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SOCIALISM IN ENGLAND.
Mr. Headlam has evidently discovered what M. de Laveleye
has so well pointed out, that Christianity, though containing
in itself the germs of socialistic ideas, by inculcating patience
and submission, and by pointing to a recompense beyond the
tomb, is, as usually taught, antagonistic to the full flowering of
Socialism. He, however, instead of endeavouring to eradicate
the religious sentiment after the manner of the revolutionary
Socialists, tries to arouse “ divine discontent ” by secularizing
Christianity.
The advanced Christian Socialists call for the Disestablish
ment of the Church, and its organization on a democratic basis.
They think that their principles would gain wide acceptance
among the new ministers thus appointed. They believe that
in the doctrines and traditions of the Church, properly inter
preted, they possess a lever to move the minds of the faithful
such as the Secularists with their “ dismal creed ” can never
obtain ; they confldently look forward to such a religious re
vival, imbued with the new social ethics—to such a develop
ment of what Mr. George calls a “ deep, definite, intense
religious faith, so clear, so burning, as utterly to melt away the
thought of self”—that the question of the reconstruction of
society on socialistic lines will ere long accomplish itself with
out the necessity of any physical compulsion ; and they are
not without hope that even the stony hearts of many land
lords and capitalists will be so softened by the potent solvent
of neo-Christian charity, that they will be ready to surrender all
their goods to feed the poor.
As I have already mentioned, the Christian Socialists of “ the
extreme left ” entirely accept the teaching of Mr. George as to
Land Nationalization, and reject the idea that the landowners
have any just claim to compensation. They say, indeed,
that the principle of taxing land up to the full annual value,
though pushed on as rapidly as may be, will inevitably be so
gradually applied, that the hardship on individual landowners
will not be so great as might at first sight appear ; but they do
not shrink from answering the question of compensation frankly
in the negative, and they even retort the charge of confiscation
and robbery on the landowners. To those who use the argu-