Journal: Bibliotheca Sacra
Volume: BSAC 56:221 (Jan 1899)
Article: Sentimental Sociology
Author: George Luther Cady

BSac 56:221 (Jan 1899) p. 100

Sentimental Sociology

Rev. George Luther Cady

Sociology may be called the modern fad. The student a thousand years hence who reviews the literature of the last quarter of this century will find that word the key to its thought and life. Novels are based on it, newspapers are filled with it, and the pulpit teems with it. We would not lay one straw in its progress nor become a detractor from its glory—rather we hail it as a harbinger of a renaissance of Christianity. The modern pulpit has heard the same voice that called to Zaccheus, “Come down,” and, coming down, has found the Christ, not so much among theological quibbles as sociological problems. The theological seminary has done nothing more in sympathy with the spirit of Jesus, or more fraught with hope for the future, than when by the side of systematic theology it has placed systematic sociology. It is high time that every pulpit became a “Chair of Applied Christianity.” Let no man accuse me of being an enemy of sociology; for I doubt if any follow it with keener interest or more intense sympathy. Because I love it and am wrapped up in its triumphs, I am quick to perceive its danger. The damage that may be done by a machine when diverted from its purpose is in proportion to its power; and the dangers that attend sociology are in direct ratio to its possibilities; hence, when we point out its danger, we also magnify its power and possibilities.

The danger into which the modern sociology has run,

BSac 56:221 (Jan 1899) p. 101

is the denial of the freedom of man’s will. Everywhere there is a tendency to explain the actions of men by other causes than volitions. Man is a machine, a puppet, a mere automaton; and modern sociology has discovered that the strings that work this helpless being are heredity and environment. It has become the ignis fatuus of the scientist. Professor Tyndall tells us, that we live in a realm of “physical and moral necessity.” Professor Huxley says, that even murderers do what they cannot help doing, and are no more worthy of punishment than those who do what are called virtuous acts. And the unscientific Ingersoll, their foster son, only apes them when, in his Chicago speech, he declares, “Men should not be sent to the penitentiary as a punishment, because we must remember that men do as they must,” and Dr. Maudsley says, “There is a destiny made for a man by his ancestors, and no one can elude, were he able to attempt it, the tyranny of his organization.” J. Colter Munson, in the “Service of Man,” says, “A man with a criminal nature and education, under given circumstances of temptation, can no more help committing crime than he could help having a headache under certain conditions of brain and stomach.” Henry Beauchamp says, ...