Abridged from the French of Edouard Ordinaire.
by Goodwyn Barmby.
Originally published in Howitt's Journal (William & Mary Howitt) vol.2 #31 (31 Jul 1847).
... In arriving at Hernhutt, we were completely disappointed, as, instead of the unitary habitation which we had hoped to see, we found a little civilized town, parcelled out like all others. In accordance with an opinion very generally accredited at present, we supposed that the Moravians lived under the system of community. This error had been rooted in us from a recent perusal of a romance which M. Victor Ducange has given forth as a faithful portrait of Moravian customs. The novelist assures us that he had seen with his own eyes all the details which he had given; and after having read the long preface of The Lutheran, or the Moravian Family—a preface, political, historical, philosophic and social—we took as serious that which is, like the rest of the book, nothing but a pure fiction, although its author has presented it as a veritable truth. As it is an amplification cf vulgar errors, which it has itself since contributed to spread, we believe it our duty to stay with it a moment. M. Ducange teaches us then that the Moravians live in the most perfect community.
"Each brother," says he, "is obliged to have a trade or some art, this calling or that art should be lucrative, and all the benefits which are gained by it are thrown in common, belong to the mass, and are equally reparted."
They have always, according to M. Ducange, a master and a mistress, charged, the one with the administration of the community, the other with the domestic economy, the laundries, the infirmaries, the kitchens, and such like etceteras. They have built themselves a house as large as to be sufficient to lodge all the community: the plan of this edifice is found even at the commencement of the work. *** The author gives his plan, with the most formal affirmations, as that of a Moravian community in particular, and of all of them in general. He proceeds then regularly to the mystification of the reader, as he engages him to accompany him quickly to dwell in this mansion, which he makes the abode of wisdom, and also of goodness. If you would become wise and happy, become Moravian. Such is, in two words, the recipe proposed by Victor Ducange for the social malady.
In his Eldorado, he expatiates upon and applies community to nearly all the branches of activity. "The children are brought up together as if they belonged to the same father, the mothers suckle them, as they say, in common, and they preside all together over their physical and moral education, under the inspection of twelve brethren, chosen among their husbands. They have no priests; each old man in his turn fulfils this duty, by reading each day the dominical lesson, and by preaching upon festival days upon a point of practical morality. The Moravians are deists."
That all this was but a sad pleasantry, we comprehended very quickly upon entering into Hernhutt. At first it was necessary to seek for board and lodgings, and we were as indifferently treated as in the auberge on the road, which is but ordinary justice upon the turnpike, but which differs a little from the sacred and generous hospitality which Ducange announces to his readers. We hastened then to see men and things, and to study them closely; and it is from the conversations of many Moravian brethren, young and old, and of varied intelligence and position, that we have drawn up the following information.
Their association, which is, as they understand it, a religious society, bears the name of "Unity of Regenerate Brethren" (Unitas Fratrum; Erneute Brüder-Unitût). Its first founders were the disciples of John Huss, who settled there, the 1st of March 1457, thirty-seven years after the martyrdom of their master, whom the council of Constance doomed to the flames, as every one knows. Thus, the anniversary of that event is celebrated in all the families of the unity. John Huss is the true founder of the reformation; Luther, who afterwards received all the glory, executed simply only the plan of demolition which his predecessor had presented to the world. The unity of brethren is thus the most ancient reformed communion, and perhaps that which approaches the most to the primitive church. This is, at least, the pretension of those who compose it.
These men are Christians, who wish to live in Jesus Christ, being, they say, the members of the same body of which Jesus is the head. It is a veritable Christocracy which they assume to have, a spiritual empire in which Christ alone governs. To arrive at this end, to submit themselves in every respect to the laws of the Gospel, they impose upon themselves while remaining faithful to the kings of the earth a particular social code. Thus, like the inhabitants of the cloisters, they hold to be very difficult—what almost all have accounted impossible—the becoming a true Christian in the midst of actual society; and like them they betake themselves apart, and in this act logically. ***
Thus, in all times, the men who hold by a religious, philosophic, and social doctrine, have not recoiled before its practical consequences, but have been forced to establish for themselves a special material centre, for lodging and for clothing, according to their nature and their wants. The Moravians, then, are Christians, in practice, as in theory—a thing very rare in civilized societies! To be received among them, one must believe in the doctrine of the Master and of his apostles, and observe his commandments; nothing else. Never does religious dispute arise to divide them; they are Christians by sentiment, by faith, much more than by reason; they lay aside every question of detail, to hold by the fundamental truths of the sacred books. It is in vain that over this land of Germany science pursues the work of Luther, and demolishes more and more the religious edifice; their faith remains immovable: impavidum feriunt ruinæ. And it is this absence of discussion which maintains the fraternal bond which unites them, and which causes them to live in peace and in community of sentiment with the other Christians who may be of their communion. Thus have they well established the principle, that their design is not to form a separate sect, apart from other evangelical churches, but that every Christian, even the Catholic, may, without denying his belief, become a member of the unity. For this they require him, by verbal speech, or writing, to observe the statutes and the discipline, but he remains free to retire when it seems good. *** Thus was formed the population of Hernhutt, which, descending from the ancient Moravian brethren, formed the nucleus around which were grouped the men of different worships and opinions. Consequently their religion is all practical, and not speculative and dogmatic, and their regulations appropriately tend to favour its appliance. Admitting the verity and goodness of biblical precepts, they desire that they may be the rigorous guides of all the acts of their existence. We repeat it, that it is for this solely that the Moravian communes are established.
Let us examine their constitution. We have said that the condition of their existence is the intimate union of wills. It is to maintain and reinforce this union that their synods are assembled. Each commune sends thither its Plenipotentiaries: they represent the entire unity, and act in its name. The members who compose them are:—
First.—The brothers to whom the preceding synod had confided the government of the unity; who, after the duty of convoking the synod, place also their authority in its hands.
Second.—The bishops and other dignitaries.
Third.—The proprietors, or holders of the foundation of a commune, if they are members of the unity.
Fourth.—The assistant (helfer), provincial or overseer of all the communes of a province.
Fifth.—The deputies chosen by these to represent them in the assembly.
Sixth—The deputies of the communal administration.
Seventh—Those of the servants of the communes and of the churches who are specially called there by the direction of the unity.
The synod elects its president and council. The right of vote is equal for all; all may freely sustain their opinion verbally, or by writing. This deliberative assembly is thus not only open to the most influential proprietors; it receives besides the most special and capacitated persons. Its divers sessions are customarily separated by an interval of from seven to twelve years. Since the foundation of Hernhutt, and the renewal of the unity, it has been eight; the last was convoked in 1825.
By an exception, perhaps unique of its kind, the majority is not always sovereign in this assembly; sometimes it is left to the decision of destiny. It is this which turns the balance in affairs of high importance, or when an established deficiency of certitude permits them not themselves to decide with a perfect knowledge on the matter, and for peremptory reasons. This method is perhaps not the worst, because, when our reason hesitates between two sides, or it finds equal inconveniences, chance may, as well as our will, lead us to the better. But if the Moravians consult the lot, it is because they humbly know their insufficiency, especially in that which concerns Divine things. They say that "their thoughts are not always the thoughts of God, nor their means his means." An artless, simple faith persuades them that Jesus Christ will enlighten and direct his Church. Besides, it is not without inconvenience, according to themselves, that the majority conducts itself under every circumstance, and they wish to prevent the vain babble to which every assembly is subject. And then, the first apostles, who could not have done wrong, had they not demanded by lot the election of St. Matthew? The lot, was it not also consulted in 1466-7 at the Lhota synod, by the brothers of Bohemia, for a new election of brothers and of elders?
In the interval of the sessions, the administration devolves upon a college chosen by the synod, and confirmed by lot. It is under the name of the Directory of the Unity, or Conference of Ancients—a little ministry, divided into three departments, of instruction and worship, of interior business, and of foreign affairs. Correspondence is active between it and the communes; and as the means of bringing into connexion ell the brethren among themselves, and with it, it publishes every year an account of its administration, and a monthly journal. Each one here seeks with devotion the news of the unity, and the names of the brothers recently admitted. If a member of the conference dies or retires, in the interval of the synods, it is himself who names his successor, for election.
Such are the bases of the constitution which joins in one same body these elements of the Moravian Society, spread over nearly all the inhabited earth. How are these elements or communes organised and administered?
The inhabitants of each are classed in series or choirs, after their state, their sex, their age. Thus there are choirs of married people, of widows and widowers, of celibatary men and women, of boys and girls, and of youths and maidens. This arrangement is intended to render more present to the various estates of human life the duties which religion impresses upon them, and to facilitate their performance. It is arranged thus that the servants or pastors of the commune may bestow the most scrupulous attention upon the care of their souls, and that they may give to each the counsels and the sermons which its position calls for. Each choir has its chief, who is an elder, who watches over its interests, and over the observance of its rules.
In the less important communes there is the house of brothers and that of unmarried sisters, sometimes of widows and of widowers. There are common habitations for the members of those choirs who have not, in their own right, either family or house. The table there is in common, as in a boarding house; the work of each covers the expenses; and the direction of everything belongs to the chiefs of the choirs. Such is the only portion of community which we have been able to discover in the constitution of the Moravians; it is, as we can see, a little exception, but has sufficed, without doubt, to make it believed that all was in common among them. But when we comprehend this rightly, the inhabitants of these houses keep the products of their industry, their expenses being paid; and their community consists in assembling under the same roof to sleep, to eat, and to pray. ***
The brother, who is in the position for having a wife, begins by obtaining the advice of the elders. This is the custom to which each conforms. Afterwards he makes his choice himself, or by the recommendation of the elders; and the directress of the choir, if the parents consent, is employed to make known his request to the young girl. The affianced are united according to the laws human and Divine.
This is transacted in nearly the same way as everywhere else, with the difference that, instead of seeking for suitableness of fortune, they endeavour after suitableness of character. It is imagined generally that the young brothers are always obliged to marry, according to the desire of the elders, and to women even whom they have not seen. This rarely happens. We know one example; it was of a young German, who was sent to an Englishwoman; and never, they say, did a marriage succeed better. However, it is true that they forward European women to the inhabitants of remote Moravian colonies; but this is far better than that they should want them.
The severity of their manners is excessive. Love, among them, is always reduced to its most simple expression in marriage; and those who permit themselves any amorous recreations, are precluded from their commune, and seek in vain to penetrate into another. The Moravians will hear no raillery on this point; and they dismiss also those charitable souls who favour the meeting of others, and even those who innocently promote marriage, without the valid power of authority.
Disorders of this nature are rare, and everything tends to prevent them. From their infancy they are used to this kind of life; they fashion them to the Christian yoke under which they ought to pursue their career; and those whose nature bears it help those whose would not, because occasion fails. In our state of society men are born Christians, but how few live in it as Christians! Those even who preserve for the Christian doctrine a theoretic fidelity, turn it into derision by the practice of their lives. And it is not a thing desired by the social circumference which environs us, and which has never been organized Christianly, in the rigorous acceptation of the word. If it took the fancy of the thirty-four millions of the French to renounce Satan, in his pomps and in his works, and to be faithful to the words of their baptism, the most terrible of revolutions would inevitably follow from this conversion, because it would put aside the working multitude, industry being reduced to the satisfaction of the wants of strict necessity, and those of luxury being repressed. It would put out of the way even the Moravians themselves, if Germany and the other European countries imitated France; because, if their religious principles should keep them from using things of luxury, it should not permit them their fabrication, or these brave Christians, like the inhabitants of Salente, would thus send corruption to their neighbours. In the house of the brothers, and in that of the sisters, we have seen articles of jewellery, of fashion, and other things, which could not have been worn at Hernhutt, or in any family of the unity. To repress among the women the taste for appearance, and to restrain them from the government of fashion, they place upon their heads the uniformity of a cap without grace, and of a bonnet small and homely. The ribbon which is appointed is red for the girls, blue for the married women, and white for the widows. We conceive that a like association cannot exist but partially, and as an exception, in the midst of general society: and the Moravians, who have numerous missionaries in all countries, cannot desire that they should have universal success, because, what would then become of their industry? Here necessity, more strong than their principles, has placed them in contradiction with themselves, because it would that all the world should live. Among themselves, in fact, each lives, according to the ordinary acceptation and restriction of the word, because each labours; and he who fails, or whom misfortune has placed in want, is supported by his brethren. They have even a poor-fund for those whom age or disease have rendered incapable of labour.
That they may be faithful to their religious principles and morals, they avoid all occasion of sin; they proscribe all balls, spectacles, or assemblies, which bring together the two sexes. They are born and they die at Hernhutt, without understanding the music of the waltz, pleasures which we find in the meanest village of Germany. But, on the other hand, they there learn the simplicity and calmness of family life; they receive there the lessons and example of complete probity. Under this aspect, all the world renders justice to the Moravians, even with regard to their commercial affairs, n which they are never deceptious.
They bestow great care upon the education of their children. Each commune has schools for the two sexes, where children receive, up to the age of thirteen or fourteen years, a complete primary education, and some elements of Latin. Instead of this last, the girls acquire needle-work. The pastor overlooks the school, and directs the religious instruction. They have also boarding-houses, where are moreover received the children of missionaries and other functionaries who cannot bring them up themselves. The reputation of these establishments being well known, many parents who are strangers send their children there. The boys destined to a scientific career are placed at Niesky, in Upper Lusatia, in the college of the unity, where they meet with the requisite knowledge to commence their university studies in law, medicine, etc. Those who would devote themselves to theology, go to the seminary of the unity, which is at Gnadenfeld, in Upper Silesia. We shall speak more, further on, concerning the clergy, and the spiritual organization of the Moravian Church. In these establishments the rich pay, and the poor are supported by voluntary gifts.
We have seen that the whole unity is governed by the synod, and the council of elders. Each commune as an analogous organization; they have also each their college, or conference. The elders who compose it are appointed for the government of the commune generally, and for that of each of its choirs specially. The communal assistant presides in it by right; he represents the general interests of his place. The pastors and chiefs of the choirs are admitted to it, to sustain, the one the interests of religion, in its worship and instruction, and the others those of their group, and of the assemblies of which they form part. The inspectors of educational establishments, and the heads of various administrations, have also there a deliberative voice. This council also bears the name of the Communal Direction, because its authority extends over the other conferences, whose procedure it overlooks. In the little populated families, one single individual is often charged with many functions; but all those which give entry into the council are conferred by the synod, or the administration of the unity.
To finish with the Moravian authorities, we shall speak of the college of superintendence; its functions were in part those of the Roman censors; thus, all which concerns manners, behaviour, good faith, in the relations of the brethren among themselves, is under its care. It insures order and police, the strict execution of the laws of the country, the regulations of the community, and the decisions of the council of elders. In its councils we find the greater part of the members who hold the other functions. But as the mass of citizens are most vividly interested in public order, a certain number chosen by them are sent to the college of superintendence. Lastly, purely temporal matters are directed by the municipal council, which unites the members of the two councils of which we have spoken, and besides some others chosen by the inhabitants.
The impressions which we have received at Hernhutt and elsewhere, have led us to believe that the laws of the unity are well observed by those simple men. *** However, there are exceptions to every rule, and they have proved it so there. Misconduct, and excitement to debauch and libertinism, are faults sought out and punished by the communal discipline, a judicature which has its hierarchy and means of repression; these means consisting of warnings, remonstrances, and punishments. The ministers of this judicature are generally the companions of the culpable, who exhort them with good feeling; perhaps an elder, but finally the council of superintendence. The punishments which are used are, exclusion from Divine service, and from the holy table for a time, which the judges render more or less in duration according to the weight of the crime and the repentance of the sinner. When remedies thus benign are without effect upon the confirmedly diseased, they have recourse to more determined means. They cut off from the living body of the unity its gangrened members, at least when they do not detach themselves. But such is, according to the Moravians, the extent of social misery, that even after this last extremity the fold may be again opened to the wandering sheep, when the shepherds recognise a sincere spirit for restoration, and a complete change. The infraction of the laws of the country are followed up by the tribunals.
In the name of the Gospel, of reason, and of necessity, the Moravians have for their laws, and those who maintain them, a perfect submission, and their particular customs are not in opposition to them. Not the less do they easily comprehend that their societies could not exist and act, in all their purity, without a concession to government, because it is that which permits them to establish themselves in the family of the order, and in the particular discipline of their Church, as also its liturgy and its usages; to name themselves their governors and preachers; to build the houses of reunion which they require; and, in fine, to free them from the jurisdiction of the consistories which their organization renders unnecessary. All their communes in the old and in the new world have been sanctioned in this manner, and each celebrates the anniversary of its foundation.
Governments favour their establishment; some even exempt them from military service. Napoleon, who began to make such a great consumption of men, continued to them this favour, but Prussia has concluded to suppress it. They preserve it, however, in Saxony, and most portions of the Germanic states.
We have seen that this little society, for maintaining itself in perfect unity in doctrine and in conduct, has been led by reason or by instinct to a commencement of the serial order, and to the union of its elements, through the powerful bond of a hierarchy. This hierarchy is remarkable, moreover, in the bosom of a Protestantism which desires it not. Its results are remarkable, as, notwithstanding its imperfections, it has been able to maintain intact the unity of the brethren, since the time of their master, John Huss, exempting them from those variations of opinion which are wont to diminish sects, under the name of free will. Its clergy are personally divided into deacons, preachers, and bishops. The powers of these are retraced to 1467, having been transmitted from the ancient Church of Bohemia to the new by an uninterrupted course of ordinations. The bishops are taken from among the pastors, and elected by the synods, or in its absence, when the case requires, by the conference of the elders. Their duty is to conserve religious tradition, and to invest the pastors and the deacons with their ecclesiastical functions. The pastors are placed over the religious direction of a commune, or sent upon missions among the pagans, and the deacons assist the pastors in their functions, and administer even the sacraments whenever they have received the necessary authority. Both are subordinate to the synod and the conference. The Augsburg confession did not preserve the episcopacy, notwithstanding which the countries in which it appeared established it because it was not contradictory to its principles. This was done in Denmark and Sweden, although Germany did not adopt it.
The Moravian Church has some resemblance to that of Rome, through its hierarchy, and it is otherwise related to it by some practices of its worship. Thus its believers meet in the temple nearly every day, and communicate many times in the year. Thus the pastors and chiefs of choirs are nearly confessors, they have the sustenance of their faith, the confidance of their sins. But in other relations it is akin to Lutheran Protestantism. Nothing is more naked than their temple, if they can thus call four white walls, furnished with a square of benches, and a little table above the aisle. It would be a crime among them to call upon, through the least image, through any material emblem whatsoever, that Divine power which manifests itself everywhere through the marvellous luxury of creation. Certainly the magnificence of Catholicism is contradictory and illogical, in a religion which preaches poverty, humility, and suffering, and which exalts the senses which it would put to sleep; but does it not gain by being illogical, if in discarding its principles it approaches truth?
The bishops the most renowned among the Moravians, are Spangenberg and Count Zinzendorf. This last was impassioned in favour of these religionists, when they were persecuted and chased from Bohemia and Moravia. He offered them an asylum in the territory of the signory of Berthelsdorf. On the 17th of June, 1722, the first stone of the first house was laid, and the first tree was hewed by its carpenter. The memory of this event is dear to the inhabitants of this at present flourishing colony; they have shown us, in the middle of a little walk, planted with trees, a monumental stone which consecrates it. The site of Hernhutt is charming in simplicity, and peculiarly adapted to serve as the retreat of tranquil piety. The houses are built on the sunny declivity of the mountain of Hutt, which has given its name to the capital of the unity. The town has 1,200 inhabitants; it is twenty-one leagues from Dresden, in the middle of Upper Lusatia, between Löbau and Zittau. The summit of the mountain is crowned by a beautiful terrace, from which the country around is seen; before arriving at the place, we find a field surmounted by hedges; it is the Field of God, the cemetery. The tombs are arranged in order, and surmounted by stones exactly alike; they tell the visitors the name of the defunct, the dates of birth and of death, and nothing more. Three tombs in white marble arise, however, in the midst of this funereal equality; the founder of Hernhutt and the members of his family have well merited them; they are placed in the midst of a wide alley which separates the cemetery into two parts. One side of the cemetery is for the men, the other is reserved for the women. Separated in the temple, separated in all the details of life, death even does not unite their bones. An avenue of beautiful trees unites Hernhutt to the village of Berthelsdorf; its ancient manor-house is inhabited by the conference of elders; the synods hold there their sessions. One of the most venerable of the conference desired to receive us there, and answer our inquiries. ***
Besides the communes occupied by the brethren, and where only they have the right of fixing themselves, there are in such towns as Stockholm, Moscow, London, some Moravian families, who maintain relations with their central administration, and who unite among themselves to pray and refresh their faith. Among the members of this religious association, there is much corporative spirit; they know their number, and the journal makes known to them the names of the brethren newly received. In Europe they have at least nearly 14,000, divided into thirty-five different families, of which more than three-fourths are in entirely Moravian communes. The greatest number of these are in Germany; the others are found in England, in Holland, in Denmark, in Sweden, and in Russia. The least removed from Paris is at Zeist near Utrecht. In the other continents their population amounts to 10,000, without counting the aborigines of savage countries whom their missionaries have converted to Christianity. It possesses a quarantine of different families situated in the two Americas, and in the English, Danish, and Dutch colonies of Asia and Africa. Their most important mission is in Greenland, in the country of icebergs, which bears the name of New Hernhutt. They also possess in this country two or three other establishments. The Moravians owe in a great part their prosperity to the incredible activity of Zinzendorf. ** He was made for being the chief of a sect or party. ** Nature had destined him to impassion, to organize, and to put in order. As a child, his vocation had been fixed to establish among his comrades the Order of the Mustard-seed, a mysterious association of which the design is unknown to us, although probably it was one of extreme pietism. It was in vain that his uncle and tutor sent him to the university of Wittenberg, to hear the lessons of the enemies of his opinions; he preserved them untouched, and his pen fought for them. The elector of Saxony, of whom his father, long since dead, had been minister, called him to him as a councillor of state; but his attraction was not there, and he soon quitted the court to become the champion and chief of the Moravians, whom some years previously he had received and supported. Ever after, his life was a battle and a travel; he not only passed through Europe for the propagation of his church, but went to the United States, to Greenland, to the Isles of St. Croix and St. Thomas, and to the East Indies. In the midst of all this, he wrote without ceasing, sometimes to answer his numerous adversaries, and sometimes to publish books of piety. He has written more than a hundred volumes! The Elector of Saxony decreed him for some while the honour of exile. He died at Hernbutt in 1760; he was born at Dresden, sixty years previously. This man, we believe, notwithstanding some contradictory assertions, was always one of good faith; he sought the perfection and welfare of his fellow creatures; he merits then their veneration, and those above others should render him homage who intend the same end, although by different means.
Perhaps it will not have been without interest, and some utility, that we have placed here in relief the good germs which in the Moravian affiliation maintain order, calm, and a surety of material welfare, and also the inferior elements which prevent its spreading and generalizing itself in the world. But without making this article too long, we think that this simple development of facts and ideas will be sufficient to make it understood that although there is among the Moravians a happy excitement of corporative spirit and religious sentiment, their system is far from being a system of perfect community.