Sectarianism

“ The spirit of sectarianism has been hitherto our fault, and the cause of our failures. We have imprisoned our own conceptions by the lines, which we have drawn, in order to exclude the conceptions of others. ”

“ In America the taint of sectarianism lies broad upon the land. Not content with acknowledging the supremacy of the Deity, and with erecting temples in his honor, where all can bow down with reverence, the pride and vanity of human reason enter into and pollute our worship, and the houses that should be of God and for God, alone, where he is to be honored with submissive faith, are too often merely schools of metaphysical and useless distinctions. The nation is sectarian, rather than Christian. ”

“ Sectarianism, bigotry and its horrible descendant fanaticism, have possessed long this beautiful earth. It has filled the earth with violence, drenched it often and often with human gore, destroyed civilization and sent whole nations into despair. ”

“ I doubt if wickedness does half as much harm as sectarianism, whether it be the sectarianism of the church or of dissent, the sectarianism whose virtue is condescension, or the sectarianism whose vice is pride. Division has done more to hide Christ from the view of men, than all the infidelity that has ever been spoken. It is the half-Christian clergy of every denomination that are the main cause of the so-called failure of the Church of Christ. ”

“ The spirit of sectarianism spread itself far and wide, dividing and diversifying the opinions of the Church, and each new sectary seemed to be endowed with a new portion of that rancorous malignity, which has so universally marked the conduct of those whose pride and folly have led them to conclude, that they spoke in the name of heaven, and were the favourites of the Most High. ”

“ Sectarianism, it is vaguely supposed, is the normal condition of religion. Now a sect is, by its very nature, instinctively adverse to a scientific theology; it feels that it is short-lived, without a history, and unconnected with the main stream of ecclesiastical progress, and it is inspired with hatred and with contempt for the past, for its teaching and its writings. Practically, sectaries hold that a tradition is the more surely to be rejected the older it is, and the more valuable in proportion to the lateness of its origin. ”

“ Sectarianism, with its manifold evils [Pg 151] of violence, malignity, hatred, misrepresentation, is a standing evidence of the harm done to society by a priesthood, whether Catholic or Protestant, and ministers who have labored to overthrow its influence as being fatal to charity have been obliged to fight against the spirit of party, and to rely more upon their natural disposition than upon their professional training. ”

“ His popularity, which is great, has, by some scribes sitting in the armless chairs of the scorners, been attributed chiefly to the power of sectarianism. He is, we believe, a sectary; and, if all sects were animated by the spirit that breathes throughout his poetry, we should have no fears for the safety and stability of the Established Church; for in that self-same spirit was she built, and by that self-same spirit were her foundations dug in a rock. Many are the lights—solemn and awful all—in which the eyes of us mortal creatures may see the Christian dispensation. ”

“ I should think that a man, in going to England, would feel the evil of belonging to a sect, unless that sect [141] embraced all the good and wise and gifted,—which can be said of no sect. The sectarianism of sects, however, is the bad thing. These are necessary; that is not necessary, but to human weakness. But fie upon discoursing to a man who is just stepping on shipboard! ”

“ As to sectarianism, it is only by dint of an occasional idiotic persecution that a sect becomes interesting; in the absence of this, outlandish sects play the fool's role, are anything but heroic, and have little to do with either the name or the substance of liberty. The old colonial religious parties have gradually become the "pillars of society," their animosities have died out, their offensive peculiarities have been effaced, they are as like one another as beans in a pod, they build churches - and sleep in them. ”

“ Elizabeth Barrett Browning: Letter to Leigh Hunt. ‘Correspondence of Leigh Hunt,’ edited by his son. London: Smith, Elder & Co., 1862.
May I say of myself that I hope there is nobody in the world with a stronger will and aspiration to escape from sectarianism in any sort or sense, when I have [Pg 105] eyes to discern it—and that the sectarianism of the National Churches, to which I do not belong, and of the dissenting bodies, to which I do, stand together before me on a pretty just level of detestation? ”

“ As each sect has its peculiar creed, the dogmatic position of the church is thought to be of little moment. The important thing is to promote intelligence and virtue. The distinctively sectarian view they look upon as narrow and false, and the good which ecclesiastical organizations do is done in spite of their characteristic doctrines. The note of sectarianism is to them what the note of provincialism is to a man of culture, or lack of breeding to a gentleman. The moral fervor, which sectarians more than others feel, is, they freely grant, a power for good. ”

“ Some sense of the shame and sin of sectarianism has, of late years, been getting possession of the mind of the church, and the tendencies toward unity are stronger now than the tendencies toward division. Splits and secessions are rare in these times; movements toward unity are multiplying. All this is hopeful, but many generations of toil and sacrifice will be required to recover for the church the ground she has lost by the ravages of sectarianism. ”

“ The state can add nothing more to her power or her security in her moral and spiritual warfare with sectarianism, and any attempt to give her more would only weaken her as against the sects, place her in a false light, partially justify their hostility to her, render effective their declamations against her, mix her up unnecessarily with political changes, interests, and passions, and distract the attention of her ministers from their proper work as churchmen, and impose on them the duties of politicians and statesmen. ”

“ I believe it was after this, that the worthy man proposed adding himself to our population; a scheme in which I could not discourage him, convinced, as I was, that a taste of our religious condition might perhaps change his views as to the comparative evils of the English Church, and those of the Saturnalia of unbelief which are fast developing under the influences of our illimitable sectarianism. ”

“ The Sunday service which Phillips burlesques shows no signs of Presbyterian discipline. In fact, sectarianism is almost at its worst in his picture of a congregation crying destruction against Covenant-breakers, making grinning appeals for free grace, and screaming for the Fifth Monarchy in a state of revelation-madness. ”

“ Thus sectarianism and intolerance went for once hand in hand, and openly or covertly, as they found occasion, did their best to make the people dissatisfied with the benefit accorded them, trying to persuade them its acceptance would prejudice their eternal welfare. ”

“ In a country where, owing to the religious difference, it was peculiarly necessary that a vigorous lay public opinion should be fostered to dilute or restrain the sectarian spirit, it suppressed the centre and organ of political life, directed the energies of the community into the channels of sectarianism, drove its humours inwards, and thus began a perversion of public opinion which has almost destroyed the elements of political progress. ”

“ Sectarianism, with her vermin swarm of envy, hatred, error, waste and confusion, devastates the land. In the kingdom of the 'Prince of peace' is heard the drum-beat of party warfare, where theology prevails against Christology, dogma against devotion, partyism against piety ”

“ I might show how it has been denounced by the friends and agents of denominational colleges and in many sectarian journals, how the most preposterous charges have been made and believed by good men, how the epithets of "godless," "infidel," "irreligious," "unreligious," "atheistic," have been hurled against a body of Christian trustees, professors, and students, and with little practical result save arousing a suspicion in the minds of large bodies of thoughtful young men, that the churches dread scientific studies untrammeled by sectarianism. ”

“ We do not dissent from the suggestion conveyed, that religion has its political rights, under the Constitution, as much as any other interest, feeling, or principle; but we do not see the force of the distinction drawn between religion and sectarianism for this particular purpose ”

“ Now, if hell has no bottom in it, those who were sent there would crawl out at the other side. If the inhabitants of the earth could be persuaded of the absurdity of the sectarian notions, they would not care much about the hell they believe in. You know, if sectarianism be true, the wicked will have to go down and down, and never stop! ”

“ MUCH as has been said upon the evils of sectarianism, within the last forty or fifty years, it is still true, that no one has given the subject too high a coloring. Its evils are equal to the most brilliant description we have had. ”

“ He assumed a basis of faith every whit as dogmatic as special revelation, and sometimes grievously misrepresented the creeds which he assailed. Strangers might go to the Music Hall to breathe the free air of a catholic liberality, and find nothing but the old fierceness of sectarianism broken loose against the sects. ”

“ The ministers hesitate to enforce these hereditary traditions, and the members neither know nor care what the creeds teach, and, therefore, we hear on every hand, "One church is just as good as another."
We thank God for this relaxing of sectarianism and for the trend toward Christian union. But the movement involves a grave danger. Having lost faith in their distinctive sectarian doctrines, which they considered synonymous with New Testament teaching, many sectarian people are rapidly drifting into indifference, worldliness and unbelief. ”

“ Its severity has been sometimes justified on the ground that sectarianism has had a political as well as a religious significance. A State like Russia cannot overlook the existence of sects which preach the duty of systematic resistance to the civil and ecclesiastical authorities and hold doctrines which lead to the grossest immorality. This argument, it must be admitted, is not without a certain force, but it seems to me that the policy adopted tended to increase rather than diminish the evils which it sought to cure. ”

“ but it is only till they have brought people into the pale of their own church. This is downright sectarianism, not catholicism. How can I act consistently, unless I receive and love all the children of God, whom I esteem to be such, of whatever denomination they may be? ”

“ In the sense intended in the constitution, every sect of that character is ‘sectarian’ and all members thereof are sectarians.”32 In Pennsylvania the court adopted the definitions given in the Standard and in Webster's [pg 026] dictionaries.33 The Supreme Court of Missouri, citing Webster's and the Century dictionaries, gave the following additional definition of sectarianism: “Sectarianism includes adherence to a distinct political party, as much as to a separate sect.”34 The Presbyterians35 and the “Shakers”36 have been adjudged sects. ”

“ This is the fallacy in the many modern attempts at a creedless creed, at something variously described as essential Christianity or undenominational religion or a world faith to embrace all the faiths in the world. It is that every sectarian is more sectarian in his unsectarianism than he is in his sect. ”

“ Whether that great tenderness toward sectaries, which now so much prevails, be chiefly owing to the fears of popery, or to that spirit of atheism, deism, scepticism, and universal immorality, which all good men so much lament?
Granting popery to have many more errours in religion, than any one branch of the sectaries, let us examine the actions of both, as they have each affected the peace of these kingdoms, with allowance for the short time which the sectaries had to act in, who are in a manner but of yesterday. ”

“ Open the door to toleration, mutual hatred relaxes among the sectaries, their attachment to their particular modes of religion decays; the common occupations and pleasures of life succeed to the acrimony of disputation; and the same man who, in other circumstances, would have braved flames and tortures, is induced to change his sect from the smallest prospect of favor and advancement, or even from the frivolous hope of becoming more fashionable in his principles. ”

“ The sectarian spirit, the fundamental trait of which is to confound unity with uniformity, to transform divergencies into separations, to refuse to admit into the bosom of the church the element of diversity and of liberty; to exact the signing of a theological formula, and the formal adhesion as a whole to a collection of dogmas and practices, without tolerating the slightest shade of difference—the sectarian spirit, with its narrowness, with its traditions of men, with its exaggeration of little things, with its separate denominations, is certainly not worthy of admiration. ”

“ The increase of the puritans, the smooth-faced evangelical, and the lank-haired sectarian, with their pious love-meetings and bible associations, have at last roused the slumbering spirit of the constituted authorities, who are now making the most vigorous efforts to impede the progress of these anti-national and hypocritical fanatics, who, mistaking the true dictates of religion and benevolence, have, in their inflamed zeal, endeavoured to extirpate every species of innocent recreation, and have laid formidable siege to honest-hearted mirth and rustic revelry. ”