First, to begin with the trifle, note something slipshod and vague in the
mere verbiage, typical of those who prefer a catchword to a creed. "This
cigarette business" might mean anything. It might mean Messrs. Salmon
and Gluckstein's business. But the pastor at Bromley will not interfere
with that, for the indignation of his school of thought, even when it is
sincere, always instinctively and unconsciously swerves aside from
anything that is rich and powerful like the partners in a big business,
and strikes instead something that is poor and nameless like the soldiers
in a trench. Nor does the expression make clear who "they" are--whether
the inhabitants of Britain or the inhabitants of Bromley, or the
inhabitants of this one crazy tabernacle in Bromley; nor is it evident how
it is going to be stopped or who is being asked to stop it. All these
things are trifles compared to the more terrible offences of the phrase;
but they are not without their social and historical interest. About the
beginning of the nineteenth century the wealthy Puritan class, generally
the class of the employers of labour, took a line of argument which was
narrow, but not nonsensical. They saw the relation of rich and poor quite
coldly as a contract, but they saw that a contract holds both ways. The
Puritans of the middle class, in short, did in some sense start talking
and thinking for themselves.
Pages:
106
107
108
109
110
111
112
113
114
115
116
117
118
119
120
121
122
123
124
125
126
127
128
129
130