In the previous posting on this subject we mentioned that
as early as the 1820s in France there were a significant number of sects of the
“democratic religion” — socialism — springing up everywhere. Within a generation there had grown to be so
many that Alexis de Tocqueville commented in his recollections of the 1848
Revolution,
From the 25th of February onwards, a thousand
strange systems came issuing pell-mell from the minds of innovators, and spread
among the troubled minds of the crowd. . . . These theories were of very varied
natures, often opposed and sometimes hostile to one another; but all of them,
aiming lower than the government and striving to reach society itself, on which
government rests, adopted the common name of Socialism.
Socialism will always remain the essential characteristic and
the most redoubtable remembrance of the Revolution of February. The Republic will only appear to the
on-looker to have come upon the scene as a means not as an end. (De
Tocqueville, The Recollections of
Alexis de Tocqueville. Cleveland, Ohio: The World Publishing
Company, 1959, 78-79.)
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| Alexis de Tocqueville |
Even though (as de Tocqueville hinted) there was a certain
dreary sameness to all the various types of socialism proposed, a few names did
take precedence, or gain notoriety, depending on how you look at it, when the
modern phase of socialism began in the early nineteenth century. These were the socialists whose influence has
lasted down to the present day, even to the extent of having some versions of
their teachings accepted as authentic Christian doctrine, in some instances
rivaling that of the Incarnation itself.
We specify “Christian doctrine,” because while the
Catholic Church was the principal target, none of the mainstream organized
religious was safe from the new doctrines.
Particularly since it was a very social church and already cut off from
the great mass of its own adherents by its political character and
establishment by the government, the Church of England also came in for special
attention.
While never truly separate from socialism itself,
specifically religious aspects of socialism soon took on almost a life of their
own under various (and mostly confusing) headings. Terms included modernism, liberalism, the New
Christianity, Neo-Catholicism, and — perhaps most damaging — social justice.
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| Msgr. Ronald A. Knox |
Of course, as Msgr. Knox pointed out in Enthusiasm, every new religion needs its
prophets and saints, if only to make the members feel more special than anyone
else. Nowhere is this more true than in
all the various kinds of socialism.
One problem socialism has with its list of saints and
prophets, in fact, is an embarrassment of riches. Trying to pick only a few key individuals
from out of the many messiahs is a difficult task. This selection of the top three, therefore,
is extremely tentative, but should be sufficient to give a good idea of what
the Christian churches were dealing with two centuries ago — and why socialism
was viewed as such a serious problem.
All three (two of which we look at today) are critically important for
reasons we hope to make clear — and purely by coincidence, each one in a
country in which a different type of liberalism held sway.
Claude Henri de Rouvroy,
comte de Saint-Simon (1760-1825). Henri de
Saint-Simon, although pretty much a failure in his chosen career as a power
behind the throne and social entrepreneur, has the somewhat dubious honor of
being one of the most influential socialists in history, apart from Karl Marx —
and in some respects he may even be said to have surpassed Marx in influence.
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| Henri de Saint-Simon |
Saint-Simon began publishing works detailing his
religious, social, political, and economic ideas in 1803. His idea was to “associate” all of society to
integrate production with a moral code based on science that could be
coercively enforced.
With his secretary Auguste Comte (1798-1857), the future founder of positivism, Saint-Simon decided that society needed to be run by
religious authority of some kind, but not one relying on traditional concepts
of God. (Comte would develop this idea
more fully after Saint-Simon’s
death by natural causes — he had failed in an earlier attempt at suicide — in
his “Religion of Humanity” that replaced God with Collective Man.)
Saint-Simon and Comte developed the idea of a society
organized like a “medieval theocracy” in which people would all associate on
the basis of shared moral values and common social vision. In place of civil governors or ecclesiastical
authorities, however, there would be an “Industrial Hierarchy” wielding
economic, political, and military power, the last of which would soon fade away
as society became harmonious through association.
By putting everything under the Industrial Hierarchy,
there would be an end to conflict between classes and universal prosperity and
harmony would ensue in a scientifically and morally directed economy. The whole of society, construed as
exclusively economic in nature, would be devoted to material improvement, with
special emphasis on uplifting the poor.
According to Saint-Simon,
Christianity had been useful in its day, but that day was now past. He decided a new religion was needed to
replace Christianity, not merely reform it along economic and humanitarian
lines.
Consequently, in his last book, Le Nouveau Christianisme (1825), “The New Christianity,” Saint-Simon declared himself the prophet of a “true
Christianity.” This was a universal
religion returning to the pure doctrine of Christ with the goal of evolving a
rational, scientific, positivist religion.
A global social organization stressing “the spirit of association” and
based on peace and the brotherhood of man would direct economic life and bring
an end to poverty.
Saint-Simon’s
great contribution to socialism was his articulation of the fundamental
principle that drives and justifies all forms of socialism. His goal was “to resolve Christianity
into its essential elements” by focusing on the moral teachings and removing
anything purely religious. He summed up
his efforts in the precept, “The whole of society ought to strive towards the
amelioration of the moral and physical existence of the poorest class; society
ought to organize itself in the way best adapted for attaining this end.”
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| Charles Fourier |
François Marie Charles
Fourier (1772-1837). Although
Fourier had been writing books on his theories for many years, running through
two inheritances in the process to pay for their publication (being poorly,
even crudely written, they did not sell well), it was not until 1831 when he
attacked the ideas of fellow socialists Saint-Simon and Robert Owen (1771-1858) in a pamphlet, Pièges et Charlatanisme de Deux Sects, St.
Simon et Owen, as false religions (as opposed to his true one) that Fourier’s own work attracted any
attention.
Founding a new, scientific religion and declaring himself
the successor of Jesus and Sir Isaac Newton (1642-1726, Old Style), Fourier collected a small number of disciples. These adherents began expressing themselves
in religious language and claimed to be the only true Christians.
Fourier’s ideas included the belief that association
would replace individualism and competition. “Unrestrained indulgence of human passion,”
however, is the true path to happiness and virtue.
As Fourier theorized,
all creation is but a manifestation of God.
The evolution of Collective Man toward the perfect society is the evolution of
God Himself. The more perfect society
becomes, the less need there is for God.
Progress consists of Collective Man gaining absolute freedom through transformation
into the immanent God, and the gradual death of the transcendent God.
According to Fourier, one of the most damaging
barriers society erects is the institution of marriage. Marriage and family must be abolished and
replaced with libidinal associations if human beings are to realize their
potential.
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| "I'm not making this up, you know!" |
Fourier’s idea was that civilization must be abolished;
free access to sex and food as the basics of life must be available to all,
even children, without restraint. All
work is to be “libidinalized,” and to be performed only so long as the task
itself gives sexual pleasure.
Fourier also
declared that in his future world the oceans would be desalinated and turn to
lemonade. In the perfect harmony that
would come about through the implementation of his ideas, the North Pole would
become a sunny paradise.
Look it up yourself.
Not one word of that was invented or exaggerated.
The influence of both Saint-Simon and Fourier was, not to
put too fine a point on it, immense.
Soon after his death, the followers of Saint-Simon organized a new
religion along the lines detailed by their “prophet,” Le Église Saint-Simonienne.
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| Antoine-Frédéric Ozanam |
After going through a series of scandals and schisms,
however (which may have included outraging even Parisian public decency with bizarre
orgies), the sect eventually disappeared.
Their influence, however, continues down to the present day. It can be seen especially in the work of the
sociologist David Émile Durkheim (1858-1917), who developed a form of fascist
and socialist solidarism later corrected and substantially modified by Father
Heinrich Pesch, S.J. (1854-1926) . . . although some of Pesch’s latter day
followers failed to see any difference.
It is interesting to note that, while still a student, Antoine-Frédéric
Ozanam (1813-1853), renowned as the founder of the
Society of Saint Vincent de Paul (in part to counter the spread of socialism) and
venerated as a “beatus” by the Catholic Church (one step away from
canonization), wrote a pamphlet, Réflexions sur la Doctrine de Saint-Simon (1831).
Having observed the strange antics of the followers of Saint-Simon,
Ozanam studied their doctrines, concluded they were nonsense, and harshly
criticized the thought of socialism in general and Saint-Simon in particular.
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| François-René de Chateaubriand |
The work brought him to the attention of the poet and
orator Alphonse Marie Louis de Prat de
Lamartine (1790-1869) and the French writer, politician, diplomat, and
historian François-René (Auguste), vicomte de Chateaubriand (1768-1848), himself the
author of Génie de Christianisme
(1802), a defense of Catholicism.
(Ozanam’s work also impressed Alexis de Tocqueville, although they never
met.)
Chateaubriand praised the pamphlet and its author
highly, but as he held Saint-Simonianism and its adherents in utter contempt,
thought Ozanam had wasted his time writing it.
As Chateaubriand
wrote in a letter to a friend,
I have glanced over the little work by Monsieur Ozanam. I had already seen something of it in the Précurseur.
[The journal in which the pamphlet had
originally appeared — ed.] The
work is excellently conceived and the closing passage is arresting. I am sorry that the author should have
squandered his time and his talents in refuting what was not worthy of his
attention. (Ainslie Coates, Letters of Frédéric Ozanam. London: Elliot
Stock, 1886, 19.)
Fourier’s influence was also by any measure incredible,
especially in the United States, where “Fourierism,” “Associationism,” and
“socialism” were often used as synonyms, along with “the New Christianity” of
Saint-Simon and the “Neo-Catholicism” of de Lamennais (of whom more later). Largely through the efforts of Albert
Brisbane (1809-1890) and the newspaperman Horace Greeley (1811-1872), a much-sanitized
version of Fourier’s theories with the sexual aspects and anti-marriage
features expurgated was promoted in the United States.
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| Henry George |
Bowdlerized Fourierism influenced most American
socialists, including (or especially) the agrarian socialist Henry George (1839-1897)
and his Catholic cohort, Father Edward McGlynn (1837-1900). Significantly, both George and McGlynn made
speeches claiming to be founding a new Christianity and establishing the
Kingdom of God on Earth. McGlynn was
excommunicated in 1887 for refusing to go to Rome to explain his theories. The ban was lifted in 1893 when McGlynn
finally agreed to go to Rome, where he failed to convince Pope Leo XIII that
socialism in any form is consistent with Catholic social doctrine.
A significant number of utopian communities were formed,
especially in Texas, most of which survive today as ordinary
municipalities. Brook Farm, the
Transcendentalist commune founded by George Ripley (1802-1880), became a
Fourierist community over the strenuous protests of Orestes Brownson.
Still, as dangerous as the New Christianity turned out to
be to all forms of traditional Christianity, Catholic, Protestant, and — to a lesser
degree — Orthodox, it was not the most immediate threat to the Church of
England. That dubious distinction belonged
to Neo-Catholicism, the brainchild of the “tormented, headstrong Breton priest” Hugues-Félicité
Robert de Lamennais (1782-1854), who set out to eliminate the
threat of “religious indifferentism.”
Somewhat
ironically, de Lamennais’s theories managed briefly to escape scrutiny at the
highest levels of the Catholic Church, and rapidly spread far and wide having
gained what appeared to be ecclesiastical sanction. Once they were closely examined, however, they
were condemned, and their author abjured Christianity, proclaiming himself the
Apostle of Humanity.
That, however, will be the subject of the next posting on
this subject.
#30#
