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The Image of the Protestant Minister in the Christian Social Novel

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 July 2009

Grier Nicholl
Grier Nicholl
Affiliation:
Associate Professor of English, Augsburg College, Minneapolis, Minnesota
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Extract

The image of the American Protestant minister in the American novel of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries was, according to many scholars, predominantly a negative one. Conservative, steeped in outdated creeds, aloof from modern realities, and materialistic—these were some of the kinder descriptions of the much maligned Protestant clergyman which they find in the American novel of this period. But my own study of over one hundred Christian social novels, which reflect the rise of the social gospel in American Protestantism, leads me to urge a reassessment of this traditional view of the literary image of the Protestant minister. As propaganda for the emerging social gospel, the Christian social novel portrays not only the stereotyped picture of the clergyman, but more prominently a new kind of minister—physically rugged, intelligent, deeply religious, compassionate and above all a man concerned with the application of the gospel to economic and social problems. He was, in sum, an idealized image of the kind of heroic minister needed to take the gospel out of the sanctuary and into the slums and factories of modern urban America.

Type
Research Article
Information
Church History , Volume 37 , Issue 3 , September 1968 , pp. 319 - 334
Copyright
Copyright © American Society of Church History 1968

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References

1. The Christian Social Novel in America, 1865–1918. (Unpublished Ph.D. Dissertation, American Studies, University of Minnesota, 1964)Google Scholar.

2. Brown, Herbert R., The Sentimental Novel in America, 1789–1960. (N. Y.: Pageant Books, 1959), pp. 352, 367.Google Scholar

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8. (N. Y.: A. L. Burt Co., 1909), pp. 65, 103–4.

9. pp. 55, 124, 211.

10. pp. 116–17.

11. Notably, , A Prophet in Babylon; George and Lillian Chester, The Ball of Fire (N. Y.: Hearst's International Library Co., 1914)Google Scholar; The Inside of the Cup. In the latter novel, the Rev. Mr. Hodder's conversion is presented in terms of the new depth psychology to make it appear consonant with modern trends.

12. The situation portrayed in Holland, Josiah, Sevenoaks (N. Y.: International Association of Newspapers, 1901 [1875])Google Scholar; Haynes, Emory J., Dollars and Duty (Boston: James H. Earle Co., 1887)Google Scholar; and The Broken Lance.

13. p. 206.

14. Precisely the viewpoint advocated in Altars to Mammon, pp. 202–3; The Ball of Fire, pp. 210, 218–19, 357–66; and Ronald Carnaquay, pp. 68–9.

15. A Prophet in Babylon, p. 17.

16. Notably, Reed, Isaac G., From Heaven to New York (Optimum Printing Co., 1894)Google Scholar; Pratt, Magee, The Orthodox Preacher and Nancy (Hartford: The Connecticut Magazine Co., 1901)Google Scholar; Howells, William Dean, Annie Kilburn (N. Y.: Harper & Bros., 1889)Google Scholar; and Bellamy, Edward, Looking Backward, 2000–1887 (N. Y.: Grosset & Dunlap, 1900 [1888]).Google Scholar

17. For example, Wright, Harold, That Printer of Udell's (N. Y.: A. L. Burt Co., 1911 [1903])Google Scholar; Murvale Eastman, Christian Socialist; Sheldon, Charles M., The Crucifixion of Phillip Strong (Chicago: Advance Publishing Co., 1898).Google Scholar

18. (Boston: Houghton-Mifflin Co., 1873), p. 377.

19. (Boston: Roberts' Brothers, 1892), p. 425.

20. pp. 86–8.

21. See Page, Thomas N., John Marvel, Assistant (N. Y.: Charles Scribners' Sons, 1909), pp. 143ff., 278ff.Google Scholar; Dollars and Duty, pp. 379ff.; The Broken Lance, pp. 216ff.; A gular Life, p. 347; Eddy, George S., A Modern Minister, in The Coming Age, Vol III, 188Google Scholar; and Beach, David N., The Annie Laurie Mine (Boston: Pilgrim Press, 1902), p. 191.Google Scholar

22. pp. 122–3; see also The Inside of the Cup, p. 117.

23. pp. 490ff., 528.

24. pp. 204–5 and echoed later, pp. 245–6. Similar statements can be found in Varney, George R., Out of the Depths (Philadelphia: Griffith & Rowland Press, 1909), p. 365Google Scholar; and Sheldon, , The Reformer (Chicago: Advance Publishing Co., 1902), P. 137.Google Scholar

25. p. 143.

26. (N. Y.: A. L. Burt Co., 1897), pp. 3–12.

27. For example, Altars to Mammon, A Man for 'A That, Soldier of the Future, A Prophet in Babylon; and Daniel, Charles S., Ai, a Social Vision (Boston. Arena Publishing Co., 1893).Google Scholar

28. Richard Bruce (Boston: Congregational Sunday School & Publishing Co., 1892), p. 206.Google ScholarPubMed

29. pp. 18–19.

30. pp. 333–4.

31. For example, in A Man for 'A That, p. 331; The Ball of Fire, pp. 32, 124, 150; and The Calling of Dan Mathews, pp. 32–3.

32. p. 216.

33. p. 157.

34. A Modern Minister, p. 192; John Marvel, Assistant, p. 571; Altars to Mammon, p. 47; and Dollars and Duty, p. 458.

35. In A Singular Life, pp. 11–12; A Man for 'A That, pp. 393–6; Sheldon, Charles M., Jesus is Here. (New York: Hodder, Stoughton, Deran Co., 1914), pp. 163–4Google Scholar; Dollars and Duty, pp. 385ff.; and Cortland Myers, Would Christ Belong to a Labor Union? (N. Y.: Street and Smith, 1900), pp. 158–60.Google Scholar

36. Richard Bruce, pp. 268–74; A Modern Minister, pp. 292, 412.

37. p. 126.

38. Ibid., p. 138.

39. The position taken in Richard Bruce, pp. 227–8, 278–9; The Crucifixion of Phillip Strong pp. 106–8; and Marvel, John, Asststant, p. 463.Google Scholar

40. p. 179.

41. (Chicago: F. H. Revell Co., 1905), pp. 43–4.

42. pp. 216–17.

43. Murvale Eastman, Christian Socialist, p. 80.

44. Notably, , The Crucifixion of Phillip Strong. pp. 122ff.Google Scholar; In His Steps, pp. 268–9; Jesus is Here!, pp. 163ff., 215–18; and Richard Bruce. p. 292.

45. Murvale Eastman, Christian Socialist, pp. 55–64.

46. Soldier of the Future, pp. 327ff.; The Calling of Dan Mathews, pp. 259–63, 323ff.

47. Namely, Moore, John T.. The Bishop of Cottontown (Nashville: Cokesbury Press, 1906), pp. 633–9Google Scholar; The Calling of Dan Mathews, p. 358; Mason, Caroline A., A Woman of Yesterday (N. Y.: Doubleday Page & Co., 1900), pp. 168–72; 221–30Google Scholar; and Altars to Mammon, pp. 51–2.

48. pp. 191–2

49. (Boston: Roxburgh Publishing Co., 1914), p. 216.

50. Ibid., p. 385.

51. Ibid., pp. 472–3.

52. Ibid., p. 507.