CANTERBURY FREETHOUGHT ASSOCIATION.

Globe, Volume XXIII, Issue 2368, 4 November 1881, Page 3

CANTERBURY FREETHOUGHT ASSOCIATION.

The opening of the now hall in Worcester street, which it is intended to use as a Freethought Hall, took place last night. The hall is a building situate at the rear of the offices of No. 3 Building Soeioty, and is well fitted for the purposes of the association. There was a fairly good attendance, including several ladies.

Mr A. W. Stiffe, the secretary of the association, briefly gave an outline of the rise and progress of the association. It had arisen out of a collection for the Bradlaugh Fund, when it was found that there were a number of gentlemen who would be likely to become members of the association. In August last the association was formed, and some thirty gentlemen joined it. They had hoped to have had Mr Stout to deliver their inaugural address, but he was detained in Dunedin. It was not improbable, howerer, that thoy might have Mr Stout to address them. They had gone on steadily, and now had some eighty members, with promises of support. They did not wish to interfere with any sect or religious body. All they required was liberty and freedom to express their thoughts and feelings, and this was their mission. Their principles were founded, they believed, on a sound basis, and they courted inquiry, feeling sure that their principles would spread with the growth of knowledge and spread of education. He could not conclude without expressing their sympathy with the English Church in at least having been enabledat last to open the beautiful Cathedral. The orthodox party no doubt felt that to them this was an expression of their desire to do honor to the higher powcrr. In connection with this subject he might say that the same feeling which had animated the orthodox party in opening the Cathedral, though with different aims and objects, had animated them in opening their Free-thought Hall. [Cheers.] He would not longer detain them, but call on Mr W.Pratt, the president of the Freathought Association, to deliver the inaugural address. Mr W. Pratt, the president, then delivered the inaugural address. Having briefly apologised for his inexperience as a public speaker, he said the opening of a cathedral of the English Church during that week in their city seemed to suggest the appropriateness of reviewing the progress of the Christian Church from the earliest period to the present time, marking its influence for good or evil, and contrasting it with what he should style secular progress —by which he meant to enable those present to judge what the world had lost or gained by the advent of Christianity. Simultaneously with the event to which he had referred, another of no less general significance had taken place., viz., the opening of the Freethought Hall in whioh they were then. Mr Pratt then proceoded at some length to argus that Christianity, as interpreted during several centuries, had been productive of nothing but misery and persecution. Of late years there were but few who preached the doctrine of the torments of tho damned. Reference was then made to the growth of ritualism, and the speaker went on to assert that tho erection of tho Cathedral was an anachronism in the nineteenth century, and contended that the grandest templo of God was an honest, upright, and intelligent man. The second part of the address dealt with the rising of the sect known as the Waldenses and the efforts of Cromwell to dissipate the idea of the divine right of kings. The work of the printing press in dissipating the clouds of ignorance and priestcraft was next referred to, and it was pointed out how the liberties of the publio had been conserved and intensified by the efforts of the press. The growth of thought and freedom had been rapid and wide spread ; and the bearing upon the character of the people by the discovery of eteam, the telegraph, &0., was referred to. This was all attained in the face of the opposition of the teachers of religion. To the victories won by secularism, quite irrespective of re ligion, they owed all the improvements that had been effected, arising from a rational view of tho duties and reapons'bilitiea of this life. No doubt the progress he had claimed as having been effected by secularism would be claimed for religion, but he denied it. His intention that evening had not been to attack the belief of any individual, but as it had been specially claimed for Christianity that to it was due all the advancement, oulturo, and refinement now existing, he had thought it useful and instructive to challenge such pretensions, and to leave it to his hearers to decide how far he had been successful. rGheers.] During the evening several instrumental selections were rendered by a band under Mr Button, and some recitations were also given.