Social Diseases : Part 20

Evolution and Ethics
by Thomas H. Huxley

(Page 25 of 30)

Mr. "Commissioner" Booth-Clibborn speaks of my "challenge." I presume that he refers to my request for information about the authorship and fate of "The New Papacy," in the letter published in the "Times" on December 27th, 1890. The "Commissioner" deals with this matter in paragraph No. 4 of his letter; and I observe, with no little satisfaction, that he does not venture to controvert any one of the statements of my witnesses. He tacitly admits that the author of "The New Papacy" was a person "greatly esteemed in Toronto," and that he held "a high position in the army"; further, that the Canadian "Commissioner" thought it worth while to pay the printer's bill, in order that the copies already printed off might be destroyed and the pamphlet effectually suppressed. Thus the essential facts of the case are admitted and established beyond question.

How does Mr. Booth-Clibborn try to explain them away?

"Mr. Sumner, who wrote the little book in a hot fit, soon regretted it (as any man would do whose conscience showed him in a calmer moment when his 'respectability' returned with his repentance, that he had grossly misrepresented), and just before it appeared offered to order its suppression if the army would pay the costs already incurred, and which he was unable to bear."

"The New Papacy" fills sixty closely printed duodecimo pages. It is carefully written, and for the most part in studiously moderate language; moreover, it contains many precise details and figures, the ascertainment of which must have taken much time and trouble. Yet, forsooth, it was written in "a hot fit."

I sincerely hope, for the sake of his own credit, that Mr. "Commissioner" Booth-Clibborn does not know as much about this melancholy business as I do. My hands are unfortunately tied, and I am not at liberty to use all the information in my possession. I must content myself with quoting the following passage from the preface to "The New Papacy": -

"It has not been without considerable thought and a good deal of urging that the following pages have been given to the public. But though we would have shrunk from a labour so distasteful, and have gladly avoided a notoriety anything but pleasant to the feelings, or conducive to our material welfare, we have felt that in the interests of the benevolent public, in the interests of religion, in the interests of a band of devoted men and women whose personal ends are being defeated, and the fruit of whose labour is being destroyed, and, above all, in the interests of that future which lies before the Salvation Army itself, if purged and purified in its executive and returned to its original position in the ranks of Canadian Christian effort, it is no more than our duty to throw such light as we are able upon its true inwardness, and with that object and for the furtherance of those ends we offer our pages to the public view."

The preface is dated April 1889. According to the statement in the "Toronto Telegram" which Mr. "Commissioner" Booth-Clibborn does not dare to dispute, his Canadian fellow-"Commissioner" bought and destroyed the whole edition of "The New Papacy" about the end of the third week in April. It is clear that the writer of the paragraph quoted from the preface was well out of a "hot fit," if he had ever been in one, while he had not entered on the stage of repentance within three weeks of that time. Mr. "Commissioner" Booth-Clibborn's scandalous insinuations that Mr. Sumner was bribed by "a few sovereigns," and that he was "bought off," in the face of his own admission that Mr. Sumner "offered to order its suppression if the army would pay the costs already incurred, and which he was unable to bear" is a crucial example of that Jesuitry with which the officials of the army have been so frequently charged.

Mr. "Commissioner" Booth-Clibborn says that when "London headquarters heard of the affair, it disapproved of the action of the Commissioner." That circumstance indicates that headquarters is not wholly devoid of intelligence; but it has nothing to do with the value of Mr. Sumner's evidence, which is all I am concerned about. Very likely London headquarters will disapprove of its French "Commissioner's" present action. But what then? The upshot of all this is that Mr. Booth-Clibborn has made as great a blunder as simple Mr. Trotter did. The pair of Balaams greatly desired to curse, but have been compelled to bless. They have, between them, completely justified my reliance on Mr. Sumner as a perfectly trustworthy witness; and neither of them has dared to challenge the accuracy of one solitary statement made by that worthy gentleman, whose full story I hope some day or other to see set before the public. Then the true causes of his action will be made known.

Paragraph 2 of the "Commissioner's" letter says many things, but not much about Mr. Hodges. The columns of the "Times" recently showed that Mr. Hodges was able to compel an apology from Mr. Trotter. I leave it to him to deal with the "Commissioner."

As to the "Eagle" case, treated of in paragraph No. 3, a gentleman well versed in the law, who was in court during the hearing of the appeal, has assured me that the argument was purely technical; that the facts were very slightly gone into; and that, so far as he knows, no dissenting comment was made on the strictures of the Judge before whom the case first came. Moreover, in the judgment of the Master of the Rolls, fully recorded in the "Times" of February 14th, 1884, the following passages occur: -

"The case had been heard by a learned Judge, who had exercised his discretion upon it, and the Court would not interfere with his discretion unless they could see that he was wrong. The learned Judge had taken a strong view of the conduct of the defendant, but nevertheless had said that he would have given relief if he could have seen how far protection and compensation could be given. And if this Court differed from him in that view, and could give relief without forfeiture, they would be acting on his own principle in doing so. Certain suggestions had been made with that view, and the Court had to consider the case under all the circumstances.... He himself (the Master of the Rolls) considered that it was probable the defendant, with his principles, had intended to destroy the property as a public-house, and that it was not right thus to take property under a covenant to keep it up as a public-house, intending to destroy it as such. He did not, however, think this was enough to deprive him of all relief. The defendant could only expect severe terms."

About the Author

Thomas Huxley's famous debate against the Lord Bishop of Oxford Samuel Wilberforce was a key moment in the wider acceptance of evolution, and in his own career. Wilberforce was coached by Richard Owen, against whom Huxley also debated on whether man was closely related to apes. Huxley was slow to accept some of Darwin's ideas, such as gradualism, and was undecided about natural selection, but despite this he was wholehearted in his public support of Darwin.