral endeavor. This\nrelationship is due to the fact that a perfect ethical freedom is\npossible only if personality is withdrawn from or lifted above the\nimmediate necessities of the physical life. The other-worldly hopes and\nthe mystical experience of religion by which the strategy of withdrawal\nand transcendence has been effected is momentarily discredited because\nit has resulted too frequently in absolving the soul of its moral\nresponsibilities in the specific problems of society. But the fact that\nreligious hopes and religious experiences may help people to escape the\nonerous duties of the moral enterprise cannot permanently obscure the\nneed of religious experience and religious hope for the development of\nan ethical life. If men are to center their life in moral purpose they\nmust reassure themselves periodically on the moral purpose in life\nitself. That is mysticism and prayer. If they are to develop a perfect\nethical freedom which makes no compromises with life\u2019s immediate\nnecessities, they must find a content and a meaning in life beyond its\npresent conflict of interests and desires. That is other-worldliness.\nIf the quest for ethical freedom and integrity does not lead to\nreligious experience and religious hope, it will issue in despair.\nIf the assurances of religious hope and the certainties of religious\nexperience are not accompanied by sincere moral effort, they result in\nhypocrisy. The hope of an ethical society is therefore bound up in the\npossibility of restoring ethical integrity to religion and religious\ndynamic to the moral effect.\n\n\n                              [Footnotes]\n\n[1] Professor Alfred Whitehead, in his _Science and the Modern World_\nand _Religion in the Making_, indicates the inevitable anti-mechanistic\ntrend of philosophical thought as it achieves mastery of the varied\nfields of modern science.\n\n[2] _Prospects of Industrial Civilization_, page 218.\n\n[3] Matthew v. 43\u201348.\n\n[4] _The Decline of the West._\n\n[5] Stuart Mill\u2019s refutation of LePlay\u2019s thesis that the salvation of\nthe working classes can come only through the benevolence of their\nsuperiors is worth quoting in this connection: \u201cNo times can be pointed\nout in which the higher classes of this or any other country performed\na part even distantly resembling the one assigned to them in this\ntheory. All privileged and powerful classes have used their power in\nthe interest of their own selfishness. I do not affirm that what has\nalways been must always be. This at least seems to be undeniable, that\nlong before superior classes could be sufficiently inspired to govern\nin the tutelary manner supposed, the inferior classes would be too much\nimproved to be governed.\u201d\n\n[6] _Gesammelte Aufsaetze zur Religions-Sociologie._\n\n[7] _Religion and the Rise of Capitalism._\n\n[8] Quoted by Tawney, _op. cit._\n\n[9] The relation of puritanism to modern capitalism has been most\nexhaustively treated by Max Weber in his essay on \u201cDie Protestantische\nEthic und der Geist des Kapitalismus.\u201d\n\n[10] Quoted in Southey\u2019s _Life of Wesley_, Chapter xxix.\n\n[11] Both Max Weber and E. Troeltsch make much of the relation of\nCalvinism to medieval asceticism. See Max Weber, _op. cit._, and E.\nTroeltsch, _Sociallehren der Christlichen Kirche_.\n\n[12] Romans vii. 19\u201325.\n\n[13] _Grosser Sermon vom Wucher_ (_Werke_, Vol. IV, page 49).\n\n[14] Article 3 in Twelve Articles, quoted by J. S. Shapiro in _Social\nReform and the Reformation_.\n\n[15] In his _Education of Henry Adams_, Chapter x.\n\n[16] Commenting on the first Hague conference Count Holstein of the\nGerman foreign office made some realistic observations which may not\nhave justified his obstructive conclusions but which are nevertheless\npertinent. He wrote: \u201cSubjects of international law are states and not\nindividuals. It will therefore be formally difficult and practically\nimpossible to isolate the individual judge from the passions and\ninterests of the whole in a way that happens or is supposed to happen\nin private law. Of all conceivable judges Great Powers are least\ndisinterested, for in every conceivable question of any importance that\nmay come up all Great Powers are interested _\u00e0 un degre quelconque_. An\nimpartial decision is therefore excluded by the nature of things....\nSmall disinterested states as subjects, small questions as objects of\narbitral decision are conceivable; great states and great questions are\nnot.\u201d (Quoted by Dickinson in _International Anarchy_, p. 351.)\n\n[17] _Social Evolution_, page 140.\n\n[18] James iv. 2\u20134.\n\n[19] II Corinthians iv. 16.\n\n[20] In _Civilization and Ethics_ and _The Decay and Restoration of\nCivilization_.\n\n[21] _Christianity and Other World Religions._\n\n[22] _Religion in the Making_, page 50.\n\n[23] George Santayana in _Religion and Reason_, page 176.\n\n[24] In _Development and Purpose_, page 360.\n\n[25] In _Religion in the Making_.","title":"Does civilization need religion? : $b A study in the social resources and limitations of religion in modern life","tradition":"scripture-revelation","translated_text":null,"word_count":41781}