Robert Elsmere, by Mrs. Humphrey Ward

Suppose somebody told you they were reading a novel about a man who joined the ranks of the clergy, married a religious woman, found himself plagued by doubts (in university, he had moved with a crowd of mostly rationalist atheist science types), left the church, found himself in conflict with his wife and worried that the situation might destroy his marriage, poured himself into social justice causes and became a community organizer. You might say: That’s a current-sounding book that captures the mood of the times, and then you might point to The Clergy Project which, with the support of the Richard Dawkins Foundation, helps clergy who find themselves in precisely that position.

Would it surprise you that your current-sounding book was a late Victorian bestseller? Mrs. Humphrey Ward (niece of Matthew Arnold and aunt to Aldous Huxley) wrote her novel, Robert Elsmere, in the 1880’s. Not only that, but it sold more than a million copies, including half a million in the U.S. Readers cared about the issues raised by the novel and embraced them with enthusiasm. Henry James thought highly of Ward’s work.

The novel documents what looks a lot like a Progressive Christian or Post-Christian narrative, a current (i.e. 2014) trend in mainstream liberal Protestantism that I have talked about here and here. Here are some themes of that narrative:

• A belief in scientific and technological progress, coupled to a belief in social and moral progress. Humans have the capacity to improve themselves. Darwin’s evolutionary principles also apply to the soul.

• The valorization of reason. Whatever the soul may be, it must bow to the dictates of rationality.

• Anger and a sense of betrayal when ordinary people discover the enormous gap between current scholarship in seminaries and the kind of pablum the clergy feed their flock. It’s almost as if clergy conspire against progress. Maybe they’re afraid that if they tell an honest modern account of religious belief, they’ll put themselves out of a job, so they lie or at least fudge the truth.

• A personal ‘coming out’ narrative. People who have grown up as insiders within an ethos of religious dogma may experience a moment of insight when they realize they can no longer live as an insider. Typically, they experience it as a private ‘aha’. This produces a split in identity. They continue to behave as if they believe the dogma for fear that they will alienate themselves from their primary social supports. Then, when they are ready, they come out to friends and family. It’s both disruptive and liberating.

All of these themes appear in Mrs. Ward’s novel. Robert Elsmere experiences “the constant struggle…between love and intellectual honesty”. His areligious professor, Mr. Grey, from his Oxford days, speaks of ‘The fairy-tale of Christianity’—‘The origins of Christian Mythology.’ (italics in original). Here is a sampling of other quotes that give a sense of the novel’s tone:

It is not that Christianity is false, but that it is only an imperfect human reflection of a part of truth. Truth has never been, can never be, contained in any one creed or system!

For six or seven months, Catherine…I have been fighting with doubt—doubt of orthodox Christianity—doubt of what the Church teaches—of what I have to say and preach every Sunday. First it crept on me I knew not how. Then the weight grew heavier, and I began to struggle with it. I felt I must struggle with it. Many men, I suppose, in my position would have trampled on their doubts—would have regarded them as sin in themselves, would have felt it their duty to ignore them as much as possible, trusting to time and God’s help. I could not ignore them. The thought of questioning the most sacred beliefs that you and I—‘and his voice faltered a moment—‘held in common, was misery to me. On the other hand, I knew myself. I knew that I could no more go on living to any purpose, with a whole region of the mind shut up, as it were, barred away from the rest of me, than I could go on living with a secret between myself and You.

…I have joined no other religious association. But it is not…because there is nothing left me to believe, but because in this transition England it is well for a man who has broken with the old things to be very patient. No good can come of forcing opinion or agreement prematurely. A generation, nay, more, may have to spend itself in mere waiting and preparing for those new leaders and those new forms of corporate action which any great revolution of opinion, such as that we are now living through, has always produced in the past, and will, we are justified in believing, produce again.

In the period of social struggle which undeniably lies before us, both in the old and the new world, are we then to witness a war of classes?…It looks like it.

The novel raises a nagging question: if the issues it addresses continue to have currency, why has Robert Elsmere been largely forgotten? This is especially puzzling given the fact that it obviously struck a chord in the popular imagination when it was published. A number of reasons come to mind, some peculiar to the novel itself, some relating to social and historical concerns.

• The novel isn’t particularly well-written. Henry James may have enjoyed it, but Oscar Wilde wrote that it was “simply Arnold’s Literature and Dogma with the literature left out.” Probably a fair assessment. Sometimes, Ward’s writing is awkward: “he jumped down from the carriage as the man stopped with the alacrity of a boy.” And other times it’s just plain…well, you be the judge: “They both behave as if husbands tumbled into your mouth for the asking.” Trust me, that doesn’t mean what it sounds like it means.

• The concerns for moral and social progress underwent a major disruption with the rise of nationalism in Western Europe and its culmination in two world wars. The period from 1914 until 1945 presents a chasm that makes it difficult to trace a continuity between, say, Darwinism and post-war consumerism.

• Maybe the modernist aspirations enshrined both in the 1888 novel and in 2014 ‘progressive’ movements, aspirations like social and moral progress, are illusory. Maybe Robert Elsmere stands as an illustration of cultural stasis. Maybe the only way we can speak of progress is by blinding ourselves to a past that gives the lie to our claims. This last observation casts an ironic gloss on one of the narrative themes of Progressive/Post Christianity by suggesting that traditional religious institutions aren’t the only ones who produce a gap between scholarship and belief on the ground. Progressive institutions are likewise guilty, but in their own way.

Robert Elsmere is in the public domain and available for free download from the Gutenberg Project.