THE RELIGIOUS DIFFICULTY IN GERMANY.

Evening Star, Issue 3448, 11 March 1874, Page 3

THE RELIGIOUS DIFFICULTY IN GERMANY.

js to beccpae of religion in this chaos of antagonistic forces ? What, more especially, of the religion of those classes, which while' they are being weaned with the rest from tfle Church, are yet totally unable to make up for. the loss from their own intellectual resources ? This leads us to the delicate question of the reform of dogma. Were the Germans a frivolous nation, scoffing at a doctrine which they have Ceased to believe, and content to be without any faith at all, the present movement would bid fair tp issue m atheism. But, so fay from this being the epe, the principal motive inducing people to ignore the religious notions of their ancestors is a wish to pave the way for some thing they can believe in consistently with tbeir present views of life before and after death right or wrong—a question which it Is not my province to investigate in a political letter. What there is of earnest religious sentiment in the country is in favor of reforming rather than preserving the traditional creeds of the past. The feeling is common to Catholics and Protestants; and what is a remarkable coincidence, which ought not to be overlooked, likewise prevails among the Jews, a numerous, highlycultivated, and most influential element of the population Who can tell whether fa© confident pluck of the Government

in withstanding the Pope is not based as much upon the popular yearning for another reformation, as upon the pretty general antipathy to the existing creeds ? Who knows whether, in combating the Pope, the Cabinet are not urged on by a hope, that if the worst come to the worst, the religious spi it of the people will come to their aid and assist them - n defeating a faith which has lost its hold upon this part of the world ? The quarrel was certainly a purely political one at first, and remained so while confined within moderate limits. Yet, should it be destined to reach the extreme proportions which it promises, it is just possible that, in order to secure a more rapid victory, Government wou‘d not be displeased were an attempt made to combine the arduous task of religious reform with the comparatively easv work of the political straggle. Though tohod

their own against the Vatican they hardly re quire the assistance of a religious movement, it is within the hounds of probability that if one branch of the old religion is more and more weakened in the heat of the fight, the interest the Government necessarily feel in the maintenance of religion and morality in general will induce them to encourage the a which, if successful, would necessarily supersede all denominations alike. There are certain signs pointing to some such eventuality being under conS rK^ a^on higher quarters. Semiofficial papers, which formerly confined their arguments to repelling the political interference of the Pope, have recently begun to descant upon his religion in a most sarcastic style. One organ ridic lies the “ authorized” appearance of the Holy Virgin in ever so many apple and plum trees in Alsace and Lorraine, a phenomenon said to have come to a dead stop the moment the authorities threatened to imprison any one who saw her. Another paper has an article upon the (50,000 bottles of Ignatius water annually sold in Germany with the sanction of the Pope, and supposed to work miracles, from the contents having, before bottling, been poured over the shoulder-blade of St Loyola, improving upon this, a third journal—and this a publication known to be directly connected with the Government—goes t he length of asserting that the Roman hierarchy has no chance of prolonging its existence except among the utterly ignorant, or those entirely abandoned by hope, manliness, and common sense. This, one must_ confess, is strong language to hold for the journalistic satelites of a Government, one-third of whose subjects are, as yet, at least, nominally Roman Catholics. At any rate, the intellectual habits of Berlin would have to be entirely changed before such phraseology could be lightly used, and the inference therefore is that something is meant. But it is evident that though the Government may secretly hope for assistance from the eventual rise of a reforming sect, reformation cannot be resolved upon by aboard, but has to emanate from the independent action of some honest and enthusiastic hearts. More than this, in the pres mt instance it requires intellects of a very super or order, % qiu sfciona to be solved being the most awful that can present themselves to the human m nd.

I am revealing nothing particularly new w hen I say that the earnest and reflective scepticism which first gained ground in Germany a hundred years ago has been gradually developed to giant proportions. Twenty or thirty years ago the boldest philosopher might well hesitate before he undertook to attack in a popular form a faith identified with the religion and morality of the lower strata of society ; this restraining motive is now all but laid to rest. By far the major portion of the people are now-a-days very much of one mind on these things, and there is little fear of shocking a formidable minority by downright denial or fargoing objections. Iu all the larger towns the feeling is the same in high and low ; in the smaller towns it is very much to too : it is different certainly in the villages, bUh Catholic and Protestant, though even there people are hardly sufficiently orthodox to remain so when brought into contact with town life. When this is the general aspect of the land, from a religious point of view, it will be easily understood that religion has ceased to a considerable extent to ex ercise the controlling influence over morality it possessed in former days. No one acquainted with the present intellectual condition of the race will be able to contend that ii ths moral statistics are as yet tolerably good, this is owing to the influence of religion over the life and habits of the individual. On the contrary, if the absolute number of crimes has not fearfully increased, we have exclusively to thank for this the

moral elevation of the middle class ; in other words, of that very class most deeply tainted with the religious, or rather irreligious notions, of the age. The lower strata—who are the only orthodox portion of the people, as far as orthodoxy can ’be said to exist at ad—have lately produced more criminals than formerly, and, which is worse, criminals o a fiercer, wilder, and more sanguinary character than Germany has been accustomed to for a century or so. The inference derived from this is that even the lower classes are no longer restrained by the faith they profess, and not having the education and salufavy checks ’binding upon their superiors in rank, have to stumble through Ufa unaided by any help from with, in. Murder, xkpo, and brutal violence of all sorts have lately become so much the order of the day in the centres of the population that it is a public calamity, and the cry for remedy universal. In Berlin algue we had three murders last week, all committed in oold blood by house-

breakers to prevent discovery. Looking at this fast-growing depravity among a section of the poor, some philosopher who formerly abstained from preaching his notions too generally, lest he shock the million, might now be tempted to think that the millipjd're? BO fll el h|ng else to keep them upright tflan the medicine prescribed by the priest. He might be led to make a trial, the more readily that crime is nowhero so rife as among the rural population of those districts regarded as devoutly addicted to the Pope Not to speak of the Catholic half of Westphalia and Upper Silesia, where the knife seems to be fast becoming a new and must degrading sorb of national lypappn, Bavaria yoper, the flitramontane paradise, is in Buell a condition that the policemen and judges are absolutely impotent to cope with the rowdy and the rough. Viewing religion merely as a force in the political organisation of the state, society clearly has an interest in modifying its form when ancient ideals Lave become so inefficient. Thus a variety of circumstances contribute to push this conntry into a path beset with serious di emmas, and leading to a fresh and altogether unprecedented period of its history* 1 here is a lesson in this, showing how historical events are united with each other, and politics and religion intertwined by an inseparable bond. The Pope’s resistance to unity nrst led to the Government prohibiting his clergy from acting as political agitators. The bishops rebelling against the laws calculated to secure this end brought on severer measures, aiming at the downfall of the Catholic hierarchy and the separation of the German Catholics from Heme. But such a task is a hard one, even though two-thirds of the inhabitants are Protestants, and though almost every educated Catholic is arrayed on the Government side. In their predicament the Government begin to encourage the idea of religious reform as a means of defeating their determined adversary. Though they must know that in the prevailing scepticism of the times such a

reform will not be restricted to Catholicism, but embrace Protestantism alike, they are broaching the project of an intellectual leap in the dark. The yearnings of the most sincere spirits and the brutality of the lowest, co-operate to accelerate the advent of the crisis, and the result is that we are approaching events more serious and more pregnant than either the wars of 1866 or 1870.