A WORD FROM MR. BRAITHWAITE.

Freethought Review, Volume I, Issue 6, 1 March 1884, Page 9

A WORD FROM MR. BRAITHWAITE.

TO THE EDITOR OF THE FREETHOUGHT REVIEW. Sir, —In last Review you assert I changed my views since ioth November last, and quote in proof from the ' Echo ' of that date, wherein I said " Freethought is sure to succeed in the long run, and that the unessentials of orthodoxy must give way before the ever advancing tide of an educated public opinion." Why should I refer to the " unessentials of orthodoxy" if I did not hold the same opinions then as now ? Any impartial person can see that my letter resigning the Dunedin Freethought Association and my rejoinder to Mr Stout are quite in keeping with the above extract.

To confirm this I quote from my letter resigning the Association thus : —" I do not doubt that when the Church finds that what I conceive to be the unessentials of religion—as related to the present age —have almost lost their influence, like the belief in a ' material hell fire ' almost has, that she will either let them go or modify them in accordance with the spirit of the age, and be all the stronger for it." You also seem to think Freethought inseparable from Freethought Associations. I never thought this. Freethought belongs to humanity, not to any special organisation. And you overlooked the fact that in the " valedictory address " you quoted from I wrote that " that much misunderstood subject, Spiritualism, would form a portion of the editorial policy" of the new ' Echo.' To me New Testament Christianity and Spiritualism rightly understood are the same, the proof of which I am content to leave in the hands of Science. So much for my " change of opinions regarding the future of Freethought since the loth November, 1883." The President of the Christchurch Freethought Asssciation, Mr Wm. Pratt, not only misses the drift of my letter resigning the Dunedin Freethought Association and knocks down arguments of his own invention, but makes me say that " the mere right to think for one's self is not only of no value but absolutely powerless of good." I never used such words. They are opposed to the whole tenor of my letter. Besides, Mr Pratt acted most unfairly in placing the words, the mere right to think for one's self," between inverted commas (as if quoting from my letter), coupling them with " is not only of no possible value," &c, thus fathering an absurdity upon me. I fail to see that misrepresenting others serves the cause of truth. Mr Pratt thinks I " hold opinions more in harmony with the Romish Church than a Freethought Association." How is this when the concluding part of my resignation says : " I shall ever be found standing up for civil and religious liberty and the completest toleration one to another ! " Perhaps you and Mr Pratt think neither liberty, toleration,- nor freethought can exist outside of a Freethought Association. I think differently. Yet there is no need to fall out because of this. My main contention, which neither Mr Stout nor Mr Pratt touches, was and is, that those who firmly believe in God and a future state cannot work effectively in religious matters with those who do not, and the fact that the Secular and Freethought Associations everywhere are, with rare exceptions, composed of the latter, and that the two parties have had to organise separately in America, England, and Australia, proves what I.say. I am, yours faithfully, Joseph Braithwaite. Dunedin, February 21st, ISS4. [The resources of Etymology are in this instance only available to support a mental reservation. " Freethought " or " Spiritualism " no more represents Christianity than does Buddhism. We never implied in the faintest way that Freethought was inseparable from Freethought Associations. As Mr Braithwaite believes in the Resurrection, the reference to the " unessentials of orthodoxy is obscure. Used in a Christian sense by one representing himself as a Freethinker, the phrase was deceptive,—Ed.]