"The poor man finds himself in an armed world where might is God, and poverty is fettered. Abroad the hired soldier blocks up the path of freedom, and the priest the path of progress. Every penniless man, woman, and child is virtually the property of the capitalist, no less in England than is the slave in New Orleans.* Society blockades poverty, leaving it scarce escape. The artisan is engaged in an imminent struggle against wrong and injustice; then what has he the struggler, to do with doctrines which brand him with inherited guilt, which paralyse him by an arbitrary faith, which deny saving power to good works, which menace him with eternal perdition?"
The two first works of importance, controverting Secularist principles, were by the Rev. Joseph Parker and Dr. J. A. Langford; Dr. Parker was ingenious, Dr. Langford eloquent. I had discussed with Dr. Parker in Banbury. In his Six Chapters on Secularism** which was the title of his book, he makes pleasant references to that debate. The Christian Weekly News of that day said: "These Six Chapters have been written by a young provincial minister of great power and promise, of whom the world has not yet heard, but of whom it will hear pleasing things some day."
* Not entirely so. The English slave can run away—at his
own peril.
** Published by my, then, neighbour, William Freeman, of 69
Fleet Street, himself an energetic, pleasant-minded
Christian.
This prediction has come true. I had told Mr. Freeman that the "young preacher" had given me that impression in the discussion with him. Dr. Parker said in his first Chapter that, "If the New Testament teachings oppose our own consciousness, violate our moral sense, lead us out of sympathy with humanity, then we shall abandon them." This was exactly the case of Secularism which he undertook to confute. Dr. Langford held a more rational religion than Dr. Parker. His Answer, which reached a second thousand, had passages of courtesy and friendship, yet he contended with graceful vigor against opinions—three-fourths of which justified his own.
In an address delivered Sept. 29, 1851, I had said that, "There were three classes of persons opposed to Christianity:—
"1. The dissolute.
"2. The indifferent.
"3. The intellectually independent.
"The dissolute are against Christianity because they regard it as a foe to sensuality. The indifferent reject it through being ignorant of it, or not having time to attend to it, or not caring to attend to it, or not being able to attend to it, through constitutional insensibility to its appeals. The intellectually independent avoid it as opposed to freedom, morality and progress." It was to these classes, and not to Christians, that Secularism was addressed. Neither Dr. Parker nor Dr. Langford took notice that it was intended to furnish ethical guidance where Christianity, whatever might be its quality, or pretensions, or merit, was inoperative.*
* In 1857 Dr. Joseph Parker published a maturer and more
important volume, Helps to Truth Seekers, or, Christianity
and Scepticism, containing "The Secularist Theory—A
Critique." At a distance of more than thirty-five years it
seems to me an abler book, from the Christian point of view,
than I thought it on its appearance.