EDITOR'S TABLE. 



267 



EDITOR'S TABLE. 



GOLDWIN SMITH ON MORALS. 



PROFESSOR GOLDWIX SMITH 

 is a student of history, and in the 

 November " Atlantic Monthly " he has 

 given us the fruits of his historical stud- 

 ies in relation to morality. He con- 

 tributes an article on " The Prospect of 

 a Moral Interregnum," which, being in- 

 terpreted, means a moral break-down. 

 He says that morality is based upon re- 

 ligion, and that in the past the coUapse 

 of religious systems has always been fol- 

 lowed by periods of moral debasement. 

 He then shows that in the present age 

 there is an extensive decline of religious 

 belief, which promises, and has already 

 brought forth, another period of moral 

 debasement. Goldwin Smith is an elo- 

 quent writer, and always sure of a large 

 number of readers ; whatever he says, 

 therefore, is entitled to attention, and 

 this article is entitled to especial atten- 

 tion. We dissent from some of his 

 views, and propose to give the reasons 

 for it. 



His first historic illustration is from 

 the Greeks, Hellenic life, public and } 

 private, is stated to have been full of j 

 religion, while the fear of the gods Avas 

 a mainstay of morality. " Hellenic re- 

 ligion, however, was entangled with a 

 gross mythology, immoral legends, a 

 worship of sacrifices, a thaumaturgic 

 priesthood, an infantine cosmogony, a 

 polytheistic division of the physical uni- 

 verse into the domains of a number of 

 separate deities." We are told that it 

 fell before awakened intellect, while its 

 fall was conducive to progress ; but mo- 

 rality felt the withdrawal of its basis, 

 as is variously shown, especially in the 

 pages of Thucydides. 



Rome is next taken up, and we are in- 

 formed that here also public and private 

 virtue was sustained by reverence for 



the gods. Polybius is quoted as attest- 

 ing the strength of the religious senti- 

 ment among the Roman people, and the 

 necessity of maintaining superstitions 

 " as a concession to the requirements of 

 the multitude." But the Roman reli- 

 gion, like the Greek, broke up, though 

 " practical good sense probably played 

 a more important part in the over- 

 throw of superstition at Rome than in 

 Hellas." This was followed by wide- 

 spread immorality, but it is admitted 

 that the case is complex : " At the same 

 time a tremendous strain was laid on 

 public morality by the circumstances of 

 the empire. There ensued a cataclysm 

 of selfish ambition, profligate corruption, 

 and murderous faction, which left to 

 society only the choice between chaos 

 and a military corruption." 



Professor Smith next points out the 

 marked religious character of life and 

 society in the middle ages under Catho- 

 lic predominance, and enumerates many 

 moral conquests of that period. Be- 

 sides the triumphs of religious art there 

 grew up the conception of the brother- 

 hood of mankind, the sanctity of life, 

 the value of virtues other than military, 

 and the happy transition of society from 

 slavery through serfage to free labor. 

 " Catholicism fell through the supersti- 

 tions and impostures which had gath- 

 ered around it, and which intellect, 

 awakened by the Renaissance, spurned 

 away ; through Papal tyranny and cler- 

 ical corruption, through the general os- 

 sification, so to speak, of a system which 

 had onCe in all its organs ministered to 

 spiritual life. With it fell the morality 

 that it had sustained, and once more 

 we find ourselves in a moral interreg- 

 num." 



Now, if we assume that these are 

 correct historical representations, what 



