Ethical Addresses and Ethical Record 18 (1911)

The 18th Series of Ethical Addresses and Ethical Record was published in 1911.  A substantial portion of the volume was devoted to the speeches offered at the dedication of the Meeting House of the New York Society for Ethical Culture.  Another substantial portion of the volume includes discussion of moral education and actual lessons for the mid-primary grades.  As well there is news of the Ethical Summer School, the Universal Races Conference, and other initiatives.  

The dedication of the NYSEC Meeting House is covered in three parts (history of the project, dedication for ethical and religious purposes, dedication for civic uses) with multiple speeches, poems, and descriptions of the music and symbolic activities.  Bibliographic issues arise in how to document the varied sections and credit the speakers.  In the end, I used the three parts listed above and cited the various parts under "No Author."  The pagination was not consecutive over the various issues of this volume; the binding of the volume scanned for the Internet Library placed them together (but out of order from the remainder of the volume).

One address that caught my attention was William Mackintyre Salter's "The Culture of the Moral Nature" (199-214).  This address had originally been given in 1883 but recently "rewritten" to be given again before the Societies in Chicago, St. Louis, Brooklyn, Philadelphia, and New York.  Salter takes time to explore the meaning of "ethical" and "culture" before he focuses on the difference between action that is for one's own benefit or for one's fellow human--the latter being inherently more moral than anything one does for oneself.  He then talks about the "shape" of morality--wherein does it manifest itself?--as he talks about truth (and keeping truth, or faithfulness), mercy (or pity) manifesting as charity, and public spirit.  In the latter, Salter talks very pointedly about public policies that have a negative effect on the community and the lack of public spirit that might otherwise inspire Ethicals to challenge those policies (and thereby grow in their own moral nature!).  It doesn't take much to read this address as clear justification for contemporary Ethical Action and greater involvement in the world around us.

In addition, Henry Moskowitz' address on "The Moral Challenge of the Industrial Struggle" (223-241) bears some further investigation by those interested in the early influence of Ethical Culture on public policy.  He mentions the establishment of a Joint Board of Sanitary Control, "suggested by one of the members of our Society" (p. 233).  This Board appears to be an early attempt to investigate and establish standards for worker health and safety.  It would be interesting to know how deeply members of the Society became involved in this work.

On a sadder note, two reports by Anna Garlin Spencer appear to mark her exit from this serial.  She reported on the Summer School of Ethics (23-32, 242-247) and gave an address at the Summer School on "The Need for Schools of Ethics" (1-12).  Having read elsewhere that she may have felt constrained by the narrow role that Felix Adler allowed her to play in the Ethical Society and left the Society around this time, I checked the final volumes in Ethical Addresses and Ethical Record and see no further items listed to her credit.  That discovery led me to look further for her work, since so little is evident at this point in my research into Ethical Culture.  I found, with help from Hathi Trust and the Internet Library a lengthy trail to AGS and the "social housekeeping" movement (related to the Sanitary Board described in Moskowitz' address?) as well as an extensive body of work by her and about her.  

Regarding the two covers included in this bound copy which show lists of books and pamphlets, almost everything listed has been shown in the Bibliography as it was published separately or in Ethical Addresses and Ethical Record.  Several addresses that were part of a memorial or anniversary program have not been listed separately in the Bibliography.  Without seeing the pamphlet listed as "O. B. Frothingham--Memorial Address," for example, we cannot know whether the pamphlet includes only Felix Adler's address on that occasion or the entire body of the memorial program.  A similar situation exists for the pamphlet listed for "Twentieth Anniversary of the Society for Ethical Culture of New York"  Some pamphlets show changes in titles from what was published in EA&ER:

• "The International Ethical Congress" may be "The Recent Congress of American and European Ethical Societies at Zurich" from the Third Series;
• "Our Hopes for the Twentieth Century" is published as "Our Hopes for Humanity in the Twentieth Century" in the Eighth Series;
• "The Moral Value of Science," an apparent typo, continues to be listed rather than "The Moral Value of Silence," published in the Ninth Series; and
• "Immortality:  Whence and Whither?" seems to be "A Modern Scientist's Answer to the Questions:  Whence and Whither?" published in the Twelfth Series.

I had quite a search to locate Percival Chubb's "Ruskin's Message to Our Time."  Without belaboring the drama of the hunt nor the nobility of my own perseverance, I found the address--all two parts of it--in the Seventh Series of Ethical Addresses, published in 1901.  I was entering the addresses from this volume in the Bibliography in the summer of 2022, but something seems to have distracted me from the work enough to completely omit most of them!  Once I finally located Chubb's address(es) on Ruskin, I checked all of the entries for that volume (and they are all now fully entered).  Ironically, I blogged at length about addresses from Walter L. Sheldon in the Seventh Series and never posted those items in the Bibliography--before now.  Clearly this work needs more eyes as well as more hands.