SOCIALISM CRITICISED.

Dominion, Volume 1, Issue 275, 13 August 1908, Page 7

SOCIALISM CRITICISED.

DISCUSSION BY CONGREGATIONAL COUNCIL.

Dr. Russoll (of Glasgow) occupied the chaii at the meeting of the International Congregational Church Council in Edinburgh on July 2. '

The Rev. Dr. Goodrich (Manchester) spoke of the effect oil tho Church idea of iudependoncy.' Ho said that to attempt to patronise and control tho body of which Christ was tho Head, be it by State or person, was an impertinence, indeed, an outrago. There were, ho remarked, things that looked, liko an attempt to capture their churches for Socialistic purposes, but they must tell King Demos that ho was but a vassal in God's Kingdom. (Applause.) ■ ■ : . A paper on "Democracy, Labour, and Socialism, by Dr. Gosman (Victoria, Australia), was read by the Rev. J. W; Jones (Victoria). One objection to Socialism, wrote Dr. Gosman, was that it was : a' speculative remedy for existing evils. • That remedy might have deep moral convictions at its heart, but those were conspicuously absent from- its lips. The perils of revolutionary Socialism must not be struck in an alarmist key, but if the proletariat ever got the upper hand there were two classes that would receive the full measure of its class hatreds —the bourgcoisio and tho prominent leaders in tho churohes. Tho Rev- J. Hirst Hollowell (Rochdale) said tho realisation of Socialism was mora difficult than the abandonment of war. (Applause.) . The Rev. W. Reason (London) said ho was a Socialist, and protested against the state-, mcnt that Socialists had not morality on their lips.