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Title: The Works of Robert G. Ingersoll, Vol. 2 (of 12)
Dresden Edition--Lectures
Author: Robert G. Ingersoll
Release Date: February 9, 2012 [EBook #38802]
Language: English
*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK WORKS OF INGERSOLL ***
Produced by David Widger
THE WORKS OF ROBERT G. INGERSOLL
"THE CLERGY KNOW, THAT I KNOW, THAT THEY KNOW, THAT THEY DO NOT KNOW."
IN TWELVE VOLUMES, VOLUME II.
LECTURES
1900
THE DRESDEN EDITION
TO
MRS. SUE. M. FARRELL,
IN LAW MY SISTER,
AND IN FACT MY FRIEND,
THIS VOLUME,
AS A TOKEN OF RESPECT AND LOVE, IS DEDICATED.
CONTENTS OF VOLUME II.
SOME MISTAKES OF MOSES.
(1879.)
Preface--I. He who endeavors to control the Mind by Force is a
Tyrant, and he who submits is a Slave--All I Ask--When a Religion
is Founded--Freedom for the Orthodox Clergy--Every Minister an
Attorney--Submission to the Orthodox and the Dead--Bounden Duty of
the Ministry--The Minister Factory at Andover--II. Free Schools--No
Sectarian Sciences--Religion and the Schools--Scientific
Hypocrites--III. The Politicians and the Churches--IV. Man and Woman the
Highest Possible Titles--Belief Dependent on Surroundings--Worship of
Ancestors--Blindness Necessary to Keeping the Narrow Path--The Bible the
Chain that Binds--A Bible of the Middle Ages and the Awe it Inspired--V.
The Pentateuch--Moses Not the Author--Belief out of which Grew
Religious Ceremonies--Egypt the Source of the Information of Moses--VI.
Monday--Nothing, in the Light of Raw Material--The Story of Creation
Begun--The Same Story, substantially, Found in the Records of Babylon,
Egypt, and India--Inspiration Unnecessary to the Truth--Usefulness of
Miracles to Fit Lies to Facts--Division of Darkness and Light--VII.
Tuesday--The Firmament and Some Biblical Notions about it--Laws of
Evaporation Unknown to the Inspired Writer--VIII. Wednesday--The Waters
Gathered into Seas--Fruit and Nothing to Eat it--Five Epochs in the
Organic History of the Earth--Balance between the Total Amounts of
Animal and Vegetable Life--Vegetation Prior to the Appearance of the
Sun--IX. Thursday--Sun and Moon Manufactured--Magnitude of the Solar
Orb--Dimensions of Some of the Planets--Moses' Guess at the Size of Sun
and Moon--Joshua's Control of the Heavenly Bodies--A Hypothesis Urged
by Ministers--The Theory of "Refraction"--Rev. Henry Morey--Astronomical
Knowledge of Chinese Savants--The Motion of the Earth Reversed by
Jehovah for the Reassurance of Ahaz--"Errors" Renounced by Button--X.
"He made the Stars Also"--Distance of the Nearest Star--XI.
Friday--Whales and Other Living Creatures Produced--XII.
Saturday--Reproduction Inaugurated--XIII. "Let Us Make Man"--Human
Beings Created in the Physical Image and Likeness of God--Inquiry as
to the Process Adopted--Development of Living Forms According to
Evolution--How Were Adam and Eve Created?--The Rib Story--Age of
Man Upon the Earth--A Statue Apparently Made before the World--XIV.
Sunday--Sacredness of the Sabbath Destroyed by the Theory of Vast
"Periods"--Reflections on the Sabbath--XV. The Necessity for a Good
Memory--The Two Accounts of the Creation in Genesis I and II--Order
of Creation in the First Account--Order of Creation in the Second
Account--Fastidiousness of Adam in the Choice of a Helpmeet--Dr.
Adam Clark's Commentary--Dr. Scott's Guess--Dr. Matthew Henry's
Admission--The Blonde and Brunette Problem--The Result of Unbelief and
the Reward of Faith--"Give Him a Harp"--XVI. The Garden--Location of
Eden--The Four Rivers--The Tree of Knowledge--Andover Appealed
To--XVII. The Fall--The Serpent--Dr. Adam Clark Gives a Zoological
Explanation--Dr. Henry Dissents--Whence This Serpent?--XVIII.
Dampness--A Race of Giants--Wickedness of Mankind--An Ark Constructed--A
Universal Flood Indicated--Animals Probably Admitted to the Ark--How Did
They Get There?--Problem of Food and Service--A Shoreless Sea Covered
with Innumerable Dead--Drs. Clark and Henry on the Situation--The Ark
Takes Ground--New Difficulties--Noah's Sacrifice--The Rainbow as a
Memorandum--Babylonian, Egyptian, and Indian Legends of a Flood--XIX.
Bacchus and Babel--Interest Attaching to Noah--Where Did Our First
Parents and the Serpent Acquire a Common Language?--Babel and the
Confusion of Tongues--XX. Faith in Filth--Immodesty of Biblical
Diction--XXI. The Hebrews--God's Promises to Abraham--The Sojourning
of Israel in Egypt--Marvelous Increase--Moses and Aaron--XXII.
The Plagues--Competitive Miracle Working--Defeat of the Local
Magicians--XXIII. The Flight Out of Egypt--Three Million People in a
Desert--Destruction of Pharaoh ana His Host--Manna--A Superfluity of
Quails--Rev. Alexander Cruden's Commentary--Hornets as Allies of the
Israelites--Durability of the Clothing of the Jewish People--An Ointment
Monopoly--Consecration of Priests--The Crime of Becoming a Mother--The
Ten Commandments--Medical Ideas of Jehovah--Character of the God of
the Pentateuch--XXIV. Confess and Avoid--XXV. "Inspired" Slavery--XXVI.
"Inspired" Marriage-XXVII. "Inspired" War-XXVIII. "Inspired" Religious
Liberty--XXIX. Conclusion.
SOME REASONS WHY.
(1881.)
I--Religion makes Enemies--Hatred in the Name of Universal
Benevolence--No Respect for the Rights of Barbarians--Literal
Fulfillment of a New Testament Prophecy--II. Duties to God--Can we
Assist God?--An Infinite Personality an Infinite Impossibility-Ill.
Inspiration--What it Really Is--Indication of Clams--Multitudinous
Laughter of the Sea--Horace Greeley and the Mammoth Trees--A Landscape
Compared to a Table-cloth--The Supernatural is the Deformed--Inspiration
in the Man as well as in the Book--Our Inspired Bible--IV. God's
Experiment with the Jews--Miracles of One Religion never astonish the
Priests of Another--"I am a Liar Myself"--V. Civilized Countries--Crimes
once regarded as Divine Institutions--What the Believer in the
Inspiration of the Bible is Compelled to Say--Passages apparently
written by the Devil--VI. A Comparison of Books--Advancing a Cannibal
from Missionary to Mutton--Contrast between the Utterances of Jehovah
and those of Reputable Heathen--Epictetus, Cicero, Zeno,
Seneca--the Hindu, Antoninus, Marcus Aurelius--The Avesta--VII.
Monotheism--Egyptians before Moses taught there was but One God
and Married but One Wife--Persians and Hindoos had a Single Supreme
Deity--Rights of Roman Women--Marvels of Art achieved without the
Assistance of Heaven--Probable Action of the Jewish Jehovah incarnated
as Man--VIII. The New Testament--Doctrine of Eternal Pain brought to
Light--Discrepancies--Human Weaknesses cannot be Predicated of
Divine Wisdom--Why there are Four Gospels according to Irenæus--The
Atonement--Remission of Sins under the Mosaic Dispensation--Christians
say, "Charge it"--God's Forgiveness does not Repair an Injury--Suffering
of Innocence for the Guilty--Salvation made Possible by Jehovah's
Failure to Civilize the Jews--Necessity of Belief not taught in the
Synoptic Gospels--Non-resistance the Offspring of Weakness--IX. Christ's
Mission--All the Virtues had been Taught before his Advent--Perfect and
Beautiful Thoughts of his Pagan Predecessors--St. Paul Contrasted
with Heathen Writers--"The Quality of Mercy"--X. Eternal Pain--An
Illustration of Eternal Punishment--Captain Kreuger of the Barque
Tiger--XI. Civilizing Influence of the Bible--Its Effects on the
Jews--If Christ was God, Did he not, in his Crucifixion, Reap what
he had Sown?--Nothing can add to the Misery of a Nation whose King is
Jehovah
ORTHODOXY.
(1884.)
Orthodox Religion Dying Out--Religious Deaths and Births--The Religion
of Reciprocity--Every Language has a Cemetery--Orthodox Institutions
Survive through the Money invested in them--"Let us tell our Real
Names"--The Blows that have Shattered the Shield and Shivered the Lance
of Superstition--Mohammed's Successful Defence of the Sepulchre of
Christ--The Destruction of Art--The Discovery of America--Although
he made it himself, the Holy Ghost was Ignorant of the Form of this
Earth--Copernicus and Kepler--Special Providence--The Man and the Ship
he did not Take--A Thanksgiving Proclamation Contradicted--Charles
Darwin--Henry Ward Beecher--The Creeds--The Latest Creed--God as
a Governor--The Love of God--The Fall of Man--We are Bound
by Representatives without a Chance to Vote against Them--The
Atonement--The Doctrine of Depravity a Libel on the Human Race--The
Second Birth--A Unitarian Universalist--Inspiration of the
Scriptures--God a Victim of his own Tyranny--In the New Testament
Trouble Commences at Death--The Reign of Truth and Love--The Old
Spaniard who Died without an Enemy--The Wars it Brought--Consolation
should be Denied to Murderers--At the Rate at which Heathen are being
Converted, how long will it take to Establish Christ's Kingdom on
Earth?--The Resurrection--The Judgment Day--Pious Evasions--"We shall
not Die, but we shall all be Hanged"--"No Bible, no Civilization"
Miracles of the New Testament--Nothing Written by Christ or his
Contemporaries--Genealogy of Jesus--More Miracles--A Master of
Death--Improbable that he would be Crucified--The Loaves and Fishes--How
did it happen that the Miracles Convinced so Few?--The Resurrection--The
Ascension--Was the Body Spiritual--Parting from the Disciples--Casting
out Devils--Necessity of Belief--God should be consistent in the
Matter of forgiving Enemies--Eternal Punishment--Some Good Men who are
Damned--Another Objection--Love the only Bow on Life's dark Cloud--"Now
is the accepted Time"--Rather than this Doctrine of Eternal Punishment
Should be True--I would rather that every Planet should in its Orbit
wheel a barren Star--What I Believe--Immortality--It existed long before
Moses--Consolation--The Promises are so Far Away, and the Dead are so
Near--Death a Wall or a Door--A Fable--Orpheus and Eurydice.
MYTH AND MIRACLE.
(1885.)
I. Happiness the true End and Aim of Life--Spiritual People and
their Literature--Shakespeare's Clowns superior to Inspired
Writers--Beethoven's Sixth Symphony Preferred to the Five Books of
Moses--Venus of Milo more Pleasing than the Presbyterian Creed--II.
Religions Naturally Produced--Poets the Myth-makers--The Sleeping
Beauty--Orpheus and Eurydice--Red Riding Hood--The Golden Age--Elysian
Fields--The Flood Myth--Myths of the Seasons--III. The Sun-god--Jonah,
Buddha, Chrisnna, Horus, Zoroaster--December 25th as a Birthday of
Gods--Christ a Sun-God--The Cross a Symbol of the Life to Come--When
Nature rocked the Cradle of the Infant World--IV. Difference between
a Myth and a Miracle--Raising the Dead, Past and Present--Miracles
of Jehovah--Miracles of Christ--Everything Told except the Truth--The
Mistake of the World--V. Beginning of Investigation--The Stars as
Witnesses against Superstition--Martyrdom of Bruno--Geology--Steam and
Electricity--Nature forever the Same--Persistence of Force--Cathedral,
Mosque, and Joss House have the same Foundation--Science the
Providence of Man--VI. To Soften the Heart of God--Martyrs--The God was
Silent--Credulity a Vice--Develop the Imagination--"The Skylark" and
"The Daisy"--VII. How are we to Civilize the World?--Put Theology out
of Religion--Divorce of Church and State--Secular Education--Godless
Schools--VIII. The New Jerusalem--Knowledge of the Supernatural
possessed by Savages--Beliefs of Primitive Peoples--Science is
Modest--Theology Arrogant--Torque-mada and Bruno on the Day of
Judgment--IX. Poison of Superstition in the Mother's Milk--Ability
of Mistakes to take Care of Themselves--Longevity of Religious
Lies--Mother's religion pleaded by the Cannibal--The Religion of
Freedom--O Liberty, thou art the God of my Idolatry
PREFACE.
For many years I have regarded the Pentateuch simply as a record of a
barbarous people, in which are found a great number of the ceremonies
of savagery, many absurd and unjust laws, and thousands of ideas
inconsistent with known and demonstrated facts. To me it seemed almost
a crime to teach that this record was written by inspired men; that
slavery, polygamy, wars of conquest and extermination were right, and
that there was a time when men could win the approbation of infinite
Intelligence, Justice, and Mercy, by violating maidens and by butchering
babes. To me it seemed more reasonable that savage men had made these
laws; and I endeavored in a lecture, entitled "Some Mistakes of Moses,"
to point out some of the errors, contradictions, and impossibilities
contained in the Pentateuch. The lecture was never written and
consequently never delivered twice the same. On several occasions it was
reported and published without consent, and without revision. All these
publications were grossly and glaringly incorrect As published, they
have been answered several hundred times, and many of the clergy are
still engaged in the great work. To keep these reverend gentlemen from
wasting their talents on the mistakes of reporters and printers, I
concluded to publish the principal points in all my lectures on this
subject. And here, it may be proper for me to say, that arguments cannot
be answered by personal abuse; that there is no logic in slander, and
that falsehood, in the long run, defeats itself. People who love their
enemies should, at least, tell the truth about their friends. Should it
turn out that I am the worst man in the whole world, the story of the
flood will remain just as improbable as before, and the contradictions
of the Pentateuch will still demand an explanation.
There was a time when a falsehood, fulminated from the pulpit, smote
like a sword; but, the supply having greatly exceeded the demand,
clerical misrepresentation has at last become almost an innocent
amusement. Remembering that only a few years ago men, women, and even
children, were imprisoned, tortured and burned, for having expressed
in an exceedingly mild and gentle way, the ideas entertained by me, I
congratulate myself that calumny is now the pulpit's last resort. The
old instruments of torture are kept only to gratify curiosity; the
chains are rusting away, and the demolition of time has allowed even the
dungeons of the Inquisition to be visited by light. The church, impotent
and malicious, regrets, not the abuse, but the loss of her power, and
seeks to hold by falsehood what she gained by cruelty and force, by
fire and fear. Christianity cannot live in peace with any other form of
faith. If that religion be true, there is but one savior, one inspired
book, and but one little narrow grass-grown path that leads to heaven.
Such a religion is necessarily uncompromising, unreasoning, aggressive
and insolent. Christianity has held all other creeds and forms in
infinite contempt, divided the world into enemies and friends, and
verified the awful declaration of its founder--a declaration that
wet with blood the sword he came to bring, and made the horizon of a
thousand years lurid with the fagots' flames.
Too great praise challenges attention, and often brings to light a
thousand faults that otherwise the general eye would never see. Were we
allowed to read the Bible as we do all other books, we would admire its
beauties, treasure its worthy thoughts, and account for all its absurd,
grotesque and cruel things, by saying that its authors lived in rude,
barbaric times. But we are told that it was written by inspired men;
that it contains the will of God; that it is perfect, pure, and true in
all its parts; the source and standard of all moral and religious truth;
that it is the star and anchor of all human hope; the only guide for
man, the only torch in Nature's night. These claims are so at variance
with every known recorded fact, so palpably absurd, that every free
unbiased soul is forced to raise the standard of revolt.
We read the pagan sacred books with profit and delight. With myth and
fable we are ever charmed, and find a pleasure in the endless repetition
of the beautiful, poetic, and absurd. We find, in all these records of
the past, philosophies and dreams, and efforts stained with tears,
of great and tender souls who tried to pierce the mystery of life and
death, to answer the eternal questions of the Whence and Whither, and
vainly sought to make, with bits of shattered glass, a mirror that
would, in very truth, reflect the face and form of Nature's perfect
self.
These myths were born of hopes, and fears, and tears, and smiles, and
they were touched and colored by all there is of joy and grief between
the rosy dawn of birth, and deaths sad night. They clothed even the
stars with passion, and gave to gods the faults and frailties of the
sons of men. In them, the winds and waves were music, and all the lakes,
and streams, and springs,--the mountains, woods and perfumed dells were
haunted by a thousand fairy forms. They thrilled the veins of Spring
with tremulous desire; made tawny Summer's billowed breast the throne
and home of love; filled Autumn's arms with sun-kissed grapes, and
gathered sheaves; and pictured Winter as a weak old king who felt,
like Lear upon his withered face, Cordelia's tears. These myths, though
false, are beautiful, and have for many ages and in countless ways,
enriched the heart and kindled thought. But if the world were taught
that all these things are true and all inspired of God, and that eternal
punishment will be the lot of him who dares deny or doubt, the sweetest
myth of all the Fable World would lose its beauty, and become a scorned
and hateful thing to every brave and thoughtful man.
Robert G. Ingersoll.
Washington, D. C., Oct. 7th, 1879.
SOME MISTAKES OF MOSES.
HE WHO ENDEAVORS TO CONTROL THE MIND BY FORCE IS A TYRANT, AND HE WHO
SUBMITS IS A SLAVE.
I.
I want to do what little I can to make my country truly free, to broaden
the intellectual horizon of our people, to destroy the prejudices born
of ignorance and fear, to do away with the blind worship of the ignoble
past, with the idea that all the great and good are dead, that the
living are totally depraved, that all pleasures are sins, that sighs
and groans are alone pleasing to God, that thought is dangerous, that
intellectual courage is a crime, that cowardice is a virtue, that a
certain belief is necessary to secure salvation, that to carry a cross
in this world will give us a palm in the next, and that we must allow
some priest to be the pilot of our souls.
Until every soul is freely permitted to investigate every book, and
creed, and dogma for itself, the world cannot be free. Mankind will be
enslaved until there is mental grandeur enough to allow each man to have
his thought and say. This earth will be a paradise when men can, upon
all these questions differ, and yet grasp each other's hands as friends.
It is amazing to me that a difference of opinion upon subjects that we
know nothing with certainty about, should make us hate, persecute, and
despise each other. Why a difference of opinion upon predestination,
or the Trinity, should make people imprison and burn each other
seems beyond the comprehension of man; and yet in all countries where
Christians have existed, they have destroyed each other to the exact
extent of their power. Why should a believer in God hate an atheist?
Surely the atheist has not injured God, and surely he is human, capable
of joy and pain, and entitled to all the rights of man. Would it not be
far better to treat this atheist, at least, as well as he treats us?
Christians tell me that they love their enemies, and yet all I ask
is--not that they love their enemies, not that they love their friends
even, but that they treat those who differ from them, with simple
fairness.
We do not wish to be forgiven, but we wish Christians to so act that we
will not have to forgive them.
If all will admit that all have an equal right to think, then the
question is forever solved; but as long as organized and powerful
churches, pretending to hold the keys of heaven and hell, denounce every
person as an outcast and criminal who thinks for himself and denies
their authority, the world will be filled with hatred and suffering. To
hate man and worship God seems to be the sum of all the creeds.
That which has happened in most countries has happened in ours. When
a religion is founded, the educated, the powerful--that is to say, the
priests and nobles, tell the ignorant and superstitious--that is to
say, the people, that the religion of their country was given to their
fathers by God himself; that it is the only true religion; that all
others were conceived in falsehood and brought forth in fraud, and that
all who believe in the true religion will be happy forever, while all
others will burn in hell. For the purpose of governing the people, that
is to say, for the purpose of being supported by the people, the priests
and nobles declare this religion to be sacred, and that whoever adds to,
or takes from it, will be burned here by man, and hereafter by God. The
result of this is, that the priests and nobles will not allow the people
to change; and when, after a time, the priests, having intellectually
advanced, wish to take a step in the direction of progress, the people
will not allow them to change. At first, the rabble are enslaved by the
priests, and afterwards the rabble become the masters.
One of the first things I wish to do, is to free the orthodox clergy.
I am a great friend of theirs, and in spite of all they may say against
me, I am going to do them a great and lasting service. Upon their necks
are visible the marks of the collar, and upon their backs those of the
lash. They are not allowed to read and think for themselves. They are
taught like parrots, and the best are those who repeat, with the fewest
mistakes, the sentences they have been taught. They sit like owls upon
some dead limb of the tree of knowledge, and hoot the same old hoots
that have been hooted for eighteen hundred years. Their congregations
are not grand enough, nor sufficiently civilized, to be willing that
the poor preachers shall think for themselves. They are not employed for
that purpose. Investigation regarded as a dangerous experiment, and the
ministers are warned that none of that kind of work will be tolerated.
They are notified to stand by the old creed, and to avoid all original
thought, as a mortal pestilence. Every minister is employed like an
attorney--either for plaintiff or defendant,--and he is expected to
be true to his client. If he changes his mind, he is regarded as
a deserter, and denounced, hated, and slandered accordingly. Every
orthodox clergyman agrees not to change. He contracts not to find new
facts, and makes a bargain that he will deny them if he does. Such is
the position of a Protestant minister in this nineteenth century. His
condition excites my pity; and to better it, I am going to do what
little I can.
Some of the clergy have the independence to break away, and the
intellect to maintain themselves as free men, but the most are compelled
to submit to the dictation of the orthodox, and the dead. They are
not employed to give their thoughts, but simply to repeat the ideas of
others. They are not expected to give even the doubts that may suggest
themselves, but are required to walk in the narrow, verdureless path
trodden by the ignorance of the past. The forests and fields on either
side are nothing to them. They must not even look at the purple hills,
nor pause to hear the babble of the brooks. They must remain in the
dusty road where the guide-boards are. They must confine themselves
to the "fall of man," the expulsion from the garden, the "scheme of
salvation," the "second birth," the atonement, the happiness of the
redeemed, and the misery of the lost. They must be careful not to
express any new ideas upon these great questions. It is much safer for
them to quote from the works of the dead. The more vividly they describe
the sufferings of the unregenerate, of those who attended theatres and
balls, and drank wine in summer gardens on the Sabbath-day, and laughed
at priests, the better ministers they are supposed to be. They must show
that misery fits the good for heaven, while happiness prepares the bad
for hell; that the wicked get all their good things in this life, and
the good all their evil; that in this world God punishes the people he
loves, and in the next, the ones he hates; that happiness makes us bad
here, but not in heaven; that pain makes us good here, but not in hell.
No matter how absurd these things may appear to the carnal mind, they
must be preached and they must be believed. If they were reasonable,
there would be no virtue in believing. Even the publicans and sinners
believe reasonable things. To believe without evidence, or in spite of
it, is accounted as righteousness to the sincere and humble Christian.
The ministers are in duty bound to denounce all intellectual pride, and
show that we are never quite so dear to God as when we admit that we are
poor, corrupt and idiotic worms; that we never should have been born;
that we ought to be damned without the least delay; that we are so
infamous that we like to enjoy ourselves; that we love our wives and
children better than our God; that we are generous only because we are
vile; that we are honest from the meanest motives, and that sometimes we
have fallen so low that we have had doubts about the inspiration of the
Jewish Scriptures. In short, they are expected to denounce all pleasant
paths and rustling trees, to curse the grass and flowers, and glorify
the dust and weeds. They are expected to malign the wicked people in the
green and happy fields, who sit and laugh beside the gurgling springs or
climb the hills and wander as they will. They are expected to point out
the dangers of freedom, the safety of implicit obedience, and to show
the wickedness of philosophy, the goodness of faith, the immorality of
science and the purity of ignorance.
Now and then a few pious people discover some young man of a religious
turn of mind and a consumptive habit of body, not quite sickly enough
to die, nor healthy enough to be wicked. The idea occurs to them that
he would make a good orthodox minister. They take up a contribution, and
send the young man to some theological school where he can be taught to
repeat a creed and despise reason. Should it turn out that the young
man had some mind of his own, and, after graduating, should change his
opinions and preach a different doctrine from that taught in the school,
every man who contributed a dollar towards his education would feel that
he had been robbed, and would denounce him as a dishonest and ungrateful
wretch.
The pulpit should not be a pillory. Congregations should allow the
minister a little liberty. They should, at least, permit him to tell the
truth.
They have, in Massachusetts, at a place called Andover, a kind of
minister factory, where each professor takes an oath once in five
years--that time being considered the life of an oath--that he has not,
during the last five years, and will not, during the next five years,
intellectually advance. There is probably no oath that they could easier
keep. Probably, since the foundation stone of that institution was laid
there has not been a single case of perjury. The old creed is still
taught. They still insist that God is infinitely wise, powerful and
good, and that all men are totally depraved. They insist that the best
man God ever made, deserved to be damned the moment he was finished.
Andover puts its brand upon every minister it turns out, the same as
Sheffield and Birmingham brand their wares, and all who see the brand
know exactly what the minister believes, the books he has read, the
arguments he relies on, and just what he intellectually is. They know
just what he can be depended on to preach, and that he will continue to
shrink and shrivel, and grow solemnly stupid day by day until he reaches
the Andover of the grave and becomes truly orthodox forever.
I have not singled out the Andover factory because it is worse than the
others. They are all about the same. The professors, for the most part,
are ministers who failed in the pulpit and were retired to the seminary
on account of their deficiency in reason and their excess of faith. As
a rule, they know nothing of this world, and far less of the next; but
they have the power of stating the most absurd propositions with faces
solemn as stupidity touched by fear.
Something should be done for the liberation of these men. They should
be allowed to grow--to have sunlight and air. They should no longer
be chained and tied to confessions of faith, to mouldy books and
musty creeds. Thousands of ministers are anxious to give their honest
thoughts. The hands of wives and babes now stop their mouths. They
must have bread, and so the husbands and fathers are forced to preach
a doctrine that they hold in scorn. For the sake of shelter, food and
clothes, they are obliged to defend the childish miracles of the past,
and denounce the sublime discoveries of to-day. They are compelled to
attack all modern thought, to point out the dangers of science, the
wickedness of investigation and the corrupting influence of logic. It is
for them to show that virtue rests upon ignorance and faith, while vice
impudently feeds and fattens upon fact and demonstration. It is a part
of their business to malign and vilify the Voltaires, Humes, Paines,
Humboldts, Tyndalls, Haeckels, Darwins, Spencers, and Drapers, and
to bow with uncovered heads before the murderers, adulterers, and
persecutors of the world. They are, for the most part, engaged in
poisoning the minds of the young, prejudicing children against science,
teaching the astronomy and geology of the Bible, and inducing all to
desert the sublime standard of reason.
These orthodox ministers do not add to the sum of knowledge. They
produce nothing. They live upon alms. They hate laughter and joy. They
officiate at weddings, sprinkle water upon babes, and utter meaningless
words and barren promises above the dead. They laugh at the agony of
unbelievers, mock at their tears, and of their sorrows make a jest.
There are some noble exceptions. Now and then a pulpit holds a brave
and honest man. Their congregations are willing that they should
think--willing that their ministers should have a little freedom.
As we become civilized, more and more liberty will be accorded to these
men, until finally ministers will give their best and highest thoughts.
The congregations will finally get tired of hearing about the patriarchs
and saints, the miracles and wonders, and will insist upon knowing
something about the men and women of our day, and the accomplishments
and discoveries of our time. They will finally insist upon knowing how
to escape the evils of this world instead of the next. They will ask
light upon the enigmas of this life. They will wish to know what we
shall do with our criminals instead of what God will do with his--how
we shall do away with beggary and want--with crime and misery--with
prostitution, disease and famine,--with tyranny in all its cruel
forms--with prisons and scaffolds, and how we shall reward the honest
workers, and fill the world with happy homes! These are the problems
for the pulpits and congregations of an enlightened future. If Science
cannot finally answer these questions, it is a vain and worthless thing.
The clergy, however, will continue to answer them in the old way, until
their congregations are good enough to set them free. They will still
talk about believing in the Lord Jesus Christ, as though that were the
only remedy for all human ills. They will still teach that retrogression
is the only path that leads to light; that we must go back, that faith
is the only sure guide, and that reason is a delusive glare, lighting
only the road to eternal pain.
Until the clergy are free they cannot be intellectually honest. We can
never tell what they really believe until they know that they can safely
speak. They console themselves now by a secret resolution to be as
liberal as they dare, with the hope that they can finally educate
their congregations to the point of allowing them to think a little for
themselves. They hardly know what they ought to do. The best part of
their lives has been wasted in studying subjects of no possible value.
Most of them are married, have families, and know but one way of making
their living. Some of them say that if they do not preach these foolish
dogmas, others will, and that they may through fear, after all, restrain
mankind. Besides, they hate publicly to admit that they are mistaken,
that the whole thing is a delusion, that the "scheme of salvation" is
absurd, and that the Bible is no better than some other books, and worse
than most.
You can hardly expect a bishop to leave his palace, or the pope to
vacate the Vatican. As long as people want popes, plenty of hypocrites
will be found to take the place. And as long as labor fatigues, there
will be found a good many men willing to preach once a week, if other
folks will work and give them bread. In other words, while the demand
lasts, the supply will never fail.
If the people were a little more ignorant, astrology would flourish--if
a little more enlightened, religion would perish!
II. FREE SCHOOLS.
It is also my desire to free the schools. When a professor in a college
finds a fact, he should make it known, even if it is inconsistent with
something Moses said. Public opinion must not compel the professor to
hide a fact, and, "like the base Indian, throw the pearl away." With the
single exception of Cornell, there is not a college in the United
States where truth has ever been a welcome guest. The moment one of the
teachers denies the inspiration of the Bible, he is discharged. If he
discovers a fact inconsistent with that book, so much the worse for the
fact, and especially for the discoverer of the fact. He must not corrupt
the minds of his pupils with demonstrations. He must beware of
every truth that cannot, in some way be made to harmonize with the
superstitions of the Jews. Science has nothing in common with religion.
Facts and miracles never did, and never will agree. They are not in the
least related. They are deadly foes. What has religion to do with
facts? Nothing. Can there be Methodist mathematics, Catholic astronomy,
Presbyterian geology, Baptist biology, or Episcopal botany? Why, then,
should a sectarian college exist? Only that which somebody knows should
be taught in our schools. We should not collect taxes to pay people for
guessing. The common school is the bread of life for the people, and it
should not be touched by the withering hand of superstition.
Our country will never be filled with great institutions of learning
until there is an absolute divorce between Church and School. As long
as the mutilated records of a barbarous people are placed by priest and
professor above the reason of mankind, we shall reap but little benefit
from church or school.
Instead of dismissing professors for finding something out, let us
rather discharge those who do not. Let each teacher understand that
investigation is not dangerous for him; that his bread is safe, no
matter how much truth he may discover, and that his salary will not be
reduced, simply because he finds that the ancient Jews did not know the
entire history of the world.
Besides, it is not fair to make the Catholic support a Protestant
school, nor is it just to collect taxes from infidels and atheists to
support schools in which any system of religion is taught.
The sciences are not sectarian. People do not persecute each other on
account of disagreements in mathematics. Families are not divided about
botany, and astronomy does not even tend to make a man hate his father
and mother. It is what people do not know, that they persecute each
other about. Science will bring, not a sword, but peace.
Just as long as religion has control of the schools, science will be an
outcast. Let us free our institutions of learning. Let us dedicate them
to the science of eternal truth. Let us tell every teacher to ascertain
all the facts he can--to give us light, to follow Nature, no matter
where she leads; to be infinitely true to himself and us; to feel that
he is without a chain, except the obligation to be honest; that he is
bound by no books, by no creed, neither by the sayings of the dead nor
of the living; that he is asked to look with his own eyes, to reason for
himself without fear, to investigate in every possible direction, and to
bring us the fruit of all his work.
At present, a good many men engaged in scientific pursuits, and who
have signally failed in gaining recognition among their fellows, are
endeavoring to make reputations among the churches by delivering weak
and vapid lectures upon the "harmony of Genesis and Geology." Like all
hypocrites, these men overstate the case to such a degree, and so
turn and pervert facts and words that they succeed only in gaining the
applause of other hypocrites like themselves. Among the great scientists
they are regarded as generals regard sutlers who trade with both armies.
Surely the time must come when the wealth of the world will not be
wasted in the propagation of ignorant creeds and miraculous mistakes.
The time must come when churches and cathedrals will be dedicated to the
use of man; when minister and priest will deem the discoveries of the
living of more importance than the errors of the dead; when the truths
of Nature will outrank the "sacred" falsehoods of the past, and when a
single fact will outweigh all the miracles of Holy Writ.
Who can over estimate the progress of the world if all the money
wasted in superstition could be used to enlighten, elevate and civilize
mankind?
When every church becomes a school, every cathedral a university, every
clergyman a teacher, and all their hearers brave and honest
thinkers, then, and not until then, will the dream of poet, patriot,
philanthropist and philosopher, become a real and blessed truth.
III. THE POLITICIANS.
I would like also to liberate the politician. At present, the successful
office-seeker is a good deal like the centre of the earth; he weighs
nothing himself, but draws everything else to him. There are so many
societies, so many churches, so many isms, that it is almost impossible
for an independent man to succeed in a political career. Candidates are
forced to pretend that they are Catholics with Protestant proclivities,
or Christians with liberal tendencies, or temperance men who now and
then take a glass of wine, or, that although not members of any church
their wives are, and that they subscribe liberally to all. The result of
all this is that we reward hypocrisy and elect men entirely destitute of
real principle; and this will never change until the people become grand
enough to allow each other to do their own thinking, our Government
should be entirely and purely secular. The religious views of a
candidate should be kept entirely out of sight. He should not be
compelled to give his opinion as to the inspiration of the Bible, the
propriety of infant baptism, or the immaculate conception. All these
things are private and personal. He should be allowed to settle such
things for himself, and should he decide contrary to the law and will of
God, let him settle the matter with God. The people ought to be wise
enough to select as their officers men who know something of political
affairs, who comprehend the present greatness, and clearly perceive the
future grandeur of our country. If we were in a storm at sea, with deck
wave-washed and masts strained and bent with storm, and it was necessary
to reef the top sail, we certainly would not ask the brave sailor who
volunteered to go aloft, what his opinion was on the five points of
Calvinism. Our Government has nothing to do with religion. It is neither
Christian nor pagan; it is secular. But as long as the people persist in
voting for or against men on account of their religious views, just so
long will hypocrisy hold place and power. Just so long will the
candidates crawl in the dust--hide their opinions, flatter those with
whom they differ, pretend to agree with those whom they despise; and
just so long will honest men be trampled under foot. Churches are
becoming political organizations. Nearly every Catholic is a Democrat;
nearly every Methodist in the North is a Republican.
It probably will not be long until the churches will divide as sharply
upon political, as upon theological questions; and when that day comes,
if there are not liberals enough to hold the balance of power, this
Government will be destroyed. The liberty of man is not safe in the
hands of any church. Wherever the Bible and sword are in partnership,
man is a slave.
All laws for the purpose of making man worship God, are born of the same
spirit that kindled the fires of the _auto da fe_, and lovingly built
the dungeons of the Inquisition. All laws defining and punishing
blasphemy--making it a crime to give your honest ideas about the Bible,
or to laugh at the ignorance of the ancient Jews, or to enjoy yourself
on the Sabbath, or to give your opinion of Jehovah, were passed by
impudent bigots, and should be at once repealed by honest men. An
infinite God ought to be able to protect himself, without going in
partnership with State Legislatures. Certainly he ought not so to act
that laws become necessary to keep him from being laughed at. No one
thinks of protecting Shakespeare from ridicule, by the threat of fine
and imprisonment. It strikes me that God might write a book that would
not necessarily excite the laughter of his children. In fact, I think
it would be safe to say that a real God could produce a work that would
excite the admiration of mankind. Surely politicians could be better
employed than in passing laws to protect the literary reputation of the
Jewish God.
IV. MAN AND WOMAN
Let us forget that we are Baptists, Methodists,
Catholics, Presbyterians, or Freethinkers, and remember only that we are
men and women. After all, man and woman are the highest possible titles.
All other names belittle us, and show that we have, to a certain extent,
given up our individuality, and have consented to wear the collar of
authority--that we are followers. Throwing away these names, let us
examine these questions not as partisans, but as human beings with hopes
and fears in common.
We know that our opinions depend, to a great degree, upon our
surroundings--upon race, country, and education. We are all the result
of numberless conditions, and inherit vices and virtues, truths and
prejudices. If we had been born in England, surrounded by wealth and
clothed with power, most of us would have been Episcopalians, and
believed in church and state. We should have insisted that the people
needed a religion, and that not having intellect enough to provide one
for themselves, it was our duty to make one for them, and then compel
them to support it. We should have believed it indecent to officiate in
a pulpit without wearing a gown, and that prayers should be read from
a book. Had we belonged to the lower classes, we might have been
dissenters and protested against the mummeries of the High Church.
Had we been born in Turkey, most of us would have been Mohammedans and
believed in the inspiration of the Koran. We should have believed that
Mohammed actually visited heaven and became acquainted with an angel by
the name of Gabriel, who was so broad between the eyes that it required
three hundred days for a very smart camel to travel the distance. If
some man had denied this story we should probably have denounced him as
a dangerous person, one who was endeavoring to undermine the foundations
of society, and to destroy all distinction between virtue and vice. We
should have said to him, "What do you propose to give us in place
of that angel? We cannot afford to give up an angel of that size for
nothing." We would have insisted that the best and wisest men
believed the Koran. We would have quoted from the works and letters of
philosophers, generals and sultans, to show that the Koran was the best
of books, and that Turkey was indebted to that book and to that alone
for its greatness and prosperity. We would have asked that man whether
he knew more than all the great minds of his country, whether he was so
much wiser than his fathers? We would have pointed out to him the fact
that thousands had been consoled in the hour of death by passages from
the Koran; that they had died with glazed eyes brightened by visions of
the heavenly harem, and gladly left this world of grief and tears.
We would have regarded Christians as the vilest of men, and on all
occasions would have repeated "There is but one God, and Mohammed is his
prophet!"
So, if we had been born in India, we should in all probability have
believed in the religion of that country. We should have regarded the
old records as true and sacred, and looked upon a wandering priest as
better than the men from whom he begged, and by whose labor he lived.
We should have believed in a god with three heads instead of three gods
with one head, as we do now.
Now and then some one says that the religion of his father and mother
is good enough for him, and wonders why anybody should desire a better.
Surely we are not bound to follow our parents in religion any more than
in politics, science or art. China has been petrified by the worship
of ancestors. If our parents had been satisfied with the religion of
theirs, we would be still less advanced than we are. If we are, in any
way, bound by the belief of our fathers, the doctrine will hold good
back to the first people who had a religion; and if this doctrine is
true, we ought now to be believers in that first religion. In other
words, we would all be barbarians. You cannot show real respect to your
parents by perpetuating their errors. Good fathers and mothers wish
their children to advance, to overcome obstacles which baffled them, and
to correct the errors of their education. If you wish to reflect credit
upon your parents, accomplish more than they did, solve problems that
they could not understand, and build better than they knew. To sacrifice
your manhood upon the grave of your father is an honor to neither. Why
should a son who has examined a subject, throw away his reason and adopt
the views of his mother? Is not such a course dishonorable to both?
We must remember that this "ancestor" argument is as old at least as
the second generation of men, that it has served no purpose except to
enslave mankind, and results mostly from the fact that acquiescence
is easier than investigation. This argument pushed to its logical
conclusion, would prevent the advance of all people whose parents were
not Freethinkers.
It is hard for many people to give up the religion in which they were
born; to admit that their fathers were utterly mistaken, and that the
sacred records of their country are but collections of myths and fables.
But when we look for a moment at the world, we find that each nation has
its "sacred records"--its religion, and its ideas of worship. Certainly
all cannot be right; and as it would require a life time to investigate
the claims of these various systems, it is hardly fair to damn a man
forever, simply because he happens to believe the wrong one. All these
religions were produced by barbarians. Civilized nations have contented
themselves with changing the religions of their barbaric ancestors, but
they have made none. Nearly all these religions are intensely selfish.
Each one was made by some contemptible little nation that regarded
itself as of almost infinite importance, and looked upon the other
nations as beneath the notice of their god. In all these countries it
was a crime to deny the sacred records, to laugh at the priests, to
speak disrespectfully of the gods, to fail to divide your substance
with the lazy hypocrites who managed your affairs in the next world upon
condition that you would support them in this. In the olden time
these theological people who quartered themselves upon the honest
and industrious, were called soothsayers, seers, charmers, prophets,
enchanters, sorcerers, wizards, astrologers, and impostors, but now,
they are known as clergymen.
We are no exception to the general rule, and consequently have our
sacred books as well as the rest. Of course, it is claimed by many of
our people that our books are the only true ones, the only ones that the
real God ever wrote, or had anything whatever to do with. They insist
that all other sacred books were written by hypocrites and impostors;
that the Jews were the only people that God ever had any personal
intercourse with, and that all other prophets and seers were inspired
only by impudence and mendacity. True, it seems somewhat strange that
God should have chosen a barbarous and unknown people who had little or
nothing to do with the other nations of the earth, as his messengers to
the rest of mankind.
It is not easy to account for an infinite God making people so low in
the scale of intellect as to require a revelation. Neither is it easy to
perceive why, if a revelation was necessary for all, it was made only
to a few. Of course, I know that it is extremely wicked to suggest these
thoughts, and that ignorance is the only armor that can effectually
protect you from the wrath of God. I am aware that investigators with
all their genius, never find the road to heaven; that those who look
where they are going are sure to miss it, and that only those who
voluntarily put out their eyes and implicitly depend upon blindness can
surely keep the narrow path.
Whoever reads our sacred book is compelled to believe it or suffer
forever the torments of the lost. We are told that we have the privilege
of examining it for ourselves; but this privilege is only extended to
us on the condition that we believe it whether it appears reasonable or
not. We may disagree with others as much as we please upon the meaning
of all passages in the Bible, but we must not deny the truth of a single
word. We must believe that the book is inspired. If we obey its every
precept without believing in its inspiration we will be damned just as
certainly as though we disobeyed its every word. We have no right to
weigh it in the scales of reason--to test it by the laws of nature, or
the facts of observation and experience. To do this, we are told, is to
put ourselves above the word of God, and sit in judgment on the works of
our creator.
For my part, I cannot admit that belief is a voluntary thing. It seems
to me that evidence, even in spite of ourselves, will have its weight,
and that whatever our wish may be, we are compelled to stand with
fairness by the scales, and give the exact result. It will not do to say
that we reject the Bible because we are wicked. Our wickedness must be
ascertained not from our belief but from our acts.
I am told by the clergy that I ought not to attack the Bible; that I am
leading thousands to perdition and rendering certain the damnation of my
own soul. They have had the kindness to advise me that, if my object is
to make converts, I am pursuing the wrong course. They tell me to use
gentler expressions, and more cunning words. Do they really wish me
to make more converts? If their advice is honest, they are traitors to
their trust. If their advice is not honest, then they are unfair with
me. Certainly they should wish me to pursue the course that will make
the fewest converts, and yet they pretend to tell me how my influence
could be increased. It may be, that upon this principle John Bright
advises America to adopt free trade, so that our country can become a
successful rival of Great Britain. Sometimes I think that even ministers
are not entirely candid.
Notwithstanding the advice of the clergy, I have concluded to pursue my
own course, to tell my honest thoughts, and to have my freedom in this
world whatever my fate may be in the next.
The real oppressor, enslaver and corrupter of the people is the Bible.
That book is the chain that binds, the dungeon that holds the clergy.
That book spreads the pall of superstition over the colleges and
schools. That book puts out the eyes of science, and makes honest
investigation a crime. That book unmans the politician and degrades the
people. That book fills the world with bigotry, hypocrisy and fear.
It plays the same part in our country that has been played by "sacred
records" in all the nations of the world.
A little while ago I saw one of the Bibles of the Middle Ages. It was
about two feet in length, and one and a half in width. It had immense
oaken covers, with hasps, and clasps, and hinges large enough almost
for the doors of a penitentiary. It was covered with pictures of winged
angels and aureoled saints. In my imagination I saw this book carried
to the cathedral altar in solemn pomp--heard the chant of robed and
kneeling priests, felt the strange tremor of the organ's peal; saw the
colored light streaming through windows stained and touched by blood
and flame--the swinging censer with its perfumed incense rising to the
mighty roof, dim with height and rich with legend carved in stone, while
on the walls was hung, written in light, and shade, and all the colors
that can tell of joy and tears, the pictured history of the martyred
Christ. The people fell upon their knees. The book was opened, and the
priest read the messages from God to man. To the multitude, the book
itself was evidence enough that it was not the work of human hands. How
could those little marks and lines and dots contain, like tombs, the
thoughts of men, and how could they, touched by a ray of light from
human eyes, give up their dead? How could these characters span the vast
chasm dividing the present from the past, and make it possible for the
living still to hear the voices of the dead?
V. THE PENTATEUCH
The first five books in our Bible are known as the Pentateuch. For a
long time it was supposed that Moses was the author, and among the
ignorant the supposition still prevails. As a matter of fact, it seems
to be well settled that Moses had nothing to do with these books, and
that they were not written until he had been dust and ashes for hundreds
of years. But, as all the churches still insist that he was the author,
that he wrote even an account of his own death and burial, let us speak
of him as though these books were in fact written by him. As the
Christians maintain that God was the real author, it makes but little
difference whom he employed as his pen.
Nearly all authors of sacred books have given an account of the creation
of the universe, the origin of matter, and the destiny of the human
race, all have pointed out the obligation that man is under to his
creator for having placed him upon the earth, and allowed him to live
and suffer, and have taught that nothing short of the most abject
worship could possibly compensate God for his trouble and labor suffered
and done for the good of man. They have nearly all insisted that we
should thank God for all that is good in life; but they have not all
informed us as to whom we should hold responsible for the evils we
endure.
Moses differed from most of the makers of sacred books by his failure
to say anything of a future life, by failing to promise heaven, and to
threaten hell. Upon the subject of a future state, there is not one
word in the Pentateuch. Probably at that early day God did not deem
it important to make a revelation as to the eternal destiny of man.
He seems to have thought that he could control the Jews, at least, by
rewards and punishments in this world, and so he kept the frightful
realities of eternal joy and torment a profound secret from the people
of his choice. He thought it far more important to tell the Jews their
origin than to enlighten them as to their destiny.
We must remember that every tribe and nation has some way in which, the
more striking phenomena of nature are accounted for. These accounts
are handed down by tradition, changed by numberless narrators as
intelligence increases, or to account for newly discovered facts, or for
the purpose of satisfying the appetite for the marvelous.
The way in which a tribe or nation accounts for day and night, the
change of seasons, the fall of snow and rain, the flight of birds,
the origin of the rainbow, the peculiarities of animals, the dreams
of sleep, the visions of the insane, the existence of earthquakes,
volcanoes, storms, lightning and the thousand things that attract the
attention and excite the wonder, fear or admiration of mankind, may be
called the philosophy of that tribe or nation. And as all phenomena are,
by savage and barbaric man accounted for as the action of intelligent
beings for the accomplishment of certain objects, and as these beings
were supposed to have the power to assist or injure man, certain things
were supposed necessary for man to do in order to gain the assistance,
and avoid the anger of these gods. Out of this belief grew certain
ceremonies, and these ceremonies united with the belief, formed
religion; and consequently every religion has for its foundation a
misconception of the cause of phenomena.
All worship is necessarily based upon the belief that some being exists
who can, if he will, change the natural order of events. The savage
prays to a stone that he calls a god, while the Christian prays to a god
that he calls a spirit, and the prayers of both are equally useful. The
savage and the Christian put behind the Universe an intelligent cause,
and this cause whether represented by one god or many, has been, in all
ages, the object of all worship. To carry a fetich, to utter a prayer,
to count beads, to abstain from food, to sacrifice a lamb, a child or an
enemy, are simply different ways by which the accomplishment of the same
object is sought, and are all the offspring of the same error.
Many systems of religion must have existed many ages before the art of
writing was discovered, and must have passed through many changes before
the stories, miracles, histories, prophecies and mistakes became fixed
and petrified in written words. After that, change was possible only by
giving new meanings to old words, a process rendered necessary by the
continual acquisition of facts somewhat inconsistent with a literal
interpretation of the "sacred records." In this way an honest faith
often prolongs its life by dishonest methods; and in this way the
Christians of to-day are trying to harmonize the Mosaic account of
creation with the theories and discoveries of modern science.
Admitting that Moses was the author of the Pentateuch, or that he gave
to the Jews a religion, the question arises as to where he obtained
his information. We are told by the theologians that he received his
knowledge from God, and that every word he wrote was and is the exact
truth. It is admitted at the same time that he was an adopted son of
Pharaoh's daughter, and enjoyed the rank and privilege of a prince.
Under such circumstances, he must have been well acquainted with the
literature, philosophy and religion of the Egyptians, and must have
known what they believed and taught as to the creation of the world.
Now, if the account of the origin of this earth as given by Moses is
substantially like that given by the Egyptians, then we must conclude
that he learned it from them. Should we imagine that he was divinely
inspired because he gave to the Jews what the Egyptians had given him?
The Egyptian priests taught _first_, that a god created the original
matter, leaving it in a state of chaos; _second_, that a god moulded it
into form; _third_, that the breath of a god moved upon the face of
the deep; _fourth_, that a god created simply by saying "Let it be;"
_fifth_, that a god created light before the sun existed.
Nothing can be clearer than that Moses received from the Egyptians the
principal parts of his narrative, making such changes and additions as
were necessary to satisfy the peculiar superstitions of his own people.
If some man at the present day should assert that he had received from
God the theories of evolution, the survival of the fittest, and the
law of heredity, and we should afterwards find that he was not only an
Englishman, but had lived in the family of Charles Darwin, we certainly
would account for his having these theories in a natural way, So, if
Darwin himself should pretend that he was inspired, and had obtained
his peculiar theories from God, we should probably reply that his
grandfather suggested the same ideas, and that Lamarck published
substantially the same theories the same year that Mr. Darwin was born.
Now, if we have sufficient courage, we will, by the same course of
reasoning, account for the story of creation found in the Bible. We
will say that it contains the belief of Moses, and that he received his
information from the Egyptians, and not from God. If we take the account
as the absolute truth and use it for the purpose of determining the
value of modern thought, scientific advancement becomes impossible. And
even if the account of the creation as given by Moses should turn out
to be true, and should be so admitted by all the scientific world, the
claim that he was inspired would still be without the least particle
of proof. We would be forced to admit that he knew more than we had
supposed. It certainly is no proof that a man is inspired simply because
he is right.
No one pretends that Shakespeare was inspired, and yet all the writers
of the books of the Old Testament put together, could not have produced
Hamlet.
Why should we, looking upon some rough and awkward thing, or god in
stone, say that it must have been produced by some inspired sculptor,
and with the same breath pronounce the _Venus de Milo_ to be the work
of man? Why should we, looking at some ancient daub of angel, saint or
virgin, say its painter must have been assisted by a god?
Let us account for all we see by the facts we know. If there are things
for which we cannot account, let us wait for light. To account for
anything by supernatural agencies is, in fact to say that we do not
know. Theology is not what we know about God, but what we do not know
about Nature. In order to increase our respect for the Bible, it became
necessary for the priests to exalt and extol that book, and at the same
time to decry and belittle the reasoning powers of man. The whole
power of the pulpit has been used for hundreds of years to destroy the
confidence of man in himself--to induce him to distrust his own powers
of thought, to believe that he was wholly unable to decide any question
for himself, and that all human virtue consists in faith and obedience.
The church has said, "Believe, and obey! If you reason, you will become
an unbeliever, and unbelievers will be lost. If you disobey, you will
do so through vain pride and curiosity, and will, like Adam and Eve, be
thrust from Paradise forever!"
For my part, I care nothing for what the church says, except in so far
as it accords with my reason; and the Bible is nothing to me, only in so
far as it agrees with what I think or know.
All books should be examined in the same spirit, and truth should be
welcomed and falsehood exposed, no matter in what volume they may be
found.
Let us in this spirit examine the Pentateuch; and if anything appears
unreasonable, contradictory or absurd, let us have the honesty and
courage to admit it. Certainly no good can result either from deceiving
ourselves or others. Many millions have implicitly believed this book,
and have just as implicitly believed that polygamy was sanctioned by
God. Millions have regarded this book as the foundation of all
human progress, and at the same time looked upon slavery as a divine
institution. Millions have declared this book to have been infinitely
holy, and to prove that they were right, have imprisoned, robbed
and burned their fellow-men. The inspiration of this book has been
established by famine, sword and fire, by dungeon, chain and whip, by
dagger and by rack, by force and fear and fraud, and generations have
been frightened by threats of hell, and bribed with promises of heaven.
Let us examine a portion of this book, not in the darkness of our fear,
but in the light of reason.
And first, let us examine the account given of the creation of this
world, commenced, according to the Bible, on Monday morning about five
thousand eight hundred and eighty-three years ago.
VI. MONDAY.
Moses commences his story by telling us that in the beginning God
created the heaven and the earth.
If this means anything, it means that God produced, caused to exist,
called into being, the heaven and the earth. It will not do to say that
he formed the heaven and the earth of previously existing matter. Moses
conveys, and intended to convey the idea that the matter of which the
heaven and the earth are composed, was created.
It is impossible for me to conceive of something being created from
nothing. Nothing, regarded in the light of a raw material, is a decided
failure. I cannot conceive of matter apart from force. Neither is it
possible to think of force disconnected with matter. You cannot imagine
matter going back to absolute nothing. Neither can you imagine nothing
being changed into something. You may be eternally damned if you do not
say that you can conceive these things, but you cannot conceive them.
Such is the constitution of the human mind that it cannot even think of
a commencement or an end of matter, or force.
If God created the universe, there was a time when he commenced to
create. Back of that commencement there must have been an eternity. In
that eternity what was this God doing? He certainly did not think.
There was nothing to think about. He did not remember. Nothing had ever
happened. What did he do? Can you imagine anything more absurd than an
infinite intelligence in infinite nothing wasting an eternity?
I do not pretend to tell how all these things really are; but I do
insist that a statement that cannot possibly be comprehended by any
human being, and that appears utterly impossible, repugnant to every
fact of experience, and contrary to everything that we really know, must
be rejected by every honest man.
We can conceive of eternity, because we cannot conceive of a cessation
of time. We can conceive of infinite space because we cannot conceive
of so much matter that our imagination will not stand upon the farthest
star, and see infinite space beyond. In other words, we cannot conceive
of a cessation of time; therefore eternity is a necessity of the mind.
Eternity sustains the same relation to time that space does to matter.
In the time of Moses, it was perfectly safe for him to write an account
of the creation of the world. He had simply to put in form the crude
notions of the people. At that time, no other Jew could have written
a better account. Upon that subject he felt at liberty to give his
imagination full play. There was no one who could authoritatively
contradict anything he might say. It was substantially the same story
that had been imprinted in curious characters upon the clay records
of Babylon, the gigantic monuments of Egypt, and the gloomy temples of
India. In those days there was an almost infinite difference between
the educated and ignorant. The people were controlled almost entirely
by signs and wonders. By the lever of fear, priests moved the world. The
sacred records were made and kept, and altered by them. The people could
not read, and looked upon one who could, as almost a god. In our day it
is hard to conceive of the influence of an educated class in a barbarous
age. It was only necessary to produce the "sacred record," and ignorance
fell upon its face. The people were taught that the record was inspired,
and therefore true. They were not taught that it was true, and therefore
inspired.
After all, the real question is not whether the Bible is inspired, but
whether it is true. If it is true, it does not need to be inspired. If
it is true, it makes no difference whether it was written by a man or a
god. The multiplication table is just as useful, just as true as though
God had arranged the figures himself. If the Bible is really true,
the claim of inspiration need not be urged; and if it is not true, its
inspiration can hardly be established. As a matter of fact, the truth
does not need to be inspired. Nothing needs inspiration except a
falsehood or a mistake. Where truth ends, where probability stops,
inspiration begins. A fact never went into partnership with a miracle.
Truth does not need the assistance of miracle. A fact will fit every
other fact in the Universe, because it is the product of all other
facts. A lie will fit nothing except another lie made for the express
purpose of fitting it. After a while the man gets tired of lying, and
then the last lie will not fit the next fact, and then there is an
opportunity to use a miracle. Just at that point, it is necessary to
have a little inspiration.
It seems to me that reason is the highest attribute of man, and that if
there can be any communication from God to man, it must be addressed
to his reason. It does not seem possible that in order to understand a
message from God it is absolutely essential to throw our reason away.
How could God make known his will to any being destitute of reason? How
can any man accept as a revelation from God that which is unreasonable
to him? God cannot make a revelation to another man for me. He must make
it to me, and until he convinces my reason that it is true, I cannot
receive it.
The statement that in the beginning God created the heaven and the
earth, I cannot accept. It is contrary to my reason, and I cannot
believe it. It appears reasonable to me that force has existed from
eternity. Force cannot, as it appears to me, exist apart from matter.
Force, in its nature, is forever active, and without matter it could
not act; and so I think matter must have existed forever. To conceive
of matter without force, or of force without matter, or of a time when
neither existed, or of a being who existed for an eternity without
either, and who out of nothing created both, is to me utterly
impossible. I may be damned on this account, but I cannot help it. In my
judgment, Moses was mistaken.
It will not do to say that Moses merely intended to tell what God did,
in making the heavens and the earth out of matter then in existence.
He distinctly states that in the _beginning_ God created them. If this
account is true, we must believe that God, existing in infinite space
surrounded by eternal nothing, naught and void, created, produced,
called into being, willed into existence this universe of countless
stars.
The next thing we are told by this inspired gentleman is, that God
created light, and proceeded to divide it from the darkness.
Certainly, the person who wrote this believed that darkness was a thing,
an entity, a material that could get mixed and tangled up with light,
and that these entities, light and darkness, had to be separated. In his
imagination he probably saw God throwing pieces and chunks of darkness
on one side, and rays and beams of light on the other. It is hard for a
man who has been born but once to understand these things. For my part,
I cannot understand how light can be separated from darkness. I had
always supposed that darkness was simply the absence of light, and that
under no circumstances could it be necessary to take the darkness away
from the light. It is certain, however, that Moses believed darkness to
be a form of matter, because I find that in another place he speaks of
a darkness that could be felt. They used to have on exhibition at Rome a
bottle of the darkness that overspread Egypt.
You cannot divide light from darkness any more than you can divide heat
from cold. Cold is an absence of heat, and darkness is an absence of
light. I suppose that we have no conception of absolute cold. We know
only degrees of heat. Twenty degrees below zero is just twenty degrees
warmer than forty degrees below zero. Neither cold nor darkness are
entities, and these words express simply either the absolute or partial
absence of heat or light. I cannot conceive how light can be divided
from darkness, but I can conceive how a barbarian several thousand years
ago, writing upon a subject about which he knew nothing, could make a
mistake. The creator of light could not have written in this way. If
such a being exists, he must have known the nature of that "mode of
motion" that paints the earth on every eye, and clothes in garments
seven-hued this universe of worlds.
VII. TUESDAY.
We are next informed by Moses that "God of the waters, and let it divide
the waters from the waters;" and that "God made the firmament, and
divided the waters which were under the firmament from the waters
which were above the firmament." What did the writer mean by the word
firmament? Theologians now tell us that he meant an "expanse." This will
not do. How could an expanse divide the waters from the waters, so that
the waters above the expanse would not fall into and mingle with the
waters below the expanse? The truth is that Moses regarded the firmament
as a solid affair. It was where God lived, and where water was kept. It
was for this reason that they used to pray for rain. They supposed that
some angel could with a lever raise a gate and let out the quantity of
moisture desired. It was with the water from this firmament that the
world was drowned when the windows of heaven were opened. It was in this
said Let there be a firmament in the midst firmament that the sons of
God lived--the sons who "saw the daughters of men that they were
fair and took them wives of all which they chose." The issue of such
marriages were giants, and "the same became mighty men which were of
old, men of renown."
Nothing is clearer than that Moses regarded the firmament as a vast
material division that separated the waters of the world, and upon
whose floor God lived, surrounded by his sons. In no other way could he
account for rain. Where did the water come from? He knew nothing about
the laws of evaporation. He did not know that the sun wooed with amorous
kisses the waves of the sea, and that they, clad in glorified mist
rising to meet their lover, were, by disappointment, changed to tears
and fell as rain.
The idea that the firmament was the abode of the Deity must have been in
the mind of Moses when he related the dream of Jacob. "And he dreamed,
and behold, a ladder set upon the earth and the top of it reached to
heaven; and behold the angels of God ascending and descending on it; and
behold the Lord stood above it and said, I am the Lord God."
So, when the people were building the tower of Babel "the Lord came down
to see the city, and the tower which the children of men builded. And
the Lord said, Behold the people is one, and they have all one language:
and this they begin to do; and nothing will be restrained from them
which they imagined to do. Go to, let us go down and confound their
language that they may not understand one another's speech."
The man who wrote that absurd account must have believed that God lived
above the earth, in the firmament. The same idea was in the mind of the
Psalmist when he said that God "bowed the heavens and came down."
Of course, God could easily remove any person bodily to heaven, as it
was but a little way above the earth. "Enoch walked with God, and he was
not, for God took him." The accounts in the Bible of the ascension of
Elijah, Christ and St. Paul were born of the belief that the firmament
was the dwelling-place of God. It probably never occurred to these
writers that if the firmament was seven or eight miles away, Enoch and
the rest would have been frozen perfectly stiff long before the journey
could have been completed. Possibly Elijah might have made the voyage,
as he was carried to heaven in a chariot of fire "by a whirlwind."
The truth is, that Moses was mistaken, and upon that mistake the
Christians located their heaven and their hell. The telescope destroyed
the firmament, did away with the heaven of the New Testament, rendered
the ascension of our Lord and the assumption of his Mother infinitely
absurd, crumbled to chaos the gates and palaces of the New Jerusalem,
and in their places gave to man a wilderness of worlds.
VIII. WEDNESDAY.
We are next informed by the historian of creation, that after God had
finished making the firmament and had succeeded in dividing the waters
by means of an "expanse," he proceeded "to gather the waters on the
earth together in seas, so that the dry land might appear."
Certainly the writer of this did not have any conception of the real
form of the earth. He could not have known anything of the attraction of
gravitation. He must have regarded the earth as flat and supposed that
it required considerable force and power to induce the water to leave
the mountains and collect in the valleys. Just as soon as the water was
forced to run down hill, the dry land appeared, and the grass began to
grow, and the mantles of green were thrown over the shoulders of the
hills, and the trees laughed into bud and blossom, and the branches were
laden with fruit. And all this happened before a ray had left the quiver
of the sun, before a glittering beam had thrilled the bosom of a flower,
and before the Dawn with trembling hands had drawn aside the curtains of
the East and welcomed to her arms the eager god of Day.
It does not seem to me that grass and trees could grow and ripen into
seed and fruit without the sun. According to the account, this all
happened on the third day. Now, if, as the Christians say, Moses did not
mean by the word day a period of twenty-four hours, but an immense and
almost measureless space of time, and as God did not, according to this
view make any animals until the fifth day, that is, not for millions of
years after he made the grass and trees, for what purpose did he cause
the trees to bear fruit?
Moses says that God said on the third day, "Let the earth bring forth
grass, the herb yielding seed, and the fruit tree yielding fruit after
his kind, whose seed is in itself upon the earth; and it was so. And the
earth brought forth grass and herb yielding seed after his kind, and the
tree yielding fruit whose seed was in itself after his kind; and God saw
that it was good, and the evening and the morning were the third day."
There was nothing to eat this fruit; not an insect with painted wings
sought the honey of the flowers; not a single living, breathing thing
upon the earth. Plenty of grass, a great variety of herbs, an abundance
of fruit, but not a mouth in all the world. If Moses is right, this
state of things lasted only two days; but if the modern theologians are
correct, it continued for millions of ages.
"It is now well known that the organic history of the earth can be
properly divided into five epochs--the Primordial, Primary, Secondary,
Tertiary, and Quaternary. Each of these epochs is characterized by
animal and vegetable life peculiar to itself. In the First will be found
Algæ and Skulless Vertebrates, in the Second, Ferns and Fishes, in the
Third, Pine Forests and Reptiles, in the Fourth, Foliaceous Forests and
Mammals, and in the Fifth, Man."
How much more reasonable this is than the idea that the earth was
covered with grass, and herbs, and trees loaded with fruit for millions
of years before an animal existed.
There is, in Nature, an even balance forever kept between the total
amounts of animal and vegetable life. "In her wonderful economy she must
form and bountifully nourish her vegetable progeny--twin-brother life to
her, with that of animals. The perfect balance between plant existences
and animal existences must always be maintained, while matter courses
through the eternal circle, becoming each in turn. If an animal be
resolved into its ultimate constituents in a period according to the
surrounding circumstances, say, of four hours, of four months, of four
years, or even of four thousand years,--for it is impossible to deny
that there may be instances of all these periods during which the
process has continued--those elements which assume the gaseous form
mingle at once with the atmosphere and are taken up from it without
delay by the ever-open mouths of vegetable life. By a thousand pores
in every leaf the carbonic acid which renders the atmosphere unfit for
animal life is absorbed, the carbon being separated, and assimilated to
form the vegetable fibre, which, as wood, makes and furnishes our houses
and ships, is burned for our warmth, or is stored up under pressure for
coal. All this carbon has played its part, and many parts in its time,
as animal existences from monad up to man. Our mahogany of to-day has
been many negroes in its turn, and before the African existed, was
integral portions of many a generation of extinct species."
It seems reasonable to suppose that certain kinds of vegetation-and
certain kinds of animals should exist together, and that as the
character of the vegetation changed, a corresponding change would take
place in the animal world. It may be that I am led to these conclusions
by "total depravity," or that I lack the necessary humility of spirit to
satisfactorily harmonize Haeckel and Moses; or that I am carried away by
pride, blinded by reason, given over to hardness of heart that I might
be damned, but I never can believe that the earth was covered with
leaves, and buds, and flowers, and fruits before the sun with glittering
spear had driven back the hosts of Night.
IX. THURSDAY.
After the world was covered with vegetation, it occurred to Moses that
it was about time to make a sun and moon; and so we are told that on the
fourth day God said, "Let there be light in the firmament of the heaven
to divide the day from the night; and let them be for signs and for
seasons, and for days and years; and let them be for lights in the
firmament of the heaven to give light upon the earth; and it was so. And
God made two great lights; the greater light to rule the day, and the
lesser light to rule the night; he made the stars also."
Can we believe that the inspired writer had any idea of the size of the
sun? Draw a circle five inches in diameter, and by its side thrust a pin
through the paper. The hole made by the pin will sustain about the same
relation to the circle that the earth does to the sun. Did he know that
the sun was eight hundred and sixty thousand miles in diameter; that it
was enveloped in an ocean of fire thousands of miles in depth, hotter
even than the Christian's hell, over which sweep tempests of flame
moving at the rate of one hundred miles a second, compared with which
the wildest storm that ever wrecked the forests of this world was but a
calm? Did he know that the sun every moment of time throws out as much
heat as could be generated by the combustion of millions upon millions
of tons of coal? Did he know that the volume of the earth is less than
one-millionth of that of the sun? Did he know of the one hundred and
four planets belonging to our solar system, all children of the sun? Did
he know of Jupiter eighty-five thousand miles in diameter, hundreds
of times as large as our earth, turning on his axis at the rate of
twenty-five thousand miles an hour accompanied by four moons, making the
tour of his orbit in fifty years, a distance of three thousand million
miles? Did he know anything about Saturn, his rings and his eight moons?
Did he have the faintest idea that all these planets were once a part of
the sun; that the vast luminary was once thousands of millions of miles
in diameter; that Neptune, Uranus, Saturn, Jupiter and Mars were all
born before our earth, and that by no possibility could this world have
existed three days, nor three periods, nor three "good whiles" before
its source, the sun?
Moses supposed the sun to be about three or four feet in diameter and
the moon about half that size. Compared with the earth they were but
simple specks. This idea seems to have been shared by all the "inspired"
men. We find in the book of Joshua that the sun stood still, and the
moon stayed until the people had avenged themselves upon their enemies.
"So the sun stood still in the midst of heaven, and hasted not to go
down about a whole day."
We are told that the sacred writer wrote in common speech as we do
when we talk about the rising and setting of the sun, and that all he
intended to say was that the earth ceased to turn on its axis "for about
a whole day."
My own opinion is that General Joshua knew no more about the motions of
the earth than he did about mercy and justice. If he had known that the
earth turned upon its axis at the rate of a thousand miles an hour, and
swept in its course about the sun at the rate of sixty-eight thousand
miles an hour, he would have doubled the hailstones, spoken of in the
same chapter, that the Lord cast down from heaven, and allowed the sun
and moon to rise and set in the usual way.
It is impossible to conceive of a more absurd story than this about the
stopping of the sun and moon, and yet nothing so excites the malice of
the orthodox preacher as to call its truth in question. Some endeavor
to account for the phenomenon by natural causes, while others attempt
to show that God could, by the refraction of light have made the sun
visible although actually shining on the opposite side of the earth. The
last hypothesis has been seriously urged by ministers within the last
few months. The Rev. Henry M. Morey of South Bend, Indiana, says "that
the phenomenon was simply optical. The rotary motion of the earth was
not disturbed, but the light of the sun was prolonged by the same laws
of refraction and reflection by which the sun now appears to be above
the horizon when it is really below. The medium through which the sun's
rays passed may have been miraculously influenced so as to have caused
the sun to linger above the horizon long after its usual time for
disappearance."
This is the latest and ripest product of Christian scholarship upon
this question no doubt, but still it is not entirely satisfactory to me.
According to the sacred account the sun did not linger, merely, above
the horizon, but stood still "in the midst of heaven for about a
whole day," that is to say, for about twelve hours. If the air was
miraculously changed, so that it would refract the rays of the sun while
the earth turned over as usual for "about a whole day," then, at the
end of that time the sun must have been visible in the east, that is,
it must by that time have been the next morning. According to this, that
most wonderful day must have been at least thirty-six hours in length.
We have first, the twelve hours of natural light, then twelve hours of
"refracted and reflected" light. By that time it would again be morning,
and the sun would shine for twelve hours more in the natural way, making
thirty-six hours in all.
If the Rev. Morey would depend a little less on "refraction" and a
little more on "reflection," he would conclude that the whole story is
simply a barbaric myth and fable.
It hardly seems reasonable that God, if there is one, would either stop
the globe, change the constitution of the atmosphere or the nature of
light simply to afford Joshua an opportunity to kill people on that
day when he could just as easily have waited until the next morning.
It certainly cannot be very gratifying to God for us to believe such
childish things.
It has been demonstrated that force is eternal; that it is forever
active, and eludes destruction by change of form. Motion is a form of
force, and all arrested motion changes instantly to heat. The earth
turns upon its axis at about one thousand miles an hour. Let it be
stopped and a force beyond our imagination is changed to heat. It has
been calculated that to stop the world would produce as much heat as the
burning of a solid piece of coal three times the size of the earth.
And yet we are asked to believe that this was done in order that one
barbarian might defeat another. Such stories never would have been
written, had not the belief been general that the heavenly bodies were
as nothing compared with the earth.
The view of Moses was acquiesced in by the Jewish people and by the
Christian world for thousands of years. It is supposed that Moses
lived about fifteen hundred years before Christ, and although he was
"inspired," and obtained his information directly from God, he did not
know as much about our solar system as the Chinese did a thousand
years before he was born. "The Emperor Chwenhio adopted as an epoch, a
conjunction of the planets Mercury, Mars, Jupiter and Saturn, which has
been shown by M. Bailly to have occurred no less than 2449 years before
Christ." The ancient Chinese knew not only the motions of the planets,
but they could calculate eclipses. "In the reign of the Emperor
Chow-Kang, the chief astronomers, Ho and Hi were condemned to death for
neglecting to announce a solar eclipse which took place 2169 B. C., a
clear proof that the prediction of eclipses was a part of the duty of
the imperial astronomers."
Is it not strange that a Chinaman should find out by his own exertions
more about the material universe than Moses could when assisted by its
Creator?
About eight hundred years after God gave Moses the principal facts about
the creation of the "heaven and the earth" he performed another miracle
far more wonderful than stopping the world. On this occasion he not
only stopped the earth, but actually caused it to turn the other way.
A Jewish king was sick, and God, in order to convince him that he would
ultimately recover, offered to make the shadow on the dial go forward,
or backward ten degrees. The king thought it was too easy a thing to
make the shadow go forward, and asked that it be turned back. Thereupon,
"Isaiah the prophet cried unto the Lord, and he brought the shadow
ten degrees backward by which it had gone down in the dial of Ahaz." I
hardly see how this miracle could be accounted for even by "refraction"
and "reflection."
It seems, from the account, that this stupendous miracle was performed
after the king had been cured. The account of the shadow going backward
is given in the eleventh verse of the twentieth chapter of Second Kings,
while the cure is given in the seventh verse of the same chapter. "And
Isaiah said, Take a lump of figs. And they took and laid it on the boil,
and he recovered."
Stopping the world and causing it to turn back ten degrees after that,
seems to have been, as the boil was already cured by the figs, a useless
display of power.
The easiest way to account for all these wonders is to say that the
"inspired" writers were mistaken. In this way a fearful burden is lifted
from the credulity of man, and he is left free to believe the evidences
of his own senses, and the demonstrations of science. In this way he can
emancipate himself from the slavery of superstition, the control of the
barbaric dead, and the despotism of the church.
Only about a hundred years ago, Buffon, the naturalist, was compelled by
the faculty of theology at Paris to publicly renounce fourteen "errors"
in his work on Natural History because they were at variance with the
Mosaic account of creation. The Pentateuch is still the scientific
standard of the church, and ignorant priests, armed with that, pronounce
sentence upon the vast accomplishments of modern thought.
X. "HE MADE THE STARS ALSO."
Moses came very near forgetting about the stars, and only gave five
words to all the hosts of heaven. Can it be possible that he knew
anything about the stars beyond the mere fact that he saw them shining
above him?
Did he know that the nearest star, the one we ought to be the best
acquainted with, is twenty-one billion of miles away, and that it is
a sun shining by its own light? Did he know of the next, that is
thirty-seven billion miles distant? Is it possible that he was
acquainted with Sirius, a sun two thousand six hundred and eighty-eight
times larger than our own, surrounded by a system of heavenly bodies,
several of which are already known, and distant from us eighty-two
billion miles? Did he know that the Polar star that tells the mariner
his course and guided slaves to liberty and joy, is distant from this
little world two hundred and ninety-two billion miles, and that Capella
wheels and shines one hundred and thirty-three billion miles beyond? Did
he know that it would require about seventy-two years for light to reach
us from this star? Did he know that light travels one hundred and
eighty-five thousand miles a second? Did he know that some stars are so
far away in the infinite abysses that five millions of years are
required for their light to reach this globe?
If this is true, and if as the Bible tells us, the stars were made after
the earth, then this world has been wheeling in its orbit for at least
five million years.
It may be replied that it was not the intention of God to teach geology
and astronomy. Then why did he say anything upon these subjects? and if
he did say anything, why did he not give the facts?
According to the sacred records God created, on the first day, the
heaven and the earth, "moved upon the face of the waters," and made
the light. On the second day he made the firmament or the "expanse" and
divided the waters. On the third day he gathered the waters into seas,
let the dry land appear and caused the earth to bring forth grass, herbs
and fruit trees, and on the fourth day he made the sun, moon and stars
and set them in the firmament of heaven to give light upon the earth.
This division of labor is very striking. The work of the other days is
as nothing when compared with that of the fourth. Is it possible that
it required the same time and labor to make the grass, herbs and fruit
trees, that it did to fill with countless constellations the infinite
expanse of space?
XI. FRIDAY.
We are then told that on the next day "God the moving creatures that hath
life, and fowl that may fly above the earth in the open firmament of
heaven. And God created great whales and every living creature which the
waters brought forth abundantly, after their kind, and every winged
fowl after his kind, and God saw that it was good. And God blessed them,
saying, Be fruitful and multiply and fill the waters in the seas, and
let fowl multiply in the earth."
Is it true that while the dry land was covered with grass, and herbs,
and trees bearing fruit, the ocean was absolutely devoid of life, and so
remained for millions of years?
If Moses meant twenty-four hours by the word day, then it would make but
little difference on which of the six days animals were made; but if the
word said, Let the waters bring forth abundantly day was used to express
millions of ages, during which life was slowly evolved from monad up to
man, then the account becomes infinitely absurd, puerile and foolish.
There is not a scientist of high standing who will say that in his
judgment the earth was covered with fruit-bearing trees before the
moners, the ancestors it may be of the human race, felt in Laurentian
seas the first faint throb of life. Nor is there one who will declare
that there was a single spire of grass before the sun had poured upon
the world his flood of gold.
Why should men in the name of religion try to harmonize the
contradictions that exist between Nature and a book? Why should
philosophers be denounced for placing more reliance upon what they know
than upon what they have been told? If there is a God, it is reasonably
certain that he made the world, but it is by no means certain that he is
the author of the Bible. Why then should we not place greater confidence
in Nature than in a book? And even if this God made not only the world
but the book besides, it does not follow that the book is the best part
of creation, and the only part that we will be eternally punished for
denying. It seems to me that it is quite as important to know something
of the solar system, something of the physical history of this globe,
as it is to know the adventures of Jonah or the diet of Ezekiel. For my
part, I would infinitely prefer to know all the results of scientific
investigation, than to be inspired as Moses was. Supposing the Bible to
be true; why is it any worse or more wicked for Freethinkers to deny
it, than for priests to deny the doctrine of evolution, or the dynamic
theory of heat? Why should we be damned for laughing at Samson and his
foxes, while others, holding the Nebular Hypothesis in utter contempt,
go straight to heaven? It seems to me that a belief in the great truths
of science are fully as essential to salvation, as the creed of any
church. We are taught that a man may be perfectly acceptable to God
even if he denies the rotundity of the earth, the Copernican system, the
three laws of Kepler, the indestructibility of matter and the attraction
of gravitation. And we are also taught that a man may be right upon
all these questions, and yet, for failing to believe in the "scheme of
salvation," be eternally lost.
XII. SATURDAY.
On this, the last day of creation, God said;--
"Let the earth bring forth the living creature after his kind, cattle
and creeping thing and beast of the earth after his kind; and it was
so. And God made the beast of the earth after his kind, and cattle after
their kind, and every thing that creepeth upon the earth after his kind;
and God saw that it was good."
Now, is it true that the seas were filled with fish, the sky with fowls,
and the earth covered with grass, and herbs, and fruit bearing trees,
millions of ages before there was a creeping thing in existence? Must
we admit that plants and animals were the result of the fiat of some
incomprehensible intelligence independent of the operation of what are
known as natural causes? Why is a miracle any more necessary to account
for yesterday than for to-day or for to-morrow?
If there is an infinite Power, nothing can be more certain than that
this Power works in accordance with what we call law, that is, by and
through natural causes. If anything can be found without a pedigree of
natural antecedents, it will then be time enough to talk about the fiat
of creation. There must have been a time when plants and animals did not
exist upon this globe. The question, and the only question is, whether
they were naturally produced. If the account given by Moses is true,
then the vegetable and animal existences are the result of certain
special fiats of creation entirely independent of the operation of
natural causes. This is so grossly improbable, so at variance with the
experience and observation of mankind, that it cannot be adopted without
abandoning forever the basis of scientific thought and action.
It may be urged that we do not understand the sacred record correctly.
To this it may be replied that for thousands of years the account of
the creation has, by the Jewish and Christian world, been regarded as
literally true. If it was inspired, of course God must have known just
how it would be understood, and consequently must have intended that
it should be understood just as he knew it would be. One man writing to
another, may mean one thing, and yet be understood as meaning something
else. Now, if the writer knew that he would be misunderstood, and also
knew that he could use other words that would convey his real meaning,
but did not, we would say that he used words on purpose to mislead, and
was not an honest man.
If a being of infinite wisdom wrote the Bible, or caused it to be
written, he must have known exactly how his words would be interpreted
by all the world, and he must have intended to convey the very meaning
that was conveyed. He must have known that by reading that book, man
would form erroneous views as to the shape, antiquity, and size of this
world; that he would be misled as to the time and order of creation;
that he would have the most childish and contemptible views of the
creator; that the "sacred word" would be used to support slavery and
polygamy; that it would build dungeons for the good, and light fagots
to consume the brave, and therefore he must have intended that these
results should follow. He also must have known that thousands and
millions of men and women never could believe his Bible, and that the
number of unbelievers would increase in the exact ratio of civilization,
and therefore, he must have intended that result.
Let us understand this. An honest finite being uses the best words, in
his judgment, to convey his meaning. This is the best he can do, because
he cannot certainly know the exact effect of his words on others. But an
infinite being must know not only the real meaning of the words, but the
exact meaning they will convey to every reader and hearer. He must know
every meaning that they are capable of conveying to every mind. He must
also know what explanations must be made to prevent misconception. If
an infinite being cannot, in making a revelation to man, use such words
that every person to whom a revelation is essential will understand
distinctly what that revelation is, then a revelation from God through
the instrumentality of language is impossible, or it is not essential
that all should understand it correctly. It may be urged that millions
have not the capacity to understand a revelation, although expressed in
the plainest words. To this it seems a sufficient reply to ask, why a
being of infinite power should create men so devoid of intelligence,
that he cannot by any means make known to them his will? We are told
that it is exceedingly plain, and that a wayfaring man, though a fool,
need not err therein. This statement is refuted by the religious history
of the Christian world. Every sect is a certificate that God has not
plainly revealed his will to man. To each reader the Bible conveys a
different meaning. About the meaning of this book, called a revelation,
there have been ages of war, and centuries of sword and flame. If
written by an infinite God, he must have known that these results must
follow; and thus knowing, he must be responsible for all.
Is it not infinitely more reasonable to say that this book is the work
of man, that it is filled with mingled truth and error, with mistakes
and facts, and reflects, too faithfully perhaps, the "very form and
pressure of its time"?
If there are mistakes in the Bible, certainly they were made by man. If
there is anything contrary to nature, it was written by man. If there is
anything immoral, cruel, heartless or infamous, it certainly was never
written by a being worthy of the adoration of mankind.
XIII. LET US MAKE MAN.
We are next informed by the author of the Pentateuch that God said "Let
us make man in our image, after our likeness," and that "God created man
in his own image, in the image of God created he him--male and female
created he them."
If this account means anything, it means that man was created in the
physical image and likeness of God. Moses while he speaks of man as
having been made in the image of God, never speaks of God except as
having the form of a man. He speaks of God as "walking in the garden
in the cool of the day;" and that Adam and Eve "heard his voice." He is
constantly telling what God said, and in a thousand passages he refers
to him as not only having the human form, but as performing actions,
such as man performs. The God of Moses was a God with hands, with feet,
with the organs of speech.
A God of passion, of hatred, of revenge, of affection, of repentance; a
God who made mistakes:--in other words, an immense and powerful man.
It will not do to say that Moses meant to convey the idea that God made
man in his mental or moral image. Some have insisted that man was made
in the moral image of God because he was made pure. Purity cannot be
manufactured. A moral character cannot be made for man by a god.
Every man must make his own moral character. Consequently, if God
is infinitely pure, Adam and Eve were not made in his image in that
respect. Others say that Adam and Eve were made in the mental image
of God. If it is meant by that, that they were created with reasoning
powers like, but not to the extent of those possessed by a god, then
this may be admitted. But certainly this idea was not in the mind of
Moses. He regarded the human form as being in the image of God, and for
that reason always spoke of God as having that form. No one can read
the Pentateuch without coming to the conclusion that the author supposed
that man was created in the physical likeness of Deity. God said "Go to,
let us go down." "God smelled a sweet savor;" "God repented him that he
had made man;" "and God said;" and "walked;" and "talked;" and "rested."
All these expressions are inconsistent with any other idea than that the
person using them regarded God as having the form of man.
As a matter of fact, it is impossible for a man to conceive of a
personal God, other than as a being having the human form. No one can
think of an infinite being having the form of a horse, or of a bird, or
of any animal beneath man. It is one of the necessities of the mind to
associate forms with intellectual capacities. The highest form of which
we have any conception is man's, and consequently, his is the only form
that we can find in imagination to give to a personal God, because all
other forms are, in our minds, connected with lower intelligences.
It is impossible to think of a personal God as a spirit without form.
We can use these words, but they do not convey to the mind any real and
tangible meaning. Every one who thinks of a personal God at all, thinks
of him as having the human form. Take from God the idea of form; speak
of him simply as an all pervading spirit--which means an all pervading
something about which we know nothing--and Pantheism is the result.
We are told that God made man; and the question naturally arises, how
was this done? Was it by a process of "evolution," "development;" the
"transmission of acquired habits;" the "survival of the fittest," or was
the necessary amount of clay kneaded to the proper consistency, and then
by the hands of God moulded into form? Modern science tells that man has
been evolved, through countless epochs, from the lower forms; that he
is the result of almost an infinite number of actions, reactions,
experiences, states, forms, wants and adaptations. Did Moses intend
to convey such a meaning, or did he believe that God took a sufficient
amount of dust, made it the proper shape, and breathed into it the
breath of life? Can any believer in the Bible give any reasonable
account of this process of creation? Is it possible to imagine what
was really done? Is there any theologian who will contend that man
was created directly from the earth? Will he say that man was made
substantially as he now is, with all his muscles properly developed for
walking and speaking, and performing every variety of human action?
That all his bones were formed as they now are, and all the relations of
nerve, ligament, brain and motion as they are to-day?
Looking back over the history of animal life from the lowest to
the highest forms, we find that there has been a slow and gradual
development; a certain but constant relation between want and
production; between use and form. The Moner is said to be the simplest
form of animal life that has yet been found. It has been described as
"an organism without organs." It is a kind of structureless structure;
a little mass of transparent jelly that can flatten itself out, and can
expand and contract around its food. It can feed without a mouth, digest
without a stomach, walk without feet, and reproduce itself by simple
division. By taking this Moner as the commencement of animal life, or
rather as the first animal, it is easy to follow the development of the
organic structure through all the forms of life to man himself. In this
way finally every muscle, bone and joint, every organ, form and function
may be accounted for. In this way, and in this way only, can the
existence of rudimentary organs be explained. Blot from the human mind
the ideas of evolution, heredity, adaptation, and "the survival of
the fittest," with which it has been enriched by Lamarck, Goethe,
Darwin, Haeckel and Spencer, and all the facts in the history of animal
life become utterly disconnected and meaningless.
Shall we throw away all that has been discovered with regard to organic
life, and in its place take the statements of one who lived in the
rude morning of a barbaric day? Will anybody now contend that man was a
direct and independent creation, and sustains and bears no relation to
the animals below him? Belief upon this subject must be governed at
last by evidence. Man cannot believe as he pleases. He can control his
speech, and can say that he believes or disbelieves; but after all, his
will cannot depress or raise the scales with which his reason finds the
worth and weight of facts. If this is not so, investigation, evidence,
judgment and reason are but empty words.
I ask again, how were Adam and Eve created? In one account they are
created male and female, and apparently at the same time. In the next
account, Adam is made first, and Eve a long time afterwards, and from a
part of the man. Did God simply by his creative fiat cause a rib slowly
to expand, grow and divide into nerve, ligament, cartilage and flesh?
How was the woman created from a rib? How was man created simply from
dust? For my part, I cannot believe this statement.
I may suffer for this in the world to come; and may, millions of years
hence, sincerely wish that I had never investigated the subject, but had
been content to take the ideas of the dead. I do not believe that any
deity works in that way. So far as my experience goes, there is an
unbroken procession of cause and effect. Each thing is a necessary link
in an infinite chain; and I cannot conceive of this chain being broken
even for one instant. Back of the simplest moner there is a cause,
and back of that another, and so on, it seems to me, forever. In my
philosophy I postulate neither beginning nor ending.
If the Mosaic account is true, we know how long man has been upon this
earth. If that account can be relied on, the first man was made about
five thousand eight hundred and eighty-three years ago. Sixteen hundred
and fifty-six years after the making of the first man, the inhabitants
of the world, with the exception of eight people, were destroyed by
a flood. This flood occurred only about four thousand two hundred and
twenty-seven years ago. If this account is correct, at that time, only
one kind of men existed. Noah and his family were certainly of the same
blood. It therefore follows that all the differences we see between the
various races of men have been caused in about four thousand years. If
the account of the deluge is true, then since that event all the ancient
kingdoms of the earth were founded, and their inhabitants passed through
all the stages of savage, nomadic, barbaric and semi-civilized life;
through the epochs of Stone, Bronze and Iron; established commerce,
cultivated the arts, built cities, filled them with palaces and temples,
invented writing, produced a literature and slowly fell to shapeless
ruin. We must believe that all this has happened within a period of four
thousand years.
From representations found upon Egyptian granite made more than three
thousand years ago, we know that the negro was as black, his lips as
full, and his hair as closely curled then as now. If we know anything,
we know that there was at that time substantially the same difference
between the Egyptian and the Negro as now. If we know anything, we know
that magnificent statues were made in Egypt four thousand years before
our era--that is to say, about six thousand years ago. There was at
the World's Exposition, in the Egyptian department, a statue of king
Cephren, known to have been chiseled more than six thousand years ago.
In other words, if the Mosaic account must be believed, this statue was
made before the world. We also know, if we know anything, that men lived
in v Europe with the hairy mammoth, the cave bear, the rhinoceros, and
the hyena. Among the bones of these animals have been found the stone
hatchets and flint arrows of our ancestors. In the caves where they
lived have been discovered the remains of these animals that had been
conquered, killed and devoured as food, hundreds of thousands of years
ago.
If these facts are true, Moses was mistaken. For my part, I have
infinitely more confidence in the discoveries of to-day, than in the
records of a barbarous people. It will not now do to say that man has
existed upon this earth for only about six thousand years. One can
hardly compute in his imagination the time necessary for man to emerge
from the barbarous state, naked and helpless, surrounded by animals far
more powerful than he, to progress and finally create the civilizations
of India, Egypt and Athens. The distance from savagery to Shakespeare
must be measured not by hundreds, but by millions of years.
XIV. SUNDAY.
"And on the seventh day God ended his work which he had made, and he
rested on the seventh day from all his work which he had made. And God
blessed the seventh day and sanctified it; because that in it he had
rested from all his work which God created and made."
The great work had been accomplished, the world, the sun, and moon, and
all the hosts of heaven were finished; the earth was clothed in
green, the seas were filled with life, the cattle wandered by the
brooks--insects with painted wings were in the happy air, Adam and Eve
were making each others acquaintance, and God was resting from his work.
He was contemplating the accomplishments of a week.
Because he rested on that day he sanctified it, and for that reason and
for that alone, it was by the Jews considered a holy day. If he only
rested on that day, there ought to be some account of what he did the
following Monday. Did he rest on that day? What did he do after he
got rested? Has he done anything in the way of creation since Saturday
evening of the first week?
It is now claimed by the "scientific" Christians that the "days" of
creation were not ordinary days of twenty-four hours each, but immensely
long periods of time. If they are right, then how long was the seventh
day? Was that, too, a geologic period covering thousands of ages?
That cannot be, because Adam and Eve were created the Saturday evening
before, and according to the Bible that was about five thousand eight
hundred and eighty-three years ago. I cannot state the time exactly,
because there have been as many as one hundred and forty different
opinions given by learned Biblical students as to the time between the
creation of the world and the birth of Christ. We are quite certain,
however, that, according to the Bible, it is not more than six thousand
years since the creation of Adam. From this it would appear that the
seventh day was not a geologic epoch, but was in fact a period of less
than six thousand years, and probably of only twenty-four hours.
The theologians who "answer" these things may take their choice. If they
take the ground that the "days" were periods of twenty-four hours, then
geology will force them to throw away the whole account. If, on the
other hand, they admit that the days were vast "periods," then the
sacredness of the Sabbath must be given up.
There is found in the Bible no intimation that there was the least
difference in the days. They are all spoken of in the same way. It may
be replied that our translation is incorrect. If this is so, then only
those who understand Hebrew, have had a revelation from God, and all the
rest have been deceived.
How is it possible to sanctify a space of time? Is rest holier than
labor? If there is any difference between days, ought not that to be
considered best in which the most useful labor has been performed?
Of all the superstitions of mankind, this insanity about the "sacred
Sabbath" is the most absurd. The idea of feeling it a duty to be solemn
and sad one-seventh of the time! To think that we can please an infinite
being by staying in some dark and sombre room, instead of walking in the
perfumed fields! Why should God hate to see a man happy? Why should it
excite his wrath to see a family in the woods, by some babbling stream,
talking, laughing and loving? Nature works on that "sacred" day. The
earth turns, the rivers run, the trees grow, buds burst into flower, and
birds fill the air with song. Why should we look sad, and think about
death, and hear about hell? Why should that day be filled with gloom
instead of joy?
A poor mechanic, working all the week in dust and noise, needs a day of
rest and joy, a day to visit stream and wood--a day to live with wife
and child; a day in which to laugh at care, and gather hope and strength
for toils to come. And his weary wife needs a breath of sunny air, away
from street and wall, amid the hills or by the margin of the sea, where
she can sit and prattle with her babe, and fill with happy dreams the
long, glad day.
The "Sabbath" was born of asceticism, hatred of human joy, fanaticism,
ignorance, egotism of priests and the cowardice of the people. This
day, for thousands of years, has been dedicated to superstition, to the
dissemination of mistakes, and the establishment of falsehoods. Every
Freethinker, as a matter of duty, should violate this day. He should
assert his independence, and do all within his power to wrest the
Sabbath from the gloomy church and give it back to liberty and joy.
Freethinkers should make the Sabbath a day of mirth and music; a day to
spend with wife and child--a day of games, and books, and dreams--a day
to put fresh flowers above our sleeping dead--a day of memory and hope,
of love and rest.
Why should we in this age of the world be dominated by the dead? Why
should barbarian Jews who went down to death and dust three thousand
years ago, control the living world? Why should we care for the
superstition of men who began the Sabbath by paring their nails,
"beginning at the fourth finger, then going to the second, then to the
fifth, then to the third, and ending with the thumb?" How pleasing
to God this must have been. The Jews were very careful of these nail
parings. They who threw them upon the ground were wicked, because Satan
used them to work evil upon the earth. They believed that upon the
Sabbath, souls were allowed to leave purgatory and cool their
burning souls in water. Fires were neither allowed to be kindled nor
extinguished, and upon that day it was a sin to bind up wounds. "The
lame might use a staff, but the blind could not." So strict was the
Sabbath kept, that at one time "if a Jew on a journey was overtaken
by the 'sacred day' in a wood, or on the highway, no matter where, nor
under what circumstances, he must sit down," and there remain until the
day was gone. "If he fell down in the dirt, there he was compelled to
stay until the day was done." For violating the Sabbath, the punishment
was death, for nothing short of the offender's blood could satisfy the
wrath of God. There are, in the Old Testament, two reasons given for
abstaining from labor on the Sabbath:--the resting of God, and the
redemption of the Jews from the bondage of Egypt.
Since the establishment of the Christian religion, the day has been
changed, and Christians do not regard the day as holy upon which God
actually rested, and which he sanctified. The Christian Sabbath, or
the "Lord's day" was legally established by the murderer Constantine,
because upon that day Christ was supposed to have risen from the dead.
It is not easy to see where Christians got the right to disregard the
direct command of God, to labor on the day he sanctified, and keep as
sacred, a day upon which he commanded men to labor. The Sabbath of God
is Saturday, and if any day is to be kept holy, that is the one, and not
the Sunday of the Christian.
Let us throw away these superstitions and take the higher, nobler
ground, that every day should be rendered sacred by some loving act,
by increasing the happinesss of man, giving birth to noble thoughts,
putting in the path of toil some flower of joy, helping the unfortunate,
lifting the fallen, dispelling gloom, destroying prejudice, defending
the helpless and filling homes with light and love.
XV. THE NECESSITY FOR A GOOD MEMORY.
It must not be forgotten that there are two accounts of the creation
in Genesis. The first account stops with the third verse of the second
chapter. The chapters have been improperly divided. In the original
Hebrew the Pentateuch was neither divided into chapters nor verses.
There was not even any system of punctuation. It was written wholly with
consonants, without vowels, and without any marks, dots, or lines to
indicate them.
These accounts are materially different, and both cannot be true. Let us
see wherein they differ.
The second account of the creation begins with the fourth verse of the
second chapter, and is as follows:
"These are the generations of the heavens and of the earth when they
were created, in the day that the Lord God made the earth and the
heavens.
"And every plant of the field before it was in the earth, and every herb
of the field before it grew; for the Lord God had not caused it to rain
upon the earth, and there was not a man to till the ground.
"But there went up a mist from the earth and watered the whole face of
the ground.
"And the Lord God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed
into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living soul.
"And the Lord God planted a garden eastward in Eden; and there he put
the man whom he had formed.
"And out of the ground made the Lord God to grow every tree that is
pleasant to the sight, and good for food; the tree of life also in the
midst of the garden, and the tree of knowledge of good and evil.
"And a river went out of Eden to water the garden; and from thence it
was parted and became into four heads.
"The name of the first is Pison; that is it which compasseth the whole
land of Havilah, where there is gold.
"And the gold of that land is good: there is bdellium and the onyx
stone.
"And the name of the second river is Gihon: the same is it that
compasseth the whole land of Ethiopia.
"And the name of the third river is Hiddekel; that is it which goeth
toward the east of Assyria. And the fourth river is Euphrates.
"And the Lord God took the man, and put him into the Garden of Eden to
dress it and to keep it.
"And the Lord God commanded the man, saying, Of every tree of the garden
thou mayest freely eat; But of the tree of the knowledge of good and
evil, thou shalt not eat of it; for in the day that thou eatest thereof
thou shalt surely die.
"And the Lord God said, It is not good that the man should be alone; I
will make him an helpmeet for him.
"And out of the ground the Lord God formed every beast of the field, and
every fowl of the air; and brought them unto Adam to see what he would
call them: and whatsoever Adam called every living creature, that was
the name thereof.
"And Adam gave names to all cattle, and to the fowl of the air, and to
every beast of the field; but for Adam there was not found a helpmeet
for him.
"And the Lord God caused a deep sleep to fall upon Adam, and he slept;
and he took one of his ribs, and closed up the flesh instead thereof;
"And the rib, which the Lord God had taken from man, made he a woman and
brought her unto the man.
"And Adam said, This is now bone of my bones, and flesh of my flesh; she
shall be called Woman, because she was taken out of man.
"Therefore shall a man leave his father and his mother, and shall cleave
unto his wife; and they shall be one flesh.
"And they were both naked, the man and his wife, and were not ashamed."
Order of creation in the first account:
1. The heaven and the earth, and light were made.
2. The firmament was constructed and the waters divided.
3. The waters gathered into seas--and then came dry land, grass, herbs
and fruit trees.
4. The sun and moon. He made the stars also.
5. Fishes, fowls, and great whales.
6. Beasts, cattle, every creeping thing, man and woman.
Order of creation in the second account:
1. The heavens and the earth.
2. A mist went up from the earth, and watered the whole face of the
ground.
3. Created a man out of dust, by the name of Adam.
4. Planted a garden eastward in Eden, and put the man in it.
5. Created the beasts and fowls.
6. Created a woman out of one of the man's ribs.
In the second account, man was made _before_ the beasts and fowls. If
this is true, the first account is false. And if the theologians of our
time are correct in their view that the Mosaic day means thousands of
ages, then, according to the second account, Adam existed millions of
years before Eve was formed. He must have lived one Mosaic day before
there were any trees, and another Mosaic day before the beasts and fowls
were created. Will some kind clergymen tell us upon what kind of food
Adam subsisted during these immense periods?
In the second account a man is made, and the fact that he was without a
helpmeet did not occur to the Lord God until a couple "of vast periods"
afterwards. The Lord God suddenly coming to an appreciation of the
situation said, "It is not good that the man should be alone. I will
make him an helpmeet for him."
Now, after concluding to make "an helpmeet" for Adam, what did the Lord
God do? Did he at once proceed to make a woman? No. What did he do? He
made the beasts, and tried to induce Adam to take one of them for "an
helpmeet." If I am incorrect, read the following account, and tell me
what it means:
"And the Lord God said, It is not good that the man should be alone; I
will make him an helpmeet for him.
"And out of the ground the Lord God formed every beast of the field, and
every fowl of the air; and brought them unto Adam to see what he would
call them: and whatsoever Adam called every living creature, that was
the name thereof.
"And Adam gave names to all cattle, and to the fowl of the air, and to
every beast of the field; but for Adam there was not found an helpmeet
for him."
Unless the Lord God was looking for an helpmeet for Adam, why did
he cause the animals to pass before him? And why did he, after the
menagerie had passed by, pathetically exclaim, "But for Adam there was
not found an helpmeet for him"?
It seems that Adam saw nothing that struck his fancy. The fairest ape,
the sprightliest chimpanzee, the loveliest baboon, the most bewitching
orangoutang, the most fascinating gorilla failed to touch with love's
sweet pain, poor Adam's lonely heart. Let us rejoice that this was so.
Had he fallen in love then, there never would have been a Freethinker in
this world.
Dr. Adam Clarke, speaking of this remarkable proceeding says:--"God
caused the animals to pass before Adam to show him that no creature yet
formed could make him a suitable companion; that Adam was convinced that
none of these animals could be a suitable companion for him, and that
therefore he must continue in a state that was not good (celibacy)
unless he became a further debtor to the bounty of his maker, for among
all the animals which he had formed, there was not a helpmeet for Adam."
Upon this same subject, Dr. Scott informs us "that it was not conducive
to the happiness of the man to remain without the consoling society,
and endearment of tender friendship, nor consistent with the end of his
creation to be without marriage by which the earth might be replenished
and worshipers and servants raised up to render him praise and glory.
Adam seems to have been vastly better acquainted by intuition or
revelation with the distinct properties of every creature than the most
sagacious observer since the fall of man.
"Upon this review of the animals, not one was found in outward form his
counterpart, nor one suited to engage his affections, participate in his
enjoyments, or associate with him in the worship of God."
Dr. Matthew Henry admits that "God brought all the animals together
to see if there was a suitable match for Adam in any of the numerous
families of the inferior creatures, but there was none. They were all
looked over, but Adam could not be matched among them all. Therefore God
created a new thing to be a helpmeet for him."
Failing to satisfy Adam with any of the inferior animals, the Lord God
caused a deep sleep to fall upon him, and while in this sleep took out
one of Adam's ribs and "closed up the flesh instead thereof." And out of
this rib, the Lord God made a woman, and brought her to the man.
Was the Lord God compelled to take a part of the man because he had used
up all the original "nothing" out of which the universe was made? Is it
possible for any sane and intelligent man to believe this story? Must a
man be born a second time before this account seems reasonable?
Imagine the Lord God with a bone in his hand with which to start
a woman, trying to make up his mind whether to make a blonde or a
brunette!
Just at this point it may be proper for me to warn all persons from
laughing at or making light of, any stories found in the "Holy Bible."
When you come to die, every laugh will be a thorn in your pillow. At
that solemn moment, as you look back upon the records of your life, no
matter how many men you may have wrecked and ruined; no matter how many
women you have deceived and deserted, all that can be forgiven; but
if you remember then that you have laughed at even one story in God's
"sacred book" you will see through the gathering shadows of death the
forked tongues of devils, and the leering eyes of fiends.
These stories must be believed, or the work of regeneration can never be
commenced. No matter how well you act your part, live as honestly as you
may, clothe the naked, feed the hungry, divide your last farthing
with the poor, and you are simply traveling the broad road that leads
inevitably to eternal death, unless at the same time you implicitly
believe the Bible to be the inspired word of God.
Let me show you the result of unbelief. Let us suppose, for a moment,
that we are at the Day of Judgment, listening to the trial of souls
as they arrive. The Recording Secretary, or whoever does the
cross-examining, says to a soul:
Where are you from?
I am from the Earth.
What kind of a man were you?
Well, I don't like to talk about myself. I suppose you can tell by
looking at your books.
No, sir. You must tell what kind of a man you were.
Well, I was what you might call a first-rate fellow. I loved my wife and
children. My home was my heaven. My fireside was a paradise to me. To
sit there and see the lights and shadows fall upon the faces of those I
loved, was to me a perfect joy.
How did you treat your family?
I never said an unkind word. I never caused my wife, nor one of my
children, a moments pain.
Did you pay your debts?
I did not owe a dollar when I died, and left enough to pay my funeral
expenses, and to keep the fierce wolf of want from the door of those I
loved.
Did you belong to any church?
No, sir. They were too narrow, pinched and bigoted for me, I never
thought that I could be very happy if other folks were damned.
Did you believe in eternal punishment?
Well, no. I always thought that God could get his revenge in far less
time.
Did you believe the rib story?
Do you mean the Adam and Eve business?
Yes! Did you believe that?
To tell you the God's truth, that was just a little more than I could
swallow.
Away with him to hell!
Next!
Where are you from?
I am from the world too.
Did you belong to any church?
Yes, sir, and to the Young Men's Christian Association besides.
What was your business?
Cashier in a Savings Bank.
Did you ever run away with any money?
Where I came from, a witness could not be compelled to criminate
himself.
The law is different here. Answer the question. Did you run away with
any money?
Yes, sir.
How much?
One hundred thousand dollars.
Did you take anything else with you?
Yes, sir.
Well, what else?
I took my neighbor's wife--we sang together in the choir.
Did you have a wife and children of your own? Yes, sir.
And you deserted them?
Yes, sir, but such was my confidence in God that I believed he would
take care of them.
Have you heard of them since?
No, sir.
Did you believe in the rib story?
Bless your soul, of course I did. A thousand times I regretted that
there were no harder stories in the Bible, so that I could have shown my
wealth of faith.
Do you believe the rib story yet?
Yes, with all my heart.
Give him a harp!
Well, as I was saying, God made a woman from Adam's rib. Of course, I do
not know exactly how this was done, but when he got the woman finished,
he presented her to Adam. He liked her, and they commenced house-keeping
in the celebrated Garden of Eden.
Must we, in order to be good, gentle and loving in our lives, believe
that the creation of woman was a second thought? That Jehovah really
endeavored to induce Adam to take one of the lower animals as an
helpmeet for him? After all, is it not possible to live honest and
courageous lives without believing these fables? It is said that from
Mount Sinai God gave, amid thunderings and lightnings, ten commandments
for the guidance of mankind; and yet among them is not found--"Thou
shalt believe the Bible."
XVI. THE GARDEN.
In the first account we are told that God made man, male and female,
and said to them "Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth and
subdue it."
In the second account only the man is made, and he is put in a garden
"to dress it and to keep it." He is not told to subdue the earth, but to
dress and keep a garden.
In the first account man is given every herb bearing seed upon the face
of the earth and the fruit of every tree for food, and in the second,
he is given only the fruit of all the trees in the garden with the
exception "of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil" which was a
deadly poison.
There was issuing from this garden a river that was parted into four
heads. The first of these, Pison, compassed the whole land of Havilah,
the second, Gihon, that compassed the whole land of Ethiopia.
The third, Heddekel, that flowed toward the east of Assyria, and the
fourth, the Euphrates. Where are these four rivers now? The brave prow
of discovery has visited every sea; the traveler has pressed with weary
feet the soil of every clime; and yet there has been found no place from
which four rivers sprang. The Euphrates still journeys to the gulf, but
where are Pison, Gihon and the mighty Heddekel? Surely by going to the
source of the Euphrates we ought to find either these three rivers or
their ancient beds. Will some minister when he answers the "Mistakes of
Moses" tell us where these rivers are or were? The maps of the world are
incomplete without these mighty streams. We have discovered the sources
of the Nile; the North Pole will soon be touched by an American; but
these three rivers still rise in unknown hills, still flow through
unknown lands, and empty still in unknown seas.
The account of these four rivers is what the Rev. David Swing would call
"a geographical poem." The orthodox clergy cover the whole affair with
the blanket of allegory, while the "scientific" Christian folks talk
about cataclysms, upheavals, earthquakes, and vast displacements of the
earth's crust.
The question, then arises, whether within the last six thousand years
there have been such upheavals and displacements? Talk as you will about
the vast "creative periods" that preceded the appearance of man; it
is, according to the Bible, only about six thousand years since man was
created. Moses gives us the generations of men from Adam until his day,
and this account cannot be explained away by calling centuries, days.
According to the second account of creation, these four rivers were
made after the creation of man, and consequently they must have been
obliterated by convulsions of Nature within six thousand years.
Can we not account for these contradictions, absurdities, and falsehoods
by simply saying that although the writer may have done his level best,
he failed because he was limited in knowledge, led away by tradition,
and depended too implicitly upon the correctness of his imagination?
Is not such a course far more reasonable than to insist that all these
things are true and must stand though every science shall fall to mental
dust?
Can any reason be given for not allowing man to eat of the fruit of the
tree of knowledge? What kind of tree was that? If it is all an allegory,
what truth is sought to be conveyed? Why should God object to that fruit
being eaten by man? Why did he put it in the midst of the garden? There
was certainly plenty of room outside. If he wished to keep man and this
tree apart, why did he put them together? And why, after he had eaten,
was he thrust out? The only answer that we have a right to give, is
the one given in the Bible. "And the Lord God said, Behold the man has
become as one of us to know good and evil; and now, lest he put forth
his hand and take also of the tree of life, and eat, and live forever:
Therefore the Lord God sent him forth from the Garden of Eden, to till
the ground from whence he was taken."
Will some minister, some graduate of Andover, tell us what this means?
Are we bound to believe it without knowing what the meaning is? If it is
a revelation, what does it reveal? Did God object to education then, and
does that account for the hostile attitude still assumed by theologians
toward all scientific truth? Was there in the garden a tree of life, the
eating of which would have rendered Adam and Eve immortal? Is it true,
that after the Lord God drove them from the garden that he placed upon
its Eastern side "Cherubim and a flaming sword which turned every way
to keep the way of the tree of life?" Are the Cherubim and the flaming
sword guarding that tree still, or was it destroyed, or did its rotting
trunk, as the Rev. Robert Collyer suggests, "nourish a bank of violets"?
What objection could God have had to the immortality of man? You
see that after all, this sacred record, instead of assuring us of
immortality, shows us only how we lost it. In this there is assuredly
but little consolation.
According to this story we have lost one Eden, but nowhere in the Mosaic
books are we told how we may gain another. I know that the Christians
tell us there is another, in which all true believers will finally be
gathered, and enjoy the unspeakable happiness of seeing the unbelievers
in hell; but they do not tell us where it is.
Some commentators say that the Garden of Eden was in the third
heaven--some in the fourth, others have located it in the moon, some
in the air beyond the attraction of the earth, some on the earth, some
under the earth, some inside the earth, some at the North Pole, others
at the South, some in Tartary, some in China, some on the borders of the
Ganges, some in the island of Ceylon, some in Armenia, some in Africa,
some under the Equator, others in Mesopotamia, in Syria, Persia, Arabia,
Babylon, Assyria, Palestine and Europe. Others have contended that
it was invisible, that it was an allegory, and must be spiritually
understood.
But whether you understand these things or not, you must believe them.
You may be laughed at in this world for insisting that God put Adam into
a deep sleep and made a woman out of one of his ribs, but you will be
crowned and glorified in the next. You will also have the pleasure of
hearing the gentlemen howl there, who laughed at you here. While you
will not be permitted to take any revenge, you will be allowed to
smilingly express your entire acquiescence in the will of God. But where
is the new Eden? No one knows. The one was lost, and the other has not
been found.
Is it true that man was once perfectly pure and innocent, and that
he became degenerate by disobedience? No. The real truth is, and the
history of man shows, that he has advanced. Events, like the pendulum of
a clock have swung forward and back ward, but after all, man, like
the hands, has gone steadily on. Man is growing grander. He is not
degenerating. Nations and individuals fail and die, and make room
for higher forms. The intellectual horizon of the world widens as the
centuries pass. Ideals grow grander and purer; the difference between
justice and mercy becomes less and less; liberty enlarges, and love
intensifies as the years sweep on. The ages of force and fear, of
cruelty and wrong, are behind us and the real Eden is beyond. It is said
that a desire for knowledge lost us the Eden of the past; but whether
that is true or not, it will certainly give us the Eden of the future.
XVII. THE FALL.
We are told that the serpent was more subtle than any beast of the field,
that he had a conversation with Eve, in which he gave his opinion about
the effect of eating certain fruit; that he assured her it was good to
eat, that it was pleasant to the eye, that it would make her wise; that
she was induced to take some; that she persuaded her husband to try it;
that God found it out, that he then cursed the snake; condemning it to
crawl and eat the dust; that he multiplied the sorrows of Eve, cursed
the ground for Adam's sake, started thistles and thorns, condemned man
to eat the herb of the field in the sweat of his face, pronounced the
curse of death, "Dust thou art and unto dust shalt thou return," made
coats of skins for Adam and Eve, and drove them out of Eden.
Who, and what was this serpent? Dr. Adam Clarke says:--"The serpent must
have walked erect, for this is necessarily implied in his punishment.
That he was endued with the gift of speech, also with reason. That these
things were given to this creature. The woman no doubt having often seen
him walking erect, and talking and reasoning, therefore she testifies
no sort of surprise when he accosts her in the language related in
the text. It therefore appears to me that a creature of the ape or
orangoutang kind is here intended, and that Satan made use of this
creature as the most proper instrument for the accomplishment of his
murderous purposes against the life of the soul of man. Under this
creature he lay hid, and by this creature he seduced our first parents.
Such a creature answers to every part of the description in the text. It
is evident from the structure of its limbs and its muscles that it might
have been originally designed to walk erect, and that nothing else than
the sovereign controlling power could induce it to put down hands--in
every respect formed like those of man--and walk like those creatures
whose claw-armed parts prove them to have been designed to walk on
all fours. The stealthy cunning, and endless variety of the pranks
and tricks of these creatures show them even now to be wiser and more
intelligent than any other creature, man alone excepted. Being obliged
to walk on all fours and gather their food from the ground, they are
literally obliged to eat the dust; and though exceeding cunning,
and careful in a variety of instances to separate that part which is
wholesome and proper for food from that which is not so, in the article
of cleanliness they are lost to all sense of propriety. Add to this
their utter aversion to walk upright; it requires the utmost discipline
to bring them to it, and scarcely anything offends or irritates them
more than to be obliged to do it. Long observation of these animals
enables me to state these facts. For earnest, attentive watching, and
for chattering and babbling they (the ape) have no fellows in the animal
world. Indeed, the ability and propensity to chatter, is all they have
left of their original gift of speech, of which they appear to have been
deprived at the fall as a part of their punishment."
Here then is the "connecting link" between man and the lower creation.
The serpent was simply an orang-outang that spoke Hebrew with the
greatest ease, and had the outward appearance of a perfect gentleman,
seductive in manner, plausible, polite, and most admirably calculated to
deceive.
It never did seem reasonable' to me that a long, cold and disgusting
snake with an apple in his mouth, could deceive anybody; and I am glad,
even at this late date to know that the something that persuaded Eve to
taste the forbidden fruit was, at least, in the shape of a man.
Dr. Henry does not agree with the zoological explanation of Mr. Clark,
but insists that "it is certain that the devil that beguiled Eve is the
old serpent, a malignant by creation, an angel of light, an immediate
attendant upon God's throne, but by sin an apostate from his first
state, and a rebel against God's crown and dignity. He who attacked
our first parents was surely the prince of devils, the ring leader in
rebellion. The devil chose to act his part in a serpent, because it is
a specious creature, has a spotted, dappled skin, and then, went erect.
Perhaps it was a flying serpent which seemed to come from on high, as a
messenger from the upper world, one of the seraphim; because the serpent
is a subtile creature. What Eve thought of this serpent speaking to her,
we are not likely to tell, and, I believe, she herself did not know
what to think of it. At first, perhaps, she supposed it might be a good
angel, and yet afterwards might suspect something amiss. The person
tempted was a woman, now alone, and at a distance from her husband,
but near the forbidden tree. It was the devil's subtlety to assault the
weaker vessel with his temptations, as we may suppose her inferior to
Adam in knowledge, strength and presence of mind. Some think that Eve
received the command not immediately from God, but at second hand from
her husband, and might, therefore, be the more easily persuaded to
discredit it. It was the policy of the devil to enter into discussion
with her when she was alone. He took advantage by finding her near the
forbidden tree. God permitted Satan to prevail over Eve, for wise and
holy ends. Satan teaches men first to doubt, and then to deny. He makes
skeptics first, and by degrees makes them atheists."
We are compelled to admit that nothing could be more attractive to a
woman than a snake walking erect, with a "spotted, dappled skin," unless
it were a serpent with wings. Is it not humiliating to know that our
ancestors believed these things? Why should we object to the Darwinian
doctrine of descent after this?
Our fathers thought it their duty to believe, thought it a sin to
entertain the slightest doubt, and really supposed that their credulity
was exceedingly, gratifying to God. To them, the story was entirely
real. They could see the garden, hear the babble of waters, smell the
perfume of flowers. They believed there was a tree where knowledge grew
like plums or pears; and they could plainly see the serpent coiled amid
its rustling leaves, coaxing Eve to violate the laws of God.
Where did the serpent come from? On which of the six days was he
created? Who made him? Is it possible that God would make a successful
rival? He must have known that Adam and Eve would fall. He knew what
a snake with a "spotted, dappled skin" could do with an inexperienced
woman. Why did he not defend his children? He knew that if the serpent
got into the garden, Adam and Eve would sin, that he would have to drive
them out, that afterwards the world would be destroyed, and that he
himself would die upon the cross.
Again, I ask what and who was this serpent? He was not a man, for only
one man had been made. He was not a woman. He was not a beast of the
field, because "he was more subtile than any beast of the field which
the Lord God had made." He was neither fish nor fowl, nor snake, because
he had the power of speech, and did not crawl upon his belly until after
he was cursed. Where did this serpent come from? Why was he not kept out
of the garden? Why did not the Lord God take him by the tail and snap
his head off? Why did he not put Adam and Eve on their guard about this
serpent? They, of course, were not acquainted in the neighborhood, and
knew nothing about the serpent's reputation for truth and veracity
among his neighbors. Probably Adam saw him when he was looking for "an
helpmeet" and gave him a name, but Eve had never met him before. She was
not surprised to hear a serpent talk, as that was the first one she had
ever met. Every thing being new to her, and her husband not being with
her just at that moment, it need hardly excite our wonder that she
tasted the fruit by way of experiment. Neither should we be surprised
that when she saw it was good and pleasant to the eye, and a fruit to
be desired to make one wise, she had the generosity to divide with her
husband.
Theologians have filled thousands of volumes with abuse of this serpent,
but it seems that he told the exact truth. We are told that this serpent
was, in fact, Satan, the greatest enemy of mankind, and that he entered
the serpent, appearing to our first parents in its body. If this is
so, why should the serpent have been cursed? Why should God curse the
serpent for what had really been done by the devil? Did Satan remain
in the body of the serpent, and in some mysterious manner share his
punishment? Is it true that when we kill a snake we also destroy an evil
spirit, or is there but one devil, and did he perish at the death of
the first serpent? Is it on account of that transaction in the Garden
of Eden, that all the descendants of Adam and Eve known as Jews and
Christians hate serpents?
Do you account for the snake-worship in Mexico, Africa and India in the
same way?
What was the form of the serpent when he entered the garden, and in what
way did he move from place to place? Did he walk or fly? Certainly he
did not crawl, because that mode of locomotion was pronounced upon him
as a curse. Upon what food did he subsist before his conversation with
Eve? We know that after that he lived upon dust, but what did he eat
before? It may be that this is all poetic; and the truest poetry is,
according to Touchstone, "the most feigning."
In this same chapter we are informed that "unto Adam also and to his
wife did the Lord God make coats of skins and clothed them." Where did
the Lord God get those skins? He must have taken them from the animals;
he was a butcher. Then he had to prepare them; he was a tanner. Then
he made them into coats; he was a tailor. How did it happen that they
needed coats of skins, when they had been perfectly comfortable in a
nude condition? Did the "fall" produce a change in the climate?
Is it really necessary to believe this account in order to be happy
here, or hereafter? Does it tend to the elevation of the human race to
speak of "God" as a butcher, tanner and tailor?
And here, let me say once for all, that when I speak of God, I mean
the being described by Moses; the Jehovah of the Jews. There may be for
aught I know, somewhere in the unknown shoreless vast, some being whose
dreams are constellations and within whose thought the infinite exists.
About this being, if such an one exists, I have nothing to say. He has
written no books, inspired no barbarians, required no worship, and has
prepared no hell in which to burn the honest seeker after truth.
When I speak of God, I mean that god who prevented man from putting
forth his hand and taking also of the fruit of the tree of life that
he might live forever; of that god who multiplied the agonies of woman,
increased the weary toil of man, and in his anger drowned a world--of
that god whose altars reeked with human blood, who butchered babes,
violated maidens, enslaved men and filled the earth with cruelty and
crime; of that god who made heaven for the few, hell for the many,
and who will gloat forever and ever upon the writhings of the lost and
damned.
XVIII. DAMPNESS.
"And it came to pass, when men began to multiply on the face of the
earth, and daughters were born unto them.
"That the sons of God saw the daughters of men that they were fair; and
they took them wives of all which they chose.
"And the Lord said, My spirit shall not always strive with man, for that
he also is flesh; yet his days shall be an hundred and twenty years.
"There were giants in the earth in those days; and also after that
when the sons of God came in unto the daughters of men, and they bare
children to them, the same became mighty men which were of old, men of
renown.
"And God saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and
that every imagination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil
continually.
"And it repented the Lord that he had made man on the earth, and it
grieved him at his heart.
"And the Lord said, I will destroy man whom I have created from the face
of the earth; both man, and beast, and the creeping thing, and the fowls
of the air; for it repenteth me that I have made them."
From this account it seems that driving Adam and Eve out of Eden did not
have the effect to improve them or their children. On the contrary, the
world grew worse and worse. They were under the immediate control and
government of God, and he from time to time made known his will; but in
spite of this, man continued to increase in crime.
Nothing in particular seems to have been done. Not a school was
established. There was no written language. There was not a Bible in the
world. The "scheme of salvation" was kept a profound secret. The five
points of Calvinism had not been taught. Sunday schools had not been
opened. In short, nothing had been done for the reformation of the
world. God did not even keep his own sons at home, but allowed them to
leave their abode in the firmament, and make love to the daughters
of men. As a result of this, the world was filled with wickedness and
giants to such an extent that God regretted "that he had made man on the
earth, and it grieved him at his heart."
Of course God knew when he made man, that he would afterwards regret
it. He knew that the people would grow worse and worse until destruction
would be the only remedy. He knew that he would have to kill all except
Noah and his family, and it is hard to see why he did not make Noah and
his family in the first place, and leave Adam and Eve in the original
dust. He knew that they would be tempted, that he would have to drive
them out of the garden to keep them from eating of the tree of life;
that the whole thing would be a failure; that Satan would defeat his
plan; that he could not reform the people; that his own sons would
corrupt them, and that at last he would have to drown them all except
Noah and his family. Why was the Garden of Eden planted? Why was the
experiment made? Why were Adam and Eve exposed to the seductive arts of
the serpent? Why did God wait until the cool of the day before looking
after his children? Why was he not on hand in the morning?
Why did he fill the world with his own children, knowing that he would
have to destroy them? And why does this same God tell me how to raise my
children when he had to drown his?
It is a little curious that when God wished to reform the ante-diluvian
world he said nothing about hell; that he had no revivals, no
camp-meetings, no tracts, no outpourings of the Holy Ghost, no baptisms,
no noon prayer meetings, and never mentioned the great doctrine of
salvation by faith. If the orthodox creeds of the world are true, all
those people went to hell without ever having heard that such a place
existed. If eternal torment is a fact, surely these miserable wretches
ought to have been warned. They were threatened only with water when
they were in fact doomed to eternal fire!
Is it not strange that God said nothing to Adam and Eve about a future
life; that he should have kept these "infinite verities" to himself and
allowed millions to live and die without the hope of heaven, or the fear
of hell?
It may be that hell was not made at that time. In the six days of
creation nothing is said about the construction of a bottomless pit, and
the serpent himself did not make his appearance until after the creation
of man and woman. Perhaps he was made on the first Sunday, and from that
fact came, it may be, the old couplet,
"And Satan still some mischief finds
For idle hands to do."
The sacred historian failed also to tell us when the cherubim and the
flaming sword were made, and said nothing about two of the persons
composing the Trinity. It certainly would have been an easy thing to
enlighten Adam and his immediate descendants. The world was then only
about fifteen hundred and thirty-six years old, and only about three
or four generations of men had lived. Adam had been dead only about six
hundred and six years, and some of his grandchildren must, at that time,
have been alive and well.
It is hard to see why God did not civilize these people. He certainly
had the power to use, and the wisdom to devise the proper means. What
right has a god to fill a world with fiends? Can there be goodness in
this? Why should he make experiments that he knows must fail? Is there
wisdom in this? And what right has a man to charge an infinite being
with wickedness and folly?
According to Moses, God made up his mind not only to destroy the people,
but the beasts and the creeping things, and the fowls of the air. What
had the beasts, and the creeping things, and the birds done to excite
the anger of God? Why did he repent having made them? Will some
Christian give us an explanation of this matter? No good man will
inflict unnecessary pain upon a beast; how then can we worship a god who
cares nothing for the agonies of the dumb creatures that he made?
Why did he make animals that he knew he would destroy? Does God delight
in causing pain? He had the power to make the beasts, and fowls, and
creeping things in his own good time and way, and it is to be presumed
that he made them according to his wish. Why should he destroy them?
They had committed no sin. They had eaten no forbidden fruit, made no
aprons, nor tried to reach the tree of life. Yet this god, in blind
unreasoning wrath destroyed "all flesh wherein was the breath of life,
and every living thing beneath the sky, and every substance wherein was
life that he had made."
Jehovah having made up his mind to drown the world, told Noah to make
an Ark of gopher wood three hundred cubits long, fifty cubits wide and
thirty cubits high. A cubit is twenty-two inches; so that the ark was
five hundred and fifty feet long, ninety-one feet and eight inches wide
and fifty-five feet high. This ark was divided into three stories, and
had on top, one window twenty-two inches square. Ventilation must have
been one of Jehovah's hobbies. Think of a ship larger than the Great
Eastern with only one window, and that but twenty-two inches square!
The ark also had one door set in the side thereof that shut from the
outside. As soon as this ship was finished, and properly victualed, Noah
received seven days notice to get the animals in the ark.
It is claimed by some of the scientific theologians that the flood was
partial, that the waters covered only a small portion of the world, and
that consequently only a few animals were in the ark. It is impossible
to conceive of language that can more clearly convey the idea of a
universal flood than that found in the inspired account. If the flood
was only partial, why did God say he would "destroy all flesh wherein
is the breath of life from under heaven, and that every thing that is
in the earth shall die"? Why did he say "I will destroy man whom I have
created from the face of the earth, both man and beast, and the creeping
thing and the fowls of the air"? Why did he say "And every living
substance that I have made will I destroy from off the face of the
earth"? Would a partial, local flood have fulfilled these threats?
Nothing can be clearer than that the writer of this account intended to
convey, and did convey the idea that the flood was universal. Why should
Christians try to deprive God of the glory of having wrought the most
stupendous of miracles? Is it possible that the Infinite could not
overwhelm with waves this atom called the earth? Do you doubt his power,
his wisdom or his justice?
Believers in miracles should not endeavor to explain them. There is but
one way to explain anything, and that is to account for it by natural
agencies. The moment you explain a miracle, it disappears. You should
depend not upon explanation, but assertion. You should not be driven
from the field because the miracle is shown to be unreasonable. You
should reply that all miracles are unreasonable. Neither should you be
in the least disheartened if it is shown to be impossible. The possible
is not miraculous. You should take the ground that if miracles were
reasonable, and possible, there would be no reward paid for believing
them. The Christian has the goodness to believe, while the sinner asks
for evidence. It is enough for God to work miracles without being called
upon to substantiate them for the benefit of unbelievers.
Only a few years ago, the Christians believed implicitly in the literal
truth of every miracle recorded in the Bible. Whoever tried to explain
them in some natural way, was looked upon as an infidel in disguise,
but now he is regarded as a benefactor. The credulity of the church is
decreasing, and the most marvelous miracles are now either "explained,"
or allowed to take refuge behind the mistakes of the translators, or
hide in the drapery of allegory.
In the sixth chapter, Noah is ordered to take "of every living thing
of all flesh, two of every sort into the ark--male and female." In the
seventh chapter the order is changed, and Noah is commanded, according
to the Protestant Bible, as follows: "Of every clean beast thou shalt
take to thee by sevens, the male and his female, and of beasts that are
not clean, by two, the male and his female. Of fowls also of the air by
sevens, the male and the female."
According to the Catholic Bible, Noah was commanded---"Of all clean
beasts take seven and seven, the male and the female. But of the beasts
that are unclean two and two, the male and the female. Of the fowls also
of the air seven and seven, the male and the female."
For the purpose of belittling this miracle, many commentators have
taken the ground that Noah was not ordered to take seven males and seven
females of each kind of clean beasts, but seven in all. Many Christians
contend that only seven clean beasts of each kind were taken into the
ark--three and a half of each sex.
If the account in the seventh chapter means anything, it means _first_,
that of each kind of clean beasts, fourteen were to be taken, seven
males, and seven females; _second_, that of unclean beasts should be
taken, two of each kind, one of each sex, and _third_, that he should
take of every kind of fowls, seven of each sex.
It is equally clear that the command in the 19th and 20th verses of the
6th chapter, is to take two of each sort, one male and one female. And
this agrees exactly with the account in the 7th, 8th, 9th, 14th, 15th,
and 16th verses of the 7th chapter.
The next question is, how many beasts, fowls and creeping things did
Noah take into the ark?
There are now known and classified at least twelve thousand five hundred
species of birds. There are still vast territories in China, South
America, and Africa unknown to the ornithologist.
Of the birds, Noah took fourteen of each species, according to the 3d
verse of the 7th chapter, "Of fowls also of the air by sevens, the male
and the female," making a total of 175,000 birds.
And right here allow me to ask a question. If the flood was simply a
partial flood, why were birds taken into the ark? It seems to me that
most birds, attending strictly to business, might avoid a partial flood.
There are at least sixteen hundred and fifty-eight kinds of beasts. Let
us suppose that twenty-five of these are clean. Of the clean, fourteen
of each kind--seven of each sex--were taken. These amount to 350. Of
the unclean--two of each kind, amounting to 3,266. There are some six
hundred and fifty species of reptiles. Two of each kind amount to 1,300.
And lastly, there are of insects including the creeping things, at least
one million species, so that Noah and his folks had to get of these into
the ark about 2,000,000.
Animalculæ have not been taken into consideration. There are probably
many hundreds of thousands of species; many of them invisible; and
yet Noah had to pick them out by pairs. Very few people have any just
conception of the trouble Noah had.
We know that there are many animals on this continent not found in the
Old World. These must have been carried from here to the ark, and then
brought back afterwards. Were the peccary, armadillo, ant-eater, sloth,
agouti, vampire-bat, marmoset, howling and prehensile-tailed monkey, the
raccoon and muskrat carried by the angels from America to Asia? How did
they get there? Did the polar bear leave his field of ice and journey
toward the tropics? How did he know where the ark was? Did the kangaroo
swim or jump from Australia to Asia? Did the giraffe, hippopotamus,
antelope and orang-outang journey from Africa in search of the ark? Can
absurdities go farther than this?
What had these animals to eat while on the journey? What did they eat
while in the ark? What did they drink? When the rain came, of course
the rivers ran to the seas, and these seas rose and finally covered the
world. The waters of the seas, mingled with those of the flood, would
make all salt. It has been calculated that it required, to drown the
world, about eight times as much water as was in all the seas. To find
how salt the waters of the flood must have been, take eight quarts of
fresh water, and add one quart from the sea. Such water would create
instead of allaying thirst. Noah had to take in his ark fresh water for
all his beasts, birds and living things. He had to take the proper food
for all. How long was he in the ark? Three hundred and seventy-seven
days! Think of the food necessary for the monsters of the ante-diluvian
world!
Eight persons did all the work. They attended to the wants of 175,000
birds, 3,616 beasts, 1,300 reptiles, and 2,000,000 insects, saying
nothing of countless animalculæ.
Well, after they all got in, Noah pulled down the window, God shut the
door, and the rain commenced.
How long did it rain?
Forty days.
How deep did the water get?
About five miles and a half.
How much did it rain a day?
Enough to cover the whole world to a depth of about seven hundred and
forty-two feet.
Some Christians say that the fountains of the great deep were broken up.
Will they be kind enough to tell us what the fountains of the great deep
are? Others say that God had vast stores of water in the center of the
earth that he used on that occasion. How did these waters happen to run
up hill?
Gentlemen, allow me to tell you once more that you must not try to
explain these things. Your efforts in that direction do no good, because
your explanations are harder to believe than the miracle itself. Take my
advice, stick to assertion, and let explanation alone.
Then, as now, Dhawalagiri lifted its crown of snow twenty-nine thousand
feet above the level of the sea, and on the cloudless cliffs of
Chimborazo then, as now, sat the condor; and yet the waters rising seven
hundred and twenty-six feet a day--thirty feet an hour, six inches
a minute,--rose over the hills, over the volcanoes, filled the vast
craters, extinguished all the fires, rose above every mountain peak
until the vast world was but one shoreless sea covered with the
innumerable dead.
Was this the work of the most merciful God, the father of us all? If
there is a God, can there be the slightest danger of incurring his
displeasure by doubting even in a reverential way, the truth of such a
cruel lie? If we think that God is kinder than he really is, will our
poor souls be burned for that?
How many trees can live under miles of water for a year? What became of
the soil washed, scattered, dissolved, and covered with the _debris_ of
a world? How were the tender plants and herbs preserved? How were the
animals preserved after leaving the ark? There was no grass except such
as had been submerged for a year. There were no animals to be devoured
by the carnivorous beasts. What became of the birds that fed on worms
and insects? What became of the birds that devoured other birds?
It must be remembered that the pressure of the water when at the highest
point--say twenty-nine thousand feet, would have been about eight
hundred tons on each square foot. Such a pressure certainly would have
destroyed nearly every vestige of vegetable life, so that when the
animals came out of the ark, there was not a mouthful of food in the
wide world. How were they supported until the world was again clothed
with grass? How were those animals taken care of that subsisted on
others? Where did the bees get honey, and the ants seeds? There was not
a creeping thing upon the whole earth; not a breathing creature beneath
the whole heavens; not a living substance. Where did the tenants of the
ark get food?
There is but one answer, if the story is true. The food necessary
not only during the year of the flood, but sufficient for many months
afterwards, must have been stored in the ark.
There is probably not an animal in the world that will not, in a year,
eat and drink ten times its weight. Noah must have provided food and
water for a year while in the ark, and food for at least six months
after they got ashore. It must have required for a pair of elephants,
about one hundred and fifty tons of food and water. A couple of mammoths
would have required about twice that amount. Of course there were other
monsters that lived on trees; and in a year would have devoured quite a
forest.
How could eight persons have distributed this food, even if the ark had
been large enough to hold it? How was the ark kept clean? We know how it
was ventilated; but what was done with the filth? How were the animals
watered? How were some portions of the ark heated for animals from the
tropics, and others kept cool for the polar bears? How did the animals
get back to their respective countries? Some had to creep back about
six thousand miles, and they could only go a few feet a day. Some of the
creeping things must have started for the ark just as soon as they were
made, and kept up a steady jog for sixteen hundred years. Think of
a couple of the slowest snails leaving a point opposite the ark and
starting for the plains of Shinar, a distance of twelve thousand miles.
Going at the rate of a mile a month, it would take them a thousand
years. How did they get there? Polar bears must have gone several
thousand miles, and so sudden a change in climate must have been
exceedingly trying upon their health. How did they know the way to go?
Of course, all the polar bears did not go. Only two were required. Who
selected these?
Two sloths had to make the journey from South America. These creatures
cannot travel to exceed three rods a day. At this rate, they would make
a mile in about a hundred days. They must have gone about six thousand
five hundred miles, to reach the ark. Supposing them to have traveled by
a reasonably direct route, in order to complete the journey before Noah
hauled in the plank, they must have started several years before the
world was created. We must also consider that these sloths had to board
themselves on the way, and that most of their time had to be taken up
getting food and water. It is exceedingly doubtful whether a sloth could
travel six thousand miles and board himself in less than three thousand
years.
Volumes might be written upon the infinite absurdity of this most
incredible, wicked and foolish of all the fables contained in that
repository of the impossible, called the Bible. To me it is a matter
of amazement, that it ever was for a moment believed by any intelligent
human being.
Dr. Adam Clarke says that "the animals were brought to the ark by the
power of God, and their enmities were so removed or suspended, that the
lion could dwell peaceably with the lamb, and the wolf sleep happily by
the side of the kid. There is no positive evidence that animal food was
ever used before the flood. Noah had the first grant of this kind."
Dr. Scott remarks, "There seems to have been a very extraordinary
miracle, perhaps by the ministration of angels, in bringing two of every
species to Noah, and rendering them submissive, and peaceful with each
other. Yet it seems not to have made any impression upon the hardened
spectators. The suspension of the ferocity of the savage beasts during
their continuance in the ark, is generally considered as an apt figure
of the change that takes place in the disposition of sinners when they
enter the true church of Christ."
He believed the deluge to have been universal. In his day science had
not demonstrated the absurdity of this belief, and he was not compelled
to resort to some theory not found in the Bible. He insisted that "by
some vast convulsion, the very bowels of the earth were forced upwards,
and rain poured down in cataracts and water-spouts, with no intermission
for forty days and nights, and until in every place a universal deluge
was effected.
"The presence of God was the only comfort of Noah in his dreary
confinement, and in witnessing the dire devastation of the earth and its
inhabitants, and especially of the human species--of his companions, his
neighbors, his relatives--all those to whom he had preached, for whom he
had prayed and over whom he had wept, and even of many who had helped to
build the ark.
"It seems that by a peculiar providential interposition, no animal of
any sort died, although they had been shut up in the ark above a year;
and it does not appear that there had been any increase of them during
that time.
"The Ark was flat-bottomed--square at each end--roofed like a house so
that it terminated at the top in the breadth of a cubit. It was divided
into many little cabins for its intended inhabitants. Pitched within and
without to keep it tight and sweet, and lighted from the upper part.
But it must, at first sight, be evident that so large a vessel, thus
constructed, with so few persons on board, was utterly unfitted to
weather out the deluge, except it was under the immediate guidance and
protection of the Almighty."
Dr. Henry furnished the Christian world with the following:--
"As our bodies have in them the humors which, when God pleases, become
the springs and seeds of mortal disease, so the earth had, in its
bowels, those waters which, at God's command, sprung up and flooded it.
"God made the world in six days, but he was forty days in destroying it,
because he is slow to anger.
"The hostilities between the animals in the ark ceased, and ravenous
creatures became mild and manageable, so that the wolf lay down with the
lamb, and the lion ate straw like an ox.
"God shut the door of the ark to secure Noah and to keep him safe, and
because it was necessary that the door should be shut very close lest
the water should break in and sink the ark, and very fast lest others
might break it down.
"The waters rose so high that not only the low flat countries were
deluged, but to make sure work and that none might escape, the tops of
the highest mountains were overflowed fifteen cubits. That is, seven
and a half yards, so that salvation was not hoped for from hills or
mountains.
"Perhaps some of the people got to the top of the ark, and hoped to
shift for themselves there. But either they perished there for want of
food, or the dashing rain washed them off the top. Others, it may be,
hoped to prevail with Noah for admission into the ark, and plead old
acquaintance.
"'Have we not eaten and drank in thy presence? Hast thou not preached in
our streets?' 'Yea,' said Noah, 'many a time, but to little purpose. I
called but ye refused; and now it is not in my power to help you. God
has shut the door and I cannot open it.'
"We may suppose that some of those who perished in the deluge had
themselves assisted Noah, or were employed by him in building the ark.
"Hitherto, man had been confined to feed only upon the products of the
earth. Fruits, herbs and roots, and all sorts of greens, and milk, which
was the first grant; but the flood having perhaps washed away much
of the fruits of the earth, and rendered them much less pleasant and
nourishing, God enlarged the grant and allowed him to eat flesh, which
perhaps man never thought of until now, that God directed him to it. Nor
had he any more desire to it than the sheep has to suck blood like the
wolf. But now, man is allowed to feed upon flesh as freely and safely as
upon the green herb."
Such was the debasing influence of a belief in the literal truth of the
Bible upon these men, that their commentaries are filled with passages
utterly devoid of common sense.
Dr. Clarke speaking of the mammoth says:
"This animal, an astonishing proof of God's power, he seems to have
produced merely to show what he could do. And after suffering a few of
them to propagate, he extinguished the race by a merciful providence,
that they might not destroy both man and beast.
"We are told that it would have been much easier for God to destroy all
the people and make new ones, but he would not want to waste anything
and no power or skill should be lavished where no necessity exists.
"The animals were brought to the ark by the power of God."
Again gentlemen, let me warn you of the danger of trying to explain a
miracle. Let it alone. Say that you do not understand it, and do not
expect to until taught in the schools of the New Jerusalem. The more
reasons you give, the more unreasonable the miracle will appear. Through
what you say in defence, people are led to think, and as soon as they
really think, the miracle is thrown away.
Among the most ignorant nations you will find the most wonders, among
the most enlightened, the least. It is with individuals, the same as
with nations. Ignorance believes, Intelligence examines and explains.
For about seven months the ark, with its cargo of men, animals and
insects, tossed and wandered without rudder or sail upon a boundless
sea. At last it grounded on the mountains of Ararat; and about three
months afterward the tops of the mountains became visible. It must not
be forgotten that the mountain where the ark is supposed to have first
touched bottom, was about seventeen thousand feet high. How were the
animals from the tropics kept warm? When the waters were abated it would
be intensely cold at a point seventeen thousand feet above the level of
the sea. May be there were stoves, furnaces, fire places and steam coils
in the ark, but they are not mentioned in the inspired narrative. How
were the animals kept from freezing? It will not do to say that Ararat
was not very high after all.
If you will read the fourth and fifth verses of the eight chapter you
will see that although "the ark rested in the seventh month, on the
seventeenth day of the month, upon the mountains of Ararat, it was not
until the first day of the tenth month that the tops of the mountains
could be seen." From this it would seem that the ark must have rested
upon about the highest peak in that country. Noah waited forty days
more, and then for the first time opened the window and took a breath
of fresh air. He then sent out a raven that did not return, then a dove
that returned. He then waited seven days and sent forth a dove that
returned not. From this he knew that the waters were abated. Is it
possible that he could not see whether the waters had gone? Is it
possible to conceive of a more perfectly childish way of ascertaining
whether the earth was dry?
At last Noah "removed the covering of the ark, and looked and behold the
face of the ground was dry," and thereupon God told him to disembark. In
his gratitude Noah built an altar and took of every clean beast and of
every clean fowl, and offered burnt offerings. And the Lord smelled a
sweet savor and said in his heart that he would not any more curse the
ground for man's sake. For saying this in his heart the Lord gives as a
reason, not that man is, or will be good, but because "the imagination
of man's heart is evil from his youth." God destroyed man because "the
wickedness of man was great in the earth, and _because every imagination
of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually_." And he
promised for the same reason not to destroy him again. Will some
gentleman skilled in theology give us an explanation?
After God had smelled the sweet savor of sacrifice, he seems to have
changed his idea as to the proper diet for man. When Adam and Eve were
created they were allowed to eat herbs bearing seed, and the fruit of
trees. When they were turned out of Eden, God said to them "Thou shalt
eat the herb of the field." In the first chapter of Genesis the "green
herb" was given for food to the beasts, fowls and creeping things. Upon
being expelled from the garden, Adam and Eve, as to their food, were
put upon an equality with the lower animals. According to this, the
ante-diluvians were vegetarians. This may account for their wickedness
and longevity.
After Noah sacrificed, and God smelled the sweet savor; he said--"Every
moving thing that liveth shall be meat for you, even as the green herb
have I given you all things." Afterward this same God changed his mind
again, and divided the beasts and birds into clean and unclean, and made
it a crime for man to eat the unclean. Probably food was so scarce when
Noah was let out of the ark that Jehovah generously allowed him to eat
anything and everything he could find.
According to the account, God then made a covenant with Noah to the
effect that he would not again destroy the world with a flood, and as
the attesting witness of this contract, a rainbow was set in the cloud.
This bow was placed in the sky so that it might perpetually remind God
of his promise and covenant. Without this visible witness and reminder,
it would seem that Jehovah was liable to forget the contract, and drown
the world again. Did the rainbow originate in this way? Did God put it
in the cloud simply to keep his agreement in his memory?
For me it is impossible to believe the story of the deluge. It seems so
cruel, so barbaric, so crude in detail, so absurd in all its parts,
and so contrary to all we know of law, that even credulity itself is
shocked.
Many nations have preserved accounts of a deluge in which all people,
except a family or two, were destroyed. Babylon was certainly a city
before Jerusalem was founded. Egypt was in the height of her power when
there were only seventy Jews in the world, and India had a literature
before the name of Jehovah had passed the lips of superstition. An
account of a general deluge "was discovered by George Smith, translated
from another account that was written about two thousand years before
Christ." Of course it is impossible to tell how long the story had
lived in the memory of tradition before it was reduced to writing by the
Babylonians. According to this account, which is, without doubt, much
older than the one given by Moses, Tamzi built a ship at the command of
the god Hea, and put in it his family and the beasts of the field. He
pitched the ship inside and outside with bitumen, and as soon as it was
finished, there came a flood of rain and "destroyed all life from the
face of the whole earth. On the seventh day there was a calm, and the
ship stranded on the mountain Nizir." Tamzi waited for seven days more,
and then let out a dove. Afterwards, he let out a swallow, and that, as
well as the dove returned. Then he let out a raven, and as that did not
return, he concluded that the water had dried away, and thereupon
left the ship. Then he made an offering to god, or the gods, and "Hea
interceded with Bel," so that the earth might never again be drowned.
This is the Babylonian story, told without the contradictions of the
original. For in that, it seems, there are two accounts, as well as
in the Bible. Is it not a strange coincidence that there should be
contradictory accounts mingled in both the Babylonian and Jewish
stories?
In the Bible there are two accounts. In one account, Noah was to take
two of all beasts, birds, and creeping things into the ark, while in the
other, he was commanded to take of clean beasts, and all birds by
sevens of each kind. According to one account, the flood only lasted
one hundred and fifty days--as related in the third verse of the eighth
chapter; while the other account fixes the time at three hundred and
seventy-seven days. Both of these accounts cannot be true. Yet in order
to be saved, it is not sufficient to believe one of them--you must
believe both.
Among the Egyptians there was a story to the effect that the great god
Ra became utterly maddened with the people, and deliberately made up his
mind that he would exterminate mankind. Thereupon he began to destroy,
and continued in the terrible work until blood flowed in streams, when
suddenly he ceased, and took an oath that he would not again destroy the
human race. This myth was probably thousands of years old when Moses was
born.
So, in India, there was a fable about the flood. A fish warned Manu
that a flood was coming. Manu built a "box" and the fish towed it to a
mountain and saved all hands.
The same kind of stories were told in Greece, and among our own Indian
tribes. At one time the Christian pointed to the fact that many nations
told of a flood, as evidence of the truth of the Mosaic account; but
now, it having been shown that other accounts are much older, and
equally reasonable, that argument has ceased to be of any great value.
It is probable that all these accounts had a common origin. They were
likely born of something in nature visible to all nations. The idea of a
universal flood, produced by a god to drown the world on account of
the sins of the people, is infinitely absurd. The solution of all these
stories has been supposed to be, the existence of partial floods in most
countries; and for a long time this solution was satisfactory. But the
fact that these stories are greatly alike, that only one man is warned,
that only one family is saved, that a boat is built, that birds are sent
out to find if the water had abated, tend to show that they had a common
origin. Admitting that there were severe floods in all countries; it
certainly cannot follow that in each instance only one family would be
saved, or that the same story would in each instance be told. It may be
urged that the natural tendency of man to exaggerate calamities, might
account for this agreement in all the accounts, and it must be admitted
that there is some force in the suggestion. I believe, though, that the
real origin of all these myths is the same, and that it was originally
an effort to account for the sun, moon and stars. The sun and moon
were the man and wife, or the god and goddess, and the stars were their
children. From a celestial myth, it became a terrestrial one; the air,
or ether-ocean became a flood, produced by rain, and the sun moon and
stars became man, woman and children.
In the original story, the mountain was the place where in the far east
the sky was supposed to touch the earth, and it was there that the ship
containing the celestial passengers finally rested from its voyage. But
whatever may be the origin of the stories of the flood, whether told
first by Hindu, Babylonian or Hebrew, we may rest perfectly assured that
they are all equally false.
XIX. BACCHUS AND BABEL.
As soon as Noah had disembarked, he proceeded to plant a vineyard, and
began to be a husbandman; and when the grapes were ripe he made wine and
drank of it to excess; cursed his grandson, blessed Shem and Japheth, and
after that lived for three hundred and fifty years. What he did during
these three hundred and fifty years, we are not told. We never hear of
him again. For three hundred and fifty years he lived among his sons,
and daughters, and their descendants. He must have been a venerable man.
He was the man to whom God had made known his intention of drowning the
world. By his efforts, the human race had been saved. He must have been
acquainted with Methuselah for six hundred years, and Methuselah was
about two hundred and forty years old, when Adam died. Noah must himself
have known the history of mankind, and must have been an object of
almost infinite interest; and yet for three hundred and fifty years he
is neither directly nor indirectly mentioned. When Noah died, Abraham
must have been more than fifty years old; and Shem, the son of Noah,
lived for several hundred years after the death of Abraham; and yet he
is never mentioned. Noah when he died, was the oldest man in the whole
world by about five hundred years; and everybody living at the time of
his death knew that they were indebted to him, and yet no account is
given of his burial. No monument was raised to mark the spot. This,
however, is no more wonderful than the fact that no account is given of
the death of Adam or of Eve, nor of the place of their burial. This may
all be accounted for by the fact that the language of man was confounded
at the building of the tower of Babel, whereby all tradition may have
been lost, so that even the sons of Noah could not give an account of
their voyage in the ark; and, consequently, some one had to be directly
inspired to tell the story, after new languages had been formed.
It has always been a mystery to me how Adam, Eve, and the serpent were
taught the same language. Where did they get it? We know now, that
it requires a great number of years to form a language; that it is of
exceedingly slow growth. We also know that by language, man conveys to
his fellows the impressions made upon him by what he sees, hears, smells
and touches. We know that the language of the savage consists of a few
sounds, capable of expressing only a few ideas or states of the
mind, such as love, desire, fear, hatred, aversion and contempt. Many
centuries are required to produce a language capable of expressing
complex ideas. It does not seem to me that ideas can be manufactured by
a deity and put in the brain of man. These ideas must be the result of
observation and experience.
Does anybody believe that God directly taught a language to Adam and
Eve, or that he so made them that they, by intuition spoke Hebrew, or
some language capable of conveying to each other their thoughts? How did
the serpent learn the same language? Did God teach it to him, or did he
happen to overhear God, when he was teaching Adam and Eve? We are told
in the second chapter of Genesis that God caused all the animals to pass
before Adam to see what he would call them. We cannot infer from this
that God named the animals and informed Adam what to call them. Adam
named them himself. Where did he get his words? We cannot imagine a man
just made out of dust, without the experience of a moment, having the
power to put his thoughts in language. In the first place, we cannot
conceive of his having any thoughts until he has combined, through
experience and observation, the impressions that nature had made upon
him through the medium of his senses. We cannot imagine of his knowing
anything, in the first instance, about different degrees of heat, nor
about darkness, if he was made in the day-time, nor about light, if
created at night, until the next morning. Before a man can have what we
call thoughts, he must have had a little experience. Something must have
happened to him before he can have a thought, and before he can express
himself in language. Language is a growth, not a gift. We account now
for the diversity of language by the fact that tribes and nations have
had different experiences, different wants, different surroundings, and,
one result of all these differences is, among other things, a difference
in language. Nothing can be more absurd than to account for the
different languages of the world by saying that the original language
was confounded at the tower of Babel.
According to the Bible, up to the time of the building of that tower,
the whole earth was of one language and of one speech, and would have so
remained until the present time had not an effort been made to build
a tower whose top should reach into heaven. Can any one imagine what
objection God would have to the building of such a tower? And how could
the confusion of tongues prevent its construction? How could language
be confounded? It could be confounded only by the destruction of memory.
Did God destroy the memory of mankind at that time, and if so, how?
Did he paralyze that portion of the brain presiding over the organs
of articulation, so that they could not speak the words, although they
remembered them clearly, or did he so touch the brain that they
could not hear? Will some theologian, versed in the machinery of the
miraculous, tell us in what way God confounded the language of mankind?
Why would the confounding of the language make them separate? Why would
they not stay together until they could understand each other? People
will not separate, from weakness. When in trouble they come together
and desire the assistance of each other. Why, in this instance, did they
separate? What particular ones would naturally come together if nobody
understood the language of any other person? Would it not have been just
as hard to agree when and where to go, without any language to express
the agreement, as to go on with the building of the tower?
Is it possible that any one now believes that the whole world would be
of one speech had the language not been confounded at Babel? Do we not
know that every word was suggested in some way by the experience of men?
Do we not know that words are continually dying, and continually being
born; that every language has its cradle and its cemetery--its buds, its
blossoms, its fruits and its withered leaves? Man has loved, enjoyed,
hated, suffered and hoped, and all words have been born of these
experiences.
Why did "the Lord come down to see the city and the tower"? Could he
not see them from where he lived or from where he was? Where did he come
down from? Did he come in the daytime, or in the night? We are taught
now that God is everywhere; that he inhabits immensity; that he is in
every atom, and in every star. If this is true, why did he "come down to
see the city and the tower?" Will some theologian explain this?
After all, is it not much easier and altogether more reasonable to say
that Moses was mistaken, that he knew little of the science of language,
and that he guessed a great deal more than he investigated?
XX. FAITH IN FILTH.
No light whatever is shed upon what passed in the world after the
confounding of language at Babel, until the birth of Abraham. But,
before speaking of the history of the Jewish people, it may be proper
for me to say that many things are recounted in Genesis, and other books
attributed to Moses, of which I do not wish to speak. There are many
pages of these books unfit to read, many stories not calculated, in my
judgment, to improve the morals of mankind. I do not wish even to call
the attention of my readers to these things, except in a general way. It
is to be hoped that the time will come when such chapters and passages
as cannot be read without leaving the blush of shame upon the cheek of
modesty, will be left out, and not published as a part of the Bible. If
there is a God, it certainly is blasphemous to attribute to him the
authorship of pages too obscene, beastly and vulgar to be read in the
presence of men and women.
The believers in the Bible are loud in their denunciation of what they
are pleased to call the immoral literature of the world; and yet few
books have been published containing more moral filth than this inspired
word of God. These stories are not redeemed by a single flash of wit or
humor. They never rise above the dull details of stupid vice. For one,
I cannot afford to soil my pages with extracts from them; and all such
portions of the Scriptures I leave to be examined, written upon, and
explained by the clergy. Clergymen may know some way by which they can
extract honey from these flowers. Until these passages are expunged
from the Old Testament, it is not a fit book to be read by either old
or young. It contains pages that no minister in the United States would
read to his congregation for any reward whatever. There are chapters
that no gentleman would read in the presence of a lady. There are
chapters that no father would read to his child. There are narratives
utterly unfit to be told; and the time will come when mankind will
wonder that such a book was ever called inspired.
I know that in many books besides the Bible, there are immodest lines.
Some of the greatest writers have soiled their pages with indecent
words. We account for this by saying that the authors were human; that
they catered to the taste and spirit of their times. We make excuses,
but at the same time regret that in their works they left an impure
word. But what shall we say of God? Is it possible that a being of
infinite purity--the author of modesty, would smirch the pages of his
book with stories lewd, licentious and obscene? If God is the author of
the Bible, it is, of course, the standard by which all other books can,
and should be measured. If the Bible is not obscene, what book is? Why
should men be imprisoned simply for imitating God? The Christian world
should never say another word against immoral books until it makes the
inspired volume clean. These vile and filthy things were not written
for the purpose of conveying and enforcing moral truth, but seem to
have been written because the author loved an unclean thing. There is
no moral depth below that occupied by the writer or publisher of obscene
books, that stain with lust, the loving heart of youth. Such men should
be imprisoned and their books destroyed. The literature of the world
should be rendered decent, and no book should be published that cannot
be read by, and in the hearing of the best and purest people. But as
long as the Bible is considered as the work of God, it will be hard
to make all men too good and pure to imitate it; and as long as it is
imitated there will be vile and filthy books. The literature of our
country will not be sweet and clean until the Bible ceases to be
regarded as the production of a god.
We are continually told that the Bible is the very foundation of modesty
and morality; while many of its pages are so immodest and immoral that
a minister, for reading them in the pulpit, would be instantly denounced
as an unclean wretch. Every woman would leave the church, and if the men
stayed, it would be for the purpose of chastising the minister.
Is there any saving grace in hypocrisy? Will men become clean in speech
by believing that God is unclean? Would it not be far better to admit
that the Bible was written by barbarians in a barbarous, coarse and
vulgar age? Would it not be safer to charge Moses with vulgarity,
instead of God? Is it not altogether more probable that some ignorant
Hebrew would write the vulgar words? The Christians tell me that God is
the author of these vile and stupid things? I have examined the question
to the best of my ability, and as to God my verdict is:--Not guilty.
Faith should not rest in filth.
Every foolish and immodest thing should be expunged from the Bible.
Let us keep the good. Let us preserve every great and splendid thought,
every wise and prudent maxim, every just law, every elevated idea, and
every word calculated to make man nobler and purer, and let us have the
courage to throw the rest away. The souls of children should not
be stained and soiled. The charming instincts of youth should not be
corrupted and defiled. The girls and boys should not be taught that
unclean words were uttered by "inspired" lips. Teach them that these
words were born of savagery and lust. Teach them that the unclean is the
unholy, and that only the pure is sacred.
XXI. THE HEBREWS.
After language had been confounded and the people scattered, there
appeared in the land of Canaan a tribe of Hebrews ruled by a chief or
sheik called Abraham. They had a few cattle, lived in tents, practiced
polygamy, wandered from place to place, and were the only folks in the
whole world to whom God paid the slightest attention. At this time
there were hundreds of cities in India filled with temples and palaces;
millions of Egyptians worshiped Isis and Osiris, and had covered their
land with marvelous monuments of industry, power and skill. But these
civilizations were entirely neglected by the Deity, his whole attention
being taken up with Abraham and his family.
It seems, from the account, that God and Abraham were intimately
acquainted, and conversed frequently upon a great variety of subjects.
By the twelfth chapter of Genesis it appears that he made the following
promises to Abraham. "I will make of thee a great nation, and I will
bless thee, and make thy name great: and thou shalt be a blessing. And I
will bless them that bless thee, and curse him that curseth thee."
After receiving this communication from the Almighty, Abraham went into
the land of Canaan, and again God appeared to him and told him to take
a heifer three years old, a goat of the same age, a sheep of equal
antiquity, a turtle dove and a young pigeon. Whereupon Abraham killed
the animals "and divided them in the midst, and laid each piece one
against another." And it came to pass that when the sun went down and
it was dark, behold a smoking furnace and a burning lamp that passed
between the raw and bleeding meat. The killing of these animals was
a preparation for receiving a visit from God. Should an American
missionary in Central Africa find a negro chief surrounded by
a butchered heifer, a goat and a sheep, with which to receive a
communication from the infinite God, my opinion is, that the missionary
would regard the proceeding as the direct result of savagery. And if
the chief insisted that he had seen a smoking furnace and a burning
lamp going up and down between the pieces of meat, the missionary would
certainly conclude that the chief was not altogether right in his mind.
If the Bible is true, this same God told Abraham to take and sacrifice
his only son, or rather the only son of his wife, and a murder would
have been committed had not God, just at the right moment, directed him
to stay his hand and take a sheep instead.
God made a great number of promises to Abraham, but few of them were
ever kept. He agreed to make him the father of a great nation, but he
did not. He solemnly promised to give him a great country, including all
the land between the river of Egypt and the Euphrates, but he did not.
In due time Abraham passed away, and his son Isaac took his place at
the head of the tribe. Then came Jacob, who "watered stock" and enriched
himself with the spoil of Laban. Joseph was sold into Egypt by his
jealous brethren, where he became one of the chief men of the kingdom,
and in a few years his father and brothers left their own country and
settled in Egypt. At this time there were seventy Hebrews in the world,
counting Joseph and his children. They remained in Egypt two hundred and
fifteen years. It is claimed by some that they were in that country for
four hundred and thirty years. This is a mistake. Josephus says they
were in Egypt two hundred and fifteen years, and this statement is
sustained by the best biblical scholars of all denominations. According
to the 17th verse of the 3rd chapter of Galatians, it was four hundred
and thirty years from the time the promise was made to Abraham to
the giving of the law, and as the Hebrews did not go to Egypt for two
hundred and fifteen years after the making of the promise to Abraham,
they could in no event have been in Egypt more than two hundred and
fifteen years. In our Bible the 40th verse of the 12th chapter of
Exodus, is as follows:--
"Now the sojourning of the children of Israel, who dwelt in Egypt, was
four hundred and thirty years."
This passage does not say that the sojourning was all done in Egypt;
neither does it say that the children of Israel dwelt in Egypt four
hundred and thirty years; but it does say that the sojourning of the
children of Israel who dwelt in Egypt was four hundred and thirty
years. The Vatican copy of the Septuagint renders the same passage as
follows:--
"The sojourning of the children of Israel which they sojourned in Egypt,
and in the land of Canaan, was four hundred and thirty years."
The Alexandrian version says:--"The sojourning of the children of Israel
which they and their fathers sojourned in Egypt, and in the land of
Canaan, was four hundred and thirty years."
And in the Samaritan Bible we have:--"The sojourning of the children of
Israel and of their fathers which they sojourned in the land of Canaan,
and in the land of Egypt, was four hundred and thirty years."
There were seventy souls when they went down into Egypt, and they
remained two hundred and fifteen years, and at the end of that time they
had increased to about three million. How do we know that there were
three million at the end of two hundred and fifteen years? We know it
because we are informed by Moses that "there were six hundred thousand
men of war." Now, to each man of war, there must have been at least five
other people. In every State in this Union there will be to each voter,
five other persons at least, and we all know that there are always more
voters than men of war. If there were six hundred thousand men of war,
there must have been a population of at least three million. Is it
possible that seventy people could increase to that extent in two
hundred and fifteen years? You may say that it was a miracle; but
what need was there of working a miracle? Why should God miraculously
increase the number of slaves? If he wished miraculously to increase the
population, why did he not wait until the people were free?
In 1776, we had in the American Colonies about three millions of people.
In one hundred years we doubled four times: that is to say, six, twelve,
twenty-four, forty-eight million,--our present population.
We must not forget that during all these years there has been pouring
into our country a vast stream of emigration, and that this, taken
in connection with the fact that our country is productive beyond all
others, gave us only four doubles in one hundred years. Admitting that
the Hebrews increased as rapidly without emigration as we, in this
country, have with it, we will give to them four doubles each century,
commencing with seventy people, and they would have, at the end of
two hundred years, a population of seventeen thousand nine hundred and
twenty. Giving them another double for the odd fifteen years and there
would be, provided no deaths had occurred, thirty-five thousand eight
hundred and forty people. And yet we are told that instead of having
this number, they had increased to such an extent that they had six
hundred thousand men of war; that is to say, a population of more than
three millions?
Every sensible man knows that this account is not, and cannot be true.
We know that seventy people could not increase to three million in two
hundred and fifteen years.
About this time the Hebrews took a census, and found that there were
twenty-two thousand two hundred and seventy-three first-born males.
It is reasonable to suppose that there were about as many first-born
females. This would make forty-four thousand five hundred and forty-six
first-born children. Now, there must have been about as many mothers
as there were first-born children. If there were only about forty-five
thousand mothers and three millions of people, the mothers must have had
on an average about sixty-six children apiece.
At this time, the Hebrews were slaves, and had been for two hundred and
fifteen years. A little while before, an order had been made by the
Egyptians that all the male children of the Hebrews should be killed.
One, contrary to this order, was saved in an ark made of bullrushes
daubed with slime. This child was found by the daughter of Pharaoh, and
was adopted, it seems, as her own, and, may be, was. He grew to be
a man, sided with the Hebrews, killed an Egyptian that was smiting a
slave, hid the body in the sand, and fled from Egypt to the land of
Midian, became acquainted with a priest who had seven daughters, took
the side of the daughters against the ill-mannered shepherds of that
country, and married Zipporah, one of the girls, and became a shepherd
for her father. Afterward, while tending his flock, the Lord appeared to
him in a burning bush, and commanded him to go to the king of Egypt and
demand from him the liberation of the Hebrews. In order to convince him
that the something burning in the bush was actually God, the rod in his
hand was changed into a serpent, which, upon being caught by the tail,
became again a rod. Moses was also told to put his hand in his bosom,
and when he took it out it was as leprous as snow. Quite a number of
strange things were performed, and others promised. Moses then agreed to
go back to Egypt provided his brother could go with him. Whereupon
the Lord appeared to Aaron, and directed him to meet Moses in the
wilderness. They met at the mount of God, went to Egypt, gathered
together all the elders of the children of Israel, spake all the words
which God had spoken unto Moses, and did all the signs in the sight of
the people. The Israelites believed, bowed their heads and worshiped;
and Moses and Aaron went in and told their message to Pharaoh the king.
XXII. THE PLAGUES.
Three millions of people were in slavery. They were treated with the
utmost rigor, and so fearful were their masters that they might, in
time, increase in numbers sufficient to avenge themselves, that they
took from the arms of mothers all the male children and destroyed
them. If the account given is true, the Egyptians were the most cruel,
heartless and infamous people of which history gives any record. God
finally made up his mind to free the Hebrews; and for the accomplishment
of this purpose he sent, as his agents, Moses and Aaron, to the king
of Egypt. In order that the king might know that these men had a divine
mission, God gave Moses the power of changing a stick into a serpent,
and water into blood. Moses and Aaron went before the king, stating that
the Lord God of Israel ordered the king of Egypt to let the Hebrews
go that they might hold a feast with God in the wilderness. Thereupon
Pharaoh, the king, enquired who the Lord was, at the same time stating
that he had never made his acquaintance, and knew nothing about him.
To this they replied that the God of the Hebrews had met with them, and
they asked to go a three days journey into the desert and sacrifice
unto this God, fearing that if they did not he would fall upon them with
pestilence or the sword. This interview seems to have hardened Pharaoh,
for he ordered the tasks of the children of Israel to be increased; so
that the only effect of the first appeal was to render still worse the
condition of the Hebrews. Thereupon, Moses returned unto the Lord and
said, "Lord, wherefore hast thou so evil entreated this people? Why is
it that thou hast sent me? For since I came to Pharaoh to speak in thy
name he hath done evil to this people; neither hast thou delivered thy
people at all."
Apparently stung by this reproach, God answered:--
"Now shalt thou see what I will do to Pharoah; for with a strong hand
shall he let them go; and with a strong hand shall he drive them out of
his land."
God then recounts the fact that he had appeared unto Abraham, Isaac and
Jacob, that he had established a covenant with them to give them the
land of Canaan, that he had heard the groanings of the children of
Israel in Egyptian bondage; that their groanings had put him in mind of
his covenant, and that he had made up his mind to redeem the children
of Israel with a stretched-out arm and with great judgments. Moses then
spoke to the children of Israel again, but they would listen to him no
more. His first effort in their behalf had simply doubled their trouble
and they seemed to have lost confidence in his power. Thereupon Jehovah
promised Moses that he would make him a god unto Pharaoh, and that
Aaron should be his prophet, but at the same time informed him that his
message would be of no avail; that he would harden the heart of Pharaoh
so that he would not listen; that he would so harden his heart that he
might have an excuse for destroying the Egyptians. Accordingly, Moses
and Aaron again went before Pharaoh. Moses said to Aaron;--"Cast down
your rod before Pharaoh," which he did, and it became a serpent. Then
Pharaoh not in the least surprised, called for his wise men and
his sorcerers, and they threw down their rods and changed them into
serpents. The serpent that had been changed from Aaron's rod was, at
this time crawling upon the floor, and it proceeded to swallow the
serpents that had been produced by the magicians of Egypt. What became
of these serpents that were swallowed, whether they turned back into
sticks again, is not stated. Can we believe that the stick was changed
into a real living serpent, or did it assume simply the appearance of a
serpent? If it bore only the appearance of a serpent it was a deception,
and could not rise above the dignity of legerdemain. Is it necessary to
believe that God is a kind of prestigiator--a sleight-of-hand performer,
a magician or sorcerer? Can it be possible that an infinite being would
endeavor to secure the liberation of a race by performing a miracle that
could be equally performed by the sorcerers and magicians of a barbarian
king?
Not one word was said by Moses or Aaron as to the wickedness of
depriving a human being of his liberty. Not a word was said in favor
of liberty. Not the slightest intimation that a human being was justly
entitled to the product of his own labor. Not a word about the cruelty
of masters who would destroy even the babes of slave mothers. It seems
to me wonderful that this God did not tell the king of Egypt that no
nation could enslave another, without also enslaving itself; that it was
impossible to put a chain around the limbs of a slave, without putting
manacles upon the brain of the master. Why did he not tell him that a
nation founded upon slavery could not stand? Instead of declaring these
things, instead of appealing to justice, to mercy and to liberty, he
resorted to feats of jugglery. Suppose we wished to make a treaty with
a barbarous nation, and the President should employ a sleight-of-hand
performer as envoy extraordinary, and instruct him, that when he came
into the presence of the savage monarch, he should cast down an umbrella
or a walking stick, which would change into a lizard or a turtle; what
would we think? Would we not regard such a performance as beneath the
dignity even of a President? And what would be our feelings if the
savage king sent for his sorcerers and had them perform the same feat?
If such things would appear puerile and foolish in the President of a
great republic, what shall be said when they were resorted to by the
creator of all worlds? How small, how contemptible such a God appears!
Pharaoh, it seems, took about this view of the matter, and he would not
be persuaded that such tricks were performed by an infinite being.
Again, Moses and Aaron came before Pharaoh as he was going to the
river's bank, and the same rod which had changed to a serpent, and,
by this time changed back, was taken by Aaron, who, in the presence of
Pharaoh, smote the water of the river, which was immediately turned to
blood, as well as all the water in all the streams, ponds, and pools, as
well as all water in vessels of wood and vessels of stone in the entire
land of Egypt. As soon as all the waters in Egypt had been turned
into blood, the magicians of that country did the same with their
enchantments. We are not informed where they got the water to turn into
blood, since all the water in Egypt had already been so changed. It
seems from the account that the fish in the Nile died, and the river
emitted a stench, and there was not a drop of water in the land of
Egypt that had not been changed into blood. In consequence of this, the
Egyptians digged "around about the river" for water to drink. Can we
believe this story? Is it necessary to salvation to admit that all the
rivers, pools, ponds and lakes of a country were changed into blood, in
order that a king might be induced to allow the children of Israel the
privilege of going a three days journey into the wilderness to make
sacrifices to their God?
It seems from the account that Pharaoh was told that the God of the
Hebrews would, if he refused to let the Israelites go, change all the
waters of Egypt into blood, and that, upon his refusal, they were so
changed. This had, however, no influence upon him, for the reason that
his own magicians did the same. It does not appear that Moses and Aaron
expressed the least surprise at the success of the Egyptian sorcerers.
At that time it was believed that each nation had its own god. The
only claim that Moses and Aaron made for their God was, that he was the
greatest and most powerful of all the gods, and that with anything like
an equal chance he could vanquish the deity of any other nation.
After the waters were changed to blood Moses and Aaron waited for seven
days. At the end of that time God told Moses to again go to Pharaoh and
demand the release of his people, and to inform him that, if he refused,
God would strike all the borders of Egypt with frogs. That he would make
frogs so plentiful that they would go into the houses of Pharaoh, into
his bedchamber, upon his bed, into the houses of his servants, upon his
people, into their ovens, and even into their kneading troughs.
This threat had no effect whatever upon Pharaoh. And thereupon Aaron
stretched out his hand over the waters of Egypt, and the frogs came
up and covered the land. The magicians of Egypt did the same, and with
their enchantments brought more frogs upon the land of Egypt.
These magicians do not seem to have been original in their ideas, but
so far as imitation is concerned, were perfect masters of their art. The
frogs seem to have made such an impression upon Pharaoh that he sent
for Moses and asked him to entreat the Lord that he would take away the
frogs. Moses agreed to remove them from the houses and the land, and
allow them to remain only in the rivers. Accordingly the frogs died out
of the houses, and out of the villages, and out of the fields, and the
people gathered them together in heaps. As soon as the frogs had left
the houses and fields, the heart of Pharaoh became again hardened, and
he refused to let the people go.
Aaron then, according to the command of God, stretched out his hand,
holding the rod, and smote the dust of the earth, and it became lice in
man and in beast, and all the dust became lice throughout the land of
Egypt. Pharaoh again sent for his magicians, and they sought to do
the same with their enchantments, but they could not. Whereupon the
sorcerers said unto Pharaoh: "This is the finger of God."
Notwithstanding this, however, Pharaoh refused to let the Hebrews go.
God then caused a grievous swarm of flies to come into the house of
Pharaoh and into his servants' houses, and into all the land of Egypt,
to such an extent that the whole land was corrupted by reason of the
flies. But into that part of the country occupied by the children of
Israel there came no flies. Thereupon Pharaoh sent for Moses and Aaron
and said to them: "Go, and sacrifice to your God in this land." They
were not willing to sacrifice in Egypt, and asked permission to go on a
journey of three days into the wilderness. To this Pharaoh acceded, and
in consideration of this Moses agreed to use his influence with the Lord
to induce him to send the flies out of the country. He accordingly told
the Lord of the bargain he had made with Pharaoh, and the Lord agreed to
the compromise, and removed the flies from Pharaoh and from his servants
and from his people, and there remained not a single fly in the land of
Egypt. As soon as the flies were gone, Pharaoh again changed his mind,
and concluded not to permit the children of Israel to depart. The Lord
then directed Moses to go to Pharaoh and tell him that if he did not
allow the children of Israel to depart, he would destroy his cattle, his
horses, his camels and his sheep; that these animals would be afflicted
with a grievous disease, but that the animals belonging to the Hebrews
should not be so afflicted. Moses did as he was bid. On the next day all
the cattle of Egypt died; that is to say, all the horses, all the asses,
all the camels, all the oxen and all the sheep; but of the animals owned
by the Israelites, not one perished. This disaster had no effect upon
Pharaoh, and he still refused to let the children of Israel go. The Lord
then told Moses and Aaron to take some ashes out of a furnace, and
told Moses to sprinkle them toward the heavens in the sight of Pharaoh;
saying that the ashes should become small dust in all the land of Egypt,
and should be a boil breaking forth with blains upon man and upon beast
throughout all the land.
How these boils breaking out with blains, upon cattle that were already
dead, should affect Pharaoh, is a little hard to understand. It must
not be forgotten that all the cattle and all beasts had died with the
murrain before the boils had broken out.
This was a most decisive victory for Moses and Aaron. The boils were
upon the magicians to that extent that they could not stand before
Moses. But it had no effect upon Pharaoh, who seems to have been a man
of great firmness. The Lord then instructed Moses to get up early in the
morning and tell Pharaoh that he would stretch out his hand and smite
his people with a pestilence, and would, on the morrow, cause it to rain
a very grievous hail, such as had never been known in the land of Egypt.
He also told Moses to give notice, so that they might get all the cattle
that were in the fields under cover. It must be remembered that all
these cattle had recently died of the murrain, and their dead bodies had
been covered with boils and blains. This, however, had no effect, and
Moses stretched forth his hand toward heaven, and the Lord sent thunder,
and hail and lightning, and fire that ran along the ground, and the hail
fell upon all the land of Egypt, and all that were in the fields, both
man and beast, were smitten, and the hail smote every herb of the field,
and broke every tree of the country except that portion inhabited by the
children of Israel; there, there was no hail.
During this hail storm Pharaoh sent for Moses and Aaron and admitted
that he had sinned, that the Lord was righteous, and that the Egyptians
were wicked, and requested them to ask the Lord that there be no more
thunderings and hail, and that he would let the Hebrews go. Moses agreed
that as soon as he got out of the city he would stretch forth his hands
unto the Lord, and that the thunderings should cease and the hail should
stop. But, when the rain and the hail and the thundering ceased, Pharaoh
concluded that he would not let the children of Israel go.
Again, God sent Moses and Aaron, instructing them to tell Pharaoh that
if he refused to let the people go, the face of the earth would be
covered with locusts, so that man would not be able to see the ground,
and that these locusts would eat the residue of that which escaped from
the hail; that they would eat every tree out of the field; that they
would fill the houses of Pharaoh and the houses of all his servants, and
the houses of all the Egyptians. Moses delivered the message, and went
out from Pharaoh. Some of Pharaoh's servants entreated their master
to let the children of Israel go. Pharaoh sent for Moses and Aaron and
asked them, who wished to go into the wilderness to sacrifice. They
replied that they wished to go with the young and old; with their sons
and daughters, with flocks and herds. Pharaoh would not consent to this,
but agreed that the men might go. Thereupon Pharaoh drove Moses and
Aaron out of his sight. Then God told Moses to stretch forth his hand
upon the land of Egypt for the locusts, that they might come up and eat
every herb, even all that the hail had left. "And Moses stretched out
his rod over the land of Egypt, and the Lord brought an east wind all
that day and all that night; and when it was morning the east wind
brought the locusts; and they came up over all the land of Egypt and
rested upon all the coasts covering the face of the whole earth, so that
the land was darkened; and they ate every herb and all the fruit of the
trees which the hail had left, and there remained not any green thing
on the trees or in the herbs of the field throughout the land of Egypt."
Pharaoh then called for Moses and Aaron in great haste, admitted that
he had sinned against the Lord their God and against them, asked their
forgiveness and requested them to intercede with God that he might take
away the locusts. They went out from his presence and asked the Lord to
drive the locusts away, "And the Lord made a strong west wind which took
away the locusts, and cast them into the Red Sea so that there remained
not one locust in all the coasts of Egypt."
As soon as the locusts were gone, Pharaoh changed his mind, and, in the
language of the sacred text, "the Lord hardened Pharaoh's heart so that
he would not let the children of Israel go."
The Lord then told Moses to stretch out his hand toward heaven that
there might be darkness over the land of Egypt, "even darkness which
might be felt." "And Moses stretched forth his hand toward heaven, and
there was a thick darkness over the land of Egypt for three days during
which time they saw not each other, neither arose any of the people from
their places for three days; but the children of Israel had light in
their dwellings."
It strikes me that when the land of Egypt was covered with thick
darkness--so thick that it could be felt, and when light was in the
dwellings of the Israelites, there could have been no better time for
the Hebrews to have left the country.
Pharaoh again called for Moses, and told him that his people could go
and serve the Lord, provided they would leave their flocks and herds.
Moses would not agree to this, for the reason that they needed the
flocks and herds for sacrifices and burnt offerings, and he did not know
how many of the animals God might require, and for that reason he could
not leave a single hoof. Upon the question of the cattle, they divided,
and Pharaoh again refused to let the people go. God then commanded Moses
to tell the Hebrews to borrow, each of his neighbor, jewels of silver
and gold. By a miraculous interposition the Hebrews found favor in the
sight of the Egyptians so that they loaned the articles asked for. After
this, Moses again went to Pharaoh and told him that all the first-born
in the land of Egypt, from the first-born of Pharaoh upon the throne,
unto the first-born of the maid-servant who was behind the mill, as well
as the first-born of beasts, should die.
As all the beasts had been destroyed by disease and hail, it is
troublesome to understand the meaning of the threat as to their
first-born.
Preparations were accordingly made for carrying this frightful threat
into execution. Blood was put on the door-posts of all houses inhabited
by Hebrews, so that God, as he passed through that land, might not be
mistaken and destroy the first-born of the Jews. "And it came to pass
that at midnight the Lord smote all the first-born in the land of Egypt,
the first-born of Pharaoh who sat on the throne, and the first-born of
the captive who was in the dungeon. And Pharaoh rose up in the night,
and all his servants, and all the Egyptians, and there was a great cry
in Egypt, for there was not a house where there was not one dead."
What had these children done? Why should the babes in the cradle be
destroyed on account of the crime of Pharaoh? Why should the cattle be
destroyed because man had enslaved his brother? In those days women and
children and cattle were put upon an exact equality, and all considered
as the property of the men; and when man in some way excited the wrath
of God, he punished them by destroying all their cattle, their wives,
and their little ones. Where can words be found bitter enough to
describe a god who would kill wives and babes because husbands and
fathers had failed to keep his law? Every good man, and every good
woman, must hate and despise such a deity.
Upon the death of all the first-born Pharaoh sent for Moses and Aaron,
and not only gave his consent that they might go with the Hebrews into
the wilderness, but besought them to go at once.
Is it possible that an infinite God, creator of all worlds and sustainer
of all life, said to Pharaoh, "If you do not let my people go, I will
turn all the water of your country into blood," and that upon the
refusal of Pharaoh to release the people, God did turn all the waters
into blood? Do you believe this?
Do you believe that Pharaoh even after all the water was turned to
blood, refused to let the Hebrews go, and that thereupon God told him he
would cover his land with frogs? Do you believe this?
Do you believe that after the land was covered with frogs Pharaoh still
refused to let the people go, and that God then said to him, "I will
cover you and all your people with lice?" Do you believe God would make
this threat?
Do you also believe that God told Pharaoh, "It you do not let these
people go, I will fill all your houses and cover your country with
flies?" Do you believe God makes such threats as this?
Of course God must have known that turning the waters into blood,
covering the country with frogs, infesting all flesh with lice, and
filling all houses with flies, would not accomplish his object, and that
all these plagues would have no effect whatever upon the Egyptian king.
Do you believe that, failing to accomplish anything by the flies, God
told Pharaoh that if he did not let the people go he would kill his
cattle with murrain? Does such a threat sound God-like?
Do you believe that, failing to effect anything by killing the cattle,
this same God then threatened to afflict all the people with boils,
including the magicians who had been rivaling him in the matter of
miracles; and failing to do anything by boils, that he resorted to hail?
Does this sound reasonable? The hail experiment having accomplished
nothing, do you believe that God murdered the first-born of animals and
men? Is it possible to conceive of anything more utterly absurd, stupid,
revolting, cruel and senseless, than the miracles said to have been
wrought by the Almighty for the purpose of inducing Pharaoh to liberate
the children of Israel?
Is it not altogether more reasonable to say that the Jewish people,
being in slavery, accounted for the misfortunes and calamities, suffered
by the Egyptians, by saying that they were the judgments of God?
When the Armada of Spain was wrecked and scattered by the storm, the
English people believed that God had interposed in their behalf,
and publicly gave thanks. When the battle of Lepanto was won, it was
believed by the Catholic world that the victory was given in answer to
prayer. So, our fore-fathers in their Revolutionary struggle saw, or
thought they saw, the hand of God, and most firmly believed that they
achieved their independence by the interposition of the Most High.
Now, it may be that while the Hebrews were enslaved by the Egyptians,
there were plagues of locusts and flies. It may be that there were
some diseases by which many of the cattle perished. It may be that a
pestilence visited that country so that in nearly every house there
was some one dead. If so, it was but natural for the enslaved and
superstitious Jews to account for these calamities by saying that they
were punishments sent by their God. Such ideas will be found in the
history of every country.
For a long time the Jews held these opinions, and they were handed from
father to son simply by tradition. By the time a written language had
been produced, thousands of additions had been made, and numberless
details invented; so that we have not only an account of the plagues
suffered by the Egyptians, but the whole woven into a connected story,
containing the threats made by Moses and Aaron, the miracles wrought by
them, the promises of Pharaoh, and finally the release of the Hebrews,
as a result of the marvelous things performed in their behalf by
Jehovah.
In any event it is infinitely more probable that the author was
misinformed, than that the God of this universe was guilty of these
childish, heartless and infamous things. The solution of the whole
matter is this:--Moses was mistaken.
XXIII. THE FLIGHT.
Three millions of people, with their flocks and herds, with borrowed
jewelry and raiment, with unleavened dough in kneading troughs bound in
their clothes upon their shoulders, in one night commenced their journey
for the land of promise. We are not told how they were informed of the
precise time to start. With all the modern appliances, it would require
months of time to inform three millions of people of any fact.
In this vast assemblage there were six hundred thousand men of war, and
with them were the old, the young, the diseased and helpless. Where were
those people going? They were going to the desert of Sinai, compared
with which Sahara is a garden. Imagine an ocean of lava torn by
storm and vexed by tempest, suddenly gazed at by a Gorgon and changed
instantly to stone! Such was the desert of Sinai.
All of the civilized nations of the world could not feed and support
three millions of people on the desert of Sinai for forty years. It
would cost more than one hundred thousand millions of dollars, and would
bankrupt Christendom. They had with them their flocks and herds, and the
sheep were so numerous that the Israelites sacrificed, at one time, more
than one hundred and fifty thousand first-born lambs. How were these
flocks supported? What did they eat? Where were meadows and pastures for
them? There was no grass, no forests--nothing! There is no account
of its having rained baled hay, nor is it even claimed that they were
miraculously fed. To support these flocks, millions of acres of pasture
would have been required. God did not take the Israelites through the
land of the Philistines, for fear that when they saw the people of that
country they would return to Egypt, but he took them by the way of
the wilderness to the Red Sea, going before them by day in a pillar of
cloud, and by night, in a pillar of fire.
When it was told Pharaoh that the people had fled, he made ready
and took six hundred chosen chariots of Egypt, and pursued after the
children of Israel, overtaking them by the sea. As all the animals had
long before that time been destroyed, we are not informed where Pharaoh
obtained the horses for his chariots. The moment the children of Israel
saw the hosts of Pharaoh, although they had six hundred thousand men
of war, they immediately cried unto the Lord for protection. It is
wonderful to me that a land that had been ravaged by the plagues
described in the Bible, still had the power to put in the field an army
that would carry terror to the hearts of six hundred thousand men of
war. Even with the help of God, it seems, they were not strong enough
to meet the Egyptians in the open field, but resorted to strategy. Moses
again stretched forth his wonderful rod over the waters of the Red Sea,
and they were divided, and the Hebrews passed through on dry land, the
waters standing up like a wall on either side. The Egyptians pursued
them; "and in the morning watch the Lord looked into the hosts of the
Egyptians, through the pillar of fire," and proceeded to take the wheels
off their chariots. As soon as the wheels were off, God told Moses to
stretch out his hand over the sea. Moses did so, and immediately "the
waters returned and covered the chariots and horsemen and all the hosts
of Pharaoh that came into the sea, and there remained not so much as one
of them."
This account may be true, but still it hardly looks reasonable that God
would take the wheels off the chariots. How did he do it? Did he pull
out the linch-pins, or did he just take them off by main force?
What a picture this presents to the mind! God the creator of the
universe, maker of every shining, glittering star, engaged in pulling
off the wheels of wagons, that he might convince Pharaoh of his
greatness and power!
Where were these people going? They were going to the promised land.
How large a country was that? About twelve thousand square miles. About
one-fifth the size of the State of Illinois. It was a frightful country,
covered with rocks and desolation. How many people were in the promised
land already? Moses tells us there were seven nations in that country
mightier than the Jews. As there were at least three millions of Jews,
there must have been at least twenty-one millions of people already in
that country. These had to be driven out in order that room might be
made for the chosen people of God.
It seems, however, that God was not willing to take the children of
Israel into the promised land immediately. They were not fit to inhabit
the land of Canaan; so he made up his mind to allow them to wander upon
the desert until all except two, who had left Egypt, should perish. Of
all the slaves released from Egyptian bondage, only two were allowed to
reach the promised land!
As soon as the Hebrews crossed the Red Sea, they found themselves
without food, and with water unfit to drink by reason of its bitterness,
and they began to murmur against Moses, who cried unto the Lord, and
"the Lord showed him a tree." Moses cast this tree into the waters,
and they became sweet. "And it came to pass in the morning the dew lay
around about the camp; and when the dew that lay was gone, behold,
upon the face of the wilderness lay a small round thing, small as the
hoar-frost upon the ground. And Moses said unto them, this is the bread
which the Lord hath given you to eat." This manna was a very peculiar
thing. It would melt in the sun, and yet they could cook it by seething
and baking. One would as soon think of frying snow or of broiling
icicles. But this manna had another remarkable quality. No matter how
much or little any person gathered, he would have an exact omer; if he
gathered more, it would shrink to that amount, and if he gathered less,
it would swell exactly to that amount. What a magnificent substance
manna would be with which to make a currency--shrinking and swelling
according to the great laws of supply and demand!
"Upon this manna the children of Israel lived for forty years, until
they came to a habitable land. With this meat were they fed until
they reached the borders of the land of Canaan." We are told in the
twenty-first chapter of Numbers, that the people at last became tired
of' the manna, complained of God, and asked Moses why he brought
them out of the land of Egypt to die in the wilderness. And they
said:--"There is no bread, nor have we any water. Our soul loatheth this
light food."
We are told by some commentators that the Jews lived on manna for forty
years; by others that they lived upon it for only a short time. As
a matter of fact the accounts differ, and this difference is the
opportunity for commentators. It also allows us to exercise faith in
believing that both accounts are true. If the accounts agreed, and were
reasonable, they would be believed by the wicked and unregenerated. But
as they are different and unreasonable, they are believed only by the
good. Whenever a statement in the Bible is unreasonable, and you believe
it, you are considered quite a good Christian. If the statement is
grossly absurd and infinitely impossible, and you still believe it, you
are a saint.
The children of Israel were in the desert, and they were out of water.
They had nothing to eat but manna, and this they had had so long that
the soul of every person abhorred it. Under these circumstances they
complained to Moses. Now, as God is infinite, he could just as well have
furnished them with an abundance of the purest and coolest of water, and
could, without the slightest trouble to himself, have given them three
excellent meals a day, with a generous variety of meats and vegetables,
it is very hard to see why he did not do so. It is still harder to
conceive why he fell into a rage when the people mildly suggested that
they would like a change of diet. Day after day, week after week, month
after month, year after year, nothing but manna. No doubt they did
the best they could by cooking it in different ways, but in spite of
themselves they began to loathe its sight and taste, and so they asked
Moses to use his influence to secure a change in the bill of fare.
Now, I ask, whether it was unreasonable for the Jews to suggest that a
little meat would be very gratefully received? It seems, however, that
as soon as the request was made, this God of infinite mercy became
infinitely enraged, and instead of granting it, went into partnership
with serpents, for the purpose of punishing the hungry wretches to whom
he had promised a land flowing with milk and honey.
Where did these serpents come from? How did God convey the information
to the serpents, that he wished them to go to the desert of Sinai and
bite some Jews? It may be urged that these serpents were created for the
express purpose of punishing the children of Israel for having had the
presumption, like Oliver Twist, to ask for more.
There is another account in the eleventh chapter of Numbers, of the
people murmuring because of their food. They remembered the fish, the
cucumbers, the melons, the leeks, the onions and the garlic of Egypt,
and they asked for meat. The people went to the tent of Moses and asked
him for flesh. Moses cried unto the Lord and asked him why he did not
take care of the multitude. God thereupon agreed that they should have
meat, not for a day or two, but for a month, until the meat should come
out of their nostrils and become loathsome to them. He then caused a
wind to bring quails from beyond the sea, and cast them into the camp,
on every side of the camp around about for the space of a days journey.
And the people gathered them, and while the flesh was yet between their
teeth the wrath of God being provoked against them, struck them with
an exceeding great plague. Serpents, also, were sent among them, and
thousands perished for the crime of having been hungry.
The Rev. Alexander Cruden commenting upon this account says:--
"God caused a wind to rise that drove the quails within and about the
camp of the Israelites; and it is in this that the miracle consists,
that they were brought so seasonably to this place, and in so great
numbers as to suffice above a million of persons above a month. Some
authors affirm, that in those eastern and southern countries, quails
are innumerable, so that in one part of Italy within the compass of five
miles, there were taken about an hundred thousand of them every day for
a month together; and that sometimes they fly so thick over the sea,
that being weary they fall into ships, sometimes in such numbers, that
they sink them with their weight."
No wonder Mr. Cruden believed the Mosaic account.
Must we believe that God made an arrangement with hornets for the
purpose af securing their services in driving the Canaanites from
the land of promise? Is this belief necessary unto salvation? Must we
believe that God said to the Jews that he would send hornets before them
to drive out the Canaanites, as related in the twenty-third chapter of
Exodus, and the second chapter of Deuteronomy? How would the hornets
know a Canaanite? In what way would God put it in the mind of a hornet
to attack a Canaanite? Did God create hornets for that especial purpose,
implanting an instinct to attack a Canaanite, but not a Hebrew? Can
we conceive of the Almighty granting letters of marque and reprisal to
hornets? Of course it is admitted that nothing in the world would
be better calculated to make a man leave his native land than a few
hornets. Is it possible for us to believe that an infinite being would
resort to such expedients in order to drive the Canaanites from their
country? He could just as easily have spoken the Canaanites out of
existence as to have spoken the hornets in. In this way a vast amount of
trouble, pain and suffering would have been saved. Is it possible that
there is, in this country, an intelligent clergyman who will insist that
these stories are true; that we must believe them in in order to be good
people in this world, and glorified souls in the next?
We are also told that God instructed the Hebrews to kill the Canaanites
slowly, giving as a reason that the beasts of the field might increase
upon his chosen people. When we take into consideration the fact that
the Holy Land contained only about eleven or twelve thousand square
miles, and was at that time inhabited by at least twenty-one millions of
people, it does not seem reasonable that the wild beasts could have been
numerous enough to cause any great alarm. The same ratio of population
would give to the State of Illinois at least one hundred and twenty
millions of inhabitants. Can anybody believe that, under such
circumstances, the danger from wild beasts could be very great? What
would we think of a general, invading such a State, if he should order
his soldiers to kill the people slowly, lest the wild beasts might
increase upon them? Is it possible that a God capable of doing the
miracles recounted in the Old Testament could not, in some way, have
disposed of the wild beasts? After the Canaanites were driven out, could
he not have employed the hornets to drive out the wild beasts? Think of
a God that could drive twenty-one millions of people out of the promised
land, could raise up innumerable stinging flies, and could cover
the earth with fiery serpents, and yet seems to have been perfectly
powerless against the wild beasts of the land of Canaan!
Speaking of these hornets, one of the good old commentators, whose
views have long been considered of great value by the believers in the
inspiration of the Bible, uses the following language:--"Hornets are a
sort of strong flies, which the Lord used as instruments to plague
the enemies of his people. They are of themselves very troublesome and
mischievous, and those the Lord made use of were, it is thought, of an
extraordinary bigness and perniciousness. It is said they live as the
wasps, and that they have a king or captain, and pestilent stings
as bees, and that, if twenty-seven of them sting man or beast, it is
certain death to either. Nor is it strange that such creatures did drive
out the Canaanites from their habitations; for many heathen writers give
instances of some people driven from their seats by frogs, others by
mice, others by bees and wasps. And it is said that a Christian city,
being besieged by Sapores, king of Persia, was delivered by hornets; for
the elephants and beasts being stung by them, waxed unruly, and so the
whole army fled."
Only a few years ago, all such stories were believed by the Christian
world; and it is a historical fact, that Voltaire was the third man of
any note in Europe, who took the ground that the mythologies of Greece
and Rome were without foundation. Until his time, most Christians
believed as thoroughly in the miracles ascribed to the Greek and Roman
gods as in those of Christ and Jehovah. The Christian world cultivated
credulity, not only as one of the virtues, but as the greatest of them
all. But, when Luther and his followers left the Church of Rome, they
were compelled to deny the power of the Catholic Church, at that time,
to suspend the laws of nature, but took the ground that such power
ceased with the apostolic age. They insisted that all things now
happened in accordance with the laws of nature, with the exception of a
few special interferences in favor of the Protestant Church in answer
to prayer. They taught their children a double philosophy: by one, they
were to show the impossibility of Catholic miracles, because opposed to
the laws of nature; by the other, the probability of the miracles of the
apostolic age, because they were in conformity with the statements of
the Scriptures. They had two foundations: one, the law of nature, and
the other, the word of God. The Protestants have endeavored to carry
on this double process of reasoning, and the result has been a gradual
increase of confidence in the law of nature, and a gradual decrease of
confidence in the word of God.
We are told, in this inspired account, that the clothing of the Jewish
people did not wax old, and that their shoes refused to wear out. Some
commentators have insisted that angels attended to the wardrobes of the
Hebrews, patched their garments, and mended their shoes. Certain it is,
however, that the same clothes lasted them for forty years, during the
entire journey from Egypt to the Holy Land. Little boys starting out
with their first pantaloons, grew as they traveled, and their clothes
grew with them.
Can it be necessary to believe a story like this? Will men make better
husbands, fathers, neighbors, and citizens, simply by giving credence
to these childish and impossible things? Certainly an infinite God could
have transported the Jews to the Holy Land in a moment, and could, as
easily, have removed the Canaanites to some other country. Surely there
was no necessity for doing thousands and thousands of petty miracles,
day after day for forty years, looking after the clothes of three
millions of people, changing the nature of wool and linen and leather,
so that they would not "wax old." Every step, every motion, would wear
away some part of the clothing, some part of the shoes. Were these
parts, so worn away, perpetually renewed, or was the nature of things
so changed that they could not wear away? We know that whenever matter
comes in contact with matter, certain atoms, by abrasion, are lost. Were
these atoms gathered up every night by angels, and replaced on the soles
of the shoes, on the elbows of coats, and on the knees of pantaloons, so
that the next morning they would be precisely in the condition they were
on the morning before? There must be a mistake somewhere.
Can we believe that the real God, if there is one, ever ordered a man
to be killed simply for making hair oil, or ointment? We are told in
the thirtieth chapter of Exodus, that the Lord commanded Moses to take
myrrh, cinnamon, sweet calamus, cassia, and olive oil, and make a
holy ointment for the purpose of anointing the tabernacle, tables,
candlesticks and other utensils, as well as Aaron and his sons; saying,
at the same time, that whosoever compounded any like it, or whoever put
any of it on a stranger, should be put to death. In the same chapter,
the Lord furnishes Moses with a recipe for making a perfume, saying,
that whoever should make any which smelled like it, should be cut off
from his people. This, to me, sounds so unreasonable that I cannot
believe it. Why should an infinite God care whether mankind made
ointments and perfumes like his or not? Why should the Creator of all
things threaten to kill a priest who approached his altar without having
washed his hands and feet? These commandments and these penalties would
disgrace the vainest tyrant that ever sat, by chance, upon a throne.
There must be some mistake. I cannot believe that an infinite
Intelligence appeared to Moses upon Mount Sinai having with him a
variety of patterns for making a tabernacle, tongs, snuffers and dishes.
Neither can I believe that God told Moses how to cut and trim a coat for
a priest. Why should a God care about such things? Why should he insist
on having buttons sewed in certain rows, and fringes of a certain color?
Suppose an intelligent civilized man was to overhear, on Mount Sinai,
the following instructions from God to Moses:--
"You must consecrate my priests as follows:--You must kill a bullock
for a sin offering, and have Aaron and his sons lay their hands upon the
head of the bullock. Then you must take the blood and put it upon the
horns of the altar round about with your finger, and pour some blood at
the bottom of the altar to make a reconciliation; and of the fat that
is upon the inwards, the caul above the liver and two kidneys, and
their fat, and burn them upon the altar. You must get a ram for a burnt
offering, and Aaron and his sons must lay their hands upon the head of
the ram. Then you must kill it and sprinkle the blood upon the altar,
and cut the ram into pieces, and burn the head, and the pieces, and the
fat, and wash the inwards and the lungs in water and then burn the whole
ram upon the altar for a sweet savor unto me. Then you must get another
ram, and have Aaron and his sons lay their hands upon the head of that,
then kill it and take of its blood, and put it on the top of Aaron's
right ear, and on the thumb of his right hand, and on the great toe of
his right foot. And you must also put a little of the blood upon the
top of the right ears of Aaron's sons, and on the thumbs of their right
hands and on the great toes of their right feet. And then you must take
of the fat that is on the inwards, and the caul above the liver and the
two kidneys, and their fat, and the right shoulder, and out of a basket
of unleavened bread you must take one unleavened cake and another of oil
bread, and one wafer, and put them on the fat of the right shoulder. And
you must take of the anointing oil, and of the blood, and sprinkle it on
Aaron, and on his garments, and on his sons' garments, and sanctify
them and all their clothes."--Do you believe that he would have even
suspected that the creator of the universe was talking?
Can any one now tell why God commanded the Jews, when they were upon the
desert of Sinai, to plant trees, telling them at the same time that they
must not eat any of the fruit of such trees until after the fourth year?
Trees could not have been planted in that desert, and if they had been,
they could not have lived. Why did God tell Moses, while in the desert,
to make curtains of fine linen? Where could he have obtained his flax?
There was no land upon which it could have been produced. Why did he
tell him to make things of gold, and silver, and precious stones, when
they could not have been in possession of these things? There is but one
answer, and that is, the Pentateuch was written hundreds of years after
the Jews had settled in the Holy Land, and hundreds of years after Moses
was dust and ashes.
When the Jews had a written language, and that must have been long after
their flight from Egypt, they wrote out their history and their laws.
Tradition had filled the infancy of the nation with miracles and special
interpositions in their behalf by Jehovah. Patriotism would not allow
these wonders to grow small, and priestcraft never denied a miracle.
There were traditions to the effect that God had spoken face to face
with Moses; that he had given him the tables of the law, and had, in a
thousand ways, made known his will; and whenever the priests wished to
make new laws, or amend old ones, they pretended to have found something
more that God said to Moses at Sinai. In this way obedience was more
easily secured. Only a very few of the people could read, and, as a
consequence, additions, interpolations and erasures had no fear of
detection. In this way we account for the fact that Moses is made to
speak of things that did not exist in his day, and were unknown for
hundreds of years after his death.
In the thirtieth chapter of Exodus, we are told that the people, when
numbered, must give each one a half shekel after the shekel of the
_sanctuary_. At that time no such money existed, and consequently the
account could not, by any possibility, have been written until after
there was a shekel of the sanctuary, and there was no such thing until
long after the death of Moses. If we should read that Cæsar paid his
troops in pounds, shillings and pence, we would certainly know that the
account was not written by Cæsar, nor in his time, but we would know
that it was written after the English had given these names to certain
coins.
So, we find, that when the Jews were upon the desert it was commanded
that every mother should bring, as a sin offering, a couple of doves to
the priests, and the priests were compelled to eat these doves in the
most holy place. At the time this law appears to have been given, there
were three million people, and only three priests, Aaron, Eleazer and
Ithamar. Among three million people there would be, at least, three
hundred births a day. Certainly we are not expected to believe that
these three priests devoured six hundred pigeons every twenty-four
hours.
Why should a woman ask pardon of God for having been a mother? Why
should that be considered a crime in Exodus, which is commanded as a
duty in Genesis? Why should a mother be declared unclean? Why should
giving birth to a daughter be regarded twice as criminal as giving birth
to a son? Can we believe that such laws and ceremonies were made and
instituted by a merciful and intelligent God? If there is anything in
this poor world suggestive of, and standing for, all that is sweet,
loving and pure, it is a mother holding in her thrilled and happy arms
her prattling babe. Read the twelfth chapter of Leviticus, and you will
see that when a woman became the mother of a boy she was so unclean
that she was not allowed to touch a hallowed thing, nor to enter the
sanctuary for forty days. If the babe was a girl, then the mother was
unfit for eighty days, to enter the house of God, or to touch the sacred
tongs and snuffers. These laws, born of barbarism, are unworthy of our
day, and should be regarded simply as the mistakes of savages.
Just as low in the scale of intelligence are the directions given in the
fifth chapter of Numbers, for the trial of a wife of whom the husband
was jealous. This foolish chapter has been the foundation of all appeals
to God for the ascertainment of facts, such as the corsned, trial by
battle, by water, and by fire, the last of which is our judicial oath.
It is very easy to believe that in those days a guilty woman would
be afraid to drink the water of jealousy and take the oath, and that,
through fear, she might be made to confess. Admitting that the deception
tended not only to prevent crime, but to discover it when committed,
still, we cannot admit that an honest god would, for any purpose, resort
to dishonest means. In all countries fear is employed as a means of
getting at the truth, and in this there is nothing dishonest, provided
falsehood is not resorted to for the purpose of producing the fear.
Protestants laugh at Catholics because of their belief in the efficacy
of holy water, and yet they teach their children that a little holy
water, in which had been thrown some dust from the floor of the
sanctuary, would, work a miracle in a woman's flesh. For hundreds of
years our fathers believed that a perjurer could not swallow a piece of
sacramental bread. Such stories belong to the childhood of our race, and
are now believed only by mental infants and intellectual babes.
I cannot believe that Moses had in his hands a couple of tables of
stone, upon which God had written the Ten Commandments, and that when he
saw the golden calf, and the dancing, that he dashed the tables to the
earth and broke them in pieces. Neither do I believe that Moses took a
golden calf, burnt it, ground it to powder, and made the people drink it
with water, as related in the thirty-second chapter of Exodus.
There is another account of the giving of the Ten Commandments to Moses,
in the nineteenth and twentieth chapters of Exodus. In this account not
one word is said about the people having made a golden calf, nor about
the breaking of the tables of stone. In the thirty-fourth chapter of
Exodus, there is an account of the renewal of the broken tables of
the law, and the commandments are given, but they are not the same
commandments mentioned in the twentieth chapter. There are two accounts
of the same transaction. Both of these stories cannot be true, and yet
both must be believed. Any one who will take the trouble to read
the nineteenth and twentieth chapters, and the last verse of the
thirty-first chapter, the thirty-second, thirty-third, and thirty-fourth
chapters of Exodus, will be compelled to admit that both accounts cannot
be true.
From the last account it appears that while Moses was upon Mount Sinai
receiving the commandments from God, the people brought their jewelry
to Aaron and he cast for them a golden calf. This happened before any
commandment against idolatry had been given. A god ought, certainly,
to publish his laws before inflicting penalties for their violation. To
inflict punishment for breaking unknown and unpublished laws is, in
the last degree, cruel and unjust. It may be replied that the Jews knew
better than to worship idols, before the law was given. If this is so,
why should the law have been given? In all civilized countries, laws are
made and promulgated, not simply for the purpose of informing the people
as to what is right and wrong, but to inform them of the penalties to be
visited upon those who violate the laws. When the Ten Commandments
were given, no penalties were attached. Not one word was written on
the tables of stone as to the punishments that would be inflicted for
breaking any or all of the inspired laws. The people should not have
been punished for violating a commandment before it was given. And yet,
in this case, Moses commanded the sons of Levi to take their swords and
slay every man his brother, his companion, and his neighbor. The brutal
order was obeyed, and three thousand men were butchered.. The Levites
consecrated themselves unto the Lord by murdering their sons, and their
brothers, for having violated a commandment before it had been given.
It has been contended for many years that the Ten Commandments are the
foundation of all ideas of justice and of law. Eminent jurists have
bowed to popular prejudice, and deformed their works by statements to
the effect that the Mosaic laws are the fountains from which sprang all
ideas of right and wrong. Nothing can be more stupidly false than such
assertions. Thousands of years before Moses was born, the Egyptians
had a code of laws. They had laws against blasphemy, murder, adultery,
larceny, perjury, laws for the collection of debts, the enforcement
of contracts, the ascertainment of damages, the redemption of property
pawned, and upon nearly every subject of human interest. The Egyptian
code was far better than the Mosaic.
Laws spring from the instinct of self-preservation. Industry objected
to supporting idleness, and laws were made against theft. Laws were made
against murder, because a very large majority of the people have always
objected to being murdered. All fundamental laws were born simply of the
instinct of self-defence. Long before the Jewish savages assembled at
the foot of Sinai, laws had been made and enforced, not only in Egypt
and India, but by every tribe that ever existed.
It is impossible for human beings to exist together, without certain
rules of conduct, certain ideas of the proper and improper, of the right
and wrong, growing out of the relation. Certain rules must be made,
and must be enforced. This implies law, trial and punishment. Whoever
produces anything by weary labor, does not need a revelation from heaven
to teach him that he has a right to the thing produced. Not one of
the learned gentlemen who pretend that the Mosaic laws are filled with
justice and intelligence, would live, for a moment, in any country where
such laws were in force.
Nothing can be more wonderful than the medical ideas of Jehovah. He
had the strangest notions about the cause and cure of disease. With
him everything was miracle and wonder. In the fourteenth chapter of
Leviticus, we find the law for cleansing a leper:--"Then shall the
priest take for him that is to be cleansed, two birds, alive and clean,
and cedar wood, and scarlet, and hyssop. And the priest shall command
that one of the birds be killed in an _earthen_ vessel, over _running_
water. As for the living bird, he shall take it, and the cedar wood, and
the scarlet, and the hyssop, and shall dip them, and the living bird,
in the blood of the bird that was killed over the running water. And he
shall sprinkle upon him that is to be cleansed from the leprosy, seven
times, and shall pronounce him clean, and shall let the living bird
loose into the open field."
We are told that God himself gave these directions to Moses. Does
anybody believe this? Why should the bird be killed in an _earthen_
vessel? Would the charm be broken if the vessel was of wood? Why over
_running_ water? What would be thought of a physician now, who would
give a prescription like that?
Is it not strange that God, although he gave hundreds of directions for
the purpose of discovering the presence of leprosy, and for cleansing
the leper after he was healed, forgot to tell how that disease could be
cured? Is it not wonderful that while God told his people what animals
were fit for food, he failed to give a list of plants that man might
eat? Why did he leave his children to find out the hurtful and the
poisonous by experiment, knowing that experiment, in millions of cases,
must be death?
When reading the history of the Jewish people, of their flight from
slavery to death, of their exchange of tyrants, I must confess that my
sympathies are all aroused in their behalf. They were cheated,
deceived and abused. Their god was quick-tempered, unreasonable, cruel,
revengeful and dishonest. He was always promising but never performed.
He wasted time in ceremony and childish detail, and in the exaggeration
of what he had done. It is impossible for me to conceive of a character
more utterly detestable than that of the Hebrew god. He had solemnly
promised the Jews that he would take them from Egypt to a land flowing
with milk and honey. He had led them to believe that in a little while
their troubles would be over, and that they would soon in the land of
Canaan, surrounded by their wives and little ones, forget, the stripes
and tears of Egypt. After promising the poor wanderers again and again
that he would lead them in safety to the promised land of joy and
plenty, this God, forgetting every promise, said to the wretches in his
power:--"Your carcasses shall fall in this wilderness and your children
shall wander until your carcasses be wasted." This curse was the
conclusion of the whole matter. Into this dust of death and night faded
all the promises of God. Into this rottenness of wandering despair fell
all the dreams of liberty and home. Millions of corpses were left to rot
in the desert, and each one certified to the dishonesty of Jehovah. I
cannot believe these things. They are so cruel and heartless, that my
blood is chilled and my sense of justice shocked. A book that is equally
abhorrent to my head and heart, cannot be accepted as a revelation from
God.
When we think of the poor Jews, destroyed, murdered, bitten by serpents,
visited by plagues, decimated by famine, butchered by each other,
swallowed by the earth, frightened, cursed, starved, deceived, robbed
and outraged, how thankful we should be that we are not the chosen
people of God. No wonder that they longed for the slavery of Egypt, and
remembered with sorrow the unhappy day when they exchanged masters.
Compared with Jehovah, Pharaoh was a benefactor, and the tyranny of
Egypt was freedom to those who suffered the liberty of God.
While reading the Pentateuch, I am filled with indignation, pity and
horror. Nothing can be sadder than the history of the starved and
frightened wretches who wandered over the desolate crags and sands of
wilderness and desert, the prey of famine, sword, and plague. Ignorant
and superstitious to the last degree, governed by falsehood, plundered
by hypocrisy, they were the sport of priests, and the food of fear. God
was their greatest enemy, and death their only friend.
It is impossible to conceive of a more thoroughly despicable, hateful,
and arrogant being, than the Jewish god. He is without a redeeming
feature. In the mythology of the world he has no parallel. He, only, is
never touched by agony and tears. He delights only in blood and pain.
Human affections are naught to him. He cares neither for love nor music,
beauty nor joy. A false friend, an unjust judge, a braggart, hypocrite,
and tyrant, sincere in hatred, jealous, vain, and revengeful, false in
promise, honest in curse, suspicious, ignorant, and changeable, infamous
and hideous:--such is the God of the Pentateuch.
XXIV. CONFESS AND AVOID
The scientific Christians now admit that the Bible is not inspired in
its astronomy, geology, botany, zoology, nor in any science. In other
words, they admit that on these subjects, the Bible cannot be depended
upon. If all the statements in the Scriptures were true, there would be
no necessity for admitting that some of them are not inspired. A
Christian will not admit that a passage in the Bible is uninspired,
until he is satisfied that it is untrue. Orthodoxy itself has at last
been compelled to say, that while a passage may be true and uninspired,
it cannot be inspired if false.
If the people of Europe had known as much of astronomy and geology when
the Bible was introduced among them, as they do now, there never could
have been one believer in the doctrine of inspiration. If the writers of
the various parts of the Bible had known as much about the sciences as
is now known by every intelligent man, the book never could have
been written. It was produced by ignorance, and has been believed and
defended by its author. It has lost power in the proportion that man
has gained knowledge. A few years ago, this book was appealed to in the
settlement of all scientific questions; but now, even the clergy
confess that in such matters, it has ceased to speak with the voice
of authority. For the establishment of facts, the word of man is now
considered far better than the word of God. In the world of science,
Jehovah was superseded by Copernicus, Galileo, and Kepler. All that God
told Moses, admitting the entire account to be true, is dust and ashes
compared to the discoveries of Descartes, Laplace, and Humboldt. In
matters of fact, the Bible has ceased to be regarded as a standard.
Science has succeeded in breaking the chains of theology. A few years
ago, Science endeavored to show that it was not inconsistent with the
Bible. The tables have been turned, and now, Religion is endeavoring to
prove that the Bible is not inconsistent with Science. The standard has
been changed.
For many ages, the Christians contended that the Bible, viewed simply as
a literary performance, was beyond all other books, and that man without
the assistance of God could not produce its equal. This claim was made
when but few books existed, and the Bible, being the only book generally
known, had no rival. But this claim, like the other, has been abandoned
by many, and soon will be, by all. Com pared with Shakespeare's "book
and volume of the brain," the "sacred" Bible shrinks and seems as feebly
impotent and vain, as would a pipe of Fan, when some great organ, voiced
with every tone, from the hoarse thunder of the sea to the winged warble
of a mated bird, floods and fills cathedral aisles with all the wealth
of sound.
It is now maintained--and this appears to be the last fortification
behind which the doctrine of inspiration skulks and crouches--that the
Bible, although false and mistaken in its astronomy, geology, geography,
history and philosophy, is inspired in its morality. It is now claimed
that had it not been for this book, the world would have been inhabited
only by savages, and that had it not been for the Holy Scriptures, man
never would have even dreamed of the unity of God. A belief in one God
is claimed to be a dogma of almost infinite importance, that with out
this belief civilization is impossible, and that this fact is the sun
around which all the virtues revolve. For my part, I think it infinitely
more important to believe in man. Theology is a superstition--Humanity a
religion.
XXV. "INSPIRED" SLAVERY
Perhaps the Bible was inspired upon the subject of human slavery. Is
there, in the civilized world, to-day, a clergyman who believes in the
divinity of slavery? Does the Bible teach man to enslave his brother? If
it does, is it not blasphemous to say that it is inspired of God? If
you find the institution of slavery upheld in a book said to have been
written by God, what would you expect to find in a book inspired by the
devil? Would you expect to find that book in favor of liberty? Modern
Christians, ashamed of the God of the Old Testament, endeavor now to
show that slavery was neither commanded nor opposed by Jehovah. Nothing
can be plainer than the following passages from the twenty-fifth chapter
of Leviticus. "Moreover of the children of the strangers that do sojourn
among you, of them shall ye buy, and of their families that are with
you, which they begat in your land: and they shall be your possession.
And ye shall take them as an inheritance for your children after you, to
inherit them for a possession, they shall be your bondmen forever. Both
thy bondmen, and thy bondmaids, which thou shalt have, shall be of the
heathen that are round about you; of them shall ye buy bondmen, and
bondmaids."
Can we believe in this, the Nineteenth Century, that these infamous
passages were inspired by God? that God approved not only of human
slavery, but instructed his chosen people to buy the women, children and
babes of the heathen round about them? If it was right for the Hebrews
to buy, it was also right for the heathen to sell. This God, by
commanding the Hebrews to buy, approved of the selling of sons and
daughters. The Canaanite who, tempted by gold, lured by avarice, sold
from the arms of his wife the dimpled babe, simply made it possible for
the Hebrews to obey the orders of their God. If God is the author of
the Bible, the reading of these passages ought to cover his cheeks with
shame. I ask the Christian world to-day, was it right for the heathen
to sell their children? Was it right for God not only to uphold, but to
command the infamous traffic in human flesh? Could the most revengeful
fiend, the most malicious vagrant in the gloom of hell, sink to a lower
moral depth than this?
According to this God, his chosen people were not only commanded to buy
of the heathen round about them, but were also permitted to buy each
other for a term of years. The law governing the purchase of Jews is
laid down in the twenty-first chapter of Exodus. "If thou buy a Hebrew
servant, six years shall he serve: and in the seventh he shall go out
free for nothing. If he came in by himself, he shall go out by himself:
if he were married, then his wife shall go out with him. If his master
have given him a wife, and she have borne him sons or daughters, the
wife and her children shall be her master's, and he shall go out by
himself. And if the servant shall plainly say, I love my master, my
wife, and my children; I will not go out free: Then his master shall
bring him unto the judges; he shall also bring him to the door, or unto
the door-post: and his master shall bore his ear through with an awl:
and he shall serve him forever."
Do you believe that God was the author of this infamous law? Do you
believe that the loving father of us all, turned the dimpled arms of
babes into manacles of iron? Do you believe that he baited the dungeon
of servitude with wife and child? Is it possible to love a God who would
make such laws? Is it possible not to hate and despise him?
The heathen are not spoken of as human beings. Their rights are never
mentioned. They were the rightful food of the sword, and their bodies
were made for stripes and chains.
In the same chapter of the same inspired book, we are told that, "if a
man smite his servant, or his maid, with a rod, and he dies under his
hand, he shall be surely punished. Notwithstanding, if he continue a day
or two, he shall not be punished, for he is his money."
Must we believe that God called some of his children the money of
others? Can we believe that God made lashes upon the naked back, a
legal tender for labor performed? Must we regard the auction block as an
altar? Were blood hounds apostles? Was the slave-pen a temple? Were the
stealers and whippers of babes and women the justified children of God?
It is now contended that while the Old Testament is touched with the
barbarism of its time, that the New Testament is morally perfect, and
that on its pages can be found no blot or stain. As a matter of fact,
the New Testament is more decidedly in favor of human slavery than the
old.
For my part, I never will, I never can, worship a God who upholds the
institution of slavery. Such a God I hate and defy. I neither want his
heaven, nor fear his hell.
XXXVI. "INSPIRED" MARRIAGE
Is there an orthodox clergyman in the world, who will now declare that
he believes the institution of polygamy to be right? Is there one who
will publicly declare that, in his judgment, that institution ever was
right? Was there ever a time in the history of the world when it was
right to treat woman simply as property? Do not attempt to answer these
questions by saying, that the Bible is an exceedingly good book, that we
are indebted for our civilization to the sacred volume, and that without
it, man would lapse into savagery, and mental night. This is no answer.
Was there a time when the institution of polygamy was the highest
expression of human virtue? Is there a Christian woman, civilized,
intelligent, and free, who believes in the institution of polygamy? Are
we better, purer, and more intelligent than God was four thousand years
ago? Why should we imprison Mormons, and worship God? Polygamy is just
as pure in Utah, as it could have been in the promised land. Love and
Virtue are the same the whole world round, and Justice is the same in
every star. All the languages of the world are not sufficient to express
the filth of polygamy. It makes of man, a beast, of woman, a trembling
slave. It destroys the fireside, makes virtue an outcast, takes from
human speech its sweetest words, and leaves the heart a den, where crawl
and hiss the slimy serpents of most loathsome lust. Civilization rests
upon the family. The good family is the unit of good government. The
virtues grow about the holy hearth of home--they cluster, bloom, and
shed their perfume round the fireside where the one man loves the one
woman. Lover--husband--wife--mother--father--child--home!--? without
these sacred words, the world is but a lair, and men and women merely
beasts.
Why should the innocent maiden and the loving mother worship the
heartless Jewish God? Why should they, with pure and stainless lips,
read the vile record of inspired lust?
The marriage of the one man to the one woman is the citadel and fortress
of civilization. Without this, woman becomes the prey and slave of lust
and power, and man goes back to savagery and crime. From the bottom of
my heart I hate, abhor and execrate all theories of life, of which the
pure and sacred home is not the corner-stone. Take from the world the
family, the fireside, the children born of wedded love, and there is
nothing left. The home where virtue dwells with love is like a lily with
a heart of fire--the fairest flower in all the world.
XXVII. "INSPIRED" WAR
If the Bible be true, God commanded his chosen people to destroy men
simply for the crime of defending their native land. They were not
allowed to spare trembling and white-haired age, nor dimpled babes
clasped in the mothers' arms. They were ordered to kill women, and to
pierce, with the sword of war, the unborn child. "Our heavenly Father"
commanded the Hebrews to kill the men and women, the fathers, sons and
brothers, but to preserve the girls alive. Why were not the maidens also
killed? Why were they spared? Read the thirty-first chapter of Numbers,
and you will find that the maidens were given to the soldiers and the
priests. Is there, in all the history of war, a more infamous thing than
this? Is it possible that God permitted the violets of modesty, that
grow and shed their perfume in the maiden's heart, to be trampled
beneath the brutal feet of lust? If this was the order of God, what,
under the same circumstances, would have been the command of a devil?
When, in this age of the world, a woman, a wife, a mother, reads this
record, she should, with scorn and loathing, throw the book away. A
general, who now should make such an order, giving over to massacre
and rapine a conquered people, would be held in execration by the whole
civilized world. Yet, if the Bible be true, the supreme and infinite God
was once a savage.
A little while ago, out upon the western plains, in a little path
leading to a cabin, were found the bodies of two children and their
mother. Her breast was filled with wounds received in the defence of her
darlings. They had been murdered by the savages. Suppose when looking at
their lifeless forms, some one had said, "This was done by the command
of God!" In Canaan there were countless scenes like this. There was
no pity in inspired war. God raised the black flag, and commanded his
soldiers to kill even the smiling infant in its mother's arms. Who
is the blasphemer; the man who denies the existence of God, or he who
covers the robes of the Infinite with innocent blood?
We are told in the Pentateuch, that God, the father of us all, gave
thousands of maidens, after having killed their fathers, their mothers,
and their brothers, to satisfy the brutal lusts of savage men. If there
be a God, I pray him to write in his book, opposite my name, that I
denied this lie for him.
XXVIII. "INSPIRED" RELIGIOUS LIBERTY.
According to the Bible, God selected the Jewish people through whom to
make known the great fact, that he was the only true and living God. For
this purpose, he appeared on several occasions to Moses--came down to
Sinai's top clothed in cloud and fire, and wrought a thousand miracles
for the preservation and education of the Jewish people. In their
presence he opened the waters of the sea. For them he caused bread to
rain from heaven. To quench their thirst, water leaped from the dry and
barren rock. Their enemies were miraculously destroyed; and for forty
years, at least, this God took upon himself the government of the Jews.
But, after all this, many of the people had less confidence in him than
in gods of wood and stone. In moments of trouble, in periods of
disaster, in the darkness of doubt, in the hunger and thirst of famine,
instead of asking this God for aid, they turned and sought the help of
senseless things. This God, with all his power and wisdom, could not
even convince a few wandering and wretched savages that he was more
potent than the idols of Egypt. This God was not willing that the Jews
should think and investigate for themselves. For heresy, the penalty was
death. Where this God reigned, intellectual liberty was unknown. He
appealed only to brute force; he collected taxes by threatening plagues;
he demanded worship on pain of sword and fire; acting as spy,
inquisitor, judge and executioner.
In the thirteenth chapter of Deuteronomy, we have the ideas of God as to
mental freedom. "If thy brother, the son of thy mother, or thy son, or
the wife of thy bosom, or thy friend which is as thine own soul, entice
thee secretly, saying, Let us go and serve other gods, which thou hast
not known, thou nor thy fathers; namely of the gods of the people which
are around about you, nigh unto thee, or far off from thee, from the one
end of the earth even unto the other end of the earth, Thou shalt not
consent unto him, nor hearken unto him, neither shall thine eye pity
him, neither shalt thou spare him, neither shalt thou conceal him. But
thou shalt surely kill him; thine hand shall be first upon him to put
him to death, and afterward the hand of all the people. And thou shalt
stone him with stones that he die."
This is the religious liberty of God; the toleration of Jehovah. If
I had lived in Palestine at that time, and my wife, the mother of my
children, had said to me, "I am tired of Jehovah, he is always asking
for blood; he is never weary of killing; he is always telling of his
might and strength; always telling what he has done for the Jews,
always asking for sacrifices; for doves and lambs--blood, nothing
but blood.--Let us worship the sun. Jehovah is too revengeful, too
malignant, too exacting. Let us worship the sun. The sun has clothed the
world in beauty; it has covered the earth with flowers; by its divine
light I first saw your face, and my beautiful babe."--If I had obeyed
the command of God, I would have killed her. My hand would have been
first upon her, and after that the hands of all the people, and she
would have been stoned with stones until she died. For my part, I would
never kill my wife, even if commanded so to do by the real God of this
universe. Think of taking up some ragged rock and hurling it against the
white bosom filled with love for you; and when you saw oozing from
the bruised lips of the death wound, the red current of her sweet
life--think of looking up to heaven and receiving the congratulations of
the infinite fiend whose commandment you had obeyed!
Can we believe that any such command was ever given by a merciful and
intelligent God? Suppose, however, that God did give this law to the
Jews, and did tell them that whenever a man preached a heresy, or
proposed to worship any other God that they should kill him; and suppose
that afterward this same God took upon himself flesh, and came to this
very chosen people and taught a different religion, and that thereupon
the Jews crucified him; I ask you, did he not reap exactly what he
had sown? What right would this God have to complain of a crucifixion
suffered in accordance with his own command?
Nothing can be more infamous than intellectual tyranny. To put chains
upon the body is as nothing compared with putting shackles on the brain.
No god is entitled to the worship or the respect of man who does not
give, even to the meanest of his children, every right that he claims
for himself.
If the Pentateuch be true, religious persecution is a duty. The dungeons
of the Inquisition were temples, and the clank of every chain upon
the limbs of heresy was music in the ear of God. If the Pentateuch was
inspired, every heretic should be destroyed; and every man who advocates
a fact inconsistent with the sacred book, should be consumed by sword
and flame.
In the Old Testament no one is told to reason with a heretic, and not
one word is said about relying upon argument, upon education, nor upon
intellectual development--nothing except simple brute force. Is there
to-day a Christian who will say that four thousand years ago, it was
the duty of a husband to kill his wife if she differed with him upon
the subject of religion? Is there one who will now say that, under such
circumstances, the wife ought to have been killed? Why should God be so
jealous of the wooden idols of the heathen? Could he not compete with
Baal? Was he envious of the success of the Egyptian magicians? Was it
not possible for him to make such a convincing display of his power as
to silence forever the voice of unbelief? Did this God have to resort to
force to make converts? Was he so ignorant of the structure of the human
mind as to believe all honest doubt a crime? If he wished to do away
with the idolatry of the Canaanites, why did he not appear to them? Why
did he not give them the tables of the law? Why did he only make known
his will to a few wandering savages in the desert of Sinai? Will some
theologian have the kindness to answer these questions? Will some
minister, who now believes in religious liberty, and eloquently
denounces the intolerance of Catholicism, explain these things; will he
tell us why he worships an intolerant God? Is a god who will burn a soul
forever in another world, better than a Christian who burns the body for
a few hours in this? Is there no intellectual liberty in heaven? Do the
angels all discuss questions on the same side? Are all the investigators
in perdition? Will the penitent thief, winged and crowned, laugh at the
honest folks in hell? Will the agony of the damned increase or decrease
the happiness of God? Will there be, in the universe, an eternal _auto
da fe?_
XXIX. CONCLUSION
If the Pentateuch is not inspired in its astronomy, geology, geography,
history or philosophy, if it is not inspired concerning slavery,
polygamy, war, law, religious or political liberty, or the rights of
men, women and children, what is it inspired in, or about? The unity
of God?--that was believed long before Moses was born. Special
providence?--that has been the doctrine of ignorance in all ages.
The rights of property?--theft was always a crime. The sacrifice of
animals?--that was a custom thousands of years before a Jew existed.
The sacredness of life?--there have always been laws against murder.
The wickedness of perjury?--truthfulness has always been a virtue.
The beauty of chastity?--the Pentateuch does not teach it. Thou shalt
worship no other God?--that has been the burden of all religions.
Is it possible that the Pentateuch could not have been written by
uninspired men? that the assistance of God was necessary to produce
these books? Is it possible that Galileo ascertained the mechanical
principles of "Virtual Velocity," the laws of falling bodies and of all
motion; that Copernicus ascertained the true position of the earth and
accounted for all celestial phenomena; that Kepler discovered his three
laws--discoveries of such importance that the 8th of May, 1618, may be
called the birthday of modern science; that Newton gave to the world
the Method of Fluxions, the Theory of Universal Gravitation, and the
Decomposition of Light; that Euclid, Cavalieri, Descartes, and Leibnitz,
almost completed the science of mathematics; that all the discoveries
in optics, hydrostatics, pneumatics and chemistry, the experiments,
discoveries, and inventions of Galvani, Volta, Franklin and Morse, of
Trevethick, Watt and Fulton and of all the pioneers of progress--that
all this was accomplished by uninspired men, while the writer of the
Pentateuch was directed and inspired by an infinite God? Is it possible
that the codes of China, India, Egypt, Greece and Rome were made by man,
and that the laws recorded in the Pentateuch were alone given by
God? Is it possible that Æschylus and Shakespeare, Burns, and Beranger,
Goethe and Schiller, and all the poets of the world, and all their
wondrous tragedies and songs, are but the work of men, while no
intelligence except the infinite God could be the author of the
Pentateuch? Is it possible that of all the books that crowd the
libraries of the world, the books of science, fiction, history and song,
that all save only one, have been produced by man? Is it possible that
of all these, the Bible only is the work of God?
If the Pentateuch is inspired, the civilization of our day is a mistake
and crime. There should be no political liberty. Heresy should be
trodden out beneath the bigot's brutal feet. Husbands should divorce
their wives at will, and make the mothers of their children houseless
and weeping wanderers. Polygamy ought to be practiced; women should
become slaves; we should buy the sons and daughters of the heathen and
make them bondmen and bondwomen forever. We should sell our own flesh
and blood, and have the right to kill our slaves. Men and women should
be stoned to death for laboring on the seventh day. "Mediums," such
as have familiar spirits, should be burned with fire. Every vestige of
mental liberty should be destroyed, and reason's holy torch extinguished
in the martyr's blood.
Is it not far better and wiser to say that the Pentateuch while
containing some good laws, some truths, some wise and useful things is,
after all, deformed and blackened by the savagery of its time? Is it not
far better and wiser to take the good and throw the bad away?
Let us admit what we know to be true; that Moses was mistaken about a
thousand things; that the story of creation is not true; that the Garden
of Eden is a myth; that the serpent and the tree of knowledge, and the
fall of man are but fragments of old mythologies lost and dead; that
woman was not made out of a rib; that serpents never had the power of
speech; that the sons of God did not marry the daughters of men; that
the story of the flood and ark is not exactly true; that the tower of
Babel is a mistake; that the confusion of tongues is a childish thing;
that the origin of the rainbow is a foolish fancy; that Methuselah did
not live nine hundred and sixty-nine years; that Enoch did not leave
this world, taking with him his flesh and bones; that the story of Sodom
and Gomorrah is somewhat improbable; that burning brimstone never fell
like rain; that Lot's wife was not changed into chloride of sodium; that
Jacob did not, in fact, put his hip out of joint wrestling with God;
that the history of Tamar might just as well have been left out; that a
belief in Pharaoh's dreams is not essential to salvation; that it makes
but little difference whether the rod of Aaron was changed to a serpent
or not; that of all the wonders said to have been performed in Egypt,
the greatest is, that anybody ever believed the absurd account; that
God did not torment the innocent cattle on account of the sins of their
owners; that he did not kill the first born of the poor maid behind
the mill because of Pharaoh's crimes; that flies and frogs were not
ministers of God's wrath; that lice and locusts were not the executors
of his will; that seventy people did not, in two hundred and fifteen
years, increase to three million; that three priests could not eat
six hundred pigeons in a day; that gazing at a brass serpent could not
extract poison from the blood; that God did not go in partnership with
hornets; that he did not murder people simply because they asked for
something to eat; that he did not declare the making of hair oil
and ointment an offence to be punished with death; that he did not
miraculously preserve cloth and leather; that he was not afraid of wild
beasts; that he did not punish heresy with sword and fire; that he was
not jealous, revengeful, and unjust; that he knew all about the sun,
moon, and stars; that he did not threaten to kill people for eating the
fat of an ox; that he never told Aaron to draw cuts to see which of two
goats should be killed; that he never objected to clothes made of woolen
mixed with linen; that if he objected to dwarfs, people with flat noses
and too many fingers, he ought not to have created such folks; that
he did not demand human sacrifices as set forth in the last chapter
of Leviticus; that he did not object to the raising of horses; that he
never commanded widows to spit in the faces of their brothers-in-law;
that several contradictory accounts of the same transaction cannot all
be true; that God did not talk to Abraham as one man talks to another;
that angels were not in the habit of walking about the earth eating veal
dressed with milk and butter, and making bargains about the destruction
of cities; that God never turned himself into a flame of fire, and lived
in a bush; that he never met Moses in a hotel and tried to kill him;
that it was absurd to perform miracles to induce a king to act in a
certain way and then harden his heart so that he would refuse; that God
was not kept from killing the Jews by the fear that the Egyptians would
laugh at him; that he did not secretly bury a man and then allow the
corpse to write an account of the funeral; that he never believed the
firmament to be solid; that he knew slavery was and always would be a
frightful crime; that polygamy is but stench and filth; that the brave
soldier will always spare an unarmed foe; that only cruel cowards
slay the conquered and the helpless; that no language can describe the
murderer of a smiling babe; that God did not want the blood of doves and
lambs; that he did not love the smell of burning flesh; that he did not
want his altars daubed with blood; that he did not pretend that the sins
of a people could be transferred to a goat; that he did not believe in
witches, wizards, spooks, and devils; that he did not test the virtue of
woman with dirty water; that he did not suppose that rabbits chewed the
cud; that he never thought there were any four-footed birds; that he did
not boast for several hundred years that he had vanquished an Egyptian
king; that a dry stick did not bud, blossom, and bear almonds in one
night; that manna did not shrink and swell, so that each man could
gather only just one omer; that it was never wrong to "countenance the
poor man in his cause;" that God never told a people not to live in
peace with their neighbors; that he did not spend forty days with Moses
on Mount Sinai giving him patterns for making clothes, tongs, basins,
and snuffers; that maternity is not a sin; that physical deformity is
not a crime; that an atonement cannot be made for the soul by shedding
innocent blood; that killing a dove over running water will not make its
blood a medicine; that a god who demands love knows nothing of the human
heart; that one who frightens savages with loud noises is unworthy the
love of civilized men; that one who destroys children on account of
the sins of their fathers is a monster; that an infinite god never
threatened to give people the itch; that he never sent wild beasts to
devour babes; that he never ordered the violation of maidens; that
he never regarded patriotism as a crime; that he never ordered the
destruction of unborn children; that he never opened the earth and
swallowed wives and babes because husbands and fathers had displeased
him; that he never demanded that men should kill their sons and
brothers, for the purpose of sanctifying themselves; that we cannot
please God by believing the improbable; that credulity is not a virtue;
that investigation is not a crime; that every mind should be free;
that all religious persecution is infamous in God, as well as man; that
without liberty, virtue is impossible; that without freedom, even love
cannot exist; that every man should be allowed to think and to express
his thoughts; that woman is the equal of man; that children should be
governed by love and reason; that the family relation is sacred; that
war is a hideous crime; that all intolerance is born of ignorance and
hate; that the freedom of today is the hope of to-morrow; that the
enlightened present ought not to fall upon its knees and blindly worship
the barbaric past; and that every free, brave and enlightened man should
publicly declare that all the ignorant, infamous, heartless, hideous
things recorded in the "inspired" Pentateuch are not the words of God,
but simply "Some Mistakes of Moses."
SOME REASONS WHY
I.
RELIGION makes enemies instead of friends. That one word, "religion,"
covers all the horizon of memory with visions of war, of outrage, of
persecution, of tyranny, and death. That one word brings to the mind
every instrument with which man has tortured man. In that one word are
all the fagots and flames and dungeons of the past, and in that word is
the infinite and eternal hell of the future.
In the name of universal benevolence Christians have hated their
fellow-men. Although they have been preaching universal love, the
Christian nations are the warlike nations of the world. The most
destructive weapons of war have been invented by Christians. The
musket, the revolver, the rifled canon, the bombshell, the torpedo, the
explosive bullet, have been invented by Christian brains.
Above all other arts, the Christian world has placed the art of war.
A Christian nation has never had the slightest respect for the rights of
barbarians; neither has any Christian sect any respect for the rights
of other sects. Anciently, the sects discussed with fire and sword, and
even now, something happens almost every day to show that the old spirit
that was in the Inquisition still slumbers in the Christian breast.
Whoever imagines himself a favorite with God, holds other people in
contempt.
Whenever a man believes that he has the exact truth from God, there is
in that man no spirit of compromise. He has not the modesty born of
the imperfections of human nature; he has the arrogance of theological
certainty and the tyranny born of ignorant assurance. Believing himself
to be the slave of God, he imitates his master, and of all tyrants, the
worst is a slave in power.
When a man really believes that it is necessary to do a certain thing
to be happy forever, or that a certain belief is necessary to ensure
eternal joy, there is in that man no spirit of concession. He divides
the whole world into saints and sinners, into believers and unbelievers,
into God's sheep and Devil's goats, into people who will be glorified
and people who will be damned.
A Christian nation can make no compromise with one not Christian; it
will either compel that nation to accept its doctrine, or it will wage
war. If Christ, in fact, said "I came not to bring peace but a sword,"
it is the only prophecy in the New Testament that has been literally
fulfilled.
II. DUTIES TO GOD.
RELIGION is supposed to consist in a discharge of the duties we owe to
God. In other words, we are taught that God is exceedingly anxious that
we should believe a certain thing. For my part, I do not believe that
there is any infinite being to whom we owe anything. The reason I say
this is, we can not owe any duty to any being who requires nothing--to
any being that we cannot possibly help, to any being whose happiness we
cannot increase. If God is infinite, we cannot make him happier than
he is. If God is infinite, we can neither give, nor can he receive,
anything. Anything that we do or fail to do, cannot, in the slightest
degree, affect an infinite God; consequently, no relations can exist
between the finite and the Infinite, if by relations is meant mutual
duties and obligations.
Some tell us that it is the desire of God that we should worship him.
What for? Why does he desire worship? Others tell us that we should
sacrifice something to him. What for? Is he in want? Can we assist him?
Is he unhappy? Is he in trouble? Does he need human sympathy? We cannot
assist the Infinite, but we can assist our fellow-men. We can feed the
hungry and clothe the naked, and enlighten the ignorant, and we can
help, in some degree at least, toward covering this world with the
mantle of joy.
I do not believe there is any being in this universe who gives rain
for praise, who gives sunshine for prayer, or who blesses a man simply
because he kneels.
The Infinite cannot receive praise or worship.
The Infinite can neither hear nor answer prayer.
An Infinite personality is an infinite impossibility.
III. INSPIRATION.
WE are told that we have in our possession the inspired will of God. What
is meant by the word "inspired" is not exactly known; but whatever else
it may mean, certainly it means that the "inspired" must be the true. If
it is true, there is, in fact, no need of its being inspired--the truth
will take care of itself.
The church is forced to say that the Bible differs from all other books;
it is forced to say that it contains the actual will of God. Let us then
see what inspiration really is. A man looks at the sea, and the sea
says something to him. It makes an impression upon his mind. It awakens
memory, and this impression depends upon the man's experience--upon
his intellectual capacity. Another looks upon the same sea. He has a
different brain; he has had a different experience. The sea may speak
to him of joy, to the other of grief and tears. The sea cannot tell the
same thing to any two human beings, because no two human beings have had
the same experience.
A year ago, while the cars were going from Boston to Gloucester, we
passed through Manchester. As the cars stopped, a lady sitting opposite,
speaking to her husband, looking out of the window and catching, for the
first time, a view of the sea, cried out, "Is it not beautiful!" and the
husband replied, "I'll bet you could dig clams right here!"
Another, standing upon the shore, listening to what the great Greek
tragedian called "the multitudinous laughter of the sea," may say: Every
drop has visited all the shores of the earth; every one has been frozen
in the vast and icy North; every one has fallen in snow, has been
whirled by storms around mountain peaks; every one has been kissed to
vapor by the sun; every one has worn the seven-hued garment of light;
every one has fallen in pleasant rain, gurgled from springs and laughed
in brooks while lovers wooed upon the banks, and every one has rushed
with mighty rivers back to the sea's embrace. Everything in nature tells
a different story to all eyes that see and to all ears that hear.
Once in my life, and once only, I heard Horace Greeley deliver a
lecture. I think its title was, "Across the Continent." At last he
reached the mammoth trees of California, and I thought "Here is an
opportunity for the old man to indulge his fancy. Here are trees that
have outlived a thousand human governments. There are limbs above his
head older than the pyramids. While man was emerging from barbarism
to something like civilization, these trees were growing. Older than
history, every one appeared to be a memory, a witness, and a prophecy.
The same wind that filled the sails of the Argonauts had swayed these
trees." But these trees said nothing of this kind to Mr. Greeley. Upon
these subjects not a word was told to him. Instead, he took his pencil,
and after figuring awhile, remarked: "One of these trees, sawed into
inch-boards, would make more than three hundred thousand feet of
lumber."
I was once riding on the cars in Illinois. There had been a violent
thunder-storm. The rain had ceased, the sun was going down. The
great clouds had floated toward the west, and there they assumed most
wonderful architectural shapes. There were temples and palaces domed
and turreted, and they were touched with silver, with amethyst and gold.
They looked like the homes of the Titans, or the palaces of the gods.
A man was sitting near me. I touched him and said, "Did you ever see
anything so beautiful!" He looked out. He saw nothing of the cloud,
nothing of the sun, nothing of the color; he saw only the country and
replied, "Yes, it is beautiful; I always did like rolling land." On
another occasion I was riding in a stage. There had been a snow, and
after the snow a sleet, and all the trees were bent, and all the boughs
were arched. Every fence, every log cabin had been transfigured, touched
with a glory almost beyond this world. The great fields were a pure and
perfect white; the forests, drooping beneath their load of gems, made
wonderful caves, from which one almost expected to see troops of fairies
come. The whole world looked like a bride, jewelled from head to foot.
A German on the back seat, hearing our talk, and our exclamations of
wonder leaned forward, looked out of the stage window and said: "Yes, it
looks like a clean table cloth!"
So, when we look upon a flower, a painting, a statue, a star, or a
violet, the more we know, the more we have experienced, the more we
have thought, the more we remember, the more the statue, the star,
the painting, the violet has to tell. Nature says to me all that I am
capable of understanding--gives all that I can receive.
As with star, or flower, or sea, so with a book. A man reads
Shakespeare. What does he get from him? All that he has the mind to
understand. He gets his little cup full. Let another read him who knows
nothing of the drama, nothing of the impersonations of passion, and what
does he get? Almost nothing. Shakespeare has a different story for each
reader. He is a world in which each recognizes his acquaintances--he may
know a few, he may know all.
The impression that nature makes upon the mind, the stories told by sea
and star and flower, must be the natural food of thought. Leaving out
for the moment the impression gained from ancestors, the hereditary
fears and drifts and trends--the natural food of thought must be the
impression made upon the brain by coming in contact through the medium
of the five senses with what we call the outward world. The brain is
natural. Its food is natural. The result, thought, must be natural. The
supernatural can be constructed with no material except the natural. Of
the supernatural we can have no conception. Thought may be deformed, and
the thought of one may be strange to, and denominated as unnatural
by, another; but it cannot be supernatural. It may be weak, it may be
insane, but it is not supernatural. Above the natural man cannot rise,
even with the aid of fancy's wings. There can can be deformed ideas,
as there are deformed persons. There can be religions monstrous and
misshapen, but they must be naturally produced. Some people have ideas
about what they are pleased to call the supernatural; but what they
call the supernatural is simply the deformed. The world is to each man
according to each man. It takes the world as it really is and that man
to make that man's world, and that man's world cannot exist without that
man.
You may ask, and what of all this? I reply, as with everything in
nature, so with the Bible. It has a different story for each reader. Is
then the Bible a different book to every human being who reads it? It
is. Can God then, through the Bible, make the same revelation to two
persons? He cannot. Why? Because the man who reads it is the man who
inspires. Inspiration is in the man, as well as in the book. God should
have inspired readers as well as writers.
You may reply: "God knew that his book would be understood differently
by each one, and that he really intended that it should be understood as
it is understood by each." If this is so, then my understanding of the
Bible is the real revelation to me. If this is so, I have no right to
take the understanding of another. I must take the revelation made to me
through my understanding, and by that revelation I must stand. Suppose
then, that I do read this Bible honestly, fairly, and when I get through
I am compelled to say, "The book is not true." If this is the honest
result, then you are compelled to say, either that God has made no
revelation to me, or that the revelation that it is not true, is the
revelation made to me, and by which I am bound. If the book and my brain
are both the work of the same Infinite God, whose fault is it that the
book and the brain do not agree? Either God should have written a book
to fit my brain, or should have made my brain to fit his book.
The inspiration of the Bible depends upon the ignorance of him who
reads. There was a time when its geology, its astronomy, its natural
history, were inspired. That time has passed. There was a time when
its morality satisfied the men who ruled mankind. That time has passed.
There was a time when the tyrant regarded its laws as good; when the
master believed in its liberty; when strength gloried in its passages;
but these laws never satisfied the oppressed, they were never quoted by
the slave.
We have a sacred book, an inspired Bible, and I am told that this book
was written by the same being who made every star, and who peopled
infinite space with infinite worlds. I am also told that God created
man, and that man is totally depraved. It has always seemed to me that
an infinite being has no right to make imperfect things. I may be
mistaken; but this is the only planet I have ever been on; I live in
what might be called one of the rural districts of this universe,
consequently I may be mistaken; I simply give the best and largest
thought I have.
IV. GOD'S EXPERIMENT WITH THE JEWS
THE Bible tells us that men became so bad that God destroyed them all
with the exception of eight persons; that afterwards he chose Abraham
and some of his kindred, a wandering tribe, for the purpose of seeing
whether or no they could be civilized. He had no time to waste with all
the world. The Egyptians at that time, a vast and splendid nation,
having a system of laws and free schools, believing in the marriage of
the one man to the one woman; believing, too, in the rights of woman--a
nation that had courts of justice and understood the philosophy of
damages--these people had received no revelation from God,--they were
left to grope in Nature's night. He had no time to civilize India,
wherein had grown a civilization that fills the world with wonder
still--a people with a language as perfect as ours, a people who had
produced philosophers, scientists, poets. He had no time to waste on
them; but he took a few, the tribe of Abraham. He established a perfect
despotism--with no schools, with no philosophy, with no art, with no
music--nothing but the sacrifices of dumb beasts--nothing but the abject
worship of a slave. Not a word upon geology, upon astronomy; nothing,
even, upon the science of medicine. Thus God spent hours and hours with
Moses upon the top of Sinai, giving directions for ascertaining the
presence of leprosy and for preventing its spread, but it never occurred
to Jehovah to tell Moses how it could be cured. He told them a few
things about what they might eat--prohibiting among other things
four-footed birds, and one thing upon the subject of cooking. From the
thunders and lightnings of Sinai he proclaimed this vast and wonderful
fact: "Thou shalt not seethe a kid in its mother's milk." He took these
people, according to our sacred Scriptures, under his immediate care,
and for the purpose of controlling them he wrought wonderful miracles in
their sight.
Is it not a little curious that no priest of one religion has ever been
able to astonish a priest of another religion by telling a miracle? Our
missionaries tell the Hindoos the miracles of the Bible, and the Hindoo
priests, without the movement of a muscle, hear them and then recite
theirs, and theirs do not astonish our missionaries in the least! Is it
not a little curious that the priests of one religion never believe the
priests of another? Is it not a little strange that the believers
in sacred books regard all except their own as having been made by
hypocrites and fools?
I heard the other day a story. A gentleman was telling some wonderful
things and the listeners, with one exception, were saying, as he
proceeded with his tale, "Is it possible?" "Did you ever hear anything
so wonderful?" and when he had concluded, there was a kind of chorus
of "Is it possible?" and "Can it be?" One man, however, sat perfectly
quiet, utterly unmoved. Another listener said to him "Did you hear
that?" and he replied "Yes." "Well," said the other, "You did not
manifest much astonishment." "Oh, no," was the answer, "I am a liar
myself."
I am told by the sacred Scriptures that, as a matter of fact, God, even
with the help of miracles, failed to civilize the Jews, and this shows
of how little real benefit, after all, it is, to have a ruler much above
the people, or to simply excite the wonder of mankind. Infinite wisdom,
if the account be true, could not civilize a single tribe. Laws made by
Jehovah himself were not obeyed, and every effort of Jehovah failed.
It is claimed that God made known his law and inspired men to write
and teach his will, and yet, it was found utterly impossible to reform
mankind.
V. CIVILIZED COUNTRIES
IN all civilized countries, it is now passionately asserted that slavery
is a crime; that a war of conquest is murder; that polygamy enslaves
woman, degrades man and destroys home; that nothing is more infamous
than the slaughter of decrepit men, of helpless mothers, and of
prattling babes; that captured maidens should not be given to their
captors; that wives should not be stoned to death for differing with
their husbands on the subject of religion. We know that there was
a time, in the history of most nations, when all these crimes were
regarded as divine institutions. Nations entertaining this view now are
regarded as savage, and, with the exception of the South Sea Islanders,
Feejees, a few tribes in Central Africa, and some citizens of Delaware,
no human beings are found degraded enough to agree upon these subjects
with Jehovah.
The only evidence we can have that a nation has ceased to be savage, is
that it has abandoned these doctrines of savagery.
To every one except a theologian, it is easy to account for these
mistakes and crimes by saying that civilization is a painful growth;
that the moral perceptions are cultivated through ages of tyranny, of
crime, and of heroism; that it requires centuries for man to put out the
eyes of self and hold in lofty and in equal poise the golden scales
of Justice. Conscience is born of suffering. Mercy is the child of
the imagination. Man advances as he becomes acquainted with his
surroundings, with the mutual obligations of life, and learns to take
advantage of the forces of nature.
The believer in the inspiration of the Bible is compelled to say, that
there was a time when slavery was right, when women could sell their
babes, when polygamy was the highest form of virtue, when wars of
extermination were waged with the sword of mercy, when religious
toleration was a crime, and when death was the just penalty for having
expressed an honest thought. He is compelled to insist that Jehovah is
as bad now as he was then; that he is as good now as he was then. Once,
all the crimes that I have mentioned were commanded by God; now they are
prohibited. Once, God was in favor of them all; now the Devil is their
defender. In other words, the Devil entertains the same opinion to-day
that God held four thousand years ago. The Devil is as good now as
Jehovah was then, and God was as bad then as the Devil is now. Other
nations besides the Jews had similar laws and ideas--believed in and
practiced the same crimes, and yet, it is not claimed that they received
a revelation. They had no knowledge of the true God, and yet they
practiced the same crimes, of their own motion, that the Jews did by
command of Jehovah. From this it would seem that man can do wrong
without a special revelation.
The passages upholding slavery, polygamy, war and religious persecution
are certainly not evidences of the inspiration of that book. Suppose
nothing had been in the Old Testament upholding these crimes, would
the modern Christian suspect that it was not inspired on that account?
Suppose nothing had been in the Old Testament except laws in favor of
these crimes, would it still be insisted that it was inspired? If the
Devil had inspired a book, will some Christian tell us in what respect,
on the subjects of slavery, polygamy, war and liberty, it would have
differed from some parts of the Old Testament? Suppose we knew
that after inspired men had finished the Bible the Devil had gotten
possession of it and had written a few passages, what part would
Christians now pick out as being probably his work? Which of the
following passages would be selected as having been written by the
Devil: "Love thy neighbor as thyself," or "Kill all the males among the
little ones, and kill every woman, but all the women children keep alive
for yourselves"?
Is there a believer in the Bible who does not now wish that God, amid
the thunders and lightnings of Sinai, had said to Moses that man should
not own his fellow-man; that women should not sell their babes; that all
men should be allowed to think and investigate for themselves, and that
the sword never should be unsheathed to shed innocent blood? Is there
a believer who would not be delighted to find that every one of the
infamous passages are interpolations, and that the skirts of God were
never reddened by the blood of maiden, wife, or babe? Is there an honest
man who does not regret that God commanded a husband to stone his wife
for suggesting the worship of some other God? Surely we do not need
an inspired book to teach us that slavery is right, that polygamy is
virtue, and that intellectual liberty is a crime.
VI. A COMPARISON OF BOOKS
LET us compare the gems of Jehovah with Pagan paste. It may be that
the best way to illustrate what I have said, is to compare the supposed
teachings of Jehovah with those of persons who never wrote an inspired
line. In all ages of which any record has been preserved, men have given
their ideas of justice, charity, liberty, love and law. If the Bible is
the work of God, it should contain the sublimest truths, it should excel
the works of man, it should contain the loftiest definitions of justice,
the best conceptions of human liberty, the clearest outlines of duty,
the tenderest and noblest thoughts. Upon every page should be found the
luminous evidence of its divine origin. It should contain grander and
more wonderful things than man has written.
It may be said that it is unfair to call attention to bad things in the
Bible. To this it may be replied that a divine being ought not to put
bad things in his book. If the Bible now upholds what we call crimes,
it will not do to say that it is not verbally inspired. If the words are
not inspired, what is? It may be said, that the thoughts are inspired.
This would include only thoughts expressed without words. If ideas are
inspired, they must be expressed by inspired words--that is to say, by
an inspired arrangement of words. If a sculptor were inspired of God to
make a statue, we would not say that the marble was inspired, but
the statue--that is to say, the relation of part to part, the married
harmony of form and function. The language, the words, take the place of
the marble, and it is the arrangement of the words that Christians claim
to be inspired. If there is an uninspired word, or a word in the wrong
place, until that word is known a doubt is cast on every word the book
contains.
If it was worth God's while to make a revelation at all, it was
certainly worth his while to see that it was correctly made--that it was
absolutely preserved.
Why should God allow an inspired book to be interpolated? If it was
worth while to inspire men to write it, it was worth while to
inspire men to preserve it; and why should he allow another person to
interpolate in it that which was not inspired? He certainly would not
have allowed the man he inspired to write contrary to the inspiration.
He should have preserved his revelation. Neither will it do to say that
God adapted his revelation to the prejudices of man. It was necessary
for him to adapt his revelation to the capacity of man, but certainly
God would not confirm a barbarian in his prejudices. He would not
fortify a heathen in his crimes....
If a revelation is of any importance, it is to eradicate prejudice.
They tell us now that the Jews were so ignorant, so bad, that God was
compelled to justify their crimes, in order to have any influence
with them. They say that if he had declared slavery and polygamy to be
crimes, the Jews would have refused to receive the Ten Commandments.
They tell us that God did the best he could; that his real intention was
to lead them along slowly, so that in a few hundred years they would be
induced to admit that larceny and murder and polygamy and slavery were
not virtues. I suppose if we now wished to break a cannibal of the bad
habit of devouring missionaries, we would first induce him to cook
them in a certain way, saying: "To eat cooked missionary is one step
in advance of eating your missionary raw. After a few years, a little
mutton could be cooked with missionary, and year after year the amount
of mutton could be increased and the amount of missionary decreased,
until in the fullness of time the dish could be entirely mutton, and
after that the missionaries would be absolutely safe."
If there is anything of value, it is liberty--liberty of body, liberty
of mind. The liberty of body is the reward of labor. Intellectual
liberty is the air of the soul, the sunshine of the mind, and without
it, the world is a prison, the universe a dungeon.
If the Bible is really inspired, Jehovah commanded the Jewish people to
buy the children of the strangers that sojourned among them, and ordered
that the children thus bought should be an inheritance for the children
of the Jews, and that they should be bondmen and bondwomen forever. Yet
Epictetus, a man to whom no revelation was ever made, a man whose soul
followed only the light of nature, and who had never heard of the Jewish
God, was great enough to say: "Will you not remember that your servants
are by nature your brothers, the children of God? In saying that you
have bought them, you look down on the earth, and into the pit, on the
wretched law of men long since dead, but you see not the laws of the
gods."
We find that Jehovah, speaking to his chosen people, assured them that
their bondmen and their bondmaids must be "of the heathen that were
round about them." "Of them," said Jehovah, "shall ye buy bondmen
and bondmaids." And yet Cicero, a pagan, Cicero, who had never been
enlightened by reading the Old Testament, had the moral grandeur to
declare: "They who say that we should love our fellow-citizens but not
foreigners, destroy the universal brotherhood of mankind, with which
benevolence and justice would perish forever."
If the Bible is inspired, Jehovah, God of all worlds, actually said:
"And if a man smite his servant or his maid with a rod, and he die under
his hand, he shall be sorely punished; notwithstanding, if he continue
a day or two, he shall not be punished, for he is his money." And yet
Zeno, founder of the Stoics, centuries before Christ was born, insisted
that no man could be the owner of another, and that the title was bad,
whether the slave had become so by conquest or by purchase.
Jehovah ordered a Jewish general to make war, and gave, among others,
this command: "When the Lord thy God shall drive them before thee, thou
shalt smite them and utterly destroy them; thou shalt make no covenant
with them, nor show mercy unto them." And yet Epictetus, whom we have
already quoted, gave this marvelous rule for the guidance of human
conduct: "Live with thy inferiors as thou wouldst have thy superiors
live with thee."
Is it possible, after all, that a being of infinite goodness and wisdom
said: "I will heap mischief upon them; I will send mine arrows upon
them; they shall be burned with hunger, and devoured with burning heat,
and with bitter destruction. I will send the tooth of beasts upon them,
with the poison of serpents of the dust. The sword without, and terror
within, shall destroy both the young man and the virgin, the suckling
also, with the man of gray hairs" while Seneca, an uninspired Roman,
said: "The wise man will not pardon any crime that ought to be
punished, but he will accomplish, in a nobler way, all that is sought
in pardoning. He will spare some and watch over some, because of their
youth, and others on account of their ignorance. His clemency will not
fall short of justice, but will fulfill it perfectly."
Can we believe that God ever said to any one: "Let his children be
fatherless and his wife a widow; let his children be continually
vagabonds, and beg; let them seek their bread also out of their desolate
places; let the extortioner catch all that he hath, and let the stranger
spoil his labor; let there be none to extend mercy unto him, neither let
there be any to favor his fatherless children." If he ever said these
words, surely he had never heard this line, this strain of music from
the Hindu: "Sweet is the lute to those who have not heard the prattle of
their own children."
Jehovah, "from the clouds and darkness of Sinai," said to the Jews:
"Thou shalt have no other gods before me.... Though shalt not bow down
thyself to them nor serve them; for I, the Lord thy God, am a jealous
God, visiting the iniquities of the fathers upon the children unto the
third and fourth generation of them that hate me." Contrast this with
the words put by the Hindu in the mouth of Brahma: "I am the same to all
mankind. They who honestly serve other gods involuntarily worship me.
I am he who partakest of all worship, and I am the reward of all
worshipers."
Compare these passages; the first a dungeon where crawl the things begot
of jealous slime; the other, great as the domed firmament inlaid with
suns. Is it possible that the real God ever said:
"And if the prophet be deceived when he hath spoken a thing, I, the
Lord, have deceived that prophet; and I will stretch out my hand upon
him and will destroy him from the midst of my people." Compare that
passage with one from a Pagan.
"It is better to keep silence for the remainder of your life than to
speak falsely."
Can we believe that a being of infinite mercy gave this command:
"Put every man his sword by his side, and go in and out from gate to
gate, throughout the camp, and slay every man his brother, and every man
his companion, and every man his neighbor; consecrate yourselves to-day
to the Lord, even every man upon his son and upon his brother, that he
may bestow a blessing upon you this day."
Surely, that God was not animated by so great and magnanimous a spirit
as was Antoninus, a Roman emperor, who declared that, "he had rather
keep a single Roman citizen alive than slay a thousand enemies."
Compare the laws given to the children of Israel, as it is claimed by
the Creator of us all, with the following from Marcus Aurelius:
"I have formed the ideal of a state, in which there is the same law
for all, and equal rights, and equal liberty of speech established; an
empire where nothing is honored so much as the freedom of the citizen."
In the Avesta I find this: "I belong to five: to those who think good,
to those who speak good, to those who do good, to those who hear, and to
those who are pure."
"Which is the one prayer which in greatness, goodness, and beauty is
worth all that is between heaven and earth and between this earth and
the stars? And he replied: To renounce all evil thoughts and words and
works."
VII.
IT is claimed by the Christian world that one of the great reasons for
giving an inspired book to the Jews was, that through them the world
might learn that there is but one God. This piece of information has
been supposed to be of infinite value. As a matter of fact, long before
Moses was born, the Egyptians believed and taught that there was but
one God--that is to say, that above all intelligences there was the one
Supreme. They were guilty, too, of the same inconsistencies of modern
Christians. They taught the doctrine of the Trinity--God the Father, God
the Mother, and God the Son. God was frequently represented as father,
mother and babe. They also taught that the soul had a divine origin;
that after death it was to be judged according to the deeds done in the
body; that those who had done well passed into perpetual joy, and those
who had done evil into endless pain. In this they agreed with the most
approved divine of the nineteenth century. Women were the equals of
men, and Egypt was often governed by queens. In this, her government
was vastly better than the one established by God. The laws were
administered by courts much like ours. In Egypt there was a system of
schools that gave the son of poverty a chance of advancement, and
the highest offices were open to the successful scholar. The Egyptian
married one wife. The wife was called "the lady of the house." The women
were not secluded. The people were not divided into castes. There was
nothing to prevent the rise of able and intelligent Egyptians. But like
the Jehovah of the Jews, they made slaves of the captives of war.
The ancient Persians believed in one God; and women helped to found the
Parsee religion. Nothing can exceed some of the maxims of Zoroaster. The
Hindoos taught that above all, and over all, was one eternal Supreme.
They had a code of laws. They understood the philosophy of evidence and
of damages. They knew better than to teach the doctrine of an eye for an
eye, and a tooth for a tooth.
They knew that when one man maimed another, it was not to the interest
of society to have that man maimed, thus burdening the people with two
cripples, but that it was better to make the man who maimed the other
work to support him. In India, upon the death of a father, the daughters
received twice as much from the estate as the sons.
The Romans built temples to Truth, Faith, Valor, Concord, Modesty, and
Charity, in which they offered sacrifices to the highest conceptions of
human excellence. Women had rights; they presided in the temple; they
officiated in holy offices; they guarded the sacred fires upon which the
safety of Rome depended; and when Christ came, the grandest figure in
the known world was the Roman mother.
It will not do to say that some rude statue was made by an inspired
sculptor, and that the Apollo of Belvidere, Venus de Milo, and the
Gladiator were made by unaided men; that the daubs of the early ages
were painted by divine assistance, while the Raphaels, the Angelos, and
the Rembrandts did what they did without the help of heaven. It will not
do to say, that the first hut was built by God, and the last palace by
degraded man; that the hoarse songs of the savage tribes were made by
the Deity, but that Hamlet and Lear were written by man; that the pipes
of Pan were invented in heaven, and all other musical instruments on the
earth.
If the Jehovah of the Jews had taken upon himself flesh, and dwelt as a
man among the people had he endeavored to govern, had he followed his
own teachings, he would have been a slaveholder, a buyer of babes, and a
beater of women. He would have waged wars of extermination. He would
have killed grey-haired and trembling age, and would have sheathed his
sword, in prattling, dimpled babes. He would have been a polygamist, and
would have butchered his wife for differing with him on the subject of
religion.
VIII. THE NEW TESTAMENT.
NE great objection to the Old Testament is the cruelty said to have been
commanded by God. All these cruelties ceased with death. The vengeance
of Jehovah stopped at the tomb. He never threatened to punish the dead;
and there is not one word, from the first mistake in Genesis to the last
curse of Malachi, containing the slightest intimation that God will take
his revenge in another world. It was reserved for the New Testament
to make known the doctrine of eternal pain. The teacher of universal
benevolence rent the veil between time and eternity, and fixed the
horrified gaze of man upon the lurid gulf of hell. Within the breast of
non-resistance coiled the worm that never dies. Compared with this,
the doctrine of slavery, the wars of extermination, the curses, the
punishments of the Old Testament were all merciful and just.
There is no time to speak of the conflicting statements in the various
books composing the New Testament--no time to give the history of the
manuscripts, the errors in translation, the interpolations made by the
fathers and by their successors, the priests, and only time to speak of
a few objections, including some absurdities and some contradictions.
Where several witnesses testify to the same transaction, no matter how
honest they may be, they will disagree upon minor matters, and such
testimony is generally considered as evidence that the witnesses
have not conspired among themselves. The differences in statement are
accounted for from the facts that all do not see alike, and that all
have not equally good memories; but when we claim that the witnesses are
inspired, we must admit that he who inspired them did know exactly what
occurred, and consequently there should be no disagreement, even in the
minutest detail. The accounts should not only be substantially, but they
should be actually, the same. The differences and contradictions can be
accounted for by the weaknesses of human nature, but these weaknesses
cannot be predicated of divine wisdom.
And here let me ask: Why should there have been more than one correct
account of what really happened? Why were four gospels necessary? It
seems to me that one inspired gospel, containing all that happened, was
enough. Copies of the one correct one could have been furnished to any
extent. According to Doctor Davidson, Irenæus argues that the gospels
were four in number, because there are four universal winds, four
corners of the globe. Others have said, because there are four seasons;
and these gentlemen might have added, because a donkey has four legs.
For my part, I cannot even conceive of a reason for more than one
gospel.
According to one of these gospels, and according to the prevalent
Christian belief, the Christian religion rests upon the doctrine of the
atonement. If this doctrine is without foundation, the fabric falls; and
it is without foundation, for it is repugnant to justice and mercy.
The church tells us that the first man committed a crime for which all
others are responsible. This absurdity was the father and mother of
another--that a man can be rewarded for the good action of another. We
are told that God made a law, with the penalty of eternal death. All
men, they tell us, have broken this law. The law had to be vindicated.
This could be done by damning everybody, but through what is known as
the atonement the salvation of a few was made possible. They insist that
the law demands the extreme penalty, that justice calls for its victim,
that mercy ceases to plead, and that God by allowing the innocent to
suffer in the place of the guilty settled satisfactory with the law. To
carry out this scheme God was born as a babe, grew in stature, increased
in knowledge, and at the age of thirty-three years having lived a life
filled with kindness, having practiced every virtue, he was sacrificed
as an atonement for man. It is claimed that he took our place, bore our
sins, our guilt, and in this way satisfied the justice of God.
Under the Mosaic dispensation there was no remission of sin except
through the shedding of blood. When a man sinned he must bring to the
priest a lamb, a bullock, a goat, or a pair of turtle-doves.
The priest would lay his hand upon the animal and the sin of the man
would be transferred to the beast. Then the animal would be killed in
place of the sinner, and the blood thus shed would be sprinkled upon
the altar. In this way Jehovah was satisfied. The greater the crime, the
greater the sacrifice. There was a ratio between the value of the animal
and the enormity of the sin.
The most minute directions were given as to the killing of
these animals. Every priest became a butcher, every synagogue a
slaughter-house. Nothing could be more utterly shocking to a refined
soul, nothing better calculated to harden the heart, than the continual
shedding of innocent blood. This terrible system culminated in the
sacrifice of Christ. His blood took the place of all other. It is not
necessary to shed any more. The law at last is satisfied, satiated,
surfeited.
The idea that God wants blood is at the bottom of the atonement, and
rests upon the most fearful savagery; and yet the Mosaic dispensation
was better adapted to prevent the commission of sin than the Christian
system. Under that dispensation, if you committed a sin, you had
to bring a sacrifice--dove, sheep, or bullock, now, when a sin is
committed, the Christian says, "Charge it," "Put it on the slate, If
I don't pay it the Savior will." In this way, rascality is sold on a
credit, and the credit system of religion breeds extravagance in sin.
The Mosaic dispensation was based upon far better business principles.
The debt had to be paid, and by the man who owed it. We are told that
the sinner is in debt to God, and that the obligation is discharged by
the Savior. The best that can be said of such a transaction is that the
debt is transferred, not paid. As a matter of fact, the sinner is in
debt to the person he has injured. If you injure a man, it is not enough
to get the forgiveness of God--you must get the man's forgiveness, you
must get your own. If a man puts his hand in the fire and God forgives
him, his hand will smart just as badly. You must reap what you sow. No
God can give you wheat when you sow tares, and no Devil can give you
tares when you sow wheat. We must remember that in nature there are
neither rewards nor punishments--there are consequences. The life and
death of Christ do not constitute an atonement. They are worth the
example, the moral force, the heroism of benevolence, and in so far as
the life of Christ produces emulation in the direction of goodness, it
has been of value to mankind.
To make innocence suffer is the greatest sin, and it may be the only
sin. How, then, is it possible to make the consequences of sin an
atonement for sin, when the consequences of sin are to be borne by one
who has not sinned, and the one who has sinned is to reap the reward of
virtue? No honorable man should be willing that another should suffer
for him. No good law can accept the sufferings of innocence as an
atonement for the guilty; and besides, if there was no atonement until
the crucifixion of Christ, what became of the countless millions who
died before that time? We must remember that the Jews did not kill
animals for the Gentiles. Jehovah hated foreigners. There was no way
provided for the forgiveness of a heathen. What has become of the
millions who have died since, without having heard of the atonement?
What becomes of those who hear and do not believe? Can there be a law
that demands that the guilty be rewarded. And yet, to reward the guilty
is far nearer justice than to punish the innocent. If the doctrine of
the atonement is true, there would have been no heaven had no atonement
been made.
If Judas had understood the Christian system, if he knew that Christ
must be betrayed, and that God was depending on him to betray him, and
that without the betrayal no human soul could be saved, what should
Judas have done?
Jehovah took special charge of the Jewish people. He did this for the
purpose of civilizing them. If he had succeeded in civilizing them,
he would have made the damnation of the entire human race a certainty;
because if the Jews had been a civilized people when Christ appeared--a
people who had not been hardened by the laws of Jehovah--they would not
have crucified Christ, and as a consequence, the world would have been
lost. If the Jews had believed in religious freedom, in the rights of
thought and speech, if the Christian religion is true, not a human soul
ever could have been saved. If, when Christ was on his way to Calvary,
some brave soul had rescued him from the pious mob, he would not only
have been damned for his pains, but would have rendered impossible the
salvation of any human being.
The Christian world has been trying for nearly two thousand years to
explain the atonement, and every effort has ended in an admission that
it cannot be understood, and a declaration that it must be believed. Has
the promise and hope of forgiveness ever prevented the commission of
a sin? Can men be made better by being taught that sin gives happiness
here; that to live a virtuous life is to bear a cross; that men can
repent between the last sin and the last breath; and that repentance
washes every stain of the soul away? Is it good to teach that the
serpent of regret will not hiss in the ear of memory; that the saved
will not even pity the victims of their crimes; and that sins forgiven
cease to affect the unhappy wretches sinned against?
Another objection is, that a certain belief is necessary to save the
soul. This doctrine, I admit, is taught in the gospel according to John,
and in many of the epistles; I deny that it is taught in Matthew, Mark,
or Luke. It is, however, asserted by the church that to believe is the
only safe way. To this, I reply: Belief is not a voluntary thing. A man
believes or disbelieves in spite of himself. They tell us that to
believe is the safe way; but I say, the safe way is to be honest.
Nothing can be safer than that. No man in the hour of death ever
regretted having been honest. No man when the shadows of the last day
were gathering about the pillow of death, ever regretted that he had
given to his fellow-man his honest thought. No man, in the presence of
eternity, ever wished that he had been a hypocrite. No man ever then
regretted that he did not throw away his reason. It certainly cannot be
necessary to throw away your reason to save your soul, because after
that, your soul is not worth saving. The soul has a right to defend
itself. My brain is my castle; and when I waive the right to defend it,
I become an intellectual serf and slave.
I do not admit that a man by doing me an injury can place me under
obligations to do him a service. To render benefits for injuries is
to ignore all distinctions between actions. He who treats friends and
enemies alike has neither love nor justice. The idea of non-resistance
never occurred to a man with power to defend himself. The mother of this
doctrine was weakness. To allow a crime to be committed, even against
yourself, when you can prevent it, is next to committing the crime
yourself. The church has preached the doctrine of non-resistance, and
under that banner has shed the blood of millions. In the folds of
her sacred vestments have gleamed for centuries the daggers of
assassination. With her cunning hands she wove the purple for hypocrisy
and placed the crown upon the brow of crime. For more than a thousand
years larceny held the scales of justice, hypocrisy wore the mitre and
tiara, while beggars scorned the royal sons of toil, and ignorant fear
denounced the liberty of thought.
XI. CHRIST'S MISSION.
HE came, they tell us, to make a revelation, and what did he reveal?
"Love thy neighbor as thyself"? That was in the Old Testament. "Love
God with all thy heart"? That was in the Old Testament. "Return good for
evil"? That was said by Buddha, seven hundred years before Christ was
born. "Do unto others as ye would that they should do unto you"? That
was the doctrine of Lao-tsze. Did he come to give a rule of action?
Zoroaster had done this long before: "Whenever thou art in doubt as to
whether an action is good or bad, abstain from it." Did he come to tell
us of another world? The immortality of the soul had been taught by the
Hindoos, Egyptians, Greeks, and Romans hundreds of years before he was
born. What argument did he make in favor of immortality? What facts
did he furnish? What star of hope did he put above the darkness of
this world? Did he come simply to tell us that we should not revenge
ourselves upon our enemies? Long before, Socrates had said: "One who
is injured ought not to return the injury, for on no account can it be
right to do an injustice; and it is not right to return an injury, or to
do evil to any man, however much we have suffered from him." And Cicero
had said: "Let us not listen to those who think we ought to be angry
with our enemies, and who believe this to be great and manly. Nothing
is so praiseworthy, nothing so clearly shows a great and noble soul, as
clemency and readiness to forgive." Is there anything in the literature
of the world more nearly perfect than this thought?
Was it from Christ the world learned the first lesson of forbearance,
when centuries and centuries before, Chrishna had said, "If a man strike
thee, and in striking drop his staff, pick it up and hand it to him
again?" Is it possible that the son of God threatened to say to a vast
majority, of his children, "Depart from me, ye cursed, into everlasting
fire prepared for the devil and his angels," while the Buddhist was
great and tender enough to say:
"Never will I seek nor receive private individual salvation; never
enter into final peace alone; but forever and everywhere will I live
and strive for the universal redemption of every creature throughout
all worlds. Never will I leave this world of sin and sorrow and struggle
until all are delivered. Until then, I will remain and suffer where I
am?"
Is there anything in the New Testament as beautiful as this, from a
Sufi?--"Better one moment of silent contemplation and inward love than
seventy thousand years of outward worship."
Is there anything comparable to this?--"Whoever carelessly treads on
a worm that crawls on the earth, that heartless one is darkly alienate
from God."
Is there anything in the New Testament more beautiful than the story of
the Sufi?
For seven years a Sufi practised every virtue, and then he mounted the
three steps that lead to the doors of Paradise. He knocked and a voice
said: "Who is there?" The Sufi replied: "Thy servant, O God." But the
doors remained closed.
Yet seven other years the Sufi engaged in every good work. He comforted
the sorrowing and divided his substance with the poor. Again he mounted
the three steps, again knocked at the doors of Paradise, and again
the voice asked: "Who is there?" and the Sufi replied: "Thy slave, O
God."--But the doors remained closed.
Yet seven other years the Sufi spent in works of charity, in visiting
the imprisoned and the sick. Again he mounted the steps, again knocked
at the celestial doors. Again he heard the question: "Who is there?" and
he replied: "Thyself, O God."--The gates wide open flew.
Is it possible that St. Paul was inspired of God, when he said: "Let the
women learn in silence, with all subjection."--"Neither was the man
created for the woman, but the woman for the man?"
And is it possible that Epictetus, without the slightest aid from
heaven, gave to the world this gem of love:
"What is more delightful than to be so dear to your wife, as to be on
that account dearer to yourself?"
Did St. Paul express the sentiments of God when he wrote--
"But I would have you know that the head of every man is Christ, and the
head of every woman is the man, and the head of Christ is God. Wives,
submit yourselves unto your husbands as unto the Lord?"
And was the author of this, a poor despised heathen?--
"In whatever house the husband is contented with the wife, and the wife
with the husband, in that house will fortune dwell; but upon the house
where women are not honored, let a curse be pronounced. Where the wife
is honored, there the gods are truly worshiped."
Is there anything in the New Testament as beautiful as this?--
"Shall I tell thee where nature is most blest and fair? It is where
those we love abide. Though that space be small, it is ample above
kingdoms; though it be a desert, through it run the rivers of Paradise."
After reading the curses pronounced in the Old
Testament upon Jew and heathen, the descriptions of slaughter, of
treachery and of death, the destruction of women and babes; after you
shall have read all the chapters of horror in the New Testament, the
threatenings of fire and flame, then read this, from the greatest of
human beings:
"The quality of mercy is not strained:
It droppeth as the gentle rain from heaven
Upon the place beneath. It is twice blessed;
It blesseth him that gives and him that takes.
'Tis mightiest in the mightiest: it becomes
The throned monarch better than his crown."
X. ETERNAL PAIN
UPON passages in the New Testament rests the doctrine of eternal pain.
This doctrine subverts every idea of justice. A finite being can neither
commit an infinite sin, nor a sin against the Infinite. A being of
infinite goodness and wisdom has no right to create any being whose life
is not a blessing. Infinite wisdom has no right to create a failure,
and surely a man destined to everlasting failure is not a conspicuous
success. The doctrine of eternal punishment is the most infamous of
all doctrines--born of ignorance, cruelty and fear. Around the angel of
immortality, Christianity has coiled this serpent.
Upon Love's breast the church has placed the eternal asp. And yet in
the same book in which is taught this most frightful of dogmas, we are
assured that "the Lord is good to all, and his tender mercies are over
all his works."
A few days ago upon the wide sea, was found a barque called "The
Tiger," Captain Kreuger, in command. The vessel had been one hundred and
twenty-six days upon the sea. For days the crew had been without water,
without food, and were starving. For nine days not a drop had passed
their lips. The crew consisted of the captain, a mate, and eleven men.
At the end of one hundred and eighteen days from Liverpool they killed
the captain's Newfoundland dog. This lasted them four days. During the
next five days they had nothing. For weeks they had had no light
and were unable to see the compass at night. On the one hundred and
twenty-fifth day Captain Kreuger, a German, took a revolver in his hand,
stood up before the men, and placing the weapon at his temple said:
"Boys, we can't stand this much longer, and to save you all, I am
willing to die." The mate grasped the revolver and begged the captain to
wait another day. The next day, upon the horizon of their despair, they
saw the smoke of the steamship Nebo. They were rescued.
Suppose that Captain Kreuger was not a Christian, and suppose that he
had sent the ball crashing through his brain, and had done so simply
to keep the crew from starvation, do you tell me that a God of infinite
mercy would forever damn that man?
Do not misunderstand me. I insist that every passage in the Bible
upholding crime was written by savage man. I insist that if there is
a God, he is not, never was, and never will be in favor of slavery,
polygamy, wars of extermination, or religious persecution. Does any
Christian believe that if the real God were to write a book now, he
would uphold the crimes commanded in the Old Testament? Has Jehovah
improved? Has infinite mercy become more merciful? Has infinite wisdom
intellectually advanced?
WILL any one claim that the passages upholding slavery have liberated
mankind? Are we indebted to polygamy for our modern homes? Was religious
liberty born of that infamous verse in which the husband is commanded to
kill his wife for worshiping an unknown God?
The usual answer to these objections is, that no country has ever been
civilized without a Bible. The Jews were the only people to whom Jehovah
made his will directly known. Were they better than other nations? They
read the Old Testament and one of the effects of such reading was, that
they crucified a kind, loving, and perfectly innocent man. Certainly
they could not have done worse, without a Bible. In crucifying Christ
the Jews followed the teachings of his Father. If Jehovah was in fact
God, and if that God took upon himself flesh and came among the Jews,
and preached what the Jews understood to be blasphemy; and if the Jews
in accordance with the laws given by this same Jehovah to Moses,
crucified him, then I say, and I say it with infinite reverence, he
reaped what he had sown. He became the victim of his own injustice.
But I insist that these things are not true. I insist that the real God,
if there is one, never commanded man to enslave his fellow-man, never
told a mother to sell her babe, never established polygamy, never urged
one nation to exterminate another, and never told a husband to kill his
wife because she suggested the worship of another God.
From the aspersions of the pulpit, from the slanders of the church,
I seek to rescue the reputation of the Deity. I insist that the Old
Testament would be a better book with all these passages left out; and
whatever may be said of the rest of the Bible, the passages to which I
have called attention can, with vastly more propriety, be attributed to
a devil than to a god.
Take from the New Testament the idea that belief is necessary to
salvation; that Christ was offered as an atonement for the sins of
mankind; that heaven is the reward of faith, and hell the penalty of
honest investigation, and that the punishment of the human soul will go
on forever; take from it all miracles and foolish stories, and I most
cheerfully admit that the good passages are true. If they are true, it
makes no difference whether they are inspired or not. Inspiration is
only necessary to give authority to that which is repugnant to human
reason. Only that which never happened needs to be substantiated by a
miracle.
The universe is natural.
The church must cease to insist that passages upholding the institutions
of savage men were inspired of God. The dogma of atonement must be
abandoned. Good deeds must take the place of faith. The savagery of
eternal punishment must be renounced. It must be admitted that credulity
is not a virtue, and that investigation is not a crime. It must be
admitted that miracles are the children of mendacity, and that nothing
can be more wonderful than the majestic, unbroken, sublime, and eternal
procession of causes and effects. Reason must be the arbiter. Inspired
books attested by miracles cannot stand against a demonstrated fact. A
religion that does not command the respect of the greatest minds will,
in a little while, excite the mockery of all.
A man who does not believe in intellectual liberty is a barbarian. Is
it possible that God is intolerant? Could there be any progress, even
in heaven, without intellectual liberty? Is the freedom of the future
to exist only in perdition? Is it not, after all, barely possible that
a man acting like Christ can be saved? Is a man to be eternally rewarded
for believing according to evidence, without evidence, or against
evidence? Are we to be saved because we are good, or because another was
virtuous? Is credulity to be winged and crowned, whilst honest doubt is
chained and damned.
If Jehovah, was in fact God, he knew the end from the beginning. He
knew that his Bible would be a breast-work behind which all tyranny
and hypocrisy would crouch. He knew that his Bible would be the
auction-block on which women would stand while their babes were sold
from their arms. He knew that this Bible would be quoted by tyrants;
that it would be the defence of robbers called kings, and of hypocrites
called priests. He knew that he had taught the Jewish people nothing of
importance. He knew that he had found them free and left them slaves. He
knew that he had never fulfilled a single promise made to them. He knew
that while other nations had advanced in art and science his chosen
people were savage still. He promised them the world, and gave them a
desert. He promised them liberty and he made them slaves. He promised
them victory and he gave them defeat. He said they should be kings and
he made them serfs. He promised them universal empire and gave them
exile. When one finishes the Old Testament he is compelled to say:
"Nothing can add to the misery of a nation whose king is Jehovah!"
The Old Testament filled this world with tyranny and injustice, and the
New gives us a future filled with pain for nearly all of the sons of
men.
The Old Testament describes the hell of the past, and the New the hell
of the future.
The Old Testament tells us the frightful things that God has done, the
New the frightful things that he will do.
These two books give us the sufferings of the past and the future--the
injustice, the agony and the tears of both worlds.
ORTHODOXY.
A LECTURE.
IT is utterly inconceivable that any man believing in the truth of the
Christian religion should publicly deny it, because he who believes in
that religion would believe that, by a public denial, he would peril the
eternal salvation of his soul. It is conceivable, and without any great
effort of the mind, that millions who do not believe in the Christian
religion should openly say that they did. In a country where religion
is supposed to be in power--where it has rewards for pretence, where it
pays a premium upon hypocrisy, where it at least is willing to purchase
silence--it is easily conceivable that millions pretend to believe what
they do not. And yet I believe it has been charged against myself not
only that I was insincere, but that I took the side I am on for the sake
of popularity; and the audience to-night goes far toward justifying the
accusation.
Orthodox Religion Dying Out.
It gives me immense pleasure to say to this audience that orthodox
religion is dying out of the civilized world. It is a sick man. It has
been attacked with two diseases--softening of the brain and ossification
of the heart. It is a religion that no longer satisfies the intelligence
of this country; that no longer satisfies the brain; a religion against
which the heart of every civilized man and woman protests. It is a
religion that gives hope only to a few; that puts a shadow upon the
cradle; that wraps the coffin in darkness and fills the future of
mankind with flame and fear. It is a religion that I am going to do what
little I can while I live to destroy. In its place I want humanity,
I want good fellowship, I want intellectual liberty--free lips, the
discoveries and inventions of genius, the demonstrations of science--the
religion of art, music and poetry--of good houses, good clothes, good
wages--that is to say, the religion of this world.
Religious Deaths and Births.
We must remember that this is a world of progress, a world of perpetual
change--a succession of coffins and cradles. There is perpetual death,
and there is perpetual birth. By the grave of the old, forever stand
youth and joy; and when an old religion dies, a better one is born. When
we find out that an assertion is a falsehood a shining truth takes its
place, and we need not fear the destruction of the false. The more false
we destroy the more room there will be for the true.
There was a time when the astrologer sought to read in the stars the
fate of men and nations. The astrologer has faded from the world, but
the astronomer has taken his place. There was a time when the poor
alchemist, bent and wrinkled and old, over his crucible endeavored to
find some secret by which he could change the baser metals into purest
gold. The alchemist has gone; the chemist took his place; and, although
he finds nothing to change metals into gold, he finds something that
covers the earth with wealth. There was a time when the soothsayer and
augur flourished. After them came the parson and the priest; and the
parson and the priest must go. The preacher must go, and in his place
must come the teacher--the real interpreter of Nature. We are done with
the supernatural. We are through with the miraculous and the impossible.
There was once the prophet who pretended to read the book of the future.
His place has been taken by the philosopher, who reasons from cause to
effect--who finds the facts by which we are surrounded and endeavors
to reason from these premises and to tell what in all probability will
happen. The prophet has gone, the philosopher is here. There was a time
when man sought aid from heaven--when he prayed to the deaf sky. There
was a time when everything depended on the supernaturalist. That time in
Christendom is passing away. We now depend upon the naturalist--not upon
the believer in ancient falsehoods, but on the discoverer of facts--on
the demonstrater of truths. At last we are beginning to build on a
solid foundation, and as we progress, the supernatural dies. The leaders
of the intellectual world deny the existence of the supernatural. They
take from all superstition its foundation.
The Religion of Reciprocity.
Supernatural religion will fade from this world, and in its place we
shall have reason. In the place of the worship of something we know
not of, will be the religion of mutual love and assistance--the great
religion of reciprocity. Superstition must go. Science will remain. The
church dies hard. The brain of the world is not yet developed. There
are intellectual diseases as well as physical--there are pestilences and
plagues of the mind.
Whenever the new comes the old protests, and fights for its place as
long as it has a particle of power. We are now having the same warfare
between superstition and science that there was between the stage coach
and the locomotive. But the stage coach had to go. It had its day of
glory and power, but it is gone. It went West. In a little while it will
be driven into the Pacific. So we find that there is the same conflict
between the different sects and different schools not only of philosophy
but of medicine.
Recollect that everything except the demonstrated truth is liable
to die. That is the order of Nature. Words die. Every language has a
cemetery. Every now and then a word dies and a tombstone is erected, and
across it is written "obsolete." New words are continually being born.
There is a cradle in which a word is rocked. A thought is married to a
sound, and a child-word is born. And there comes a time when the word
gets old, and wrinkled, and expressionless, and is carried mournfully
to the grave. So in the schools of medicine. You can remember, so can I,
when the old allopathists, the bleeders and blisterers, reigned supreme.
If there was anything the matter with a man they let out his blood.
Called to the bedside, they took him on the point of a lancet to the
edge of eternity, and then practiced all their art to bring him back.
One can hardly imagine how perfect a constitution it took a few years
ago to stand the assault of a doctor. And long after the old practice
was found to be a mistake hundreds and thousands of the ancient
physicians clung to it, carried around with them, in one pocket a bottle
of jalap, and in the other a rusty lancet, sorry that they could not
find some patient with faith enough to allow the experiment to be made
again.
So these schools, and these theories, and these religions die hard. What
else can they do? Like the paintings of the old masters, they are kept
alive because so much money has been invested in them. Think of the
amount of money that has been invested in superstition! Think of the
schools that have been founded for the more general diffusion of useless
knowledge! Think of the colleges wherein men are taught that it is
dangerous to think, and that they must never use their brains except
in the act of faith! Think of the millions and billions of dollars that
have been expended in churches, in temples, and in cathedrals! Think of
the thousands and thousands of men who depend for their living upon the
ignorance of mankind! Think of those who grow rich on credulity and
who fatten on faith! Do you suppose they are going to die without a
struggle? What are they to do? From the bottom of my heart I sympathize
with the poor clergyman that has had all his common sense educated out
of him, and is now to be thrown upon the cold and unbelieving world. His
prayers are not answered; he gets no help from on high, and the pews are
beginning to criticise the pulpit. What is the man to do? If he suddenly
changes he is gone. If he preaches what he really believes he will get
notice to quit. And yet, if he and the congregation would come together
and be perfectly honest, they would all admit that they believe little
and know nothing.
Only a little while ago a couple of ladies were riding together from a
revival, late at night, and one said to the other, as they rode along:
"I am going to say something that will shock you, and I beg of you never
to tell it to anybody else. I am going to tell it to you." "Well, what
is it?" Said she: "I do not believe the Bible." The other replied:
"Neither do I."
I have often thought how splendid it would be if the ministers could but
come together and say: "Now, let us be honest. Let us tell each other,
honor bright"--like Dr. Curry, of Chicago, did in the meeting the other
day--"just what we believe." They tell a story that in the old time a
lot of people, about twenty, were in Texas in a little hotel, and one
fellow got up before the fire, put his hands behind him, and said:
"Boys, let us all tell our real names." If the ministers and their
congregations would only tell their real thoughts they would find that
they are nearly as bad as I am, and that they believe as little.
Orthodoxy dies hard, and its defenders tell us that this fact shows that
it is of divine origin. Judaism dies hard. It has lived several thousand
years longer than Christianity. The religion of Mohammed dies hard.
Buddhism dies hard. Why do all these religions die hard? Because
intelligence increases slowly.
Let me whisper in the ear of the Protestant: Catholicism dies hard. What
does that prove? It proves that the people are ignorant and that the
priests are cunning.
Let me whisper in the ear of the Catholic: Protestantism dies hard. What
does that prove? It proves that the people are superstitious and the
preachers stupid.
Let me whisper in all your ears: Infidelity is not dying--it is
growing--it increases every day. And what does that prove? It
proves that the people are learning more and more--that they are
advancing--that the mind is getting free, and that the race is being
civilized.
The clergy know that I know that they know that they do not know.
The Blows That Have Shattered the Shield and Shivered the Lance of
Superstition.
Mohammed.
Mohammed wrested from the disciples of the cross the fairest part of
Europe. It was known that he was an impostor, and that fact sowed the
seeds of distrust and infidelity in the Christian world. Christians made
an effort to rescue from the infidels the empty sepulchre of Christ.
That commenced in the eleventh century and ended at the close of the
thirteenth. Europe was almost depopulated. The fields were left waste,
the villages were deserted, nations were impoverished, every man who
owed a debt was discharged from payment if he put a cross upon his
breast and joined the Crusades. No matter what crime he had committed,
the doors of the prison were open for him to join the hosts of the
cross. They believed that God would give them victory, and they carried
in front of the first Crusade a goat and a goose, believing that both
those animals were blessed by the indwelling of the Holy Ghost. And I
may say that those same animals are in the lead to-day in the orthodox
world. Until the year 1291 they endeavored to gain possession of that
sepulchre, and finally the hosts of Christ were driven back, baffled and
beaten,--a poor, miserable, religious rabble. They were driven back, and
that fact sowed the seeds of distrust in Christendom. You know that at
that time the world believed in trial by battle--that God would take
the side of the right--and there had been a trial by battle between the
cross and the crescent, and Mohammed had been victorious. Was God at
that time governing the world? Was he endeavoring to spread his gospel?
The Destruction of Art.
You know that when Christianity came into power it destroyed every
statue it could lay its ignorant hands upon. It defaced and obliterated
every painting; it destroyed every beautiful building; it burned the
manuscripts, both Greek and Latin; it destroyed all the history, all
the poetry, all the philosophy it could find, and reduced to ashes every
library that it could reach with its torch. And the result was, that the
night of the Middle Ages fell upon the human race. But by accident,
by chance, by oversight, a few of the manuscripts escaped the fury of
religious zeal; and these manuscripts became the seed, the fruit of
which is our civilization of to-day. A few statues had been buried; a
few forms of beauty were dug from the earth that had protected them, and
now the civilized world is filled with art, the walls are covered with
paintings, and the niches filled with statuary. A few manuscripts were
found and deciphered. The old languages were learned, and literature
was again born. A new day dawned upon mankind. Every effort at mental
improvement had been opposed by the church, and yet, the few things
saved from the general wreck--a few poems, a few works of the ancient
thinkers, a few forms wrought in stone, produced a new civilization
destined to overthrow and destroy the fabric of superstition.
The Discovery of America.
What was the next blow that this church received? The discovery of
America. The Holy Ghost who inspired men to write the Bible did not
know of the existence of this continent, never dreamed of the Western
Hemisphere. The Bible left out half the world. The Holy Ghost did not
know that the earth is round. He did not dream that the earth is round.
He believed it was flat, although he made it himself. At that time
heaven was just beyond the clouds. It was there the gods lived, there
the angels were, and it was against that heaven that Jacob's ladder
leaned when the angels went up and down. It was to that heaven that
Christ ascended after his resurrection. It was up there that the New
Jerusalem was, with its streets of gold, and under this earth was
perdition. There was where the devils lived; where a pit was dug for
all unbelievers, and for men who had brains. I say that for this reason:
Just in proportion that you have brains, your chances for eternal joy
are lessened, according to this religion. And just in proportion that
you lack brains your chances are increased. At last they found that the
earth is round. It was circumnavigated by Magellan. In 1519 that brave
man set sail. The church told him: "The earth is flat, my friend; don't
go, you may fall off the edge." Magellan said: "I have seen the shadow
of the earth upon the moon, and I have more confidence in the shadow
than I have in the church." The ship went round. The earth was
circumnavigated. Science passed its hand above it and beneath it, and
where was the old heaven and where was the hell? Vanished forever! And
they dwell now only in the religion of superstition. We found there was
no place there for Jacob's ladder to lean against; no place there for
the gods and angels to live; no place to hold the waters of the deluge;
no place to which Christ could have ascended. The foundations of the
New Jerusalem crumbled. The towers and domes fell, and in their places
infinite space, sown with an infinite number of stars; not with New
Jerusalems, but with countless constellations.
Copernicus and Kepler.
Then man began to grow great, and with that came Astronomy, In 1473
Copernicus was born. In 1543 his great work appeared. In 1616 the system
of Copernicus was condemned by the pope, by the infallible Catholic
Church, and the church was about as near right upon that subject as upon
any other. The system of Copernicus was denounced. And how long do you
suppose the church fought that? Let me tell you. It was revoked by Pius
VII. in the year of grace 1821. For two hundred and seventy-eight years
after the death of Copernicus the church insisted that his system was
false, and that the old Bible astronomy was true. Astronomy is the first
help that we ever received from heaven. Then came Kepler in 1609, and
you may almost date the birth of science from the night that Kepler
discovered his first law. That was the break of the day. His first law,
that the planets do not move in circles but in ellipses; his second law,
that they describe equal spaces in equal times; his third law, that the
squares of their periodic times are proportional to the cubes of their
distances. That man gave us the key to the heavens. He opened the
infinite book, and in it read three lines.
I have not time to speak of Galileo, of Leonardo da Vinci, of Bruno, and
of hundreds of others who contributed to the intellectual wealth of the
world.
Special Providence.
The next thing that gave the church a blow was Statistics. We found by
taking statistics that we could tell the average length of human life;
that this human life did not depend upon infinite caprice; that it
depended upon conditions, circumstances, laws and facts, and that these
conditions, circumstances, and facts were during long periods of time
substantially the same. And now, the man who depends entirely upon
special providence gets his life insured. He has more confidence even
in one of these companies than he has in the whole Trinity. We found by
statistics that there were just so many crimes on an average committed;
just so many crimes of one kind and so many of another; just so many
suicides, so many deaths by drowning, so many accidents on an average,
so many men marrying women, for instance, older than themselves; so many
murders of a particular kind; just the same number of mistakes; and
I say to-night, statistics utterly demolish the idea of special
providence.
Only the other day a gentleman was telling me of a case of special
providence. He knew it. He had been the subject of it. A few years ago
he was about to go on a ship when he was detained. He did not go, and
the ship was lost with all on board.
"Yes!" I said, "Do you think the people who were drowned believed in
special providence?" Think of the infinite egotism of such a doctrine.
Here is a man that fails to go upon a ship with five hundred passengers
and they go down to the bottom of the sea--fathers, mothers, children,
and loving husbands and wives waiting upon the chores of expectation.
Here is one poor little wretch that did not happen to go! And he thinks
that God, the Infinite Being, interfered in his poor little withered
behalf and let the rest all go. That is special providence. Why does
special providence allow all the crimes? Why are the wife-beaters
protected, and why are the wives and children left defenceless if the
hand of God is over us all? Who protects the insane? Why does Providence
permit insanity? But the church cannot give up special providence. If
there is no such thing, then no prayers, no worship, no churches, no
priests. What would become of National Thanksgiving?
You know we have a custom every year of issuing a proclamation of
thanksgiving. We say to God, "Although you have afflicted all the other
countries, although you have sent war, and desolation, and famine on
everybody else, we have been such good children that you have been
kind to us, and we hope you will keep on." It does not make a bit of
difference whether we have good times or not--the thanksgiving is always
exactly the same. I remember a few years ago a governor of Iowa got out
a proclamation of that kind. He went on to tell how thankful the people
were and how prosperous the State had been. There was a young fellow in
that State who got out another proclamation, saying that he feared the
Lord might be misled by official correspondence; that the governor's
proclamation was entirely false; that the State was not prosperous; that
the crops had been an almost utter failure; that nearly every farm in
the State was mortgaged, and that if the Lord did not believe him, all
he asked was that he would send some angel in whom he had confidence, to
look the matter over and report.
Charles Darwin.
This century will be called Darwin's century. He was one of the greatest
men who ever touched this globe. He has explained more of the phenomena
of life than all of the religious teachers. Write the name of Charles
Darwin on the one hand and the name of every theologian who ever lived
on the other, and from that name has come more light to the world
than from all of those. His doctrine of evolution, his doctrine of the
survival of the fittest, his doctrine of the origin of species,
has removed in every thinking mind the last vestige of orthodox
Christianity. He has not only stated, but he has demonstrated, that the
inspired writer knew nothing of this world, nothing of the origin of
man, nothing of geology, nothing of astronomy, nothing of nature; that
the Bible is a book written by ignorance--at the instigation of fear.
Think of the men who replied to him. Only a few years ago there was no
person too ignorant to successfully answer Charles Darwin; and the more
ignorant he was the more cheerfully he undertook the task. He was held
up to the ridicule, the scorn and contempt of the Christian world, and
yet when he died, England was proud to put his dust with that of her
noblest and her grandest. Charles Darwin conquered the intellectual
world, and his doctrines are now accepted facts. His light has broken
in on some of the clergy, and the greatest man who to-day occupies
the pulpit of one of the orthodox: churches, Henry Ward Beecher, is a
believer in the theories of Charles Darwin--a man of more genius than
all the clergy of that entire church put together.
And yet we are told in this little creed that orthodox religion is about
to conquer the world! It will be driven to the wilds of Africa. It must
go to some savage country; it has lost its hold upon civilization. It is
unfortunate to have a religion that cannot be accepted by the intellect
of a nation. It is unfortunate to have a religion against which every
good and noble heart protests. Let us have a good religion or none. My
pity has been excited by seeing these ministers endeavor to warp and
twist the passages of Scripture to fit the demonstrations of science. Of
course, I have not time to recount all the discoveries and events that
have assisted in the destruction of superstition. Every fact is an
enemy of the church. Every fact is a heretic. Every demonstration is
an infidel. Everything that ever really happened testifies against the
supernatural.
The church teaches that man was created perfect, and that for six
thousand years he has degenerated. Darwin demonstrated the falsity
of this dogma. He shows that man has for thousands of ages steadily
advanced; that the Garden of Eden is an ignorant myth; that the doctrine
of original sin has no foundation in fact; that the atonement is an
absurdity; that the serpent did not tempt, and that man did not "fall."
Charles Darwin destroyed the foundation of orthodox Christianity. There
is nothing left but faith in what we know could not and did not happen.
Religion and science are enemies. One is a superstition; the other is
a fact. One rests upon the false, the other upon the true. One is the
result of fear and faith, the other of investigation and reason.
The Creeds.
I have been talking a great deal about the orthodox religion. Often,
after having delivered a lecture, I have met some good, religious person
who has said to me:
"You do not tell it as we believe it."
"Well, but I tell it as you have it written in your creed."
"Oh, we don't mind the creed any more."
"Then, why do you not change it?"
"Oh, well, we understand it as it is, and if we tried to change it,
maybe we would not agree."
Possibly the creeds are in the best condition now. There is a tacit
understanding that they do not believe them, that there is a way to
get around them, and that they can read between the lines; that if they
should meet now to form new creeds they would fail to agree; and that
now they can say as they please, except in public. Whenever they do so
in public the church, in self-defence, must try them; and I believe in
trying every minister that does not preach the doctrine he agrees to.
I have not the slightest sympathy with a Presbyterian preacher who
endeavors to preach infidelity from a Presbyterian pulpit and receives
Presbyterian money. When he changes his views he should step down and
out like a man, and say, "I do not believe your doctrine, and I will not
preach it. You must hire some other man." The Latest Creed.
But I find that I have correctly interpreted the creeds. There was put
into my hands the new Congregational creed. I have read it, and I will
call your attention to it to-night, to find whether that church has made
any advance; to find whether the sun of science has risen in the heavens
in vain; whether they are still the children of intellectual darkness;
whether they still consider it necessary for you to believe something
that you by no possibility can understand, in order to be a winged angel
forever. Now, let us see what their creed is. I will read a little of
it.
They commence by saying that they
"_Believe in one God, the Father Almighty, maker of heaven and earth,
and of all things visible and invisible_."
They say, now, that there is the one personal God; that he is the maker
of the universe and its ruler. I again ask the old question, Of what did
he make it? If matter has not existed through eternity, then this God
made it. Of what did he make it? What did he use for the purpose? There
was nothing in the universe except this God. What had the God been doing
for the eternity he had been living? He had made nothing--called nothing
into existence; never had had an idea, because it is impossible to have
an idea unless there is something to excite an idea. What had he been
doing? Why does not the Congregational Church tell us? How do they know
about this Infinite Being? And if he is infinite how can they comprehend
him? What good is it to believe in something that you know you do not
understand, and that you never can understand?
In the Episcopalian creed God is described as follows:
"_There is but one living and true God, everlasting, without body, parts
or passions_."
Think of that!--without body, parts, or passions.
I defy any man in the world to write a better description of nothing.
You cannot conceive of a finer word-painting of a vacuum than "without
body, parts, or passions." And yet this God, without passions, is angry
at the wicked every day; this God, without passions, is a jealous God,
whose anger burneth to the lowest hell. This God, without passions,
loves the whole human race; and this God, without passions, damns a
large majority of mankind. This God without body, walked in the Garden
of Eden, in the cool of the day. This God, without body, talked with
Adam and Eve. This God, without body, or parts met Moses upon Mount
Sinai, appeared at the door of the tabernacle, and talked with Moses
face to face as a man speaketh to his friend. This description of God is
simply an effort of the church to describe a something of which it has
no conception.
God as a Governor.
So, too, I find the following:
"_We believe that the Providence of God, by which he executes his
eternal purposes in the government of the world, is in and over all
events._"
Is God the governor of the world? Is this established by the history of
nations? What evidence can you find, if you are absolutely honest and
not frightened, in the history of the world, that this universe is
presided over by an infinitely wise and good God?
How do you account for Russia? How do you account for Siberia? How do
you account for the fact that whole races of men toiled beneath the
master's lash for ages without recompense and without reward? How do you
account for the fact that babes were sold from the arms of mothers--arms
that had been reached toward God in supplication? How do you account for
it? How do you account for the existence of martyrs? How do you account
for the fact that this God allows people to be burned simply for loving
him? Is justice always done? Is innocence always acquitted? Do the
good succeed? Are the honest fed? Are the charitable clothed? Are the
virtuous shielded? How do you account for the fact that the world has
been filled with pain, and grief, and tears? How do you account for the
fact that people have been swallowed by earthquakes, overwhelmned by
volcanoes, and swept from the earth by storms? Is it easy to account
for famine, for pestilence and plague if there be above us all a Ruler
infinitely good, powerful and wise?
I do not say there is none. I do not know. As I have said before, this
is the only planet I was ever on. I live in one of the rural districts
of the universe, and do not know about these things as much as the
clergy pretend to, but if they know no more about the other world than
they do about this, it is not worth mentioning.
How do they answer all this? They say that God "permits" it. What would
you say to me if I stood by and saw a ruffian beat out the brains of a
child, when I had full and perfect power to prevent it? You would say
truthfully that I was as bad as the murderer. Is it possible for this
God to prevent it? Then, if he does not he is a fiend; he is no god.
But they say he "permits" it. What for? So that we may have freedom of
choice. What for? So that God may find, I suppose, who are good and who
are bad. Did he not know that when he made us? Did he not know exactly
just what he was making? Why should he make those whom he knew would be
criminals? If I should make a machine that would walk your streets and
take the lives of people you would hang me. And if God made a man whom
he knew would commit murder, then God is guilty of that murder. If God
made a man knowing that he would beat his wife, that he would starve
his children, that he would strew on either side of his path of life the
wrecks of ruined homes, then I say the being who knowingly called that
wretch into existence is directly responsible. And yet we are to find
the providence of God in the history of nations. What little I have read
shows me that when man has been helped, man has done it; when the
chains of slavery have been broken, they have been broken by man; when
something bad has been done in the government of mankind, it is easy to
trace it to man, and to fix the responsibility upon human beings. You
need not look to the sky; you need throw neither praise nor blame upon
gods; you can find the efficient causes nearer home--right here.
The Love of God.
What is the next thing I find in this creed?
"_We believe that man was made in the image of God, that he might know,
love, and obey God, and enjoy him forever._"
I do not believe that anybody ever did love God, because nobody ever
knew anything about him. We love each other. We love something that we
know. We love something that our experience tells us is good and great
and beautiful. We cannot by any possibility love the unknown. We can
love truth, because truth adds to human happiness. We can love justice,
because it preserves human joy. We can love charity. We can love every
form of goodness that we know, or of which we can conceive, but we
cannot love the infinitely unknown. And how can we be made in the image
of something that has neither body, parts, nor passions?
The Fall of Man.
The Congregational Church has not outgrown the doctrine of "original
sin." We are told that:
"_Our first parents, by disobedience, fell under the condemnation
of God, and that all men are so alienated from God that there is no
salvation from the guilt and power of sin except through God's redeeming
power._"
Is there an intelligent man or woman now in the world who believes in
the Garden of Eden story? If you find any man who believes it, strike
his forehead and you will hear an echo. Something is for rent. Does any
intelligent man now believe that God made man of dust, and woman of a
rib, and put them in a garden, and put a tree in the midst of it? Was
there not room outside of the garden to put his tree, if he did not want
people to eat his apples?
If I did not want a man to eat my fruit, I would not put him in my
orchard.
Does anybody now believe in the story of the serpent? I pity any man or
woman who, in this nineteenth century, believes in that childish fable.
Why did Adam and Eve disobey? Why, they were tempted. By whom? The
devil. Who made the devil? God. What did God make him for? Why did
he not tell Adam and Eve about this serpent? Why did he not watch the
devil, instead of watching Adam and Eve? Instead of turning them out,
why did he not keep him from getting in? Why did he not have his flood
first, and drown the devil, before he made a man and woman.
And yet, people who call themselves intelligent--professors in colleges
and presidents of venerable institutions--teach children and young men
that the Garden of Eden story is an absolute historical fact. I defy
any man to think of a more childish thing. This God, waiting around
Eden--knowing all the while what would happen--having made them on
purpose so that it would happen, then does what? Holds all of us
responsible, and we were not there. Here is a representative before the
constituency had been born. Before I am bound by a representative I want
a chance to vote for or against him; and if I had been there, and known
all the circumstances, I should have voted "No!" And yet, I am held
responsible.
We are told by the Bible and by the churches that through this fall of
man "_Sin and death entered the world?_"
According to this, just as soon as Adam and Eve had partaken of the
forbidden fruit, God began to contrive ways by which he could destroy
the lives of his children. He invented all the diseases--all the fevers
and coughs and colds--all the pains and plagues and pestilences--all the
aches and agonies, the malaria and spores; so that when we take a breath
of air we admit into our lungs unseen assassins; and, fearing that some
might live too long, even under such circumstances, God invented the
earthquake and volcano, the cyclone and lightning, animalcules to infest
the heart and brain, so small that no eye can detect--no instrument
reach. This was all owing to the disobedience of Adam and Eve!
In his infinite goodness, God invented rheumatism and gout and
dyspepsia, cancers and neuralgia, and is still inventing new diseases.
Not only this', but he decreed the pangs of mothers, and that by the
gates of love and life should crouch the dragons of death and pain.
Fearing that some might, by accident, live too long, he planted
poisonous vines and herbs that looked like food. He caught the serpents
he had made and gave them fangs and curious organs, ingeniously devised
to distill and deposit the deadly drop. He changed the nature of the
beasts, that they might feed on human flesh. He cursed a world, and
tainted every spring and source of joy. He poisoned every breath of air;
corrupted even light, that it might bear disease on every ray; tainted
every drop of blood in human veins; touched every nerve, that it
might bear the double fruit of pain and joy; decreed all accidents and
mistakes that maim and hurt and kill, and set the snares of life-long
grief, baited with present pleasure,--with a moment's joy. Then and
there he foreknew and foreordained all human tears. And yet all this is
but the prelude, the introduction, to the infinite revenge of the good
God. Increase and multiply all human griefs until the mind has reached
imagination's farthest verge, then add eternity to time, and you may
faintly tell, but never can conceive, the infinite horrors of this
doctrine called "The Fall of Man." The Atonement.
We are further told that:
"_All men are so alienated from God that there is no alleviation from
the guilt and power of sin except through God's redeeming grace;_"
And that:
"_We believe that the love of God to sinful man has found its highest
expression in the redemptive work of his Son, who became man, uniting
his divine nature with our human nature in one person; who was tempted
like other men and yet without sin, and by his humiliation, his holy
obedience, his sufferings, his death on the cross, and his resurrection,
became a perfect redeemer; whose sacrifice of himself for the sins
of the world declares the righteousness of God, and is the sole and
sufficient ground of forgiveness and of reconciliation with him_."
The absurdity of the doctrine known as "The Fall of Man," gave birth
to that other absurdity known as "The Atonement." So that now it is
insisted that, as we are rightfully charged with the sin of somebody
else, we can rightfully be credited with the virtues of another. Let us
leave out of our philosophy both these absurdities. Our creed will read
a great deal better with both of them out, and will make far better
sense.
Now, in consequence of Adam's sin, everybody is alienated from God. How?
Why? Oh, we are all depraved, you know; we all do wrong. Well, why?
Is that because we are depraved? No. Why do we make so many mistakes?
Because there is only one right way, and there is an almost infinite
number of wrong ways; and as long as we are not perfect in our
intellects we must make mistakes. "There is no darkness but ignorance,"
and alienation, as they call it, from God, is simply a lack of
intellect. Why were we not given better brains? That may account for the
alienation.
The church teaches that every soul that finds its way to the shore of
this world is against God--naturally hates God; that the little dimpled
child in the cradle is simply a chunk of depravity. Everybody against
God! It is a libel upon the human race; it is a libel upon all the men
who have worked for wife and child; upon all mothers who have suffered
and labored, wept and worked; upon all the men who have died for their
country; upon all who have fought for human liberty. Leave out the
history of religion and there is little left to prove the depravity of
man.
Everybody that comes is against God! Every soul, they think, is like the
wrecked Irishman, who drifted to an unknown island, and as he climbed
the shore saw a man and said to him, "Have you a Government here?" The
man replied "We have." "Well," said he, "I'm forninst it!"
The church teaches us that such is the attitude of every soul in the
universe of God. Ought a god to take any credit to himself for making
depraved people? A god that cannot make a soul that is not totally
depraved, I respectfully suggest, should retire from the business. And
if a god has made us, knowing that we are totally depraved, why should
we go to the same being to be "born again?"
The Second Birth.
The church insists that we must be "born again" and that all who are not
the subjects of this second birth are heirs of everlasting fire. Would
it not have been much better to have made another Adam and Eve? Would it
not have been better to change Noah and his people, so that after that a
second birth would not have been necessary? Why not purify the fountain
of all human life? Why allow the earth to be peopled with depraved and
monstrous beings, each one of whom must be re-made, re-formed, and born
again?
And yet, even reformation is not enough. If the man who steals
becomes perfectly honest, that is not enough; if the man who hates his
fellow-man, changes and loves his fellow-man, that is not enough; he
must go through that mysterious thing called the second birth; he must
be born again. He must have faith; he must believe something that
he does not understand, and experience what they call "conversion."
According to the church, nothing so excites the wrath of God--nothing so
corrugates the brows of Jehovah with hatred--as a man relying on his own
good works. He must admit that he ought to be damned, and that of the
two he prefers it, before God will consent to save him.
I met a man the other day, who said to me, "I am a Unitarian
Universalist." "What do you mean by that?" I asked. "Well," said he,
"this is what I mean: the Unitarian thinks he is too good to be damned,
and the Universalist thinks God is too good to damn him, and I believe
them both."
Is it possible that the sacrifice of a perfect being was acceptable to
God? Will he accept the agony of innocence for the punishment of guilt?
Will he release Barabbas and crucify Christ?
Inspiration.
What is the next thing in this great creed?
"_We believe that the Scriptures of the Old and New Testaments are the
record of God's revelation of Himself, the work of redemption; that
they were written by men under the special guidance of the holy spirit;
that they are able to make wise unto salvation; and that they constitute
an authoritative standard by which religious teaching and human conduct
are to be regulated and judged._"
This is the creed of the Congregational Church; that is, the result
reached by a high-joint commission appointed to draw up a creed for
their churches; and there we have the statement that the Bible was
written "by men under the special guidance of the Holy Spirit."
What part of the Bible? All of it? All of it. And yet what is this Old
Testament that was written by an infinitely good God? The being who
wrote it did not know the shape of the world he had made; knew nothing
of human nature. He commands men to love him, as if one could love upon
command. The same God upheld the institution of human slavery; and the
church says that the Bible that upholds that institution was written by
men under the guidance of the Holy Spirit. Then I disagree with the Holy
Spirit.
This church tells us that men under the guidance of the Holy Spirit
upheld the institution of polygamy--I deny it; that under the
guidance of the Holy Spirit these men upheld wars of extermination and
conquest--I deny it; that under the guidance of the Holy Spirit these
men wrote that it was right for a man to destroy the life of his wife if
she happened to differ with him on the subject of religion--I deny it.
And yet that is the book now upheld in this creed of the Congregational
Church.
If the devil had written upon the subject of slavery, which side would
he have taken? Let every minister answer. If you knew the devil had
written a work on human slavery, in your judgment, would he uphold
slavery, or denounce it? Would you regard it as any evidence that he
ever wrote it, if it upheld slavery? And yet, here you have a work
upholding slavery, and you say that it was written by an infinitely good
God! If the devil upheld polygamy, would you be surprised? If the devil
wanted to kill men for differing with him would you be astonished? If
the devil told a man to kill his wife, would you be shocked? And yet,
you say, that is exactly what God did. If there be a God, then that
creed is blasphemy. That creed is a libel upon him who sits on heaven's
throne. If there be a God, I ask him to write in the book in which my
account is kept, that I denied these lies for him.
I do not believe in a slaveholding God! I do not worship a polygamous
Holy Ghost, nor a Son who threatens eternal pain; I will not get upon my
knees before any being who commands a husband to slay his wife because
she expresses her honest thought. Suppose a book should be found old as
the Old Testament in which slavery, polygamy and war are all denounced,
would Christians think that it was written by the devil?
Did it ever occur to you that if God wrote the Old Testament, and
told the Jews to crucify or kill anybody that disagreed with them on
religion, and that this God afterward took upon himself flesh and came
to Jerusalem, and taught a different religion, and the Jews killed
him--did it ever occur to you that he reaped exactly what he had sown?
Did it ever occur to you that he fell a victim to his own tyranny, and
was destroyed by his own hand? Of course I do not believe that any God
ever was the author of the Bible, or that any God was ever crucified,
or that any God was ever killed, or ever will be, but I want to ask you
that question.
Take this Old Testament, then, with all its stories of murder and
massacre; with all its foolish and cruel fables; with all its infamous
doctrines; with its spirit of caste; with its spirit of hatred, and
tell me whether it was written by a good God. If you will read the
maledictions and curses of that book, you will think that God, like
Lear, had divided heaven among his daughters, and then, in the insanity
of despair, had launched his curses on the human race.
And yet, I must say--I must admit--that the Old Testament is better
than the New. In the Old Testament, when God had a man dead, he let
him alone. When he saw him quietly in his grave he was satisfied. The
muscles relaxed, and the frown gave place to a smile. But in the New
Testament the trouble commences at death. In the New Testament God is
to wreak his revenge forever and ever. It was reserved for one who said,
"Love your enemies," to tear asunder the veil between time and eternity
and fix the horrified gaze of man upon the gulfs of eternal fire. The
New Testament is just as much worse than the Old, as hell is worse than
sleep; just as much worse, as infinite cruelty is worse than dreamless
rest; and yet, the New Testament is claimed to be a gospel of love and
peace.
Is it possible that: "_The Scriptures constitute the authoritative
standard by which religious teaching and human conduct are to be
regulated and judged"?_
Are we to judge of conduct by the Old Testament, by the New, or by both?
According to the Old, the slaveholder was a just and generous man; a
polygamist was a model of virtue. According to the New, the worst can be
forgiven and the best can be lost. How can any book be a standard,
when the standard itself must be measured by human reason? Is there a
standard of a standard? Must not the reason be convinced? and, if so, is
not the reason of each man the final arbiter of that man? If he takes a
book as a standard, does he so take it because it is to him reasonable?
In what way is the human reason to be ignored? Why should a book take
its place, unless the reason has been convinced that the book is the
proper standard? If this is so, the book rests upon the reason of those
who adopt it. Are they to be saved because they act in accordance with
their reason, and are others to be damned because they act by the same
standard--their reason? No two are alike. Can we demand of all the same
result? Suppose the compasses were not constant to the pole--no two
compasses exactly alike--would you expect all ships to reach the same
harbor?
The Reign of Truth and Love.
I also find in this creed the following:
"_We believe that Jesus Christ came to establish among men the Kingdom
of God, the reign of truth and love, of righteousness and peace!_"
Well, that may have been the object of Jesus Christ. I do not deny it.
But what was the result? The Christian world has caused more war than
all the rest of the world beside. Most of the cunning instruments of
death have been devised by Christians. All the wonderful machinery by
which the life is blown from men, by which nations are conquered and
enslaved--all these machines have been born in Christian brains. And yet
he came to bring peace, they say; but the Testament says otherwise: "I
came not to bring peace, but a sword." And the sword was brought. What
are the Christian nations doing to-day in Europe? Is there a solitary
Christian nation that will trust any other? How many millions of
Christians are in the uniform of forgiveness, armed with the muskets of
love?
There was an old Spaniard on the bed of death, who sent for a priest,
and the priest told him that he would have to forgive his enemies before
he died. He said, "I have none." "What! no enemies?" "Not one," said the
dying man; "I killed the last one three months ago."
How many millions of Christians are now armed and equipped to destroy
their fellow-Christians? Who are the men in Europe crying against war?
Who wishes to have the nations disarmed? Is it the church? No; the men
who do not believe in what they call this religion of peace. When there
is a war, and when they make a few thousand widows and orphans; when
they strew the plain with dead patriots, Christians assemble in their
churches and sing "Te Deum Laudamus." Why? Because he has enabled a
few of his children to kill some others of his children. This is the
religion of peace--the religion that invented the Krupp gun, that will
hurl a ball weighing two thousand pounds through twenty-four inches
of solid steel. This is the religion of peace that covers the sea with
men-of-war, clad in mail, in the name of universal forgiveness. This is
the religion that drills and uniforms five millions of men to kill their
fellows.
The Wars It Brought.
What effect has this religion had upon the nations of the earth? What
have the nations been fighting about? What was the Thirty Years' War
in Europe for? What was the war in Holland for? Why was it that England
persecuted Scotland? Why is it that England persecutes Ireland even to
this day? At the bottom of every one of these conflicts you will find
a religious question. The religion of Jesus Christ, as preached by his
church, causes war, bloodshed, hatred, and all uncharitableness; and
why? Because, they say, a certain belief is necessary to salvation. They
do not say, if you behave yourself you will get there; they do not say,
if you pay your debts and love your wife and love your children, and are
good to your friends, and your neighbors, and your country, you will
get there; that will do you no good; you have got to believe a certain
thing. No matter how bad you are, you can instantly be forgiven; and no
matter how good you are, if you fail to believe that which you cannot
understand, the moment you get to the day of judgment nothing is left
but to damn you, and all the angels will shout "hallelujah."
What do they teach to-day? Nearly every murderer goes to heaven; there
is only one step from the gallows to God, only one jerk between the
halter and heaven. That is taught by this church.
I believe there ought to be a law to prevent the giving of the slightest
religious consolation to any man who has been found guilty of murder.
Let a Catholic understand that if he imbrues his hands in his brother's
blood, he can have no extreme unction. Let it be understood that he
can have no forgiveness through the church; and let the Protestant
understand that when he has committed that crime the community will not
pray him into heaven. Let him go with his victim. The victim, dying in
his sins, goes to hell, and the murderer has the happiness of seeing him
there. If heaven grows dull and monotonous, the murderer can again give
life to the nerve of pleasure by watching the agony of his victim.
The truth is, Christianity has not made friends; it has made enemies. It
is not, as taught, the religion of peace, it is the religion of war.
Why should a Christian hesitate to kill a man that his God is waiting
to damn? Why should a Christian not destroy an infidel who is trying to
assassinate his soul? Why should a Christian pity an unbeliever--one who
has rejected the Bible--when he knows that God will be pitiless forever?
And yet we are told, in this creed, that "_we believe in the ultimate
prevalence of the Kingdom of Christ over all the earth._"
What makes you? Do you judge from the manner in which you are getting
along now? How many people are being born a year? About fifty millions.
How many are you converting a year, really, truthfully? Five or six
thousand. I think I have overstated the number. Is orthodox Christianity
on the increase? No. There are a hundred times as many unbelievers in
orthodox Christianity as there were ten years ago. What are you doing in
the missionary world? How long is it since you converted a Chinaman?
A fine missionary religion, to send missionaries with their Bibles and
tracts to China, but if a Chinaman comes here, mob him, simply to show
him the difference between the practical and theoretical workings of the
Christian religion. How long since you have had an intelligent convert
in India? In my judgment, never; there never has been an intelligent
Hindoo converted from the time the first missionary put his foot on
that soil; and never, in my judgment, has an intelligent Chinaman been
converted since the first missionary touched that shore. Where are they?
We hear nothing of them, except in the reports. They get money from poor
old ladies, trembling on the edge of the grave, and go and tell them
stories, how hungry the average Chinaman is for a copy of the New
Testament, and paint the sad condition of a gentleman in the interior
of Africa without the works of Dr. McCosh, longing for a copy of _The
Princeton Review_,--in my judgment, a pamphlet that would suit a savage.
Thus money is scared from the dying, and frightened from the old and
feeble.
About how long is it before this kingdom is to be established? No one
objects to the establishment of peace and good will. Every good man
longs for the time when war shall cease. We are all hoping for a day of
universal justice--a day of universal freedom--when man shall control
himself, when the passions shall become obedient to the intelligent
will. But the coming of that day will not be hastened by preaching the
doctrines of total depravity and eternal revenge. That sun will not rise
the quicker for preaching salvation by faith. The star that shines
above that dawn, the herald of that day, is Science, not
superstition,--Reason, not religion.
To show you how little advance has been made, how many intellectual bats
and mental owls still haunt the temple, still roost above the altar,
I call your attention to the fact that the Congregational Church,
according to this creed; still believes in the resurrection of the dead,
and in their Confession of Faith, attached to the creed, I find that
they also believe in the literal resurrection of the body.
The Resurrection.
Does anybody believe that, who has the courage to think for himself?
Here is a man, for instance, that weighs 200 pounds and gets sick
and dies weighing 120; how much will he weigh in the morning of the
resurrection? Here is a cannibal, who eats another man; and we know that
the atoms you eat go into your body and become a part of you. After
the cannibal has eaten the missionary, and appropriated his atoms to
himself, and then dies, to whom will the atoms belong in the morning of
the resurrection? Could the missionary maintain an action of replevin,
and if so, what would the cannibal do for a body? It has been
demonstrated, in so far as logic can demonstrate anything, that there
is no creation and no destruction in Nature. It has been demonstrated,
again and again, that the atoms in us have been in millions of other
beings; have grown in the forests and in the grass, have blossomed in
flowers, and been in the metals. In other words, there are atoms in each
one of us that have been in millions of others; and when we die, these
atoms return to the earth, again appear in grass and trees, are again
eaten by animals, and again devoured by countless vegetable mouths and
turned into wood; and yet this church, in the nineteenth century,'in a
council composed of, and presided over by, professors and presidents
of colleges and theologians, solemnly tells us that it believes in the
literal resurrection of the body. This is almost enough to make
one despair of the future--almost enough to convince a man of the
immortality of the absurd. They know better. There is not one so
ignorant but knows better.
The Judgment-Day.
And what is the next thing?
"_We believe in a final judgment, the issues of which are everlasting
punishment and everlasting life!_"
At the final judgment all of us will be there. The thousands, and
millions, and billions, and trillions, and quadrillions that have died
will be there. The books will be opened, and each case will be called.
The sheep and the goats will be divided. The unbelievers will be sent to
the left, while the faithful will proudly walk to the right. The saved,
without a tear, will bid an eternal farewell to those who loved them
here--to those they loved. Nearly all the human race will go away to
everlasting punishment, and the fortunate few to eternal life. This
is the consolation of the Congregational Church! This is the hope that
dispels the gloom of life!
Pious Evasions.
When the clergy are caught, they give a different meaning to the
words and say the world was not made in seven days. They say "good
whiles"--"epochs."
And in this same Confession of Faith and in this creed they say that the
Lord's day is holy--every seventh day. Suppose you lived near the North
Pole where the day is three months long. Then which day would you keep?
If you could get to the North Pole you could prevent Sunday from ever
overtaking you. You could walk around the other way faster than the
world could revolve. How would you keep Sunday then? Suppose we invent
something that can go one thousand miles an hour? We can chase Sunday
clear around the globe. Is there anything that can be more perfectly
absurd than that a space of time can be holy? You might as well talk
about a virtuous vacuum. We are now told that the Bible is not a
scientific book, and that after all we cannot depend on what God said
four thousand years ago--that his ways are not as our ways--that we must
accept without evidence, and believe without understanding.
I heard the other night of an old man. He was not very well educated,
and he got into the notion that he must have reading of the Bible and
family worship. There was a bad boy in the family, and they were reading
the Bible by course. In the fifteenth chapter of Corinthians is this
passage: "Behold, brethren, I show you a mystery; we shall not all
die, but we shall all be changed." This boy had rubbed out the "c" in
"changed." So when the old man put on his spectacles, and got down his
Bible, he read: "Behold, brethren, I show you a mystery, we shall not
all die, but we shall all be hanged." The old lady said, "Father, I
don't think it reads that way." He said, "Who is reading this?" "Yes
mother, it says 'hanged,' and, more than that, I see the sense of it.
Pride is the besetting sin of the human heart, and if there is anything
calculated to take the pride out of a man it is hanging." It is in this
way that ministers avoid and explain the discoveries of Science.
People ask me, if I take away the Bible what are we going to do? How can
we get along without the revelation that no one understands? What are
we going to do if we have no Bible to quarrel about What are we to do
without hell? What are we going to do with our enemies? What are we
going to do with the people we love but don't like?
"No Bible, No Civilization."
They tell me that there never would have been any civilization if it had
not been for this Bible. The Jews had a Bible; the Romans had not. Which
had the greater and the grander government? Let us be honest. Which of
those nations produced the greatest poets, the greatest soldiers, the
greatest orators, the greatest statesmen, the greatest sculptors? Rome
had no Bible. God cared nothing for the Roman Empire. He let the men
come up by chance. His time was taken up with the Jewish people. And
yet Rome conquered the world, including the chosen people of God. The
people who had the Bible were defeated by the people who had not. How
was it possible for Lucretius to get along without the Bible?--how did
the great and glorious of that empire? And what shall we say of Greece?
No Bible. Compare Athens with Jerusalem. From Athens come the beauty and
intellectual grace of the world. Compare the mythology of Greece with
the mythology of Judea; one covering the earth with beauty, and the
other filling heaven with hatred and injustice. The Hindoos had no
Bible; they had been forsaken by the Creator, and yet they became the
greatest metaphysicians of the world. Egypt had no Bible. Compare Egypt
with Judea. What are we to do without the Bible? What became of the Jews
who had a Bible? Their temple was destroyed and their city was taken;
and they never found real prosperity until their God deserted them. The
Turks attributed all their victories to the Koran. The Koran gave them
their victories over the believers in the Bible. The priests of each
nation have accounted for the prosperity of that nation by its religion.
The Christians mistake an incident for a cause, and honestly imagine
that the Bible is the foundation of modern liberty and law. They forget
physical conditions, make no account of commerce, care nothing for
inventions and discoveries, and ignorantly give the credit to their
inspired book.
The foundations of our civilization were laid centuries before
Christianity was known. The intelligence of courage, of self-government,
of energy, of industry, that uniting made the civilization of this
century, did not come alone from Judea, but from every nation of the
ancient world.
Miracles of the New Testament.
There are many things in the New Testament that I cannot accept as true.
I cannot believe in the miraculous origin of Jesus Christ. I believe he
was the son of Joseph and Mary; that Joseph and Mary had been duly and
legally married; that he was the legitimate offspring of that union.
Nobody ever believed the contrary until he had been dead at least one
hundred and fifty years. Neither Matthew, Mark, nor Luke ever dreamed
that he was of divine origin. He did not say to either Matthew, Mark,
or Luke, or to any one in their hearing, that he was the Son of God,
or that he was miraculously conceived. He did not say it. It may be
asserted that he said it to John, but John did not write the gospel
that bears his name. The angel Gabriel, who, they say, brought the news,
never wrote a word upon the subject. The mother of Christ never wrote
a word upon the subject. His alleged father never wrote a word upon
the subject, and Joseph never admitted the story. We are lacking in
the matter of witnesses. I would not believe such a story now. I cannot
believe that it happened then. I would not believe people I know, much
less would I believe people I do not know.
At that time Matthew and Luke believed that Christ was the son of Joseph
and Mary. And why? they say he descended from David, and in order to
show that he was of the blood of David, they gave the genealogy of
Joseph. And if Joseph was not his father, why did they not give the
genealogy of Pontius Pilate or of Herod? Could they, by giving the
genealogy of Joseph, show that he was of the blood of David if Joseph
was in no way related to Christ? And yet that is the position into which
the Christian world is driven. In the New Testament we find that in
giving the genealogy of Christ it says, "who was the son of Joseph?" and
the church has interpolated the words "as was supposed." Why did they
give a supposed genealogy? It will not do. And that is a thing that
cannot in any way, by any human testimony, be established.
If it is important for us to know that he was the Son of God, I say,
then, that it devolves upon God to give us the evidence. Let him write
it across the face of the heavens, in every language of mankind. If it
is necessary for us to believe it, let it grow on every leaf next
year. No man should be damned for not believing, unless the evidence is
overwhelming. And he ought not to be made to depend upon say so, or upon
"as was supposed." He should have it directly, for himself. A man says
that God told him a certain thing, and he tells me, and I have only his
word. He may have been deceived. If God has a message for me he ought
to tell it to me, and not to somebody that has been dead four or five
thousand years, and in another language.
Besides, God may have changed his mind on many things; he has on
slavery, and polygamy at least, according to the church; and yet his
church now wants to go and destroy polygamy in Utah with the sword. Why
do they not send missionaries there with copies of the Old Testament?
By reading the lives of Abraham and Isaac, and Lot, and a few other
patriarchs who ought to have been in the penitentiary, maybe they can
soften their hearts.
More Miracles.
There is another miracle I do not believe,--the resurrection. I want to
speak about it as we would about any ordinary transaction. In the first
place, I do not believe that any miracle was ever performed, and if
there was, you cannot prove it. Why? Because it is altogether more
reasonable to believe that the people were mistaken about it than that
it happened. And why? Because, according to human experience, we know
that people will not always tell the truth, and we never saw a miracle
ourselves, and we must be governed by our experience; and if we go by
our experience, we must say that the miracle never happened--that the
witnesses were mistaken.
A man comes into Jerusalem, and the first thing he does is to cure the
blind. He lets the light of day visit the night of blindness. The eyes
are opened, and the world is again pictured upon the brain. Another man
is clothed with leprosy. He touches him and the disease falls from
him, and he stands pure, and clean, and whole. Another man is deformed,
wrinkled, and bent. He touches him, and throws around him again the
garment of youth. A man is in his grave, and he says, "Come forth!"
And the man walks in life, feeling his heart throb and his blood going
joyously through his veins. They say that actually happened. I do not
know.
There is one wonderful thing about the dead people that were raised--we
do not hear of them any more. What became of them? If there was a man
in this city who had been raised from the dead, I would go to see him
to-night. I would say, "Where were you when you got the notice to come
back? What kind of a country is it? What kind of opening there for a
young man? How did you like it? Did you meet there the friends you had
lost? Is there a world without death, without pain, without a tear? Is
there a land without a grave, and where good-bye is never heard?" Nobody
ever paid the slightest attention to the dead who had been raised. They
did not even excite interest when they died the second time. Nobody
said, "Why, that man is not afraid. He has been there once. He has
walked through the valley of the shadow." Not a word. They pass quietly
away.
I do not believe these miracles. There is something wrong somewhere
about that business. I may suffer eternal punishment for all this, but I
cannot, I do not, believe.
There was a man who did all these things, and thereupon they crucified
him. Let us be honest. Suppose a man came into this city and should meet
a funeral procession, and say, "Who is dead?" and they should reply,
"The son of a widow; her only support." Suppose he should say to the
procession, "Halt!" and to the undertaker, "Take out that coffin,
unscrew that lid. Young man, I say unto thee, arise!" and the dead
should step from the coffin and in a moment afterward hold his mother in
his arms. Suppose this stranger should go to your cemetery and find some
woman holding a little child in each hand, while the tears fell upon a
new-made grave, and he should say to her, "Who lies buried here?"
and she should reply, "My husband;" and he should cry, "I say unto
thee, oh grave, give up thy dead!" and the husband should rise, and in a
moment after have his lips upon his wife's, and the little children with
their arms around his neck; do you think that the people of this city
would kill him? Do you think any one would wish to crucify him? Do
you not rather believe that every one who had a loved one out in that
cemetery would go to him, even upon their knees, and beg him to give
back their dead? Do you believe that any man was ever crucified who was
the master of death?
Let me tell you to-night if there shall ever appear upon this earth the
master, the monarch, of death, all human knees will touch the earth. He
will not be crucified. All the living who fear death; all the living who
have lost a loved one, will bow to him. And yet we are told that this
worker of miracles, this man who could clothe the dead dust in the
throbbing flesh of life, was crucified. I do not believe that he worked
the miracles, I do not believe that he raised the dead, I do not believe
that he claimed to be the Son of God, These things were told long after
he was dead; told because the ignorant multitude demanded mystery and
wonder; told, because at that time the miraculous was believed of all
the illustrious dead. Stories that made Christianity powerful then,
weaken it now. He who gains a triumph in a conflict with a devil, will
be defeated by science.
There is another thing about these foolish miracles. All could have
been imitated. Men could pretend to be blind; confederates could feign
sickness, and even death.
It is not very difficult to limp or to hold an arm as though it were
paralyzed; or to say that one is afflicted with "an issue of blood." It
is easy to say that the son of a widow was raised from the dead, and
if you fail to give the name of the son, or his mother, or the time and
place where the wonder occurred, it is quite difficult to show that it
did not happen.
No one can be called upon to disprove anything that has not apparently
been established. I say apparently, because there can be no real
evidence in support of a miracle.
How could we prove, for instance, the miracle of the loaves and fishes?
There were plenty of other loaves and other fishes in the world? Each
one of the five thousand could have had a loaf and a fish with him. We
would have to show that there was no other possible way for the people
to get the bread and fish except by miracle, and then we are only half
through. We must then show that they did, in fact, get enough to
feed five thousand people, and that more was left than was had in the
beginning.
Of course this is simply impossible. And let me ask, why was not the
miracle substantiated by some of the multitude?
Would it not have been a greater wonder if Christ had _created_ instead
of multiplied the loaves and fishes?
How can we now prove that a certain person more than eighteen hundred
years ago was possessed by seven devils?
How was it ever possible to prove a thing like that?
How can it be established that some evil spirits could talk while others
were dumb, and that the dumb ones were the hardest to control?
If Christ wished to convince his fellow-men by miracles, why did he not
do something that could not by any means have been a counterfeit?
Instead of healing a withered arm, why did he not find some man whose
arm had been cut off, and make another grow?
If he wanted to raise the dead, why did he not raise some man of
importance, some one known to all?
Why did he do his miracles in the obscurity of the village, in the
darkness of the hovel?
Why call back to life people so insignificant that the public did not
know of their death?
Suppose that in May, 1865, a man had pretended to raise some person by
the name of Smith from the dead, and suppose a religion had been founded
on that miracle, would it not be natural for people, hundreds of years
after the pretended miracle, to ask why the founder of that religion
did not raise from the dead Abraham Lincoln, instead of the unknown and
obscure Mr. Smith?
How could any man now, in any court, by any known rule of evidence,
substantiate one of the miracles of Christ?
Must we believe anything that cannot in any way be substantiated?
If miracles were necessary to convince men eighteen centuries ago, are
they not necessary now?
After all, how many men did Christ convince with his miracles? How many
walked beneath the standard of the master of Nature?
How did it happen that so many miracles convinced so few? I will
tell you. The miracles were never performed. No other explanation is
possible.
It is infinitely absurd to say that a man who cured the sick, the halt
and blind, raised the dead, cast out devils, controlled the winds and
waves, created food and held obedient to his will the forces of the
world, was put to death by men who knew his superhuman power and who
had seen his wondrous works. If the crucifixion was public, the miracles
were private. If the miracles had been public, the crucifixion could not
have been. Do away with the miracles, and the superhuman character of
Christ is destroyed. He becomes what he really was--a man. Do away with
the wonders, and the teachings of Christ cease to be authoritative. They
are then worth the reason, the truth that is in them, and nothing more.
Do away with the miracles, and then we can measure the utterances of
Christ with the standard of our reason. We are no longer intellectual
serfs, believing what is unreasonable in obedience to the command of a
supposed god. We no longer take counsel of our fears, of our cowardice,
but boldly defend what our reason maintains.
Christ takes his appropriate place with the other teachers of mankind.
His life becomes reasonable and admirable. We have a man who hated
oppression; who despised and denounced superstition and hypocrisy; who
attacked the heartless church of his time; who excited the hatred of
bigots and priests, and who rather than be false to his conception of
truth, met and bravely suffered even death.
The Resurrection.
The miracle of the resurrection I do not and cannot believe. If it was
the fact, if the dead Christ rose from the grave, why did he not appear
to his enemies? Why did he not visit Pontius Pilate? Why did he not call
upon Caiaphas, the high priest? upon Herod? Why did he not again enter
the temple and end the old dispute with demonstration? Why did he not
confront the Roman soldiers who had taken money to falsely swear that
his body had been stolen by his friends? Why did he not make another
triumphal entry into Jerusalem? Why did he not say to the multitude:
"Here are the wounds in my feet, and in my hands, and in my side. I am
the one you endeavored to kill, but Death is my slave"? Simply because
the resurrection is a myth. It makes no difference with his teachings.
They are just as good whether he wrought miracles or not. Twice two are
four; that needs no miracle. Twice two are five--a miracle can not help
that. Christ's teachings are worth their effect upon the human race.
It makes no difference about miracle or wonder. In that day every
one believed in the impossible. Nobody had any standing as teacher,
philosopher, governor, king, general, about whom there was not supposed
to be something miraculous. The earth was covered with the sons and
daughters of gods and goddesses.
In Greece, in Rome, in Egypt, in India, every great man was supposed to
have had either a god for his father, or a goddess for his mother. They
accounted for genius by divine origin. Earth and heaven were at that
time near together. It was but a step for the gods from the blue arch
to the green earth. Every lake and valley and mountain top was made rich
with legends of the loves of gods. How could the early Christians have
made converts to a man, among a people who believed so thoroughly in
gods--in gods that had lived upon the earth; among a people who had
erected temples to the sons and daughters of gods? Such people could not
have been induced to worship a man--a man born among barbarous people,
citizen of a nation weak and poor and paying tribute to the Roman power.
The early Christians therefore preached the gospel of a god.
The Ascension.
I cannot believe in the miracle of the ascension, in the bodily
ascension of Jesus Christ. Where was he going? In the light shed upon
this question by the telescope, I again ask, where was he going?
The New Jerusalem is not above us. The abode of the gods is not there.
Where was he going? Which way did he go? Of course that depends upon
the time of day he left. If he left in the evening, he went exactly
the opposite way from that he would have gone had he ascended in the
morning. What did he do with his body? How high did he go? In what way
did he overcome the intense cold? The nearest station is the moon, two
hundred and forty thousand miles away. Again I ask, where did he go? He
must have had a natural body, for it was the same body that died. His
body must have been material, otherwise he would not as he rose have
circled with the earth, and he would have passed from the sight of his
disciples at the rate of more than a thousand miles per hour.
It may be said that his body was "spiritual." Then what became of the
body that died? Just before his ascension we are told that he partook of
broiled fish with his disciples. Was the fish "spiritual?"
Who saw this miracle?
They say the disciples saw it. Let us see what they say. Matthew did not
think it was worth mentioning. He does not speak of it. On the contrary,
he says that the last words of Christ were:
"Lo, I am with you alway, even unto the end of the world." Is it
possible that Matthew saw this, the most miraculous of miracles, and
yet forgot to put it in his life of Christ? Think of the little miracles
recorded by this saint, and then determine whether it is probable that
he witnessed the ascension of Jesus Christ.
Mark says: "So, then, after the Lord had spoken unto them he was
received up into heaven and sat on the right hand of God." This is all
he says about the most wonderful vision that ever astonished human eyes,
a miracle great enough to have stuffed credulity to bursting; and yet
all we have is this one, poor, meagre verse. We know now that most of
the last chapter of Mark is an interpolation, and as a matter of fact,
the author of Mark's gospel said nothing about the ascension one way or
the other.
Luke says: "And it came to pass while he blessed them he was parted from
them and was carried up into Heaven."
John does not mention it. He gives as Christ's last words this address
to Peter: "Follow thou Me." Of course, he did not say that as he
ascended. It seems to have made very little impression upon him; he
writes the account as though tired of the story. He concludes with an
impatient wave of the hand.
In the Acts we have another account. A conversation is given not
spoken of in any of the others, and we find there two men clad in white
apparel, who said: "Ye men of Galilee why stand ye here gazing up into
heaven? This same Jesus that was taken up into heaven shall so come in
like manner as ye have seen him go up into heaven."
Matthew did not see the men in white apparel, did not see the ascension.
Mark forgot the entire transaction, and Luke did not think the men in
white apparel worth mentioning. John had not confidence enough in the
story to repeat it. And yet, upon such evidence, we are bound to believe
in the bodily ascension, or suffer eternal pain.
And here let me ask, why was not the ascension in public?
Casting out Devils.
Most of the miracles said to have been wrought by Christ were recorded
to show his power over evil spirits. On many occasions, he is said to
have "cast out devils"--devils who could speak, and devils who were
dumb.
For many years belief in the existence of evil spirits has been fading
from the mind, and as this belief grew thin, ministers endeavored to
give new meanings to the ancient words. They are inclined now to put
"disease" in the place of "devils," and most of them say, that the
poor wretches supposed to have been the homes of fiends, were simply
suffering from epileptic fits! We must remember that Christ and these
devils often conversed together. Is it possible that fits can talk?
These devils often admitted that Christ was God. Can epilepsy certify to
divinity? On one occasion the fits told their name, and made a contract
to leave the body of a man provided they would be permitted to take
possession of a herd of swine. Is it possible that fits carried Christ
himself to the pinnacle of a temple? Did fits pretend to be the owner
of the whole earth? Is Christ to be praised for resisting such a
temptation? Is it conceivable that fits wanted Christ to fall down and
worship them?
The church must not abandon its belief in devils. Orthodoxy cannot
afford to put out the fires of hell. Throw away a belief in the devil,
and most of the miracles of the New Testament become impossible, even
if we admit the supernatural. If there is no devil, who was the original
tempter in the garden of Eden? If there is no hell, from what are
we saved; to what purpose is the atonement? Upon the obverse of the
Christian shield is God, upon the reverse, the devil. No devil, no hell.
No hell, no atonement. No atonement, no preaching, no gospel.
Necessity of Belief.
Does belief depend upon evidence? I think it does somewhat in some
cases. How is it when a jury is sworn to try a case, hearing all the
evidence, hearing both sides, hearing the charge of the judge, hearing
the law, are upon their oaths equally divided, six for the plaintiff and
six for the defendant? Evidence does not have the same effect upon all
people. Why? Our brains are not alike. They are not the same shape. We
have not the same intelligence, or the same experience, the same sense.
And yet I am held accountable for my belief. I must believe in the
Trinity--three times one is one, once one is three, and my soul is to be
eternally damned for failing to guess an arithmetical conundrum. That
is the poison part of Christianity--that salvation depends upon
belief. That is the accursed part, and until that dogma is discarded
Christianity will be nothing but superstition.
No man can control his belief. If I hear certain evidence I will believe
a certain thing. If I fail to hear it I may never believe it. If it is
adapted to my mind I may accept it; if it is not, I reject it. And what
am I to go by? My brain. That is the only light I have from Nature, and
if there be a God it is the only torch that this God has given me to
find my way through the darkness and night called life. I do not depend
upon hearsay for that. I do not have to take the word of any other man
nor get upon my knees before a book. Here in the temple of the mind I
consult the God, that is to say my reason, and the oracle speaks to me
and I obey the oracle. What should I obey? Another man's oracle? Shall
I take another man's word--not what he thinks, but what he says some God
has said to him?
I would not know a god if I should see one. I have said before, and I
say again, the brain thinks in spite of me, and I am not responsible for
my thoughts. I cannot control the beating of my heart. I cannot stop
the blood that flows through the rivers of my veins. And yet I am held
responsible for my belief. Then why does not God give me the evidence?
They say he has. In what? In an inspired book. But I do not understand
it as they do. Must I be false to my understanding? They say: "When you
come to die you will be sorry if you do not." Will I be sorry when I
come to die that I did not live a hypocrite? Will I be sorry that I
did not say I was a Christian when I was not? Will the fact that I was
honest put a thorn in the pillow of death? Cannot God forgive me for
being honest? They say that when he was in Jerusalem he forgave his
murderers, but now he will not forgive an honest man for differing from
him on the subject of the Trinity.
They say that God says to me, "Forgive your enemies." I say, "I do;" but
he says, "I will damn mine." God should be consistent. If he wants me to
forgive my enemies he should forgive his. I am asked to forgive enemies
who can hurt me. God is only asked to forgive enemies who cannot hurt
him. He certainly ought to be as generous as he asks us to be. And I
want no God to forgive me unless I am willing to forgive others, and
unless I do forgive others. All I ask, if that be true, is that this God
should act according to his own doctrine. If I am to forgive my enemies,
I ask him to forgive his. I do not believe in the religion of faith,
but of kindness, of good deeds. The idea that man is responsible for his
belief is at the bottom of religious intolerance and persecution.
How inconsistent these Christians are! In St. Louis the other day I read
an interview with a Christian minister--one who is now holding a
revival. They call him the boy preacher--a name that he has borne for
fifty or sixty years. The question was whether in these revivals, when
they were trying to rescue souls from eternal torture, they would allow
colored people to occupy seats with white people; and that revivalist,
preaching the unsearchable riches of Christ, said he would not allow the
colored people to sit with white people; they must go to the back of the
church. These same Christians tell us that in heaven there will be no
distinction. That Christ cares nothing for the color of the skin. That
in Paradise white and black will sit together, swap harps, and cry
hallelujah in chorus; yet this minister, believing as he says he does,
that all men who fail to believe in the Lord Jesus Christ will eternally
perish, was not willing that a colored man should sit by a white man and
hear the gospel of everlasting peace.
According to this revivalist, the ship of the world is going down;
Christ is the only life-boat; and yet he is not willing that a colored
man, with a soul to save, shall sit by the side of a white brother,
and be rescued from eternal death. He admits that the white brother
is totally depraved; that if the white brother had justice done him he
would be damned; that it is only through the wonderful mercy of God that
the white man is not in hell; and yet such a being, totally depraved,
is too good to sit by a colored man! Total depravity becomes arrogant;
total depravity draws the color line in religion, and an ambassador of
Christ says to the black man, "Stand away; let your white brother hear
first about the love of God."
I believe in the religion of humanity. It is far better to love our
fellow-men than to love God. We can help them. We cannot help him. We
had better do what we can than to be always pretending to do what we
cannot.
Virtue is of no color; kindness, justice and love, of no complexion.
Eternal Punishment.
Now I come to the last part of this creed--the doctrine of eternal
punishment. I have concluded that I will never deliver a lecture in
which I will not attack the doctrine of eternal pain. That part of the
Congregational creed would disgrace the lowest savage that crouches
and crawls in the jungles of Africa. The man who now, in the nineteenth
century, preaches the doctrine of eternal punishment, the doctrine of an
eternal hell, has lived in vain. Think of that doctrine! The eternity of
punishment! I find in this same creed--in this latest utterance of
Congregationalism--that Christ is finally going to triumph in this world
and establish his kingdom. This creed declares that "we believe in the
ultimate prevalence of the kingdom of God over all the earth." If
their doctrine is true he will never triumph in the other world. The
Congregational Church does not believe in the ultimate prevalence of the
kingdom of Christ in the world to come. There he is to meet with eternal
failure. He will have billions in hell forever.
In this world we never will be perfectly civilized as long as a gallows
casts its shadow upon the earth. As long as there is a penitentiary,
within the walls of which a human being is immured, we are not a
perfectly civilized people. We shall never be perfectly civilized until
we do away with crime. And yet, according to this Christian religion,
God is to have an eternal penitentiary; he is to be an everlasting
jailer, an everlasting turnkey, a warden of an infinite dungeon, and
he is going to keep prisoners there forever, not for the purpose of
reforming them--because they are never going to get any better, only
worse--but for the purpose of purposeless punishment. And for what?
For something they failed to believe in this world. Born in ignorance,
supported by poverty, caught in the snares of temptation, deformed by
toil, stupefied by want--and yet held responsible through the countless
ages of eternity! No man can think of a greater horror; no man can dream
of a greater absurdity. For the growth of that doctrine ignorance was
soil and fear was rain. It came from the fanged mouths of serpents, and
yet it is called "glad tidings of great joy." Some Who are Damned.
We are told "God so loved the world" that he is going to damn almost
everybody. If this orthodox religion be true, some of the greatest, and
grandest, and best who ever lived are suffering God's torments to-night.
It does not appear to make much difference with the members of the
church. They go right on enjoying themselves about as well as ever. If
this doctrine is true, Benjamin Franklin, one of the wisest and best of
men, who did so much to give us here a free government, is suffering
the tyranny of God to-night, although he endeavored to establish freedom
among men. If the churches were honest, their preachers would tell their
hearers: "Benjamin Franklin is in hell, and we warn all the youth not to
imitate Benjamin Franklin. Thomas Jefferson, author of the Declaration
of Independence, with its self-evident truths, has been damned these
many years."
That is what all the ministers ought to have the courage to say. Talk
as you believe. Stand by your creed, or change it. I want to impress it
upon your minds, because the thing I wish to do in this world is to put
out the fires of hell. I will keep on as long as there is one little red
coal left in the bottomless pit. As long as the ashes are warm I shall
denounce this infamous doctrine.
I want you to know that according to this creed the men who founded this
great and splendid Government are in hell to-night. Most of the men who
fought in the Revolutionary war, and wrested from the clutch of Great
Britain this continent, have been rewarded by the eternal wrath of God.
Thousands of the old Revolutionary soldiers are in torment tonight. Let
the preachers have the courage to say so. The men who fought in 1812,
and gave to the United States the freedom of the seas, have nearly all
been damned. Thousands of heroes who served our country in the Civil
war, hundreds who starved in prisons, are now in the dungeons of God,
compared with which, Andersonville was Paradise. The greatest of heroes
are there; the greatest of poets, the greatest scientists, the men who
have made the world beautiful--they are all among the damned if this
creed is true.
Humboldt, who shed light, and who added to the intellectual wealth
of mankind; Goethe, and Schiller, and Lessing, who almost created the
German language--all gone--all suffering the wrath of God tonight, and
every time an angel thinks of one of those men he gives his harp an
extra twang. Laplace, who read the heavens like an open book--he is
there. Robert Burns, the poet of human love--he is there. He wrote
the "Prayer of Holy Willie." He fastened on the cross the Presbyterian
creed, and there it is, a lingering crucifixion. Robert Burns increased
the tenderness of the human heart. Dickens put a shield of pity before
the flesh of childhood--God is getting even with him. Our own Ralph
Waldo Emerson, although he had a thousand opportunities to hear
Methodist clergymen, scorned the means of grace, lived to his highest
ideal, gave to his fellow-men his best and truest thought, and yet his
spirit is the sport and prey of fiends to-night.
Longfellow, who has refined thousands of homes, did not believe in the
miraculous origin of the Savior, doubted the report of Gabriel, loved
his fellow-men, did what he could to free the slaves, to increase the
happiness of man, yet God was waiting for his soul--waiting to cast
him out and down forever. Thomas Paine, author of the "Rights of Man;"
offering his life in both hemispheres for the freedom of the human race;
one of the founders of this Republic, is now among the damned; and yet
it seems to me that if he could only get God's attention long enough
to point him to the American flag he would let him out. Auguste Comte,
author of the "Positive Philosophy," who loved his fellow-men to that
degree that he made of humanity a god, who wrote his great work in
poverty, with his face covered with tears--they are getting their
revenge on him now.
Voltaire, who abolished torture in France; who did more for human
liberty than any other man, living or dead; who was the assassin
of superstition, and whose dagger still rusts in the heart of
Catholicism--he is with the rest. All the priests who have been
translated have had their happiness increased by looking at Voltaire.
Giordano Bruno, the first star of the morning after the long night;
Benedict Spinoza, the pantheist, the metaphysician, the pure and
generous man; Diderot, the encyclopedist, who endeavored to get all
knowledge in a small compass, so that he could put the peasant on an
equality intellectually with the prince; Diderot, who wished to sow all
over the world the seed of knowledge, and loved to labor for mankind,
while the priests wanted to burn; who did all he could to put out the
fires--he was lost, long, long ago. His cry for water has become so
common that his voice is now recognized through all the realms of
heaven, and the angels laughing, say to one another, "That is Diderot."
David Hume, the Scotch philosopher, is there, with his inquiry about
the "Human Understanding" and his argument against miracles. Beethoven,
master of music, and Wagner, the Shakespeare of harmony, who made the
air of this world rich forever, they are there; and to-night they have
better music in hell than in heaven!
Shelley, whose soul, like his own "Skylark," was a winged joy, has been
damned for many, many years; and Shakespeare, the greatest of the human
race, who did more to elevate mankind than all the priests who ever
lived and died, he is there; but founders of inquisitions, builders
of dungeons, makers of chains, inventors of instruments of torture,
tearers, and burners, and branders of human flesh, stealers of babes,
and sellers of husbands and wives and children, and they who kept the
horizon lurid with the fagot's flame for a thousand years--are in heaven
to-night. I wish heaven joy!
That is the doctrine with which we are polluting the souls of children.
That is the doctrine that puts a fiend by the dying bed and a prophecy
of hell over every cradle. That is "glad tidings of great joy."
Only a little while ago, when the great flood came upon the Ohio, sent
by him who is ruling the world and paying particular attention to the
affairs of nations, just in the gray of the morning they saw a house
floating down and on its top a human being. A few men went out to the
rescue. They found there a woman, a mother, and they wished to save her
life. She said: "No, I am going to stay where I am. In this house I
have three dead babes; I will not desert them." Think of a love so
limitless--stronger and deeper than despair and death! And yet, the
Christian religion says, that if that woman, that mother, did not happen
to believe in their creed God would send her soul to eternal fire! If
there is another world, and if in heaven they wear hats, when such a
woman climbs the opposite bank of the Jordan, Christ should lift his to
her.
The doctrine of eternal pain is my trouble with this Christian religion.
I reject it on account of its infinite heartlessness. I cannot tell them
too often, that during our last war Christians, who knew that if they
were shot they would go right to heaven, went and hired wicked men to
take their places, perfectly willing that these men should go to hell
provided they could stay at home. You see they are not honest in it,
or they do not believe it, or as the people say, "they don't sense it."
They have not imagination enough to conceive what it is they believe,
and what a terrific falsehood they assert. And I beg of every one
who hears me to-night, I beg, I implore, I beseech you, never to give
another dollar to build a church in which that lie is preached. Never
give another cent to send a missionary with his mouth stuffed with
that falsehood to a foreign land. Why, they say, the heathen will go to
heaven, any way, if you let them alone. What is the use of sending them
to hell by enlightening them? Let them alone. The idea of going and
telling a man a thing that if he does not believe, he will be damned,
when the chances are ten to one that he will not believe it, is
monstrous. Do not tell him here, and as quick as he gets to the other
world and finds it is necessary to believe, he can say "Yes." Give him a
chance.
Another Objection.
My objection to orthodox religion is that it destroys human love, and
tells us that the love of this world is not necessary to make a heaven
in the next.
No matter about your wife, your children, your brother, your sister--no
matter about all the affections of the human heart--when you get there,
you will be with the angels. I do not know whether I would like the
angels. I do not know whether the angels would like me. I would rather
stand by the ones who have loved me and whom I know; and I can conceive
of no heaven without the loved of this earth. That is the trouble with
this Christian relief-ion. Leave your father, leave your mother, leave
your wife, leave your children, leave everything and follow Jesus
Christ. I will not. I will stay with my people. I will not sacrifice on
the altar of a selfish fear all the grandest and noblest promptings of
my heart.
Do away with human love and what are we? What would we be in another
world, and what would we be here? Can any one conceive of music without
human love? Of art, or joy? Human love builds every home. Human love is
the author of all beauty. Love paints every picture, and chisels every
statue. Love builds every fireside. What could heaven be without human
love? And yet that is what we are promised--a heaven with your wife
lost, your mother lost, some of your children gone. And you expect to be
made happy by falling in with some angel! Such a religion is infamous.
Christianity holds human love for naught; and yet Love is the only bow
on Life's dark cloud. It is the morning and the evening star. It shines
upon the babe, and sheds its radiance on the quiet tomb. It is the
mother of art, inspirer of poet, patriot and philosopher. It is the air
and light of every heart--builder of every home, kindler of every fire
on every hearth. It was the first to dream of immortality. It fills the
world with melody--for music is the voice of love. Love is the magician,
the enchanter, that changes worthless things to joy, and makes right
royal kings and queens of common clay. It is the perfume of that
wondrous flower, the heart, and without that sacred passion, that divine
swoon, we are less than beasts; but with it, earth is heaven, and we are
gods.
And how are you to get to this heaven? On the efforts of another.
You are to be a perpetual heavenly pauper, and you will have to admit
through all eternity that you never would have been there if you had not
been frightened. "I am here," you will say, "I have these wings, I have
this musical instrument, because I was scared. I am here. The ones who
loved me are among the damned; the ones I loved are also there--but I am
here, that is enough."
What a glorious' world heaven must be! No reformation in that world--not
the slightest. If you die in Arkansas that is the end of you! Think of
telling a boy in the next world, who lived and died in Delaware, that he
had been fairly treated! Can anything be more infamous?
All on an equality--the rich and the poor, those with parents loving
them, those with every opportunity for education, on an equality with
the poor, the abject and the ignorant--and this little day called life,
this moment with a hope, a shadow and a tear, this little space between
your mother's arms and the grave, balances eternity.
God can do nothing for you when you get there. A Methodist preacher can
do more for the soul here than its creator can there. The soul goes to
heaven, where there is nothing but good society; no bad examples; and
they are all there, Father, Son and Holy Ghost, and yet they can do
nothing for that poor unfortunate except to damn him. Is there any sense
in that?
Why should this be a period of probation? It says in the Bible, I
believe, "Now is the accepted time." When does that mean? That means
whenever the passage is pronounced. "Now is the accepted time." It will
be the same to-morrow, will it not? And just as appropriate then
as to-day, and if appropriate at any time, appropriate through all
eternity.
What I say is this: There is no world--there can be no world--in which
every human being will not have the eternal opportunity of doing right.
That is my objection to this Christian religion; and if the love
of earth is not the love of heaven, if those we love here are to be
separated from us there, then I want eternal sleep. Give me a good cool
grave rather than the furnace of Jehovah's wrath. I pray the angel of
the resurrection to let me sleep. Gabriel, do not blow! Let me alone!
If, when the grave bursts, I am not to meet the faces that have been my
sunshine in this life, let me sleep. Rather than that this doctrine of
endless punishment should be true, I would gladly see the fabric of our
civilization crumbling fall to unmeaning chaos and to formless dust,
where oblivion broods and even memory forgets. I would rather that the
blind Samson of some imprisoned force, released by chance, should so
wreck and strand the mighty world that man in stress and strain of want
and fear should shudderingly crawl back to savage and barbaric night. I
would rather that every planet should in its orbit wheel a barren star!
What I Believe.
I think it is better to love your children than to love God, a thousand
times better, because you can help them, and I am inclined to think that
God can get along without you. Certainly we cannot help a being without
body, parts, or passions!
I believe in the religion of the family. I believe that the roof-tree is
sacred, from the smallest fibre that feels the soft cool clasp of earth,
to the topmost flower that spreads its bosom to the sun, and like a
spendthrift gives its perfume to the air. The home where virtue dwells
with love is like a lily with a heart of fire--the fairest flower in all
the world. And I tell you God cannot afford to damn a man in the next
world who has made a happy family in this. God cannot afford to cast
over the battlements of heaven the man who has a happy home upon this
earth. God cannot afford to be unpitying to a human heart capable of
pity. God cannot clothe with fire the man who has clothed the naked
here; and God cannot send to eternal pain a man who has done something
toward improving the condition of his fellow-man. If he can, I had
rather go to hell than to heaven and keep the company of such a god.
Immortality.
They tell me that the next terrible thing I do is to take away the hope
of immortality! I do not, I would not, I could not. Immortality was
first dreamed of by human love; and yet the church is going to take
human love out of immortality. We love, therefore we wish to live. A
loved one dies and we wish to meet again; and from the affection of the
human heart grew the great oak of the hope of immortality. Around
that oak has climbed the poisonous vines of superstition. Theologians,
pretenders, soothsayers, parsons, priests, popes, bishops, have taken
advantage of that. They have stood by graves and promised heaven. They
have stood by graves and prophesied a future filled with pain. They have
erected their toll-gates on the highway of life and have collected money
from fear.
Neither the Bible nor the church gave us the idea of immortality. The
Old Testament tells us how we lost immortality, and it does not say a
word about another world, from the first mistake in Genesis to the last
curse in Malachi. There is not in the Old Testament a burial service.
No man in the Old Testament stands by the dead and says, "We shall meet
again." From the top of Sinai came no hope of another world.
And when we get to the New Testament, what do we find? "They that are
accounted worthy to obtain that world and the resurrection of the dead."
As though some would be counted unworthy to obtain the resurrection of
the dead. And in another place. "Seek for honor, glory, immortality."
If you have it, why seek it? And in another place, "God, who alone hath
immortality." Yet they tell us that we get our idea of immortality from
the Bible. I deny it.
I would not destroy the faintest ray of human hope, but I deny that
we got our idea of immortality from the Bible. It existed long before
Moses. We find it symbolized through all Egypt, through all India.
Wherever man has lived he has made another world in which to meet the
lost of this.
The history of this belief we find in tombs and temples wrought and
carved by those who wept and hoped. Above their dead they laid the
symbols of another life.
We do not know. We do not prophesy a life of pain. We leave the dead
with Nature, the mother of us all. Under the bow of hope, under the
seven-hued arch, let the dead sleep.
If Christ was in fact God, why did he not plainly say there is another
life? Why did he not tell us something about it? Why did he not turn
the tear-stained hope of immortality into the glad knowledge of another
life? Why did he go dumbly to his death and leave the world in darkness
and in doubt? Why? Because he was a man and did not know.
What consolation has the orthodox religion for the widow of the
unbeliever, the widow of a good, brave, kind man? What can the orthodox
minister say to relieve the bursting heart of that woman? What can he
say to relieve the aching hearts of the orphans as they kneel by the
grave of that father, if that father did not happen to be an orthodox
Christian? What consolation have they? When a Christian loses a friend
the tears spring from his eyes as quickly as from the eyes of others.
Their tears are as bitter as ours. Why? The echoes of the words spoken
eighteen hundred years ago are so low, and the sounds of the clods upon
the coffin are so loud; the promises are so far away, and the dead are
so near.
We do not know, we cannot say, whether death is a wall or a door; the
beginning or end of a day; the spreading of pinions to soar, or the
folding forever of wings; the rise or the set of a sun, or an endless
life that brings the rapture of love to everyone. A Fable.
There is the fable of Orpheus and Eurydice. Eurydice had been captured
and taken to the infernal regions, and Orpheus went after her, taking
with him his harp and playing as he went. When he came to Pluto's realm
he began to play, and Sysiphus, charmed by the music, sat down upon the
stone that he had been heaving up the mountain's side for so many years,
and which continually rolled back upon him; Ixion paused upon his wheel
of fire; Tantalus ceased his vain efforts for water; the daughters of
the Danaides left off trying to fill their sieves with water; Pluto
smiled, and for the first time in the history of hell the cheeks of the
Furies were wet with tears. The god relented, and said, "Eurydice may
go with you, but you must not look back." So Orpheus again threaded the
caverns, playing as he went, and as he reached the light he failed to
hear the footsteps of Eurydice. He looked back, and in a moment she was
gone. Again and again Orpheus sought his love. Again and again looked
back.
This fable gives the idea of the perpetual effort made by the human mind
to rescue truth from the clutch of error.
Some time Orpheus will not look back. Some day Eurydice will reach the
blessed light, and at last there will fade from the memory of men the
monsters of superstition.
MYTH AND MIRACLE.
I.
HAPPINESS is the true end and aim of life. It is the task of
intelligence to ascertain the conditions of happiness, and when found
the truly wise will live in accordance with them. By happiness is meant
not simply the joy of eating and drinking--the gratification of the
appetite--but good, wellbeing, in the highest and noblest forms. The joy
that springs from obligation discharged, from duty done, from generous
acts, from being true to the ideal, from a perception of the beautiful
in nature, art and conduct. The happiness that is born of and gives
birth to poetry and music, that follows the gratification of the highest
wants.
Happiness is the result of all that is really right and sane.
But there are many people who regard the desire to be happy as a very
low and degrading ambition. These people call themselves spiritual. They
pretend to care nothing for the pleasures of "sense." They hold this
world, this life, in contempt. They do not want happiness in this
world--but in another. Here, happiness degrades--there, it purifies and
ennobles.
These spiritual people have been known as prophets, apostles, augurs,
hermits, monks, priests, popes, bishops and parsons. They are devout and
useless. They do not cultivate the soil. They produce nothing. They
live on the labor of others. They are pious and parasitic. They pray
for others, if the others will work for them. They claim to have been
selected by the Infinite to instruct and govern mankind. They are "meek"
and arrogant, "long-suffering" and revengeful.
They ever have been, now are, and always will be the enemies of liberty,
of investigation and science. They are believers in the supernatural,
the miraculous and the absurd. They have filled the world with hatred,
bigotry and fear. In defence of their creeds they have committed every
crime and practiced every cruelty.
They denounce as worldly and sensual those who are gross enough to love
wives and children, to build homes, to fell the forests, to navigate the
seas, to cultivate the earth, to chisel statues, to paint pictures and
fill the world with love and art.
They have denounced and maligned the thinkers, the poets, the
dramatists, the composers, the actors, the orators, the workers--those
who have conquered the world for man.
According to them this world is only the vestibule of the next, a kind
of school, an ordeal, a place of probation. They have always insisted
that this life should be spent in preparing for the next; that those
who supported and obeyed the "spiritual guides"--the shepherds, would
be rewarded with an eternity of joy, and that all others would suffer
eternal pain.
These spiritual people have always hated labor. They have added nothing
to the wealth of the world. They have always lived on alms--on the labor
of others. They have always been the enemies of innocent pleasure, and
of human love.
These spiritual people have produced a literature. The books they have
written are called sacred. Our sacred books are called the Bible.
The Hindoos have the Vedas and many others, the Persians the Zend
Avesta--the Egyptians had the Book of the Dead--the Aztecs the Popol
Vuh, and the Mohammedans have the Koran.
These books, for the most part, treat of the unknowable. They describe
gods and winged phantoms of the air. They give accounts of the origin
of the universe, the creation of man and the worlds beyond this. They
contain nothing of value. Millions and millions of people have wasted
their lives studying these absurd and ignorant books.
The "spiritual people" in each country claimed that their books had been
written by inspired men--that God was the real author, and that all men
and women who denied this would be, after death, tormented forever.
And yet, the worldly people, the uninspired, the wicked, have produced a
far greater literature than the spiritual and the inspired.
Not all the sacred books of the world equal Shakespeare's "volume of
the brain." A purer philosophy, grander, nobler, fell from the lips of
Shakespeare's clowns than the Old Testament, or the New, contains.
The Declaration of Independence is nobler far than all the utterances
from Sinai's cloud and flame. "A Man's a Man for a' That," by Robert
Burns, is better than anything the sacred books contain. For my part, I
would rather hear Beethoven's Sixth Symphony than to read the five books
of Moses. Give me the Sixth Symphony--this sound-wrought picture of
the fields and woods, of flowering hedge and happy home, where thrushes
build and swallows fly, and mothers sing to babes; this echo of the
babbled lullaby of brooks that, dallying, wind and fall where meadows
bare their daisied bosoms to the sun; this joyous mimicry of summer
rain, the laugh of children, and the rhythmic rustle of the whispering
leaves; this strophe of peasant life; this perfect poem of content and
love.
I would rather listen to Tristan and Isolde--that Mississippi of
melody--where the great notes, winged like eagles, lift the soul above
the cares and griefs of this weary world--than to all the orthodox
sermons ever preached. I would rather look at the Venus de Milo than to
read the Presbyterian creed.
The spiritual have endeavored to civilize the world through fear and
faith--by the promise of reward and the threat of pain in other worlds.
They taught men to hate and persecute their fellow-men. In all ages they
have appealed to force. During all the years they have practiced fraud.
They have pretended to have influence with the gods--that their prayers
gave rain, sunshine and harvest--that their curses brought pestilence
and famine, and that their blessings filled the world with plenty. They
have subsisted on the fears their falsehoods created. Like poisonous
vines, they have lived on the oak of labor. They have praised charity,
but they never gave. They have denounced revenge, but they never
forgave.
Whenever the spiritual have had power, art has died, learning has
languished, science has been despised, liberty destroyed, the thinkers
have been imprisoned, the intelligent and honest have been outcasts, and
the brave have been murdered.
The "spiritual" have been, are, and always will be the enemies of the
human race.
For all the blessings that we now enjoy--for progress in every form, for
science and art--for all that has lengthened life, that has conquered
disease, that has lessened pain, for raiment, roof and food, for music
in its highest forms--for the poetry that has ennobled and enriched our
lives--for the marvellous machines now working for the world--for all
this we are indebted to the worldly--to those who turned their attention
to the affairs of this life. They have been the only benefactors of our
race.
II.
AND yet all of these religions--these "sacred books," these priests,
have been naturally produced. From the dens and caves of savagery to
the palaces of civilization men have traveled by the necessary paths and
roads. Back of every step has been the efficient cause. In the history
of the world there has been no chance, no interference from without,
nothing miraculous. Everything in accordance with and produced by the
facts in nature.
We need not blame the hypocritical and cruel. They thought and acted as
they were compelled to think and act.
In all ages man has tried to account for himself and his surroundings.
He did the best he could. He wondered why the water ran, why the trees
grew, why the clouds floated, why the stars shone, why the sun and moon
journeyed through the heavens. He was troubled about life and death,
about darkness and dreams. The seas, the volcanoes, the lightning and
thunder, the earthquake and cyclone, filled him with fear. Behind all
life and growth and motion, and even inanimate things, he placed
a spirit--an intelligent being--a fetich, a person, something like
himself--a god, controlled by love and hate. To him causes and effects
became gods--supernatural beings. The Dawn was a maiden, wondrously
fair, the Sun, a warrior and lover; the Night, a serpent, a wolf--the
Wind, a musician; Winter, a wild beast; Autumn, Proserpine gathering
flowers.
Poets were the makers of these myths. They were the first to account for
what they saw and felt. The great multitude mistook these fancies
for facts. Myths strangely alike, were produced by most nations, and
gradually took possession of the world.
The Sleeping Beauty, a myth of the year, has been found among most
peoples. In this myth, the Earth was a maiden--the Sun was her lover,
She had fallen asleep in winter. Her blood was still and her breath had
gone. In the Spring the lover came, clasped her in his arms, covered her
lips and cheeks with kisses. She was thrilled, her heart began to beat,
she breathed, her blood flowed, and she awoke to love and joy. This myth
has made the circuit of the globe.
So, Red Riding-Hood is the history of a day. Little Red Riding-Hood--the
morning, touched with red, goes to visit her kindred, a day that is
past. She is attacked by the wolf of night and is rescued by the hunter,
Apollo, who pierces the heart of the beast with an arrow of light.
The beautiful myth of Orpheus and Eurydice is the story of the year.
Eurydice has been captured and carried to the infernal world. Orpheus,
playing upon his harp, goes after her. Such is the effect of his music
when he reaches the realm of Pluto, the laughterless, that Tantalus
ceases his efforts to slake his thirst. He listens and forgets his
withered lips, the daughters of the Danaides cease their vain efforts
to fill the sieve with water, Sisyphus sits down on the stone that he
so often had heaved against the mountain's misty side, Ixion pauses
upon his wheel of fire, even Pluto smiles, and for the first time in the
history of hell the cheeks of the Furies are wet with tears.
"Give me back Eurydice," cried Orpheus, and Pluto said: "Take her, but
look not back." Orpheus led the way and Eurydice followed. Just as he
reached the upper world, he missed her footsteps, turned, looked, and
she vanished.
And thus the summer comes, is lost, and comes again through all the
years.
So, our ancestors believed in the Garden of Eden, in the Golden Age, in
the blessed time when all were good and pure--when nature satisfied the
wants of all. The race, like the old man, has golden dreams of youth.
The morning was filled with light and life and joy, and the evening is
always sad. When the old man was young, girls were beautiful and men
were honest. He remembers his Eden. And so the whole world has had its
age of gold.
Our fathers were believers in the Elysian Fields. They were in the far,
far West. They saw them at the setting of the sun. They saw the floating
isles of gold in sapphire seas; the templed mist with spires and domes
of emerald and amethyst; the magic caverns of the clouds, resplendent
with the rays of every gem. And as they looked, they thought the curtain
had been drawn aside and that their eyes had for a moment feasted on the
glories of another world.
The myth of the Flood has also been universal. Finding shells of the
seas on plain and mountain, and everywhere some traces of the waves,
they thought the world had been submerged--that God in wrath had drowned
the race, except a few his mercy saved.
The Hindus say that Menu, a holy man, dipped from the Ganges some water,
and in the basin saw a little fish. The fish begged him to throw him
back into the river, and Menu, having pity, cast him back. The fish then
told Menu that there was to be a flood--told him to build an ark, to
take on board, people, animals and food, and that when the flood came,
he, the fish, would save him. The saint did as he was told, the flood
came, the fish returned. By that time he had grown to be a whale with
a horn in his head. About this horn Menu fastened a rope, attached the
other end to the ark, and the fish towed the boat across the raging
waves to a mountain's top, where it rested until the waters subsided.
The name of this wonderful fish was Matsaya.
Many other nations told similar stories of floods and arks and the
sending forth of doves.
In all these myths and legends of the past we find philosophies and
dreams and efforts, stained with tears, of great and tender souls who
tried to pierce the mysteries of life and death, to answer the questions
of the whence and whither, and who vainly sought with bits of shattered
glass to make a mirror that would in very truth reflect the face and
form of Nature's perfect self. These myths were born of hopes and fears,
of tears and smiles, and they were touched and colored by all there is
of joy and grief between the rosy dawn of birth and death's sad night.
They clothed even the stars with passion, and gave to gods the faults
and frailties of the sons of men. In them the winds and waves were
music, and all the springs, the mountains, woods and perfumed dells were
haunted by a thousand fairy forms. They thrilled the veins of Spring
with tremulous desire, made tawny Summer's billowy breast the throne and
home of love, filled Autumn's arms with sun-kissed grapes and gathered
sheaves, and pictured Winter as a weak old king, who felt, like Lear,
upon his withered face, Cordelia's tears.
These myths, though false in fact, are beautiful and true in thought,
and have for many ages and in countless ways enriched the heart and
kindled thought.
III.
IN all probability the first religion was Sun-worship. Nothing could
have been more natural. Light was life and warmth and love. The sun
was the fireside of the world. The sun was the "all-seeing"--the "Sky
Father." Darkness was grief and death, and in the shadows crawled the
serpents of despair and fear.
The sun was a great warrior, fighting the hosts of Night. Apollo was
the sun, and he fought and conquered the serpent of Night. Agni, the
generous, who loved the lowliest and visited the humblest, was the sun.
He was the god of fire, and the crossed sticks that by friction leaped
into flame were his emblem. It was said that, in spite of his goodness,
he devoured his father and mother, the two pieces of wood being his
parents. Baldur was the sun. He was in love with the Dawn--a maiden--he
deserted her and traveled through the heavens alone. At the twilight
they met, were reconciled, and the drops of dew were the tears of joy
they shed.
Chrishna was the sun. At his birth the Ganges thrilled from its source
to the sea. All the trees, the dead as well as the living, burst into
leaf and bud and flower.
Hercules was a sun-god.
Jonah the same, rescued from the fiends of Night and carried by the fish
through the under world. Samson was a sun-god. His strength was in
his hair--in his beams. He was shorn of his strength by Delilah, the
shadow--the darkness. So, Osiris, Bacchus, Mithra, Hermes, Buddha,
Quelzalcoatle, Prometheus, Zoroaster, Perseus, Codom Lao-tsze Fo-hi,
Horus and Rameses were all sun-gods.
All these gods had gods for fathers and all their mothers were virgins.
The births of nearly all were announced by stars.
When they were born there was celestial music--voices declared that a
blessing had come upon the earth.
When Buddha was born, the celestial choir sang: "This day is born
for the good of men Buddha, and to dispel the darkness of their
ignorance--to give joy and peace to the world."
Chrishna was born in a cave, and protected by shepherds. Bacchus,
Apollo, Mithra and Hermes were all born in caves. Buddha was born in an
inn--according to some, under a tree.
Tyrants sought to kill all of these gods when they were babes.
When Chrishna was born, a tyrant killed the babes of the neighborhood.
Buddha was the child of Maya, a virgin, in the kingdom of Madura. The
king arrested Maya before the child was born, imprisoned her in a tower.
During the night when the child was born, a great wind wrecked the
tower, and carried mother and child to a place of safety. The next
morning the king sent his soldiers to kill the babes, and when they came
to Buddha and his mother, the babe appeared to be about twelve years of
age, and the soldiers passed on.
So Typhon sought in many ways to destroy the babe Horus. The king
pursued the infant Zoroaster. Cadmus tried to kill the infant Bacchus.
All of these gods were born on the 25th of December.
Nearly all were worshiped by "wise men."
All of them fasted for forty days.
All met with a violent death.
All rose from the dead.
The history of these gods is the history of our Christ. He had a god for
a father, a virgin for a mother. He was born in a manger, or a cave--on
the 2 5th of December. His birth was announced by angels. He was
worshiped by wise men, guided by a star. Herod, seeking his life, caused
the death of many babes. Christ fasted for forty days. So, it rained for
forty days before the flood--Moses was on Mt. Sinai for forty days. The
temple had forty pillars and the Jews wandered in the wilderness for
forty years. Christ met with a violent death, and rose from the dead.
These things are not accidents--not coincidences. Christ was a sun-god.
All religions have been born of sun-worship. To-day, when priests
pray, they shut their eyes. This is a survival of sun-worship. When men
worshiped the sun, they had to shut their eyes. Afterwards, to flatter
idols, they pretended that the glory of their faces was more than the
eyes could bear.
In the religion of our day there is nothing original. All of its
doctrines, its symbols and ceremonies are but the survivals of creeds
that perished long ago. Baptism is far older than Christianity--than
Judaism. The Hindus, the Egyptians, the Greeks and Romans had holy
water. The eucharist was borrowed from the Pagans. Ceres was the goddess
of the fields, Bacchus the god of the vine. At the harvest festival they
made cakes of wheat and said: "These are the flesh of the goddess." They
drank wine and cried: "This is the blood of our god."
The cross has been a symbol for many thousands of years. It was a symbol
of immortality--of life, of the god Agni, the form of the grave of a
man. An ancient people of Italy, who lived long before the Romans, long
before the Etruscans, so long that not one word of their language is
known, used the cross, and beneath that emblem, carved on stone, their
dead still rest. In the forests of Central America, ruined temples have
been found, and on the walls the cross with the bleeding victim. On
Babylonian cylinders is the impression of the cross. The Trinity came
from Egypt. Osiris, Isis and Horus were worshiped thousands of years
before our Father, Son and Holy Ghost were thought of. So the Tree of
Life grew in India, China and among the Aztecs long before the Garden
of Eden was planted. Long before our Bible was known, other nations
had their sacred books, temples and altars, sacrifices, ceremonies and
priests. The "Fall of Man" is far older than our religion, and so are
the "Atonement" and the Scheme of Redemption.
In our blessed religion there is nothing new, nothing original.
Among the Egyptians the cross was a symbol of the life to come. And
yet the first religion was, and all religions growing out of that, were
naturally produced. Every brain was a field in which Nature sowed the
seeds of thought. The rise and set of sun, the birth and death of day,
the dawns of silver and the dusks of gold, the wonders of the rain and
snow, the shroud of Winter and the many colored robe of Spring, the
lonely moon with nightly loss or gain, the serpent lightning and the
thunder's voice, the tempest's fury and the zephyr's sigh, the threat
of storm and promise of the bow, cathedral clouds with dome and spire,
earthquake and strange eclipse, frost and fire, the snow-crowned
mountains with their tongues of flame, the fields of space sown thick
with stars, the wandering comets hurrying past the fixed and sleepless
sentinels of night, the marvels of the earth and air, the perfumed
flower, the painted wing, the waveless pool that held within its magic
breast the image of the startled face, the mimic echo that made a record
in the viewless air, the pathless forests and the boundless seas,
the ebb and flow of tides--the slow, deep breathing of some vague and
monstrous life--the miracle of birth, the mystery of dream and death,
and over all the silent and immeasurable dome. These were the warp and
woof, and at the loom sat Love and Fancy, Hope and Fear, and wove the
wondrous tapestries whereon we find pictures of gods and fairy lands
and all the legends that were told when Nature rocked the cradle of the
infant world.
IV.
WE must remember that there is a great difference. Myth is the
idealization of a fact. A miracle is the counterfeit of a fact. There is
the same difference between a myth and a miracle that there is between
fiction and falsehood--between poetry and perjury. Miracles belong to
the far past and the far future. The little line of sand, called the
present, between the seas, belongs to common sense, to the natural.
If you should tell a man that the dead were raised two thousand years
ago, he would probably say: "Yes, I know that." If you should say that
a hundred thousand years from now all the dead will be raised, he might
say: "Probably they will." But if you should tell him that you saw a
dead man raised and given life that day, he would likely ask the name of
the insane asylum from which you had escaped.
Our Bible is filled with accounts of miracles and yet they always fail
to convince.
Jehovah, according to the Scriptures, wrought hundreds of miracles for
the benefit of the Jews. With many miracles he rescued them from
slavery, guided them on their journey with a miraculous cloud by day and
a miraculous pillar of fire by night--divided the sea that they might
escape from the Egyptians, fed them with miraculous manna and
supernatural quails, raised up hornets to attack their enemies, caused
water to follow them wherever they wandered and in countless ways
manifested his power, and yet the Jews cared nothing for these wonders.
Not one of them seems to have been convinced that Jehovah had done
anything for the people.
In spite of all these miracles, the Jews had more confidence in a golden
calf, made by themselves, than in Jehovah. The reason of this is, that
the miracles were never performed, and never invented until hundreds of
years after those, who had wandered over the desert of Sinai, were dust.
The miracles attributed to Christ had no effect. No human being seems to
have been convinced by them. Those whom he raised from the dead, cured
of leprosy, or blindness, failed to become his followers. Not one of
them appeared at his trial. Not one offered to bear witness of his
miraculous power.
To this there is but one explanation: The miracles were never performed.
These stories were the growth of centuries. The casting out of devils,
the changing of water into wine, feeding the multitude with a few loaves
and fishes, resisting the devil, using a fish for a pocketbook, curing
the blind with clay and saliva, stilling the tempest, walking on the
water, the resurrection and ascension, happened and only happened, in
the imaginations of men, who were not born until several generations
after Christ was dead.
In those days the world was filled with ignorance and fear. Miracles
happened every day. The supernatural was expected. Gods were continually
interfering with the affairs of this world. Everything was told
except the truth, everything believed except the facts. History was a
circumstantial account of occurrences that never occurred. Devils and
goblins and ghosts were as plentiful as saints. The bones of the dead
were used to cure the living. Cemeteries were hospitals and corpses were
physicians. The saints practiced magic, the pious communed with God in
dreams, and the course of events was changed by prayer. The credulous
demanded the marvelous, the miraculous, and the priests supplied the
demand. The sky was full of signs, omens of death and disaster, and the
darkness thick with devils endeavoring to mislead and enslave the souls
of men.
Our fathers thought that everything had been made for man, and that
demons and gods gave their entire attention to this world. The people
believed that they were the sport and prey, the favorites or victims, of
these phantoms. And they also believed that the Creator, the God, could
be influenced by sacrifice, by prayers and ceremonies.
This has been the mistake of the world. All the temples have been
reared, all the altars erected, all the sacrifices offered, all the
prayers uttered in vain. No god has interfered, no prayer has been
answered, no help received from heaven. Nothing was created, nothing has
happened for, or with reference to man. If not a human being lived,--if
all Were in' their graves, the sun would continue to shine, the wheeling
world would still pursue its flight, violets would spread their velvet
bosoms to the day, the spendthrift roses give their perfume to the air,
the climbing vines would hide with leaf and flower the fallen and the
dead, the changing seasons would come-and go,-time would repeat the poem
of the year, storms would wreck and whispering rains repair, Spring
with deft and unseen hands would weave her robes of green, life with
countless lips would seek fair Summer's swelling breasts, Autumn would
reap the wealth of leaf and fruit and seed, Winter, the artist, would
etch in frost the pines and ferns, while Wind and Wave and Fire, old
architects, with ceaseless toil would still destroy and build, still
wreck and change, and from the dust of death produce again the throb and
breath of life.
V.
A FEW years ago a few men began to think, to investigate, to reason.
They began to doubt the legends of the church, the miracles of the past.
They began to notice what happened. They found that eclipses came at
certain intervals and that their coming could be foretold. They became
satisfied that the conduct of men had nothing to do with eclipses--and
that the stars moved in their orbits unconscious of the sons of men.
Galileo, Copernicus, and Kepler' destroyed the astronomy of the Bible,
and demonstrated that the "inspired" story of creation could not be
true, and that the church was as ignorant as the priests were dishonest.
They found that the myth-makers were mistaken, that the sun and stars
did not revolve about the earth, that the firmament was not solid,
that the earth was not flat, and that the so-called philosophy of the
theologians was absurd and idiotic.
The stars became witnesses against the creeds of superstition.
With the telescope the heavens were explored. The New Jerusalem could
not be found.
It had faded away.
The church persecuted the astronomers and denied the facts. In
February, in the year of grace sixteen hundred, the Catholic Church, the
"Triumphant Beast," having in her hands, her paws, the keys of heaven
and hell, accused Giordano Bruno of having declared that there were
other worlds than this. He was tried, convicted, imprisoned in a dungeon
for seven years. He was offered his liberty if he would recant. Bruno,
the atheist, the philosopher, refused to stain his soul by denying what
he believed to be true. He was taken from his cell by the priests, by
those who loved their enemies, led to the place of execution. He was
clad in a robe on which representations of devils had been painted--the
devils that were soon to claim his soul. He was chained to a stake and
about his body the wood was piled. Then priests, followers of Christ,
lighted the fagots and flames consumed the greatest, the most perfect
martyr, that ever suffered death.
And yet the Italian agent of God, the infallible Leo XIII., only a few
years ago, denounced Bruno, the "bravest of the brave," as a coward.
The church murdered him, and the pope maligned his memory. Fagot and
falsehood--two weapons of the church.
A little while ago a few men began to examine rocks and soils,
mountains, islands, reefs and seas. They noticed the valleys and deltas
that had been formed by rivers, the many strata of lava that had been
changed to soil, the vast deposits of metals and coal, the immense reefs
that the coral had formed, the work of glaciers in the far past, the
production of soil by the disintegration of rock, by the growth and
decay of vegetation and the countless evidences of the countless ages
through which the Earth has passed. The geologists read the history
of the world written by wave and flame, attested by fossils, by the
formation of rocks, by mountain ranges, by volcanoes, by rivers,
islands, continents and seas.
The geology of the Bible--of the "divinely inspired" church, of the
"infallible" pope, was found to be utterly false and foolish.
The Earth became a witness against the creeds of superstition.
Then came Watt and Galvani with the miracles of steam and electricity,
while countless inventors created the wonderful machines that do the
work of the world. Investigation took the place of credulity. Men became
dissatisfied with huts and rags, with crusts and creeds. They longed for
the comforts, the luxuries of life. The intellectual horizon enlarged,
new truths were discovered, old ideas were thrown aside, the brain was
developed, the heart civilized and science was born. Humboldt, Laplace
and hundreds of others explained the phenomena of nature, called
attention to the ancient and venerable mistakes of sanctified ignorance
and added to the sum of knowledge. Darwin and Haeckel gave their
conclusions to the world. Men began to really think, the myths began
to fade, the miracles to grow mean and small, and the great structure,
known as theology, fell with a crash.
Science denies the truth of myth and miracle, denies that human
testimony can substantiate the miraculous, denies the existence of the
supernatural. Science asserts the absolute, the unvarying uniformity
of nature. Science insists that the present is the child of all the
past,--that no power can change the past, and that nature is forever the
same.
The chemist has found that just so many atoms of one kind unite with
just so many of another--no more, no less, always the same. No caprice
in chemistry; no interference from without.
The astronomers know that the planets remain in their orbits--that their
forces are constant. They know that light is forever the same,
always obeying the angle of incidence, traveling with the same
rapidity,--casting the same shadow, under the same circumstances in
all worlds. They know that the eclipses will occur at the times
foretold--neither hastening nor delaying. They know that the attraction
of gravitation is always the same, always in perfect proportion to mass
and distance, neither weaker nor stronger, unvarying forever. They know
that the facts in nature cannot be changed or destroyed, and that the
qualities of all things are eternal.
The men of science know that the atomic integrity of the metals is
always the same, that each metal is true to its nature and that the
particles cling to each other with the same tenacity,--the same force.
They have demonstrated the persistence of force, that it is forever
active, forever the same, and that it cannot be destroyed.
These great truths have revolutionized the thought of the world.
Every art, every employment, all study, all experiment, the value of
experience, of judgment, of hope, all rest on a belief in the uniformity
of nature, on the eternal persistence and indestructibility of force.
Break one link in the infinite chain of cause and effect, and the Master
of Nature appears. The broken link would become the throne of a god.
The uniformity of Nature denies the supernatural and demonstrates that
there is no interference from without. There is no place, no office left
for gods. Ghosts fade from the brain and the shrivelled deities fall
palsied from their thrones.
The uniformity of Nature renders a belief in "special providence"
impossible. Prayer becomes a useless agitation of the air, and religious
ceremonies are but motions, pantomimes, mindless and meaningless.
The naked savage, worshiping a wooden god, is the religious equal of the
robed pope kneeling before an image of the Virgin. The poor African who
carries roots and bark to protect himself from evil spirits is on the
same intellectual plane of one who sprinkles his body with "holy water."
All the creeds of Christendom, all the religions of the heathen world
are equally absurd. The cathedral, the mosque and the joss house have
the same foundation. Their builders do not believe in the uniformity
of Nature, and the business of all priests is to induce a so-called
infinite being to change the order of events, to make causes barren of
effects and to produce effects without, and in spite of, natural causes.
They all believe in the unthinkable and pray for the impossible.
Science teaches us that there was no creation and that there can be no
destruction. The infinite denies creation and defies destruction. An
infinite person, an "infinite being" is an infinite impossibility.
To conceive of such a being is beyond the power of the mind. Yet all
religions rest upon the supposed existence of the unthinkable, the
inconceivable. And the priests of these religions pretend to be
perfectly familiar with the designs, will, and wishes of this
unthinkable, this inconceivable.
Science teaches that that which really is has always been, that behind
every effect is the efficient and necessary cause, that there is in the
universe neither chance nor interference, and that energy is eternal.
Day by day the authority of the theologian grows weaker and weaker. As
the people become intelligent they care less for preachers and more for
teachers. Their confidence in knowledge, in thought and investigation
increases. They are eager to know the discoveries, the useful truths,
the important facts made, ascertained and demonstrated by the explorers
in the domain of the natural. They are no longer satisfied with the
platitudes of the pulpit, and the assertions of theologians. They are
losing confidence in the "sacred Scriptures" and in the protecting power
and goodness of the supernatural. They are satisfied that credulity is
not a virtue and that investigation is not a crime.
Science is the providence of man, the worker of true miracles, of
real wonders. Science has "read a little in Nature's infinite book of
secrecy." Science knows the circuits of the winds, the courses of the
stars. Fire is his servant, and lightning his messenger. Science freed
the slaves and gave liberty to their masters. Science taught man to
enchain, not his fellows, but the forces of nature, forces that have no
backs to be scarred, no limbs for chains to chill and eat, forces that
have no hearts to break, forces that never know fatigue, forces that
shed no tears. Science is the great physician. His touch has given
sight. He has made the lame to leap, the deaf to hear, the dumb to
speak, and in the pallid face his hand has set the rose of health.
Science has given his beloved sleep and wrapped in happy dreams the
throbbing nerves of pain. Science is the destroyer of disease, builder
of happy homes, the preserver of life and love. Science is the teacher
of every virtue, the enemy of every vice. Science has given the true
basis of morals, the origin and office of conscience, revealed the
nature of obligation, of duty, of virtue in its highest, noblest forms,
and has demonstrated that true happiness is the only possible good.
Science has slain the monsters of superstition, and destroyed the
authority of inspired books. Science has read the records of the rocks,
records that priestcraft cannot change, and on his wondrous scales has
weighed the atom and the star.
Science has founded the only true religion. Science is the only Savior
of this world.
VI.
FOR many ages religion has been tried. For countless centuries man
has sought for help from heaven. To soften the heart of God, mothers
sacrificed their babes! but the God did not hear, did not see, and did
not help. Naked savages were devoured by beasts, bitten by serpents,
killed by flood and frost. They prayed for help, but their God was
deaf. They built temples and altars, employed priests and gave of their
substance, but the volcano destroyed and the famine came. For the sake
of God millions murdered their fellow-men, but the God was silent.
Millions of martyrs died for the honor of God, but the God was blind. He
did not see the flames, the scaffolds. He did not hear the prayers,
the groans. Thousands of priests in the name of God tortured their
fellow-men, stretched them on racks, crushed their feet in iron boots,
tore out their tongues, extinguished their eyes. The victims implored
the protection of God, but their god did not hear, did not see. He
was deaf and blind. He was willing that his enemies should torture his
friends.
Nations tried to destroy each other for the sake of God, and the banner
of the cross dripping with blood floated over a thousand fields--but the
god was silent. He neither knew nor cared. Pestilence covered the earth
with dead, the priests prayed, the altars were heaped with sacrifices,
but the god did not see, did not hear. The miseries of the world did
not lessen the joys of heaven. The clouds gave no rain, the famine came,
withered babes with pallid lips sought the breasts of dead mothers,
while starving fathers knelt and prayed, but the god did not hear.
Through many centuries millions were enslaved, babes were sold from
mothers, husbands from wives, backs were scarred with the lash. The
poor wretches lifted their clasped hands toward heaven and prayed for
justice, for liberty--but their god did not hear. He cared nothing for
the sufferings of slaves, nothing for the tears of wives and mothers,
nothing for the agony of men. He answered no prayers. He broke no
chains. He freed no slaves.
The miserable wretches appealed to the priests of God, but they were on
the other side. They defended the masters. The slaves had nothing to
give.
During all these years it was claimed by the theologians that their
God was governing the world, that he was infinitely powerful, wise and
good--and that the "powers" of the earth were "ordained" by him. During
all these years the church was the enemy of progress. It hated all
physicians and told the people to rely on prayer, amulets and relics.
It persecuted the astronomers and geologists, denounced them as infidels
and atheists, as enemies of the human race. It poisoned the fountains of
learning and insisted that teachers should distort the facts in nature
to the end that they might harmonize with the "inspired" book. During
all these years the church misdirected the energies of man, and when it
reached the zenith of its power, darkness fell upon the world.
In all nations and in all ages, religion has failed. The gods have never
interfered. Nature has produced and destroyed without mercy and without
hatred. She has cared no more for man than for the leaves of the forest,
no more for nations than for hills of ants, nothing for right or wrong,
for life or death, for pain or joy.
Man through his intelligence must protect himself. He gets no help from
any other world. The church has always claimed and still claims that
it is the only reforming power, that it makes men honest, virtuous
and merciful, that it prevents violence and war, and that without its
influence the race would return to barbarism.
Nothing can exceed the absurdity of these claims.
If we wish to improve the condition of mankind--if we wish for nobler
men and women we must develop the brain, we must encourage thought
and investigation. We must convince the world that credulity is
a vice,--that there is no virtue in believing without, or against
evidence, and that the really honest man is true to himself. We must
fill the world with intellectual light. We must applaud mental courage.
We must educate the children, rescue them from ignorance and crime.
School-houses are the real temples, and teachers are the true priests.
We must supply the wants of the mind, satisfy the hunger of the brain.
The people should be familiar with the great poets, with the tragedies
of Æschylus, the dramas of Shakespeare, with the poetry of Homer and
Virgil. Shakespeare should be taught in every school, found in every
house.
Through photography the whole world may become acquainted with the great
statues, the great paintings, the victories of art. In this way the mind
is enlarged, the sympathies quickened, the appreciation of the beautiful
intensified, the taste refined and the character ennobled.
The great novels should be read by all. All should be acquainted with
the men and women of fiction, with the ideal world. The imagination
should be developed, trained and strengthened. Superstition has degraded
art and literature. It gave us winged monsters, scenes from heaven and
hell, representations of gods and devils, sculptured the absurd and
painted the impossible in the name of Art. It gave us the dreams of the
insane, the lives of fanatical saints, accounts of miracles and wonders,
of cures wrought by the bones of the dead, descriptions of Paradise,
purgatory and the eternal dungeon, discourses on baptism, on changing
wine and wafers into the the blood and flesh of God, on the
forgiveness of sins by priests, on fore-ordination and accountability,
predestination and free will, on devils, ghosts and goblins, the
ministrations of guardian angels, the virtue of belief and the
wickedness of doubt. And this was called "sacred literature."
The church taught that those who believed, counted beads, mumbled
prayers, and gave their time or property for the support of the gospel
were the good and that all others were traveling the "broad road" to
eternal pain. According to the theologians, the best people, the
saints, were dead, and real beauty was to be found only in heaven. They
denounced the joys of life as husks and filthy rags, declared that the
world had been cursed, and that it brought forth thistles and thorns
because of the sins of man. They regarded the earth as a kind of dock,
running out into the sea of eternity,--on which the pious waited for the
ship on which they were to be transported to another world.
But the real poets and the real artists clung to this world, to this
life. They described and represented things that exist. They expressed
thoughts of the brain, emotions of the heart, the griefs and joys, the
hope and despair of men and women. They found strength and beauty
on every hand. They found their angels here. They were true to human
experience and they touched the brain and heart of the world. In
the tragedies and comedies of life, in the smiles and tears, in the
ecstasies of love, in the darkness of death, in the dawn of hope, they
found their materials for statue and song, for poem and painting. Poetry
and art are the children of this world, born and nourished here. They
are human. They have left the winged monsters of heaven, the malicious
deformities of hell, and have turned their attention to men and women,
to the things of this life.
There is a poem called "The Skylark," by Shelley, graceful as the
motions of flames. Another by Robert Burns, called "The Daisy,"
exquisite, perfect as the pearl of virtue in the beautiful breast of a
loving girl. Between this lark and this daisy, neither above nor below,
you will find all the poetry of the world. Eloquence, sublimity, poetry
and art must have the foundation of fact, of reality. Imaginary worlds
and beings are nothing to us.
At last the old creeds are becoming cruel and vulgar. We now have
imagination enough to put ourselves in the place of others. Believers
in hell, in eternal pain, like murderers, lack imagination. The murderer
has not imagination enough to see his victim dead. He does not see the
sightless and pathetic eyes. He does not see the widow's arms about the
corpse, her lips upon the dead. He does not hear the sobs of children.
He does not see the funeral. He does not hear the clods as they fall on
the coffin. He does not feel the hand of arrest, the scene of the trial
is not before him. He does not hear the awful verdict, the sentence of
the court, the last words. He does not see the scaffold, nor feel about
his throat the deadly noose.
Let us develop the brain, civilize the heart, and give wings to the
imagination.
VII.
IF we abandon myth and miracle, if we discard the supernatural and the
scheme of redemption, how are we to civilize the world?
Is falsehood a reforming power? Is credulity the mother of virtue? Is
there any saving grace in the impossible and absurd? Did wisdom perish
with the dead? Must the civilized accept the religion of savages?
If we wish to reform the world we must rely on truth, on fact, on
reason. We must teach men that they are good or bad for themselves, that
others cannot be good or bad for them, that they cannot be charged with
the crimes, or credited with the virtues of others. We must discard the
doctrine of the atonement, because it is absurd and immoral. We are not
accountable for the sins of "Adam" and the virtues of Christ cannot be
transferred to us. There can be no vicarious virtue, no vicarious vice.
Why should the sufferings of the innocent atone for the crimes of the
guilty. According to the doctrine of the atonement right and wrong do
not exist in the nature of things, but in the arbitrary will of the
Infinite. This is a subversion of all ideas of justice and mercy.
An act is good, bad, or indifferent, according to its consequences. No
power can step between an act and its natural consequences. A governor
may pardon the criminal, but the natural consequences of the crime
remain untouched. A god may forgive, but the consequences of the
act forgiven, are still the same. We must teach the world that the
consequences of a bad action cannot be avoided, that they are the
invisible police, the unseen avengers, that accept no gifts, that hear
no prayers, that no cunning can deceive.
We do not need the forgiveness of gods, but of ourselves and the ones
we injure. Restitution without repentance is far better than repentance
without restitution.
We know nothing of any god who rewards, punishes or forgives.
We must teach our fellow-men that honor comes from within, not from
without, that honor must be earned, that it is not alms, that even an
infinite God could not enrich the beggar's palm with the gem of honor.
Teach them also that happiness is the bud, the blossom and the fruit of
good and noble actions, that it is not the gift of any god; that it must
be earned by man--must be deserved.
In this world of ours there is no magic, no sleight-of-hand, by which
consequences can be made to punish the good and reward the bad.
Teach men not to sacrifice this world for some other, but to turn their
attention to the natural, to the affairs of this life. Teach them that
theology has no known foundation, that it was born of ignorance and
fear, that it has hardened the heart, polluted the imagination and made
fiends of men.
Theology is not for this world. It is no part of real religion. It has
nothing to do with goodness or virtue. Religion does not consist in
worshiping gods, but in adding to the well-being, the happiness of man.
No human being knows whether any god exists or not, and all that has
been said and written about "our god," or the gods of other people, has
no known fact for a foundation. Words without thoughts, clouds without
rain.
Let us put theology out of religion.
Church and state should be absolutely divorced. Priests pretend that
they have been selected by, and that they get their power from God.
Kings occupy their thrones in accordance with the will of God. The pope
declares that he is the agent, the deputy of God and that by right
he should rule the world. All these pretentions and assertions are
perfectly absurd and yet they are acknowledged and believed by millions.
Get theology out of government and kings will descend from their
thrones. All will admit that governments get their powers from the
consent of the governed, and that all persons in office are the servants
of the people. Get theology out of government and chaplains will be
dismissed from Legislatures, from Congress, from the army and navy. Get
theology out of government and people will be allowed to express their
honest thoughts about "inspired books" and superstitious creeds. Get
theology out of government and priests will no longer steal a seventh of
our time. Get theology out of government and the clergy will soon
take their places with augurs and soothsayers, with necromancers and
medicine-men.
Get theology out of education. Nothing should be taught in a school that
somebody does not know.
There are plenty of things to be learned about this world, about this
life. Every child should be taught to think, and that it is dangerous
not to think. Children should not be taught the absurdities, the
cruelties and imbecilities of superstition. No church should be allowed
to control the common school, and public money should not be divided
between the hateful and warring sects. The public school should be
secular, and only the useful should be taught. Many of our colleges
are under the control of churches. Presidents and professors are mostly
ministers of the gospel and the result is that all facts inconsistent
with the creeds are either suppressed or denied. Only those professors
who are naturally stupid or mentally dishonest can retain their places.
Those who tell the truth, who teach the facts, are discharged.
In every college truth should be a welcome guest. Every professor
should be a finder, and every student a learner, of facts. Theology and
intellectual dishonesty go together. The teacher of children should be
intelligent and perfectly sincere.
Let us get theology out of education.
The pious denounce the secular schools as godless. They should be. The
sciences are all secular, all godless. Theology bears the same relation
to science that the black art does to chemistry, that magic does to
mathematics. It is something that cannot be taught, because it cannot
be known. It has no foundation in fact. It neither produces, nor accords
with, any image in the mind. It is not only unknowable but unthinkable.
Through hundreds and thousands of generations men have been discussing,
wrangling and fighting about theology. No advance has been made. The
robed priest has only reached the point from which the savage tried to
start.
We know that theology always has and always will make enemies. It sows
the seeds of hatred in families and nations. It is selfish, cruel,
revengeful and malicious. It has heaven for the few and perdition
for the many. We now know that credulity is not a virtue and that
intellectual courage is. We must stop rewarding hypocrisy and bigotry.
We must stop persecuting the thinkers, the investigators, the creators
of light, the civilizers of the world.
VIII.
WILL the unknown, the mysteries of life and itiations of the mind,
forever furnish food for superstition? Will the gods and ghosts perish
or simply retreat before the advancing hosts of science, and continue to
crouch and lurk just beyond the horizon of the known? Will darkness
forever be the womb and mother of the supernatural?
A little while ago priests told peasants that the New Jerusalem, the
celestial city was just above the clouds. They said that its walls
and domes and spires were just beyond the reach of human sight. The
telescope was invented and those who looked at the wilderness of stars,
saw no city, no throne. They said to the priests: "Where is your New
Jerusalem?" The priests cheerfully and confidently replied. "It is just
beyond where you see."
At one time it was believed that a race of men existed "with their heads
beneath their shoulders." Returning travelers from distant lands were
asked about these wonderful people and all replied that they had not
seen them. "Oh," said the believers in the monsters, "the men with heads
beneath their shoulders live in a country that you did not visit." And
so the monsters lived and flourished until all the world was known. We
cannot know the universe. We cannot travel infinite distances, and so,
somewhere in shoreless space there will always be room for gods and
ghosts, for heavens and hells. And so it may be that superstition will
live and linger until the world becomes intelligent enough to build upon
the foundation of the known, to keep the imagination within the domain
of the probable, and to believe in the natural--_until the supernatural
shall have been demonstrated_.
Savages knew all about gods, about heavens and hells before they knew
anything about the world in which they lived. They were perfectly
familiar with evil spirits, with the invisible phantoms of the air, long
before they had any true conception of themselves. So, they knew all
about the origin and destiny of the human race. They were absolutely
certain about the problems, the solution of which, philosophers know, is
beyond the limitations of the mind. They understood astrology, but not
astronomy, knew something of magic, but nothing about chemistry. They
were wise only as to those things about which nothing can be known.
The poor Indian believed in the "Great Spirit" and saw "design" on every
hand.--Trees were made that he might have bows and arrows, wood for his
fire and bark for his wigwam--rivers and lakes to give him fish, wild
beasts and corn that he might have food, and the animals had skins that
he might have clothes.
Primitive peoples all reasoned in the same way, and modern Christians
follow their example. They knew but little of the world and thought that
it had been made expressly for the use of man. They did not know that it
was mostly water, that vast regions were locked in eternal ice and that
in most countries the conditions were unfavorable to human life. They
knew nothing of the countless enemies of man that live unseen in water,
food and air. Back of the little good they knew they put gods and back
of the evil, devils. They thought it of the greatest importance to gain
the good will of the gods, who alone could protect them from the devils.
Those who worshiped these gods, offered sacrifices, and obeyed priests,
were considered loyal members of the tribe or community, and those who
refused to worship were regarded as enemies and traitors. The believers,
in order to protect themselves from the anger of the gods, exiled or
destroyed the infidels.
Believing as they did, the course they pursued was natural. They
not only wished to protect themselves from disease and death, from
pestilence and famine in this world but the souls of their children from
eternal pain in the next. Their gods were savages who demanded flattery
and worship not only, but the acceptance of a certain creed. As long
as Christians believe in eternal punishment they will be the enemies of
those who investigate and contend for the authority of reason, of those
who demand evidence, who care nothing for the unsupported assertions of
the dead or the illogical inferences of the living.
Science always has been, is, and always will be modest, thoughtful,
truthful. It has but one object: The ascertainment of truth. It has no
prejudice, no hatred. It is in the realm of the intellect and cannot
be swayed or changed by passion. It does not try to please God, to gain
heaven or avoid hell. It is for this world, for the use of man. It is
perfectly candid. It does not try to conceal, but to reveal. It is the
enemy of mystery, of pretence and canc. It does not ask people to be
solemn, but sensible. It calls for and insists on the use of all the
senses, of all the faculties of the mind. It does not pretend to be
"holy" or "inspired." It courts investigation, criticism and even
denial. It asks for the application of every test, for trial by every
standard. It knows nothing of blasphemy and does not ask for the
imprisonment of those who ignorantly or knowingly deny the truth. The
good that springs from a knowledge of the truth is the only reward it
offers, and the evil resulting from ignorance is the only punishment it
threatens. Its effort is to reform the world through intelligence.
On the other hand theology is, always has been, and always will be,
ignorant, arrogant, puerile and cruel. When the church had power,
hypocrisy was crowned and honesty imprisoned. Fraud wore the tiara and
truth was a convict, Liberty was in chains, Theology has always sent the
worst to heaven, the best to hell.
Let me give you a scene from the day of judgment. Christ is upon
his throne, his secretary by his side. A soul appears. This is what
happens--
"What is your name?"
Torquemada.
"Were you a Christian?"
I was.
"Did you endeavor to convert your fellow-men?"
I did. I tried to convert them by persuasion, by preaching and praying
and even by force.
"What did you do?"
I put the heretics in prison, in chains. I tore out their tongues, put
out their eyes, crushed their bones, stretched them upon racks, roasted
their feet, and if they remained obdurate I flayed them alive or burned
them at the stake.
"And did you do all this for my glory?"
Yes, all for you. I wanted to save some, I wanted to protect the young
and the weak minded.
"Did you believe the Bible, the miracles--that I was God, that I was
born of a virgin and kept money in the mouth of a fish?"
Yes, I believed it all. My reason was the slave of faith.
"Well done, good and faithful servant, enter thou into the joys of thy
Lord. I was hungry and you gave me meat, naked and you clothed me.."
Another soul arises.
"What is your name?"
Giordano Bruno.
"Were you a Christian?"
At one time I was, but for many years I was a philosopher, a seeker
after truth.
"Did you seek to convert your fellow-men?"
Not to Christianity, but to the religion of reason. I tried to
develop their minds, to free them from the slavery of ignorance and
superstition. In my day the church taught the holiness of credulity--the
virtue of unquestioning obedience, and in your name tortured and
destroyed the intelligent and courageous. I did what I could to civilize
the world, to make men tolerant and merciful, to soften the hearts
of priests, and banish torture from the world. I expressed my honest
thoughts and walked in the light of reason.
"Did you believe the Bible, the miracles? Did you believe that I was
God, that I was born of a virgin and that I suffered myself to be killed
by the Jews to appease the wrath of God--that is, of myself--so that God
could save the souls of a few?"
"No, I did not. I did not believe that God was ever born into my world,
or that God learned the trade of a carpenter, or that he 'increased
in knowledge,' or that he cast devils out of men, or that his garments
could cure diseases, or that he allowed himself to be murdered, and in
the hour of death "forsook" himself. These things I did not and could
not believe. But I did all the good I could. I enlightened the ignorant,
comforted the afflicted, defended the innocent, divided even my poverty
with the poor, and did the best I could to increase the happiness of my
fellow-men. I was a soldier in the army of progress.--I was arrested,
imprisoned, tried and convicted by the church--by the 'Triumphant
Beast.' I was burned at the stake by ignorant and heartless priests and
my ashes given to the winds."
Then Christ, his face growing dark, his brows contracted with wrath,
with uplifted hands, with half averted face, cries or rather shrieks:
"Depart from me ye cursed into everlasting fire prepared for the devil
and his angels."
This is the justice of God--the mercy of the compassionate Christ.
This is the belief, the dream and hope of the orthodox theologian--"the
consummation devoutly to be wished."
Theology makes God a monster, a tyrant, a savage; makes man a servant,
a serf, a slave; promises heaven to the obedient, the meek, the
frightened, and threatens the self-reliant with the tortures of hell.
It denounces reason and appeals to the passions--to hope and fear.
It does not answer the arguments of those who attack, but resorts to
sophistry, falsehood and slander. It is incapable of advancement. It
keeps its back to the sunrise, lives on myth and miracle, and guards
with a misers care the "sacred" superstitions of the past.
In the great struggle between the supernatural and the natural, between
gods and men, we have passed midnight. All the forces of civilization,
all the facts that have been found, all the truths that have been
discovered are the allies of science--the enemies of the supernatural.
We need no myths, no miracles, no gods, no devils.
IX.
FOR thousands of generations the myths have been taught and the miracles
believed. Every mother was a missionary and told with loving care the
falsehoods of "faith" to her babe. The poison of superstition was in the
mother's milk. She was honest and affectionate and her character, her
goodness, her smiles and kisses, entered into, mingled with, and became
a part of the superstition that she taught. Fathers, friends and priests
united with the mothers, and the children thus taught, became the
teachers of their children and so the creeds were kept alive.
Childhood loves the romantic, the mysterious, the monstrous. It lives in
a world where cause has nothing to do with effect, where the fairy waves
her hand and the prince appears. Where wish creates the thing desired
and facts become the slaves of amulet and charm. The individual lives
the life of the race, and the child is charmed with what the race in its
infancy produced.
There seems to be the same difference between mistakes and facts
that there is between weeds and corn. Mistakes seem to take care of
themselves, while the facts have to be guarded with all possible care.
Falsehoods like weeds flourish without care. Weeds care nothing for soil
or rain. They not only ask no help but they almost defy destruction. In
the minds of children, superstitions, legends, myths and miracles find a
natural, and in most instances a lasting home. Thrown aside in manhood,
forgotten or denied, in old age they oft return and linger to the end.
This in part accounts for the longevity of religious lies. Ministers
with clasped hands and uplifted eyes ask the man who is thinking for
himself how he can be wicked and heartless enough to attack the religion
of his mother. This question is regarded by the clergy as unanswerable.
Of course it is not to be asked by the missionaries, of the Hindus and
the Chinese. The heathen are expected to desert the religion of their
mothers as Christ and his apostles deserted the religion of their
mothers. It is right for Jews and heathen, but not for thinkers and
philosophers.
A cannibal was about to kill a missionary for food.
The missionary objected and asked the cannibal how he could be so cruel
and wicked.
The cannibal replied that he followed the example of his mother. "My
mother," said he, "was good enough for me. Her religion is my religion.
The last time I saw her she was sitting, propped up against a tree,
eating cold missionary."
But now the mother argument has mostly lost its force, and men of mind
are satisfied with nothing less than truth.
The phenomena of nature have been investigated and the supernatural has
not been found. The myths have faded from the imagination, and of them
nothing remains but the poetic. The miraculous has become the absurd,
the impossible. Gods and phantoms have been driven from the earth and
sky. We are living in a natural world.
Our fathers, some of them, demanded the freedom of religion. We have
taken another step. We demand the Religion of Freedom.
O Liberty, thou art the god of my idolatry! Thou art the only deity
that hateth bended knees. In thy vast and unwalled temple, beneath the
roofless dome, star-gemmed and luminous with suns, thy worshipers stand
erect! They do not cringe, or crawl, or bend their foreheads to the
earth. The dust has never borne the impress of their lips. Upon thy
altars mothers do not sacrifice their babes, nor men their rights. Thou
askest naught from man except the things that good men hate--the whip,
the chain, the dungeon key. Thou hast no popes, no priests, who stand
between their fellow-men and thee. Thou carest not for foolish forms,
or selfish prayers. At thy sacred shrine hypocrisy does not bow, virtue
does not tremble, superstition's feeble tapers do not burn, but Reason
holds aloft her inextinguishable torch whose holy light will one day
flood the world.
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