The ‘Life of Lord George Bentinck’ is an admirably written biography of the friend who had stood by Disraeli in his conflict with Peel, and who, after living long enough to show promise of eminence, had suddenly and prematurely died. To the student of the Parliamentary history of those times the book is of great value. To the general reader the most interesting parts of it are those which throw light on Disraeli’s own mind.
The most important fact to every man is his religion. If we would know what a man is we ask what notions he has formed about his duty to man and God. The question is often more easily asked than answered, for ordinary persons repeat what they have learnt, and have formed no clear notions at all; and the few wise, though at bottom they may be as orthodox as a bishop, prefer usually to keep their thoughts to themselves. Disraeli, however, in this book invites attention to his own views. An insincere profession on such a subject forfeits the respect of everyone, and we are entitled to examine what he says and to enquire how far he means it.
ALTERNATIVE THEORIES OF LIFE
Those who cannot bear suspense and feel the necessity of arriving at a positive conclusion, make their choice between two opinions—one, that God created the world and created man to serve Him, that He gave to man a revelation of His law and holds him answerable for disobedience to it: the other, that the world has been generated by the impersonal forces of nature: that all things in it, animate and inanimate, find their places and perform their functions according to their several powers and properties; that man having ampler faculties than other animals, discovers the rules which are good for him to follow, as he discovers other things, and that what he calls ‘revelations’ are no more than successive products of the genius of gifted members of his race thrown out in a series of ages. The second of these theories is what we generally call the ‘creed of science;’ the first is the religious and is represented by Judaism and Christianity. Disraeli, with a confessed pride in belonging himself to the favoured race, desires us to understand that he receives with full and entire conviction the fact that a revelation was really made to his forefathers, and rejects the opposite speculation as unsupported by evidence and degrading to human nature. The subject is introduced in an argument for the admission of the Jews to Parliament. He does not plead for their admission on the principle of ‘toleration,’ which he rejects as indifferentism, but on the special merits of the Jews themselves, and on their services to mankind. He regards Christianity as simply completed Judaism. Those who profess to be Jews only he considers unfortunate in believing only the first part of their religion, but still as defending and asserting the spiritual view of man’s nature in opposition to the scientific, and as holding a peculiar place in the providential dispensation. He speaks of the mysteries of Christianity in a tone which, if not sincere, is detestable. ‘If,’ he says, ‘the Jews had not prevailed upon the Romans to crucify our Lord, what would have become of the atonement? But the human mind cannot contemplate the idea that the most important deed of time could depend upon human will. The immolator was preordained, like the Victim, and the holy race supplied both.’ The most orthodox divine could not use severer words of censure than Disraeli used for the critical rationalism which treats the sacred history as a myth—for Bishop Colenso, for the Essayists and Reviewers. His words have not the ring of the genuine theological metal. Artificial and elaborate diction is not the form in which simple belief expresses itself. Yet the fault may not be entirely in Disraeli. Even when most in earnest he was inveterately affected. It is to be remembered also that in his real nature he remained a Jew, and his thoughts on these great subjects ran on Asiatic rather than on European lines. We imagine that the Scriptures must be read everywhere into the same meaning; we forget how much European thought has passed into them through the traditions of the Church and through the various translations. In the English version St. Paul reasons like an Englishman. A Jew reads in St. Paul’s language allusions to oriental customs and beliefs of which Europeans know nothing; we have therefore no reason to suspect Disraeli of insincerity because he did not express himself as we do.
RELIGION AND THE STATE
Perhaps the truth may be this: He was a Conservative English statesman; he knew that the English Church was the most powerful Conservative institution still remaining. Criticism was eating into it on one side, and ritualism on the other, breaking through the old use and wont, the traditionary habits which were its strongest bulwarks. He wished well to the Church. He was himself a regular communicant, and he desired to keep it as it was. He believed in the religious principle as against the philosophic; and from the nature of his mind he must have known that national religions do not rest upon argument and evidence. When forms vary from age to age and country to country no one of them can be absolutely free from error. Plato, having drawn the model of a commonwealth with a code of laws as precise as positive enactment can prescribe, goes on to say that for conduct in ordinary life which law cannot reach there is the further rule of religion. Religion, however, is a thing which grows and cannot be made. The central idea that man is a responsible being is everywhere the same; but the idea shapes various forms for itself, into which legend, speculation, and prevailing opinions necessarily enter. As time goes on, therefore, questions rise concerning this or that fact and this or that ceremony, which if indulged will create general scepticism. Such enquiries must be sternly repressed. In religion lies the only guidance for human life. The wise legislator, therefore, will regard the Church of his country as the best support of the State. The subject will reflect that although observances may seem offensive and stories told about the gods may seem incredible; yet as a rule of action a system which has been the growth of ages is infinitely more precious than any theory which he could think out for himself. He will know that his own mind, that the mind of any single individual, is unequal to so vast a matter, that it is of such immeasurable consequence to him to have his conduct wisely directed that, although the body of his religion be mortal like his own, he must not allow it to be rudely meddled with. He may think as he likes about the legends of Zeus and Here, but he must keep his thoughts to himself: a man who brings into contempt the creed of his country is the deepest of criminals; he deserves death and nothing less. Θανάτῳ ζημιούσθω, ‘Let him die for it’ a remarkable expression to have been used by the wisest and gentlest of human lawgivers.
Disraeli’s opinions on these subjects were perhaps the same as Plato’s. He too may have had his uncertainties about Zeus and Here, and yet have had no uncertainty at all about the general truth of the teaching of the Church of England, while as a statesman he was absolutely convinced of the necessity of supporting and defending it, defending it alike from open enemies and from the foolish ecclesiastical revivalism into which Tractarianism had degenerated. The strength of the Church lay in its hold upon the habits of the people, and whoever was breaking through the usages which time had made familiar and consecrated was equally dangerous and mischievous. The critics were bringing in reason to decide questions which belonged to conscience and imagination. The ritualists were bringing back pagan superstition in a pseudo-Christian dress. He despised the first. He did what he could to restrain the second with a Public Worship Bill as soon as he had power to interfere. Late in his career, when he was within view of the Premiership, he used an opportunity of expressing his feeling on the subject in his own characteristic manner.
A SCENE AT OXFORD
Oxford having produced the High Churchmen, was now generating rationalists and philosophers. Intellectual society was divided into the followers of Strauss and Darwin and those who believed that the only alternative was the ‘Summa Theologiæ.’ Both streams were concentrated in support of the Liberal leader, who was Disraeli’s political antagonist; one because he represented progress, the other because in matters spiritual he was supposed to hold the most advanced Catholic doctrines. In the year 1864 Disraeli happened to be on a visit at Cuddesdon, and it happened equally that a diocesan conference was to be held at Oxford at the time, with Bishop Wilberforce in the chair. The spiritual atmosphere was, as usual, disturbed. The clerical mind had been doubly exercised by the appearance of Colenso on the ‘Pentateuch’ and Darwin on the ‘Origin of Species.’ Disraeli, to the surprise of everyone, presented himself in the theatre. He had long abandoned the satins and silks of his youth, but he was as careful of effect as he had ever been, and had prepared himself in a costume elaborately negligent. He lounged into the assembly in a black velvet shooting-coat and a wide-awake hat, as if he had been accidentally passing through the town. It was the fashion with University intellect to despise Disraeli as a man with neither sweetness nor light; but he was famous, or at least notorious, and when he rose to speak there was general curiosity. He began in his usual affected manner, slowly and rather pompously, as if he had nothing to say beyond perfunctory platitudes.
The Oxford wits began to compare themselves favourably with the dulness of Parliamentary orators, when first one sentence and then another startled them into attention. They were told that the Church was not likely to be disestablished. It would remain, but would remain subject to a Parliament which would not allow an imperium in imperio. It must exert itself and reassert its authority, but within the limits which the law laid down. The interest grew deeper when he came to touch on the parties to one or other of which all his listeners belonged. High Church and Low Church were historical and intelligible, but there had arisen lately, the speaker said, a party called the Broad, never before heard of. He went on to explain what Broad Churchmen were.