In conclusion, let us try to go to the root of the matter. Two systems are suggested as cures for the evils under which society is suffering. On the one hand, it may be said, in accordance with the doctrines of Christianity and socialism, that these evils are the consequences of men’s perversity and selfishness, and that it behoves charity and fraternity to remedy them. We must do our best to assist our unfortunate brethren. But how? By trying, Christ tells us, to imitate God’s Kingdom, where “the last shall be first and the first last;”—or by “having all things in common,” say the Apostles in all the ardor of primitive Christianity, and later on certain religious communities;—or by the giving of alms and other charitable acts, says the Christianity of the middle ages;—while socialism maintains that this may be affected by reforms in the laws regulating the division of property. On the other hand, political economy and evolutionary sociology teach us that these miseries are the inevitable and beneficent consequences of natural laws; that these laws, being necessary conditions of progress, any endeavor to do away with them would be to disturb the order of nature and delay the dawn of better things. By “the weeding out of the sickly and infirm,” and the survival of the fittest, the process of amelioration of species in the animal kingdom is accomplished. The law of natural selection should be allowed free and ample scope in human society. “Society is not a manufacture, but a growth.” Might is really right, for it is to the general interest that the mighty should triumph and perpetuate the race. Thus argues what is now called Science.
In a book entitled “The True History of Joshua Davidson,” the author places ideal Christianity and contemporary society face to face, and shows very clearly the opposition which exists between the doctrines of would-be science and those of the Gospel:—
“If the dogmas of political economy are really exact, if the laws of the struggle for life and the survival of the fittest must really be applied to human society, as well as to plants and animals, then let us at once admit that Christianity, which gives assistance to the poor and needy, and which stretches out a hand to the sinner, is a mere folly; and let us at once abandon a belief which influences neither our political institutions nor our social arrangements, and which ought not to influence them. If Christ was right, then our present Christianity is wrong, and if sociology really contains scientific truth, then Jesus of Nazareth spoke and acted in vain, or rather He rebelled against the immutable laws of nature.” (Tauchnitz edition, p. 252.)
Mr. William Graham, in his “Creed of Science” (p. 278), writes as follows:—
“This great and far-reaching controversy, the most important in the history of our species, which is probably as old as human society itself, and certainly as old as the ‘Republic’ of Plato, in which it is discussed, or as Christianity, which began with a communistic form of society, had yet only within the past half-century come to be felt as a controversy involving real and living issues of a momentous character, and not utopias only remotely bordering upon the possible.”
I think it may be proved that this so-called “doctrine of science” is contrary to facts, and is, consequently, not scientific; whereas the creed of Christianity is in keeping with both present facts and ideal humanity.
Darwin borrowed his ideal of the struggle for existence and the survival of the fittest from Malthus, from whom he also drew his theories of evolution and of transformism; but no naturalist ever dreamt of applying either of these laws to human society. It has been reserved to sociology to attempt this, because it has accepted, blindfolded, from the hands of economists, this most erroneous principle: that society is governed by natural laws, and that it suffices to give them free scope for the greatest possible happiness and prosperity to reign. It is manifestly true that, as human society is comprehended in what we call Nature, it must obey her laws; but the laws and institutions, in all their different forms, which decree as to the acquisition and transmission of property or possessions, and hereditary succession, in a word, all civil and penal laws, emanate from men’s will, and from the decisions of legislators; and if experience, or a higher conception of justice, shows us that these laws are bad, or in any way lacking, we are free to change them. As far as the Darwinian laws are concerned, it would be perfectly impossible to apply them to existing society without more radically destroying all established institutions than the most avowed Nihilist would wish to do.
If it be really advisable that the law of the “survival of the fittest” should be established amongst us, the first step to be taken would be the abolition of all laws which punish theft and murder. Animals provide themselves with food by physical activity and the use of their muscles. Among men, in consequence of successive institutions, such as slavery, servitude, and revenue, numbers of people now live in plenty on their income, and do nothing at all. If Mr. Herbert Spencer is really desirous to see the supreme principle, “reward in proportion to desert,” in force amongst us, he must obtain, first of all, the suppression of the existing regulations as to property. In the animal world, the destiny of each is decided by its aptitudes. Among ourselves, the destiny of each is determined by the advantages obtained or inherited from parents, and the heir to, or owner of, a large estate is sure to be well received everywhere. We see then, that before Darwinian laws can become established, family succession must be abolished. Animals, like plants, obey the instincts of nature, and reproduce themselves rapidly; but incessant carnage prevents their too excessive multiplication! As men become more civilized, peace becomes more general; they talk of their fellow-men as their brothers, and some philosophers even dream—the madmen!—of arbitration supplanting war! The equilibrium between the births and the deaths is thus upset! To balance it again, let us glorify battles, and exclaim, with General Moltke, that the idea of suppressing them is a mischievous utopia; let us impose silence on those dangerous fanatics who repeat incessantly, “Peace on earth, good-will towards men.”
In the very heart of nature reigns seeming injustice; or, as M. Renan puts it more strongly, nature is the embodiment of injustice. A falling stone crushes both the honest man and the scamp! A bird goes out to find food for its young, and after long search is returning to its nest with its well-earned gains, when an eagle, the despot of the air, swoops down and steals the food; we think this iniquitous and odious, and would not tolerate such an instance amongst us. Vigorous Cain kills gentle Abel. Right and justice protest. They should not do so, for it is the mere putting in practice “of the purifying process by which nature weeds out the least powerful and prevents the vitiation of the race by the multiplication of its inferior samples.” Helvetius admirably defines, for its condemnation, this Darwinian law which Herbert Spencer would have society accept:—
“The savage says to those who are weaker than himself: Look up to the skies and you see the eagle swooping down on the dove; cast your eyes on the earth and you see the lion tearing to pieces the stag or the antelope; while in the depths of the ocean small fishes are destroyed by sharks. The whole of nature announces that the weak must be the prey of the strong. Strength is a gift of the gods. Through it I become possessor of all it is in my power to capture.” (“De l’Homme,” iv. 8.)
The constant effort of moralists and legislators has been to replace the reign of might by a reign of justice. As Bacon says, In societate aut vis aut lex viget. The object is to subject men’s actions more and more to the empire of the law, and that the law should be more and more in conformity with equity. Society has ever been, and still is, to a great extent, too much a reflection of nature. Violations of justice are numerous, and, if these are to be put a stop to, we must oppose ourselves still more to the laws of nature, instead of contemplating their re-establishment.
This is why Christianity, which is an ardent aspiration after justice, is in real accordance with true science. In the book of Job the problem is tragically proposed. The unjust are equally happy with the just, and, as in nature, the strong live at the cost of the weak. Right protests against this, and the voice of the poor is raised against their oppressors. Listen. What deep thought is contained in the following passage!—“Wherefore do the wicked live, become old, yea, are mighty in power? Their seed is established in their sight with them, and their offspring before their eyes. Their houses are safe from fear, neither is the rod of God upon them” (Job xxi. 7-9). “Some remove land-marks; they violently take away flocks and feed thereof. They cause him to go naked without clothing, and they take away the sheaf from the hungry; which make oil within their walls, and tread their wine-presses, and suffer thirst” (Job xxiv. 2, 10, 11).
The prophets of Israel raised an eloquent protest against the evils then reigning in society, and announced that a time should come when justice would be established upon the earth. These hopes of a Messiah were expressed in such precise terms that they may serve as a programme of the reforms which yet remain to be accomplished. “He shall judge the poor of the people, He shall save the children of the needy, and shall break in pieces the oppressor. He shall spare the poor and needy, and shall save the souls of the needy. There shall be an handful of corn in the earth upon the top of the mountains” (Psalm lxxii. 4, 13, 16). “And the work of righteousness shall be peace; and the effect of righteousness, quietness and assurance for ever” (Isaiah xxxii. 17). “Surely I will no more give thy corn to be meat for thine enemies, and the sons of the stranger shall not drink thy wine, for the which thou hast labored; but they that have gathered it shall eat it, and praise the Lord; and they that have brought it together shall drink it in the courts of My holiness” (Isaiah lxii. 8, 9). In the New Jerusalem “there shall be no more sorrow nor crying,” “They shall not build, and another inhabit; they shall not plant, and another eat; for as the days of a tree are the days of My people, and Mine elect shall long enjoy the work of their hands” (Isaiah lxv. 21, 22).
The prophet thus raises his voice in favor of the poor, in the name of justice, not of charity and mercy. “The Lord will enter into judgment with the ancients of His people and the princes thereof: for ye have eaten up the vineyard; the spoil of the poor is in your houses. What mean ye that ye beat My people to pieces, and grind the faces of the poor? saith the Lord God of hosts” (Isaiah iii. 14, 15). “Woe unto them that join house to house, that lay field to field, till there be no place, that they may be placed alone in the midst of the earth” (Isaiah v. 8). In the future society property will be ensured to all, and every one will “sit under his vine and under his fig-tree” (Micah iv. 4).
The ideal of the prophets comprehends, then, in the first place, the triumph of justice, which will bring liberty to the oppressed, consolation to the outcast, and the produce of their labors to the workers; and secondly, and chiefly, it will bring the glorification and domination of the elect people—Israel.
The ideal of the Gospel makes less of this second consideration of national grandeur and pre-eminence, and places in the foreground the radical transformation of the social order. The Gospel is the “good tidings of great joy,” the Εὐαγγέλιον, carried to the poor, the approach of the Kingdom of God—that is to say, of the reign of justice. “The last shall be first;” therefore the pretended “natural order” will be reversed!
Who will possess the earth? Not the mightiest, as in the animal creation, and as Darwinian laws decree; not the rich, “for it is easier for a camel to go through a needle’s eye than for a rich man to enter the Kingdom of God.” Lazarus is received into Abraham’s bosom, while Dives is cast into the place of torment, “where there is weeping and gnashing of teeth.” The first of biological precepts, the one respecting the survival of the fittest, as it immolates others for personal benefit, is essentially selfish, which is a vice incessantly reprobated in the New Testament. “Look not every man on his own things, but every man also on the things of others” (Philippians ii. 4). The chief of all Christian virtues is charity; it is the very essence of the Gospel. “Seek ye first the Kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things shall be added unto you” (St. Matthew vi. 33).
How very true is the economic doctrine that, with equitable laws, each should enjoy the integral produce of his labor, and that, were this the case, personal activity would attain its highest degree. Nothing is more adverse to the prosperity of a nation than unjust laws; and this is precisely what the prophets and Christ teach us.
If Darwinian laws were applied to human society, the utility of history, considered as a moral lesson for both kings and people, would be destroyed. The history of man might then be looked upon as a mere zoological strife between nations, and a simple lengthening out of natural history. What moral instruction can possibly be drawn from the study of the animal world, where the strong devour or destroy the weak. No spectacle could be more odious or more demoralizing!
The incomparable sublimity of the Gospel, which is, alas! only too often misinterpreted, consists in an ardent longing for perfection, in that aspiration for an ideal of justice which urged Jesus and His earliest disciples to condemn the world as it then was. Thence sprang the hatred of evil in its many various forms, the desire for better things, for reforms and progress! Why do Mahometans stand still in the march of civilization, while Christian countries advance ever more and more rapidly? Because the first are resigned to evil, whereas the second combat and endeavor to extirpate it. The stoicism—the elevated character of which can hardly be sufficiently admired—the austerity, and purity of such ancients as Marcus Aurelius, nevertheless, bowed before absolute facts, looking upon them as the inevitable results of the actual and natural order of things. Like modern evolutionists, they glorified the laws of nature, considering them perfect. Their optimism led them so far as to adore the cosmos as a divinity. “All that thou wilt, O Cosmos,” says Marcus Aurelius, “is my will; nothing is too early or too late for me, if it be at the hour thou decidest upon. My fruit is such as thy seasons bring, O Nature! From thee comes all. Thou art all. All go towards thee. If the gods be essentially good and just, they must have permitted nothing, in the arrangement of the world, contrary to right and justice.” What a contrast between this serene satisfaction and the complaints of Job, of the prophets, and of Christ Himself! The true Christian, in direct opposition to stoics and to Mr. Herbert Spencer, holds that the world is completely infected with evil; he avoids it carefully, and lives in the hope of a general cataclysm, which will reduce our globe to ashes, and make place for a new and purified heaven and earth! The belief of stoics and of evolutionary sociologists logically advocates inaction, for it respects the present order of things as attributable to natural laws. The Christian’s belief leads him to ardently desire reform and progress, but also, when he is deceived and reduced to despair, it occasionally culminates in revolutionary violence and in Nihilism.
Not only Jesus, but all great religious reformers, such as Buddha, Mahomet, Luther, and the great philosophers, especially Socrates and Plato, and the great law-givers, from Solon and Lycurgus to the legislators of the French Revolution—all the elect of humanity, in fact—are struck with the evils under which our race is forced to suffer, and have imagined and revealed an ideal social order more in conformity with the ideal of justice; and in their writings they place this Utopia in contrast with the existing order. The more Christianity becomes despoiled of dogmas, and the more the ideas of moral and social reform, contained in Christ’s teachings, are brought forward as the chief aim, the more Mr. Herbert Spencer’s principles will be shunned and avoided. In the splendid development of Roman law, which lasted fifteen hundred years, a similar evolution took place. In the beginning, in the laws of the twelve tables, many traces of the hard law in favor of the mighty may be found. This is symbolized by the lance (quir), which gave its name to the quiritarian right. The father was allowed to sell or destroy his children, as they were his possession. He had absolute power over his slaves, who were his “things”. The creditor might throw his debtor in prison, or even cause him to be cut in pieces—in partes secanto. The wife was entirely in her husband’s power—in manu. Little by little, as centuries rolled on, eminent lawgivers succeeded each other, and gradual changes were made, so that, finally, just and humanitarian principles penetrated the entire Roman code, and the Darwinian law, which glorifies might, gave place to the Christian law, which extols justice.
This movement will most assuredly continue, in spite of all the abuse it may receive from Mr. Herbert Spencer, and from others who think as he does. It is a result of the advance of civilization from the commencement of Christianity, and even from the time of the prophets of Israel. It will manifest itself, not as it did in the middle ages, by works of mercy, but, under the control of economic science, by the intervention of the State in favor of the disinherited, and by measures such as Mr. Shaw Lefevre approves of, so that each and all should be placed in a position to be able to command reward in proportion to the amount of useful labor accomplished.
Darwinian laws, generally admitted in the domain of natural history and in the animal kingdom, will never be applied to human societies, until the sentiments of charity and justice, which Christianity engraves on our hearts, are completely eradicated.—Contemporary Review.