“The
Religion of Solidarity” is a short text written by Edward Bellamy when he was
24 years old. It was posthumously found among Bellamy´s papers by his
biographer Arthur E Morgan and subsequently published. Bellamy is, of course,
famous for his utopian novel “Looking Backward” (1888). One of the serious lacunas
in my knowledge of things large and small is that I never actually read it.
Back in the days, the novel triggered an entire political movement, known as
Nationalism (with a capital N). Most of its members soon joined the more successful
Populists.
I
expected “The Religion of Solidarity” to be a materialist-positivist-populist
screed of some kind. It isn´t. Unexpectedly, it turns out to be a spiritual
text, obviously based on Emerson and the New England Transcendentalists. And
while the little piece isn´t *that* interesting, I admit that Bellamy was a
better writer than Emerson, Thoreau and Alcott. In a note appended much later,
Bellamy writes that he tried to live according to the principles expounded upon
in “The Religion of Solidarity” all his life. He even asks for the text to be
read at his funeral!
Bellamy
reflects at length at the opposition between the individual and Spirit (my
term), the latter being infinite and immortal. The “centripetal” and “centrifugal”
forces are said to be basic to the universe, one leading to unity with Spirit
or impersonal consciousness, the other moving in the direction of
individuality. The most common mistake of men is to live as if the individual is
immortal. This is said to characterize Napoleon and Caesar, whom Bellamy
doesn´t seem to fancy. The Christian idea of individual immortality is
criticized. That the Spirit is real can be sensed in nature mysticism, poetry,
love and sexual union. The text gives the impression of
being written by a desperate young man longing to live life to the fullest and prove
himself thereby – which, of course, it was.
Interestingly,
it´s not entirely clear what Bellamy *really* wants to do, based on his
insights into the immortality of the universal soul. We somehow expect the future
prophet of socialism and industrial armies to say something, well, socialist
and industrial army-ish. Instead, Bellamy rather says the opposite. Since our
individuality counts for nothing compared to the infinite Spirit, we may as
well live our lives with a certain reckless abandon, indifferent to our fates,
since we are ultimately nothing and yet immortal at the same time. Later in the
text, however, Bellamy sounds more serious-minded, and draws the obvious
conclusion that since everything is One, the moral thing to do is to identify
with the One and sacrifice yourself for the One. Patriotism, oneness with
Nature and ultimately an oneness with the entire cosmos is said to follow from
this. Friendship and family is also said to be important.
Well,
thank you.
The text
is incomplete, or rather Bellamy misplaced a few pages, in which he attempted
to reconcile his essentially pantheist perspective with belief in a personal
god. His argument strikes me as “panentheist”. Just as humans are both personal
and impersonal at the same time, a Supreme Being might be both. To find Edward
Bellamy of all people in a gallery of panentheists is intriguing, to say the
least.
With
that, I end my little reflection.
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