THE PRINCIPLES OF SECULARISM

By George Jacob Holyoake


"Do the duty nearest hand,"—Goethe.

[third edition, revised.]

LONDON: BOOK STORE, 282, STRAND;
Austin. & Co., 17, Johnson's court, Fleet Street. 1871.






Contents

CHAPTER I. INTRODUCTORY
CHAPTER II. THE TERM SECULARISM
CHAPTER III. PRINCIPLES OF SECULARISM DEFINED
CHAPTER IV. LAWS OF SECULAR CONTROVERSY
CHAPTER V. MAXIMS OF ASSOCIATION
CHAPTER VI. THE SECULAR GUILD
CHAPTER VII. ORGANIZATION INDICATED
CHAPTER VIII.   THE PLACE OF SECULARISM
CHAPTER IX. CHARACTERISTICS OF SECULARISM










CHAPTER I. INTRODUCTORY

     "If you think it right to differ from the times, and to make     a stand for any valuable point of morals, do it, however     rustic, however antiquated, however pedantic it may appear;     do it, not for insolence, but seriously—as a man who wore a     soul of his own in his bosom, and did not wait till it was     breathed into him by the breath of fashion."—The Rev. Sidney     Smith, Canon of St Paul's.

IN a passage of characteristic sagacity, Dr. J. H. Newman has depicted the partisan aimlessness more descriptive of the period when this little book first appeared, sixteen years ago, than it is now. But it will be long before its relevance and instruction have passed away. I therefore take the liberty of still quoting his words:—

"When persons for the first time look upon the world of politics or religion, all that they find there meets their mind's eye, as a landscape addresses itself for the first time to a person who has just gained his bodily sight. One thing is as far off as another; there is no perspective. The connection of fact with fact, truth with truth, the bearing of fact upon truth, and truth upon fact, what leads to what, what are points primary and what secondary, all this they have yet to learn. It is all a new science to them, and they do not even know their ignorance of it. Moreover, the world of to-day has no connection in their minds with the world of yesterday; time is not a stream, but stands before them round and full, like the moon. They do not know what happened ten years ago, much less the annals of a century: the past does not live to them in the present; they do not understand the worth of contested points; names have no associations for them, and persons kindle no recollections. They hear of men,

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