THE LIBRARY OF THE NEW YORK STATE SCHOOL OF INDUSTRIAL AND LABOR RELATIONS AT CORNELL UNIVERSITY Cornell University Library The original of tliis bool< is in tine Cornell University Library. There are no known copyright restrictions in the United States on the use of the text. http://www.archive.org/details/cu31924002674566 MARXIAN SOCIALISM AND RELIGION A Study of the Relation of the Marxian Theories to the Fundamental Principles of Religion BY JOHN SPARGO Author of "Socialism, a Summary and Interpretation of Socialist Principles," "Applied Socialism,'' "The Substance of Socialism," "Syndicalism, Industrial Union- ism and Socialism," etc., etc. NEW YORK B. W. HUEBSCH .,.. 1915 „ Copyright, 1915, by B. W. HUEBSCH TO NINA BULL Amicus tuque ad aras PREFACE The Socialist challenge to the heart and brain of modern civilization has inspired a literature of vast magnitude. Socialism has been advocated and opposed, praised and condemned, in a bewil- dering array of books and pamphlets, printed in all languages and dealing with the subject from every point of view imaginable. A considerable portion of this great mass of lit- erature deals with the subject of religion and the relation of Socialism thereto. Anti-Socialist writers have claimed, in numerous books and pam- phlets, that Socialism is the deadly enemy of religion, while the advocates of Socialism, in books and pamphlets equally numerous, have denied the accusation. To support their charge, the Anti-Socialists have gleaned from the writings and speeches of Social- ists a formidable array of atheistic and anti- religious quotations. Every statement by a So- cialist, assailing or ridiculing religious beliefs, cere- monies or institutions, has been carefully preserved to become a shaft in the Anti-Socialist quiver. To refute the charge, the Socialist advocates viii PREFACE have declared that the anti-religious utterances quoted against them must be regarded as the ex- pression of individual opinions, in nowise binding upon or committing the Socialist movement. They have made the most of the formal declara- tions of the Socialist parties that Socialism is not antagonistic to religion. Against the anti- religious statements of some Socialists they have balanced the religious statements of other Social- ists, and the Socialist utterances of noted religious leaders. In England, the charge that Socialism and atheism go together was met by the challenge of the Socialists that for every atheist among So- cialists named by the Anti-Socialists they would name a dozen among well-known members of the Liberal and Tory parties. As in the theological controversies of an earlier day, there has been a warfare of texts. Naturally, this method of controversy has brought forth all the evils manifested in the theo- logical disputations of the past. Textual warfare develops the worst phases of partizanship. Iso- lated passages, torn from their contexts, have been made to convey meanings quite opposed to the In- tention of their authors; numerous and intermin- able disputes have taken place over the interpreta- tion of obscure texts, and there have been mistranslations, cunning interpolations and for- PREFACE ix genes — quite after the fashion of theological controversy. But the gravest objection of all to the method is that it leads nowhere and can determine nothing except the fact that many Sociahsts have opposed religion. And that fact no candid mind will at- tempt to deny. When so much has been shown, we are as far as ever from knowing whether op- position to religion by Socialists is accidental, an individual matter, resulting from the mental and temperamental peculiarities of individuals, or from their intellectual environment, or whether it is the logical and necessary outcome of the Socialist philosophy. So far as I am aware, the present volume is the only work on the subject of Socialism and religion which absolutely ignores the warfare of texts. It is the only work on the subject, so far as I am aware, which attempts to determine whether or not Socialism and religion are opposed to each other, by means of a candid analysis and comparison of both. Whatever the defects of this contribution to the discussion may be, it has at least this merit: it approaches the question in a more philosophical spirit than has generally prevailed, and in a man- ner less open to abuse. I have carefully distinguished between Socialism as an economic programme and the Marxian the- X PREFACE ories which form the theoretical and philosophical basis of the modern Socialist movement. After a careful analysis of religion, ending with a defi- nition of religion which is entirely candid and free from the charge of evasiveness, I have carefully outlined the Marxian synthesis, with special em- phasis upon the one doctrine in it which has been held by most Anti-Socialist writers, and some Socialist writers, to be incompatible with religious belief. I have tried to show that there is nothing in the Marxian theories, or in any of their neces- sary implications, which the essential principles of religion either explicitly or implicitly oppose or deny. I believe that I have demonstrated this be- yond reasonable doubt, and that the open-minded reader will be compelled to acknowledge that Marxism and religion are not mutually exclusive; that there is nothing in the Marxian system of thought which requires a denial of belief in God, the Creator and Moral Ruler of the Universe, or of belief in the immortality of the soul. In my attempt to show how the Marxian theory of the materialistic conception of history applies to the evolution of religious conceptions, how man's conceptions of God and of immortality are influenced by his economic conditions, and his material environment In general, I have advanced a number of suggestions which, I must In fairness PREFACE xi warn the reader, are personal speculations only. They are no part of the theory itself and their refutation would not weaken the theory in any par- ticular. Furthermore, while the Socialist move- ment may be charged with responsibility for the theory so long as its advocates and spokesmen base their arguments upon it, for these personal specu- lations in which I have indulged the Socialist move- ment cannot justly be held responsible. I wish that it were possible for me to believe that this statement will prevent any of the critics of the So- cialist movement from making the claim that the suggestions to which I refer are inherent in the Socialist philosophy and holding my comrades responsible for them. My experience forbids the hope. Nevertheless, for honest minds, I have forestalled that trick. As far as possible, I have acknowledged in the text my indebtedness to other writers. But I am especially indebted for their definitions of religion to Professor Thomas C. Hall, D.D. ; Rev. George Hodges, D.D. ; Professor Charles P. Fagnani, D.D. ; Rev. Samuel Schulman, D.D. ; Rev. Maurice Harris, D.D.; Rev. John Augustus Ryan, D.D. ; Professor Simon N. Patten and Mr. Rufus W. Weeks. I am also obliged for various courte- sies to the Principal of Manchester College, Ox- ford, Dr. J. Estlin Carpenter; Rev. Anson Phelps xii PREFACE Stokes, of Yale ; Professor Walter Rauschenbusch, and Mr. Algernon Lee, Educational Director of the Rand School of Social Science, New York. It is my earnest hope that the book will con- tribute to a better understanding of Sodalism by many men and women of religious belief and affil- iations, and to a better understanding of religion by my fellow Socialists. If it lessens the misun- derstanding and prejudice between these two classes I shall be well content. J. S. " Nestledown," Old Bennington, Vermont. August, 1915. CONTENTS CHAPTER I PAGE Religion and the Socialist Programme i An objective definition of Socialism — 'Wherein it dif- fers from Communism — The Socialist principle illus- trated — Scope of the present inquiry — Hostility of the forces of organized Socialism and organized religion — The two movements in a state of constant conflict — Ef- forts of minorities in both movements to stop the con- flict — Religious and Socialist press reflects the antagon- ism of the two movements — The phenomenon worthy of close examination and study — Is it impossible to be- lieve in the essentials of religion and in the Socialist programme? — Considered concretely, as a programme, Socialism is not opposed to belief in God — For an ex- planation of the reciprocal antagonism of organized re- ligion and organized Socialism we must seek elsewhere than in the Socialist programme — Domination of the literature and thought of international Socialism by the teachings of Karl Marx — Socialism and Marxism not one and inseparable — The economic programme of in- ternational Socialism not dependent on Marx's theories — Importance of distinguishing between Marxism and Socialism — The attacks of organized religion are upon Marxism rather than on the actual Socialist programme — Socialist assaults on religion are not prompted by the necessities of the economic programme, but of the Marx- ian theories as they are understood — Is the Marxian synthesis compatible with religious belief? — The need of definitions. CHAPTER II Religion Defined 9 Abuse and misuse of the word " religion " — It l^ks fixed value and is used in an uncertain manner — The lack of precise definition has been defended — The xiv CONTENTS PAGE claim that religion cannot be defined — What the claim involves — The imperative necessity of an authoritative definition — Religion as defined by the Apostle James — His viewpoint common among New Testament writers — They practically identify religion with ethics — Micah's saying which Huxley accepted as the best defini- tion of religion — Micah also practically identifies _ re- ligion and ethics — Why we may not regard the ethical content as the whole of religion — Faith an essential ele- ment of religion — Religious conduct is the outcome of religious belief — Sir Leslie Stephen's lucid definition contrasted with Matthew Arnold's — John Stuart Mill assumes that ethical conduct and religion are identical — )VIax Miiller in several works practically ignores the ethical element in defining religion — Later he qualifies his views — Herbert Spencer also slights the ethical aspect — Benjamin Kidd's definition and some interest- ing questions raised by it — Religion applies to conduct generally, not to special phases of conduct — Ernest Renan makes religion identical with the progress of Rea- son — Comte's definition of religion as the " Worship of Humanity " — Davidson identifies religion with righteous political government — William James and Josiah Royce insist that the essence of religion is a belief in an unseen spiritual order — Martineau emphasizes the belief in an ever'living God, ruling the Universe and holding moral relations with mankind — Romanes likewise insists that belief in a personal God is essential — Religion is a living force, necessarily influenced by the expansion of man's consciousness — Can the expressions of an earliei; generation reflect the religious thought of today? — Can non-religious writers like Mill and Spencer interpret religion fairly? — No judgment should be passed on re- ligion except as it is defined by the consensus of present day religious thinking — Dr. Thomas C. Hall defines re- ligion — A definition by Dean Hodges — Definitions by Rabbi Schulman and Rabbi Harris — An authoritative Roman Catholic definition — Professor Fagnani's defini- nition — The definition of a Socialist layman — The definition of a political economist — The essential differ- ences in these contemporary definitions relatively trivial — They largely agree in principle and differ only in details — We may conclude, therefore, that it is pos- sible to formulate a definition of religion which will gatisfjr the believer and be comprehensible to the non- CONTENTS XV PAGE believer — The two vital elements in religion — Their relative importance in monotheistic and polytheistic re- ligions — Belief in a God or gods and in a Divine gov- ernment of the Universe inseparable from the concept of religion — The case of the so-called ethical or non- theistic religions — Brinton on Buddhism — At their best Buddhism, Confucianism and Taouism are ethical systems or philosophies rather than religions — Buddha has been deified — Lao-Tze likewise is worshipped as a god — The history of these "religions" proves that re- ligion without a God to worship is an anachronism — A definition of religion for the purpose of this dis- cussion — The cardinal principles of the Judso-Chris- tian religions — Are these principles compatible with the Marxian theories? CHAPTER III The Essentials of "Marxism" 35 The term " Marxism " is applied to a system of thought and to certain principles of proletarian action — In this study we 'are concerned with the former, theoretical Marxism, rather than with the latter, prac- tical Marxism — Theoretical Marxism rests on two great theories, the materialistic conception of history and the theory of surplus-value — These two theories comprise the essentials of Marxism — Our study not con- cerned with their validity, but simply with their bear- ing on the essentials of religion — It is conceded that , various Socialist writers have declared Marxism to be incompatible with religious belief — Others have held the contrary view — The relation of Marxism to re- ligion is not to be determined by the failure or success of individuals who attempt to reconcile the two — The rational method — The materialistic conception of his- tory has nothing to do with the philosophy of material- ism — Marx clearly separates the two — What the Marxian theory of historical materialism teaches — It does not deal with the problems which philosophical materialism attempts to solve — It is not open to the criticisms which apply to philosophical materialism — — Why the name materialistic conception of history is generally discarded — Crudity of the Marxian theory — Its lack of systematic development — Need of tracing the evolution of the theory — First application of the theory in Tht Holy Family, in 184.5 — Marx on Feuei- xvl CONTENTS PAGE bach — Assails the mechanical determinism of _ philo- sophical materialism — The theory appears in his con- troversies with Griin, Hess, Heinzen and Proudhon — The theory implicit in the Communist Manifesto — In- teresting applications of the theory in 1850 — In The Eighteenth Brumaire of Louis Bonaparte the ideals and views of individuals are ascribed to economic causes — Statement of the theory in the Critique of Political Economy — In Capital Marx asserts that the history of religion must be studied from the standpoint of his- torical materialism — Refinements and modifications of the theory by Engels — The theory must be judged in the later form which Engels thus gave it — What Marx and Engels meant by the " economic factor " — Soil, climate and race included — Engels confesses that too much emphasis has been placed on economic factor — He points out that legal and philosophical theories and religious views influence historical evolution in im- portant respects — The di£Sculties due to lack of system- atic formulation not removed by the refinements of Engels — Some pressing questions — Historical mate- rialism summarized — How class conflicts develop and give rise to class consciousness — The class struggle theory is part of the materialistic conception of history — Marx and Engels not the first to recognize impor- tance of class struggles in history — Their distinctive merit — The class struggle not artificial but inherent in the system — The characteristic class struggle of capi- talism — Other classes and class conflicts — Class hatred — Outside the economic conflict the warring classes have interests in common — National solidarity — History is not merely the record of class struggles — The abolition of classes — The surplus-value theory — No ethical element in the theory — The materialistic conception of history, the doctrine of class struggles and the theory of surplus-value three component parts of one great whole. CHAPTER IV Religion and Marxism 76 The philosophical foundation of religion — It is an hypothesis which seeks to account for the world — The distinction between philosophy and religion — Philo- sophical materialism and religion irreconcilable — The Marxian theory of historical materialism ofFers no ex- CONTENTS xvii PAGE planadon of the Universe — It neither affirms nor de- nies God — Religion is vitally concerned with prob- lems and phenomena anterior to those with which the Marxian theory deals — It must account for the exist- ence of the Universe and mankind — The Marxian theory takes the Universe and mankind for granted — Impossible to discover in the doctrine of historical materialism any essential antagonism to belief in a Su- preme Being — Religion implies belief in God as a present, living Power — Grotesque conceptions of God — Leading religious thinkers today conceive God as ruling the Universe through law — Belief in the gov- ernment of the Universe through law does not involve denial of God's existence — The theory of evolution — Foremost leaders of religious thought have accepted the theory — The theory invites belief in a Supreme Be- ing — Many find that the evolutionary hs^pothesis makes belief in God imperative — Comparison of the Marxian theory with the Darwinian theory — Belief in a Divine government of the Universe involves the belief that social evolution is directed by God — If the Marx- ian theory denies that there is a purposive intelligence in social evolution it cannot be reconciled with religion — If the theory denies that the spiritual forces influence social evolution it cannot be harmonized with religion — The theory has been so interpreted by Laf argue, Loria and others — The more liberal interpretation has the sanction of science — Compatibility of the theory with religion shown by analysis of the industrial revo- lution in England — The Marxian theory does not nec- essarily lead to Socialism — Its essentials accepted by a noted Roman Catholic writer — Efforts of Father J. A. Ryan to explain away the acceptance of historical materialism by Father Dewe — The narrow sense in which Father Dewe uses the term " economic factor " makes him attribute greater influence to the purely economic factor than Marx and Engels attributed to it — Father Cathrein, a noted Jesuit, also adopts an atti- tude toward history that is quite Marxian — The Marxian theory has an important bearing on religion — The origin of the idea of God — The controversy be- tween Supernaturalists, Intuitionalists and Evolutionists — Polytheism preceded monotheism — Max Muller and the theory that henotheism was the earliest form of re- ligion — Monotheism first developed in Israel — Kenan's xviu CONTENTS PAGE theory of an innate monotheistic instinct as a Semitic trait — Hebrew polytheism — The evidence of the Old Testament — Baal-worship among the Israelites — How it arose — Coordination of the worship of Jehovah and Baal — Religion identical with patriotism among He- brews — The overthrow of Baal-worship and the rise of monotheism — Character of the god or gods wor- shiped is determined by economic environment — Je- hovah at first a tribal god — So long as Israel was en- gaged in constant warfare Jehovah was a warrior god — ^The passions and cruelties of war attributed to Je- hovah — The Israelites could not conceive of God as omnipotent, omniscient or omnipresent — The_ agri- cultural life in Canaan influenced the conception of God — The pastoral life produces a pastoral god — Christianity arose in a time of peace ^Turmoil of the Middle Ages reflected in the conception of God and the religious consciousness in general — In a social democ- racy undemocratic conceptions of God will perish — Influence of material conditions on the conception of immortality — Origiti of the idea of the soul and of immortality — Dreams and shadows — The North American Indian conceived the hereafter as a happy hunting ground — Such a view of the life celestial pos- sible only to a people dependent on hunting — Chinese reproduce earthly hierarchy in their conceptions of the celestial life — The same is true of the religions of India — Eschatological conceptions of the Eskimo re- flect his materia] environment — Influence of material environment on the religious thinking of the modern world more subtle and less easy to trace — The re- actions are more indirect and obscure — They are also less powerfully determinative — Man's power to control and direct the economic forces is growing — The mod- ern democratic trend has greatly influenced the concep- tion of God — The idea of eternal tormenH not compatible with democracy and humanitarianism — Recognition of this fact by religious thinkers — A typical utterance — Miss Scudder on the relation of the growth of democ- racy to the spread of immanential conceptions of God — Historical materialism of great value as a means of interpreting comparative religion — Marx's failure to comprehend religion — His mistake in applying his theory of historical materialism to religion — Bern- Stein's comment on the mistake — Exaggerations of tht CONTENTS xix PAGE theory inevitable — Just as the evolutionary hypothesis has been accepted by religious leaders (even in the Catholic Church) so the Marxian theory will be ac- cepted — It will be found that it does not weaken be- lief in a Divine intelligence governing man's evolution — The class struggle theory raises questions of fact, not of faith or doctrine — Father Cathrein on class struggles — The moral arguments against the appeal to class con- sciousness — Class consciousness not the highest ethical standard conceivable, but the highest attainable under the present system — The Socialist ideal is a world not limited in its loyalties by class boundaries — There is no philosophical or ethical element in Marxism which conflicts with a reverent and profound belief in a per- sonal God — To believe in God and_ in the Marxian theory requires no evasive interpretations. CHAPTER V Religion and the Socialist Movement 127 Most Socialist parties have disavowed hostility to re- ligion — Declarations by the German party at Gotha and Erfurt — Declaration of the Austrian party — Reso- lution on the subject by Socialist Party of America — Attitude of the Belgian Labor Party — Rare exceptions to the rule — Hostility of French Socialists to religion — Declaration by moderate section of movement un- der Jaures — Resolution by Parti Ouvrier socialiste revolutionnaire — Similar resolution by Spanish Social- ists — Attitude of Italian Socialists toward Jesuits — Causes of bitter hostility to religion — Clericalism — Early French Socialists were deeply religious — The position in Great Britain — Atheistic views of well- known writers not generally accepted — Keir Hardie's religious attitude — Position of the Social Democratic Party — The Socialist Party of Great Britain attacks re- ligion — Insignificance of this party — Its unrepre- sentative character — Socialism numbers among its ad- herents men and women of all creeds — Roman Cath- olics among Socialist representatives in German parlia- ment — Norwegian Socialists elect a Roman Catholic and a Lutheran — The American Socialist Party — Why the Socialist movement must be tolerant — An English Socialist quoted — Declaration that religion is a private matter criticized — The criticisms considered XX CONTENTS PAGE — An explanation by Vermont Socialists — Speech of Wilhelm Liebknecht on the subject — Consistent ad- herence of German Socialists to their programme — They oppose anti-Catholic legislation in_ 1871-73, 1900 and 1912 — Reject appeals of ministry to join in fight on Catholics — Pannekoek on the party declaration — Ad- dress to citizens on party's attitude toward religion issued by Vermont Socialists — Harmony of Socialist po- sition with basis of American democracy — Catholic parties oppose separation of Church and State — Father Cathrein declares it contrary to teaching of Church — Socialist writers take the same view — Cath- olicism always adapts itself to environment — Amer- ican Catholics approve separation of Church and State — View of Cardinal Gibbons — He approves the So- cialist position — Hostility to religion common in So- cialist propaganda — Complaint of Professor Rauschen- busch — What party neutrality implies — It guarantees freedom of individual opinion — Attacks on religion call forth protests from party members — Statement by G. von Vollmar at Frankfort — Religious views more common than anti-religious views in the Socialist propa- ganda — Great majority not hostile to religion — Greater toleration for religion and less Atheism in the movement than formerly — The association of Atheism and Socialism adventitious — The effect of Darwinism in developing rationalism — How the Socialist move- ment became identified with Darwinism and drawn into the controversy with the Church — A few dates and their interpretation — Father Ryan questions the suffi- ciency of the explanation — Another notable example of the blending of Atheism with a popular movement — Irreligion of the Revolutionary patriots — Timothy Dwighfs experience — The dawn of a new era — Sci- ence and religion no longer opposed — Leaders of con- temporary science reconcile science and religious belief — Dogmatic Atheism rarer in the Socialist movement — Another reason for hostility to the churches — Their subservience to the master class — Their lack of sym- pathy with the struggling proletariat — How the Colorado struggle reacted against the Church — The workers are doing a work that is essentially religious — The Socialist propaganda is shot through with re- ligious passion — Paul Sabatier on a wonderful sermon — But Socialism can never take the place of religion CONTENTS xxi PAGE — Enduring character of religion — Socialism cannot afFord to ignore religion or to oppose it — To succeed, it must enlist the moral and spiritual forces of or- ganized religion — The majority of religious believers ■want a social order not essentially different from So- cialism — ' On the other hand, religion needs the Social- ist movement — The ethical ideals of true religion can- not be realized within the present social order — The Kingdom of God and the Cooperative Commonwealth — Laveleye on Christianity — Common purpose of re- ligion and Socialism — Socialism comes as the liberator of religion — Organized Socialism needs to understand religion. Index . . i8i MARXIAN SOCIALISM AND RELIGION CHAPIER I RELIGION AND THE SOCIALIST PROGRAMME Socialism may be objectively defined in very sim- ple terms. So considered, it means neither more nor less than the reorganization of the economic life of society upon the basis of two very simple principles, namely, democratic collectivism in the production of wealth and liberal individualism in its distribution and consumption. It is not to be confused with communism. It unites communism in production to the private ownership of consump- tion goods. This union is admirably illustrated by the municipal ownership and operation of such public services as the supply of light, water and ice, and by municipal dwellings. Socialism as a prac- tical movement aims to extend the application of these two principles to cover the economic life of I 2 MARXIAN SOCIALISM AND RELIGION society so far as may be necessary to secure the maximum of efficiency and the complete democ- ratization of opportunity. At present we need not attempt to weigh this economic programme. We need not make any at- tempt to determine whether the programme is wise or unwise, practical or visionary, progressive or retrogressive. It is no part of our task to pass judgment upon these much mooted points. We are concerned only with the relations existing be- tween the forces organized to advance the pro- gramme of Socialism and the forces of organized religion. It is not an exaggeration to describe the rela- tions of these two movements as actively hostile. For good or ill, whatever the reason may be, a state of warfare exists between them. In the name of religion Socialism is bitterly assailed, while, on the other hand, religion is assailed with equal bitterness in the name of Socialism. This conflict is not temporary, a thing of the moment. It is rather the normal condition of affairs. Of course, there are many on either side who deplore this warfare and denounce it as wrong. Many even go so far as to proclaim that Socialism and re- ligion are kindred forces, having a common object. A large and appreciably growing number of re- ligious leaders take this view, and in the Socialist THE SOCIALIST PROGRAMME 3 movement it is held by many, whose number is likewise increasing. There are many more So- cialists who, while not claiming that Socialism and religion are in any sense kindred movements, deny that they are in any sense antagonistic. Making all due allowance for the salutary in- fluence of these minorities on both sides, the im- portant fact that they are minorities remains. It is impossible to read a number of representative religious papers week by week for any consider- able length of time without becoming aware of the hostility to Socialism of most of them. Many are merely indifferent, but most are actively hostile. On the other hand, it is equally Impossible to read a number of representative SociaHst papers and magazines regularly for any considerable length of time without becoming aware of a widespread antagonism to and contempt for religion and all its associations. In the average religious paper the most bitter, brutal, stupid and false charges against Socialism and Its advocates are to be found with a frequency which precludes the suggestion of accident as an explanation. In the Socialist papers, with equal frequency, charges just as brutal, stupid and false are hurled against religion and all Its associations. The churches may not be formally pledged to fight Socialism ; they may even declare that they are neutral, but most of them 4 MARXIAN SOCIALISM AND RELIGION do fight it, nevertheless. Most of the Socialist parties are committed to a neutral attitude, their programmes specifically repudiating any hostility to religion, but a very large number of Socialists are bitterly opposed to religion and rarely miss an opportunity to assail or deride it. This phenomenon is worthy of close examina- tion and study. Why should an earnest and sin- cere belief in the essentials of religion be regarded as incompatible with an equally earnest and sincere belief in the Socialist programme ? Is it impossible for one to believe reverently that beyond the vis- ible world is " a power not ourselves making for righteousness," and to believe also, at the same time, but independently, that public ownership of mines and railways is better than private owner- ship, that democratic collectivism applied to the production of coal and shoes would be better than the prevailing capitalistic method? What theolo- gian will show wherein such economic beliefs in- volve unbelief in the responsibility of the human soul to a superior power called God, which, to an- ticipate somewhat a later stage of our discussion, we may regard as the essence of religion? Or what Socialist will show wherein the idea that the economic basis of society ought to be changed from capitalism to democratic collectivism, from pro- duction for private profit to production for social THE SOCIALIST PROGRAMME 5 well-being, logically implies, or even remotely suggests, a denial of the omnipresent impulse to worship a higher power than man, beyond the vis- ible universe, the Eternal and Infinite ? The answers to these questions are obvious. When Socialism is examined concretely, not as a philosophy, but as a programme of practical ap- plication to the life of today, it is evident that, no matter what may be thought of the claims made for the programme, it is not inherently opposed to the hypothesis that there exists a Power or Will, known as God, a Supreme Being to whom man voluntarily subjects himself, and whom he recog- nizes as perfect. That being the case, we must seek elsewhere than in the coUectivist programme of Socialism for an explanation of the reciprocal antagonism of organized religion and organized Socialism. For if the specific proposals of So- cialism are not incompatible with religious belief and practice, and the essentials of religious belief and conduct are in nowise inimical to the charac- teristic economic programme of Socialism, the war- fare which is the normal relation of the two move- ments must be due to some other cause than the actual aim of the Socialist movement. In other words, the churches which fight the Socialist move- ment fight it for some other reason than their be- lief in religion, and the Socialists who fight religion 6 MARXIAN SOCIALISM AND RELIGION do so, not because they believe in Socialism, but for some other reason not originating in that be- lief. II The personality and the teachings of Karl Marx have so completely dominated the literature, the thought, the tactics and the propaganda of the So- cialist movement that " Marxism " and " Social- ism " have come to be regarded as synonymous terms. That this should be so is quite natural. The international Socialist movement is really dominated and inspired by the theories and prac- tical precepts of Marx. Practically all the or- ganized Socialist movement of the world today proclaims itself to be Marxian. Outside of Marxian Socialism, there is no Sodalist move- ment of any magnitude to arouse either hope of fear, loyalty or hate. But, notwithstanding all that, Socialism and Marxism are not one and inseparable. The eco- nomic programme of Socialism is by no means de- pendent upon Marx's theories. If Karl Marx had never lived, the Socialist programme for the reorganization of the economic life of society would have been developed, substantially as it is now. If Marx should prove a " false prophet," and all his theories and generalizations be dis- THE SOCIALIST PROGRAMME 7 proved, the demand for the collective ownership and administration of the social instruments and processes of production would not be lessened. Upon the basis of that demand there would of necessity arise a movement of the oppressed and discontented in every nation of the modem capi- talist world. As a world phenomenon, interna- tional Socialism is by no means limited to the Marxian formulae. Discredit Marxism and So- cialism remains. It is quite possible to reject every one of the theories originated by Marx and^ still believe in Socialism. It is highly important that we thus distinguish the simple Socialist programme from the body of dogmas and theories called Marxism, the credo of the vast majority of active Socialists through- out the world, in order that we may comprehend the reason for the conflict between religion and Socialism. The attacks of organized religion are mainly directed against certain of the Marxian dogmas and theories, not against the actual programme of Socialism, which exists quite independently, that is, without a necessary connection with the dogmas and theories in question. And the assaults of representative Socialist writers and orators upon religion and religious institutions do not arise from the necessities of the programme of Social- 8 MARXIAN SOCIALISM AND RELIGION ism. In so far as the assaults are made in the name of Socialism, they are due to the necessities, real or imaginary, of theoretical Marxism. Having denied that there is any incompatibility between religion and practical Socialism as repre- sented by the concrete programme of the move- ment, we must now broaden the scope of our in- quiry. We must next consider whether there is any good reason to regard theoretical Socialism, the Marxian synthesis, as being incompatible with religion. To answer that question satisfactorily, we need to define with care and accuracy what we mean by religion and what we mean by Marxism. CHAPTER II RELIGION DEFINED Few terms of cardinal importance in philosophi- cal and sociological discussion have been so griev- ously abused and misused as the word religion. There is hardly another word of equal importance the meaning of which is so vague, disputed and uncertain. If we compare with it such terms as philosophy and science we find that these terms,, unlike religion, have a fairly definite value in the currency of speech. They have been so accurately and comprehensively defined that they are com- monly understood and their use leads to no con- fusion of thought. But what is Religion? Who shall answer with authority? The word seems to have no fixed value. It is so elastic and vague as to be almost void of definite meaning. By some writers this lack of precise definition is defended and held to be Inevitable. Religion, it is argued, relates to infinity and therefore in- herently defies definition. Even so profound and lo MARXIAN SOCIALISM AND RELIGION courageous a thinker as Professor Gilbert Mur- ray declares that religion cannot be defined.^ Ac- cording to this view, we must conclude that no definition of religion at once true and precise has ever been formulated, or ever can be. If this be true, the discussion of religion — and especially of its relation to philosophy and science — must be permanently clouded by misconceptions and un- certain values. No two disputants can ever be certain that they mean the same thing by religion unless there is an authoritative definition of the term acceptable to both. If we are to avoid chaos and endless confusion, therefore, we must formulate a definition of re- ligion at once comprehensible and acceptable to both parties to our present discussion, that is, to the exponents of religion and Socialism, respec- tively, just as we must in the same way formulate, in due course, a similarly satisfying definition of Marxian Socialism. In the New Testament we find a definition of re- ligion which relates only to man's social relations. It makes religion exclusively a matter of ethics. " Pure religion and undefiled before our God and Father is this, to visit the fatherless and widows in their affliction, and to keep himself unspotted from ''■Four Stages of Greet Religion, by Gilbert Murray, p. i8. RELIGION DEFINED ii the world." ^ There is no theology In this sum- mary, but simply a very practical ethical view of life. It disregards faith, dogma, ritual, worship, sacerdotalism, and other concomitants of religion, and deals only with the social bond, man's obliga- tion to man. This simple epitome of religion as the Apostle James conceived it might well be the credo of an ultra-rationalist. Its emphasis of helpful, loving and sympathetic conduct is by no means unusual among New Testament writers. Peter, Paul and John notably emphasize the vir- tues of humility, forbearance, sobriety, compas- sion, forgiveness, self-control and consideration for others. Their writings abound with moral in- junctions and the glorification of moral conduct.* The apostolic definition of religion suggests the fine saying of the Prophet Micah, which Professor Huxley accepted as the best available definition of religion : " He hath showed thee, O man, what is good; and what doth the Lord require of thee, but to do justly, and to love mercy, and to walk humbly with thy God?"* Here, as in the case 2 James I, 27. ^ See, e.g., Romans xii, xiii ; Corinthians xiii ; Galatians vi ; Fhilippians i, iv; Colossians iii; I Thessalonians iv; I Timo- thy, iv; I Peter iii; I John i. ^ Micah vi, 8. See also, Isaiah i, 11-17, xliii, 25; Iviii, 6, 7; Ezekiel xviii; Hosea vi, 6; viii, 13; x, 12; Amos v, 2i; Zecha- riah vii, 9 ; Malachi ii, 10. 12 MARXIAN SOaALISM AND RELIGION of the Christian Apostle, the emphasis is upon the human relations. There is indeed the hypothesis of God, a Personality or Power, and the statement of man's duty to regard that Personality or Power with humility. We feel, however, that the Prophet, like the Christian Apostle, regards ethics and religion as identical, or practically so. It may well be doubted whether this view ever wholly satisfied a thoughtful religious mind. There is more to religion than the perfect fra- ternalism implied by exalted ethical codes. While we may not omit from our definition of religion its ethical content, we likewise may not regard the ethical content as the whole," or nearly the whole, of religion. That which alone is worthy to be called religion is very much more than an ethical code. It is not wholly concerned with human re- lations, even where it is the most important influ- ence governing these. We may not assume that justice and lovingkindness among men constitute the sum of religious living. There is no religion without faith. Religion and faith are not syno- nyms, indeed, any more than are religion and ethics, but they are equally as inseparable. More- over, in religion, the elements of faith and ethics are not merely joined together, as by arbitrary choice, but they are interdependent and vitally re- lated as cause and effect. Religious conduct is RELIGION DEFINED 13 what It Is largely because religious faith is what it is. To the earnest and devout religious mind service to the Eternal One through service to man is not a verbal conceit, but a vitally important and inspiring faith. II Of the numerous formal definitions of religion with which the secular literature of the subject abounds, one of the most comprehensive and il- luminating is that given by the late Sir Leslie Stephen In his English Utilitarians: "It [re- ligion] implies a philosophy and a poetry; a state- ment of the conceptions which men have formed of the Universe, of the emotions with which they regard it, and of the ethical conceptions which emerge." ^ What a contrast this lucid statement affords to Matthew Arnold's well-known defini- tion, " Religion is morality touched by emotion." As If the cause and the nature of the emotion were of no significance whatever ! Quite as lucid and as explicit as Sir Leslie Stephen's, but essentially different from It, is this definition by John Stuart Mill: " The essence of religion is the strong and earnest direction of the emotions and desires toward an ideal object, rec- ognized as of the highest excellence, and as rightly ^ English Utilitarians, by Leslie Stephen, London, 1900, p. )o6. 14 MARXIAN SOCIALISM AND RELIGION paramount over all selfish objects of desire." Mill here assumes that ethical conduct and re- ligion are identical. According to this definition, the zeal of the Single-Taxer, Socialist or Anarchist in pursuit of a goal believed to be " the highest excellence," and " rightly paramount over all self- ish objects of desire," is the very essence of re- ligion. Man's conception of the Universe and the emotions with which he regards it are thus summarily banished from the realm of religion. Another philosopher, Professor Max Muller, on the other hand, so emphasizes the conception of the Universe as to make it appear practically the whole of religion. The element of conduct is almost lost sight of in several of his works on the subject. Thus, in his Introduction to the Science of Religion he wrote : " Religion is a mental fac- ulty or disposition, which, independent of, nay in spite of, sense and reason, enables man to appre- hend the Infinite under different names, and under varying disguises. Without that faculty no re- ligion, not even the lowest worship of idols and fetiches, would be possible ; and if we will but listen attentively, we can hear in all religions a groaning of the spirit, a struggle to conceive the inconceiv- able, to utter the unutterable, a longing after the Infinite, a love of God." In his Origin of Re- ligion Muller further emphasizes the view that RELIGION DEFINED 15 religion essentially consists of speculation concern- ing the Infinite. He substitutes for the term " mental faculty," which might be interpreted to mean a separate religious consciousness, the term " potential energy." The human mind comprises three " faculties " or " potential energies," namely, sense, reason and faith. Both reason and faith are developments of sensuous perception, but they are different, both in kind and in degree. Re- ligion is subjectively defined as " the potential energy which enables man to apprehend the Infi- nite." « In all this there is no hint that religion relates to conduct in any manner whatsoever. Where writers like Mill ignore that aspect of religion which has to do with the interpretation of the Universe and the perception of a Power or Will designated by the symbols God and the Infinite, Miiller ignores all else. True, in a later work. Professor Miiller admits this error and confesses the insufficiency of his earlier definitions : " I plead guilty to not having laid sufficient emphasis on the practical side of religion ; I admit that mere theories about the Infinite, unless they influence human conduct, have no right to the name of re- ligion." ' * Origin of Religion, p. 23. 7 Cf . the afford Lectures on Natural Relipon, i6 MARXIAN SOCIALISM AND RELIGION A similar confession might well have been made by that profoundest of modern thinkers, Herbert Spencer. He, too, devotes himself almost ex- clusively to the philosophical speculations and as- sumptions underlying religion and slights the eth- ical element. While it would be practically im- possible without injustice to select a single passage from Spencer's voluminous works and to present it as a formal definition of religion, it is strictly just to say that he regards as " the vital element in all religions " some sort of interpretation of the Universe, " an hypothesis which is supposed to make the Universe comprehensible." ® Another interesting definition, which raises a question quite distinct from any of those which we have touched upon, is that of Benjamin Kidd, who says : " A religion is a form of belief providing an ultra-rational sanction for that large class of conduct in the individual where his interests and the interests of the social organism are antagonis- tic, and by which the former are rendered sub- ordinate to the latter in the general interests of the evolution which the race is undergoing." * Why the influence of religion should be supposed to be restricted to those actions in which there is a discernible conflict of the interests of the individ- 8 See, e.g., First Principles, chapters II and V. ^Social Evolution, by Benjamin Kidd, p. 3. RELIGION DEFINED 17 ual with those of society is not evident. Surely, the qualification is as invalid as it is arbitrary! Religion relates to conduct generally, not to par- ticular phases of conduct. It relates to conduct which is primarily personal in its influence, and which affects the social organism only indirectly or not at all perceptibly, and it equally relates to all that large class of actions in which the interests of the individuals performing those actions appear to be, and are regarded as, identical with those of society in general. In another passage Mr. Kidd says : " No form of belief is capable of function- ing as a religion . . . which does not provide an ultra-rational sanction for social conduct in the individual." ^"^ This statement of what Is not re- ligion does not imply the arbitrary restriction con- tained In the formal definition quoted above. Ernest Renan makes religion Identical with ra- tional progress. " My religion is now as ever the progress of reason; in other words, the progress of science," he says.^^ This Is less satisfactory, even, than Comte's definition of religion as " the Worship of Humanity." ^^ That great and worthy American teacher. Dr. Thomas Davidson, identifies religion with righteous political govern- ^'^Idem, pp. 108-109. 11 In the Preface to The Future of Science, 18 Comte, Catechisme Positimste. 1 8 MARXIAN SOCIALISM AND RELIGION merit: '* A religion is that which places us in such harmony with our environment that we attain the highest possible development in knowledge, love and will. But surely no institution was ever bet- ter calculated for this than our republic." ^* WiUiam James, in his well-known work, Varie- ties of Religious Experience, says : " In the broadest and most general terms possible, one might say that religious life consists of the belief that there is an unseen order and that our supreme good lies in adjusting ourselves thereto. This be- lief and this adjustment are the religious attitude of the soul." ^* He goes on to qualify this broad statement by insisting that the nature of our regard for the unseen order must be taken into account. " There must be something solemn, serious and tender about any attitude which we call religion." We are reminded by this definition of that by Josiah Royce: " Religion is the consciousness of our practical relation to an invisible, spiritual or- der." « We may well include in this survey of some of the classic definitions of religion those formulated by two great religious teachers, at once curiously I* American Democracy as a Religion. Inter. Jour, of Ethics, Vol. X, pp. 37-39- " Page S3. 15 Quoted by Leuba, The Psychology of Religion, p. 357. RELIGION DEFINED 19 alike and unlike — James Martineau and G. J. Romanes. Martineau defines religion as " the belief in an ever living God, that is, in a Divine Mind and Will, ruling the Universe and holding moral relations with mankind." " Romanes like- wise insists that belief in a personal God Is essen- tial. " The distinguishing feature of any theory which can properly be termed a religion is that it should refer to the ultimate source or sources of things; that it should suppose this source to be an objective, Intelligent and personal nature. . . . To speak of the Religion of the Unknowable, the Religion of Cosmism, the Religion of Humanity, and so forth, where the personality of the First Cause is not recognized, is as unmeaning as it would be to speak of the love of a triangle, or the rationality of the equator." ^'' III Now religion is not something apart from hu- man experience, unaffected by the growth of knowledge, and by the constant succession of changes in social organization and social under- standing. Religion is a product of man's con- sciousness. The expansion of that consciousness necessarily leads to an expansion of religious con- !• Martineau, A Study of Religion, p. i. 1^ Romanes, Some Thoughts on Religion, p. 41. ao MARXIAN SOCIALISM AND RELIGION ceptions. Therefore, the question arises, how far do the formulae we have been considering, the ma- jority of which have come to us from an earher generation, adequately and fairly reflect the re- ligious consciousness of today? Can the religious consciousness of one age be expressed in the for- mulae of another? Moreover, may it not well be doubted whether confessedly non-religious writers, like Mill and Spencer, for example, can interpret religion fairly? The religious believer is entitled to ask that no judgment be passed on religion ex- cept as it is defined by the consensus of today's religious thinking. Among American religious teachers of the pres- ent day Dr. Thomas C. Hall holds an honored place. His History of Ethics JVithin Organized Christianity and Historical Setting of the Early Gospels take high rank in contemporary religious literature. Dr. Hall defines religion as follows: " Religion is a reverent attitude of the person- ality either — (a) toward the totality of life and being generally under the symbol God, or (b) toward some highest reality over against the world (dualism), or (c) toward the complexities of life under the symbols of various gods (polytheism), resulting in a desire for consonance of life-purpose with the highest ideal. As a reaction of the whole man religion has intellectual, emotional and RELIGION DEFINED 21 will elements, and so may result in creeds, cults and rules of conduct, but all of these are but ex- pressions of the fundamental evaluation of experi- ence in terms of permanence and worth." ^^ Dean Hodges, of the Episcopal Theological School, Cambridge, Mass., author of numerous works on religious and theological subjects, and one of the most learned of American theologians, writes : " ( I ) Religion, in general terms, is a conscious- ness of an unseen Power or powers, making, main- taining and ruling the world and man ; and a con- sciousness also of that within us, which is our true self, different from our physical being, and inde- structible by death. Religion is the endeavor to establish a right relation between the soul of man and the life of God. " The rule of God is so constant, universal and unvarying that we are able to express it in terms of cause and effect, and to call it the Reign of Law. But it proceeds under two conditions: first, the freedom of the divine will, by reason of which we may pray to God to act specially on our behalf; and second, the freedom of the human will, in which resides the inevitable possibility of a wrong i^This and all other definitions contained in this section, ex- cept as otherwise stated, have been specially contributed to this discussion by their authors. 22 MARXIAN SOCIALISM AND RELIGION choice, resulting in pain to ourselves and others, but essential to our true humanity. " The consciousness of the unseen Power results in worship; the conviction of the divine free-will leads to prayer; the exercise of the human free- will appears in conduct. (2) " Religion, in Christian terms, is all this as it is affected by the life and teaching of Jesus Christ. He taught that God is our Father, who desires not only our recognition but our love. He taught also that right conduct, which he held to be of the essence of religion, is both spiritual and social : spiritual in that it includes our motives and the inmost thoughts of our hearts; social, in that it is based on the brotherhood of man in the fam- ily of God. By his life and death, especially by faith which means loyal allegiance to him, he saves us, if we will, from the wrong choices which result in pain, and brings us into harmony, in this world and the next, with the unseen Power, our Father." Dr. Samuel Schulman, Rabbi of Temple Beth El, New York City, has defined religion as " hu- man life lived as in the presence of superior pow- ers called God, or gods." In an address entitled Our Definition of Religion, delivered at the New RELIGION DEFINED 23 York State Conference of Religion, in 1905, Dr. Schulman said: "As a general definition of religion I would venture to say that religion is human life lived as in the presence of God. It is not exclusively feel- ing, like fear or trust, or dependence, nor is it a special faculty with which the soul discovers the Divine. Being life, it has feeling, but also belief. It thinks something, and is, inevitably, always some deed. When human life reacts upon its environment, not merely as an environment that is seen and understood, and fully exhausted in the mechanism, but as the invisible and the mysteri- ous, and that which transcends the machinery, evi- dent, visible to the senses, and comprehensible to the understanding, it is then living religion. In this definition the word * life ' is given so as to embrace every side of the soul's activity. The phrase ' as in the presence of God ' is to point out the second term of the relation in that kind of life which we call religious. In religion there are two elements, man and God; these elements are necessarily permanent. Were the second to vanish, we might have a philosophy of life, but no longer a religion. The environment of life as functioning religiously is the invisible, the unknow- able, the ultimate reality, the transcendental, 24 MARXIAN SOCIALISM AND RELIGION which we interpret as best we know how (and interpret it we must) ; but which we know is in- finitely more than ourselves." ^^ Another scholarly leader of American Judaism, Dr. Maurice H. Harris, President of the Eastern Council of Reform Rabbis, gives to his confirma- tion classes this definition : " Religion is our con- ception of a Power, greater than ourselves, and our persistent effort to come near to his perfection in all things." The well-known Roman Catholic writer, Dr. John A. Ryan, Professor of Moral Theology and Economics in St. Paul Seminary, accepts and quotes with approval the definition given by Rev. Dr. Aiken, Professor of Apologetics at the Cath- olic University, Washington, D. C. It may there- fore be regarded as an authoritative Catholic statement. The definition reads: " Religion is essentially a personal relation, the relation of the subject and creature, man, to his Lord and creator, God. Religion may thus be defined as the voluntary subjection of oneself to God, that is, to the free, supernatural being (or beings), on whom man is conscious of being de- pendent, of whose powerful help he feels the need, ^* Addresses Before the New York State Conference of Re- ligion, Series IV, No. i, pp. 13-14. RELIGION DEFINED 25 and in whom he recognizes the source of his per- fection and happiness." 2* Professor Charles P. Fagnani, D. D., of the Union Theological Seminary, New York, an ac- tive Socialist, offers this definition : " Religion involves a belief or hypothesis that posits the existence of a Power, or Will, or Per- sonality not unlike ourselves to account for the Universe. (Logically this power itself needs to be accounted for, but that need is more remote and does not press upon us so directly for satisfac- tion.) " This hypothesis of God, like every other hy- pothesis, demands confirmation and since it in- volves nothing less than the explanation of the Universe, the necessary data for its progressive verification can only come from the accumulative experience of the whole human race throughout its entire history, " Ideas of God and religion then necessarily change and improve with the progress of man in knowledge and in emancipation from bondage to traditional ideas. The modern tendency is to conceive of God as Loving Energetic 20 Catholic Encyclopedia, Vol. XII, p. 739, art. " I^eligion.'" 26 MARXIAN SOCIALISM AND RELIGION Purposeful Democratic working for the advancement of human welfare and the development of human life, in dependence more and more on human cooperation for the car- rying out of His programme. " He has come to be thought of not as craving propitiation, nor worship, nor etiquette, nor any- thing else, for Himself personally, but only the whole-souled consecration of every one to the com- mon task, the Cause of Man, which is the Cause of God. " The individual believer, after the example of Jesus Christ, finds inexpressible satisfaction in the thought of the personal friendliness of God for him and the Divine interest in him. Above all the sense of union with the Heavenly Father in the common life-purpose nerves him to do his best for the advancement of the Cause, while leaving his own personal interests without anxiety in the safe-keeping of his Great Companion. " This personal side of religion is purely a mat- ter of individual choice, elective not compulsory. Whosoever will is free to taste and see that the Lord is good. If one feels no need or craving for this personal association it cannot conceivably be brought about by external compulsion. " Since the modern conception of God regards RELIGION DEFINED 27 him as concerned pre-eminently with the social purpose, the advancement of man, this necessarily brings religion today into relation with the social life of man in all its phases, economic, political, industrial. " It makes It that every socially disposed per- son is, in an essential sense, religious, whether he knows it or not. " The personal side of religion is elective, en- tirely a private affair ; the social side of religion is becoming more and more a matter of moral obli- gation imperative upon all." So far we have considered the definitions formu- lated by professional theologians, and it may be well to include in our survey the definitions which have been formulated by laymen. In what he calls " a Naturalistic Definition of Religion," Mr. Rufus W. Weeks, a Socialist and an ex-president of the Actuarial Society of America, writes : " In all stages of human evolution, past and present, man has apprehended invisible powers having dispositions toward himself; and has en- deavored to please those powers. This endeavor has taken three forms: first, the use of symbolic acts and words to express the emotions of man toward those powers; second, the bringing about of behavior, personal and tribal, such as those powers are thought to desire; and, third, the dis- a8 MARXIAN SOaALISM AND RELIGION cipllne of individuals, by teaching and by self-cul- ture, toward an interior state thought to be pleas- ing to those powers. This apprehension of su- perior powers, and the resulting effort to come into touch with them through worship, conduct and spiritual education are called Religion. " If now we take into account only the stage of human evolution characteristic of the present, and ignore existing survivals of past stages, we may say that religion is the apprehension by man of one invisible power, felt to have benevolent dispositions toward man and to be worthy of rev- erence in the highest degree ; and the resulting ef- fort to attain harmony with that power through worship, through right conduct, personal and so- cial, and through moral and spiritual education and self-discipline. " Upon the highest plane of human evolution there has emerged the conviction that the only type of character and action which is in harmony with the will of the worshipped unseen power is that type of character and action which is animated by the passion for human welfare. This same pas- sion for human welfare presents itself in some in- dividuals as a self-supporting motive, bearing the strongest sanction though not depending on any feeling of an unseen benevolent power. There are all shades of mixture of the two motives; but, RELIGION DEFINED 29 as a rule, those who begin action for human wel- fare without any feeling of the presence of an unseen Ally, and who persevere in such action, sooner or later are visited by that feeling in greater or less degree. The devotion to human welfare, if at all tinged with the sense of a kindly unseen power, is undoubtedly to be included under the term religion, even where no ceremonial ex- pression is found; and even where darkened by the absence of feeling of such a power, is fairly en- titled to be considered a variant of religion." Professor Simon N. Patten, whose Social Basis of Religion has been widely discussed, gives the following definition: " Religion is an impulse and an interpretation. As an impulse, it is the feeling that beyond the visible world is a higher power planning for the uplift of humanity. As an interpretation, it rec- ognizes a downward tendency among men and na- tions due to a gulf between God and man made by the passions and stubbornness of men. The latter is the basis of Theology, the former arouses zeal for a higher life. " This view of religion assumes that naturally we would expect to find a pleasing advancing world and an optimistic view. But the prophets and re- ligious teachers have found a decadent world and a declining civilization. The endeavor to har- 30 MARXIAN SOCIALISM AND RELIGION monize the facts and hopes has led to the ortho- dox formulae, now so hard to accept since the world has again become progressive." IV A comparison of these several contemporary definitions of religion, from almost as many points of view, is interesting. In view of the unregu- lated usage of the term, and the differences which have divided Christendom and the religious world in general, candor compels the admission that the essential differences revealed by these definitions are relatively trivial, and the degree of unanimity quite remarkable. The Catholic apologist, the Jewish Rabbi, the Protestant teachers, the Social- ist layman and the professional economist agree in principle and differ only in minor details. Surely, then, it is as possible as it is desirable to formulate such a definition of religion as will be generally acceptable to religious believers of all the creeds and schools of thought, a definition ac- curately and comprehensively descriptive of the essentials of religion, satisfying the religious de- votee to that extent and comprehensible to the non-believer. We may conclude that the two vital elements of religion are belief and conduct, man's view of the Universe and his behavior. In the monotheistic RELIGION DEFINED 31 religions the first of these elements, the philosophi- cal, attributes the origin, maintenance and govern- ment of the Universe, including mankind, to an invisible Superior Being, Supreme Power or First Great Cause, called God, whom man regards with such emotions as awe, reverence, fear, love, trust or worship, the nature of the emotions varying in the different religions and in different stages of the evolution of each religion. In the polytheistic religions the origin, maintenance and government of the Universe, including mankind, are ascribed to various invisible beings, powers, forces or per- sonalities called gods. As in the case of the God of the monotheistic religions, these gods are re- garded with such emotions as awe, reverence, fear, love, trust or worship. In every religion, mono- theistic and polytheistic, the second element, the ethical, springs from the conception of Deity and man's relation thereto which is the basis of the par- ticular religion. That conduct is sanctioned and deemed to be good which is supposed to be pleas- ing to the God or gods believed in, and is there- fore regarded as being harmonious with the Di- vine Will. That conduct is held to be evil and condemned which is supposed to be contrary to the Divine Will and out of harmony with it. It might be objected that such a summary of religion must fail to ^ve satisfaction because of 32 MARXIAN SOCIALISM AND RELIGION its insistence upon a belief in a God or gods and a Divine government of the Universe. It excludes the so-called " ethical," or non-theistic religions, notably Buddhism, Confucianism and Taouism. Some writers have vigorously protested against this limitation of the term religion. Thus, Brin- ton protests : " No mistake could be greater than to suppose that every creed must teach a belief in a God or Gods, in an immortal soul, and in the Divine government of the world. . . . The re- ligion of today which counts the largest number of adherents. Buddhism, rejects every one of these items." 21 It is doubtful whether anything but confusion can result from the broadening of the meaning of religion to embrace systems of thought which do not include the idea of God. At their best, when uncorrupted. Buddhism, Confucianism and Taou- ism are better described as ethical systems, or as philosophies, than as religions. In the case of the former, moreover, while Buddha himself taught no definite theories of God or immortality, his followers undoubtedly deified him after his death, making a god of Buddha himself. ^^ In like man- ^^ Religion of Primiti« ment, of their conditions and education, and insists that this environment may itself be altered by men. Fragmentary as these notes are, they are of vital importance to students of the theory as showing how, from the beginning, Marx dis- avowed economic fatalism, the mechanical deter- ministic process of philosophical materialism. There is no mistaking the clear and emphatic in- sistence that man is not wholly the creature of his environment, but is likewise superior to and master of his environment.* "The translation is by Prof. E. R. A. Seligman and appears in his Economic Interpretation of History, p. 31. * Feuerbach, the Roots of the Socialist Philosophy, by F. En- gels, translated by Austin Lewis, Chicago, 1903, p. 130. 44 MARXIAN SOCIALISM AND RELIGION In the years 1846-47 Marx wrote a number of articles In which references to the new theory were made. For example, in criticizing the manner in which the Anti-Rent Riots were treated in a Ger- man communistic paper published in New York, Marx ridiculed the failure of the editor to recog- nize the intimate and inevitable connection be- tween economic and political phenomenal In an essay dealing with the so-called " True Socialists," Karl Griin and Moses Hess, he scornfully rails at their failure to recognize that changes in the meth- ods of production bring about changes in the whole life of society.* In yet another essay he levels a very similar criticism at Karl Heinzen.^ In 1847 Marx published his famous critique of Proudhon, the Misere de la Philosophie, in which he gave a more careful and comprehensive expo- sition of his theory than he had done in any of his earlier writings. Mercilessly satirising Proud- hon's concept of " eternal laws," Marx argues that social life at any given time is the result of economic evolution, and that changes in the meth- ^ The substance of these articles, -which appeared in the West- falischer Dampfboot originally has been published in Die Neue Zeit, XIV (1896), 41-48. *This essay, -which also appeared originally in the Westfdl- ischer Dampfboot, has been reprinted, -with an introduction by Bernstein, in Die Neue Zeit, XVIII (1900), pp. 4, 37, ij2, 164. » This was published in the Deutsche Brussler Zeitung, early in 1847. THE ESSENTIALS OF " MARXISM " 45 ods of production involve changes in all social re- lations. He objects to the classical school of po- litical economists because they fail to comprehend that economic institutions can only be understood as historical categories. The theory is funda- mental to the whole work, and not merely the subject of incidental illusion, but the following paragraphs fairly summarise the argument: " The social relations are intimately attached to the productive forces. In acquiring new pro- ductive forces men change their mode of produc- tion, and in changing their mode of production, their manner of gaining a living, they change all their social relations. The windmill gives you society with the feudal lord; the steam mill, so- ciety with the industrial capitalist. " The same men who establish social relations conformably with their material productivity, produce also the principles, the ideas, the cate- gories, conformably with their social relations. " Thus these ideas, these categories, are not more eternal than the relations which they ex- press. They are historical and transitory prod- ucts." »<» In the famous Communist Manifesto, which appeared in February, 1848, its authors, Marx ^0 The Poverty of Philosophy, by Karl Marx, English transla- tion by H. Quelch, London, 1900, p. 88. [Italics mine J. S.] 46 MARXIAN SOCIALISM AND RELIGION and Engels, make no direct, explicit statement of the doctrine of historical materialism, but it is clearly implied throughout the work. Forty years later, in 1888, in a preface to a new edition of the historic document, Engels wrote a remark- ably lucid summary of its " fundamental proposi- tion." Now, this summary, as a formulation of the theory, really belongs to a much later period than the one we are discussing. It was written after Marx's death and in the light of all the criticism to which the theory had been subjected. Nevertheless, the summary is so accurately de- scriptive of the doctrine implied throughout the Manifesto as to warrant this quotation from it: "... in every historical epoch, the prevailing mode of economic production and exchange, and the social organization necessarily following from it, form the basis upon which is built up, and from which alone can be explained, the political and in- tellectual history of that epoch." In 1849 Marx published a series of articles in the Neue Rheinische Zeitung. The text of the articles was made up of some lectures which Marx had delivered in Brussels in 1847. The series was never completed, owing to the suppression of the paper. The articles which appeared were subsequently published in pamphlet form, under THE ESSENTIALS OP " MARXISM " 47 the title Wage-Labor and Capital. In one of them appears this explicit statement: " In the process of production, human beings work not only upon nature, but also upon one an- other. They produce only by working together in a specified manner and reciprocally exchanging their activities. In order to produce, they enter into definite connections and relations to one an- other, and only within these social connections and relations does their influence upon nature operate, i. e., does production take place. " These social relations between the producers, and the conditions under which they exchange their activities and share in the total act of pro- duction, will naturally vary according to the char- acter of the means of production. With the dis- covery of a new instrument of warfare, the fire- arm, the whole internal organization of the army was necessarily altered, the relations within which individuals compose an army and can work as an army were transformed, and the relation of dif- ferent armies to one another was likewise changed. " We thus see that the social relations within which individuals produce, the social relations of production, are altered, transformed, with the change and development of the material means of production, of the forces of production. The re- lations of production in their totality constitute 48 MARXIAN SOCIALISM AND RELIGION what is called the social relations, society, and, moreover, a society at a definite stage of historic development, a society with peculiar, distinctive character. Ancient society, feudal society, bour- geois (or capitalist) society, are such totalities of relations of production, each of which denotes a particular stage of development in the history of mankind." ^^ In 1850 Marx published, in the Neue Rhein- ische Zeitung, a series of articles, entitled 1848- 1849, in which he made some interesting applica- tions of his theory. He ascribed the French revo- lutionary uprising of February, 1848, to the com- mercial crisis of 1847. To the economic reaction of 1849 ^^^ 1850 he ascribed the political reaction of the period.^* In 1852 he published his Eight- eenth Brumaire of Louis Bonaparte,^^ in which he extended the doctrine in a most important direc- tion, tracing even the ideals and views of indi- viduals to economic causes: '^'^JVage-habor and Capital, by Karl Marx, New York, 1902, pp. 35-36. Italics mine. ^2 These articles have been many times republished in pam- phlet form under the title, The Class Struggles in France from 184S to 1850. The first edition, edited by Engels, appeared in 1895- ^' Published first, in 1852, in Die Revolution, a monthly edited by Marx's friend, Joseph Weydemeyer, and published in New York. It was issued " as a pamphlet by Marx in 1869, lince when there have been numerous editions in many lan- guages. THE ESSENTIALS OF " MARXISM " 49 " Upon the several forms of property, upon the social conditions of existence, a whole superstruc- ture is reared of various and peculiarly shaped feel- ings, illusions, habits of thought and conceptions of life. The whole class produces and shapes these out of its material foundation and out of the cor- responding social conditions. The individual unit to whom they flow through tradition and educa- tion may fancy that they constitute the true reasons for the premises of his conduct. Al- though Orleanists and Legitimists, each of these factions, sought to make itself and the other be- lieve that what kept the two apart was the attach- ment of each to its respective royal House, never- theless, facts proved later that it rather was their divided interests that forbade the union of the two royal Houses. As, in private life, the distinction is made between what a man thinks of himself and says, and that which he really is and does, so, all the more, must the phrases and notions of parties in historic struggles be distinguished from their real organism, and their real interests, their no- tions and their reality." " Throughout the whole of the articles which Marx contributed to the New York Tribune dur- ing the early fifties he applied his theory to the ex- 1* The Eighteenth Brumaire of Louis Bonaparte, by Karl Marx, translated by Daniel De Leon, New York, 1898, p. 34. so MARXIAN SOCIALISM AND RELIGION amination and discussion of European politics. He continually takes the theory for granted and rarely makes explicit reference to it. But in the preface to his Contribution to the Critique of Po- litical Economy, published in 1859, we find the most elaborate formulation of the theory to be found in all his writings : " I was led by my studies to the conclusion that legal relations as well as forms of state could neither be understood by themselves, nor explained by the so-called general progress of the human mind, but that they are rooted in the material con- ditions of life, which are summed up by Hegel after the fashion of the English and French of tlie eighteenth century under the name ' civic society ' ; the anatomy of that civic society is to be found in political economy. The study of the latter which I had taken up in Paris, I continued at Brussels whither I immigrated on account of an order issued by Guizot. The general conclusion at which I ar- rived and which, once reached, continued to serve as the leading thread in my studies, may be briefly summed up as follows : In the social production which men carry on they enter into definite rela- tions that are indispensable and independent of their will; these relations of production correspond to a definite stage of development of their material powers of production. The sum total of these re- THE ESSENTIALS OF " MARXISM " 51 lations of production constitutes the economic structure of society — the real foundation, on which rise legal and political superstructures and to which correspond definite forms of social con- sciousness. The mode of production in material life determines the general character of the social, political and spiritual processes of life. It is not the consciousness of men that determines their ex- istence, but, on the contrary, their social existence determines their consciousness." ^^ Having thus defined the theory, Marx proceeds to amplify it by explaining the interrelation of eco- nomic methods and institutions to social and polit- ical developments: " At a certain stage of their development, the material forces of production in society come in conflict with the existing relations in production, or — what is but a legal expression for the same thing — with the property relations with which they had been at work before. From forms of development of the forces of production these relations turn into their fetters. Then comes the period of social revolution. With the change of the economic foundation the entire immense super- structure is more or less rapidly transformed. In 1° A Contribution to the Critique of Political Economy, by Karl Marx, translated from the second German edition by N. I. Stone, p. II. 52 MARXIAN SOCIALISM AND RELIGION considering such transformations the distinction should always be made between the material trans- formations of the economic conditions of produc- tion which can be determined with the precision of natural science, and the legal, political, religious, assthetic or philosophic — in short, ideological forms in which men become conscious of, the con- flict and fight it out. Just as our opinion of an individual is not based on what he thinks of him- self, so can we not judge of such a period of trans- formation by its own consciousness; on the con- trary, this consciousness must rather be explained from the contradictions of material life, from the existing conflict between the material forces of pro- duction and the relations of production. No social order ever disappears before all the produc- tive forces for which there is room in it, have been developed; and new higher relations of produc- tions never appear before the material conditions of their existence have matured in the womb of old society. Therefore, mankind always takes up only such problems as it can solve : since, looking at the matter more closely, we will always find that the problem itself arises only when the material conditions necessary for its solution exist or are at least in the process of formation." " One might naturally expect to find the theory ''■^ Idem, pp. 18-13. THE ESSENTIALS OF " MARXISM " 53 which Marx himself regarded as the foundation of all his work explicitly stated in the first volume of Das Kapital, which appeared in 1867. But who- ever turns to the book with that expectation will be disappointed. While it is fundamental to the whole conception of the book, and implied throughout, beginning with the very first para- graph, the theory is nowhere explicitly set forth in clear and comprehensive terms. The one specific reference to it is extremely important, however. In it Marx asserts that the history of religion must be studied from the standpoint of historical materialism, which he sharply distinguishes from " the abstract materialism of natural science ": " A critical history of technology would show how little any of the inventions of the eighteenth century are the work of a single individual. Hith- erto there has been no such book. Darwin has interested us in the history of Nature's technology, i. e., in the formation of the organs of plants and animals, which organs serve as instruments of pro- duction for sustaining life. Does not the history of the productive organs of man, of organs that are the material basis of all social organization, deserve equal attention? And would not such a history be easier to compile, since, as Vico says, human history differs from natural history in this, that we have made the former, but not the latter? 54 MARXIAN SCXIIALISM AND RELIGION Technology discloses man's mode of dealing with Nature, — the process of production by which he sustains his life, and thereby also lays bare the mode of formation of his social relations, and of the mental conceptions that flam from them. Every history of religion, even, that fails to take account of this material basis. Is uncritical. It is, in reality, much easier to discover by analysis the earthly core of the misty creations of religion than it is, conversely, to develop from the actual rela- tions of life the corresponding celestialized forms of those relations. The latter is the only material- istic, and therefore the only scientific method. The weak points in the abstract materialism of natural science, a materialism that excludes history and its process, are at once evident from the abstract and ideological conceptions of its spokesmen, whenever they venture beyond the bounds of their own specialty." " In the third volume of his monumental work, which was never finished, but was edited and pub- lished in an incomplete state by Engels in 1894, there are numerous interesting applications of the theory. For our present purpose these applica- tions of the theory are less important than the defi- nite statement of the theory itself, qualified in im- '" Capital, Vol. I, American (Kerr) edition, p. 406, note. Italics mine. THE ESSENTIALS OF " MARXISM " 55 portant particulars and admitting the influence of other factors: " It is always the direct relation of the owners of the conditions of production to the direct pro- ducers, which reveals the innermost secret, the hiddert foundation of the entire social construction, and with it of the political form of the relations between sovereignty and dependence, in short, of the corresponding form of the state. The form of this relation between rulers and ruled naturally corresponds always with a definite stage in the development of the methods of labor and of its productive social power. This does not prevent the same economic basis from showing infinite vari- ations and gradations in its appearance, even though its principal conditions are everywhere the same. This is due to innumerable outside circum- stances, natural environment, race peculiarities, outside historical influences, and so forth, all of which must be ascertained by careful analysis." ^* III We have already noted that after the death of Marx the statement of the doctrine of the economic interpretation of history was refined and modified by Engels.^* We cannot base our judgment of 18 Capital, Vol. Ill, translated by Ernest Untermann, p. 919. w Page 40. 56 MARXIAN SOCIALISM AND RELIGION the theory upon any statement which does not in- clude these refinements. Whether or not we believe that Marx, if alive, would have assented to the qualifications which Engels introduced into the statement of the theory, notably in the letter on the subject which he wrote from 1890 to 1894, is altogether irrelevant. True, Engels specifically claims to speak for Marx as well as for himself, and his authority and veracity are scarcely impeach- able. But even if it were otherwise, and we be- lieved that Engels introduced into the doctrine ele- ments which Marx would have rejected, it would be none the less necessary to base our criticism and our judgment upon the later statement. For the acknowledged exponents of Socialist thought everywhere have accepted the Engels version of the theory, and in that form, and no other, it has become the cornerstone of the Socialist philosophy. In his crushing refutation of Herr Diihring, published in 1878, Engels, more clearly than had been done before emphasized the struggle of an- tagonistic economic classes as a vital part of the doctrine of the economic interpretation of history. In the preface which he wrote for a new edition of the Communist Manifesto, in 1888, he made it still more clear. Moreover, he specifically ex- empted from the law of progression through class conflict prehistoric society which knew no private THE ESSENTIALS OF " MARXISM " 57 property in land. This statement of the theory is better known and more quoted than any other: " The Manifesto, being our joint production, I consider myself bound to state that the funda- mental proposition which forms its nucleus belongs to Marx. That proposition is : that in every his- torical epoch, the prevailing mode of economic production and exchange, and the social organiza- tion necessarily following from it, form the basis upon which is built up, and from which alone can be explained, the political and intellectual history of that epoch; that consequently the whole history of mankind {since the dissolution of primitive tribal society, holding land in common ownership) has been a history of class struggles, contests between exploiting and exploited, ruling and op- pressed classes; that the history of these class struggles form a series of evolution in which, now- adays, a stage has been reached where the exploited and oppressed class — the proletariat — cannot attain its emancipation from the sway of the ex- ploiting and ruling class — the bourgeoisie — without, at the same time, and once and for all, emancipating society at large from all exploitation, oppression, class-distinctions and class-strug- gles." 20 2° Preface to English translation of the Communist Manifesto, i888. Italics mine. 58 MARXIAN SOCIALISM AND RELIGION Many of the severest criticisms of the theory have depended for their validity and force upon a much narrower conception of the economic factor than either Marx or Engels ever held. It is true that Marx declared that " the mode of production in material life determines the general character of the social, political and spiritual processes of life," *^ and that many similar passages can be cited to bolster up the position of those who insist upon the strictest and narrowest interpretation of the economic factor,^^ But the context of these passages would suffice, even if there were not an abundance of other textual evidence, to prove that Marx and Engels based their theory upon a much broader conception of the economic factor. Thus, the context of the passage just cited shows that the mode of production, meaning thereby the technical process of production, was not of itself regarded as the factor conditioning social development. It is specifically stated that, " In the social produc- tion which men carry on they enter into definite relations that are indispensable " and " the sum total of these relations of production constitutes the economic structure of society, the real founda- 21 Preface to A Contribution to the Critique of Political Econ- omy. 22 Cf . Ellwood, Marx's " Economic Determinism " in the Light of Modern Psychology, Amer. Jour, of Sociology, Vol. XVII, No. I. July, 19". P- 36. THE ESSENTIALS OF " MARXISM " S9 tion, on which rise legal and political superstruct- ures and to which correspond definite forms of social consciousness." Thus, it is r;ot merely the technique of production, but the technique of commerce, of industrial relations, and so on. Not merely so, but due account is to be taken of such physical factors as fertility of the soil, climate, and even race itself. In one of the let- ters which Engels wrote on the subject in 1894, and which was published after his death, he in- sists that we must broaden our conception of the economic factor so as to include among the eco- nomic conditions, not only the geographical basis, but the actually transmitted remains of former economic changes, which have often survived only through tradition, or vis inertia, as well as the whole external environment of this particular form. Even race itself is declared to be an economic factor. Moreover, he admits that the political, legal, religious, literary and artistic development, while resting upon the economic, all react upon one another and upon the economic foundation itself. " It is not that the economic situation is the cause, in the sense of being the only active agent, and that everything else is only a passive result. It is, on the contrary, a case of mutual action on the basis of the economic necessity, 6o MARXIAN SOCIALISM AND RELIGION which in last instance always works itself out." ^s In another letter, written in 1890 to a student, and first published in 1895, Engels wrote: " Marx and I are partly responsible for the fact that the younger men have sometimes laid more stress on the economic side than it deserves. In meeting the attacks of our opponents it was neces- sary for us to emphasize the dominant principle, denied by them; and we did not always have the time, place or opportunity to let the other factors, which were concerned in the mutual action and re- action, get their deserts." Clearly, Engels is far from claiming that all social life is to be inter- preted in terms of economics. Still less does he abstract the economic from all other phases of the social life process and treat It as a thing apart.^* On the contrary, he emphasizes here, as In the letter previously quoted, their interdependence, their mutual action and reaction, which, he insists, takes place upon the basis of economic necessity," which in last instance always works itself out." In yet another letter Engels still further em- phasized the important role of other factors than the economic In the process of social evolution : 23Quoted by Seligman, The Economic Interpretation of His- tory, p. 64, from Der Soxialisliscke Akademiker. I am indebted to Prof. Seligman's work for the entire paragraph summarising the letter of Engels.. 2* Ellwood, of. cit., p. 40. THE ESSENTIALS OF " MARXISM " 6i " According to. the materialistic view of history the factor which is in last instance decisive in history is the production and reproduction of actual life. More than this neither Marx nor I have ever asserted. But when any one distorts this so as to read that the economic factor is the sole element, he converts the statement into a meaning- less, abstract, absurd phrase. The economic con- dition is the basis, but the various elements of the superstructure — the political forms of the class contests, and their results, the constitutions — the legal forms, and also the reflexes of these actual contests in the brains of the participants, the political, legal, philosophical theories, the religious views. ... all these exert an influence on the development of the historical struggles, and in many instances determine their form.^ In another letter on the same subject Engels described as " not only pedantic but ridiculous " the view that every fact of history can be explained on economic grounds. He points out that politi- cal conditions and national traditions often play an important role. It is foolish, for instance, to say that of all the German states Brandenburg should have been selected to become the great poVer of the future solely because of economic considerations. To claim that every petty Ger- 2° Quoted by Seligtnan, op, cit. pp. 142-143. Italics mine. 63 MARXIAN SOCIALISM AND RELIGION man principality was destined to live or die for economic reasons alone, would be as absurd as to ascribe the difference between the various Ger- man dialects solely to economic causes.^* The theory thus presented by Engels is very dif- ferent from the doctrine advanced by that eminent Marxist, the late Paul Lafargue, Marx's son-in- law, who argued that the sole determinant of human progress is economic development."^ En- gels does not present the theory as a theory of absolute economic determinism at all. At most it is a theory of the predominating influence of economic factors in social evolution. But while Engels has removed some of the dif- ficulties arising from the extreme exaggerations of the theory it cannot be said that he has materially lessened those which are due to the lack of system- atic formulation and careful elaboration. What evidence is there that the basis of economic neces- sity "in last instance always works itself out"? And just what is meant by the reaction of political, legal and philosophical theories, and religious views, upon the economic basis? Do they exert fundamental, determining influences, or are the in- fluences merely superficial and modifying? Does '* Seligman, op. cit., pp. 144-145. " Le Diterminisme Sconomiqut It Ktrl Marx, par Paul La- fargue, Parii, 1909, . THE ESSENTIALS OF " MARXISM " 63 not the admission that these other forces react upon the economic basis, to the extent, in some instances, of determining the forms of historical struggles, lead directly to the conclusion that there cannot be any satisfactory interpretation of history in terms of economic conditions or methods alone ? ^® To these and other similar questions no answer need here be attempted. Our task is to strip the doctrine of its excrescences and to as- certain exactly what it is and what its implications are. IV To sum up: Historical materialism is the theory or doctrine that the methods of production, distribution and exchange, and all the institutions and social relations which these involve, together with such physical factors as race, climate, geo- graphical position and fertility of soil, constitute the economic environment which is the predomi- nant factor in social evolution. As the basis of the entire superstructure of society, this economic en- vironment is the principal, but not the exclusive, determinant force in the evolution of political in- *8 These pages were already written when my friend, Mr. W. J. Ghent, a Marxian expositor and comnientator of note, published (New York Call, December 13, 1914) a criticism of the doctrine of the economic interpretation of history, pleading for a better and more scientific formulation of the doctrine. 64 MARXIAN SOCIALISM AND RELIGION stitutions, laws, ethics, philosophy, aesthetics, and even of religious conceptions. But in accordance with the great law of natural causality, that every effect is the resultant of various concurrent causes and not of any one single cause, and that every effect becomes in turn a cause of other phenomena, it is a necessary part of the theory that the various results of the economic en- vironment in the form of political institutions, laws, ethical codes, philosophical theories, aesthetic ideas, religious views, and so on, become active causes, reacting upon one another and upon the economic environment which produced them, functioning as co-determinants of social evolution. Because these co-determinants can only function within the limits of the economic environment, and are, there- fore, subject to it, they must be regarded as sec- ondary and subordinate factors. Conflicting economic interests inherent in the social relations consequent upon the methods of production, distribution and exchange become the basis of class antagonisms and class conflicts. Economic impulses are developed — different in each class — which shape the thoughts, ideals, eth- ical conceptions and political and social actions of the classes. The sum total of these conceptions constitutes the consciousness of the class, which the individuals comprising that class share, and by THE ESSENTIALS OF " MARXISM " 65 which their conduct is in general governed. But economic impulses are not the sole determinants of the intellectual and moral conceptions and conduct of economic classes or the individuals comprising them. Racial traditions, ethical conceptions, phil- osophical and religious views, and other resultants of the economic environment, become important co-determinants of both consciousness and conduct, sometimes exercising greater power than the eco- nomic impulses. Thus we find that individuals frequently rise above their material interests and act otherwise than their economic impulses direct. The same is true of families and larger social groups, sometimes even of whole classes and of nations.^^ In general, however, the functioning of motives and impulses other than the economic is limited by the economic environment and are subordinate to it. As a necessary consequence of the foregoing it follows that the evolution of society in general, 2» Professor O. D. Skelton commits a grotesquely stupid error ■when he says: "Clearly Marx recognizes the existence of ideal or rather ideological motives, but recognizes them only as the intermediate outcome of material class interest and as invariably impelling the actor in the direction lahich that material interest determines." (Skeleton, Socialism, A Critical Analysis, p. no.) Marx paid too many tributes to individual idealism, to men and groups pursuing ideals in defiance of their economic interest — as Marx himself did, by the way — to afford Professor Skeltoa the slightest excuse for the statement quoted. 66 MARXIAN SOCIALISM AND RELIGION its political institutions, its laws, its ethics, Its philo- sophical views and its religions, together with the struggles and conflicting mental and moral con- ceptions of the classes, cannot be comprehended apart from the economic environment, the matrix within which these phenomena are developed. Not being the sole factor, the economic basis alone does not furnish a complete and exclusive interpre- tation of history — for which a synthesis of all the determinant factors would be necessary — but, as the main efficient determinant factor, it furnishes the most useful key to the understanding of the phenomena of history. So considered, the theory, as a working hypothesis, is of inestimable value to the sociologist. Perhaps no Socialist theory has been more gen- erally misinterpreted, or more bitterly assailed, than the theory of class conflicts. Strictly speak- ing, it is not a self-contained theory at all, but simply part and parcel of the theory of historical materialism, the economic interpretation of his- tory. It is a vitally important part of that theory and explains the manner in which great changes in the social structure are wrought under the urge of economic forces. It deals with the mechanics of THE ESSENTIALS OF " MARXISM " 67 social development as distinguished from its dy- namics. In the classic statement by Engels, already quoted,^" the whole matter is very lucidly and con- cisely stated: "The whole history of mankind (since the dissolution of primitive tribal society, holding land in common ownership) has been a history of class struggles, contests between exploit- ing and exploited, ruling and oppressed classes." Now, Marx and Engels were by no means the first to perceive not only that the record of class struggles is an important part of the history of mankind, but, what is vastly more important, that through class conflict the greatest social changes have been wrought. Professor Simkhovitich has rendered a distinct service to all students of the subject by his exposition of the extent to which this conception of history was held prior to the advent of Marx and Engels.^^ Even the Socialist prede- cessors of Marx and Engels acknowledged the ex- istence of class struggles, past and present, but they almost invariably regarded the fact with hor- ror, and utterly failed to see in class conflict the in- evitable outcome of economic development and the equally inevitable way of accomplishing decisive 3«See p. 57. 31 V. G. Simkhovitch, Marxism Versus Socialism, Chapter viii. 68 MARXIAN SOCIALISM AND RELIGION and far-reaching social changes. To have per- ceived this, and to have pointed to the proletarian struggle against the capitalist class as the sure and certain preparation of a new social order, to have made that the basis of the Socialist propaganda, so that henceforth Socialism was to be a proletarian movement, is the distinctive merit of Marx and Engels. The class struggle, then, is not the wicked inven- tion of Karl Marx. Class struggles are not " made," though methods and weapons employed in the struggles may be. The common idea that social harmony would prevail were it not for the " agitators " is extremely silly. All that agitators can do is to point to the existence of the struggle and to become spokesmen for one side or the other. The struggle itself is inherent in the economic basis of society, as Madison pointed out a hundred and thirty years ago.^^_ And because class struggles are the inevitable outcome of the economic system prevailing at the time, it follows that important changes in the economic system give rise to cor- responding changes in the class struggle. Each historical epoch, having its own characteristic eco- nomic system, needs must have its own peculiar form of class conflict and may be characterized by it. The prevailing economic system of today is 82 In the Federalist, No, X. THE ESSENTIALS OF " MARXISM " 69 based upon wage-paid labor, involving the rela- tions of employer and employed, and the charac- teristic class struggle of our time is necessarily that between the wage-earning class and the capitalist, or wage-paying class. It is not contended that these two classes include the whole of society, that a horizontal division of society can be made, all above being capitalists and all below being proletarians. Nor does it mean that there can be no other class conflict than that between the two classes named. There are, for example, struggles within each of these classes. There are also struggles by other classes. But the dominant and characteristic struggle of the capitalist epoch is that between the proletariat and the capitalist class. Nor is class hatred a part of the theory. The worker who is conscious of the class struggle is bound to see that the individual capitalist is no more responsible for conditions than himself. His hatred will be directed against the system, rather than against the individual cap- italist. The conception of the class struggle has always been a strong deterrent of violence against individuals and the doctrine has long been held in contempt by the Anarchists, because it discourages the idea of personal attack.** 33 For a fuller discussion of the ethics of the theory, see the chapter on " The Moral Value of Class Consciousness " in my Substance of Socialism. 70 MARXIAN SOCIALISM AND RELIGION Finally, it is no part of the theory that the con- flicting classes can have no interests in common with each other and with society at large. True, in Socialist speeches and pamphlets one frequently encounters the statement that capitalists and work- ers can have no interests in common, but it is simply a bit of absurd rhetoric. Employers and employed not only hold that special relation to- ward each other, but they are citizens likewise, holding quite other relations toward each other and toward society, having common interests which may, and in fact often do, entirely over- shadow their class interests. As Kautsky reminds us, the whole is greater than its parts and the common interest frequently outweighs class inter- est. One may deny the solidarity of classes and yet recognize the solidarity of mankind.^* The national solidarity shown in the various in- dustrial nations of Europe at the outbreak of the great war, in 19 14, splendidly illustrates the man- ner in which national interests, patriotism, oblit- erate class interests. It can hardly be claimed, therefore, that history is nothing but a record of class struggles, and that class struggles constitute the whole of history. s*Cf. Neue Zeit, Jahr. XXI, Vol. ii, (1903) pp. 266-274. I have argued this point at some length in my Socialism: a Sum- mary and Interpretation of Socialist Principles, pp. 157-159, and my Substance of Socialism, pp. 120-122. THE ESSENTIALS OF " MARXISM " 71 Marx and Engels can hardly have meant that, even though the declaration that " the history of all hitherto existing society is the history of class struggles " bears that interpretation. Numerous examples of great historical developments which were in no sense the outcome of class struggles might be cited. Achille Loria made a study of nearly three hundred wars and showed that the vast majority of them were due to economic causes, principally to trade monopolies, but no one has ever shown that class conflict is a common cause of international wars. Certainly, the Franco- Prussian war of 1870-71 can hardly be ascribed to the struggle of hostile classes, nor can it be said that conflicting class interests were responsible for liberating the dogs of war in the month of August, 1 9 14, and bringing about the greatest war of all ages. The fear and hatred of the Slav by the Teuton had nothing to do with class conflict. The motive of history is not always class struggle.^** But when we put aside all exaggerations of the theory, the fact remains that class struggles have existed ever since the establishment of private property, exercising a profound influence upon his- tory. So much cannot be denied. Nor can it be denied that present society is torn by a keen struggle between the wage-paying and wage-re- s'* Cf. Kautsky, Die historische Leistung Leatham, Was Jesus a Socialist? 8 For example, The New York Call declared, in its issue of March 2, ign: "The theory of economic determinism alone, if thoroughly grasped, leaves no room for a belief in the super- natural." 86 MARXIAN SOCIALISM AND RELIGION And, just as the conception of organic evolution as a theory which rendered God unnecessary and belief in His existence impossible has been out- grown, so that the idea that God rules the Uni- verse and fulfills His purpose through the laws of evolution is now universally respected and admitted to be compatible with the theory of evolution, so the Marxian theory is now generally acknowledged to be compatible with a sincere belief that God guides the evolution of society. In the same way that the conception of evolution, which forced men to content themselves with the idea that life began with " a fortuitous concourse of atoms " has ceased to hold absolute sway, so has the concep- tion of the economic interpretation of history which implied the absence of a governing intelli- gence and purpose. That the newer and more liberal conception is the more rational and scientific can be readily dem- onstrated. We need only to take any great his- torical epoch or event in which the operation of material and economic factors as primary and original causes can be discerned and to subject those causal factors to a simple test. For ex- ample: It is clearly enough seen that the series of great mechanical inventions which marked the close of the eighteenth century, the work of Har- greaves, Arkwright, Cartwright, Watt, and others, RELIGION AND MARXISM 87 initiated an economic revolution which involved the most profound and far-reaching social, politi- cal, intellectual and moral consequences. No one would think of attempting to interpret the history of England and Europe in the century which fol- lowed without reference to those great inventions. England's colonial expansion and her foreign rela- tions were directly determined by that economic revolution. From that marvellous galaxy of bril- liant inventions sprang a revolution, not only in industry and commerce, but likewise in politics, in jurisprudence, in philosophy, in ethics, and even in religion. So much must be admitted by the most implac- able opponents of the Marxian theory of history. And so much is all that the theory involves. But if at this point some one attempts to interpret the phenomena of the industrial revolution and claims that a great purpose is discernible, the theory Is silent. It neither affirms the interpretation nor implies a different interpretation. It neither ac- cepts the claim advanced nor denies it. It is quite compatible with an intelligent and unreserved ac- ceptance of the theory to believe that an Infinite Intelligence guided all the inventors, that Har- greaves invented the " spinning jenny," Cartwright the power loom and Watt the steam engine, under Divine inspiration and guidance, and that God used 88 MARXIAN SOCIALISM AND RELIGION them to further a design older than the world itself. Such an interpretation of the Marxian the- ory is entirely possible and does not require any intellectual compromise whatsoever. To sum up this phase of our discussion: The Marxian theory of historical materialism deals only with observed forces and tendencies in social evolution. It has nothing to do with those ulti- mate problems which He beyond the realms of science and belong peculiarly to the realm of phi- losophy and religion. It neither explicitly nor im- plicitly denies that social evolution is subject to Divine direction and control. It does not deny that other than material and economic factors, particularly ethics and religion, exert direct and independent influence upon the rate, manner and direction of the social evolutionary process. At the outset of this discussion we emphasized the important fact that Socialism as a living move- ment does not depend upon the Marxian synthesis. Each generalization and theory in that synthesis might be overthrown and Socialism remain a vital challenging force. It is equally necessary to em- phasize the fact that the Marxian doctrine of his- torical materialism does not of necessity lead to the conclusion that the Socialist programme is either RELIGION AND MARXISM 89 inevitable, practical or desirable. It is quite pos- sible for one to accept the doctrine while rejecting and opposing Socialism. The essentials of the doctrine have been lucidly and ably expounded and defended by a noted Roman Catholic writer whose work bears the Nihil Obstat of the ecclesiastical censor and the Imprim- atur of the Very Reverend Archbishop John M. Farley, since elevated to the rank of cardinal. The writer is the Reverend J. A. Dewe, and his work is entitled History of Economics, or Eco- nomics as a Factor in the Making of History. The following passage is thoroughly typical of Father Dewe's work : "It is evident that economics must have an al- most unbounded influence on human conduct, both public and private. For the great majority spend the greater part of their time either in producing or distributing wealth, and, from the point of view of extension, the time that an ordinary man has to employ in earning his daily bread is greater than that which he can possibly expend in explicit acts of religion. This all-pervading activity of eco- nomics is still more apparent in the state or com- monwealth. In the whole course of ancient and modern history there is scarcely any single import- ant political event that has not been caused, either directly or indirectly, by some economic influence. 90 MARXIAN SOCIALISM AND RELIGION Religion and physical causes may also have been present, but the economic factor seems to have been the most constant and the most pervasive." ' When this passage was cited by Morris Hillquit, the well-known Socialist writer, in the course of a notable debate ^^ on Socialism with the Reverend John A. Ryan, the learned Catholic apologist un- fortunately resorted to the time-worn expedient of insisting upon the extremest and most narrow in- terpretation of the Marxian doctrine and upon the broadest and most liberal interpretation of the words of his co-religionist. Upon this foundation he based a very plausible distinction between the views of Father Dewe and the Marxian doctrine. Candid minds, not dulled by sectarian prejudice nor warped by controversial passion, interested in getting at the truth and not in the defense of a par- ticular theory or point of view, will unreservedly identify Father Dewe's views, as expressed in the passage quoted, with the Marxian doctrine of his- torical materialism. The passage contains a clear and unequivocal statement of the essentials of that doctrine and throughout the entire work Father Dewe treats history very like an orthodox Marxist. In one respect, indeed. Father Dewe carries the *The italics are mine. — J. S. '^° Socialism, Promise or Menace f By Morris Hillquit and John A. Ryan, D.D., ch. VI. RELIGION AND MARXISM 91 influence of the economic factors farther than either Marx or Engels did. He distinguishes between the " economic factor " and " physical causes," coupling the latter with religion as subor- dinate to and dependent on the economic factor. He comes perilously close to abstracting the eco- nomic factor from all the rest of life and treating it as a thing apart, the very thing for which Engels rebuked the youthful extremists who distorted the Marxian doctrine by over-emphasis. Marx and Engels and practically all the representative spokesmen of the Socialist movement have insisted upon including in the term " economic factor " the very physical causes which Father Dewe excludes from the term.^^ .When the Catholic scholar says that economics exert " an almost unbounded influence on human conduct, both public and private," he goes quite as far as either Marx or Engels ever went in assert- ing the determinism of ethical codes and personal conduct by economic conditions. Short of that absolute, unqualified determinism which Engels ridiculed,^* it would be impossible to lay greater stress upon the economic motivity of history than Father Dewe does in the statement that " in the whole course of ancient and modern history there 11 See p. 59. i» See p. 61. 92 MARXIAN SOCIALISM AND RELIGION is scarcely any important political event that has not been caused, either directly or indirectly, by some economic influence." Finally, when he says that " Religion and physical causes may also have been present, but the economic factor seems to have been the most constant and pervasive," he clearly relegates religion to a minor place among the forces shaping history and attributes the greater influence to the economic factor. If the elabora- tions of the Marxian doctrine by Engels are set beside Father Dewe's statements and candidly compared with them the Socialist scholar and the Catholic scholar will be found to be in substantial agreement. The differences revealed by the most critical analysis are without any practical import- ance and suffice only to afford room for Talmudic hairsplitting.^^ Naturally, the conclusions reached by the Catho- lic scholar do not involve the necessity of his deny- ing the existence of God, the Divine government of the world, or any other essential of religion. ^5 Another noted Catholic writer, Father Cathrein, enumerates a number of important inventions, such as gunpowder, printing, steam engines, electric motors, steamboats, railways and tele- graphs and says of them "they are the real revolutionaries, they are the creators of the new world." {Socialism: Its The- oretical Basis and Practical Application) p. 139. This is quite a Marxian argument and cannot be successfully upheld except on the basis of historical materialism. On no other ground can we claim that inventions are "the creators of the new world." RELIGION AND MARXISM 93 With full philosophic sanction, he holds equally to his beUef in God, Creator and Moral Ruler of the Universe. Why, then, should any Christian, Catholic or Protestant, insist that the Socialist can not consistently maintain his religious faith and hold a similar view of historical development? VI But the economic Interpretation of history has an Important bearing on religion notwithstanding the fact that It does not deal with the phenomena which religion seeks to Interpret, and therefore neither afSrms nor denies the existence of God and the corollaries of that belief. Religion is not something apart from and independent of human thought and knowledge. It cannot be subtracted from the general life of mankind and regarded as being independent of the general evolution of man- kind and the laws governing that evolution. Re- ligious conceptions are subject to change. Even if we believe that their essence Is unchanging and Independent of time, place and material conditions, we must concede that their forms change and are responsive to changes of time and place and ma- terial conditions. Let us consider, briefly, the ever-changing con- ception of God. It Is necessary, perhaps, to em- 94 MARXIAN SOCIALISM AND RELIGION phasize the fact that recognition of the indisput- able truth that the conception of God which now prevails is the result of many changes, and is itself subject to change, does not affect the conception itself. In the words of a famous evolutionist: " To analyze the origin of a concept is not to attack the validity of the belief it encloses. The idea of gravitation, for example, arose by slow de- grees in human minds, and reached at last its final expression in Newton's law. But to trace the steps by which that idea was gradually reached is not in any way to disprove or discredit it. The Christian believer may similarly hold that men arrived by natural stages at the knowledge of th^ one true God; he is not bound to reject the final conception as false merely because of the steps by which it was slowly evolved. A creative God, it is true, might prefer to make a sudden revelation of Himself to some chosen body of men; but an evolutionary God, we may well believe, might pre- fer in His inscrutable wisdom to reveal His own existence and qualities to His creatures by means of the same slow and tentative intellectual gropings as those by which He revealed to them the physi- cal truths of Nature." " It would be entirely foreign to our purpose to attempt to discuss the various theories of the origin 1* Grant Allen, Tht Evtluiion of the Idea of God, Ch. I. RELIGION AND MARXISM 95 of the Idea of God. It matters not in this discus- sion whether we believe that man is by nature a religious being, endowed with an innate conscious- ness and conception of a Supreme Being as the Creator and Ruler of the Universe, or in Herbert Spencer's well-known theory that the idea of God is a relatively late acquisition, a development of ghost-worship.^® Nor are we concerned with the furious controversies which have been waged be- tween Supernaturalists, Intuitionalists and Evolu- tionists. It makes no difference whether we be- lieve that God, an Infinite Uncaused Cause, created man and revealed Himself to His creature, or that, as the Intuitionalists have claimed, man Is by Na- ture endowed with the capacity of intuitively com- prehending God and entering into relationship with Him, or that the conception of God is the product of evolution, taking its rise in ignorance, fear and superstitution. Our task Is not to account for the existence of the idea of God, but rather to explain, If possible, the numerous striking changes In that idea. The weight of evidence would appear to be overwhelmingly In favor of the belief that religion originated In polytheism, that the monotheistic con- 1° " There are savages without God in any proper sense of the word, but there are none without ghosts." Huxley, Lay Ser- mons and Addresses, p. 163. 96 MARXIAN SOCIALISM AND RELIGION ception of God arose out of polytheism. The idea that monotheism was the basis of primeval religion has been rejected by the vast majority of anthropologists. A great deal may be said in favor of the idea advanced by Max Miiller, among others, that the basis of primeval religion was henotheism, a primitive and rudimentary monothe- ism, in which one God was recognized, not in con- tradistinction to a plurality of gods, but simply because primitive thought went no farther. Poly- theism was not the contradiction of this henothe- ism, but rather its natural development. Monotheism attained its fullest development in Israel, which has been called the first monotheistic nation. Why monotheism should have flourished with such special vigor in Israel has been the theme of much disputation. Some, following the lead of Renan," have argued that the Semitic race possessed from the beginning a peculiar Innate monotheistic instinct — a fantastic theory quite un- supported by historical evidence. Others have argued that primitive Semitic religion was mono- theistic from the first, a theory which likewise rests on no basis of credible historical evidence. In- deed, the evidence is all against it. The Old Tes- tament is replete with evidences of Hebrew poly- theism. A single reference must suffice. In the 1* Kenan, Histoirt des Langues Simetiques, RELIGION AND MARXISM 97 thirty-second chapter of the book of Deuteronomy we read: "They sacrificed unto demons, which were no God, To gods whom they knew not, To new gods that came up of late. Whom your fathers dreaded not." Scores of passages affording equally conclusive evidence of polytheism might be cited. Indeed, it was not until many centuries after Moses, not more than seven or eight hundred years before Christ, that the monotheistic concep- tion of Jehovah as the one and only God of the Universe prevailed. That monotheism had its roots in the material history of Israel seems to be almost indisputable. If we take Baal worship and the struggle to abol- ish it we see this most clearly. Baal was a tribal god of the Canaanites. The peasants of Canaan worshipped Baal as the deity upon whom they de- pended for their success in agriculture. Baal it was who gave them their corn, their wine and their oil. Baal was to the Canaanites exactly what Dionysus was to the Greeks. When the Israel- ites conquered Canaan they speedily partook of the culture of the conquered people, becoming an agri- cultural people. A far-reaching economic revolu- tion was effected. The transformation of their material life was complete. With that trans- formation in material life went an important de^ velopment of their religious life. 98 MARXIAN SOCIALISM AND RELIGION Heretofore the Hebrews had cared most for Jehovah, their tribal warrior god. They had lit- tle use for an agricultural divinity. But when they settled in Canaan and became an agricultural people, the importance which agriculture assumed in their lives led them to appropriate the agricul- tural divinity of the land. As was most natural, the reaction consequent upon leaving the wilder- ness and settling down to an agricultural life led to an almost feverish acceptance of the deity respon- sible for agricultural success. An almost fanatical tribal passion kept the worship of Jehovah alive, but with it was coordinated the worship of Baal. Gradually, as the Hebrews grew in power, and Israel became identified with the conquered land, the God of the dominant people overshadowed the other. The functions of Baal were ascribed more and more often to Jehovah. Just as the feast of the ingathering which the Canaanites held in honor of Baal " became the chief feast of the Israelites in honor of Jehovah, so Baal and Baal-worship in- evitably became, in the course of time, absorbed by Jehovah and Jehovah-worship. It is clear that the invasion and conquest of one tribe by another led to a multiplication of deities. The religious conceptions and cults of the con- quered were rarely destroyed, even where their 1^ See Judges, ix. 27. RELIGION AND MARXISM 99 destruction was attempted by the conquerors. But in general the religious conceptions and cults of the conquerors were imposed upon those of the con- quered, while the former also took something from the latter. Bringing their own religious beliefs and worships with them, the conquerors sometimes were content to worship by themselves and some- times forced the conquered to join with them. Under such conditions polytheism flourishes, there is a multiplication of deities, cults and priests. The monotheistic idea, with its unification of cults and priesthoods, does not evolve until the culture of one people dominates all others. The warfare upon Baal worship, the destruction of its altars and places of worship by Gideon,^^ Elijah,i9 Jehu,2<> Jehoiada.^i Hilkiah^a and Josiah,^^ was due to patriotic zeal. Religion and patriotism were identical. Jehovah was Israel's God. The cause of Israel and the cause of Jehovah were one. Apart from the material his- tory of Israel Baal-worship among the Hebrews, its overthrow and the rise of monotheism cannot be understood. In other words, historical ma- ** Judges vi. 25. i» I Kings xviii, 40 20 II Kings X, 18. 21 II Kings xi, 18. 22 II Kings xxiii, 4. 23 II Chronicles xxW, 4. loo MARXIAN SOCIALISM AND RELIGION terialism is the key necessary to the understanding of those important phases of religious develop- ment. Recognition of this dependence of religion upon environment does not require a denial of the belief In an unchanging and eternal God. It is possible to believe that the economic environment is the most important influence in shaping religious beliefs and cults because God chose that method of revealing Himself to man. In some critical annotations of the Wesen des Christenthums of Ludwig Feuerbach, written in 1845 but first published by Engels in 1888, Marx criticises the great philosopher of materialism be- cause he abstracts religious sentiment from the course of history and places it by itself. The the- ologians have, in a great many Instances, com- mitted exactly the same mistake as the materialist, thereby making the whole subject of the develop- ment of religious conceptions unintelligible. The Marxian theory applied to religion makes Its de- velopment Intelligible and makes it possible for comparative religion to be scientifically studied. Not until we grasp the Important fact that the re- ligious conceptions and practices of a people al- ways bear a very definite and ascertainable relation to their mental development and their economic and material environment does a scientific study of comparative religion become possible. RELIGION AND MARXISM loi VII There is less need than formerly to emphasize the fact that the conception of God changes from age to age. Time was when the assertion of this fact would have been angrily denied. Men have been ostracised and persecuted for less. Today it is possible for one of the most orthodox Chris- tian writers to call attention to the fact: "We see with increasing clearness that the great word ' God,' greatest that mankind has ever uttered, connotes a different concept in every age. The God of nomadic tribes is a tribal chieftain. The God of feudalism, as imaged in the superb mosaic that overlooks ruined Messina from the fallen glory of its shrine, is a masterful feudal over- lord." 2* Thus Miss Scudder can write without reproach today: E pur si muove — 'the world of thought moves I Not only are religious ideas in general con- trolled and shaped by social institutions and con- ditions, so that great social changes inevitably pro- duce great religious changes, but social institutions and conditions powerfully influence the conception of Deity. No fact in the whole range of historical phenomena is better attested than the fact that in the evolution of religion the character of the God f*Sacialism and Character, by Vida Scudder, p. 331. I02 MARXIAN SOCIALISM AND RELIGION or gods worshipped is determined mainly, if not altogether, by the economic environment. Where the life of a people is largely given to militarism, that being the natural method of tribal and na- tional expansion, the result is the worship of a God or gods of war, mighty in battle. Thus Yahve, or Jehovah, the God of Israel, was at first simply a local tribal or family god. The primitive Israel- ites could not conceive of a single Supreme Being, Creator and Ruler of the Universe. Each tribe had its local tribal god, supposed to dwell in some lonely spot. Jehovah was such a god and the Israelites never doubted that other tribes had sim- ilar gods of their own. Fortunately, Jehovah was stronger than the gods of other tribes, so that He could win the battles of His people, but He was not fundamentally different from the gods of other tribes, who were quite as real as Jehovah. Like all tribal gods. He must be propitiated by much sacrifice. Jehovah loved the smell of burnt offer- ings. So long as the Israelitish tribes were engaged in more or less constant warfare with other tribes, and militarism was the most important tribal activ- ity, Jehovah was a warrior god. The name Israel means " El does battle." Jehovah was the war- rior El, after whom the nation was named. When Israel went forth to battle Jehovah led. He was RELIGION AND MARXISM 103 always on the side of Israel, no matter what the cause of conflict might be. He was relied upon to bring His people through every crisis in safety. Not wholly forgotten in times of peace, Jehovah manifested His power primarily in times of war as befitted a warrior god. In times of peace He might not even reside among His people. Thus, when the Israelites settled in Palestine Jehovah re- mained in His original abode, on Sinai, leaving it only occasionally for Palestine.^® The cruelties and evil passions of war were naturally attributed to the war god who was the object of worship. That is to say, the mental and moral traits engendered in the people by militar- ism were reflected in their conception of Jehovah. It is notable that instead of conceiving that they were in some sense partakers of the life of Jeho- vah, as the modern religious mind conceives that man partakes of the life of God, the Israelites con- ceived of Jehovah as a partaker of their life. He is forever leaving His abode to share Israel's perils and to participate in Israel's struggles. They could not conceive of Him as an omnipresent be- ing. Nor was there any conception of omnipo- tence. That Jehovah's power was, after all, lim- ited, despite its greatness, is shown by numerous occurrences. Israel was sometimes defeated in 25 Judges V. 104 MARXIAN SOCIALISM AND RELIGION battle, notwithstanding Jehovah's efforts. For ex- ample, in a battle with the Philistines " the ark of God was taken." ^^ Again, we are told that in a battle against the Canaanites led by Judah the Lord " could not drive out the inhabitants of the valley, because they had chariots of iron." *^ Neither omniscience, omnipotence nor omnipres- ence was attributed to Jehovah until a very late date. But although these qualities were not at- tributed to God until a late period, we are by no means compelled to reject the belief that they are inseparable from the nature of God, that even be- fore the foundations of the world were laid an omniscient and omnipotent God was omnipresent in space. We have seen how when the people of Israel settled down to an agricultural life in Canaan they took the Canaanites' conception of deity and im- posed it upon their previous conception of Jeho- vah as a military God. In a similar manner we find that the pastoral regime was reflected in the conception of God. Thus, He is spoken of as the owner of " the cattle on a thousand hills." ^* Just as when the successful warrior was the most im- portant personage the Israelites thought of God 2*1 Samuel iv. "Judges i, 19. 2° Psalms i, 10. RELIGION AND MARXISM 105 as a warrior, so when, under other conditions, the most important personage is the owner of immense flocks and herds, God is thought of as the owner of " the cattle on a thousand hills." Such a concep- tion of God could only have arisen among a pas- toral people. The same is true of the idea of God as a shepherd, which holds such a prominent place in both the Old and New Testaments.^® We never find God conceived of as a loving and tender Father during times of peril and military struggle, and it was not by chance or mere coincidence that Christianity arose during a period of peace. The conception of an All-loving, Universal Father, lov- ing the just and the unjust, equally loving to all peoples, could not have originated or made head- way during a period of tribal or national warfare. Nor could the conception of God as a King have arisen prior to the development of nationality and a national consciousness. Finally, not only is it true that during the Mid- dle Ages God was conceived of as " a masterful feudal overlord," as Miss Scudder points out, but it is equally true that the entire religious conscious- ness reflected the turmoil and strife of the period. In no other way can we explain the transformation of the gospel of Jesus, with its gentleness, forbear- ance, charity and tenderness, into the ferocious 28 Psalms xxiii, i ; Isaiah xl, z ; Ezekiel xxxiv, 6 ; John x, 14. io6 MARXIAN SOCIALISM AND RELIGION gospel of hate and bigotry which was propagated by means of the sword, the rack, the thumbscrew and the stake. Acceptance of the theory that social and eco- nomic conditions exert a controlling influence upon the most fundamental of all religious conceptions and beliefs, leads inevitably to the conclusion that such a profound and far-reaching social transform- ation as Socialism proposes must have an impor- tant influence upon all reli^ous conceptions, includ- ing that of Deity. While we must admit so much, it is not incumbent upon us to forecast the probable conception of God which will prevail in the Social- ist society of the future. Prophecy is hazardous work. We may, however, be confident of one thing, namely, that the changes which occur in the conception of God will correspond to and harmonize with the changes in social and economic conditions and institutions. Just as people in republics cease to think of God as a monarch, so, we may believe, all undemocratic conceptions of Him will perish in a social democracy. The equality of economic opportunity, the democracy and freedom of the fraternal state will be reflected in the character of the God worshipped. As wider skies break on man's view, God greatens in his growing mind; RELIGION AND MARXISM 107 Each age he dreams his God anew, And leaves his older God behind. He sees the boundless scheme dilate In star and blossom, sky and clod; And as his universe grows great, He dreams for it a greater God.*" VIII The influence of economic conditions and polit- ical structures upon the conception of immortality Ls even more direct and therefore more readily per- ceived. The idea of a continuation of life, in some form, after death is perhaps the most univer- sal of all the mental concepts of mankind. Nu- merous writers have argued from the almost uni- versal prevalence of a belief in some kind of im- mortality that the conception is innate in the nature of man. There are, however, too many well- authenticated evidences of the existence of peoples possessing no ideas of immortality to permit us to regard such ideas as being innate.^ ^ The origin of the idea of the soul and the belief in immortality has been attributed to dreams coupled with the shadow of the body. According to this theory, primitive man never questioned the 8° John White Chadwick. SI Cf. Lubbock's Prehistoric Times, and Origin of CivilistaUon and Spencer's Principles of Sociology, Vol. Ill, Ch. I. io8 MARXIAN SOCIALISM AND RELIGION reality of his dreams. If he dreamt of a voyage, of a hunting expedition or of a battle the thing dreamed of was very real to him. He believed that it had actually taken place. But the fact that he awakened on the same spot as he lay down upon to sleep necessitated explanation. The shadow of his body suggested an adequate explanation. His shadow was his double, another himself, dwelling in the same body and leaving it at will during sleep to go long journeys, to hunt or to fight. And this double, or other self, which could leave his body at will and return and take up its abode, was readily believed to be as independent of life in the body as of consciousness. That is to say, it was readily believed to be as capable of surviving the death and decay of the body as of its suspended con- sciousness through sleep. The fact that in his dreams he often saw and even talked with his an- cestors confirmed this belief. If death should hap- pen to come under his observation, for which there was no obvious cause, such as accident or wounds, as, for example, from old age or sickness, he con- cluded that the dead person's double, or inner personality, had failed to return to his abode in the dead man's body. This failure to return might be due to any one of several causes. A sorcerer might have stolen the double of the dead man, or some enemy might have prevented its return, or RELIGION AND MARXISM 109 the double might have lost its way. Thus, accord- ing to the theory, arose the first idea of the soul as the vital principle of life, maintaining life in the body by its presence and causing death by its pro- longed absence. Thus, too, according to the the- ory, arose in time the first conceptions of immortal- Ity.32 Whatever may be thought of this attempt to account for the origin of the idea of the soul, and its immortality, it cannot be denied that man's con- ception of the life of the soul after the death of the body has always been influenced by his economic environment and its resulting culture. Only minds which fanaticism has made impervious to argument and evidence will attempt to deny that when the North American Indian conceived the hereafter as a celestial hunting ground, in which game was abundant and hunting well rewarded, his idea of Paradise was shaped and limited by his every-day earthly experience. For any but a people econom- ically dependent upon hunting, as the Indian was, such a conception of the life celestial would have been as impossible as it would have been for the 32 One of the best popular presentations of the theory is Paul Lafargue's interesting study, Origine et Evolution de I'Idee de I'Ame, contained in his Le Determinisme Economigue De Karl Marx, Paris, 1909. See also Spencer, Principles- of Sociology, Vol. iii, ch. I. no MARXIAN SOCIALISM AND RELIGION Indian to have conceived of Paradise as a glorified Stock Exchange. It was long ago observed that the Chinese in their celestial hierarchy reproduced in an idealised form the essential features of the earthly hierarchy with which they were familiar. They carried the distinctions of class and rank intact into heaven, and all the privileges of rank were supposed to be observed in heaven as on earth. Likemse, in the several religions of India we find, almost without exception, the degrees and divisions of the various castes reproduced In the concepts of the life celes- tial. Religious critics of Marx have denounced his statement that " the religious world is but the reflex of the real world." ^^ They have regarded it as a denial of religion itself, a view which many of the followers of Marx have too eagerly adopted as their own. But in truth the statement is not In- compatible with the most passionate and profound religious befief. It is simply a plain statement of what is now regarded as one of the most obvious commonplaces of religious criticism. No compe- tent authority on the evolution of religion disputes its validity. Compare the statement for which Marx is so vigorously abused, especially by certain popular Jesuit writers, with the following passage *' Capital (American edition) Vol. I, p. 91. RELIGION AND MARXISM in from the pen of that eminent scholar, Professor C. P. Tiele, of the University of Leyden : " We cannot deny the fact that not only In the Ural-Altaic ahd Japanese, but also In the highly developed Chinese religions the relation between the divine powers and man is purely patriarchical. Just as the chief of the horde — nay, even the son of heaven, the Chinese emperor — is regarded as the father of all his subjects, whom they'are bound to obey and to venerate, so are the gods to their worshippers. The only difference is that the Chi- nese heavemgod Tien Is an emperor like his earthly representative, ruling over the other spirits of heaven and earth as does the latter over the dukes of the empire and their subjects, while the Ural-Altaic heaven-god is indeed the most power- ful being, Invoked in the greatest difSculties, when he only is able to save, but no supreme ruler, — not anything more than a primus inter pares, every other god being absolute lord and master in his own domain. Now this difference is not one of character but of progress, and answers fully to the difference of the political institutions of which it is the reflex." ^* It is an easy task thus to trace the determining influence of material conditions In the basic concep- ^* Encfclopadia Brittanica (gth ed.) Vol. ao, p. 363, art. " Religions.'^ 112 MARXIAN SOCIALISM AND RELIGION tions of the primitive religions. Just as the con- nection between the economic life of the North American Indian and his Ideas of a future life of the soul is too obvious to be mistaken or over- looked, so, In like manner, the eschatologlcal con- ceptions of the Eskimo reflect In a striking manner his material environment and his economic con- ditions and the limited experience which these in- volve. Who but a dweller in the arctic circle could conceive of a celestial life in which spirits playing ball with walrus skulls create the aurora borealis? To rest the defense of religion upon the denial of a truth so well attested as that re- ligious conceptions reflect material conditions and experiences, must ultimately bring disaster to the cause of religion. IX It is much more difficult to trace the Influence of material and social transformations in the religious thinking and feeling of the modern world. The reactions are more subtle and indirect and ob- scure. They are also less powerfully determina- tive, perhaps, for it can hardly be gainsaid that man's power to control and direct the economic forces is constantly growing. With each increase in that power his life becomes less dependent on the economic factor and the importance of other RELIGION AND MARXISM 113 factors, the ideological ones, is increased. As yet the subject has not attracted adequate scholarship, notwithstanding its great importance. But we do know in a general way that the great transforma- tions in economic methods, and, consequently, in social and political ideas, and institutions, have been attended by changes in religious conceptions and values similar in quality to the changes in po- litical and social thought and feeling. The demo- cratic trend of the nineteenth century was the logi- cal and inevitable outcome of nineteenth century industrialism. That democratic trend, with its instinctive humanitarianism, was fatal to many a sacred religious conception — for example, the cherished Protestant doctrine of a remorseless avenging God physically torturing His creatures through eternity as a punishment for their failure to do His will and attain His perfection. Such a conception of God could not long survive the dem- ocratic awakening. Recognition of this fact by the clearest minds in the Christian world is becoming more and more common. The following is typical of utterances to be found in the religious journals of today: " Neither God nor man is the same as they were to our grandfathers. We are under a new heaven and in a new earth. Ew)Iution has undermined the notion of the race having sinned in Adam, and 114 MARXIAN SOCIALISM AND RELIGION being consequently born in a state of inherited cor- ruption. Now, thinkers see the race cradled amongst animal entanglements from which it has to loose itself, and this natural struggle — which in itself is a virtue — almost by necessity issues in exaggerations and mistakes. . . . The British public has discovered a new Deity. The former Supreme, who was all eyes, and wrote down in a book of remembrance even our microscopic fail- ings, no longer exists except for a few obscurantists who belong to a previous generation. On the throne there is a God of love, who understands and is more pitiful than the best of fathers. " Tout connditre, dest tout pardonner," applies to Him. Accordingly, men are more kindly in their judgments of each other, and more hopeful of themselves." ®® And in still more subtle ways, as yet but dimly perceived, the industrialism and the democracy of modern life have reacted upon our religious beliefs and perceptions. Miss Scudder, with fine insight, has attributed the growth of immanential, as opposed to transcendental, ideas of God to the advance of democracy.^® It was natural for de- SBRev. Alexander Brown, in The Hibbert Journal, Vol. VII, No. 3, April, 1909, pp. 617-618. •* Socialism and Character, by Vida Scudder, pp. 331-33. RELIGION AND MARXISM 115 mocracy to abandon the idea of God as a monarch ruling the Universe. It was equally natural for it to develop the conception of an Immanent Spirit, Such a conception flowed naturally out of the ex- perience of the struggle which shattered the " di- vine right of kings," deprived aristocracy of its political supremacy, and substituted for the direct personal rule of the many by the few the suprem- acy of an impersonal collective consciousness. Modern science has emphasized that conception of the Immanent God. X It is clear that the Marxian doctrine of historical materialism is capable of rendering immense serv- ice to the study of religion. As a method of in- terpretation it is as helpful to students of compar- ative religion and Biblical criticism as to students of secular history and politics. Used with dis- crimination, it throws light upon many obscure phases of the development of man's sense of rela- tionship to the Universe and to the Final Reality. When discrimination in the use of the method is lacking the results are either ludicrous or dis- astrous. In the hands of the inexpert novice the keen tools of the master craftsman work mischief! ii6 MARXIAN SOCIALISM AND RELIGION When we are told that religion is simply a by- product of economic evolution, destined to ob- livion, or when men seeing how a groping humanity adapts the forms of material life and daily experience to express religious emotions and aspirations, conclude that religion has no roots deeper than the transitory economic institutions, we may know that the economic interpretation of religion is imperfectly understood and improperly used. This is true even if it is Marx himself who speaks. Though a profoundly spiritual nature, Marx had little sympathy for, or comprehension of, the mysticism of religion, its concern over eter- nity, its assumption of a communion with the Author of Life and Being. He was Darwin's contemporary and his profound admirer, and naturally partook of the prevailing skeptical tem- per of that epoch. Writing of religion in a pas- sage which we have already quoted in our sketch of the development of the theory of historical materialism, Marx says : " Every history of re- ligion, even, that fails to take account of this material basis is uncritical. It is, in reality, much easier to discover by analysis the earthly core of the misty creations of religion than it is, con- versely, to develop from the actual relations of life the corresponding celestialised forms of those rela- RELIGION AND MARXISM 117 tions. The latter method Is the only materialistic, and therefore the only scientific one." ^^ Commenting upon this passage, Edward Bern- stein has shrewdly observed: "In this contrast there is great exaggeration. Unless one already knew the heavenly forms, the method of deduction described would lead to all kinds of arbitrary con- structions, and if one knew them the deduction de- scribed is a means of scientific analysis, but not a scientific antithesis to analytic interpretation." ^* When we know the religious conceptions of the Eskimo, for example, we can readily discern the influence of the economic conditions and the material environment as whole upon those concep- tions. Thus the economic Interpretation of re- ligion is possible. But If, without any idea of the religious conceptions of the Eskimo, with nothing to guide us except our knowledge of the Eskimo's economic conditions and material environment, we attempted to deduce from that knowledge an out- line of his religious ideas our failure would be in- evitable and complete. Like every new theory which comes Into conflict with some existing theory, the Marxian theory of the economic interpretation of history first ap- *' Capital, Vol. I, American (Kerr) edition, p. 406, note. Italics mine. '^ EvolutioKary Socialism, by Edward Bernstein, pp. 16-17, note. ii8 MARXIAN SOCIALISM AND RELIGION peared in an exaggerated form, as Engels admitted in the eighteen-nineties, in the letters from which we have quoted in an earlier chapter. As Bern- stein remarks, " it cannot be denied that Marx and Engels originally assigned to the non-economic factors a much less influence on the evolution of society, a much less power of modifying by their action the conditions of production than in their later writings." ^® But even if we ignore the later developments of the theory, and confine our atten- tion to the earlier formulations of it, we are forced to admit that Marx and Engels recognized that non-economic factors influence historical develop- ment, that they never regarded the economic fac- tor as the sole and exclusively determining force in history. Hence, we are forced to conclude that the attempts to interpret it as a monistic theory are unwarranted. Of course, this conclusion is strengthened by the amplifications of the theory by Engels. Unques- tionably, the letters in which the latter developed the theory in 1890 and 1894 must be taken into account and their qualifications and elaborations added to the earlier definitions. And when it is so delimited, every excuse for assailing it as " atheis- tic " vanishes. In the excess of enthusiasm for or against Dar- ^^ Evolutionary Socialism, p. 11. RELIGION AND MARXISM 119 winism which marked the first two decades of the latter half of the nineteenth century it was freely asserted by the advocates of the new theory, and as freely admitted by its opponents, that accept- ance of the evolutionary hypothesis necessitated the rejection of the teleological argument of design in the Universe. Today that sort of argument is never heard in enlightened circles. Even the Roman C.atholic Church does not oppose the evo- lutionary hypothesis. Religion has become recon- ciled to it. When such a noted Jesuit as Father Wasmann, of Luxemburg, exposes the fallacy of the older doctrine of the fixity and independent cre- ation of the different species, and states the case for evolution in a manner worthy of Huxley, or even of Darwin himself, we are not surprised. In the same way religion must accept the theory of historical materialism. In the excess of en- thusiasm for and against Marx's great theory it has often been asserted and admitted that the the- ory necessarily leads to the rejection of belief in God and of the belief in the superiority of mind over matter. Yet, from the first it has been a necessary implication of the theory that mankind steadily advances in power to control the economic forces, steadily gains in freedom from economic restraints and in capacity for a free and indepen- dent spiritual and ethical direction of life. That 120 MARXIAN SOCIALISM AND RELIGION is what Engels meant when he wrote his critique of Herr Diihring: " Just as far as society obtains the domination of the social means of production in order to organize them socially, it abolishes the servitude of man to his own means of produc- tion." *" As a consequence of his greater insight into the laws of economic evolution, and the influ- ence of economic conditions upon life in general, man in the twentieth century is much more the master of the economic forces, much more capable of subordinating the economic forces to suit his needs instead of being controlled by them, than man has ever been at any previous time in all hu- man history. The time of his complete emancipa- tion from any kind of economic mastery is already at hand. It is safe to predict that, just as organized religion has accepted the hypothesis of evolution, finding that it does not weaken or destroy the evi- dences of design exhibited by the Universe, so it will accept the materialistic conception of history and realize that it does not weaken or destroy the evidence of Divine purpose in man's slow ascent from the lowly and gross animal entanglements of his beginning to the glory of oneness with God. *<• Engels, Landmarks of Scientific Socialism ("Anti-Dfih- ring") p. «40. RELIGION AND MARXISM 121 XI Finally, whether or not the great decisive changes in human history have been effected through class conflicts is a question of fact, not one of faith or doctrine. It must be judged by the criteria of history and not by the criteria of re- ligion or theology. The noted Catholic critic of Socialism, the learned Jesuit, Father V. Cathrein, recognizes this and makes no attempt to assail the class struggle theory upon religious grounds, but makes his appeal solely to history.*^ He admits that class struggles play an important part in the history of mankind, but holds that the Marxian theory ascribes too great an influence to such strug- gles. Certainly, Father Cathrein is right in crit- icizing the statement of Engels that " the history of all hitherto existing society is the history of class struggles," as an exaggeration. We have already dealt vi'ith this point.*^ Truly, it is an exaggeration to claim that every great historical development is the outcome of economic class conflict. Nevertheless, class strug- gles have played a most important part in history. Apparently, only through class struggles has man- *^ Socialism: Its Theoretical Basis and Practical Applica- tion, by Victor Cathrein, S.J., revised and enlarged by Victor F. Gettelmann, S.J., pp. 137-140. •i^See p. 71. 122 MARXIAN SOCIALISM AND RELIGION kind effected the great fundamental changes in social and political relations, such as from feudal to commercial supremacy, from absolutism to con- stitutionalism, from the political supremacy of the propertied few to political democracy. There are moral arguments against the Socialist appeal to the class consciousness of the proletariat which we must briefly consider. The first is that it is unethical to promote class hatred. There are many fine spirits who would gladly ally themselves with the Socialist movement but for this stumbling block. To them, the appeal to the class conscious- ness of the workers is a monstrous thing. This judgment proceeds from a fundamental miscon- ception. It is believed that the Socialist is en- gaged in the unethical task of creating class antag- onism and inciting class hatred. But in truth the Socialist has nothing to do with the creation of the class antagonism concerning which he waxes so eloquent in denunciation or ap- peal. The antagonism is inherent in the social order which develops a class of owners on one hand and a proletariat on the other hand. The Socialist simply directs attention to the fact. He does not hold the capitalist class responsible for existing conditions. He recognizes that hatred is not only unjustifiable but dangerous. The entire appeal to the class consciousness of the workers RELIGION AND MARXISM 123 has for its object their awakening to the fact that individuals are not responsible for the fundamental evils of capitalist society, that nothing can be gained by assailing individuals, and that only by changing the system can the proletariat free itself. Thus, by turning the revolt of the workers away from individuals of the exploiting class and direct- ing it against the system itself, Socialism discour- ages class hatred and its sinister offspring, inde- pendent personal revolt. It is never the class conscious worker who resorts to dagger, bomb or rifle shot in a desperate revolt against harsh con- ditions. It is always the poor wretch who does not see beyond the individual, does not grasp the fact that the system is at fault, does not see the need of the effort of a united class to change the system, and therefore acts independently. Social- ism by its gospel of class-consciousness has ren- dered the world a great service in turning the wrath of the oppressed and disinherited away from channels of abortive violence into the chan- nels of patient and consistent political and eco- nomic effort.** Another moral argument against class conscious- ness measures the appeal to the interest of a class ^^This entire question is discussed at much greater length in the section of my Substance of Socialism which is entitled "The Moral Value of Class Consciousness." 124 MARXIAN SOCIALISM AND RELIGION against the broader humanitarian appeal to all mankind and condemns it. So considered, class consciousness represents a relatively low ethical standard. With this objection we must be very patient. Unquestionably, a universal race con- sciousness, involving a loyalty to and unity with all the human race, is a nobler ethical ideal than class consciousness which involves only loyalty to and union with the class to which one belongs. Class consciousness is not the highest ethical stan- dard conceivable. But until the system under which we live has been radically readjusted, so that economic antagonisms are swept away and there is no division into exploiters and exploited, property owners and proletariat, that complete union of all mankind is destined to be no more than a beautiful dream, far off and unrelated to the world of reality. It is not an effective ethic. The largest commonality of interests possible under the present social system is that which binds together the workers of all lands, irrespective of racial or geographical divisions. The common consciousness of the working class, using that term in its broadest and most liberal sense, is the most inclusive loyalty possible within the present eco- nomic system. Class consciousness is therefore the most efficient ethical force yet developed. Furthermore, the whole purpose of the appeal to RELIGION AND MARXISM 125 class consciousness is to enlist the necessary force to put an end to the system of classes, to make class rule impossible and thereby to make possible the universal race consciousness. So considered, class consciousness is the gateway to that larger social consciousness. Those who remind us so gravely that no moral gain would result from a change of masters, that if the proletariat could overthrow the dominant class of today and take its place, things would in nowise be bettered, utterly mistake the whole spirit of the class consciousness of modern Socialism. That spirit aims at nothing less than the destruction of every condition upon which class rule might be rested. Its ideal is a world free from conflicting class interests, a world not limited in its loyalties by class boundaries, but welded in a glorious har- mony by an all-embracing consciousness and loy- alty. XII Those who investigate the subject with open minds will find that there is no philosophical or ethical element in the Marxian system which con- flicts with a reverent and profound belief in a Su- preme Being, a personal God of infinite wisdom, immanent in the Universe of which He is Creator and Ruler. It is possible to believe in the Marx- 126 MARXIAN SOCIALISM AND RELIGION ian synthesis in the most unqualified manner and at the same time to worship God and acknowledge Him as Lord and Master. It requires no evasive interpretations, no subtle metaphysical twists, to accept the materialistic con- ception of history, the class struggle theory and the prophecy of a cooperative commonwealth while believing as fervently as any Saint of old in " One God, one law, one element, And one far-off divine event, To which the whole creation moves." To believe that the whole process of organic evolu- tion from the lowest protozoa to man is ruled and directed by an Infinite Intelligence is no longer held to be incompatible with the teachings of sci- ence. So far we have advanced. That the whole process of social evolution from the tribal com- munism of the prehistoric savage to the capitalism of today, with its foreshadowings of a fraternal state, shows the guidance of the same Infinite Intel- ligence is likewise quite compatible with the sci- ence of social evolution. There is no conflict be- tween Marxism and religion. CHAPTER V RELIGION AND THE SOCIALIST MOVEMENT I By way of authoritative reply to the critics of So- cialism most of the Socialist parties of the world have at one time or another formally disavowed any hostility to religion, and have pledged them- selves to maintain complete religious freedom. The oldest of the Socialist parties, that of Ger- many, naturally led the way with a declaration upon this important matter. Its first declaration was made in May, 1875, at the Gotha Congress when the union of the Marxists and the Lasalleans was effected. Article VI of the programme adopted on that occasion- read as follows : "Uni- versal and equal popular education by the State. Universal compulsory education. Free instruc- tion in all forms of art. Declaration that religion is a private matter." That programme remained in force until 1891, when the Erfurt Congress adopted the programme by which the party has been governed ever since. In the Erfurt pro- gramme education and religion are treated sep- 127 128 MARXIAN SOCIALISM AND RELIGION arately, each in a section by itself, and not merged in a single paragraph as in the programme of 1875. Article VI of the programme reads: Declaration that religion is a private matter. Ab- olition of all expenditure from public funds upon ecclesiastical and religious objects. Ecclesiastical and religious bodies are to be treated as private as- sociations which order their affairs independently." The programme of the Social Democratic Party of Austria closely copies the German declaration and adds a provision concerning marriage: " Declaration that religion is a private matter. Separation of the Church from the State, and declaration that ecclesiastical and religious com- munities are private associations which manage their affairs quite independently. Compulsory civil marriage." Similar declarations have been adopted by nearly every Socialist party in the world at some time or another. Some have dealt with the sub- ject in special resolutions, while others, following the example of Germany and Austria, have dealt with it in their formal programmes. Thus, the Socialist Party of America, at its national conven- tion in 1908, incorporated in the party platform a declaration that religion must be treated as " a private matter — a question of the individual conscience." On the other hand, the Belgian THE SOCIALIST MOVEMENT 129 party has dealt with the subject of religion in special resolutions, declaring itself to be strictly neutral in matters pertaining to religious belief. In its programme it makes no specific mention of religion, but demands " Separation of the Churches and the State; suppression of the grant for public worship ; philosophical or religious asso- ciations to be civil persons at law; complete neu- trality of all communal services from the philo- sophical point of view." The last named pro- vision, scarcely intelligible to Americans, deals with the practice, quite common in Belgium, of making religious belief and affiliation a condition of employment in the public service. The exceptions to this general rule of official neutrality have been very rare. In general they have been confined to groups and factions which did not represent the national movements. In countries where the Church takes an active part in politics, where Clerical parties exist, it has been difficult for the Socialist parties to maintain their neutral attitude. Thus, before the union of the various Socialist factions of France into the pres- ent United Socialist Party, in 1905, one faction, the moderate French Socialist Party, led by Jean Jaures, in its programme of 1902, made a declara- tion of its position which was frankly hostile to religion. It read : 130 MARXIAN SOCIALISM AND RELIGION " The Socialist Party needs, to organize the new world, free minds, emancipated from superstitions and prejudices. It asks for and guarantees every human being, every individual, absolute freedom of thinking and writing, and affirming their be- liefs. Over against all religions, dogmas, and churches, as well as over against the class concep- tions of the bourgeoisie, it sets the unlimited right of free thought, the scientific conception of the uni- verse, and a system of public education based ex- clusively on science and reason." In the programme of the party, in the section entitled " Complete secularization of the State," we find freedom of public worship provided for, as well as the abolition of the religious orders. The section reads: (a) Separation of the Churches and the State; abolition of the Budget of Public Worship; free- dom of public worship ; prohibition of the political and collective action of the Churches against the civil laws and republican liberties. (b) Abolition of the congregations; national- ization of the property In mortmain, of every kind, belonging to them, and appropriation of it for works of social insurance and solidarity; in the interval, all industrial, agricultural, and com- mercial undertakings are to be forbidden to the congregations." THE SOCIALIST MOVEMENT 131 It is not necessary to consider here the causes which led to the disestablishment of the Church in France and the exclusion of the religious orders. That would take us into the labyrinth of contem- porary French politics. Suffice it to say that the political activities of the Church led to such wide- spread corruption and intrigues so serious as to menace, in the opinion of an overwhelming major- ity of the French people, the existence of the Re- public. The Socialists were by no means alone in their fight against Clericalism. Indeed, they were not even the pioneers of that fight. That the long and bitter struggle against the Church, the repre- sentative institution of religion, should have de- veloped a bitter feeling against that which the Church represented, and so have given to French Socialism an anti-religious character is not strange. It would be strange, indeed, if It were otherwise. When the struggle against Clericalism in France is carefully studied, we no longer marvel at the resolution of the Parti Ouvrier socialiste revolu- tionnaire, adopted on August 22, 1901, which, as a protest, pledged Its members to perform no act of public worship.^ In the same way, the bitter fight against clericalism in Spain led to the adop- tion of a similar resolution in September, 1899. That the Socialists of France should make com- 1 Vandervelde, Essais Socialistes, p. 106, 132 MARXIAN SOCIALISM AND RELIGION mon cause with other non-Socialist parties to bring about the expulsion of the religious orders is quite intelligible to one familiar with contemporary French life. They were not opposed to Clerical- ism because they were Socialists: if they had been ordinary bourgeois radicals, or Liberals, in the English sense of that word, their position would have been the same. In a word, the explanation of their hostility toward the religious establish- ments must be sought, not in their Socialist princi- ples, but in their political environment. The same may be said of the action of those Socialists in the Italian Parliament who, on February 29, 1904, assailed the Jesuits and demanded the inflexible application of the law of 1 848 expelling the Jesuits from Italian territory. The political intrigues and ambitions of the Roman clergy have done more to make French So- cialists hostile to religion than all other causes combined. And, to measure the extent of the re- action, we must bear in mind that many of the early French Socialists were devout followers of Christ, sincere religious believers. They identi- fied Socialism with religion. Vandervelde has re- produced from Proudhon's paper, Le Peuple, an interesting description of a banquet held by some French Socialists in 1848, at which toasts were drunk " To Christ, the Father of Socialism," " To THE SOCIALIST MOVEMENT 133 the coming of God on earth " and " To the living Christ." 2 The whole literature of that early French Socialism is vibrant with a strong religious passion. Professor Ely has said of the Socialist movement in France in 1850: "At that time if any one had visited the assembly rooms of a Com- munistic or Socialistic society in Paris, he would in all probability have found there a picture of Christ with these words written under it, ' Jesus of Naza- reth, the first representative of the people.' " ^ Although some British Socialist writers have vigorously assailed religion, the movement as a whole has never followed their example. Writers like Bax and Leatham have vainly tried to identify Socialism with, philosophical materialism, but the Socialist parties and the general Socialist public have refused to follow them. They have pre- ferred the view of Macdonald that " Socialism has no more to do with a man's religion than it has with the color of his hair. Socialism deals with secular things, not with ultimate beliefs." A very large number of British Socialists have been de- voutly religious and actively Identified with re- ligious movements. The declaration of Keir Hardle, " I first learned my Socialism in the New Testament, where I still find my chief Inspiration," 2 Vandervelde, Essais Socialistes, pp. 130-131. ^French and German Socialism, by R. T. Ely, p. 146. 134 MARXIAN SOCIALISM AND RELIGION is typical of the experience of many. It is worthy of remark that when, in the summer of 1 910, some three hundred English Socialists, representing the Labor Party, visited France and Belgium, they bore banners inscribed: " We represent 500,000 English workpeople. One for all and all for one. We proclaim the Fatherhood of God and human brotherhood. Jesus Christ, the social reformer, leads and inspires us." The oldest Socialist organization in Great Brit- ain, the Social Democratic Party, at its annual Congress in Manchester, April 1908, adopted the following resolution : " That in view of the efforts of enemies of So- cialism to create division and prejudice in the ranks of the workers by raising sectarian disputes, this conference definitely re-affirms the position always maintained by the International Social Democracy, that the Socialist movement is concerned solely with secular affairs, and regards religion as a pri- vate matter." Another British Socialist organization, the So- cialist Party of Great Britain, has officially pub- lished a pamphlet in which it is declared that " So- cialism is the natural enemy of religion " and that the entry of Socialism is the exodus of religion.* * Socialism and Religion. First Edition. Published in 1910 by the Socialist Party of Great Britain, p. i8. THE SOCIALIST MOVEMENT 135 It asserts in very positive terms the incompatibility of Socialism and religion : " No man can be consistently both a Socialist and a Christian. It must be either the Socialist or the religious principle that is supreme, for the at- tempt to couple them equally together betrays charlatanism or lack of thought. There is, there- fore, no need for a specifically anti-religious test. So surely does the acceptance of Socialism lead to the exclusion of the supernatural, that the Socialist has little need for such terms as Atheist, Free- Thinker, or even Materialist ; for the word Social- ist, rightly understood, implies one who on all such questions takes his stand on positive science, ex- plaining all things by purely natural causation; Socialism being not merely a politico-economic creed, but also an integral part of a consistent world-philosophy." ^ Professor Werner Sombart has observed that nowadays " fundamentally hostile views about re- ligion are to be heard only in the circles of half-ed- ucated Socialists." ^ The Socialist Party of Great Britain evidently belongs to this category. It reit- erates the now generally abandoned idea that re- ligion and science are Incompatible : " Those whose standpoint is the welfare of the working " Idem, p. 34. « Sombart, Sozialismus und Sozial Bewegung (1908), p. loi. 136 MARXIAN SOCIALISM AND RELIGION class can make no appeal on grounds of religion; for religion is an instrument of domination which cannot be used as an agent of emancipation at this stage of social development. The great theoretic weapon of the wage-workers in their fight for free- dom is science, not religion; and religion and sci- ence are as incompatible as fire and water." "^ This pamphlet is perhaps the most remarkable declaration of antagonism to religion ever made by a Socialist organization. It is wholly at variance with the attitude of nearly all the great Socialist parties, and is in no sense representative of the Socialist position. Nor can " The Socialist Party of Great Britain " be called a representative So- cialist party. It is not, as its title would indicate, the representative organization of Socialism in Great Britain. It is not even a factor in the movement. It is a very insignificant faction, se- ceded from one of the major Socialist organiza- tions, entirely without influence, either in the So- cialist movement or in the outside world. It has never had more than a handful of members, less than two hundred altogether, organized in ten or a dozen branches. The members of this organization are, almost without exception, malcontents who have left one or other of the larger Socialist bodies and spend ^P- 33- THE SOCIALIST MOVEMENT 137 their time attacking prominent Socialist and Labor members of Parliament and denouncing the older Socialist parties. The organization is not affili- ated with the International Bureau, and has no standing in the international movement. Upon other matters, such as the attitude of Socialists to- ward the trade union movement, the promulgation of social reforms, and the policy to be pursued in the political struggle, the attitude of the members of the organization is quite as contrary to that of the principal Socialist bodies as its declaration on religion. When these facts are considered, this extraor- dinary document, which the American Anti-Social- ist League so eagerly welcomed as a valuable addi- tion to its ammunition, loses all its importance and most of its interest. It proves nothing except that it is possible to find small groups of Socialists who believe and declare that religion and Socialism can- not be reconciled. And that no one ever thought of denying. II In every country Socialism numbers among its adherents many men and women of religious faith and affiliations. In the German Reichstag among the Social Democratic representatives loyal Roman Catholics have sat for years. The first Roman 138 MARXIAN SOCIALISM AND RELIGION Catholic to enter the Norwegian Storthing was elected as a Socialist, while another Socialist repre- sentative elected at the same time was a Lutheran clergyman. In the Socialist Party of America there are thousands of men and women who loyally maintain religious affiliations. At a national con- vention of the party it is not at all uncommon to find, among the delegates, loyal Roman Catholics, clergymen belonging to various Protestant sects, active Christian Scientists, Spiritualists, Baptists, Presbyterians, Methodists, Lutherans — and so on through the list of Protestant sects. Because Socialism is the movement of a class in revolt and aspiring to be free, it must value class solidarity above everything else. Whatever jeop- ardises that class solidarity menaces the very life of the movement. For that reason, if for no other, Socialism must stand for religious tolera- tion, the complete freedom of the individual in all matters of belief and worship. The popular Brit- ish Socialist writer whose identity is concealed by the pseudonym " Tattler," expresses the viewpoint of the overwhelming majority of Socialists every- where : "... I conclude by most earnestly appealing to my fellow-workers. Christian or Pagan, Jew or Gentile, Catholic or Protestant, Mohammedan or Buddhist, Believer or Atheist, to let no question of THE SOCIALIST MOVEMENT 139 religion divide them in pursuing the road to their class emancipation. Let us learn from the exam- ple of our masters. They do not allow religious differences to present any barrier to their class interest or to divide their class solidarity. Let us then be tolerant in such matters ourselves — re- fuse to allow creed or race to divide us, in our fight for economic freedom; conscious of the fact that only when man is no longer enslaved by man ; only when all are economically free, will true and last- ing accord, true comradeship, true brotherhood, perfect spiritual freedom and true religion be pos- sible." 8 The necessity for class solidarity is not the only reason for freedom of the individual in all matters of belief and worship. It is a fundamental re- quirement of democracy. How could Social De- mocracy do other than declare itself opposed to any Interference with the religious convictions of individuals? Complete freedom of religious be- lief and worship Is inseparable from the concept of democracy. Ill The statement that religion Is " a private mat- ter " has been denounced as a vote-catching device, * Some Objections to Socialism Considered and Ansiaered, by " Tattler," London, 1907, p. 16. Uo MARXIAN SOCIALISM AND RELIGION an insincere statement issued for tactical reasons. We need not waste time over the suggestion. The Socialist movement is too much given to searching self-criticism to warrant our giving any considera- tion to the charge of insincerity. When the decla- ration was made in the platform of the Socialist Party of the United States it was not the work of a small group of shrewd political leaders. The platfojm was submitted to a referendum vote of the entire party membership and adopted by an immense majority. It is not possible to charge a hundred thousand men and women with insincerity and adopting a false declaration for political rea- sons. Other critics have assailed the declaration for its unscientific character. Religion is not merely a private matter, they say, but a social matter. It is a social force of great importance. This criticism has been tersely answered in an official address is- sued by the Socialist Party of Vermont, in 1912: " When we say that religion is ' a private mat- ter ' we do not mean that it has no social signifi- cance. Such a contention would be manifestly ab- surd. Religion is inseparable from conduct, from human relations, and hence it is a social force of the greatest importance. What is meant by the declaration is that religious belief or non-belief is a matter for the individual conscience with which THE SOCIALIST MOVEMENT 141 the State or political parties within the State can have nothing to do. Therefore the Socialists of all countries take their stand upon the broad prin- ciple that Church and State should be entirely separate." ^ The best commentary upon the declaration that religion is a private matter is still the address which that veteran Socialist, Wilhelm Liebknecht, made at the Erfurt Congress, in 1891, upon the new programme, immediately prior to its adoption. After telling how difficult it had been to formulate the party demands with reference to religion and education, Liebknecht said : " To meet the difficulty it was moved to accept the democratic demands as found in the Eisen- acher programme : * Separation of the Church from the school and from the State.' That was quite right in its time, but at present it does not comprehend all that we would and must say. In the earlier formulation the church is regarded as an institution equal in rank with the State. This is not our idea. We go much further; according to our view, in the free community for which we strive the church is simply a private association, which is controlled by its own laws, as all other 9 The Socialist Party and Religion. An address to Citizens of Religious Belief and Affiliation. Adopted by the State Con- vention, June 1912. Vermont Socialist News, Vol. II, Double Number 8-9. 142 MARXIAN SOCIALISM AND RELIGION private associations are. That is the meaning of the absolute equality to which we have here given expression. Therefore, we say : ' The ecclesi- astical and religious bodies are to be regarded as private associations.' And in order that the Cath- olics may not be able to say that we wish to ofer them violence we have added : ' Associations which order their affairs independently.' " In connection with this passage concerning the church we demand ' secularization of education.' This means that the church, that religion, should have nothing to do with the school. We are bound by principle to demand this and the point is so clear that explanation seems unnecessary. However, it is worth while to meet beforehand all misunderstandings and intentional or unintentional misrepresentations to which such a demand in our platform could give occasion. It is well known how stubbornly the ecclesiastical bodies carry on the struggle concerning the school whenever that question comes tp the front. One recognizes how much it means to them, Catholics, Protestants and others, to hold and make their control firm over the intellect. You know how the Social Democ- racy is represented as a red specter, how the eccle- siastical associations say of us that we are a party of atheists, and that the Social Democrats would forcibly take religion from every one and violently THE SOCIALIST MOVEMENT 143 crush the church. In order to take the foundation from and to break the point of these demagogical slanders and pious falsehoods, we state here that the regulation of religious matters lies with each individual, and we declare religion to he a private matter. I admit that I struggled for some time against taking up these practical considerations, since their meaning seemed so self-evident in the declaration of the programme. But in looking back over the systematic calumny of our position in regard to religion it appears necessary that they be stated. The Social Democracy as such has ab- solutely nothing to do with religion. Every man has a right to think and believe what he will, and no one has the right to molest or limit another in his thoughts or beliefs, or to allow any one's opin- ions to be a disadvantage to him in any way. Opinions and beliefs can only be proceeded against when they become converted into pernicious and unlawful acts, as for example, with certain bigoted sects. But the opinions and beliefs in themselves must be free, perfectly free. We as Social Dem- ocrats must respect them, and those Social Demo- crats who respect the genuineness and worth of their fellow men will also avoid scoffing at their be- liefs. Above all, scoiSng at a prejudice is foolish and impolitic, since it but strengthens It. Only education can be of help here. But if it were our 144 MARXIAN SOCIALISM AND RELIGION duty to state that we will not rob any one of his re- ligion or hinder him in the exercise thereof, we dare not offer the church any handle by means of which it can come into the schools, and, therefore, we say, ' Compulsory attendance at public national schools.' Every child must be sent by its parents or relatives to these secular schools, in which no religion is taught, but by virtue of the fundamental statement, that religion is a private matter, it re- mains to the parents themselves to teach their chil- dren, or allow them to he taught, in the religion which they choose. At first we thought to ex- pressly state this in the programme, but we found that such a practical commentary did not belong there. " We demand further that expenditures from the public funds not only to ecclesiastical but to religious objects be abolished. We have added the word ' religious ' because there are associa- tions of a religious nature that are not ecclesias- tical, and also there shall be no expenditure from the public funds, just because religion is a private matter." ^^ The German Social Democracy has always faithfully adhered to the principles set forth by its great champion. Immediately after the forma- "Italics mine.— J. S. THE SOCIALIST MOVEMENT 14s tion of the German Empire Bismarck undertook to suppress the Catholic Church. Three measures were introduced with this object in view in the three years, 1 871-1873. The first of these sought to limit the freedom of expression from the pulpit, the second to expel the Jesuit order from the country, and the third to remove the education of priests from the Church. Notwithstanding the fact that from the first they had been bitterly at- tacked and misrepresented by the Catholic clergy, the Social Democrats conducted a very vigorous agitation against these reactionary measures. Thus, the " Atheistic " Social Democracy was from its early days a defender of Catholic rights. To put an end to the persecution of their orders in various German States, the Catholic representa- tives in the Reichstag introduced, in 1900, a bill which provided that there be " freedom of re- ligious beliefs." This "Toleration Bill" de- manded that the religious communities recognized by the State should be entirely independent. The Socialist representatives offered an amendment to the effect that there should be complete freedom and independence for all religious beliefs and practices, not merely for those recognized by the State. The Catholic representatives unanimously voted against the Socialist amendment, which 146 MARXIAN SOCIALISM AND RELIGION aimed to give to all creeds and beliefs the freedom which the Catholics desired for themselves. But, notwithstanding the provocation thus furnished by the reactionary attitude of the Catholic representa- tives, the Social Democrats finally supported the Catholic measure by unanimous vote rather than jeopardise the principle of toleration. In 19 1 2 the German government made a fresh attack upon the famous Catholic order, the Society of Jesus. An attempt was made to rigidly inter- pret the anti- Jesuit laws of 1872, and there was great excitement and indignation among the Cath- olics of Germany. The Catholics, the Centre Party, had been a part of the government bloc, but the hostility to the Jesuits broke the alliance. At that juncture, the ministry took the unprecedented step of appealing to the Social Democrats to make common cause with it against the Catholic Centre. The hatred of the Catholics for the Socialists was made the basis of a very clever plea. Whereas the Catholics had 90 votes in the Reichstag, the Social Democrats had no. Had they let their opposition to the Catholic Party obscure their principles, the Social Democrats could have dealt the Catholics a terrible blow. But instead a rep- resentative of the Social Democracy assured the Centre of his party's earnest support, and once more the Social Democracy came to the support of THE SOCIALIST MOVEMENT 147 the Catholics In their fight for religious freedom.^* That influential Marxist, Dr. Anton Pannekoek, has written on the subject of the attitude of the Social Democracy to religion : " We Socialists consider religion as a private concern of each individual, and we demand that the State shall take the same position. This de- mand proves clearly that the assertion of the clergy that we wish to abolish religion is simply a decep- tion and a slander. The platform plank, ' Re- ligion is a private matter,' clearly expresses that fundamental character of our movement by which it may be distinguished from all earlier revolution- ary mass movements. We do not inquire into personal views; we do not demand any profession of faith; we insist only on cooperation in our prac- tical aims. Our aim is a definite, material trans- formation of society, a different regulation of labor, the substitution of the Socialist mode of production for the present system. Nothing else. Anybody who wants to cooperate with us for the attainment of this aim is welcome as a comrade-in- arms, regardless of his philosophic, religious, or other personal views. Our aims bear no relation 11 This episode was dealt with in the American Catholic press at the time. For example, The Catholic Telegraph, December 13, 1912, describes the failure of the government's appeal to the Social Democrats. The Catholic Tribune of the same date deals with the subject. 148 MARXIAN SOCIALISM AND RELIGION to religion — they move in entirely different spheres." ^^ IV The Address issued to citizens of religious be- lief and affiliation by the Socialist Party of Ver- mont, from which we have already quoted, is perhaps the fullest and most comprehensive state- ment on the subject yet issued by any body of orthodox Socialists. It is a document of more than local or temporary interest and is worthy of preservation : " In view of the fact that several Vermont clergymen, principally of the Roman Catholic church, have bitterly assailed the Socialist move- ment, charging that it is hostile to religion and subversive of religious belief, the State Conven- tion of the Socialist Party of Vermont addresses this plain statement of its position to all citizens of religious belief and affiliation, irrespective of creed. " The aim of the Socialist Party is to organize the wage-workers and farmers of America in a great political movement for the sole purpose of bringing about the collective ownership of those ^"Die Abschaffung des Eigentums, des Staates und der Re- ligion, quoted by Hillquit, in Socialism, Promise or Menacef p. 200. THE SOCIALIST MOVEMENT 149 means of production and exchange which are at present used by the few to exploit the many. Only by this means, we believe, will it be possible to put an end to those conditions which are respon- sible for the existing social unrest — conditions which His Eminence, Cardinal Gibbons, has re- cently declared to be analogous to those which led to the downfall of the Roman Empire. " Beyond this political and economic effort to bring about the social ownership and control of the necessities of social life, restricting private property to those things which individuals can use and own with advantage to themselves and with- out disadvantage to others, the Socialist Party has no programme or aim. In particular, it has noth- ing whatever to do with matters of religious belief, worship or organization. " In common with the Socialists of every coun- try, the Socialist Party of America has declared religion to be a * private matter.' The meaning of this declaration is self-evident to all who possess ' understanding hearts,' but it has, nevertheless, been shamefully misrepresented by those who are waging warfare against Socialism by unchristian appeals to passion and hatred. " When we say that religion Is ' a private mat- ter ' we do not mean that it has no social signifi- cance. Such a contention would be manifestly I50 MARXIAN SOCIALISM AND RELIGION absurd. Religion is inseparable from conduct, fi'om human relations, and hence it is a social force of the greatest importance. What is meant by the declaration is that religious belief or non-belief Is a matter for the individual conscience with which the State or political parties within the State can have nothing to do. Therefore, the Socialists of all countries take their stand upon the broad prin- ciple that church and State should be entirely sep- arate. This Is, likewise, a fundamental provision of the Constitution of the United States, and those who assail us for our strict adherence to it assail one of the basic principles of American democracy. " Proceeding logically from this cardinal prin- ciple, the Socialist Party does not concern Itself with the religious views or affiliations of its mem- bers. In common with other political parties It embraces In Its membership men and women be- longing to numerous religious sects — Jews, Prot- estants, Catholics, Bahaists, Spiritualists, Chris- tian Scientists, Theosophlsts, and so on, ad infini- tum. " Everywhere the Socialist movement stands for religious freedom and against the union of church and State which has always led to religious privi- lege on the one hand and religious disability upon the other hand, with intolerance, persecution and martyrdom as the inevitable results. Thus, the THE SOCIALIST MOVEMENT 151 Socialists in the German parliament have always cooperated with their bitterest enemies, the Center or Catholic party, in fighting for legislation giving the Jesuits the right to establish missions and to carry on their propaganda by lectures and publica- tion; it was the Socialists of France who led the fight against thie persecution of Dreyfus, a Jew; and the Belgian Socialists who fought for the pro- tection of the Christian missionaries of the Congo. " In our national conventions and congresses, and upon the most important committees of our party, Christians and Agnostics, Catholics and Protestants, serve with equal fidelity, side by side. Never was any discrimination made against any member of the party on account of his race or his religion. " In Germany, loyal Catholics like George von VoUmar (one of the foremost living Socialists), George Horn, Karl Pinkau, and Richard Fischer (a member of the party's National Executive), sit side by side in the Reichstag with avowed atheists like- Bebel and Bernstein and orthodox Jews like Hugo Haase, Ludwig Frank and Eman- uel Wurm. " In Norway, when the Socialist party first secured representation in the Storthing, the Nor- wegian parliament, in 1903, it was found that of the four elected Socialists one (Dr. Erickson) was 152 MARXIAN SOCIALISM AND RELIGION a Lutheran clergyman and another (Professor Berge) was a Roman Catholic. He was the only Roman Catholic to sit in the Norwegian parlia- ment at that time. " Again, when a few years ago the quarrymen of Belgium were on strike, notwithstanding the fact that they were practically all Catholics, not connected with the trades union movement, and generally bitterly hostile to Socialism, it was left to the Socialists to send bread and other food supplies to the starving Catholic strikers and their families from the Socialist cooperative bakeries and stores. " We have set down these few facts from the overwhelming mass of available evidence as the best possible answer to those appeals which are being made to our fellow workingmen and women of Catholic faith in a persistent endeavor to preju- dice them against the Socialist movement, "We repeat: The Socialist Party stands for full religious freedom, but is entirely neutral in its attitude towards all religious beliefs and creeds. It leaves every individual free to follow the dic- tates of his own reason and conscience, but calls upon all working people, regardless of race, color or creed, to unite with it in an earnest endeavor to change, through political action, the economic con- ditions which now make it well-nigh impossible for the devout believer to live according to his faith, THE SOCIALIST MOVEMENT 153 and to develop in their stead the conditions which will make Human Brotherhood possible." It is difficult to see how the position of the Socialist movement generally can be offensive to any loyal American, for it is in perfect harmony with the basis of our democracy. It is part of our American heritage to cherish and maintain the freedom of the individual to believe and worship according to the dictates of conscience; to believe that the State should impose no religious tests or obligations upon its citizens ; that Church and State must be kept separate; that religious associations must be free and independent of the State; that public funds should not be spent for religious or ecclesiastical purposes. These fundamental re- quirements of American democracy summarize the entire Socialist position and attitude on this ques- tion of religion. In the actual conflict in the political world the Socialist demand for the complete separation of Church and State has occasioned the greatest amount of opposition, particularly on the part of the Catholic parties. The leaders of the Catholic Church declare that the separation of Church and State must be opposed. Thus, Cathrein says: 154 MARXIAN SOCIALISM AND RELIGION " This doctrine is directly antagonistic' to tiie teach- ings of the Catholic Church, which has always con- demned as injurious and untenable the principle of the absolute separation of Church and State." ^^ Such statements are common in Catholic criticisms of Socialism. It is not to be wondered at, there- fore, that Socialist writers have taken the Catholic leaders at their word and asserted that while the separation of Church and State is in perfect accord with the spirit of Protestantism, it cannot accord with the spirit of Catholicism, or be accepted in Catholic countries, where the affirmation that religion is a private matter is directly opposed to the pretensions of the Church." Karl Kautsky, while stating as his personal view that the belief in a personal God and a personal immortality is irreconcilable with modern science, admits, nevertheless, that it is possible to be a good Christian and a Socialist at the same trnie : " One may well be a good Christian and still feel the warmest sympathy for the class struggle of the proletariat," he says, and again, " the striving of the masses for the abolition of class distinction is perfectly reconcilable with the Christian teaching of the Gospels." ^' But with the Roman Catholic IS Victor Cathrein, Socialism, Its TkeoreHcal Basis and Prac- tical Application, p. 2ii. ^* Vandervelde, Essais Socialistes, p. ii6. ''■* Di* SoKialdemokratic und die Katholische Kirchi. THE SOCIALIST MOVEMENT 155 I clergy, rather than with their religious beliefs, Socialism finds itself in conflict when it preaches the separation of Church and State : " Although Social Democracy respects every religious conviction and declares that such convic- tions are a matter of private concern for each in- dividual; and although the doctrines of New Testament Christianity may be harmonized with our aims, it is none the less true that Socialism in its struggle constantly meets the opposition of that authority which rules the Catholic religion, considered as a religion of the masses — the clergy." ^® We must remember that the Roman Catholic Church has always adapted Itself to its political environment. In Europe its leaders may declare that the Church cannot tolerate the separation of Church and State, but in the United States, where the separation is a fact, the leaders of the Catholic Church show no disposition to question the wisdom of that separation or to advocate the change in our Constitution necessary to bring about a union of Church and State. Indeed, many of the most eminent leaders of the Catholic Church in Amer- ica have publicly expressed the view that the sep- aration of Church and State as we have it in this country is a good thing for both. Cardinal 1* Idem. 1S6 MARXIAN SOCIALISM AND RELIGION Gibbons has frequently expressed this view." If the view expressed by Cardinal Gibbons is correct, and to be accepted as authoritative, it necessarily follows that there is nothing in the Socialist position with which the loyal Catholic must take issue. The separation of Church and State Is the logical outcome of treating religion as a private matter. The two things cannot be separated. With the separation of Church and State all kinds of religious tests imposed by the State must go, religious associations must be free and independent of the State, religious belief and worship must be left to the private judgment and conscience. Father Cathrein, writing from Continental Europe, in a monarchical environment, declares that the Catholic Church must condemn and op- pose the absolute separation of Church and State advocated by the Socialist parties of Europe. Cardinal Gibbons, living in a democratic republic 1^ A statement to this effect, purporting to be an exact quo- tation from Cardinal Gibbons, having gone the rounds of the press, I -wrote to His Eminence to ascertain whether the state- ment was correct. From his Secretary, Mr. E. J. Connelly, I received the following reply: "Dear Mr. Spargo: His Eminence, Cardinal Gibbons, directs me to say in answer to your letter that the quotation you re- ferred to is correct. He believes and never fails to speak his convictions when an opportunity presents its,elf, that for our country, the separation of Church and State as we have it here is the best thing for both Church and State." THE SOCIALIST MOVEMENT 157 which is based on the separation of Church and State, takes the opposite view. He approves the separation, for this country at least, and believes it best for the Church and the State. Upon that part of the international Socialist programme which deals with religion a great Prince of the Church places his approval, VI It must be admitted that, in spite of the formal declarations of neutrality toward religion by the Socialist parties, attacks on religion and the churches are common features of the Socialist propaganda. Sombart very truthfully says that " fundamentally hostile views about religion are to be heard only in the circles of half-educated Social- ists," but the number of these is considerable. Professor Rauschenbusch, himself a Socialist, com- plains : " Religious men are forced into a tragic dilemma when they face organized Socialism. On the one hand they realize in its ideas the most thorough and consistent economic elaboration of the Christian social ideal. It is far and away the most powerful force for justice, democracy, and organized fraternity in the modern world. On the other hand, these moral elements are fused 158 MARXIAN SOCIALISM AND RELIGION with an alloy that is repellent to their Christian instincts. " There are religious people who are not Chris- tians. Their sympathies are not with the common people, but with the parasitic classes. They do not trust in freedom, but want a strong Church to lay down the law to the common man. If Jesus appeared in modem dress among such people, they would not know what to do with him. To such persons, of course, Socialism is horrid. I am not concerned for them. I speak for men who have drawn their economic insight from Socialism, and their democracy and moral ardor from Jesus him- self, and who yet find it hard to cooperate whole- heartedly with party Socialism as they actually find it. " When they attend Socialist meetings, they en- counter a rougher, directer, more dogmatic, more acrimonious tone of discussion than they are used to in gatherings of the educated classes. . . . But they will also find an almost universal attitude of suspicion and dislike against the Church, which often rises to downright hate and bitterness, and expands to general antagonism against religion itself. The materialistic philosophy of history as the average Socialist expounds it, emphasizes the economic and material factors of life so exclusively that the spiritual elements of humanity seem as un- THE SOCIALIST MOVEMENT iS9 important as the coloring of a flower or the bloom on the grape. In large parts of the party litera- ture the social and economic teachings of Socialism are woven through a web of materialistic philos- ophy, which is part of ' scientific Socialism.' The party platform declares religion to be a private affair, but that declaration of neutrality does not exclude persistent attacks on religion by official exponents of the party. . . . "... A man of mature religious convictions may discriminate between the economic doctrines of Socialism, which are its essential, and the philo- sophical teachings, which are an adventitious his- torical taint of it. But others who may be drawn into the party through his influence may not be able to keep the two things apart. " Socialist leaders in America have committed an enormous tactical mistake in allowing Socialism to be put in antagonism to Christianity. Why should they permit some of their agitators to go out of their way to belie the neutrality promised by the party platform. Why should they erect a barb-wire fence between the field of Socialism and Christianity which makes it hard to pass from one to the other ?"i^ Now, the expression of hostility to religion by 18 Christianizing the Social Order, by Walter Rauschenbusch, pp. 397-399- i6o MARXIAN SOCIALISM AND RELIGION individual Socialists can hardly be deemed a breach of the party neutrality upon the subject. Still less can such expressions be made the basis of a charge of bad faith against the party. If the party for- bade its members to express their individual opin- ions if these should be opposed to religion, and dis- ciplined those who did so, permitting freedom of utterance only to religious believers, its attitude would not be a neutral one. The declaration that religion is a private matter does not carry with it the implication that no member of the party must give expression to views on the subject, whether religious or anti-religious. On the contrary, it implies the fullest freedom of individual opinion on the subject. It means that religion is not a matter with which the party has any concern, that it does not attempt to determine the religious be- liefs or practices of its members, and that the State must not interfere with the religious beliefs or practices of its citizens. Nevertheless, when the channels of the party, its press and its lecture platforms, are used for the advocacy of anti-religious views the party is inev- itably compromised, to some extent, in the public mind. This is especially the case when the per- sons advancing the anti-religious views are promi- nent party members. It does not help matters very much to say in such circumstances that the THE SOCIALIST MOVEMENT i6i party is not responsible. Feeling this, many influ- ential Socialists, both in Europe and in America, have protested against permitting religion to be attacked in the party press or upon its platforms. Thus George von VoUmar, the eminent German Socialist, at the Frankfort Congress, in 1894, pro- tested : " We must put the fine words of our pro- gramme into practice and maintain absolute neu- trality. We must do away entirely with the equivocation of declaring that religion is a private matter and at the same time continuing the tactics of base and stupid priest-eating and beating on the drum of science which have done the party so much harm." ^^ But the matter is really not so simple as it appears. Those who demand the suppression of the anti-religious views are rarely willing to agree to the suppression of religious views. It is incon- ceivable that any Socialist party, or, for that mat- ter, any non-Socialist party, would forbid any of its members from basing an appeal on behalf of the party's principles upon their religious beliefs, especially in an attempt to win the support of their co-religionists. Those who are shocked and pained by the numerous expressions of anti- religious views in connection with the Socialist propaganda are apt to forget that the expression "Protokoll, p. 146. i62 MARXIAN SOCIALISM AND RELIGION of religious views is even more common. It is a far more frequent occurrence for Socialist lec- turers and writers to base their appeals upon the principles and precepts of religion than contrari- wise. Even if we admit that the instinct of polit- ical expediency enters into it, there can be no doubt that the avidity with which Socialists in this coun- try seize upon every utterance by prominent religious leaders favorable to Socialism, and the eagerness with which Socialist clergymen who deal •with Socialism from the religious viewpoint are welcomed to Socialist platforms, prove that the great majority of Socialists are not hostile to re- ligion. Indifferent to it they may be, so far as they themselves are concerned, but they are not hostile to it. They do not believe it to be incom- patible with Socialism. On the contrary, they recognize that religion and Socialism are not op- posed, and that many valuable recruits can only be won to Socialisrrt through the religious appeal. There is far more toleration for religious views, and far less dogmatic atheism, in the Socialist propaganda of today than formerly. With the subsidence of the wave of crude atheism which followed in the wake of Darwinism, the Socialist movement has become more tolerant of religion. The dogmatic atheism which was rampant in the Socialist propaganda of a quarter of a century ago THE SOCIALIST MOVEMENT 163 Is obsolete. Fulminations against religion are still far from rare, but they are no longer characteristic of the Socialist movement. VII The association of atheism and Socialism was altogether adventitious. Most assuredly there Is nothing In the economic programme of Socialism which is explicitly or implicitly opposed to religion. Nor is there anything In the Marxian theories which the modern Socialist movement has accepted which is explicitly or implicitly In conflict with re- ligion. How, then, are we to account for the widespread atheism and irreligion historically associated with the Socialist movement? We have already noted the fact that in the dis- cussion of the Darwinian theories, which raged during the first two decades of the latter half of the nineteenth century, It was taken for granted that acceptance of Darwinism implied rejection of be- lief In God and the Divine government of the Uni- verse. In the excess of their enthusiasm, the pop- ularizers of the Darwinian theories claimed that they so completely explained all that had hereto- fore been shrouded In mystery, that they ren- dered God unnecessary. Organized religion, with characteristic shortsightedness and conservatism, viewed the new theories in exactly the same light, i64 MARXIAN SOCIALISM AND RELIGION and set itself resolutely against them. Once more, religion and science were opposed, each marshal- ling its legions against the legions of the other. Once more, organized religion closed the doors of its temples and churches to newly discovered truths. So furious was the controversy that it drew into one camp or the other practically every educated per- son. That controversy and its immediate results occupy the most important place in the intellectual history of the nineteenth century. The Darwinian theories inspired a tremendous amount of skepticism and gave birth to a far-reach- ing rationalist movement. On the side of science the ablest and best minds of the age ranged them- selves. All the youthful and progressive intellects accepted Darwinism. Against the Darwinian the- ories, on the side of organized religion, were mediocrity and reaction. Religion sank to a lower level than It had done for a century. Under these conditions, on an ebbing tide of religion, the modern Socialist movement, the move- ment of Marx, arose. A few dates will throw a flood of light upon the association of Marxian Socialism with atheism and irreligion: Darwin's Origin of Species appeared in 1859, and in that same year Marx published his first important work on political economy, the Critique of Political Economy, precursor of Das Kapital. Four years THE SOCIALIST MOVEMENT 165 after the publication of Darwin's great work, when it was beginning to attract attention on the Conti- nent, the organized Socialist movement arose in Germany under the leadership of Lasalle, that cultured agitator whose proud boast it was that the new movement of the proletariat was " armed with all the knowledge and culture of the centuries." In 1864, just five years after the publication of the Oriffin of Species, when the controversy which it aroused was at fever heat, the International was formed under the leadership of Marx. In the circumstances it was inevitable that the Socialist movement should be drawn Into the great conflict of Ideas. That would have happened even if Marx had not given it a theory of social evolu- tion for its theoretical basis. The radical In one sphere of thought is most likely to be radical in other directions. The fact that they were radicals, possessing sufliclent Independence of judgment, imagination and courage to renounce old ideas and to undertake the arduous and often unpleasant task of advocating new ideas, would have made the So- cialists more ready than most men to embrace the new scientific theories. The Socialist movement has always embraced more than its proportionate share of adherents of the most advanced scientific theories, as well as of vegetarians, anti-vacclnation- ists, advocates of strange theories like the Bacon- i66 MARXIAN SOCIALISM AND RELIGION ian authorship of the Shakespeare plays, and so on. Their fundamental radicalism would have made most of the Socialists of the time espouse Darwin- ism. But there was a more powerful and universal reason. Marx and Engels had for more than twenty years, ever since 1848, been trying to im- press upon their proletarian followers a great theory of social evolution, and the consciousness of an inevitable triumph over social injustice by the workers, inevitable because the forces of social evolution were on their side. And now the Dar- winian theories brought new arguments. Evolu- tion was everywhere discussed. Liebknecht, who was intimately connected with Marx in those days, has told us how Marx and his little circle of friends could talk of nothing else. Naturally, they par- took of the anti-religious spirit and temper which characterized the scientific movement of their day. It would have been strange if it had been other- wise. It was quite natural that the Socialist move- ment should have battled for the new scientific the- ories against the orthodox religion of the time. It was inevitable that the bitterness and venom with which the churches assailed the Darwinians should stamp the Socialist mind with an almost ineradica- ble belief that religion is the foe of progress, of enlightenment and science. And now that the con- THE SOCIALIST MOVEMENT 167 troversy is over, science having been victorious, and organized religion no longer denies the doc- trine of evolution, nor regards it as a denial of God, the Socialist movement still retains, to some extent, the mental attitude acquired fifty years ago. This is especially true of the older men and women in the movement. The younger men and women, naturally, partake of the new spirit.^" The blending of Socialism and atheism was, to a very large extent, the result of the confluence of two great streams of nineteenth century thought, the scientific movement and the democratic trend. It was by no means unique. Numerous move- ments of great magnitude and capital importance have been thus adventitiously blended with skep- 20 I offered this explanation of the close association of Social- ism and atheism in my little book, The Spiritual Significance of Modern Socialism. In his debate with Mr. Hillquit, Father Ryan referred to it as " not at all adequate." (Socialism, Prom- ise or Menace, p. 195.) But later on he says that had Mr. Hill- quit " merely declared that Socialist irreligion was due in great part to the general irreligion and skepticism of the last cen- tury and a half, he would have been on safe ground." (Ibid, p. 220.) Father Ryan goes on to say that a very large propor- tion of Socialists had adopted the atheistic views of the popular science of the time before they became Socialists. Now, I have never suggested that the association of Marxism and Darwinism in point of time was, by itself, a complete explanation of the antagonism to religion which is found among present day So- cialists. I have suggested only that it explains, in large part at least, the close historical association of Socialism and atheism. Father Ryan's suggestion to Mr. Hillquit is a tacit acceptance of my contention. i68 MARXIAN SOCIALISM AND RELIGION ticism and irreligion. The American Revolution affords a notable example of this. Many of the leading Revolutionary patriots were skeptics and atheists. This was not due to their democracy, but rather to the spirit and temper of the age. The unbelief of the patriots was just as little due to their political ideals and theories as the unbelief of the Socialists is due to their social ideals and the- ories. It was an age of unbelief. Just as the modern Socialist movement arose on an ebbing tide of re- ligion, so, on another ebbing tide of religion, nearly a century earlier, arose the great movement of American democracy. When Timothy Dwight became president of Yale College, in 1795, athe- ism was rampant there as, indeed, it was among the educated classes in general. We are told that " a considerable portion of the class which he first taught had assumed the names of the leading English and French infidels, and were more famil- iarly known by them than by their own." The Honorable Samuel Hopkins, who graduated from Yale in 1791, wrote that " The Spirit of Yale College was at that time the spirit of literary am- bition and of infidelity." In the autobiography of Lyman Beecher we find an interesting account of the atheistic influences at Yale when Dr. Dwight became its president in 1795 : THE SOCIALIST MOVEMENT 169 " Before he came the college was in a most ungodly state. The college church was almost extinct. Most of the students were skeptical, and rowdies were plenty. Wine and liquors were kept in many rooms ; intemperance, profanity, gambling, and licentiousness were common. . . . That was the day of the infidelity of the Tom Paine school. Boys that dressed flax in the barn, as I used to, read Tom Paine and believed him; I read, and fought him all the way. . . . But most of the class before me were infidels, and called each other Vol- taire, Rousseau, D'Alembert, etc., etc." ^^ The association of American democracy and philo- sophical materialism can be readily traced to the influence of the French Revolution. Neverthe- less, the association was as adventitious as the later association of philosophical materialism and mod- ern Socialism. Fortunately, a new era has dawned. Science and religion are no longer opposed. Darwinism has entered the pulpit. The ideas which brought the anathema of organized religion upon Darwin, Huxley, Spencer and their associates, are now preached from tens of thousands of pulpits. Sci- ence and atheism are no longer regarded as syno- nyms. If the preachers no longer misunderstand 21 Autobiography, Correspondence, etc., of Lyxnan Beecher, D.D., Edited by Charles Beecher. Vol. I, New York, 1864, p. 43. 170 MARXIAN SOCIALISM AND RELIGION and assail the doctrine of evolution, neither do the men of science assail religion and declare that be- lief in God and Immortality are superstitions which enslave the ignorant. The greatest scien- tists of our day not only admit that science and religion may be reconciled, but they reconcile them in their own lives. In consequence of this revolution in the scientific and theological thought of the world the crude dog- matic atheism of an earlier generation is becoming rarer in the Socialist movement. There is far more toleration for all religious beliefs. It is not assumed, as It formerly was, that science means atheism and excludes religion. Most of the athe- ism that one encounters in the Socialist movement today is a survival : it is directed against a concep- tion of God that is antiquated and crude. It really has little relation to the best theological thought of today. It deals with the childish theological con- ceptions of the early part of the nineteenth century — as remote from the theology of today as the paleolithic age of man. VIII There Is still a great great deal of hostility to the churches, even where there is tolerance and reverent respect for religion. Often enough the scorn and bitterness with which the Church is THE SOCIALIST MOVEMENT 171 regarded springs from a passionate devotion to the fundamentals of religion. There is hatred for organized Christianity because it is believed to be false to the essential teachings of Jesus. The Church — Protestant and Catholic — has been judged and found wanting. This bitter hostility is quite natural. The churches and synagogues have been dominated by the interests of the possessing class, the class against which Socialism as the movement of the proletariat must struggle. They have depended upon the rich and powerful for maintenance, and in return have generally defended the existing social order and resisted the efforts of the workers to revolutionize it. All too rarely have the churches shown any sympathy with the cause of the struggling masses. They have been class con- scious to a degree and loyal to the class by which they are maintained rather than to religion. They have either actively opposed the masses or been indifferent to their claims and their interests. Close association of the churches and synagogues with the dominant economic class inevitably breeds in the minds of the struggling proletariat suspicion of and contempt for organized religion. When, during the fierce class war In Colorado, in 19 14, In- nocent and helpless men, women and children were butchered with a savagery that would shame bar- 172 MARXIAN SOCIALISM AND RELIGION barians, the denunciations of the Rockefellers, who were large owners of stock in the Colorado Fuel and Iron Company, not unnaturally included biting satire and bitter invective against the religion with which the Rockefellers were identified. The fact that the huge sums contributed to religious and charitable objects by such men is realized through the exploitation of the workers, leads inevitably to a hostile attitude toward the churches and the various organized charities on the part of the class conscious proletariat. So long as It remains true that the membership of the churches includes the most ruthless exploit- ers of labor, the owners of ramshackle tenements in which both rents and death-rates are high, the owners of firetrap factories, of brothels and gam- bling dens, the leaders of corrupt political machines and rings, so long will organized religion deserve and receive the contempt of the workers. In their struggle to bring about economic justice and fra- ternity the workers are doing a work that is essen- tially religious. In their Irreligion they are often far more religious than organized religion Itself. The Socialist propaganda may be marred and tainted by a crude atheism, Its heritage from an age of tumultuous controversy, and embittered by hate and contempt for the churches, but it Is, nev- ertheless, shot through with genuine religious pas- THE SOCIALIST MOVEMENT 173 sion, vibrant with that which makes the teaching of Jesus sublime. Many a Socialist lecture con- tains more genuine religious sentiment and feeling than the average minister's sermon. Paul Sabatier tells an interesting story which illustrates this point. At a great religious festival at Lyons, at- tended by all the bishops of southeastern France, the bishop who had delivered the sermon was being felicitated at the dinner table by his admirers, in- cluding many of his fellow clerics. The bishop told them that he had just read one of the most beautiful and impressive sermons he had ever read in his life, and begged their attention while he read some extracts. The extracts made a deep impres- sion and there were many requests for the name of the preacher. The bishop asked them to guess. There were many guesses ; all the great preachers of France were named, but no one guessed cor- rectly. Finally, the bishop announced that the sermon was an address by the great Socialist leader, the intrepid foe of clericalism, Jean Jaures 1 ^^ IX And yet, closely allied as it is with the ethical side of religion. Socialism can never take the place 22 Sabatier, L'Orientaiion Religieuse de la France Actuelle, p. 38. 174 MARXIAN SOCIALISM AND RELIGION of religion in the human heart. It deals with the things temporal, which are seen, not with the spiritual things which are unseen. It offers no so- lution of the great ultimate problems to solve which is one of the fundamental necessities of the human soul. While Socialism Is a spiritual force of profound Importance and far-reaching Influence, satisfying the spiritual needs of many, there will always be millions for whom it cannot take the place of a belief in God and the consciousness of dependence upon Him. Its glorious and nobly inspiring ideal of a Cooperative Commonwealth cannot, for these millions, take the place of a sure and certain hope of immortality. Religion is not the transient emotional thing imagined by the ad- venturous minds who In the French Revolution de- creed the abolition of God and in the middle of the nineteenth century forecasted the speedy disap- pearance of all religion, dispersed by science as darkness is dispersed by light. It will endure in some form as long as humanity endures. So long as the religious spirit exists it will ex- press itself In organized religion of some sort, even if the name is abandoned. And since it is safe to say that organized religion will always em- brace the moral aspirations and efforts of many of the best and noblest men and women, Socialism cannot afford to ignore it, to oppose it or to THE SOCIALIST MOVEMENT 175 estrange it. If the Socialist movement is to suc- ceed, it must enlist the moral and spiritual forces embraced in organized religion. For, after all, there is in all religion an ethical element which is closely related to the ethical element in Socialism, and that ethical kinship makes mutuality of under- standing and of political and economic effort pos- sible and necessary. Organized religion, equally with organized So- cialism, reflects its human origin and limitations. It is marred by the frailties and imperfections of the human beings represented in it. But, for all that, in every city, organized religion embraces many of the most intelligent and earnest seekers after social righteousness. The exploiters of labor, despoilers of childhood, rack-renters, sweat- ers, brothel lords and corrupt politicians may loom large against the background of their religious pro- fessions, but they constitute a small minority. They hide their evil deeds beneath the mantle of religion, just as men have cloaked the most selfish and anti-social lives in the broad folds of the mantle of Socialism. But the overwhelming ma- jority of religious believers are sincere and honest. They want, under the title of The Kingdom of God, a social order based on economic justice in which fratemalism shall rule, a social order not essentially different from that which the Socialist 176 MARXIAN SOCIALISM AND RELIGION seeks to establish under the title of the Coopera'- tive Commonwealth. And to the realization of their splendid vision they often bring an intelli- gence and a capacity for work and sacrifice as gen- uine and as unselfish as those qualities are within the Socialist movement itself. It is to be hoped, then, that the Socialist move- ment will drop its hostility to religion; that its class consciousness will not betray it into assailing organized religion as a whole for the anti-social conduct of the few who seek the shelter of its fel- lowship ; that it will not charge against the devout believer of the present day, and of tomorrow, the crude conceptions of God evolved in the brutal past; that it will not charge against the free de- mocracies of organized religious life in America today the evils of religious autocracy of other lands and other times. Let its protest against re- ligious hypocrisy be as vigorous as it can be made, but let there be a just discrimination between the hypocrisy of the few, the unworthy minority, and the splendid faith and spiritual integrity of the great majority. On the other hand, religion needs the great spiritual passion, the exalted idealism and the faith with which the Socialist movement vibrates. The ideal of human brotherhood which is the ethical core of Judaism and Christianity, as well as of THE SOCIALIST MOVEMENT 177 Islam, Buddhism and Confucianism, cannot be realized within the existing capitalistic system. Until the world has been revolutionized econom- ically along the lines of the Socialist programme that ideal will be unrealized, a fair and futile dream. The Kingdom of God for which Jesus prayed, as did the older prophets of Israel before him, involved social justice and equal opportunity. Of that there can be no question. And the King- dom of God is a meaningless phrase in the twen- tieth century unless it implies all that. Let the thoughtful Christian make a careful and candid attempt to interpret the Kingdom in terms of actual relations and conditions: he will soon find that he has visualized a society not essentially dif- ferent from the Cooperative Commonwealth toward which the Socialist agitator at the street corner urges his fellow men to strive. Well has Emile Laveleye declared that " If Christianity were taught and understood conformably to the spirit of its Founder, the existing social organism could not last a day." ^^ We cannot divorce the ethical implications of religion from social justice, democracy and organ- ized fraternity, even if we wish to do so. And organized Socialism presents to organized religion the most consistent statement of religious princi- 23 Laveleye, Primitive Property, xxxi. 178 MARXIAN SOCIALISM AND RELIGION pies yet formulated into social and political pro- grammes. The Socialist movement is the most powerful and efficient force in the world con- sciously working for the realization in the social order of the essential principles of religion. The Socialists not only see the moral and spiritual blight inherent in the present social system, but they point the way to that reorganization of society which is essential to the highest spiritual freedom and perfection of collective man. If it is to prevail against the powers of darkness, organ- ized religion must enlist the support of the Social- ist movement. The two movements have a great common purpose : each cherishes an ideal of per- sonal and social righteousness which requires for its attainment a social democracy. Until the Socialist State is reached, religion will be subject to the cruel limitations and restrictions inseparable from an economic system fundamen- tally unethical and anti-religious. Human broth- erhood will be impossible until then. The Golden Rule of Jesus will be crushed by the rule of gold. It will not be possible to be thoroughly faithful to the ethical teachings and implications of Christian- ity. In a very real sense, therefore. Socialism is the emancipator of religion. What matters it that many Socialists with their lips deny God, if with their lives they serve Him and do His will? THE SOCIALIST MOVEMENT 179 Organized Socialism needs a better understand- ing of religion, to be more tolerant, to treat with reverent sympathy the religious spirit, and to enlist the ethical idealism of religion on its side. And organized religion needs a better understand- ing of Socialism, to maintain an attitude of friendly sympathy toward it, to honor its idealism, its cour- age and consecration, and to cooperate with it in its efforts to establish economic justice and fra- ternity. INDEX Abschaffung des Eigenthums, des Staates und der Reli- gion, Die, 148. Addresses Before the New York Slate Conference of Religion, 2411. Aiken, Rev. Dr., quoted, 21. Allen Grant, quoted, 94. American Anti - Socialist League, 137. American Democracy as a Re- ligion, 18 n. American Revolution and Atheism, 168, 169. American Socialists and Reli- gion, 128, 138, 140, 148-153. Anarchists, 14, 69. Arkwright, inventor, 86. Arnold, Matthevr, quoted, 13. Atheism, 135, 138, 142, 14s, 162, 163, 164, 166, 168, 169, 170, 172. Austrian Socialists and Reli- gion, 128. B Baal-worship, 97, 98, 99. Baconian theory, 165. Bauer, Bruno, 42. Bax, Belfort, 85 n., 133. Bebel, August, 151. Beecher, Dr. Lyman, 165 n. Belgian Socialists: defend 164, 181 Christian missionaries, 151; on religion, 128, 129. Berge, Professor, elected to Storthing, 152. Bernstein, Edvrard : 44 n., quoted, 117, 118, 151. Bismarck, 145. Brinton, D. G., quoted, 32. British Socialists on religion, 133-137. Brown, Rev. A. W., quoted, 113-H4. Buddha, 32, 33. Buddha, the Gospel of, 32 n. Buddhism, 32, 177. Buddhism, 32 n. Canaan: capture of by Jews, 97; tribal god of, 97, 98, 99. Capital, S3, 54, 55, no, 117, 164. Carruth, W. H., 82 n. Carus, Dr. Paul, 32 n. Cartwright, inventor, 86, 87. Catechisme Positi'viste, 17 n. Catholic Encyclopedia, 25 n. Catholic Telegraph, 147. Catholic Tribune, 147. Cathrein, Rev. V., 92 n, 121, 154, 156. Chadwick, J. W., quoted, 106- Chinese religions, no, in. Christianizing the Social Or- der, 1591. 1 82 INDEX Church and State, separation of: advocated by Socialists, 137-129, 130, 141, 14a, 150; a principle of American democracy, 150, 153; Car- dinal Gibbons on, 156, 157; Father Cathrein on, 154, ij6; Protestantism and, 154. Class consciousness, 64, 65. Class Struggles in France, 48. Class Struggle theory: An- archists opposed to, 69; a question of fact, not of doc- trine or morals, izi ; En- gels on, 67; exaggerations of, 71, 121; Father Cathrein on, 121 ; Madison on, 68 ; part of materialistic concep- tion of history, 66; product of system, 68; recognition of importance of class strug- gles by pre-Marxists, 67; subordination of class inter- ests, 70, 71; war of classes to be ended by Socialism, 72, 125. Clericalism, 129, 130, 131, 132. Colorado, class struggle in, I 71-172. Communism, i. Communist Manifesto, 45, 46, 56, S7i 83- Comte, August, quoted, 17. Confucianism, 32, 177. Confucianism and Taouism, 3*- . . Congo missionaries, 151. Connelly, E. J., 136 n. Contribution to the Critique of Political Economy, a, jo, 51, 58 n, 164. D Darwin, 83, 119, 164, 165. Darwinism, 83, 118, 162, 163, 164, 166, 167. Davids, T. W. Rhys, 32 n. Davidson, Dr. Thomas, quoted, 17. De Leon, Daniel, 49 n. Democracy, effect of on con- ception of God, 106. Determinisme Economique de Karl Marx, Le, 85, 109. Deuteronomy, Book of, quoted, 96-97. Deutsche Brussler Zeitung, 44 n. Dewe, Rev. J. A., 89, 90, 91, 92- Douglas, Prof. R. K., 32 n. Dreyfus, defended by Social- ists, 151. Diihring, Herr, 56, i20. D wight, Timothy, 164. E Economic Foundations of So- ciety, 85. Economic Interpretation of History, 43, 60. _ Eighteenth Brumaire of Louis Bonaparte, 49 n. Ellwood, Prof. C. A., 39, 58, 60 n. Ely, Prof. R. T., 133 n. Encyclopedia Britannica, iii n. Engels, F.: critique of Diih- ring, 56; literary partner- ship with Marx, 41, 45 ; ma- terialistic conception of his- tory modified by, 41, 55, 59- 62, quoted, 36, 42, 46, S7i S9, 60, 6i, 62, 67, 71, 120. English Socialism, see British Socialists. English Utilitarians, 13. INDEX 183 Eskimo, ideas of immortality of the, 112. Erfurt Pfogramme, 127-128. Erickson, Dr., elected to Storthing, 151. Essais soctalistes, 131, 154. Ethics: of class consciousness, 124; of Socialism, 178; of religion, 175. Evolutionary Socialism, 117, 118. Evolution of the Idea of God, 94. Evolution, theory of, see Dar- winism. Fagnani, Prof. C. P., quoted, 25-27. Farley, Cardinal, 89. Federalist, The, 68. Feuerbach, L., 43, 100. First Principles, 16, 107. Fischer, Richard, 151. Four Stages of Greek Reli- gion, 10. France: anti-clericalism in, 130-132; hostility of Social- ists of to religion, 129-130; position of French Socialist Party, 130; _ of the Parti Ouvrier socialiste revolu- tionnaire, 131; the religious views of early Socialists of, i32i 133 ; visit of British So- cialists to, 134. Franco-Prussian War, 71. Frank, Ludwig, 151. Frankfort Congress, i6i. French and German Social- ism, 112. French Revolution decreed the abolition of God, 174. Future of Sdence, The, 17. German Social Democracy and religion, 127, 128, 141- 148, 151. Gettelmann, Rev. V., I2i n. Ghent, W. J., 63 n. Gibbons, Cardinal, 156, 157. Gifford _ Lectures on Natural Religion, 15 n. God: changing conceptions of, 93 et seq.; conception of, as King, 105 ; conception of in Middle Ages, loi, 105; how democracy influences our conceptions of, 106, 114, 115; monotheistic conception of arose out of polytheism, 95 ; origin of the idea of, 94- 95 ; monotheism of late origin, 97; Jehovah origi- nally a tribal god, 102; a warrior god, 102; Jehovah not omnipotent, 103-104; not omnipresent, 103 ; not om- niscient, 104; becomes an agricultural deity, 98 ; a pastoral deity, 105. Gotha Congress declares re- ligion a private matter, 127. Grun, Karl, 44. H Haase, Hugo, 151. Hall, Prof. T. C, quoted, 20- 21. Hardie, J. Keir, 133. Harris, Rev. Maurice H., 24. Hegel, so. Heinzen, Karl, 44. Henotheism, 96. Hess, Moses, 44. Hibbert Journal, The, 114. Hillquit, Morris, 90, 148, 167. 1 84 INDEX Histoire des langues Semet- igues, 96. Historical Setting of the Early Gospels, 20. _ Historische Leistung 'uon Karl Marx, Die, 71 n. History of Economics, or Eco- nomics as a Factor in the Making of History, 89. History of Ethics Within Or- ganized Christianity, zo. Hodges, Dean, quoted, 21-23. Holy Family, The, etc., 41- 42. Hopkins, Samuel, 168. Horn, George, 151. Huxley, T. H., n, 95, 119. India, religions of, no. Indians, North American, their conceptions of im- mortality, 109, 1 12. Introduction to the Science of Religion, 14. Islam, 177. Israel: Baal -worship in, 97, 98; conquest of Canaan by, 97; Jehovah and, 98-99; meaning of, 102; monothe- ism developed in, 96, 97; polytheism in, 96, 97. Italian Socialists and clerical- ism, 132. James, William, quoted, 18. Japanese religion, in. Jaures, Jean, 129, 173. Jesuits, no, 119, I2i, 132, 14s, 146, 151. Jesus, los, 132, 133, 134, 158, i73i 177. 178- K Kautsky, Karl, 70, 154. Kidd, Benjamin, quoted, 16, 17. L Lafargue, Paul, 85, 109, 133. Landmarks of Scientific So- cialism, 120. Lassalle, F., 165. Laveleye, Emile, 177. Leatham, James, 85, 133. Leuba, James H., 18. Lewis, Austin, 43 n. Liebknecht, W., i£6, quoted, 141-144. Loria, A., 71, 85. Lubbock, Sir John, 107. M Macdonald, J. R., 133. Madison, James, 68. Martineau, James, 19. Marx, Karl: and Darwin, 116, 164-167; a materialist, 37 ; separates materialistic conception of history from materialism, 37-38; at- tempts to apply his theory to religion, n6; his failure to understand religion, 116; first formulated the theory in 1845, 42; criticizes Froudhon, 44; comments on Feuerbach's views, 43, 100; contributes to New York Tribune, 49; his surplus- value theory, 72-75; quoted, 42. 43, 45. 46. 47. 48. 49. 5°. SI. 52. 53. 54. 55. 58. "O. 116-117. Marxfs "Economic Determin- INDEX i8s ism" in the Light of Mod- ern Psychology, 38, 39, 58, 60. Marxism: defined, 35, 36; dis- tinguished from Socialism, 6, 7; theoretical and prac- tical, 35; relation of to re- ligion, 34, Marxism versus Socialism, 40, 67. Materialism, 37, 38, 39, 77, 84, 88. Materialistic Conception of History: crude state of the theory, 40, 41; development of the theory, 40-62; diffi- culties in the theory, 62, 63 ; essentials of the theory stated by Father Dewe, 89- 93 ; exaggerations of the theory, 61, 62; Marx applies it to the study of religion, 116; other names given to the theory, 39, 40; refinements of the theory by Engels, 58-63 ; the theory not connected with philo- sophical materialism, 37, 38, 39, 77, 88; service of theory to the study of religion, H5-116. Micah's words as a definition of religion, 11. Mill, John Stuart, 13-14. Misire de la Philosophie, 44. Monotheism, evolution of, 95- 99- Miiller, Prof. Max, quoted, 14, IS. Murray, Gilbert, 10. N National interests versus class interests, 70, 71. Naturalistic definition of re- ligion, a, 27-29. Neue Rheinische Zeitung, 46, 48. _ Neue Zett, Die, 44 n., 70 n. New York Call, 63, 85. New York Tribune, 49. Orientation Religieuse de la France Actuelle, V, 173. Origin of Cimlization, 107. Origin of Religion, 15. Origin of Species, xB/f., 165. Origine et Evolution de I'ldie de I' A me, 109. Our Definition of Religion, 22. Pannekoek, Dr. A., 147-148. Parti Ouvrier socialiste revo- lutionnaire, 131. Patten, Prof. S. N., quoted, 29-30. Philistines, 104. Pinkau, Karl, 151. Polytheism, 95-96, 98, 99. Poverty of Philosophy, 45. Prehistoric Times, 107. Primitive Property, 177. Principles of Sociology, 107, 109. Proudhon, 132. Psychology of Religion, The, 18. Quelch, H., 45. R Rauschenbusch, Prof. W., quoted, 157-159. i86 INDEX Religion : abuse of the term, 9 ; and ethics, 9, 10-12, 175; and philosophy, 13-16, 76- 77; and science, 17, 136, 161, 163-167, 170; declared a private matter by Social- ists, 137-129, 134, 139, 140- 145; defined in New Testa- ment, lo-ii; economic in- terpretation of, 93, et seq.; exerts influence on eco- nomics, 61 ; history of must be studied from material viewpoint, 54; not incom- patible with belief in evolu- tion, 81-83; opposed by some Socialists, 2-4, 160- 161; Socialism cannot sup- plant, 173-175; various definitions of, 10-30. Religion of Primitiiie Peoples, 3?-. Religion of Socialism, The, 8s. Kenan, E., 17, 96. Revolution, Die, 48 n. Romanes, G. J., quoted, 19. Royce, Josiah, quoted, 18. Ryan, Rev. John A., 24, 90, 167. S Sabatier, P., 173. Schulman, Rev. S., 22, 23. Science and religion, 17, 136, 161, 163-167, 170. Scudder, Vida, 101, 114. Seligman, Prof. £. R. A., 43, 60, 61, 62. Simkhovitch, Prof. V. G., 67, quoted, 40. Skelton, Prof. O. D., 65. Social Basis of Religion, 29. Social Democratic Party of England, 134. Social Evolution, 16. Socialism: and Atheism, 163- 167; conflict with religion, 2-4> 129. 130, 131-132, 135, 157-1591. 160-161; defined, i; distinguished from Commun- ism, I ; distinguished from Marxism, 6; ethical kinship with religion, 175; regards religion as a private matter, 127-129, 134, 139, I40-145- Socialism, a Critical Analysis, 65. . Socialism and Character, loi. Socialism and Religion, 134, Socialism, a Summary and In- terpretation of Socialist Principles, 70. Socialism, Its Theoretical Basis and Practical Appli- cation, 92 n., 121 n., 154. Socialism, Promise or Men- ace f, 90, 148, 167. Socialism, Utopian and Scien- tific, 36. Socialist Party of Great Britain, 134, 136. Socialist Party and Religion, The, 141. Sombart, Prof. Werner, 135. Some Objections to Socialism Considered and Anstoered, '?9- Sozialdemokratie und die katholische Kirche, Die, 154. Soxialistische Akademiker, Der, 60. Soiialiemus und Sozial Bevier gung, 135. Spanish Socialists hostile to religion, 131. Spencer, Herbert, 16, 20, 76, 95. Jfoy. I09- INDEX 187 Spiritual Significance of Mod- ern Socialism, 167. Stephen, Leslie, 13. Study of Religion, A, 19 n. Substance of Socialism, 69, 123. Surplus-value theory, 36, 73- 75- T "Tattler," quoted, 138. U United Socialist Party (of France), 129. Untermann, E., 55. Vandervelde, E., 131, 154. Varieties of Religious Experi- ence, 18. Vermont, Socialist Party of, on religion, 140-141, 148- 153- Vico, 53. Vollmar, von, 151, 161. W Wasmann, Father, 119. Watt, J., inventor, 86, 87. Wesen des Christenthums, 100. Wurm, Emanuel, 151. Yale College, Atheism In, in 179s, 168-169. Date Due Cornell University Library HX 536.S65 Marxian socialism and religion; a study o 3 1924 002 674 566