THE SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE
OF CHRISTIANITY

BY THE SAME AUTHOR

LA PHYSIOLOGIE MORALE

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HEREDITY AND SELECTION
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THE

SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE

OF

CHRISTIANITY

BY

GEORGES CHATTERTON-HILL, PH.D.

DOCENT OF SOCIOLOGY AT THE UNIVERSITY OF GENEVA

AUTHOR OF
' HEREDITY AND SELECTION IN SOCIOLOGY '

LONDON
ADAM AND CHARLES BLACK

1912

IN MEMORIAM

MATKIS CARISSIMAE

PER AETATEM PUERILEM SOCII MEL
REQUIEM SEMPITERNAM HAEEAT.

324758

PREFACE

To attempt, at the present time of day, to defend a religious
system from a dogmatic point of view, appears a very thank-
less task. Such is by no means the object of the present book.
The epoch of sterile controversies between the theologians of
antagonistic creeds has been brought to a close, and the great
mass of educated people are perfectly convinced of the absolute
uselessness of all discussion concerning so-called " dogmatic
truths." The reason for the general indifference towards tEe
intestine quarrels and wrangling between the various sections
of Christianity, is to be found in the fact that humanity, in
that it has increased in knowledge, has increased likewise in
wisdom. Wisely has humanity recognised the inanity of
quarrels regarding questions which no mortal being can hope
to solve, which lie beyond the field of vision and the reach of
criticism. Wisely has it come to admit that all beliefs of a
suprarational (i.e. religious) nature, are equally legitimate —
seeing that they are, all of them, equally unprovable.
Controversies concerning the great Unknowable which is at
the basis of all religions, reduce themselves to mere empty and
senseless verbiage ; for the controversialists are discussing the
truth of things that lie by definition outside the sphere of
human knowledge, and of which all controversialists must of
needs be equally ignorant. The wisdom of theologians, as
Goethe well said,

Bleibt stets am gleichen Schlag,

Und ist so wunderlich als wie am ersten Tag.

vii b

viii SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHEISTIANITY

We of the twentieth century know not one iota more about the
so-called "fundamental truths of religion," than those of the
first Christian century did ; we stand to-day before the same
unsolved riddles as did our Aryan ancestors of the Veda, who
invoked Varuna, Usha, Savitri, the Asuras, with the same
legitimate degree of confidence and certainty as Christians of
the twentieth century invoke the Father, the Son, and the
Holy Ghost; exactly the same amount of theological truth
was expressed in the daily Vedic sacrifice to Agni, as is ex-
pressed in the daily Christian sacrifice of the Mass. Der
Wahrheit letzter Schluss, the last word of truth, to use the
expression of Faust, was spoken by the worshippers of Isis at
Thebes and Memphis, when, on the veil that concealed the
face of the goddess to mortal eyes, they inscribed the sentence :
" No mortal is able to raise my veil."

The esoteric worshippers of Isis used to impose on all new
adepts an tpreuve de foi on entering the association of the
faithful ; they had to walk without trembling along the brink
of an abyss, the depths of which were shrouded in darkness.
This abyss, unfathomable to the eye of him who peered into it
from above, symbolised the Unfathomable Truth. The abyss
of truth remains as unfathomable to-day as it was unfathom-
able then ; neither the blood of innumerable martyrs, nor the
learned and persevering efforts of scientists and philosophers,
have succeeded in lighting up the sombre recesses of the
precipice. The great enigma of Life and Death has not been
solved ; none of those who have set sail on the great Ocean of
Eternity have ever returned to " give us a sign." We still
stand on the shores of the Ocean of Mystery, and wait for a
sign, until our turn comes; and we have to embark on the
journey from which there is no return, without ever having
received the sign. The seven Genii of the Vision of Hermes,
the seven Devas of India, the seven Amsphapands of Persia,
the seven Angels of Chaldea, the seven Sephiroths of the

PEEFACE ix

Kabal, the seven Archangels of the Christian Apocalypse :
none of these have given us the sign whereby we may com-
prehend the riddle of Life and Death.

Doubtless will Christian apologists reply that there where
all other religions have failed, the religion of Jesus has suc-
ceeded— that the resurrection of Jesus has opened unto us the
gates that bar the threshold of the Mystery. For the believer
this is incontestably true ; but it is a subjective truth, a truth
that can be grasped only after the preliminary accomplishment
of an act of faith. The keynote of the Christian religion, as
of all religions, is to be found in the word credo : the Christian
believer, like all other believers, believes certain things to be
true. But these things lie outside the domain of experience ;
by scientific methods they are unprovable ; and they remain
accessible solely to the subjective vision engendered by faith.
This is the reason why the application of scientific methods to
the study of the origins of the Christian religion, has yielded
results so meagre by comparison with the amount of labour
and energy spent on the task. The believer, he who repeats
with the fervour of intense conviction : Credo et confiteor, cares
not one straw for the results of learned researches concerning
the probable authorship of the Synoptics, or the date of the
fourth gospel. What matters it to him if, as M. Alfred Loisy
maintains, the gospels be " hypothetical, vague, legendary,
partial " — or if, as M. Loisy further maintains, " at the time
when the ecclesiastical organisation was anxious to arrest the
flowing tide of the Gnostic heresy by means of the Gospels,
one possessed nevertheless only the most shadowy information
concerning the origin of the latter " ? 1 The application of the
methods of scientific research, so fruitful in the domain of
experience, to the elucidation of questions of faith — has, as we
said, yielded but meagre results, as far as the sapping of the
strength of the Christian organisation is concerned. The

TA. Loisy, Simples Keflexions (1908), p. 127.

x SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHRISTIANITY

believer's belief is an essentially subjective phenomenon ; being
such, the undermining of the objective historical basis of the
Church leaves it wholly undisturbed. Faith appeals to the
sentiment, science to the reason. The believer will not seek
to reason his faith — for this would either have no meaning
at all, or else it would signify the destruction of faith. The
believer clings with tenacity to his faith, no arguments will
shake the latter, because it responds to the deepest emotional
needs of human nature.

The theological criterion of religious truth remains an
essentially subjective one : the consolations offered by Christi-
anity are true for him who has an intense need of them.
Embedded in the innermost recesses of the individual
conscience, the glorious vision of the Divine Master will not
be extinguished by methods that cannot be applied in this
domain, where the individual emotion, the individual sentiment,
are all-powerful. But this purely subjective justification of
Christianity — is it sufficient ? And does it explain at all
adequately the triumph of the Church over pagan syncretism
in the first Christian centuries, and the survival of the Church
up to the present day ? The reply must in each case be
negative. Christianity must be able to justify itself on
objective grounds, it must be able to encounter the criticisms
of science in the domain of concrete facts, it must be able to
demonstrate the advantages derived by humanity from it
irrespective of its subjective workings in the recesses of the
individual conscience. It must be able to vindicate the claim
to be an indispensable factor in social evolution — to be an
instrument of the positive and concrete utility for society.
Christianity, in other words, must not merely be able to shelter
itself from the criticisms and attacks of its adversaries by
retreating into the inner conscience of the individual, by
concealing itself in a subjective domain into which scientific
criticism cannot penetrate; it must be able to oppose to

PREFACE xi

scientific criticism, which deals exclusively with objective and
concrete facts, other facts of a like tangible nature.

But in order to do this, as we have said, Christianity must
not retreat into the individual conscience, must not reduce
itself to a mere medicine, a mere "inner light," for the
individual soul. It must rise above the individual, its light
must shine without unto the world, it must be something
more than a vague "interior music," to speak like Schleier-
macher. Over and above the ephemeral individual con-
science, with its purely subjective wants and emotions, there
is society — which is permanent, whose needs are universal.
The permanent and the universal — such must be the basis
of Christianity, and not the ephemeral and the subjective.
And the very fact of its survival, of its triumph over pagan
syncretism in the early centuries of its existence, proves that
the religion of Jesus possesses a principle, is built up on a
principle, that is of a permanent and universal nature. Were
this religion a mere medicine for the individual soul, a mere
" inner light " for the individual conscience, then could we
have no possible guarantee of its perennity, no adequate
explanation either of its persistence or of its universality.
At the most, in this case, could we reasonably expect it to
have survived the first two Christian generations, that is to
say, so long as the personal influence of the Master was still a
living force. To suppose that a philosophy built up on so
unstable and ephemeral a basis could have survived the storms
of twenty centuries, is to suppose human history to be one
long miracle. If Christianity has survived these storms, it
can only be because Christianity is built up on principles that
respond to permanent and universal needs of Western Society.

" La morale chretienne, . . ." says M. Salomon Eeinach,
". . . n'est pas sociale, elle neglige les devoirs de 1'homme
envers la cite, parce qu'elle tend a la perfection, a la purete*
individuelle ; mais elle prepare I'homme a mieux remplir ses

xii SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHEISTIANITY

devoirs sociaux en condamnant la haine et la violence, en
enseignant la fraternite." ] We have taken, in the present
book, a diametrically opposite view of Christianity, to that
taken by M. Salomon Eeinach ; and we have endeavoured to
show that the strength of Christianity, the secret of its/
survival amidst the storms of centuries, are to be sought
precisely in the fact that the doctrine of Jesus is a social
doctrine, a doctrine that inculcates rules of social life that are
indispensable to the persistence of Western civilisation. Here
have we the objective criterion whereby to judge the merits
of Christianity — here^ have we the objective justification of the
latter, that is to say, a justification far removed from the
variegated and unstable wants of heterogeneous individual
consciences. Too long have men quarrelled about questions
that none can solve, because the solution lies beyond the
sphere of human knowledge ; too much valuable time, too much
valuable energy have been wasted on hairsplitting concerning
dogmas, the truth of which can never be objectively proved,
and which can be grasped only as the result of an act of
individual faith. The world has grown indifferent to such
hairsplitting, which has not advanced our knowledge of the
Unknown and Unknowable one step beyond that of our
ancestors many thousand years back.

It is not in themselves that the doctrines of any religious
system can be judged — for, as we said, they concern matters
that lie outside the sphere of human knowledge, they are not
susceptible of being objectively proved, and each individual
conscience must be left to appreciate them according to its
own particular light. It is according to their objective con-
sequences for society that all religious doctrines must be judged
— according to the only criterion whereby we are able to
judge them, whereby we are able to appreciate their value,
that is to say, the degree of objective truth which such doctrines

1 S. Reinach, Orpheus: histoire generate des religions, pp. 341, 342.

PEEFACE xiii

may contain. The sociological study of religions has begun
to open unto our vision a new aspect of religious belief, has
begun to show us in religious belief something more than a
mere individual yearning after hidden truths ; it has begun
to show us in such belief a fundamental and permanent factor
of social existence and evolution. Instead of seeking, as
theology does, to justify or to condemn a religious system by
an appeal to evidence that can never be proved — or that can
be regarded as "proved" only as far as the individual
conscience is concerned, which latter believes or disbelieves
the evidence according to its wholly subjective tendencies and
wants ; sociology justifies or condemns a religious system by
an appeal to the concrete results obtained, in the life of
society, by the working and influence of such a system.

And such, we repeat, is the only criterion that we possess
whereby to judge the value of a system of religious beliefs.
When it does not exercise itself on questions of which we
can know nothing, our judgment becomes more tolerant because
based on certainties. As long as we discuss unprovable
hypotheses, our fanaticism is excited, because no objective
criterion of truth exists, according to which we may control
our assertions and limit, in consequence, the violence of our
passions. How much poignant suffering was caused, what
rivers of blood were shed, on account of differences of opinion
concerning the possibility of transubstantiation, concerning
the definition of the sacrifice of the Mass, concerning other
equally insoluble theological problems ! If humanity has
grown more tolerant to-day, this is due to the fact that we
have come gradually to recognise the insoluble nature of such
problems — that we have come to substitute an objective
criterion of religious truth for the former subjective one.
There is* no need to burn or to hang the " heretic " to-day ; we
can convince him of heresy by a simple appeal to facts — and,
if he be intelligent and of good faith, he will not seek to

xiv SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHKISTI^NITY

contest facts. The substitution of provable facts for unprovaWe
hypotheses as the criterion of religious truth — such has been the
appreciable result already obtained by the sociological study of
religions. We henceforth see in every religious system that
has survived in the universal struggle for existence, a funda-
mental factor in the life of that society to which such a
system belongs. Every religious system that survives is
adapted to the necessities of the society in which it survives.
Such a religious system is therefore true in the only sense in
which truth can be proved — in the sense that it responds to
the end in view of which it was evolved. Truth is necessarily
a relative conception ; and the truth of a religious system
can be judged of only with reference to a given environment.
In this environment the system is true (or untrue), and its
truth (or untruth) can be proved by the concrete results of its
influence on social life. Christianity is true for the Western
world ; Islam, Brahmanism, Buddhism, Confucianism, are
true in their respective environments. Each responds to the
peculiar needs of heterogeneous social aggregates.

As to the theological truth of the doctrines of all these
religions — and of all the others — it must be left to the
individual believer to decide. The criterion of theological
truth is a subjective one, and each must say for himself, in the
measure in which he is capable : Credo et confiteor. Theological
truths cannot be criticised, for they lie outside the domain of
criticism. But their justification is likewise a matter for the
individual conscience, and for the individual conscience alone.

The words pronounced by the greatest of modern scientists,
Louis Pasteur, on the occasion of his solemn reception by the
Academic fran9aise, remain eternally true, in the past, in the
present, and for all future times. ~By their quotation we will
close : —

La notion de I'lnfini a ce double caractdre de s'imposer et

PKEFACE xv

d'etre incomprehensible. Quand cette notion s'empare de
Ventendement, il ny a qu'a se prosterner. Encore, a ce moment
de poignantes angoisses, il faut demander grdce fa sa raison :
tous les ressorts de la vie intellectuelle menacent de se ddtendre ;
on se sent pres d'etre saisi par la sullime folie de Pascal. Cette
notion positive et primordiale, le positivisme Vecarte gratuitement,
elle et toutes ses consequences dans la vie des societes.

La notion de I'Infini dans le monde, fen vois partout
V inevitable expression. Par elle, le surnaturel est au fond de
tous les cceurs. L'idee de Dieu est une forme de I idee de
I'Infini. Tant que le mystere de I'Infini pesera sur la pense'e
humaine, des temples seront eleves du culte de I'Infini, que le Dieu
s'appelle Brakma, Allah, Jehova ou Jesus. Et sur la dalle de
ces temples vous verrez des hommes agenouilUs, prosternes, abimes
dans la pensee de VInfini. La metaphysique ne fait que
traduire au dedans de nous la notion dominatrice de I'Infini.
La conception de I'id^al nest-elle pas encore la facultt, reflet de
I'Infini, qui, en presence de la leaute", nous porte a imaginer une
beaute1 supe'rieure ? La science et la passion de comprendre, sont-
elles autre chose que I'effet de I'aiguillon du savoir que met
en notre dme le myst&re de I' Univers ? Ou sont les vraies sources
de la dignity humaine, de la liberte et de la democratic moderne,
sinon dans la notion de I'Infini devant laquelle tous les hommes
sont egaux ?

Thus spoke the greatest of modern scientists, if by " great "
we mean him who has been humanity's greatest benefactor —
thus spoke the man whose discoveries have revolutionised all
our conceptions of disease and its treatment, and who has done
more than any man of his generation to diminish human
misery and to alleviate human suffering. The speech of
Pasteur to t'he Academic franchise reminds us of the profound
words of Goethe, to the effect that " wir still verehren diirfen, was
unerforschlich ist." In the common veneration of a lofty ideal,
in a common humility before the great Mystery of the Infinite,

xvi SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHRISTIANITY

men of all creeds can unite, remembering that, as the Apostle
said, Videmus nunc per speculum in aenigmate — remembering
that, in consequence, the rule of our conduct in relation to the
beliefs of our fellow-men should invariably be : In omnibus
caritas. Abandoning all vain controversy concerning beliefs
that are theologically identical at the bottom, it should be the
aim of all to endeavour to realise, as far as possible, the
inexhaustible social genius of Christianity, to draw from the
fountain of the Gospel that " social wisdom " which flows
from it in such a crystal stream.

CONTENTS

CHAPTER I

INTRODUCTORY KEMARKS .... Pp- 1-21

Position to be adopted by the sociologist with regard to the problem of the
authenticity of the Gospels. — Sociology has no concern with theological
or exegetical questions. — Misunderstanding of the purport of the teaching
of Jesus alike by admirers and detractors. — The teaching of Jesus is not
destined primarily for the individual, but for society.— Influence of
Christianity on the evolution of Western civilisation. — Social importance
of religion in general. — Incomprehensibility of religious beliefs when
viewed from an individual standpoint. — Primitive practices and customs,
the rites de passage, marriage regulations of totemic groups. — Collective
origin and nature of religious beliefs. — Religion is the primordial pheno-
menon of social life. — The social necessities which engendered religion,
the social needs to which the latter responds. — Only in its later forms does
religion take any account of the individual. — Place sui generis occupied
in this respect, in the evolution of religious beliefs, by Christianity. —
Christianity realises an equilibrium between social and individual in-
terests.— Adaptation of Christianity to the double series of antagonistic
necessities (social and individual).

CHAPTER II

RELIGION AND SOCIETY ..... Pp. 22-50

I. Primitive undifferentiated condition of individual thought, which confounds

itself with collective thought. — Progressive diminution of the " sphere
of influence " of the collective representations : formation of rational
concepts. — Social function of rationalism : adaptation of society to
environing conditions with less expenditure of social force. — Necessity
of the limitation of rationalism. — Differentiation of the terms religion-
society, individual-society. — The ethical religions limit rationalism and
adapt the latter to its social function. — By means of the limitation of
rationalism, religion establishes an equilibrium between society and the
individual. — This equilibrium is realised by means of the notion of
Duty. — The sacrifice of egotistical interests and the idea of compensation.
— The correlative notions of Duty and Compensation in Christian ethics.

II. Social growth entails the formation of differentiated social subdivisions. —

In a disintegrated society, such subdivisions are no longer adapted to the
fulfilment of their primary function, which is that of organising and
xvii

xviii SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHRISTIANITY

co-ordinating the divers individual activities in the interest of the whole
aggregate. — In that it secures an equilibrium between society and the
individual, religion also secures an equilibrium between the social sub-
divisions and the whole aggregate. — Class interests and social interests. —
Difficulty of curbing class egotism. — Religion secures social integration. —
The four social functions of religion are in reality varied aspects of the
primordial function of securing social integration. — The Moral Law and
the social" law.

III. Absence of ethical conceptions in primitive societies. — Development of
the Moral Law is correlative of the development of rationalism. — Differ-
entiation of religion and society, whereby the former is rendered capable
of controlling that part of human conduct which, as a result of the
development of rationalism, henceforth escapes the control of the social
law. — The emancipation of the "rationalised personality" of the indi-
vidual from social control must needs have the development of an
Absolute Moral Law, i. e. the extension of the sphere of religion beyond
the limits of society, as corollary. — Plasticity and adaptability of the
religious structure. — Rationalism and the Moral Law. — The Protestant
doctrine of subjectivism. — Morals, like religion, are a social creation,
responding to social necessities. — The value of a religious system can
be judged only from the standpoint of the interests of society.

CHAPTER III

THE THEORY AND THE PRACTICE OF CHRISTIANITY . Pp. 51-67

Impossibility, for the sociologist, of distinguishing between theory and practice in
Christianity. — The theories formulated in the Gospels cannot be appreciated
independently of the concrete application of such theories. — The supersti-
tion of equality and the attitude of Christianity thereto. — The Jesus of
Tolstoi. — Disconcerting assumptions of the theory which seeks to place
the teaching of Jesus in antagonism to the historical development of
Christian doctrine and practice. — Impossibility of supposing Church
Christianity to be a falsification of the Christianity of Jesus. — It is
equally impossible to suppose the former to be " inferior " to the latter. —
Widespread ignorance of the nature and workings of social laws. — The
force of ideas. — Origin of the Christian doctrine. — It is legitimate to
assume that the early Christians practised the authentic teaching of Jesus.
— But it was impossible that the social organisation of the early Christians
could reflect the whole social teaching of Jesus. — The Church of the
Middle Ages was the successor of the primitive Church, whose task
it continued and developed.

CHAPTEE IV

FRATERNITY VERSUS EQUALITY . . . . Pp. 68-107

I. The notion of equality is based on egotism. — Egotistical nature of Socialism.

— Psychology of the masses. — Psychology of the representatives of
intellect. — The doctrine of equality implies the correlative notion of the
superiority of those who aspire after equality. — The " dictature of the
proletariat" and the "dictature of intellect."

II. The psychological basis of equality and the psychological basis of fraternity.

— The Christian doctrine of fraternity applies to all classes of society. —

CONTENTS xix

Fraternity implies the necessity of humility. — It acts, therefore,
with peculiar force as a curb on the egotism of the governing classes.
— Insufficiency of the social policy of the bourgeoisie. — Demoralising
effects of bourgeois egotism and materialism. — Destruction of social
cohesion and solidarity. — The anarchy of individualism. — The agony of
bourgeois society.

III. Three underlying conditions implied by the doctrine of fraternity : social
integration, recognition of human dignity, individual humility. — These
fundamental conditions were realised by Christianity. — Necessity of dis-
tinguishing between the Absolute or Moral and the Relative or Social. —
Error of Tolstoyism. — Jesus accepted the social law, but over and above
it he placed the Moral Law. — Differentiation of the two laws equivalent
to the differentiation of the Absolute and the Relative. — The Moral Law
at once completes and reinforces the social law. — The two laws are funda-
mentally different in their nature, because they appertain to two
fundamentally different worlds. — Jesus admitted the inequalities of the
relative World. — In Christian ethics, Duty is the indispensable counter^
part of Inequality. — Duty and responsibility increase in the same measure^
as capacity and power. — Synthetic nature of the message of fraternity. —
The latter inculcates to each social class its duties. — Fraternity is based
on the idea of the fundamental identity of the duties, the moral value,
and the insufficiency, of all classes. — Necessity of humility and the
example of Jesus.

CHAPTER V

THE SUPREME DIGNITY OF LABOUR . . . Pp. 108-120

Immense quantity of suffering entailed by social evolution. — This suffer-
ing is enhanced if social solidarity does not exist. — The supreme dignity
of labour consecrated by Christianity. — Equality of the various categories
of labour before the Moral Law. — Responsibility increases with capacity.
— Parable of the labourers in the vineyard. — Social inequality is measured
by inequality of capacity. — The Moral Law does not take account
capacity, but of the will underlying each individual capacity. — Labour
must always be proportioned to the individual patrimony. — The notion,
of pride in Christian ethics. — Those to whom little has been given, must
also work. — The Christian idea of compensation.

CHAPTER VI

MARRIAGE AND FAMILY LIFE . .Pp. 121-149

I. The family is a miniature society. — The family as a religious institution. —

The teaching of Jesus regarding marriage. — Difficulty of applying regula-
tions affecting the sexual life of the individual. — Sexual legislation of the
Catholic Church. — Hatred of restraints on sexual intercourse was the
chief factor at work in the anti-Catholic movement of the sixteenth and
seventeenth centuries, and is the principal lever of the modern revolu-
tionary movement. — In Christian ethics, husband and wife are unequal
before the social law, and equal before the Moral Law.— As in society in
general, so also in the family, the notion of inequality is tempered by
the ideas of Duty and Responsibility. — Duties of parents towards their
children.

II. The integration of society depends on the integration of the family. —

xx SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHEISTIANITY

Difference between the family and other subdivisions of society. —
Degeneracy of contemporary ideas regarding marriage. — Undermining of
family life by egotism. — Dangers of divorce. — Deplorable biological and
moral consequences of a miscomprehension of the meaning of marriage.
— Immense social value of the Catholic conception of marriage. — The
doctrine of Ibsen, as preached in The Doll's House. — Perniciousness of
this doctrine for society. — Even as Christianity realises a synthesis
between the various classes, so does it also realise a synthesis between the
various members of the family. — The anti-egotistical teaching of
Christianity is applicable alike to the whole society and to the family. —
The Catholic teaching of the family as a school of discipline. — The
attitude of Catholicism and Protestantism towards the sexual life of the
individual.

CHAPTER VII

STRUGGLE AND SUFFERING . . . . Pp. 150-183

PRELIMINARY : — Human history is one long record of struggle and suffering. —
Progress of the species conditioned by individual suffering. — Rationalism
tends to create an antinomy between natural law and the individual. —
Mysterious nature of the process of organic evolution. — Extermination
of inferior forms of life is an universal law only within the limits of the
species. — In how far rationalism can favour individual interests without
imperilling social interests.

I. The utility of rationalism for society. — Development and preservation of

eugenic elements. — Religion is never humanitarian. — Attitude of Jesus
towards the question of individual happiness. — The message of the
Cross. — Individual salvation is made by Christianity to depend on the
very conditions on which depends social salvation. — Christianity
combats egotism by an appeal to egotism. — Christianity is neither
equalitarian nor humanitarian. — The notion of duty as conceived by the
social law and by the divine law. — Christian ethics give a value to
individual life, and so induce the individual to sacrifice himself to social
ends. — Christianity is pre-eminently an organ of social defence and social
integration.

II. Humanitarianism is an aspect of egotism. — Jesus on the necessity and

desirableness of suffering. — Humanitarianism is not a consequence of the
Christian doctrine |of fraternity. — Fraternity is based on the idea of
Duty. — The primordial duty of the individual is to conform his conduct
to the interests of the collectivity. — The interests of the collectivity
demand the elimination of inferior elements. — The teaching of Jesus and
St. Paul in this respect. — The parable of the talents. — Jesus condemns
parasitism. — Fundamental difference between even the humblest work
and parasitism. — Misuse of the word pity. — The great lesson of Calvary.
— It is our duty to aid those who are worthy. — Christianity teaches that
we are judged according to our actions.

CHAPTER VIII

CHRISTIANITY AND RATIONALISM . . .Pp. 184-207

I. Christianity a fundamental factor of Western civilisation.— In Christian
ethics, compensation and consolation are conditioned by duty and
suffering. — If the notion of duty is to be efficacious, the individual must

CONTENTS xxi

be strongly integrated in society. — Christianity guarantees the perpetuity
of individual effort and sacrifice. — In Christian ethics, observance of the
social law is required as part of the individual's duty towards the Moral
Law.

II. Widespread underestimation of the social importance of Christianity. —

Auguste Comte and the positivist school. — Misconception of the nature
of Christianity. — Pernicious consequences of a unilateral development
of rationalism. — Insufficiency of purely analytical reasoning. — Analysis
must be completed by synthesis. — The disappearance of Christianity
would signify the suppression of all efficient restraints on egotism. —
The continuity of Christianity is assured by the synthetic nature of the
latter. — Life itself contains no principle capable of conferring an adequate
value on life. — Rationalism can bring about a temporary cessation of
social conflict ; but this would imply the ultimate elimination of the
social group. — Reason can confer no sufficient sanction on suffering. —
In the interests of society and of the individual, rationalism must be
completed by supra-rational principles. — Christianity safeguards both
series of interests. — Christian idealism. — Rationalism creates a permanent
contradiction between the self-conscious individual and his environment. —
Christianity does not seek to suppress suffering, but it gives suffering
a meaning. — Christianity resolves the problem of how to enforce natural
and social laws, whilst at the same time safeguarding individual
interests. — Nihilism the only possible result of excessive rationalism.

III. A rational society has greater need of supra-rational and ethical beliefs

than a pre-rational society in which individuality is wholly undeveloped.
— Rationalism is the force that impels humanity to have recourse to
ethical religious belief.

CHAPTER IX

THE FUTURE OF CHRISTIANITY . . . .Pp. 208-258

PRELIMINARY : — We can now understand better the nature of the two antagon-
istic forces of human evolution : religion and rationalism. — The " artificial
idealism" of the Greeks. — Art cannot, as a general rule, be substituted
for religion. — The reason of the persistence of Christian beliefs.

I. Two parallel series of movements constitute the history of Western society

since the end of the fourteenth century. — The reactions against rational-
ism.— Excessive rationalism creates moral instability and anarchy. —
But an essential condition of happiness is order and regularity. —
Necessity of Christianity for Western civilisation. — But Christianity is
not a homogeneous mass. — Individualist and undogmatic forms of
Christianity do not respond to the needs of Western society. — Inferiority,
in this respect, of Protestantism. — Reason is powerless to exert an
inhibitory influence on the promptings of egotism and on the impulsions
of instinct. — The effects of egotism in social life are never indifferent. —
Necessity of preventing social disintegration.

II. Notion of Duty reduced by Protestantism to its lowest possible minimum. —

Suppression of the priesthood implies the abolition of all efficacious
moral authority over the individual. — Illusory nature of the discipline
imposed by Protestantism. — The life of the Protestant is an essentially
free one.— The terminus of Protestant evolution is self-destruction. —
Protestant sects. — Denial by contemporary Protestant theology of the
fundamental Christian doctrines. — The Yatho case at Cologne. —
Protestantism fails to satisfy the deeper aspirations of the individual
soul. — The quantitative and qualitative limitation of public worship. —

xxii SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHRISTIANITY

Exclusion of Protestantism from participation in the future evolution of
Western society. — Patriotism as a social force. — Conditions under which
patriotism can secure adequate social integration. The example of
Germany. — The United States. — Necessity, for the United States, of a
strong integrating force.

III. Exclusively critical nature of Protestantism. — Soundness of the social

principles of the Catholic Church : hierarchy without heredity ; separa-
tion of the moral and political. — The institution of ecclesiastical celibacy
and its social purport. — Necessity of separating the moral and the
political spheres. — Danger of State control over the Church. — Struggle
between State and Church during the Middle Ages. — The accomplish-
ment of the sociological task of the Church was conditioned by the
maintenance of the latter 's independence. — Social idealism is based on
the fundamental distinction between the moral and the political powers. —
Noxious results of the confusion of these two powers. — The combination
of aristocratism and democracy in the Catholic system. — The error of
aristocracies. — Heredity alone does not ensure fitness, or adaptation of
capacity to function. — Danger of the caste. — If we admit that the
bourgeois regime secures, in contemporary society, the adaptations of
capacity to function ; nevertheless it fails to provide the notion of
authority with an' adequate basis. —Anarchical condition of the French
democracy. — Symptoms of social disintegration in Germany and Great
Britain. — The Catholic organisation adequately safeguards authority.—
It likewise affords free play to the action of selection.

IV. Catholicism at once safeguards social interests and ministers to individual

wants.— Remarkable capacity of survival of the Catholic Church. —
Failure of all attempts to create a schism. — Integrating power of the
Church proved by the acceptance of the infallibility dogma. —Sociological
justification of papal infallibility. — The future policy of Western society
must be based on the great social principles of the Catholic Church. —
But this does not imply the possibility of a re-establishment of dogmatic
unity.

CHAPTER X

CONCLUSIONS . . . . . .Pp. 259-285

Summary of the main ideas developed in this book. — Collective nature of religion
and morals. — Incomprehensibility of both from the standpoint of the
individual. — Christianity, like all other religions, is an instrument of
social defence and integration. — The debt of the Western world to
Christianity. — The social value of Christianity is not ephemeral, but
permanent. — Vital importance of heredity, whether biological or moral,
in social life. — Christianity constitutes the hereditary moral patrimony of
Western society. — Disquieting symptoms in contemporary civilisation. —
The disease of anarchy. — Anomalies and contradictions of the bourgeois
regime. — Solidarity of Western nations produced by increase of inter-
communication. The lessons of the past. — History shows us how the
problem of disciplining society can be solved. — Untoward effects of the
diminution of Christian influence in modern times. — Evil consequences
of too sudden and too prolonged prosperity. — The future prospects of
Western society.

THE SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE
OF CHRISTIANITY

CHAPTER I

INTRODUCTORY REMARKS

IT is not without interest, in this twentieth century which, we
are told, shall witness the definite destruction of all the old
faiths that have consoled humanity during two thousand years
— it is not without interest, at such a time, to examine the
question of the sociological value of Christianity. We have
neither the desire nor the authority to examine the problem
of the authenticity of the Christian Gospels. That is a matter
for theological experts, and we have not the slightest claim
to any sort of authority in matters theological. We assume
therefore, in order to simplify the debate, that the gospels
are authentic, that is to say, that they do really contain, or at
any rate reflect, the teaching of Jesus of Nazareth as propounded
to his disciples and to those who heard him teach, or as further
propagated by those who gathered the purport of his teaching
from those who heard him teach. We have here to do purely
and simply with the man Jesus ; we neither affirm nor deny
his divine character. In like manner we have to do purely
and simply with the four gospels and the epistles as they are
given us in the version accepted by the Church ; we neither
affirm nor deny the authenticity of these writings, we leave

1 1

2 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHRISTIANITY

entirely aside the question of their divine inspiration. We
approach the New Testament in the same manner as a man
of science approaches any other work. We desire to judge
Christ as a sociologist, to see whether the teaching of Christ
is of any value to us in the twentieth century from a
sociological point of view, to see whether the social evolution
of two thousand years has left anything standing of the social
teaching of Jesus, to see, in fact, whether Jesus did in reality
teach anything of social import, whether indeed he took the
facts of our social existence into consideration — or whether
he was only a spiritual guide, a moral comforter, perhaps a
misguided mystic visionary.

The general feeling with regard to the gospels is that the
latter constitute a collection of exclusively moral precepts, the
application of which is peculiarly useful in times of individual
moral distress. In other words, the teaching of Christ has the
individual as its aim, the entire doctrine of moral regeneration
has the individual as starting-point, basis, and centre. If
Christ's teaching has any social value, it can only be the effect
of a repercussion of individual interests on the society at
large : the amelioration of social conditions is regarded as a
consequence of an amelioration of the individual conscience
and character. Christ came to educate the individual, to
instruct and to comfort the individual, to show the individual
the path that leads to a better life. If this view be correct,
it is clear that Christ cannot be regarded as a sociologist, the
gospels cannot be considered as affording a basis for sociological
reorganisation and reconstruction. It may be admitted that
Christ was not wholly regardless of social laws, that his work
can likewise be appreciated as that of a social reformer ; yet
only indirectly. The main object of his mission was the
redemption of the individual, the preaching of the doctrine
of individual salvation, the winning of the individual soul.
Christ's desire was to conduct the individual along the road

INTRODUCTORY REMARKS 3

which leads to the gate of eternal life, along the road of
righteousness. And righteousness is understood as implying
in the main the duty towards God, individual conduct is
directed with a view to placing the individual on satisfactory
terms with his creator. The duty towards the neighbour,
which is the fundament of social relations, is secondary, and
is derived from the duty towards God, from the necessity of
winning God's favour in order to obtain eternal life. Thus
is the altruism which presides over the social duties a mere
consequence of the egoistical desire of divine reward for
obedience to divine commands.

And those who contest the value of the moral teaching of
Christ, who consider that the advent of Christianity indicated
a regression of the onward movement of civilisation, that the
introduction of Christianity signified the clogging of the wheels
of progress, the death-blow to the magnificent antique ideals
of force and beauty — those also consider exclusively the
teaching of Christ as applicable to the individual. " Der
Gott am Kreuz ist ein Fluch auf das Leben," exclaimed
Nietzsche, " ein Fingerzeig, sich von ihm zu entfernen." l
But why is the Nazarene a blight on life ? Because he
turned the channel of the individual's thoughts towards a
spiritual existence, because he made the restriction of individual
wants and desires a condition sine qua non of the attainment
of this spiritual existence, because he made the individual an
end unto himself, because he centred the thoughts and the
activities of the individual on the individual, because hence-
forth the individual, in obedience to Christ's teaching,
abandoned his rights and liberties in order to consecrate
himself to the task of self-perfection, because the intellectual
activity of the individual was henceforth restricted to the
searching after personal amelioration, because the individual

1 "The crucified God is a curse and a blight on life, a warning to flee from
all existence."

4 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHRISTIANITY

life was made to revolve around the axis of individual salvation,
which latter can only be obtained by means of moral and
physical castration. Those who see in the Greek ideal of life
the quintessence of moral beauty, anathematise Christianity
because Christianity is the antithesis of the Greek ideal.
They admire the Greek ideal for the liberty permitted to the
individual, for the scope afforded for the satisfaction of
individual desires ; and they hate Christianity for the restric-
tions brought by it to bear on individual liberty. They do not
put the question as to whether the restrictions thus imposed
by Christianity have, any social import, any consequences for
the shaping of social conduct and the social relations.

It appears, however, to us, that those who regard the
Christian gospel as containing solely a doctrine of individual
salvation, who consider the teaching of Christ as a mere balm
for individual sorrow or as being exclusively a guide for
individual conduct, belittle strangely the value of the New
Testament. True, Christ did indeed bring a message of
individual consolation, he did indeed show the road that leads
to individual salvation, he did indeed insist on the sacred
duty of ministering to the needs of the individual soul ;
but the message of Christ was not restricted to the individual,
it rang out, far beyond the limits of the individual, throughout
the length and breadth of society. Those who see in Christ
a mere preacher of individual regeneration and salvation,
who see in religion a mere individual phenomenon, a mere
expression of individual emotions, of individual psychological
needs, are greatly mistaken. The mission of Christ was not
restricted to the individual, the duty of the Christian Church
is not restricted to saving the individual soul, the value of
religion lies not only in the fact that it voices individual
emotions and needs. The mission of Christ was also a
sociological mission, the duty of the Church resides also in
the ensuring of social cohesion and integration, the value of

INTRODUCTORY REMARKS 5

religion is equally to be sought in the fact that, through the
influence of religious institutions, social conditions prevail that
are indispensable to the continuity of social existence.

Is it not, in truth, extraordinary — the affirmation we so
often meet with to the effect that the influence of Christianity on
the evolution of Western civilisation has been practically null ?
A vast institution like the Christian Church, which has
maintained itself throughout all the changes and chances of
twenty centuries, should be the outcome of purely individual
needs ! An institution which imposes on the individual a
number of most inconvenient, not to say galling, restrictions
— which limits severely the scope of individual liberty — which
prohibits some of the most imperious desires of the individual :
this institution is a mere fruit of individual cravings, a mere
outlet for individual emotions ! Verily can such a conception
claim to be founded neither on depth of historical knowledge
nor on a logical comprehension of facts. Institutions which
have arisen and disappeared again in the course of centuries,
after an existence more or less ephemeral — empires, kingdoms,
corporations, feudalism with its accompanying institutions of
serfdom, vassalage, and villainage, codes of law and territorial
divisions — all these, and so many others likewise vanished, are
regarded as being sociological factors of importance, as having
exerted marked and durable influence on the development of
European civilisation, as having numbered among the funda-
mental developmental forces which have been at work in the
shaping of Western society as we know it. And the one
institution which has not been ephemeral, the one institution
which has victoriously repulsed all the assaults of Time, the
one institution which can lay claim to universality — the term
being, of course, restricted to the limits of what is known as
Western civilisation — this one institution, which is the Christian
Church, and more especially the Catholic Church, is not to be
reckoned among the social forces which have produced Western

6 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHEISTIANITY

culture, which have preserved the continuity of our social
existence ! This great permanent and universal institution
is to be relegated to the domain of individual psychology !
Assuredly are those who hold to this point of view deep
neither in history nor in logic.

It is, nevertheless, only quite recently that the sociological
importance of religion in general has come to be recognised.
The work accomplished by the French school of sociologists,
with Professor Durkheim at its head, has been particularly
valuable in this respect.1 The doctrine of Animism, which
has found such brilliant exponents in Tylor, Frazer, Hartland,
and others, is based upon the fundamental notion of the
individual as the centre of all religious phenomena. Accord-
ing to this doctrine, religious belief has as its starting-point
the desire of the individual to explain the various phenomena
witnessed by him — death, sickness, swoons, sleep, dreams,
shadows, and the like. Primitive religious belief is founded
on the notion of Analogy, on the notion of the various
phenomena in Nature as produced by a life similar to the life
of the individual who witnesses such phenomena.2 Eeligious
beliefs are due to the individual craving for explanation of the
world-riddles, and the latter are interpreted in the light of
analogy — the same forces are deemed to be at work in Nature
at large, as are supposed to be active within the individual.
The primitive man reasons according to the same methods and
laws of logic as does the civilised man, and the apparently
absurd conclusions to which the former comes are merely due
to the lack of knowledge, to ignorance of the workings of natural
law. Were the civilised man placed in the same conditions,
could he divest himself totally of all the knowledge accumulated

1 See the numerous volumes of L'Annee sociologique ; also Mauss and Hubert,
Melanges d'histoire des religions (1908) ; Le vy-Bruhl, Les Fonctions mentales dans
les societes inferieures (1910); Chatterton-Hill, "L'Etude sociologique des
religions," in Revue d'histoire etde litterature religieuses (January-February, 1912).

2 Tylor, Primitive Culture, vol. i. p. 29(5.

INTRODUCTORY REMAEKS T

by successive centuries of social evolution, he would not fail to
arrive at identical conclusions — for his methods of reasoning
remain the same and are invariably dominated by the research
after adequate causality. Thus all the religious systems of
primitive humanity cannot but appear as grotesque illusions,
as ridiculous distortions of what are to us palpable facts.
During many thousands of years humanity has laboured under
snares and delusions so monstrous as to appear to us incon-
ceivable. And what possible value can all these grotesque
beliefs have had, what possible part can they have played in
human development ? How lamentable a waste of human
effort do they represent ! The ethnologist and the historian
can but marvel at the spectacle of the persistence and diffusion
of such absurd superstitions.

Yet when we come to observe the phenomenon attentively,
the question must needs arise : How comes it that these
grotesque religious systems be so universally diffused ? If
they be due to mere individual needs, to the individual desire
to interpret incomprehensible phenomena, then indeed their
diffusion and persistence remain profoundly enigmatical. For
if we regard them in this light, they certainly cannot be
considered as being of any particular utility to the individual,
as tending in any way to further the individual's adaptation
to surrounding conditions. Biology teaches us, nevertheless,
that the diffusion and persistence of an organ in a species are
the sure evidence of the utility of that organ — are the proof
of the organ in question being instrumental in ensuring the
survival of the species in the struggle for existence : and what
holds good, in this case, for the species, holds good for society.
The diffusion and persistence of the religious systems prove
that the latter are instrumental in ensuring the survival of
the societies in which they prevail. But when we come to
analyse the beliefs of primitive men, the religious systems of
primitive societies, we absolutely fail to see what utility they

8 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHKISTIANITY

can possess from an individual point of view. Lord Avebury
very justly observed in his work on primitive civilisation that
these primitive religious systems impose a great number of
highly inconvenient restrictions on the individual.1 And if
we take any concrete case, such as the religious practices
relating to the capture of prey, to the curing of disease, or the
various practices of magic and divination, etc., can we find in
such practices any benefit accruing to the individual ? Even
to the primitive man it must after a certain time appear
evident that magic incantations and mimicry do not materially
assist him to catch his prey, that the treatment of the medicine-
man does not relieve pain or cure disease. We might there-
fore expect him to abandon such incantations and to give up
consulting the medicine-man. But he does nothing of the
sort. Hence we have the apparent anomaly of the individual
deliberately clinging to practices which in no wise further his
individual welfare or benefit him in any way as individual.

Let us take some further instances. Let us consider the
numerous ceremonies which form, so to speak, an integral part
of the life of each individual in primitive societies and which
M. Van Gennep has so aptly termed rites de passage.2 At any
given moment of his existence, the individual finds himself
" catalogued " in a certain " life-compartment," and in order to
quit this compartment and enter another, he must go through
a certain number of strictly defined ceremonies having for
their object to separate him completely from his former com-
partment, and to introduce him as effectively as possible into
the new compartment. Thus, when the individual passes
from childhood to puberty, from the state of celibacy to
the state of marriage, from the profane to the sacred world ;
when he is definitely received into the totem or into
the tribe or into a given profession ; when he passes into

1 Lubbock, The Origins of Civilisation, p. 301.

2 A. Van Gennep, Les Rites de passage (1909).

INTRODUCTORY KEMARKS 9

the new lunar month, into the new season ; when he
passes over the threshold of the house or of the town ;
when the woman becomes pregnant or accouches : — in all such
cases the child, the man, or the woman have to submit to a
certain number of strictly-defined ceremonies. Is it possible
to explain these ceremonies, and the beliefs which give rise to
them, in the terms of individual psychology — to interpret
them as based on individual wants and necessities ? Can
we suppose the individual as such to derive any profit from
them? The reply must clearly be in the negative. The
numerous ceremonies to which the prevailing religious beliefs
require the individual to submit in all the varying phases
of his existence, cannot but be terribly burdensome to the in-
dividual. Evidently, therefore, these ceremonies and the beliefs
underlying them cannot emanate from the individual; they
must inevitably derive from a power superior to the individual.
Let us take again another instance : the marriage
regulations in the totemic societies of Australia. The
complication of these regulations, the object of which is to
prevent totemic endogamy, is truly extraordinary. How can
it be supposed that these regulations, which so severely
prohibit sexual union between members of the same totem,
are a mere expression of individual needs ? To explain them
as due to an instinctive fear of the dangers of consanguinity is
quite out of the question. In the first place, consanguinity
per se is not dangerous from a biological point of view; it
only becomes dangerous when the parents are diseased. In
the second place, to suppose the aborigines of Central
Australia avoiding consanguinous unions from fear of the
possible consequences of such unions, is to suppose them
possessed of considerably greater foresight and considerably
greater biological knowledge than the civilised societies of
Western Europe. In the third place, the marriage regulations
of the Australian tribes are complicated to the extent of pre-

10 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHKISTIANITY

venting marriages even between persons brought-up together
on the same territory — consequently between persons linked
by no physiological ties. Considered from an individual
point of view, all these regulations cannot but prove irksome
in the extreme. How then are we to explain them as based
on individual wants and necessities ? Evidently the beliefs on
which such complicated and irksome regulations are founded
do not emanate from the individual but are derived from
social necessities, as Professor Durkheim pointed out in
his admirable and lucid essay on the Origins of the
Prohibition of Incest} In other words, these beliefs, which
are incomprehensible when viewed in the light of individual
psychology, can only be interpreted in the light of social
psychology.

And when we see the extraordinary force with which the
primitive man's beliefs act on him ; when we see these beliefs
capable of radically preventing the satisfaction of the
strongest individual instincts ; when we see them imposing
themselves on the individual in spite of manifest ocular
evidence of their absurdity ; when we see them producing,
as in the case of the magician, swoons and delirium, and
inspiring, in all cases, inexpressible fear and sentiments of
veneration and awe of which we can have but a faint
conception ; when we see all this, it must appear clear to us
that the origin of such beliefs is not to be sought in the
individual intellect, in the calm contemplation of environing
phenomena, in the wish to explain the mysteries of Nature.
Is it at all likely that primitive men should have felt a
desire to interpret Nature so imperious, that they were willing
to subordinate their entire existence to this interpretation ?
No reasoned belief, engendered by the mere working of the
intellect, is capable of producing the violent emotions which

1 Durkheim, "La Prohibition de 1'inceste et ses origines, " in L'Annte socio-
logique, vol. i. pp. 1-70 (1896-97).

INTKODUCTOKY KEMAEKS 11

the beliefs of primitive man invariably inspire. Beliefs thus
capable of exciting violent emotions, of imposing themselves a
priori on the individual, of inducing the individual to submit
without questioning to the most irksome restraints and
restrictions, must necessarily have their origin outside the
individual, must needs derive from a power superior to
the individual and able to impress unquestioning obedience
on the latter. But the only power superior to the indi-
vidual, within the limits of our experience, is the society.
Hence the conclusion that the beliefs which exert so immense
an influence on the life of primitive men, are of a social,
and not of an individual, nature. Their origin must be
sought in social necessities, not in individual necessities.
They dominate the individual, because the individual cannot
exist outside the society or independently of the society,
because the society is able to enforce its will with irresistible
force. The individual mind has not invented such beliefs, it
has received them from the society, from the social mind.
Such beliefs are of a collective nature and, as regards each
individual, a priori. The collective mentality, the social
mind, is not synonymous with the individual mentality, it
is not a mere grouping of individual mentalities. The
social mind, the collective mentality, is something sui generis,
which is not subject to the laws that are operative in the
domain of individual psychology. It is a force superior to
the individual. True, the society is composed of individuals ;
but the life of society is as independent of the lives of
the individuals composing it, as the existence of the indi-
vidual is independent of that of the cells composing the
individual organism. As little as we can interpret the life
of a man according to the life of one of the cells composing
his organism at any given moment — as little can we interpret
the life of society in the light of that of one of its individual
components.

12 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHEISTIANITY

The work accomplished by the French school of sociology
has enabled us to grasp better three fundamental facts : firstly,
that the society is a phenomenon sui generis, the evolution
of which is independent of the evolution of its individual
components ; secondly, that religious beliefs and institutions
are the product of society, of the workings of the social mind —
that they do not emanate from the individual ; thirdly, that such
religious beliefs and institutions constitute the most fundamental
of all the forces underlying the vast process of social evolution
We are now in a better position to comprehend the pheno-
menon, already noticed, of the extraordinary diffusion and
persistence of religious beliefs so transparently absurd to our
rationally educated minds. For we now see in them a
product, not of the individual mind, but of the collective
mind ; we know society to be independent of the individual,
we know that it completely dominates the individual ;
and we know such beliefs to correspond to imperious social
necessities, to be fundamentally operative in the formation of
the social life and the social structure. Hence that which,
judged as a product of individual psychology and of individual
wants, appeared to us wholly inexplicable and absurd, appears
now, when we judge it as a product of social psychology and of
social wants, in a very different light.

Far, then, from being a mere individual phenomenon,
religion appears to us as an essentially social phenomenon, as a
product of social life, as a fundamental factor of social develop-
ment. Keligion, as M. Durkheim very justly observes,
contains in potentia all the various elements which, sub-
sequently dissociated and combined in a thousand ways, give
rise to the diverse manifestations of social life. Science and
poetry are derived from myths and legends; religious
ornamentation and religious ceremonies have given birth to
the plastic arts ; ritual practices have engendered law and
morals ; parentage and relationship were originally conceived

INTRODUCTORY REMARKS 13

as purely mystical links ; punishments, contracts, gifts, homage,
are but transformations of the doctrine of religious sacrifice ;
our philosophical conceptions concerning the soul, concerning
immortality, concerning life itself, can be understood only by
reference to the religious notions that constituted their first
form. And the most recent researches, far from confirming
the doctrine of historical materialism, show us the economic
functions and structure of society as products of religious
belief and religious influences. Engendered was religion by
the social mind, because it is a factor of social existence, an
instrument of social activity and evolution. Its diffusion is
universal, because the same necessities, universally prevalent,
gave rise to the same organs of social life.

The question now arises : What necessities can have
engendered religion, to what social needs does religion
respond ? The reply is that religion constitutes an indispens-
able element of social unity, of social cohesion and integration,
in that it restrains individual liberty and subordinates the
individual to society in the interest of the continuity of social
existence. Social existence is possible only if the individual
limits his liberty, if he imposes certain restrictions on his
desires, if he refrains from committing certain acts which his
purely individual interests would prompt him to commit.
Obviously the liberty of the individual can be thus limited
only by a power superior to him ; and the only power
superior to him, as we have said, is — within the limits of our
experience — society. Society controls the individual by the
means of religious belief, by the means of collective representa-
tions that impose themselves a priori with irresistible force.
When metaphysicians talk to us of the reconciliation of
individual and social interests, it is necessary to avoid mis-
understandings. In reality, individual and social interests are
never reconciled ; there is always an inevitable antagonism
between the two. What really happens is, that individual

14 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHRISTIANITY

interests are sacrificed to social interests. This sacrifice is
necessary, if the stability of society, if the continuity of social
existence, are to be maintained. But the interests of the
individual are incontestably sacrificed to social needs; and
the only benefit accruing to the individual out of the trans-
action, is that by means of this sacrifice he is enabled to lead
a diminished and impoverished existence — for outside the
society he can lead no existence at all, he cannot survive.
The individual has the choice between a diminished exist-
ence and no existence at all ; if life can in any way be
considered a blessing — and we have no possible justification
for an affirmative solution of the riddle, for we know nothing
of life and we have nothing known to compare it with — then
we may perhaps say that the individual's interests are
" reconciled " with the interests of society. Only let us not
imagine this " reconciliation " as implying that any remarkable
benefit accrues thereby for the individual, or as implying that
no positive sacrifice of individual interests is entailed thereby.
Religion is therefore the instrument whereby the sacrifice
of individual interests to social needs is obtained. Only quite
secondarily, from the point of view of its conception, and quite
subsequently, from the point of view of its historical develop-
ment, does religion minister to individual needs. First and
foremost it is a factor of social existence, a lever of social
evolution. It is primarily conceived and commences primarily
its functions, as a factor antagonistic to individual interests.
Primitive religion, far from being a source of consolation for
the individual, is on the contrary a source of perpetual
anguish, of never-ceasing impediments, of endless irksome
restraints, of incalculable terror and much misery. Even
when we rise to higher stages of culture we still find religious
belief marked by the same characteristics. We have only to
glance at the religious beliefs and practices of the Incas of
Peru, of the Aztecs of Mexico, or of the monotheistic Israelites,

INTRODUCTORY REMARKS 15

in order to judge of the terror inspired by them. We see the
individual ruthlessly sacrificed, condemned to appalling tortures
and torments, to the most cruel death, in order to appease the
gods, in order to satisfy the divine lust of blood. And again,
at the spectacle of the unspeakable terror inspired, and the
incalculable hardships caused, by these religious beliefs, we
may well ask the question : What benefit did the individual
derive from them, to what individual needs did they respond ?
Considered otherwise than as manifestations of what we may
term the collective mind, such beliefs must remain utterly
incomprehensible.

It is only very late in mental evolution that we see
religion beginning to temper severity with mildness, to blend
its prohibitions with consolations, to seek not only to curb
the individual by fear but to gain him by persuasion, to
mingle with the stern commands more tender appeals and
advice. The religion of Israel marks a beginning in this
direction, the deity of the time of the later prophets appears
possessed of more humanitarian sentiments than those attri-
buted to the old relentless Yahveh, whose Ten Commandments
represent him as a "jealous god," who visits the sins of the
fathers upon the offspring unto the third and fourth genera-
tion— commandments still included apparently in the
Protestant catechisms, however incompatible some of the
expressions contained in them may appear with the Christian
doctrine. But the great religious revolution, whereby religion,
whilst remaining true to its fundamental function of assuring
social integration and cohesion, became nevertheless a source
of unequalled consolation for individual distress, of unrivalled
hope and comfort for the individual — this great religious
revolution was the work of Christianity. Christianity proved
hereby its immense superiority, in that it succeeded — and
succeeded magnificently — in combining the defence of social
interests with the defence of individual interests, in acting at

16 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHKISTIANITY

the same time as the supreme restraint on the individual and
as the supreme consoler of the individual. Before Christianity,
no religion had succeeded in effecting any sort of moral
junction between the interests of society and those of the
individual — no religion, unless we except the religion of Israel
in its later stages, had ever made an effort to compensate the
restrictions imposed on the individual by rewards for comply-
ing with irksome and wearisome regulations, had ever sought
to gain the individual by persuasion as well as grinding him
down by terror. The superiority of Christianity, the wonder-
ful social adaptability possessed by it, consist essentially in
the exquisite blending of severity and mildness. By the
severity of the restraints imposed by it on the individual,
Christianity proved its adaptability to social necessities ; and
by the unequalled consolation it offered, on the other hand, to
the individual, Christianity proved its adaptability to individual
needs. The older religions only manifested the single aspect
of factors of social evolution ; Christianity manifested the double
aspect of a factor of social and of individual development.

It is precisely this double aspect presented by Christianity
that has been misunderstood alike by its admirers and by its
detractors. Admirers of Christianity have been too prone to
see only the consolations offered by it for individual distress,
the precepts inculcated by it with a view to furthering
individual development. Detractors of Christianity have
dwelt on the illusory nature of the consolations offered, on
the fallacious character of the hope founded on the insecure
basis of immortality ; and they have expatiated on the irk-
someness of the restraints imposed on individual liberty, of
the numerous restrictions whereby the expansion of the superior
individual, of the Super-Man, is curtailed and obstructed.
Both sides have grasped only one of the aspects of Christianity ;
and in their inability to perceive the counterpart of this one
aspect, they have diminished the part played by Christianity in

INTRODUCTORY REMARKS 17

human evolution. The admirers of Christianity, seeing only
the rights of the individual as safeguarded in the Christian
doctrine, seeing only the consolations offered to individual
distress, only the love and pity of Christ for the individual
struggling beneath the burden of his cross — these have tended
to overlook the other aspect of the Master's teaching, have
tended to forget the duties of the individual and the rights of
society, have tended to fall into a weak and sickly humani-
tarianism which must inevitably disintegrate society, shatter
the bonds of social cohesion and unity. The foes of Christianity,
of the type of Nietzsche, on the other hand, seeing only the
restraints and restrictions imposed on the individual, seeing
only in the teaching of Christ the antithesis of their ideal of
boundless individual expansion, have entirely neglected to take
into consideration the social value of those restraints, the social
significance of such restrictions. Hence we see the danger of
a one-sided, unilateral evaluation of the merits of Christianity
as a factor of human evolution. We must never neglect to
consider the double aspect of Christianity as an instrument
at once of social and of individual development. We must
not neglect to consider the rights and duties recognised by
Christianity as appertaining alike to society and to the individual.
Only when we consider Christianity under this double aspect,
when we consider it as realising an equilibrium between social
and individual interests, can we hope to judge rightly of its
value.

In truth, the equilibrium which Christianity has been
instrumental in realising between the interests of society and
those of the individual, represents as perfect an equilibrium as
it is humanly possible to imagine between interests which
are naturally and fundamentally antagonistic to each other.
The necessity of individual sacrifice is well recognised by
the Christian doctrine ; but this individual sacrifice, which
cannot be compensated for on earth and in this life, shall receive

2

18 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHRISTIANITY

adequate reward after death. The balance between social and
individual interests, which is so unfavourable in this life to
the individual interests, shall be adjusted in the life to come.
If the individual be condemned to sacrifice himself now to the
interests of society, he shall recover, so to speak, the lost part
of himself in Eternity. The diminished existence that he
must needs lead on earth is but the prelude to the integral life
beyond the tomb.

Under another aspect, again, we see the magnificent
adaptability of Christianity to social and to individual
necessities clearly manifesting itself. In primitive societies,
the individual mind is absolutely dominated by the collective
mind ; individual thought is nearly non-existent ; only in the
rarest cases is any scope allowed for the individual to exercise
his thinking faculties outside the sphere of the collective repre-
sentations, that is to say, of those representations coined by the
collective mind and imposed a priori on the individual. These
collective representations are of an essentially mystical nature,
they tend to grasp exclusively the subjective and mystical links
between phenomena, to neglect wholly the objective and concrete
links. Social progress, considered from a mental point of view,
consists in the diminution of the " sphere of influence " of col-
lective representations, in the liberation of individual thought
from the yoke imposed by the collective mind. Concurrently
with this diminution of the "sphere of influence" of collec-
tive representations, with this gradual liberation of individual
thought from the social yoke, and as a necessary effect of the
same, the formation of logical concepts becomes possible owing
to the progressive differentiation of the intellectual element
which, in the collective representations, is inextricably bound
up with other elements, of an affective and a motor nature.
But with the differentiation of the purely intellectual or
cognitive element, whereby the formation of logical concepts is
rendered possible and the growth of rational thought furthered,

INTRODUCTORY REMARKS 19

the antagonism between the interests of the society and those
of the individual cannot fail to manifest itself. In the
measure that the individual emancipates himself from the
tyranny of the collectivity, the power of the latter to impose
restrictions on individual liberty inevitably diminishes. The
rationally-minded individual will be less willing to accept the
necessity of sacrificing a part of his existence in the interests
of the future of society. In other words, the development of
rationalism leads to a development of individualism ; and the
development of individualism cannot but menace the foundations
of social existence. Hence the imperative necessity of effecting
an equilibrium between social and individual interests, whereby
the rights acquired by individual evolution are adjusted to the
fundamental necessities of social life. Such an equilibrium,
we have said, was realised by Christianity. Whilst fully
appreciating the necessities of social existence and adequately
safeguarding the interests of society accordingly, Christianity
did not commit the error — which would have been fatal in
view of the height already attained by mental evolution at the
epoch of its introduction — of treating the individual as a
negligible quantity, as a mere bouc dmissaire capable of being
indefinitely sacrificed to social needs. Whilst safeguarding
the interests of society, Christ was also careful to minister to
the needs of the individual. The duty of individual sacrifice
was inculcated, but at the same time compensation for this
sacrifice was offered.

The value of the equilibrium realised by Christianity
between individual and social interests can be the better
appreciated when we perceive the consequences that ensue
from a rupture of this equilibrium. Under existing conditions,
that have been gradually realised by long centuries of psycho-
logical evolution, such a rupture can be profitable only to the
individual ; the rupture must therefore have as its consequence
the overflowing of the tide of individualism, which menaces

20 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHKISTIANITY

to sweep away the foundations of society. Such appears
unfortunately to be the case in France to-day. The wise
restraints edicted by Christianity having been abandoned as
incompatible with revolutionary metaphysics, we see the
torrent of egotism steadily gaming in force every day,
threatening ever more and more the stability of French
society, and the incomparable edifice of French civilisation.

We set out then from the standpoint that Christianity is
not only a powerful factor of individual evolution, but also
an essential factor of social evolution. Its sociological value
resides in the fact that it established, at a momentous epoch
in the world's history, when the break-up of society appeared
to be imminent, an equilibrium between the interests of society
and those of the individual, that it set up a barrier against
individualism, whilst at the same time enhancing immeasurably
the value of human personality. The supreme importance of
Christianity lies far more in its objective sociological value,
than in its subjective individual value. For if it were a
mere individual phenomenon, a doctrine applicable solely to
individual needs, it would in no wise guarantee the continuity
of social existence — and consequently it would in no wise
preserve the individual himself from ultimate destruction. It
is time to transfer the justification of Christianity from the
unstable basis of individual aspirations and individual wants,
and to establish it on the sure basis of the sociological value
of the Christian doctrine. The Christian doctrine contains a
prescription for social ills and diseases, and not only a pre-
scription for individual woes. In that it points so clearly to
the path that leads to social salvation, Christianity eo ipso
points to the path that leads to individual salvation. For we
must bear in mind that the existence of the individual is
conditioned by that of society — that outside the society the
individual cannot be. In order, therefore, that the individual
may evolve normally, it is necessary that the society evolve

INTKODUCTOKY EEMAEKS 21

normally, that the stability of the society be guaranteed.
Individual welfare is subordinated to social welfare, even as
individual existence is subordinated to social existence. The
doctrine so greatly in favour to-day, and according to which the
welfare of the individual is the basis of the welfare of society,
is nothing but an inversion of the truth. The welfare of
society, the continuity of social existence — consequently the
welfare of the individual, the continuity of individual existence
— demand that individual conduct shall conform itself to
certain immutable rules. By conforming his conduct to these
rules, by curtailing his liberty in the interests of society, by
subordinating the satisfaction of his individual desires to the
stability of the social aggregate — the individual is enabled to
survive, albeit at the price of a sacrifice of part of his
personality. His survival, and consequently his welfare, are
thus conditioned by the survival and the welfare of society.

Hence those who would reduce Christianity to a mere
doctrine for the individual, reduce immeasurably its significa-
tion and value. A doctrine which conduces solely to the
satisfaction of individual aspirations and to the relief of
individual distress, is a doctrine condemned to an existence
as ephemeral as that of the individual. Only when we are
in a position to appreciate its sociological value, to judge of
its sociological purport, can we understand the extraordinary
persistence of that Christian belief and of those Christian
institutions which have survived, unchangeable, the changes
produced by twenty centuries of social evolution.

CHAPTEE II

RELIGION AND SOCIETY

THE study of the sociological value of Christianity brings us face
to face with the fundamental problem of the part played by
religion in social life. In the first chapter of the present
work we have observed that religious beliefs present them-
selves to us everywhere as instruments of social survival,
and that the great sociological task of religion is the securing
of an equilibrium between the individual and society, between
individual interests and social interests. We propose now to
examine at greater length this all-important question of the
influence of religion on social life.

In the early stages of culture, religion is essentially the
symbol of the unity of the social group, of the latter's power
of expansion. It is in religion that the idea of the collectivity
as such, that is to say, as a being per se apart from the
individuals that compose it, is realised — in religion that the
collectivity first attains to a consciousness of its existence.
Keligion is consequently the first form of organised thought
— it represents the first effort made towards a classification of
beings and objects. The first organisation of thought must
necessarily be a collective organisation, seeing that the
individual is completely submerged by the group, that

22

EELIGION AND SOCIETY 23

individual thought is wholly undifferentiated from collective
thought. Keligion being the earliest form of organised
thought; and this form being likewise that in which the
collectivity first attains to consciousness of its existence ; it
ensues that religion and society are, in primitive culture,
synonymous terms. All social laws, customs, and sanctions
appear clothed in a religious garb — emanate solely from the
religious beliefs. In a word, social laws properly so called
are non-existent at this stage of social evolution ; the only
laws extant are religious laws, for religion embraces in its
scope all human activities and all the spheres of thought which
are subsequently differentiated ; and such religious laws possess
immense influence and a vast authority, for the reason that
religion is synonymous with the collectivity, that religious
thought is synonymous with collective thought, and that no
form of organised thought other than the collective form as
yet exists.

As we observed in the first chapter, social progress is
characterised, from a psychological point of view, by the
ever -increasing differentiation of individual thought from
collective thought, by the gradual diminution of the " sphere
of influence " of collective representations, by the emancipa-
tion of the individual from the tyranny of the group. Only
in the measure that individual thought differentiates itself
from collective thought, does the formation of rational
concepts become possible — for such concepts can be evolved
only if the mystical collective representations, in which
the cognitive element is amalgamated with motor and
affective elements, lose their force and influence. Social
progress is rendered possible by intellectual progress ; and
intellectual progress is possible only if the individual contrive
to detach himself, in a certain measure, from society.

If the detachment of the individual from the collectivity
leads to the formation of rational concepts, rationalism tends

24 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHEISTIANITY

in its turn to develop individualism, consequently to loosen
the bonds of social solidarity. If this process be pursued far
enough, the break-up of society must necessarily be the
ultimate result. Hence we appear to be in presence of an
anomaly : social progress, considered from a psychological
point of view, consists in the development of a factor — i.e.
rationalism — incompatible with social integration, conse-
quently with the continuity of social existence. But if such
be indeed the social function of rationalism, the latter would
certainly never have been evolved ; seeing that the develop-
ment of an organ in a species that survives, is always a proof
of the utility of that organ, or at any rate of its indiffer-
ence— i.e. of such an organ being devoid of any biological
importance, consequently of its being incapable of producing
any harmful effects. The conclusion to be arrived at is, there-
fore, that the social function of rationalism cannot reside in its
tendency to produce social disruption — that its social func-
tion, on the contrary, must be one that responds to social
needs.

We find, as a matter of fact, that the social function of
rationalism consists in the latter's ability to secure the
adaptation of society to environing conditions with less
expenditure of social force. Thanks to the development of
rationalism, we are enabled to know better the great natural
laws which govern human evolution. This knowledge permits
us, not indeed to escape these laws, to which we must
invariably remain subject — but to foresee the consequences of
their operation. It permits us, not to suppress natural laws,
but to nullify the action of one natural force by the action of
another, to utilise such forces and to dispose of them for our
own profit. It permits us, further, to second the action of
laws whose working is beneficial to us : as in the case of
the law of selection. Natural selection is a negative process
which weeds-out unsatisfactory elements ; and the develop-

EELIGION AND SOCIETY 25

ment of our intellect and of our knowledge permits of our
completing natural selection by means of a reasoned social
selection, that is to say, by a positive process which " selects "
the eugenic elements of the race. By enabling us to
comprehend the working of natural laws, rationalism enables
us to put ourselves into harmony with these laws, to adapt
ourselves to them — thereby permitting a positive increase of
happiness, and a positive diminution of misery. Herein lies
the social function of rationalism.

But if rationalism is to fulfil its indispensable social
function, it must be limited. Unlimited rationalism conduces,
not to social welfare, but to social disintegration — for it leads
to an excessive unilateral assertion of individual rights,
assertion which is incompatible with the co-existence of
social rights. Having its basis in the individual reason, it
can be limited only by a power exterior to the individual.
In primitive stages of culture, the only power exterior to
the individual and superior to him, is society. But when
the individual is no longer completely submerged in the
group ; when his mentality is no longer entirely dominated
by the collective mentality — when his representations are
no longer co-extensive with the collective representations ;
then is evidently the power of society over him very
considerably reduced. First of all it is certain that precisely
that part of the individual which has emancipated itself from
social control, will not submit itself henceforth to an
authority that it has outgrown.

It is here that religion steps in. In primitive societies,
as we have said, religion and society are synonymous terms —
religious thought is synonymous with social thought. But, in
the measure that individual thought differentiates itself from
collective thought, the latter tends also to become ever less
co-extensive with religious thought. The differentiation of the
terms religion and society, is the counterpart of the differentia-

26 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHRISTIANITY

tion of the terms individual and society. In the later re-
ligions, notably in the religion of the Israelites and in Christi-
anity, we find ever more and more developed the idea of a
Moral Law exterior to society, and which at once dominates
society and completes the latter. In Christianity this idea of
the Moral Law attains the highest point of its evolution. In
Christianity we find the Moral Law acting at once as a rein-
forcement and as an extension of the social law. In other
words, the moral sphere contains the social sphere, but is not
limited by it.

The ethical religions, and especially Christianity, constitute
an extension of society and of the social law, in that they
subordinate directly to themselves that part of the individual
which has liberated itself from social control. Religion thus
/ imposes a limitation on rationalism, limitation which responds
to the necessities of social life. By limiting rationalism in
this way, religion adapts it therefore to its social function. By
subordinating directly to itself that part of individual life and
of individual thought which is no longer subject to the
tyranny of collective representations, religion restrains the
excessive development of egotism, and checks the too unilateral
and violent assertion of individual rights at the expense of
social rights. In primitive societies the social law is able to
control the entire personality ; in higher stages of culture, the
Moral Law of the ethical religions fulfils, in respect of the
" rationalised personality," the same task as the social law
originally fulfilled as regards the entire personality — and
which it still continues to fulfil, supported henceforth by the
sanctions of the Moral Law, as regards that part of human
conduct which is still " socialised."

We see, then, that the first social function of religion in
the higher stages of culture, is the limitation of rationalism,
with a view to adapting the latter, in its turn, to the social
function it is destined to fulfil. By means of the limitation

RELIGION AND SOCIETY 27

of rationalism, religion establishes an equilibrium between the
individual and society, in the interests of both. If rationalism
be not limited, this necessary equilibrium is destroyed —
for an unlimited development of reason leads to an unlimited
assertion of individual rights at the expense of social rights.
But as the individual cannot live outside society, as individual
existence is conditioned by social existence — it is evident that
immediate short-lived advantages must be sacrificed by the
individual to ultimate and permanent benefits, even though
— as is generally the case — he never reap the latter himself.
The equilibrium realised by religion, is realised by means of
the notion of Duty. Duty is a categorical imperative,
reinforced by an Absolute sanction. It constitutes the
counterpart of the notion of Rights ; and, in the moral system
of Christianity, an exact correlation between the two is
established, so that the rights of every individual — rights
which are conditioned by capacity — are exactly balanced by
his duties. Eeason suffices for the dictation of individual
rights ; but it is not capable of dictating to the individual the
corresponding duties — much less of attaching to the notion of
Duty the notion of an adequate sanction.

The limitation of the " rationalised personality " by
religion, as also the subordination of the still socialised part
of human conduct to social laws — both imply the sacrifice of
individual (i.e. egotistical) interests. In primitive societies,
where the individual is wholly under social control, this
sacrifice is effected without the slightest recompense being-
offered or, indeed, hoped for. It must not be thought that
primitive men are more disinterested than civilised ones —
for the psychological motives underlying human conduct
remain invariably the same. If primitive man sacrifices
himself to society without receiving or hoping for any
compensation, this is due solely to the fact that he is so
solidly embedded in the group to which he belongs, that his

28 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHKISTIANITY

existence as individual is reduced to the lowest possible
minimum. Living exclusively for the collectivity, thinking
almost exclusively by means of representations coined for
him a priori by the collectivity, dominated at every moment
of his existence by the all-absorbing influence of society, the
power of the latter is sufficient to compel him to make all the
sacrifices of his personal liberty required by the group. It is
only later, when the individual has emancipated himself in a
certain degree from social tyranny, when thought has become
partly rational, that the utility of sacrificing individual interests
to social interests will come to be questioned. As the necessity
of a certain sacrifice of egotism remains, it becomes indispens-
able to counterbalance the notion of sacrifice by the notion of
recompense.

As we observed in the first chapter, it will remain the
great merit of Christianity, and a proof of the wonderful
knowledge possessed by its founder and first organisers of
human psychology as well as of social necessities, that this
great religion took account of the individual as well as of
society. The rationalised human being is no longer in the
same situation as irrational primitive man. Christianity
understood this well. It understood that, when the individual
has once attained a certain degree of rational independence,
he is no longer a mere blind tool. True, the individual thus
rationalised is capable of obedience and submission, of sacrifice
and self-restraint ; but it is necessary that some compensation
for his sacrifice be offered him — that moral persuasion
strengthened by Hope replace the purely material tyranny of
early society. When the unlimited power of society in its
primitive stages no longer exists, the difficulty of curbing
egotism very considerably augments. Even when the ethical
religions, leaving moral persuasion aside, have recourse to
material acts of pressure, they cannot hope to make their
restraints anything like as efficacious as the restraints imposed

RELIGION AND SOCIETY 29

by primitive societies on their members. The reason for this
is that individualism and egotism, being derived from the
development of rational thought, cannot be curbed by acts of
material pressure, but only by an efficient moral control.
But a moral control, if it is to be efficacious, cannot neglect
the fundamental sentiments at the basis of the moral and
mental life of the individual, once this life commences to
evolve independently of collective representations — that is to
say, the egotistical sentiments. Such a moral control must,
to be efficacious, utilise these sentiments : and this is precisely
what Christianity did. Christianity restrained egotism in this
life by the hope of compensation hereafter — it vanquished
egotistical desires by other egotistical desires. In so doing, it
showed its consummate knowledge of human psychology, its
profound sense of realities. And not only that : but also its
profound sense of justice. For does not justice require that
Duty and Compensation be correlative notions ?

By means of these correlative notions of Duty and
Compensation, Christianity has realised as perfect an
equilibrium as possible between individual interests and social
interests. It has obtained the necessary sacrifice of the
individual to society ; and it has contrived, by means of the
promise of compensation, to make the sacrifice less one-sided —
it has contrived to unite the ideas of sacrifice and of justice.

II

In primitive societies the individual is very rigorously
incorporated by the group ; the latter, being small and un-
differentiated, is able to subordinate to itself the entire life of
each one of its members. The savage has practically no
existence outside his group ; his actions and thoughts alike
confound themselves with the actions and thoughts of society.
In these primitive stages of culture, the influence exerted by

30 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHKISTIANITY

society over the individual attains a degree of which civilised
man can form no adequate conception. In the measure that
social aggregates increase in size and that the functions and
structure of society become differentiated, the power of society
over the individual diminishes. In Western civilisation
to-day, society is too vast and too complex an organisation to
be able to control efficaciously the activity of its members.
The individual is too far removed from society for the latter
to be able to incorporate him with anything like the rigour
of primitive social groups ; in so extensive and so highly
differentiated an aggregate, the individual necessarily escapes
supervision, except in such cases when he commits the
particularly violent and flagrant acts of insubordination
designed as crimes. It becomes indispensable, under these
circumstances, for society to section itself into a number of
subdivisions, which, being less extensive, are better adapted
to the task of controlling the individual and of incorporating
him. Such subdivisions are constituted by the various
classes, professions, corporations, syndicates, etc. These serve
as intermediaries between the individual and the whole society.
Their dimensions being limited, they are, as we have said,
better able to incorporate and to control the individual, because
they stand nearer to him than does society as a whole, because
they embrace more directly the sphere of his daily activities
and interests.

In a strongly integrated society, in which religion has
secured a harmonious equilibrium between the individual and
society, between individual interests and social interests, all
such subdivisions are adapted to the end in view of which
they were evolved, namely, the " socialisation " of the individual.
The individual is, in such a case, attached to society by means
of the notion of Duty, and his egotism is subordinated to
higher, extra-individual aims ; this being so, he will work
through the agency of his class or professional organisation for

KELIGION AND SOCIETY 31

the benefit of the whole society. There where the subordination
of egotism to extra-individual aims, and the consequent
integration of society, are adequately realised thanks to
religious influences, the individual is adapted to society ; and
the various subdivisions of the latter are similarly adapted to
the needs of the whole.

But when the bonds of social solidarity are slackened,
when individualism — that is to say, egotism — gains the upper
hand over the sentiment of fraternity, when the great notion
of social duty is obscured ; then will the individual seek to
convert the class into an instrument of social disintegration.
The class is then no longer adapted to its natural function,
which we have seen to be that of " socialising " the individual,
of binding the individual more securely to the social aggregate.
The social subdivision, be it class or professional organisation,
becomes a mere instrument whereby the egotistical interests
of the individuals composing the subdivision in question may
be more easily and more conveniently satisfied. Such is the
state of affairs in Western society at the present day — a state
of affairs that we see peculiarly well shown-up in contemporary
France. French society, as we have pointed out elsewhere,
is divided up into a number of heterogeneous groups,
each at war with the other, and all of them equally destitute
of any comprehension of the wider interests of the nation.
While the working classes, following the instructions of their
leaders, have transformed the labour syndicates into so many
revolutionary organisations ; while the bourgeoisie has considered
the power entrusted to it simply as a means for enriching
itself and for satisfying sectarian hatred, absolutely regardless
of what the consequences may be; we see great bodies of"
public servants, like the Post Office employees and the rail-
road employees, deliberately paralysing the entire life of a
great nation, and exposing the latter to the gravest perils in
case of invasion, in order that some personal grievances, real

32 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHEISTIANITY

or imaginary, may be redressed. If the dangers of class
egotism, as we would call the egotism of any one of the
subdivisions, such as the class or the professional organisation,
that go to make up society, be particularly manifest in France ;
this does not mean that similar class egotism is non-existent
elsewhere. Unfortunately it is rampant everywhere ; and
everywhere it produces dire results.

We have seen that religion ensures an equilibrium between
the individual and society by means of the notion of Duty :
it impresses on the individual the necessity of fulfilling his
duty towards society, of sacrificing his egotistical interests to
the welfare of the collectivity. Evidently, if religion be an
active force in social life, the individual, mindful of his duty
towards society, will seek to utilise the force inherent to his
class or to his professional organisation, in order to further
exclusively social interests. This being so, we see that the
adaptation of the class or of the professional organisation to
their respective social functions, in other words, the limitation
of what we have termed class egotism, result from the
adaptation of the individual to his social functions, that is to
say, from the limitation of individual egotism. Thus if the
individual be strongly integrated in society, the class and the
professional organisation will be ipso facto elements of social
cohesion. But if the individual be detached from society, if
the bonds of social solidarity are slackened by the growth of
egotism, the individual can nevertheless remain strongly
attached to his class or to his professional organisation, or to
both ; and, in this case, as we have seen, such subdivisions
will become active elements of social disintegration, because
they are henceforth instruments for furthering egotistical
interests at the expense of collective interests. In other
words, the integration of the individual in society implies a
similar integration of the social subdivisions ; but, on the
other hand, the integration of the individual in any one of these

KELIGION AND SOCIETY 33

subdivisions, does not imply his integration in society — neither
does it imply the integration of such subdivisions.

When religion has ensured an equilibrium between the
individual and society, it has ipso facto ensured an equilibrium
between the subdivisions of society and the whole. We may
say therefore that a third social function of religion consists
in establishing harmonious relations between society and its
various subdivisions, such as the class, the professional organisa-
tion, etc. The establishment of such harmonious relations
implies the realisation of an equilibrium between those sub-
divisions. Egotism in one class engenders egotism in the
others. The abuse made by one class of the strength inherent
to it, will necessarily cause a weakening of the social feelings
in the other classes, a diminution of their attachment to the
collectivity, to the respublica. The cynical misuse of their
power and riches by the bourgeois classes has necessarily had
as its counterpart the misuse of their power by the working-
classes, the destruction of all sentiment of social duty, of social
solidarity, in the latter. An equilibrium must be established
between the classes, based on the idea of the duty of each
class being proportionate to its power, capacity, and rank.
Only when the liabilities of each class as regards the
collectivity are proportioned to what may be called the
patrimony of the class, and only when each class is strictly
bound to perform the duties attributed to it, can we expect
class egotism to give way to wider sentiments of social
solidarity. Social solidarity is conditioned by a sliding-scale
of reciprocal class duties that are scrupulously fulfilled.

Although the growth of the social sentiment in the
individual engenders the growth of the social sentiment in
the class, yet religion — or, at all events, the Christian
religion — does not content itself with inculcating only to
the individual the notion of Duty. Christianity addresses
itself directly to the classes, inculcates directly to the classes

3

34 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHRISTIANITY

the duty of subordinating class interests to social interests.
The class has two great duties which merge one into the other :
a duty towards society as a whole, and a duty towards each of
the other classes. The duty of the classes towards each other
confounds itself with their duty towards the whole society.
Only when each class fulfils its obligations towards the other,
does it fulfil its obligations towards the collectivity, towards
the respublica. Even as duty and responsibility increase
with individual capacity, so do they likewise increase with the
rank of the class — for the rank of the class depends, or ought
to depend, on the average capacity of the individuals com-
posing it.

The social integration realised by religion implies therefore
the checking of individual egotism, and of class egotism.
When the former is checked, the latter will ipso facto be held
under restraint. Vice versa does the growth of individual
egotism always entail the correlative growth of class egotism.
Egotism being naturally the most powerful sentiment in
individual life, the tendency must always be present to make
use of the power and influence derived from the class, in order
to further egotistical interests. Present in all classes, such a
tendency is inevitably stronger in the classes at the top of the
social hierarchy. It requires discipline of a rare force to be
able to prevent the individual with much capacity, much
power, and many riches, from misusing these advantages — to
be able to induce him to employ these advantages for the
collective welfare, rather than for individual welfare. ^ The
biographer of Jesus of Nazareth tells us that the young man
whom the Master counselled to sell his goods and give the
proceeds to the poor, went away very sorrowful — for he was
rich. And Jesus pronounced the words that millionaire
Christian company promoters prefer to pass over in silence :
" It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle, than
for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God." The words do not

RELIGION AND SOCIETY 35

signify that Jesus condemned riches per se. But Jesus saw in
wealth, not an end, but a means to an end — a means for doing
good to the community. When he said that the rich shall have
difficulty in entering the kingdom of God, he was insisting on
the immense difficulty, for the rich man, of combating egotism,
of putting his wealth at the service of higher ideals, of not em-
ploying that wealth solely for the satisfaction of egotistical wants
and desires. And thereby did Jesus once more manifest his
profound knowledge of human life and of the human character.
Difficult indeed is it to prevent the individual succumbing
to a narrow egotism. The picture of the narrow path and the
narrow gate that lead to salvation, is an exceedingly true symbol
of the immense and manifold difficulties that await the
individual at every step of his career as a social being —
difficulties that increase in the measure that capacity, power,
rank, wealth, increase. Powerful indeed must be the force
which is able to restrain and to curb egotism, to integrate the
individual so solidly in society that he is willing to sacrifice him-
self in the interests of social welfare. In primitive societies,
as we have said, the question does not arise — seeing that the
life of the individual is almost entirely absorbed in the life
of the collectivity. But in the societies of Western civilisation,
where the individual is in so large a measure detached from
society, where he in so large a measure escapes social control
— the problem becomes at once a redoubtable one. For the
continuity of social existence depends on the repression of
egotism — and, in the first place, of individual egotism, seeing
that class egotism is but a derivation from the former. To
attempt to repress egotism, in Western society, by means of
material compulsion, is useless ; the only efficacious restraint
can be a moral one. The individual being in so large a
measure detached from society, it is likewise evident that
society is not in a position to impose anything like adequate
discipline on him. It must therefore needs be a power

36 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHEISTIANITY

superior to society, to which recourse must be had ; and this
power is a moral one. By far the most satisfactory moral
power is religion, for alone the commands issued in the name
of religion possess a sufficient force, and are backed by sufficient
sanctions, to be able to impose themselves as categorical im-
peratives. Eeligion being thus the only force capable of
imposing adequate restraints on egotism, it ensues that alone
religion can guarantee social integration — that religion is thus
the instrument best adapted to the maintenance of social life.

A fourth social function of religion is therefore the securing
of social integration. We have seen that religion limits
rationalism, in the interests of society, by subordinating to
itself that part of the individual which escapes all social
control — what we have called the " rationalised personality " of
the individual. This subordination of the individual is obtained
by means of the creation of a powerful ideal that dominates
individual existence ; and by means of the notion of Duty,
conceived of as a categorical imperative supported by adequate
sanctions. Only if the individual be subordinated to a higher
power, can egotism be restrained ; and only if egotism be
restrained, can the equilibrium between individual interests
and social interests, which we have seen to be indispensable
to the continuity of social existence, be realised. But the
subordination of the individual to a power higher than himself,
can itself be effective only if the individual be strongly and
solidly integrated in society — only if the idea of Duty presents
itself to him with irresistible force, in such a manner that he
be willing to sacrifice to Duty a part of himself and his interests.
Thus is social integration the fundamental condition of social
life ; and the social function of religion which we have
enunciated last is in reality the primordial function — for only
if this function be satisfactorily accomplished can the other
functions be carried out.

It must not for a moment be supposed that the four social

KELIGION AND SOCIETY 37

functions of religion successively enunciated by us are distinct
and separate functions. On the contrary, they merge into
each other, condition each other— are, in fact, various aspects
of the one fundamental function of securing social integration.
Only if society be sufficiently integrated can the individual be
subordinated to a higher ideal and to a higher law ; and only
if he be thus subordinated, can the necessary equilibrium
between the individual and society, between society and its sub-
divisions, be established. If society is sufficiently integrated,
if the notion of social Duty have sufficient hold over the
individual, then will the individual be willing to subordinate
his interests to those of society — then will the equilibrium
between the individual and society be realised. Everything
thus depends on social integration — on the efficacity of the
principles on which the notion of Duty is based, on the
efficacity of the sanction which gives to this notion the character
of a categorical imperative. As we have said, no principles
appear so efficacious as religious principles, no sanction so
powerful as the religious sanction. By removing the Moral Law
to the domain of the Absolute, religion effectively takes away
from the individual all possibility of discussion. Its commands,
emanating as they do from a sphere into which the human
reason cannot penetrate, appear as something unquestionable.
The system of Christianity possesses immense social efficacity,
in that it not only subordinates to itself that "rationalised
personality " which escapes all social control ; but also in that
it reinforces social laws by representing the latter as approved
by the Moral Law, and by requiring, in consequence, submission
to such social laws as a duty towards the Moral Law. Reddite
quae sunt Caesaris, Caesari ; et quae sunt Dei, Deo — this is a
command which embraces the whole extent of individual
life, and which indicates the conduct that the individual is to
observe in regard both to social and to moral (or religious)
laws. He is to submit himself to social laws ; and, in respect

38 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHKISTIANITY

of those acts and thoughts not under social control, he is to
be subordinate to the Moral Law.

Ill

The idea of a moral law superior to social law is entirely
absent from primitive conceptions. In primitive societies, not
only is there no moral law apart from the social law, but the
latter is itself destitute of any moral element. The " morality "
of the savage, which Herbert Spencer believed to represent a
primitive golden age destroyed by the advent of civilisation,
is in reality entirely lacking in any ethical basis. In a word,
primitive " morality " is of a magical, and not of an ethical,
nature. If the savage refrains from committing certain acts,
this is due, not to any comprehension of what right or wrong
means, but to fear of certain magical consequences which
must automatically ensue if the acts in question be committed.
The only criminals, in early stages of culture, are those who
violate the law of taboo. It is in the form of taboo that the
first prohibitions are issued, that the first restraints on
individual liberty are enforced. If the negative elements of
savage " morality " are thus based on fear of certain magical
consequences that ensue if prohibited acts are committed ; so
are the positive elements similarly inspired by fear of the
magical consequences that ensue if acts that are expressly
enjoined be left undone. The abstention from certain acts,
and the perpetration of certain other acts, have an identical
motive, which is wholly unethical in its nature.

Ethical laws being entirely unknown to the primitive
mentality, it is evident that the relations of the individual to
society cannot be regulated by any moral conceptions. Moral
laws, as we have observed, are unknown to primitive societies.
From a sociological point of view, this absence of any ethical
element in early culture is explained by the fact that the

KELIGION AND SOCIETY 39

individual is completely submerged in society — that he has
scarcely any existence as individual apart from his existence
as a cell of the social organism, which latter dominates com-
pletely his whole life. Under these circumstances the moral
law has no sociological function to fulfil ; and it is consequently
non-existent. The development of the moral law is correlative
of the development of rationalism. The growth of the rational
spirit, the progressive emancipation of the " rationalised
personality " from the tyranny of the group, are the factors
that engender the moral law ; and they must necessarily
engender such a law, if society is not to fall to pieces.

In the measure that rationalism gains ground, does the
individual detach himself from the collectivity. The material
pressure exercised on him in early stages of culture becomes
insufficient, once the differentiation of the individual from the
group has progressed far enough. We see therefore — as we
have previously remarked — the separation of the individual
and society accompanied by a process, whereby society andf
religion tend to become ever more and more differentiated
from each other. But the differentiation between society and
religion does not, like the differentiation between society and
the individual, signify the growth of an antagonism between
the two. This differentiation does not imply a separation,
much less an antagonism. Eeligion* continues to be allied to
society, the religious (or moral) law supports and reinforces the
social law, the authority of which it backs-up by means of
supra-social sanctions. But religion is no longer identical
with society ; henceforth it dominates the latter. Keligious
law is no longer identical with social law ; the sphere of the
former is henceforth wider, and embraces also the sphere of
the social law. In other words : whereas, in primitive culture,
religion and society are identical conceptions ; whereas, in
these early stages, religious law is synonymous with social
law ; religion becomes later an extension of society, religious

40 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHKISTIANITY

law becomes an extension, a completion, of social law. In
primitive societies, no need exists for completing the social
law by a higher law, seeing that the individual is wholly
submerged in society, is dominated in all his acts and thoughts
by the authority of society — seeing that the material pressure
which society is able to bring to bear on him, suffices alike to
restrain him from action and to prompt him to action. Only
in the measure that the individual, as a result of mental
evolution, detaches himself from the collectivity and contrives
thereby to escape social control, does it become necessary, in
the interest of the continuity of social existence, to reinforce
and complete the authority of society by the authority of the
Moral Law — that is to say, of a law capable of controlling
that part of human conduct which henceforth escapes the
control of the social law.

Keligion is thus a social creation, created by society with
a view to safeguarding its own interests as against the
individual. In primitive stages of culture, religion and
society are identical conceptions, for religion is the first form
in which thought organises itself, and it is in this form that
society first attains to consciousness of its existence as a
collectivity, that is to say, as a being per se, distinct from
the individuals composing it. The earliest form of law and
morals, as of all other functions of social life, whether economic,
esthetic, intellectual, or political, is the religious form — it is
from religious beliefs that all the varied manifestations of
social activity, which have subsequently differentiated them-
selves in the course of social evolution, derive in the first
instance. Social evolution is one long-continued process of
differentiation, whereby ever-increasing heterogeneity has gradu-
ally replaced an original homogeneity. As social aggregates
increased in dimension and in complexity ; as the primitive
forms of mentality gave way to higher forms ; so was it
inevitable that religion, in the long run, should differentiate

EELIGION AND SOCIETY 41

itself from society, even as the individual differentiated himself
and slowly emerged from the social group. In the early
stages of culture, religion was not only a social creation, but
also an exclusively social element ; in later stages, while
remaining a social creation, it widened itself and extended its
boundaries beyond the limits of society. Being originally
identical with social law, religion knew no higher sanction for
conduct than a purely material sanction ; only later, when it
outgrew, so to speak, the sbcial law, could religion create
sanctions of a moral nature.

We may say, therefore, that when social evolution had
arrived at a stage at which the differentiation of the individual
and of society could proceed no further without the existence
of society being seriously menaced, a correlative differentiation
of social law and of religious law became indispensable. Society
could only hope to maintain a certain authority over the
individual by projecting, so to speak, its authority into the
sphere of the Absolute — by giving unto its authority an
extension outside the limits of the finite world. The
" rationalised personality " of the individual being henceforth
independent of social control, it was indispensable that it be
submitted to an authority exterior to society : and no authority
above society can be found, unless we cross the frontiers of the
Kelative and enter the domain of the Absolute. In its early
stages religion is limited by society — for society has no need
of a reinforcement of its authority from outside, seeing that the
individual is sufficiently integrated in the group. But in
later stages religion exceeds the limits of society, ej^n as the
individual exceeds them. Society being unable t# control the
" rationalised personality " of the individual, needs a power
exterior to itself, and which surpasses it, in order to bring this
rationalised personality to submission.

The sociological function of religious belief remains essenti-
ally the same in all stages of social evolution ; the methods

42 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHEISTIANITY

alone whereby that function is fulfilled, modify themselves
in view of the adaptation of the function to changed conditions.
Social integration would never have been realised had it not
been for religion — for it is in its religious beliefs, as we have
said, that society first attains to the consciousness of its
existence. The formation of society is thus due to religion,
and the continuity of social existence is conditioned by the
continuity of religious beliefs. Only when collective thought
had organised itself, could it hope to impose itself a priori on
the individual — only then could obedience be imposed on the
individual in the form of a categorical imperative. Collective
thought, in the shape of collective beliefs, imposes itself in early
stages of culture with such extraordinary force, because in-
dividual thought is not organised — is, indeed, hardly existent.
Not until individual thought has become organised by means of
rational concepts, from which the mystical elements imposed
by collective thought are banished, does the individual attain
to a consciousness of his personality — that is to say, of his
existence as individual, apart from his existence as a mere
social element. In early stages of culture, the subordina-
tion of the individual to collective aims is thus easy of
accomplishment ; for alone collective thought is organised,
alone the collectivity has attained to consciousness of its
existence, consequently to consciousness of its power ; whereas
individual thought is as yet wholly unorganised, the individual
is as yet wholly ignorant of a personal existence distinct
from his social existence. He is therefore at the mercy
of the collectivity. But the collectivity can itself exist only
as a religious collectivity. Without an organised system of
collective beliefs there is no collectivity, but only a number
of loose atoms without cohesion. Eeligion is therefore not
merely a social force, but the social force par excellence.

In order to survive, a society must be able to adapt itself
to a modified environment. Ipso facto must religion, which

KELIGION AND SOCIETY 43

conditions social existence, likewise possess sufficient plasticity
and adaptability. This we have seen to be the case. When
the conditions of social life have been completely modified
by the growth of rationalism, by the evolution of individual
thought and individual self-consciousness, religion extends its
boundaries, widens its scope, takes on new forms, in order to
continue the fulfilment of the same indispensable social function.
When society has need of a reinforcement of its authority,
has need of a power higher than itself in order to subordinate
the individual, who has outgrown his former limited existence
— then do we find religion abandoning its original mechani-
cal character, and assimilating to itself new elements, of a
moral nature. Commands and prohibitions are no longer
accompanied by material, automatic sanctions; the sanction
for conduct becomes a moral one, it is transported to a world
into which human reason cannot penetrate, and which is
therefore superior to all rational criticism.

Individual interests being invariably in latent antagonism
to social interests ; and the latter being guaranteed by the
authority of religious belief, by the categorical imperative of
the Moral Law ; it was inevitable that rationalism should seek
to undermine this Moral Law, should seek to deprive it of
its Absolute character, and thereby render it accessible to
rational criticism. Having outgrown the authority of the
social law, with its purely material sanctions, it could not be
expected that individual thought remain henceforth stationary
— rational thought could not be expected to submit itself
permanently to the Moral Law, which is but an extension
of the social law, the result of the removal of the power
always necessary to ensure individual subordination, to a
higher sphere, inaccessible to rational research and criticism,
nationalism, having carried by storm the first line of entrench-
ments defending the fortress of society, was held up for a
time by the inner line of entrenchments, more formidable and

44 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHKISTIANITY

more difficult of access than the first ones; but, at a given
moment, it was bound to renew the assault, bound to turn its
batteries against these inner entrenchments. The individual
had liberated himself from the greater number of the
irksome restraints imposed on him by society; nevertheless
he found his dearly-won liberty always curtailed, he found
that at nearly every step forward new barriers confronted
him, obstructing his further progress on the road of self-
assertion. In the measure that his thought emancipated
itself from the tyranny of collective representations, that the
consciousness of his personality developed itself, the individual
found himself confronted by the Moral Law, which, spectre-
like, escaped all the efforts made to grasp it. Little by little
the " sphere of influence " of the collective representations had
been diminished, the vast network of mystical links connecting
phenomena had been progressively reduced. The number of
phenomena rendered accessible to rational interpretation had
constantly increased ; and with this increase in the number of
phenomena subjected to rational observation and criticism
— with the concurrent decrease of the influence and authority
of collective religious beliefs — it was inevitable that a decrease
in the power of the collectivity over the individual should go
hand in hand. For the entire regulation of human conduct
was intimately and inextricably bound up with those beliefs
whose influence and authority were constantly diminishing. In
the measure that the notion of taboo ceased to find credence,
must the power of that notion to prohibit certain acts neces-
sarily have diminished. In the measure that magical ideas in
general ceased to be believed in, must the power of such ideas
to induce the individual to commit various acts of obedience,
chastity, hospitality, etc., have likewise diminished. Thus
individual conduct was gradually freed from many restraints ;
and the fundamental notion of individual Duty must sooner
or later have shared the fate of the collective beliefs on which

KELIGION AND SOCIETY 45

it was founded, and which constituted its sanction. And yet,
despite the immense reduction of the " sphere of influence " of
mystical collective representations during the many centuries
that separate the earliest religious beliefs from the advent of
monotheism, the individual still found himself dominated, at
the latter epoch, by the notion of Duty — still found himself
nearly as far removed as formerly from the goal of integral
liberty. The automatic sanction for conduct which, in
primitive stages of culture, must have been so wonderfully
efficacious, no longer existed ; for belief in taboo, and other
magico-religious beliefs of a similar nature, had vanished.
The material sanction still remaining for various acts of a
peculiarly delictuous character, although acting as a certain
restraint, clearly could not possess the efficacity of the
automatic sanction of former times, seeing that the individual
had always the possibility of escaping detection, and con-
sequently of escaping punishment. It seemed therefore as if
the individual must soon arrive at his complete emancipation
from all the restraints implied by the notion of Duty, in
view of the absence of all adequate sanction accompanying
this notion.

Nevertheless was this not the case. In the measure that
the old beliefs with their automatic material sanctions for
conduct were undermined by the progress of rationalism, new
beliefs with new sanctions took their place : the power that the
collectivity lost on earth, so to speak, it regained in heaven.
The primitive automatic sanctions for conduct could not in
the long run withstand the development of rational observation
and rational criticism. But the moral sanctions, vested in the
hands of an Omnipotent and Omnipresent Deity, were beyond
the domain of observation and criticism. The individual
found himself still checked and hampered at every step, by means
of an extension in the direction of the Infinite and Absolute of the
same collective representations, the power of which had been so

46 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHRISTIANITY

greatly reduced within the sphere of the finite and relative. The
sanction for conduct, although no longer automatic and
material, was none the less unavoidable, seeing that the
culprit could not possibly escape detection. Duty, together
with the restraints implied by it on individual liberty,
remained as rigorously sanctioned as before — albeit in a
different manner ; and the sanction appeared the more
formidable, because it descended on the culprit in a mys-
terious way unknown to us, because mortal eye could not
judge of its effects. In a word, the individual had but
exchanged one yoke for another ; and the second yoke could
never possibly be removed, seeing that the Moral Law is by
its nature eternal, because Absolute.

Under these circumstances it was inevitable, as we have
said, that rationalism should seek to deprive the Moral Law of
its absolute character, should seek to place it within the
domain of the relative, alone accessible to rational criticism.
So long as the individual remained subjected to a Moral Law
beyond the control of rational judgment, was it impossible
for him to escape from restrictions that prevented the satis-
faction of some of the strongest egotistical desires. The so-
called Protestant Reformation of the sixteenth century, which
had been prepared by the intellectual movement during the
two preceding centuries, can only be properly appreciated,
from a sociological point of view, if we see in it the first
systematic attempt made by rationalism to undermine the
Moral Law by reducing the latter to a mere phenomenon —
by withdrawing it from the domain of the Absolute in order
to render it accessible to observation and criticism. True, the
Protestant theologians of the sixteenth century still held fast
to the notion of an immutable and absolute Moral Law which
they identified with God; but by declaring that the Moral
Law is revealed unto each individual, that the individual finds
in himself the germs of this Law implanted by God, and that

KELIGION AND SOCIETY 4*7

he must develop those germs in the manner which appears
best to him and which best satisfies his reason — by this
teaching, based on the fundamental idea underlying all
Protestantism, namely, that the criterion of truth is within
the individual, Protestant theologians opened wide the gates
to all subsequent rational criticism. We may thus consider
Protestantism as the first decisive step on the road that
leads to the disintegration of Western society.

The Moral Law can possess efficacity, can fulfil its
sociological function of subordinating the individual to society,
only if it be placed beyond the reach of criticism, only if it
be rendered independent of the fluctuations of individual
judgment. The Protestant doctrine of subjectivism under-
mines the foundations of social integration, in that it removes
the criterion of truth from a power exterior to the individual,
in order to place it within the individual. And if the
individual be himself the measure of all truth, he is ipso facto
liberated from all obedience to laws that are not of his own
making. This being so, it ensues necessarily that the
individual can invariably follow the inclinations of his
passions, of his personal likes and dislikes — can invariably
give full satisfaction to his egotistical wants and desires ; for
all his acts can be justified by the appeal to his individual
conscience, that is to say, to a tribunal that is extra-territorial
in the fullest sense of the word, to a tribunal which escapes
all exterior control. The doctrines of individualist anarchism
as preached by Stirner and Nietzsche, descend legitimately
from the subjective moralism of Kant and from the teaching
of Calvin and Luther. Once it is admitted that the individual
is himself the measure of all truth, the doors are thrown
open to every aberration, to the most extreme doctrines of
individualism contained in S timer's famous book, as well
as to the most pernicious forms of religious folly, such as
Anabaptism.

48 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHRISTIANITY

The integration of the societies composing Western
civilisation can be effected only if the criterion of truth be
exterior to the individual, only if the individual be subjected
to a higher law accepted quod semper, quod ubique, quod
omnibus. But a moral law based on subjectivism can never
be universal, for universality and individuality are two
conceptions that are opposed to each other. A proposition
can become an universal truth only if all the individuals
composing society at a given moment bow down before a law
recognised as superior to them — before a law which is above
the subjective judgment of the individual. There is no such
thing as individual morality, any more than there exists such
a phenomenon as individual religion : there can only be a
collective morality, even as there can only be a collective
religion. When it is proposed to lay the foundations of
ethical law in the individual conscience, then is the whole
nature and raison d'etre of ethical law misunderstood. Morals,
like religion which is their natural basis, are not an individual
phenomenon, but an exclusively social phenomenon. They
must therefore have their foundation, not in the individual,
but in society — not in individual beliefs, but in collective
beliefs. They do not, any more than does religion, exist
primordially for the benefit of the individual ; if the individual
gains any profit from them, it is but secondarily. They exist
for the benefit of society, by whom they are created. A
subjective moral law is thus a contradiction : the moral law
cannot have a subjective basis, because it is not a law invented
by the individual for individual benefit, but a law created
by society in the latter's interests. Even as religion must
necessarily have a basis exterior to the individual, because it
is a social creation destined to subordinate the individual to
society ; so must morals have a supra-individual basis, for the
Moral Law is essentially a religious law, and its aim therefore
confounds itself with the aim of religion in general, namely,

KELIGION AND SOCIETY 49

the subordination of the individual, the repression of
egotism.

The sociological study of religion and morals leads us, as
will be seen, to very different conclusions from those generally
accepted both in orthodox and in non-orthodox schools of
thought. The general view prevailing is that religion exists
primarily, if not exclusively, for the benefit of the individual ;
and only quite secondarily, if indeed at all, for the benefit of
society. The sociologist will come to a diametrically opposite
conclusion, as soon as he seeks to analyse alike the nature of
religious belief, and the deeper causes which underlie the
persistence of that belief, under various forms, in all societies
at all times and in all latitudes. Everywhere does the nature
of religious belief manifest itself as an organisation of collective
representations imposed on the individual in the interests of
society. Everywhere do we find these collective representa-
tions, in one shape or another, persisting and maintaining
themselves, because the existence of society depends on the
existence of such representations. If we consider religion as
existing for the benefit of the individual; if we regard its
precepts, prohibitions, commands, and representations in
general, as having been created by the individual conscience
in response to individual needs ; then indeed, as we observed
in the first chapter, does religion remain an inexplicable
enigma. Christianity, as we have said, is the religion that
takes most count of the individual ; and yet how greatly does
even Christianity restrain individual liberty !

It follows that religion, and the Moral Law which is
derived from religion, must be studied, not in the individual,
but in society. The value of every institution resides in its
capacity to fulfil the function for which it was created : this
is the sole criterion which science, the product of rational
thought, possesses whereby to judge of the value of any
institution. Consequently can the value of a religious system

4

50 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHRISTIANITY

be appreciated only according to the ability manifested by
such a system to fulfil the sociological function of religion in
general — which we have seen to be the maintenance of social
integration, the obtention of an equilibrium between social
interests and individual interests. The first question to be
put, therefore, when examining the merits of a religious system,
is this: In what measure has that system succeeded in
maintaining social integration, in reconciling individual
interests and social interests by subordinating the former to
the latter ? The value of a religious system can be judged
only from the point of view of society, not from the point of
view of the individual, seeing that religion is a social creation,
and that its function is a social function. It is only natural
that the majority of persons should judge their religious beliefs
according to the amount of personal satisfaction derived by
them from such beliefs. The man of science must rise to a
higher level, he must make abstraction of the individual claim
to happiness, and judge of a religious system according to its
social capacities. Only when we invert the traditional point
of view — only when, instead of seeking the value of a religion
in its effects on our subjective personality, we seek it in the
ability of that religion to fulfil its sociological function — only
then can we hope to judge religion from a really objective
point of view.

CHAPTEE III

THE THEORY AND THE PRACTICE OF CHRISTIANITY

IF it be permissible for theologians to endeavour to separate
theory and practice in Christianity, to distinguish between the
teaching of Jesus and the concrete applications of this teaching
realised by the Church, such artificial distinctions are impossible
when we undertake to study the sociological value of the
Christian doctrine. The social effects of Christ's teaching
could certainly not be expected to manifest themselves during
the three short years of his ministry ; neither can we expect
to judge adequately of them during the four centuries of the
primitive Church. Only when the Church was definitely
victorious, only after the assembling of the Council of Mcea
in 325, or even later, after the death of Theodosius in 395,
could the seed sown by Jesus Christ, and which had germin-
ated during nearly four hundred years, ripen to maturity.
The social effects of Christianity must necessarily be judged
according as they asserted themselves under the influence of a
Christian regime, acting on an entirely Christianised society.
Even as a tree can be judged only by its fruit, which develops
after a certain period of growth ; so can the sociological value
of Christianity be judged only by the social results obtained
through the working of institutions having attained to maturity,
and possessing consequently sufficient vitality and sufficient
force to enable them to show adequately all the capacity
inherent to them.

51

52 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHKISTIANITY

For this reason we deem it better to speak, not so much
of the sociological value of the gospel, as of the sociological
value of Christianity. The social purport of the former could
not be in any way guessed until the gospel had had the
opportunity of being applied ; and the application of the
gospel teaching to society was only possible after the triumph
of Christianity, after the Christianising of the peoples of Europe,
after the consolidation of Christian institutions. It is a
strange claim, that which is so often made, that we must go
back to its first origins in order to be able to appreciate
Christianity. We can, on the contrary, appreciate the value
of Christian doctrine as far as it affects society, only when we
see that doctrine applied to a considerable social aggregate,
only when we are in a position to judge of its effects on a
social body formed and moulded under the influence of Christian
precepts and Christian ideals. It is just as reasonable to ask
us to judge the sociological value of Christianity according to
the sole teaching of Christ, without stopping to consider the
concrete applications to society of the theories formulated in
the gospel — as it would be to ask us to judge the intellectual
value of a renowned philosopher or scientist by a simple
analysis of the intellectual manifestations of his childhood.
Most certainly does the organisation of the child condition and
limit the intellectual capacity of the man ; and the teaching
of Christ, in a similar manner, conditions and limits the
sociological capacities of the Church founded by him. But
the capacity, in both cases, can manifest itself adequately only
when, after a preliminary period of growth and development,
the functions and structure have attained a certain degree of
evolution permitting them, so to speak, to put forth their
whole strength.

We must therefore, in effecting a survey of Christianity
from the sociological point of view, complete the theories
formulated in the gospel by the concrete application of these

THEORY AND PRACTICE OF CHRISTIANITY 53

theories to social conditions which was realised by the Church.
If we find that the application of the gospel theories made by
the Church was, on the whole, beneficial to society ; then we
may unhesitatingly say that the social value of Christianity
has been duly proved.

Herbert Spencer very rightly observed that the great
superstition of our time is the superstition of the divine right
of parliaments. Had the illustrious philosopher analysed more
closely the nature of this prevailing and highly mischievous
superstition, he would have seen that it is but a derivation
from the democratic idea as a whole, which can be resumed in
the catchpenny phrase, "Government for the people, by the
people." The infallible and sovereign people merely transfers
its " divine rights " to a body of so-called representatives.
And the democratic idea, in its turn, can only be based on, and
only be justified by, the underlying idea of the equality of the
individual component elements of the democracy. Once given
the notion of equality, and the democratic system of govern-
ment, the democratic organisation of the State, must be the
necessary consequences.

Of all the popular superstitions current in our times, the
superstition of equality is perhaps the most abhorrent to the
man of science, and particularly to the biologist. The
generality of the belief in the doctrine of equality — which
latter is given us by shallow metaphysicians as a dogma
a priori — is certainly not a guarantee of the objective value of
that doctrine. As a matter of fact, and despite the efforts of
certain University professors in France, no superstition is
more profoundly incompatible with all the laws of nature,
with all the facts accumulated by biological science. Nowhere
do we see " equality " in Nature ; we see, on the contrary,
everywhere a fierce struggle for existence and a selection of
the fittest, of those best adapted to environmental conditions.
In the same way, we seek in vain for any traces of equality

54 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHRISTIANITY

in social life, if we except the lowest social aggregates, whose
habitat is so situated as not to bring them into conflict with
neighbouring tribes concerning the capture of prey, and
whose power of expansion is limited to a minimum. Once we
rise beyond the lowest level of culture, we find everywhere
strife to be the foremost developmental factor in social evolution.
The sociologist who has grasped the significance of the facts
revealed by modern biology, and who can follow, throughout
human history, the operation of the same great biological laws
of strife and selection in all phases of social evolution —
the sociologist will not suffer himself to be led astray by the
fallacies of democratic teaching, will not bow down before the
idols invented in the name of science to replace the gods, that
this so-called " science " is supposed to have destroyed.

The apostles of equality, who are in general the relentless
foes of " obscurantism " and " monkish superstition," being un-
able to justify their pet doctrine by an appeal to Nature and
to real science, are frequently forced to fall back, in spite of
themselves, on the very Christianity which they otherwise
view with all the contempt begotten of the consciousness of
immeasurable superiority. It has been the fate of Christianity,
as it has been the fate of science, to see its name abused of,
in order to lend support to the wildest phantasms and to the
most grotesque aberrations of the human mind. Christianity
has been the " justification " of Anabaptism, of Tolstoyism, of the
" Peculiar People," of Mormonism, of hundreds of other weird
sects. Science has been supposed to lend support to the
fanatical anticlericalism of Latin countries, to the spoliation
and brigandage organised by the French and Portuguese
governments with regard to ecclesiastical property, to the
ruthless expulsion of thousands of peaceful citizens on account
of their religious belief. No reasonable person will, of course,
render either Christianity or science responsible for the monstrous
abuse made of their names and prestige — no reasonable person

THEOKY AND PKACTICE OF CHRISTIANITY 55

will fall into the strange errors of logic of those who, blinded
by hatred, seek to render the Catholic Church responsible for
the butcheries of Alva in the Netherlands, for the massacre of
Saint-Bartholomew, or for the corruption of the Court clergy at
Versailles during the Eegency and the reign of Louis XV.
But it is not without use to examine the question of the
attitude of Christianity towards the doctrine of equality ; and
we will see this attitude manifested by the teaching of Jesus,
by the teaching of the Apostles, and by the teaching of the
Church.

It is evident that, if Christianity should have, either in
theory or in practice, preached or favoured in any way the
doctrine of equality, its sociological value cannot fail to be
gravely impaired by the fact of its having countenanced so
dangerous a superstition. If the Jesus of Tolstoi be the real
Jesus, if the Sermon on the Mount did indeed contain the
antisocial teaching which the great Kussian writer so much
admired, then certainly was Jesus no sociologist, no social
reformer, then certainly was he nothing but a misguided
visionary, the victim of hallucinations that distorted his view
of things and weakened his powers of reasoning. If the
words, Judge not, that ye be not judged, are to be interpreted
as Tolstoi interpreted them, as condemning all our notions of
law and order, and as recommending absolute anarchy as the
ideal state for society — then certainly need the sociologist
waste but few words on Christianity, then indeed does the
teaching of Jesus appear almost as something pathological, as
revealatory of a diseased mind. How we are, under such
circumstances, to explain the extraordinary diffusion, influence,
and persistence of Christianity in the Western world, is a
mystery which Tolstoi unfortunately neglected to unravel.

The Jesus of Tolstoi is but an exaggeration of the Jesus
of democratic teaching in general. It is customary to
represent Jesus as the democrat par excellence, as the preacher

56 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHEISTIANITY

of equality, as the apostle of universal peace and humani-
tarianism, as the forerunner of socialism if not of anarchism.
It is customary to attribute to Jesus the paternity of all the
sentimental fads that have been current since the eighteenth
century. It is customary to justify the whole democratic and
socialistic movement as a return to Jesus and to primitive
Christianity. Mark the extraordinary, the disconcerting,
assumptions of the argument which seeks to separate theory
and practice in Christianity, to place the teaching of Jesus in
antagonism to the entire development of the Christian doctrine
and practice during nearly twenty centuries. In the first
place, it is assumed that the whole of the immense movement
which has resulted in the establishment of Western civilisation
as we know it, has been nothing but a colossal aberration —
that the whole process of social evolution in Europe during
two thousand years represents nothing but one long error ; in
the second place, it is assumed that those forms of Christianity
which have asserted and maintained themselves, are inferior
to the forms that have been eliminated — that Catholicism,
notably, is socially and morally inferior to the communistic
heresies, such as Anabaptism, which have not survived ; and
especially inferior to the pure doctrine of Jesus which, we are
told, it suppressed in order to build up doctrines diametrically
opposed to that far superior and loftier teaching. Mark the
extraordinary contradictions which these assumptions contain.
Let us analyse the first assumption. If the Christianity of
the Church be a distortion, a falsification, of the Christianity
of Jesus, which latter responds alone to the real needs of
society and of the individual ; and if it be precisely the
Christianity of the Church which has formed, moulded, and
directed social evolution in Europe during many centuries ; it
follows obviously that social evolution has been very badly
directed, that it has assumed forms antagonistic to social and
individual welfare, that the gigantic task of the formation of

THEOEY AND PKACTICE OF CHKISTIANITY 57

Western civilisation, which was carried out under the auspices
of the Church from the fifth to the fifteenth century, constitutes
an anomaly, an aberration, a work which should logically have
destroyed Western civilisation instead of building it up.
Examine now this strange theory in the light of knowledge
and in the light of reason. We know that, in the realm of
nature, the survival of an organism, the persistence of a species,
is a proof of the fact that they are adapted to surrounding
conditions, that they are in harmony with their environment.
If the environment is modified, the vitality of the species is
put to a test : the persistence of the species will only be
assured if its members, or some of them, present functional
and organic variations that respond to the needs of the
species as regards the modified environment. Such variations
will be " selected," in that the individuals possessing them,
being in a more favourable posture as regards the new
conditions of life, will survive and reproduce themselves at the
expense of those who, not possessing these variations, are in
an inferior posture. In other words, everywhere we find
" inferior " individuals and " inferior " species eliminated under
the pressure of the constant struggle for existence. Similar
conditions prevail in social life. The only reason we can
possibly assign for the elimination of societies once great, for
the destruction of civilisations once flourishing, is that they
became "inferior," and had to make room for "superior"
societies and " superior " civilisations. The developmental
forces at work in the shaping of the eliminated, and con-
sequently inferior, societies, were not instrumental in securing
survival, did not therefore respond to the needs of those
societies.

Such are the facts, facts known to every biologist, and
which can be verified by any student of history. How do
they adapt themselves to the assumption under analysis ?
According to that assumption, on the contrary, the develop-

58 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHEISTIANITY

mental forces at work in the shaping of Western society,
although not responding to the needs of that society, and
therefore not instrumental in securing its survival, far from
being fatal to social existence, built up and consolidated the
very society to the needs of which they did not respond !
Can we imagine a more flagrant contradiction than that
implied by the terms of this proposition ? If Western society
was built up, moulded, and consolidated by the Christian
Church, it ensues obviously that the latter, in that it was
eminently instrumental in securing survival, responded fully
to the fundamental needs of Western society.

This brings us to the second assumption, according to
which the Christianity of the Church, which survived, was
inferior to the Christianity of Jesus, which was eliminated.
Theories and doctrines, in a word ideas, are powerful factors
in social evolution ; and they are as rigorously subjected to
the laws of conflict and survival as is everything else in the
world of phenomena, for these laws apply to the moral as well
as to the physical world. Those theories, those doctrines,
which are instrumental in furthering social survival and
development — in other words, those ideas which we term fruit-
ful— will themselves survive ; they will gradually assert them-
selves in spite of all obstacles. A fruitful idea sent forth
into the world is like unto the grain of seed which the hand
of the sower flings to the mother earth ; after remaining for
a time invisible, it will appear and shoot forth, and the grain
will develop into the plant, and the plant will become the
tree, the shade of which extends further with every year that
passes. But a fruitless idea, an idea which responds to no
social needs, will not develop ; it is like unto the grain of seed
sowed upon a rock. Accordingly to the assumption under
analysis, the fruitful idea of Jesus, which responded to the
needs of society, remained barren and had no development ;
whereas the idea of the Church, idea that in no wise furthered

THEOKY AND PKACTICE OF CHEISTIANITY 59

social interests, prospered and flourished. It is not necessary
to point out the contradiction implied by this strange theory,
which we nevertheless so frequently hear propounded.

All this brings us back once more to what we said in the
first chapter. Whether the view be taken that Christianity
in general be a negligible factor in social evolution, that
Christianity in general has exerted practically no influence on the
formation and development of Western civilisation ; or whether
the view be taken that Church Christianity in particular has ex-
erted a noxious and evil influence on social evolution — in both
cases the diffusion and remarkable persistence of Christianity,
which has persisted precisely under the form of what we may
term Church Christianity, remain enshrouded in a veil of
impenetrable mystery, and can only be explained as the effect
of a miracle. If Christianity be destitute of sociological
value and bereft of sociological importance, what is the
meaning of its diffusion and persistence ? If the form under
which Christianity has asserted itself be a distorted form and
hostile to the real interests of society, why should precisely this
distorted form have asserted itself victoriously and persisted ?
Such is the dilemma to which partisans of either theory are
reduced. And the only way out of the dilemma is to suppose
social evolution to be absolutely arbitrary, to be the result of
chance and haphazard, to be a chaotic and incomprehensible
process. If, however, we accept the idea of social evolution
as determined by fixed and unchangeable laws, in the same
way as any other order of phenomena in the natural world is
determined, the theories in question become quite untenable.
It is curious to observe that those who, in general, insist most
strongly on the notion of natural law, and seek thereby to
shake the foundations of supernatural belief, are often those
who ignore absolutely the working of natural law in social
evolution.

It is to this ignorance of the working of immutable social

60 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHEISTIANITY

laws that we must attribute the popular belief that social
evolution is a thing of choice, that society can be re-cast and
re-formed at will, according to the likes and desires of
legislators and would-be social " reformers." To those who
ignore social laws, the idea of the fruitful teaching of Jesus
remaining barren, or of the noxious teaching of the Church
prospering and developing, has nothing surprising in it. By
such as these, the idea of an indissoluble link existing between
the society of the Middle Ages and the society of to-day is
entirely ignored. The fact is that these persons, who con-
stitute unfortunately the majority, are wholly ignorant of the
rudiments of social philosophy. They are ignorant of the
fact that heredity and selection constitute fundamental laws
of social existence, just as much as the same factors determine
the life of biological species and organisms. They know not
that every society is the offspring of heredity, that in its
past history lies its indispensable vital patrimony. They know
not that the fundamental life conditions of all societies remain
invariably the same — that these life conditions cannot be
modified at will — that if these life conditions are tampered
with, the continuity of social existence is thereby imperilled —
that the modifications of which a society is susceptible, are
strictly limited by such fundamental life conditions. Hence
the belief that the evolution which has formed Western
civilisation as we know it is a false one — that the past is a
long error to be got rid of as speedily as possible. Hence the
belief that it is possible, as we expressed it, to separate theory
and practice in Christianity — that, if the practice has been
bad, it is only necessary to resuscitate the theory. And, as
we said, the question is never put as to why an inherently
excellent theory should have remained barren during twenty
centuries — should have been supplanted by a false theory
which has " corrupted " and misled society during all these
centuries of its evolution. The question is not necessary if

THEOKY AND PKACTICE OF CHRISTIANITY 61

we suppose social evolution to be a merely arbitrary process,
a mere thing of choice, the product of chance and chaos and
haphazard.

It was a momentous epoch in the world's history, that
at which Jesus of Nazareth made his appearance. The
decomposition of Western society was so far advanced that
a powerful impulsion — an exceptionally powerful impulsion —
was indispensable in order to save it from total disruption
and annihilation. At such a period of decomposition and
ferment, new and original ideas cannot but have possessed
unusual force. Noxious ideas can only spread in a decayed
society, such as was Eoman society at the time of Tiberius. And
when degeneracy has prepared the ground for them, such
noxious ideas will spread with rapidity, hastening the process
of social decay and disintegration ; for at such periods the
dissolving power of antisocial ideas is great. Fruitful ideas,
on the other hand — ideas which respond to the permanent and
universal needs of social existence — must possess a rare
vitality, a rare strength, if under such adverse circumstances
they are to arrest the downward movement of society, prevent
the irremediable decadence of the biological value of the race,
assert themselves despite the degeneracy already manifest,
which it is their difficult task to stem. Concerning the
teaching of Jesus, it is clear to any one who has the least
respect for historical facts, that this teaching had an immediate
and extraordinary success. If it was a teaching that contained
antisocial ideas, its dissolving power must have been immense ;
it must inevitably have brought about the definite fall of
Western society, which would have shared the fate of the Koman
empire ; it must inevitably have proved a most powerful
stimulant of the movement of decomposition and degeneracy
visible at the time of its introduction. If, on the contrary,
the teaching of Jesus contained ideas which responded to the
permanent needs of society, which afforded an adequate basis

62 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHKISTIANITY

whereon to reconstruct a degenerate and dying society, its
diffusion must inevitably have resulted in such a reconstruc-
tion and reorganisation of the social fabric. And we find,
effectively, that the spread of Christianity, the consolidation
of Christian institutions, coincided with the saving of Western
society from annihilation and with the rebuilding of that
society.

But, we are told, the Christianity which thus spread,
which thus asserted itself, was not the Christianity of Jesus ;
it was but a distortion, or, if we prefer, an inferior edition of
the Christianity of Jesus. In the first place, as we have
already observed, to maintain that an inferior doctrine —
especially in so peculiarly critical a time — could supplant
and suppress a superior one, without leading to social
bankruptcy and annihilation unless arrested in time in its
turn, is to ignore all the conditions under which social
evolution takes place. As the Christianity which spread
and diffused itself led, not to social bankruptcy, but to social
reconstruction and regeneration, we may regard it as con-
taining the ideas adapted to social needs, as being — from a
sociological point of view — the true and sound Christianity,
as constituting, if it should indeed differ from the Christianity
of Jesus, the superior form of Christianity. In the second
place, if the Christianity which spread and diffused itself was
not the Christianity of Jesus, we may well ask : What was,
then, its origin ? What other personality, what other currents
of thought, can have given rise to it ? When did it originate ?

If we regard the Christianity of the Church as being
fundamentally and essentially identical with the Christianity
of Jesus, the questions alike of the origin of the former, and
of the reason of its diffusion, are solved. The fruitful ideas
propounded by Jesus spread and asserted themselves by reason
of their extraordinary vitality ; they possessed force enough to
stem the tide of degeneracy, to arrest the decay of Western

THEORY AND PEACTICE OF CHRISTIANITY 63

society, to reconstruct and reorganise the latter on the basis
of those immutable principles that constitute the foundation
of all social existence. In this case, the Christianity of the
Church derived its strength and influence from the ideas
sown by Jesus, which ideas it incorporated and permitted to
manifest themselves, to bear fruit a thousandfold. If, on the
other hand, we regard the Christianity of the Church as
differing essentially from the Christianity of Jesus, then we
must regard the former, in view of the results achieved by
it, as being incontestably superior to the latter. If we hold
to that view, the difficulty of the origins of this superior
Christianity remains ; and this problem appears truly, if we
accept the theory in question, as wellnigh insoluble, if not
as altogether insoluble.

When we come, however, to view the facts more closely,
such a theory cannot but appear in the light of a wholly
gratuitous assumption. If we take the first centuries of
Christianity, how was it possible that these centuries, standing
as they did directly under the influence of Jesus and of his
teaching, can nevertheless have followed with such remarkable
unanimity and persistence a teaching essentially different to
that of the Master ? To suppose all the Christian communities
of the first centuries capable of such an aberration, capable of
distorting, nay of inverting, the teaching of the same Jesus
for whom Christians were prepared joyfully to sacrifice their
lives and to endure every torture — to suppose this not only
appears entirely gratuitous, but is equivalent to affirming that
the whole of the Christian world of those times was afflicted
with a mental malady, with a psychological disease, of the
existence of which we have not the shadow of any evidence.
If, therefore, Jesus did indeed preach the doctrines of anarchy
and communism, for instance, why should the tenets and the
arganisation of the Christian communities not have been of
on anarchistic and communistic nature ? And yet the tenets

64 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHKISTIANITY

and the organisation of the Church of the first centuries were
neither of an anarchistic nor — if we except the Church of
the Catacombs — of a communistic nature. If the earliest
Christians lived under a regime of communism, this cannot be
taken as signifying that the doctrine of the primitive Church
made communism a necessity. In the first stages of an
organisation, exceptional solidarity between the members is
indispensable from a practical point of view. The communism
of the earliest Christians responded to the consciousness they
had of this necessity, and also to the desire to insist with
especial force on the duty of earnestness, of combating the
dominant tendency of the times to regard the satisfaction of
material cravings as the one goal of life.

It is, again, as we have already said, impossible to consider
the social organisation of the early Christians as reflecting the
whole of the social teaching contained in the message of Jesus.
How could the elementary organisation of the early Christians
manifest all the sociological capacities of the doctrine ? Un-
relentlessly persecuted, compelled to conceal themselves, to
seek the obscurity of the catacombs in order to be free to
pray and accomplish their religious duties, a little community
surrounded by bitter foes — how could the early Christian
Church represent anything more than the first humble germ
of the gospel seed ? We could as well have expected the
early colonisers of North America, gathered behind the
palisades of their first settlements, to manifest all the social
genius of which the Americans of the States and of Canada
have since proved themselves capable. Only gradually, as
the new religion spread and conquered ground, could it reveal
the capacities latent in it, capacities that finally expanded,
that finally manifested themselves in their full strength and
bloom, after the definite triumph of Christianity at the
beginning of the fifth century.

We have said, and we insist again on the fact, that it is

THEORY AND PKACTICE OF CHRISTIANITY 65

in the past history of an organism, whether biological or
social, that lies its indispensable vital patrimony. If this be
the case, the vitality of the later Church, the immense social
force and social influence of the Church of the Middle Ages,
from the fifth to the fifteenth century, must have its roots
embedded in the past history of that Church, must have been
derived from the vitality, from the latent force and power, of
the earlier Church, of the Church of the first four centuries ;
just as the vitality and force of the States and of Canada have
their roots in the past history of those great countries, in the
latent force and power of the early colonisers, of primitive
institutions ; and just as the vitality and force of any nation
are derived from the vitality and force of its early ancestors, of
its early institutions. The marvellous adaptation of the early
Church to social needs and wants is the secret of the vitality
of that Church, of its triumph; and the adaptation of the
later Church to social needs is the secret, in turn, of the
extraordinary vitality manifested by it during a thousand
years. The early Church, the Church of the first four
centuries, had saved Western society from annihilation ; and
to the later Church was left the not less difficult task of
consolidating a society still bleeding from its wounds, torn by
war and strife, without adequate institutions and without
authority — a society still quivering from the shock of the
tremendous upheavals caused by the invasion of the barbarians
and the downfall of the Eoman Empire. The social force of
Christianity had been put to a severe test during the four
hundred years that followed the coming of Jesus ; and the
work accomplished by it, although already immense, had been
but the preamble of the herculean task still awaiting it, of
the task of reconstructing and reorganising society on the
foundations laid by the earlier Church. If the early Church
had been possessed of an extraordinary power of adaptation
to social necessities, it was imperative that the later Church

5

66 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHRISTIANITY

should possess a similar power not one whit inferior. That
this was the case, is proved by the work accomplished by the
Church during the thousand years that lasted the Middle Ages.
From a sociological point of view, it is quite impossible to
draw any distinction between the earlier and the later Church,
between the Church of the first four centuries and the Church
of the Middle Ages. Western society had been saved from
annihilation by the immense effort of the early Church, and the
early Church had laid the foundations for its reconstruction and
reorganisation. Had the Church of the Middle Ages not
continued the task begun by the early Church, not carried into
the domain of concrete practice and application the principles
laid down by the latter, Western society would have quickly
sunk back again into the lowest forms of barbarism, its decom-
position, arrested for a time, would have recommenced and
would have progressed with rapid strides. The fact that
Western society was reconstructed and reorganised, regenerated
and consolidated, by the ceaseless efforts of the Church of the
Middle Ages, is the proof that the Church of the Middle
Ages continued the work of social redemption and healing
begun by the early Church ; unless, indeed, it can be pretended
that the treatment prescribed in order to attain convalescence
and ultimate perfect health, is based on radically different
principles to the treatment prescribed in order to rescue the
patient from imminent death. Western society had been
saved from imminent death by early Christianity. The same
society, having the same needs, placed amidst the same
fundamental environmental conditions, could only hope to
evolve normally, to attain eventual health and strength, on
condition that the same needs be attended to, that its power
of adaptation to the same environment be constantly developed.
It is clear that if Western society evolved normally, if It
was reorganised and consolidated by the efforts of the later
Church, it can only have been due to the later Church having

THEOEY AND PRACTICE OF CHRISTIANITY 6*7

continued the treatment commenced by the earlier Church. It
is obvious that the same society, having the same needs, placed
amidst the same fundamental environmental conditions,
could not be saved by one method, fortified and developed by
another and contrary method.

CHAPTEK IV

FRATERNITY VERSUS EQUALITY

THE secret of the success which has attended the preaching
of the doctrine of equality among the masses of Western
Europe, lies in the fact that the notion of equality must
necessarily flatter the fundamental egotistical interests of the
individual, always unwilling to admit his inferiority. Equality
is thus the god of egotism. Especially among the over-
whelming number of those who are really and hopelessly
inferior, who cannot succeed, cannot rise beyond their original
level, because they do not possess the indispensable quali-
ties which make for success — especially among such as
these, do we find the most fervent disciples of the idea of
equality. Equality is balm for the weak and inferior,
naturally envious of those who possess the qualities, and who
consequently reap the success, which will always remain
unknown to the inferior. The idea of equality is, transported
into the political sphere, but the means whereby the envy and
spite of the inferior may give free vent to themselves, and
wreak vengeance on the superior few, who must invariably be
an object of hatred on the part of those who are beneath them.
Whether the masses be conscious or not conscious of their
inferiority, the sentiment of being inferior in fact will always
engender corresponding sentiments of envy and hatred —

68

FEATEENITY VERSUS EQUALITY 69

unless, indeed, these natural sentiments be restrained by a
powerful and efficacious moral discipline. Under the specious
plea of obtaining justice, it is proposed by " equalitarians " to
perpetrate the most evident injustice, in that it is proposed
to despoil the superior of the rights they have conquered by
reason of their superiority.

If any one doubt of the support lent by the egotistical
sentiments of envy and hatred to the idea of equality, he
has only to analyse the psychological forces underlying the
socialistic and revolutionary movement of our times. The
mentality of the masses is not a complicated one ; especially is
this mentality incapable of grasping abstract notions. To
suppose the masses capable of waxing enthusiastic on account
of a mere vague, shadowy, and abstract idea of justice, is to
ignore entirely the psychology of the masses. For the latter,
the idea of justice is inseparable from the idea of the
satisfaction of egotistical interests. What excites the en-
thusiasm of the masses is not an idea of abstract justice,
but the prospect of being able, once the Zukunftsstaat of
socialism has been realised, to work the least possible
for the most possible remuneration ; and the idea of
remuneration, in its turn, is inseparable from the idea of
individual pleasure. Not without reason has socialism
established its doctrines on a materialistic basis ; for a
materialistic doctrine will always find the most adherents
among the ignorant and half-educated. To do it justice,
socialism has never concealed, or attempted to conceal, the
fact that it appeals to egotistical interests. The whole theory
of the class-war derived from Karl Marx — what is it if not a
frank appeal to the proletarian class to battle exclusively for
the conquest of so-called proletarian rights ? True, the
theorists of socialism declare that the war of the classes must
inevitably lead to the reconciliation of the classes — that the
victorious assertion of the exclusive rights of the proletariat

70 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHRISTIANITY

implies ipso facto the assertion of the rights of those who do
not belong to the proletariat, seeing that the interests of the
proletariat are synonymous with the interests of society as a
whole. But, as M. Alfred Fouillee has very justly pointed
out, no one outside the privileged group of socialist theorists
and metaphysicians has ever been able to understand any-
thing of this most extraordinary theory — can understand how
the bitterest warfare, terminated by general confiscation and
spoliation, can engender peace and harmony and fraternal
reconciliation — can understand how the interests of a single
one of the warring classes can be rendered synonymous with the
interests of the whole society. Least of all, we may be quite
sure, have the logomachies of Marx been understood of the
masses enrolled under the red flag of the revolution. The
masses care not one straw for theories ; what they alone
understand is action. When M. Paul Lafargue, the son-in-law
of Marx and one of the pontiffs of French socialism, tells the
masses that their aim should be to work as little as possible
and to amuse themselves as much as possible, bombancer la
moitti de la journte et toute la nuit as this contemporary moralist
candidly recommends as the highest goal of life, we may be
certain that his teaching is understood. For this teaching is
perfectly adapted to the mentality of those whom M. Lafargue,
the lay preacher of future morality, has undertaken to catechise.
The simple prelogical nature of the mentality of the
masses, which can only grasp the visible and the concrete,
which understands therefore only action and not theory, and
which confounds — by reason of a psychological deficiency
that prevents it from distinguishing adequately between cause
and effect, from differentiating between heterogeneous categories
of concepts and phenomena — the action with the results to be
obtained by it: this mentality was well illustrated by the
demonstrations which took place in Paris on the evening of
October 10, 1909, when the execution of the Spanish agitator

FRATERNITY VEESUS EQUALITY 71

Ferrer became known. Not one tenth part of the forty
thousand demonstrators who gathered to " protest in the
name of justice," had ever heard of Ferrer. They came,
none the less, in response to the invitation of socialist and
revolutionary newspapers ; and they " protested " against the
" judicial assassination " of a man they had never heard of, by
tearing up the pavements, by burning the public benches and
the public lavatories, by smashing windows, by shooting an
unfortunate policeman who could hardly be rendered respons-
ible for the death of Ferrer. Such is the only method of
protestation known to the multitude — violence. They can
conceive a violent protestation that degenerates into tumult
and riot, because such a protestation is realised by immediate
and violent action. And the Paris demonstrators undoubtedly
believed that the action of tearing up stones, extinguishing
street-lamps, burning public property, effectively avenged
Ferrer. The action was confounded with the result, because
action and result are, for this mentality, one and the same
thing, because the mystical properties supposed inherent to
the action are such as to produce, mechanically and ipso facto,
the result desired.

We have mentioned the case of the Ferrer demonstrations
in Paris as illustrative of the workings of the prelogical
mentality of the masses. This mentality, as we have said, is
radically incapable of grasping abstract notions. It cares
nothing for the metaphysical justifications of equality invented
by Rousseau, and repeated by the revolutionary metaphysicians
of 1789 and 1792. If we go to a political meeting of
working-men, and listen to the arguments propounded by
simple minds, we shall very soon observe that the hope of
equality, the longing for equality, is by no means based on
the lofty principles which interested flatterers of mob-passion
would make us believe dominate the mental life of the masses.
And when we hear the gospel of equality preached in a gin-

72 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHEISTIANITY

tavern by gin-sodden orators, in an atmosphere reeking of
drink, to the accompaniment of foul oaths, coarse blasphemies,
and cheap invectives ; we shall have a different idea of the
loftiness of the principles underlying this gospel. We shall
then understand better that equality, for the masses, has but
a very slender connection with notions of justice — that the
idea of equality is here based on the vilest passions, on the
blind hatred of inferior beings for superiority of every sort,
whether superiority of wealth or superiority of morals. The
theorists who, in the calm of their studies, preach the gospel
of equality and seek to base it on all kinds of empty catch-
words, have perhaps themselves no idea that their high-
sounding doctrines act on the masses only as a ferment, as a
ferment of hatred and destruction which, in order to satisfy
blind envy and spite, is capable of destroying, by one felon
stroke, all the multifarious acquisitions of civilisation obtained
by long centuries of patient labour. For what importance,
for the masses thus excited and let loose, have the purest
monuments of the human genius, when weighed in the balance
with the prospect of satisfying freely animal lusts and passions ?
And the intellectuals, who preach the theory of equality
without stopping to consider the effects of their theory on
the popular mentality, without stopping to consider the
concrete applications of the theory by the masses — for the
masses care only about such concrete applications : what of
them ? It would be interesting and instructive to have a
detailed study of the psychology of the representatives of
intellect — and by representatives of intellect we by no means
understand solely university teachers. Such a study would
show us that probably among no category of persons do we
find as much vanity and as much egotism as among the
category classed as " intellectuals." This vanity and this
egotism are engendered by a system of education which is
impregnated by the idea that science is the main lever, if not

FKATEKNITY VERSUS EQUALITY 73

the exclusive lever, of social evolution — and that therefore
the prophets of science are necessarily the salt of the earth,
the pioneers and creators of civilisation. Into the boy and
into the youth this idea is drilled ; and when the youth has
conquered the coveted diploma, goal of his ambitions, is it
extraordinary that he should consider himself as a being apart,
as the rightful leader of society ? But in our present state of
civilisation, with the overcrowding of the liberal professions,
with the frenzied run on diplomas of every kind and description,
it very frequently happens that the young man, taught
invariably to consider himself as the salt of the earth, finds
his diploma to be of no value whatever to him in the struggle
for existence. He has hitherto lived aloof from real life, shut
up more or less in an ivory tower ; he has crammed sufficient
knowledge into his brain to enable him to pass his examina-
tions, but nothing more ; he has no originality, no personal
gifts, his mediocrity is palpable, but of this he has of course
no conception ; he is, on the contrary, swollen with vanity,
having been nourished exclusively on egotism. And now he
finds that all his vaunted knowledge has no material value,
that instead of the world being at his feet, the world has no
need of him, for he is ill adapted to the world's necessities.
Misery frequently awaits him, bitter disappointment and dis-
illusion always. What can be the result ? Disappointed
ambition, mortified vanity, will make of the young intellectuel
a revolutionary. Having nothing to lose by the revolution,
and possibly much to gain by it, he will not for one instant
pause to consider the interests of society, of civilisation.
Society has wounded his vanity and is henceforth his enemy.
Mortified vanity will make of him a preacher of equality.
But this equality, he preaches it in order to degrade those
who are superior to him, who have succeeded in the struggle
which has vanquished him, and not in order to elevate those
who are beneath him.

74 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHKISTIANTTY

And so it is with the majority of "intellectuals," even
with those who have succeeded and proved thereby their
value. Equality, for them, is a weapon directed against
those who, not being "intellectuals," exercise the authority
in society — against all those who, whether by reason of their
wealth, or by reason of their talents, or by any other reason,
are possessed of greater influence, of greater power. In
advocating equality, they look towards those above, not
towards those below. To the savant the masses are indifferent,
if they are not positively repugnant. He looks down on them
with contempt, conscious of the unfathomable gulf that
separates him from them. He generally ignores altogether
the effects of " equalitarian " teaching on the masses, or else
he underestimates the importance of the latter ; he does not
believe in the possibility of a " proletarian revolution " which
might very possibly submerge the class of savants as much as
any other class. Equality is for him an instrument by means
of which he may ascend to the top of the social hierarchy ;
for his ideal is that of a society ruled by " intellect," guided
and directed by philosophers and by the priests of science.

Whether among the " intellectuals " or among the masses,
we find the doctrine of equality to be a mere cloak for
egotism. Equality is a doctrine preached almost invariably
with a view to satisfying interests of an essentially egotistical
nature, whether individual interests or class interests. Such
egotism need not necessarily be conscious egotism ; but only
in the rarest cases do we find the preachers of equality to be
absolutely disinterested. For the masses, equality signifies
the suppression of the authority which has hitherto held
the plebs in check, which has hitherto held popular passion
in check. When, in obedience to the theory of equality, all
curb on popular passion has been removed, we shall see the
long pent-up cravings and desires of the plebs burst forth like
a roaring cataract that has swept away the dykes — and this

FKATEENITY VERSUS EQUALITY 75

cataract will submerge Western civilisation for good. The
equality preached by savants who choose to ignore the facts
of biology and of human history, acts, as we have said, as a
ferment on the masses, whose mentality cannot grasp abstract
notions, and which are always impelled, by reason of this
mentality, to action, because action is concrete. The masses
see the glittering riches of this world dazzled before their
eyes, offered to them as compensation for centuries of "toil
and oppression " ; and they long to seize them, because these
riches will enable them to satisfy all their desires, enable
them to live in luxury and in idleness. When we have
swept away the cobweb of revolutionary verbiage, what other
ideals do they possess, these masses whom we see around us,
excited by the lust of hate, lured by the hope of ample booty,
a menace to the future of Western civilisation ? The masses,
detached from the old religious beliefs and from the moral
restraints which these beliefs imposed, taught to regard the
satisfaction of material cravings, the conquest of material
ease and wealth, as the sole aim of life, taught to regard all
" possessors " as thieves whom it is legitimate to despoil at
will, taught to consider themselves as the only rightful
claimants to the social wealth accumulated by past centuries,
taught that there is nothing beyond this life and that in this
life the only thing of value is pleasure, unlimited pleasure —
what other ideal can the masses have, than that of grabbing
as much of the world's wealth as possible, so as to be able to
satisfy therewith all their instincts and desires ? Equality,
translated into the language of the masses, is simply : Ote-toi
de Id que je m'y mette.

Mark, now, that the doctrine of equality implies always
and necessarily the correlative notion of the superiority of
those who aspire after equality. The socialistic theory of
equality is, in this respect, far more candid than the liberal
theory. Socialism says quite frankly to the proletariat : do

76 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHRISTIANITY

battle for your interests, conquer your interests, seize the
power for yourselves, and establish your dictature. Were
there not so many contradictions in the socialist theory, one
might be astonished at the manifest contradiction which arises
between the notion of equality, on which socialism is ostensibly
based, and the notion of the dictature of the proletariat. For
the proletariat can only establish such a dictature at the
expense of the other social classes ; such a dictature implies
obviously the tyrannising of all the other social classes by
the proletarian dictators, the subordination, nay the annihila-
tion, of the legitimate interests of all the other classes, in
order that the exclusive interests of the one proletarian class
may be furthered. What becomes, in all this, of the doctrine
of equality ? For it is quite evident that the idea of equality
is absolutely incompatible with the idea of a class dictature.
If a class dictature be established, then are the other classes
not equal to the dictator class, then are the other classes
necessarily inferior, they will be ruled by the dictator in the
interest of the latter, and their own interests will be un-
hesitatingly and ruthlessly sacrificed.

Instead of the empty catchword of liberal political meta-
physics : " Government for the people, by the people," socialism
formulates the doctrine of " government for the proletariat, by
the proletariat." The socialist formula is clear, and there is
no ambiguity about it. The proletariat is to strive to conquer
exclusively proletarian rights, to establish an exclusively
proletarian dictature ; the other social classes have no right
to existence, no account shall be taken of their interests,
they must be mercilessly exterminated. We understand the
message of socialism very clearly ; what we do not under-
stand is that socialist theorists should talk about equality,
seeing that socialism denies absolutely and categorically the
rights of every social class other than the proletariat.

At the basis of the demand so frequently made by certain

FKATEKNITY VERSUS EQUALITY 77

" intellectuals " for equality, we shall find the same pretensions
to superiority and to dictature, if we come to analyse more
closely the psychological foundations of their claim. If
certain " intellectuals " claim equality with insistence, it is
not because they consider themselves " equal " to a crossing-
sweeper or to an agricultural labourer, any more than they
consider those who have the government of society in their
hands, as " equal " to the representatives of intellect. The
late Ferdinand Brunetiere, than whom no one was better
qualified to speak as a representative of intellect, pointed out
very justly, in a celebrated article of the Revue des Deux
Mondes, that the intellectual class is frequently given to over-
estimation of its power, over-estimation due to excessive
egotism and overweening vanity. The man of science, into
whom the idea has been drilled since boyhood that science is
infallible and that its priests partake of this character of
infallibility, very often imagines, in all sincerity, that because
he is an expert in his special line, whether it be mathematics,
or astronomy, or physics, or chemistry, or biology, he is
therefore ipso facto an expert on any and every other subject
under the sun ; that in regard to literature, or to wireless
telegraphy, or to aviation, or to politics, he is guided by some
mysterious higher light, there where other unfortunate mortals
are hopelessly groping in the dark. This mentality of the
man of science was well manifested in France during the
Dreyfus case. We were then treated to the spectacle of
savants, doubtless distinguished in their respective branches,
seriously claiming to be able to appreciate the facts of the
case better than the officers of the two courts-martial who
condemned Dreyfus for high treason and felony. And this
astonishing claim was based on the supposition that laboratory
work, or the hunting after dusty parchments in a library,
render those who busy themselves with such things infallible
in all matters, whether connected with their speciality or not.

78 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHEISTIANITY

The not very dignified spectacle to which we were treated by
these erudite defenders of Dreyfus proved, unfortunately, that
the laborious acquisition of learning frequently engenders
incurable myopia with regard to all phenomena situated
outside the sphere of one's daily activities.

The part played by certain savants in the miserable Dreyfus
agitation was symptomatic of the mentality of a large
number of representatives of intellect. As Brunetiere very
truly observed, these savants looked down with unconcealed
contempt on the officers of the army ; they even lent, without
any scruples of conscience, their aid and support to the
vilest campaign of calumny directed against the army, and
especially against the galonnds. When we come to seek for
the reason of the contempt so unsparingly manifested, we find
it to lie in the overweening vanity of men who, nourished
from youth with the idea that science and its prophets are
infallible, imagine that when a savant expresses an opinion on
any subject, no other course is left open to any one but to
acquiesce. Contradiction sets men of this stamp into fury ;
disagreement with their opinion appears to them in the light of
a personal injury. Hence the intense hatred of certain French
savants for French officers, hence the unmitigated contempt of
the same savants for the army. Their vanity was mortified
because the French army and the French nation would not
believe, on the strength of the simple affirmation of men who
had not the remotest connection with the business, that all the
officers of the General Staff were perjurers and forgers.

When, therefore, we find representatives of intellect
claiming equality and preaching equality, we must not be
under any illusions as to their humility. Equality, as we have
already observed, is for them an instrument whereby they may
ascend to the top of the social ladder and direct actively the
whole course of social evolution. We must not imagine that
the representatives of intellect would willingly submit to a

FKATEKNITY VERSUS EQUALITY 79

proletarian dictature, or consent to be placed on an equal
footing with mere working-men. Let us hasten to add that
it would be highly unnatural for them to consent to be so
placed. The truth is that representatives of intellect, like
any one else, have their opinions concerning what measures are
beneficial, and what measures are not beneficial, to society —
concerning what measures tend to further, and what measures
tend to obstruct, social progress. Only the representative of
intellect tends too frequently to suppose his opinion to be a
more or less infallible expression of the truth — to overlook
the fact that erudition in one branch does not qualify
necessarily its possessor in other branches. As the course
pursued by a given social policy does not always please the
representatives of intellect ; as practical politicians, having to
consider the realities of concrete facts and to adjust their
efforts to possibilities, are often compelled to neglect the
ambitious schemes of social regeneration propounded by
learned theorists ; the latter, convinced of their immeasurable
superiority, question impatiently the right of such politicians
to thus neglect theories which are the fruit of so large an
expenditure of erudition. They consider themselves unjustly
relegated to what they conceive to be an inferior position,
and they therefore loudly claim equality — which signifies
for them the right to direct the social movement according to
their theories, the right for them to impose their theories,
regardless as to whether such theories take account of the
possibilities of the situation.

When we come to analyse the psychological foundations of
the doctrine of equality, we thus find that doctrine to be, whether
consciously or unconsciously, a mere cloak for the satisfaction of
egotistical interests. The demand for equality is inspired by
egotism. The masses wish for " equality " in order to be able
to satisfy without restraint all the desires and all the passions
which have up till now been curbed, more or less adequately,

80 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHKISTIANITY

in the interests of society, by the influence of authority. The
representatives of intellect aspire after " equality," but only as
regards those at the summit of the social hierarchy, only as a
means of obtaining for themselves the active direction of
social evolution. On the one hand and on the other, the
demand for equality is not founded on a sentiment of
humility. With the masses it is founded on the lust of hate,
on the desire to satisfy material cravings and the animal
instincts ; and with the intellectual class it is founded on
overweening vanity.

II

A very different doctrine from the doctrine which is based
either — as in the case of the masses — on envy and spite, on
hatred and the craving for purely material satisfactions, or —
as in the case of representatives of the intellectual class — on
egotism and vanity, is the doctrine of fraternity presented to
us by Christianity. And, if the psychological motives inspiring
the demand for equality be all of them derived from egotism,
whether class egotism or individual egotism, is it not obvious
that these motives are the diametrical opposite of those which
inspired the teaching of Jesus Christ, of whom we read that
bajulans sibi crucem exivit ?

And when we assist at a meeting organised by the
revolutionaries of to-day ; when we witness the extraordinary
mixture of crass ignorance and boundless vanity in the over-
strung brains of both orators and hearers ; when we see the
savage hatred manifested against every kind of superiority ;
when we listen to the threats and appeals to violence, which
show us the amount of justice and liberty we may expect when
these enemies of civilisation have the reins of power in their
hands, to the blasphemous insults levelled against everything
which has been held sacred by Western society ; when we ^ee

FKATEKNITY VERSUS EQUALITY 81

around us, amidst the atmosphere of coarse invective,
flash the lurid light of the social revolution — when we see,
by anticipation, the day when, all the barricades having
been destroyed, the masses will be able to pillage and loot and
sack, able to give vent to all their pent-up passions, able to
satisfy all their animal instincts and cravings ; then can
we grasp the measureless difference between this gospel of
egotism, of hatred, of materialism, and the gospel of fraternity,
of solidarity, of humility, of love, preached by Jesus Christ.

Measure — nay, we cannot measure the difference ! The
masses vaguely understand it — understand that Christianity is
the chief obstacle to the social revolution. And the first
object of the hatred of the masses is Christianity.

The Christian doctrine of fraternity applies with equal
force to all classes of society. Based as it is on the under-
lying idea of humility, it reminds high and low, the powerful
and the weak, of their duties — of the supreme duty of
solidarity. All men are brothers — but all men are not
equal: such is the truth contained in the gospel message.
And a profound truth it is. All men are brothers who work,
who contribute, each according to his abilities, each in his
sphere of life, to the great collective task of humanity ; and
every worker has the right to be respected for his work,
besides the duty of respecting others for theirs. But the
objective, social value of the different categories of work is not
the same — the various categories of work cannot all be
reduced to a common level, for the creation of their hetero-
geneous products demands heterogeneity of effort and hetero-
geneity of capacity. Yet each individual, however small the
effort allowed to him by his limited capacity, possesses, by
reason of his work, an inalienable subjective value — a value
which, not being of a social but of a moral nature, cannot be
measured in the terms of a social evaluation, but which can be
appreciated only according to a moral standard.

82 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHEISTIANITY

The doctrine of fraternity is based on the necessity of
individual humility. " To know how to command, and to
know how to obey," said Nietzsche, the bitter foe of Christi-
anity, " both are essential to real greatness." Nietzsche failed
to see that this magnificent doctrine, so profoundly true, is
also the doctrine of the Christianity he detested — a doctrine
illustrated by the whole life of Jesus. Jesus knew how to
command : " he spoke with authority," we are told by his
biographer. And Jesus knew how to obey ; he knew full well
how to practise that most difficult of all human virtues because
it is the most galling of all to human egotism and pride — the
virtue of obedience. Et erat subditus illis, we read. As in
his childhood he was obedient to his parents, so all through
life was he obedient to a great and noble ideal, to what he
believed to be the command of his Father in heaven — obedient
to that ideal, to that command, to the point of laying down
his life for it. The life of Jesus is admirably summed up in
the beautiful words of St. Philip : Humiliamt semetipsum factus
obediens usque ad mortem, mortem autem crucis. Obedient in
his childhood, obedient in his manhood, obedient in his death,
Jesus is an example to the world for all time of the humility
that constitutes the foundation of fraternity. He, who was
the loftiest, humiliated himself and made himself obedient
unto death, unto the death of the cross.

The message of Jesus is thus not only a message for the
masses ; it is also a message for the more highly placed, for
those who exercise authority and who command. In the
vastness of its scope, the message of Jesus embraced all classes
of society ; and therein lies the secret of its force, therein lies
its incommensurable sociological value. It is for having
neglected the truths contained in it, that those who exercise
authority have seen their authority dimmish and decay. They
have, in a large measure, failed in their duty of fraternity,
failed to recognise the necessity of that solidarity which is

FKATEKNITY VERSUS EQUALITY 83

indispensable to social cohesion and integration. The non-
recognition, in the higher spheres of society, of the duty of
solidarity, has had its inevitable repercussion in a slackening
of the bonds of social solidarity in the lower spheres. Had
the governing classes in France in the eighteenth century been
conscious of their duty, conscious of their essential solidarity
with the classes governed — then would not misgovernment
and tyranny have engendered the formidable outburst of the
[Revolution. And had the governing classes in Europe
generally, during the nineteenth century, been conscious of
their duty towards the masses, conscious of the duty imposed
on them by the great law of fraternity — then would we not
have to fear to-day the imminent danger of a yet more terrible
and far-reaching revolution. Too long have the governing
classes ignored the duty of fraternity, ignored the necessity of
solidarity. Having fortified themselves behind the pallisades
of class egotism, given themselves up to the pursuit of
egotistical aims, shut their ears to the cry of the masses for
more justice — can the governing class wonder now if their
authority is gone, if they are an object of hatred instead of
respect ; can they wonder if their appeals fall on deaf ears, if
their promises excite nothing but defiance and suspicion,
seeing that they were deaf so long to the appeals of others,
seeing that, when asked to give bread, they only gave stones ?

Omnis gui se exaltat, humiliabitur ; et qui se humiliat,
exaltabitur. The bourgeoisie, whose reign, stained by blood,
by oppression, by mammonolatry, is drawing to an end, will
learn by bitter experience the truth of these words, even as
the old monarchy of France learned it. Applied to social
conditions, these words signify that the government whose
policy is founded on egotism, and which neglects its duties
towards those it is supposed to govern, is a government that
stands condemned. And what policy can have been more
egotistical than that pursued by the bourgeoisie of Europe

84 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHKISTIANITY

since its advent to power ? Even as, to-day, equality is the
pretext under which the masses seek to satisfy instincts of
hatred and lucre, so, during the nineteenth century, was
liberty the catchword by means of which the bourgeoisie
sought to justify an inhuman exploitation of labour in the
interests of capitalism — an exploitation such, that it must
inevitably have led to a general biological regression of the
race, had not the strongest of human instincts, that of self-
preservation, induced the most far-sighted representatives of
the bourgeoisie to have recourse to legislative measures in
order to limit it. But mere legislative measures are in-
sufficient to counteract the moral effects of an entire social
policy systematically based on egotism. The social policy of
the bourgeoisie, founded on individualism, on an antisocial
exaggeration of egotistical sentiments, only modified itself
unwillingly and under the pressure brought to bear from
outside. Protective measures were adopted with regard to
the work of children, women, and young persons, not because
of any sympathy being felt for the sufferings of those unable
to defend themselves against the rapacious greed of un-
scrupulous employers ; but because the more clear-sighted of
the bourgeoisie perceived that, in permitting women and
children to be sacrificed to the greed of gain of capitalist
slave-drivers, the bourgeoisie was itself, in the long run,
cutting its throat. It is obvious that, if the hygienic con-
ditions in which labour is accomplished sink beneath a
certain irreductible minimum, the biological value of the
labourers will be diminished ; and diminished biological value
of the labourers means diminished capacity to work, conse-
quently diminished production ; which latter, in its turn,
signifies diminished returns for the capitalist. From this
purely egotistical standpoint did the more far-sighted repre-
sentatives of the bourgeoisie undertake to limit the exploiting
power of the capitalist. But, as we have said, a social policy,

FKATEKNITY VERSUS EQUALITY 85

even if its effects be good, which is derived exclusively from
egotistical calculations — which is not inspired by the idea of
fraternity — which is not fertilised by the living stream of
fraternity — is a policy which will remain without any of the
moral effects that a social policy in the true sense of the word
should produce. The social legislation of the bourgeoisie has
not touched the heart of the people, but it has whetted their
appetite. The people have understood that it is a legislation
based on calculations of self-defence, that it does not derive
from a policy inspired by sympathy with suffering, by a
sincere wish to redress grievances and to avoid unnecessary
hardships. The people have seen that the only sentiment to
which its rulers are accessible is the sentiment of fear ; and
the people endeavour consequently to terrorise what they
consider to be a cowardly government into abdication of all
authority.

The effects produced by our actions are never lost. And
if we to-day see the masses destitute of all higher moral
ideals, a prey to the lowest forms of materialism, inspired in
all their strivings by the greed of gain, by hatred and envy ;
this is due to the pernicious example set them by a bourgeoisie
which, having destroyed the old moral restraints that curbed
popular passion, has itself known no higher ideal than that
of enriching itself, no higher aim than that of lucre, no
higher sentiment than that of egotism. The egotism of the
higher spheres has had its inevitable repercussion in the lower
spheres of society — it has engendered boundless egotism among
the masses. When we see the corruption of the governing
classes, the absence of all notion of responsibility among them,
the hardness of heart and egotism of those whose task it is to
guide and direct society — can we wonder at the egotism and
the corruption of the masses ? The egotism and vanity of a
parvenue class prompted to the suppression of the old faiths.
The bourgeoisie, having attained to power, having enriched

86 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHEISTIANITY

itself, having obtained the means whereby all material desires
and cravings may be satisfied, was too proud to bow down
before a higher power, too proud to submit to the restrictions
imposed by a moral law. In order that its own egotistical
interests might be furthered without let or hindrance, it
undertook to destroy the old faiths, which in its arrogant
self-satisfaction it termed superstitions, because these faiths
curbed individual desires and checked the outburst of
individual passions. Such superstitions might be good
enough for the masses, but they must not be permitted to
interfere with the enjoyment of life, with the pursuit of
gain and pleasure, which were the only aims that the
bourgeoisie set itself. And the bourgeoisie paused not to
consider the effect of a destruction of the traditional moral
restraints on the masses — it did not ask itself whether these
moral restraints are not indispensable bulwarks of social
stability, if their disappearance would not provoke a formidable
outburst of egotism among the masses which, henceforth
uncontrolled, would then sweep forward to lay hands on the
wealth and privileges of the bourgeoisie.

The consequences, which any careful observer might have
foreseen, are now making themselves felt. We see now the
results of the destruction of the old moral restraints so
wantonly and so stupidly undertaken by the bourgeoisie.
True, the latter has not, as a general rule, followed the
example set by the French bourgeoisie — has not openly and
officially decreed that God does not exist any longer and that
Christianity is a degraded superstition. In other countries it
has, on the contrary, elected to appear before the people
clothed in robes of piety. If the bourgeoisie hopes to throw
dust in the eyes of the people by means of such contemptible
pharisaism, of such a pitiable masquerade, then indeed is
it woefully mistaken. Probably no one outside a lunatic
asylum is capable of being deceived by the Christian effusions

FKATEKNITY VERSUS EQUALITY 87

of a bourgeois society at bay, and which seeks to postpone
the inevitable debdcle with the assistance of the Master, whose
teaching the bourgeoisie has too long sought to turn to scorn
and derision. The bourgeoisie forgets that doctrines preached
merely with the lips fail to carry conviction. After that the
masses have been infected with the virus of egotism, taught
to regard the acquisition of earthly wealth as the raison d'Stre
of life, taught that the end justifies the means — that the
acquisition of wealth suffices to pass the sponge over the
immoral acts committed in order to acquire it ; after that
the masses have been treated to the spectacle of a bourgeoisie
trampling under foot all moral laws, when such laws have
stood in the way of the satisfaction of personal interests : after
all this, it is too late to come and preach resignation in the
name of those same moral laws that one has systematically
neglected to observe oneself — too late to preach disinterested-
ness when one's whole existence has been nothing else but a
race after lucre.

The doctrine and practice alike of the bourgeoisie have
acted as ferments of corruption on the masses — theory and
conduct have been here equally pernicious, which is only
natural, seeing that the conduct was the outcome of the
theory. The antisocial doctrine of individualism could not but
sap the bonds of social solidarity and social cohesion. It is
not the place here to go into details regarding the concrete
results of the application of the doctrine to social life ; some of
these results we have enumerated in a previous work.1 How
could society not be gangrened by the prevalence of such a
doctrine as the famous each for himself? Such a doctrine
ignores the foundations of social life. Society is not a
collection of heterogeneous, warring atoms, but an organic whole
of which the parts are mutually dependent on each other for
existence. It can exist only on condition that the individuals
1 Chatterton-Hill, Heredity and Selection in Sociology, Part III. ch. ii. (1907).

88 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHKISTIANITY

composing it make certain sacrifices, that they surrender a
portion of their individuality — only if each individual
constantly bears in mind that his life is conditioned by the
life of the great organism of which he is a cell, and that he
is therefore linked by indissoluble links to all the other
individuals whose lives go to make up the existence of that
social organism. The idea of society implies necessarily the
correlative idea of solidarity. The individual is not and
cannot be an end unto himself; he must have an end which
is superior to his individuality, seeing that his life is
conditioned by the life of society — that without the society he
would not be. The individual is the debtor of the past,
seeing that he profits by all the manifold acquisitions of
civilised life that are due to the labours and sacrifices of
past generations — that the entire patrimony of the present
generation, his own included, whether the biological
patrimony or the social patrimony, is derived from the past.
Even as he is a debtor of the past, so is the individual bound
by a debt to the present ; for without the activity of those
who surround him, without the assistance of his fellow-workers
in the great social hive, he would be powerless ; at the most,
were he alone, could he vegetate, if we suppose that he could
unaided secure the food necessary to maintain physiological
existence ? The doctrine of each for himself implies that the
individual is an independent entity, detached from all social
obligations. But when we recognise that the individual is
bound by certain social obligations that he cannot repudiate,
seeing that his life is conditioned by the life of society ;
it ensues that the individual, mindful of his obligations,
mindful of the ties which unite him to all the other
members of the society to which he owes everything, is
bound to work for others, even as others work for him. Each
for all, and all for each, is the doctrine which alone corresponds
to the realities of social life.

FKATEENITY VERSUS EQUALITY 89

The individual being thus detached in theory from all
social obligations — why should he be asked to respect social
laws, to obey the moral regulations edicted by the collectivity ?
If each is for himself, then each is an end unto himself and
consequently a law unto himself. The logical terminus of
individualism is anarchy. The bourgeoisie, which affected to
be roused to indignation by the anarchist movement among
the masses at the end of the nineteenth century, movement
which manifested itself chiefly in murderous acts perpetrated
by young persons suffering from an unhinged and diseased
mind — the bourgeoisie it is whose individualist anarchism has
prepared the way for revolutionary anarchism. It has
trampled under foot all the moral laws of humanity, it has
practised all the forms of jobbery and spoliation without
any attempt at concealment, the almighty dollar has crushed
every sentiment of probity, of delicacy, and of honour, out of
existence ; and the masses have seized hold, in their turn, of
the arms forged for them by a governing class destitute of all
foresight, of all sense of responsibility, and on whose tomb-
stone can be engraved the words that appear to have been its
motto : Jouir jusqu'au deluge.

Ill

The doctrine of fraternity, as preached by Christianity,
implies the existence of three underlying conditions, without
which it can be but an empty and meaningless phrase : firstly,
the subordination of individual aims to social aims ; secondly,
the recognition of the equal dignity, of the equal moral value,
of all categories of labour — or, in other words, the recognition
of individual dignity, of the moral value of the individual,
irrespective of the latter's capacities or social position ; thirdly,
individual humility, as contrasted with the arrogance, vanity,

90 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHRISTIANITY

and self-satisfaction we find so widely prevalent at the
present day.

When we come to analyse more closely the idea of
fraternity, we shall find, effectively, that this notion implies
the existence of the three conditions aforesaid. All men are
brothers, because all work with a view to realising aims which
are common to all — because all are strongly integrated in a
whole dominated by powerful ideals that act as a bond of
unity ; all men are brothers, because all are equal in dignity
before the Moral Law ; all men are brothers, because all are
conscious of their moral insufficiency — because this conscious-
ness incites to solidarity, since each must show indulgence to
the failings of others, even as he needs the indulgence of others
for his own failings. Social integration, the recognition of
human dignity, individual humility — are thus the conditions
presupposed by the doctrine of fraternity. If .these conditions
fail, fraternity may exist on paper, as in the first and third
Eepublics in France ; but it cannot exist as a living reality.

The three fundamental conditions under which alone the
doctrine of fraternity can bring forth fruit, were all of them
realised by Christianity. Christianity integrated society by
means of the Christian ideal — it knit the members of the
community together in the love and veneration of a common
tradition. Christianity introduced the notion of human
dignity, and its counterpart, individual humility, basing
both conceptions on the existence of a Moral Law which,
being Absolute in its nature, is exterior and superior to all
the fluctuations of the finite and relative world. Before
Christianity, the notion of human dignity as such — of a
dignity attaching to the human personality as such, irrespective
of social rank — did not exist. Neither, indeed, did the notion
of humility. The nearest approach to this last notion which
existed previously to Christianity, was the humiliation inflicted
on the lower, and more especially on the slave, classes. But

FKATEKNITY VERSUS EQUALITY 91

the humiliation thus inflicted was inflicted by purely human
laws, on grounds that had nothing to do with morality ; and
it was an unlimited humiliation, if we may thus express
ourselves — a humiliation that crushed down the humiliated
classes, who had no belief in their own inalienable dignity to
prop them up and console them. The humility preached by
Christianity results, on the contrary, from the voluntary sub-
mission of the individual to a divine law ; and it has its
counterpart in the notion of human dignity. The humiliation
brutally inflicted by an exterior power prompted solely by
egotistical motives, is far removed from the humility resulting
from the consciousness of one's own shortcomings, from the
willing subordination of oneself to a power recognised as
higher and better.

When judging the value of Christianity, we must be
extremely careful to avoid falling into the grave error of
confounding two wholly distinct categories : the moral and
the social, or, if we prefer it, the absolute and the relative.
The confusion of these categories is the cause of the numerous
aberrations which have distorted the teaching of Jesus in the
course of centuries, and which have sought to represent that
teaching as a justification of equality, of communism, and of
anarchy. In no doctrine do we find such confusion to be
more productive of errors than in Tolstoyism. Based on a
radically false starting-point, the doctrine of Tolstoi could not
but constitute a tissue of absurdities. If we seek to apply
the famous nolite judicare et nolite condemnare to social life —
or the equally famous command to turn the left cheek when
struck on the right one — it is evident that anarchy must
result ; and anarchy engenders social disruption. In the
same way, with many of the sayings of Jesus. How would
any one, for instance, consent to work if salaries were regulated
on the principles inculcated in the parable of the labourers in
the vineyard ? If we seek to apply such sayings to social

92 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHRISTIANITY

existence, if we take certain precepts contained in the Sermon
on the Mount as enunciating social laws, then is it clear that
the teaching of Jesus, as far as it has any social purport,
would infallibly lead — were it applied — to the annihilation
of society. It is an extraordinary example of the crass
ignorance of the elementary necessities of social life of which
a man of high intellect can be guilty, that Tolstoi saw precisely
in his ridiculous caricature of Christ's teaching, the ideal for
society. For this extraordinary social reformer, the ideal for
society was social annihilation — the salvation of society could
only be sought in its disintegration and disruption.

And the founder of the religion that saved Western society
from annihilation is held up to our admiration and veneration,
not because he was instrumental in averting such a catastrophe,
but because he did his level best, according to Tolstoi, to bring
about that catastrophe ! Let those who admire Tolstoi's social
philosophy see, if they will, the salvation of society in anarchy
and disruption — but let them not render Jesus responsible
for their own aberrations.

The fact is that never did Jesus seek to apply to this
finite and relative world of ours, conditions that prevail
exclusively in the world of the infinite and the absolute-
Such conditions could not be applied in our world, seeing
that we know them not, that they escape all our methods of
investigation, that we lack entirely all means whereby to
judge them. Realist as he was, Jesus did not set himself
the fruitless task of endeavouring to invert all natural and
social laws, of trying to stand the world on its head, so to
speak. He accepted fully the laws which govern our finite
world and our finite existence ; but above these laws he set
the laws of the Infinite and the Absolute. Even as the
physico-chemical and biological sciences bring us at every
step to frontiers that our understanding cannot cross ; even
as these sciences show us the limits inexorably set to our

FKATEENITY VERSUS EQUALITY 93

knowledge, and the impossibility in which we find ourselves
of exceeding such limits ; so does the research after the moral
value of life bring us quickly to the boundary, and show us
that the value of life must needs be exterior to life. For
what compensation can we find in life itself for all the
sufferings, for all the disillusions, for all the tears, which life
brings with it ? In order to find any such compensation, in
order to find an answer to the anguished cry, Wozu? Wohin ?
we must seek for it outside the narrow limits of our finite
existence. Thus whether it be in the intellectual or in the
moral sphere, always do we find our life dominated by a
higher life, always do we find ourselves overshadowed by the
shadow of the great Unknown. Into this Unknown world
we cannot penetrate, and yet it imposes its presence on us at
every moment. On the mysterious ocean of the Unknown,
no human barque can set sail — and yet the waves of that
ocean never cease to beat, whether softly or violently, against
the shores of human life.

And it was in this Unknown world — in this world of the
Infinite and the Absolute — that Jesus placed the Moral Law
which he came to reveal unto us : the Moral Law which is
higher than the Social Law, because the former is eternal,
because it appertains to the world of the Absolute ; whereas
the Social Law is but a human creation, responding to finite
and passing needs. Our social laws are subordinated to a
higher Moral Law, even as our physiological life is sub-
ordinated to forces that surpass the measure of human power.
The Moral Law of Jesus was itself the Absolute, not merely
an aspect of the Absolute. Its commands we can understand,
but we cannot understand its methods. The methods of
God, symbol and incarnation of the Moral Law, remain
mysterious and incomprehensible. His measures are not our
measures — the moral evaluation of our acts is not identical
with the social evaluation of such acts. And this is inevitable,

94 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHKISTIANITY

if we consider that society can appreciate our acts only in
respect of their utility or harmfulness for social life — can
judge them only according to a purely utilitarian and finite
standard ; whereas the Moral Law, or God, judges human
conduct according to what we may term an Absolute standard,
according to a standard that does not only take account of the
social utility or harmfulness of such conduct. The moral
evaluation of our acts differs thus completely from their social
evaluation. But the social evaluation always responds to
social needs ; and it remains, therefore, as an indispensable
sanction for human conduct in so far as the latter affects social
life. Most certainly did Jesus never seek to supplant the
social evaluation of conduct by the moral evaluation — never
seek to apply precepts which refer only to the moral life of
the individual, to social conditions governed by finite laws
and responding to finite necessities. Precepts such as the
nolite judicare, which are evidently inapplicable as regards social
life, take on another meaning as soon as we apply them to the
moral life of the individual. For the laws which govern this
world of ours, and to which we, finite beings, are subject — are
none the less finite themselves ; and they do not apply to
the world of the Infinite, any more than the laws of the
Infinite apply to our world.

Jesus not only fully recognised the difference between the
moral and the social — between the moral, which is infinite
and absolute, and the social, which is finite and relative — but
he was careful to insist on it. Reddite quae sunt Caesaris,
Caesari ; et quae sunt Dei, Deo : the line of demarcation between
the two spheres could not be more sharply drawn than Jesus
drew it in these words. We must conform our conduct in
this life to the laws that condition our finite existence ; we
must not " kick against the pricks," not waste our energy in
seeking to destroy laws that dominate us. But, in the later
phases of social evolution, the individual is not exclusively a

FKATEKNITY VERSUS EQUALITY 95

" social being " — his individuality tends ever more and more
to differentiate itself, to assert itself, to liberate itself from
the tyranny of the collectivity. It is this differentiated
individuality, which no longer constitutes an integral part of
the social whole, that must subject itself to the Moral Law.
If the individual be not subordinated to such a higher law, in
the measure that he emancipates himself from the bonds of
social tyranny he will fall a prey to anarchy. In the early
stages of social evolution the individual has no existence
whatever, so to speak, outside the collectivity — his thoughts,
and the actions they prompt, are moulded for him by the
collective mentality. As he gradually reduces the " sphere
of influence " of collective representations, as his personality
gradually emerges and differentiates itself, so is it necessary
to subordinate this " individualised personality " to another
law, since it henceforth escapes the control of the social law.
The Moral Law thus acts as an indispensable completion of
the social law.

But the Moral Law does not only complete the social
law — it frequently confounds itself with the latter. It is
evident that the more the individual emancipates himself from
social tyranny, the more does society risk to be disintegrated ;
for the individual will not consent to halve himself, so to
speak, to consider one part of his personality as subject to
society, and one part as independent. His liberation once
commenced, it will tend inevitably to become an integral
liberation — the commencing antagonism between individual
interests and social interests will develop until a total rup-
ture is reached. Hence the imperative necessity of checking
individual liberty if the continuity of social existence is to be
maintained. The Moral Law subordinates to itself that part
of the individual nature which escapes social control ; but it also,
in the form in which it was revealed by Jesus, lends the invalu-
able support of its high sanction to social laws. All our acts

96 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHRISTIANITY

which directly concern the welfare of society, and which are
under the control of social laws, are to conform to such
laws, provided such laws themselves conform to the Moral
Law. If we violate those social laws, we violate ipso facto the
Moral Law. And as regards the acts that escape social control,
we are bowid by the Moral Law to regulate our conduct in such a
manner that the chief danger always menacing social existence,
namely the development of egotism, be avoided.

Because the Moral Law confounds itself frequently with
the social law, it does not therefore ensue that the latter is
co-extensive with the former. On the contrary, the Moral
Law dominates the social law and completes it. Its precepts
are applicable to that part of individual conduct which escapes
social control ; and the aim of such precepts is invariably to
subordinate the individual to a power exterior to himself,
and thereby to check the growth of an unhealthy egotism that
must otherwise conduce to anarchy. For instance, the
precept nolite judicare applies to the private judgments passed
by an individual on other individuals ; in this light it is
perfectly comprehensible ; and it is a precept that condemns
not only the uncharitableness of harsh judgments, but the
arrogance which is at the basis of all such judgments. Applied
to society, the precept is either meaningless or grotesque. It
is thus a precept applicable to individual acts that are outside
social control, but it is a precept which at the same time tends
to repress the development of antisocial feelings, in that it
combats egotism and engenders altruism. In other words, the
Moral Law at once completes and reinforces the social law.

It is exceedingly necessary that we bear in mind the
essential difference between the Moral Law and the social law
— necessary that we should remember that, if the one
completes and reinforces the other, the two are nevertheless
fundamentally different as regards their essence and their
methods. The two are fundamentally different because they

FKATEKNITY VERSUS EQUALITY 97

appertain to fundamentally different worlds. The conditions
that prevail in this finite world do not prevail in the world of
the Absolute, and vice versa. We understand the commands of
the Moral Law, in so far as they apply to our finite existence ;
but we do not understand the wherefore of such commands,
nor do we know anything of the measure whereby God,
creator and incarnation of the Moral Law, judges of our acts.
All we know is that we are, all of us, equal before the
Moral Law — for the moral evaluation of our conduct must needs
differ altogether from the social evaluation. Inequality is the
law of the finite world, equality of the Infinite.

The inequalities that necessarily exist in social life, and
which result from differences of capacity constantly engendered
by heredity and constantly accentuated by selection, were as
fully admitted and recognised by Jesus, as was the equality of
all before the Moral Law. The parable of the talents shows
us this clearly ; he with five talents differed in this life from
him with two talents, but both " entered into the joy of their
Lord " when their race was run, for both had used the
capacities confided to them in a worthy manner. When
Jesus said to his disciples, Vos estis sal terrae, vos estis lux
mundi, it is evident that he considered them as greatly
superior to other mortals. Similarly, when Jesus said to St.
Peter, Tu es Petrus et super hanc petram aediftcabo Ecclesiam
meam, and when he expressly confided to him the power of
the keys, it appears evident to any impartial person that
Jesus recognised St. Peter to be the chief of the apostles, the
Head of the Christian Church — recognising ipso facto the
existence of inequality among the apostles. Reddite giiae sunt
Caesaris, Caesari, is a clear indication of our duty to submit to
the laws governing social life, of which laws inequality is one
of the most fundamental. St. Paul is exceedingly explicit
concerning the necessity of subordination to those above us :
Obedite praepositis vestris et subjacete eis, he writes. St. Peter

7

98 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHKISTIANITY

writes in a similar strain : Subjecti igitur estate omni liumanae
creaturae propter Deum, sive regi quasi praecellenti, sive ducibus
tamquam ab eo missis ad vindictam malefactorum, laudem vero
bonorum. . . . Omnes honorate, fraternitatem diligite, Deum
timete, regem honorificate. Servi subditi estate in omni timore
dominis, non tantum bonis et modestis, sed etiam dyscolis. And
we need not insist on what has been invariably the doctrine of
the Christian Church. It is clear that social inequality is
fully recognised and admitted by Christianity.

But Christianity did not, like the individualist theories of
the nineteenth century, content itself with merely recognising
the existence of inequality, with merely admitting that a few are
superior, whereas the great number are inferior. It did not,
like the individualist theories of liberal economics, content
itself with recognising that superior capacity entails superior
rights for its possessor. Christianity, on the contrary, was
always careful to insist, not on rights but on duties ; it did
not seek to develop egotism, but to refrain it ; it did not flatter
the superior individual, but taught him to humble himself
before the Moral Law. Liberalism set before the individual
no higher ideal than himself; the unique aim of the superior
individual must be the development of his powers, with a view
to satisfying with greater facility individual cravings and
desires. Christianity gave the superior individual an end
outside the limits of his personality, higher and more durable
than himself. Christianity also taught the duty of self-develop-
ment— only the aim of self-development is different in Christian
ethics to what it is in liberal ethics. The self-development of
the Christian means the constant development of his strength
and power, in order that he may thereby serve more usefully
his fellow-men — in order that he may become an ever more
perfect citizen of the community to which he is subject ; it
means, also, the constant progress of his moral life, the unceas-
ing effort to attain the ultimate goal of moral perfection. The

FKATEENITY VERSUS EQUALITY 99

self-development of the Christian implies therefore rigorous
self-control and persevering labour.

In the system of Christian ethics, the notions of duty and
responsibility are the invariable correlatives of the notion of
superiority. In the measure that capacity, and consequently
power, increase, do also Duty and Kesponsibility increase-
The possession of power does not signify the possession of
means whereby egotistical interests may be better served.
The possession of power, on the contrary, entails for him who
possesses it onerous duties and grave responsibilities. Those
who govern are responsible for the welfare, material and moral,
of those who are governed. If Jesus tells his disciples that
they are the salt of the earth and the light of the world, he
also reminds them that ego elegi vos et posui vos, ut eatis et
fructum offer utis. If St. Paul enjoins on his followers the
duty of obedience to those in authority, he hastens to add,
Ipsi enim pervigilant, quasi rationem pro animabus vestris
reddituri. The inferior are to submit themselves to the
superior, because the latter care for the welfare of those under
them, and must render account of their souls. The whole of
the social teaching of Christianity is here admirably resumed
by St. Paul. The words of the Apostle constitute a clear
negation of the doctrine of equality, and an equally clear
affirmation of the doctrine of fraternity. The duty of obedi-
ence on the part of the governed — the duty of vigilance on
the part of the governing : such is the lesson taught us. St.
Paul is careful to insist on the grave responsibility of those to
whom the government of society is entrusted, for they must
give account of the souls of those confided to their care. The
possession of power imposes thus the most onerous of responsi-
bilities : responsibility for the moral welfare of the governed.
The duty of submission of the inferior is a light duty by
comparison with the duty of vigilance imposed on the governing
classes, on the superior few.

100 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHEISTIANITY

The parable of the talents teaches us the same lesson —
namely, that duty and responsibility increase with capacity and
power. He who has five talents must bring forth, by his
labour, five more talents ; whereas he to whom but two talents
have been given, is only bound to produce a similar number
of new ones. Duty and responsibility are always equivalent
to capacity. Much is exacted from him to whom much has
been given — great is the responsibility of him whom Nature
has richly endowed.

The message of Jesus embraced all classes of society — and
therein lies its incomparable sociological value. To those who
are governed, that is to say, to the masses, Jesus inculcated
the duty of submission to those in authority ; to those who
govern, to the tlite, Jesus taught the double duty of exercising
authority with firmness, and of caring for the material and
moral welfare of the governed. Jesus thus sought to solve what
we may call the social problem in the only way in which the
latter can be solved, namely, by establishing an equilibrium
between the divers social elements, whose interests tend to
enter into conflict with each other. All the modern solutions
of the social problem proposed during the last hundred and
fifty years have proved unsatisfactory, precisely because of
their unilateral character, because they have all of them taken
into consideration but one aspect of the social relations,
because they have failed to see that the normal character of
social evolution depends on the maintenance of an equilibrium
between the heterogeneous parts of the social organism. The
liberal theory of the Eechtsstaat maintained on paper this
essential equilibrium ; but the curb it imposed on the egotism
of those in power has proved altogether insufficient in practice.
The application of liberal theories to the government of society
has resulted in a complete " falsification of the balance " of
social interests, for the liberal regime has served exclusively
the interests of the governing classes. Socialism, on the other

FKATEKNITY VERSUS EQ^ALlT^ : '( '/• 10 1

hand, likewise falsities entirely the balance of social interests,
for it seeks professedly to further the sole interests of the
masses, to bring about the extermination of all classes of society
other than the proletariat. The mortal sin of Liberalism and
of Socialism is that both develop class egotism.

Far different to these unilateral, one-sided doctrines, is the
social synthesis realised by Christianity. On all, high and
low, Christianity enjoins the practice of humility, of the
humility that checks egotism in the individual. To each
class it inculcates the notion of Duty — of Duty that increases
with every step that one mounts in the social hierarchy — of
Duty that is proportioned to the extent of power, to the extent
of capacity ; and this great doctrine of class duty, of class re-
sponsibility, is the best antidote to the development of egotism
in the class — of that Klassengeist which obscures the funda-
mental idea of social solidarity. To the masses, Christianity
inculcates the duty of submission to those alone capable of
guiding a society, amidst the pitfalls and snares that perpetually
menace the stability and the existence of that society. It is
thus in their own interest that Christianity enjoins on the
masses this duty of submission to those in authority; the
masses must submit to their rulers for the same reason that
the sailor submits himself to the orders of his captain : it is
to the interest of the sailor to obey, seeing that insubordination
on his part would very likely cause the wreck of the ship,
and consequently his own death ; and it is, similarly, to the
interest of the masses to obey, seeing that revolt and revolution
threaten the foundations of social life, and that social disruption
cannot but entail the elimination of the entire society. But,
on the other hand, it is indispensable that those to whom
incumbs the difficult task of governing and directing society,
show themselves to be equal to their mission — indispensable
that they prove themselves worthy of the confidence of the
masses. It is their duty to earn the respect of the masses by

102 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHKISTIANITY

manifesting their ability to exercise authority, to govern with
a firmness that is unflinching when it is a question of safe-
guarding the legitimate interests of society. And it is their
duty to win the love and affection of the masses by the zeal
with which they minister to the latter's needs. Both these
duties have been ignored by the bourgeois governments of Europe
during the last century; and it is for having ignored them,
that bourgeois society stands condemned to annihilation at no
very distant date.

The governing classes are to be for the governed what the
elder brother is for the younger. They must be able to repel
insubordination, to maintain order and discipline. They must,
however, not rule by the rod, but rule by affection ; their
authority must be based on the confidence they have gained,
and of which they have proved themselves worthy. The govern-
ment must beware of treating those subject to it with contempt.
It must treat them as friends, even as the elder brother is
a friend for the younger brother, even as Jesus was the friend
of his disciples, to whom he said, Jam non dicam vos servos
. . . vos autem dixi amicos. Those who govern must place
their capacity and their experience at the service of the whole
society — the experienced elder brother must guide the inex-
perienced junior, for "if the blind lead the blind, both will
fall into the ditch." These exceedingly true words pronounced
by Jesus show us once more how clearly he recognised the
necessity of authority in society — of a helmsman capable of
steering the social ship, and capable of enforcing his will. Those
who govern are responsible for the welfare, material and moral,
of the governed, even as the elder brother is responsible for
the welfare of the younger. The government of society is thus
in the nature of a trust, and those who govern are in the
position of trustees. They are the trustees for the welfare of
society — welfare which can be assured only by unceasing
vigilance, only if the trustees remain always conscious of the

FKATERNITY VERSUS EQUALITY 103

grave responsibility assumed by them. The power which those
who govern exercise, is a power to be wielded exclusively for
the common good, and not for the furtherance of egotistical
class interests. And what higher ideal could Christianity
hold up to the rulers of society than the sublime words of
Jesus : Venite ad me omnes, qui laboratis et onerati estis, et ego
reficiam ws. Tollitejugum meum super vos, et discite a me quia
mitis sum et humilis corde. . . . Jugum enim meum suave est,
et onus meum leve ? Whatever the present century, saturated
with egotism and vanity, may think, certain it is that such
sublime words as these were uttered by no ordinary man ;
for their sublimity has never been attained by any other
teacher, before or since. But these words do not apply
exclusively to the individual and to individual distress ; they
have also a meaning for society. Even as Jesus was mild and
humble of heart — even as his yoke was easy and his burden
light — so should those who exercise power in society learn to
temper firmness with mildness, so should they be mindful of
the duty of humility, so should their yoke be easy and light.
It will remain the eternal honour of the Catholic Church that
it never ceased, during the long centuries of its uncontested
supremacy, and before events had compelled it to make a
political alliance with the secular power, to enjoin on the civil
government the necessity of modelling its policy on the teaching
of the Master who spoke such as none other has ever spoken.

The message of Christianity embraced, therefore, as we
observed, all classes of society. The social genius of Christi-
anity manifested itself in the realisation of a magnificent
social synthesis, such as no other philosophy, before or after
it, has been able to realise. And this social synthesis has as
its keynote the notion of fraternity. Fraternity is unrivalled
as a bond of social unity, of social solidarity. All men are
brothers because all have the same fundamental duties, the
same fundamental moral value and moral dignity, the same

104 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHKISTIANITY

consciousness of their respective shortcomings. Or we can,
if we will, revert the proposition, and say that because all
have the same fundamental duties, the same fundamental
moral dignity, the same consciousness of their respective
shortcomings, therefore all are brothers. All have the same
fundamental duties towards society, but all have not the same
capacity. Inequality of capacity entails necessarily social
inequality; but this social inequality is engendered by finite
laws, is due to finite causes, and responds to finite necessities.
Over and above the finite stands the Infinite ; over and
above our social inequalities stands our moral equality. The
fundamental duty which each one of us, high or low, must
fulfil towards society, is at the same time a duty to be fulfilled
towards the Moral Law, which remains the supreme sanction
of the social law. And outside that social duty is also the
directly moral duty, exacted from each individual, irrespective
of rank or capacity, in regard to that part of individual
conduct which escapes social control. All having, therefore,
the same fundamental duty towards the Moral Law, all are
equal before the Moral Law. As, however, capacities differ,
and as the social value of the labour performed by each depends
on capacity, so are we not equal before the social law, but
unequal.

See, then, how wonderfully the doctrine of fraternity, as
preached by Christianity, is adapted to the necessities of social
life. The great social law of inequality is admitted and
recognised, but the inevitable hardships that accompany its
working are softened, are rendered acceptable, by the intro-
duction of the idea of moral equality. Discontent is stilled,
the dignity of even the humblest labour is safeguarded. Egotism
is restrained, by the fact of each individual being constantly
reminded of his duties towards Csesar and towards God,
towards the social law and towards the Moral Law — by the
fact of each individual being taught to practise humility,

FKATEENITY VERSUS EQUALITY 105

being taught to recognise the insufficiency and feebleness of
his efforts, however great, by comparison with that which is
required of him by a Moral Law that judges not according to
our finite standards. Labour, instead of being a source of
misery, becomes a source of joy, because all are conscious of
working for the realisation of a common aim, of a common
ideal — because each one is encouraged by the sympathy and
esteem of the others, and can count on fraternal assistance in
times of difficulty or distress. Individual egotism is sacrificed
to an ideal higher than the individual, class egotism to an
ideal higher than class. The individual is not alone in the
world, isolated from his fellow-creatures, hating and distrusting
the latter as dangerous rivals in a bitter and merciless struggle
for existence. He feels himself to be the member of a great
family, to the other members of which he is linked by common
interests, common ideals, common aspirations. Society being
thus strongly integrated, the individual is far better able to
fulfil his duties, social and moral, and he is far more willing
to fulfil them, because rendered more conscious of them.

This brings us back to our starting-point. If fraternity
is to be realised, three conditions are indispensable. Fraternity
implies the working of all together for a common ideal, for
the common good — in other words, social integration ; it
implies, further, the recognition by each one of the dignity of
all of the others ; and it implies the practice of humility.
Humility is indeed necessary, if egotism is to be sacrificed to
higher ideals, and if those above are to admit the moral
dignity of those below. Humility is essential for all classes.
It is indispensable for those who are governed, for without it
the duty of submission is hard to fulfil, the fact of social
inferiority is hard to accept, although it be inevitable. And
it is indispensable for the upper classes, for those whose duty
it is to govern and to think ; for without it these classes must
tend to abuse of the power entrusted to them, to use such

106 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHEISTIANITY

power for the furtherance of exclusively egotistical interests,
to forget the solidarity of their interests with the interests of
the classes below them in the social hierarchy, to neglect the
welfare of these lower classes for which they are responsible.
Without humility the sacrifice of egotism is impossible ;
without the sacrifice of egotism, social integration is impossible ;
and without social integration, the continuity of social existence
is impossible. How necessary, therefore, in this age of
rampant egotism and self-satisfaction, is it that all classes of
society be constantly reminded of the lofty ideal of Christi-
anity— that the life of Jesus be perpetually held up before
us as a great example — that the Cross be always in front
of us now, even as it shone, in its humble and yet immortal
splendour, amidst the fading light of evening, when the sun of
Eome's glory was sinking beneath the darkened horizon. In
the gloom that enshrouded the dying empire the Cross stood
out against the stormy sky, a beacon-light to guide desolate
humanity along new paths to a higher destiny.

And to-day, amidst the whirl of frivolities and amusements
of a decrepit governing class, which has been unable alike to
understand its responsibilities and to foresee the consequences
entailed by the neglect of those responsibilities ; amidst the
din and clash of social strife, the whistling of the wind that
announces the coming storm of the social revolution ; amidst
all this bustle and rush, turmoil and noise, it is necessary that
we pause to listen to a voice that calls to us from across the
quicksands of time, from beyond the silence of past centuries
— to the voice that uttered the simple and sublime words,
Discite a me quia mitis sum et humilis corde. Eoman society,
too highly cultured, pampered by too much luxury, corrupted
by idleness, sensualism, and the too exclusive consecration of
life to pleasure, was unable to comprehend the lesson con-
veyed by the life of Jesus — obediens usque ad mortem, mortem
autem crucis. Eoman society could not understand the lesson

FKATEKNITY VERSUS EQUALITY 107

of humility ; and Eoman society was condemned, in conse-
quence, to disappear from the scene of the world's history.
Such, also, will inevitably be the fate of Western civilisation,
unless it consent to profit by the experience of the past —
unless it consent to learn the virtue of humility, to sacrifice
egotistical interests to higher ideals.

We may, to conclude, resume in a single sentence the
immense sociological importance of the doctrine of fraternity
preached by Christianity : A lone the notion of fraternity can
reconcile the two conflicting necessities of inequality and of
solidarity. Fraternity admits social inequality, based on
inequality of capacity ; and at the same time it implies the
solidarity of all, the working of all together for the common
good — and likewise the recognition by each one of the moral
dignity of all the others. Fraternity is a notion that responds
to the needs of society, because it rises beyond the limits of
society and of this finite life to seek for a higher sanction for
Conduct and Duty ; because it regards Duty as a correlative
of capacity and consequently of inequality ; because social
inequality receives thereby an ethical significance; and
because, in the doctrine of fraternity, social inequality is
invariably limited by the idea of moral equality.

CHAPTEE V

THE SUPKEME DIGNITY OF LABOUR

MULTI sunt vocati , pauci vero electi. The words of the gospel
apply also to this world. Few, indeed, are called to the
enjoyment of the world's riches and privileges — few called to
the possession of power — few gifted with the qualities that
make of them superior beings. The overwhelming majority of
the members of society at any moment are condemned to a
life of obscurity and strife, of toil and anxiety. They are
born into the world, they see dimly, through the fog of daily
labour and daily distress, the wealth of this world glittering
before their eyes ; but they will never touch this wealth,
never know any of the comforts it can purchase, never guess
the peace of mind it can engender ; they will toil throughout
youth, throughout manhood, possibly throughout old age ; and
they will finally be shovelled into the earth, their bones will
rot, and the great world moves on without stopping one
instant, heedless of those who embark on the journey from
which there is no return.

During life, not one ray of light has penetrated the
atmosphere of dark despair or of dull resignation in which
they are compelled to vegetate until Death, the great Consoler,
brings peace. Their toil has brought them no reward. Well
may they ask, What is the value of life ? What is the
meaning of so sombre and so useless a tragedy ?

108

THE SUPKEME DIGNITY OF LABOUR 109

All these countless victims of the world, these myriads of
unknown toilers who have sacrificed their humble lives to the
insatiable monster we call society — all these are the instru-
ments, unconscious and obscure, but indispensable, by means
of which the great developmental forces which shape social
evolution can operate. At the price of untold sufferings, of
much blood and of countless tears, do such forces operate —
only at such a price can the benefit of their action be ultimately
reaped.

Those, however, who are the victims mercilessly immolated
to the ruthless deity of social progress, can they be expected
to understand the wherefore of their martyrdom ? Such as
these cannot penetrate the mystery of far-distant Causes, work-
ing in them and through them, and working for the salvation
of future society. If they never pause to reason, the enigma
will never trouble them. But if they do pause — and be their
mental faculties ever so weak — they cannot fail to question the
value of life.

And the question will be put with all the more bitterness
if the toilers and sufferers have before them the spectacle of a
leisured class given up to pleasures and vanities, to ostentation
and luxury, who know not what duty and responsibility mean,
and whose whole existence is consecrated exclusively to frivolity
or to the pursuit of gain. The utility of labour will appear the
more questionable, if the only object of that labour be apparently
to maintain a class of parasites. The injustice of suffering will
appear the more terrible, when the cry of those who suffer
awakens, among the privileged, no feelings other than in-
difference or contempt.

The dignity of labour is degraded when the higher spheres
of society affect to despise work, and consider idleness as the
ideal, as the only condition befitting superior beings. All
loftier moral aspirations are stifled when the pursuit of wealth,
the gratification of material desires, are held up as the sole

110 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHKISTIANITY

aims of life, as the only goal worthy of our efforts. Under
the influence of such materialism, which spreads from the
higher to the lower spheres, which gangrenes little by little all
the classes of society, labour loses its value. It comes to be
regarded as abasing human dignity, as an evil to be suppressed
as quickly as possible.

Wealth is no longer considered as a means whereby
social duties may be performed ; it is regarded solely as a
means for enabling its possessor to live in luxury and idleness.
Luxury and idleness are the supreme ideals of society. When
we have arrived at such a state of things — as we have arrived
to-day — egotism is triumphant. And when egotism is
triumphant, when the notion of duty is obscured, then are
the masses ripe for revolution, the governing classes ripe for
annihilation, and society as a whole ripe for disruption.

The great doctrine of fraternity implies the recognition of
the supreme dignity of labour. All men are brothers, because
all work, because all contribute, each according to his capacities,
to the maintenance of social life, to the formation of the
material and moral patrimony of society. No philosophy has
ever insisted more strongly on the supreme dignity of labour
than Christianity. Jesus was the son of a humble carpenter,
and he himself worked in his father's workshop until thirty
years of age. Et erat subditus illis — he was obedient unto his
parents, and he was not ashamed of serving under Joseph's
orders as Joseph's apprentice. For those who believe in the
divine mission of Jesus of Nazareth, it is certain that labour
received here its highest consecration.

And when Jesus left the little workshop of Nazareth, where
he had worked so many years, in order to commence his
ministry, to attend to his Father's business as he himself
expressed it — among whom did he seek his disciples ? Among
the workers and toilers. To whom did he go and preach ?

THE SUPREME DIGNITY OF LABOUR 111

Also to the workers and toilers. Of his disciples, Peter and
Andrew, James and John, were simple fishermen, Matthew a
publican ; and the others were likewise, all of them, humble
working men. The masses of the oppressed, the laborious
multitude, the world of the toilers, of the outcast, flocked in
their thousands to hear Jesus preach ; and it was with regard
to these, lowly sons and daughters of labour, that the Master
spoke the beautiful misereor super turbam — for these that,
according to the gospel story, he performed the miracle of the
five thousand loaves.

If we turn to the teaching of Jesus, we find expressed in
it clearly the ideas of the supreme dignity of labour, and of the
equality of all the various categories of labour before the Moral
Law. In the parable of the talents, the same reward awaits
him who only possessed two talents as is given to him who
had five talents. To the one as to the other are spoken the
words, " Well done, good and faithful servant." This parable
has a double meaning : it shows us, on the one hand, that the
man who has accomplished little because he has only received
little, ranks as the equal of him who has accomplished much
because he has received much ; but it shows us also, on the
other hand, that he who has received little must not think
that the fact of his having received but little justifies his
remaining idle. The servant who has, in the parable, received
but one talent, is punished and cast out into the darkness for
having failed to make use of the little confided to him. Those
whom Nature has equipped but scantily, have the same duty
to perform in respect of labour as those to whom Nature has
supplied riches in abundance. Each must work in such a
way that his patrimony, however small, bring forth fruit for
the benefit of society. No one, in consequence, must permit
his patrimony to remain idle — for that which has been given
him has been given in order that he may increase and
multiply it by his labour.

112 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHKISTIANITY

We cannot conceive of a clearer indication to us, that to
labour is our sacred duty. Neither can we conceive of a less
ambiguous reminder to all classes of society, of the responsi-
bility borne by each one of them. The upper classes, having
received much, must produce much ; but the lower classes
must not think that, having received but little, they need
produce nothing. He who has received little must not fail to
work in such a manner, that the little he has be increased
proportionately. And the upper classes who have received
abundantly, must beware of thinking that the richness of their
patrimony is accounted to them for virtue — those to whom
Nature has been generous must not suppose that higher
capacity entitles them to greater consideration before the
Moral Law. Judged according to the principles of the Moral
Law, before the higher tribunal of Absolute Justice, the
labour of the savant and the statesman has the same value as
the labour of the blacksmith or the carpenter. The weight
which is placed in the balance, increases in heaviness according
as the capacity increases in dimension — and this weight,
being of a moral nature, appertains to the domain of the
Absolute, and cannot be measured by our relative understand-
ing. The sacred duty of labour remains the same, whatever
be the capacity, and however small the latter may be ; but the
responsibility increases with the capacity.

The remarkable parable of the workers in the vineyard
teaches us the same lesson. The proprietor of the vineyard
had agreed with his labourers to pay the latter one penny
(deiiarius) as remuneration for their work. At the third
hour the proprietor went out, and, seeing other labourers
standing idle around, sent them in to work likewise.
Similarly at the sixth, ninth, and eleventh hours, fresh
labourers were added to the original cohort. The evening
having come, the proprietor of the vineyard paid to all the
labourers alike, to those of the first and third hours as also to

THE SUPKEME DIGNITY OF LABOUK 113

those of the eleventh hour, the same remuneration of one
penny. And when the labourers of the first hour protested,
arguing that it was not just that they, who had worked
throughout the heat of the day, should receive the same
remuneration as those who had only commenced work at the
eleventh hour, the proprietor of the vineyard answered : Amice,
non facio tibi injuriam : nonne ex denario convenisti mecum ?
Tolle quod tuum est, et vade. The reply may have seemed
harsh, and to us it may appear incomprehensible. But read
what the proprietor of the vineyard adds : Is your eye bad,
because mine is good ? — An oculus tuus nequam est, quia ego
bonus sum ? Which means : Is your eye, adapted solely to
the world of the relative, capable of discerning justice
meted out according to a measure that is not of this world ?

The parable of the workers in the vineyard as also the
parable of the talents, teaches us that all the categories of
labour, however different may be the social value attributed
to their various products, possess the same moral value.
Christianity has, as we observed in the last chapter,
recognised the inequalities which prevail in this world of
ours ; it has not sought to combat Nature, to stand the
natural world on its head, so to speak ; and had it thus
attempted to go contrary to natural law, Christianity must
speedily have ended in bankruptcy. Christianity therefore
accepted the laws prevailing in the natural world, of which
inequality is one of the most fundamental. Above such
inequality, however, which is only of a relative nature,
seeing that it results from the working of a law applicable
only in this relative world of ours, Christianity set the notion
of equality, which belongs to the domain of the Absolute.
Jesus did not seek to apply conditions that appertain to the
domain of the Absolute, to this relative world in which we
live. To have done so would indeed have been folly ; and
those who attribute to Jesus the wish to see such an

8

114 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHRISTIANITY

impossibility realised, misunderstand strangely the whole
purport of his teaching. Jesus was not a visionary dreamer,
but a realist who possessed a rare comprehension of the
realities of existence. Conditions which prevail in the world
of the Absolute are not applicable in the world of the
Eelative; but such conditions do, none the less, remain as
a higher ideal. Our knowledge is strictly limited; the
realities which our understanding is capable of grasping, are
but phenomena of which we cannot penetrate the inner
significance. At every step we take, we are brought face
to face with the Unknown. The Absolute world dominates
our phenomenal world and overshadows it, manifesting its
presence every time we seek to explore the underlying
Causes of phenomena, to lighten the darkness of the mystery
that enshrouds our life and our destinies. Although we
cannot cross its threshold, although we are unable to raise the
veil that hides its secrets from our finite vision, the Absolute
is thus none the less a " reality " to us, although a negative
reality, a reality that we cannot aspire to know, seeing that
it escapes all our methods of investigation. The ideal
conditions which prevail in this domain of the Absolute, in
this domain that perpetually dominates our finite existence,
remain as a great yearning — as an aim that we cannot hope
to realise here, but that none the less presents itself to us as
the natural goal towards the attainment of which we should
direct our efforts.

Inequality signifies inequality of capacity. Capacity is a
biological conception, it is derived from heredity and is
constantly developed by selection. We measure capacity
according to physical and intellectual standards, we judge it
from a utilitarian point of view, according to the benefit which
society is susceptible of deriving from it. But the standard
by which we judge of capacity, and which is based on the
utility to society of such capacity, is not the standard by

THE SUPEEME DIGNITY OF LABOUK 115

which capacity is judged of in the light of the moral law.
The Moral Law, which Jesus identified with God, takes not
account of the capacity per se, or of the capacity in its
relation to social needs, but of the will which underlies each
individual capacity. The will is of a moral, and not of a
biological nature. We understand the laws that govern the
biological evolution of man, which evolution belongs to the
domain of the finite and the relative ; but the laws that
govern his moral nature escape our understanding. For the
moral nature of man appertains to the Absolute, partakes of
the Absolute. It is, therefore, not subject to the laws
which prevail in this finite and relative world ; and it is,
consequently, not subject to the law of inequality that is
operative in the sphere of phenomena.

The parable of the talents shows that Jesus recognised
fully the inequality of capacity of those whose toil and labour,
in the manifold and varied spheres of activity, go to make up
the patrimony of society. He who has five talents is the man
of superior capacity, who can consequently produce more
than the man of less capacity, who has only two talents.
Not only can the man with five talents produce more from
a quantitative point of view — he can also produce things of
greater qualitative value. The inequality of capacity of the
various labourers, and the consequent inequality of the products
of labour, is thus admitted by Jesus. Society measures the
value of labour according to the capacity of the labourers,
according to the utility which each category of products
possesses for social life ; it rewards the labourers according to
their capacity to produce things judged useful to society at any
given moment. But over and above this social evaluation,
there remains the moral evaluation which takes account solely
of the will underlying each individual capacity. This moral
evaluation of a moral entity on which we have no hold is not,
of course, accessible to our finite understanding, that can grasp

116 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHKISTIANITY

only the relative. Jesus left it in the hands of God,
considered as identical with the Absolute.

The moral evaluation of labour being thus entirely
independent of its social evaluation, the dignity of all the
various categories of labour is safeguarded. Those at the
bottom of the social scale rank as the equals of those at the
top, when judged according to the principles of the Moral
Law. It is in this light that we must interpret the words
of Jesus to his disciples : Qui major est vestrum, erit minister
vester. He who, having great capacities, becomes arrogant on
that account, considering himself as superior to those having
less capacity, must recollect that if, in this finite existence,
" the princes of the world exercise dominion and wield great
power," yet are our scales of justice and remuneration different
from those of the Absolute world. Certainly must he who
is richly endowed by Nature be careful to utilise his gifts,
careful to fertilise the field of his patrimony by his labour —
and that labour must be in harmony with the extent of his
possessions. The greater the heritage, the more intense must
be the labour. No man must therefore forget his situation, no
man must sink beneath his situation, no man must prove him-
self unworthy of his inheritance. For, in this case, he has
chosen to forsake the duties and responsibilities which have
been allotted to him ; and if he who, having received but one
talent, is cast out into the darkness for having neglected his
duty, much greater must needs be the punishment awaiting
him who, having five talents, has left duty unfulfilled. He
who has received much must consequently be proud, not of
his capacity, but of the possibilities given him of utilising that
capacity for the good of society. He must be proud of his
situation, not because of the honours and privileges attached
to it, but because of the onerous duties and responsibilities
which such a situation implies. He should set his pride on
fulfilling those duties, on labouring in a manner commensurate

THE SUPKEME DIGNITY OF LABOUK 117

with the wealth of his patrimony. His post is a post of
honour and a post of danger. It is an honour to be able to
labour in such a way as to bring forth fruit a hundred-fold ;
but the danger is always present that those in high places
abuse their position, that they perceive only the material
advantages conferred by such a position, and are blind to the
duties and responsibilities entailed by it. The pride of the
superior man should reside in the consciousness of having been
equal to the calls made upon him, of having proved himself
worthy of his high and responsible situation.

The teaching of Jesus thus not only admits the differences
of rank due to inequality of capacity, but imposes on those
placed in the higher ranks the duty of pride. They are to be
proud of their inheritance ; yet only because this inheritance
entails grave responsibilities, yet only because this inheritance
burdens them with duties so formidable as to be the supreme
test of their value. It must be their pride to show their
value, to show the stuff they are made of, to show that they
are able to fulfil the high duties exacted of them ; it must be
their pride to be able to produce, at the close of their career,
an account that bears witness to the fact that they have nobly
striven to wipe out their debt to society by the services they
have rendered ; it must be their pride to be able to say, with St.
Paul, when the sun has sunk and the dusk of evening obscures
the horizon, Bonum certamen certavi, cursum consummavi.

But the pride of duty and responsibility inculcated by
Jesus is very different from the arrogance due to self-satisfaction
and vanity. Vos estis sal terrae, said Jesus to his disciples.
The latter are to remember that they are the salt of the earth,
and they are to be proud of being called, in consequence, to fulfil
the most onerous and the most exacting duties. But they are
to remember also that " the Son of Man came not to be served,
but to serve." Bearing this in mind, they are to say with
St. Paul, " By the grace of God, I am what I am." Their

118 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHRISTIANITY

pride must be in the consciousness of duty done, and well
done. But if they are to be proud of labour accomplished,
they are to remember that the force by which they have
laboured is not theirs, but that it was given them by a Higher
Power. Therefore are they not to be vain and arrogant ; but,
humbling themselves, they are to regard the labour accom-
plished by them as always inferior to the labour due — they are
to consider their debt to be of such magnitude that it never
can be adequately compensated for.

And he to whom little has been given, let him succumb
neither to despair nor to envy. If he give way to despair,
then will he not work, for he will regard his work as useless,
because too insignificant. But work is exacted also from him,
even though he has received but two talents ; and, if he shirk
that work, he will be rigorously called to account. Let him
not be envious, seeing that envy will profit him nothing —
seeing that, as we are reminded in the old fable, if the frog
attempt to swell to the dimensions of the ox, it will burst.
Let him do the work exacted from him, let him bring forth
the fruit commensurate with his capacities. However humble
that work may be, it will in no wise lose its reward, for the
moral evaluation of labour considers not the mere social value
of the latter. He who has received five talents, and he who
has received but two, will both of them, if their talents have
borne fruit in proportion, hear the words spoken, "Well
done." When the widow put her humble mite into the alms-
box, Jesus declared to his disciples, " Verily, verily, I say
unto you, she has put in more than all the others together."
It is not the material value of labour, not its social value,
which the Moral Law considers, but the will underlying all
labour, however humble. Those who are called to work in the
vineyard at the eleventh hour, receive the same reward as.
those who have worked therein since the first hour, because
the will in both cases has been identical.

THE SUPKEME DIGNITY OF LABOUK 119

Here again we see how magnificently the teaching of
Jesus applies to all classes of society. It reminds all of their
duties, and it checks, in all classes, the tendency to egotism.
Greater capacity, far from rendering its possessors egotistical
and self-satisfied, should render them proud only of their
responsibilities, proud only of the opportunity afforded them
of proving their value, proud only of being able to labour the
more intensely for the common good. And those whose
capacity is inferior, who are less generously endowed by
Nature, have also their responsibility. They also have their
work to perform, their share of social duties to execute. But
Christianity does not content itself with saddling all classes,
high and low, with responsibilities ; it does not content itself
with indicating to the individual his duties. With a con-
summate knowledge of human psychology, it seeks also to
establish the counterpart of those duties, seeks to reward the
individual for his persevering efforts, to compensate him for
his sacrifices, to pay him adequately for his labour. Duties
performed towards society without any return being offered,
is like labour accomplished without salary under the pressure
of compulsion. Both tend to be badly done, both tend to
sicken and disgust, in the long run, those who accomplish them.
The more greatly does the individual intellect develop, the
more rational does the individual become ; and the less willing
will he be to perform duties towards society without com-
pensation, the more intolerable will the social tyranny that
exacts such duties appear to him. Such a state of affairs is
perilous in the extreme for society. In the interest of society
it becomes imperatively necessary to establish an equilibrium
between the individual and the collectivity — to prevent the
antagonism between social requirements and individual
interests from reaching a point at which it could not but
menace the stability of society. And this is what Christianity
has done. Those to whom incumb the most irksome social

120 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHEISTIANITY

duties, those whose lot it is to accomplish the most painful
and the most ungrateful tasks, those who perform the most
humble and the least remunerative labour: all these, who
would otherwise be necessarily prone to revolt, and whose
revolt, if successful, would engender social disruption — all these
find, in Christianity, compensation for the sacrifices demanded
of them ; and they are thus rendered willing to make the
necessary sacrifice of their egotism, sacrifice which is indispens-
able if the continuity of social life is to be assured.

CHAPTEE VI

MAKEIAGE AND FAMILY LIFE

IT is a commonplace saying, that the stability of society is
conditioned by the stability of family life. And this saying
is profoundly true. It is therefore inevitable that religion,
which is the great instrument of social integration and stability,
should strive, by all the means in its power, to maintain the
cohesion of the family — should envelop family life and the family
organisation in a network of regulations, having for their object
to prevent a dissolution of the domestic institutions. In the
most primitive religions we find a regulation of marriage and
of the family organisation, so complicated as to be nearly incom-
prehensible to civilised minds. And, as we ascend the scale,
we are always confronted by similar regulations, different in
their form, but identical as regards their aim and as regards
their stringency.

It has been said, and rightly said, that the family is a
miniature society. It is in the family that the individual first
learns the great and fundamental duty of submission — in the
family that he first learns the other great social duty of co-
operation. And when the child has attained to maturity, has
in its turn founded a new family — then does the young man
or the young woman first learn the meaning of responsibility.

121

122 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHRISTIANITY

Family life is the great educator ; it is here that the individual
is constantly reminded, all through life, of his Duty and of his
Responsibility ; that is to say, of the two things without which
the existence of society is impossible — nay, unthinkable. No
other school, no other environing influences, are comparable to
the wonderful school, to the wonderful influence, of family life.

In the early stages of culture, the family and all the
domestic relations are not only submitted to religious influences,
but are essentially of a religious nature. The links between
parent and offspring, and all other links of kinship, are only
quite secondarily, if at all, of a physical nature ; such links are
primarily, if not exclusively, mystical. Even later, when the
physiological character of parentage and kinship has come to
be recognised, the family remains nevertheless an essentially
religious institution — as the marriage regulations contained in
the Veda clearly show us. In Greece and Rome the family
has still retained much of its original religious character —
the paterfamilias still unites in his person the functions of
head of the domestic group, and of priest who sacrifices to the
family gods. With the advent of Christianity the family
ceases to be per se a religious institution, while continuing to
remain subject to the control and supervision of religion.

It was only natural that Jesus of Nazareth, who, by his
preaching, sought to lay the foundations of a new religion,
should seize the opportunity, when it presented itself to him,
of laying down the law with regard to marriage. The stability
of family life depends on the stability of the marriage tie. Turn-
ing his attention to the latter question, therefore, Jesus
enunciated the doctrine whereby the marriage tie is indis-
soluble, save by death :

" Dimittet homo patrem et matrem, et adhaerelit uxori
suae, et erunt duo in came una. Itaque jam non sunt
duo, sed una caro. Quod ergo Deus conjunxit, homo non
separet."

MAKKIAGE AND FAMILY LIFE 123

And when the Jews asked him if it were permissible to
repudiate one's wife, repudiation admitted by the Mosaic Law,
Jesus replied with the severe words :

" Quoniam Mdyses ad duritiam cordis vestri permisit vobis
dimittere uxores vestras : ab initio autem non fuit sic. Dico
autem vobis, quia quicumque dimiserit uxorem suam, nisi ob
fornicationem, et aliam duxerit, moechatur : et qui dimissam
duxerit, moechatur"

The only difficulty of interpretation which arises concern-
ing these words, is as to whether Jesus did or did not admit
a dissolution of marriage in the one case of adultery. The
Eoman Church categorically denies that any such admission
is contained in the doctrine propounded. The Greek and
Eussian Orthodox Churches, on the other hand, allow divorce
if the adultery of either of the partners is proved ; such is like-
wise the standpoint adopted by Protestantism, in the in-
numerable forms under which it exists. An exception to this
general doctrine of Protestantism is perhaps to be found in
the doctrine of the Protestant Church of England, in which
a section of the clergy refuses to admit the dissolution of
marriage under any circumstances ; but the doctrine of the
Church of England is an exceedingly wide and fluctuating
one, and it is impossible to formulate it definitely on any single
subject — impossible, in consequence, to judge of the attitude
of that Church towards the question of marriage and divorce.
There where theologians disagree, it is not admissible that
laymen intervene ; we therefore abstain from emitting an
opinion as to whether Catholic theologians, or the theologians
of other confessions, are right in their respective interpretations
of the doctrine of Jesus regarding marriage. The sociologist
can appreciate that doctrine only according to its social
consequences — only according to the influence exerted by it
on the evolution of society. If he finds that the social effects
of the Catholic interpretation have been better than the social

124 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHKISTIANITY

effects of the Protestant interpretation — if he finds that the
Catholic doctrine has been more favourable to the maintenance
of social stability ; then must the sociologist pronounce that
doctrine to be " right," according to the only criterion which
he possesses whereby to judge of it.

Kegulations affecting the sexual life of the individual are
the most difficult of any to apply. The strongest instinct in
human nature is the sexual instinct ; and it is in this instinct
that egotism manifests itself with the greatest force. It
requires power of a colossal magnitude to control the sexual
instinct, to discipline it, to adapt it to social necessities. Only
by means of the severest taboo are restraints placed, in primitive
societies, on the satisfaction of sexual desires. When the
material automatic sanctions, whereby society seeks to enforce
its commands, have given place to sanctions of a moral nature,
the control of the sexual life becomes still more difficult ; for
a moral sanction, however terrible, has rarely the power to
outweigh the imperious, often irresistible, desires of the moment.
Even during the epoch of its greatest political splendour,
from the eighth to the fourteenth century, the immense
authority and influence of the Catholic Church proved in-
sufficient to enforce with anything like completeness the law
prohibiting adultery — to say nothing of the law prohibiting
sexual intercourse between unmarried persons. Man is essen-
tially a polygamic animal ; the introduction of monogamy,
there where the number of women was limited, was for him in
the nature of a galling restriction. Every time it has been
possible for him to escape the irksome bonds imposed by
monogamy, he has been quick to avail himself of the oppor-
tunity. And yet the necessity of monogamy for Western
society is proved by the very fact of its having maintained
itself, despite all individual revolts, from the early days of the
Eoman republic down to the present time. Had it not been
a fundamental necessity for Western society, monogamy would

MAKRIAGE AND FAMILY LIFE 125

long since have disappeared before the violent opposition of
the strongest individual instincts.

In view of the fundamental importance of maintaining
monogamy in the interest of the continuity of social
existence, and in view of the tremendous difficulties
attendant on the fulfilment of this essential task of social
defence, the Catholic Church could only hope to succeed,
even partially, in its mission, if it relentlessly and categoric-
ally refused to countenance a derogation to the monogamic
marriage law under any shape or form. Absolutely indifferent
to the individual claim to happiness, to the individual demand
for satisfaction of the most imperious instinct, the Church
took solely into consideration the interests of society. It
knew full well that any exception made to the rule once for
all laid down, any concession granted to human weakness,
any deviation from the straight path traced out, would be
fatal ; for it would be the introduction of the thin end of the
wedge into the masonry of the social edifice. The only way
in which the Church could hope to combat the excesses due to
lack of restraint placed on the sexual feelings, was — once the
material automatic sanction of the taboo no longer existed —
by attaching to all sexual intercourse outside the married
state a moral stigma. All gratification of the sexual feelings
outside the married state implied the committing of a " mortal
sin " — implied a grave breach of the moral law, which could
be atoned for only by adequate penance. Unflinchingly,
without regard to the opinions of the day, without paying
heed to the inconvenience and suffering caused to individuals
by the enforcing of so stringent a rule, the Church condemned
every derogation to the law of strict monogamy, never
admitting any extenuating circumstances, never authorising an
exception to be made, on whatever plea it might be sought to
obtain it.

Of all the restraints imposed on individual conduct, the

126 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHEISTIANITY

restraint placed on the satisfaction of sexual desires is the
most irksome. Belief in any number of given dogmas, the
necessity of attending public worship, fasting, penance — all
this is relatively easy ; but against the rigorous regulations
edicted by the Catholic Church with regard to his sexual life,
the individual will never cease to chafe and fret. Even in
the centuries in which faith was most intense, these regula-
tions, as we have said, were not observed with anything like
exactitude. Far leee than any positive disbelief in dogma,
was hatred of such restraints the real lever of the Protestant
movement in the sixteenth century. Neither the various
princes who embraced the Protestant cause, nor those who
followed them, cared one straw about dogma ; finely-spun
distinctions between transubstantiation and consubstantiation,
incomprehensible controversies regarding the doctrine of the
sacrifice of the Mass, would never have sufficed to excite
enthusiasm among a population sunk in ignorance, unable for
the most part even to read or write, and most certainly
incapable of grasping any abstract notions, however simple —
and the abstract notions contained in these Christian dogmas
(i.e. transubstantiation, the sacrifice of the Mass) are extremely
complicated. How are we to suppose such purely intel-
lectual problems to be accessible to the understanding of
ignorant and semi-barbaric populations ? And even if we
were to admit such an impossibility, can it for a moment be
supposed that merely intellectual problems are capable of
provoking enthusiasm or fury — of kindling those passions
that burst forth with such amazing, such uncontrollable
violence, during the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries ?

And when we come to view more closely other similar
movements against the Church — such as the philosophical and
libertine movement of the eighteenth century, or the Eevolution
of 1789-1794, or the anticlerical agitation in Latin countries
at the present day — we see the same forces at work, directed

MARRIAGE AND FAMILY LIFE 127

towards the accomplishment of the same purpose — namely,
the liberation of the individual from the servitude imposed by
galling and irksome restraints. The philosophers of the
eighteenth century and of the Kevolution, as also the anti-
clerical agitators of to-day, make no secret of their aims.
The comedies of Beaumarchais and Marivaux served to
popularise the contempt for chastity and for conjugal fidelity,
openly expressed in the salons dominated by the ideas of
Voltaire and Diderot, of d'Holbach and d'Alembert. The
Revolution was the most formidable explosion of passion and
instinct " run amuck " that the annals of human history
have ever recorded. Here we have the spectacle, indeed, of
a disintegrated society, without tradition, without solidarity,
without authority, without anything — of a society unable to
check the riot of individual instincts and passions, unable to
place the slightest restraint on the individual, who, henceforth
abandoned to his own devices, appears transformed into an
animal of some untamed and inferior species. And as for
the anticlerical movement of to-day, the motives inspiring it
are obvious to any one who is at all acquainted with the
psychology of the masses, to any one who has come into closer
contact with the latter, who knows their ideals — to any one
who has studied even cursorily the revolutionary movement
in contemporary society.

The Christian doctrine relating to marriage constitutes an
efcellent example of the reunion of the two ideas of equality
and inequality, which we have already seen, in the second and
fourth chapters, to be characteristic of the sociological teaching
of Christianity in general. The wife is to be subject to the
husband, is to obey the husband ; and yet husband and
wife are absolutely equal before the Moral Law. The social
inequalities which prevail in this finite world of ours are
necessarily reflected in the family, which is a miniature
society. Husband and wife are not equal before the social

128 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHKISTIANITY

law, because the social value of the work performed by each
is different ; and to the difference in the social value of their
respective labour must be added the difference of physiological
strength between the two. The husband is the head of the
family in virtue of a natural law which applies to all
species, because he is the stronger, because it is to him that
incumbs the duty of supporting wife and children ; the social
value of the husband's labour, in civilised society, is necessarily
higher than the social value of the wife's, seeing that it is the
husband's labour which permits the wife, in her turn, to work
and to accomplish her domestic duties — seeing, also, that the
husband's labour likewise contributes to the maintenance and
welfare of society as a whole. It is for this reason that
St. Paul enjoins on wives the duty of submission to their
husbands : Mulieres viris suis subditae sint, sicut Domino :
quoniam vir caput est mulieris, sicut Christm caput est Ecclesiae.
. . . Sicut Ecdesia subjecta est Christo, ita et mulieres viris suis
in omnibus. But the Apostle hastens to add : Viri diligite
uxores vestras, sicut et Christus dilexit Ecclesiam. . . . Viri
debent diligere uxores suas ut corpora sua. Qui suam uxorem
diligit, seipsum diligit. And the duty of the husband is strongly
insisted on by Jesus : Dimittet homo patrem et matrem, et
adhaerebit uxori suae, et erunt duo in carne una. Jesus is
careful to drive home with especial force the idea of the
essential, indissoluble unity of husband and wife, and he repeats
the beautiful words, Jam non sunt duo, sed una caro. If they be
thus one person, necessarily must the husband love his wife
and care for her, seeing that, as St. Paul remarks, nemo carnem
suam odio habuit, sed nutrit et fovet earn.

Obviously the notion of the equality of husband and wife
before the Moral Law must efficaciously safeguard the rights of
the weaker party, that is to say, of the wife ; just as, in the
case of society as a whole, the equality of all the social
classes before the Moral Law, serves to protect the inferior

MAKKIAGE AND FAMILY LIFE 129

classes, to guarantee the latter against an abuse of power on
the part of the more powerful classes. The effect of the
unique combination, in Christian doctrine, of the notions of
relative inequality and of absolute equality, is always the
same, whether it be applied to society as a whole, or to any of
the subdivisions of society. The laws prevailing in this finite
and relative world are recognised ; while at the same time
a higher meaning is given to them. These laws must receive
an ethical interpretation, if they are to fulfil their purpose,
which is that of ensuring social welfare. The great law of
inequality, however necessary, however immutable it may be
as regards this finite world, will, if it be left destitute of any
moral sanction, lead to social disintegration, and through
social disintegration to social annihilation. Inequality of
strength, inequality of power, must conduce to egotism and
abuse of such strength on the part of the strong, to correspond-
ing egotism, to hatred and discontent, on the part of the weak.
Only when inequality is tempered by the ideas of Duty and
Eesponsibility, can we hope to see that great natural and
social law operate in such a manner that society derive
advantage from it. The equilibrium between the various
unequal elements composing society, which Christianity realised,
permits of natural law fulfilling its indispensable function in
social life ; for only when society is sufficiently integrated can
it support the action of natural law — even as only a robust
organism can support hard work or violent exercise.

Having assured the fulfilment, by husband and wife, of
their mutual duties towards each other, Christianity is careful
to ensure that both fulfil, linked as they are henceforth by
ties of indissoluble solidarity, their duties towards their offspring.
St. Paul declares that those who neglect their children are
worse than any infidels : Si quis autem suorum et domeslicorum
curam non habet, fidem negavit et est infideli deterior, are the
severe words he uses. Jesus insists more than once on the

130 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHKISTIANITY

rights and dignities of the children, to whom he issued the
invitation: Sinite parvulos venire ad me. And why are the
little children to come to him, why does Jesus particularly
invite them ? Tedium est enim regnum caelorum — to them
does the kingdom of Heaven, which Jesus came to preach,
belong. Unless his disciples become like unto a little child,
obedient, pure, and innocent, they shall not enter the
promised land. As to those who are guilty of corrupting the
innocence or of destroying the faith of " one of these little
ones," it would be better for them, declared Jesus, that a
millstone be hanged around their neck and that they be drowned.
But the innocence of the child need not be corrupted by any
positive act — it is not necessary that parents or others
deliberately lead the child into temptation, deliberately push
it into the path of vice : negative culpability suffices — it is
enough if, by their neglect, by their indifference, by their bad
example, the parents have caused the child to lose its
innocence or its faith. It is in order to safeguard yet more
efficaciously the interests of the child that the Church has
instituted "godparents," that is to say persons who are
directly responsible, before the Church, for the moral and
material welfare of the infant — persons who, being "parents
in God," have the duty imposed on them of aiding and
assisting the natural parents, or of replacing the latter should
these neglect their responsibilities. With the decline of faith,
the office of godparent has come to lose all practical meaning ;
the acceptance of it signifies to-day nothing but the fulfilment
of an empty formality for the sake of obliging a friend.
When the godparent has given a silver cup or some other
present to his protfyt, the former considers his duties at an
end. But we must not judge of the office of godparent in
the light of its present-day decadence. We must recollect
that this institution was created by the Church in order that
the interests of the child might be more efficaciously safe-

MARKIAGE AND FAMILY LIFE 131

guarded — that its creation was due to the maternal solicitude
of the Church for the welfare of those who cannot care for
themselves, and of whom Jesus declared to his disciples that
theirs is the kingdom of Heaven. And the acceptance of the post
implied grave and onerous responsibilities, responsibilities on
which the Catholic Church particularly insists in the exhortation
with which the priest terminates the ceremony of baptism : —

" The Church reminds you, first of all, that, vigilant
guardians of the faith and purity of this child, you share with
its parents the grave responsibility of its Christian education.
You will have, therefore, to see that the child is instructed in
time of the truths of religion and of its duty as a Christian.
You will be careful always to help and assist it by your
advice, your prayers, and your good example. . . . The Church,
in her maternal solicitude, goes yet further : she entreats you,
in the interest of this child, to be careful that it be confided
only to a Catholic nurse, whose morals are pure, should its
mother be unable to nourish it ; and, later, you will have to
see that the child is handed over to the care of Christian
teachers and masters.

" The Church enjoins on you, also, the duty of taking
every precaution so as to preserve this child from all danger,
and to protect it from all accidents, until it has attained the
age at which it can protect itself. . . . You will preserve, before
God, safe and sound, pure and innocent, this little child that
our Holy Eeligion confides to your affection and to your
piety."

The godparents are thus what their name implies them to
be : the spiritual guardians of the child, responsible for the
latter's moral and material welfare. Immense is their
responsibility before the Moral Law, before God, to whom they
will have to render strict account of their stewardship. But
the responsibility of the godparents by no means excludes
that of the natural parents : the one merely supplements

132 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHRISTIANITY

the other. The godparents are an extra safeguard, the
counsellors of the parents, those to whom incumbs the task
of seeing that the parents fulfil their duties. The parents are
not allowed to resign their powers into the hands of the
godparents ; parental responsibility is, on the contrary, a
responsibility that can never, under any circumstances what-
soever, be evaded. It is, therefore, the parents who have to
fulfil the parental duties. Only in the case of the parents
proving themselves unworthy of their high and sacred mission,
must the godparents execute the task which should be
performed by the parents. It was to prevent the innocent
offspring from suffering from the effects of parental unworthi-
ness and parental neglect, that the Church created the institu-
tion of godparents — but let not parents imagine that this
institution was created in order to permit them to evade their
own responsibilities.

II

If society as a whole be disintegrated ; if the bonds of
social cohesion in general be loosened ; we may expect to
find the family likewise disintegrated, the bonds of family life
similarly loosened. The disintegration of society is a malady
that implies the disintegration of the various elements com-
posing society : that is to say the cessation, by such divers
elements, of the fulfilment of the social functions in view of
which they were evolved. The family, as we have said, is a
miniature society ; and the disintegration of this miniature
society cannot but produce the disintegration of the larger
society — even as social disintegration in its turn points to a
disintegration of the family. If the individual be not strongly
integrated in the family, neither will he be integrated in society
as a whole ; if he be not conscious of his duties and responsi-
bilities in the family, he will not be conscious of his duties and

MAEKIAGE AND FAMILY LIFE 133

responsibilities towards society. No society can hope to be
strong if the family be weak — even as no individual can hope
to be strong if he be afflicted with a weak heart. For the
family is by far the most efficacious of all the social subdivisions,
such as the class, the profession, the syndicate, the corporation,
etc., the function of which is to adapt the individual to social
life by integrating him in a group to which he is attached by
ties of especial affection or interest — society as a whole being,
as we saw in a previous chapter, too large, too far removed
from the individual, to be able to influence him sufficiently.

The family differs from other social subdivisions, such as
the corporation or the syndicate, in that the integration of the
individual in the former implies ipso facto his integration in
society ; whereas, as we have seen in a previous chapter, the
integration of the individual in his corporation or syndicate
is by no means necessarily synonymous with the subordination
of individual ends to social ends. The family can never
become an instrument of social disintegration, such as the
corporation or the syndicate become, if the egotistical sentiments
in the individual gain the upper hand over the social
sentiments. The duties which incumb on the individual as
parent or spouse or child, are such as necessarily fit him to
be a good citizen ; and this is not necessarily the case with
the duties performed by an individual towards his corporation
or his syndicate. The family is the school in which the
individual cannot fail to learn the great notion of Duty — in
which he cannot fail to learn what Kesponsibility means and
what Submission and Discipline mean — in which he cannot
fail to restrain his egotism, to subordinate the latter to supra-
individual ends. Whereas the corporation or the syndicate
can be converted into means for satisfying egotism, for
gratifying individual desires at the expense of society ; the
constitution of the family and the duties incumbing to each
of its members, are such as to prove a salutary check on

134 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHRISTIANITY

egotism. For the members of the family are linked together
by ties sui generis — ties at once of a physiological and a
psychological nature, which do not exist between the mem-
bers of any other group, of any other organisation. Hence
the supreme importance of maintaining intact these ties, of
maintaining intact the family structure, without which the
family functions cannot be performed.

These truths are elementary. And yet how greatly are
they neglected to-day ! The egotism so rampant in our times
has not failed to gangrene family life — has not failed to make
the duties and responsibilities of family life appear irksome
and meaningless. Marriage tends ever more and more to
become a mere business contract, a mere means whereby
individual ends may be more easily attained, whereby
individual interests may be more easily served. The great
social import of marriage, the fundamental social signific-
ance of family life, tend to be ever more and more
ignored. The mercantilism and mammonolatry of bourgeois
society has corroded family life, as it has corroded
everything else. It is a proverbial saying in France that
I'homme n'dpouse pas la femme, mais la dot. The man
marries in order that the money of his wife may assist
him in his career ; and the wife marries in order that she
may share the honours of her husband's social situation. In
Latin countries it is usual for parents to marry their daughters ;
it is exceptional that the daughters marry themselves, i.e.
choose themselves their future husbands. The conditions
which Moliere never ceased to rail against still exist in
France ; if parents have no longer the legal power to compel
their children to marry against their will, or to prevent their
children from marrying according to the latter's wishes — the
tradition still remains almost unmodified : and tradition, ths
unwritten law, can at times be as powerful as, if not more
powerful than, the written code. But, in France, things are

MAKEIAGE AND FAMILY LIFE 135

rendered even worse by the facilities which are to-day afforded
for divorce. The number of unhappy marriages contracted
formerly was assuredly not less than it is to-day ; but marriage
being formerly indissoluble, the integrity of the family was
better guaranteed, the interests of the children were better
safeguarded. Husband and wife, being bound to each other
by a legal tie that they could not sever, were compelled, as is
vulgarly said, " to make the best of a bad job " — compelled to
adapt themselves to the circumstances, compelled to restrain
in a certain degree their egotism, compelled to make certain
efforts to arrive at an understanding, in their own interests.
Whereas to-day, if things go wrong, if disagreements crop up,
no sort of restraint on individual desires is necessary, no sort
of effort over oneself is required : for the marriage can be
undone almost as easily as it is contracted.

If mammonolatry has corrupted family life ; if the
tendency to see in marriage a mere business matter, a mere
financial transaction, has degraded the institution, and
obscured the notion of the fundamental social import of the
latter ; yet is such mammonolatry, such a tendency to reduce
even the highest things in life to a question of cash, but
symptomatic of the underlying social disease of egotism.
Egotism being rampant, it cannot be expected that marriage
be considered otherwise than as a means for gratifying
egotistical desires. Egotism throws the individual back upon
himself, limits the world to the individual personality —
effaces consequently all idea of social duty and responsibility.
Under these conditions it is but natural that marriage should
be contracted without the slightest regard being paid to the
social aspect of marriage, to the social repercussions, to the
social consequences that an unwise and imprudent marriage
may entail. It being, in many countries, easy to obtain a
dissolution of marriage, the individual finds his personal
interests safeguarded — finds himself protected personally

136 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHKISTIANITY

against the possible disagreeable consequences of an unwise
marriage ; and he has not a moment to spare, wherein to
consider the larger interests of society. Divorce having been
introduced solely with a view to safeguarding the interests of
the individual, it is but natural that divorce should, in its turn,
engender egotism and develop the latter. There where
divorce does not exist, where there is consequently less
possibility for the individual to escape the effects of his own
actions, the individual will be driven to reflect more before
taking so momentous a decision as that on which the happiness
of a life-time depends ; or, should he nevertheless omit to
reflect beforehand on the consequences, he will have to accept
these consequences — he will have, therefore, as we have already
observed, if his existence is to be tolerable, to adapt himself
to the circumstances; and this adaptation implies a certain
self-restraint, a certain check on egotism, a certain mastery
over oneself. When the individual finds himself compelled to
practise the precept : Medice, cura teipsum — when he can have
recourse to no artificial means whereby the consequences of
his actions may be escaped from ; he will necessarily, in his
own interest, have to seek to effect some sort of reconciliation
between his desires and his duties — he will have, consequently,
to sacrifice some of his desires.

But it must not for a moment be thought that the mere
suppression of divorce implies a suppression of the disease
of which divorce is but one of the symptoms. Even if
divorce be not legally possible, family life can be none the
less disintegrated. No one will pretend, for instance, that
family life is more stable in Italy, where divorce is unknown,
than it is in Germany, where divorce is obtainable. The
disintegration of family life is due to the prevalence of
egotism ; and egotism is a moral malady that the law is
wholly incapable of curing, even though a bad law be able
to develop the evil. That which it is urgently necessary to

MAKKIAGE AND FAMILY LIFE 137

combat in the interest of society, is the conception according
to which marriage is solely an institution whereby individual
interests and individual pleasures may be satisfied. The
great truth to be grasped, and which is so much neglected,
is that marriage is a social institution which exists primarily
for the benefit of society, and only secondarily for the benefit
of the individual. It ensues that marriage should be entered
into with a view to fulfilling certain fundamental social
duties. Only when we consider marriage as a social institu-
tion, can we understand the extraordinary efforts invariably
made by all religions without exception to regulate and
control marriage laws and customs; for if marriage were
not an eminently social institution, it is evident that religion
would not be thus interested in its maintenance and stability.
But it is precisely this social aspect of marriage that is so
widely neglected at the present day. And mark the lament-
able consequences of such a miscomprehension of the meaning of
marriage ! On the one hand, moral dissensions resulting from
the union of persons wholly unadapted to each other — moral
dissensions pregnant with evil consequences for the education
of the children, and which cannot but loosen the bonds of
family solidarity, even if they do not lead directly to the
break-up of the family. On the other hand, the most
deplorable neglect of those biological laws on the strict
observance of which the ultimate welfare and survival of
society depend. If we are to-day seriously menaced by
biological regression, this is due to the culpable negligence of
biological law — to the criminal light-heartedness with which
marriages are contracted between persons wholly unfit to
beget offspring, and who thereby burden society with ever-
increasing numbers of worthless and degenerate members.

The deplorable lack of foresight among the lower classes,
as regards the consequences of marriage, is proverbial ; and the
results of such lack of foresight are palpable. But the lack of

138 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHRISTIANITY

foresight is scarcely less great, and infinitely less excusable,
among the higher classes. We could cite the case of a wealthy
French solicitor, himself a man who was biologically fit, but
whose criminal egotism led him to engender a numerous
family of hopelessly degenerate individuals. His first wife,
a dipsomaniac, had to be shut up in an asylum ; the child
issue from the marriage set the house on fire deliberately, and had
likewise to be shut up. The second and third wives were like-
wise hereditarily degenerate, and both of them dipsomaniacs.
No less than twelve children were born of the two marriages, the
one more worthless than the other. Two sons got into trouble
with the police, and had to be sent to America, where they
both came to a bad end. Four daughters are imbecile,
another son is in an asylum. Here, then, we have an educated
and cultured man guilty of putting a number of hopelessly
degenerate children into the world, of bequeathing to society
a number of dangerous enemies, without even a thought as to
the ultimate consequences of his acts. Such a man is a far
more dangerous criminal even than the apache who stabs the
passer-by under cover of the darkness. He has not a thought
for the misery which he inflicts on a number of beings who
most certainly did not ask to be born ; and he has not a
thought for the ultimate consequences resulting to society from
the reproduction, in their turn, of his degenerate and worthless
offspring. We cite this case, known to us personally, as an
example of the criminal lack of foresight to be found, as
regards marriage and its consequences, among those classes of
society reputed to be cultured. How can we then wonder at
the lack of foresight prevailing among the uncultured and
uneducated classes ? And this lack of foresight is due to the
prevalence of egotism, to the prevalence of that pernicious
conception of marriage which sees in the latter a mere means
for satisfying individual interests of one kind or another — to
that absolutely false conception according to which the social

MAEKIAGE AND FAMILY LIFE 139

import of marriage, the social duties imposed by marriage, are
entirely ignored.

And the moral consequences of the prevalence of this
egotistical conception of marriage are not less deplorable, not
less dangerous for the ultimate welfare of society, than the
biological consequences. When persons who are biologically fit
contract marriage solely with a view to satisfying interests of
an egotistical nature, the danger for social stability, for social
solidarity, is not less evident than when biologically unfit
persons marry and burden society with a number of degenerate
and worthless citizens. For biological fitness, indispensable
as it is, is not the only condition on which social welfare
depends ; the social (i.e. moral) fitness of its citizens is not
less important for society. And in a family torn asunder by
moral dissensions, in a family lacking in that solidarity which
constitutes the essence of family life, how are the parents to
be educated, how are they to be taught the great social duties
of co-operation, of self-sacrifice, and of self-restraint ? How
are the children to learn the great social duty of submission,
how are they to learn the necessity of refraining in early years
the egotism naturally so strong in a yet insufficiently socialised
being ? Unless the family be strongly integrated, the
individuals composing it will never learn the great and
fundamental social duties which alone family life can
adequately inculcate ; and the family cannot be integrated,
its cohesion and solidarity cannot be assured, unless husband
and wife be fully conscious of their common duties and of
their common responsibilities, unless they regard married life
as constituting a solemn stewardship, of which they have to
render account to society.

The great service rendered by the Church lies precisely
in its recognition of the great social import of marriage, in its
having sanctified marriage, and imposed duties that cannot be
evaded on those who contract it— duties towards each other,

140 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHRISTIANITY

duties towards their children, duties towards society. There
can be no doubt whatever that those who accept the lofty
teaching of the Church as regards marriage, who consider
marriage to be, in the words of the liturgy, " a sacrament
instituted in the interests of the reproduction of the human
species " — that such as these are more likely to found a family
which shall be adapted to its social function of fitting the
individual for social life, than those who regard marriage merely
as a means for satisfying physiological desires or financial
interests. The very fact of marriage being a sacrament,
imposes on those who accept the teaching of the Church the
duty of ample reflection before receiving this solemn sacrament.
And how earnestly does the Church enjoin on husband and
wife the duty of mutual attachment, of mutual fidelity, of
mutual love- — the duty of bearing one another's faults with
patience, of sacrificing their egotistical desires for the common
good — the duty of rearing their children in such a manner that
the latter shall grow up to be, in their turn, good soldiers of
Christ and good citizens of society. The fulfilment of mutual
duties — such is the keynote of the teaching of the Church
as regards marriage. The fulfilment of mutual duties, which
implies the sacrifice of egotism for an end that is outside the
individual and superior to the individual ! It is by means of
this doctrine that the Church guarantees the stability of family
life, that the Church seeks to make of the family a school
wherein the individual may learn to play the part that
incumbs to him in the wider life of society. The family is a
great school, a school of duty, wherein each one learns the
meaning of the word responsibility. There is no higher
doctrine than this, no doctrine more eminently adapted to
social requirements.

How much loftier, how much worthier, is this doctrine
of the Catholic Church, than the contrary doctrine so greatly
in favour to-day, and according to which marriage is nothing

MAEEIAGE AND FAMILY LIFE 141

but a business contract, or a simple formality to be gone
through before sexual desires can be satisfied ! In both these
cases, consideration is given exclusively to the interests of
the two persons contracting marriage ; and no thought is
given to the many duties imposed by marriage : to the duties
of mutual love, mutual forbearance, mutual patience, mutual
sacrifice — to the numerous and grave duties of parents towards
their children. The consequence of the prevalence of this
egotistical conception of marriage, is that the latter is too
frequently contracted by persons totally unadapted to each
other ; and the family, far from being a school of moral
training and moral discipline, becomes a school of discord
and anarchy. Or else, the physiological desire having been
satisfied, it is found after a time that satiety sets in, and that
a marriage which has no more stable basis than a physical
basis is a marriage founded upon the sand. Here also,
dissension or at any rate the indifference which is a fruit of
satiety, must render the family incapable of fulfilling the
social functions, in view of the performance of which it exists.
And when it ceases to fulfil its social functions, the family as
such ceases to exist — henceforth there is a group of individuals
linked by physiological ties, but who are no longer united by
those moral ties which constitute the essence of the family in
civilised society, and which differentiate the social family from
the biological family.

The egotistical view of marriage, the view that sees in
marriage an institution existing for the benefit of the individual
and not for the benefit of society, was nowhere preached with
greater talent and with greater frankness than in Ibsen's famous
drama, The Doll's House. Because Koran has been deceived
in her husband, because the latter turns out to be a contempt-
ible and low - minded creature, because Norah, after this
discovery, suddenly becomes conscious of the fact that she has
been leading a meaningless and valueless existence ; for all

142 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHKISTIANITY

these reasons she decides to abandon, not only her husband,
but also her children, although the latter can certainly not be
rendered responsible for the father's conduct. She will leave
the house in order to, pursue her own education, in order to
develop herself, in order to give — by her own efforts — a
meaning and a value to her existence. She will no longer
consent to " rot " in the poisoned atmosphere of her husband's
house, she will go out into the world in the search for light,
for ever more light. And when it is objected to her that she
should not leave her children, she replies that she is not
worthy to educate them — that she must first go out into the
world and create an ideal for herself that shall give a meaning
and a value to life, before she can think of undertaking the
education of her children.

The conduct of Norah would be justifiable if she had only
her husband ; but it becomes monstrous by the fact of her
having children. She, who declares the atmosphere of her
husband's house to be so pestilential that she cannot possibly
breathe it any longer ; she, who maintains that no possibility
of human evolution is to be sought for in such an environment ;
she is content to leave her children in this poisoned atmo-
sphere, in this unwholesome environment — she is ready to
leave them to be educated and cared for by a man whom she
despises, and very justly despises ! Truly is Norah the type
of the woman suffering from the disease of individualism, of
the woman blinded by egotism to the extent of not being
able to perceive her most elementary duties as mother. The
doctrine enunciated in Ibsen's drama is the most pernicious of
doctrines — a doctrine which, like all such individualist theories,
must lead, if put into practice, to the disruption of society.
As against doctrines such as these, Christianity proclaims the
necessity of sacrificing one's interests to one's duties, the
necessity of enduring much in order to attain thereby to
the realisation of an end that is outside the individual and

MARRIAGE AND FAMILY LIFE 143

superior to him. The end to which the wife must sacrifice
herself, if her husband be unworthy, is the child ; if the
husband be debarred, by his indignity, from demanding the
submission of the wife, yet is the latter not only a wife but
also a mother. In Ibsen's drama the rights of the woman, of
the wife, take precedence of the duties of the mother ; in the
doctrine of the Church the contrary is the case — the develop-
ment of the individual personality must not be allowed to
take precedence of the needs of society, the individual may
develop his personality only in so far as such development
does not go contrary to the wider interests of the collectivity.
There where individual interests and social interests clash,
the individual interests must be sacrificed ; for it is by such
sacrifices that social existence is conditioned.

Even as the family is a miniature reproduction of society ;
so does the Christian doctrine concerning the family repro-
duce the Christian doctrine concerning society as a whole.
In the same way that Christianity realises a synthesis between
the various classes composing society, so does it likewise
realise a synthesis between the various members composing
the family — even as the former synthesis is constituted by
means of the notion of Duty, so is the latter synthesis also so
constituted. Father, mother, and child, husband and wife —
each has its Duties and its Rights ; but the rights are correlative
of the duties, and are conditioned by them : just as each
class has its Duties and its Rights, the duties being always
strictly proportionate to the rights, and the former increasing
invariably with the latter. The parent has greater rights
because it has greater responsibilities, more difficult duties,
than the child ; the husband has rights that the wife has not,
because the former has also responsibilities and duties that the
latter has not. And, in the same way, if the upper classes,
the superior elements whose mission it is to govern and to
guide society, have greater rights than the inferior multitude

144 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHKISTIANITY

who are governed, it is only because the former are saddled
with onerous responsibilities, and because the most arduous of
tasks is assigned them. In the family as in society as a
whole, we see the same admirable Christian doctrine to
prevail — the doctrine of the equilibrium of interests, whereby
Duty and Eight are correlative notions.

Even as this doctrine of the equilibrium of interests is
but an aspect of the wider doctrine of the necessity of sacri-
ficing egotism to supra-individual aims ; so also do we find the
fundamental anti-egotistical teaching of Christianity applicable
alike to the whole society and to the family. Even as the
individual is to sacrifice individual interests, and the class to
sacrifice class interests, both in order to further the welfare
of society ; so is the individual, considered as member of a
family, to sacrifice himself for the family, his rights to his
duties. It is in the family and through the family that the
individual learns to sacrifice egotism — in the family and
through the family that he learns to become a useful citizen
of society, that he learns, consequently, to rise beyond the
limits of his personality, to increase the value of life by giving
to life an end that is exterior to the individual, that is not
confined within the narrow frontiers of individuality. The
whole teaching of the Church with regard to marriage
inculcates the supreme duty of self-sacrifice. When the man
has taken unto himself a wife, he is ipso facto no longer a
mere individual ; his individuality has extended itself, he forms
henceforth with his wife one flesh, the two atoms have fusioned,
each finds henceforth in the other its extension, its completion,
its aim, and its value. And once his individuality has been
extended in this manner, the individual may under no
circumstances reduce it to its former narrow limits ; under no
circumstances may he seek to evade the duties and responsi-
bilities freely accepted by him. In order that the individual
may not be burdened with duties and responsibilities, to

MAKEIAGE AND FAMILY LIFE 145

accomplish which he is incapable ; in order that he may
not be able to pretext that such duties were thrust upon him
by exterior compulsion, and that he therefore cannot be
expected to continue to fulfil them ; in order to prevent this,
the Church has always insisted with particular force on the
liberty of marriage, has always held the freely -given consent
to be sufficient to validate marriage, has always condemned
and repudiated the use of compulsion, or of any undue pressure,
by parents or others.

Thus when the individual has been married, he has crossed
the limits of his individuality ; his life is no longer an
individual life, but a social life. And when the new family
has been increased by the advent of children, then does the
already extended personality of each of the parents extend
still further ; then does the individuality of each parent no
longer include only the individuality of the other parent, so
to speak, but it henceforth includes likewise the individuality
of each child. Along with this continual extension of his
individuality, goes a continual extension of the individual's
duties and responsibilities. The family, as we have said, is
the great school of duty, the great school of preparation for
social life, the great school in which the sacrifice of egotism
to higher ideals is perpetually inculcated.

Once having entered the gates of this school, there is no
going back ; once the individual has socialised himself by the
foundation of a family, he may not de-socialise himself, he
may not return to his pre-socialised individualistic condition,
he may not evade the responsibilities once assumed. For if
it were thus permissible for the individual to throw overboard
the discipline he has once and for all imposed on himself,
what would be the use and value of this discipline ? The
school of discipline is a hard school, the road of self-sacrifice
is a thorny and difficult one ; but the individual can only be
fully adapted to social life, he can only be fully adapted to

10

146 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHKISTIANITY

his social mission, when he has passed right through the
school, when he continued along the road up to the end,
without turning hack. Ne tenta, aut perfice — such is the
motto inspiring the teaching of the Church : to commence a
task without achieving it, is useless ; and it were better if
it never were commenced. Life is real, and life is earnest —
and life is too real and too earnest for it to be considered as
a mere series of experiments whereby the individual may
attain to purely individual happiness, or whereby he may
more fully develop his powers in the interests of the ego.

The condemnation and prohibition of divorce is thus
entirely in harmony with the whole teaching of Christianity-
teaching that never ceases to inculcate the necessity of the
sacrifice of egotism. The rupture of the marriage-tie can be
considered profitable only from the point of view of the
egotistical interests of the individual. It is a direct
encouragement to the individual to evade responsibilities
which he has solemnly taken upon himself. It is sapping
the foundations of the great and unique school of social
training that the family constitutes. It is permitting the
individual to shirk his duties and to escape the difficulties that
he must needs learn to support if he is to become a citizen
in the true sense of the word. It was impossible that the
Catholic Church, which combats with such unceasing energy
the development of egotism under all its forms, could permit
divorce. It was only natural, on the other hand, that the
Protestant movement of the sixteenth century, and the
revolutionary movement of our times, which is the legitimate
intellectual child of Protestantism, should both of them be
favourable to divorce — seeing that both are engendered by
the revolt of the individual against social authority.

Unceasingly and unremittingly does the Catholic Church
combat egotism ; and the entire doctrine of the Church
regarding the sexual life of the individual, whether in married

MAKKIAGE AND FAMILY LIFE 147

life or outside married life, is founded upon the fundamental
idea of the necessity of curbing individual desires and
passions. The difference between the eminently social nature
of Catholicism, and the individualist nature of Protestantism,
is nowhere better shown up than in their respective attitudes
towards the sexual life of the individual. Protestantism
attaches no importance whatsoever to chastity; it permits its
ministers to marry ; it contents itself with condemning
adultery, but apparently attaches little importance, if any, to
the sexual intercourse of unmarried persons. The Catholic
Church, on the other hand, enjoins strict chastity on its priests
— prohibits these from satisfying, under any conditions, the
most imperious instinct of the human being; and not only
does it condemn adultery, but attaches to all sexual intercourse
outside the married state a moral stigma. And to this rule it
knows no derogation. The extreme rigour of this Catholic
discipline appears frequently unjustifiable and unnecessary ;
for it is generally admitted that the satisfaction of sexual
desires on the part of the unmarried man is not by any
means reprehensible, seeing that it is only natural. But we
must not judge of the disciplinary rules of Catholicism in this
matter from the standpoint of the individual — any more than
we must judge of religious beliefs and religious institutions in
general from that standpoint. As we have already observed,
beliefs and institutions which appear meaningless or absurd
from the individual point of view, take on a very deep signi-
ficance when we consider them from the standpoint of society
and of social interests. And thus is it with the disciplinary
rules of Catholicism affecting the sexual life of the individual.
It is not the physiological sexual act, in itself entirely
insignificant, which the Church condemns. What the
Church condemns is the satisfaction of egotistical desires ;
what the Church aims at, is the rigorous subordination of the
individual to a higher power than himself — the rigorous

148 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHEISTIANITY

repression of egotism under any shape or form. As egotism
manifests itself most strongly and most virulently in the
sexual instinct, therefore does the Church seek, by all the
means in its power, to repress that instinct, to curb it, to
discipline it, to regulate it. As a total prohibition of sexual
intercourse is impossible, so does the Church seek to regulate
that intercourse, thereby adapting a fundamentally egotistical
instinct to social needs.

We see once more, by this example, how impossible it
is to judge of a religious system, to understand a religious
system, when we consider the latter from the standpoint of
the individual and of individual interests. Kegulations which
appear wholly unnecessary when viewed from such a stand-
point, appear necessary when viewed from the standpoint of
society. The whole institution of marriage, which is essentially
— even in the most advanced stages of culture, for instance
in Greece and Eome — a religious institution, is entirely
incomprehensible from the individual point of view. The
only justification of marriage, and of all marriage regulations, is
to be found in their social necessity. It is thus solely from
the point of view of their social necessity that we must judge
the disciplinary rules, whereby the Church seeks to regulate
the sexual life of the individual. Only when we understand
that the condemnation of sexual intercourse outside married
life is but a means to an end — a means whereby egotism may
more efficaciously be curbed, more efficaciously be placed under
restraint : only then does such a condemnation come to possess
a meaning. Meaningless when judged of from the stand-
point of the individual, this condemnation then appears in
the light of a safeguard of social interests.

We may say, then, that in its whole conception of family
life ; in the protection afforded to the wife, as to the weaker
party, by the condemnation of the husband's adultery, and by
the doctrine of the indissolubility of the marriage-tie ; by its

MAKEIAGE AND FAMILY LIFE 149

insistence on the mutual duties of husband and wife, and on
the duties of both towards their children ; and in its having
made of the family a great school of duty and responsibility,
a great school of preparation for social life : Christianity,
and particularly Catholic Christianity, has proved itself an
invaluable factor of social integration and social stability, which
can only be assured by the integration and stability of the
family.

CHAPTER VII

STRUGGLE AND SUFFERING

A CURSORY study of human history will suffice to convince
any one of the fact, that that history is one long record of
struggle and suffering. It is through endless struggles, through
incalculable suffering, that humanity has slowly emerged from
barbarism and ascended the ladder of civilisation. The road
along which it has passed, in its long march, is strewn with the
ruins of societies once great and flourishing, now extinct — is
strewn with the dry bones which alone remain to tell the tale
of former magnificence and power. Egypt, Assyria, Persia,
Carthage, Greece, Rome, Peru, Mexico — such are some among
the names that we meet with — names which evoke visions of
splendour and might and glory that contrast with the sombre
spectacle of later decline and decadence. And who shall
ever know of the countless number of inferior societies totally
exterminated in the course of the merciless and universal
conflict which resumes the entire history of mankind — who
shall ever know of the myriads of individuals ruthlessly
sacrificed to the exigencies of social evolution, ruthlessly
immolated to what we term progress ? Truly does progress
appear in the light of an insatiable Moloch, thirsting for
blood, and whose lust of carnage and destruction can never be
stilled.

All life is conditioned by struggle ; no organism, whether

150

STKUGGLE AND SUFFEKING 151

biological or social, can escape the working of this inexorable
law. Excessive fertility, on the one hand, limited space and
limited means of subsistence, on the other, must invariably
engender conflict — and it is by means of conflict that the fitter,
that is to say those better adapted to environing conditions, are
selected, are enabled to survive. Without conflict, no progress,
organic or social, would be possible ; for without conflict there
would be no elimination of the inferior. The evolution of life
in general, of which the evolution of society is but an aspect, is
thus governed by an iron law that takes no account of the
individual, that uses the individual only as a tool wherewith
supra-individual, collective interests may be better served —
by a law that unswervingly pursues one unique goal, which
is the maintenance, not of individual life, but of the life of the
collectivity — by a law which, having the furtherance of
collective interests as its sole aim, is pitiless in its operation
as regards the individual, whom it sacrifices ruthlessly to a
higher end, regardless of the suffering produced. The progress
of the species, be it biological or social, is conditioned by the suffer-
ing of the individual. Such is the great law that dominates
the history of all life.

It is obvious that the development of rationalism, which has
as its result the differentiation of the individual from the
collectivity, the development of the individual person ality, and
the consequent insistence on individual rights ; cannot but
engender the desire, on the part of the individual, to put an
end to a struggle productive of so much suffering for the
latter. When the personality of the individual comes to detach
itself from the collectivity, when a value per se is attributed to
that personality, irrespective of its value as a mere instrument
for furthering social welfare : then must the consciousness of
his individuality tend to place the individual in antagonism to
all the laws of nature, which latter operate exclusively in view
of the welfare of the collectivity. The rise of the spirit of

152 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHKISTIANITY

rationalism, together with the growth of egotism which is its
consequence, create therefore a dangerous antinomy between
the individual and natural law ; as the latter is superior to the
individual, so will the latter be vanquished in the struggle —
and being vanquished is, in this case, synonymous with being
annihilated. If, in a society of rational individuals, the
formerly omnipotent collective representations come to lose all
their force and influence ; and if, as a consequence of the
ensuing social disintegration, the individuals are enabled to create
artificial conditions of existence responding to individual needs
instead of to social needs ; so will the whole society, after a
short time, be necessarily eliminated by rival societies, whose
integration is still intact, thanks to the prevalence of collective
representations sufficiently strong to limit rationalism, and to
subordinate the individual to collective ends.

The whole history of life, the whole process of organic
evolution, cannot but appear to us, when we seek to fathom
their inner significance, when we seek to discover a purpose
in them, in the light of inexplicable mysteries. Did the
development of the higher forms of life entail the elimination
of the lower, then might we be able to ascribe an aim to
evolution, then might we be able to find a purpose in the
latter. Then, indeed, could we say that the purpose in
question is the creation of an ever more developed, of an ever
more complicated, organic type. But the evolution of higher
biological forms has not entailed the elimination of the lower
ones — the evolution of the Vertebrata has not caused the
disappearance of the Invertebrata, any more than the evolution
of the Metazoa in general has had the elimination of the
Protozoa as a result. Man co-exists with the Amoeba, even as
the Anthropoid apes co-exist with the Lemurians. It becomes
thus impossible to assign to Evolution the creation of a higher
organic type as its aim and purpose. All we can say is that
within each species the superior individuals survive. But when

STKUGGLE AND STJFFEKING 153

we take the whole domain of life, the entire Biosphere, into
consideration, we do not find any such universal law prevailing.
True, when two species enter into conflict ; or when the
habitat of a species changes rapidly and suddenly ; then will the
weaker of the two conflicting species be eliminated — then will
the species incapable of adapting itself promptly enough to the
changed environment, be likewise eliminated. But the very
fact of the persistence of the lower forms of life all through
the long history of biological evolution, shows clearly that no
universal law exists, applicable to the Biosphere as a whole,
and according to which such lower forms are necessarily
eliminated by higher and more recently developed forms.

The relentless extermination of inferior forms of life is
thus an universal law only within the limits of the species.
And, again, we must not forget that " inferior " and " superior,"
"higher" and "lower," are purely relative notions, which
express purely and simply the degree of adaptation of an
organism to environing conditions. We employ the expressions
" inferior " and " superior " in default of any better ones ; but
we must beware of attaching any absolute value to them.
And we seek in vain for any satisfactory reason underlying
the life-history of any given species, whether considered from
a dynamic or from a static point of view : why the species in
question was evolved, why environing conditions should be such
as to have called that species into existence, why certain
qualities should ensure adaptation to those conditions, and
others not — all these are problems that can be solved only
from a purely relative point of view. The whole process of
organic evolution, with the tremendous sacrifice of life involved
by it, with the immense holocaust of individuals which it
entails, appears as an insoluble riddle, when we seek to fathom
its meaning and its purpose.

The human species, which is not outside Nature and
superior to Nature, but which forms an integral part of Nature,

154 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHRISTIANITY

must submit to natural law under penalty of elimination if it
does not do so. The development of the higher forms of
rational thought, as we have already said in the second
chapter, does not signify that mankind can henceforth evade
natural law ; it signifies that mankind can henceforth com-
prehend better the working of the natural laws — can conse-
quently adapt itself to them, adapt itself to its environment,
with less expenditure of its vital force ; that is to say, in other
words, with less expenditure of human life. In so far, therefore,
does rationalism favour the interests of the individual, while at
the same time not imperilling the existence of the society. But
rationalism possesses an innate tendency to advance beyond
this limit ; based as it is on human reason, it tends invariably
to an exaggerated and unilateral assertion of individual rights
at the expense of social rights ; unless it be controlled, as we
saw in the second chapter, by an adequate collective force.

When the question is asked : In what way does rationalism,
by increasing our knowledge of the workings of natural law,
by furthering consequently our power of adaptation to
environing conditions, enable society to effect an economy of
human effort, of human life ? — the answer is that increase of
knowledge permits of our gradually substituting a positive and
rational selection for the negative selection of Nature. The
latter will never cease from acting; but we can, in a large
measure, render it superfluous by means of positive and
rational selection. It is obvious that what we term natural
selection, which is a negative process, is very costly. Every
inferior organism is pitilessly exterminated ; and if a society is
able to withdraw itself momentarily, so to speak, from the
natural order of things — if it is able, as a result of an un-
limited growth of rationalism, to establish artificial conditions

STKUGGLE AND SUFFEKING 155

whereby the inferior are allowed to multiply on equal terms
with the superior; sooner or later Nature will have its
revenge ; and the entire society will be eliminated. Positive
selection, by " selecting " exclusively the superior or eugenic
elements of society for reproduction, prevents the multiplication
of inferior elements ; ipso facto does it limit the destruction of
such elements, does it prevent the hecatombs of worthless
organisms that appear to rational minds as such useless waste of
life. It is, of course, impossible to prevent altogether the birth
of inferior elements ; but the number of such elements can be
limited, can be reduced to a minimum. On the other hand,
the superior elements can be systematically cultivated, can be
preserved against the many dangers that assail them in the
course of their existence. The social function of rationalism,
as we have said, consists precisely in the development and
preservation of the eugenic elements of the race. Our
increased knowledge of natural laws, our increased powers of
thinking, enable us to put ourselves into harmony with those
laws, to conform our conduct to them, thereby avoiding the
useless sacrifice of many valuable lives and much useless waste
of effort. Every superior element which is lost to humanity
owing to insufficient knowledge of natural law, signifies a
loss of power, a loss of vital force, a consequent weakening of
the species. By increasing our knowledge, by increasing our
foresight, by developing our powers of thought, rationalism can
prevent much useless sacrifice of valuable racial elements —
can prevent, therefore, a positive loss of social force, an
unnecessary weakening of social power. In this way, we
repeat, does rationalism respond at once to individual and to
social needs : for if, on the one hand, it economises individual
life ; on the other hand, it enhances considerably the society's
chances of survival in the struggle for existence.

But we must constantly bear in mind that the social
function of rationalism consists in the development and

156 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHRISTIANITY

preservation of the eugenic elements of the race by means of
positive and reasoned selection. It does not consist in the
development and preservation of inferior elements. Rational-
ism, however, possesses an innate tendency to overstep the
limits imposed on it. Developing as it does the sense of
egotism, it becomes, in the hands of the inferior elements,
an instrument for eluding the workings of natural law, for
preserving the useless members of society. And it frequently
becomes, in the hands of the superior elements, an instrument
for furthering exclusively personal aims, regardless of social
interests. In every individual, the growth of rational thought
engenders egotism, in that it develops the consciousness of
individuality. Huinanitarianism on the one hand, and
what we may call Nietzscheism on the other : such are the
results of an unlimited growth of rationalism. In both cases,
the social function of rationalism is perverted ; and rationalism
becomes an instrument of social disintegration, instead of
being an instrument of social survival.

We have seen, in the second chapter, that one of the
social functions of religion consists in limiting rationalism
in such a manner that the latter may be able to fulfil, in
its turn, the social function incumbing on it. Humanitarian -
ism being nothing but the egotism of the weak and inferior
elements of society, it is evident that religion, the main task
of which we have seen to be the repression of egotism under
every shape and form in the interest of the collectivity,
cannot be humanitarian — that it must, on the contrary, be
an implacable adversary of humanitarianism. And, as a
matter of fact, we find no trace of a humanitarian religion
in history. We find, on the contrary, religion everywhere
indifferent to individual suffering, everywhere imposing
hardships and sacrifices of vast magnitude on the individual,
everywhere exacting the rigorous subordination of individual
happiness to collective welfare. Being essentially, alike as

STKUGGLE AND SUFFEKING 157

regards its nature and as regards its aims, a collective force,
we find everywhere religion at work in the service of the
collectivity — everywhere actively seconding the action of
that inexorable law of nature according to which the
individual, regarded exclusively as an instrument whereby
collective ends may be realised, is invariably immolated
to such ends. As we observed in the first chapter,
Christianity is the first religious system which takes any
account of the individual and of individual needs ; but, for
all the consolation it offers to individual suffering, Christianity
is not a humanitarian religion — for if it were, it would be
a religion that ministers to egotism, to the egotism of the
weak and inferior; whereas we know its main task to be
the suppression of egotism.

Non veni pacem mittere, sed gladium : the words of Jesus
constitute an unequivocal condemnation of the sickly humani-
tarianism so greatly in favour to-day in an enervated and
enfeebled society. Jesus did not come to invert natural law,
to preach a crusade against Nature, to awaken in the individual
illusory hopes of an era of dolce far niente — of an era in
which individual suffering should be suppressed, in which
the individual should be born into the world merely to enjoy
it, without any effort on his part — of an era in which the
individual should be artificially protected against the natural
consequences of weakness and inferiority. Jesus held out
to the individual no humanitarian illusions of happiness. He
never ceased, on the contrary, to insist on the necessity of
suffering — not only on the fact that suffering is in itself in-
evitable, but also on the fact that suffering is good for the
individual, that suffering is the only means whereby to attain
to moral perfection. Again and again he is careful to em-
phasise this truth. Si quis vult post me venire, abneget semet-
ipsum et tollat crucem suam, et sequatur me (Matt, xvi.) ; qui
non bajulat crucem suam et venit post me, non potest esse meus

158 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHKISTIANITY

discipulus (Luke xiv.) ; qui non accipit crucem suam et sequitur
me, non est me dignus (Matt, x.) — can anything be more
emphatic than this repeated insistence, by the Master, on
the duty of sacrifice and on the consequent necessity of
suffering ? " He who does not accept his cross and follow
me, is not worthy of me " — can we find a sterner rebuke to
what is commonly known as humanitarianism than that con-
tained in these words ? The individual is to take up his
cross, the individual is to be always ready to sacrifice himself,
always ready to immolate himself; he is not merely to accept
suffering passively, when it comes to him — but he is to seek
it, the aim of his life should be suffering, for through suffering
alone can the individual prove his value, through suffering
alone can he attain to moral perfection. It is to the in-
dividual struggling beneath the burden of his cross that the
words of Dante apply : Qui si parra la tua nobilitate.

There is reason to be grateful to Pope Pius X. for having
reminded the world of these truths, in his Encyclica con-
demning the Sillon movement in France, in 1910. Constantly
bowed down over the miseries of humanity in order to console
and comfort those who weep, yet did Jesus never encourage
the individual to flee from suffering, to seek to evade that
inexorable law which condemns to suffering all life that is
born. He showed us the way that we must follow if we
wish to count ourselves among his disciples, if we wish to
gain the goal of moral perfection assigned to us — the royal
way of the Cross. The way of the Cross teaches us two great
lessons : the necessity of bowing down before a higher law,
before the divine law of suffering, before the immutable law
that condemns us to suffer ; and the necessity of accepting
this law, not only with resignation, but with joy. The
message of the Cross, the message of Calvary, is at the same
time " tidings of great joy."

Conflict and suffering are thus not only recognised by

STRUGGLE AND SUFFERING 159

Christianity as inevitable, but also as desirable. And thereby
does the message of Jesus admirably safeguard social interests
— seeing that all social progress is conditioned by conflict,
and consequently by individual suffering. The particular
genius of Christianity resides in the fact of its making these
indispensable levers of social evolution, these fundamental
factors of social welfare, appear to the individual in the light
of levers of individual evolution, of factors of individual
welfare. Christianity was introduced into the world at a
moment when the spirit of rationalism was already too far
advanced, for the individual to consent any longer to sacrifice
himself blindly in the interest of society. It was, as we
observed in the first chapter, a momentous epoch in the
history of humanity, that which marked the advent of
Christianity. In order to prevent the total disruption of
Western society, in order to preserve the monuments of
civilisation already erected by the genius of Greece and Rome,
it was necessary that religion should henceforth take account
of the interests of the individual, while continuing neverthe-
less to fulfil its indispensable social function of maintaining
intact the integration of society. For the individual had
outgrown the limits formerly imposed on his individuality,
individual thought had rendered itself independent of the
once omnipotent collective representations. The new collective
representations, the new religion, had to take account of this
growth of rationalism, of this extension of individual power,
of this differentiation of the individual personality. And
this is precisely what Christianity did. Confronted by the
double necessity of maintaining intact those conditions of
conflict and suffering on which all social development depends
— and of giving, on the other hand, a value to individual life
commensurate with the level of rational culture already at-
tained ; Christianity reconciled these two conflicting necessities
by means of the doctrine whereby individual salvation is made

160 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHKISTIANITY

to depend on the very conditions on which depends social salva-
tion. The continuity of social existence is conditioned by
society conforming itself to the great law of struggle and
suffering; and the path which the individual must follow,
if he is to attain to moral perfection, and, through moral per-
fection, to salvation, is likewise the path of struggle and
suffering. Truly does the teaching of Christianity prove a
profound comprehension of social necessities, and consummate
knowledge of individual psychology.

In order to facilitate the obtention of the sacrifice it exacted
of the individual, Christianity offered the individual a reward
commensurate with the latter's efforts and sufferings. For
the attainment of the goal of moral perfection is in itself in-
sufficient, as a motive for determining the rationalised indi-
vidual to pursue a line of conduct detrimental to immediate
individual interests. In order to determine the individual to
conform his acts to social necessities, it is necessary always to
bring adequate pressure to bear on him ; but, as we have
already seen, mere material pressure loses its efncacity once a
certain level of rational culture has been attained. It then
becomes necessary to have recourse to pressure of a moral
nature ; and, with a wonderful comprehension of the psychology
of the rationalised individuals with which it had to deal,
Christianity tempered the fear of punishment with the hope
of reward — it made the pressure easier to bear by promising
reward to those who obeyed. The individual was incited to
pursue indefatigably the path that leads to moral perfection
along the road of suffering and sacrifice, because the state of
moral perfection was rendered synonymous with the state of
perfect bliss and perfect happiness ; perseverance in the
struggle meant the possibility of knowing, at last, joy un-
tarnished by any pain ; it meant the possibility of drinking
of the fountain of living water that flows unto eternal life, of
enjoying, in a better land, that peace which this world of ours

STKUGGLE AND SUFFEKING 161

cannot give. Thus the individual could attain to moral per-
fection, consequently to salvation, only by following a line of
conduct in strict conformity with the interests of society ; and, as
the pursuit of the goal of moral perfection is in itself insufficient
as a motive for determining the individual to sacrifice egotistical
desires, therefore is he incited to pursue it by the hope of reward.
In other words, egotism is combated by an appeal to egotism ;
and this is, in truth, the only way in which egotism can be
combated in the rationalised individual.

Jesus did not come to stand the world on its head, but to
save society from imminent disruption. The latter catastrophe
could only be averted if full consideration were given to the
immutable laws governing social life: for the survival of
society is conditioned by the strict observance of such laws.
As we observed in the third chapter, had Christianity sought
to invert natural law, instead of seeking to rigorously sub-
ordinate society to it, the triumph of Christian principles
would have signified the final break-up of western civilisation.
The latter was saved, it was reconstructed and reorganised,
precisely because Christianity re-introduced the notion of
natural law into a society that was ignorant of the existence
of such a law. The social teaching of Christianity having
thus the observance of natural law as its basis, it is evident
that Christianity could favour neither equality nor humani-
tarianism, which are contrary to all natural law. Both these
doctrines are derived from egotism ; they are consequently
incompatible with social existence. To suppose that Chris-
tianity, whose mission it was to maintain social integration, and
so to further the chances of social survival — to suppose that
it preached, or even countenanced, such egotistical and antisocial
ideas, is to labour under a colossal misunderstanding as to the
essence of the Christian religion.

If Christianity was careful to insist on the imperative
necessity of conforming one's conduct in this life to natural

11

162 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHKISTIANITY

law, it nevertheless sought, on the other hand, as we pointed
out, to attenuate the many hardships imposed by this law.
For it knew that the rationalised individual cannot be in-
definitely sacrificed — that the development of reason must
tend to render the individual more egotistical, less willing to
forgo the satisfaction of personal interests — and that the
growth of egotism, in its turn, cannot but imperil the existence
of society. Hence did Christianity complete the notion of
natural (social) law by the notion of the Moral Law ; hence
did it seek to effect a reconciliation between the individual
and society by means of the notion of Duty. The duties of
the individual towards society are at the same time duties
towards the Moral Law, towards God ; and the acts of the
individual over which society has no control, are submitted
directly to the authority of that Moral Law. But the force
even of the Moral Law cannot reside exclusively in the
fear it inspires, in the punishments with which it threatens
offenders. The idea of Duty must therefore be completed by
the idea of Keward. The submission of the individual to the
Moral Law, and through the Moral Law to society, will thus
be facilitated. The strongest motive inspiring individual conduct,
namely the hope of individual profit, will henceforth determine
the individual to sacrifice himself to social ends, under the
impression that he is thereby working out his own salvation.
Egotism is vanquished by egotism, immediate smaller profits
are sacrificed to the hope of infinitely larger profits later on.
It is not a matter for the sociologist to inquire whether the
hoped-for larger profits are of an illusory nature or not; all
that the sociologist is concerned with, and all that matters to
society, is that the hope held out is sufficiently strong to
induce the individual to sacrifice his interests in this life.
Society has no interest whatsoever in individual welfare after
death ; society has only to deal with the individual as an
instrument for furthering social welfare, for aiding society to

STKUGGLE AND SUFFEKING 163

realise aims that are not only entirely distinct, but antagon-
istic, to individual aims.

Suffering is at once a divine law and a natural law ; the
sacrifice of egotism is commanded alike by God and by society :
in all this does the teaching of Christ coincide with social
necessities. The divine law as revealed by Jesus, and the
natural (social) law, both pursue the same object, which is the
suppression of egotism. Where the divine law completes the
social law, where it rises beyond the latter, is in the incentive
which the divine law holds out to the individual in order to
induce him to accept more easily the sacrifice exacted from
him. The social law, being entirely regardless of individual
interests, offers no reward that shall counterbalance the duties
imposed on the individual. The social law imposes these
duties, and nothing further; it has no thought for the indi-
vidual, it cares not for his sufferings, it considers him ex-
clusively as a tool whereby social interests may be furthered.
The divine law revealed by Christianity imposes even more
difficult duties, for it imposes not only the duties towards
society, but also duties towards God. But Christianity does
not content itself with imposing these duties ; it sets itself to
aid and assist the individual to perform them. It does not
content itself with exacting sacrifices, regardless of the suffer-
ings and privations entailed by them ; it exacts sacrifices,
and heavy sacrifices, but it sets itself to console the suffering
individual, and to hold out to him the soothing hope of a just
reward for his sufferings. It does not consider the individual
as a mere instrument of social welfare ; but it also considers
the individual per se, and gives to each individual life an
Absolute value, a value that our finite measures cannot
measure. True, in this world, the individual, inexorably
subject to immutable natural laws that care not one iota for
the individual, but that operate exclusively in view of social
welfare — in this world has the individual no value per se ; in

164 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHEISTIANITY

this world he is a mere tool, whereby higher ends may be
attained; never has Christianity sought to awaken illusions
in the individual on this point, never has it sought to provoke
him to useless revolt against forces that dominate him com-
pletely, against laws that he cannot understand nor change.
But over and above this finite world is the Moral world, the
world of the Absolute and the Infinite. Whereas formerly
the individual had no personal value — whereas he was formerly
entirely absorbed in society ; henceforth the individual has a
value — henceforth the end of the individual, his raison d'etre,
is not limited by society, does not confound itself with the
end and the raison d'etre of society. Henceforth the end of
the individual, his raison d'etre, is transported to the world of
the Absolute. The great natural law that demands the
sacrifice of individual ends to social ends is thus respected
and safeguarded ; but it is henceforth completed by a super-
natural law that gives to this sacrifice a personal value over
and above its social value, a personal value that human under-
standing is unable to appreciate.

The rationalised individual, who will refuse to sacrifice
himself for a society that cares nothing for him — for a society
that imposes onerous duties without offering any compensation
— will naturally be more ready to make the sacrifice required
of him when he knows his life to possess a personal and
permanent value, when he knows that the results of his action
are not lost for him, when he knows that his sacrifice will in
no wise lose its reward. The eminently social genius of
Christianity manifests itself with singular force in this
equilibrium between individual and social interests, thanks to
which the sacrifices of egotism so necessary for society are made
to appear as benefiting likewise, if not primarily, the individual.
As it is impossible that any benefit accrue, in this world, to
the individual, the reaping of such benefit is, with rare clever-
ness, adjourned by Christianity to the world to come — that is

STKUGGLE AND SUFFEKING 165

to say to a world of which we can have no knowledge. Had
Christianity endeavoured to give to individual life a value and
a raison d'etre in this world, the individual would very soon
have discovered that any such attempt is based on a delusion.
Try as he will, seek where he will — the individual will never
find any value for his life in this world. In this world he is
the sport of forces that dominate time ; in this world he is
absolutely subject to the iron law which, operating exclusively
for the benefit of society, demands the ruthless and uncon-
ditional sacrifice of the individual — seeing that, according to
natural law, the end of the individual confounds itself with
the end of society, and that the individual possesses value
solely as a social factor. If, therefore, the individual wishes
to find a value for life, he must go outside this world ; and
here is precisely where Christianity adapts itself to individual
interests. Christianity gives a value to individual life, because
Christianity knows that this is the only means whereby the
sacrifice of the rationalised individual to social ends can be
obtained ; for the consciousness of his personal value, and of
the consequent value to himself of the sacrifice to be made,
will alone induce the rationalised individual to make it.
Being essentially an organ of social defence, an instrument of
social integration, Christianity adapts itself to the needs of the
individual, because only thereby can it fulfil its primordial
social function of subordinating the individual to society.

We view Christianity, therefore, from a standpoint wholly
different from that from which it is generally considered. We
see in Christianity pre-eminently an organ of social defence,
an instrument of social integration, and only secondarily a
factor of individual evolution. True, Christianity ministers
to individual needs, and ministers to them in an incomparably
beautiful and efficacious manner. But it ministers to them
in order thereby to better reduce the individual to subordina-
tion, in the interests of society. The individual ministry of

166 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHRISTIANITY

Christianity is a means to an end — and that end is of an
essentially social nature. The rationalised individual will not
consent to sacrifice immediate egotistical interests, unless this
sacrifice is made to appear to him as ultimately benefiting
himself — unless a reward be held out that seems to compen-
sate for present abstention or present positive loss. Thus it
is that the road of individual salvation which Christianity has
traced out — the road of suffering and sacrifice — is likewise the
road that leads, far beyond the individual, to the salvation
of society.

II

Humanitarianism, like equalitarianism of which it is a
corollary, is a means whereby egotism may be satisfied ; it is
the result of the egotism of inferior beings, whose reason has
attained a development out of all proportion to that of their
physical and moral capacity. Such inferior beings are neces-
sarily vanquished in the struggle for life, and their suppression
imposes itself as an imperious necessity if the vitality of the
species is to be maintained. Yet is it not to be wondered at,
if the reason of these inferior beings refuses to admit the
necessity of the latter's suppression. Eeason, being essentially
and fundamentally an individual product, cannot but defend
the interests of the individual per se, regardless of his value or
utility to society. Hence, as we have seen, the necessity of
controlling reason, of setting a limit to rationalism, in the
interests of society. Christianity, like every other religion, is
an institution that exists primarily for the defence of society ;
it cannot, therefore, in any way favour movements that are
based on egotism — that are, consequently, detrimental to
social interests. It is thus impossible that Christianity can
countenance humanitarianism, which is precisely such an
egotistical movement fraught with imminent peril for society.

Is it not, in truth, a strange assumption betraying ex-

STKUGGLE AND SUFFERING 16*7

traordinary ignorance of the nature of Christianity, that the
latter, which has been the main factor of the evolution of
Western society during nineteen centuries, should be based on
principles which, if put into application, could not but bring
about the speedy and irremediable break-up of society ?

Jesus, the so-called humanitarian, never ceased to insist on
the necessity of suffering, on the desirableness of suffering — of
that suffering which a weak and sickly humanitarianism
would fain suppress if it could. Jesus, the so-called humani-
tarian, declared that it were better for him who betrayed the
Son of Man that he had never been born, so terrible would
be the vengeance of God upon him. Jesus, the so-called
humanitarian, did not hesitate to cry out : " Woe unto the
pharisees and scribes " — did not hesitate to drive with a whip
from the temple those who profaned the latter, because domus
mea, domus orationis. Jesus, the so-called humanitarian, did
not hesitate to predict that those who neglected in this life
the great duty of charity Hunt in supplicium aeternum —
surely by no means a humanitarian prediction. Just as little
humanitarianism do we find in the words : Si quis venit ad me,
et non odit patrem suum, et matrem, et uxorem, et filios, et
fratres, et sorores, adhuc autem et animam suam, non potest meus
esse discipulus. Far from foreseeing an era of universal love
and peace and fraternal effusions, Jesus warned his disciples :
Surget gens contra gentem, et regnum adversus regnum. Et
terraemotus magni erunt per loca, et pestilentiae, et fames,
terroresgue de caelo, et signa magna erunt. Jesus did not come
to send peace, but a sword ; he did not come to abolish
suffering, but to preach it as humanity's highest ideal ; he did
not come to predict an era of humanitarianism and dolce far
niente, but an era of strife and war and rumours of war.

It may be objected that the doctrine of fraternity ad-
mittedly preached by Jesus, is a doctrine of humanitarianism.
But it is nothing of the sort ; and those who seek to identify

168 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHKISTIANITY

the humanitarianism in favour in a degenerate society, with
the lofty and noble ideal of fraternity as revealed by Jesus,
degrade this pure ideal. Humanitarianism is the fad of a
society that is advancing along the path that leads to decay and
destruction — of a society that has lost all energy, that hates
all effort and all suffering, because effort and suffering are
intolerable for enfeebled and degenerate constitutions. A
degenerate and enfeebled society hates suffering and strife,
hates effort under any shape or form, because such a society
distrusts life. It distrusts life because it has no ideal capable
of conferring a value on life, capable of giving to struggle and
suffering a meaning that shall justify them. Such a society is
ripe for elimination, for it is disintegrated, it lacks cohesion,
the egotism of its component individuals has gained the upper
hand and undermined collective discipline. When a society has
no further power of expansion, when the sight of suffering and
effort are intolerable to it — then must it make room for other
societies, whose vitality, whose power of expansion are intact.
The struggle for existence requires energy, vigour, manliness,
fearlessness, on the part of the combatants. When a society
ceases to comply with these desiderata of natural law, then
does the latter, sooner or later, operate the elimination of that
society. For no society can suspend indefinitely the action of
natural law.

We have seen, in the fourth chapter, that the doctrine of
fraternity implies the notion of Duty, as well as the notion
of the equality of all with regard to the Moral or Absolute Law.
But the very fact of the idea of Duty being a corollary of the
idea of fraternity, proves that the latter is incompatible with
humanitarianism. For what does the idea of Duty imply ?
It implies the responsibility of the individual before the Moral
and the Social Law alike. The individual must, in order to
satisfy the requirements of the Moral Law, fulfil his duties
towards society ; over and above the material social sanction

STKUGGLE AND SUFFEKING 169

for social duty, there remains the Moral sanction — for the
Moral Law not only subordinates directly to itself that part
of individual conduct that escapes social control, but also
constitutes the supreme sanction of social laws. The Moral
Law therefore enjoins on the individual the necessity of
obeying social laws — enjoins on Mm the sacred duty of fulfilling
his duty to society. But what is the essence of the individual's
duty to society ? To conform his conduct in all respects to the
interests of the collectivity. Mark, now, that it is contrary to
the interests of the collectivity that inferior and useless ele-*
ments of the latter be preserved. Consequently it is not the
duty of the individual to hinder an elimination of such ele-
ments that responds to social needs, and that is in harmony
with natural law. His duty, on the contrary, is to further by
all the means in his power the action of that law, which
operates in the interests of society.

Fraternity has a sense and a value for society only if
it signify the fraternity of those capable, by their work, of
furthering social cohesion and assuring social progress. The
protection and preservation of the weak and inferior means
the sacrifice of the stronger and superior elements of society,
seeing that space and food are limited. But if fraternity
signifies the sacrifice of the superior to the inferior, what
possible sense could such a doctrine possess ? In this case,
fraternity would be nothing but an instrument of social
disintegration and annihilation. Once again we ask : Is it
not a truly strange assumption, that the religion which has
been the main factor at work in the building up of Western
society, should be founded on a doctrine that spells social
destruction instead of social construction ?

One would think it obvious that the great doctrine of
fraternity signifies the co-operation and mutual aid of all
those who, in whatever situation, are capable of contributing
to the welfare of society. When we thus read it, the doctrine

170 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHRISTIANITY

of fraternity appears not only entirely comprehensible, but
self-evident. All are brothers, all must co-operate, all must
aid and respect each other, because all contribute, each in
the measure of his capacities, to the great collective work of
humanity, biological and psychological, which we term social
evolution. But these contributors to the vast collective task
are not the brothers of those who are incapable of co-operating
with them, of those who, far from facilitating the labour of the
workers, far from furthering the cause of human progress,
obstruct that labour and hinder the onward march of humanity.
The sheep whom Jesus assembles at his right hand are
separated from the goats gathered together at his left hand,
and have no communion with them. In the same way, the
useful members of society, those whose labour in the social
vineyard brings forth fruit, cannot hold communion with those
who work not, and who are nothing but an impediment to
society, a burden on the latter. To such as these the words
of Jesus apply - Quia receperunt mercedem suam. And their
reward will, or ought to be, that which Jesus foretold to him
who rejected the teaching of the Son of Man : Mittetur foras
sicut palmes, et arescet, et colligent eum et in ignem mittent, et
ardet. Jesus did not hesitate to foretell such a fate to those
unworthy of him ; and yet, in the name of Jesus, society is
to be forbidden to execute in a similar manner those who are
unworthy to exist as members of the collectivity ! But let
humanitarians, who seek to prevent society from eliminating
the parasites who clog the wheels of social progress, remember
the parable of the man who, invited to the wedding feast,
came thither without a wedding garment. This man likewise
received his reward — and was thrown out into the darkness,
where there is much " gnashing of teeth." Let humanitarians
remember that multi sunt vocati, pauci vero electi. Many are
born into the world, many are invited to the banquet of life ;
but those, and they are the greater number, who come without

STRUGGLE AND SUFFERING 171

a wedding garment — those who are unfit to share in that
banquet — those will be dealt with as Jesus said : they will be
thrown out into the darkness.

The words of St. Paul : Quae enim seminaverit homo, haec
et metet, enunciate a profound truth, and trace for society the
line of conduct which the latter must pursue with regard to
its worthless and inferior elements. The seed which the
latter sow must be reaped by them — they must reap the
consequences of their worthlessness and of their inferiority.
Even as Jesus tells us that our actions are never lost in the
sight of God — so must they not be suffered to lose themselves
in the finite sphere of society ; if the individual be artificially
protected against the consequences of his acts, against the
consequences of his worthlessness, then is society doomed. Each
must reap what he sows : if such be the command of the Moral
Law, so is it also the command of the social law. There
is no room here for misguided pity and false sentimentalism.
The inferior individual must pay the penalty of his inferiority ;
having come to the banquet of life without a wedding garment,
he must be cast out. Peccatum generat mortem, says the
Apostle St. James ; and even as sin engenders death, so does
inferiority in this life beget elimination. The sower who
sows tares instead of wheat must reap what he sows : such
is the unvarying law of the natural world, as St. Paul well
recognised. Even as he who is worthy receives the reward
justly due to him, so must he who is worthless in no wise
lose his reward ; the reward of each must be proportionate
to his merits ; and, in accordance with this rule, the worthless
individual will be condemned to elimination. For he is
useless ; not only is his presence in the nature of a positive
burden on society, but he absorbs food and occupies space
that should of right belong exclusively to the useful. There-
fore must he go, therefore must he be exterminated — quae
enim seminaverit homo, haec et metet.

172 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHKISTIANITY

But nowhere is the doctrine of Christianity, as regards
humanitarianism, better illustrated than in the parable of the
talents. We have already seen, in the fifth chapter, how
wonderfully the lesson taught in this parable safeguards the
dignity of labour of all categories, high or low — seeing that
he who has received but two talents is accounted equal,
before the Moral Law, with him who has received five talents,
because each has produced a work equivalent to his capacities.
We will now see how sharply, and with what admirable
perspicacity, Jesus, in the same parable, puts us on our guard
against a pernicious humanitarianism. He who has received
but one talent is the inferior and worthless member of society ;
he has not done his share of work, he has not contributed
towards the maintenance or increase of the human patrimony
— he is consequently useless and without value. And Jesus
does not stop to squander his pity on this parasite of society
— mercilessly and unhesitatingly he condemns him. The
little which he has shall be taken from him and given to
the capable servant who, having received five talents, has
caused these to bring forth fruit. Jesus does, therefore,
exactly the contrary of what humanitarian faddists would do.
Jesus eliminates the parasite, the useless member of society —
he eliminates him without pity because he is useless, because
he has contributed nothing towards the welfare of the com-
munity ; and he eliminates him in favour of the more capable,
superior element — he takes the useless talent from him who
is incapable of utilising it, and gives it to him who is already
rich, and who is able to make good use of the talent that lay
idle in the hands of the other. Humanitarianism, on the
other hand, would fain deprive the rich of his riches, the
servant with five talents of some of his talents, in order to
bestow them on the incapable servant who is unable to
utilise even one talent. Instead of depriving this incapable
servant of his one talent, in order to give it to others more

STKUGGLE AND SUFFEKING 173

capable, humanitarianism seeks to console the former, it sheds
tears over him, it raises the cry of injustice, it demands
" equality " for good and bad, for useful and useless — instead
of leaving the incapable servant to his fate, it seeks to pre-
serve him from that deserved fate by artificial means. In-
stead of rewarding the useful and capable servant as Jesus
rewarded him, humanitarianism never ceases to cavil at this
capable servant's success, never ceases to belittle it, never
ceases to endeavour to prevent the capable servant from
reaping the benefit of his success. Whereas Jesus had admira-
tion only for the capable servant, and nothing but scorn and
contempt for the incapable — humanitarianism seeks to degrade
the former and to exalt the latter, seeks to prevent the capable
from reaping the just reward of his capacity, while pampering
and whining over the incapable. How different from the vile
sentimentalism of whining humanitarians, whose own mediocrity
prompts them to hate superiority of any kind — how totally
different from all the humanitarian trash published in our times,
are the words of Jesus who, when it was pointed out that the
capable servant had already ten talents, replied : Dico autem
vobis, quia omni habenti dabitur, et abundabit ; ab eo autem qui
non habet, et quod Jidbet auferetur ab eo.

In these words Jesus succinctly enunciates a doctrine
which is in conformity with the interests of society. There is
no humanitarianism in the words, none of that humanitarianism
which sacrifices social interests to individual egotism. Un-
hesitatingly does Jesus command that from him who has
nothing shall be taken even that which he has. Jesus wastes no
pity on such as these ; the space they occupy, the food they
absorb, are to be given over to those who have already much
space and much food, but whose work brings in abundant
profit for society. The parasite who does nothing, who is
incapable of working, is not to be allowed to continue to eke
out a miserable existence — he is to be destroyed, for he is to

174 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHEISTIANITY

make room for others more capable. Assuredly have those
who seek to render Jesus of Nazareth responsible for their
own humanitarian aberrations — assuredly have they omitted
to read the gospels. For most certainly is the Jesus we see
in the gospels not a humanitarian Jesus. At every page we
meet with stern and severe condemnations of error, under all
the manifold forms in which such error can manifest itself.
Never does Jesus endeavour to condone or to palliate error, never
does he hesitate to predict pitiless chastisement for those who
persist in their error, never does he allow misguided senti-
mental pity to blind him to the fatal consequences of error,
alike for society and for the individual. The numerous
restrictions of individual liberty edicted by Jesus — are these
humanitarian ? Or are they not, on the contrary, in the
nature of an iron discipline imposed on the individual, regard-
less of individual suffering, in the higher interests of society ?

The essence of Christianity, which consists in the
subordination of the individual to society, is of an anti-
humanitarian nature. Humanitarianism is a doctrine that
takes account only of the individual — that seeks the best
means whereby individual interests may be satisfied.
Christianity never stops to consider individual interests, never
pauses to take account of the individual as such. The end
that Christianity assigns to the individual is always higher
than the latter, and to this end the individual is invariably
to be sacrificed ; in order that this end may be realised, any
amount of individual suffering is justified. How is it possible,
under these circumstances, to pretend that Christianity is
humanitarian ? By its rejection of the doctrine of equality,
Christianity ipso facto rejected the doctrine of humanitarianism.
Those whose capacities are inferior must rest content with
inferior remuneration in this life ; and those whose capacity is
nil must be pitilessly eliminated, like the man who caine to
the feast without a wedding garment, or like him who was

STEUGGLE AND SUFFERING 175

unable to make use of the solitary talent confided to him.
Those who are a burden to society, who obstruct the latter's
progress by taking up the space that should be occupied by
others who are worthier, because more capable — those need
not think that they can justify their existence by an appeal to
the Gospel ; the answer to their appeal is given by Jesus :
Mittetur foras sicut palmes, et arescet, et colligent eum et in ignem
mittent, et ardet. From him who has nothing, shall be taken
even that which he has ; that is to say, a life worthless morally,
worthless commercially, and worthless to its possessor as it is
worthless to society.

So little did Jesus foresee the advent of a humanitarian
era in which success should no longer be proportioned to effort
and capacity, that he expressly said to his disciples : Semper
pauperes hdbetis vobiscum, meaning thereby that the existence of
poor and rich in this finite world is a requirement of justice,
a necessary consequence of the unequal distribution of capacity.
And let us remember, as Herbert Spencer observed, that
nowhere in the Gospels is the institution of slavery expressly
condemned. If Jesus sought to bring consolation to those
who, in this life, are weary and heavy-laden, he never sought
to excite them to revolt against the conditions that prevail
here below, he never sought to destroy social law — but, on the
contrary, to consolidate the latter, by rendering the duty of
the individual towards the social law part of his duty to-
wards the Moral Law. And we must beware of confounding,
as humanitarians do, the useful albeit less gifted workers, with
the useless parasites. The man or woman of humble situation,
whose capacity is inferior, but who, in his or her humble
sphere, contributes in the measure of his or her powers to the
great collective work of society — this man or woman, however
humble, however restricted his or her capacity, however small
in consequence the social value of his or her work, is none the
less a useful citizen ; and if the work of this citizen have

176 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHEISTIANITY

small social value, if the social remuneration of such work be
therefore insignificant, we must recollect that the Moral Law
judges not according to our standard, neither does it remunerate
as society remunerates. The parable of the talents teaches us
that he who, having but two talents, makes nevertheless good
use of them, receives the reward due to his labour — that he,
also, hears the " Well done " spoken to him, even as it was
spoken to the servant with five talents. And the parable of
the talents shows us clearly the difference between this humble
worker, and the useless parasite who is radically incapable
of making use of his one solitary talent. The humble worker,
whose social remuneration has assuredly been but small, will
nevertheless " enter into the joy of his Lord." From the
parasite, on the other hand, shall be taken even the little that
he has. The parable of the workers in the vineyard shows
us that those labourers who are called at the eleventh hour,
receive the same recompense as those who have worked
throughout the heat of the day. The former receive their
recompense, because, although their work is of slight social
value, it has nevertheless a value, and has been executed care-
fully and willingly. But those who, standing idle around
when the master of the vineyard goes out, do not respond to
the master's invitation to come in and work — they shall be
shut out from all participation in the eating of the fruits of
the vineyard.

The whole doctrine of Jesus may be summed up in the
words : He who does not work, shall not eat. And no doctrine
can be more anti-humanitarian than this — no doctrine can
be more thoroughly conform to the interests of society.
Never did a greater enemy of social parasitism exist than
Jesus. Wherever such parasitism presented itself, whether in
the higher or in the lower spheres of society, mercilessly did he
condemn it. Most certainly, therefore, would Jesus have
been a resolute adversary of an economic and ethical system

STKUGGLE AND SUFFEKING 177

that engenders parasitism at both ends of the social ladder,
that tends consequently to produce a biological degeneracy
which cannot but be the forerunner of the disintegration and
disruption of society. But to suppose that Jesus was there-
fore a socialist — that is to say the partisan of a social system
based on the systematic cultivation and organisation of
parasitism — is as erroneous as to suppose that socialism is
the only possible alternative to the bourgeois society of to-day,
which is advancing to its doom for having neglected to observe
those immutable laws on which social existence depends.

Pity ! Such is the universal catchword of humanitarians
at all times and in all places. And most certainly do we
find pity in the message of Jesus — vast and inexhaustible
stores of pity from which humanity will never cease to draw.
But where it is necessary to raise a warning cry, is against
the misuse of the word pity. It is indispensable to prevent
this word being misused of — to prevent it becoming a simple
catchword, whereby weak and worthless members of society
may be prevented from reaping what they have sowed,
whereby such as these may be artificially preserved from their
natural fate. Jesus had no pity, no words of tenderness for
those who persist in their error ; they shall go in supplicium
aeternum ; they shall be cast out into the darkness like the
man destitute of a wedding garment; they shall be gathered
up like the wood of the vine and burned in the fire ; they
shall be ruthlessly deprived even of the little that they have ;
they shall be destroyed like those whom the king invited to
the banquet and who did not come. In the same way society
must have no pity for those whose very presence is a perpetual
burden for their fellow-creatures, for those who, by their very
presence, create misery for themselves and for their descendants,
and prevent happiness in others. Pity ! — it is a beautiful
and a divine thing; but those who misuse it in order to
justify perpetual violations of natural law to the detriment of

12

178 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHEISTIANITY

society, are like unto "the wolves who come in sheep's
clothing," against whose machinations Jesus was careful to
warn us. The greatest thing in the world is Love, has truly-
said Ealph Waldo Trine — Love which implies Pity. But
Love and Pity must not be squandered on those unworthy of
them. We must beware of the humanitarianism which sheds
tears over the assassin, and which has not a thought to spare
for the victim; of the humanitarianism which seeks to
glorify the prostitute while turning its back at the honest
girl-mother ; of the humanitarianism of the Beecher-Stowe
type, that delights in hypocritical effusions over good-for-
nothing niggers, while remaining wholly indifferent to the
real miseries of tens of thousands of worthy and honourable
persons of our own race and civilisation. There is no greater
curse to society, no more appalling blight on humanity, than
such vile and odious humanitarianism, the hypocrisy of which
is on a par with its imbecility. It is no wonder, when we
witness the terrible misuse made of the word, that philo-
sophers, biologists, and sociologists have sometimes come to
consider pity as the greatest obstacle to human progress ;
have come to consider Christianity, which preaches pity, as
the enemy of all civilisation ; for they have judged Christianity
and its doctrine of pity according to the caricatures so freely
drawn in the sentimental trash literature of humanitarian
zealots.

Against this caricature of Christianity, against this misuse
of the word pity, we shall never cease to raise our most
earnest protest. It is an imperative duty for all those who
have the interests of civilisation at heart — of that civilisation
which is founded on Christianity — to cleanse Christianity
from the unmerited stigma placed upon it by those who abuse
of its authority and prestige, in order to try and justify anti-
social doctrines. The pure and lofty doctrine of pity, as
preached by Jesus, applies to all those who, having fallen, are

STEUGGLE AND SUFFEKING 179

none the less capable of raising themselves. It does not apply
to those who, having fallen, cannot raise themselves, even
though they be assisted, because they are too weak, too hope-
lessly degenerate, to be able to do so. In the bitter struggle
for life, many fall through no fault of their own ; many sink
beneath the burden of a cross at times too heavy for them to
bear alone. It is for such as these that the love and pity of
Jesus is destined, for such as these merit love and pity,
merit aid and assistance. The royal way of the Cross, the
way of suffering which Jesus trod, is it possible that one
cannot comprehend the lesson that it teaches us ? Jesus fell
on the way, Jesus sank thrice beneath the burden of his cross,
and yet did Jesus continue to the end, yet did he drink
unto the dregs the cup of bitterness which he believed his
Father to have prepared for him. The way of the Cross
teaches us then the great lesson of perseverance ; teaches us that,
although we fall beneath the burden that weighs us down, we
must strive to raise ourselves, strive to vanquish the difficulties
that beset us, strive to attain, in spite of all sufferings and of
all obstacles, the goal set to our efforts. When we fall, we
merit help and sympathy if we endeavour to raise ourselves
and to continue ; and, if we see another fall, and yet
endeavour to raise himself, it is our sacred duty to help him
in like manner. Jesus accepted the help of Simon the
Cyrenean ; and it is no derogation to our dignity to accept
aid under similar circumstances. No one, even the best, is
sure of himself ; and those who are most greatly confident in
their strength will soonest fall. But they will continue, they
will raise themselves and renew the struggle ; and when the
dusk of evening comes, when the sun of life sinks beneath the
horizon, they will be able to say with St. Paul, Certa bonvm
certamen.

It is to such as these — to these who have fallen many times
and yet raised themselves and continued the struggle — that

180 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHEISTIANITY

Jesus promised reward, these that he undertook to console.
Certa bonum certamen, apprehende mtam aeternam — the Apostle
to the Gentiles awaits eternal life, because he has fought the
good fight. The great difference between Christianity and the
pseudo-humanitarianism of a decadent society, is that the
former teaches that we are judged according to our actions.
Doctrine admirably adapted to social necessities, admirably
conform to natural law ! Igitur ex fructibus eorum cognoscetis
eos. In this finite world the working of natural law is such,
that each reaps what he has sown ; that the fit survive, and
that the unfit are destroyed. And Jesus tells us that, in this
respect, the Moral Law of the Absolute world is similar to the
natural law of the finite world. The Moral Law will also
judge us according to our actions ; the higher justice of the
Moral Law demands also that we reap what we sow. Here-
in lies, as we have already seen, the great difference between
Christianity and what is known as humanitarianism : Christian-
ity declares that we shall be known by the fruit we bring forth,
that we shall be judged by our actions ; whereas humani-
tarianism would fain preserve us from the consequences of our
actions. In a society dominated by the influence of
Christianity the individual knows that he must reap what he
sows, that he must accept the consequences of his conduct ; and
he will shape his conduct accordingly, he will strive to sow only
good seeds, so that he may reap a good harvest. Thus is
individual conduct adapted by Christianity to social ends —
thus is individual salvation made to depend on a line of
conduct that conduces to social salvation.

NOTE

No contradiction is to be seen between the statement that Christianity
was careful to differentiate the Relative from the Absolute, the Social Law
from the Moral Law — and the statement that the Moral Law and the
social law alike judge the individual according to his actions. We have

STRUGGLE AND SUFFERING 181

said, in the fifth chapter, that the social evaluation of work differs from the
moral evaluation of such work, seeing that the former is based exclusively
on the objective value of work for society, whereas the latter takes the
subjective element of the will into consideration. But when speaking of
the reward offered by the Moral Law or God for work of inferior social
value, we were speaking solely of work of positive social utility. All the
humble and unobtrusive labour performed in the fields, in factories, in
workshops, in the streets, in shops, in offices, and elsewhere, is inferior
when measured by its social evaluation — but it is none the less work of
positive social utility. The social evaluation of any category of labour is
a complicated process, based as it is on many different factors, partly of an
economic and partly of a biological nature. These factors do not enter
into the moral evaluation of labour — the latter takes no account of the
offer and demand for a given product of labour, of the density of
population in a given branch, of the costs of production, etc., all of which
factors are of influence in determining the social evaluation of labour.
The humblest labourer, who performs, nevertheless, a work of positive
social utility, is equal, before the Moral Law, to the mightiest potentate.
But the difference between even the humblest labour of positive social
utility, and parasitism, i.e. incapacity to labour — is as vast as the
difference between zero and one. The Moral Law differs from the social
law in its evaluation of labour, but not in its evaluation of parasitism.
This will be clear to any one who has followed what we said in the
fifth chapter. We there expressly observed that, according to the
teaching of Christianity, he who has received much must perform duties
in proportion, and that he who has received little, must likewise perform
duties in proportion. We observed that Christianity allows no one, under
any pretext, to elude his responsibilities ; that it does not permit him
who has received but little to evade on this account the performance of
his duties. All this is very explicitly taught in the parable of the
talents. And he who has performed the duties assigned to him,
according to his capacities, be those duties ever so humble, will in no
wise lose his reward. He, on the contrary, who has neglected to perform
his duties, will be treated without mercy. The punishment foretold by
Jesus will be meted out alike to him who, capable of better things,
remains during life inferior to himself — who defrauds therefore society
of work which he is able to perform ; and to him who is radically
incapable a priori of doing any useful work, who is incapable a priori of
having any existence other than that of a parasite. Such is the only
sense that we can attribute to the plain words : ab eo qui non habet, et quod
habet auferetur ab eo.

182 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHRISTIANITY

The right of society to deliver itself from the presence of worthless and
noxious members is thus in no wise denied by Christianity. Christianity,
as we have seen, does not waste its pity on such as these. True, the
biological, economic, and moral uselessness of a man does not preclude
the possibility of pardon on the part of God ; Christianity is careful to
deny to us not only the right, but the possibility, of foreseeing the judg-
ment of the Higher Tribunal to which all must be deferred. Even those
whom the Catholic Church considers as having died in a state of mortal
sin, i.e. those who commit suicide, or who die in duel, are not condemned
by the Church to perdition, seeing that we finite beings have no means
of understanding the nature of judgments rendered by an Infinite Being.
Here we corne to the frontier separating the Moral Law from the social
law, frontier that we are not in a position to cross. The Moral Law
enjoins on us the duty of fulfilling the social task assigned to us ; it
condemns us if we do not fulfil that task, if we neglect our duty. That is
all we know, and can know. That is all that the sociologist has to take
account of, when judging of the social influence exerted by such a
Moral Law. The rest concerns exclusively the theologian.

The doctrine and constant practice of the Catholic Church is in
conformity with what we have said concerning the right of society
to rid itself of the presence of undesirable and worthless elements. The
Church has always claimed the right, from the earliest times down to
the present day, of casting out by means of excommunication those
elements whom it deems noxious. This right, claimed alike by the
Western and the Eastern Church, is of the esse of a social organisation ;
and if this right has been abandoned by Protestantism, it is because
Protestantism in its innumerable forms is not a social organisation, but
an incoherent mass of loose atoms linked together by no adequate ties of
solidarity. In the same way as the Catholic Church of West and East
claims the right of eliminating useless and pernicious elements, so does
society as a whole legitimately claim this right. Even as the Church has
never been humanitarian in this respect — even as the Church has never
allowed humanitarian considerations to interfere with the exercise of its
right of elimination — so must society beware of humanitarianism when it
is a question of ridding itself of the presence of inferior and worthless
members. Had Jesus been a humanitarian in the perverted sense of the
word, most assuredly would he not have authorised the Church founded
by him to have recourse to the extreme measures of excommunication and
elimination. If he authorised the Church to have recourse to such
measures, it was because he knew that the elimination of undesirable
elements is a vital necessity for any social organisation. The Church,

STKUGGLE AND SUFFERING 183

being essentially a social organisation, could not have survived, had
it been bereft of these means of self-defence. The energy which the
Church displayed formerly in rooting-out heresies that would have caused
her fall, is an example that contemporary society would do well to
follow as regards the biologically, morally, and economically worthless
elements in its midst.

CHAPTEE VIII

CHRISTIANITY AND RATIONALISM

WESTERN civilisation being based on Christianity, and the
history of that civilisation being so inextricably interwoven
with the history of its religious beliefs and institutions, it is
evident that the question of the future of Christianity is
indissolubly bound up with the question of the future of
Western society. The disappearance of so fundamental a
factor of social evolution could not but entail the gravest
consequences for the Western world — could not but herald
the speedy and final break-up of our civilisation. In examin-
ing the question of the future of Christianity, we are thus
ipso facto examining the question of the future of Western
society, the fate of which depends on the fate of the religious
system by which it was reconstructed and reorganised after
the upheavals that marked the downfall of the Eoman empire.
That Christianity is a fundamental factor of Western
civilisation, a fundamental mainstay of the latter, we have
endeavoured to show in this book. Often enough we hear the
remark that, even if Christianity did once upon a time play
a certain part in the shaping of social evolution, it has long
ceased to do so ; that it is destined in the future to be a
mere source of individual hope and consolation. Such a
remark betrays lamentable ignorance of the nature of religious

184

CHEISTIANITY AND KATIONALISM 185

belief in general, and of the nature of Christianity in particular.
There is no such thing as an individual religion, seeing that
religion is primordially and essentially an instrument of social
evolution ; seeing that the raison d'etre of religion consists in
the subordination of the individual to a power higher than
himself, in the interests of society. If we see in religion a
mere factor of individual evolution, then does the persistence
of religious beliefs, together with the irksome restrictions placed
by such beliefs on individual liberty, appear totally incom-
prehensible. To suppose the individual having invented, for
his own benefit, a system of beliefs which weigh upon his
entire life, which curtail immensely his freedom of action,
which exact numerous onerous duties from him — duties which,
considered from an individual point of view, cannot but appear
wholly unnecessary ; to suppose this, appears contrary to all
common sense. Those who consider religion from this uni-
lateral, individualist point of view, consider exclusively certain
ethical precepts of Christianity ; they entirely ignore all other
religious systems, even as they ignore the counterpart, in
Christian doctrine, of the ethical precepts in question — a
counterpart which it is, nevertheless, indispensable that we
should know if we wish to interpret correctly such precepts.
Those who see in religion exclusively an institution for satisfy-
ing individual wants and needs, take solely into consideration
the rewards promised by Christianity for individual conduct,
and the consolation offered by Christianity for individual
suffering. And they neglect entirely the duties imposed
before such rewards can be obtained, and the suffering im-
posed in order to render the individual worthy of consolation.
These individualist philosophers, with strange shortsightedness,
perceive only the Christian rewards and consolations ; they
do not perceive the Christian duties and sufferings. But the
latter constitute the fundament of the former; reward and
consolation come only secondarily into consideration, they are

186 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHRISTIANITY

offered only in order better to induce the individual to sacrifice
his liberty to higher ends. And in no other religious system
do we find such rewards and consolations offered in exchange
for duties and suffering imposed — in all other religious
systems we find the individual ruthlessly sacrificed without
any compensation of any sort being offered, or, at the most,
as in the case of the Hebrews, in exchange for very inadequate
compensation.

If the individual, in the Christian system, is no longer a
mere blind instrument for mechanically serving a supra-
individual purpose — if Christian ethics, separating the domain
of the Absolute from that of the Relative, assign to the
individual a value per se in the Absolute world — he is none
the less rigorously subordinated to a severe moral code, none
the less restricted in his liberty at every turn. Those who
see in Christianity an institution existing for the benefit of
the individual, apparently forget the duties exacted by
Christianity from the latter, the restrictions on his liberty,
the sacrifices demanded of him. They forget that si quis vult
post me venire, abneget semetipsum et tollat crucem suam. Seeing
only the rewards promised and the consolations held out, they
overlook the fact that these rewards and consolations are
conditioned by duty and self-sacrifice. Perceiving only one
aspect of the Christian doctrine, they do not understand that
the aim of Christianity is primarily to dominate and to sub-
due the individual; and only secondarily to reward and
console him. They do not understand, as we have said, that
reward and consolation are conditioned by duty and suffering
— that they are in the nature of stimulants whereby the
sacrifice of individual interests, individual pleasures, individual
liberty, may more easily be obtained.

If the notion of duty, whereby egotism is refrained and an
equilibrium between society and the individual secured — it
this notion is to have the necessary efficacity in order that

CHRISTIANITY AND KATIONALISM 187

the aforementioned ends may be realised, it is indispensable
that the individual be so strongly integrated in society that
he be willing to prefer duty, together with the sacrifice of
individual interests implied by it, to the immediate satisfaction
of personal desires. It is obviously not enough to preach to
the individual the duty of sacrifice — it is essential that an
ideal be held up to the individual, sufficiently attractive,
sufficiently powerful, for him to be willing to sacrifice himself
to such an ideal. The Christian ideal is, in this respect, as
perfect an ideal as it is humanly possible to conceive of. The
individual is asked to sacrifice himself to God, in exchange
for the wondrous sacrifice whereby God voluntarily immolated
himself in order to obtain for the individual the possibility
of eternal life. Christianity thus appeals at once to the
gratitude of the individual and to his sense of duty — or,
rather, the sense of duty is developed by an appeal to
gratitude. The gratitude of the individual for the wondrous
and incomprehensible sacrifice of Calvary must find expression,
it must manifest itself in the willingness of the individual to
perform the duties assigned to him — duties which, although
onerous when considered from the point of view of the in-
dividual, are in reality but a poor return for the immense
sacrifice of the divine victim. The ideal which demands
obedience, and to which the individual is required to sacrifice
himself, is thus an ideal which can never be attained. How-
ever great be the sacrifices he consents to, however punctually
he fulfils the duties exacted of him, the individual can never
live up to his ideal, can never give adequate compensation
for the sacrifice and sufferings of his God. Christianity thus
guarantees the perpetuity of individual effort and of individual
sacrifice; it ensures that never can the individual abandon
his task, under the pretext of having fulfilled the latter;
seeing that that task, as we have said, can never, under any
circumstances, be entirely fulfilled.

188 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHKISTIANITY

The ideal of Christianity is thus adapted to social
necessities, in that it is capable of obtaining the sacrifice of
individual egotism, and in that it ensures that this sacrifice
shall be permanent. The only way in which the individual
can attain to moral perfection, and consequently to the
salvation promised by Jesus Christ, is by continual and
never-ending sacrifice. The sacrifice of Calvary demands a
return ; and the gratitude of the individual towards the God
who so loved him as to willingly suffer death and ignominy
in order to open unto him the gates of eternal life — the
gratitude of the individual must be such, that the supreme
object of his existence must be to endeavour, by all the means
in his power, to render himself worthy of the divine love and
sacrifice. Christianity thus appeals to the individual, appears
to the latter as a message of individual hope and consolation,
as a means of individual salvation. But this message to the
individual is none the less a secondary aspect of Christianity,
as we find when we come to analyse the latter more closely.
Christianity is first and foremost an instrument of social
integration, of social salvation ; and the hope and consolation
which it offers the individual, are but the means whereby
the integration of the rationalised individual in society may
be obtained. We have seen in the seventh chapter how the
individual, in that he subordinates himself to the Christian
ideal, ipso facto adapts himself to the needs of society. For
Christianity requires observance of the social law, as part of
the individual's duty towards the Moral Law — as part of that
duty, which is but a means whereby the individual's gratitude
towards God may be expressed. And in respect of that part
of individual conduct which escapes social control, Christianity
requires, likewise, the rigorous repression of egotism — and the
repression of egotism is a conditio sine qua non of the in-
dividual's subordination to society and to social law ; in all
his actions, the individual is thus trained to follow a line of

CHKISTIANITY AND KATIONALISM 189

conduct that ensures his integration in society. In the third
place Christianity represses egotism by constantly imposing
suffering and struggle on the individual — by constantly
disciplining the individual in the only school in which he
can be effectively disciplined. The primary aim of Christianity
remains thus invariably the subordination of the individual to
higher supra-individual ends. If it appeals to the individual,
if it speaks soothingly to him, if it brings him a message of
hope and consolation, this is due to the fact that the rationalised
individual will not consent to sacrifice himself to higher ends
— that is to say to ends exterior to his personality — unless he
has reason to believe that the sacrifice of immediate interests
will be compensated for by greater gains in the future.

As we have already seen in the seventh chapter, Christianity
vanquishes egotism by an appeal to egotism. The individual
is induced to sacrifice himself in this life, by the hope of re-
ward in the life to come. He is induced to pursue in this
life a line of conduct profitable to society ; he is induced to
accept the suffering and struggle which the working of im-
mutable social laws entails, because it is precisely the path
of suffering and struggle which leads to individual salvation.
The eminently social genius of Christianity has enabled the
latter to adapt the individual to society, by representing the
conditions that conduce to social salvation as conditions
necessary to individual salvation. The individual can repay
his debt to God only by following a line of conduct that
ensures the stability and integration of society. The duties
towards God, towards the Moral Law, are precisely those
which the individual must perform in the interest of the con-
tinuity of social existence — duties which are all of them re-
sumed in the fundamental duty of sacrifice and suffering.

190 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHRISTIANITY

II

It is customary, since the eighteenth century, to look down
with contempt on Christianity as a thing of the past, as an
exploded superstition, as a puerility which it is waste of
time to discuss. And this is by no means only the case with
the professional anticlericals of Latin countries ; for if it
were, we could certainly afford to treat the absurd
lucubrations and vulgar insults of insignificant politicians and
journalists with the contempt they merit. But the
tendency to see in Christianity a superstition of the past is by
no means confined to such as these : it is, on the contrary,
very general among the elite of the world of thought. It is
incontestable that the majority of men of science, if they are
not actively hostile to Christianity, are none the less prone to
despise it — to consider its influence in the past as prejudicial
to the highest interests of civilisation, and its influence in the
present as nil. Far from regarding Christianity as an
essential lever of social evolution, as a fundamental factor of
Western culture, they regard it as an enemy of progress, as
the instrument par excellence of reaction and obscurantism, as
an obstacle which it is indispensable to clear out of the way if
humanity is ever to realise an era of justice and true
fraternity. Under the influence of these ideas, common to
the majority of the elite of the world of thought, the most
" progressive " States tend to become even more and more
hostile to Christian traditions and Christian ideals. The
nation which has always been the torch-bearer of civilisation in
Europe, that is to say France, has now officially severed all
connection between the State and Christianity. And it is
a generally accepted view that the example set by France
will be followed by other nations ; that the humanity of the
future will be an areligious humanity. In other words,
Christianity is nothing but an infantile disease, which

CHKISTIANITY AND KATIONALISM 191

humanity has vanquished. At the best can we say that it is
an infantile philosophy, which the world has outgrown. For
even the deepest of nineteenth-century philosophers, Auguste
Comte himself, who had so profound a comprehension of the
necessities of society, who grasped so profoundly the inner
significance of social evolution, whose unrivalled historical
insight enabled him to render well-deserved justice to the
sociological task accomplished by Catholicism — even Comte
saw in Christianity a thing of the past. So convinced was
Comte of the inevitable disappearance of Christianity in the
near future, that he devoted his whole genius to the herculean
work of elaborating a social philosophy capable of replacing it.
Comte, and the eminent thinkers who have followed his
lead, such as Taine, Littre, Frederic Harrison, and others,
cannot certainly incur the reproach of not being deep in
history, or of not appreciating sufficiently the nature of social
evolution, and the importance of the various developmental
factors at work in the shaping of that evolution. It is to
Comte, on the contrary, that sociological science owes its
foundation — to Comte that we owe at once the enunciation of
the static laws of the social structure, and the luminous
historical synthesis without which no science of social life is
possible. Comte was the first to grasp the nature of social
evolution, the first to understand the laws by which the rise
and progress of society are conditioned. This being the case,
it was inevitable that he should appreciate the part played by
Catholic Christianity in the formation of Western society.
Most especially have we reason to be profoundly grateful to
Comte for having inaugurated a reaction against the shallow
philosophy of the eighteenth century, for having combated the
individualism of the Eevolution, for having insisted on the
imperative necessity of subordinating the individual to a
higher power in the interest of society, for having established
the notion of law in social life, for having raised history to its

192 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHEISTIANITY

proper rank as a science of comparative sociology. To Comte
belongs the honour of having been the first to show us, in the
admirable historical synthesis that he sketched in the fifth
volume of the Cours de Philosophic positive, the forces which
are at work in the shaping of the evolution of Western
civilisation. Far from us the wish to diminish the value of
the work accomplished in this line by Bossuet and Saint-
Simon; but it is in Comte's work that we have the first
really scientific effort to interpret history from a sociological
point of view.

Despite the depth of his thought, the keenness of his
insight, the encyclopedic nature of his knowledge ; despite his
unique comprehension of sociological law and of the factors
that are active in shaping social evolution ; Comte nevertheless
failed to render justice to the part played by Christianity in
the social movement of the nineteenth century, and still more
to render justice to the capacities of the Christian religion in
the future.1 If this be the case with Comte, far more must it
be so with those who possess neither his philosophical insight,
nor his amazing encyclopedic erudition, nor his comprehension
of sociological law. It is not surprising, under these
circumstances, if experts in other branches of science fail to
appreciate the value of Christianity. As a matter of fact, the
question of the future of Christianity is habitually posed in an
entirely wrong manner. And if Comte, who examined the
question and endeavoured to answer it from the standpoint of
the trained sociologist, came to unsatisfactory conclusions,

1 It is, of course, possible that Christianity plays scarcely any part in the social
evolution of the twentieth century — even as it is possible that biology and the
observance of biological law be ever more and more relegated to the background.
But this proves absolutely nothing against the capacities of Christianity, any
more than it proves anything against the value and necessity of observing
biological laws. A society of which unrestricted rationalism has destroyed the
cohesion and stability, can forsake the path that alone conduces to social
salvation. Sooner or later, however, Nature will have her revenge. If French
anticlerical politicians imagine that they have destroyed God, they will one day
discover, to their cost, that they have not been able to destroy natural law.

CHRISTIANITY AND KATIONALISM 193

much more must the conclusions of all those, mathematicians,
astronomers, physicists, biologists, geologists, psychologists, who
have no training whatever in sociology, but who decide so
frequently and so dogmatically concerning the future of
Christianity, appear unconvincing. It is a strange pheno-
menon, which we will merely note in passing, that whereas
the sociologist would not consider himself justified in laying
down the law in a branch of natural science in which he is
not an expert, yet so many professors of mathematics or of
natural science think themselves competent to solve problems
of sociology, simply by reason of the fact that they are experts
in their own domain.

The great majority of those who hasten to relegate
Christianity to the museum of antiquities, consider religion in
general and Christianity in particular from an exclusively
individualist point of view. They consider solely the question
as to whether Christianity has or has not benefited the
individual. Viewing Christianity from the standpoint of the
individual, it is not surprising that they see in Christianity
a formidable obstacle to individual emancipation and to
individual liberty, and that they do not understand the
sociological necessity of the restrictions imposed. Rational
thought can never justify the subordination of the individual
to an exterior power, seeing that in the light of his own
reason the individual cannot but appear the measure of all
things. It is not in the individual reason that a justification
of the repression of egotism can be found, for reason is the
instrument of egotism par excellence. Hence, as we have seen,
the necessity of a limitation of rationalism, considered as the
organised form of individual thought, by an organised form of
collective thought, i.e. religion. Only when we assign a limit
to rationalism, can we rise beyond the individual ; and only
when we have risen beyond the individual, can we hope to
interpret correctly those vast collective organisations, which,

13

194 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHRISTIANITY

everywhere developed, have as primary function the subordina-
tion of the individual to collective ends.

The inevitable result of a one-sided and unilateral develop-
ment of rationalism is the setting-up of the individual as the
measure of truth, and the consequent ignoring of collective
rights and collective needs. Science, which is a product of
rational thought, is of necessity individualistic ; hence, as
Comte well recognised, is it indispensable that our education
and the development of our knowledge be subordinated to
certain principles capable of preventing them from becoming
forces of social disintegration. Nothing is more pernicious
for the individual, in the long run, than a liberty that is not
founded on principles susceptible of serving as an adequate
restraint on such liberty; for unrestricted liberty means the
eventual destruction of those social conditions without which
the individual would cease to be. Of an essentially rational
and analytical nature, science is in itself incapable of furnish-
ing the principles whereby rationalism, and the analysis that
derives from the latter, may be controlled. It is for this
reason that we so often see men of science absolutely
indifferent to the claims of society, for this reason that all
individualist movements of modern times seek to justify
themselves by an appeal to science. And doubtless does
science justify such movements, seeing that science is based
on individual reason, and that it is by its nature essentially
analytical. The analytical mind loses sight of the higher
unity and harmony of things, of the fundamental synthesis in
which all phenomena are co-ordinated. Being concerned with
the elements which it dissociates in order to be able to study
better, and having no concern with the whole, analysis
necessarily disposes the scientist to grasp exclusively the
individual aspect of things. Hence, we repeat, is it indispens-
able that analysis should be completed by synthesis, that
science should find its completion in philosophy, that the

CHRISTIANITY AND RATIONALISM 195

analytical mind be controlled by principles capable of prevent-
ing the dissociating and disintegrating tendency inherent to
it from pursuing a too unilateral development, which latter
would be fraught with imminent danger for social stability.

It is the absence of all such principles underlying
education at the present day, which is responsible for the
growth of an excessive and one-sided individualism that
menaces the foundations of society. Individual reason, not
being subordinated to a salutary discipline whereby alone an
intelligent use could be made of it, it is inevitable that we
should assist at a formidable development of egotism.
Rationalism being of an essentially individualist nature, has
ipso facto an analytical character. The tendency to concentrate
the mind exclusively on analysis, to produce what we may
term an " atomic " state of mind, that is apt only to dissociate,
and that is blind to all idea of underlying unity, tendency
which was characteristic of the culture of the nineteenth
century, as it is, unfortunately, to a large extent characteristic
of contemporary culture ; this tendency is the natural con-
sequence of an unilateral development of rationalism, of the
non-subordination of reason to a " limitative principle." For
reason, being essentially an individual product, can perceive
everywhere only the individual, the atom, the element.
When we wish to rise beyond the individual to society, beyond
the element to the synthesis of elements which we call the
Whole, then must we also rise beyond the analytical reason
of the individual to a higher principle, of a synthetic and
social nature.

The nature of science being, as we said, an essentially
analytical one, it is only natural that men of science should
frequently be unable to take a synthetic view of things.
Pre-eminence in one particular branch of knowledge by no
means prevents him who is thus pre-eminent from having a
a very restricted horizon, and consequently from taking a

196 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHRISTIANITY

very short-sighted view of phenomena. Being naturally
disposed to analysis, the man of science is naturally prone to
see only the individual, and to lose sight of the collectivity.
Being used to work solely by aid of his reason, to interpret
phenomena from an exclusively rational point of view, the man
of science is naturally hostile to the idea of any limitation
being placed on reason, is naturally hostile to the idea of
a "limitative principle," such as that constituted by religion.
The man of science is thus often led to ignore altogether the
existence of forces superior to the individual. And, if this be
the case with the analytical chemist or the biologist, so is it
also the case with the sociologist, unless the latter possess the
indispensable philosophical training which alone can enable its
possessor to understand the real meaning of social evolution,
to penetrate beneath the surface, and to seek, beneath the
surface and beyond appearances, the fundamental causes that
preside over the destinies of society.

The sociologist, who has studied the workings of the
human mind throughout history, who has grasped the nature
of the forces that shape the course of social evolution, who
has analysed the causes underlying the phenomena of the rise
and decay of societies — the sociologist who has done this will
not consider so lightly the possibility of the disappearance
of those collective beliefs which have constituted the main
principle of Western civilisation since the downfall of the
Koman Empire. For the sociologist who has been prepared
by adequate training sees in religion, not an institution created
for the benefit of the individual, but an institution evolved by
society for social purposes. The disappearance of Christianity
would signify the loss of those bulwarks erected by Western
society for the defence of its vital interests, the levelling of
the rampart that protects society against the individual. With
Christianity would vanish the only efficient restraint on
egotism, the only adequate guarantee of social integration.

CHRISTIANITY AND EATIONALISM 197

Those who, being ignorant of the nature of social evolution,
and devoid of the rudiments of a sociological training, consider
Christianity as a mere individual phenomenon, as a mere
obstacle to the emancipation of the individual ; and who, in
consequence, desire and predict the speedy downfall of that
religion ; these, of course, take no sort of consideration of
the interests of society, which Christianity, in that it is
primarily a social institution, has the task of defending.

But those who predict the disappearance of Christianity ;
who tell us that the twentieth century will see the final
break-up of all the old faiths of Western humanity ; who tell
us that, at the most, Christianity can only hope to survive as
a purely individual philosophy and as a purely individual
consolation ; these are not necessarily infallible prophets.
And this infallibility may the more legitimately be doubted
if we take account of the lessons of history, if we study
throughout the history of humanity the workings of the same
sociological laws. At the conclusion of such a study we may
come to the conclusion that the continuity of the Christian
religion, continuity that is indispensable to society, is guaranteed
ly the fact of that religion possessing an essentially synthetic nature,
in that it takes account alike of social and of individual necessities.
Did it take no account of the individual, did it exact the
sacrifice of the individual to society, without giving anything
in return to the former ; then may we be certain that the
progress of rationalism would long since have undermined and
ruined it. The fact that it has survived the many and violent
storms encountered on the way, such as the terrible storms of
the Keformation and the Kevolution ; that it has vanquished the
manifold heresies that sprang up like mushrooms on its path,
Gnosticism and Monophysitism, Manichaeanism and Nestor-
ianism, Quietism and Jansenism, and all the other multifarious
aberrations which history records ; this fact constitutes
surely an irrefragable proof of the wondrous adaptation of

198 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHEISTIANITY

Christianity to the needs alike of society and of the
individual. As we have said, did Christianity take no account
of the individual, assuredly would the development of
rationalism long since have killed it ; for the development of
rationalism, and the growth of egotism which results from it,
will always prevent the individual from sacrificing his
immediate personal interests to higher ends, unless he has
reason to believe that the sacrifice will be adequately
compensated for later on. The peculiar genius of Christianity
resides in the fact that, while rigorously subordinating the
individual to a higher law, while strictly curtailing individual
liberty, it nevertheless adapts itself far more to the permanent
needs of the individual than does rationalism. It is in this
synthetic nature of Christianity, in this unique capacity which
it possesses for adapting itself to two series of antagonistic
interests, that the guarantee of the stability of the Christian
religion is to be found.

We have said, in the seventh chapter, that look where he
will, the individual will find in life itself no principle capable
of conferring an adequate value on life. In life itself no
sanction can be found for the struggle and suffering that are
the necessary accompaniments of existence. Only too soon
does the individual discover the fugacity and vanity of all
pleasure, only too soon does he who thinks he has satisfied
all his desires, find that insatiability is one of the forms in
which suffering manifests itself. And rationalism can neither
arrest the struggle, nor confer on the latter a sanction that
is anything like sufficient, in view of the sacrifices which it
entails. Rationalism can, it is true, bring about a temporary
cessation of the social conflict; it can engender artificial
conditions, whereby a society is momentarily withdrawn from
the sphere in which natural law operates. But the equilibrium
thus realised between social and individual interests is a
radically false one ; and in verity it is no equilibrium, seeing

; CHRISTIANITY AND RATIONALISM 199

that the interests of society are wholly sacrificed to those of
the individual. This artificial, unnatural state of things cannot
therefore be durable. Sooner or later will the society in
which egotism has gained the upper hand, be eliminated :
inner decay cannot fail to set in, and exterior foes will
achieve its ruin. The temporary cessation of social conflict
brought about by rationalism is thus fraught with imminent
danger for society, and is invariably but the prelude to
society's destruction. And rationalism is entirely unable,
under any circumstances, to put an end to the " fight within
himself" of which Browning speaks — to those sorrows and
tragedies which accompany the life of every mortal being,
and for which a sanction cannot be sought in life itself.
Rationalism develops the sense of individualism, it tends to
make of the individual the centre of all things ; and the
individual, thus awakened to a consciousness of his value, of
his importance, of his rights, cannot but perceive how little
his much-vaunted rights, how little his entire life, are worth,
when weighed in the balance with all the suffering which life
entails. The inexorable laws of life take upon themselves
to refute the claim of rationalism to be able to confer a
value and a meaning on life. For judged of according to the
sole light of reason, life, with its disappointments and
disillusions, with its partings, and the fugacity of the rare
joys it allows us, is but a meaningless tragedy. Reason can
give no answer to the questions that assail us most in
moments of poignant grief.

Rationalism is thus incapable of conferring a value on
individual life that is anything like equivalent to the suffering
which is the law of all existence. And it is likewise wholly
incapable of securing that durable equilibrium between the
interests of society and those of the individual, without which
society must fall to pieces and be eliminated. Alike from an
individual and from a social point of view, rationalism appears

200 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHRISTIANITY

thus as an insufficient and unsatisfactory principle. Eeason
being unable to confer a value on life, it is therefore beyond
reason that we must seek a principle that renders life worth
living, that contains in consequence a sufficient incentive to
work, in that it gives an adequate sanction to effort. Reason
being likewise incapable of securing that permanent harmony
between social interests and individual interests, without which
society cannot continue to exist — without which, consequently,
individual life is ipso facto devoid of any value, seeing that the
individual can live only in society ; it ensues that alone a
principle exterior to reason can secure the harmony in
question. Whether we consider the interests of the individual or
those of society, it thus appears evident that rationalism must needs
be not only limited, but completed, by supra-rational principles.

And herein lies the incomparable value of Christianity,
alike for society and for the individual. By reason of its
synthetic nature Christianity adapts itself alike to social needs
and to individual needs. It restrains egotism, whether in the
class or in the individual, by means of the idea of Duty. It
obtains the performance of the duties assigned to the individual,
it obtains the sacrifice of the latter's interests, by means of
the Ideal held up by it to the love and veneration of humanity
— an Ideal sufficiently powerful to command unquestioning
obedience, and sufficiently attractive to command boundless
devotion. By the great Ideal that it holds up before him,
and which is the supreme incentive to effort, Christianity
secures the integration of the individual in society ; and by
this integration is secured, in turn, that equilibrium between
individual interests and social interests without which the
existence of society is imperilled. An equilibrium between
these two series of antagonistic interests can only be secured
if the rights of each party are safeguarded. Rationalism, as
we have seen, having necessarily the individual as its basis,
sacrifices entirely the rights of society. Christianity safe-

CHKISTIANITY AND KATIONALISM 201

guards these essential rights, it exacts the rigorous subordi-
nation of individual desires to social needs, the sacrifice of the
individual to social exigencies. Christianity promises nothing
in this life to the individual — and most assuredly is it well-
advised in so doing, seeing that it could not possibly give him
anything. But over and above this life is the life to come,
over and above the finite social law is the Absolute Moral
Law; and that which the individual is compelled to sacrifice
in this finite life in obedience to the inexorable exigencies of
the social law, he will recuperate in the world to come, when
he will receive his reward in accordance with the prescriptions
of the Moral Law.

Christianity possesses precisely what rationalism lacks —
namely a great ideal, an ideal which confers an adequate
value of life, which contains an adequate principle of
authority and an adequate sanction for suffering and effort.
Eationalism is only capable of offering the most illusory of
consolations to those who are condemned by the exigencies
of social life to struggle and suffering: that is to say, a
suspension of the natural conditions of life, suspension that
must inevitably conduce to the disruption and elimination
of society. And to those moral sufferings that are not a
consequence of the social struggle for existence, but which
have their source in the immutable laws of all life, rationalism
is wholly unable to offer any consolation whatever. By
developing, on the one hand, in the individual, the consciousness
of personal value and personal rights — while, on the other
hand, depriving life itself of its value and significance, in that
it undermines religious faith : rationalism can but exasperate
individual discontent, in that it creates a permanent contra-
diction between the individual, with his hypertrophied
self-consciousness, and the realities of every-day existence.
Eationalism, if it sacrifices the vital interests of society, does
not for all that add one iota to the value of individual life ;

202 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHRISTIANITY

on the contrary does it diminish and impoverish the latter, by
depriving it of the only meaning which it can possess.

As we have said, Christianity offers the individual nothing
in this life. It does not, therefore, like rationalism, flatter
the individual with vain hopes, which are doomed in advance
to be deceived. The individual is thus spared an unnecessary
disillusion — an unnecessary suffering is not added to those
which he must of necessity endure, and which are sufficiently
numerous. Christianity does not excite the individual to
revolt against natural law, but teaches him the duty of sub-
mission to the latter. Christianity does not seek to render
the individual happy in this life, does not hold up before his
eyes the mirage of an earthly paradise. On the contrary,
Christianity recognises full well the necessity of suffering ;
and not only that, but it teaches us that suffering is desirable,
that we must not merely accept it, but seek it. Alone the
path of suffering leads to the goal of individual salvation ; and
he who has not manfully carried his cross, is not fit to wear
the crown. The Christian ideal offers to the individual
nothing in this life but suffering ; and it thereby puts itself
into entire harmony with natural law. But suffering has here
a meaning, which it has not otherwise. Rationalism can give
no meaning to suffering, and this is why rationalism must seek
to suppress the latter, must seek to create artificial conditions
under which natural laws shall be unable to operate.
Christianity, on the other hand, is under no obligation to
suppress the fundamental condition of all life, for suffering is
not only admitted but glorified by it ; and Christianity is able
to admit suffering, to glorify suffering, because it is able to
give to suffering a higher meaning. Suffering is accepted,
suffering is justified, because life has a value. Not a value
which can be measured by earthly measures, but a value
infinitely greater than all earthly values. Our passage in the
finite world, with all the struggles and sufferings entailed by

CHKISTIANITY AND KATIONALISM 203

it, is a preparation — a preparation to the ulterior state of
perfect bliss.

Thus does Christianity, by its genius, realise the complete
adaptation of the individual to social life and to social
necessities, whilst giving, on the other hand, a value to
individual life. Truly a formidable problem to solve, and
which could only be solved by an institution possessing the
rarest social capacities. For the individual can exist only in
society ; and his existence as a social being is devoid of
meaning, and consequently devoid of value. During his
passage in this world, he is ruthlessly sacrificed to interests
wholly foreign to his, and immeasurably higher than his ;
during this life he is condemned to labour and to suffer,
without seeing any adequate profit accrue to him. He is
condemned, either to see his ambitions disappointed and his
hopes falsified, or else, if he attain his wished-for goal, to
discover that insatiability is a law of life, and one of the
cruellest of such laws. All this is fully accepted by
Christianity, which supports and backs up natural law by
making suffering appear as something desirable, by giving to
suffering the character of a divine law. And yet, although it
not only admits, but reinforces, natural law — the natural law
whereby the individual is condemned to perpetual suffering
and to perpetual sacrifice — Christianity nevertheless safeguards
individual interests, in that it gives to each individual life its
permanent value in the absolute world.

The solution brought by Christianity to the great problem
aforementioned — the problem of how to enforce natural and
social laws whilst at the same time safeguarding individual
interests — is in truth the only possible satisfactory solution.
The law of life condemns us to suffer ; and in life itself we
can find no explanation of this law, in life itself we can find
no principle that confers a value on life. Therefore must
rationalism, which refuses to seek for any principle outside

204 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHEISTIANITY

life, outside the domain of experience, condeinn suffering as
useless, because meaningless. But if we seek to suppress
natural law, we ipso facto suppress ourselves ; for our finite
existence is conditioned by natural laws. ^Rationalism thus
leading to social destruction, the only alternative for society, if
it is to continue to exist, is to have recourse to supra-rational
principles. For the rationalised individual will, unless
rationalism be limited and completed at the same time by
supra-rational ideals, prefer destruction to living. Nihilism
is the only possible result of rationalism pushed to excess —
nihilism that is a consequence of the contradiction perceived
by the individual between his aspirations, and the reality in
which he is compelled to live. The one-sided development of
his personality, the hypertrophy of his self-consciousness, on
the one hand ; the disillusion and disappointment produced by
the non-realisation of the hopes held out, by the bankruptcy
of the promises made, on the other hand: these inevitable
consequences of an excessive growth of rationalism cannot but
lead the individual direct to nihilism, which is but the
expression by the disabused individual, who has no superior
principles to fall back on, of the consciousness of the non-
value of all life at which he has arrived.

The needs of society and the needs of the individual can be
satisfied, only if we seek outside this finite life for a principle
capable of reconciling the two. The needs of society demand
that the individual be sacrificed to social interests ; and the
rationalised individual will not consent to this sacrifice unless
the latter come to possess a higher significance, unless its
utility for the individual be duly manifested. The genius of
Christianity has succeeded in making the individual suffering,
the individual sacrifices, which are indispensable for the
welfare of the collectivity, appear as indispensable for
individual welfare. By making individual salvation depend
on the acceptance of suffering, on the voluntary sacrifice of

CHRISTIANITY AND RATIONALISM 205

egotistical interests, Christianity adapts the individual to
society by bringing individual conduct into harmony with
social requirements. The primordial function of Christianity
is the defence of social interests; but the only means of
causing the rationalised individual to consent to the sacrifices
necessary to the survival of society, is to captivate him by a
sufficiently powerful ideal, so that the sacrifices in question may
appear indispensable to the realisation of that ideal. This is
what Christianity does : it ministers to the needs of the
individual, and thereby does it secure the fulfilment of the
individual's duties toward society. The conditions of all life
are such, that the individual will always have to go outside life,
to exceed the narrow limits of his individuality, in order to give
any value to existence, to find any adequate sanction for effort.
This being so, the perennity of Christianity is guaranteed, et
portae inferi non praevalebunt adversus earn. And thus we
find that the survival of Christianity in a rational society is
assured in the first place ly the Christian system of individual
consolations and individual rewards — a system that is of quite
secondary importance with regard alike to the nature of
Christianity, which is primordially an organ of social defence,
and to the part played by Christianity in the history of the
world.

Ill

The survival of Christianity appears thus assured by the
eminently synthetic nature of that religion. The conditions
of life are such, that rationalised humanity will never be able
to exist without having recourse to supra-rational ideals.
Always will humanity seek outside life for the value of life,
always will it seek outside life for consolation, always will it
have its gaze riveted on the Infinite, in the measureless
domain of which it will search for Hope amidst the tribula-

206 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHKISTIANITY

tions and disillusions of this world. Far from being able to
exist as an areligious community fed on the meagre scraps of
rationalism, rationalised society has infinitely greater need of
the support, consolation, and hope afforded by those religious
beliefs which are likewise ethical in their nature, than has
a pre-rational society in which individuality is wholly un-
developed. In primitive societies, dominated by collective
representations, the mentality of the individual is far too
restricted for the individual to be able to appreciate the value
or the non- value of life. Questions of this magnitude cannot
occur to the simple pre-logical mind of the savage. Having
no concern with the meaning of existence, wholly immerged in
society, entirely dominated by the collective beliefs imposed
on him a priori with irresistible force, the savage has no need
of consolation, no need of a higher principle whereon to base
his hope of compensation for the suffering endured in this
world. Primitive man is not a philosopher ; and his individual
mentality being practically non-existent, he is quite incapable
of any aspirations which surpass the limits of the collective
beliefs that envelop his whole activity. Only in the measure
that rationalism is developed, that the personality of the
individual comes to differentiate itself, that the individual
mentality renders itself independent of the collective
mentality, that the individual begins to form concepts
independently of collective representations, that his thought
surpasses the limits assigned to it formerly by such representa-
tions; only in this measure does the individual become
capable of putting to himself questions of an ethical import,
such as the question of the value of life and of the meaning
of suffering. As rationalism can give no satisfactory answer
to these questions, the individual, as we have said, is face to
face with two alternatives : nihilism, or the acceptance of a
supra-rational (i.e. religious) solution. For the fundamental
condition of all life is suffering ; and suffering can be

CHEISTIANITY AND KATIONALISM 20*7

abolished only if life itself be suppressed. If humanity does
not have recourse to this extreme measure, then is it
inevitable that the question of the meaning of suffering —
which implies the wider question of the value of life in
general — be put. And this question can only be answered,
as we have said, if we go outside the limits of life, if we
forsake the domain of scientific empiricism and cross the
frontiers of supra-rational belief. In a word : rationalism is
the force that impels humanity to have recourse to what we
may call ethical religious belief ; rationalism, by the fact of it
obliging us unceasingly to put the question as to the meaning
of suffering and the value of life, constitutes the raison d'etre
of those higher forms of religion which are at once of a
collective and of an individual nature.

CHAPTER IX

THE FUTURE OF CHRISTIANITY

THE foregoing study will, perhaps, have enabled the reader to
understand more clearly the nature of the two great forces
that perpetually stand opposed to each other in the process of
social evolution, ever since the moment when, in the course
of this evolution, individual reason was developed : the two
forces of religion and rationalism. At first sight, it appears
hard to understand why, in spite of all the apparent ad-
vantages offered by rationalism to the individual, the develop-
ment of rationalism should nevertheless always and system-
atically be held in check — it appears hard to understand why
the collective mind and the collective needs should always
triumph over individual liberty. We are now, perhaps, in a
better position to understand the apparent anomaly underlying
human evolution. For we now see that if rationalism does
indeed permit the satisfaction of immediate interests, and does
therefore secure for the individual immediate profits ; yet this
satisfaction and these profits are of short duration, and lead
consequently to ultimate disillusion and disappointment. The
conditions of life are such that we are invariably placed before
the alternative : either a short - lived pleasure or else no
pleasure at all, i.e. negative or positive suffering.

Why life should be thus conditioned, we know not. We
cannot explain the mystery ; and we can only bow down in

208

THE FUTURE OF CHRISTIANITY 209

submission before an inexorable law. But certain it is that
this law of existence, which imposes itself on us in our daily
experience, is such that it must conduct us to nihilism —
unless it conducts us to religious belief. The individual soon
discovers the truth of Shelley's words : —

Our sincerest pleasure with some pain is fraught,

Our sweetest songs are those that tell of saddest thought.

He soon discovers that joy is not of this world, that the only
tangible reality of existence is suffering, whether in a negative
or in a positive form. The metaphysics of Schopenhauer were
not necessary to prove to us a palpable fact revealed by
experience — a fact known long before Schopenhauer to the
sages of India and China, as well as to the Greeks. Sakya-
Mouni taught that the only means of fleeing from suffering is
to take refuge in the Nirvana, after all desire, all wish to
live, have been suppressed ; and this is a doctrine that must
needs be fatal to society, destructive as it is of all energy and
of all effort. The Greeks, as Nietzsche well pointed out,
created the splendid vision of the Olympic gods, this immortal
ideal of transcendent force and beauty, in order to counteract
the spectacle of this life's woes, in order to repose themselves
and refresh themselves after gazing at the endless suffering
and shortcomings of the world ; but this idealism of the
Greeks, as Nietzsche was careful to insist upon, is the idealism
of a chosen race of aristocrats, able and willing to contemplate
suffering without fear, able and willing to make such suffering
serve in order to create beauty, having strength enough to
find joy and to derive benefit from a vision that they knew to
be a mere artifice, a mere creation of the imagination, but that
they revered nevertheless because it was a vision of beauty,
and because Beauty was for them the justification of life.
For a race less strong, less Olympic — in a word, less ex-
ceptional— than the Greeks, an artifice, however magnificent,
of however transcendent art, does not suffice; it is indispens-

14

210 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHEISTIANITY

able that the object of its belief be a reality to it. And this
is why art in itself cannot be substituted for religion, except
in the case of a very few — although art be none the less an
essential factor of religion. Art conceals reality, idealises
reality, renders that which is prosaic poetical : but the great
majority are not capable of finding in art durable satisfaction
of their deepest aspirations, precisely because art is but a
concealment, an idealisation of reality ; and they demand, not a
concealment of reality, but reality itself — they demand that the
very tangible reality of life and suffering be compensated for by
what is for them the not less tangible reality of a life hereafter,
which shall be devoid of suffering. As Goethe expressed it : —

Wer Kunst und Wissenschaft besitzt,

Hat auch Religion ;

Wer alle beide nicht besitzt,

Der habe Religion.

The only alternative for the individual being thus a short-
lived, and consequently illusory, pleasure — or else suffering
and sacrifice ; it ensues, as we said, that the individual must
choose between nihilism and belief in an ideal reality. The
conditions of life are such, that religion is the only means of
escape from self-annihilation. Hence can we understand
what at first sight appears inexplicable : namely, that the
rationalised individual should persist in clinging to Christian
beliefs which represent reality otherwise than it is, and which
impose on him many irksome restraints and much positive
sacrifice. Christianity induces the individual to accept suffer-
ing and sacrifice in exchange for a compensation which far
outweighs such suffering. Society and the individual alike
find here a profit : society cannot exist unless the individual
forgo his liberty and subordinate himself to social needs ; and
the individual prefers to self-annihilation the hope — which is
equivalent, for the believer, to reality — of future happiness
and future reward.

THE FUTUEE OF CHRISTIANITY 211

The history of Western society since the end of the
fourteenth century has been marked by two parallel series of
movements. In the first series, we see society struggling to
emancipate itself from the inexorable laws of nature, struggling
to attain a goal that is outside nature ; in the second, we see
it retracing its steps, we see it seeking, not to suppress nature,
but to interpret the latter, and to give a higher ethical
meaning to those workings of natural law that most greatly
affect individual welfare. Such, at any rate, is the case with
all those societies whose fitness has not been undermined by
biological causes — with all those who still possess the Wille
zur Macht, and the energy and vigour necessary to the expansion
of their power. We can, perhaps, now understand the mean-
ing of those reactions that invariably set in against the excesses
of rationalism. For if such excesses be directly and palpably
antagonistic to the needs of society, the individual, in his
turn, cannot find in rationalism any durable satisfaction of his
aspirations and desires. Rationalism, being a product of the
individual reason, has the individual as its basis and is limited
by the individual. But the individual, as we know him in
Western society, is an essentially social being; the whole of
his psychological life is a social creation ; and he is conse-
quently not an end unto himself. All the manifold needs,
aspirations, and emotions of his psychological life having been
developed by social life, by forces that are outside the
individual and superior to him; it follows that it is only in
society that such needs, emotions, and aspirations can find
satisfaction — that it is only by society that the psychological
existence of the individual can be regulated. Obviously can
society only fulfil its functions in this respect if it be strongly
integrated. A society which is a prey to anarchy and
incoherence, in which the notion of solidarity is obscured,

212 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHEISTIANITY

cannot exercise sufficient control over its component elements,
cannot subject them to an adequate discipline. The individual
is thus detached from society and forced to fall back on
himself; he no longer finds the completion of himself, so to
speak, in a disorganised society — the latter is incapable of
setting an aim to, and of regulating, the activities of its
members. An immediate incompatibility arises between the
needs of the individual and the latter's power of satisfying
such needs. And this condition of moral instability and
anarchy is of necessity an exceedingly painful one.

The life of the individual can only be worth living if a
satisfactory aim be set to his activities, if his subjective and
emotional existence be regulated and disciplined in such a
way, that his needs be always adapted to his capacity for
satisfying them. Otherwise will the perpetual consciousness
of unappeased wants, the perpetual sentiment of insatiability,
render life intolerable. An essential condition of any sort of
happiness is order and regularity. But order and regularity
can prevail in the psychological life of the individual, only if
society be strongly integrated. For this psychological life,
having been created and developed by society, can be regulated
solely by a social force ; and all social force must be non-
existent if society lack cohesion and integration.

The life of the individual is thus tolerable only if its
activities be regulated and disciplined ; such regulation, such
discipline, can only be enforced in a strongly integrated
society ; and society, as we have seen, can be properly
integrated only by religion. Therefore is the individual
brought, in the long run, to recognise that rationalism is a
deception, and that the sole value which his life can possess
is conferred on it by religion. Hence can we understand the
reactions that history shows us setting in after every great
social convulsion. When society is torn asunder by a sudden
catastrophe or a violent upheaval, the individual is like a ship

THE FUTUKE OF CHKISTIANITY 213

cut adrift from its anchor and tossed hither and thither, the
sport of the wind and waves. Earnestly does he yearn for
some port, where peace and security await him. After the
convulsions produced by the so-called Eeformation and by
the Eevolution, a reaction was not long in setting in ;
and such is the case after every storm — the flowing tide is
checked and retreats, however high it may flow. And there
where no adequate reaction sets in, where a society is
perpetually the prey of revolutions and upheavals, the conse-
quence must be ultimate elimination. Society being per-
manently disintegrated, life loses all its value ; and the sources
of energy and of effort are ipso facto dried up.

Eeligion, although it be primordially and essentially a
social institution, consequently a factor antagonistic to individual
interests — although the individual be a purely secondary
consideration in any religious system ; appears thus to us,
none the less, in Western civilisation, as a necessity not
only for society but also for the individual. And it is but
natural that this should be the case when we consider the
conditions of life. For the individual can live solely in
society ; his existence is thus dependent on his subordination
to social needs and interests ; and, this being so, the only
possible happiness to which he can aspire must be obtainable
exclusively by his acceptance of the discipline imposed on him
by society. As society can impose such discipline only if it
be strongly integrated ; and as the integration of society can
be realised only by religion ; it follows that the value of
individual life depends, par ricochet, on the efficacity of religious
beliefs. It is in this double aspect presented by ethical
religion, in its necessity alike for society and for the individual,
that we may see the guarantee of the maintenance of religion
in Western society, as long as the latter remains equal to its
task. The disappearance of this indispensable lever of social
evolution could have but one meaning : the setting in of a

214 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHKISTIANITY

process of rapid and irremediable degeneracy. Evidently,
among the various forms of religion, that form will survive
which is best adapted to the needs of Western civilisation ;
and the form in question is incontestably Christianity.

But Christianity is itself not a homogeneous mass ; and,
of its various branches, that one, again, will survive, which
fulfils best the function assigned to religion in general : the
securing of social integration. If the integration of society
can be realised only by religion, and if, as we have seen,
the value of individual life depends on such integration
and consequently on the efficacity of religious beliefs ; it
is indispensable that the beliefs in question be of an
essentially social nature. Mere individualist beliefs, mere
" undogmatic " religion, are wholly unable to secure the
integration of society — are ipso facto unable to give to
individual life itself the stability that is derived from social
discipline and cohesion. Being primordially and funda-
mentally a social factor, religion can become " individualist "
only if it be perverted ; a religion based on the quicksands of
subjectivism is a religion standing on its head, so to speak.
The pernicious doctrine which constitutes the foundation of
Protestantism, and which is so greatly in favour to-day —
namely, that the individual is the measure of all things, and
consequently the centre of religious truth — is absolutely false.
Eeligion can only be efficacious, can only fulfil its indispensable
function of integrating the individual in society, of subordinat-
ing the individual to society, on condition that it exceed the
narrow limits of the individual, that it dominate the latter,
that it impose itself on him with irresistible force. If religion
is to be efficacious, its commands must be withdrawn from the
sphere of discussion. It follows that religion, if it is to be
a social force in the true sense of the word, must be dogmatic
— that its criterion of truth must be an objective one, exterior
to the individual and superior to him. Only the dogma,

THE FUTUKE OF CHEISTIANITY 215

which is indiscutable, can impose itself with sufficient force, as
a categorical imperative.

What is, in truth, a "subjective" religion, an
" individualist " religion, if not a contradiction in its terms ?
How is a " religion " founded on the individual reason to
impose itself on the latter, to command obedience ? If it is
not able to impose itself and command obedience, then is it
not religion ; for religion is an extra-individual and a supra-
individual force. The fact is that Protestantism has been
radically incapable of grasping the real significance and
purport of religion, and of the part played by religion in
social life. For this reason has Protestantism always been
unable to secure the integration of society ; far from acting as
an integrating force, it has invariably tended to produce social
disintegration, to engender social anarchy. And this is
inevitable, seeing that Protestantism contains no principles
susceptible of acting as an efficient restraint on the individual,
of subordinating the latter to higher ends. When the
criterion of truth is placed within the individual, when the
individual is taught to accept as true that only which his
" conscience " prompts him to consider as true — then are the
gates opened wide to all the aberrations and excesses of
individualism.

We have seen, it is true, that, if rationalism be conform
to the immediate interests of the individual, it none the less
fails to afford durable satisfaction to his aspirations and
desires. This being so, it may be urged that the aberrations
of an excessive rationalism cannot produce very great or
permanent harm; seeing that, taught by experience, the
individual soon retraces his steps, soon comes to recognise the
necessity of imposing a check on himself. That " individualism"
be not conform, in the long run, to individual interests, is
profoundly true ; but to suppose that the average individual
possesses sufficient foresight and sufficient self-control to be

216 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHKISTIANITY

able to voluntarily forgo immediate pleasure for the sake of
a future benefit, unless the latter be of an exceedingly
remunerative nature, is to ignore strangely the workings of the
human mind. How many individuals are checked, in their
youth, from committing all sorts of physiological excesses,
by fear of the ultimate consequences that they may reap in
the shape of an infirm old age, or in the shape of a shortened
life? How many restrain themselves in sexual intercourse
from fear of syphilis ? And we take here only the most
palpable cases of lack of restraint from fear of ultimate
consequences. When we see how numerous are those who,
unmarried, have absolutely no thought for the future, no
concern as to the effect of present excesses on their married
life to come ; or those who, married and having children, are
unable to resist the attraction and influence of a passion that
spells the moral ruin of their family ; or those who, as regards
money matters, are incapable of the slightest prevision or
reflection — when we see all these, and their number is legion,
we understand how powerless is reason to exert an inhibitory
influence on the promptings of egotism and on the impulsions
of instinct.

When the individual has attained to a mature age, he
may regret — and probably will regret — the excesses of youth ;
when the imprudent spendthrift has got rid of all he possesses,
he will likewise be grieved ; when the married man or woman has
sacrificed family obligations to passion, he or she may discover
how unstable and ephemeral is human happiness, and more
especially that happiness which we call Love — he or she may
learn all too soon to know " love's sad satiety." Before
committing their imprudent acts, every one of these could
foresee the consequences : and yet this foresight is absolutely
powerless to restrain them, absolutely incapable — as we
expressed it — of exerting an inhibitory influence. The man
who, having contracted syphilis in his youth, marries in the

THE FUTUKE OF CHKISTIANITY 217

usual happy-go-lucky style in which marriages are generally
contracted nowadays, without a thought entering his mind as to
the possible consequences, and who subsequently contaminates
his wife and engenders a hopelessly degenerate family — this
man certainly knows, at all events vaguely, that " syphilis is a
terrible disease." Does this knowledge in any way interfere
with his desire to get " settled down " — or with any other of
the motives that may inspire him to get married ? When we
remember that, out of one hundred women in Paris who are
syphilitic, no fewer than twenty are honourable married women,
according to the researches of Professor Fournier; we may judge
of the degree of influence exerted by reason and foresight even
in a case in which, we might think, they would be more likely
to make themselves felt. Too late, when his children are
stillborn, or when they die within the first year, or when they
survive as sickly and degenerate beings, does the criminally
imprudent father regret his imprudence. But it is too late !

Eeason is always, an the average individual, impotent to
restrain egotism, impotent to check the passion of the moment.
The average individual, although he certainly knows what the
consequences will be, cares not one straw about the latter.
And the natural price of imprudence is often, in individual
life, paid too late for the individual to be able to derive any
tangible profit from the lesson. Society, being less ephemeral
than the individual, is more apt to profit by experience.
Hence do we see later generations profiting by the experience
of earlier ones ; if, indeed, a process of degeneracy has not set
in and undermined the vital energy of the race. When a
society has not fallen a prey to such degeneracy, later genera-
tions can arrest further progress in the direction of the abyss ;
and we then see what is commonly known as a " reaction "
setting in. Provided a society be not degenerate, the evil
effects of rationalism and egotism are thus susceptible of " self-
amelioration " or " self-adjustment," if we may thus express

218 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHEISTIANITY

ourselves. But none the less do the disintegration and
disorganisation that result from such excesses of egotism and
rationalism represent a formidable waste of social force, a
formidable squandering of social energy ; none the less do such
disintegration and such disorganisation gravely impair social
efficacity. And if this be the case even then, when anarchy is
but a passing evil, that can be repaired by later generations ;
we must likewise recollect that often do such convulsions
not only shatter momentarily the foundations of society, but
that they frequently occasion such a weakening of society that
the latter is unable ever to recover.

We thus come to two conclusions. Firstly, that reason is,
in the average individual, powerless to inhibit acts of an
egotistical nature, although the individual is able to foresee the
ultimate consequences, for himself and for others, of such acts ;
when the consequences make themselves felt, it is often too
late to repair the evil ; and then does the individual discover
that, having forsaken the path of duty, he has but "bitter
herbs, and no bread with them." Secondly, that if society, on
account of its longer life, is better able to profit by the
lessons of experience than the individual — yet, nevertheless,
the effects of egotism are never indifferent in social life ; even
if they can be remedied, they leave a trace ; the disintegration
of society resulting from egotism represents always a great
loss of social force and of social energy. It follows that it is
not sufficient to endeavour to remedy the evil produced by
social disintegration ; but that it is necessary to prevent that
disintegration taking place. Similarly, it is not sufficient that
the individual live to regret the consequences of imprudent
and antisocial acts, that have procured him momentary pleasure
and satisfaction at the expense of society ; for society derives
no profit from such sterile regrets. It is therefore essential
that the individual be disciplined in such a way that egotism be
placed under adequate restraint — that the perpetration of such

THE FUTUKE OF CHRISTIANITY 219

antisocial acts be prevented as far as possible. In return for
the sacrifice of immediate interests which it demands,
Christianity offers a reward far exceeding such sacrifice ; it
thus prevents the disillusion that is the ultimate consequence
of all pleasure in this life, and holds out the hope of
permanent happiness hereafter. Qui bibit ex aqua hac, sitiet
iterum; qui autem ex aqua biberit, quam ego dabo ei, non in
aeternum sitiet. In that it imposes discipline on the individual,
and thereby prevents the disintegration of society which is a
consequence of the lack of individual discipline ; Christianity
safeguards those social interests, to protect which is its
primordial task. In that it maintains social integration,
Christianity ipso facto gives stability to individual life — that
stability without which life is intolerable. If it demands, in
the interest of such integration, the sacrifice of individual
interests in this life ; it offers to the individual a reward far
greater than the sacrifice. And thus does it respond, also, to
the ultimate interests of the individual.

II

If it is to discipline the individual and to check egotism, it
is evident that Christianity must be a force superior to the
individual, a force capable of imposing itself on the latter.
Protestantism, being based on rationalism and on sub-
jectivism, cannot consequently be such a force. ,For
rationalism has no means of enforcing the fundamental notion
of Duty ; reason is incapable of exacting the sacrifice of
the individual to social ends. And, as a matter of fact,
Protestantism hastened to reduce Duty to its lowest possible
minimum. This was inevitable, seeing that Protestantism
constitutes, under a vague dogmatic pretext, a " protest of the
individual" against social authority. It was evidently im-
possible that the populations which, in the sixteenth century,

220 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHRISTIANITY

followed the banner of Calvin and Luther, of Zwingli and
Socinius — populations sunk in ignorance and semi-barbarism
— should understand anything about transubstantiation or
consubstantiation, about predestination or the doctrine of the
Trinity. And even if they had done so, certain is it that no
mere intellectual movement would have sufficed to produce
the cataclysms of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries.
If abuses existed in the Church — and they certainly did exist ;
they could incontestably have been remedied without the
violent schism inaugurated by Luther ; and, in fact, all such
abuses were effectively suppressed, not by Protestantism, but
by the Counter -Eeformation, by the zeal and energy of
Ignatius of Loyola and the Society of Jesus, and by the
laudable efforts of the Council of Trent. Protestantism
brought no remedy to anything. Exclusively critical in its
nature, it was powerless to construct. But its power of
destruction has been great. Everywhere where it has passed,
it has served as a ferment of social disorganisation and
disruption.1

Protestantism, as we said, undertook to reduce Duty to its
minimum. "We have only to compare the disciplinary system
of Catholicism with that of Protestantism, under any one of
the innumerable forms in which the latter exists, in order to
verify this statement. Nothing can be more astonishing than
the remark occasionally heard, to the effect that Catholic
discipline and morals are easier than are Protestant discipline

1 When an adverse judgment is passed 011 Protestantism, the writer who
passes it is invariably accused of partiality. When, on the other hand, a writer
violently attacks Catholicism, he is held to be an impartial judge. Let him who
is able to explain this psychological mystery do so if he can. As for us, we are
totally indifferent to such criticism. But we repeat that we hold absolutely no
brief for any form of religion ; that we endeavour to judge religion from an
entirely objective point of view ; and that we are exclusively concerned with the
sociological aspects of the various religious systems. It is not dogma as such
that we criticise — the question neither concerns us, nor have we the slightest
theological competence : we only seek to appreciate, with entire impartiality,
the sociological consequences deriving from certain dogmas.

THE FUTUKE OF CHKISTIANITY 221

and morals. It can only be supposed that those who make
this extraordinary statement have never had the ghost of a
notion of what Catholic discipline is. If Protestantism
suppressed the priesthood, together with all the powers
invested in the latter, this suppression implied the abolition
of a permanent and efficacious spiritual control over the
individual — the removal of a power capable of constraining
the individual to fulfil his duties. And this suppression of
the priesthood, this abolition of all efficacious moral authority
over the individual, was conform to the subjectivist-rationalistic
basis on which Protestantism established itself ; if the criterion
of truth be placed within the individual, obviously is no room
left for the existence of an authority superior to the individual.
Conversely, the institution of the priesthood implies that the
individual is subordinated to a criterion of truth exterior to
himself.

Together with the suppression of all efficacious moral
control over the individual, Protestantism undertook to reduce
the latter's duties themselves to a minimum. Henceforth is
the individual, liberated from all adequate supervision, no
longer required to live up to a high or difficult standard —
henceforth is his life rendered more " comfortable " for him.
Luther, who was unable to observe himself the vow of chastity
solemnly subscribed to, and who sanctioned bigamy in high
places in order to serve political interests, was well able to
appreciate the irksomeness of the regulations edicted by the
Catholic Church concerning the sexual life of the individual.
Henceforth no exterior and visible authority should be there
to impose discipline ; henceforth is the individual responsible
" before his conscience " and " before God." And a very
cursory knowledge of human psychology suffices, in order to
teach us that only in very rare cases is the consciousness of
such vague responsibility sufficient to prevent excesses, and to
induce the individual to prefer duty to the satisfaction of

222 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHEISTIANITY

personal desires and interests. The doctrine of "justification
by faith alone " is likewise only to be appreciated in the light
of a concession to human weakness. When the responsibility
of the individual is reduced to a mere vague notion of
responsibility before a tribunal that can obviously have no
immediate hold on him ; and when the possibility is further
given to the individual of escaping even the judgment of this
remote tribunal, on the only condition that he die firmly
convinced of the greatness and the mercy of God ; then indeed
is the discipline imposed on the individual likely to prove of
a wholly illusory nature.

It was only conform to the nature of Protestantism that all
the other duties imposed by Catholicism on the individual —
and which are the logical consequences of the Catholic
system — should be likewise abolished. Not only is the
irksome necessity of auricular private confession suppressed,
not only does the ecclesiastical tribunal — that is to say, the
only efficacious spiritual control over the individual — cease to
exist ; but the other duties imposed by the Catholic Church,
penance, fasting, pilgrimage, compulsory attendance at public
worship, are also done away with. The sacramental character
of marriage is suppressed, and the dissolution of the marriage
tie is allowed. The vows exacted from the Catholic priest — the
vow of chastity demanded of every priest, and the vows of
obedience and poverty required of the members of the regular
clergy — are of course suppressed ; for nothing could be more
incompatible with individual liberty. The prohibitions edicted
by the Catholic Church concerning suicide and duelling are
withdrawn. And as the notion itself of " mortal sin " is done
away with ; as the ecclesiastical penitentiary tribunal is
suppressed ; as the individual is no longer subjected to any
supervision ; as his conduct is a quite secondary matter by
comparison with his " faith," which alone suffices to justify
him; as he may go through all the religious ceremonies, such

THE FUTUKE OF CHKISTIANITY 223

as communion, marriage, etc., without having to fulfil any
specified conditions — or, at all events, without having to prove
that he has fulfilled any such conditions : so is the life of the
Protestant an .essentially free one. His obligations are so few
in number, the sanction for conduct is so far removed, his
responsibility is so vague, that religion exercises scarcely
any authority over him at all. And this is inevitable, this is
as it should be according to the fundamental principles of
Protestantism, which latter is based on rationalism — conse-
quently on individual liberty.

How profoundly different this individualistic, anarchical
system of Protestantism is from the rigid discipline, powerful
organisation, and remarkable integration of the Catholic
Church, need not be insisted upon. And where Protestantism
leads to, we know — it leads directly to self-destruction and to
social disintegration. Founded as it is on the quicksands of
subjectivism, Protestantism is wholly lacking in principles
whereby individual liberty may be restricted, and whereby
the individuals may be linked together in a coherent and
disciplined organisation. The orgies of John of Leyden and
Knipperdolling were but a logical outcome of Protestant
doctrine ; and most certainly would Anabaptism have ended
in social annihilation, had it not been suppressed. Its sup-
pression, the condemnation of its excesses by the other
Protestant bodies, were due to the elementary instinct of self-
preservation — but the suppression of Anabaptism was in itself
an illogical and unjustifiable measure, when judged of
according to the tenets of Protestantism. For if the individual
be the measure of all truth ; if the criterion of truth be
within the individual ; then has no exterior power the right to
intervene, seeing that the " individual conscience " is the sole
judge of right and wrong.

The disintegrating tendency inherent in Protestantism has /
manifested itself with sufficient force in the splitting up of the

224 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHRISTIANITY

" reformed religion " into some four hundred sects — each of
which claims to be the true representative of Christianity.
And doubtless is the claim of each one of these bodies
justifiable in the light of Protestant doctrine — seeing that no
supra-individual tribunal is present to decide the question.
Each individual conscience being the depositary of truth and
the sole measure of truth, each individual can logically claim
to possess the " pure and unadulterated doctrine " — whether
he belong to the Calvinist confession, which counts some
thirty million believers, or to an obscure sect of a dozen
persons and a wooden shanty. But Protestantism obviously
does not stop here : the basis of truth being not the sect but
the individual, each individual, however solitary he may*
be, is the criterion of truth, and the exclusive arbitrator
of what is right or wrong. That such a doctrine must
necessarily lead to the destruction of Protestantism itself is
evident : we have only to glance at the state of Protestant
theology in order to verify this statement. It is not necessary
to go back to the Tubingen school, to Strauss and Baur,
Reuss and Volkmar, in order to find this out. If we read the
works of the most respected and eminent of contemporary
theologians, of Pfleiderer and Harnack for instance, we shall
soon perceive the extent to which Protestantism has " reduced "
Christianity, in order to render the latter up to date. For
these most distinguished of Protestant theologians, the so-
called fundamental doctrines of traditional Christianity — the
Incarnation, the Redemption, the Resurrection — are " poetical
legends " ; in other words, fables and myths. Christianity is
nothing but an " interior music," to speak like Schleiermacher,
nothing but the vague consciousness of the "penetration of
nature by a divine principle." Jesus lived in intimate spiritual
communion with God ; he was one of the " selected vehicles "
in which the divinity reveals itself; his consciousness of the
presence of God at every moment of his life was so acute, that it

THE FUTUKE OF CHKISTIANITY 225

was able to develop the psychological illusion of the mystical
union of the divine and human natures within him : such is the
Christ of contemporary Protestant theology. And Protestant-
ism has not remained content with suppressing the divinity
of Jesus ; it has not hesitated to suppress the idea of God
altogether. In 19 11, a Protestant minister at Cologne, Yatho
by name, was summoned before the Superior Ecclesiastical
Council (Oberkirchenrat) in Berlin, to answer a charge of
heresy ; and he was declared incapable of fulfilling any
longer his ecclesiastical functions. It must be borne in mind
that Yatho not only absolutely and categorically denied the
divinity of Jesus, not only categorically rejected the New
Testament en Uoc, but that he not less categorically denied
the existence of God. Very justly could the Monistic Union
of Germany claim Yatho as one of theirs, seeing that the latter
only admitted God as an " inner force, not conceived of as
exterior to the individual, but as inherent to him " — in other
words, reduced God to a mere synonym with the " individual
conscience." All duality of God and Nature having been done
away with, the ideas of creation, of providence, of prayer, of
immortality, are ipso facto deprived of any raison d'etre. The
Protestant Oberkirchenrat not unnaturally came to the con-
clusion that a gentleman holding these views could not occupy
a post as Christian minister — that he who denied the existence
of God could not be expected to convince others of what he
himself disbelieved ; and that he who denied the possibility
of a future life could not well fulfil one of the essential duties of
the ministry — namely, the duty of speaking, by the side of the
grave, words that remind those who are left behind of the hope
of immortality.

Of all this, there would be no reason to speak, were it
simply a case of a minister being dismissed by his superiors for
heresy. But the dismissal of Yatho, however natural it may
appear, called forth a storm of indignation, not only in lay

15

226 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHEISTIANITY

circles, but also among the " liberal " clergy. It is this wide-
spread indignation caused by the dismissal of a minister who
categorically denied every single one of the doctrines he is
supposed to preach, that interests legitimately all those who
follow the social movement in the various branches of the
great European family. For it shows us to what extent
Protestantism is undermined by the effects of its own doctrines.
True to the doctrine of subjectivism, true to the principle
hat the individual must only consider as true that which his
" individual conscience " is pleased to accept as such, a
large and increasing body of Protestant theologians and
ministers are busy sapping the foundations not only of
Christianity, but of Theism. We have only to read the
numerous protests against Yatho's dismissal, the numerous
addresses of sympathy with Yatho, sent in by Lutheran
ministers all over the German empire, in order to understand
to what lengths the doctrines of subjectivism and rationalism
have led Protestantism. To such lengths, that even Protestants
themselves have found it necessary to intervene ! Being a
State Church, the Prussian Lutherian confession could have
recourse to the State for assistance in the matter. However
incompatible it may be with Protestant principles, however
untrue to Protestant tradition, however irreconcilable with the
Protestant doctrines of integral liberty and subjectivism — the
Prussian Lutheran Church has found it necessary, in the
interests of self- protection, to erect, in the year of grace 1910,
a tribunal of the Holy Office, in which a State-created Pope,
rendered infallible by State decrees, judges — without the
possibility of appeal — Protestant ministers for heresy. But as
to the efficacity of this tardy intervention on behalf of the
interests of orthodoxy, that is another question.

If Protestantism, on the one hand, entirely fails to secure
the integration of the individual in society, to impose discipline
on him, to enforce the notion of Duty ; it likewise fails, on the

THE FUTUKE OF CHRISTIANITY 227

other hand, to afford adequate satisfaction to the deeper
aspirations of the soul, to the yearning after consolation and
hope in the hours of distress. It thus fails at once to satisfy
the requirements of society, and those of the individual. In
the same way that it reduces the notion of duty and obligation
to a minimum, so also does Protestantism reduce mysticism
to a minimum. Being a religion founded on reason, it seeks
to suppress as much as possible all mysticism, all religious
effusions, all those manifestations of piety that are not deemed
absolutely indispensable. An exceedingly intellectual German
lady, Freifrau von Heyking, in her most interesting book,
Briefe die iJin nicht erreichten, has remarked that Protestantism
allows only the worship of the Deity at fixed hours ; one goes
to church at a certain hour, strictly determined, just like one
goes to consult one's solicitor. If one is unable to attend the
consultation at this fixed hour, the solicitor is not at home —
in other words, the church is shut. The God of Protestantism
has his fixed hours, during which it is permitted to worship
him in a prescribed manner — just like the physician has his
consulting hours. And any one who has sojourned in the
Protestant districts of Sweden, or Finland, or North Germany,
or Scotland, can easily verify the truth of Frau von Heyking's
assertion. During the entire week the churches remain shut,
the doors securely barred ; and they open on Sundays for the
prescribed service, at the prescribed hour. Protestants are not
supposed to have any religious wants during the week ; if they
have, it is considered improper, and they must restrain them.

In entire conformity with the rational nature of Protestant-
ism is also the strict limitation of worship, not only from the
quantitative, but likewise from the qualitative point of view —
if we may so express ourselves. Not only do the churches
open only at the prescribed hours on Sunday, but, when they
do open, worship is reduced to its lowest possible expression —
the religious manifestations are qualitatively limited to a

228 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHRISTIANITY

minimum. Art is studiously banished from the Protestant
Gotteshaus — for art acts too powerfully on the individual,
weakens his reasoning faculties, and develops mystical
tendencies within him ; and, beyond everything, Protestantism
abhors mysticism. That which appears the most beautiful,
the most moving, the most elevating, the most consoling in
the Catholic Church, whether in the West or in the East — the
Sacrifice of the Mass and the invocation of the Virgin Mary-
is in Protestantism non-existent. The coldest and most
monotonous of services, absolutely devoid of art, of ritual, or
any sort of warmth or enthusiasm — a dry homily, a few icy
prayers, some terribly unesthetic hymns sung in a yet more
appallingly unesthetic manner ; and all this in a building the
mere aspect of which is sufficient to stifle any enthusiasm,
however slight — to drench with cold water any flickering
flame of mystical desire : this is all that Protestantism offers.
A meagre pittance, in truth ! And how can we wonder if the
individual, finding in his religion no satisfaction of his inner-
most wants and aspirations — finding no reply to queries that
have their source in the outpourings of the soul — finding only
stones there where he expects bread ; if the individual,
disappointed and disillusioned, abandons what is henceforth to
him a mere formality without meaning ?

These things are not indifferent for the sociologist — not
indifferent for him who, comprehending the importance of the
religious factor in social evolution, seeks to judge of the
influence which this factor is capable of exerting on Western
society in the twentieth century. The fact that Protestantism
responds neither to social nor to individual needs must exclude
this form of Christianity from playing any part in the^
future development of Western society. The elimination of
Protestantism, which has never been anything but a force of
social disintegration, does not in any way modify the situation
that has prevailed hitherto, except in so far that it renders it

THE FUTUKE OF CHRISTIANITY 229

clearer ; and it will, perhaps, bring home to those who willingly
take refuge in illusions, the impossibility of a religion, or of
any other social force, being founded on the unstable and
insecure basis of rationalism — whereby such a collective force
is ipso facto perverted and rendered incapable of fulfilling those
functions which constitute its raison d'etre. The total
bankruptcy of Protestantism, considered as a social force, may
even have a beneficial result, in that it compels those societies
who have had recourse to Protestantism, to seek another and
more efficacious means by which the conditions of order,
cohesion, and stability, that are essential to survival, may be
maintained.

There are undoubtedly circumstances in which patriotism
may constitute a social force capable of imposing adequate
discipline on a nation, and of securing adequate integration.
Especially is this the case when disaster befalls society, as, for
instance, it befell Prussia in 1806. When society is thus
visited by sudden and overwhelming disaster, adversity tends
to discipline it, to secure the sacrifice of individual interests to
the wider interests of the whole ; unless, indeed, the society in
question be undermined by biological degeneracy, in which case
a great disaster will either sweep it out of existence, or at all
events mark the beginning of its end. But it is evidently
unsatisfactory to wait until a disaster has befallen society and
shaken the latter's foundations — for it is an old adage, that
prevention is better than cure. There are, however, other
circumstances in which patriotism may suffice to repress
egotism and to secure social discipline. When a nation is
surrounded by foes, when survival is conditioned by unceasing
vigilance, then, also, can the instinct of self-preservation
manifest itself with sufficient force to be able to obtain the
rigorous subordination of the individual to collective ends —
provided, as usual, that the nation in question has not fallen a
victim to degeneracy. Or it is, again, possible that a nation

230 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHRISTIANITY

be sufficiently dominated by collective political ideals, for its
integration to be secured by the latter. The latter case is
certainly rare ; for we nowadays seldom find a nation in which
anything resembling unanimity prevails regarding political
ideals. The latter, on the contrary, act almost invariably as a
disintegrating force, rather than as an integrating one.

Of all European nations, Germany constitutes, perhaps, the
best example of a society surrounded by foes, and the survival
of which is conditioned by unceasing vigilance. Sandwiched
in as she is between France and Russia, with Great Britain
menacing her ports and commerce and fleet — unable to depend
on one of her allies, for the hostility of Italian public opinion
towards Germany is well known ; the power of Germany, her
Weltstellung and Machtstellung, depend on the vigilance,
patriotism, and spirit of sacrifice of German citizens. That
the latter have achieved very remarkable things in this respect,
the history of the various states that now form the German
empire, since the commencement of the nineteenth century,
clearly proves. And yet who can say that, at the present time,
German society is sufficiently disciplined — that the individual
interests are there sufficiently subordinated to the national
interests ? And when we speak of discipline, we do not, we
need scarcely say, mean that outward and visible discipline
known as corporalism and bureaucratism ; for of this Germany
has more than enough. What we mean by discipline, is the
rigorous subordination of individual ends to collective ends —
the unity of a nation in the realisation of a great common
ideal. And this subordination of the individual to society,
this essential unity of the nation, we do not find them in
Germany at the present time. We find, on the contrary,
unending conflict, unending strife of all against all — political
strife, economic strife, religious strife. We find the bourgeois
classes pitted against the social democracy, and, within the
limits of the bourgeoisie, the agricultural population pitted

THE FUTUKE OF CHRISTIANITY 231

against the industrial and commercial population — we find
Protestants battling with Catholics, orthodoxy wrangling with
free-thought. We find, in Prussia, the governing class sunk in
self-satisfied lethargy — we see here a governing class unable
to perceive anything beyond the narrowest interests of class
egotism, a governing class wholly indifferent to wider national
interests provided the pockets of its members be filled. What
matters it, for example, to the Agrarians who rule Prussia, if
meat and every other article of subsistence has increased
sevenfold in price within the last ten years, in consequence of
Protectionism on the one hand, and cattle disease inside the
country on the other — what matters it to these patriotic
landlords if, as a result of the enormous increase in the price
of food, the working-classes must be underfed and therefore
incapable of producing as much as they could otherwise
produce ? When we see the rampant egotism of the governing
classes in Prussia — egotism pushed to an extent such, that
even the Conservative Berliner Post has drawn attention to its
dangers ; and when we see, likewise, the bitter strife and the
total want of unity in the inner life of the nation — when we
see this, we understand that not even the strongest pressure
brought to bear on a nation from outside, not even the
strongest pressure exerted by the possibility of exterior attack,
is always sufficient to curb egotism, and to obtain the
sacrifice of particular interests to collective interests. Over
and above this " exterior integrating principle," if we may so
express ourselves, it is necessary to have recourse to an
"interior integrating principle," in the shape of an ideal
sufficiently powerful to impose obedience and sufficiently
attractive to obtain willing adhesion — capable, in a word, of
securing the firm integration of the individual in society.

Discipline and social integration are not less necessary
in a country in which astonishing material progress has not
prevented a moral regression, a slackening of the bonds of

232 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHKISTIANITY

social cohesion, a relaxation of the sentiment of social duty, that
are pregnant with danger for the future — we mean the United
States. The materialism that dominates public and private
life in the States, the too exclusive worship of the almighty
dollar, have had as inevitable consequence the growth of an
individualism that obscures the fundamental notion of social
duty. The disintegration of family life, which manifests
itself in the frivolous conception of marriage so widely
prevalent, in the alarming increase in the number of divorces,
in the arrest of the growth of population — a phenomenon
that is already causing anxiety to American economists and
philosophers ; this disintegration of family life is a most un-
healthy and dangerous symptom. As we have already observed
in the fifth chapter, unless the individual learn the notions of
duty and responsibility in the family, he will never learn
them at all. If the family structure be disorganised, this
is but the prelude to the disorganisation and disintegration of
the whole society. No great nation can exist without the
integration that can alone be secured by a great ideal.
Idealism is precisely what fails in the States — an idealism
that carries the individual beyond himself, and sets to his
activity an end that is not of an egotistical nature, but that
demands the sacrifice of individual interests as the condition of
its realisation. In the States more, perhaps, than elsewhere,
is the presence of a supra-rational ideal essential to the
maintenance of social integration. In a homogeneous nation,
with great traditions stretching back throughout the centuries
to a dim and distant past, and which is placed in an environ-
ment such, that unceasing vigilance and undiminished fitness
are vital and indispensable conditions of survival in the
struggle for existence with surrounding foes ; patriotism may
suffice as a link of unity and solidarity, as an instrument for
curbing indiscipline and revolt. But the population of the
States is formed by a conglomeration of heterogeneous

THE FUTUKE OF CHRISTIANITY 233

elements, the majority of which have come out in the hope of
gaining money. The States lack completely all great historical
traditions, and the chief tie which binds the majority of its
citizens to the land over which float the Stars and Stripes, is
an essentially egotistical one — namely, the hope of individual
profit. Add to this the fact that no strong pressure from
outside acts as a centripetal force, binding the citizens together
in the fear of a common and imminent peril. The country
not being menaced by the neighbourhood of any dangerous
foes, patriotism is not kept perpetually on the qui vive — the
sentiment of patriotism is consequently not a living force in
the sense in which it is, for instance, in the German empire.

We do not, of course, imply that Americans are not as
patriotic as any Europeans; what we mean is that patriotism
in the States, as a natural consequence of the political situation
of the Union, is not kept at a white- heat condition — that
patriotism is here rather latent than active. This is inevitable
in a country placed in so peculiar a situation, in a situation
so totally different to that of a European nation. As the
Monroe doctrine, properly understood and wisely applied,
effectively prevents the States from being mixed up in any
European complications ; as the prospect of a war with
Japan is still too far distant — though such a war is perhaps
nearer than one thinks, as the modifications in the renewed
treaty of alliance between Great Britain and Japan appear to
show — to be able to pour oil on the flame of patriotism ;
therefore does this flame burn languidly, like unto a semi-
extinguished gas flame. Under these circumstances, we see
at once the immense importance, for the States, of a strong
idealistic force other than patriotism, and which is capable of
securing the integration and cohesion of the great American
nation. Too rapid material progress is not always good for
society; and it is a positive source of danger, unless it be
accompanied by a corresponding strengthening of moral

234 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHRISTIANITY

discipline. Such, unfortunately, has not been the case with
the States. The unparalleled material expansion of the
young republic has produced a relaxation of public morals and
a diminution of the sense of social duty, to an extent such
that the political, economic, and family life of the nation is in
a condition of notorious anarchy and deplorable corruption.
Especially serious, as we have said, are such phenomena in a
nation which is lacking alike in historical tradition and in
homogeneity of composition. Imperatively necessary is it that
a strong social force be developed in order to combat the
anarchy resulting from a deficiency of idealism — and this force
must needs be of an idealistic, that is to say, of a supra-rational
and religious, nature. Such a social force alone can secure, for
American society, the integration which the latter stands badly
in need of ; such a social force alone can impose with sufficient
power the social discipline lacking in the States, alone can
bring home with sufficient authority to Americans the great
notions of social duty and social responsibility. The disease
that manifests itself only too clearly in the corruption of the
political life of the States, in the economic anarchy, in the
disorganisation of family life, in the general prevalence of
materialism and mammonolatry — this disease needs radical
cure. Protestantism has been unable to prevent the develop-
ment and disquieting spread of the social disease we have
noticed, and which threatens to undermine the fabric of
American society, unless it be arrested in time. As a social
force, in the States as elsewhere, Protestantism stands
condemned. Based on the quicksands of subjectivism, lacking
in authority and in discipline, reduced to a mere rationalist
formula for obtaining individual satisfaction — how is Protes-
tantism to undertake so formidable a task as that of socialising
a great nation ? Being an essentially individualist philosophy,
and appealing to no higher principle than individual reason,
how is Protestantism to bring home to the individual the

THE FUTURE OF CHRISTIANITY 235

notion of Duty, which can only be justified by an appeal
precisely to supra-individual, supra-rational principles ?

Ill

There can be no doubt that Catholicism is vastly, nay,
immeasurably, superior to Protestantism, when we consider these
religions from a sociological point of view. Any weakening of
the influence of Catholicism in countries long submitted to the
salutary influence of Catholic discipline and morals is invari-
ably accompanied by a grave weakening of social authority
and cohesion. This is clearly exemplified in the case of France,
where the decay of Catholicism is one of the causes — though
not the unique cause — of a serious relaxation of public morals,
of a dangerous growth of egotism, of a dangerous weakening
the sentiment of social solidarity. During ten centuries,
Catholicism was intimately associated with the expansion of
French power, with the development of French civilisation ;
and it is, therefore, only natural that the decay of France,
since the eighteenth century, should have the decay of
Catholicism as its accompaniment.

Protestantism is an exclusively critical doctrine ; conse-
quently is it powerless to create and to organise. This
exclusively critical nature of Protestantism, as Auguste Comte
very justly observed, is well manifested in the name itself,
given by general consent to the heterogeneous collection of
doctrines assembled together under this common designation.
It is a doctrine of " protest," of criticism and dissolution. It
lacks entirely the organic foundation of a system of coherent
principles, exterior to the individual, superior to the fluctua-
tions of opinion, accepted quod, semper, quod ubique, quod
omnibus, and which impose themselves on the individual with
irresistible force.

Catholicism, on the other hand, is not only great by reason

236 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHRISTIANITY

of its organisation, of the discipline it is able to impose on the
individual in the interests of society ; it is great also by
reason of the principles that preside over the entire social
system of the Catholic Church. The two main principles
underlying this system are : firstly, a combination, unique in
its ingenuity, of the democratic with the aristocratic ; secondly,
the complete separation of the moral and the political. The
principle of Catholic government is an aristocratic one, in
that that government is strictly hierarchical in its nature ; but
this aristocratism is tempered by a large mingling of demo-
cracy, in that all heredity is suppressed, and in that the
hierarchy is recruited, even in its highest stages, from amongst
all classes, and solely with a view to the fitness of the
candidate. The moral is separated from the political in that
the former is placed on an objective, supra-individual basis,
wholly removed from the sphere of political combinations and
fluctuations.

Those who criticise the institution of ecclesiastical celibacy,
which latter was first imposed, as a general rule in the
Western Church, by Hildebrand, in 1074, do not understand
the motives that inspired the interdiction of marriage on the
part of the clergy. When we consider the uninterrupted
efforts made by the German emperors during the Middle Ages
in order to reduce the papacy to a mere vassalage of the Holy
Roman empire ; when we bear in mind that the constant
object of a policy systematically pursued by the emperors
during centuries was the obtaining for themselves of the right
to nominate the Pope ; we shall see that the obligation of
celibacy imposed by Hildebrand was a means whereby all
durable mainmise of the secular power on the Church might
be frustrated. Let us suppose that the marriage of the clergy
was allowed ; and let us further suppose that the emperors
succeeded in their efforts to obtain for themselves the right to
nominate the Pope ; and we can at once perceive the conse-

THE FUTUEE OF CHEISTIANITY 237

quences : a dynasty would have been established in the Chair
of St. Peter, a dynasty in which the succession would naturally
have gone from father to son — and a dynasty which would
have been allied, alike by the ties of blood and by the ties of
political sympathy, with the imperial dynasty. That this
would have ruined the Church both morally and materially
is evident. And the great Hildebrand, who brought the
investiture controversy to a close by imposing on Henry IV.
the pilgrimage to Canossa, was far-sighted enough not to remain
content with this triumph, but to take steps so as to render
beforehand all future attempts to enslave the papacy fruitless.
For if all possibility of heredity be suppressed, then must all
hope of founding a papal dynasty necessarily vanish. The
interdiction of marriage by Hildebrand must be considered as
one of a series of measures taken by Nicholas II., Alexander
III., the Council of Lyon, and Clement V., with the object of
securing the independence of the Church and the Holy See,
and of maintaining thereby the separation of the moral and
political powers.1

Of very vital importance to Europe was it that this
essential separation of the moral and political powers be
maintained. For, if they be not thus separated, if the moral

1 How far-sighted it was of Hildebrand not to remain content with his victory
over the Emperor Henry IV., and to take steps to check effectually all future
attempts made by the secular power to dominate the spiritual power, can be seen
from a glance at the later history of the relations between the Church and the
temporal rules of Europe. Alexander III., less than a century later, had to
maintain himself against no fewer than two counter-popes set up by the Emperor
Frederic I. And let us not forget the conduct of France, the violent removal of
the Popes to Avignon in 1307, exile which ended with the deplorable "great
schism." The papacy was always considered by the temporal rulers of Europe
as a mere pawn in the great political game, in the struggle for political
hegemony. It required all the efforts of numerous men of genius in the Chair of
Peter in order to maintain the dignity and independence of the Church. Had
Hildebrand not imposed the obligation of celibacy, inevitably would a papal
dynasty have been established, as a branch either of the French dynasty or of
the imperial dynasty. And we can see without difficulty to what results the
exile in Avignon and the great schism would have led to, had not this exceed-
ingly wise law of celibacy been introduced in time.

238 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHEISTIANITY

power come to be absorbed in the political — if it come to be
a mere dependency of the latter — then is all efficacity ipso facto
withdrawn from the moral power. The moral power is con-
cerned with the education and moral development of humanity ;
the temporal power is concerned with the upkeep of order and
the administration of the material interests of society. Neither
of them is adapted to fulfil the functions of the other. The
lamentable results of the subordination of the moral to the
secular power, of that policy known as Erastianism after the
name of an obscure advocate in the sixteenth century, were
too well manifested in the history of the Church of France
from the middle of the sixteenth to the end of the eighteenth
century — as they have been too well manifested, likewise, in
the history of the Prussian Lutheran Church and of the
Protestant Church of England — for it to be necessary to
further insist on them here. For when the moral power
becomes a mere dependency of the temporal power, then must
the former necessarily lend the support of its sanction and
approbation to all the acts of the latter, however immoral and
antisocial such acts may be. The moral power thus loses all
authority, it is degraded and rendered impotent. But the
authority of the State is thereby itself undermined. For we
have seen, in the course of this present book, that the rational-
ised individual, in the measure that he emancipates himself
and becomes detached from society, needs a supra-social and
supra-rational power in order to subordinate to itself that part
of individual conduct which henceforth escapes social control.
The authority of the State cannot penetrate beyond a limited
number of material acts ; and it is thus powerless to check
that moral anarchy which must finally destroy the State.
And if the State has deprived religion of all authority, by
reducing it to a mere department of the State, then is the State
ipso facto debarred from appealing to an efficacious moral
principle for support.

THE FUTUKE OF CHRISTIANITY 239

It is a service for which humanity should be everlastingly
grateful to the Catholic Church for having performed — the
separation of the moral from the political power, and the
consequent maintenance of the supreme dignity and independ-
ence of the moral power. For without such a separation,
Western civilisation would never have been able to develop.
Assuredly was it no indifferent matter that the spiritual or the
temporal power should succeed in the long struggle, of which
the conflicts between Hildebrand and the Emperor Henry IV.,
between Alexander III. and the Emperor Frederic I., between
Archbishop a Becket and Henry II. of England, between
Innocent XI. and Louis XIV. of France, between Pius VII.
and Napoleon — of which the exile in Avignon, and the sack
of Eome by the troops of the Emperor Charles V. ; of which
all these events were but episodes. For had the secular power
succeeded in its persevering efforts to make of the papal see a
mere fief, then would Western civilisation have fallen a speedy
prey to disintegration and disruption. In the long centuries
that separated the downfall of the Eoman empire, in 476,
from the dawn of the Eenaissance, at the close of the fourteenth
century — during all this long period the Church constituted
the only basis whereon the fabric of the new civilisation, that
arose from the dust of the old one, could be reared ; during
these hundreds of years the Church alone stood between this
growing civilisation and a return to complete barbarism.
Those who talk so glibly about " papal aggression " and
" obscurantism " may be exceedingly deep in many things ;
assuredly are they not deep in history. Any one who is able
to form even a remote conception of the tremendous labour
required in order to build up a new civilisation on the ruins of
the old one — of the stupendous efforts necessary to impose
order and discipline on a wild and barbarous agglomeration of
peoples — will understand that, even at the summit of her
power in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries, the Church had

240 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHRISTIANITY

but barely sufficient force for the carrying out of so herculean
a task. When we contemplate the anarchy prevailing in
Europe in the fifth century ; when we take into adequate
consideration the wild, uncouth, and undisciplined nature of
the populations of Europe ; when we see the economic, moral,
and intellectual conditions prevalent all over the Western
world after the abdication of the last Roman emperor ; when
we essay to penetrate the depths of economic, moral, and
intellectual misery to which such conditions had reduced
Western society — then must we marvel at the extraordinary
power, at the incredible perseverance, thanks to which the
Catholic Church caused a new civilisation, a new culture, to
arise of the chaos — thanks to which the Church was able to
cause the darkness to vanish, after many centuries, and to
give place to the pure light of Christianity.

And never would the Church have been able to accomplish
this gigantic task had she not known how to safeguard her
independence — had she not known how to rise superior to
the struggles and rivalries and intrigues of political rulers.
In her far-seeing wisdom she edicted, as one of her fundamental
laws, a rule whereby the individual is enjoined to fulfil his
duties as citizen, to perform his obligations towards society ;
but she knew well that an indispensable condition of the
maintenance of social order, is that the obligations of the
governed find their counterpart in the obligations of the
governing. To secure the punctual fulfilment of these recipro-
cal obligations, it is essential that there should exist a moral
power superior to all classes of society — a moral power
in which the indispensable ideal of social solidarity shall be
incarnated. The individual can be disciplined, he can be made
to subordinate his ends to social ends, only if he be dominated
by a moral power ; that is to say, by a power that derives its
power from a law higher than any finite law — that is capable,
in consequence, of subordinating to itself, in the interests of

THE FUTUKE OF CHRISTIANITY 241

the collectivity, that " rationalised personality " which escapes
social control. The class can be adapted to its social functions
— and the same holds good of all the subdivisions of society
— only on condition that there exist a power superior to all
such classes and to all such subdivisions ; and which is able,
by reason of its superiority, to ensure that the " sliding-scale
of reciprocal duties," of which we spoke in the second chapter,
is duly observed. The moral power, in other words, must be
as superior to the upper classes of society as it is to the lower.
And if it be reduced to the condition of a political vassal, of a
mere department of the State, how is it to exercise authority
over the governing classes, how is it to carry out its indispens-
able function of controlling and guiding the State ? How is it
to carry out its function of penetrating there where the State
cannot penetrate, into the individual conscience — in which,
in the absence of adequate supervision, the germs of moral
anarchy cannot but develop ?

It is, therefore, one of the chief lessons taught us by the
Catholic Church : this lesson of the imperative necessity of
separating the moral from the political, in order that the
moral power may fulfil its great function of assuring social
integration. If the moral power be not distinct from the
political, if it be not superior to the latter, how is it to give
to society an ideal that embraces all classes, that dominates
all classes, even as it embraces and dominates the whole sphere
of individual life ? And in the absence of such an ideal, how
is the solidarity of the various elements composing society to
be realised, how is the integration of the individual in the
collectivity to be realised ? The chief cause of the weakness
of the Church of France during the seventeenth and eighteenth
centuries lay precisely therein, that the Church was degraded
to the rank of handmaid of the political power ; consequently
was she unable to control that power, unable to guide it,
unable to remonstrate with it, unable to hold up to French

16

242 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHRISTIANITY

society an ideal backed up by sufficient authority to restrain
the spread of anarchy. Far from representing an ideal
superior to all finite contingencies, an ideal in which all classes
of the nation could unite — the Church of France, in the
seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, appeared as forming
part of a corrupt and obsolete order of things, as the apanage
of a corrupt court and a corrupt governing class. Had she
remained true to the best traditions of the Catholic Church,
the Church of France would perhaps have been able to stem
the flowing tide, to arrest the movement of decay and
degeneracy. As it was, she could not but be swept away by
the storms of the Revolution — and she has never recovered
anything like her former authority and prestige since.

The result of the confusion of the moral and the political
is the same everywhere. The corroding influence of what is
known as erastianism on the Prussian Lutheran Church is
visible; for what is the Prussian Lutheran Church to-day if
not a mass of dry bones ? And we know that all that is best
in the Protestant Church of England never ceases to protest
against the interference of the State in matters ecclesiastical,
never tires of denying the right of the State to exercise
authority in the spiritual domain. Under the influence of
that vicious Protestant principle which confounds the moral
and the political, and reduces the Church to a mere
handmaid of the State, the Anglican Church sank to the
lowest level which can be attained by a spiritual body. We
have only to look at the condition of this Church in the
eighteenth and in the first half of the nineteenth century, in
order to judge of the fatal effects of the confusion of two wholly
distinct spheres of social life. Only since a regeneration was
commenced in 1840, on the basis of Catholic principles
and Catholic traditions, has the Anglican Church been pulled
out of the mire into which " State protection " had dragged her.

Another great lesson taught us by the Catholic Church is

THE FUTUKE OF CHRISTIANITY 243

that conveyed by one of the essential principles on which the
Catholic system is based — by the principle according to which
aristocratism and democracy are combined in the ecclesiastical
organisation. As we have already said, the organisation of the
Church is aristocratic in that it is hierarchical ; but it is also
democratic in that the hierarchy is recruited, in all its branches,
among all classes of the population. Heredity being
suppressed, the efficacity of the ecclesiastical organisation
depends solely on the rigorous application of the principle of
selection. All the various social organisations that have
developed outside the Church in the Western world have
been based either on the aristocratic or on the democratic
principle ; and the organisation which socialism projects for
the society of to-morrow is based on what we may call the
revolutionary principle ; that differs very considerably from
either of the other too, in that it substitutes for the hierarchy
(Ubereinander) of aristocratism, and for the stable equality
(Nebeneinander) of democracy, an unstable and fluctuating
Gegeneinander which negatives all idea of a durable equilibrium.
The equilibrium realised by the aristocratic system responds
incontestably to social needs ; but the aristocracies which
history has known have erred in the methods employed in
order to maintain this equilibrium. The equilibrium realised
by democracy, on the other hand, can be realised only at the
expense of the existence of society — it corresponds in the
social organism to that final equilibrium which, in a biological
organism, we call death. The system adopted by the Church
consists in a widening of the principles of aristocratism by the
application of the one principle which, in democracy, is
acceptable — namely, the adaptation of capacity to function
irrespective of all considerations of birth rank. Borrowing
from democracy this one essentially sane principle, the
Church unhesitatingly rejects that other principle, which has
come to dominate completely in modern democracy, and which

244 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHKISTIANITY

constitutes the most absolute antithesis of the former one —
the principles, namely, whereby all men are reputed equal.
The principle of the adaptation of capacity to function,
irrespective of considerations of birth, is as incompatible with
the ridiculous doctrine of equality as the latter doctrine is
incompatible with the class dictature of socialist theory. The
democratic and the socialistic systems are both inconsistent
with their respective premisses, and both are at least
equally inconsistent with human welfare.

We have said that if the equilibrium realised by the
aristocratic system in the social organisation responds to
social needs ; yet the aristocracies which history has known
have erred in the methods employed in order to maintain
this equilibrium. Incontestably can society survive only if
the fundamental social law of inequality be duly observed ; and
the only system which is compatible with this law is the
aristocratic or hierarchical system. Heredity doubtless plays a
very considerable part in the maintenance of a hierarchy ; but
those who believe that the latter can be maintained solely by
heredity, forget that heredity does not per se ensure fitness.
In order that heredity may produce favourable results, it is
indispensable that all biological defects be rigorously excluded.
In a consanguineous caste, fitness will only be ensured as long
as biological degeneracy has not set in ; if such degeneracy
has once set in, consanguineous unions will but enhance
and aggravate it, and heredity then becomes a dangerous
instrument of regression. Seeing the extreme difficulty of
avoiding the introduction of all inferior biological elements in
the course of evolution, the creation of a " closed aristocracy,"
such as the caste, is a dangerous experiment. An essential
condition of the survival of an aristocracy is, on the contrary,
that such an aristocracy be " open " — that the effects of
heredity be corrected, so to speak, by the constant recruit-
ing of new members from outside. But this is precisely what

THE FUTUKE OF CHKISTIANITY 245

almost every aristocracy known to history has vehemently
opposed. Jealous of its privileges, proud of its traditions,
proud of its blue blood, an aristocracy is almost invariably
hostile to the introduction of " outsiders " into its midst ;
lacking in foresight, an aristocracy is scarcely ever able to
see that such an introduction of " outsiders " is necessary in
its own interests, in order to rejuvenate it. And thus it is
that the aristocracies of Greece and Eome, and all the
aristocracies of Europe — with the exception, perhaps, of the
British, Austrian, and Hungarian — have withered and
decayed; because all of them have refused to recognise that
heredity alone is not a guarantee of fitness, but that heredity
must constantly be completed by selection. And unless
the three last mentioned, the sole surviving aristocracies in
Europe worthy of the name, take account in time of the
ineluctable necessities imposed by Nature, they will share the
fate of the others in no very distant future.

Capacity should in all cases be adapted to function ; this
is an elementary truth. And it is certain that the mere
heredity of functions does not imply the heredity of the
capacity to fulfil such functions. Yet such is the error into
which aristocracies fall, and which is the cause of their ruin.
The bourgeois regime, which throws open the various posts in
the social hierarchy to all, at least nominally, and which
makes the obtaining of a post dependent solely on a
competitive examination, regardless of a candidate's birth ;
appears more in harmony with the exigencies of natural law.
We will not insist on the notorious fact that success in a
competitive examination by no means implies the successful
candidate's fitness for any given functions ; for it is now
admitted by every one, except apparently by the unteachable
officials of Ministries of Public Instruction, that an
examination is rarely of the slightest value as a test of ability.
We will admit, for the sake of argument, that the successful

246 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHKISTIANITY

candidate at a public examination is always the "right man in
the right place," as the popular saying has it. But bourgeois
regime, in our contemporary democratic societies, takes away
with one hand what it gives with the other, if we may thus
express ourselves. It enables the proper man to secure the
proper place, it thereby adapts capacity to function—
we admit for the sake of argument. But, on the other hand,
it fails entirely to invest this man with the authority essential
to the adequate fulfilment of his functions. For our con-
temporary democratic societies are undermined by the effects
of the vicious and contradictory principles on which they are
built up — principles which, deriving as they do from the
superstition of equality, are subversive of all idea of
authority. How can a hierarchy exist in anything but name,
how can authority be anything but a farce, in a society which
is founded on the idea of equality ? Nowhere do we see the
contradiction better exemplified than in France, that is to
say, in the country in which democratic principles have been
carried to their most extreme and logical consequences.
Equality being, despite all theories, radically impossible in
fact, the French democracy has been compelled to institute a
hierarchy of functions exactly similar to that in any
monarchical country. But this hierarchy is devoid of any
vestige of real authority — for the seed sown by equalitarian
teaching has not been sown in vain ; and respect for authority
of any sort is considered in France to-day as an antique and
grotesque superstition, as a survival of that " monkish
obscurantism " which it is the duty of every self-respecting
man to emancipate himself from.

If we take the one case of the executive power in con-
temporary democratic societies, we see at once the hopelessness
of endeavouring to institute a hierarchy in a society founded
on equalitarian principles. For the existence of a hierarchy
implies the existence of authority ; and authority is wholly

THE FUTUKE OF CHRISTIANITY 247

lacking in such a society. If the United States have been
wise enough not to admit the doctrine of the responsibility of
ministers towards Congress, this certainly speaks highly for
the prudence and foresight of those illustrious men who drew
up the constitution of the American republic ; but it is none
the less inconsistent with the equalitarian principles of demo-
cratic government — with the principles of government by the
divine right of the sovereign people. Let us take the case of
ultra-democratic France. Under the influence of democratic
doctrines, the theory of the responsibility of the executive to
the legislative power has been pushed to such an extent, that
the instability of ministries in the third republic is proverbial
The nominal rulers of the nation are entirely in the hands of a
popular assembly, which latter is in its turn at the mercy of
the multitude — or, at the best, of a number of wirepullers and
manipulators, political stockjobbers and fishers in troubled
waters, who exploit the credulity and imbecility of the electors.
The result is anarchy in the highest political sphere, an
anarchy that is reflected in the whole public life of the nation ;
in the incoherence and impotence of Parliament; in the
constant capitulation of the constituted authorities before
threats of violence from outside ; in the absence of discipline
and of all respect for order of any sort, of which the Post Office
strike in 1909, the railroad strike in 1910, the propaganda of
the General Confederation of Labour with its accompaniments
of chronic strikes, violence, and sabotage, antipatriotism and the
terrorising of workers all over France, are so many symptoms.
In an article commenting on the pardon accorded to Durand, one
of the leaders of the dockers' syndicate at Le Havre, who was
sentenced to death in November 1910 for complicity in the
assassination of a workman named Dong£, murdered on the
quays of Le Havre for having refused to join in the strike
ordered by the dockers' syndicate — the Paris Opinion of
February 7, 1911, observed: —

248 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHKISTIANITY

" En ve*rit£ la bourgeoisie, de*bordee par ses propres principes,
n'est plus en mesure de se de*fendre. Des qu'elle frappe,
la pitie* la saisit et la paralyse. Des qu'elle n'est plus
menace'e, elle se laisse gagner par la bonte", qui est ordinaire-
ment la vertu des gens satisfaits. Ajoutez a cela le de"sir
constant qu'ont les proprie'taires de ne pas se cre*er de soucis
au dela de leur propre existence, et vous aurez toute la
psychologic d'une classe qui se meurt de faiblesse."

The fact is that democratic government is radically incapable
of instituting authority of any sort, for the democratic system
lacks all principles whereby liberty may be limited. Based
on such principles, democracy cannot but lead to social
disintegration and disruption ; and such is the case in France.
Lacking in all authority, unable to appeal to any principles
whereby liberty may be limited and discipline imposed, French
democracy has seen, during thirty years, disorder and anarchy
gradually spread, until the whole edifice of French civilisation
is undermined. Chronic strikes wantonly declared without
economic justification; indiscipline in all branches of the
public services ; the incredible tyranny exercised by the
revolutionary labour syndicates, and to check which the
constituted authorities are powerless ; the systematic under-
mining of the fundamental ideas of social solidarity, such as
the idea of patriotism ; the disorganisation of family life, and
the incoherence and corruption of political life — such are
some of the symptoms by which the bankruptcy of the
democratic system of government in France may be recognised.
And this bankruptcy is due to the lack of all principles
whereon Authority, indispensable to the maintenance of social
integration, may be based.

In Germany, authority is still maintained, as it is in
Austria, by means of physical force. It is not good, however,
for authority to lack foundations of a moral nature, and to be
dependent only on the pressure exerted by guns and bayonets.

THE FUTURE OF CHRISTIANITY 249

True, both in the German Empire and in Austria a deeply
embedded sentiment of patriotism, and long-acquired habits of
discipline and order, lend valuable support to authority, and
constitute a still effective barrier against anarchy. But,
especially in Germany, ominous movements are at work which,
if victorious, cannot fail to destroy this barrier and to seriously
disintegrate German society : the sentiment of patriotism
having been unable to restrain the egotism of the agrarian
classes who govern, the notion of social duty is likewise
weakened among the masses ; and the necessity reveals itself
always more clearly of a stronger link of social solidarity, of
a more efficacious principle of authority and discipline. In
Great Britain, the evils of democracy have up till now been
held in check by means of a compromise between the principle
of liberty and the principle of authority; but as to whether
the sacrifice of the power of the House of Lords to demagogical
agitation is a step calculated to strengthen the principle of
authority, may well be doubted. And, in Great Britain,
signs are not wanting of a relaxation of discipline, of a weaken-
ing of social solidarity. The introduction of antipatriotic and
antimilitarist ideas into the programme of the Socialist party ;
the strike of the dockers in 1911, which paralysed trade and
commerce in order that certain class interests might be satisfied
— employers and employed alike failing to see that an agree-
ment would be more advantageous for the national welfare
than conflict carried to the bitter end ; the strike of the
railroad employees, also in 1911, which shows that British
public servants are in danger of being contaminated by the
virus of that spirit of class egotism or particularism that has
borne such manifold evil fruit in France ; and the calamitous
general strike in the mines in 1912 — these are symptoms
which do not fail to tell a significant tale, and which
point to future developments that are unlikely to enhance
authority inside the country — and unlikely, in consequence,

250 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHRISTIANITY

to increase the much-vaunted prestige of Great Britain in
the world.

The great problem confronting Western society to-day is
not that of how to best safeguard and develop liberty ; but the
problem of how to best safeguard the great principle of
authority — of how to safeguard that discipline without which
social integration is an impossibility. And the only social
organisation in our midst in which authority and discipline
are adequately safeguarded, is the organisation of the Catholic
Church. The latter is based on the hierarchical system,
whereby alone capacity can be adapted to function ; and, at
the same time, the necessary authority is conferred on those
whose function it is to command and to enforce order and
discipline. The Catholic system combines all that is best in
aristocratism, with the one sane principle of democracy. That
system admits no " closed aristocracy," no caste. In it, the
highest posts are open to all — for the only test is capacity.
Pope Pius X. is the son of a simple peasant ; Cardinal Gotti,
the Prefect of the Congregation of the Propaganda, was the son
of a Genoese docker: Cardinal Gruscha, the late Prince-
Archbishop of Vienna, was the son of a shoemaker — these
instances suffice to show us how " democratic " the Catholic
system is in the best sense of the word. The Catholic
hierarchy is recruited from among all classes, the superior
elements of all classes are called to labour in the vineyard.
Nothing, therefore, can be further from the truth than the
assertion that the upper ranks of the Catholic hierarchy are
the monopoly of the aristocracy or of the grande bourgeoisie.
Into this capital error of all aristocratism, into the error of
exclusivism, into the error of closing its ranks to " outsiders "
— the Church has never fallen. That which, in the Catholic
system, qualifies a man for a high post, for a post of trust and
responsibility, is not birth, but capacity ; whereas the error of
aristocracies, as we have seen, has been invariably that of

THE FUTUKE OF CHKISTIANITY 251

regarding birth, and not capacity, as the sole qualification.
As against modern democracy, on the other hand, the Catholic
system not only proclaims the necessity of authority, but is
founded on principles which permit of authority being duly
enforced. Eejecting the pernicious doctrine of equality, the
Church vests all authority in a supra-individual, supra-rational
principle which is removed from the sphere of discussion, and
which imposes itself as a categorical imperative.

IV

At the close of this study we come, then, to the conclusion
that Christianity constitutes a vital necessity for European
civilisation ; and that the form of Christianity adapted to the
needs of Western society is not Protestantism, but Catholicism.
For Catholicism alone possesses a social organisation, Catholi-
cism alone is able to impose discipline and to secure the
adequate integration of the individual in society, Catholicism
alone constitutes a religion in the true sense of the word, in that
it appeals to supra-rational principles. And if, on the one hand,
Catholicism is alone able to subordinate the individual to
society, to secure the sacrifice of individual interests to
collective interests — on the other hand, it is alone able to
satisfy the emotional and mystical needs of the individual
soul.

It is this unique capacity of Catholicism, at once to safe-
guard social interests and to minister to individual wants,
that explains its persistence throughout the centuries in spite
of so many difficulties and of such violent opposition.
Macaulay once wrote that on the far-distant day when a New
Zealander shall contemplate the ruins of London Bridge, the
Catholic Church will still be standing, unchangeable as ever.
And it is a very remarkable fact, which cannot but afford much
food for reflection to the student of human history, that the

252 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHKISTIANITY

Catholic Church has always withstood victoriously all the
storms encountered, whether within the Catholic fold or
without it. The Keformation movement, which bid fair to
destroy the foundations of society, not only failed in its
endeavour to sweep the Church out of existence, but was
repulsed and forced to abandon a large part of the ground
momentarily gained ; and the net result of the wars of
religion kindled by Protestantism, was distinctly unfavourable
to the latter. The French Eevolution likewise bid fair to
destroy, if not the whole Church, at all events the Church of
France ; and yet, seven years after the desecration of Notre
Dame de Paris by the hordes of Clootz and Chaumette,
Napoleon signed the Concordat with Pius VII., whereby the
Catholic religion was officially recognised as the religion of the
State. If the Church has withstood such terrible storms as
those of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, and of the
Kevolution, she may not unreasonably look forward with
confidence to the future.

But the Church has not only had storms to weather
from outside ; she has also had storms inside the fold. As
such we may reckon the unceasiDg attempts made, during the
Middle Ages, alike by the emperors and by the kings of
France, to subordinate the Church to the secular power, to
incorporate the spiritual organisation in the organisation of the
State. As such, also, we may reckon the doctrinal storms
created by Jansenism, by the infallibility controversy, by
modernism, etc. All these storms, whether great or small,
the Church has likewise survived. It is curious and
interesting to observe that none of the attempts made to
secure a scission within the Catholic Church, with the one
exception of the Protestant movement in the sixteenth century,
has ever succeeded. Gallicanism, backed up by all the
Bishops of France, including Bossuet, energetically supported
by his Most Christian Majesty Louis XIV, and subsequently

THE FUTUKE OF CHRISTIANITY 253

by the Emperor Napoleon I., and appealing as it did to the
national sentiment in France, was yet unable to survive,
and has long since been nothing but an historical reminiscence.
The same fate has, in recent times, awaited Americanism,
despite the authority and influence of Archbishop Ireland.
Who to-day remembers anything of the " German Catholic "
agitation started by Ronge, in 1844 — who knows anything
about the so-called DeutschJcatholiken ? And the success of the
Altkatholizismus, founded by Dollinger and other German
theologians in 18*70, as a protest against the infallibility dogma,
has not been greater than that of its predecessor. The violent
campaign undertaken by Bismarck against the Church on
account of the decisions of the Vatican Council, in no wise
furthered the separatist movement — and yet might one have
expected the Kulturkampf, on the one hand, and the efforts of
Dollinger and various Catholic University professors on the
other hand, to produce the desired result of weakening the
Catholic Church in Germany. If Bismarck and Dollinger
combined did not succeed ; if Bismarck had to surrender his
arms and make a moral pilgrimage to Canossa — it is not
surprising that the ridiculous separatist movement set on
foot by a handful of obscure individuals in France, in 1906,
with the object of founding a "national French Catholic
Church " by way of protest against the refusal of the Holy
See to accept the Separation Law, ended in a pitiable farce.

Whereas Protestantism, which possesses no cohesion, no
authority, no discipline, has been broken up into some four
hundred sects ; the Catholic organisation, on the other hand,
appears to be proof against all attempts made to create a
scission within the Catholic Church. When we bear in
mind the innumerable predictions made with the utmost
confidence in and after 1870, to the effect that the infallibility
dogma would inevitably have as a result the creation of an
irremediable schism, and the alienation of all intelligent

254 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHRISTIANITY

Catholics from the Church — we shall be in a better position
to appreciate the value of the predictions made at the present
day, to the effect that the condemnation of modernism
signifies the ruin of Catholicism. It may appear strange
that a doctrine which is so questionable, when viewed from
an historical point of view, as the doctrine of papal infalli-
bility, should nevertheless have been accepted with docility
by the quasi-unanimity of Catholics, and more especially by
those eminent men — such as Strossmayer, Newman, Dupanloup
— who most vigorously criticised and opposed it. But this
acceptance of the doctrine, once the latter had been propounded
as dogma, this submission even of its leading opponents to
the voice of authority, is truly a magnificent example of the
strength inherent to the Catholic organisation, of the wonderful
integration of the individual in the collectivity secured by
Catholicism. And if the integrating power of the latter was
sufficient to secure the acceptance of the infallibility dogma,
we may be sure of its ability to secure the acceptance of the
anti-modernist edict of 1910.

We see once more the necessity of judging a religious
system from a sociological, and not from a theological point of
view, when we come to consider the question of the dogma
of papal infallibility. Only when we place ourselves at the
standpoint of the sociologist, can we succeed in appreciating
the value of any given doctrine according to the only
objective criterion which we possess whereby to judge of it
— according to its utility for the society for which it is
destined. Considered from an historico-theological point of
view, the dogma of papal infallibility appears very questionable ;
but considered from the point of view of its utility for Catholic
society, this dogma appears to us under a different aspect. In
a vast international organisation like the Catholic Church, it is
essential that power be centralised — it is essential that a strong
centripetal force exist in order to counterbalance the tendency

THE FUTURE OF CHRISTIANITY 255

to disaggregation that cannot fail to exist, at all events in a
latent condition, in so extensive an organisation. Especially
at the present time, when the Church is exposed to so many
dangers, when she is the object of so many attacks, is it necessary
that powerful discipline prevail in her ranks ; for only by means
of such discipline, only by means of the strongest cohesion and
of the most efficacious integration of the individual in the whole,
can the survival of the Church in the midst of a hostile
environment be ensured. Whenever a social group is
menaced, whenever such a group is forced to take up a
defensive attitude, we see it shrink together, so to speak —
we see its members assemble in a compact mass behind their
leaders. And the less leaders there are the better ; for it is
a truism that divided counsels spell anarchy and incoherence,
consequently annihilation. Infinitely more advantageous for
Catholicism in the Sturm und Drang of modern times is it to
possess one unique central organisation — for Catholics to obey
one unique voice, to look to one unique leader for direction. And
the necessity of exalting the moral power of the Pope appears
the greater, when we take into consideration the reduction of his
material power. To the confiscation of the Papal states by
la giovine Italia must sooner or later have responded the pro-
clamation of papal infallibility — the material diminution of
the Pope would in any case have had to be counterbalanced
by the moral exaltation of the Holy Father. Thus when we
consider the dogma of papal infallibility from a sociological point
of view, we find it fully justified ; for centralisation of authority
corresponds to the necessities of the Catholic Church in
modern times, which can survive only on condition that she
be strongly integrated ; and integration is evidently stronger,
discipline is evidently greater, if a society be submitted to a
strong central authority.

In order to prevent all misunderstanding, it is necessary

256 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHEISTIANITY

that we should add that we by no means imply that Western
society, if it is to survive, must needs go back to the Middle
Ages, and re-establish complete religious homogeneity under
the authority of the Papal See. The mere enunciation of
such a proposition, of such a desideratum, would be monstrous.
Most certainly can no sane person expect to see the universal
domination of the Catholic Church re-established. What we
mean, is that every effort made with a view to securing the
greater integration and cohesion of Western society, to placing
efficient restraints on an individualism which threatens to
undermine the fabric of our civilisation, must needs be based on
the same principles as those which inspired the Catholic Church
in her work of building up and consolidating European society.
The social hierarchy must be maintained, for in the hierarchy
alone can the principle of authority be embodied and find
adequate expression ; the recruiting of the diverse categories
of the social hierarchy must be proceeded with in strict
accordance with the law of selection, for hereby can alone the
adaptation of capacity to function be assured ; the moral
sphere must be separated from the political sphere, and the
moral law must be recognised as superior to all political con-
tingencies ; the entire life of the self-assertive individual must
be dominated by an ideal which is supra-individual in its
nature, which is capable of disciplining the individual, and of
ensuring his subordination to social ends. These are the
main principles of the Catholic tradition, of the Catholic
organisation — principles whose validity holds good for all
times and in all places.

The religious organisation changes its structure and its form
in the course of evolution, for it must needs adapt itself to
modified conditions, and it is subject, like everything else, to the
law of development. The Catholic structure, considered as a
dogmatic edifice, will evidently never again include the whole
of Western society — will evidently never regain its former

THE FUTURE OF CHRISTIANITY 257

dimensions. The sociologist has no need to enter into questions
of dogma, and, indeed, he is entirely incompetent to judge of
them. Our task has been that of examining the sociological value
of Christianity, and we have come to recognise in Christianity,
and particularly in Catholic Christianity, an indispensable
factor of Western civilisation — nay, we have seen Christianity
to constitute the basis of that civilisation, the main instrument
of its survival and consolidation. But, while fully recognising
and insisting upon the immense services rendered by the
Catholic Church to Western civilisation, we must not allow
any personal proclivities to lead us to indulge in chimeric
aspirations or illusory hopes. The integrating force of
Western civilisation in the future will not be the Christian
religion, considered as a system of dogmatic religious beliefs : in
other words, the cohesion of Western society will not, in the
future, be assured by universal assent to certain dogmas
concerning the Incarnation, the Redemption, or the Im-
maculate Conception. But, as long as Western society is
to survive, it must continue to be based on those fundamental
principles of government which Christianity, and particularly
Catholic Christianity, enunciated — on those fundamental
traditions of social policy which we owe to the genius of
the Catholic Church. Of the social teaching of Jesus, and of
the great principles of social organisation and government
derived from that teaching, the words of the Master are true :
coelum et terra transibunt, verba autem mea non transibunt.

NOTE

With regard to the force of expansion inherent to Catholicism, and
which, far from being exhausted, is as active to-day as it ever was, we may
quote the words of M. J. Bricout, by which he resumes the progress ac-
complished within the last fifty years by Catholic propaganda : —

" Plus de deux cent cinquante nouveaux sieges episcopaux, pres de
deux cents nouveaux vicariats ou prefectures apostoliques ; le continent
noir, 1'Asie centrale, les iles perdues de 1'Oceanie s'ouvrant pour la

17

258 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHRISTIANITY

premiere fois a la predication des apotres du Christ ; et pour dire le mot
qui resume tout, plus de vingt-cinq millions de nouveaux chretiens devenus
les sujets de la Propagande, qui en comptait a peine cinq millions il y a
un siecle : voila des resultats acquis, palpables, indeniables, qui rnontrent
qu'au cours du dernier siecle, 1'apostolat catholique n'a pas perdu tout a
fait son temps." J

Those who talk so glibly about the extinction of Catholicism, forget
the immense power of expansion possessed by the latter, and which is in
every organism a proof, not of decay, but of vitality. This expansive
power of Catholicism does not only manifest itself in the increase of the
material number of its adherents, in the activity of its propaganda in all
countries of the globe, in the progress made by it in America, in Prussia,
in Great Britain,2 but also in the development of the social and in-
tellectual activity of the Church.3 This is not the place to go into details
on the subject, but the names of Lavigerie (Algiers), Ketteler (Mayence),
Gibbons (Baltimore), Manning (London), among Catholic prelates ; of
Vogelsang and Lueger (Austria), Decurtins (Switzerland), de Mun, Lorin,
Sangnier, Gayraud, Lemire (France), among Catholic clergy and laity,
remind us of the activity of Catholics in the domain of social policy. As
for the intellectual activity of Catholics, the names of Pasteur, de
Lapparent, Branly (the inventor of wireless telegraphy), Brunetiere, de
Ruville, Duchesne, Scheil — it would be invidious to cite others — suffice
to show us that the statement to be read so often in certain papers of the
lowest category, to the effect that " to be intelligent is to cease to be a
Catholic," is simply grotesque. And we do not speak of Catholic theo-
logical activity, which a sociologist is incompetent to appreciate.

1 J. Bricout et Collaborateurs, Oden est Vhistoire des religions ? t. ii. p. 498 (1911).
For a succinct account of the progress of Catholicism in all domains of activity,
see pp. 497-597.

2 The census in Prussia shows the following results : —

Classification of Inhabitants according to Religion
{per 1000 Inhabitants}.

Protestants. Catholics.
1871 649 336

1890 642 342

1910 618 363

During the period 1905-1910 the increase in the number of Catholic inhabitants has
been 9 '22 per cent, that of the Protestant inhabitants only 6 '38 per cent. A similar
movement of Catholic progression and Protestant regression is observable in the
whole German empire. In the States and in Great Britain there is no religious
census, and it is more difficult to estimate the increase in the number of Catholic
inhabitants ; an increase is everywhere admitted, but it is problematical as to
whether this increase is anything more than a natural increase taking place in pro-
portion to the increase in the total number of inhabitants. The number of Catholics
in the States is estimated at about 15,000,000, in Great Britain (Ireland of course
excluded) at about 2,000,000.

3 For an account of the fertile social activity of the Church in Belgium, see A.
Verhaeren, Vingt-cinq ans de politique sociale, avec Preface de M. le comte A. de
Mun (1912).

CHAPTEK X

CONCLUSIONS

AT the close of our study of the sociological value of religion
in general, and of the Christian religion in particular, it may
be well to resume as briefly as possible the main ideas
developed in the course of the foregoing chapters.

In primitive societies, the individual is entirely absorbed
in the group. His individual existence, his individual thought,
are reduced to the lowest possible minimum — he exists and
he thinks only as a social element, as the member of a
social aggregate. At this stage of social evolution, collective
thought is the only form of organised thought ; and this first
organisation of thought, whereby the collectivity first arrives
at the consciousness of its existence as a collectivity, that
is to say, as something sui generis which differentiates itself
from the individuals who compose the social aggregate — this
first organisation of thought is a religious organisation. By
religion and through religion does society arrive at a con-
sciousness of its existence ; in its religious beliefs does society
first see itself reflected, so to speak — by means of its religious
beliefs is society first organised. Eeligion thus constitutes
the symbol of collective existence ; it is the instrument whereby
the collectivity organises itself, whereby the unity of the
collectivity is assured.

The individual is thus absorbed in the group ; at this
stage there exists no rudiment of an organisation of individual

259

260 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHRISTIANITY

thought, which could counterbalance the organisation of col-
lective thought ; and the individual has no notion of an auto-
nomous existence, that is to say, of an existence as individual,
and not merely as member of a social aggregate. Under
these conditions, the rigorous subordination of the individual to
collective ends is easy ; it is easy to place him under a rigid
discipline, to strongly integrate him in a society by which he
is completely dominated.

The more the collective representations which impose
themselves in early stages of culture lose their authority ; the
more the individual tends to organise his thought on a
personal basis by means of rational concepts, and consequently
to detach himself from social control ; the more difficult
does the subjection of the individual to discipline of any kind
become. In the measure that society evolves, the individual
tends to differentiate himself ever more and more from the
group ; thought tends to individualise itself, to emancipate itself
from the yoke of the collective representations ; and in the
measure that he individualises himself, that he becomes conscious
\of his strength and of his rights, the individual will consent
ever less and less to sacrifice his interests to ends exterior to
himself. The maintenance of social discipline, of social
integration, is thus far more difficult in civilised societies than
in uncivilised ones ; for in these latter the problem of the
antagonism between the individual and society does not arise,
seeing that the individual does not exist otherwise than as a
cell of the social organism.

In both civilised and uncivilised societies, the integration
of the aggregate is assured by the prevalence of collective
beliefs, which are of a religious nature ; but such religious
beliefs change their forms in order to adapt themselves to
the necessities of a modified environment. In the measure
that the individual detaches himself from the collectivity,
religion tends likewise to differentiate itself from society.

CONCLUSIONS 261

The origins of society confound themselves with the origins
of religious belief, seeing that it is as a religious organisation
that society first arrives at the consciousness of its existence ;
during the first stages of social evolution, religion and society
are co - extensive with each other — religious thought is
equivalent to social thought, and vice versa. Later on,
religious thought extends its limits, it is no longer contained
within the bounds of what we may term social thought ;
religion is no longer limited by society, and the former
assimilates unto itself elements of a moral nature. If all
ethical elements are absent from primitive beliefs, this is due
to the fact that ethics are superfluous in primitive culture,
seeing that they have there no social function to fulfil. The
purely material, automatic sanctions which society applies to
delictuous acts, principally by means of the taboo, suffice in
order to guarantee the repression of all indiscipline. The
moral law only develops itself later, and in response to new
needs and necessities. If religion takes on subsequently an
ethical character, it is in order to be able to continue to
dominate the individual, who detaches himself ever more and
more from the collectivity. The object of the moral law is that
of subordinating directly to itself that part of individual
conduct which, as a consequence of individual emancipation,
henceforth escapes all social control. The moral law must there-
fore present itself to the individual as something higher than
society, as possessing an authority which is greater than
the authority of society. When we, however, come to analyse
its nature, we shall find that the moral law, like all other
religious conceptions, is a collective creation ; we shall find
that the moral law is constituted, so to speak, by the pro-
jection of the authority of the social aggregate into a higher
sphere, that is to say, into the sphere of the Infinite and
Absolute, where such authority shall be removed from the
possibility of rational criticism.

262 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHRISTIANITY

Eeligion, as also the moral law, which originates in
religious beliefs and which is of an essentially religious nature ;
is therefore a collective creation, an instrument shaped by the
collectivity for the defence and furtherance of collective
interests. It does not exist for the benefit of the individual.
If the individual profits by it, this is exclusively in the latest
forms of ethical religious belief; and even here such profit
as may accrue to the individual is a wholly secondary con-
sideration. If Christianity consoles and rewards the individual,
this is in order to better induce him to sacrifice egotistical
interests to collective ends. Religion being a social creation,
and responding to social wants and necessities, cannot have
the individual as its basis ; it is not in the individual con-
science, in the " individual searching after truth," that we are '
to look for the origin of religious belief or for the assizes of
the moral law. Religious beliefs are fabricated by the
collective mind, they are the fruit of collective representations
that are imposed on the individual from outside. In primitive
societies, where the individual is so solidly integrated in the
whole that he has practically no existence outside the group,
the individual unquestioningly accepts all the collective repre-
sentations, and all the rules affecting conduct that derive from
such representations ; for he is entirely dominated by the collec-
tive mind. In later stages, the individual accepts less easily
such representations ; and the latter, in order to impose them-
selves must change their form and take account of individual
interests, offering compensation for the sacrifice of such interests.
Yet is this ministration to individual needs a wholly secondary
aspect of religious beliefs ; and the latter never cease to have/
as main function the furtherance of the welfare of society.

Viewed from the standpoint of the individual, religious
and ethical beliefs have no significance. All those acts which
the moral conscience of civilised humanity condemns most
strongly are merely delictuous with regard to the necessities

CONCLUSIONS 263

of a society placed under certain conditions of existence, that
are themselves the result of a long evolutionary process.
Were the individual alone to be considered, there would be no such
thing as an immoral act — for every act reputed immoral is
thus condemned solely because it affects the welfare of other
individuals ; that is to say, because the interests of society
come into play. When we descend to the primitive stages
of social culture, we see very clearly that murder, incest,
adultery, theft, and other such acts, are condemned solely
because of their incompatibility with social needs, without any
ethical notions intervening.1 Ethical law, as we have said, is
but a later adjunction to social law, an ulterior extension and
completion of the latter, rendered necessary by the develop-
ment of rationalism and the consequent diminution of the
efficacity of social control. But let us never overlook the
origins of ethical law, never forget that the latter exists only
because it responds to collective necessities — never forget
that, like unto all religious beliefs, ethical notions are a
weapon forged by society for the defence and furtherance of
social needs.

1 It is to be noted that murder, incest, adultery, theft, and all the other acts
that European laws and morals condemn, are by no means universally repro-
bated. There is no such thing as an act which is delictuous per se — an act con-
demned as delictuous quod semper, quod ubique, quod omnibus. Even in certain
parts of contemporary Europe, where the vendetta survives, murder is considered
as a sacred duty to be fulfilled. And contemporary Europe admits not merely
isolated, but wholesale, murder when the interests of society are at stake — for
war is nothing else but organised wholesale murder. Incest was practised in the
reigning houses of Egypt, Peru, Mexico, and was regarded as the only means of
preserving the royal blood free from contamination ; sister-marriage is no longer
practised in Europe, but the consanguinous unions between the various European
royal families certainly constitute incest in the second degree. As for adultery,
it is evident that the conception of the same must be wholly different in a poly-
gamous society to what it is in a monogamous one. The estimate of what is
permissible or what is not permissible in the relations between the sexes, presents
almost as many variations as there are societies. Lastly, as regards theft, if we
find the latter condemned in numerous primitive societies, this is not due to the
prevalence of any ethical notions, but to the purely material fear of certain
magical consequences that are supposed to ensue if certain objects, which are
taboo, be touched.

264 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHEISTIANITY

Christianity, like all other religions, is an instrument of
social defence and integration. Never would the religion of
Jesus have succeeded, never would it have triumphed over
the vehemence of the antagonism which it encountered on its
way, had it not responded very clearly and very exactly to
urgent social necessities. Preached by Jesus, and its theory
developed principally by the efforts of a few men of genius,
Christianity is none the less a social creation. Its spread, its
triumph over incredible difficulties, were the work of the
collectivity, the fruit of the seed sown by Jesus among the
anonymous multitude. Christianity triumphed because Western
society was not yet in its entirety degenerate, because the
germs of decay that infected the upper classes in Kome had
not communicated themselves to the rest of the population —
because there still existed a number of eugenic elements in
Europe in which the instinct of survival was as yet intact.
These elements might fuse and intermingle ; and the result
of the upheavals caused by the immigration of the Asiatic
hordes, by the movements of as yet barbaric peoples, by the
intercrossing and mixing up of heterogeneous races, might be
the creation of a new society, with new tongues and a new
culture : what is of importance is that precisely this new
society, this new culture, arose to replace the vanished empire
and the vanished civilisation. And they would not have
arisen, Western society would inevitably have succumbed
to the combined effects of the Asiatic immigrations and the
Musulman invasions after the seventh century, had Christianity
not triumphed in its struggle with egotism< — had Christianity
not given to Western society a new ideal, capable of securing
anew its integration, of maintaining discipline and repressing
insubordination.

The debt of the Western world to Christianity is a colossal
one; for it is to Christianity that Western civilisation owes
its survival — it is thanks to Christianity that this civilisation

CONCLUSIONS 265

was not swept completely and for all times out of existence,
during the dark and troubled period that stretches from
Caligula and Claudius down to Charlemagne, and beyond
Charlemagne to Charles Martel. And even as it was
Christianity which held aloof the torch of civilisation during
these terrible centuries in which, amidst the wars and rumours
of wars predicted by Jesus, amidst gloom and anarchy and
desolation, the leaven of a new civilisation was fermenting,
the foundations of a new civilisation were being laid — so was
it Christianity which, after having ploughed and reaped and
toiled in the field, enabled the seed sown to bring forth a
harvest abundant ; and so is it also Christianity which to-day
as yesterday, as in the recesses of the past, stands before us as
the bulwark of our civilisation, as the rampart against which
the waves indeed do beat, around which the wind indeed does
gather to a hurricane, and in which waves and wind have dug
breaches ominous — but which still is erect, but which still bids
defiance to the indefatigable onslaught of foes that know no rest.
Will the future still see the Cross erect, on which are
inscribed the words : In hoc signo mnces ? When Constantine
encountered the army of Maxentius on the bridge over the
Tiber, the Cross appeared to him in the heavens, and the
mysterious light of its rays lit up the stormy sky, and a white-
robed angel pointed to the words written with the gold of
flames : In hoc signo mnces. And the vision of Constantine
predicted true ; for the cross of wood on which Jesus stretched
his arms and died vanquished the world. This " piece of
wood on a piece of wood," which Goethe contemptuously
railed at, vanquished Eome and vanquished Europe, it
vanquished Csesar and it vanquished the multitude, and it
united all the divers and heterogeneous elements of the
Western world, warring and barbaric, proud and undisciplined,
wild and uncouth, in the acknowledgment of a common faith
and in the subordination to a common discipline.

266 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHRISTIANITY

But all this, we are told, appertains to the past — some add,
to the dim and distant past. And most assuredly can no one
guarantee the future. The fact that the disappearance of
Christianity could not but entail the disappearance of that
civilisation which is founded on Christianity, in itself tells us
nothing as to the future. For the foresight of mankind is
notoriously small, and the fear of consequences is very rarely
sufficient to inhibit the imperious cravings of instinct in the
individual. To suppose that the vast majority of individuals
will ever abstain from an immediate gratification by reason of
the consciousness of the fact that pleasure is a thing short-
lived and illusory — a consciousness nevertheless derived from
the experience of daily life — to suppose this, would be to fall
into the most stupendous of errors. Rare are those who look
beyond the pleasures of the day, rare are they whom the
consciousness of the illusory nature of pleasure, and the fear
of " pleasure's sad satiety," induce to abstain from seeking
pleasure or from gratifying desires that present themselves.
The fear of destroying civilisation as a consequence of destroy-
ing Christianity, will therefore never restrain the antichristian
fanaticism of a considerable part of society.

We can reckon the less on fear of the consequences for
Western civilisation, as a means whereby movements hostile
to Christianity may be stemmed and checked, when we consider
the widespread ignorance that prevails concerning the rudiments
of social law — when we see all around us the belief prevailing
that social progress is to be sought in the ever greater develop-
ment of individualism, in the reduction of social authority to
a minimum, in the unrestricted domination of rationalism.
Obviously, if such views as these prevail, then must the
dechristianisation of Western society appear as a thing
desirable — nay, as necessary — in the interest of society itself.
But this view is erroneous, because it is based on radically
false premisses, on an entirely false conception of the relations

CONCLUSIONS 267

between the individual and the collectivity. It is assumed
that if only the individual be enabled to develop his personality
without let or hindrance, if only no limits be assigned to
individual liberty save the vague limit indicated by John
Stuart Mill of doing no harm to others — that if only these
desiderata be granted, bliss and happiness will prevail on earth.
And these assumptions imply another assumption, namely, that
the welfare of society is dependent on the welfare of the
individual. But we have seen that the interests of the
individual and those of society stand in fundamental antagonism
to each other ; that if individual interests prevail over social
interests, society will be disintegrated and finally destroyed ;
and that the destruction of society implies ipso facto the
destruction of the individual, seeing that the latter can exist
only in society. Hence does individual welfare depend on
social welfare; hence does the survival of the individual
depend on the subordination of individual happiness to social
exigencies, on the sacrifice of individual ends to collective ends.
And as the essential task of Christianity, as of all religions,
consists in ensuring this subordination and sacrifice of the
individual ; so is the maintenance of Christianity indispensable
to the continuity of our social existence.

In these troubled and uncertain times, when storm-clouds
are gathering thick on the horizon, when the peals of the
distant thunder can be distinctly heard, when the sultry
and tempest-foreboding atmosphere is heavily charged with
electricity ; when the future of our Western civilisation lies
before us as a dark and insolvable enigma, veiled not by the
purple cloud that reflects the glories of the sinking sun and
which, motionless in an azure sky, heralds the dawn of a to-
morrow bright with light and hope, with the joy of work and
the sunshine of success, but as an enigma veiled by a cloud
sombre and terrifying, that portends evil and seems to conceal
unto our inquiring and alarmed gaze the gates of hell of which

268 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHRISTIANITY

Jesus spoke — in such times as these, the Cross stands before
us as it stood, so the legend tells us, illuminating the not less
sombre and stormy sky, before Constantine. In hoc signo
vinces ; the words are true to-day, as they were true then, as
they were true when Julian the Apostate, throwing dust into
the air, cried out to the desert and to the firmament, which he
took as witnesses from the world of the finite and from the
world of the Infinite to the truth of what he said : Thou hast
vanquished, Galilean. Those words are true to-day, because
to-day, as in the past and in the future, society will only
survive if it observe the immutable laws of which Christianity
is the guardian — the laws of social existence, among which
the subordination of the individual to higher ends, the necessity
of suffering, the maintenance of authority and discipline, are
to be inscribed.1

The only way in which society can be saved from
destruction amidst the many perils that menace it, is by
carefully combining the necessities of conservation with the
necessities of adaptation. One of the most prodigious
errors of our time, and one of the most mischievous, consists
in the idea that the past history of a society is a neglig-
able quantity, that the traditions of a society are merely
so many impediments to progress, so much useless ballast to
be thrown overboard with the least possible delay. But a
society cannot detach itself from the past, cannot sever itself

1 In this age of coarse materialism, it is well to recall the words of Jesus :
TioTi in solo pane vivit homo . . . nolite thesaurizare vobis thesauros in terra,
ubi aerugo et tinea demolitur, et ubifures effodiunt et furantur. It is for having
forgotten these profound words that the bourgeoisie and the masses alike will
experience nothing but disillusion and misery. When the day of the promised
social revolution dawns, the masses will find out to their cost that the old
authority, the old institutions, the old ideals, created by the wisdom, and
amidst the intense sufferings, of past generations, spelt for the multitude greater
blessing and greater happiness than the fallacious promises and the vain illusions
of revolutionary demagogues. And the wrath of the masses will be then turned
against those who, having promised bread, have given only stones — who, having
extinguished the lights in the heavens, have extinguished also the lights on earth.

CONCLUSIONS 269

from its traditions ; and if it is thus severed, then is it
violently pulled up from its roots, then is it like unto the tree
that the axe of the cutter has felled, then does it lack the sap
of life, the sdve nourricidre without which no organism can
exist. Society is an organism ; like every organism it has its
heredity; and like every organism it must seek in its
heredity for the source of all vital strength, of all vital energy.
The curse of modern democracy lies in the culpable ignoring
of the great fact of social heredity. The Revolution of 1789
sought to cut away the tree of French society from the soil
in which that tree had been planted in the remoteness of
distant ages, in which it had grown and put forth branches
that bore rich and variegated fruit, agreeable to the sight and
agreeable to the taste. This great and venerable past, mellowed
and sanctified by deeds of prowess and deeds of love, by the
willing sacrifices and the noble ambitions of many generations ;
this immortal past, rendered holy by great names and great
traditions, which stretches back far into the centuries, which
links the present, with its hopes and aspirations, with its
sorrows and joys, with its successes and disappointments, to
the dim, crepuscular light that vanishes finally in those inner-
most recesses of history whither the eye of present-day
man cannot penetrate ; this past which reveals, if we only
seek, the causes of the rise and greatness of the greatest of
Western nations — this past it was which empty-headed
demagogues, obscene pornographers, sanguinary assassins
endeavoured to annihilate, of which it was sought to wipe out
every trace, nay, every recollection. Can we conceive any-
thing more barbarous, anything more insane ? The agitators
who led the Revolution, who excited the mob against defence-
less men and defenceless women, who turned Notre Dame de
Paris into a brothel, who thought that massacre and plunder,
fire and riot were the means best adapted to reforming social
injustice — how could we expect such as these to understand

270 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHKISTIANITY

anything of the laws to which all social life is invariably
subject ? They endeavoured to annihilate the past, to cut
French society adrift from twelve centuries of heredity, and
in so doing they laid the axe to the roots of the tree. The
eighteenth century and the Eevolution ran up a heavy bill, a
bill that can only be paid, and that is effectually being paid,
by the life-blood of the French nation.

But the fundamental heresy, the unpardonable error of
the Eevolution, which is costing France so dear — this heresy
is spreading everywhere : for everywhere do we encounter the
same ignorance of social law, the same incapacity to compre-
hend the vital necessities of society. Everywhere do we
meet with the idea that society is something artificial, some-
thing which can be created, re-formed, remodelled, recast,
according to the will of legislators, and by means of Acts of
Parliament or ministerial decrees. No idea can be more
abhorrent to the sociologist ; and unfortunately is no idea more
popular, for no idea is more flattering to personal ambition,
more encouraging for all those, faddists and cranks and
regenerators of mankind, who hope to see personal fads realised,
and the personal inconveniences removed that are a natural
consequence of inferiority. In view of the constant spread of
this pernicious heresy, the sociologist should never tire of
repeating the truth — the truth that society is not an artificial
creation, but an organic creation, the result of long centuries;
of evolution and heredity, the product of the past. If a social
aggregate be determined to sever itself from the past, to cut
itself adrift from its traditions : then does that social
aggregate ipso facto condemn itself to a speedy death.

Does this mean that society is therefore immobilised, that
society must therefore remain stationary ? Not so ; for the
immobilisation of society would imply that the latter is
excepted from the universal law that applies to all organic
life — the law of evolution ; and society, as we have said, is not

CONCLUSIONS 271

outside the organic world, but is itself an organic type, an
organic creation. Society evolves, unceasingly must social
forms and social functions modify themselves in order to be
adapted to modified conditions of existence. But the conditions
of life themselves vary within strict limits ; and consequently
must the changes operated in order to secure adaptation to
modified conditions be likewise limited. Nowhere do we find,
ike immutable laws of life to vary — the only variations we
find, refer to the relations which prevail between aggregates
or between an aggregate and its environment. It is not in
our power to modify the unvarying laws of nature ; and when
human folly seeks to place society in artificial conditions of
existence, then will the arrogance of man discover that
Nature is not to be frustrated of her rights, and that her
revenge will be speedy and implacable. The adaptation of
a social aggregate to modified environmental conditions is
called forth by necessity of conforming ourselves to natural
law ; wholly different is it therefore to the attempts made by
modern democracy to suppress such law. The modification of
society in response to changes in the environment and in the
conditions of life, being thus a process carried out in obedience
to natural law, imperatively demands, as a conditio sine qua
non of its success, that the fundamental law of nature, the
great law of heredity, be duly respected. An adaptation which
would fain leave out of consideration the factor heredity is not
an adaptation, for any attempt to modify society without
taking this factor into account, far from adapting society to
the conditions of life, must result in the destruction of society.
The adaptation of an organism means the placing of that
organism in the most favourable conditions possible, in the
conditions that most greatly enhance its chances of survival.
But the attempt made to suppress a fundamental law of
nature such as heredity signifies, as we know, anything but
the increasing of an organism's capacity — consequently can

272 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHKISTIANITY

such an attempt never be justified by the pretext that thereby
is it proposed to adapt an organism to new life-conditions.

The heredity of Europe, of Western civilisation, is a
Christian heredity. The torch of the past lights up the present
and the future. The experience of past generations, wisdom
gathered up during long centuries of toil and strife, ceaseless
efforts made to adapt society to its life-conditions, sagacity
accumulated at the price of untold suffering and great
sacrifices, of patience and unceasing labour — such is the
patrimony of society, its moral patrimony which is not a whit
less important than the biological patrimony. And even as the
maintenance of the biological patrimony of society, of the
biological fitness of the race, is indispensable to the survival
of a social aggregate — so is also the maintenance of the moral
patrimony. A nation bereft of its traditions, deprived of the
stores of wealth heaped up by the efforts and tribulations of
the past, is like unto a ship deprived of helm and compass,
and abandoned to the mercy of the storm. Tradition is the
compass of society ; only when we of to-day see what those
of yesterday and before yesterday did in order to put themselves
into harmony with their life-conditions — only when we see
what our forerunners did in order to solve that ever-present
problem of the relations of the individual to society — only
then we can hope to guide ourselves amidst the shadows and
obscurity, amidst the rapids and the shallows. A great
tradition is not a thing indifferent, whether in the life of
society as a whole, or in the life of a family, or in the life of an
individual. It represents, on the contrary, the result of constant
and persevering endeavours, of indefatigable and dauntless
efforts, made throughout a long past by successive generations,
in order to solve the essential problems of social existence, in
order to adapt society to its life-conditions, in order to secure a
durable equilibrium between society and its environment.
Therefore must tradition, this legacy of the past, this indispens-

CONCLUSIONS 273

able ancestral patrimony, this deep and clear source of vital
force and energy, this sap of life without which society cannot
but decay and perish — therefore must it be maintained, be
constantly consulted, be jealously safeguarded, even as one
safeguards a very dear and very rare and incalculably costly
treasure. And the tradition of Western society is a Christian
tradition, the moral patrimony of Western society is consti-
tuted by the inexhaustible treasure of which the foundations
were laid by the Gospel of Jesus of Nazareth.

When we look around us to-day, what spectacle meets our
eyes ? Not a cheerful one assuredly. Anarchy reigning
everywhere, disorganisation and incoherence everywhere
triumphant, egotism everywhere gaining ground and obscuring
the fundamental notion of social solidarity. Anarchy in the
economic sphere, anarchy in family life, anarchy in morals,
anarchy in politics — everywhere the same absence of authority,
the same absence of commanding ideals and integrating
principles. Everywhere the individual pursuing his own ends
regardless of higher interests, everywhere individual rights
asserting themselves at the expense of social rights, everywhere
the claims of the collectivity ignored. Society is broken up
into a number of fractions at war with each other, and wholly
unconscious of their essential solidarity as parts of one great
whole. The post office strike in France in 1909, the railroad
strike in 1910, the systematic undermining of patriotism, of
all sense of discipline, of all notion of social responsibility —
this all shows us how matters stand in democratic France.
And in Great Britain, which has been held up to other
countries as the model of a democracy, things are not bright,
prospects are not reassuring. The railroad strike of 1911,
the dockers' strike of the same year, the miners' strike
of 1912, the threats of sabotage and violent destruction of
property, the infiltration of socialism and insubordination
into the Navy and Army — all these phenomena point to

18

274 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHEISTIANITY

grave dangers in the future, to perils that can sap the
strength of British society, and which must inevitably do so,
unless measures are taken in time to ameliorate matters.
And just in the moment when the dangers inherent in
democracy are manifesting themselves in Great Britain, even
as they have long since manifested themselves in France,
in the United States, in Italy, and elsewhere ; just in this
moment is the House of Lords, which has always been the
ultimate barrier against popular excesses, the ultimate bul-
wark against anarchy, deprived of its authority and reduced
to a mere shadow.1

Everywhere, in Europe as in America, we hear the same
complaints, the same cry of alarm : the arrest of the population,
originally confined to France, is now general ; family life is

1 It is to be observed that, from one point of view, the downfall of the House
of Lords is certain to be applauded by all impartial and right-minded persons
the world over — namely, from the point of view of the Irish nation. As long as
the House of Lords wielded unlimited authority, all hope of obtaining justice for
Ireland, of repairing — in a certain measure— centuries of tyranny and barbarism
surpassing in cold-bloo<led ferocity the worst exploits of any other European
nation in a conquered country, was undoubtedly vain. In the interests of the
English, however, the suppression of an effective barrier against demagogy,
against the revolutionary tyranny of labour syndicates, is to be regretted ; and to
what lengths such tyranny can go the English discovered in 1912, when the
miners' unions forced the principle of the legal minimum salary down the throat
of Government and Parliament. Later on it will be duly found out by the
English how heavy is the price to be paid for such concessions to the revolution !
Ireland is the fatality of English policy — and this is as it should be. Had the
Irish nation been granted its legitimate autonomy in 1886 or 1893 ; had England
not driven the Irish to desperation and made ot the latter England's bitterest
enemies, by centuries of massacre, spoliation, persecution, brigandage, and every
sort of the vilest oppression — then would there not have oeen, in 1911, eighty
Irishmen to seal the fate of the English Lords at Westminster ; eighty Irishmen
who turned the scales in favour of the Radical Government's proposals ; eighty
Irishmen who, brought by force into a foreign Parliament, dominate that
Parliament and condemn the foreign oppressor to destroy his surest safeguard
against internal disorganisation and disintegration ; eighty Irishmen who,
although essentially conservative in their social and political leanings, are
nevertheless compelled to vote for revolutionary measures in a foreign country,
as the only means of securing at long last justice for the Irish nation. The
eighty Irishmen, who, by their votes at Westminster, secured a majority for the
bill destroying the prerogatives of the English peerage, represented the Nemesis
for English crime in Ireland.

CONCLUSIONS 275

everywhere tending to disorganise itself, everywhere are the
duties and responsibilities entailed by marriage being ignored
or neglected ; political life, although not everywhere as corrupt
as in France and in the United States, is everywhere de-
generating into a means whereby idleness and imbecility may
be rewarded at the expense of the community; and the
bourgeois State, far from being what a State should be : that is
to say, the synthesis of the manifold activities of all categories
of citizens, the Brennpunkt in which all such activities, however
divergent and heterogeneous, are united in the higher service
of the collectivity — the "bourgeois State is reduced to play the
part of a policeman safeguarding the narrow and egotistical
interests of a class. This State, far from representing the
collectivity, does but represent a class, and the class of the
potentates of wealth. Individualism is everywhere rampant ;
all the institutions of society are perverted from their original
functions, and do but serve individual ends. Each for himself
— and each is not only an end unto himself, but a law unto
himself.

Anarchy — such is the evil from which we are suffering,
such is the malady that is gangrening Western society. And
this ana*rchy is but the inevitable result of the principles on
which democracy is based — of principles that are inherently
incapable of establishing authority, because they contain no
basis whereon authority can be established. When Protestant-
ism declared t^e individual conscience to be the sole judge of J
right and wrong — when it declared that the criterion of truth
is within the individual; then did it ipso facto suppress all
authority, for it forbade us to appeal to principles superior to
the individual. And when modern democracy, which is the
legitimate descendant of Protestantism, reduced the notion of
authority to a mere question of majority, then did it likewise
render all real authority illusory. What respect can an
authority enjoy that has no other basis than the will of a

276 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHEISTIANITY

majority — what adequate sanction can be attached to an
authority that to-morrow may be swept out of existence ?
The bourgeoisie, which could only hope to triumph, only hope
to establish itself, once the notion of authority based on birth
had been done away with, once the notion of " equality " had
been admitted — the bourgeoisie set itself upon the throne, but
the throne was lacking in a secure foundation, and will be pre-
cipitated into the abyss. Bourgeois government is based on an
anomaly, on an insoluble contradiction. Having undermined
all authority, having destroyed all the principles whereon
authority can permanently be established, the bourgeoisie dis-
covered, once it had conquered power, that it does not suffice
to proclaim the rights of man, but that such rights imply
the correlative notion of duty. But on what basis could the
bourgeoisie hope to found this idea of duty ? In its own
endeavours to secure power, the bourgeoisie had destroyed all
those traditional principles of authority, thanks to which
egotism had long been held in check. It had proclaimed the
right of the individual to liberty, to unlimited liberty ; and it
had eliminated, or endeavoured to eliminate, all those collective
forces, all those collective beliefs, which acted as restraints on
individual liberty. Profiting by the liberty obtained, profit-
ing by the downfall of the traditional obstacles to liberty,
the bourgeoisie succeeded in vesting in itself the power formerly
in the hands of the monarchy, of the Church, and of the
aristocracy. And then did the new rulers perceive the
necessity of limiting, in their own interests, the liberty which
they had declared illimited, and by means of which they had
themselves attained to power. But henceforth could liberty
only be restrained, henceforth could authority only be
established, on an artificial basis — on the basis of brute force
and bayonets. An authority that only reposes on the force of
bayonets may maintain itself for a while — but it is an authority
that lacks all stability. To be efficacious, authority must not be

CONCLUSIONS 277

founded on force, but on moral persuasion, on the moral conviction
of the governed. Authority in the bourgeois State has not
this basis, consequently does it lack stability ; for the authority
of the bourgeoisie, originally imposed by force, is maintained
solely by force. Such an authority is palpably insufficient and
inadequate, palpably incapable of responding to the needs of
society.

Amidst the troubles and turmoils and strifes that surround
us, and which point to grave events in the not far-distant
future, one great institution, one great social force, still remains
— weakened it is true, but still standing ; and this institution
is Christianity. Amidst the clouds that are gathering fast and
thick on the horizon, in the dark and stormy sky that presages
evil for to-morrow, we see a light, a star still shining amidst
the ever-increasing obscurity — a star which holds out hope
and bids us be not discouraged, even as the distant light in
the watch-tower on the shore brings courage and hope to the
sailor wrestling, on his frail barque, with the fury of wind and
waves. Great and terrible were the dangers, appalling in their
violence were the storms, that assailed Western society during
the long centuries since the deposition of Komulus Augustulus,
last and degenerate occupant of the throne of the Caesars, by
Odoaker; and yet Western society survived them. But we
must not therefore suffer ourselves to be lulled into a false
optimism — we must not neglect to take into account the
immense changes that have been operated in the whole aspect
of Western civilisation during the last hundred years. The
discovery of the use to which electricity might be put, the
introduction of the telegraph and the telephone, of the railroad
and the automobile, have annihilated space and time, and
rendered all the various elements which go to build up
Western society intimately dependent on each other. In
former times the annihilation of one group did not entrain any
far-reaching consequences, did not imperil the existence of

278 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHRISTIANITY

other groups, did not reverberate like an echo throughout the
length and breadth of society. Each group being isolated,
communication with other groups being difficult, each forming
therefore an autonomous entity, the elimination of one group
affected very little, if at all, the other groups. How vastly
different it is to-day, since the intellectual patrimony of
humanity has been so immeasurably increased, since space and
time no longer exist, since the intellectual, financial, industrial,
and commercial relations between the different aggregates have
been multiplied a million-fold, since the slightest disturbance in
Pekin or Bankok has its immediate repercussion in Paris and
London — how vastly different it is to-day, in this age of
international intercommunication and interpenetration, to what
it was in the former ages of national isolation, need certainly
not be further insisted upon. Any misfortune befalling a
great nation assumes at once the character of an international
disaster; the disintegration and disruption of one nation are
followed by the disintegration and disruption of the others.
Folly would it be, folly worthy of the lowest species of the
professionally patriotic Press, did any one nation of Western
society rejoice at the decay of another nation. For the loss
to civilisation implied by a weakening, not to speak of the
disappearance, of a great and indispensable cultural entity —
such as every nation of Western society undoubtedly is —
would be as incalculable as it would be irreparable. And the
catastrophe would naturally not remain isolated — it would
herald the advent of similar catastrophes elsewhere, and the
ultimate break up of the whole of Western society.

It is precisely the extraordinarily international character
of contemporary civilisation which renders the dangers that
menace this civilisation doubly great. The repercussion of
the post office strike and of the railroad strike in France, has
not tarried in making itself felt in Great Britain in the shape of
the railroad strike in the latter country in 1911. And the

CONCLUSIONS 279

strike in Great Britain has certainly not been without effect
on the proletarian masses in the German Empire, in Austria,
and in Italy. When in one country a disorganisation and
disintegration of society become visible, this disorganisation,
this disintegration, tend to manifest themselves elsewhere. In
the various nations that compose the great Western family on
both sides of the ocean, social diseases are of a highly
contagious nature. It is therefore far from being an
indifferent matter to other nations when one of them is
afflicted with disease ; for the latter, unless repressed in time,
will gain ground and spread with alarming rapidity, com-
municating far and wide the fatal germs.

We are told in season and out of season that a return to
the past is impossible ; and doubtless is this assertion a mere
truism, if it is thereby meant that contemporary societies
cannot reassume the structure which they had in past
centuries, structure that has unceasingly been modified by the
uninterrupted flow of the tide of evolution. But it is false,
and radically false, if it is thereby meant that the past is not
the great and inexhaustible source from which the present can
draw its knowledge and its wisdom. The experience of the
past, the experience accumulated by centuries of successive
generations, is the torch that lights up the shadows of the
present and that enables us to shape, to a certain extent, the
future. Society has at all times been confronted by the redoubt-
able problem of the relations of the individual to the collectivity ;
and if this problem, by reason of the growth of the spirit of
rationalism, is to-day more difficult to solve than formerly,
then is there all the more reason for consulting the past, for
endeavouring to steer the social barque by the help of the
unique compass that is constituted by the experience of our
forerunners. These had the same problem to solve, these
were acquainted with the same perils and difficulties. And
the problem is not susceptible of different solutions, the

280 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHRISTIANITY

laws of life remain invariable, the changes operated in the
functions and structure of society are always strictly
limited by those laws and by the necessity of rigorously
conforming to them. Human nature is not subject to
variation; and the problem of how to discipline it, of how
to repress egotism, of how to establish authority, remains
invariable likewise.

The history of civilisation shows us how the problem has
been solved in the past : and the solution, like the problem,
has never varied. Everywhere we can see discipline
maintained by a religious authority, that is to say, by an
authority that is of its nature supra-rational. Rationalism,
being an essentially individual product, is impotent to impose
authority on the individual, to reduce the latter to subor-
dination. This remains true to-day as in the past. To-day,
as formerly, recourse must be had to supra-rational and
supra-individual principles in order to establish authority.
And to-day is it especially urgent that authority be established,
an authority based on principles that command universal
moral assent and that are beyond the reach of rational
criticism. The need of such authority is felt and admitted
by the overwhelming majority of thinkers ; but, despite the
numerous endeavours unceasingly made, no satisfactory solution
of this all-important problem has been arrived at, for the
reason that almost all those who attempt to solve it seek to
base authority on rational principles and to derive it from
rational consent. Thus are we suffering to-day from the
effects of the Protestant Reformation, which transformed
the criterion of truth into a subjective one. It is evident
that no solution of the problem can be arrived at, if we a
priori refuse to ourselves the right of seeking beyond the
limits of rationalism for the basis of authority. Authority
cannot have a rationalist and a subjective basis, for it must
needs impose itself on the individual from without, it must

CONCLUSIONS 281

needs exact the submission of the individual to a power higher
than the latter and exterior to him. Otherwise is authority
nothing but a synonym of the arbitrary decrees of the
individual will.

Christianity, being an essentially social institution, could
not but provide an adequate basis for the authority so
necessary for social existence. In the Christian system,
authority is represented as having its source in God ; and God
has delegated His supreme authority to the various hierarchical
functionaries of the Church.1 And not only the ecclesiastical
dignitaries, but also the lay rulers, of whatever rank they may
be, are likewise invested by God with their authority ; the
Church, during the Middle Ages, never ceased to remind the
civil power of the subordination of all earthly might, how-
ever great, to a higher power quia regnum non est de hoc
mundo? Here, then, does authority possess a sufficient basis,
here is it established on principles that at once guarantee its
prestige. When we see the wonderful discipline that prevails
within the Catholic Church of East and West, the rigorous
subordination of each branch of the hierarchy to the branch
above it, the unquestioning submission of clergy and laymen
alike to the decisions of the supreme authority, whether Synod
or Sovereign Pontiff; then indeed do we understand that
the Catholic Church has solved the problem of how to enforce

1 This is clearly shown by the words of Jesus to St. Peter : Tibi ddbo claves
recfni caelorum. Et quodcumque ligaveris super terram, erit ligatum et in caelis ;
et quodcumque solveris super terram, erit solutum et in caelis.

2 The best example of the supremacy of the ecclesiastical power is furnished
by the claim of the Holy See to be the natural possessor of all territories not
belonging to the Christian patrimony of any of the European potentates. For
instance, the Holy See, as natural possessor, disposes of Prussia and Lithuania,
and "grants" these lands to the Order of German Knights ; it was, again, the
Holy See which, by the bull of Adrian V., "granted" Ireland to the English
monarch. The bull in question was a forgery, but the English monarch found
it advisable to have recourse to this forgery, to shelter his acts of piracy behind
the authority of the Holy See. Numerous are the instances in which the Holy
See, as natural possessor of all non-Christian lands, disposes of the latter and
grants them — under the pretence of evangelisation — to European potentates.

282 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHRISTIANITY

discipline by moral persuasion — the problem of how to base
authority on principles that command unquestioning respect
and obedience because they command universal moral assent.

The question that we must put ourselves remains therefore
this : In how far is Christianity, and more especially the
Catholic Church, capable of influencing the society of to -morrow
— what is the degree of influence which Catholicism is
capable of bringing to bear on society in order to prevent
the disintegration of the latter by reason of the absence of
adequate authority ? How far can we hope to see the
Christian ideal penetrate society and dominate society ?
Having preserved Western society from total elimination,
having reorganised and reconstructed it, having enabled it to
survive so many perils and to overcome so many difficulties,
Christianity is obviously the force best adapted to the needs of
Western civilisation. In the great conflict of the near future
between that civilisation and socialism, it will be found that the
surest instrument of social defence, the most efficient of social
forces, is Christianity. The diminution of the latter, the
weakening of Christian influence all over Europe during the
eighteenth century, had the Eevolution and all the untoward
consequences of the Revolution as a result. The weakening
of Christianity prevented it from checking the ancien regime in
France in its race towards the precipice ; and this loss of
power prevented it likewise from exerting its influence on
the momentous social transformations which marked the end
of the eighteenth and the beginning of the nineteenth
century. These great social transformations, produced by the
economic evolution of society, and determined by exclusively
economic causes, carry with them the traces of their
materialistic origin, and of a development uninfluenced by
ethical forces. We have only to compare the social trans-
formations of the end of the eighteenth century with those
operated during the early Middle Ages, in order to see how

CONCLUSIONS 283

prodigious is the difference due to the absence of all influence
of Christianity on the former. Whereas the great social trans-
formations of the Middle Ages had as a result the consolida-
tion of Western society, its integration and discipline, the
substitution of order and organisation for anarchy and
incoherence ; the transformations that marked the advent of
the industrial era and the conquest of power by the bourgeoisie
have had the growth of rampant egotism, the obscuring of all
notions of social duty and social discipline, the slackening of
the bonds of social integration, as their inevitable consequence.
The social transformations over which Christianity presided in
the Middle Ages led to the reconstruction and reorganisation of
Western society ; the transformations effected in modern times
independently of all Christian influence are leading rapidly
to its disruption.

The astonishing essor of industry and commerce, the increase
of wealth and prosperity, the expansion of Western society in
the world — all these phenomena tended inevitably to increase
egotism and to further the growth of materialism. With
society as with the individual, moments of prosperity are also
moments in which the earnestness of life, the meaning of the
great problems which life sets before us, are lost sight of.
There is a profound truth in the words of Goethe :

Alles in der Welt lasst sich ertragen,
Nur nicht eine Reihe von schonen Tagen.

Prosperity is not good for a nation, or for an individual, if it
come too suddenly or if it be too prolonged. The vital force
of a nation is diminished by too long or too sudden prosperity.
But the accumulation of wealth has limits set to it ; and it is
certain that the twentieth century will see no increase in its
riches at all comparable with the increase which the nineteenth
century obtained by comparison with the eighteenth. And
grave problems are awaiting solution : there are political

284 SOCIOLOGICAL VALUE OF CHRISTIANITY

problems enough to be solved in Africa, in the Balkans, in

Persia — and behind these political problems are the immense

social questions of our times. War-clouds loom on the horizon,

and the thunder of the approaching social revolution is heard

ever more and more distinctly. The era of prosperity, of

money-making, of peace, will not be for much longer ; there is

a tension in the atmosphere that can be relieved only by a

tempest. And these strifes and bitter conflicts, political and

social, which appear inevitable — there will be no reason to

regret them if only they have as a result the reorganisation and

re-integration of a society that, too long accustomed to

prosperity, has fallen a prey to anarchy. We must never

forget that strife is the great instrument of all social progress ;

the universal peace era dreamed of by cranks and faddists is

an impossibility, or else it will be the beginning of the end of

society. It is in the strife that awaits it, amidst the conflicts

of to-morrow, that Western society will show its capacities —

will show whether or not it is degenerate, whether or not it

still has stores of vital energy intact. Only then will we be

able to judge as to whether Western civilisation is in a position

to maintain itself and its position in the world ; if it is not

able to do this, if a too prolonged spell of peace and prosperity

has irremediably gangrened it, then must Western civilisation

abdicate, then must it be eliminated, then must it disappear

from the world's stage, and its place thereon will be taken by

that Oriental civilisation which is at once so venerable and so

young. Those who prefer living from day to day, and who

dislike having their comfort and their ease of mind disturbed,

affect to scoff at what is known as the Yellow Peril. Such as

these are ripe for enlistment in the peace brigade. Those, on

the other hand, who are not afraid to look ahead, not afraid to

be brandmarked as pessimists, will come to the conclusion that

the Yellow Peril is not a phantasm, but a reality. Here is not

the place to go more deeply into the question. But certain it

CONCLUSIONS 285

is that, if Western society is to maintain itself in the struggle
for the world hegemony with Eastern society, the former will
have to reorganise itself, to discipline itself, to put an end to
the anarchy that must otherwise prove its ruin. As we have
said, the internal conflicts which await Western society will
show the latter's value, will — so may it be hoped — prove a
precious stimulant to an indispensable reorganisation. And
this reorganisation can be carried out, if it is to be efficacious,
only on Christian principles. After the storm and strife, after
having endured the ordeal of fire and been put to the test of
the sword — perhaps then will Western society recognise the
necessity of returning to the traditions thanks to which it has
evolved from out of the ruins of the Eoman empire to those
heights of culture, on the summits of which the proudest and
loftiest movements of the human genius are to be contemplated
and venerated.

THE END

Printed by R. & R. CLARK, LIMITED, Edinburgh.

BY THE SAME AUTHOR.

HEREDITY AND SELECTION IN
SOCIOLOGY

One Volume. Pp. xxx-571.
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SOME COMMENTS OF THE PRESS

Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science. —
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SOME PRESS OPINIONS

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then follows a fair and impartial account of the theories of Spencer, Weismann, and
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" Dr. Herbert has produced a book which we think will be widely read and will
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BO often puzzle beginners; and the printing and page are very pleasant." — Man-
chester Guardian.

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