[CONSEQUENCES OF THE EXECUTION OF SOCRATES.]
Aristotle was equally cowed. A little before his death, the chief priest of Eleusis, following the Socratic precedent, entered an indictment against him for impiety. This indictment was supported by citations of certain heretical doctrines from his published writings; on which Grote makes the significant remark, that his paean in honour of his friend Hermeias would be more offensive to the feelings of an ordinary Athenian citizen than any philosophical dogma extracted from the cautious prose compositions of Aristotle. That is to say, the execution of Socrates was always before his eyes; he had to pare his expressions so as not to give offence to Athenian orthodoxy. We can never know the full bearings of such a disturbing force. The editors of Aristotle complain of the corruptness of his text; a far worse corruptness lies behind. In Greece, Socrates alone had the courage of his opinions. While his views as to a future life, for example, are plain and frank, the real opinion of Aristotle on the question is an insoluble problem. Now, considering the enormous sway of Aristotle in modern Europe,—how desirable was it that his real sentiments had reached us unperverted by the Athenian burgher and the hemlock!
It would be too adventurous to continue the illustration in detail through the Christian ages. It is well known that the later schoolmen strove to represent reason as against authority, but wrote under the curb of the Papal power; hence their aims can only be divined. A modern instance or two will be still more effective.
It can at last be clearly seen what was the motive of Carlyle's perplexing style of composition. We now know what his opinions were, when he began to write, and that to express them then would have been fatal to his success; yet he was not a man to indulge in rank hypocrisy. He, accordingly, adopted a studied and ambiguous phraseology, which for long imposed upon the religious public, who put their own interpretation upon his mystical utterances, and gave him the benefit of any doubts. In the "Life of Sterling" he threw off the mask, but still was not taken at his word. Had there been a perfect tolerance of all opinions he would have begun as he ended; and his strain of composition, while still mystical and high-flown, would never have been identified with our national orthodoxy.
I have grave doubts as to whether we possess Macaulay's real opinions on religion. His way of dealing with the subject is so like the hedging of an unbeliever that, without some good assurance to the contrary, I must include him also among the imitators of Aristotle's "caution". Some future critic will devote himself, like Professor Mohl, to expounding his ambiguous utterances.
[EVIL OF DISFRANCHISING THE CLERGY.]
When Sir Charles Lyell brought out his "Antiquity of Man" he too was cautious. Knowing the dangers of his footing, he abstained from giving an estimate of the extension of time required by his evidences of human remains. Society in London, however, would not put up with that reticence, and he had to disclose at dinner parties what he had withheld from the public —namely, that, in his opinion, the duration of man could not be less than fifty thousand years.
These few instances must suffice to represent a long history of compelled reticence on the part of the men best qualified to instruct mankind. The question now is—What has been gained by it? What did the condemnation of Socrates do for the Athenian public? What did the chief priest of Eleusis hope to attain by indicting Aristotle? Unless we can show, as is no doubt attempted, that the set of opinions that happen to be consecrated at any one time, whether right or wrong, were essential to the existence of society,—then the attempt to improve upon them was truly meritorious, instead of being censurable. If the good of society as a whole is not plainly implicated, there remains only the interest of the place-holders under the existing system, as opposed to the interest of the mass of the people, who are, one and all, concerned in knowing the truth.
Again contracting the discussion to the narrow limits of the title of the essay, I must urge the special injury done to mankind by disfranchising the whole clerical class; that is to say, by depriving their authority of its proper weight in matters of faith. It is an incontrovertible rule of evidence, that the authority of an interested party is devoid of worth. Reasons are good in themselves, whoever utters them; but in trusting to authority, apart from reason, we need a disinterested authority. This the clergy at present are not, except on the points left undecided by the articles. If a man has five thousand a year, conditional on his holding certain views, his holding those views says nothing in their favour. For a much less bribe, plenty of men can be 'got to maintain any opinions whatsoever. When to this is added that, for certain other views, the holders are subjected to loss —it may be to fine, imprisonment, or death,—the value of men's adhesion to the favoured creed, as mere authority, is simply nil.
Truth, honesty, outspokenness, are not so well established as virtues, that we can afford to subject them to discouragement. The contrary course would be more for the general good in every way. When the law is intolerant in principle, men will be hypocrites from policy. You cannot train children to speak the truth if, from whatever cause, they have an interest in deception. A repressive discipline induces a coarse outward submission, but cannot reach the inward parts: it only engenders hatred, and substitutes for open revolt an insidious secret retaliation. Those only that come under the generous nurture of freedom can be counted on for hearty and willing devotion. If we would reap the higher virtues, we must sow on the soil of liberty. Encourage a man to say whatever he thinks, and you make the most of him; for difficult questions, where the mind needs all its powers, there should be no burdensome 'caution' in giving out the results.