J,THEOLOGICAL SEMINARY, x 5 Princeton, N. J. J — J - # b*— '*** ^ 3 , g^- =l -^9 <>■ 3F 575 . F16 T2 «nr>H -io^k T aylor, Isaac, 1787-lobO. Fanaticism ■Jp # BY THE AUTHOR OF - ai [ttrx Treat's S'uzrTpotpcti 1 % 'I'VfflS xaytKUTtpxi. NEW-YORK: JSHED BY JONATHAN LEAVITT, 181 BROADWAY. BOSTON: CROCKER & BREWSTER, 47 WASHINGTON-STREET. 1834 «5 * A v NEW-YORK: PRINTED BY R. & G. S. WOOD, 25) PEARLSTREET. # PREFACE. Strict propriety seldom allows an author to obtrude upon the public the circumstances that may have attended and controlled his literary labours. Yet the rule may give way to special reasons ; and in the present instance the reader is requested courteously to admit an exception. More than twelve years ago the Author projected a work which should at one view exhibit the several principal forms of spurious or corrupted religion. But discouraged by the magnitude and difficulty of such a task, he after a while, yet not without much reluctance, abandoned the undertaking. Nevertheless the subject continually pressed upon his mind. At length he selected a single portion of the general theme, and adventured— Natural History of Enthusiasm. Emboldened to proceed, the Author almost immediately entered upon the nearly connected and sequent subject which fills the present volume. Yet fearing lest, by an unskilful or unadvised treatment of certain arduous matters which it involves, he might create embar¬ rassment where most he desired to do good, he laid aside his materials. But in the interval, by extending his researches concerning the rise and progress of the fatal errors that have obscured our holy religion, the Author greatly enhanced his wish to achieve his first purpose. He therefore resumed Fanaticism ; which is now offered to the candour of the Reader. He next proposes, in advancing towards the completion of his original design, to take in hand Superstition, and its attendant Credulity. A natural transition leads from Superstition and Credulity to Spiritual Despotism. The principal perversions of Religion having thus been reviewed, it would be proper to describe that Corruption of Morals which, in different modes, has resulted from the over¬ throw of genuine piety. There would then only remain to be considered Scepticism, or Philosophic Irreligion; and the series will embrace all that the Author deems indispensable to the undertaking he has so long meditated. CONTENTS. SECTION I. • Page Motives of the Work ........ 1 SECTION II. The Meaning of Terms—Rise of the Malign Emotions . 17 SECTION III. Allianee of the Malign Emotions with the Imagination . . 3S SECTION IV. Fanaticism the Offspring of Enthusiasm ; or Combination of the Malign Emotions with Spurious Religious Sentiments . . . 51 SECTION V. Fanaticism of the Scourge.63 SECTION VI. Fanaticism of the Brand.104 SECTION VII. Fanaticism of the Banner.155 SECTION VIII. Fanaticism of the Symbol.215 SECTION IX. The Religion of the Bible not Fanatical (The Old Testa¬ ment) .269 SECTION X. The Religion of the Bible not Fanatical (The New Testa¬ ment) .310 FANATICISM. SECTION I. MOTIVES OF THE WORK. The maladies of the mind are not to be healed any more than those of the body unless by a friendly hand. JBut through a singular infelicity it too often happens that these evils, deep as they are, and difficult of cure, fall under a treatment that is hostile and malign, or, what is worse, frivolous. Especially does this disad¬ vantage attach to that peculiar class of mental disor¬ ders which, as they are more profound in their origin than any other, and more liable to extreme aggra¬ vation, demand in whoever would relieve them, not only the requisite skill, but the very purest intentions. Vitiated religious sentiments have too much con¬ nexion with the principles of our physical constitution to be in every case effectively amended by methods that are merely theological; and yet, drawing their strength as they do from great truths with which the physiologist has ordinarily little or no personal acquaint¬ ance, and which perhaps he holds in contempt, he is likely to err, as well in theory as in practice, when he takes them in hand. How profound soever or exact may be his knowledge of human nature, whether as matter of science or as matter of observation, the 2 2 FANATICISM. subject, in these instances, lies beyond his range !—- himself neither religious nor even superstitious, he has no sympathy with the deep movements of the soul in its relation to the Infinite and Invisible Being;—he has no clue therefore to the secret he is in search of. The misapprehensions of the frigid philosopher are vastly increased if it should happen that, in reference to religion, his feelings are petulant and acrimonious. Poor preparation truly for a task of such peculiar difficulty to be at once ignorant in the chief article of the case, and hurried on by the motives that attend a caustic levity of temper ! It would indeed be difficult to furnish a satisfactory reason either for the asperity or for the levity with which persons of a certain class allow themselves to speak of grave perversions of the religious sentiment; for if such vices of the spirit be regarded as corruptions of the most momentous of all truths, then surely a due affection for our fellow-men, on the one hand, and a proper reverence towards Heaven on the other, alike demand from reasonable persons as well tenderness as awe, in approaching a subject so fraught with fatal mischiefs. Or even if Religion be deemed by these sarcastic reprovers altogether an illusion, or an invet¬ erate prejudice, infesting our luckless nature, not the more, even in that case, can rancour or levity become a wise and benevolent mind, seeing that these same powerful sentiments whether true or false, do so deeply affect the welfare of the human family. Or to look at the subject on another side, it may fairly be asked why the religious passions might not claim from supercilious wits a measure of that lenity (if not indulgence) which is readily afforded to vices of another sort. If Pride abhorrent as it is, and if Ambition, with both hands dyed in blood, and if the lust of wealth making the weak its prey, and if sensual desires, devoid of pity, are all to be gently handled, and all in turn find patrons among Sages—why might not also Fanaticism? why might not Enthusiasm? MOTIVES OP THE WORK. 3 why not Superstition ?. It would be hard to prove that the deluded religionist, even when virulent in an extreme degree, or when most absurd, is practically a more mischievous person than for instance, the adul¬ terous despoiler of domestic peace, or than the rapa¬ cious dealer in human souls and bodies. Let it be true that the Hypocrite is an odious being;—yes, but is not the Oppressor also detestable ? And what has become of the philosophic impartiality of the Sage (self-styled) who will spend his jovial hours at the table of the Cruel or the Debauched, while all he can bestow upon the victims of religious extravagance, is the bitterness of his contempt ? There is a manifest inconsistency here of which surely those should be able to give a good account who, themselves, are far too wise than to be religious ! We leave this difficulty in the hands of the parties it may concern, and proceed to say that emotions altogether strange to frigid and sardonic tempers must have come within the experience of whoever would truly comprehend the malady of the fanatic or the enthusiast; and much more so, if he is attempting to restore the disordered spirit to soundness of health.— Mere intellectualists, as well as men of pleasure, know just so much of human nature as their own frivolous sentiments may serve to give them a sense of: all that lies deeper than these slender feelings, or that stretches beyond this limited range, is to them a riddle and a mockery. But it may happen that a mind natively sound, and one now governed by the firmest principles, has in an early stage, or in some short era of its course, so far yielded to the influence of irregu¬ lar or vehement sentiments as to give it ever after a sympathy, even with the most extreme cases of the same order; so that, by the combined aid of personal experience and observation, the profound abyss where¬ in exorbitant religious ideas take their course may successfully be explored;—nor merely explored, but its fearful contents brought forth and described, and 4 FANATICISM. this too in the spirit of humanity , or with the feeling of one who, far from affecting to look down as from a pinnacle upon the follies of his fellow-men, speaks in kindness of their errors, as being himself liable to every infirmity that besets the human heart and under¬ standing. Never in fact, have we more urgent need of a settled principle of philanthropy than when we set foot upon the ground of religious delusion. Nowhere, so much as there, is it necessary to be resolute in our good-will to man, and fixed in our respect for him too, even while the strictness of important principles is not at all relaxed. Far more easy is it to be contemptu¬ ously bland, than kind and firm on occasions of this sort. We have only to abandon our concern for seri¬ ous truths, and then may be indulgent to the worst enormities.—But this were a cruel charity, and a farce too; and we must seek a much surer foundation for that love which is to be the consort of knowledge. A personal consciousness of the readiness with which even the most egregious or dangerous perver¬ sions of feeling at first recommend themselves to the human mind, and soon gain sovereign control over it, is needed to place us in the position we ought to occupy whenever such evils are to be made the subject of animadversion. And if, with the light of Christi¬ anity full around us, and with the advantages of gene¬ ral intelligence on our side, we yet cannot boast of having enjoyed an entire exemption from false or cul¬ pable religious emotions, what sentiment but pity should be harboured when we come to think of those who, born beneath a malignant star, have w r alked by no other light than the lurid glare of portentous super¬ stitions ?—A check must even be put to those strong and involuntary emotions of indignation with which we contemplate the hateful course of the spiritual des¬ pot and persecutor.—Outlaw of humanity, and off¬ spring, as he seems, of infernals, he may command also a measure of indulgence as the child of some false MOTIVES or THE WORK. 5 system which, by a slow accumulation of noxious qual¬ ities, has grown to be far more malign than its authors would have made it. Besides; there may revolve within the abyss of the human heart (as history com¬ pels us to admit) a world of wondrous inconsis¬ tencies; and especially so when religious infatuations come in to trouble it. How often has there been seen upon the stage of human affairs beings—must we call them men ? who, with hands sodden in blood—blood of their brethren, have challenged to themselves, and on no slender grounds, the praise of a species of virtue and greatness of soul! The very same spirit of kindness which should rule us in the performance of a task such as the one now in hand, must also furnish the necessary motive for the arduous undertaking. Is it a matter of curious des¬ cription only, or of entertainment, or even with the more worthy, though secondary purpose of philoso¬ phical inquiry, that we are to pass over the ground of religious extravagance 1 Any such intention would be found to lack impulse enough for the labour. There are however at hand motives of an incomparably higher order, and of far greater force, and these (or some of them at least) have a peculiar urgency in re¬ ference to the present moment. To these motives too much importance cannot be attributed; and it will be well that we should here distinctly bring them to view. All devout minds are now intent upon the hope of the overthrow of old superstitions, and of the universal spread of the Gospel. But the spread of the Gospel, as we are warranted to believe, implies and demands, its clear separation from all those false sentiments and exaggerated or mischievous modes of feeling which heretofore, and so often, have embarrassed its course. In a word Christianity must free itself from all en¬ tanglement with malignant or exorbitant passions, if it would break over its present boundaries. Is the world to be converted—are the nations to be brought 6 FANATICISM. home to God ? Yes ;—but this supposes that the Christian body should awake from every illusion, and rid itself of every disgrace. True indeed it is, and lamentable, that the families of man have remained age after age the victims of error: yet this has not happened because there has not been extant in every age, somewhere, a repository of truth, and an Instrument, or means of instruction. If even now superstition and impiety share between them the empire of almost all the world, it is not be¬ cause nothing better comes within the reach of the human mind, or because nothing more benign is pre¬ sented to its choice. No—for absolute Truth, Truth from heaven, has long sojourned on earth, and is to be conversed with. Why then do the people still sit in darkness?—The question may painfully perplex us, yet should never be dismissed. Rather a genuine and intelligent compassion for our fellow-men will lead us to prosecute with intense zeal any inquiry which may issue in the purification of the means of salvation con¬ fided to our care. If the Gospel does not (as we might have expected, and must always desire) prevail and run from land to land—the anxious question recurs —what arrests its progress ? Besides employing ourselves then in all eligible modes for propagating the faith, every one competent to the task, should institute a scrutiny, at home and abroad, in quest as well of open hinderances to the progress of the Gospel, as of the more latent or ob¬ scure causes of obstruction. The great work in an age of Missions, should it be any thing else than the re-inauguration of Christianity among ourselves? If religion—religion we mean, not as found on parch¬ ments, or in creeds, but in the bosoms of men, were indeed what once it was, it would doubtless spread, as once it did, from heart to heart, and from city to city, and from shore to shore. The special reason therefore —or the urgent reason, why we should now dismiss from our own bosoms every taint of superstition, and MOTIVES OF THE WORK. 7 every residue of unbelief, as well as whatever is fanat¬ ical, factious, or uncharitable, is this—that the world —even the deluded millions of our brethren, may at length receive the blessings of the Gospel. Although we were looking no further than to the personal welfare of individuals, it would always seem in the highest degree desirable that whoever believes the Gospel should cast off infirmities of judgment— preposterous suppositions—idle and debilitating fears, and especially should come free from the taint of malign sentiments. But after we have so thought of the individual , must we not give a renewed attention to the influence he may exert over others ? No one “liveth to himself.”—An efficacy, vital or mortal, emanates from the person of every professor of the Gospel.—Every man calling himself (in a special sense) a Christian, either saves or destroys those around him :—Such is the rule of the dispensation under which we have to act. It pleases not the Divine Power (very rare cases excepted) to operate inde¬ pendently of that living and rational agency to which even the scheme of human redemption was made to conform itself. The Saviour of men “became flesh, and dwelt among us,” because no violence could be done, even on the most urgent and singular of all occasions, to the established principles of the moral system.—The harmony of the intellectual world, in the constitution of which the Divine Wisdom is so signally displayed, must not be disturbed, notwith¬ standing that the Eternal Majesty himself was coming to the rescue of the lost; and in this illustrious in¬ stance we have a proof, applicable to every imaginable case, and always sufficient to convince us—That the saving mercy of God to man moves only along the line of rational and moral agency;—that if a sinner is to be “ converted from the error of his way,” it must be by the word or personal influence of one like him¬ self. Was it not (other purposes being granted) to give sanction to this very mode of procedure, that He who “ was rich” in the fulness of divine perfections. 8 FANATICISM. “ became poor,” that we, through the poverty of his human nature, “might be made rich?” Vain sup¬ position then that God, who would not at first save the world at the cost, or to the damage of the settled maxims of his government, shall in after instances waive them ; or put contempt in private cases upon that to which he attributed the highest importance on the most notable of all occasions! Christianity, such as it actually exists in the bosoms of those who entertain it, is the Instrument of God’s mercy to the world :—and the Effect in every age will be as is the Instrument. In these times we have not quite lost sight of this great principle; much less do we deny it:—and yet every day we give more attention to other truths, than to this. We honour the capital doctrine of the agency of the Spirit of Grace in the conversion of men ; and then we turn to proximate and visible means, and pay due regard to all the ordinary instruments of instruction. And thus having rendered homage in just proportion, to the Divine Power and sovereignty on the one hand, and to human industry on the other, we think too little of that Middle Truth which, nevertheless, to ourselves is the most significant of the three, namely—That the moral and intelligent instrumentality from the which the Sovereign Grace refuses to sever itself, is nothing else than the vital force which animates each single believer. Does not the Omnipresent Spirit, rich in power to renovate human hearts, even now brood over the populous plains and crowded cities of India and of China, as well as over the cities and plains of England? Is not God—even our God, locally present among the dense myriads that tread the precincts of idol worship? .—Is He not ever, and in all places at hand; and wherever at hand, able also to save ? Yes, but alas ! the moral and rational instrumentality is not present in those dark places ; and the immutable law of the spiritual world forbids that, apart from this system of means, the souls of men should be rescued. MOTIVES OF THE WORK. 9 Nor is the bare presence of the moral and rational in¬ strument of conversion enough;—for its Power resides in its Quality. The very same law—awful and invio¬ lable, which demands its presence, demands also its quality, as the condition of its efficiency. Yes, in¬ deed, awful and inviolable law ;—awful because invi¬ olable ; and awful to the Church, because it makes the salvation of mankind, in each successive genera¬ tion, to lean with undivided stress, upon the purity and vigour of faith and charity, as found in the hearts of the Christians of each age, severally and collectively! There might, we grant, seem more urgent need to make inquiry concerning the intrinsic condition of the Christian body in those times when its diffusive influ¬ ence had sunk to the lowest point, or seemed quite to have failed, than when this influence was growing. And yet, inasmuch as hope is a motive incomparably more efficacious than despondency, we should be prompt to avail ourselves of its aid whenever it' makes its auspicious appearance. But the present hour is an hour of hope ;—let us then seize the fair occasion, and turn it to the utmost advantage. This age of expecta¬ tion is the time when vigilance and scrutiny, of every sort, should be put in movement, and should be directed inward upon the Church itself: for in the bosom of the Church rests the hope of the conversion of the world ? How culpable then, and how ignoble too, must we deem that spirit of jealousy or reluctance which would divert such a scrutiny, as if the honour of the Gospel were better secured by cloaking the faults of its adherents, than by labouring to dispel them ! Shall we, as Christians, wish to creep under the shelter of a corrupt lenity? Shall we secretly wish that the time may never come—or at least, not come while we live, when the inveterate and deep-seated errors of the religious body shall be fairly dealt with, and honestly spread to the light ? It may indeed be true # that when we have to denounce the flagrant evils that 10 FANATICISM. abound in the world, and when open impiety and unbelief are to be reproved, we should use a serious severity; but then, when we turn homeward, shall we at once moderate our tones, and drop our voice, and plead for a sort of indulgence, as the favourites of heaven, which we are by no means forward to grant to the uninstructed and irreligious portion of mankind ? Shall our thunders always have a distant aim ? Alas ! how many generations of men have already lived and died untaught, while the Church has delicately smothered her failings, and has asked for an inobservant reverence from the profane world ! True it is that the vices of. heathens and infidels are grievous; but it is also true that the vices of the Church, if much less flagrant, and less mischievous in their immediate operation, are loaded with a peculiar aggravation, inasmuch as they destroy or impair the only existing means for the repression and exter- ruination of all error and all vice ! If then the alleged dependence of the religious welfare of mankind upon the vigour and purity of the Christian body be real, we find a full apology for whatever methods (even the most rigorous) that may conduce to its cleansing. All we need take care of is the spirit and intention of our reproofs. Should there be any, calling himself a disciple of Christ, who would protest against such impartial proceedings, he might properly be told that the inquiry in hand is too momentous, and is far too extensive in its conse¬ quences, than that it should be either diverted or relinquished in deference to the feelings or interests of the parties immediately concerned.— 1 Be it so,’ we might say to the reluctant and faulty Christian, be it so, that your spiritual delinquencies are not of so fatal a kind as to put in danger your personal salvation (an assumption, by the way, always hazard¬ ous) and let it be granted that you are chargeable only with certain infirmities of judgment, or with mere exuberances in temper or conductyes, but MOTIVES OP THE WORK. 11 these faults in you, as a Christian, and especially at the present critical moment, exert a negative power, the circle of which none can measure. Can you then desire that we should exercise a scrupulous tenderness toward you, while we forget pity towards the millions of mankind ? Nay, rather, let every instrument of correction, and the most severe, be put in play, which may seem needful for restoring its proper force to the Gospel—the only means as it is of mercy to the world.’ No, we must not flinch, although the sensi¬ tiveness and the vanity of thousands among us were to be intensely hurt. Let all—all be humbled, if such humiliation is indeed a necessary process that shall facilitate the conversion of the world. Such then is the prime motive which should animate the difficult labour we have in hand. But there are other reasons, nor those very remote, that may prop¬ erly be kept in view when it is attempted, as now, to lay bare the pernicious sentiments that have so often and so severely afflicted mankind.—If, just at the present moment, there seems little or no probability that sanguinary and malignant superstitions should regain their lost ascendancy, can we say it is certain that no such evils, congruous as they are with the universal passions of man, shall henceforth be gener¬ ated, and burst abroad ? Manifest as it is that the human mind has a leaning toward gloomy and cruel excesses in matters of religion, whence can we derive a firm persuasion that this tendency shall, in all future ages, be held as much in check as now it is?—Not surely from broad and comprehensive calculations, such as a sound philosophy authenticates. The sup¬ position that human nature has for ever discarded certain powerful emotions which awhile ago raged within its circle, must be deemed frivolous and absurd. How soon may we be taught to estimate more wisely the forces we have to guard against in our political and religious speculations ! The frigid indifference and levity we gee around us is but the fashion of a 12 FANATICISM. day ; and a day may see it exchanged for the utmost extravagance, and for the highest frenzy of fanatical zeal. Human nature, let us be assured, is a more profound and boisterous element than we are apt to imagine, when it has happened to us for a length of time to stand upon the brink of the abyss in a summer season, idly gazing upon the rippled surface—gay in froth and sunbeams. What shall be the movements of the deep, and what the thunder of its rage, at night¬ fall, and when the winds are up ! Nothing less than the ample testimony of history can support general conclusions as to what is probable or not, in the course of events. And yet even the events of the last few years might be enough to prove that mankind, whatever may be the boasted advance of civilization, has by no means outgrown its propen¬ sity to indulge vindictive passions. Or can we have looked abroad during our own era, and believe that the fascinations of impudent imposture and egregious delusion are quite spent and gone ? Rather let it be assumed as probable, at least as not impossible, that whatever intemperance, whatever atrocity, whatever folly, history lays to the charge of man, shall be re¬ peated, perhaps in our own age, perhaps in the next. The security which some may presume upon, against the reappearance of religious excesses, if founded on the present diffusion of intellectual and Biblical light, is likely to prove fallacious in two capital respects. In the first place, the inference is faulty because this spread of knowledge (in both kinds) though indeed wide and remarkable—or remarkable by comparison, is still in fact very limited, and its range bears an in¬ considerable proportion to the broad surface of society, even in the most enlightened communities. If a cer¬ tain number has reached that degree of intelligence which may be reckoned to exclude altogether the probability of violent movements, the dense masses of society, on all sides, have hitherto scarcely been blessed by a ray of genuine illumination; moreover, MOTIVES OF THE WORK. 13 there is in our own country, and in every country of Europe, a numerous middle class, whose progress in knowledge is of that sort which, while it fails to insure moderation or control of the passions, renders the mind only so much the more susceptible of imaginative ex¬ citements. Torpor, it is true, has to a great extent been dispelled from the European social system ; but who shall say in what manner, or to what purposes, the returning powers of life shall be employed 1 In now looking upon the populace of the civilized world, such as the revolutionary excitements of the last fifty years have made it, one might fancy to see a crea¬ ture of gigantic proportions just rousing itself, after a long trance, and preparing to move and act among the living. But, what shall be its deeds, and what its temper?—The most opposite expectations might be made to appear reasonable. Every thing favourable may be hoped for;—whatever is appalling may be feared. At least we may affirm that the belief enter¬ tained by some, that great agitations may not again produce great excesses ; or that egregious delusions may not once more, even on the illuminated field of European affairs, draw after them, as in other ages, myriads of votaries, rests upon no solid grounds of experience or philosophy, and will be adopted only by those who judge of human nature from partial or tran¬ sient aspects, or who think that the frivolous incidents of yesterday and to-day afford a sufficient sample of all Time. But a persuasion of this sort, founded on the spread of intelligence, whether secular or religious, seems faulty in another manner—namely, in attributing to knowledge, of either kind, more influence than it is actually found to exert over the passions and the ima¬ gination of the bulk of mankind. Education does indeed produce, in full, its proper effect to moderate the emotions, and as a preservative against delusion, in cold, arid, and calculating spirits ; and it exerts also, in a good degree, the same sort of salutary influence 3 14 FANATICISM. over even the most turbulent or susceptible minds, up to that critical moment when the ordinary counter¬ poise of reason is overborne, and when some para¬ mount motive gains ascendancy. This sudden over¬ throw of restraining principles — an overthrow to which sanguine and imaginative temperaments are always liable, is not often duly allowed for when it is attempted to forecast the course of human affairs.— We form our estimate of moral causes according to that rate of power at which we observe them now to be moving; but fail to anticipate what they shall be¬ come, perhaps the next instant, that is to say, when existing restraints of usage or feeling have been burst asunder. The rush of the passions, on such occasions, is im¬ petuous, just in proportion to the force that may have been overthrown ; and whatever has given way before the torrent goes forward to swell the tide. There are those who, from their personal history, might con¬ firm the truth that, when they have fallen, their fall was aggravated, not softened, by whatever advantages they possessed of intelligence or sensibility. And it is especially to be observed that, when the balance of the mind has once been lost, the power of intelligence or of knowledge to enhance the vehemence of malig¬ nant emotions, or to exaggerate preposterous conceits, is immeasurably greater on occasions of general ex¬ citement, or of public delusion, than in the instance of private and individual errors. Whence in fact does knowledge draw the chief part of its controlling force over the mind, but from the susceptibility it engenders to the opinions of those around us? In entering the commonwealth of intelligence do we not come under an influence that will probably out-measure the acces¬ sion we may make of personal power? It is only on particular occasions that we regulate our conduct, or repress the violence of passion by self-derived infer¬ ences from what we know; while ordinarily and al¬ most unconsciously, we apply to our modes of action MOTIVES OF THE WORK. 15 and to our sentiments, those general maxims that float in the society of which we are members. If every man’s personal intelligence absolutely governed his behaviour, the empire of knowledge would indeed be much more firm than it is, because truth would take effect at all points of the surface of society, instead of touching only a few. But this not being the fact, whatever blind impulse awakens the passions of man¬ kind affects all, individually, in a degree that bears little relation to the individual intelligence of each. The movements of a community when once excited, are far more passionate and less rational, than an estimate of its average intelligence might lead us to expect. If it be so, it must happen that when once a turn is made in the general tendency of men’s feelings—when once a certain order of sentiment, or a certain course of conduct has come to be authenticated ;—if, for example, some dark, cruel, or profligate rule of policy is assented to as necessary or just, all men in particular, in yielding themselves to the stream of affairs, will plunge into it with an impetuosity propor¬ tioned to their personal intelligence and energy of mind. Every man in assenting to the general conclu¬ sion, because assented to by others, would strengthen himself and others, in the common purpose, by all those means of knowledge and powers of argu¬ ment which he possessed. If the error or extrava¬ gance had been his own, exclusively, his faculty and furniture of mind would have been employed in defend¬ ing himself from the assaults of other men’s good sense ; and human nature does not, under such circum¬ stances, often accumulate such force.—But the same faculties moving forward with the multitude, on a broad triumphant road, swell and expand and possess themselves of the full dominion of the soul. At this present moment of general indifference the breaking forth of any species of fanaticism may seem highly improbable. We ought however to look be- 16 FANATICISM. yond to-day and yesterday ;—we should survey the general face of history, and should inspect too the depths of the human heart, and calculate the power of its stronger passions.—Disbelief is the ephemeron of our times ; but disbelief, far from being natural to man, can never be more than a reaction that comeson, as a faintness, after a season of credulity and superstition. And how soon may a revulsion take place ! How soon, after the hour of exhaustion has gone by, may the pleasurable excitements of high belief and of unbounded confidence be eagerly courted !—courted by the vulgar in compliance with its relish of whatever is pungent and intense ;—courted by the noble as a means, or as a pretext of power;—courted by the frivolous as a relief from lassitude; and by the profound and thoughtful, as the proper element of minds of that order! Whenever the turn of belief shall come round (we are not here speaking of a genuine religious faith) empassioned sentiments, of all kinds, will follow with¬ out delay: nor can any thing less than a revival of Christianity in its fullest force then avail to ward off those excesses of fanaticism and intolerance, and spiritual arrogance which heretofore have raged in the world. The connexion of credulity with virulence is deep seated in the principles of human nature, and it should not be deemed impertinent or unseasonable at any time to attempt to trace to its origin this order of sen¬ timents, or to lay bare the fibres of its strength :— unless indeed, we will profess to think that man is no more what once he was. SECTION II. THE MEANING OF TERMS-RISE OF THE MALIGN EMOTIONS. Every term, whether popular or scientific, which may be employed to designate the affections or the indivi¬ dual dispositions of the human mind, is more or less indeterminate, and is liable to many loose and im¬ proper extensions of the sense which a strict definition might assign to it. This disadvantage—the irremediable grievance of intellectual philosophy, has its origin in the obscurity and intricacy of the subject; and is be¬ sides much aggravated by the changing fashions of speech, which neither observe scientific precision, nor are watched over with any care.—Men speak not entirely as they think ; but as they think and hear ; and in what relates to things impalpable few either think or hear attentively. All ethical and religious phrases, and those psychological terms which derive their specific sense from the principles of religion, besides partaking fully of the above-named disparagements, common to intellectual subjects, labour under a peculiar inconvenience, not shared by any others of that class. For if the mass of men are inaccurate and capricious in their mode of employing the abstruse portion of language, they entertain too often, in what relates to religion, certain capital errors—errors which ordinarily possess the force and activity of virulent prejudices, and which impart to their modes of speaking, not in¬ distinctness indeed, but the vivid and positive colours of a strong delusion. 3* 18 FANATICISM. It is not the small minority of persons soundly informed in matters of religion, that gives law to the language of a country;—or even if it did, this class is not generally qualified, by habits or education, to fix and authenticate a philosophical nomenclature. From these peculiar disadvantages it inevitably follows that when, by giving attention to facts, we have obtained precise notions on subjects of this sort, or at least have approximated to truth, it will be found imprac¬ ticable to adjust the result of our inquiries to the popular and established sense of any of the terms which may offer themselves to our option. The mass of mankind, besides their backwardness always to exchange a loose and vague, for a definite and restricted notion, do not fail to descry, in any defini¬ tion that is at once philosophical and religious, some cause of offence.—The new-sharpened phrase is felt to have an edge that wounds inveterate prejudice, and rankles in the heart; and the writer who is seen to be thus whetting afresh his words, is deemed to entertain a hostile purpose, and is met with a corres¬ pondent hostility. Nor is much more favour to be looked for from the religious classes who, always alarmed at the slightest change in venerable modes of speech, will scent a heresy in every such definition. If then new terms are not to be created (a pro¬ cedure always undesirable) and if the intolerable inconvenience of a ponderous periphrasis is also to be avoided, the best that can be done, amid so many difficulties, is to select a phrase which, more nearly than any other (of those commonly in use) conveys the notion we have obtained; and then to append a caution, explicit or implied, against the misunder¬ standings to which the writer, from the peculiar circumstances of the case, is exposed. In the instance of every term connected with religious principles or modes of feeling, there must of course be admitted a far wider departure from the etymological or ancient , than from the modern and THE MEANING OF TERMS. 19 popular sense they bear. If the recent and vulgar meaning of such phrases be incorrect, or delusive, how much more so must be the remote and original meaning !—Whither does the etymon carry us, but to altogether a foreign region of thought ? In matters of religion a revolution has taken place, upon all lettered nations, which, while it leaves human nature the same, has imparted a new substance, a new form, and a new relative position, to every notion that respects Invisible Power, and human conduct. Preposterous therefore would be the pedantry of a writer who, in discoursing, for example, of Supersti¬ tion, or Enthusiasm, should confine himself to such a definition of those terms as might comport with the sense they bore, centuries ago, in the minds of Lucian, Plutarch, Epictetus, or Aristotle ! Even many of the less fluctuating ethical abstractions have dropped almost the whole of their primeval significance in the course of ages. Is Justice, in the sense of an Athenian populace, or in the sense of the “ Senate and People of Rome,” the justice either of English law, or of English opinion ? Has the Virtue of Sparta much analogy with the virtue of Christian ethics ? Where, in modern times (except indeed among the slave¬ holders of Republican America) where shall we find a meaning of the word Liberty which has even a remote resemblance to the sense attached to it by the ferocious lords of miserable Lacedaemonian helots ? The passions of man are permanent; but the dif¬ ference between polytheism and true theology—how much soever true theology may in any instance be encumbered or obscured, is so vast, as to leave nothing that belongs to the circle of religious emotion unchanged. Thus it is that the Fanatic of the Grecian and Roman writers is hardly, if at all, to be recognized as predecessor of the Fanatic of Christendom; and although, for purposes of illustration, or of mere curi¬ osity, we may hereafter glance (once and again) at 20 FANATICISM. some of the ancient and long-obsolete forms of religious extravagance, it is with the modern species (practical inferences being our prime object) that we shall, in the following pages, chiefly be conversant. In a former instance (Natural History of Enthu¬ siasm) the author was not insensible of the disadvan¬ tage he laboured under in adopting a phrase which perhaps more than any other (the one he has now to do with excepted) is employed in every imaginable diversity of meaning, and to which, in truth, every man, as he utters it, assigns a sense that reflects his his persona] rate of feeling in matters of religion. One man’s Enthusiasm being only another man’s Sobriety. Before such diversities can be harmonised not only must mankind be taught to think with pre¬ cision, but must come also to an agreement on the great principles of piety. Discordances, still more extreme, belong to the popular senses of the word Fanaticism; for inas¬ much as it takes up a more pungent element than the term Enthusiasm, it commonly draws some special emphasis from the virulence or prejudices of the mouth whence it issues:—the word is the favourite missile of that opprobrious contempt wherewith Irre- ligion defends itself in its difficult position; and it is hurled often with the indiscriminate vehemence that belongs to infuriate fear. The sense attached to a term when so employed must of course differ im¬ mensely from that which it bears in the mind of the dispassionate observer of mankind, and especially of one who takes up the truths of Christianity as the best and most certain clew to the philosophy of human nature. Once for all then, the author requests the reader to remember that he is not professing to be either lexico¬ grapher or scholastic disputant; nor does he assume it as any part of his business to adjust the nice propri¬ eties of language; but aims rather, on a very impor¬ tant subject, to make himself understood, while he. des- THE MEANING OP TERMS. 21 cribes a certain class of pernicious sentiments, which too often have been combined with religious belief. In another volume spurious and imaginative religious emotions were spoken of: our present task is to des¬ cribe the various combinations of the same spuri¬ ous pietism with the Malign Passions. After quite rejecting from our account that oppro¬ brious sense of the word Fanaticism which the viru¬ lent calumniator of religion and of the religious assigns to it, it will be found, as we believe, that the elemen¬ tary idea attaching to the term in its manifold applica¬ tions, is that of fictitious fervour in religion, rendered turbulent, morose or rancorous, by junction with some one or more of the unsocial emotions. Or if a defini¬ tion as brief as possible were demanded, we should say, that Fanaticism is Enthusiasm inflames* by Hatred. A glance at the rise and reason of the irascible emotions will facilitate our future progress. Our sub¬ ject being an instance of the combination of these emotions with other principles, we ought distinctly to have in view the elements ; and to note also some of their coalescent forms. The difficulty that attends analysis in the science of mind (science so called) belongs in a peculiar manner to those instances in which we endeavour to trace the the original construction of passions or impulses that scarcely ever present themselves otherwise than in an exaggerated and corrupted condition. It is usual if an object of philosophic curiosity be obscure or evan¬ escent, to single out for examination the most marked examples of the class. But to take this course in an analysis of the passions is to seek for primitive ele¬ ments where most they have lost their original form, and have suffered the most injury. What the contour and symmetry of the moral form was, as it came from the hand of the Creator, may be more readily determined in the dry method of ethical definition, than vividly conceived of; and this is espe- 22 FANATICISM. cially true of those emotions which imply the presence of evil. How delicate is the task—if indeed it be a practicable one, to trace the line between nature (in the best sense) and deformity—between the true and false, in these instances ! And yet, not the most ran¬ corous or foul of the malign sentiments can be thought any thing else than a disordered state of .- ome power indispensable to the constitution of a rational and inde¬ pendent agent. We need then take care lest, in our haste to condemn what is evil, we should denounce as such that of which God himself is author, and which, if we think closely, cannot even be conceived of as altogether wanting in a being placed where man is placed. Within a certain line there can however be no dif¬ ficulty in deciding between good and evil. It is quite obvious that a passion or appetite, subservient to some specific purpose, is in an irregular state when it over¬ passes or fails to secure that purpose;—the end must give law to the means ; and where the end may clearly be defined, the limit which the means should reach is not hard to ascertain. Either by Excess and too great intensity—or by Perversion, or misdirection from their proper object—or by Prolongation from mo¬ mentary impulses to habits and permanent qualities, as well the animal appetites as the irascible passions assume a pernicious form, and derange the harmony of nature. Which of the emotions or desires is it that may justly claim to be not subservient, but paramount, and may therefore safely be prolonged, and impart them¬ selves as qualities to the mind. Nature distinctly in¬ forms us, by rendering them always agreeable ; while some uneasiness, or even positive pain, is attached to the continuance of every one of those feelings which, in her intention, are only to measure out a moment¬ ary occasion, and which ought to rise and disappear in the same hour. It is thus, we need hardly say, with the bodily appe- RISE OF THE MALIGN PASSIONS. 23 tites, which disturb the system (as well corporeal as mental) whenever they do more than accomplish their definite purpose. Indispensible as these impulses are to the machinery of life, they take a noxious quality when' they are detained: their property should be to evaporate without residuum. Each, moreover, has its specific object, and throws every other function into disorder if it become fastidious; and each too must observe its due amount of force. The same is true of all forms of the irascible emo¬ tions, and which never go beyond their purpose, and especially can never pass into dispositions, with¬ out vitiating the character. Each single instance of excessive excitement contributes, shall we say, the whole amount of its excess to the formation of a habit of the same class; and then these habits—emotions parted from their occasions, soon run into some sort of perversion, or become misdirected. Unoccupied de¬ sire strays from its path, and attaches itself perni¬ ciously to whatever objects it may meet. It is thus that human nature subsides into the most corrupted states. A certain mode of feeling is generated, of the utter unreasonableness of which the mind is dimly conscious, and to rid itself of the uneasy sense of being absurd, rushes on towards sentiments still more preposterous, that by their aid it may quite surround itself with false impressions, and lose all recollection of calm truths. As there is an intoxication of the animal appetites, so is there an intoxication of the ma¬ lign passions ; and perhaps if we could completely ana¬ lyse some extreme instance of dark and atrocious hatred —hatred when it constitutes the fixed condition of the soul, we should find that the miserable being has become what he is by the impulse of a perpetual endeavour to drown self-reproach and inward con¬ tempt, in deeper and deeper draughts of the cup of poison. Up to that point where the subordinate principles of our nature become transmuted into permanent quali- 24 FANATICISM. ties, imparting a character to the mind, it is easy to discern their reason and propriety as constituents of the physical and moral life : nor can we fail to per¬ ceive that each is attended with a provision for restrain¬ ing it within due limits. Thus it is, as we have said, that while the machinery of animal life is impelled by the sense of pleasure which is attached to the brief activity of the appetites, an admonitory uneasiness attends the excessive indulgence or protracted excite¬ ment of them. Consistently with this same regard to ulterior purposes, the irascible emotions in their native state , are denied any attendant pleasurable sense; or at most so small an element of pleasure belongs to them, that the pain consequent upon their excess or their continuance is always paramount. The dash of gratification, if there be any, does but give momentary life to the rising energy, and then passes off. The irascible passions can be allowed to have respect to nothing beyond the preservation of life, or of its enjoyments, in those unforeseen occasions when no other means but an instantaneous exertion of more than the ordinary force, both of body and mind, and especially of the latter, could avail for the purpose of defence :—anger is the safeguard of beings not housed, like the tortoise, within an impenetrable crust; and if man had been born cased in iron, or were an ethereal substance, he would probably have been furnished with no passionate resentments. Neverthe¬ less every good purpose of such emotions has been answered when the faculties have received that degree and kind of stimulus which the exigency of the mo¬ ment demanded; and their continuance must be always (if it were nothing worse) a w r aste and a perver¬ sion of power; since the conservative ends they may seem to have in view are far more certainly secured by other means when the sudden peril is gone by. Malign dispositions and vindictive habits are, shall we say, miserable encumbrances of the mind ; as if a man would sustain the load of bulky armour, night THE MEANINO OF TERMS. 25 and day, and carry shield and lance, though probably he will not encounter a foe once in the year. The checks of opinion, the motives of mutual interest; and at last the provisions of law, and the arm of the body politic, are in readiness to defend us from every aggression, those only excepted which must be re¬ pelled at the instant they are made, or not at all. That brisk excitement of the faculties which a sud¬ den perception of danger occasions, not merely bears proportion to the nearness and extent of the peril, but has a relation to its quality and its supposed origin. This excitement, to answer its end, must possess an affinity with the aggressive cause. The repellant power must be such as is the assailant power. A quick sympathy with the hostile purpose of an antagonist belongs to the emotion at the impulse of which we are to withstand his attack. Simple ear, and its attendant courage, are enough if the danger we have to meet arises from material causes only ; or if a mechanical injury is all that is thought of. But anger, and the courage peculiar to anger, is called up when mind con¬ tends with mind, that is to say, when an injury is to be warded off which (whether truly so or not) we believe to spring from the inimical intention of a being like ourselves. In this case matter and its properties are forgotten, or are thought of as the mere instru¬ ments of the threatened harm, while we rouse our¬ selves to grapple, soul against soul with our foe. For the very same reason that some knowledge, more or less accurate, of the laws of matter (whether acquired by the methods of science, or by common experience) is indispensable as our guide in avoiding or repelling physical evils, so is an intuition of motives necessary to our safety when it is a hostile purpose that originates the danger we are exposed to. Suc¬ cessfully to resist an impending harm, we must rightly conceive of its occult cause. There may be those who would ask—“ Why should we suppose these irascible emotions, liable as they are 4 26 FANATICISM. to abuse, and destructive as they often become, to be original ingredients of our nature ; or why needs man be furnished with any impulses more potent or com¬ plex than those given him as a defence against physical injuries ? ” The answer is not difficult.—An additional motive and a more vigorous spring is needed in the one case which is not requisite in the other, because the danger in the one is of a far more recondite qual¬ ity than in the other, and demands a commensurate provision. If, for our safety, we must know to what extent, at what distances, and under what conditions, fire may destroy or torment us ; we must, for a like reason, know the nature, extent, and conditions of the harm that may arise from the rage of a furious man. Now it does not appear that the extreme exigency of the moment could be met in any way so efficaciously —if at all, as by this sudden sympathy with the ill intention of our enemy—a sympathy which, as by a flash of consciousness, puts us into possession of his evil purpose. The rage or the malice of the aggressor, thus reflected (if dimly yet truly) upon the imagination of whoever is its object, informs him with the rapidity of lightning, of all he should prepare himself to meet. May we not properly admire the simplicity and the fitness of this machinery ? It is quite another question, and one which does not now press upon us—Whence comes that first malignant purpose or hostile intention against which the irascible emotions are provided ? Evil existing as it does, we are here concerned only with the arrange¬ ment made for repelling it. Let it then be remember¬ ed, that inasmuch as the hostile powers of mind are far more pernicious, because more various, insidious and pertinacious than those of matter (which can move only in a single direction) there is required more motive and more energy to resist them. Now this necessary accession of power is, might we say, bor¬ rowed for the moment when it is wanted, by sympathy from the aggressor. He who rises in fatal rage upon RISE OP THE MALIGN EMOTIONS. 27 his fellow, does, by the contrivance of nature, and at the very instant of his violent act, put into the hand of his victim a weapon that may actually avert the stroke. The vicious and exaggerated condition in which these passions usually present themselves (a condition acci¬ dental, not necessary) should not prevent our assign¬ ing to the wisdom and benignity of the Creator what conspiciously exhibits both. And surely it is becom¬ ing to us to rescue (if so we may speak) the praise of the Supreme in those instances where most it is ob¬ scured by the evils that have supervened upon his work. Yet all we see around us of the wisdom and bene¬ volence of the Author of Nature, especially as dis¬ played in the constitution of the sentient orders, would stand contradicted if it appeared that passionate resent¬ ments were otherwise than painful.* In fact we do not find them to be entertained as modes of gratifica¬ tion until after thev have gone into the unnatural con- dition of permanent qualities; and even then the gratification, if such it can be called, is wrung out from the very torments of the heart. When indeed these dark emotions have formed alliance with ima¬ ginative sentiments, they at once lose a portion of their virulence, and borrow a sense of pleasure, which may become very vivid. Some remarkable cases of this sort our proper subject will lead us to consider. There is, however, an instance that may seem to be at variance with our assumptions ; and it is one which should be fairly looked at. Of what sort then is the pleasure of consummated revenge; and whence does it spring 1 —or must we trace it to the original consti¬ tution of the mind 1 To answer such a question we should go back to the elements of the moral sense.— Let it then be remembered that this sense, indispen¬ sable as it is to rational agency and to responsibility, implies, not only a consciousness of pleasure in the * - -o J'e o’pyvj 7roiMv