On the whole,
it is too apt to reflect the moral sentiments of the more reactionary,
who are generally the most self-assertive, and it has no moral, as
distinct from political, leadership. Then there are Ethical and kindred
societies which hold "services" of a humanitarian character, and are to
many people a substitute for the Christian Churches. Their influence is,
however, restricted to a few thousand people in the whole country, and
signs are not wanting that their usefulness will be only transitory. The
experience of any careful observer is that the mass of people who cease
to attend church desire and need no substitute whatever for
Christianity. The Rationalist literature which many of them read is, as
a rule, of a high idealist character; but here again the influence is
very restricted. No organised influence is at work to any great extent
as a successor to Christianity, yet it is indubitable that, as Christian
influence wanes, the temper of the age improves.
This improvement must have an adequate cause, and it would be merely
another form of crude social reasoning and of sectarian prejudice to
say, in the rich language of the older anti-clericals, that breaking
"the fetters of superstition and priestcraft" led of itself to such a
result.
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