But how any who esteem it a disastrous, and, on their
parts who brought it about, a most guilty schism, can consent to call
it by this name, has always surprised me.
Let me urge on you here the importance of seeking in every case to
acquaint yourselves with the circumstances under which any body of men
who have played an important part in history, above all in the history
of your own land, obtained the name by which they were afterwards
themselves willing to be known, or which was used for their designation
by others. This you may do as a matter of historical inquiry, and
keeping entirely aloof in spirit from the bitterness, the contempt, the
calumny, out of which very frequently these names were first imposed.
Whatever of scorn or wrong may have been at work in them who coined or
gave currency to the name, the name itself can never without serious
loss be neglected by any who would truly understand the moral
significance of the thing; for always something, oftentimes much, may
be learned from it. Learn, then, about each one of these names which
you meet in your studies, whether it was one that men gave to
themselves; or one imposed on them by others, but never recognized by
them; or one that, first imposed by others, was yet in course of time
admitted and allowed by themselves. We have examples in all these kinds.
Thus the 'Gnostics' call _themselves_ such; the name was of their own
devising, and declared that whereof they made their boast; it was the
same with the 'Cavaliers' of our Civil War.
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