8 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 



This self-limitation on the part of the Secularist is a 

 perfectly gratuitous one. To summarise the old Secu- 

 larism we shall see that the sole reliance upon Science 

 and Reason is in agreement with the Rationalists and 

 Haeckelian Monists of to-day, and we shall also see how 

 far this, their prop and stay, is trustworthy. 



The proposed means of securing happiness was ap- 

 parently much the same as now. It is also noticeable 

 that the want of enthusiasm in Secularism is also still 

 existing. 



Why Secularism should claim the invariability of 

 Nature's laws as peculiarly its own is not very clear ; 

 since that invariability has existed ever since the world 

 began. 



Secularism might be called simple morality based on 

 Utilitarian principles of social duties, for the sake of the 

 happiness which Duty brings. Our jails and police courts 

 have something to show in opposition to this. 



Secularism differed from Materialism of to-day in that 

 it permitted belief in a God and immortality as harmless 

 ideas, unless " interfering with the principles of Secular- 

 ism". 



On the other hand Monists like Haeckel ridicule both 

 as superstitions. 



When the Secularist says, " Theism has no relation 

 whatever to the practical duties of life," the greatest 

 motive power for a good life is gone ; and the weakness 

 of Secularism lies in the want of any efficient motive. 

 This becomes at once apparent in the inefficiency of 

 Secularism to gather in the multitude; as it was in the 

 seventies, so, as we shall see, is it now. 



To hold up the ideals of goodness and virtue as 

 stimulating abstractions will never appeal to the masses 

 of mankind. Nor will reading the stories in Fox's Boo^ 



