Nonconformist

“ His Friendly Debate between a Conformist and a Nonconformist was a controversial tract which excited considerable feeling at the time of its publication in 1668, but he lived long enough to soothe by his moderation and candour the exasperation it had caused. ”

“ What were left to us of the Hookers and Barrows, Taylors and Miltons, if their controversial writings were excepted? and, indeed, what would become of our Nonconformist literature itself, if this objection were allowed a practical weight. Whosoever would have knowledge respecting doctrines and principles still unsettled, in religion or in science, must seek it in such debate or be altogether disappointed. Nowhere will the nonconformists and dissenters find more of truth—and in some particulars of new truth—in relation to their own principles and duties, than in these volumes. ”

“ Both conformity and nonconformity are alike impracticable. When the conformist can stay clean in his conformity, the nonconformist come clean out of his nonconformity, it will be time to plead self-consistency. ”

“ For ourselves, we have come little in contact with Nonconformity, but, if what is accepted generally, to-day, as to the religious situation, be true—that the curse of the Ritualism of the ‘Establishment,’ finds its parallel in the Rationalism, Unitarianism, Socialism, etc., of Nonconformity—then I shall expect to find as many Nonconformists, lay and ministerial, left behind from this mysterious, spiritual translation, as churchmen. ”

“ But we have got fixed in our minds that a more full and harmonious development of their humanity is what the Nonconformists most want, that narrowness, one-sidedness, and incompleteness is what they most suffer from; in a word, that in what we call provinciality they abound, but in what we may call totality they fall short. ”

“ No one believes these fallacies which you are exposing—the Nonconformists least of all. Those I have talked with don't hold these absurd opinions that you put down to them. You don't even touch their real position. You are elaborately knocking down ninepins that have never stood up, because they have nothing to stand on. ”

“ When Nonconformists discover considerations which mitigate the censure of some who conformed, they must all the more admire those who, rising above motives which spring from self-interest, from example, from persuasion, and from prejudice, were, through a sense of duty, led to sacrifice so much which they held dear. ”

“ Thus falling short of harmonious perfection, they fail to follow the true way of salvation. Therefore that way is made the harder for others to find, general perfection is put further off out of our reach, and the confusion and perplexity, in which our society now labours, is increased by the Nonconformists rather than diminished by them. So while we praise and esteem the zeal of the Nonconformists in walking staunchly by the best light they have, and desire to take no whit from it, we seek to add to this what we call sweetness and light, and to develop their full humanity more perfectly. ”

“ And we see philosophical politicians with a turn for swimming with the stream, and philosophical divines with the same turn, seeking to give a sort of grand stamp of generality and solemnity to this antipathy of the Nonconformists, and to dress it out as a law of human progress in the future. ”

“ But the question now arises, and it is the central point of this discussion of the genius of Nonconformity in its relation to the progress of society, What is this affirmation of Nonconformity which has made it in all ages a factor of supreme importance in the culture and development of mankind? It stands as a witness against the State organization of Christianity, but that is not its strength. Not what it stands against, but what it stands for, is the secret of its power. ”

“ I glory in cranks who serve their own individuality and are in bondage to nobody. The onward sweep of progress in this age has opened up the way for non-conformists. It is not a matter of heresy, nowadays, to think for yourself, dress for yourself, and be yourself. ”

“ There are two aspects of non-conformity: first, a rebellious impulse or “contrary suggestion” leading to an avoidance of accepted standards in a spirit of opposition, without necessary reference to any other standards; and, second, an appeal from present and commonplace standards to those that are comparatively remote and unusual. These two usually work together. One is led to a mode of life different from that of the people about him, partly by intrinsic contrariness, and partly by fixing his imagination on the ideas and practices of other people whose mode of life he finds more congenial. ”

“ When we have once come to a right estimate of the strength of conformity, we shall, I think, be more kindly disposed to eccentricity than we usually are. Even a wilful or an absurd eccentricity is some support against the weighty common-place conformity of the world. If it were not for some singular people who persist in thinking for themselves, in seeing for themselves, and in being comfortable, we should all collapse into a hideous uniformity. ”

“ This restless activity of the human mind comes from a deep, indefinable, irresistible desire to get rid of contradictions, and reduce things to harmony, to consistency. This is the great desideratum. Contradiction and inconsistency is the infallible indication of falsehood and wrong. For truth and right must be harmonious. They cannot involve contradiction and discord, where they alone exist. Here then is a universal, irresistible law of our nature. It has done much to correct and reform the errors ensuing from human ignorance and depravity. ”

“ That some things are wrong I admit, but when I am peremptorily ordered to believe that everything is wrong, it arouses in me a certain obstinacy of contradiction. I might be led to such a belief, but I will not be driven to it. I rebel against those censors of manners and morals who treat all human imperfectnesses with equal rigor. ”

“ You think of yourself only as you are now dropped into the midst of a society of dull conformists. That’s where you make your mistake. You’ll not live to see it for, if you did, you would be someone else, a part of it. No one of your disposition could possibly happen in such a society. There would be no rebellion against sameness because difference would not, in any important sense, exist, even as a proposition. ”

“ Those who are not with me, and not a part of me-and-mine, are not at the center of things, and are therefore of an inferior nature!"
It could readily be seen—the psychologist was allowing a note of dryness to enter his comments—that the bulk of man's philosophy, religion, politics, social values, and yes, too often even his scientific conclusions, was based upon this egocentric notion; the supreme importance and rightness of me-and-mine ascendant at the center of things, opposed to those who are not a part of me-and-mine, on the outside, and therefore inferior. ”

“ And we seldom stop to ask ourselves whether such a course makes for a greater freedom and a healthier consciousness. We often forget too that in the cult of the Ego the worship of unconventionality becomes itself a conventionality most rigid and austere. It is, in fact, the conventionality of the elect—the conventionality supreme. ”

“ And with regard to other people, it seems to me that those who have no definite conviction which constitutes a protesting faith, may often more beneficially cherish the good within them and be better members of society by a conformity based on the recognised good in the public belief, than by a nonconformity which has nothing but negatives to utter. Not, of course, if the conformity would be accompanied by a consciousness of hypocrisy. That is a question for the individual conscience to settle. ”

“ Delawarr whom I hear say, that consistency is a prejudice and conduct to be ruled by convenience? Opinions may change with the circumstances on which they were founded, but principles never. Either your whole past life has been a lie, or else your present conduct. The high and warm feelings your youth, matured by the convictions of manhood—all that a whole life has held to be right—cannot, surely, in the experience of a few days, be utterly wrong. ”

“ Small inconventionalities are needed.—Acting sometimes against our better insight in matters of custom, yielding in practice whilst reserving our intellectual freedom, doing like everybody else, and thereby showing consideration and kindness to all, as a compensation, so to speak, for what may be unconventional in our opinions, —all this is looked upon by many tolerably free-minded people not only as safe, but even as honourable," humane, tolerant, unpecantic," and whatever else may be the beautiful words by which the intellectual conscience is lulled to sleep. ”

“ Thus the mind itself is bowed to the yoke: even in what people do for pleasure, conformity is the first thing thought of; they live in crowds; they exercise choice only among things commonly done: peculiarity of taste, eccentricity of conduct, are shunned equally with [Pg 115] crimes: until by dint of not following their own nature, they have no nature to follow: their human capacities are withered and starved: they become incapable of any strong wishes or native pleasures, and are generally without either opinions or feelings of home growth, or properly their own. ”

“ The effect of formalism upon personality is to starve its higher life and leave it the prey of apathy, self-complacency, sensuality and the lower nature in general. A formalized religion and a formalized freedom are, notoriously, the congenial dwelling-place of depravity and oppression. ”

“ Now the assertion that of such contradictories “the negative is only an abstraction of the other”—“is nothing else than its negation,”—is not true. In such correlatives as Equal and Unequal, it is obvious enough that the negative concept contains something 90besides the negation of the positive one; for the things of which equality is denied are not abolished from consciousness by the denial. And the fact overlooked by Sir William Hamilton, is, that the like holds even with those correlatives of which the negative is inconceivable, in the strict sense of the word. ”

“ It appears evident to my mind, at present, that we ought to consider whether an action be in itself good or bad, just or unjust, and totally to disregard both our own prejudices, and the prejudices of the world. Were I to pay false homage to wealth and rank, because the world tells me it is right that I should do so, and to neglect genius and virtue, which my judgment tells me would be an odious wrong, I should find but little satisfaction in the applause of the world, opposed to self-condemnation. ”

“ Ordinarily a tolerably strong antagonism is kept up between three classes : the supporters of convention, who desire to make some sort of practical life possible, and who object to whatever disturbs popular ideas; the so-called Free-thinkers, who refuse to acknowledge the validity of convention, and who do not believe in the possibility of knowing the true Law of any human relation; the Idealists, who create an ideal moral code according to some standard agreeable to their feelings. These three classes, in ordinary times, hate each other with very sufficient cordiality. ”

“ But as I am no philosopher, as you profess to be, and therefore unable to judge of things (as you would) save as they really are, I am obliged to confine my judgment to the nature of things as they appear to be, and as the judgments of society are necessarily governed by appearances, we surely claim too much from society when we expect its good opinions and its bestowal of confidence, without paying the compliment of our attention and regard to appearances. ”

“ Next comes the law of rational harmony or consistency. This ever prompts men to delight in the harmony of things - the consistency and agreement of one thing with another - and of parts of things with their whole. He is uneasy, dissatisfied, disturbed, and restless on account of incongruities, contradictions, incompatibilities and hostilities, in himself, and all things around him. Hence his intellectual powers, and specially his reasoning faculties, are constantly on the stretch to detect and remove the causes of disturbance, the points of contradiction. ”

“ For we consider as ugly, either what presents a deviation from laws which are familiar to us, and to which we have adapted ourselves, or that in which we recognise the manifestation of anything prejudicial to us; and we regard as immoral all that is contrary to the prosperity, or even the maintenance, of society. Now, the mere fact that we have looked to find laws is a proof that phenomena corresponding to recognised laws, and consequently agreeable to us, must be far more numerous than the phenomena in contradiction to those laws, and therefore repulsive ”

“ Instead of the collected original judgments of the human mind, appeals to common sense are often directed to the prejudices of individuals, which must be analyzed not into the inspirations of the Author of our mental structure, but into the perverseness of him on whom that structure has been bestowed. ”

“ That measuring other person's actions by the standards our own thoughts and feelings furnish, often causes misconstruction, is indeed a truth familiar even to the vulgar. But while among members of the same society, having natures nearly akin, it is seen that automorphic explanations are often erroneous, it is not seen with due clearness how much more erroneous such explanations commonly are, when the actions are those of men of another race, to whom the kinship in nature is comparatively remote. ”

“ If these conceptions were merely individual, we should not think of imposing them upon another individual, for to impose our own individual and personal conceptions on another individual, on another person, would be the most extravagant despotism.... We call those mad who do not admit the relations of numbers, the difference between the beautiful and the ugly, the just and the unjust. ”