72 THE AMERICAN JOURNAL OF SOCIOLOGY
brotherhood. The highest work of religion is not done for crim- inals and defectives. When men are rescued the best work of Christianity begins. The highest elements of religion cannot be given on this earth to the demented, the perverted, because their higher faculties remain stupefied and dulled, long after rescue. This idea that the social duty of the church is not merely to the vagabond and the imbecile is not even yet fully realized. Many devout persons imagine that "salvation" and philanthropy are for the abjects and weaklings. The truth is that the best fruits grow out of the strongest soils, and the best work of Christianity must be done by the strongest natures. The tendency of scien- tific philanthropy is not toward the mere support and relief of paupers and criminals but toward the gradual, painless and mer- ciful extinction of the whole class. The movement here studied illustrates the development of this idea. The miserable are indeed helped as never before; more tenderly, generously and wisely. But men are learning from experience and reason that by associating the capable, by regulating the incapable, and by diffusing the higher elements of life, we can do more to diminish misery than by all the direct relief given since the world began. Much of the poverty which society is now relieving was caused by its ignorant and selfish methods of charity.
Under the influence ot these ideas a group of members of the national church are seeking to develop the Inner Mission in the direction of influence upon the state. Among the clergy, Stocker, Naumann and Gohre are conspicuous representatives of this spirit. They declare that the well-being of the working men cannot be advanced without help of society, and that political agencies need to be filled with the Christian spirit. But if direct cooperation with the working classes is difficult, this wider and higher movement seems to confront insuperable obstacles. It is true that Wichern's "Denkschrift " led the way for such activity, but his idea found lodgment in unfriendly soil and climate. Socialists hate Dr. Stocker because he is a clergyman and because he hits them so hard. The conservatives drove him from the
