512 HEREDITY AND SELECTION IN SOCIOLOGY 



What Japan lias done so well, cannot Western civilisation do 

 also? 



We have already dwelt upon the fact that Western civilisation 

 owes its expansion and institutions very largely to Papal 

 Christianity ; and we must further remember the fact that 

 CathoUcism afiords greater security against suicide than 

 Protestantism does. The statistics which we have quoted 

 concerning the phenomenon are indeed remarkable. There is 

 not one single exception to this rule in any country the figures 

 of which we have been able to obtain. These facts are of the 

 highest possible significance from the sociological point of view. 

 If we consider suicide as iadicating a disiutegration of social 

 life, a weakening of the bonds which bind the individual to 

 society, a diminution of the value of Ufe ; then it is obvious that 

 Catholicism must be a reUgion more greatly iategrated, more 

 stable, more efiicacious in its hold over the Ladividual adhering 

 to it than Protestantism. And if Protestantism is less integrated 

 than Catholicism, it must also be less efiicacious as a social 

 force. 



It may appear strange to talk, in the twentieth century, of 

 Catholicism as a social force ; at least, it may appear strange to 

 some who, like the Freemasons and professional anti-clericals of 

 France and other Catholic countries, have learnt notMng from 

 history, and, above all, from the history of that Eevolution of 

 1789 to which they invariably appeal. In England, anti- 

 clericaUsm, as it is known in some countries on the Continent, 

 is fortunately unknown ; but anyone who lives in a country like 

 France, who knows from personal acquaintance what anti- 

 clericahsm is, must feel inclined to smile at the fears of Professor 

 Durkheim that any increase of the influence of the Church may 

 lead to the restriction of free thought. As if anyone could be 

 further from free thought than the fanatics who, obsessed by 

 the hatred of clericaUsm, oppress and persecute all those who 

 venture to disagree with them ! Truly, the Socialist Party 



